001How you guys motion on the floor to go into an executive session invited in um I'm sorry to discuss the employment history of a particular person invited in is Mrs. Oar. >> All in favor please rise for the pledge of allegiance. I pledge algiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands. One nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. >> Okay. >> Good evening everyone. At this time, it is our public input on agenda and non-aggenda items. I welcome any members of the audience to speak at this time. >> Okay. All right. Mr. Carmelo, >> Tal, you don't want to say anything? All right, great. Thank you. Um, okay. Thank you. So, my first update will be like it has been all school
002year, uh, on the merger. Uh, so we are really getting to the final stretch now. Uh, Tuesday is the vote. Um, we have a our last community virtual meeting tomorrow night, 6:00 to 7:00 p.m. Uh, and then we actually scheduled a second one at 7:15 uh, with the North Greenbush families. We got um, some people reach out just in the last week or two saying that they felt a little bit left out of the process. And you know really I mean I suppose it was a mistake but they don't they don't have a voting right to this but they do attend Garden Dickinson. They do have the similar choices and all that. So um I apologize for not reaching out to them sooner but we'll have a meeting with their community and parent group uh
003Thursday a separate meeting after the 6 to 7 last community meeting. Um, and then we're we're heading to Tuesday and uh fingers crossed. I think uh signs are pointing to uh good stuff. So, we'll we'll hope unless there's questions. That's all I got tonight on that. >> Okay. Thank you. Um Mr. Monk for the Troy High School presentation. Thank you to uh everybody on the board office, Mr. Carmelo, for this time. Really do appreciate it. Uh really, really exciting stuff. I apologize ahead of time for the length. Uh I know some of you are looking at that already. Uh but there really is a lot of great stuff in these slides tonight. It's really hard to pick and choose what we don't uh include here. So, uh the one thing I hope you see tonight
004is the variety of different things that our students are doing. And one thing that we've been saying since April 2024 is experiences and opportunities for our students. And that's exactly what I hope is showcased here tonight. Um, Miss Hour asked me a little while ago, am I uh excited? And so that's interesting. Usually the class you're nervous and I said, I'm actually incredibly excited, but I'm more proud. When you go through these slides and you see what the things our kids are doing and what they're accomplishing uh in our our staff, it's really really great stuff. So I'm very proud to stand up here. So our high school vision to make tri school a place where all students are inspired to achieve success and are supported to perform to the best of their ability. It's
005something that we strive to do each and every single day. Uh the administrative team, these four are relentless. We're making sure that we execute this vision. We work with our staff. We work with our students to really uh see this through. And again, I think you'll see and I hope I'm hopeful that you'll see uh this being accomplished as we move through these slides. starts right here with the people. Uh Mr. Styles presented earlier this month and before he got into the resources and the tools and the strategies and everything that we purchased and everything that we included as a district, he said before any of that can be accomplished, it starts with our people. And that could not be more true than at Troy High School. We are incredibly lucky at the high school
006level that you can see them all here. We have almost everybody on there. >> I was just going to ask you is that we're missing a few. Oh man, >> we're missing a few, believe it or not. But we try to get every secretary, monitor, TA, teacher, every you name it, we try to get on there, but there were just a few we didn't have the pictures of of. But but really an outstanding group of people. I mean, they are top-notch. They are dedicated. They are driven. They are passionate. They're caring. They're empathetic. You name it. Um this crew, I mean, everything you're going to see here tonight is as a result of this these individuals. Uh they also as a whole embody uh the message that Mr. Carmelo rolled out at the beginning of
007the school year as a district to raise the bar. They truly raise the bar for each other and they truly raise the bar each day for kids. Uh and that we couldn't do this without them. Everything you're going to see tonight is a testament to what they do uh each and every day. There's a a testament right there. Quick snapshot of our referral or our suspension data uh going down double digit percentages each year. Really really promising information. Um tells us we're heading in the right direction with that. our our students are buying in, our staff is buying into the things that we're doing. So really really great numbers. You know, you you go on this trend for 5 10 years and we'll continue to see like that it'll just speak to the environment uh
008that's being created in the culture uh within the high school. So really promising there. Our regent exam results, if you look at the first five that are on the screen or on your paper, algebra, learning environment, the two histories, and ELA, those are the five core that we use at the high school to graduate students. though all five of those exams saw an increase last year in the percentages passing which is really promising and even if you go further and you look at the advanced regions a few of them also saw increases. So this is a testament to the work our teachers are doing you know when we meet as a faculty department meetings faculty meetings professional development time they really are honing in on a few different things. One of them curriculum identifying the
009key skills that students need to know, the key ideas, the key concepts and really picking that apart and then also the instructional practices. What practices are we utilizing and what are we doing when students are struggling thereafter and they really do a great job connecting and enhancing what they do to make sure these numbers are where they are. Uh and we're hopeful that everything we continue to do this year will see another increase uh on these. Our graduation rate last year 85%. Uh you look at the trend over the last eight nine years, 10 years, we consistently continue to be 85 and above. We really are striving to get to that 90% and above next year. A lot of things we've looked at this year. We've honed in and targeted different subgroups, different students, and
010just different strategies in the building to make sure and we're very optimistic next year uh that it gets up there. We're going to get to that 90 uh and above. Uh this is just data point. That's all this is. uh we just use it to look at it to see where we stand across districts here. The higher needs urban district like ours in the capital region. Again, just a data point. It doesn't really change what we do or how we do things, but it tells us where we are. Uh two points to note. A few of those, most of those districts actually saw a decrease last year. And if you look all the way to the right, the New York State average in the orange column uh saw a 1% decrease from the year before.
011So, we actually stayed at the same 85, but the overall state took a 1% dip. Um, again, just a data point to know where we stand. The next piece of this, I'm going to just talk highlight some of our programs, our bigger programs. I would be remiss if I didn't talk about our journalism. All of you are very familiar with our journalism. You see our video announcements every Friday from our students. Uh, they do an incredible job. This has really enhanced and really changed the culture and climate in Detroit High School amongst our student body, amongst our faculty. Our kids are engaging. They're out in the hallways. They're out in classrooms. They're talking to each other. They're face to face. They're interactive. They're positive. They're joyful. I mean, you can see the joy in these
012pictures with these students. If I went back to the people page with some of those staff pictures, there's students in those pictures just really building a great camaraderie in the building. uh because this program has expanded so much this year we offer journalism too for Hudson Valley credit it's been outstanding um and it continues to grow and that's definitely here to stay as we move forward but really really great program that Michy does a phenomenal job with uh and our students and it's all student driven uh speaking of Hudson Valley uh our smart scholar program which is uh we have 100 students enrolled in that program that continues to get strengthened year after year uh they can earn up to 31 Hudson Valley College credits paid for in full. Uh, no penny for those 31
013credits, which is a full year's worth of of Hudson Valley College. The neat thing about this is we added two pathways this year, the criminal justice and health services, and we actually saw an increase in interest in those areas from our students. So, that has helped strengthen this program. Another neat thing about this program is our juniors and seniors are literally physically going to Hudson Valley and sitting in college courses. So certain courses on campus with college professors getting college grades on their transcript are ready prior to them walking in the stage. A little bit different than what they're taking here in the high school with our teachers, but uh really really neat opportunity where they're getting a step in the right direction, a leg ahead um before they walk across our stage. So really
014really great valley. our career internship. You know, we have students out there school and they go to these internships with local businesses, local institutions. And I just have to commend those places because they a lot of these stay the same year after year because they're willing to take our students. And I think that's a testament to how outstanding our students when they go to those places, but they really get one-on-one mentorship, leadership skills, real life um uh career skills, and they get to learn about their interest and determine, hey, do I want to do this or hey, don't I want to do this? Uh, one of the things at the end of the year when they talk about it, especially our Samaritan Hospital students that go for nursing, some of the kids would get up
015and say, "Wow, I really love this. This is what I'm going to do. Love what I saw." And then others will say, "I'm never going back to a PR again." So, it's really intriguing to hear what they say about their experience. But again, a lot of places here in house in the middle school in uh, school 14 school teaches different schools that are willing to take on our students. Uh, so really great stuff. And another neat thing about this is we have additional places that are willing to take on our students once we reach out to them and make a connection and explain hey look we have a student for example Mercedes-Benz and Leams is the first year we've made that connection with them and a student wanted to do auto mechanics with Mercedes and
016we made a connection with somebody there they were willing to take on that student. So really really great stuff. Uh student that is in Troy PD this year she came in yesterday and told us that they did a ride along the day before and she doesn't want to go back. So, we're not sure what we're going to do there. If she's going to finish that internship or not, true story. So, we'll see. But, uh really really great program uh that's giving our students a step and experience and opportunities a step ahead before they walk across Tri State graduation. I can't say enough about Regeneron. Uh for those of anybody who's not familiar with this, we have a partnership with Regeneron where a handful of individuals come regularly. They provide weekly experiments for students, hands-on activities,
017and they do site visits just getting students interested in STEM. This company and the individuals that come and work with us that we partner with are absolutely outstanding human beings. They really are. They want to do nothing but just help. We're the only high school that has a partnership. I rave about that all the time to people. We're very lucky to have that partnership and simply all they want to do is help our kids uh and get interested potentially in this field. Uh the really really great thing about this is they're not just one and done. When our kids walk the stage, they don't just say, "Okay, great having you in the program." They're sticking with our kids thereafter. So last year we had 13 graduates in this program. This year is the first year
018we have the most kids in the Regeneron STEM program, 9 through 12. Last year was a smaller cohort of 13 seniors. Out of those 13 seniors, 11 of them, well, first of all, they were given MacBooks last year at the year end celebration. Regeneron paid uh bought them all MacBooks, but then 11 of those 13 students have accepted internships with Regeneron this summer. They're paid internships, which is really, really neat. And to make it even better, they're $25 an hour paid internships for students who are a year out of high school. So, really, really great stuff this company is doing for our kids. Uh, and then who knows what entry- level positions that that leads to, and that's ultimately what they're after, getting more students involved and and potentially leading to potential career options for
019them. really really great company outstanding people. Here's a list just to give a snapshot of our offerings that uh we we offered this year. We're intending to offer next year. Uh as I go back to that experience and opportunities just providing as many opportunities we can. So we added Sunni threedimensional design course is still that that's here to stay just like the journalism course through Hudson Valley. Uh we added those this year. Next year we have approved and in the works uh three additional Hudson Valley courses. English comp 101, forensic science, and college algebra. Some of our kids that are in Smart Scholars are going there, taking those classes. We're now going to be able to offer them for other students who are not smart scholars here in the building next year. So, uh we're
020really excited about that. This introduction to microchip design uh course is through RPI. RPI is partnering with Pleasant Valley and uh Seaman's Corp, I believe it is, to pilot this course next year. Really, really great. I'm going to talk about a field trip that our students did that tie directly into this course uh a little bit later and it's a pilot program this year. So, we're one of very few schools that are offering it. They can earn their RPI credit through that. The greatest thing about it is they're going to partner with Hudson Valley to provide support to our students. So, it's not just here's the course, but they're working together. And ultimately where we want to end up, especially when I talk about the tech wing, it's going to be Troy High Valley RPI
021strengthened partnership for our students if this is the route that they wanted to get into. uh AP business and finance that'll be another additional AP course. So bring our seven up to eight AP courses that we have for next year. And then two that are pending uh I believe they will get approved. Hudson Valley uh real world mathematics and then principles practice of light construction one which will tie directly into the tech plane pathways that we're going to talk about. So those should be approved. Very optimistic they will be. Um and then lastly the new visions program the hybrid law which is really cool because it's hybrid. Students can do it here on campus. they don't have to go there and if they complete the program over the course of the year they get nine
022skinnity community college credits. So really really cool stuff. All right the next piece of this is some of the experiences our students have been afforded. So I think everybody's heard about the international club. Uh really really outstanding. Um before I even get to that if you look over to the left including the international club we added seven clubs to the high school this year and six or I'm sorry five of those seven were student driven. Students went to a faculty member, students went to administration and they said, "We have these ideas. This is what we want to do." And they came up with these ideas and the activities are loaded. And it brings me right back to that vision statement, trying to execute a place where all students, and that word was capitalized and bolded
023for a reason, to make sure every single student that walks through our doors is attached to Troy High School, that it's their home away from home. And it's by doing things like this where they they're interested and they can stay after school and just buy in more. And then of course uh the Italy trip. Uh I mean look at that blue sky. It's beautiful over there. Those architecture in those buildings. Uh I wouldn't do it justice by trying to explain what our students got what they took from that trip. Um I think we all know the cultural heritage and the international travel and the skills that our students definitely developed. So really really great stuff. 42 kids went and seven adults. Next year's Germany trip is already loaded again with 42 kids. Um, I just
024sent down a field trip request to district office for the following year. We won't we won't talk about that right now. >> Go ahead. Tell them where. >> What is it? >> Japan. >> Oh my god. >> I haven't heard back from yet. >> I'm not going to. >> So, but really cool and and that club is the students are in that club and the students are advocating. They're saying this is what we want to do. We had a parent here at the last board meeting that spoke up and said how great it is. And it really is affording our kids an opportunity that, you know, they might never get. Also, uh, Miss Case who runs that club does a great job working with families. If a family has said, which they did for the
025trip, hey, listen, we're not so sure in terms of the money, what payment plan, what supports can we do, what fundraising can we do, and she works with those families to make that happen. We did it with the trip. So, we'll see what happens over the next couple years. And Germany is full next year. Uh, here's some just some of the other trips. So, uh, here's another thing that Regeneron decided to do this year, partner with Questar and Hudson Valley. And we're not the only school that was invited. There were a few other schools, but just give students an opportunity to come to Hudson Valley and get exposed to the STEM field specifically with Regeneronic Pharmaceuticals, but just let them participate in different activities. So, we had our kids go, I get the text of
026that picture in the middle with the um uh with the golf, and I really couldn't make the connection, so I had to ask. And what those students are doing is they're hitting a golf ball, but they have glasses on. It's hard to see, but they have glasses on. And the glasses have covering. And the covering is simulating macular degeneration, which is a uh a disease in your retina that causes blurry vision and distorted vision. So then after they experience an activity to try to hit the ball with that type of disease, they then go through the process of what the pharmaceutical drug is that Regeneron was able to create. Really, really neat thing to make that connection. And then the other two pictures that you see there are the students experiencing going into a clean
027lab having to have to be completely clean and uh putting on the cape and then the blue light shows the contamination. So they simply took their bare hands, touched the the suit and then could see the germs and the contamination without washing their hands. So just a neat opportunity. Down below you see the winter boot camp. Albony Med continues to partner just offer. There's actually three different uh things that they do. This is the first. They do another thing now and another thing in the summer. Just giving kids an opportunity to come get real life experiences. So, you can see the two students on either side of the the middle picture where they're conducting uh CPR and practicing that and learning that. They did a whole bunch of other exercises while they were there. But
028the one in the middle, I blacked out the patient because that's a real human and the nurse that's next to her, they practiced actual sim actual uh things on patients. The patients had simulated or I'm sorry uh had uh symptoms and the students would then have to diagnose it and look at the ultrasound. So that's junior Izzy Stray is actually doing an ultrasound with that technology and that equipment. uh really really cool with that nurse's guidance. So again, just another experience that's uh by far something that they're getting to do prior to walking across our stage. So really really neat stuff. Our faculty do a great job by once they get a hold of this stuff, they get the kids lined up and they get them out there to do it. Here's just a handful.
029And again, I mentioned just the variety of different things that our kids are doing. So we had students go to a trip for the climate summit over at Connecticut Community College. That's actually the second of two trips. Earlier year, we had a group go to Copper Lake to do the same type of climate summit where they're participating in workshops and designing and and presenting action plans. Uh the group in the middle, they went to the capital where they were able to meet with legislators and talk about lobbying for environmental causes. The picture over here to the right with the Sienna Youth Leadership Conference, our group of students go year after year. They are a loud voice at that conference. We get great feedback when they come back and they just get a chance to have
030different activities where they collaborate and really focus on different ideas, historical ideas and really become what it says there are civic uh civically minded leaders. So uh just really great experiences that they're getting here. Uh Mr. Peace Business course took uh several students down to Winsler County Courts where they were able to tour, meet some judges, interact, meet the DA, the sitting DA, public defender, court synographer. They really had an opportunity to learn about the courts and interact with these individuals. Uh really cool. One of the students actually shadowed the courtographer since then and we have a handful of those students who have actually applied for internship down at the county for us this summer. Middle group is our group that went to Sunni Albany for the RNA institute which is really cool because they
031had a chance to go to the laboratories, meet with the researchers, have a Q&A with the researchers and actually practice with equipment and see what it's like. One of the things they did there was uh extract DNA from a strawberry. How you do that is beyond me, but they were able to do it. So just again getting experiences that it's just wild. Uh same thing with this last trip over here. This goes right with that course I mentioned that we're offering next year where the students had an opportunity to go to RPI. It was a two-day event just to learn about semiconductor manufacturing if it's an area that they want to get interested in. And um these students were did a quite a few different intense workshops while they were there. And one of the
032things they got to do was program a robotic arm to achieve whatever objectives they put in for it to do. So you could see them working there. So just again just given kind of a variety of the different things our our kids have been afforded to do our performing arts I think I said it last year uh our performing arts and our arts I probably could do an entire presentation on because the amount of things they do it's not even up there this doesn't do it justice but you know they stick with the same you know all county music festivals they go to the Albony Empire State Plaza they continuously do those performances where they do an outstanding job but the two things I wanted to mention here for for this group this year they
033had an opportunity to go down Radio City Music Hall in the city uh this past December and they were able to perform on the stage prior to the program that came out. So just a really neat opportunity for them. And then down here, this is the cast. I don't know if anybody saw I think it was out. We just happened last week. Uh a group of eight or seven or eight students went to all the elementary schools to do a snippet performance of the musical that we're doing this weekend. So the Charlie Brown musical is this Friday, Saturday, Sunday. Music department came to me uh earlier in the year and said, "Hey, we have this great idea and what an outstanding idea. We loved it. We ran right with it." They went around all the
034elementary schools. They went to Gardener Dickinson. They included them and they performed a 30 minute uh snippet of that musical performance. And you know, the whole purpose of that was we want to get younger kids in our school district. You know, we want to ignite that now. We want to see them what it's like and and get them uh involved in this and interested in it. So really uh kudos to them for coming up with that great idea. Same thing with the arts. Doesn't do it justice, but a few different things. I mean, you can see the art shows and the jured shows that our students are participating in. Their work is out there. It's really, really neat. Um I'm going to go to the third bullet, the jured exped uh ex expedition or exhibition
035uh in Albany. This is a big one. And you can see this is one of the opening nights. Look at how packed this place is. I mean, it's absolutely mob. There were there's 27 school districts that submitted artwork. Uh 515 pieces were submitted out of those 27 districts. 127 of those pieces were selected. Out of those 127, five of those pieces were our students. So they're doing a great job. You can see those pieces there. I have no idea what's going on here with this thing, but they're I mean it's incredible. They're incredibly talented. Our students are incredibly creative and they're incredibly talented and it shows down here. the Jacob Javit Center. Many of these students had an opportunity to go down earlier this year. Really great opportunity. Over 40 art schools and universities, some
036of them internationally where they had their artwork critiqued and reviewed and gained immediate feedback on the spot and then also the application process of what those schools look like for those students. So really great opportunity that they saw there. Be this has exploded so much over the last few years. Mr. Styles also mentioned this earlier this month. uh we're adding uh another pathway to graduation next year. It's called the IAP, which is the individual arts assessment pathway. So all these students who are absolutely excelling, uh it's an easy pathway for them uh for graduation. So we're going to add that pathway next year. Career exposure. So the the skill trades is the next piece of this, right? Especially when we get to the tech piece. and and that's to to us when we talk about
037all the academics, all the college offerings, all those things that we've added and and our students are in. We've got a lot of that. The next piece of this for our students is the trades. So, you can see the list of uh the different trades organizations that have come and spoke to our students. They present to our students and they share with them all the information that it takes and what a trade really is and what it takes to get into those trades. Mr. Mr. Beagle does a phenomenal job with the connections that he has with these individuals and he's out there getting them in here for our kids. One of the things that he was able to connect with one of these guys to do is they're going to come after April break that
038I have in bold there and they're going to provide a six class training where essentially it's going to pre-teach students. So, it's going to pre-teach them all the basics to get into the appren the pre-apprenticeship this summer. And what that's going to do for our students is going to give them a leg up. It's going to give them a step ahead when they enter that pre-apprentichip and it's going to guarantee them into that pre-apprenticeship this uh coming summer. So just we've got a lot of great connections. Like I said, Mr. Be's got these connections where they're just out there and they're willing to come and help and support our kids. So uh and a lot of our kids are interested in this. A lot of them not so sure about models, not so sure what
039to do. They're really really skilled. They're really really talent talented. Um and and this is a a really great direction for them. >> Mr. Mark, I have a quick question. What grade typically do they start with this? Um, I would say juniors and seniors. It's really seniors mostly. >> That's more of a senior base just because it's directly leading to the pre-apprentice. But with the new tech wing, the pathways will start much earlier to kind of figure out which career, which part of the union or which union you want to potentially go for. That is more of a laborbased post high school. If you do this, then you'll be directly into a summer essential try out to get into the union. So, >> okay. Thank you. Um and then we have our trades night in
040May. So even though they come and they present and they share those with our students, we also are offering that for our families and students to come back for that trades night where they'll present many of those things as well. All right, the next piece of this is our accolades. I love talking about this. This is one of the best parts where we highlight some of our kids uh and the great things that they either they or their team has accomplished this year. Uh masterminds we all know is undefeated, absolutely outstanding. Uh our uh main student in this uh program, Demetrios, is the top scorer in the state by far. Um he is beat the second person in our region by like,00,200 points. I mean it's not it's not even funny um how outstanding he
041is. So they're competing in nationals again this uh coming May and uh just a fun fact that they've qualified every year for uh eight year the last eight years. So they're that group just continues to do outstanding work. Um, I actually had on there all the regional championships and the state championship. It's just too much to to actually put on there, so I took it off. But I mean, when you go back the last 10 years, their accomplishments just really incredible. Odyssey the Mine uh this group uh they won first place this year in regional competition which qualified them for states. They actually had a little hiccup with transportation last week uh when they were going to states, but they came in my office. They all met as a group. We worked through that as
042a team. state works for the best team and were all able to make it to the states. They got a 95. They got up at 4:30 a.m. drove out Syracuse. They got a 95 on their spontaneous, which is good. They didn't over end up winning overall, but they had a great experience. Um, really, really great group of kids. Jerry Zho, Jerry Zhao has a full scholarship, full ride to MIT. So, he is the second student in Troy High School for the last two years to get that full ride to MIT. So he will join Hadil who's there um from last year. He will join her uh next year. Mattie Patton uh was accepted and is going to the honors college at Northwestern University. I read a stat. I don't know how accurate it is, but
043the stat that I read was that you know only 7% of applicants get in there. So really really uh hard to get in there. So good for her. Um a lot of our students actually for some reason have not heard back or they're undecided. They haven't decided or they just haven't heard back from the college yet. So, we have two students, really prestigious program, the Harvard 4-week program. It is not free, is very difficult to get into, very rigorous. Andy Williams and uh Dalia Bush were accepted in a broke filming there this summer. This US presidential scholar program, students can't apply for it, they get invited to it. So, based on their SAT score, ACT score, and a few other things, Demetro Scoredas uh was invited to that. He is a candidate. We won't know
044for a couple months who was selected, but he is a nominee. Uh Liam Bro, one of the three students capital region to receive a courage award through Sienna College. Really neat honor. They had a dinner. They had a celebration where he and his family were invited. And then two students of ours were selected this year for the Angelo Del Toro Puerto Rican Hispanic Youth Leadership Institute, which is a program run through the state assembly and senate. um where they have a task force that they're working with several students throughout the state to really just collaborate and get them to understand civic readiness and work with them through those things at the uh the capital. So really really great honors for these students, our Quest Star students, uh this program continues to grow year after year.
045Uh last year this competition had about 300 students. This year had 450. Uh Scott Kunrad and Chad Castle that you see there, they actually did not play. They placed second or third last year and this year they came back to win and they sure did. They both got first place. Um they are competing in the states uh next month uh April 22nd and April 21st. So um and then we had two students that placed third in their respective areas. That there is Christina's uh Christina's um cop salad that she put together. So really just cool things that our our students are out there and doing uh in their respective areas of interest. Our esports Rocket League team made it to state championship and this program is all done remotely on campus and then if you
046win the region which they did then you go to states in person. So they had an opportunity to see Syracuse's gaming facility which is pretty state-of-the-art. They had a great experience. Uh they didn't win while there but they have a spring competition that they're eager to get back there and get to this facility again uh to take the crown. We said states a lot. We said I've said states a few other times. I'm going to say say states a few times here. Um with these first two swimmers, they both made it to states this year. So again, just our kids are doing really outstanding work. Um Angelina and Roco, both made it to states uh and competed there. Uh two students up here, Julie and Shamaya, both won the section for the 300 meter for
047indoor track. Uh Shamaya is a freshman, so we should see a lot more to come from her. Um Joey Dgnen down here on the left won he was fifth in the section for golf in the fall which qualified him for states and we kind of don't we don't hear about it because states is actually this June. So I believe it's the sixth it starts. So that's something for us to look forward to on how he performs. Aiden McBride received the National Football Foundation College Hall of Fame scholarship. So that's a great honor for him. And then we have two girls going to for sports. Uh Mattie Valley going to stage. She committed. I'm told she's the first girl Troy High School student to play lacrosse in college. So that's a really neat thing. And then
048Vanessa Quinn committed softball UMass Dark. Really, really just great things for our students. I would never attempt to go through all this, but I had to at least show it. U Miss Lenny does a great job, by the way, um putting these posters together. I I can't say enough about the again, I'm going to use the word camaraderie. These students will each other to win. That's what we have seen this year. um taken away the phones with the honor pouches so they have no distractions, whatever it is, but they're just really outstanding individuals. Uh they're great on the on the field, on their courts, and they're also great in the building. They truly are student athlete leaders. So, you can see all of them in those pictures. I really just want to share that they're
049getting all of these honors whether it's through the suburban or the colonial council all-star type of uh nominees or if they're getting all team or if they're getting team of the week or player of the week through times union nominations they are getting recognized for their outstanding achievements. Um, Coach Gary, uh, coach of the year for section two, class A. And and up here, our first year, as we all know, of our undefeated Unified Bowling, which was an outstanding season. Coach Pree and Coach Seel uh, couldn't rave enough about this, but they really kept continued to speak about our Troy High partners. So, I wanted to make a point to mention them tonight. So the students over here in bold are our general education students who volunteer their time to go and and support and
050act as coaches if you will uh for each match. And you know there's 12 or 13 students here. So the two coaches do need additional support and those students volunteered and did a great job. So Sophia Short, Joey Dgnen, Tyler Dickinson, uh Jacob Pep, Khloe Pattero, Aiden Coocher, Gavin Valley, Jamari Flowers, Joe De Jesus, and Jacob Arnold. Really outstanding students for for doing that. >> And on deck, we have unified basketball starting next month. And then next year, we're in the works to include Unifi PE in high school. Okay, we're winding down. Techwing. Uh we are so pumped for this Techwing. You can see we had the opportunity to go in a couple weeks ago. I mean, the size of these classrooms and the windows, it's just truly going to be state-of-the-art. Uh when all
051the equipment and all the new furniture and every new technology uh is in this tech wing, the outside is coming together fabulously. I mean, it is just outstanding this building, what it's going to uh do for us and for our kids. Really, really state-of-the-art stuff. So, uh, just an example, uh, of more stuff that we're intending to include when we get to this is Project Lead the Way. It's a grant that one of our teachers actually received this year, and it allows students to take those. Those are just examples, but those are courses we currently offer right now in the high school. So, we don't need the tech for it, but they're currently offered. Students can take the courses through this grant, and then ultimately, uh, there's a test, and then you obviously have to
052complete the course. And if they apply, they can earn up to three college credits through RIT. So really, really cool stuff. And then the big thing down the line, right, if you fast forward two years, three years, four years, 5 years, is our pathways. And that's what Mr. Beagle mentioned in terms of um the different trades and the pathways, having the barber shop, having the pre-engineering, having the welding, the electrical, the construction, and just ultimately ending up with pathways where students and that would start at the ninth grade level. is absolutely can start at the ninth grade level with electives and they say I'm interested in this, I'm interested in that, whether it's construction or welding, whatever have you and they can begin that process and the ultimate goal once those pathways are implemented is
053our connection with Hudson Valley. They're building their own state-of-the-art facility as we speak. I think it'll be done in two years um in addition to what they currently have. So, our ultimate goal is we want our students, you know, being successful here with these pathways, getting credits toward those pre-apprentichips, getting credits toward those apprenticeships, or if it requires a two-year degree, whatever it is, and then having that directly tied right to Hudson Valley and going to Hudson Valley for these trades already with the leg up, already with a step in the right direction. So, that's the ultimate goal with this. We're definitely heading in that direction. So, this video I asked a couple of the seniors to put together. So, forgive me if you have already watched it. Um, I I should have been more
054explicit with them. I did ask them to put it together. I had an idea where I wanted them to go around and ask this question. Um, and when they work with Mr. Mole through journalism, they put it on the morning announcements and as a result of that, it got shared out on on social media. So, I apologize if you've seen it. Um, >> here at Trey High, we have many different people from various backgrounds with their own opinions on the school. Let's walk around the halls and find out what Troy really means. >> What is Troy High? >> Uh, good opportunity, fulfilling, >> supportive, it's fun. >> Um, a great school for lovely personalities, >> full of opportunities. >> It's something positive, a safe place to be in and perfect. Yeah. >> Everything. >> Very
055athletic. >> A special place. >> The best place I ever worked. >> Tro High is home. A welcoming community >> where it's at. Well, place of full good food, family. It's home. It's home. It's where uh you know, I love coming to work every day and uh love our students, our our community, our population, and you know, it's an awesome place to be. The greatest place on earth, >> interesting, >> a good school, good students, >> the unified Bowen team, >> strong willed, >> positive environment. >> Troy High is community. like the students, all the faculty and staff, everybody loves being around each other and helping each other and having a great time and seeing each other be successful. What is Trey High? Welcoming, diverse. >> It is the sport of unified bowling. >> A
056place of unity, perseverance, and success from many different people of all different walks of life. >> A positive environment, >> an adventure. >> Troy High is a great environment to learn. All the students and staff are amazing. It's just a great place, >> creative and ambitious, >> my home away from home, my family. Uh, and the best place I've ever had the pleasure to teach. Um, cuz it doesn't feel like a job every day. It feels like I'm home. I feel the love. The love, girl. >> The love, the love, the love. >> As you can see, Troh High is many different things, but above all, Troh High is the place to be. Thank you, Will. That's her dream for next year only. >> Yeah. Graduation. Next year. >> We'll see. Great job. >> Nice
057job. >> All right, to our budget I can follow. >> Well done, Mr. >> He didn't cut any of his great. I understand what you're saying. How do you cut any of that stuff out? I hear it. Great job. Well, I actually have good news, too, but uh not as exciting as that. That was really good. Uh so, we're at draft two. So, we were at draft one a couple of weeks ago, and um we had a $1.4 million gap. And I said at the time that that's a very manageable deficit, and we'll see. We've already uh knocked that down um more than in half. Um and you know, we're on our way to a nice final budget. Mr. month didn't start with that, but I'll start with that. The Troy School District will provide
058a strong educational and social foundation to graduate all students college and career ready actually like their vision at the high school as well. Uh the key for both of them is that all students are getting what they need to reach their full potential and be successful and that's what we're doing every single day and certainly when we put a budget together, we're going to make sure. The first few slides are all repeats, so I'm not going to go through them again, but I I want to always have them in there so we can remember where we came from. Those were I mean Mr. Monk's highlights were way better. Mr. McShane gives some highlights two two meetings ago and all the elementary principles. This was just really our state assessment stuff that we were proud of.
059Uh so that stays on there. Um and how do we keep building, right? Mr. Martin really made it clear that we're always trying to get better. He's adding college classes. He's adding AP classes. He's adding different clubs. He's adding programs. That's what we're always always always trying to do. build on our successes uh and keep making things better and better for our students, right? How do we do that and how do we do it in the most fiscally responsible way possible? That's what we're always trying to do this time of year as we're developing our budget. We always talk about those two lenses, right? Being educationally sound, what I just said, every student getting what they need to be successful, but also being good stewards of the taxpayers's money. That's what you have to balance
060every time, right? You have to make sure you're thinking of both sides of those uh both sides of of that thing. There's our tax cap history. That's something we've been bragging about for a while, especially those last 10 years. Uh less than 7% total increase in that last 10 years. Uh somebody just posted that a couple days ago, which I was kind of glad about. Uh and said how fiscally responsible we are, and I think we are. I don't know if there's any district as fiscally responsible as we are uh in those last 10 years certainly show that uh this was also a repeat. Those are the revenues that we're getting. Um our state aid, our tax levy, and then some of the miscellaneous stuff. The first two are obviously the big ones. Our state
061aid really the only difference is um $100,000 are remember our foundation aid right now and the the executive run is 1%. that goes up about 628,000, but then there's some um there's some other state aids that are calculated in there. So, there's only a $100,000 increase. Draft one and draft two right now are going to assume another 0% tax levy increase. We've already talked about, but I'll say it again as we get to it. Um the vote is Tuesday. If we get to that vote and it's not a successful vote, then we may want to talk about a little bit of a tax levy increase, right? going zero um without that um incentive aid money in the future uh you know it's just something we'll have to discuss but right now zero is built significant
062drivers of expenses we went through these last time too I did add on that slide that that's for draft one because you'll see in a moment those first two have been adjusted so we've got some savings uh from salaries that we'll talk about and we got some savings in our insurance lineu uh that we'll talk Uh so those were significant drivers are still significant drivers but there has been some reduction in those first two categories and there was our uh draft one proposed right our revenues came in so far at our expenditures are 144998434 which gives us a deficit of a little over 1.4 4 million uh and again set at that time very so what has changed since draft 1. So again, those first two drivers, salaries and benefits. I told you uh when
063we were doing draft one that we hadn't calculated our savings from retirements. We had about 11 people retire. Seven of those are teachers, right? So if a teacher's retiring, they're at top step. Um you know, in the $90,000 range and then you hire a new teacher. Um you know, not always at step one, right? So there's a calculation that we do to make sure we get the savings and we don't want to overestimate the savings that we're getting. But a a step one new teacher is in the low 50s. Uh but then there's some health insurance stuff like as you retire you still get the health insurance. So it's not it's not one for one, but um Mr. Doell went through and calculated the whole thing. So that's a $220,000 savings. So really that 2.5
064there is down to uh a little less than 2.3 with that savings. Uh, and we still have the attrition plan. I just thought it was important to put that in there. We will continue to always review. So, out of those 11, it looks like all 11 will have to be replaced of those that retired. Um, but we do continue to look at every single person that leaves, whether it's resignation or retirement to see if we do have to replace them. And then the health prescription costs um went down. Uh, so the first draft one is a calculation before we have some final numbers. And so that was good news. So that's uh 700,0001 actually uh that we thought we were increasing actually is only going to increase by 200,000. So it's been $500,000 less than
065we anticipated increasing. So that's a $700,000 savings from the 1.4. You could do that math, but we're going to be a little less than $700,000 now with our gap. The revenues still are the same as draft one. Draft one revenues 143, 583,127. Uh draft two revenues are the same. We haven't adjusted those yet because the state budget is not done yet and our tax levy is still zero. So there's no change there yet. Uh but those expenditures went down what I just said about 720,000 not give or take. Um and so our current deficit a little under 700,000. The gap is still going to be addressed by those things, right? our state budget, our tax levy if we want to do that, and any use of reserves that we want to do. Certainly, we're at
066a spot where we will not have any budgetary layoffs, which is good news. Uh we have done that uh several years. So, the one house bills had just come out when I was doing draft one. So, I kind of gave you a little rundown. Really, the key that we're looking at is the foundation aid. So, the governor gave the minimum amount at 1%. We're over 70% of the districts in New York State that are at that minimum now. Uh it's a lot, right? Um so we're one of those now. Remember when we had the phase in, we were one of the ones that were getting uh significant increases over those three years to phase in. That was, you know, a couple years ago. Um so now we're at that minimum, but we're not alone. Again,
06770 over 70% of districts are at that minimum. Both the Assembly and the Senate have moved that minimum up to 2%. Now, that doesn't mean it's going to be in the final budget, but it's a good sign when two out of the three have something similar, right? Um so, we'll see. I put in the number there uh underneath the 2% minimum increase, that would mean $628,000 for foundation, right? The 1% that we have is 628. So that goes to 2%. We'll get another 628. So another 628 for our current deficit. Uh if that final budget comes in at 2% then we're already just 7,000 behind. We'll be we'll be fine. We'll be done. U decisions to make. Um there are also some foundation a waitings that you can see there. uh new waiting for homeless,
068new waiting for foster assembly's got it at 065 and ELA at 6. Uh the Senate has the uh foster and homeless at.12 ELLL.6. Um there's no runs that that that's looking at. So we don't really have dollar amounts what that's going to mean. Um you know, Adam and I looked we talked to state a planning. They actually came to our superintendent meeting last Friday. They don't think it's going to be big money, but we do have homeless and foster and ELLL kids more than some districts. So, that could be another increase. So, the 628 if it's 2% and those things go into play, uh, you know, we could be looking at uh, you know, a little bit more than 628, which again would would close that gap even more. There were other things in the
069one house bills. We just put them on the bottom there uh just so you know that they are in those bills, but they really don't apply to us. They don't really mean much to us, so didn't want to get too much into them. Um UPK, there's a there's a increase in the per pupil, but we're already at that higher rate, so that doesn't really affect us. The electric buses is a big issue for everybody. If you've listened to the governor over the last couple of weeks, she seems to be walking that back a little bit. Nothing official yet, but my guess is that timeline will be extended out a little further, but again, we, you know, we don't have our own buses, but we do uh contract out with a bus company, so we'll have
070to worry about that when the time comes. Uh, prior year claims are things that weren't um reports that weren't filed or weren't filed on time. That's been a battle every year, but it's again, it's not huge money for us. Charter school rates is important. That's not in the one house bill. So the ones on the right are things that we need to consider. So those charter school numbers change a lot. We don't get those until the final state budget comes. They're never in the like preliminary runs. So we just got to be careful. The good news with charter school for us is fewer and fewer kids are are opting that out. I mean with Mr. Monk's presentation, I mean there's nobody really I shouldn't say nobody, but very few kids uh would rather go a
071charter school high school than to come to try high school. So, those numbers go down uh every year for us. Tier six is a huge one. I mean, I'm sure you've heard that on the news, right? Uh tier six is uh one of Governor Cuomo's things. Um and it just makes it harder. There are a lot of things in tier six that uh aren't as nice as a tier 4 people have or even back earlier than that, of course. Uh but the big thing with tier six is right now if you're not tier six and you're 55 with 30 years in you can retire without penalty. Tier six makes you go to 62 years right with 30 years in. So that's a long time to you know make people work in this field. So they've
072been battling that. Um the problem is and then people are saying they're open to the discussion and things that is um we had a lobbyist or not a lobbyist. Yeah I guess she is. She comes every month to our Quest start meeting for our superintendent. She said the price tag on if they really were going to roll that back is about 14 billion dollars. So she said they're talking so that people know that they're hearing and they're on their side, but she said there's no appetite to add 14 billion to the state budget at this point. So, uh, but that certainly would be something that would, um, you know, towns, cities, uh, state governments, like schools, everybody would have to pay for that. So, that that would be a, uh, budget buster for sure if
073they ever decide to, uh, really start considering that. Uh again, the person that we met with Friday said there's no she sees no pathway that that's in in this year or any uh rec upcoming years, near future. So the key here is again foundation. That's why that's the really main part of that slide. Uh we're really hoping that that 2% because two out of three have it is where we end up and again we'll be set. Uh again, draft one and draft two have zero. Our tax cap is uh which will be about $860,000 in revenue. Again, our gap right now is only less than 700,000. So, you know, the key is that third bullet in draft three if it's necessary. We'll give you like we did in the last couple years, you know, what
074half a percent looks like, what 1% looks like, what one and a half% looks like, what 2% looks like, and if we have to make those decisions on April 15th for draft three. Uh the good thing about the timing this year is even if the budget's a little bit late, the state budget, uh our next meeting, official budget, uh workshop and meeting is April 15th. So I guess I shouldn't say it out loud, Virginia, but I assume everything will be done at the state level by then. And then we'll and we'll know certainly uh whether we need to even look at drafting and then if the vote goes through on Tuesday in a positive manner then we already said we're going to keep that 0% type of increase. Uh even if we're stuck at 700,000
075using reserves knowing that that incentive rate is on its way won't be an issue at all. U reserves we just got to be cons careful. you can't consistently use that for recurring expenses, right? But we always uh combine it with our attrition plan which has worked out where uh we're avoiding uh any cuts to programs or staff and then the capital reserve. So we mentioned it last time I got the nod from everybody to move forward. So this will be on our May um vote, right? Right. Remember a capital reserve the only thing the voters will be voting for is to create the savings account right so community will vote on a proposition to authorize the creation of the capital reserve for the purpose of helping to finance the local share so all the capital
076projects we've done over the last 12 years have all been at no cost to the taxpayers and we've done that by a couple different ways one way is to have a savings account in advance where we're saving for that local share that's so taxpayers don't have to come up with that local share And don't forget that this um merger goes through our aid ratio goes from 90% which is already fantastic, right? 90% means if you have a million dollar project, we you know we get 900,000 of it back. Uh the local share is only really the 100,000. Now we'll go up to 98%. It's really uh it's going to be free money for us at 98%. The reserve allows capital project to be completed with no additional cost to taxpayers. I just said that. So,
077we're going to pick $6 million. I think I said that last time, but if not, I'm saying it now. The reserve may be funded. So, so it won't be $6 million right away. We put a little bit in each year. Uh, but eventually trying to get to $6 million. $6 million at a 98% building a ratio is a $300 million uh pot of money, which wouldn't be one project. It would probably be three over that 10year period. Uh remember to get the 98% you have to have the vote done in those 10 years. So we will um plan that so that we have three separate votes but $300 million uh you know Josh was just talking about the tech wing and how great that's going to be. We can have all of our buildings uh
078you know get upgraded including the Gardner Dickinson building that needs a lot of work. Uh and again all of that done with no no cost to taxpayers at all. Uh and there's no no tax increase for the creation. Again, this is just the creation of the of the savings account which will allow us to save over the next several years. Uh next steps Tuesday is a big one. Um at least show us where we are when we get back here on the 15th. Uh we'll continue to monitor the state budget process and hope for that 2%. We'll continue our advocacy. I talked to John McDonald just yesterday and over the weekend as well. uh trying to keep pushing for that. Uh and draft three again will be on April 15th, I should say. Um I
079don't even know where it would be, but I guess there. Um so the revenues we get 2% the revenue line would go up if the vote for the merger goes through. Um we do have uh some of the uh requests from the principles that we have not put in here, right? We talked about that. we've left them out and kind of just made this is a maintaining budget. So if that vote goes through uh draft three might bring uh some things that we feel like you know should be added uh that we didn't want to add with the uncertainty that we were dealing with. Right. So again, knowing that that money's coming, uh we may we may be uh coming to the board with some options to for things that you can add. Uh again,
080not meaning we would have to do tax limit or anything, but just because we know that that money's coming in the future and there are things that our principles and directors feel like really uh are needed. Some of them are driven by uh not just student wishes like Mr. talking about what students need, right? Special ed, ENL, um those kinds of things or student requests for classes that might not class sizes that we always try to keep low. So, all of those things really are not and they're addressed always, but we haven't added anything to do anything with that. So, we probably would go back to that if that Josh end with that and I will too. Can we questions? question. >> Thank you. >> Okay. Motion on the floor for approval of minutes from
081March 11th, 2026. Discussion. All those in favor? Opposed? Under superintendent recommendation, human resources, staff matters, unclassified and classified. Under unclassified, motion on the floor for consent agenda items 1 through 11. >> Second. >> Discussion. All those in favor? I >> opposed. Underclassified. Motion on the floor for consent agenda items 1 through five. Discussion. All those in favor? Opposed? Under superintendent recommendations programs. Motion on the floor for approval of item one as listed. >> Second. >> Discussion. All those in favor? >> Opposed. District announcements. We will have our uh Troy Winekill community meeting tomorrow evening from 6:00 to 7:00. It will be virtual. Our future board of ed meetings will all be held here at 6:00 p. p.m. April 15th will be our budget discussion, draft three. On April 21st, we will have our Troy Community
082School presentation and adopt the budget. May 6th, we'll have our town hall budget hearing and meet the candidates. And on May 19th, we'll have our budget vote and election. >> And and if the um vote passes on Tuesday, we'll have a special meeting on Wednesday. >> Yes. >> But only if the vote passes. >> Okay. Um, moving on to Troy Triumphs. This weekend, see the classic Peanuts game come to life in the Troy High School drama club's performance of Your Good Man, Charlie Brown. There are three shows, Friday and Saturday at 7:30 p.m. and Sunday afternoon at 2 p.m. Tickets are $10 for adults and five for students. We hope to see you there. Coming up on March 31st, school 2 will host a March Madness attendance basketball game for the winners of the March
083Madness attendance challenge. The class with the highest attendance percentage for the month will play will play a students versus staff basketball game at 1:00 to recognize their efforts in getting to school each day. School 16's annual talent show will be held on Wednesday, April 1st at 6 p.m. Come out and join us to celebrate the many the many talents of our school 16 students. Special thank you to Mrs. Frasier for organizing the talent show once again this year. Also at school 16, the PTA will host a bingo for books event on April 23rd designed for families to have some fun together and win some books to read at home. The Carol Hill Reading Olympics contest has wrapped up and we have our gold medal winners. The K1 gold goes to Miss Halberin's class. The second
084and third grade gold goes to Miss Half and Miss Krshaw's class. And the fourth and fifth grade gold medal goes to Miss Rimrell's class. Designed to encourage students to read while also celebrating the recent Winter Olympics. The program has had the program has each class track their reading minutes over the last month. Students read for an impressive total of 6,204 minutes during the four-week challenge. Great job. Keep it up. >> Very cool. Um Mariana, you want to tell us the Tri High news? Five students participated in this year's M3 challenge on Sunday, March 1st. This is a 14-hour international competition where students create mathematical models for realworld problems. This year's challenge asked teams to consider the financial implications on online gambling. The team developed quantitative models that evaluate disposable income, estimate individual gambling gains or
085losses, and assesses broader financial risk. The hope is that the winning solution will create better policies to address issues in online gambling. It'll be a couple of months before the hear from the judges. >> Very cool. All right. Anything else? Okay. A motion on the floor to adjourn the meeting. Second. >> All those in favor. >> Okay. >> Have a good night. Thank you.