001all right please stand for the Pledge of Allegiance I pledge aliance to the of the United States of America to rep religious Nation indivisible andice all well it's always nice to be at Sherman and today's uh no exception beautiful crowd um great job with the PTO over here fantastic and I have to give a shout out real quick to my four friends John will Tommy and Evan if anybody wants the best H Coco you're ever gonna get go see those guys okay all right so moving along Michelle do we have any agenda changes this evening I've had a few um changes since Friday when I first posted the agenda um items for board action we did add R the approval of a K12 principal appointment uh s the approval of a K12 uh assistant principal
002appointment uh T the approval of a separation agreement and the board members do have an updated Personnel report um to review that tonight as well with highlighted changes very good thank you is anyone here wishing to address the board on agenda related public comments okay uh Michelle do we have any Communications I do not all right then it is my distinct honor to turn it over to Mrs Gretchen Manet who is the principal here at Sherman for herh presentation thank you hoping everybody at home can hear this I don't usually talk in a mic um thank you everybody for coming to Sherman and thank you to our wonderful PTA for all of this and you do have little gift bags from our PTA as well um everybody should have one up there our Watertown mission
003statement is that Watertown city school district is committed to building a caring culture that Fosters lifelong Learners and responsible citizens and we kind of narrow that down to an elementary level when we say our Sherman pledge every day we the Sherman sharks pledge to be safe helpful a friend to everyone responsible and kind to others and we try to live by that each day we have some strategic plan goals increasing the graduation rate increase meaningful student engagement improving overall student attendance enhancing behavioral supports for students and enhancing infrastructure kind of highlighting number two and number three for tonight uh our PTA has done a lot already for us they've done a fall test um they're purchasing a Sherman shirt for every student in the building and this is what it is they will be getting
004this week it's so cute very cute so thank you to our PTA for being able to do that for all of our students um they sponsored a book fair uh they helped with Mrs Davidson's holiday Workshop that she does and um they've done meals for the staff this week from Ricardos they've done holiday treats we are being treated to manes and petties and hand treatments tomorrow and Thursday so they go all out for us and I know there's more things coming up in the spring PBIS has been hard at work this year engaging students obviously PTA has events that um brings the students in but the Fall Fest was a big one this year uh the Boosterthon fundraiser was huge and that's something that the school does to raise money for our PTA so they
005can do these wonderful things um we have some assemblies and we were able to bring parent parents back for those this year and I've received many messages that they're very appreciative of that um sponsoring luncheons for staff PBIS uh we had pizza this week we've done other luncheons and there's more coming and promoting positive behavior always that's the goal extracurricularly here at Sherman we have 17 students while it'll be 18 in January uh participating in our tutoring program 14 students participating in Steam we have numerous PD opportunities that our my staff takes regularly um PBIS and mtss is always very busy with lots of meetings and we have sack here after school as well my coach my instructional coach is um providing support in the classrooms especially with some new things that we've taken on
006this year um providing PD during teacher planning period so that we're not asking them to come in extra if it's very difficult sometimes for teachers to be able to do that PD after school for those that are able uh support during common planning time in the mornings they have time to meet just for a little bit and they can ask questions and weekly meetings with me just to see how things are going some new curriculum and Pilots happening here at Sherman Eureka math squared is a pilot we have uh one teacher in every grade level trying that out this year with the exception of fourth grade um it was a small enough grade level that we're able to have all three of our teachers do that and so far the feedback has been very positive
007uly is happening in all grades and spring math is happening in all grades and I will say that um the data that's being collected is showing to be very positive and I had one teacher today tell me in a conference that the two things that she looks most forward to are youly and um teaching the six step lesson plan she thinks those are those are the two most successful things that she does in a day so that was very promising our Sherman attendance I think our attendance is great um September overall was 94.5 two% and the highest of was from grade one with 94.5 6% October overall was 92 2.8 and the highest was from grade four at 95 November's was 93.1 and the highest was from grade three at 94 and uh as of
008when I did this in December it was currently at 93% and I think with all of the sickness and everything that's been going around that's pretty excellent so kudos to my teachers for working hard to keep kids coming every day and I would like to invite my students up here they're the ones that we want to hear from if I could have Curtis and Jesus and dein Cadence Cadence make it in come on [Music] up all right we're gonna have ctis first how does that hi my name is Curtis stun Sherman is a great school to learn I like spring math the best I try to be in my school every day my teacher is great because she makes learning fun first grade is the best hi my name is Dean what I like about
009Sherman is that they have very nice teachers they plan field trips for us the activities they do are fun I like the carnivals Sherman is the best school I could ever go to Genesis I am in first grade and this is 's class my favorite things I love about Sherman are my teacher is the best I love my friends I love Dr Earth o during science she's funny hello my name is Cadence I am in Miss ler fourth grade class I love Sherman because I feel like my teacher make me feel good I feel more confident on math and I feel like I can be my self and feel welcome at Sherman I like our celebrations like the Halloween parade and the PB assemblies hello my name is Roman I am in Miss Leer's fourth
010grade class I love Sherman because the teachers are so kind and awesome for example Miss Ry is always calm Miss would always make me happy when I was sad Miss ler on the first day of school she was confident that her class was going to be so awesome and that made me feel welcome I like the celebrations like the Halloween parade and the PV SSM my name is Elizabeth I love I mean I am in Mrs lers in fourth grade class I love my school Sherman Elementary because it's full of people who care for other people and are very wonderful also the teachers are very kind I love the teachers here and I like coach CL and Coach Al they are amazing Mrs ler is my current teacher this year she rocks and I love
011her Mr Mike is a very nice guy he cleans the playground area by picking up trash he he's funny too I love all of our celebrations and traditions they really fun great job to my Sherman students thank you yep you guys okay if I take a picture no one is on the witness protection promise me you're GNA smile question is this fourth grade teacher here today is where is she right there you're the fourth grade teacher Vanessa good evening everybody um I'm not sure this is on yet can you hear me Mike's gonna get me set up I have paper so I needed to be handsfree I'm going to talk to you about our assessment scores from 20124 assessments my name is l gney I'm the assistant superintendent for instruction I'll give you a preview
012while it's getting set up um and I can do a loud voice I was a teacher for many years so we're here to review the state assessment data and we're also here to talk about steps being taken to support Improvement in critical areas thank you Mr Shanley for people that don't know Mr Shanley he helps us with you can be at a musical you can be at a board meeting and you'll see Mr Shanley working in the background making sure everything runs smoothly how's my volume now s good it's at home but not here okay sorry here we go all right so tonight I'm gonna go over the ELA and math assessment results the grade five and eight Science assessment results and the Regent exam results and we're going to start by defining proficiency you're
013going to hear me talking about profic proficiency and percent proficiency so I just want to Define that for everybody so you know what that means a little bit long it's wordy it's from the state but proficient signify students Mastery of subject content and skills at their grade level demonstrating a strong understanding and meeting or exceeding grade level standards in essence they have effectively acquired the necessary Knowledge and Skills so when you hear proficiency that's what we're looking for on a state test that generally will mean a three or a four or three four or five at at the regions level okay so we're going to jump right into Ela results take a look at the three through eight um our results demonstrate that the work we are currently doing around structured literacy is very needed
014so you're going to see that we do have some challenges but we do have a very good plan in place and our teachers and students are working really hard to address the needs that you're going to see tonight um so Ela last year and what I did is a kind of a pre and postco so I wanted everybody to be able to see um what was going on prior to covid in 2020 and you can see there's no testing data for that year because we did not have the state test um so there's 2019 and then you have 21 through 2024 and that'll be pretty much the same for all of the results that I share with you tonight um so we did have a slight decrease and just to draw your um attention to
015the colors there if you're looking at the lighter lavender that's going to be Proficiency in New York state so across the entire State and then when you're looking at the darker purple you're going to see Proficiency in Watertown city school district so this would be across all of our schools all of our third grades um so we did have a slight dip in proficiency from 24% thank you Dr s to 23% last last year um grade four we also saw a drop and and actually I'm going to say quite honestly we saw a drop in all of our proficiencies in ela which again underscores the district's um commitment to structured liter literacy and the things that we are putting into place that I will share with you tonight Mrs Manet mentioned some of them before
016and there's grade five um so grade five we actually um did a little bit of an uptick we went from 26% you can see at the bottom last year proficiency to 27% there's grade six and in grade six we went from 31 proficiency 31% proficiency last year to 24% um and you can see in the years postco we have really declined pretty sharply at this level um grade seven we're looking at a decline from 23 to 24 from 28% proficiency to 21% proficiency and then finally for grade eight Ela assessment results we're going from a 36% Proficiency in 2023 to a 32% proficiency um one of the things I want to share with you is that the teachers are working working very hard with instructional coaches and principles to look at this data and mind
017the reasons why why are our kids not performing at a rate that is higher than this we want to see much higher than this um we know the trajectories for students that don't learn how to read and write properly and Watertown is very committed to making sure that we have a large percentage of students that are able to do just that um some trends that we did see in ela when we were looking at the results and analyzing them from grades three to eight difficulties with informational text um some challenges with vocabulary as well as finding the main idea so those are things we'll be focusing on moving forward next we'll examine our 3 through eight math assessment results so this year's results actually show improvement from last year's results at many grade levels so
018you're going to see an uptick um and again to orient your eyes to the colors here the darker green that you see would be the state proficiency across the state in a given grade and then the lighter green is Watertown city school district's proficiency um so as you can see um after covid and and this is true across the state right we're going to see that scores went down um last year excuse me yeah 2023 we had 22% proficiency and we were able to raise that to 27% Proficiency in the 2024 testing year uh grade four we were also able to show an increase demonstrate an increase in those skills so we went from 35% last year to 43% this year and then grade five we also had an increase we went from 28% last
019year to 33% this year um 26 no not 26 27 to 28 on sixth grade Mass so we did see a little bit of an improvement there and then for grade seven um we did di down a little bit just a little bit we went from 38% proficiency to 37% um finally in grade eight we went from 29% to 22% um and again I like to look at Trends so teachers will be looking at this if they haven't already um our coaches our principles look at this one of the things that really stuck out to me when I was analyzing the results is the difficulties with algebraic skills we're going to talk about that and how the district is addressing it tonight okay so in grade eight we do have a group of students every
020year um that take the algebra course and the the region exams at the end of the year and as you can see um they are scoring 100% proficiency every year so we're really pleased with that switch over to science now okay so science this graph's going to look a little strange because New York State as many of you know have has switched from a fourth grade science test to a fifth grade science test that's why in 2023 you don't see any tests at all because that was a year where we were switching over um and so 2024 is really the only data we have for fifth grade and we can see that Watertown had a 26% proficiency rate in fifth grade for the first time going through these are our eighth grade State assessment results
021for Science and we went from a 41% proficiency to a 26% Proficiency in eighth grade science keep in mind too um when we're talking about some of these like the algebra scores um those students that took eighth grade Algebra would not be included in our eighth grade math testing so that's sometimes why you see lower proficiencies when some the kids have been taken out we don't necessarily double test them we also have a group of students many of the same ones that are taking algebra that are accelerated and take our living environment course and Regents in the e8th grade and so last year we had 100% proficiency up from 97 the year before on the living environment region so we're going to head into our high school assessment results right now we're going to be
022talking about regions exams um The Lion Share of the regions exams are really taken in June with the exception of our Ela um we do have some kids that take it in June but most of our students take it in the January region so we'll be doing that actually very soon so 87% of our students demonstrated proficiency on this year's this January of 2024 Regents exam this is algebra 1 that's actually the first year um the new region was given in 2024 so we are comparing slightly different versions of the course in the regions um but we did see that we had just about the same proficiency we had 53% from 2023 as well as 2024 our geometry regions results um remain stable from last year so they read it at 74% for both 2023
023and 2024 and there's Algebra 2 and we had actually a really nice jump in Algebra 2 um as you can see in 2023 our proficiency was 75% and in 2024 it was at 98% uh global history and geography our proficiency came in at 66% this year so it was a little bit lower than last year's 70% and then we have US history and government results and we're at 42% so we did drop down quite a bit from 84% um the year before um I did look you know we've been examining the data and that's a really important aspect of any school Improvement effort that you're trying to make um we did see um some of the pieces that kids struggled with on this were were causes and effects um some issues with globalization human rights
024and global conflict so we'll be addressing those as well moving forward there's living environment um living environment did see a decrease from 2023 to 24 going from 70% to 59% proficiency our Earth Earth Science results um increase from a 68 proficiency percentage in 2023 to 70% in 2024 there's chemistry and chemistry also increased from 66% to 73% proficiency um and then finally we have physics which decreased from an 8 88% Proficiency in 2023 to a 76 Prof 76% Proficiency in 2024 um what I saw when I was analyzing the science regions I was actually a science teacher for many years is that the mised questions were really all over there wasn't a lot of trending so that's going to take a little bit more of a dig for those teachers to look into the data
025and see what's going on with that okay so now our plans to move the district forward um have already been in place for the last year and a half and I want to go over some of these key actions with you because I want the message tonight to be one of Hope and one of empowerment because we have a group of Administrators teachers and students that are working very hard to make sure our students have all the proficiency they need in every subject um so they fall into three buckets the main things that we're working on the key areas or critical areas the first one's reading and so as I said said earlier we were doing something called structured literacy that may be different than what you've heard before many districts were using something called
026Balan literacy and there were remnants of that here in Watertown when I was hired a year and a half ago um structured literacy is evidence-based and it's shown to be very very effective and I'm going to talk about some pieces of that and what our teachers are doing moving forward to make sure our students are proficient readers um one thing we've done is we've had many many train TRS with the reading League uh so this weekend I was kind of thinking about how much training we've had and sometimes I actually get grief from the district office because there's no parking up there because we have so many people coming up for training um or from the people who can't find a spot so I wanted to add it up I'm like how much how many
027hours have we done in the last um year and a half on PD um so PD all together with these three buckets of reading math and instruction we've done 6,987 hours in the last year and a half of that 92,000 has been reading math has been 35,000 and instruction has been 64856 th000 um so I want you to know that when we see scores that are not where they should be we are addressing it very assertively and and that's the teachers that are working really hard to make sure that they're getting this information and getting the trat okay so what else um we did a k through four curriculum audit and one of the things that when you start in a new position people line up at your door and they say to you hey
028did you know this might need to be changed and that was no exception when I started so one of the things the teachers pointed out is that we did not have a strong word recognition program available to our students and so that's where you fly came in um board members I think you were able to see you fly in action at Ohio and we had the sound Boards out with genen nap um that's been very successful and we'll often hear from our both our teachers and our students how successful they feel doing youly that's going to buoy up or raise up our reading scores because students are going to be able to decode right without the decoding piece the alphabet pretty much just looks like a bunch of squiggles or lines youly makes that um
029doable and decodable for them um the science of reading trainings I've mentioned to a degree um we've had the reading leak here many many times they've actually come into the buildings as well we're also sending over 20 teachers to be trained on something called letters and that's also the science of reading or structured literacy we've also reinstituted something called CAP teams and so I think maybe 10 12 years ago maybe some of the people in the room can um give me the exact timing there was something in place for many many years at Watertown called the C curriculum alignment process and those were teams of teachers that worked on the curriculum and made sure that everything was aligned if you were a new teacher you got a binder with everything that you should be teaching
030um and those have kind of Fallen by the wayside and the teachers had asked for those to be reinstituted so we so far have reinstituted those with math and Ela and we were looking to do the same with both science and social studies there's anything else with reading I think I hit on everything with reading okay math um we have something called spring math we actually heard some of the students reference it tonight and I actually have two teachers and a few students that are going to talk to you about spring math tonight um you saw you fly in action and I thought you might want to understand a little bit better on how spring math works but it's a K8 algebra Readiness initiative so one of the things I mentioned to you when I
031was looking at scores is that the students were struggling struggling with some of the algebraic pieces on that this is an initiative where everybody gets math every day um they try to beat their own scores I don't want to steal any Thunder from Mrs Johnson and Mrs O'Brien and their students um but this is going going to be a game Cher for our students in the district um also mentioned by U Mrs Manet is Eureka Mass so we have 30 teachers in the district that are piloting Eureka Math that is a program that's K5 and we're hearing really good feedback on it um we've been actually using the New York State modules for a number of years and a lot of teachers felt like those were not updated and we really needed to look at
032something new so we responded by getting Eureka Math here and more to come on that but I think we're probably um looking to adopt it for the district at some point um I mentioned the cap teams I mentioned the algebra Readiness and how important that is I also want to address that at the high school level we reorganized our algebra courses and so now um instead of students going into pre-algebra or algebra we have other courses um fundamentals and principles of algebra where they may get two extra periods or one extra period um every other day and they can get the practice that they need so a lot of these things even with reading and math to get the fundamentals down require practice um and sometimes you know we understand very well when it comes
033to sports when it comes to music that people need practice but we also want to be mindful of that when we're planning instructional activities that students need lots of practice to get good at these things um finally I want to talk about instruction which is my love I could talk about that all night um one of the things I learned when I got here is that many many teachers have previously gone to a five-day effective teaching course and that had been instituted I think in the 90s um there are two people that come from Syracuse they do this five-day course and it just sets you on the path to success um I'm just going to have people raise their hand if they've taken that course just look around the room yeah and so if you
034ask people you know what was the best course you ever took to prepare you to feel competent in the classroom most people will tell you effective teaching for whatever the reasons that kind of just fell off in Watertown over the last few years um and we've been able to reinstitute that they were here this summer the two trainers doing um training for a whole group and we sending people to Bose's as well for that um the other big passion I have is the science of learning or science of instruction so um in the past you know teachers maybe didn't have access to research or evidence and to align their practices with the evidence that is not true anymore we know the practices in classrooms that work and so my mission for the last year and
035a half is to be to get that information to teachers help them build their toolbox and I think the teachers and the principles will tell you the principles have been on the receiving end of the training as well it's very empowering to know what research actually works in the classroom and be able to pull that into your teaching when needed um finally I just want to say the instructional coaching uh Mrs Monet mentioned that we redid our instructional coaching um program we were able to add coaches and they have been pivotal in our success and our ability to get these programs in place Len I just for that piece I know you said it briefly but we added coaches this year to make sure that buildings had coaches yes and then you could speak about
036mtss RTI and the effort that's gone into that this year absolutely um so we have somebody in the back with a red sweater on Dr Amy Garts if you just raise your hand um so I don't want to take credit for um work that she's done I'm certainly a supporting role um but one of the things that's really important for a district to have in place is a mtss so it's multi-tiered systems of support and what that means is we're looking specifically at each child and exactly what they need for support for instance if a child is struggling maybe it's an attendance issue maybe it's a reading issue we don't want to address that with an intervention that's one siiz fit fits all so a really strong robust mtss system is very important to make
037sure we're matching the intervention to whatever is needed for that sh that's going on in every building do you want to say more Dr just wanted to add to like for case Middle School specifically for that building we added an entire team of teachers to really maximize that mtss r di framework yes in the intervention block um so as I mentioned before we you've seen uh you fly I wanted you to be able to see spring math so I'm going to invite Mrs Johnson and Mrs O'Brien and their students up to talk about spring Ma hi everybody I'm Mandy Johnson I teach fifth grade at Wy with my teammate Karen O'Brien um and we're here to talk about spring math just to give everybody a little background and then we'll turn it over to the
038real experts um spring math is an Intervention Program designed to help students develop a strong foundation in math through a comprehensive assessment and intervention approach it uses paired learning to lift all students and build Mastery and mathematical confidence and we did have more to say however our students actually kind of came together and came up with pretty much what we were going to stay say so this is evangelene Wright Amelia Baker and Greta Schwartz and I'm gonna let uh Eevee start it off hi I'm Evangeline Wright I am in Mrs O'Brien's fifth grade class this year spring math has helped me improve my math fluency and help me complete my work faster when you're doing a spring math worksheet you complete the problems two times the first time you do it um you get three
039minutes and you work with a partner to finish both your worksheets then the second time you you are given two minutes to complete the same problems on your own working with a partner gives us both more confidence in our answers and a chance to work through the problems together if you're having trouble they can help you see what is wrong I think my peers and I have grown a lot this year in math we have gone from skill to skill and we have already made it to division we have all work so hard in Spring math it is fun for me um so and I hope it is fun for everyone else as well I just want to thank Mrs O'Brien Mrs Johnson my old teacher Mrs Paige um um um all my past teachers
040and everyone here for thank you for all you do um all and how hard you all work thank you about hi my name is Emilia Baker I in fifth grade I some things that I like about spring math are is that we have 2 minutes for the second time and 3 minutes for the first time for the first time you work with a partner and you complete as many problems as you can if you finish the first paper you get to complete as many more on another paper as you can when the time's up you pass the paper to your partner and your partner finished the paper the second time is basically a Sprint you have 2 minutes and you get to do as many problems as you can if you finish the pap paper
041good job you completed it but you can't do another paper and thank you hi I'm gr Sports and a few things I like about spring math are that the first thing is um that when you work with a partner you can learn off each other by their strategies and way they do the the problems the second thing I like about it is that you get two you get two tribes in the beginning before you do the real sprint so it helps you um it helps you practice and get better before you do the real thing thank you all of our students love spring math and one thing they get to do it's generated for them they get to keep their own growth scores so they have a they think about okay this is what I
042got this time this is how I want to improve next time and when we get the confetti what do we do we celebrate don't we yes so it's just they absolutely love it it's 15 minutes sometimes a little bit longer but it's just we do it every single day and it's the highlight of my day the highlight of your day absolutely so thank you very much appreciate it just there I do have a question you guys have any questions for I is it a computer program or are they handout paper handout the computer generates um based on those course um previous a partner for them so you'll have a worker and a helper so the first person will work and the helper um will watch over the worker and if they notice that partner notices
043an error they'll say wait stop you made a mistake find your mistake and they're talking through the whole thing um and they're helping each other and then after three minutes the worker becomes the helper the helper becomes the worker and then at the end of that three minutes they get their own sheet and they have two minutes to complete so what we do what Karen and I do is um sometimes we try to beat each other like class um but we'll put um so it's the median score so they'll say the the goal is a 20 and so we'll put you know spring math plenty and then we'll put what our what we got that week and then for the confetti is always a big deal at the end and um the kids love to
044see their grow they get so excited and it is we call it spr you know it's your addition subtraction multiplication facts things that they need to be able to do division and simple by fractions or anything like that long way one thing that's great about it is that when they aren't didn't get as high as they wanted to they said can we have extra to work on now yes so you've all asked for that so I'm like absolutely so yeah is this differentiated to the student and where they're at or are all this the whole class okay the whole class has to hit a mediums for got before we move on to the next I mean we we know as Educators that the number one thing you can do to learn something is to teach
045it to somebody I love that philosopy and we've actually almost been using that instead of we've been using or worker like teach you know and that's why they say 5 - 2 is three or you know bring down the one when they're doing anything like that or drop the decimal they're saying it out loud to each other absolutely and there are boosts they can do when someone is proficient they get the maximum score for three times in a row we do have boost for them so extra activity they again after listening to your students I can tell you I was never that excited to discuss math so I promise we didn't write any of that we didn't know what they were going to say they said I just wanted to to say that that clearly
046reflects um both of you and the important work that you're doing and having making sure the kids have fun so kudos to you and thank you again Noelia got voted president hey I think that we kind of skipped around on the board and staff reports so I'm gonna turn it over to Lori Converse did I skip you Lori I'm sorry you were so eager Mike told me the mic still to you after Christmas Mike now anyway the moment everyone's been waiting for the policy committee meeting report all right so tonight we discussed as I mentioned uh two weeks ago we're gonna I was not here for the reconsideration policy so we just caught up on that we also talked about um adding two alternates on each side um in case people are not there so
047then we don't have to if there's something that needs to be reconsidered we're not putting on hold so we're going to get that added then put it back up in a couple weeks um we also discussed the policy on foreign exchange students we haven't talked about that um in a couple years and if we want to just keep it with five students because it does cost extra if we add more than that many students so we did discuss that um and right now we're just GNA leave it as is there was a lady that was reaching out asking for about 30 students to be added so that would be a huge cost to the um then we spoke about there's a new law about extreme temperatures that is coming that Governor hok had voted on
048on September 1st 20125 which is something we're going to have to discuss at length as a board because we have to worry about um extreme temperatures and if there's fures um we have school so we just start of discuss what we have to do for that we also discuss our student council or our non- voting student that we're going to be adding to the board they are already working on that student it's going to be either a student council member or a National Honor s National Honor Society student they're going to be nominated by their peers and they will be interviewed by Dr SEL and the high school principal so that will be coming in spring for next year that's all yeah very cool thank you very much finally turn over to Dr schmeel for
049the super School support good evening everyone um I want to thank everyone Jason had the idea this Jason um had the idea that we marched in the uh city of Watertown Christmas parade and it was a very cold evening uh but our students were excited and to watch the kids uh marching running hopping skipping singing uh in the parade was an absolutely wonderful heartwarming experience I think the only one on my team that had heat was Lynn uh made sure the gloves were heated the the vest and the pants uh I learned for next year um but I want to thank you know it was something that we joined forces with the Watertown Education Association um so I want to thank them for for letting us join them in that um and all of the
050hard work that went into that we had many teachers that met multiple days to get a plan together to allow our kids to participate and we had nearly a hundred kids that participated from White case and the high school so I just want to give all of them a wonderful Round of Applause to bring some the next thing that I want to mention uh because it was mentioned at the last Bo meeting so just a continuation here is we are going to be looking to extend the RFP for Transportation uh given the holiday season and schools being closed we needed a little bit more time to answer some questions so Breeze Department's going to be working on that um that date is going to be January 10th and what we look at doing is notifying
051our current vendors vendors that we know may be interested but we will also be making a public notification in the Watertown Daily Times to extend that date to January 10th so stay tuned for that uh the next thing I want to mention is today we had the opportunity to meet with our student advisory kids and if if when you look at our district MTO of our children our future and you hear what comes out of that group of students it's just it it's very empowering and you you have hope in the future knowing that we're doing a great job with our kids our community and today we had the opportunity to invite uh Lyn Gaffney in she spoke to our students about our de deib committee and asked them to consider joining our diversity equity
052and inclusion and belonging committee and so more information on that she also spoke to them about attendance the attendance committee oftentimes as adults we're working on trying to solve problems or or increase our student attendance or at least their ability to be in school and we don't always have the student at the table and so now we're asking to have a student on that committee and one of the things I said as Lynn was done with her presentation today with our students is that many of them we had them go around and this year as you know they had to do two things they had to serve as a mentor and they had to develop a project that they wanted to focus on and many of our students want to work on belonging they want
053to work on improve attendance and engagement and so we are extremely excited that most of those kids are interested in the topics and may be joining those committees uh moving in the in the future so we're excited about that additionally and Tina will have this in her report in more detail uh but one of the other things that we talked about today was student Court it was something that I asked about last year something that was expanded uh on this year and so the county has nine seats available so our students that are interested will be getting an application from te his Department uh sent out to the high school to stress an interest in that and then we will also be starting our own student court and kids got to really drill holes in
054that today to ask questions about what that's going to look like and how that will help our students and our community the other thing that I wanted to mention uh parent teacher conferences as you know we we had to close school on December 12th due to weather inclement weather and um a notice went out via Lynn's Department to our teachers just asking them to to please reach out to parents um I just wanted to talk to people so that you have an understanding of how the 180 days work uh we are required to be in school 180 days and uh we have so many days built in for parent teacher conferences um the other thing that I want to mention is the end of the semester is in January and so with the end of
055the semester the timing of parent teacher conferences is important and I will also mention that a calendar change to add a half day would be something that the board uh would have to act on so with all of those constraints in place what we did ask as our teachers to do is to please work with parents and to get those uh parent teacher conferences rescheduled on the day that we had to close and that is all that I have to say okay thank you very much uh at this time we are in need of an executive session to for the purpose of discussing the medical financial credit or employment history of a particular person or Corporation or matters leading to the appointment employment promotion motion discipline suspension dismissal or removal of a particular person or
056Corporation can I have a motion please John John second Billy all those in favor I okay we'll be back e e e to our regular meeting John John second cly all those in favor hi welcome back I cannot believe that anybody stayed so thank you okay number four items for consent agenda yes resolve that consent agenda items a B and C are here by approved motion please John John second Lor Lori gotcha all those in favor I any oppos motion carries item sport action GL whereas the school district tax collector the Watertown city school district has submitted under oath that at the close of business on December 6 2024 current school taxes and interest amounting to uh 10,993 36,800 cents have been collected by her for Parcels within the city of Watertown school taxes amounting
057in 4 million 526,000 and20 plus interests of $1,186 87 have been collected by her for towns of Laray Chamilia Rutland and Watertown said date taxes and interest amounting in $857,500 collected and unpaid with respect to properties located within the city of Watertown and such taxes amounting in mounting to um $237,700 34 cents remain uncollected and unpaid with respect to properties outside the city of Watertown in the towns of Laray pamilia Rutland and Watertown amounting in all to 1, 102,000 $116 such taxes and interest uh uncollected unpaid and whereas the board has caused said statement to be compared with the original School tax roles and said statement has been found to be correct resolve that so much of said statement as pertains to the unpaid taxes levied on real property located within the city of Watertown
058be TR transmitted with a copy of this resolution to the controller of the city Watertown and so much of said statement as pertains to the unpaid taxes levied on real property located outside the city of Watertown to be transmitted with a copy of this resolution to The Treasure of the Jefferson County and that set of treasures be and hereby are authorized and directed pursuant to section 1322 of the real property tax law to enforce the collection of all such uncollected and paid school taxes pertaining to these properties located within their respective jurisdiction with penalties and interest provided by law and that each of them pay over to the uh treasur of the Watertown city school district at least once each month all money realized from such collection after retaining there from for the city of
059Watertown or for Jefferson County as the case may be the 5% penalty authorized by said law motion please goad bil second Tina got your brother all those um any discussion the next one's gonna be pretty D all those in favor I oppos most carries whereas the uh Watertown city school district tax collector has submitted an affidavit uh stating that as of the close of business on December 6 2024 a total of $ 68344 69 in in FL Memorial ta Library taxes have been collected and that $ 57318 in taxes remain uncollected for properties within the city of Watertown and 92323 and taxes remain uncollected for prop properties in the towns of lay pamilia rotland and Watertown bringing the total unpaid taxes to $ 6,655 and10 including both taxes and interest and whereas this board has
060caused said statement to be compared with the original School tax roles and said statement has been found to be correct resolved that so much of said statement as pertains to unpaid taxes levied on real property located within the city of Watertown be transmitted with a copy of this resolution to the com controller of the city of Watertown and so much of this said statement as pertains to the unpaid taxes levied on real property located outside the city of Watertown to be transmitted with a copy of this resolution to The Treasure of the Jefferson County and that each of said treasures be and hereby are authorized and directed pursuant to section 13 22 of the real property tax law to enforce the collection of all such uncol uncollected and unpaid school taxes pertaining to these properties
061located within their respective jurisdiction with penalties and interest provided by law that um each of them pay over to the treasur of the Watertown city school district at least once each month all money is realized from such collection after retaining there from for the city of Watertown or for Jefferson County as the case may be the 5% penalty authorized be said law motion please John John second Lor discussion yeah I have a question so I think you said this for just clarification for me so we're supposed to give um the FL Memorial Library 75,000 we only collected 68,000 so the sixing change that is the difference who's collecting that that goes to the city to assess so the city has to collect it for them similar to our taxes that we didn't collect for school
062district taxes okay make sure we weren't okay all those in favor any oppos motion carries Jason I will need a motion in a second to amend the um Personnel report to remove section D number one okay can I have a motion for that Millie and a second Lor all those in favor I oppose get resolved that upon the recommendation the superintendent of schools Dr Larry schmeel the Board of Education hereby approves the following resignations leaves of absence appointments term non-probationary instructional appointment director appointments literacy coordinators appointment probationary non-instruction inal appointments term nonary non-instructional appointments permanent appointment permanent part-time appointment provisional tutors after school appointment Cyclone Academy appointment stem program appointments substitutes instructional appointments substitutes non-instructional motion please KY second Millie all those in favor hi any oppose motion carries whereas a resolution was passed by
063the board of education on October 15 2024 approving a January 31 2025 retirement date for Marie Whiteford and be it further resolved that this amended resolution reflects the change in her retirement date to January 30th 2025 and is hereby approved have a motion please John second really got you all those in favor I any opposed any discussion any motion carries be it resolved that upon the recommendation of Dr Larry schmeel uh superintendent of schools the following 10e appointment is hereby approved Aaron deir special education effective date January 5th 2025 it's not here okay can I have a motion please call second Lor discussion probably since probably home all those in favor I oppos motion carries resolve that upon the recommendation of Dr Larry schmeel superintendent of schools the probationary Appo appointment of a non-instructional employee
064is here by discontinued effective December 17 2024 I have motion please mil mil seconda Tina's got it all right haven't heard from you tonight any discussion all those in favor I oppos motion carries we all that upon the recommendation of Dr Larry Migel superintendent of schools the probationary report of a non-instructional employee is hereby discontinued effective December 17th 2024 can I have a motion please no second Lori discussion all those in favor any oppos motion carries resolve upon the recommendation of Dr Larry C schmeel superintendent of schools that Michael halad serving as a long-term substitute director of facilities three Factor December 11th 2024 will be con compensated at a daily rate of $450 uh per day effective um December 11th 2024 this rate will remain in effect until he completes his substitute role or until
065a permanent director of facilities is appointed at the uh by the Board of Education motion please mil Milly second John discussion none okay all those in favor I any oppos motion carries resolved that the Watertown City School District border of Education amends the 20242 school calendar as follows January 21 uh 2025 will be a testing day only for grades 9 through 12 grades K through 8 will have a regularly scheduled day of instruction can I have a motion please John John a second Lor Lori any discussion all those in favor I I any opposed motion carries resolve that the sale disposal auction or recycle of an outdated unuse and generally in poor condition forax folding machine from the district office um is hereby approved can I have a motion all right both right there any
066discussion all those in favor you guys looking at me I'm holding my wait just wait for it just wait for it Jason who is the second on that one okay so all those in favor I any oppose motion carries resolved at the sale disposal auction or recycle of outdated unuse and generally in poor condition uh audio meters from the clinics at Watertown High Starbuck Elementary North Elementary and Sherman Elementary are here by approved can I have a motion lar second discussion okay all those in favor anyos motion carries resolve at the sale disposal or recycle of outdated and unused and generally in poor condition athletic uniforms jerseys and shorts from the athletic department are hereby approved can I have a motion Millie Millie a second Lori now this was the one I was excited about
067yeah where can we where can we go through these that's I've been holding what I've asked many of them are in dist repair and we cannot pass out but what I've asked our athletic director to do is have it available at the high school for kids that maybe need spirit wear that don't have it this could be provided to them and potentially grown-ups then move to State Street are you looking for a particular Jersey out there I mean how cool right like did I play sports I kind a question is that come on find Converse ladies and gentlemen regular standup comedian all those in favor any opposed Wasing resol that generous donations have been made by the following organizations to our community Our Youth Event water found Savings Bank $500 FX Capra Kia $1,000 Sundance
068Leisure $300 John Allen Sanitation Services $300 Community Bank $500 $ these donations are gratefully accepted and approved and will be acknowledged in writing can I have a motion please k a second Lori discussion no I mean it's a you always say It's a Wonderful event and it's nice to see so many businesses in our community wanting to get behind it so obviously they have seen the value in it from last year I think that's wonderful so I'd like to know who solicits these um organizations because no one's ever asked me for money we just can I have money that phone number again folks is if you're if you're interested reach out to Matt B okay but does he have students going out because I know he is doing the he's reaching out personally to businesses
069he knows in the community he didn't ask me he didn't ask me yeah so if you're listening in and apparently there's there's several organizations three is another I don't know that you guys want my donations but maybe oh money okay well if you're tuning in this evening and got that one good job comes knock on your door he just GNA give an old basketball jersey aren't you that's right yeah I've got a lot of things yeah ladies and gentlemen if you tuned in this even to donate Monday money to our community Our Youth Event please reach out to Matt berdick email is m berdick at Watertown city school district. all right all did you really okay we get phone call okay okay all those in favor I oppos motion carries resolved that generous donations have
070been made by several community members to support the hygiene vending machines in the district these donations are gratefully accepted and approved and will be acknowledged in writing can I have a motion please lorian Millie any discussion all those in favor n any opposed motion carries resolve that an anonymous donation of uh for 20 uh Walmart gift cards in $25 increments worth a total of $500 has been received this donation is designated for districtwide students and Families in Need during the holiday season it is gratefully accepted and approved and will be acknowledged in writing can I have a motion please John John second Lor Lori discussion wonderful amazing all those in favor I I any oppos motion carries resoled that the following rubi's Board of Education policy and regulation are hereby approved and adopted 5700 education
071records um 7 7500 education records 75004 uh student privacy fura notice to reflect the records officer as the district court motion please Lori second Tina Tina all those in favor I any discussion sorry motion carries resolved that the student trips as presented to the board are hereby approved I have a motion please John John Cully any discussion all those in favor I I any opposed motion carries yeah Susan if you could please rise hand over your heart resol that upon the recommendation of Dr Larry schmegle superintendent of schools the appointment of Susan nedza as K12 principal in the district is hereby approved can I have a motion please John John a second L gotcha all those in favor I any opposed welcome to the district celsey if you can please rise resolve that upon the
072recommendation of Dr Larry schmeel superintendent of schools the appointment of Kelsey shepis as K12 assistant principal in the district is hereby approved okayy can I have a motion please bil second got you that time all those in favor I any opposed welcome to the district whereas the board has reviewed the terms and conditions of the agreement as set forth in the document and whereas the board finds that the terms of the agreement are in the best interest of the school district and that approval of the agreement is necessary to resolve all matters between the parties in a manner that is spare and Equitable to the both parties now therefore be it resolved the Board of Education of the Watertown city school district hereby approves a separation agreement and release as presented and authorizes Dr Larry
073C schmigel to execute the uh agreement on behalf of the board and to take any necessary actions to effectuate the terms of the agreement be it further resolved that the board directs a superintendent to ensure that all necessary do documentation is completed and filed in accordance with applicable laws and regulations and that all payments and benefits due under the agreement uh be processed promptly be it further resolved that this resolution take effect immediately upon its adoption motion please John laori and John any discussion all those in favor any oppose motion carries that is the end of the resolutions all right anyone in attendance tonight wishing to address the board on non agenda related public comments Christ okay um I just wanted to recognize a couple things tonight first off with the Personnel report I was
074really excited to see um some familiar names of individuals who are lending themselves to the Cyclone Academy um it's been really exciting to watch this form um and I continue to hear great positive updates um on this creative initiative that impacts A specific group of students so um just really great uh Educators and supports that I would hope would be involved just want to be popping up on these lists so um I look forward to hearing about the outcome of that and then also as far as impact I wanted to offer um personally a highlight um or Applause to Kevin dur and um I recently caught the post about the new bowling team and their fancy fresh jerseys um there's a lot of bowling teams for schools in the area so it's nice to see
075Watertown has joined those ranks um my son actually joined the Bowling Club last year um actually Kevin sought him out bowling on his personal time and recruited a couple of his friends and so to see the change from last year to this year is really exciting as well um it's nice to have that alternative to the standard clubs activities and other sports offerings something to diversify what we have going on um also exciting to watch where the Esports and the gaming clubs advance to um still with Kevin dur just it's something different for students to connect collaborate unwind build skills and just have fun so I'm excited to see all of that forming um and just wanted to as a community member recognize and appreciate those efforts and then also I'm excited to hear that
076there are students potentially joining with the that is something that I have been hoping for for quite some time so that was a great highlight to hear this evening thank you thank you kisten thank you so much anybody else this evening okay some important upcoming dates Monday December 23rd to January 1st is our holiday recess there is no school so please do not report Thursday January 2nd uh prek through 12 school resumes Tuesday the 7th uh we have our FF committee meeting at 5:00 pm at the district office followed by a regular regular Board of Education meeting at 6 um Randy start us off sure I have H Watertown High School I always think when Mrs Atkinson's here she could read this better than I could but I'll give it a try um update from
077Watertown High School Watertown High School is in the countdown to the holidays last evening our entire Watertown Community enjoyed a delightful holiday concert featuring featuring the whhs mixed choir concert choir trouble choir select choir freshman band concert band and Wind Ensemble tomorrow select choir will will visit North Elementary newon rotary and Wy school to spread seasonal cheer and on Friday the Wind Ensemble will perform at Ohio ele mentary on Thursday 16 beautiful baskets will be awarded to the lucky winners of our annual holiday basket raffle created by The whs Faculty the baskets full of gift cards movie passes candy and more will be presented to the students who have earned PBIS Pride passes and entered them to win the winners will be featured on the morning announcements everyone at Waterton High School wishes our students
078families and Board of Education a joyous holiday season and very happy New Year Leslie ainson how' I do okay uh just want to thank Sherman this is my alma moer so it's always nice to come back here yes uh and just share these same sentiments with my colleagues the community and all of you here Merry Christmas and best for 2025 Randy do you mind if we add something your since you mentioned Sherman um you want to update everyone Gretchen on the rescheduled date of your concert your holiday concert our holiday concert is for tomorrow evening at the high school at 6m good thank you okay Mr goer um I will stay with a Sherman theme I want to thank to PTA that was probably the best cup of hot chocolate I've ever had for that
079um no Sherman does hold a special place in my heart both my kids went through Sherman and um so I'm familiar with all the wonderful things that Sherman offers um and the staff um and it's really makes me happy to see that all that continues and Sheron continues to grow um and the kids feel the same way about this stff and the teachers um and their leadership as they did back then um so I really is is touching one to the heart um I wanted also to say um the parade that we did a couple weeks ago was uh fun a little chilly not as bad as it could have been um and I think that there was less people in attendance because all the kids were actually walking in the parade with us time
080was great and I think everyone had a great time I atted Wy concert they're music concert and that was wonderful and then to close it off just to congratulate Lake Morgan who um was awarded a scholarship which allowed him to attend an athletic director's conference in Texas Rec that's it for me Merry Christmas everyone Lori I just want to say thank you for bringing us here to Sherman and for the gifts he did a great job and helped dur first year here as while um I just want to say Merry Christmas Happy Year to everybody and all of you and the pray I'm glad that iist Tina what you got not much [Laughter] um um I have the pleasure today of wrapping gifts at case oh and if any house I I don't want to
081I told the kids so anybody listening that if anybody asked them who their presence it was an old Blind Lady it gets me back into the school so that I can see my kids because they're all my kids and that's what fills my heart so any excuse anybody wants to send me an email that you're doing in your schools please let me know because I'd be happy to come anybody doing anything in their schools please let me know Merry Christmas and Happy New Year to everybody I hope everybody has a safe and healthy five 26 26 that' be one year closer over there got my John Kane M just called me old I did that old um uh there is an update from North Jason you didn't get it because I just got it dear
082Jason no it does not I got letter uh students and families made donations to Meals on Wheels of gift baskets and uh there's no competitive streak in the Cane family North is working hard on trk to the North Pole and plans on winning so the there's only what a day or two left when are they counting up the month three days goes to Friday okay so the gauntlets been been been thrown down uh Mrs Monet in your PTA what a wonderful experience it's always a pleasure coming to Sherman uh and to see your teachers you your students your PTA all interacting to bring everything together tonight it beautiful it was wonderful that's the way our schools should be working and I know that our our parent teacher organization across our district work really really really
083really hard so not to discredit any of those other uh parent teacher organizations um because they all do amazing things for for our districts and I've seen it firsthand and your group was amazing tonight so thank you for hosting us tonight uh to Mrs Johnson and Mrs O'Brien and their fifth grade students to come in when it's not even your school yeah and to present thanks Lynn for having them come in I appreciate it hearing from them and being able to experience what they're doing uh I was able to drop in well my kids are in it so the case music for program for the holidays and the Watertown High School program for the holidays and I saw Dr schmeel in the back last night we just it is such a pleasure to see our
084music program and how our kids grow and and I think it was even better seeing it in the order I did seeing case first and then you know the Freshman band and the Freshman chorus and then the high schoolers you know absolutely rocking on that stage last night um so just phenomenal so kudos to them and all of their directors it's just uh it was wonderful it was beautiful and to everybody Merry Christmas happy holidays and uh have a great start to the new year thank you Millie okay so I have a few things um so I'll start with Lynn since no one talked about her very important presentation I can tell you spend a lot of time with that I just want to tell you that I admire your optimism I mean these scores
085are not what any of us want for our school district but the fact that you have been proactive and initiating a plan of Correction is very encouraging um you know we have you came up with the literacy um trainers or what what are they called coordinator coordinators which are you know very good teachers so that's I want to commend you for that I think that's a great thing that you're doing um specifically because one of the trends that I noticed you can correct me if I'm wrong but just visually on the numbers it seemed to me like the higher you went up on the grades the proficiencies got lower and I think to me I would can only speculate again what I keep saying is is that we have to start at the elementary level
086and really Build That Base up and that foundation for our students um I don't know if a lot of people know but if you're not really reading at your grade level by fourth grade you're kind of you're really behind all so I'm very um excited about the fact that you're thinking about that and you you're implementing a program so thank you for sharing those numbers that is not an easy thing to do I mean we all want to see great numbers but it's very difficult to do that so I appreciate you doing that um and I don't think you know this but I'm really curious to see what is a n like the number of eighth grade students that are taking that um math algebra region I mean because that was like 100% I can
087get the number yeah I would love to see how many of those kids are actually taking that region and scoring per and have 100% proficiency I think it yeah it's impressive I think it'd be nice to look at that Poe group of kids and see what happened like you know what was their trajectory into being 100% proficient because if we have those kids then there's a model there and we should be looking at that so I just wanted to point that out um I wanted to just point of clarification um Dr schmeel when you talked about the parent teacher conferences so it has it been a directive from the district that the teachers are to um reschedule parent teacher conferences with the parents is it like an elective thing is it going to be so
088we've asked uh Lynn I had asked Lynn to email the instructors in our district to try to re unless we were to close school or have an early release day to try to work around the time that's built into the day um I will say a lot of Educators did that on their own um but one of the things that I do want to enunciate and I think I said it earlier if not I forgot is that at any point in time if a parent wants to meet with their child's teacher they have a right to reach out to the teacher and say I'd like to meet I'm concerned um so it doesn't just because oftentimes parents believe that they only have to happen during parent teacher conferences but at any time you know a
089parent can reach out to schedule those meetings but yes teachers were asked to reach out to parents and try to reschedule them I know I was one of those parents my child's um uh parent teacher conferences based on the school closure and weather I I miss both of those parent teacher conferences yeah I'm glad to hear that because I think from the few phone calls that I got um parents kind of wait for that parent teacher conference to see where their kid is at so that they can get some hard data on how where to go moving forward so I think that those parent teacher conferences are critical to a lot of parents so if we're still making that that available um I think we need to let families know that because somehow it was
090messaged out there that teachers are not going to be doing that so we really need to know let parents know that you know we are holding that at high priority and if you want have a parent teach a conference that you can do that I think that's very important for parents to have that stream of communication the Christmas parade was amazing the thing that I love about the Christmas parade heid the fact that Lori almost got her car beat up banged up and was still nice and smiling and they're going to hit her car I'm sitting with her and she's like oh my God I'm like beat the horn she literally the nicest person I know you were still nice up until that point I would have been out the window and saying a lot
091of nice things um but anyway with the kids singing and and and the teacher singing and it and we had Brianne on the float waving yes and you and poor Mike is trying to catch up with the flow because if he's not close enough we can't get the music on the speaker a couple of times it went dead but it was just so nice and it was cold but it was so nice to be except for Lynn W Lynn was overheated I well you were smarter than most of us but on my Christmas list by the way but the best part about the parade was the Grinch who was that guy I don't know was really hot though no idea but let me tell you he was yeah I thought it was C he me
092temperatures right right that's what I me so chasing Kudos that you actually really did take the lead on that he really wanted sh up it was just amazing it was really nice to spend that kind of time you know together um so I just want to wish everyone a Happy New Year Merry Christmas everyone welcome aboard Bret I just want to tell you I don't have any kids in the school district but I do work at the urgent care so I always make a habit when kids come in I always say to them so what school do you go to and I can tell you that just we repeatedly when the kids come in and say I go to Sherman and I oh my next question is oh do you like it do you like
093it there do you like your teacher you know just to make conversation and they love this school so I think just based on that secondhand information that you're doing a wonderful job um you've you had big shoes to fill big shoes to fill so the fact that you know the kids like you and parents are saying nice things about Sherman is a testament to how hard you're working and connecting with these this family which I think is very important in our community so thank you for all that you're doing and that's all I have thanks Co you're welcome um all right I have a update first from Matt berdick uh and it says hello Jason because it's to me um no donations I reread it twice yeah it says this board meeting I want to
094recognize our district leaders Dr schmeel Tina Lane Lynn Gaffney and Brienne Durham uh I guess he accidentally omitted me having the privilege to work alongside them I witness firsthand the incredible dedication passion and effort they put into their roles every day their commitment to our district is truly inspiring and I am so grateful for their hard work to everyone to tuning into tonight's meeting whether you're a parent or Guardian student teacher or staff member I encourage you all to take a moment this week to thank these leaders for all they do to support our schools he has three updates from his office uh the first is the annual review meetings and he says after Christmas break Shannon Whitney and jod Delaney will begin annual review meetings for students with disabilities and students with 504 plans
095these meetings will take place across all our schools with hundreds scheduled in the coming months second is regarding Cyclone Academy Staffing Matt writes we are working diligently to secure quality teachers for semester two of cyclone Academy after the break the executive team will finalize plans for the Cyclone Academy assembly to ensure we are prepared for semester 2 which begins at the end of January final update uh is from Professor development for staff and Matt says I am collaborating with building principles and Christa Argo to explore ways to provide additional training for our AIDS teaching assistance and teachers we are looking for ways to equi staff with the tools they need to support students with behavioral challenges plans for additional professional development using our Vector training solution sessions will be rolled out in coming months finally
096i' would like to wish everyone a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year Matt verdick um I appreciate the praise uh on the idea for the parade but that's all that it was and I have a lot of weird ideas that one just kind of came up and it was it was great that everybody showed up I couldn't I couldn't believe I looked around and have everybody rally behind it and for you to get people I'm not sure I've ever given you this is like my first compliment up here uh to get get everybody involved in that and Mike to have the trailer over there and go over on his personal time at night um and decorate it and it was just beautiful and I can tell you I'm already starting to to think 12
097months in advance that we're going to make it bigger because I I was just so excited I've I've gone to those parades for years I thought we needed to represent and that's what we did um and once in a while you make memories that stay with you for your whole life and for me it was being towed through the city after it was all done with Mike uh sitting on the trailer and I was in a Grinch costume and we were listening to the Christmas Vacation soundtrack and it was just one of those surreal and kids were knocking on the window and we were waving it was it was really beautiful moment um so everybody who participated that was awesome and we're going to do it again we're going to do it bigger um Lynn
098I'm GNA piggy back off of what Millie said and I'm glad you brought it up uh the thing that that struck me was that you didn't hide from any of that um and that takes a lot of courage and if it was me I would have found some way to make it look great and I think sometimes you just have to say this is where it is and this is where we're going and I have every confidence that we have the right person uh to get us there so keep your head up um finally well not finally I'll say Merry Christmas to everybody and and happy holidays I think that we had a great year uh when we review everybody at this table worked very hard and the coming year is is going to be
099the same thing um and the last thing that I want to say is Lori I played sports like that really bothered me you know um I'm gonna go home and send you pictures from my yearbooks and I can't believe that you didn't know that about me um so anyway with that I played a lot um with that we'll see you after the first of the year be safe