001Good evening and welcome to the business meeting of the board of education January 22nd 2026. Please stand for the pledge of allegiance. >> I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. I'm going to open it up first to anybody that wants to speak on the listed agenda items. Please, as a reminder, this is a meeting of the board of education that's open to the public. If you wish to comment at this meeting, we ask that you please be aware of all the protocols for public comment. The protocols are listed on the back of the public agendas that are available in the meeting room. They're also posted on signage in the meeting room
002as well as on the district website. Anybody want to speak? Don't mean to scare you off. Okay. Then we're going to move to the consent agenda. Mr. Alvaro, >> resolve to approve the consent agenda. Items 2 through 10 is presented to the board at this meeting. >> Second. >> Questions or comments? The agenda includes approval of previous meeting minutes, CSSE, CPSCE placements, um additional or unpaid hours for various staff members, approval for Dr. Love to attend the Niscus 2026 Winter Institute in March, uh approval of a grant from the Putin Valley Education Foundation. They're are donating $350 through the high school for the art and aspire contest. Approval of two contracts, one of which is a health and welfare with Harrison school district. One is educational data New York cooperative for the next school year.
003Uh approval of a homebound instructor, an overnight high school science research trip in February, and approval of the 2026 spring coaches. Okay, any other questions or comments? All in favor? >> I opposed extensions. The resolutions pass. So we're going to move into our presentations. The first one is going to be on athlet athletics. Correct, Dr. Left. >> Correct. So with no further ado, we'll invite up Mr. Robert Webb, our director of physical education, health, and athletics. Welcome. >> Thank you. >> Is this an internet based presentation? >> It is. I was going to have a joke about Mike Lee, but not tonight. If the internet goes down, you're gonna have to act out the remaining portion of the >> I'll do my best. >> Good evening. Tonight, I will highlight many of our program successes
004from the past academic year, provide an update on the current year successes, and discuss proposed budgetary information for the upcoming year. Um, as a department, our focus remains on the development of the whole student through physical and health education as well as intercolastic athletics. department staffing. Our staffing levels remain consistent with no changes for the upcoming year. We will continue to have one administrator, one senior office assistant, and one athletic trainer. In physical and health education, we have eight teachers across our three buildings with two physical education teachers in each building, one health education teacher here at the high school, and then a split physical and health education teacher between the middle and the high school. Across the district, we have four nurses, one at each building, as well as a floating nurse. And we
005have one seasonal game day coordinator, as well as 67 coaching positions throughout the three seasons. Since it's my first time here this year, a little review from the 2425 athletics. Um, last year was another historic year for Putinham Valley. Uh most importantly, our district was recognized as a New York State Public High School Athletic Association School of Excellence for the first time. Um this honor was awarded because over 75% of our varsity programs maintained a GPA of 90 or above during their respective seasons. Um continuing from an academic standpoint, we had 247 scholar athlete awards as well as one Khan Edison Scholar Athlete Award winner. From an athletic standpoint, we had 113 all league selections, 37 all section and seven allstate selections. We had four team sectional champions, two individual section champions, and six league
006titles. We had one regional champion, three state championship team finalists, and three individual podium finishes. At the state level, we continue to offer a wide range of intercolastic athletic programs at the varsity, JV, and modified level. We also continue to merge sport offerings where other dish uh with other districts when needed, and those are indicated on the charts with an M next to the sport. During the fall, we offer our game day cheerleading, cross country for both boys and girls, field hockey, football, boys and girls soccer, swimming for girls, which is merged with Mayapac and Caramel, and volleyball. During the winter season, we have boys and girls basketball, our competitive cheerleading team, ice ice hockey for boys and girls, boys swimming, wrestling, and indoor track for both boys and girls. And finally, during the spring
007season, we offer baseball, flag football, boys golf, lacrosse for both boys and girls, softball, and track and field for boys and girls. >> Coach, where do where do you do the ice hockey? >> Ice hockey for girls, it's about 16 merged teams. So, this year we have uh 16 schools. There's three teams in section one. one from the southern port portion of Westchester, one in Rockland, and then the Northern School. So, we're part of the Northern Avalanche, which is hosted um out of Brewster High School. >> Okay. >> Um for for boys hockey at the modified and varsity level, we merge with Lakeland Panace. Um but there's also members of Hendrick Hudson and Halian in that program. >> Okay. Thank you. >> Welcome. >> Uh all over they go to they go to different locations.
008They go to uh Brewster Ice Arena, but they're also across the river. >> Yeah, I figured as well. >> I'm an expert in this field as a parent of two hockey players >> on the same Button Valley merch team. Um so yeah, primarily they practice either at Bare Mountain or Brewster and a vast majority of their competitions are at those two locations as well. Occasionally they go further. They've actually done a better job of scheduling all of the games sort of in a regional based so to try to minimize the travel. But we've been down in uh White Plains, we've been down to Mount Vernon, we've been up to Balling Trinity, so there's still quite quite a bit of travel. >> Yeah, >> there's there's not a lot of ice skating rinks in the area,
009>> right? That's the problem. >> Um, another big thing for us this year was we successfully rolled out final forms, which is our new athletics registration platform. Um it's been highly effective tool for our school nurses, our athletic trainer and our coaches to streamline data. In addition to um eligibility, equipment inventory and management, our coaching certification tracking, daily attendance, state reporting, and roster management, final forms has also become a great communication tool um for our district and for our department. As of ear earlier this week, um year to date, we've already generated over 14,000 emails to communicate with our families. So, a lot of emails are being sent out with final forms. We also get a great look at our participation and registration numbers. Um, overall in the fall season, we had 314 student athletes
010registered to participate in grades 7 through 12, which is approximately 41%. We had 248 this winter, around 33%. And then overall to date, we had 483 students register for at least one sport, which is about 64% of our middle, 7th, and eighth grade and high school population. So those are really high numbers, and it's great to see because we haven't even made it to our spring season yet. >> Looking at those numbers, um, from a from a grade level standard, our younger grades have excellent participation numbers. our eighth grade. So far this year, 80% of them have registered for at least one sport. Uh participation is high ac across all of our grade levels. As you can see, 50% or higher participation at each grade level. You know, you have to give credit to the
011seniors because they are especially those involved in the uh IB program, the international baloria program, uh science research, the plays, the concerts, and there's so much pulling. So that that's a pretty impressive statistic. More than half still are involved in sports. >> Our high school athletes are are very busy and they're very committed both to their academics as we can see with their grades >> as well as to the programs. A midyear update on where athletics stand right now. Just looking at mostly our fall data and information. Um we had 102 individual scholar athletes this fall. Uh we were 100% all of our fall varsity programs were recognized as scholar athlete teams meaning they all had a 90 or above. We also had a another one of our athletes was recognized um Izzy Bard on
012the state finalist volleyball team as a com scholar athlete. So this is our second KED scholar athlete over the last two years. So, prior to James Apostolicico during the winter season last year and Izzy Beard this fall, 2009 was the last time that we had a KED scholar athlete award winner. So, really impressive what our kids are doing. >> During the fall, our game day cheer also was state champions. We had one regional champion in volleyball and both were sectional champions. We had three state championship appearances, again, game day cheer and volleyball, but we also sent a swimmer as part of that merge swimming team. We're currently in the middle of our winter season and we hope to bring many more positive updates in the near future. While we do like to recognize our student
013athletes and our teams for their athletic success, we also continue to focus on the inside out initiative which transforms coaching from purely performance-based to purpose-based. The goal is really to build a culture of belonging where our student athletes grow socially and emotionally. We continue to ask our coaches four key questions at the beginning and end of each season. Why do I coach? Why do I coach the way that I do? How does it feel to be coached by me? And how do I define success? We also have encouraged our coaches to do 15-second check-ins at practice with all the student athletes. These are quick check-ins with co where coaches can connect with our student athletes on a personal level to make a meaningful difference in their lives. Another new initiative for this year is Tiger
014Talk. So Tiger Talk is something that we've asked our coaches to facilitate 3 to 5 minutes in small groupoup discussions with our athletes during practice once a week. Our goal is to build empathy, strengthen team culture, support leadership development, reinforce values beyond competition, and it aligns directly to our district goal of resilience. A couple examples include how do we handle adversity as a team and how can we build resilience? What does accountability mean to me as a student? So, we like to have those discussions once a week. I'd like our coaches to work with different groups, not the same kids in each group. And we have these discussions each week. We don't ask them to bring anything back to us, just to have these discussions. In addition to providing opportunities for our student athletes to
015talk and reflect during Tiger Talk, um this winter we've also placed an emphasis on leadership. Our coaches are encouraged to take a coaching student leadership course and we ask that our captains um take becoming a leader and leading others through the NF >> and welcome to the work session. spring, I plan to launch a captain's council where I hope to meet with all of our varsity captains to discuss things such as resilience and to ensure student voice and decision for the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indiv. >> Speaking on student leadership, I would like to highlight Julia Deich, who's one of our senior three sport athletes on the volleyball, wrestling, and track and field teams. Julia is the section one female representative for the New York State Public High School athletic
016association student athlete advisor agenda items. As a reminder of the board of education that is open to the public chosen wish to comment at this meeting, we ask that you please be aware of all the protocols for public comment. >> Protocols are listed on the back of the public agendas that are available in the meeting room. They are also posted on the meeting room as well as looking at budget related components. So our budget structured into four areas to support our students and our programs. We have our stipens and hourly component which is our coaches and our game days. >> Start with the consent agenda. We have our contraction such as coaching conference and CA2 reconditioning of agenda items the events and tournaments we participate and it also includes professional approval of the December 11th
017meeting minutes updates which are related to our session additional hours for various staff members extending the dates for a leave placement teacher appointing the homebound and homebound instructor. We're updating the subst changes in the New York State minimum wage, >> game and practice equipment, safety equipment, and all the supplies for our athletic trainer. >> Our priorities in terms of budget remain the same. Um, we really want to provide programs that give opportunity and promote student well-being. We want to ensure equitable access across across all of our programs. We want to maintain adequate and safe facilities and equipment. And sustainability is important. We want to utilize our re resources efficiently through state contracts and ED data to maximize our impact in a sustainable way. So in our anticipated expenses for the upcoming year, we do anticipate
018some slight increases across a few areas. Our coaching stipens will increase with the PVFT contract. Um there are increases in the section one and official fees and that's negotiated with section one and Boseies. And then materials and supplies across all programs just continue to increase. While those costs do increase, we try to offset cost the best that we can and we rely on the support of our booster clubs, team fundraisers, and revenue from our tournaments. uh the Putnham Valley Supertore and the facility rentals to local programs also provide additional revenue to our programs as well as to the district. Last year with the support of our booster and through a lot of fundraising especially with our cheerleaders uh we raised significant funds that our student athletes greatly benefited from physical and health education. Uh this
019year we made a positive addition to our K12 physical and health education classes by implementing the program platform as a curriculum support tool. It's a customizable evidence-based program that provides our teachers with a framework of knowledge and skills that align to the New York State physical education and health education standards. One of the most valuable features of platform is the data collection which allows us to refine instruction to make sure that we're meeting student outcomes and we're continually increasing student engagement. We're also continuing to explore and evaluate a variety of health education curriculums with our objective being to identify a program that not only aligns to the standards but specifically meets the needs of our students in Putnham Valley. We believe our best teachers are lifelong learners and to support that our physical health our
020physical education and health education teachers are all active members in New York State Aphford. This membership provides our staff with regular access to content specific re research professional publication and a network of experts across the state. In November of this year, this past year 2025, our physical education and health education teachers attended the southeastern zone aphford conference which was an opportunity for our staff to collabor collaborate and participate in professional development with hundreds of teachers from the region. They brought back innovative instructional strategies to our classroom and to our students. Looking ahead, we also have a specialized PD coming up in the coming months from welcome to wellness. This is this is going to focus on fostering growth and resilience aligning again with our district goal, but it's also specific in terms of physical and
021health education. And the last thing is some of our upcoming events. This weekend we have our competitive cheerleading tiger tournament. Um it's going to be Saturday, not the snow day cuz it's going to be snow Sunday. >> Um we have a great turnout for this. It's a great >> Did you predict it was going to snow that? >> No. No, that was that was for when it snowed Saturday. But we uh we got lucky. >> We have um 44 performances from over 40 different teams this Saturday. So from around 9:30 to about 4:30, there will be different performances here in the gym. >> Yeah. >> And then our last thing, um which we actually have two of our flag football student athletes here with us. Next week there's a girls and women in sports day
022at Metife Stadium. It's the inaugural event for the New York Giants and hosting this for section 1 flag football programs. Girls from approximately 30 section 1 schools will be in attendance at the event. We'll be sending five of our um senior flag football athletes to it. They're all scholar athletes and it's going to give them an opportunity to go to MetLife to hear from and network with women leaders in the sports industry. So, they'll be doing that next Wednesday. >> And that is all I have for you. Excellent, coach. >> Thank you so much for this. >> Yeah. I I was especially impressed with the the tiger talk and the inside out. I thought that was such >> a powerful initiative um and so good for the students. I was going to ask the students
023like do you feel like it's helping or is it adding something to your playing or >> um my team is already very close like we we already that like we talk about that stuff like every week. >> Okay. >> But I mean our coach like even like sometimes like we don't go like right on the prompts but like we're always like talking about like how we can be better and like how we can like work better as a team. >> That's good. It's good. And congratulations on the scholar athletes. I think that's amazing. >> You're not kidding. Yeah, congratulations. >> Go ahead. >> I was just going to say that you've expanded a lot of different things in in the program, uh the health aspect as well as the, you know, the the physical and
024the competitive end. That's impressive. Very impressive. Thank you. >> I can't I can't take all the credit for the Tiger Talk. Actually last year when I went to the uh athletic administrators conference, the hen hut ad at the time gave a presentation on a similar thing he was doing there. Um and now he's over in Carmel. So I I got to give a lot of credit to him. >> But that's how we learn from others. Yeah. Outstanding. >> I really love the emphasis on scholar athlete. Um if I were to have tallied the number of times you've said that tonight, it's well over 20 times. Um, and and that is so important that we ensure that our kids are getting a well-rounded education, that they understand that both on the field and off the field
025matter. Um, and that the lessons you learn on the field speak to every other part of your life. Um, I think that is so incredible. So, thank you for maintaining that focus. I also think it really sets the bar. Um, it it it's important that our kids get an opportunity to go to that Khan Ed dinner and get that award. Um, it it's one of the highlights to for me to see that because I remember my own friends in high school getting that award and and seeing the the look on their face when they had worked so hard for something. Um, it's important that we honor our kids and and really give them the platform to be able to succeed in that way and I feel like Sam said, you've taken that to the next
026level for us. So, thank you. Um, and then the last thing was the purposeful coaching. I am so excited about that idea. Um, I do have a question. How often do you meet with the coaches to like have those conversations with them about being reflective about their coaching? That question of what does it feel like to be coached by me? Um, how does that work, that structure? >> So, I see our coaches on a daily basis. I try to to make my rounds. I'm here most days till 7 8 9:00. So, there's opportunities for me to communicate with them informally pretty regularly. But when I meet with them this year, I did individual program meetings with our coaches prior to the season. So, we talked about those four questions and then when I do their
027evaluations at the end of the season, I actually put it right those four things right on their evaluation. And it's really just a talking point to see how we continue to grow. Um, and again, it's more about the purpose as opposed to the process. I tell them all, you know, it's great. I love when they bring home state titles. Um, but things like sportsmanship, awards, those things are great. >> Absolutely. Yeah. So, all of those folky are just so incredibly important. Thank you for bringing that to the center of our program. >> Thank you. >> Okay. Um again, just like everyone said, thank you for your leadership and um teaching collaboration and leadership within the teams. That's so very important. Um flag football, this last year was our first year. >> So la last year
028we did have a team, but they weren't part of section one because we started it late. So this will be they were independent last year. So this year will be their first opportunity to uh compete and potentially play for a sectional championship. >> Great. And still a lot of interest in >> last year we had over 30 girls come out for this game. >> Great. >> Um couple things I just want to confirm because the chatter comes around every budget season. So just want to hear from you that the renewal of equipment and uniforms is consistent between boy sports and girls sports. >> Yeah. So certain equipment like helmets for example, we send those out because they have to get a certain certification. Um but just like for softball where they have helmets, we send
029those out. When we look at um catcher equipment for baseball, softball, all that goes out. A lot of our uniforms we do inhouse in terms of cleaning, but anything that has a safety requirement, we send it out 100%. >> Okay. And um can you speak with some of the initi initiatives at the elementary school that are occurring? So, one of the things that we we we don't have intercolastic sports at the elementary level. It's only 7 to 12. So, one of the things this year was that platform program. And a big reason after talking to to Jackie that we went with that was because it does have an elementary um component to it. So, it's a little different. The high school would be more fitness- based where at the elementary level it's more activities. So,
030that's definitely a focus that we've had there is trying to improve not the overall curriculum but supports at least for our physical education program. Thank you. >> Thank you. >> So, thank you very much for your presentation. I I wanted to commend many of the things that our board members have already done. Um I really appreciate your focus on scholar athlete. Um obviously there's different types of students competing in sports than when I competed cuz I'm not sure I was ever on a team where that number of kids uh scored a 90 or above average. So the fact that we have that here in Putham Valley is extremely impressive. I very much appreciate the focus you've brought to Putin Valley around professional development and I know that our teachers appreciate that as well. A fit
031teacher will tell you that they get dragged around from one PD to the other and not much of it pertains to what they do in their classroom each day. and I know that they appreciate the focus that you've brought in finding content specific professional development for them where they can work with other FISA teachers and within platforms to offer them um uh ideas that directly impact what happens in their classrooms. Uh I love I I have the feeling that next year's district goal will focus on empowerment. I don't know why. I just have that feeling. Um, but I would love to hear more about Tiger Talk and all of these other opportunities. I think we are making huge strides in terms of empowering our student athletes to take on these leadership roles, to take on
032um these meaningful um values that they they learned by taking on those roles. And I really look forward to hearing more about how that continues to grow next year and maybe hear from some of our students regarding what they took out of it. Um, I would love to find an opportunity to get Julia here to talk a little bit about um, her experience. I know we'll lose her next year, but a little bit about her experience as being she's the only female sports rep for the entire section that represents that's representing all of the students in our section one uh, at those meetings. I would love to maybe find an opportunity for her to come and talk a little bit about that experience. It's a huge accomplishment for her and something that I'm sure is
033it will look great on her resume. So, and I do want to acknowledge that being an athletic director, physuming um feat, especially for someone with a young family and I know myself and all of the board members very much appreciate the hours, the days, often times seven days a week. that you to your point 7 8 9:00 at night um you're always here you're always present and that's part of the reason why our program runs as successfully as it does because you're here and you're present and I just wanted to acknowledge that we appreciate that. >> Thank you. >> He says that even when you're not here just to let know. >> That's good. >> Have a good night. >> Thank you very much. >> Thank you. Thank you. >> Okay. Our next presentation is
034technology. Um I I'm I feel badly that they're doing their opening of school presentation and their budget presentations kind of all at once, but you know, we really want to hear clearly from them and didn't want to smash them up and give them only three minutes, you know. So, we appreciate you. >> Oh, I' I'd love just three minutes. >> No, no, Michael. We want to hear more. Michael, I just lost internet access. >> He's traumatized. >> Oh man. >> So, we would like to invite Mr. Michael Lee, our director of technology, to give his opening a school/budget presentation for the technology department. >> Yes. >> Welcome, Michael. Thank you. >> So, as Jeremy just said, I'm Mike Lee, director of technology. This is the technology update and budget presentation and I'm happy to report
035that this has been a pretty uneventful week. So, you know, it's not bad. It's not it's not a bad start to uh so well let's start with a let's start with a quote as I always do. The greatest danger in time of change is not change itself but acting with yesterday's logic. >> That's good. And I guess going with the spirit of this quote, someone told me, you know, Mike, you you kind of need to move on with those rockets. You've been using the rockets for like 2 years. Maybe this is the third year now, and you you have to move on. And I'm like, but do I? Yes. Yes, you have to. Okay. So, I'm going to move on from the rockets. the copies of the presentation you guys have and can follow, those
036will be the rockets. But what we're going to do is we're gonna kind of do a live pivot to something else. Now, I'm not a visually creative person. I can't do that. That's one of my greatest like nonstrengths. I don't want to say weaknesses, but greatest non-strengths. My drawings are so bad they need subtitles as an example, right? Like even my stick figures look surprised that they exist. So what we're gonna do, we're gonna pivot a little bit. And just so you could kind of follow along what happened, Dan and I were like, well, how about this? Do you guys remember last year when we demonstrated Notebook LM? Do you remember that? and we just kind of fed Notebook LM a little something about the district and then we listen to a podcast with two
037people talking. Remember that? >> Yeah. So, >> so we don't have a podcast this year. Okay. We don't have a video, but what we do have is we took the presentation that you guys have and you guys can see. We fed Notebook LM a little bit more information about our district and then we were like, "All right, well, let's see what it comes up with." And so that's exactly what I'm going to present today. I did we didn't make any corrections. We're just going to go with it. And so and so we're going to you're going to get all the information, but then we're also going to talk through each slide about like how did it create what it created. >> Some of us are upset about the podcast. I really enjoy >> Oh yeah.
038Well, maybe next year I could we could do a video. We'll do Oh no, what is this doing? Let's not do that. Okay. Okay, let's stop the slideshow. We're going to do just full screen. Okay. All right. So, I mean, look at this. This looks this looks really professional. Technology update, elevating educational infrastructure, operational review, and strategic vision. Now, it has the the years. I would have put the dates, but that's okay. It's also 25 26 maybe a little bit like 267. Oh, no. Did I just Was that a little cringe? That was a little cringe, wasn't it? All right. All right. We're not going to So, part of the information that we fed LM was um our district goals, and it created this. It drew the graphics. It It just created the whole thing.
039So, a lot of what you're going to see in this presentation demonstrates how what we're going to do and what we do makes us more resilient as a district from a technology standpoint. Technology and service of the vision. Now, remember it created all this. I I did none of this. Okay. >> You we fed it the information. Yeah. Dan and I fed the information. All right. Operational excellence and upgrades. So the high school we completely design redesigned the the website from the ground up to make it more community focused and readable. Um the high school they really like it. Power school and Google sync. Now this is something that the teachers apparently really love. What they used to have to do is they would take their power school rosters and they would have to build,
040you know, their their classrooms in in in Google Classroom and then they would do the grading perhaps in Google Classroom and then and then what? Then you have to copy your grades back into P school, right? You have to like actually type it back into P school. Now what this does is it syncs everything. Great. >> So now the rosters just go like right into Google Classroom. They could do whatever they need to do in Google Classroom, grade in Google Classroom, and then put the grades right back into P school. Right. So that eliminates errors and it saves a lot of time. >> Yes. >> All right. Now, check this one out. Launch system integration. It says seamless integration of Heartland Mosaic with Power School. Yes. Well, we've had that for a couple years. What's
041missing from this? Can does anyone know? Okay. So, in the other presentation we have down that we did that with Garrison, right? It it left out one of the key details in this, right? So, that's just something to point out, right? Um, when using an AI tool like this, you really do need to go through and make sure you read every detail because you could very easily look at this and be like, "Oh, look how professional it looks." And just kind of move on without realizing. It's like it's missing the key detail, right? We we did this integration with Garrison. Okay, so now the Tiger Tracker. This is this is something really cool. It's a it's a customuilt community service hub. So this keeps track of the community service hours that the that the students
042have to do. Um, what's cool about it is this was completely designed and built inhouse by Dan. Say hi, Dan. Hi, Dan. Y All right. So, Dan built it all. And this and this replaces some uh fairly expensive software like Passport for Good for example. Um, now notice the the computer screen, right? It says Tiger Tracker overview. and it says screenshots of Tiger Tracker. What Notebook LM apparently did was it saw some of the pictures that we loaded in for Tiger Tracker, but it didn't use any of the pictures that that we that we wanted to use for Tiger Tracker. What it did was it saw the very first page and said, "Oh, that's good enough. Let's just let's just put that in." So then that's what you see in that computer screen, the very
043first page of some of the screenshots that we wanted to show. But rest assured, here we go. Tiger Tracker empowers student ownership. As you can see, it tells you the number of hours that you uh that that have left. No, the the approved hours. It tells you the number of hours that you have, and it gives you a little chart to look at your progress. You could also find opportunities. So when pe, you know, people type in, you know, volunteer or service needs, you can go and find those. And it's very easy to submit. Now, if we analyze the page, Notebook LM actually did a very cool thing here. These three screenshots were actually just all on one single page, right? So, Notebook LM went in, analyzed the single page, created the slide, and was
044able to zoom in and crop out three separate pictures, right? And identified what each of those pictures represent, right? It did it all on its own. Like, we didn't tell it to do that. So, that's kind of cool. All right. So, Smart Pass, this is the digital hall pass software that's being utilized by the high school now. Uh, it's it's an instructional focus. It reduces loitering and it gets students back to class. It also has a kind of a cool feature where if you know that two people should not be out at the same time, it won't let them be out at the same time. From a technology standpoint, we uh received this request in I want to say it was like late August for a September rollout. So what's involved with this from a
045technology standpoint is you need all the rosters to be fully like real time synchronized between P school and this software. So, we had to figure that out in a matter of maybe like two weeks and then get this, you know, get this trained and online and ready to go and so um we were able to do it. So, there we go. Okay. So looking at some of the security initiatives that we have uh districtwide, we implemented our multiffactor authentication and this is in full compliance with uh your New York state regulations. It lowers the risk of breaches, ransomware and it controls our cyber insur uh cyber insurance costs. We have new visitor management systems around the district. It's a ricotta check-in system and there's an there's an optional touchless uh feature. I'm not sure if
046anyone's actually using that feature, but it is enabled. It enables guests to um you know sign in with their phone if they want to. They could scan a QR code on their phone. It's got integrated screening and digital logs and it has uh basically creates an enhanced guest experience. Now on the surveillance end where uh piloting a new video recorder or if you want to call it that new DVR system, it's centralized. It scales very well and one of the best parts is it doesn't come with any recurring license fees. end when you're scrolling through the video. So, if anyone's ever had to do like security, like search for security footage, it's extremely low latency video scrubbing so you could get to your results a lot quicker. >> Can I ask a question? >> Yeah.
047>> Um, where is all of like is it surveillance in every school? Is it outside? Is it inside? >> Yes, inside and outside but not in classrooms. >> Okay. >> Yeah. So the the public areas. Yeah. Yeah. So this is kind of nice. It made a it made a chart to look at uh you know how we're maximizing the value for uh to the taxpayer by keeping a lot of our devices alive for 8 years. We recently replaced 8-year-old student devices with new MacBook Airs. Now, what's interesting about this chart is we didn't tell it that the industry standard lifespan was 4 years. It's it inserted that. So, you know, I don't know if that's true or not. It's it it seems true. We'll kind of go with that. But what is true is we
048kept these laptops alive for 8 years. So I guess that flag's pretty good. All right. Now, this one, this single slide kind of blows my mind a little bit. So I'm I'm going to escape for a second here. I'm going to go back into the other one and we're going to take a look at the two slides that this replaces. Right. Um, see where is it? Where is it? >> Yeah. So, I mean, look at this one. Yeah, that's okay. And then look at the next one. That's all right. That's all right. But I mean, this is a lot more clear. I would I would think you can see your completed upgrades upgrades that already happened. But look what it did for the road ahead. So we have our wireless access point replacement. That's what
049gives us wireless access. Look, it created a graphic to represent in progress. And then it colorcoded. We're going to utilize funds for these replacements. Same with the switch replacements which are in progress. and it used the color-coded -ate funds right now. We also have firewall replacement coming up. So, it created this icon, but look what it did. We're going to utilize -ate funding and or smart schools money for that. And it created an icon that represents two funding sources. Not bad. All right. Now, why support infrastructure? Supporting infrastructure is completely equal. It benefits everybody in the same way, right? Equally. It allows uh seamless collaboration for students and teachers, enables distance learning and computer-based testing, and it's the backbone of a district-wide security program. Now I have to pause here because what I would say
050or what word I would change in this here is I wouldn't say available capital funds. I that's I wouldn't say that I would say available aid right but again remember I said this is all AI generated notebook LM and we were just going to roll with it and see what it presented. So, this is what it gave us. We didn't use the word capital at all. It inserted that. So, again, when you're using an AI tool to create a presentation like this, you really kind of have to know what it is you're talking about because you could put something like this out for the public to see, right? You could put you could make this available on a website and people are like, "Ooh, available capital fund." No, it's really available aid. This is the
051aid that we have available to us to use for our upgrades. And these are some of our recurring operator operating expenses just you know annually just every year. This represents the IPA that we take out every year. This is to refresh MacBooks and Chromebooks um every you know like last year 285,000. Uh but the budget impact of that is $65,000. Those numbers are are pretty much pretty much equal to last year. Now, now this is interesting. This is the this is how it built our department structure and staffing. Now, I mean, I wouldn't draw it this way. I I kind of like mixing myself in with everybody. But this is what it came up with. What's uh what's also kind of cool though is it highlighted because it thought it was important to say that
052the Boseies Junior Computer Specialist is an aidable position. So it highlighted that and these are the people behind the technology. Now let's let's read the quote for a second. working together to achieve the best possible for our students. I don't really know what that means. To achieve the best possible what? Okay, so let's go back to this one for a second cuz I I I kind of like this quote that I had. Where is it? Okay, so coming together is a beginning. Keeping together is progress. Working together is success. And if there's something that we love to do in the technology department, it's working with the students, staff, and faculty to achieve the best possible for our students, whatever that best possible is. All right, I guess that's it. >> Thank you. >> Yeah. Yeah.
053Mike, my question about staffing. It's I just want to make sure I'm clear. It's consistent year-over-year or are you adding in the Boseis Jr.? >> Oh, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So, it's consistent. So, we have, you know, what's funny? The staffing is identical to last year except this here used to be 3.6, but now it's 3.4 four because we were able to retain Laura, >> right, >> as a point four >> at on a on a part-time basis. >> And you're planning to do that next year? >> Mhm. >> Yep. >> Okay. >> Michael, in your slide about equity, um, do we have equal access for kids to use computers at home? like like does every family have access to the internet at home or are there homes that don't have that? Um well I would
054say that most families have reliable access to internet. Okay. >> There are some that don't. I know that we have in the past provided internet services for some >> I remember that during CO I just wondered if that was still a problem or >> as far as I know we provide access to one family. >> Okay. Okay. I think when we surveyed families during COVID, it was you mean 98% of families had reported having reliable internet access and the few that didn't, we were able to supplement that. Um I don't know that we've done another detailed survey, but we when it's brought to our attention, I know we do have a student out right now who is utilizing district um provided internet access to complete her work. So >> Okay. >> Yeah. Michael, I like
055that. I I like that. Uh, you know, the the AI created your your slides. Comparative to last year, I really enjoyed the conversation. >> Yes. >> Because I'm a fanatic with the advanced Alexa. >> Sometimes I have an hour talk with that that disc. >> I'm dead serious. >> Gets his weather reports. We had we had a 20minut talk today about Sinners, the movie that was nominated now 16 Academy Awards, the most in the history of the Academy, >> and it just flowed like a river. >> Yep. >> Unbelievable. Like I'm talking to you right now. >> It is. Yeah. Yeah. It's unbelievable. >> And that really wows me. This is good. This is very good because the creature created that. >> Right. Right. Uh, but I like the talking. >> Oh, yeah. Oh, oh,
056me too. Oh, me too. But I figured last year since since we did audio, figure this year we'll do a little visual and maybe next year we could do video. >> Oh, there you go. >> Right. So So stay tuned for that. >> No, but it's it's good. >> And what which presentation is going to be on the website for parents to see if they're looking for >> Oh. Oh, not this one. >> The one that you have. >> That that we have. >> The one that you have. Oh, you know what? You know what I forgot to show you guys? Okay. So, so we did this, but then we were like, you know what? Like, what what would happen if we just ran it again? Okay. So, so take a look at this. This
057is what we just went through. You you kind of, you know, remember what that looks like. Now, now check this out. Check this out. >> You're going to be like, "What?" Okay, this is the same thing, the same information just run again. Look, that's completely different. It made a completely different presentation. >> Holy cow. >> Right. >> Wow. >> Look at it. Look at this. And this this it it invented it invented this graphic. >> Look at that. >> Yeah. Right. Look at this. >> Right. Completely different. So, we had to choose. We were like, "Well, which one of these do we want to go with?" Here's another one. Here's another one. We just ran it again. Look at that. You know, so somebody could take their information. No, I'm going to run How about
058I run it 10 times? I'm just going to pick the best one. Yeah, you can. You can pick the best one, but remember remember all those mistakes that we found? >> Yes. >> And what's interesting about this is it makes it into a PDF. So you can't go back and edit it, >> right? You So So what it produces, >> you have to use >> that's it. You have to use that. Maybe one day it'll produce something where you could just load it right into Google Slides and you can edit. But as it is now, these are just PDFs. I mean, look at this. Look, look how pro this looks. It It just It just made this. >> Look, >> it's amazing. Yeah, >> it is. It really is. >> Yeah, >> when are we
059going to hire AI to be the director? >> I don't know. I don't know if I trust it yet because it very confidently will tell you the wrong thing. So, Michael, you expect your um expenses, you said to be consistent year-over-year except for say contractual increases. >> Wait, said we said >> your expenses you said you estimate to be consistent year-over-year except except for contractual increases. >> Yes. Oh, yes. Yes. Yes. And so those contractual increases would be anything that's kind of prescribed to us by both. So, yeah. But I mean, uh, we we went over the budget, uh, just I think it was last week or so and it was pretty it was pretty even. >> Yeah. >> I have a question since we're sort of talking about that. Um, I don't know if
060this is you or a Grace question. Um, areate funds and smart schools bonds separate from what is given to us by the like what we take from the taxpayers? >> Yes, kind of. So, so smart schools bond money was money that the government put out there saying, uh, this is money that you could use to upgrade your schools and those funds never expire. Funds, what you do is you outlay the money and then you get your aid ratio back. So you could get you know and so we have 270 whatever that was available in aid for us to receive back now. >> So what we're taking from the taxpayers is just that 65 number just that 65,000. >> The rest is like through bonds and aid. >> Well what so essentially the way it works
061is on the expense side we have to use our regular funds to purchase this stuff in advance. Right. So we're using taxpayer monies to purchase this. what we get back is aid from the state. So from the expense side, yes, it's coming out of our general fund, which is either state aid or taxpayer uh funds coming in, but then we get revenue back on that that goes back into our general fund, which we then use to offset other expenditures. >> So, anything we buy is essentially 65% off. >> Yeah, that's sweet. >> Yeah, >> it's like a discount, but they're going to mail you the money back. next year as opposed to getting it off at the register. >> I have one more positive that I just want to share before everybody gets up. Um
062I really love the new um community service thing. >> Um when I was on the PTA, um we often offered opportunities for students to come and do child care and things like that. And it was a little bit difficult to offer it as an opportunity. Um like we didn't know exactly how to get it off. Oh, how are you doing in childcare? most 15-year-olds aren't checking, you know, our Facebook. Um, so I really like that it shows the opportunities. Um, you require, we require a lot of community service hours, and >> I like that it tracks it. I like that it shows opportunities for people to be proactive instead of, you know, come May, they're like, "Oh my god, I need 25 hours. How am I going to get it?" Um, I think it's >>
063I think it's wonderful. >> Agree. >> Great. So, I wanted to ask um just about teacher training around tools that are using generative AI and what's that been looking like lately? We just I don't think we've heard much about that topic this year. Um >> and so, >> you know, I I just asked Jackie, you know, how many people like teachers are really like using this tool, this one particular tool that we've purchased for them. And so um >> just a little bit about what what that's looking like because of the fact that AI does make mistakes and we want to ensure that you know teachers are are able to use the tools but wisely. >> Yep. So you know I actually I forgot to make a slide of the training that Keith Fury and
064I conducted earlier in the year. So what we did was we um we conducted a training um I think it was a 20-hour training uh on school AI and the teachers who attended that training we took them through how to set up you know set everything up through school AI and you know through how to use it in your classroom and um what I just demonstrated here notebook LM that's actually free so there's no you didn't have to purchase anything so um this opportunity was made available to anybody in the district who wanted to take it and um so anyone who wanted to take it, they signed up and then you know took our course. Um we're planning to hold another one for anyone who is uh who maybe wasn't able to make the first
065one and um yeah, I mean we're just going to keep training people on the tools uh or any new tools that come up. >> I think it's great that you've offered opportunities. I I would certainly um hope Jackie I'm sure you can speak to this but just that in the future that there will be like mandatory training that people will need to go through to understand the tools and understand their the pros and the cons. Um >> so I can speak a little bit to that um thanks to our wonderful future of education team of which Mike is a part uh we've been doing extensive AI work um both in the district and beyond um for the past two and a half years. So we have had uh superintendent conference day trainings for AI for
066the entire faculty of all three buildings. Everyone's had experience with different AI tools, some of which uh do come with fees, many of which are free or were free at the time. Um we piloted school AI this year to give a handful of teachers an opportunity to learn from Mike and Keith how to use it and then of course apply it to their classroom. And um after their experiences with it, the future education team will gather some data, see if it's something worth investing in for more of the secondary classrooms. And I know Jen Bruno is also working with AI in different ways, but less so with the elementary students, but uh we have had trainings. We also partner a lot with Boseies and teacher center and other type of um organizations to send teachers
067to trainings in AI um to have them engage in afterchool inservice programs with AI. So we have had teachers um engaged in this work now for about two and a half years or so. >> Great. Thank you. >> Yep. >> And what are we doing to educate the students for AI? So that is where a really great platform like school AI comes into play because the teacher has a lot of control. Whereas with something like notebook LM or uh Gemini or Chat GPT, it's kind of open-ended and it's very hard for us to explicitly instruct students in the use of AI because they can really go all over the place with it. School AI keeps them on track about the topic that the teacher designates as important. make sure that if the student tries to
068ask it other random questions, it brings it back to the topic of focus. And so that's why we felt it important to invest in something like school AI as opposed to open up the channels of any and all um uh AI platforms so that our students can learn how to use it appropriately under the guidance of a teacher. >> Okay. >> Are you teaching how to prompt AI? >> That is part of it. Yes. And so the teacher demonstrates prompting. The students ask questions which is part of prompting. And again, if the students are asking questions that are off topic or prompting off topic, it school AI guides them back to the topic. But like are you prompting them like how I used to do research on you know an like a research app where
069you would >> separate the words with and or or in order to get certain things like when you put in a prompt if you don't word it correctly you're not going to get the right answers. Are you teaching the students how to appropriately and accurately put in information so that the information that they're looking for comes out versus like >> yes any teacher who is using AI and I believe that that was part of the school AI training that Mike and Keith gave. Any teacher that's using AI or experienced any of our trainings has heard a lot about prompting and how to prompt and then demonstrating for students when they use AI. I don't think there's a lot of use of AI in the classrooms because they're trying to teach students how to research on
070their own, but um when they do, the prompting is a factor in there. >> What about things like um making sure the information is true? Are you like is that part of it? Teaching students how to appropriately use it, how to prompt, get it to prompt and how to know when like how to uh resource monitor or like >> I think we're still climbing that hill with adults as demonstrated by Mike. It's nice to have to just remind everybody that um AI does not always give you accurate information. You need to check your sources. But yes, teachers are >> Wikipedia versus like a peer-reviewed article. >> Exactly. When teachers do research in general, they're always reminding students about the quality of the research they're doing, the quality of the sites they're using, um how to
071check for information, what a reliable source looks like. That happens a lot with our librarians and they're pushing into classrooms, our English teachers, um social studies, anywhere where research is done really. Um teachers are always reminding students, no matter whether it comes from AI or not, to check their sources and make sure they're using reliable sources. >> It's so hard now. I mean, my mom tried to show me a picture of a tiger bringing a teacup to somebody's front door, and I was like, "No, no, this did not happen." No. So, but it's hard. I mean, it looks She's like, "Look how cute this is." And I'm like, "Oh, no." Like, a Siberian tiger is not bringing a teacup, but it's hard to spot. You can't tell. It's looks like a video. >> Um, so
072I feel like it's so important, you know? >> Yeah. >> To teach our children and our parents and everybody like how >> to spot it. And I I'm not, you know, a master at it or anything, but >> And it's only going to get more difficult. >> And it's only get more >> to spot these things. Absolutely. >> I have to tell you, the kids are way better at it than we are. >> Yeah. >> No. >> Oh, 100%. They are they are better at identifying when something is generated by AI. And I think it's because honestly I feel like their eyes are trained to recognize it in a way that ours are not because of the way that they use technology. right now. I thought like Elf 3 was coming out this year because
073it was an AI generated thing. I sent it to my daughter. I said, "We're going to go see it." She said, "Mom, that was AI." >> So, you know, it's scary that you can be fooled so quickly. And I think that's that's the the scary part of AI, you know, where where people can't tell the difference. But the the more we understand what real looks like, I think the more we'll be able to understand what counterfeit looks like. Um, >> and it's just really good conversation, you know, for our kids to be able to, you know, not be duped in life when they leave here, you know, um, if they can learn how to identify those things now. And I I don't really know that there will forever be a way to identify it, but
074it's an important conversation to have with them. >> Yeah, absolutely. >> Yeah. >> We're in definite strange times. >> Do you feel like you're we're in strange times? It's like, do you feel like this is as scary to you as it is to the adults in the room? >> I don't think so, cuz we're just used to it. >> Yeah. >> We've been on technology forever. >> Yeah. You grew up with it. Absolutely. >> Like all like I see like students like no one goes to Google anymore. Like a lot of kids just go straight to chat GPT. >> I do too. >> Because in Google used to I mean they do it now, but in Google you used to like have to like read the word and find your answer. Go to chat GPT.
075It tells you exactly what you need though. >> Yeah. >> And but even in Google, you search it up and like AI has it. It highlights what you have to do. So you don't have to read anything. Just gives you the answer. >> Yeah. Yeah. >> Kind of kind of makes this more easy. >> Yeah. >> And chat GBT you could follow up too. So you read and you're like, "Oh, but what if?" And then you could just continue, you know, conversa. >> Melissa Melissa, >> do you find that stu students with special needs, this is making it harder for them or easier for them? Like is the tech is technology helping our students all of our students? Well, some we were just chatting about how that can really make studying so much more efficient
076because it's highlighted. It can be colorcoded. It can be bulleted form things that we didn't have growing up, right? So, you have to read and search and search. So, I think if you look at it through that lens of being able to provide accommodations, then yes. >> Okay. And it wouldn't be a blanket statement for everyone of course but >> when the technology is able to create human beings who have every every single attribute of a human being on screen and you cannot tell the difference. That's strange times and and they have done that. There's that movie star now I I forget her name but um completely AI and they're going to be making movies and she does interviews and everything. Alexa, >> it just is >> whacked out stuff. I mean, really, >> we're
077Yeah. Yeah. It's cool. I think >> we're on that roller coaster. >> Okay. >> Thank you. >> Dangerous. >> All right. Thank you, Michael. >> Thank you. Thank you, Michael. That was great. I know I say this each year, but we're very privileged here in Pun Valley to have a technology department that services the students in the way that ours does. Whether it be through data, you know, all the integration work we saw today, whether it be infrastructure upgrades, ensuring that connectivity happens 99.9% of the time and and is also willing to go in and work with teachers and directly with students to provide professional development. Those are three separate departments in many school districts and we are very much lucky and privileged here in Pton Valley that it is all done by a single
078department. So huge kudos to uh Dan the man here who films and edits and does all these other things. He teaches classes and works with students and in his spare time he builds Tiger Tracker which I hope he's um now gotten the copyright for or something like that. So um thank you to Michael Dan and everyone else on the team. >> Thank you. >> Very good. Michael, thank you. >> Way to go Dan. >> H Oh okay. All right. Um, students, do you have a report for us? >> The second quarter ends next Friday, January 30th. The junior class took the English regents on Tuesday, so the rest of us had off. And as Mr. Webb said, on next Wednesday, the 28th, five senior flag football players will be going to Metife for the flag
079football uh >> like Yeah, the flag football day. Um, the club Friends Network, which I'm a part of. We're going to We're like, well, because I'm going to like the Metife thing. I can't, but Friends Network is doing a combined combined like day with or it's like for an hour and a half. We're It's going to be like the Olympics for them and it's going to be with Hen Hud and it's going to be at the inclusion center down the road, but I'm Or it might be here because there's so many people that are like going to it and we're getting t-shirts. This is going to be so cute. But we're doing like like a little like mock Olympics because um with like different activities and like all like the kids in the club are
080going to go and then both programs will be there. >> That's cool. >> Um and then we had building steering last week and we're doing there was talk about like doing like a combined building steering from all the the elementary, middle, and high school so then everyone could communicate about what's going on. And then we are very much looking forward to the snow day that Dr. Luff is gonna give us on Monday. Right. >> No pressure. >> I'm gonna let you record the message. >> Just get your 4 a.m. voice ready to go. You can call it in. >> Thank you. >> Um Okay, Dr. Love. So, uh, I know you've heard us joke a little bit about the internet outage, but obviously the district for a day and a half, the last day and
081a half, uh, has been working, uh, without internet access. It makes you question how life once occurred without ubiquitous access to the internet. Um, but it had nothing to do with it was a line that had broken out on the street, had nothing to do with anything here on campus. It affected many in the region, not just our school district. we were just the lucky ones to be on that line which extends from here all the way into Yorktown. Um, but I do want to right before this meeting sent out a thank you letter and spoke a little bit about resiliency which is as everyone knows our district goal for this year. And it was with you. I mean, while Michael was kind enough to email the administrators at 2:17 a.m., I can only imagine
082the noises his phone was making at that time for him to wake up and realize the internet had gone down um to another text message at 6 something in the morning for us to notify staff that whatever your plans were for today, change them because there will be no internet. But um just speaking volumes to the employees we have here. Our front offices continue to operate. Our classrooms continue to provide instruction. Our buildings continue to function as normal as possible. Transportation buildings and grounds. Even our technology department. Um, I just wanted to really commend everyone's efforts to ensure that instruction continued, our students remained safe, our buildings operated, and we were able to sort of weather that storm. So, thank you to everyone out there um for all you did over the last day and
083a half. The internet came back on about 10 something this morning, and now we were back to normal operating procedures, but um I know it was not without some angst in order for us to get there. So I did want to acknowledge that and thank our parents obviously communications went out to them as well. Uh we had limited phone access and other things. The good news is the protocols that we've put in place in many cases many years ago operated as designed, right? So we never fully lost phone service. We had backups in plan. Paper copies were available for those who needed. Elementary school dismissal was still able to happen. And um while yes, more work and probably more stress, uh we were able to accomplish what we needed to get done. So, thank you
084to everyone. As I know we had mentioned, uh, high school had their concerts. Last week was chorus. This week was band. I was able to attend the band concert last evening. Uh, tremendous, um, efforts on behalf of three different bands. Our jazz band or win ensemble in our concert band. My personal favorite was probably the James Bond um, songs where they went through each of the different James Bond movies. Um, but I'm always impressed by our students, the talent of our students. We even had a student come out and dance uh for the last song of the evening. Prior to this meeting, we held the superintendent's listening hour. Um while a few parents attended from the community, we had a great conversation about many different topics. Um the last being a our uh recent influx
085in vaping or students being caught with vapes at the middle school. I know that Mr. Ricardi sent out a communication or is sending a communication this week that speaks to that amongst other things. And really our big request is unfortunately many of these students are possessing these devices at home whether it be off the kitchen counter, off the dining room table, off the coffee table, wherever they're getting it from. But many of these students are acknowledging that they're in fact obtaining the devices at home and then bring them into school. So, our our public service announcement is just to encourage anyone who has these devices within their homes to make sure they're secure, they're locked, and they're out of the reach of children, our fifth and sixth graders or 10 and 11 years old, and
086certainly have no um should not have any access to these types of devices. We continue to work with our architects and engineers. Uh Mr. Spittle and myself attended a meeting at KG&D, our architect's office, where we met with both the civil engineers as well as the HQAC engineers going through sort of one final review of our plans. Our plans are up at state ed right now awaiting their approval. Once the plans are approved, we'll begin the bidding process where we will put the project out there and hope to entice um companies far and wide to submit a bid to complete that work. And we still remain hopeful that some of those companies will be able to mobilize and begin the work as early as this summer. While certainly not all of the work will be
087completed this summer. Um, as you'll remember with the first failed vote that delayed the project significantly and uh put us off of our timeline to complete the work this summer. That forced us to add escalation costs back into the project. And our hope is to get as much of it started as soon as possible to be able to refrain from needing to access those uh additional funds that we put in there for escalation. >> Yes. >> Uh as Michael had mentioned, we continue or we finished our budget review meetings. So Dr. Chan and myself are going to continue to work on developing the budget and you'll be hearing more about it in really next meeting is sort of our full budget kickoff. I think it's our curriculum presentation. Is that correct? Okay. Um, so our
088curriculum presentation with the three building principles will be here and that'll really start our budget presentation season. Our high school, actually I think all three buildings have uh had lockdown drills recently. So we want to thank the law enforcement agencies who come out and participate in those drills. Great opportunity for them to get to know our staff, get to know our buildings, and get to know our protocols. and I appreciate them taking time out of their busy days to come and do so. Uh I've attended several meetings, our chief school administrators meeting, a variety of section one meetings uh around advocacy, athletic council, and we hosted earlier this week our culture and discipline committee meeting which uh that work continues and probably will continue into next school year. We had our universal prek lottery. So,
089uh, 40 students were identified as being admitted, 19 students are currently on the wait list. Um, so that is, uh, those that's information has been communicated with those families and we'll see of those 40 families, how many complete the registration process and accept their positions and how far down that weight list we end up going. Uh, our public service announcement this time of year is for anyone with an incoming kindergartener, someone who will be 5 years of age by December 1st of 2026. I guess now it gets confusing now with UPK. It's different numbers. Uh, we encourage you to reach out to the elementary school and sign up for registration. We currently have 73 students registered, which is actually a higher number than we typically have this time of year. And uh we are hopeful
090for a very large kindergarten class to come in and um take advantage of all of Putnham Valley schools have to offer. Some upcoming events. PTA is their biggest fundraiser of the year. Their pocketbook bingo scheduled for tomorrow at Courtland Colonial. Doors open at 5:30. I don't know if there's tickets still available. >> Yep, >> there's tickets still available. So if you have not done so, you still have time. Our elementary school has their fourth grade winter concert next Wednesday the 28th at 7:00 p.m. High school has honor society inductions on February 4th at 7:00 p.m. and the high school blood drive Thursday, February 5th. And our Aspire celebration celebrating a student artwork is scheduled for Thursday, February 12th, the high school main hallway at 11:00 a.m. I'm looking forward to the unveiling because I have
091no idea who won and what the picture looks like. So, I'm looking forward to it. That's it. Thank you. >> Thank you. Busy, busy. Okay. New business. Um, Mr. Oliver, you want to start with number one, please? resolved on the recommendation of the superintendent of schools to appoint Olivia Roman to a 4-year probationary term as a teaching assistant commencing on January 23rd, 2026 and terminating on January 22nd, 2030 in the teaching assistant 10-year area at the annual compensation of step one of the CSEA salary schedule. Miss Roman holds teaching assistant level one certification. Second. >> Questions or comments? All in favor? >> I I >> opposed. Abstensions. The resolution passes. Number two, please. Resolved on the recommendation of the superintendent of schools to appoint Jennifer Maruis to a probationary appointment as a teacher aid effective
092January 23rd, 2026 for a probationary period of 52 weeks, January 22nd, 2027 at the elementary school on step one of the CEA salary schedule. Second >> questions or comments? All in favor? I >> opposed extensions. Resolution passes. Number three, please. >> Resolved in the recommendation of the superintendent of schools to accept the resignation of lunch monitor Jonathan Serno from the district effective January 30th, 2026 as for document number 1326 attached to the agenda and official minutes of this meeting. >> Second. >> Questions or comments? >> All in favor? I I >> opposed abstensions. Resolution passes. Number four, please. >> Resolved on the recommendation the superintendent of schools to approve the 2026 27 district calendar as per document number 128-26 attached to the agenda and official minutes of this meeting. >> Second. >> Questions or comments?
093All in favor? >> Opposed? Abstensions? Resolution passes. We'll see if we can stick to the calendar. Okay. Um, so I'd like to open it up for public comment on any topic. >> You missed the consent agenda. >> No, we did the consent agenda first. >> Did you? >> Yeah, we did. >> You want to hear it again? >> There will be no public outcry. >> You have to come to the mic, give your name, and make a comment. >> Miss Bar, can we please remove that gentleman from the That's her new role is the Okay. All right. Not seeing any public comment. Um I'd like to talk about upcoming meetings and topics. Dr. Lu mentioned the upcoming budget meetings, but um anything else? >> So February 12th is the next scheduled board meeting. That'll be
094our budget presentation for curriculum. And then the following meeting, February 26th, will be budget presentation. will be our facilities and special education presentations. Two different ones. >> Okay, >> good. >> Unless Melissa wants to do facilities as part of hers. >> She's thinking about it. >> She's dying. >> We'll get back to you. >> Um board member comments. >> Just uh I want to again uh thank um Ryan uh Ryan Odell and also Dr. Misera for two outstanding concerts. I got to tell you, their diversity >> Yep. >> of of music choices, it just wows you. It It's amazing stuff. >> For me, I like the more contemporary things. I love the Bond thing. I love the Shady Grove. Uh but the way they they have motivated these these young people to embrace the the
095musical arts really, we're so lucky to have them. >> Great shows. absolutely fantastic shows. Um, glad to see the building steering committees continuing to go strong. Um, I would say just a little plug, it is a little bit challenging for parents, working parents to be involved in those steering committees. Um, I literally save all of my personal time just so I can sit on them and sometimes I'm just not able to make it. Uh, and so maybe we can think about, I know we've done this before and it hasn't really been successful, but maybe creating a virtual option. Um, if we're going to keep times during the day so that teachers can also be involved. I believe that's why we pivoted to during the day. There was more attendance from parents and teachers were able
096to be involved, which is always great. Um, the work that's happening on all of those committees is tremendous. So, super exciting. But maybe there could be some sort of night option or virtual option for families, more families to um be included and not have to take time off of work. Um that's it from me. >> Okay. Anything else? Um we were going to talk about um town board meetings. So I'm going on the 28th. Um the next one would be February 18th. >> February 18th. >> And then March 18th. an April 15th tax day. So, >> I can do March. >> I could do March. >> I can do April. >> Wait, wait a minute. Janette, >> April. >> And Crystal, you can do April. >> I can do April. >> I'm away in February.
097I cannot do February, >> but I can do the other ones. Sam, can you do >> I can do I can do May. >> Can you do February? >> February. What? Uh, >> February 18th. >> Uh, wait a minute. >> Yeah. Yep. >> What time do they start again? >> And then I can do May. >> Okay, I'll do that. Good. >> So, when did you What did you say? >> I'm March. You said March. >> I'm February. >> May Sam, >> Janette, >> Sasha, >> Crystal, Sasha. >> Yep. >> Okay. >> What day? >> Um May 20th. >> 20th. Yep. and then I can finish up in June and then we'll see what happens after that. Okay. >> Okay. >> I I just want to mention one other thing. Today we had our community
098that cares meeting and Janette, thank you for being there. We had one of the biggest crowds that we've had in a while, but I I'd like to see a little bit more participation um overall from community members as well. Anybody who might be interested in being a part of this. We we have used parents. we have used students in the past uh would be uh outstanding. Uh we did a full range of discussions. Um Mr. McCarti was there and uh he brought up the vaping issue uh that the county is definitely aware of and they're they're trying to do everything they can to quell that but again a lot of it originates at home. Uh so anybody interested uh community that cares CTC it's part of the Putham County organization you just community that cares
099and you can get all the information on the PM county site. >> Um we used to have I know when they first started they asked the scouts to send a leader and the churches to send a leader each >> they talked about that today. >> Yeah. um maybe they need to reach out to those organizations again too so that so that the word what you discussed there then can be more effectively disseminated to other parts of the community. So >> great. >> Jeannie and Grace were also both at that meeting and um in fact Sam brought up religious leaders and Jeannie brought up scout leaders. >> Okay. >> Yeah. >> Good. >> Okay. Anything else? Motion to adjurnn. So move. >> Second. >> Questions or comments? All in favor? I >> Be safe over the
100weekend, everybody. >> Be safe.