001this is a special presentation from the Brighton Central School District Board of Education good evening welcome to the Brighton Central School District Board of Education executive budget proposal and budget hearing meeting we have a lot going on tonight which I'm grateful for as is the rest of the board the agenda that went out uh everything's going to stay on the agenda but I have to reorder a bunch of things we have board members that have full-time employment including having to work at night so with a board member needing to leave later this evening I'll be moving some budget resolutions up front I'll also know for the record that we put the public participation after the um uh both the budget piece and the community reform update so we would have a chance to get some
002feedback from the community my first note is to move to amend the agenda current and I'm so sorry about this everyone but I have to do this officially and correctly current uh agenda items 9 10 and 11 are going to be moved after current agenda item number four motion to approve so moved moved by Susan seconded by Christina all those in favor that I did that Kim am I okay to just proceed forward now great um we are called we are called to order now so I can go ahead and turn it over to Dr McCowan to do the Brighton believer Awards thanks so much uh Mr Davis and members of the board as we've been saying for quite some time now the bright beliefs Council has selected nominees to receive Brighton believer's awards for
003demonstrating Brighton believes character traits of Integrity respect responsibility kindness and self-control and the award winners are students teachers staff members community members the nomination Forum which would encourage people to take advantage of is on the website at bcsd.org and we have several people being recognized tonight I'm so excited for them to be here and for their nomination and and recognition if I could ask Chris and John font and Lori and Peter bowler to come on up with Kristen Halligan please [Applause] totally Chris and John fun and Lori and Peter bowler were nominated by 12 Corners Middle School teacher Kristen Helen Shiro Chris and Laurie and their husbands have become vital threads in the community Brighton Community fabric we met about a year ago when the family were supporting through keeping our promise a nonprofit that
004works to resettle Afghan refugees who were embedded with U.S troops in Afghanistan this family enrolled their nephew at TCMS Laurie and Chris have been full Partners in the education of this young student he is here with an older brother and his wife who had triplets shortly after arriving in Brighton Chris and Laurie have advocated terroristly for the student and have worked with Mrs Halligan to offer opportunities to the student even Beyond school they have shown kindness to this family respect for the Brighton Community and have been responsible for easing their transition to life in Brighton he has been able to participate in many extracurf activities from attending Camp Gorham to playing travel soccer and wrestling for school all because Chris and Lori and their spouses have tirelessly made themselves available for anything that he and
005his family might need they have spent countless hours driving changing diapers any impressive giving driving lessons she says teaching the student how to cook food from his country and cheering him on the sidelines as his teacher I've been so lucky to have such incredible volunteers to partner with to ensure that he is the best chance he can have at also demonstrating the qualities of our Brighton Community now nominating them for this award is only one small way I can show my appreciation and thanks for all they have done I can't think of a better example of selflessness care for others concern for our fellow human what a great example for our kids in our community thank you thank you thank you we'll take a quick picture [Music] thank you very much [Applause] and Mrs Edmonds
006can stay put because this is TCMS night for the Brighton Believers award Ashley Alice can you come on up also please along with uh those who you nominated the outdoor education Committee of TCMS Julie Whipple Katie falter Katie kantz Jamie Niles Dave Connelly and Kelsey Turan Ashley wrote that the outdoor education program at TCMS has taken place for nearly 30 years this tradition is made possible through the dedication of individuals who envisioned dream organize and create this Legacy of an opportunity for our students ode is an experience that puts forth the focus on community and connectedness at the very beginning of the school year teachers can connect with their new sixth grade students in these adventurous ways while spending time together as quote unquote people differently than we normally do middle school students they are
007definitely people if you go to Brighton have gone through Brighton or think of TCMS you think of ode this committee exhausted themselves showed up worked Beyond countless hours and ensured that our students and community members would have a meaningful unique and legendary experience they are the behind the scenes leaders of all the laughter memories community building and more they are Brighton and they are our ode reality makers how lucky we are and for many of us how lucky we have been as parents so I say to you both as a colleague but also as an odd dad and one who survives the same overnight one day we do pretty incredible work and you do it all the time not just the one time someone wants to participated so great job [Applause] falcon anything else [Music]
008thank you [Applause] thank you very much for those of our Brighton believe her Awards winners that may have homework to correct tests to prepare for or other such work you are certainly welcome to exit at your convenience you're also welcome to be here as we go through a number of important budget discussions as well as Dei Community Forum update didn't even finish Stephanie next up we have approval of the amended agenda a motion to approve move by owner seconded by Esther all those in favor also need to have you've all received the minutes from the March 14th 2023 meeting as well as the February 28 2023 meeting are there any changes or edits to those minutes okay motion to approve the minutes so I moved second move by Susan seconded by Christina all those in
009favor next up is noted when we amended the agenda will first be the approval of the resolution of the Seeker which is the acronym for State Environmental Quality review act uh resolution of the secret agreement for the 2023 Capital project this and the next item will both require roll call votes and you will hear our clerk Kim call your name for a yay or a name um do I put a motion to approve direct motion this is for new item number five approval resolution resolution for the Seeker [Music] um motion to approve move by Julian seconded by Christina okay okay I'm going to take a roll call Esther yay Susan yay Julene yay Christina yay Larry aye thank you very much okay I know but Karen hatches absent tonight ocean carries 60. next approval of
010resolution authorizing the annual budget vote election and propositions before I had a chance to review those motion to approve moved by owner second second to buy two all those in favor sorry all right okay We're Gonna Roll Call this one too we're going to roll call this one as well Larry I Christina hi Susan yay Julene yay Eleanor and Esther yay and I know that Karen hatch is absent promotion carries six you know the last of the budget vote uh propositions does not require a roll call correct my current country number seven correct um approval of the uh you've received this last approval of the election inspectors for the 2023 budget vote election and proposition motion to approve summer move by Julian seconded by Esther all those in favor aye thank you and I appreciate
011the community's patience as we had to do things by rule for the budget next up our current number eight is the Dei Boe Community Forum update this is a follow-up from our February 28th Community Forum Dr McGowan thank you very much as we as you noted at the beginning we'll have public comment after this presentation and just couple of housekeeping notes around that uh the what we did was essentially host a community Forum on February 28th which you do every fall and spring as a board of education sometimes it's an open-ended event sometimes it's about a particular topic that is timely and at the moment it certainly was timely to have a conversation about diversity Equity inclusion and about the use of racist language which has presented itself as an issue at school and so
012this is feedback to you we also attended as an administrative group as a leadership team the session with you and and you were all there as board members hearing feedback in a good Community conversation we were there also notes were taken that we have sent out to the attendees from the event itself and this is our distillation of those notes a report back to all of you on what we have learned in that process and what we're recommending to you as a board of education in terms of action steps to take from here on out the evening itself consisted of updates from the district team on work that's being done in the DI area we were able to share out some very quick updates many of the updates the updates themselves were quick but it
013took some time at the beginning certainly to communicate that and then we had table discussions and really had two essential questions at each table if you'd like to share one of your experiences related to the district's work in the diversity equity and inclusion area been like and the second question what should the district be doing more of doing less of and or considering for the future and what we learned just a general summary for you first that regarding our code of conduct Dasa procedures and practices we currently do have outlines and general protocols procedures for dealing with harassment dealing with dignity for all student act violations investigation sexual harassment bullying Etc the procedures may not be clear though and easily accessible for all so I think part of the disconnect is that we certainly believe
014that we've got parts of our code of conduct and the Dasa procedure that will address these issues but that's not very clear to people for one it's not clear where it is in those documents and how to go about that or clear that it's being addressed very directly or what the consequences are and so we recognize that families would like to see a clear outline of how we address concerns incidents particularly related to race racism racist language K-12 that includes a list of consequences follow-up including education and restorative practices so just a strategy for keeping that very clear and upfront for people we believe is something we learn people would like a general statement on appropriate language in the district and the differences between language at school versus language at home should be developed and
015that the statement should clearly differentiate that some words like the n-word may be used outside of school but have no place in the school setting regardless of race ethnicity Etc so clearly we're not endorsing I want to make sure I'm clear the use of the n-word what we're trying to say is that we recognize that there are uses of the word by individuals that are viewed it differently and we recognize that but that is an outside of school conversation inside School it is not an appropriate word to be using however we recognize also that our response varies depending on the use of the word and the context around that there is Need for lessons around the impact of language and they should be developmentally appropriate continuous throughout a child's K-12 experience this is an area
016certainly we continue to learn that we may be lacking it and this notion of social Equity needs to be considered When developing these lessons as well communication of anti-racist activities needs to be shared more regularly so some of the updates that we gave more broadly about diversity Equity inclusion we're fine and we give those Regulators part of blueprint updates but we need to find a way to communicate more clearly about the work that is happening and particularly the the many different ways that anti-racistic racist activities are taking place in school communication was a key thread that wove through many of the conversations opportunities for empowerment need to be considered as well we should continue to work with experts from outside of the district to support our journey and our work with students and families recognizing
017where we don't have internal capacity and where external capacity can be supportive and helpful and students are experiencing racist language far more than adults may be aware of and certainly we learned more about that that night clear communication Protocols are more public awareness regarding racist incidents should also be considered hiring practices are another key aspect of the work that the district has been involved in we certainly learn that we need to continue our attention on hiring practices and our diversification of our staff families need to be engaged in the discussion and more needs to be done to bring people together and for families to engage throughout the community and being anti-racist regular clear Communication in District Publications and through more effective use of the website is desired and specific training on responding to the use
018of racist language would be beneficial for all staff and we should continue to look at building our capacity in that area second piece of this those the recommendations for action and I want to give you a little bit of the framework of how we've presented these one is with regard to several items that are labeled as blueprint team with other individuals that would be responsible for addressing those issues when it says blueprint team what we're indicating is that we have an annual strategic planning process that involves a lot of stakeholders and community members in providing feedback to that process and that is the work that unites all of our committees it connects our work our strategic work our instructional work everything that we do back to our budget expenditures as well it is the work
019plan for the year and it's something that is developed again to you know use the name as a strategy document used by the leadership team and really outlines exactly what the actions will be for a year again collaboratively develop that addresses all aspects of the district's work diversity Equity inclusion initiatives have been a big part of the blueprint plan going back several years of course and and in this year as well when we indicate blueprint team what we're saying is that we would like the opportunity to collaboratively plan these items utilizing the blueprint process include them in our strategic plan going forward into next year and Beyond the first action step we would suggest is developing a vertical curriculum of system emotional learning work that is transformative and addresses racist language more directly certainly than
020what's happening now and we believe the blueprint team should address that in the plan this year and that would be likely headed up then by Dr Rio our Consultants that we work with currently from recenter and Monroe to BOCES we would ask for their support in that as well time frame would be summer 2023 that's when the blueprint planning takes place and then throughout the 23-24 school year that work would continue an implementation would happen a second action step a clear Continuum should be established across buildings around why we are doing what we are doing in terms of social emotional learning and diversity Equity inclusion lessons again that would be an item for the blueprint team to consider in this in the planning process this year also we would likely expect Dr Rio recenter and
021Monroe tube BOCES to be directly responsible for that work in the same time frame frame summer of 23 and throughout next school year other recommendations for Action develop specific staff training related to racist language and the protocols for addressing incidents of it being used again blueprint team Dr Rio recenter monro2 BOCES summer and throughout next year develop additional Clarity in how we review curriculum and pedagogy through a culture responsive lens blueprint team Dr Rio would leave curriculum Council being involved in that work also would be essential instructional leaders throughout the district again recenter Monroe to BOCES we would depend on for Consulting in that area summer of 2023 is when we would expect to address that further explore anti-racist approaches versus just culturally responsive approaches we think distinguishing between those two is very important in
022being very specific in that again Dr Rio blueprint team principles also involved in that work recenter Monroe to BOCES summer 2023 and ongoing we believe we should also review restorative practices district-wide basically asking where we are and what is next we've built capacity over the last several years it's a good point to pause determine how much capacity we actually do have at this point where we need to be doing additional training and how we can support the additional implementation of restorative practices we'd like the blueprint team to address that along with the leadership team and support from the partners in restorative initiatives period in that work also we would be doing that this summer develop a clear plan that needs to be established with response to inappropriate racial Language by building Dr Hall and the
023principles will be working on that that is not a blueprint team item that is a document we expect to create and publish by June 1st and that's something frankly that's already in progress also we'd like to rethink the Dei portion of the website how to make it more fluid reflective regular daily work improve our capacity to communicate to the community in these areas we'd like Dr Glazer Dan Goldman and Dr Rio to work on that task summer of 2023 this summer and develop an ongoing dialogue between the district and the families of Color Group I would like to work directly with the families of Color Group to talk through how that would look what we could do to make sure that we are regularly connecting and communicating and providing feedback and being there as a
024resource really to create an ongoing and consistent dialogue and I'd like to do that as soon as we can I'd also like to create space for interaction between the families of Color Group and recenter perhaps the opportunity to meet with our Consultants understand the work that has been done the journey that they've been on and really independently from District staff have the recenter group be able to work directly with families of color and gather their feedback as well and Dr I am Dr gown but Dr Rio and I would facilitate that conversation and schedule that this spring and develop more regular Dei communication more centralized overall aspects of both our website but newsletters and more communication on our Dei initiatives Dan Goldman would work on that along with cabinet and that would be an ongoing
025effort also in summary what we've learned is a great deal and appreciate the feedback from our community and many people are here tonight that participate in that and we're glad to continue to have the discussion the dialogue we learned we have work to do we have a lot of work to do we recognize that this is only a part of the journey a long journey that we will continue to be on we believe there are actions embedded in this report that we can take in the short term and those that should be considered in the context of our annual strategic planning process again that embeds the work in our everyday in what we do here connects through all of our committees and through our financial planning as well we're recommending that the short-term strategies be
026immediately addressed and that the longer term strategic guidance we addressed through our planning process we know that we need to develop better ongoing dialogue regarding these challenges as well communication is important but action is more important and implementing those actions quickly effectively is a key to making a better environment for all kids all families and all stakeholders in our school community I'm glad you moved the public comment after this because I'm certainly looking forward to hearing and I know you are as well I know this isn't set up as a dialogue or a form I hope of that opportunity in the future and hopefully by setting up time for us to work with the families of Color Group we can have that and that tonight's setup is common so I'll sit down close it and
027listen carefully so thank you very much any questions for you before I sit down no I'll make a comment uh the February 20 and I'll only speak for me February 28th forum I thought was outstanding it was all so confusing and educational and you know you walk out of some of those sessions scratching your head I see a few of my table Partners um there um and um I wrote this in a note to somebody sometimes you think you're starting to get a grasp on an issue and then you have that form and you go I don't really have any idea yet what we're supposed to be doing and so we talk a lot as a group about and this is this sounds trite but being comfortable being uncomfortable I learned a lot that night
028but I also left uncomfortable going I just got to sit and think through some of these things so I greatly appreciate all the people who came on the 28th and participated and provided feedback the one message that you've got here I guess two messages from my standpoint are the most important and that is the second part of that second bowl which is we have a lot more work to do we all agree with that and communication is important and action is more important and I know I'm speaking for the board when I when I say all that so um I don't know if anybody else wants to add anything absolutely I actually was thinking as you were presenting about the form that this has been an interest of mine since grad school so 30 years
029right to tell you how old I am and it wasn't called Dei work at the time but I think what I learned whenever we have a community forum is that this work is never done and you're never an expert because it's constantly evolving and so I appreciate the time that we as a board discuss these issues and when we have participation with our community how important that is to sort of reflect on the work that we've been doing and also reflect on what how much growth we still have so um I was just thinking about that as you were presenting that it's you really can't but I I think what I love in you know the last number of years that we've been doing this work in the district is that how we embed it
030throughout all the work that we do instead of sort of having this top-down approach you know we're trying to really grow it ground up and I I really do appreciate that and I'm I'm glad that we're having those discussions as a board and um you know with our leadership team so thank you good way to put it anybody else comments before I go to public participation okay uh we are going to have public participation we are as always uh anxious to receive feedback uh two quick comments Dan Goldman will you raise your hand please back there or you can stand up that's even better thank you um if you'd like to come up and speak just a hand in an index card and I will call you I've got one here right now and all
031you're required to do is give your name in the town you live in I would also say that while we have had a lot of good conversation on Dei you can make comments in public participation about anything you want budget or anything else finally because we do sort of have a lot of business yet to get to The Standard time that we allocate for public participation is three minutes Eleanor's at the end of the table here she's got sort of a yellow card and a red card at the two minute 30 Mark she'll raise the yellow card which means you have 30 seconds left um I'm sorry I've got a card right here of Victoria love good evening everybody thank you for this opportunity to speak to the board and members in the room um
032my family is knew the district my son my younger son started in the fall and my older child started in the school district last year got a 12th grader and a seventh grader I didn't prepare a statement so I'll kind of speak from heart has been extremely challenging um to experience the level of interpersonal racism that my son has been exposed to as a seventh grader it breaks my heart every day it keeps me up every night I would say that I'm very pleased that we had that opportunity to speak with the school district on several occasions and also the Forum that we had on the 28th I also appreciate the the outline and the action items that you've all prepared I think it's very helpful I would say that for the people that um
033are just learning about this issue please understand that it's something that families have been grappling with for years so I am really pleased that the district is willing to dedicate more resources and I would also say that while it's fabulous that we have the um the Consultants from recent herboses and other organizations we absolutely need them but my ask my biggest ask would be to have a dedicated office for a diversity equity and inclusion people here in the school district working side by side elbow to Elbow with the board Administration teachers students to learn to guide to advise I think if we really want to accelerate change it will really take that in the meantime I am grateful for an opportunity to continue this dialogue and to work with the outside Consultants that we'll be
034bringing in thank you thank you very much is there anybody else who would like to comment see no one else I will proceed with the next item on the agenda do you want to say anything else you no just thank you group I appreciate it okay um now we're going to do the presentation of the executive budget proposal for the 23-24 yeah I apologize yes so the 23-24 executive budget proposal first of all we start out as you know in the fall with our key budget guidelines and thinking about how to develop a spending plan that honors what you as a board set forth as the guidelines for our spending plan these boil down to making sure that we have sustaining revenues for our ongoing expenses right so in the first place and for this
035year this really was the notion of preparing for the high impact programs that we have developed and put in place to not be reduced because one-time federal funds are going to be leaving us so we want to make sure that in the general fund we could support those programs for the long term I want to make sure that we have the appropriate resources to support the blueprint plan and our priorities mental health Wellness academic Excellence student and family experience staff support collaborative culture safety and planning for the future which are priority buckets we wanted to make sure also that we developed a spending plan that considers the economic climate changing student needs and the board recognized in these guidelines that we need to prioritize resources evaluate opportunities for efficiency optimization and really always look at
036reduction consolidation Protectors of the community's resources for sure that's a big part of your work and ours we want to make sure we are prudently planning also for long-term investment in the district's facilities and we have a capital plan you approve several motions tonight that involve Seeker for the capital project the Environmental Quality review but also authorizing the propositions a little detail tonight a little bit about that long-term perspective on long-term investment on in capital and we always want to make sure that we are compliant with the New York state property tax cap understanding the long-term impact on our financial planning everything we do now has a significant impact for several years going forward the budget development calendar will skip all the way down almost towards the bottom to the presentation tonight of course of
037the executive budget but I point out that feedback can be provided of course uh through April 11th we're expecting finalization any day now of the state's budget as well which will help us also finalize tweak any numbers perhaps and then we'll ask you on April 11th to adopt the budget that will be presented to taxpayers at the vote on the 16th there is a hearing then of that final Budget on May 9th as well so the annual meeting and budget vote on all propositions takes place on May 16th the priorities that we've developed for the budget so you set the guidelines but then through Gathering Community feedback through thought exchange our interaction at budget forums board meetings our interactions with you stakeholders our budget makers so to speak we really kind of distill all that
038information into what are our priorities we wanted to make sure again that we're minimizing the tax impact and make sure that's as low as it can possibly be I want to ensure that the resources are targeted to student needs and staff support to meet those needs so very much our budget is a statement on how we would like to support children and make sure their individual needs are being addressed and we want to maintain our fiscal stability that's that long-term perspective and how do we maintain that you've developed a lot of physical stability how do you grow that over time as well and continue to always pay attention to that this year's budget has a big impact on the future and we would like to support new and Innovative programs always thinking about additional ways
039that we can support families and kids and they have evolving needs we need to be able to innovate to meet those needs also the budget itself and and what we are proposing to you in terms of the spending plan would be a 100 million 91 697 dollar budget up 6.9 million dollars or 7.4 percent in spending salaries and wages would increase 7.3 percent and it's important to point out that is not individual salaries going up 7.3 percent it is the salary spending overall so when you see a number of positions moving from federally Grant funded into the general fund that means they're supported now in the spending plan and the number of those positions would increase our spending our overall spending in that area constituting part of that in addition to the regular increases that
040we would see both to contractually negotiate agreements but also increase in minimum wage for example employee benefits will go up five percent and that includes benefits such as health insurance retirement system benefits that we are mandated by Statute to pay into we don't run our own programs but we get billed by the state for public employees and we pay into those both these expenses will go up 10.1 percent Supply Services up 10.5 percent debt and transfer up seven and a half percent the revenues though that we are estimating to pay for uh that spending are important to consider and this chart simply shows you the difference in Revenue in the second from right hand column uh in each area and then the far right column gives you a proportion to spending so in other words
041how much could that Revenue increase support and increase in spending and for us it's important to balance those two things if we're saying to you that we need to spend 7.4 percent more to to changing needs bringing those positions into the budget continuing those programs where what's going to pay for that what's the revenue to pay for that we want to be able to match that so going into next year we're looking at an increase in sales tax revenue of 8.2 percent that is a flow through from the county to us County sales tax investment income will go up 75 percent that sounds like fantastic news Well it's not bad news but it's only ninety five hundred dollars we don't have these large investments in places it's a relatively small amount of money and and
042the interest earned on places where that money rests before it goes out charges for services to non-public schools will go up six percent that's great except that also means there's a corresponding spending item to that we charge uh for the services that we provide that we are mandated to provide to students at those schools but we that gets billed back and revenue back to us again we've spent that money though so as it's coming in refunds and recoveries overall will go up 79 392 dollars and state and federal aid going up 25.7 percent key aspect to this is the this is the third year of the foundation Aid full implementation so we went from 60 to 80 percent 100 percent many many many of you here in the room and in the community we're involved
043in the advocacy that has made that happen it's made quite a substantial difference for us as you can see 6.4 million dollars is uh is certainly very significant and in fact you'll notice that may accept the Lion's Share of the increase in Revenue that will pay for the spending increase so overall those local sources are 22.1 percent and would add up again to seven seven point four percent overall we have a couple of interesting pieces here though that I want to point out to the community with the increase of state aid it is really important for us to reduce our Reliance on reserves to pay for program so every year you have an appropriated fund balance that you appropriate or you put towards the tax levy so it's money from the savings account when I
044say savings account the budget usually lands at about 97.98 of what has been budgeted being spent so we're pretty close to what we ask for from the community but it goes back to the community in the form of going into reserves for a variety of different purposes so we have a capital reserve for example a technology reserve and we'll talk about those tonight but we also have a reserve for Employee Retirement liability Etc but this Reserve in particular is to go towards the tax levy the appropriate fund balance and that's a really good strategy in times when you need to bridge the gap between state aid coming in and the programs that you have an expense for but if you're always taking money out of your savings account and you can't guarantee that you're going
045to be able to continue to put money into that savings account and you're withdrawing more from your savings and what you're able to put in on a check to check basis you're going to eventually reduce that savings to a point where you can't afford to continue to put it towards that bill that tax bill in particular so right now while more state aid is coming it's really important for us to use less of the savings account more of the state aid so we're reducing that as a revenue source for next year and proposing to you that we knock that down by 350 000 in the use of overall reserves and 650 000 in that appropriated fund balance uh in total that million dollars represents 1.1 percent in spending where that is made up though is
046in the property tax level so all of the other sources of income that I talked about were not property taxes what we're talking about then is raising the levy under our cap number of 1.75 percent uh it's 1.7 percent this chart obviously is rounded but we're at 1.1 percent then so what essentially the state would likely want us to be communicating to you although I wouldn't exactly put it this way is if you look at the way the numbers break down all of the aid is going to pay for a program and all of our increased expenses and the property tax levy in this case is essentially allowing us to reduce our Reliance on the savings account and it's the operational cost as opposed to kind of the increases over time all in all that
047balance is out that tax levy balances out and we don't have to use that in the appropriate fund balance and we're able to keep that spending increase at 7.4 percent and the corresponding Revenue to afford it would afford 7.4 as well how does it break down in terms of state aid what kinds of state aid what is that going towards as you can see the executive budget proposal because we don't yet have the agreed upon legislative proposal that's where this gets tweaked before the final version that you vote on and the budget hearing executive budget proposal for state aid Foundation Aid as we mentioned up 6.4 million dollars it's 18.9 million dollars next year and you can see the comparison to the previous two years our BOCES excess cost day will be 4.5 million dollars
048up just a little bit 200 000 Transportation Aid will go up about a hundred thousand dollars that's great but remember that's because we've spent that money we get reimbursed for a portion of our transportation costs it's not like some new benevolence from the state of New York it's based on increased cost and our building Aid will go up next year as I'm sorry we'll go down next year by about thirty thousand dollars but relatively flat in the grand scheme of things we are also required as a part a new part of the foundation Aid formula to report uh our plan and be accountable for that big increase in state aid and so what we are required to articulate to you and to the public and to describe very clearly is that we've sought public comment
049from parents teachers other stakeholders or we do community forums and we certainly in our board meetings have plenty of opportunity for that also take public comments into account the development of the plan we did that and actually have Illustrated using the thought exchange feedback the development of our budget priorities and an analysis the Public Public comments within the plan which we reported out on as well and our plan describes how the aid will be used in each of these areas increasing graduation rates eliminating the achievement Gap we've done that better than we have ever done that in our history and are at the highest point with the smallest gaps virtually no gaps between achievement for groups reducing class sizes we'll show you positions we're adding tonight to reduce or maintain small class sizes Provide support
050for students who are now meeting at risk of not meeting State learning standards core academic subject areas that's where we are adding instructional support and instructional support leadership in the general fund bringing those positions out of the the covid grant money addressing students social emotional health which we have done by adding lots of mental health staff again through that Federal grant now coming into the budget to be supported by Foundation Aid providing adequate resources to English language Learners students with disabilities students experiencing homelessness goal and ratio for pupil support and detailed summaries of investments in current year initiatives and the balance of funds spent in priority areas which directly aligns to actually how we articulate our spending plans along with our strategic plan unrestricted spending where is that being allocated the foundation in 5.9 million
051dollars tax levy a million dollars so in other words those are revenues that are not restricted to Capital or to Transportation or to particular areas where they have to be spent but essentially unrestricted it's going towards contract wage and benefits for one we are people business that's where it largely goes towards financial planning mental health interventions focusing on the needs of students tuitions and services programs for students where we pay tuition for them to 10 particular programs to meet their needs contract Transportation which supports those programs and again the new positions class size mandated Services support support students and other inflationary factors such as the increase of costs for materials and supplies people are experiencing at home that's happening here at school as well the sailoring wage budget factors a primary factor for us to
052communicate to the community again people business that's where we should be spending the majority of our funds this breaks down a few areas one contractual increases in the increase in the minimum hourly wage have impacted us financially in that overall spending area that I mentioned going up 7.3 percent new positions that are related to the continuity of programs and mandates K-5 class size we are committing three positions to that to minimizing or maintaining class size the chart on the right shows you where we're adding a particular position at the kindergarten level at the first grade level and at the third grade level to avoid even larger classes to minimize that increase as much as we can we have one teacher budgeted for elective choices at the secondary level as well and deaf and Visually Impaired
053positions of two teaching positions the positions that we are transferring from the expiring federal dollars are important to articulate the position of the brain support center literacy intervention math intervention reading positions school counselors and school psychologists so those who will now be part of the general fund and not dependent on one-time Revenue the tax cap calculation which you have already authorized as a board voted on prior is a mathematical formula provided by the state that results at a 1.75 percent growth from the tax heavy base which as we mentioned allows for 1.1 percent increase in spending I think it's really important for us to articulate to our community what are people getting for their investment in the school district and the service that's being provided to children and just a couple of quick highlights again
054graduation rate is the highest it's ever been 98 of our students last year graduated with with their Regents diploma and 71 with Advanced distinction 74 of our kids 74 three and four kids graduating with at least one AP credit as they leave we've placed a big priority on academic rigor for all students and we want to continue to grow that number 85 percent of our kids plan to attend a two or four year school several different recognitions ranked number one in both Rochester Upstate New York by niche.com as a school district the high school was named a Blue Ribbon School of course in 2018 and the Middle School the last time they were up for redesignation in 2021 was redesignated as a school to watch wide variety of athletic teams music opportunities we continue to
055be a best community for music education in 1600 children grades 4 through 12 participate music program 1500 roster spots for our kids who participate in athletic events as well on this document which is available on the website it really details how many kids are in each building our staff and a variety of other Awards and honors and the Readiness for our kids the overall Gap closing measures that have been taken but really the results of those and where kids are landing and some of the work that's being done in the district around diversity Equity inclusion social emotional learning and again more detail on the extracurricular activities that we would encourage people to take a look at so they really understand what they are getting for their individual investment the proposed Capital project will really help
056us you know the years are hard to see but if you take a look the first three bars are 2023 24 and 25 and that's the local share that will be paid for the capital project we're using Capital reserves for that and what has been budgeted but over time you can see that levels out to a four hundred thousand dollar annual investment and even a drop off a net further out in 2040 should nothing change but the proposal proposed Capital project would have that impact and it's really two phases one is this may and then one is December but the vote for this may I would like people to focus on but we want them also to know what's going to happen in December in May we'd be proposing uh renovations to the high school
057Tech area the music area the family consumer science area at the at the middle school and Building Systems and improvements so these are the HVAC and the kinds of buildings things that have to happen of 19.5 million dollars and I'll go into some more details around those in December remember what we would recommend is using the community's proceeds from the Brookside sale to leverage that in state aid constructing a multi-season sport turf field we really struggle in the back with the grass field being Limited in its ability to be used based on weather Turf improves that dramatically and also the quality of the surface itself some of the fields just simply aren't usable without potentially exposing kids to injury we want to make sure we have the best safest surface if it was not Turf
058even investing in the grass is very costly to really restructure that but we can position Fields differently and use Turf to really maximize that space in a way that will make a lot more sense and provide more Equity we think also for male female programs more access to that term service surface throughout the year we'd also like to reconfigure the parking lot using the acquired Church property again utilizing right away the community's investment in purchasing the property from the church next door along with the Brookside proceeds to really make a more safe exit and entrance really improve that parking lot overall really showing a 100 reinvestment in the property that was purchased but also the sale of the Brookside property that will help the entire Community it gives us an additional 10 million investment in
059Building Systems modern modernization really replenishing that that car payment overall so the capital Improvement project the budget uh what like we mentioned 19 nearly 19.5 million dollars and that consists of the Middle School 4.9 million dollars French Road 1.9 million dollars the high school 6.6 and then reauthorizing funds that were already approved by the community of 250 000 dollars the the detail around the second proposition Renovations for each of the building we'll run through those quickly we didn't mention two of the buildings French Road we'd like to redesign the front vestibule to make for a safer entrance and exit the exterior facade and signage replacement it's really time some of those are quite dated at this point hallway ceilings flooring lighting replacement which is a high priority for us and heat pump replacement the Middle
060School the entrance Door 6 and storefront replacement card readers family consumer science I mentioned to you elevator cab mechanical replacement hallway ceiling again flooring and lighting replacement hallway floor abatement and stair safety modifications also and at the high school we'd also look at the addition of a greenhouse which we had lost previously in one of our previous projects we had to take that piece out we'd like to be able to replace that and we mentioned the music Suite Tech Suite each of those areas also that that need work that I mentioned at the beginning and then site work around the high school the not fancy stuff but important things to maintain our facilities and investment that the community has made the third proposition is a withdrawal from our technology Reserve we often are asking the
061community to do this we have to ask to take money out of reserves and to establish those reserves so those are the savings account when we establish them they can be funded up to a certain amount you are able to put money into those every year but then to withdraw from that requires voter authorization and that's we think a really healthy check and balance for a community being engaged in that process this has no impact at all on the tax levy this is taking money out of the savings account one could actually argue it has a positive impact because then we don't need to include these expenses in the general fund they can come right out of the reserve as opposed to us having a budget for them so in a sense reducing the potential
062tax liability and it also generates BOCES aid for future reinvestment which we often when that Revenue comes in ask you to be designating back to reserves of course at the end of the year and that involves the Aruba switch Replacements closet cabling upgrades Wireless upgrades Promethean boards central office wiring updates and core switch Replacements as well I think the the number that people are often waiting for is what is the impact on our tax rates we also have an issue with regard to Equalization and the equalization rate is a number provided by New York state that essentially balance the balances things out for taxpayers in a community that are in two different taxing and assessment jurisdictions in our community we're looking primarily at Brighton and Pittsford in this conversation and this chart illustrates for you
063that if we had no increase in the levy or a change in the tax base what would happen based on the equalization rates that were just being provided right now by the state in the current year the equalization rate is 89 percent and in Pittsburgh it's 82 percent what that means is the state has looked at the Assessments in these taxing jurisdictions and essentially is saying that brightens assessments are 89 percent of what they should be so our individual homes are assessed 89 accurately they're short by 11 this should be 11 percent higher and their Pittsburgh homes are 82 percent accurate they should be 18 higher well in looking at next year's Levy and values the state is now saying because of the skyrocketing home values that we all hear about we talk about in
064town that our assessments are now only 70 percent accurate in Brighton and there's 72 percent accurate in Pittsburgh now that's not to say that the assessor here has been inaccurate or that people have made any kind of mistake this is an analysis that's done by the state to say you know we know you went through a full re-eval we know people have their homes revealed all the time when sales happen but based on the trends we're aware of and the numbers we're looking at this is how the property value is going up very very quickly is represented in Equalization you're not quite as accurate as you thought you were and again that's done by the state and the assessments are done by the town these are numbers that we receive not numbers that we have
065anything to do with and I'm not blaming anybody else I just want people to know these are numbers out of our control and Analysis that's done so the impact of that if there was no change in the levy Levy staying just the same so the amount we're collecting just the same one year to the next and no change in the tax base in other words the values in town now changing no new properties no new Supermarket perhaps it might change the levy going in an extra somewhat it would mean a 27 uh dollar and six cent change per thousand dollars for homes in Brighton and 2631 in Pittsburgh 11 overall in Brighton home value at 250 000 and actually less now because of the change being different for Pittsburgh of 753 dollars looking though at
066next year and what we're proposing in terms of the levy change right so if we're thinking about the different impacts now when we're proposing an increase in the levy of 1.75 with those Equalization rates of 70 and 72 percent we're talking about a rate change of 27.53 in Brighton 26.77 in Pittsburgh which would mean on a home valid at 250 000 here's the bottom line the key number 129 difference in Brighton Pittsburgh down 639 so again overall a home valid at 250 000 if you look at the yellow highlights with a change in Equalization and the levy at the cap which is what we're proposing homes in Brighton valued at 250 000 would go up 129 and Pittsburgh would go down 639 the numbers to the right of that would indicate to you changes in
067the tax levy base right the values of the levy overall if they go up a quarter percent if they don't go down a quarter percent slight variation you can see the overall values the value of the levy goes up a quarter percent we're talking about 112 dollars and less 655 in Pittsburgh if it goes down a quarter percent up 146 or down 622 in Pittsburgh and that is intended to again equalize between the two taxing jurisdiction because the way the levies are analyzed the values are analyzed so the total spending proposal is 100 million ninety one thousand six hundred ninety seven dollars or up seven point four percent six point nine million dollars the levy we're estimating that up 1.74 tax cap compliant would be a million dollars and again reflects our continued investment mental
068health and wellness academic Excellence student family experience staff support collaborative culture safety planning for the future and the priorities that over the course of the budget and uh the budget feedback stage and the working with you and our community and the feedback in the thought exchange minimize the tax impact ensure the right resources are available to support students and staff maintain our fiscal stability and support new and Innovative programs one question that often comes up is what would you do without that Levy number what about that million dollars what if because the increase in state aid you could go out with a zero that million dollars would not allow us to reduce the use of fund balance for one and then what happens next year because now that we're at 100 we can't count on
069a state aid increase next year that is of any significance we would need to capture that million dollars that we didn't collect this year in revenue and then whatever our increase in expenses is the next year essentially doubling the tax increase because that expense will not go anywhere it would still be there unless we were to cut programs in a corresponding fashion which I don't think anybody wants to plan for so that's the importance of maintaining even a minimal tax increase of 1.74 percent our next steps of course to are to continue to assess the impact of the final budget again any moment now we should hear about that and then the budget form budget adoption on the 11th with all of you budget hearing then on May 9th and the budget vote on the
07016th right here in this building from 7 AM to 9 pm do you have any questions for me no I appreciate you taking the time to go through this and I say this without the slightest hint of humor it just seems like we talk about budget every meeting and run through the numbers so for all of us we hear and see this a lot a lot of it makes sense a few things don't um not from your standpoint but in terms of how the state looks at things I appreciate and you always do an excellent job of saying this I appreciate all the work Lou and Dalia do behind the scenes prepping numbers putting things together looking at scenarios for us and going through all those things so we can provide a minimal impact to
071our community so um thank you to your team that does a lot of the work on these numbers much appreciated from a board standpoint any other comments or questions okay okay thank you for the feedback your participation throughout but I think you bring up a great Point without lose work and his team we would not have the fiscal stability we do the ability to fund program Allison Indiana would not have the ability to look at Lou and say please we need this and these things are important for children all kidding aside where the principals to be able to sit and thoughtfully say this is what I need to do the work for our kids and help them be successful and Lou to find a way he always asks how and how can we make that
072happen and why not instead of why and I think that's important while being thoughtful and analytical and protecting every penny provided by our taxpayers in the form of Aid and tax collection but make sure he provides the financial stewardship that we can all count on so thank you Lou for your work thank you thank you next up we have principal reports let's hear from the interim French Road principle first starts at the beginning that's okay I wasn't trying to guess hey it's me the interim principal [Laughter] again with all of you and today just going to give some updates on some of the fantastic fantastic things happening around the building some of them you might have heard about from the Shara before she headed back to her new position and some will be new tonight
073so um at the first Friday in March as annual um as we celebrate every year we had our read Across America day with guests coming to read to our friendship students from internal within the district you can see some familiar pieces up there Dr McGowan and Mr Green and then also anyone from the community who is interested in coming in and reading with our students so you'll see mayor Evans there and Bill Malley there as well as well as many other guests that came in for the day this is a really special day for French Road it's been going on for a long long time the students look forward to hearing books and also having conversation with people from around the district and around the community that they don't get to interact with regularly so
074that was a very fun day for them and also at the end of February we wrapped up with some special assemblies for black history so some of the ones that haven't been shared yet that I thought were really important to share with everyone tonight was especially this one because you'll recognize one person there that's Henry Westbrooks he's our fantastic security guard at French Road and you also know his brother from The High School Harvey their mom Lulu Westbrooks came to French Road for an assembly to talk about her life and being an agent of change and really connected with the kids Henry is like a superstar a french road so all of the kids love him and he connects with so many students so to have his mom there talking to the students was just
075extra special she was very engaging she got the students into her conversation and we were really happy to have her there and an awesome picture of Henry with his mom there Harvey did not come unfortunately he was at High School and also an assembly by herb Smith who is in the RPO trumpet player and he came to French Road to play for our students as well and talk about his journey so those were two really special assemblies at the end of February just like you'll hear about probably from many of the schools tonight we had Brighton believes day the first week of March and French Road did um with the support of our PTSA and Miss Flores organized a wonderful drive to benefit Mary's place and this year was a little bit different than years
076past in that we had put together a code for families to donate through an Amazon site and everything was shipped to one parent's house and brought to the school which was actually super helpful for families who wanted to participate and didn't have the chance to go to the store and find the right things and bring them to French Road which can be challenging and what we ended up with was like a huge huge huge amount of products that we were able to bring to all the classrooms you can see here how many things were donated throughout the fres community and then our students worked within their homerooms to create bags where they wrote positive messages you'll see a few examples here and then they bagged up the personal supplies and they were brought by our
077PTSA to Mary's place and it was an awesome experience for the students and hopefully easy for families to support and really valuable time for our kids to see what they can do to make a donation with their time and with you know products as well one of my favorite events at French Road which I'm thrilled to be back for it's like it came just in time for me as the science and social studies Fair where we had probably almost a hundred different booths over two nights of students who were excited to celebrate whatever was on their mind around science or social studies literally it is a time where students can present on anything that they're interested in and um we just spend the night rotating through the booths hearing what kids have presented on I
078shared a few pictures with you here today the boy in the bottom left of the screen created like an automated plant waterer so that you could like you know use Alexa to water your plants yeah that was super interesting hadn't seen that one before um there was some on recycling here there were quite a few lava lamps this year um elephant's toothpaste was a foam experiment that I saw quite a few boots up and then of course you're going to see your standard volcanoes and things like that as well lots of different exhibits um very engaging night it's just like from the minute it starts till the minute it ends kids are walking around and celebrating the work that they brought to share with others it's just really awesome to see and then this is
079you know not a video clip it's a picture of a video clip um but I wanted to highlight the partnership that uh French Rose had French Road has with the invalim school in Modine um because the focus this year has really been around mindfulness and the connection with Janice mix's health class with um a PE teacher who also works on mindfulness who visited us earlier this year in December and together they've been making these videos and sending them back and forth on different breathing strategies and they're very simple and awesome but it's really cool seeing the kids send these videos back and forth and knowing that that's a focus for both school buildings in two different countries and then I wanted to highlight something you've heard a little bit about this year but the work
080that our third and fourth grade teachers have been doing around written wisdom and what I wanted to highlight is how powerful this has been for our students and the growth we've seen in them as readers and writers throughout this year so written wisdom is the ELA program that our third and fourth graders are using at French Road and the cool part about it is every unit starts off with some artwork so the artwork that you see up here is from the unit called The Sea and the students engage in looking at the artwork talking about what they're seeing and they are making inferences about what they're going to be reading about and how this connects to what they're learning about all of the units that our students go through have some really really cool non-fiction
081texts to coincide with some fictional texts around the same topic so I just I took a screenshot there of some of the books that are part of this unit and what has been so impressive is that the watching the students grow over the course of the year just a snapshot of the writing of some third grade students and this is you know I know you can't get into reading them all here but this is pretty representative of all kids not just students who are high performing the student's writing has blossomed this year across third and fourth grade and we are just so thrilled with how good they feel about it and how willing and able they are to share what they learn so this these are some examples from Mrs Halford's third grade class around
082the shark rating piece that they did at the end of their PC unit and then we ended you know just um in March with some Irish dancing I thought this picture that um parent Jen Allen sent me was very entertaining because it's me and the girls and they were here the last time dancing at French Road and now they're back again so I'm just celebrating them and celebrating how much they've grown and happy to come back and be part of the French Road Community as you know middle school students or high school students and some still Elementary School students who were here as well our report cards are going to be sent home March 30th we have spring recess and then we have our state assessments coming up beginning on April 19th we will have
083Mass state assessment in May I don't have that on here we're excited for a bright night at Frontier field on April 26th and then as you'll hear probably tonight also no school for our conference day at the end of April so there is French Road in a nutshell happy to be back and sharing with you any questions no just a thanks on behalf of the board for the double duty you're sort of polling right now I know you appreciate being back with the kids but you're also getting a lot of curriculum stuff done so thank you for your efforts there thank you um Christine has asked the Danielle go next you know it just wasn't enough I just want to give a shout out to Allison as well because I don't know how she's doing
084it but she's continuing to support all of us and all the work that we're doing in our buildings and all the curriculum work and be amazing at French Road so I know you know all that but we are super appreciative of her um March is like there's no vacation days in March but we can pack it in there we had some amazing things going on at the middle school this month and it actually flew because we had so much going on we started off the month with our um students who take French eighth graders going on the Quebec trip and uh while I think they're crazy they like to go in the winter when it's cold so they're there for winter festival and if anybody's been on the Quebec trip before it's an absolutely amazing
085trip walking through old Quebec and then all the history um that that the students get to experience and of course the Sugar Shack and the the syrup and the snow and they just have the greatest time and I always the trips at the end of the year are always so difficult for me because you watch the kids bond in such an amazing way that you wish you could do it earlier in the year but you also know they're not quite ready to do that earlier in the year you know it's just really they're at that right spot of their maturation process where they're just they just love each other so much by the end of the trip so kudos to Lauren Michelle and the chaperones that went on it was a great trip we're so
086thankful that they were able to go and going back again they're planning for next winter as well also our French students got to experience quite a concert Dr Hall and the team at the middle school we were able to bring ATN to uh to the high school to provide a French concert for us so if you don't know ATN ATN is a world renowned concert uh he goes he has sold out concert tours all through Canada the United States China New Zealand Australia like he's a big deal and he also sings all these songs so that the kids can learn French verbs and French conjugations of verbs so the kids love him and it was like they were going to a pop concert they all need their signs they went over they were cheering the
087video just like they're out of their mind so it was super cool and there's every time I look at him over on the screen I kind of think he looks a little like Matt Chapin so I don't know if we paid a little too much for the guy or what a little a little similarity there Matt Tiffin is also super cool so yeah he is fantastic it could have been him the whole time [Laughter] um also music in our schools month which if you were able to go to The District Strings concert you saw Jenny mull dress up in her um in her blow up dinosaur costume there as they played some songs from Jurassic Park but truly just an amazing experience I brought my my own son a seventh grader and he just couldn't
088believe all of the students that we had in the program and how fourth graders were able to play a song besides 12th graders so it was really really pretty cool and then of course we had all of our concerts were banned we had our vocal prism concert as well for high schoolers and middle schoolers we had quite a few All County participants this month so two consecutive weekends we had our sixth graders participate in the elementary All County we had 19 students across the band and the orchestra participate and then the following weekend which was just this past weekend we had 25 7th and 8th graders participate in our all-county band and Orchestra so great representation for and a great experience for our students um the shinshinim continued to present in our classes regardless of
089curricular area this month though they happen to teach our yeah teach lessons in Mr Giles as eighth grade English class he's in his study on Power and uh the cortex is night so they came to talk about righteous among the Nations where they talked about non-jewish folks who risked their lives during the Holocaust to save people from from the Nazis so it was a really powerful experience for students to hear teenagers sharing the story and the information was it was great we too celebrated Brighton believes day but we kind of extended it over like two and a half weeks so on Brighton believes day proper we had uh presenters come in so that we had three different organizations we had um we had the Center for Youth came in and talked to our eighth graders
090we had representatives from the refugee resettlement Center came in and talked to our seventh graders and then folks from Asbury came in and talked to our sixth graders and they wound up kicking off our toiletry drive that lasted for about two weeks and we just packed up today so I put some pictures on Instagram but our service club with Mrs falter and Mrs kantz and all the students worked together to make up individual toiletry bags the bags were provided by the PTSA for us which was fantastic and then Mrs kantz and Mrs falter are going to donate those to the different organizations today and also you can see if you uh do you notice a familiar face there Bonnie Watson you see her there so she was one of the ones that came and talked
091about Asbury but uh she and her her colleague there have uh boxes of books that Mrs falter's sixth graders were also able to donate to Asbury we had lots of science festivities the Science Olympiad and the science Bowl teams competed this year so our science Bowl team is the the three young men on the left there sixth graders and uh first time out they they took third place in the Western New York regional so that was fantastic sanuka and kavi and nolith super excited and I know they're going to do amazing things in the next two years as representatives for TCMS as well and then we have four of our five students who also uh participated in the Science Olympiad and all of them placed in the top seven in their respective categories Leon there
092placed in five events he actually came into the day thinking he was only going to do two events and Mrs Elkins threw them into three more and he actually placed in them which was amazing and then Lily also placed in two and kinjal also placed into so great work for them again super exciting things moving forward um Mr Gibbons uh is new back to us from the high school teaching 7th and 8th grade social studies so he had his classes debating the Bill of Rights and and different aspects of it and it was super cool you know whenever the kids get so dressed up they take it seriously they get in the role they did a fantastic job developing their arguments um and refuting with each other we have quite a bit of talent far
093more than I have in our students and these are just two examples Miss Harkey is a long-term sub in our in our building as an eighth seventh and eighth grade art teacher and she's done a fabulous job of entering our students work into a variety of competitions and getting recognition for them so Mary Lundy's multimedia work on the or mixed media work on the left there is up at a nice out of art show and then Adiza Hobbies work here on the right is that the nysega legislative Student Art Show it's a virtual exhibit and it's celebrating the youth uh art month so great work coming out of our students March we had two activity nights we had seventh and eighth grade activity nights always a great thing except for when the fire alarm goes
094off at eight o'clock um but hey like we did it and it was good the kids were fantastic but the snow cones are always a favorite we had a new DJ for the last two ones so a lot more dancing um great music and and always fun and I have to tell you that the parents are amazing like if we just we couldn't do it especially the other night when the fire alarm didn't go off there's no way we could have done it without all of their help and support and then I'm just kind of wrapping up with with TCMS continuing to grow as a community you'll see on the left there that we have Kenzie Kenzie is a student who is deaf and every week she goes on the morning show and she shares
095a sign of the week to teach all of the other students in the building um different signs and it's actually like it's it's heartwarming you'll see kids walk in the hall and they they stop her and they want to practice the sign and she's using it with students in the cafeteria and having lunch and this was all she wanted to do this she also started our ASL Club at um at TCMS and she really runs it the adult just kind of sits there but she's teaching everybody and I just you know she's she's just such an advocate and a mover and a Shaker and she's going to do amazing things but we're all learning so much from her uh Miss veronis has got some baby chicks going on and if anybody knows my story with
096birds this was a really big thing for me to be holding that bird but it was very very cute um and just a nice way sunlight coming in the room and the kids to just take a deep breath um we've got our students in win on Fridays every once in a while we'll have a game day and uh playing some Uno with Miss Ellis there and then celebrating our uh our monthly dress-up days for student council I couldn't get through without just putting this up there I'll just leave it at that Mr Tappan and then April's another busy month for us obviously we have spring recess coming up um I'd be Renaissance if I didn't say that Mr Thomas and Miss Paddock are with about 207th graders in DC right now um off to a
097great great start looks beautiful there the cherry blossoms are in bloom so I think they've got a great time sports are starting soon we've got our Big Spring Dance a spring semi-formal for 8th graders coming up and the marking period ends very soon April 18th and we are also moving into State Testing season which everybody loves I just don't think there's a lull period of time in the school year every time each of you come up there's a thousand things on your thing so great work any questions from the board yes Susan Matt can go next you know how this is going toward president oh that is me good evening everyone lots of yeah I don't know who this person is but I mean to look him up to see how it is and see
098if I can impersonate him and make some money um so uh a lot of things that we did at Council Rock are echoed uh through my colleagues so we also so we celebrated pretty we celebrate pretty big um some special times at St Patrick's Day um some people call it leprechaun day but the leprechauns were very very active um and we had many traps this is just one example trying to trap uh the leprechauns I had students at lunch who saw them and knew they were up in our events and they needed me to get on the cameras and watch for them we also were treated to uh the Goodwin Academy of Irish dancers in the morning they um Lou might not want to hear this they inaugurated our stage with their heavy clipping and
099coughing and John is already working to to repair the finish on our new station but it's being used so that's the exciting thing um but a lot of a lot of great culture sharing um on St Patrick's Day speaking of culture sharing uh bojango who is one of our music teachers um received an amazing uh video so she is originally from Poland um she has friends who are there who are also music teachers so in sonina Poland a group of uh Young Elementary students created a video learning English singing happy New Year it came right at the turn of the New Year sent it to our students and I'm not going to click on them but if you need something to uplift you the map of Poland if you click on that is the video
100from them and the picture of Council Rock is our video response and it was prepared and uh just amazing kind of expanding our walls and using our technology to uh to create those Partnerships outside of our community and give kids those amazing experiences so who shows them speaking of our connections to our community Brighton believes day of caring was celebrated through arter but throughout our building again incredible thanks to our PTSA because without them especially at our level we couldn't do what we do they do amazing jobs putting packets together putting projects together for teachers to be able to pick up very user-friendly kids get to use them so you can see examples of kids braiding they're breeding for lollipop farm for the puppies creating cards for our nursing homes the residents in our nursing
101homes to celebrate birthdays to cheer them up to just say that they have a friend named Brighton and then our kindergartners created bags for a local Mercy house with toiletries so just an amazing day the kids really starting to learn to understand what it means to give back and understand who they're giving back to so thanks again to the PTSA for helping to organize that so read Across America day is usually very territorially French Road we celebrate quietly however this year we expanded a little and had a really exciting opportunity from our Brighton High School future teachers club and they came over and read to our students and they read in many different classrooms and I think one of the things that thanks to Mr Green who helped to organize that in the high school
102who helped to do that I think one of the things I took away from that day is they were my students now too so these are students that I knew at Council Rock as they've getting up so my first class is graduating this year but to see the teachers reconnect with their kids you know the only negative that I have to running a primary school is that our kids leave us relatively young and we don't sometimes get to see the fruits of our labor labor so kids who may have struggled or kids who may have been having some difficulties several of them were part of this and their teachers were so amazed to see them so excited and to hear that they had a part in inspiring them for a possible future connection as a
103teacher and then their work with kids and to provide them that opportunity kind of in a in a setting to see try it out and then you know be able to build it so it was really special and something I hope that we can continue to find those opportunities for the kids but also for my teachers to be quite honest so so rethinking math practices Stefano monikino has run a lot about making thinking visible and how to get kids to show their work this is a Liz files class and they are using wipeable markers on some of the glass surfaces and then having kids walk around and talk about it so it's just a different avenue but this is actually the math we have a math Emoji problem of the month that our math Specialists
104put up in the main hallway and kids are working on it it's a little bit of algebra a little bit of Challenge and teachers Provide support but this is like I walked through the hallway and I had to stop because I was like what are you doing you're writing on our windows and they're like no Mr tapping it wipes off don't worry so just another way our kids are learning growing and showing their thinking in different ways yeah I think glue just breathed the sirens it's wipeable and we talk very clearly about which markers can go on and this is only with adults yes you did he did um and then in our PE classes again connections outside of our school um both Kristen and Max are PE teachers um are great at bringing uh
105bringing people in and this is a local karate uh you know Dojo that is uh teaching kids about karate taking them through understanding the tenets of it um and really giving them the the strengths within it and the kids have really responded and loved it so it's been great uh so coming up report cards so report cards are actually live online right now however they are coming home paper tomorrow um so if you haven't been able to access it don't worry if you need access we can figure it out but we are sending paper report cards um home Friday uh begins our vacation spring recess and then in April we have our ice cream social open houses and Book Fairs so Tuesday Wednesday and Thursday we're trying to really kind of make a schedule within
106there so the library will be open a little bit earlier than the rest for people to come and Shop in the book fair and then classrooms will open at 6 30 along with the ice cream and then dancing will happen in the gym and then a little bit after our classrooms close we'll keep the ice cream going so that people have a chance this is all feedback from families and from staff about how we can do this a little bit better just to ensure everybody has those chances to get to all those places Tuesday is kindergarten Wednesday is first grade and then Thursday the 20th of April is second grade and then a reminder that Friday the 28th we'll be engaging in some really important work at Council Rock and across the district for our
107superintendent's conference day any questions thank you very much for the update absolutely if you want someone to come up now you know I'm contemplating um sure Tom Hall please Best For Last you said time someone else said that I would never oh well good evening everybody um last uh board meeting I did highlight a couple of things with the trips more on the Israeli exchange that we've had since 2015. tonight I just wanted to share some additional things about our German and Spanish exchanges um our German exchange has been in progress if you haven't uh if you weren't aware since 1980 wow it started with Sue Gillespie at the German School in Bremen and it's the same school we've been visiting ever since 21 German students traveled to Germany this year with Mr Schindler Mr
108Smith and Dr Geiger who's our German teacher I'm at the high school for a 10-day um tour of a variety of places in Germany but mostly Berlin and Bremen where we where they stayed they got to see the Brandenburg gate the wonderful thing about these exchanges is the students from Germany or if they're here our students get to go with um the exchange students on various trips they they take and share the the culture share the Life share the sites with our students and when our students are there they're trying to talk German or French or Spanish and when they're here they're trying to talk English so it's a great opportunity and again I I talked to a lot of principals in my Monroe County group there's very few schools right now that are actively
109still going abroad and I just I want to thank you and I know our kids are really appreciative to be able to have those opportunities um various sites famous buildings and they spend an entire day in bremerhaven which sounded wonderful touring um and various museums and just seeing kind of the sights and they welcomed um 30 students here last week they were here visiting us and they left and they're safely back at home just another great year and two more years we'll be back in a two-year schedule so in two years we'll be hosting them again and going to Germany in Spain we have a new city we were we were in Sevilla prior to we're in Madrid Barcelona now we have a partnership we're really trying to get going with Oviedo Spain which is
110in the North Western section of Spain Northwest of Madrid 17 students traveled with Mr Rivera Miss Crowley this was the first time that we actually were in Oviedo they were in Madrid and Barcelona just prior to moving to Oviedo and they did get a FC Barcelona game so that's Football Club game it's a it's not American football be soccer in America Dr McGowan and uh traditionally but they were very excited to see it um and just it was a pretty cool night to see Europeans enjoying the soccer game and the Spaniards um when they got to Oviedo this school really went all out they had us at the mayor's office the mayor spoke to them I actually got on a video conference I was stuck here in Rochester over the February break but I I
111got to communicate with their principal the mayor and just introduce myself and we're looking to start a partnership they will be traveling to us hopefully in the fall of 2023 first time ever collectio mares we haven't had a an exchange come here from Spain since the fall of 2000. which is quite remarkable when you think about it so this will hopefully be a great tour and you know new partnership with this International School our French students we had 43 here three teachers here visiting as well 30 plus year exchange and our students are heading out tomorrow for our 10-day Excursion to France Landing in Paris not there very long and then heading to Ren for the rest of their trip so very excited about that and we'll see more and hear more so Brighton Belize
112day of caring bright release day at Brighton High School we finally got to do what we've been doing for the last several years with Brighton Belize day we started with our food drive and I just have to say quickly what we actually accomplished in about an hour of students taking time in his assembly day with thousand plus students participating 750 donated items that was you know a 10-day trip or 10-day experience I guess but within the hour 300 plus birthday cards and craft gift bags for the Make-A-Wish Foundation golisano Children's Hospital 300 Red Cross hero Comfort kits for military veterans 450 pairs of no slip socks for Owen's house in Rochester General Hospital 150 letters to our service men and women all over the world through the million things project and then 800 lunches bagged
113lunches with peanut butter and jelly sandwiches cookies chips apples and water all bagged up and and put together by our students this takes months and months of planning our PTSA is a huge help but we also have advisors clubs who get involved and we have it's a huge building-wide event these are the pre-planning meetings and then putting together 88 homeroom boxes with all their supplies this is a picture that Dan Goldman sent me from the upper deck of the gym hundreds of kids making this is just one section there's another section just making the sandwiches putting the bags together a huge assembly line quite a sight to see and the Open Door Mission was so happy to get those bags there's some the kids making the socks the get well cards and the lunch is
114being prepared so just an absolute wonderful day and um then we had some students as well as advisors who dropped off this particular the lacrosse team dropping off the craft kit bags uh craft kit bags at the golisano Children's Center and these are all the clubs and their advisors who participated every year it's a little different which is amazing I put out a an invite and clubs sports teams service clubs will put in and say yeah we'd love to sponsor an event this year and it's not been the same since we've started so different clubs different sports teams we try to get a mix sometimes we get more vpa events but it's just a fantastic opportunity at the high school dodgeball game you know the high school will be better we'll come back better next
115year our students got to play against several different staff members you see the Bruin made a showing there as well this is you know the senior team who came in I think third third place second so you can see Council Rock over here came in huge numbers huge numbers nice job man for railing the troops um French Road Dr Rio um they'll come back as a big showing next year I'm sure but fantastic K-12 Community event if you were there it was fantastic kids that I will give a big kudos to our senior class and Jeff Green and their advisors Ms O'Shea and Miss vanstrom they really planned a night where they involved the Council Rock and French Road kids and activities they're running around the gym it's awesome um playing various games Dance Off
116competitions it was a huge Community event I mean it was everybody was involved K-12 and it was just so much fun and heard a lot of great things and we raised several thousand dollars for the senior class but also uh part of that money they I think it was 20 of that money goes to the PTSA support fund to support students and scholarships so what a great night um and finally as I went in order of what we've done our we've made history we went on our first historically black college trip with other Rochester area high schools Jeff Green myself and Miss Stern one of our counselors took 21 of our Brighton students to Washington DC we had 21 students three chaperones were there for three days two nights toured various sites in DC this
117is in front of the White House in one of the evenings and then our major part of the tours to tour different universities so we went to Howard University on the first day Morgan State University the second day um this is a picture of us all around at Harvard or Howard um and we actually are with um two other well three or four other schools mostly um University Prep from the city and we had students from Penfield um and Irondequoit with us there as well and something that was exciting at Howard is when we first got there I was able to call one of our former grads so this is Alana Britain on the left she's a 2019 grad she met us right as we got off the bus on the quad and basically was
118our tour guide with her new boyfriend who I met for the first time maybe it could be her fiance at some point um the kids just lit right up when they heard that Alana was a Brighton grad she is graduating from Howard this year she's majoring in Finance and Accounting and her boyfriend is in a similar major wonderful tour great q a and they were in the bookstore with us at the end and I I just want to thank her and you know Aaron her boyfriend for giving us such a great tour of Howard we got the Morgan we also there we actually got to sit down with a couple of students who were just it was a q a for almost 45 minutes kids were just asking questions um and and getting a feel
119for the campus we had a great tour and they had a wonderful lunch in their cafeteria so students came back very Jazz excited and Jeff's kind of following up with them this week about their experience and how we can maybe make the trip better next year and I want to thank Brighton student Alumni Association PTSA Brighton education fund and the next Nancy Beck fund all local you know groups here who sponsored the entire trip for our students which was quite amazing and gave everybody an opportunity and didn't cost them a Cent and it was just such a great opportunity and look forward to doing it again next year lots of activities coming up for the end of the year and I'll just highlight the conference day we have at the end of April and our
120next play a Children's Hour which is coming up um at the end of April good question a lot going on and congratulations and thank you also to Jeff who I think is back in the corner there on that trip it just sounds like it was absolutely outstanding so thank you very much questions from the board for Tom I can only make a comment I went on the Bremen trip 34 years ago now and uh the pictures throwback it has not changed much and we went on basically the same like excursions and things for a couple of them it was really nice to say thank you very much all right um up next is the consent agenda we have a few fundraising activities um again great opportunities to eat either at Five Guys on April 18th
121in support of the speech and debate club or in support of student council ordering some popcorn online also the service Club at TCMS is doing a clothing collection as you can see here March 27th through June 16th we have a series of gifts here and this is our tradition and I know there are a lot of them we're going to read them all real quick we are just so grateful to be the benefactor from so many different people who think of our kids and think of ways to improve their experience I'll first note that letters d through I are all gifts and you saw some pictures that Tom put up there in regards to the Brighton Believers projects but I'll read them first from the Brighton field hockey booster club in the amount of 250
122for the Brighton believes project a gift from the American fruit and vegetable company for the donation to Apples for the Brighton belief service project from the Mid-State Bakery Distributors for the donation of bread and of course with bread you need peanut butter and jelly so thank you to Palmer's food service for Their donation at peanut butter and jelly for the project a gift from PepsiCo for the donation to chips for the project and then finally a gift from the regional Distributors for the donation of paper supplies for the various Brighton believes service projects so as Tom pointed out on one of his last slides and as is noted here some great gifts from the community and businesses to help it all happen I'll also quickly know gift in the amount of three hundred dollars from
123the Brighton education fund for the author visit of Kelly Baptist on May 17th to TCMS in the amount of 3 325.50 for the author visit of Jerry Craft on June 7th to TCMS a gift from Jim and Lindy craft for the donation and I'm going to try this of the Box Selmer trombone to the Brighton Central School District music department and then finally a gift from the friends of the Arts in Brighton in the amount of 1770 in honor of Dr Michael leaner's retirement to be used to fund student scholarships for summer arts just a really impressive list of things from our community and business partners so we are greatly appreciative of that motion to approve the consent agenda by Susan seconded by Julian all those in favor we are prepared to join any final
124comments Dr McGowan no I just you know reflecting on the reports given by the principals and you know the executive budget proposal it's such a great example of the statement that is made by the budget to support all that work that's done I think it's just a great reminder of what happens for people and I think the beginning of the meeting and the report out on the Forum and the feedback to you is a great reminder of the work that still has to be done and be supported by that budget as well and that just enhances all of the work that is reported out in the principles report so thanks for that and uh we have excuse me over the next several weeks we'll be able to announce the results of searches for an assistant
125principal at teleporters middle school and the principal of French Road really excited about both and we're down to final candidates at this point and like I said I think great additions to the team and we'll be thrilled to be sharing that with you in the coming weeks great thanks thank you any comments from the board motion to adjourn Ed move by Julian second executive by Eleanor all those in favor we are adjourned this has been a special presentation from the Brighton Central School District Board of Education