Tuckahoe Board of Education Special Meeting and Workshop-June 7, 2021

001good evening today is uh monday june 7th today's a special meeting and workshop the board of education um i'd like to open the meeting can i get a motion uh cynthia second laurie all in favor okay so we are going to go into executive session so can i get a motion to go into executive session cynthia first or second all in favor great we'll be back at 7 30 for our special meeting thank you [Music] all right good evening today is monday june 7 2021 this is a special meeting and workshop of the board of education this meeting has actually already been opened up um we opened it at six well laura did for me because i was late and then we went to executive session we just came out of executive session so the

002meeting is already open let's start out with the pledge allegiance all right great um well let's get right into it um today today's presentation is going to be our year in review and coven 19 honorees which is really exciting so i'll turn it over to dr goodman little pocket so good evening colleagues good evening school board and good evening to the community watching from home this evening we will first review the school year and then we will highlight the accomplishments of the past 10 months review our movement towards our strategic plan goal and again recognize our stakeholders who achieved helped us during this really tough time achieve our mission and bring all students back into our school district this was a year like none other we were the first to close and we were the

003first to open we were first closed when we were in the containment zone and we were designated with new rochelle and we were the first to open believe it or not just not even a year ago in july when we offered the first in-person special education program we also offered that summer which july is the start of the school year a summer support program we opened our doors to all students in k-3 and continuously expanded our in-district offerings for students as the year progressed and we did this with the work of our our health and wellness team they helped us on all the decisions that we made and we will recognize them later this evening in other years the value of being in person for education would just be assumed and taken for granted no

004longer we work diligently to provide the services to our students and community it entails scrutinizing regulations and developing new structures among the new structures we developed just over the summer really was block schedule new classroom redesigns desk shield as time went on no desk shields as time went on outdoor learning spaces new materials to supplement shared handheld devices software from remote learning digital presentations and increased differentiation hardware for video capture assessment and student learning expanded our one-to-one initiative and we designed our gyms auditoriums and cafeterias all this was done with the express interest in providing our students with safe and equitable assets access to learning digital equity meant our technology department responded quickly to concerns and that we work around logistical barriers like supply chain breakdowns due to the pandemic we provided families in need

005with hot spots so they could access internet and worked one-on-one with families and troubleshooting faulty connections and unresponsive devices this year required transformations but the main drivers were student welfare education and service to our community we kept advancing our mission this year required cutting edge differentiation the leveraging of instructional technology and the implementation of responsive systems to address potential learning loss all the while there was focus on the whole child social emotional wellness weighed heavily on decision making and curriculum planning physical health was factored into decisions to redesign spaces and bring students back these conversations and learning experiences will benefit us in the years to come meanwhile we continued making strives towards our strategic plan many of our initiatives required in-depth professional development and active participation and reflection on behalf of our teachers and leaders

006as we will discuss in our upcoming slides we felt it necessary to advance our mission rather than pause tuckahoe is leading the way and we are doing that with the team of administrators and teachers and staff i'm willing to compromise on what makes tech taco special no matter pandemic and no matter what challenges let's begin by reviewing our strategic plan while this was the focus of our presentation earlier this year i will review the framework and goals before diving into our progress we are driven by academics and our goals to enhance performance for long-term success whether in college career and citizenship we know we can only do this by building upon strong relationships between the district the students and the community and that this work requires us to uphold our fiduciary responsibility to ensure fiscal

007responsibility and long-term sustainability the mission and these specific goals can be illustrated by this year's budget process one built on collaboration and transparency with an eye toward the future and student success preparing students for success requires a plan we have built this plan on the four pillars that you've seen before social emotional learning meeting the diverse need of needs of learners contemporary teaching and learning and professional learning in previous presentations we have distilled these into smaller goals aligned with measurable outcomes and artifacts tonight we will update you on some of these accomplishments pillar one social emotional learning to support our strategic plan's goals around social and emotional learning our district hosted parent presentations this included webinars to help families during the reopening process a presentation on from our behaviorist on behavior-based strategies to for parents

008and a virtual walk-through of our social emotional curriculum with rethink education additionally we have hosted teachers workshops reinforcing the needs for flexibility and sensitivity in the wake of the pandemic and providing our staff with skills tools and resources to address the needs of our students they have been pushing sel lessons health education at both the elementary and middle school levels focused on that and the launch of our tiger program our intervention program in the high school this year social emotional learning took on new meaning we responded to the needs of the time but also developed a foundation for continued success in the years to come pillar two diverse needs of learners in meeting the diverse needs of learners our district has moved forward with implementing i-ready while this was part of a small pilot in

009the beginning of the year we have expanded the pilot and have used it as a tool for learners striving and those who are thriving this year the elementary school created a diversity diversity club that reminded students of the importance and value of the community's diversity and a committee of stakeholders have unpacked the culturally responsive sustaining education framework and the state's diversity equity and inclusion and initiatives throughout the year we have looked closely at math cohesion and the bridge between different schools after reviewing the data we are moving forward with a more unified curriculum in grades k-7 with an accelerated and more challenging 7th grade sequence recognizing that we are increasing the rigor next year's budget allows for additional staffing to help meet the needs of students who require additional support while also providing enhancements and

010enrichment for students seeking challenges pillar 3 is contemporary teaching and learning this year we have made leaps and bounds in contemporary teaching and learning confronted with the requirements of digitizing materials and offering instruction virtually our teachers have risen to the task we have hosted throughout the years training and direct coaching on instructional technology we also launched new programs in early literacy and science despite the obstacles of the pandemic we look forward to see these continue to flourish as classes are reunited next year we will be expanding foundations to grade 3 and science 21 to grades 4 and 5. we also launched a training and project-based learning with a cohort of secondary teachers teachers develop what pbl works calls gold standard projects research informed units that allow for sustained incoming inquiry authenticity student voice reflection revision

011questioning and presentation looking ahead we want to seize our more authentic learning opportunities allowing students to see the real world connections and what they are learning and doing in the classroom lastly for professional learning our goal was to both support our staff in responding to the unprecedented challenges of the year and to push our district forward in this bold vision our asynchronous learning dates were critical in both of these they permitted not only the opportunity to respond to the needs of hybrid instruction and digital lesson design but to look ahead in terms of curriculum review lesson development and cross-grade collaboration this year we engaged in training on data collection tools seeing the value of increasing the data literacy of our professional learning communities we expect this to enhance our response to intervention program and to

012allow us to provide students with appropriate challenges and enrichment activities lastly we leverage technology for hybrid remote and responsive training experiences this year permitted us to use technology to develop rich professional development experience focus on continuous improvement now this accomplishment of the accomplishments of this year and the movement toward our strategic goals would not be possible if it was not for some of the people we recognized tonight so first we want to thank the teachers for their effort this year gene whalen president of the teachers the tucco teachers association kelly donovan vice president of the taco teachers association and rebecca chaffey carl building representative of the taco teachers association are here tonight to represent our dedicated and talented teaching staff and here's just some of the many things i could really write 100 things we

013did but first we shifted from in person to remote to hybrid and back to in person remote and hybrid throughout the year we created welcoming safe environments for our students our teachers assumed so many leadership roles they also participated in so many committees and just so that the community knows the committees didn't always happen during school time we met at night we met after school some of the representatives from the tta continue over the weekend we were very busy making sure that we were ready and always stayed ready with all the new changes our teachers adapted to new schedules and spaces they dived into new initiatives and curricular and they changed classrooms many teachers are not in the classroom that they were in before they had these new learning spaces and even some were working

014in cafeterias while some were projecting from one classroom to another teacher schedules were quickly adjusted in the high school middle school block schedules you know that takes years to usually design we just designed it over the summer and teachers were with students on extended math math breaks outside they became so adept at using all types of technology from the first day of school we had four days we remember if you can remember back to them we used our superintendent's conferences at the beginning of the year and they pretty much had four days to learn everything and also in this time learning the safety procedures which changed a number of times throughout the year understanding contact tracing understanding what it meant to be a contact sometimes teaching from home if they were quarantined some teachers were

015and are having time to do their work in cubbies they learned how to use microphones teach and teaching through masks not easy try teaching reading through masks they spent spoke over they taught over desk dividers and they taught students when they were home when they had students in their class and the main thing i have to say about our teachers is they did not let fear overcome come them for everybody it was a nerve-wracking time and at times people were confused but they always pulled themselves up for the betterment of our students and as we move away from the year i hope it is not forgotten that teachers were out front long before vaccinations and the science indicating the effectiveness of certain mitigation met measures and you know that also changed over time the tahoe

016teachers were driven by devotion and commitment to their students and their craft formal and informal observations have revealed their flexibility and responsiveness of our teaching staff we thank them tonight and will be forever grateful for their dedication this year ms weyland ms donovan and ms chaffee please come to miss dunn to accept our certificate of appreciation on behalf of the tta also if you could please pause for a brief for a quick photo because you know i have to put this up on facebook thank thank you very much and i just without any words thank you all of you for the support everything that you've done um they were difficult moments um and thank you so much for your words because they said a really beautiful job of everything that we've been through this year

017and i'm so proud of us as a community as a team as a district as a board and all of my teachers are so incredibly proud of them so thank you so very much for this [Music] next we thank the tuckahoe administrators we want to really recognize what they have done because we started the year with a vacationless summer actually it really was a weekends nights the whole summer was when i say vacationless i mean not a day off and the summer was complete with moving trucks storage units tape measures and pages and pages of regulations and health guidance they had to be expert in contact tracing leading change developing schedules serving on committees adapting to re restrictions having meetings with groups of parents all throughout the day at night if you recall we did

018have a 10 p.m meeting so that parents could hop on administrators were there they had to lead teachers who might have been anxious about the pandemic and they had to be up front and be available all the time and they were i actually thanked them because i think if you looked at their phone you would probably see how much i actually interacted with them over the summer and the three feet the six feet the barriers they were all part of that we are aware of the sacrifices they made this year and also the nights and weekends not just planning but contact tracing as soon as we had a contract contact a positive case in the school they started and if you recall it used to be you know many more people we had to um

019we had to call at that time they had to deal with nervous parents explaining this to teachers and again we had to get this all done in a certain amount of time so we could get the information out to the entire school community they helped prepare for change after change and i appreciate their leadership in a time of a crisis dr linehan and who's coming up with you dr morash and mr kilgallen please collect the certificate demonstrating our appreciation for your efforts and come for the picture [Music] i like to echo dean's words it's been an incredible year and thank the board for their support dr goodman and i can't thank the people enough i mean you know we work together in and cfca again you know everybody this has been fantastic uh we met

020the challenge and the challenge in the future but i want to thank everybody for their support thank you and the next group we would like to thank is the csea despite and this is the custodians the office staff the business office the security guards monitors teaching aids and teacher assistance so despite being confronted with the obstacles and brand new systems techos operations move fluidly and effectively this is again thanks to the hard work of all of these people and in a minute mr mrs cirillo is here tonight as a representative mr abrams is not don't go up yet and mr abrams is here too okay so let me talk about these groups a little bit um custodians they not that they didn't always clean our buildings beautifully but we had a new process called deep

021cleaning our schools and they were cleaning in between classes they were cleaning staircases and they had a specialized cleaning when we had a positive case they learned how to clean with jets on their backs and spray in classrooms again cleaning between classes they had to master new protocols because they were all there are all kinds of cleaning protocols associated with the pandemic they were always moving furniture whether it was furnitures into a pot into our i'm talking about you you could stay here whether they were moving furnitures into or moving our furniture into a storage pod or whether they were moving furniture around the classroom measuring six feet and then three feet putting up dividers again taking down those dividers and they were available at all times to us too and worked plenty of weekends

022and evenings and worked quickly and efficiently and kept our buildings very shiny clean and healthy i would like to just thank now the office staff they also um and i'm talking about right now the principal's office right now they were available morning noon and night when we had a positive case they were part of our contact tracing team they would get these spreadsheets that actually have to say we really helped the state develop they would get the spreadsheets to the county there was a certain amount of time they had to get them there they would also call parents and be that friendly voice to explain what it meant to be a contact and then they spent the day fielding calls from the rest of the community who were was nervous and always with a friendly

023smile on their face now i'd like to thank the business office so we were ordering things at a moment's notice because i did not want us to be involved with this covid um shortage shortages that people weren't getting so we would go in we'd ask for something they knew how to connect with the vendors they jumped on the orders so that they did not run out of supplies and they managed the budget to keep our school safe and also keep us in budget in terms of the security guards they worked with our students and our parents on the new security configurations and the new dismissal and arrival our monitors too mastered new methods new arrival and dismissal procedures which were changed a number of times you know especially at caudle you know kids were sitting

024on spots they were sitting here they were sitting there we had to make sure that kids were socially distanced and they also did this our kids responded so well because they were so good at it they were so friendly and calm new lunchtime procedures and again keeping kids calm and the tas again managing classrooms with and also the aides moni they managed classrooms while teachers were either special education classrooms or while teachers were streaming into another classroom they manage that we are so grateful for their hard work and their dedication so um mr abrams mrillo please come to collect a token of our gratitude and please also smile for a photo i would like to thank all of the csb members now there's so many that are in our unit that i can't stand here

025and thank all of them but they really really stepped up the plate and i'm very proud of all them and and a privilege to work with teachers and administrators it's just been a just an unbelievable year that we made it to this point it's really outstanding i thank you dr goodman robin everybody else on the board thank [Music] you softball fans the girls next i would like to and i didn't really pull out anybody seniorly from the staff but i had to pull out the school nurses and of course our incredible school physician first i'll start with dr kilagarris she was you are our medical anchor and we needed you to understand this virus and she was available not only to me but also to the administrators and the staff she was always available at

026a moment's notice even though she has an extremely busy practice dr kalagaris always got back to us and her knowledge about the virus and her level headedness i think that's what really got us through this pandemic and reopened and kept ourselves open and not overreacting she was able to decipher research and she was really instrumental in every phase of the reopening we would call her up and say what do you think about this i might be on the phone with her and a principal and we had a question and again she would with her level head headed calm way she would get us through it again our anchor and then our key our nurses you know we have great nurses and nurses are very important to a school community but this year was they were

027actually a key position they set the direction of the district in terms of reopening and contact tracing they were available early and late at night early in the morning late at night and whenever a case was found they took leadership in terms of understanding the regulations and they often called parents and were the bearer of bad news but did it in a way to so parents would not panic when students were sick they let parents know and when they couldn't come to school which parents did not always understand especially at the beginning of the year what we could allow in school and were not allowed to come to school if they had any covid covet-like symptoms they helped us navigate the guidelines so that again we wouldn't overreact and we didn't overly close schools because

028of them and they promoted our bold reopening and i just want to take time because i want to thank them both both mrs miss higgins and miss polis but i would also like to um give a special shout out to miss higgins specifically because when there was anything um that came out i could rely on her she was always available she really got to know the regulations inside and out and she was a great partner in this again another one who had her phone on all the time and still does on weekends at night or in the morning just helping us through this you really i know that you worked very closely with linda too who was new to our district and did a great job so dr calagaris ms polis and ms higgins please

029come down to collect your certificates representing next i need to thank the taco health and wellness committee we relied heavily on them throughout the reopening and i really have to say that this committee was outstanding as you can see just by the list of the people that we had on it we have rep broad representation in terms of the community members we had some of the best minds in medicine we had teaching staff that was incredibly committed some of you are back here because the health the health people dr kell garris and ms higgins were on this committee too the community members were dr thomas angelo dr dominico tortorella and dr coochie the board of ed trustees will also have a medical background science background is miss gardeire and miss laura banky the teaching staff

030miss abby benedetti miss chaffee and miss mckinley our nurse ms higgins and dr colegaris and again the all the district administrators pretty much were on this all our committees were valuable but nothing was called upon more than this committee we relied heavily on them for the reopening they helped us understand scientific data they ensured the safety of our schools ensured the safety of our students and staff came together at a moment's notice and even for example i have to say this weekend when we thought we had some guidelines from the state of course we all learned that those have changed but we wanted to get a jump start on it that on saturday afternoon i emailed this committee and by sudden we had a date to meet on zoom on sunday and this we are

031always with this committee hashing things out solving really nuanced issues within the state's guidance they gave us direction to be confident in our bold plans to get our school out in front of the pandemic we recognize the members listed on this slide here and tonight we are joined by miss higgins dr keller garris mr morash dr linehan mr keough miss chathi dr tortorello please collect your certificate from this stun as our token of our appreciation come over here we were so fortunate to have the people we had on this committee there is no way that this school would open the way it did with our bold initiative without the people who were on this committee and thank you all so much we met so many times i'll probably be calling you next week right [Music]

032next is the tuckahoe pta the pta in taco as i've said over and over again is extremely strong and provides so much to enhance our school district and i've worked in many school districts and i have to say this is the most generous involved caring pta i have ever worked in with so i even on even for the short time i was here before the pandemic i saw the things that they do and i know next year i'll see even more but this year they ended up reimagining so many events so that our students could have these events so virtual events like our halloween night at caudle they didn't do virtually they did that actually in person that was we were one of the first to do something like that with parents outside the other

033events they did some events they did virtually the halloween academy was amazing building bridges was amazing actually these are all in-person ones field day career panels that was virtual and the taste of takaho they didn't let the fact that we have a pandemic get them down they actually did it just a different way and our kids loved it they always celebrate our teachers and support them incredibly and they made the year very special and when we talk about social emotional development them doing these things for our school is what makes our kids feel good about being in taco so miss mealy is here tonight as president of the pta she has been a great partner to me i really do thank you and i know the principals do for the wonderful work that you do

034and please on behalf of the pta because i know miss mealy always says it's not me it's all of these volunteers and i know that it is please accept a certificate on behalf of the pta indicating our deep gratitude for all the pta and your hard work this year thank you thank you thank you to our administrators thank you to our faculty our staff what the pta does can't be done in isolation we can't do what we do without all of you and we don't really belong in the same breath as everybody else being honored here tonight but we are further indebted to you for supporting what the pta does and as dr goodman said we're almost 60 people on our board so i am one person up here but there are a lot more

035who make all these things possible so as somehow we coined this last year but we really are taco in this together you can see by all the people here tonight and i also want to do a few shout outs special thanks to mr keough the director of curriculum instruction and technology for all your help with all our teachers you are the key to learning in within this school year and what you did was short of miraculous with all of the technology that we had to learn i also wanted i also want to thank my administrative assistant miss robin dunn she is not only the board clerk she is my administrative assistant so she also was available at all times for everything that we needed to do this year and i thank them both for being

036my partners throughout this journey and i really want to thank the board of education i really believe this is an extremely intelligent and thoughtful board of education they strived also they wanted our students in in person and that and we we served them well and they also want to do what's best for our students so taco in this together tuckahoe leading the way finally this quote is education is not preparation for life education is life itself i think we learned that this year and i think our students learn this this year they are strong and resilient and in the end we thank them thank you so let me just say as as the board president um to pony off of everything that was presented tonight we as the board represent the community that's what we

037that's why we're here so on behalf of the community thank you to all of you every single one of you because um we as a community realize how lucky we are to have our kids go to this school district and this pandemic and the way this district handled it really drove that home and we just really want to thank you all on behalf of the community all of you teachers administrators csca pta everybody just thank you thank you very very much so we do have one more award that she doesn't know it's coming but dr goodman needs to be recognized everything you heard tonight all that wonderful recap the center of that entire wheel the air traffic controller the glue that held it all together was dr goodman and i don't think anybody can deny

038that her leadership has been has been palpable over this past year and i knew we were in good shape if you remember back to when um the synagogue episode broke out into rochelle which kind of started it all for us dr goodman saw the writing on the wall she already saw that a lockdown was probably coming and i think she had mr morash and mr gilgallon come in that weekend and start getting chromebooks ready she this entire pandemic she's been ahead of the curve she's been one step ahead of everything even like you mentioned before this weekend with the guidance commission always one step ahead always calm always calculated always thinking everything through just a steady hand and i think what she demonstrated tonight which probably her biggest strength is she knows how to tap

039into all the resources she knows how to get all the talent that we have and get it in the right direction that's true leadership so on behalf of the board of education [Music] okay all right great night very good i can't believe the end is here already it's crazy a long year all right move on all right we do have a little bit of business um not a whole lot but a little bit so we'll get right into that um first is to a motion to approve the consent agenda items two through ten do i have a motion cynthia second teres any discussion all in favor now business of the board um prove a bond resolution motion to approve the bond resolution is attached to the official agenda in minutes of this meeting this of

040course is the bond resolution of the capital improvement bond that was voted on um last month do i have a motion second cynthia any discussion thank you again to our community for supporting this bond we're really excited about it all in favor prove a moa whereas negotiations have been ongoing between the bargaining team for the tuckahoe union free school district and the bargaining team for the tuckahoe teachers association for successor to the 2018 to 2020 agreement between the parties and whereas those negotiations have resulted in a tentative agreement contained in the memorandum of agreement dated march i'm sorry may 27 2021 which has been ratified by the membership of the unit and whereas the board of education at the takaha union school district has reviewed the terms of the memorandum of agreement and finds that

041a subtle settlement consistent with the terms contained therein is in the best interest of the district now therefore be it resolved that the board of education of the tahoe union free school district nearby approves and ratifies the terms of the after said memorandum agreement and hereby authorizes the superintendent of schools in the board president to execute a collective bargaining agreement consistent with the terms thereof do you have a motion second cynthia all in favor congratulations to the teachers again what i set up there was was i could have again added pages and pages it's a great staff and you deserve what you got so thank you and with regards to this contract dude this was you know um the original term was truncated as a result of the pandemic and the teachers cooperation in doing

042that was was commendable it really was because we just were unsure where this was we were going to go financially and you were going to be patient and wait with us so we appreciate that thank you all right the last personnel recommendations resolve the board of education at tuckahoe union free school district approves personnel actions a through b as outlined below to have a motion glory second cynthia any discussion all in favor all right and that's it brings us to the end we have a motion to attend a meeting second cynthia all in favor all right thank you very much appreciate you all coming out tonight thank you