001To the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. >> Before we start, I want to thank everybody for our thank yous who >> a special thank you to our gentleman in the top row. uh for our little gifts. >> It is it is it is appreciated. Somebody forgot to get us our gifts, you know, but I'm sure the Amazon >> right now. >> Well done, Mr. Uh, so, uh, they're they're saying thank yous and we're getting some thank yous up here. It's board appreciation week. I think I owe them all the gifts. We talked about it a couple weeks ago. Um, so I'll work on that hotel. Uh, uh, but I do uh, seriously want to say,
002as I've said before, but it's the truth. Uh, we have the best board of education uh, out there. Um it's uh critical crucial for a school district to have a cohesive well functioning school board and we have just that. Um this amazing uh group of uh nine uh board members um that make decisions for kids and are here always always to support uh the things we're trying to do and to help try to make the school district better. So, uh, thank you, uh, from me, from the bottom of my heart of all you do each and every day. And we have a board appreciation, uh, video to show. [Applause] [Music] >> Thank you, Board of Education, for all you do. Thank you. >> Thank you. >> Thanks. [Music] >> Thank you, Board of Education. >>
003Thank you so much, Board of Education, for all that you do. >> Thank you. Thank you. >> Big thank you to our board of education. You guys support us every single day and make it happen for our kids and teachers. Thank you so much. [Applause] Thank you, Georgia City School Board. >> We love our school. Thank you for all the resources that you have given us. [Music] Heat. Heat. [Music] Heat. Heat. [Music] [Applause] Daddy. [Music] [Applause] [Music] Heat. [Applause] [Music] [Applause] Heat. [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] Heat. [Music] Heat. [Music] Heat. Heat. [Music] [Applause] [Music] Heat. [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] Heat. [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] That was scary. [Music] [Applause] Thank you, Patricesa, to Teresa for putting that together and thanks again for the board. [Applause] >> Okay, what a great way to start off meeting.
004>> Um, at this time it's our public input on agenda and non-aggenda items. I welcome any member of the audience to speak at this time. If you want to get up and say anything, just tell us who you are. >> August financials. >> Good Nick. Um this week I forwarded the August financials. Um all bank accounts are rec reconciled to date and all the cash is accounted for. Um through the fir our first two months, the general fund revenue expenses um are right on point point with last year's numbers with like $50,000 which is I don't know for me it's kind of like crazy but out of millions. Um going forward in the next couple months I should be able to start putting u projections on the monthly financials. Um today I finalized the remainder
005of the 831 grants. Um so we'll start to get that cash flow um coming in. Also this week I released the attention attention um retention bonus which is the last one. Um so all the employees that are eligible should start to see them hitting their bank accounts by as early as tomorrow I would say. Um and then after this I have to co grants and then start finalizing those. Um we could probably expect around another $3 million after I do the final cost reports for those which will offset um expenses once they're completed and approved. Um and then we'll be moving on to start uh working on projections for the next year's budgets. Um that's all next year. >> Wow. >> Already almost November. >> Exactly. Right. >> Any questions or anything? >> Thank you
006very much, Mr. Ford. Dr. Ford Tracy. Oops. Take mine. Sure. [Music] Thank you. Uh good evening uh and thank you Mr. Carmelo cabinet and board of education for the opportunity to present here tonight. Uh I stand here very proud of our school community. I'm going to present very briefly but some very important highlights of our school program here uh where we've shown a lot of growth over the past I would say 10 years or so here at school 16. A lot of our colleagues are are responsible are are happy because of the great efforts and work from our staff. I just want to acknowledge them at this time. Um Mr. Friend, my principal assistant, Kelly Failen, Kayla Dar Dco, Meg Monet Fio, Chris J, TJ Visinski. Um our staff uh I presented it I talked
007to them our first faculty meeting and I gave them a talk about my background where I came from you know Aubby grew up born and raised Aubber Hill going to Aubby school had the opportunity to come and educate on me going to connecting then coming to Detroit using my experiences uh to guide me and my leadership and then I talked to them about what they brought here to me to support me and support this community. We have staff in charter schools, from Baltimore, from all parts of Troy. Some of our staff has spent time in school 14. She's laughing. School 14, school 2, Carol Hill, all over the city. And that's a special part of our school is our collective experiences coming together. Uh we challenge each other, right? We challenge each other to be
008great every day. Um, I challenge them, they challenge me, and we keep our we keep ourselves in that mindset. We're always working hard for our community and the children of Troy and families of Troy. So, having said that, I want to highlight some of the great things that we've accomplished here at school 16. We start with our mission statement. The mission at school 16 is to prepare each child intellectually, socially, physically, emotionally, ethically to become a contributing member of a of society. The entire school community will provide a safe and positive educational climate that supports a challenging curriculum. Vision statement will assist all students in proving academic achievement, making adequate progress toward reaching grade level proficiency, utilizing measures and data defined by the district reading and math programs and New York state assessments. We developed
009this back I think around 2016 to revise this and our major focus was datadriven instruction datfor instruction. Um that's been our focus our timeline of student performance. some of our results. Obviously, we started back in 201213 when the New York State Educ Education Department changed um the structure of state testing. Um and the results were the results. We looked at our baseline scores. Uh the one thing we talked about early was, you know, that was our baseline. We're going to grow from there. And every year and I'm going show you that list of resources. We decided to look at things that we can improve our educational program any way we could. And obviously this past year was our our highest achieving uh achieve levels of achievement in math. Um 66% of our kids proficient in
010math. We had some amazing scores. I think TJ in his class had 79% of his kids proficient. 79% of his kids proficient in math. Meg on now the other fourth grade math teacher had 70 what 75 76% proficient me on that so she was right with me so that that speaks to um a little compet competitive mindset here at school 16 right uh it started out as competing against other schools and then within the school and we just want to be great right we want to challenge ourselves to be great and we think that's a healthy competition a healthy thing to Uh we we appreciate their hard work and efforts. Uh Kelly Failen moved down to third grade for you. I think she had what 60% proficient in math. So hard work on her end.
011So these these here at school 16 are amazing. Um and it creates that mindset of uh nothing is impossible. We can accomplish our goals each step. So this past year um obviously we're very excited about that but um as you remember a couple year years ago I I was in this gym and I said you know what let's go for 70%. I think it was two years ago was it two years two years ago I said 70% let's do it out there and I remember called me and said they do they think they can do it I said they told me they would and I said TJ can we do it he said yeah we can do it. So, it's one of those things where I've learned as a leader uh over time is if
012you set a goal and you have that collective commitment and you build your confidence and your confidence, you will achieve that goal. And I'm going to speak a little bit more about that towards the end of the presentation because we have a new goal, right, guys? New goal and we're going to reach that goal, right? Chris, you need your strength here before I say it. So, we exceeded both the New York State ELA proficiency average and MA and uh 46% ELA and then the profic proficiency average in math 52%. So, we've been pretty consistent in seeing the uh proficiency averages of the state for the past couple years, which you know is a good sign for us. It's a good indicator that, you know, our room for growth and our ability to perform well above
013is great. So, we we're keeping our eye on that. Um, and they did not yet release the individual uh school report card. So, I'm interested in seeing that data. Last year, our comparison against all these schools and snacking schools. It's going to be interesting to see um how that comparison looks for this upcoming year. But I'm also interested in seeing how many suburban schools we outperform. This is going to be another good indicator of where we're going and where we could be. Um, so that's going to be interesting to see. Our fifth grade performance in science was 33% a slightly below the state average, but the feedback we received early regarding that exam was it's going to be a very challenging exam. The baseline exams are very challenging. It's very probably the lowest scores you'll
014see uh any group students take. And then as the years progress, like you saw um these following years, you'll see scores gradually increase as you become more familiar with the materials that are being presented. Um we inform our instruction a little bit better, get more questions, you can prepare a little bit better in terms of what's anticipated. How are we getting it done? This is some of the things we we've incorporated in terms of our resources in our program over the years. Number one, and I did I think last year I had to rate these in terms of priority. We we number one was always highly qualified staff. Um and like I said, I'm very fortunate here at school 16 to have a combination of some new staff and some veteran staff um that have
015a lot of experience and they have a lot of confidence and they know exactly what they're doing in the classroom and when we present them with new materials, they're very much supportive of implementing those resources and materials. That was number one for me. The co-e model is something we we definitely value as a resource. We have two teachers in one class at first grade and at fifth grade uh currently that's definitely helped us. Uh number three is something I definitely definitely am highlighting as uh something that we look look at in terms of practical implications um beyond school 16 is the content specialist in ELA and math. I think we're the only school that have that went ELA coach and math coach K through five. Um, and what we've seen over the years with that
016is some consistent growth in each and it allows the coaches to focus on that particular content area and also focus on the data and following students from K through five consistently. U particularly important for us uh we have the highest performing grade level that fifth grade class that we've been following ever since K. That class spent two years with Chris uh in first and second and then they followed up with TJ and Richard Smith for third and fourth and that consistency and we looped the kids together. We grouped them and looped them together. Uh so they stayed together all the way through up until fifth we separated them but they had two years with Chris and then you remember you remember that from >> I remember. Yeah, that's right. So, uh, we found that we
017find groups of students that work really well together, keep them together, and, um, it it really assists us and support the progress from year to year. So, that's something I would say definitely we're highlighting as the content specialists. Uh, and they really are specialists. I mean, TD knows a lot about Eureka math. 18 years in Baltimore, he's been here uh, with Eureka Math. Uh, Chris has been a lifelong teacher. Uh, came over from school, too. I remember the day I hired her. the best move, one of the best moves I've ever made in terms of uh taking staff within the district. Uh and she knows herself for ELA. So, we're very fortunate to have them and when professional developers come in the building for Eureka, math and um and our reading and writing program, I
018know they know probably as much as those people that come in this building. And that gives me a high level of confidence in terms of the information we we receive and how we use it. District mentor program targets group instruction. I'm not going to read them all, but I'm going to highlight a couple. The ELA and math enrichment program after school for grades three through five. That's something I brought over from Auburn when I was at Philip Livingston. I developed that program there. And we tweaked it a little bit here. What we do is we focus on the kids that perform slightly below grade level and slightly above. We make sure those kids are consistent in terms of being proficient on New York State exams. So, um, we do that program every year. And the
019great thing about that program is we have our grade level teachers that teach that program after school. So this year, Meg teaching that program. She's taking a group uh at fourth grade along with the other fourth grade teacher. Um Chris is taking a group at fifth. I these are highly qualified people after school in small groups. So the confidence level for me and those kids moving is pretty high. Uh so we really value that program. Also, the rally education materials are test prep materials we've been using, I think, for about about 7 years or so now here in in in uh at school 16. They've really benefited us. It allows us to see the questions uh that are very similar to the questions they see in near exams. And once again, it comes down to
020the confidence building with students. Students see the question, they see the the answer as a question, the question is the answer. um they're able to see different vocabulary using the questions and their confidence level builds as they see which materials and build their confidence. So last year we went on school visit to I think it was Maria Cortez school in Hartford and it was a school that didn't have a lot of resources but they worked really really hard in terms of time on task. Um, so one thing we took from that visit was a concept called the math bridge. And the math bridge, what it does, it's a part of your schedule where you pass for the math block where you revisit a concept uh where the students really didn't understand. So it's part of
021your professional learning community where you meet with the other grade level teacher, you bring in your instructional coach, you may bring in some of the related service providers, you focus on that particular area to make sure you revisit it, reintroduce the instruction, make sure they understand that concept and reassess. So that piece we do in our schedule this year. Um we're interested to see how that works out. It's like a 10 to 15 minute bridge of time. We revisit that particular area. We're excited to see how that works out. The other part of our schedule that we're consistent with is the win time for ELA and math. ELA uh instruct uh win time is and that's what I need time for the uh instructional block Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday and math is Thursday to Friday. So
022those intervention blocks are important for us. Once again, we never felt that math had enough time in a schedule. So we're trying to build even more time to math and we think that is partly the reason why you see some of that those elevated scores in math over the years is that we really focus on those areas. I see I ready uh we're using that more in the district now. We're excited about seeing uh that resource and how it supports our students. Start connections mentoring program. So this program allows for some of our staff to mentor some of our students during the course of the day. Uh it's non-instructional time. So it's mainly during lunchtime or after school program. So we have 54 total students uh being mentored, nine staff members. Uh it's a social
023emotional goal or focus and it's 20 minutes of mentoring each week and like I said during lunch or after school. We're very excited about that. Um once again students staying connected to school, student day programs, kids first program. We have 84 students participating. Uh with those programs we have lacrosse, floor hockey, flag football and karate very popular programs. Uh grind time basketball with Mr. Harris 18 students participating. IC the mind program we anticipate nine students participating this year. ELA and math management program we're still receiving forms back. We anticipate about 40 students this year. We're looking for about 40. In the school 16 after school program we have a total of 50 students enrolled. equity. Our equity focus for this year continues to be the rates of referrals and suspensions for all minority males. And
024our metric is the de decrease in the rates of referrals and suspensions. Um minority males are a special area of focus for us within the building. Uh we're tracking their data for not only the discipline referrals but also their progress in terms of academics. Uh we want to make sure just like every other group they're performing at a very good grade in terms of proficiency. restorative practices with Lorita Carlo. Uh we spent the summer with her, myself, Mr. Friend, and several staff members. We went through the restorative practices training. Uh it was a great training. Uh we've implemented the restorative circles in our staff meetings. We do it each staff meeting each year. We had circle today, right guys? Great circle. So we start off the circle for our staff meeting. We come here first.
025We sit in our circle and we have our talking piece. And I think the first the question we've been focused on for our first two staff meetings for September and this month is how are things going or what do you appreciate? What do you what do you appreciate? So we go around talking circle people and it's been great feedback um this year so far. Um, and I and I told them this, I'm appreciative of the great staff and great supportive staff and the hardworking staff that pays attention to detail and we'll do anything and everything to make sure students are successful and they shared some of their feedback also. It's a great way to start the meeting without going to going through the traditional items of you know what you have to cover in a
026staff meeting. All the things I have to tell them, I'm giving to give them giving those things to them on paper now. They can review those things with them if necessary. Following our restorative circle, we go right into our committee meetings. We go going to work. So, I'll meet the school leadership team. We have MTSSI meeting. We're doing our extra work to really focus on some of our goals. It's a new approach that we tried last year while we're at school 12. So, um it worked really well for us. We decided to continue that again this year. So, restorative practice circles also we're doing that uh in the morning during our morning meetings with our students as we start the day. We also use restorative practices as it relates to discipline. Mr. Friend uses that
027with students and circle back in terms of revisiting why things happen, how we fix what the things that went wrong. And we can continue our monthly training sessions each month September through June. It's one hour a month with Lori with our school counseling team. So, stu uh family engagement, we have outstand school 16 PTA here at uh here at school. Um we're always busy. We have a fall festival this Friday, book fair coming up, Halloween parade line, which is going to be exciting. Uh I definitely encourage you if you have time to stop by. It's it's these events are absolutely great. It's a great way to kind of uh see what happens outside of the classroom here at school 16. But I I very much appreciate um the time they put in for our students
028because once again everything matters. You know time at school matters in terms of outside classes to the connectedness to our students type of school help us during the day in terms of how they feel about their school. Our students feel very strongly about school 16 school improvement uh school improvement comprehensive educational plan. Commitment one, we commit to strengthening student engagement to promote positive student behavior through implementing scaffolding rigorous curricula to meet all students diverse needs. We're committed to working to build positive home school relationships, improve student attendance, and create positive, proactive schoolwide approaches to increasing student attendance. And our attendance numbers have been great for the past year. Commitment three, commit to using culturally responsive educational practice in our school community for the focus on each of the four areas. Welcoming and affirming environment, high
029expectations and rigorous instruction, inclusive curriculum and assessment, and ongoing professional development. Commitment four, identification of tier 2 and tier three student needs of additional support who are not responding to tier one differentiated instruction. We will establish rigorous target rigorous targeted goals and progress monitoring. That's our goal. Blue River School of Excellence. We think you can do it, right? We can do it. Uh if you look at the numbers, 66% um I'm looking at across the state, across the country, 356 schools were um designated Blue Ribbon Schools. 21 schools in New York State. Most of the schools are down in New York City. They're um under the guidance of New York City education department and New York City Department of Education. Um we're looking at a school now in Cambridge. It's a Martin Luther King Jr.
030school. They were recently nominated. There's two ways to um to be designated blue ribbons. One is through achievement closing gap improvement. The other is exemplary proficiency performance, high performance. So with our numbers, we think that the exemplary achievement gap closing option could be an option for us. But we know what our numbers have to be. We have to be better, right? We have to we have to move our numbers out. We have to move the needle a little bit. So 80 to 90% right 80 to 90 m that's why not right we said 70 we said 70 a lot of >> nj you got it TJ TJ you said we had it >> we got it okay so hey why not right my my question is why not because if you if you make that
031your goal we make 70 our goal got to 66 right we're we're not finished yet. So if you make 80 to 90 year old goal and you fall to 7075 that's great right but the thing is our mindset is we can do it and I know our students mindset is we can do it so that's our commitment um our next step is to visit uh blue ribbon school to see how they operate throughout the course of the day and you know look at our numbers and monitor our numbers and keep pushing to make sure we can do the best we can do each and every today and whatever the numbers are, like I said before a couple years ago, whatever the numbers are, there are that's what the numbers are. But we know that we're
032giving our best and that's all we can ask for. And if that comes with it, that's great. If not, we're going to keep moving towards it until we get closer. So, um, but I'm confident we can get definitely get closer. There's more room for growth. Thank you to the board of education from school 16. Thank you, Mr. Carmelo, cabinet for all you do. You gave us a beautiful school. before returning back here to school 16. We very much appreciate everything you do for us and school 16 community. Thank you. [Music] [Applause] >> Thank you, Tracy. Does anybody have questions? >> Can I ask a question? >> Josh. >> So, Dr. Ford, I mean, I've told you before how excited I am that my kids get to go here. What a great job you're doing. All
033good information in here, great results. What's the biggest challenge you face right now? >> Biggest challenge for us is to um continue to move forward. I mean, it's it seems like it's easy to get those numbers, but um it's small moving parts. The thing is we have to continue to focus on things we've been doing to maintain the kids where they're at. They're with new teachers, right? Different grade levels. fourth grade technology number which is another challenge right for our fourth reason. So these are all things we're trying to make sure we make our students comfortable with ahead of time we're prepared for ahead of time. There are challenges though. We feel that you know we're ahead of ahead of the game right now. We feel by time progress here. So as we get further
034here get more comfortable. >> Awesome. >> Great job. Thank you. >> Thank you, [Music] [Applause] >> Mr. Carmelo. Capital vote discussion. Um, thank you. So, um, on tonight's agenda, there will be a, uh, proposition for the board to approve, hopefully approve. Um, and I just wanted to talk about it a little bit. Uh, thank you guys. [Applause] >> Um, so, coincidentally enough, October 16th, 2019. So, exactly five years ago, um the board approved the original proposition uh for the current project and district's given us updates along the way. Phase one, phase two, we're on to our uh getting onto our final phase and the final phase is the dry high tech link. So, I just want to read um what the proposition back in 2019 said um amongst all the other things. Remember, we we've
035done a lot of work in that same capital project, but the part that um we're dealing with right now is uh the renovation of existing Troy High School technology wing and related site work uh and the construction of minor additions to that wording has now become problematic. We spoke about it a little bit already, but I I just wanted to make sure we're on record to to explain to um the folks why we have to come back to it. So, um Mr. Hotelli and I will be going to all the parent groups at each of the schools like we do for the budget meeting and like we do when we're originally voting for capital projects. And the big thing to explain is there's no new borrowing of money. Nobody's uh asking for new borrowing. what
036we have to do since October 16, 2019. Um, the plans have changed for the better. So after a half dozen meetings with the representatives from the state education department, we finally got approval to not have to do the reconstruction while the students are in school uh and while we're trying to uh maneuver uh and use the space while we're while we're trying to reconstruct it, which was going to be really really problematic logistically. They gave us permission to construct a brand new facility which will be in that parking lot just to the south of the building. Uh and then once that's done to demolish the current techn uh and so they did that with uh the same age ratio which is which is a really big win for us. The issue right now that we're
037dealing with is that wording that I just read to you never talked about that. So on December 3rd and actually the vote at that time was December 3rd, 2019. Really crazy. Uh so on December 3rd of 2024, we're going to have to go back out for the um public to vote that it's okay for us to build the new one and demolish the old one and not just reconstruct the current one. The wording has to be there. Uh so it's a little frustrating. It seems a little bit u unnecessary but it's actually required and so we'll be doing that and Mr. Hot and I will again go to the current groups to try to explain to that to them. It's no new borrowing. It's just wording that we have to get approved and hopefully um
038because of that people will come out and and vote yes. So um I just wanted to explain a little bit before um the resolution was to Uh we have finalized our schedule for those meetings, right, Teresa? Uh so I can put them in the Friday report. Um we're going to I'll explain kind of what I just said uh to the parents at those meetings and then Mr. Hotelling will uh talk a little bit about what's going to be in the new tech wing with the renderings and all those uh cool things. So uh it'll end up being good meetings. Hopefully uh they'll be well attended and again uh hopefully a message will get out there uh that we need people to come and vote on December 30th. >> Thank you. >> Two things. Um >>
039yes, >> one thing really. What are how are we doing this with the voting machines? >> Oh, great question. So, um the county usually lets us use the voting machines because there's a presidential election um coming up in 3 weeks. They said we can't have the machines because they need to hold on to them in case there's a recount or some kind of uh audit of their machines. So, we will be using paper ballots. So, we'll have um privacy booths and paper ballots and a lock box. Uh put the paper ballots in lock. The counting of them will be a little bit longer than typical. >> You think? >> Uh well, it won't it won't be that bad because it's really just yes or no. There's not there's not board members that are running and
040there's not a whole bunch of people to select. It's yes or no. So those two aisles will be easy to separate and easy to count. I'll do it for you. >> Now who's going to will there be proper training for the people that are taking the you going to train all the people? >> Yeah. So I will have a training like workshop prior to for all of the approved election inspectors so they will know what our process is this time. Okay. >> Yeah. >> I wouldn't normally ever recommend paper ballots, but just because it's a yes or no proposition, but >> there's only one thing to count if you try to do a board election paper ballots would be >> kind of a nightmare. But we really had no choice. Uh because we were at
041the first for the machines. They they said that we could use their machines if we waited into late January, but the longer we wait um it moves it moves the needle too much and we're going to end up missing a whole summer of work possibly. So, we want to get it as soon as possible and December 3rd is that soon with all the other requirements that we have to do once once this approval. Just make sure we get the presentation things. >> They're actually listed at the on the last page. >> Great job. Thank you, >> John. One other thing I will bring up on that. >> I know during the the last election there were a lot of people that didn't know where to vote and got turned to different schools. So, if there's
042a way that we can better clarify that and help people understand where they need to go, I think that'll help our cause. Yeah, I agree. >> How would you do that? >> I'm sorry. I mean, I was, you know, I was one of the ones went to the room. >> Yeah. >> Okay. And you're right. A bunch of us went to the wrong. >> How How would we notify people? >> Oh, they're all looking at George. Well, >> we talked about it. >> Yeah. I will say um you know we had the information on our website. Uh I will say I think it was confusing just because the districts changed within Troy you know the city of Troy. So those districts don't mirror our catchment areas and that uh is another reason why we can't
043have this on the general election if anyone has to. Um but uh so now people's uh districts have changed and they get bumped to you know a different school. I think you were originally 14. >> I was originally 18. >> Yeah. >> Um so I think we need to put our heads together to you know the best way for everyone. The most difficult problem is you know we don't really have a great communication tool for all voters. Um, you know, besides just a general mailing, um, it's it's harder than most things because we don't have everyone's data until we get it from the board of elections, which is leading up to the election. Um, so it's not like we have a lot of time to figure it all out and send it to people. That's
044the real difficulty part. We can publicize it as much as possible. You know, we can send out parent squares with a link, but that only gets to our parents. it doesn't get to all voters. Um, so it is it is a challenge. >> Okay. Well, we have to make sure our people because that's that's where we're going to get our votes. Hopefully, the no votes. >> Okay. Any questions? >> Thank you. Okay. Approval of minutes. Motion on the floor for approval of minutes. October 2nd, 2024. >> Second. >> Discussion. All those in favor? >> Opposed. Superintendent recommendation human resources staff matters unclassified and classified under unclassified. Motion on the floor for consent agenda items 1 through 10. Second >> discussion. All those in favor? >> Opposed? under classified motion on the floor for consent agenda
045items 1 through six. >> Second discussion. All those in favor? >> Opposed? Superintendent recommendation programs motion on the floor for consent agenda items 1 through three. Second. All those in favor. >> I opposed. Superintendent recommendations business finance. Motion on the floor for consent agenda items 1 through 8. Second discussion. >> All those in favor? >> Opposed district announcements. Future BOE meetings, all meetings will take place at 6 p.m. November 6th will be at the middle school. November 20th will be at school 2. Our special vote dates all any and all board members that can attend any of these. It's always nice to show up and say and talk to parents. Um, you guys are going to have a busy morning. Oh. Oh, that's um I have good news. Uh only 16 pages of it this
046time. So, um, uh, I kind of condensed it, but before I start on the good news that that was written for me, um, I saw a couple articles on that were posted on Facebook that had to do with our kids and our staff. Um, last month, the middle school staff came together to show and show a support of one of their own students, a student in Mrs. Burnham's Burnham's life skills class lost their vision last year and our staff stepped forward to make a difference. They custom made Troy Braille sweatshirts. They raised $840 for Helen Keller International. Thursday morning, staff gathered in the lobby for a photo and they showed a photo of the group with them with their shirts on. and I just thought it was just uh really fantastic when you see things
047like that. Uh thank you to our staff who participated and a special shout out to TA Miss Cooney for organizing the great show of support. Then channel 10 did a feature article on uh Troy High Jr. Scott Kunrap uh is using his carpentry skills to raise money for honor flights for local veterans and uh it really is a a fantastic honor flight is just a fantastic uh flight. My father was on one of the he was a World War II vet and he was on the very first honor flight. So it's like really cool when you see something like that and kids are still holding you know like uh know enough to give back. I thought just that was great. So that's my good news. And then we had one more um a Troy High
048Jr. Michael Kunrad has been volunteering for the last year and a half on the might Mount Ida Greystone preservation project. And if anybody drives Paul and Adam, you can see them working on that constantly. He uses the CDTA pass to travel to the cemetery and he works alongside uh gravestone matters to help preserve the historic gravestones and monuments, most of which that date back to the 1800s. It's a phenomenal place just to walk through. So, it's so good that they're preserving things like that. Um, is Michael in the audience? >> Michael, thank you. [Music] given back to Troy. I remember when that whole area was just one great big um uh black rut iron fencing and everything that was always falling down and everything and they ended up taking down. Now you can see the
049whole cemetery. So it's really thank you very much for taking care of our city of Troy. So now I have my script that Jason L. Every member of the Troy High School class of 2025 has been officially accepted to HBCC. At an HBCC guarantee event this morning, college representatives gave each senior a letter of of acceptance and spoke about the opportunities available at the college. The HBCC guarantee is designed to show that all graduating high school seniors can and should consider beginning their future at HBCC. Thank you to the administration at Hudson Valley for making this opportunity available for our seniors. What an awesome thing. Every student can go to Hudson Valley. That is great. Thanks to a continued partnership with Books and Homes USA. Carol Hill students will again be able to select free
050books to bring home before the holidays. We are grateful for their support of Books and Homes to help our students find new books. October, of course, is fire prevention month. And this week, Troy firefighters visited visit the school 18, school 16 for their annual fire prevention and safety demonstration for students. Thank you to the Troy Fire Department for giving their time to teach our students about the importance of fire safety. School 2 has continued to see an impressive attendance this year. So far this year, average daily attendance is almost 92%. Oh, wow. before I start reading these. Thank you to our families and thank you to our staff working hard to support our scholars and encouraging them to be in school. That really is great. Coming up in November, two drama club productions on November
0518th and 9th. Come see the Troy High School Drama Club production of The Play That Goes Wrong, a classic who done it story. Then on nove November 22nd and 23rd, the middle school drama club presents Annie Jr. It's an adaption of Annie as she sets out to find the parents who abandon her. That is so great when you hear so many schools cutting programs and especially in the arts field um in music and and in theater and whatnot. and we're adding I mean I mean this is great but that we brought it down to the middle school because those kids will take an interest going forward. And I just want to read this one thank you note that I find so cute that we got here. Dear board of education, thank you for my teachers
052and the afterchool program and my free lunch from Willa and Mrs. Mrs. Higgins third grade class at school 18. So, you're welcome, Willa. Um, motion. Uh, does anybody have anything else? And I'm not even going to pick on anybody up there because this was a long meeting for us at least. Um, okay. >> Janice, you got to turn off that phone. >> I was trying to shut her off. for the majority of us just so we're all going most of us are going to convention this weekend. Um if make sure you if you have any questions about your travel package make sure you get in touch with Teresa before Saturday. Uh and we'll see everybody down in New York City next. Right. So um and we if you find something that if you go to
053an event, if you go to one of the sessions and it's really good, please at our next meeting, please bring what you want to talk and we can share it with each other because there's some fantastic programs that we go to. So thank you. Motion on the floor to adjourn. >> Second. >> All those in favor? I >> thank you everyone.