001okay thanks for joining us please stand for the pledge i pledge allegiance to the five of the united states of america and to the republic for which it stands one nation under god indivisible with liberty and justice president daley here vice president mcnall here trustee clements here trustee headland here and trustee valentine here uh okay thank you for being here the uh our next board of education will be held that meeting will be held on tuesday february 1st at 7 pm in the auditorium um the board met previous to this meeting for our retreat um and by retreat it's not like a spa retreat um it's although that would be nice it's uh it's an opportunity for the board to um workshop certain items and we had the opportunity today to talk specifically about diversity
002equity and inclusion and how the district or how the board feels that that is important work and we are considering how to move forward with that work so that is um that is what we were discussing at our retreat um [Music] the second item here is our public comment structure so i've prepared some comments that i'm going to read i apologize if they're lengthy i was just trying to be thorough so there were some public comments made during our january 4th meeting and those comments questioned our public comment policy so the board is appreciative of the opportunity to address the question um first it's important for the public to understand that the primary purpose of board meetings is for the board of education to conduct school business they happen in public so that there is
003a there's full transparency but these meetings are not meant to support a public discussion and dialogue there for the board to conduct the important business of the district secondly it's important to recognize that there are rules set by both the open meetings law and the new york state education laws that determine how school board meetings are conducted and we're obligated to follow them beyond that however boards do have some discretion at how they structure their meetings and here at haldane we've decided to include two public comment sections they're not required by law but our aspects that the board feels is valuable we also offer a board reflections and superintendent final thoughts section at the end of the agenda for further sharing with the public and amongst the board members and that is also not required
004by law but a choice that haldane makes the public comment sections that we offer are not a question and answer period but rather a chance for the public to share a statement or question for the board superintendent and greater public to hear each member of the public that chooses to speak is thanks for their comments and the superintendent and or board president responds to that comment either at the end of the meeting during our board reflections or for final thoughts section or in a phone call or email usually within 24 hours occasionally if the comment is quick clear a clear question aimed at a special presentation or an agenda item the superintendent or board president may choose to answer it in the moment it's important to note that nisba the new york state school boards
005association and wipspa the westchester putnam school boards association and nisba the national school board association all recommend that public comment sections are just that for comments not dialogue and in fact our current public comment policies have been held as a standard and in his example for other local school boards who are working on their public comment sections to follow so there are several reasons that the board choses to structure the public comment section in this way some public comments require the leadership to do research in order to provide complete answers some comments do not require factual information and engaging in dialogue may result in an extended unproductive exchange other comments are emotional and inflammatory and engaging in a back and forth would not provide a professional constructive dialogue further other comments require much time and
006explanation to address that would interfere with a smooth meeting another factor is that the board president is the spokesperson for the board but only on matters that have been discussed and previously decided by the board so if a public comment brings up a topic that the board hasn't discussed the board president cannot speak on the board's behalf and the response would necessitate a board discussion instead of a response which would not be an effective use of meeting time so making the decision the decision to not engage in dialogue but rather to just hear the comments is not an effort by the board to stifle public comment communication it's a protocol that the that allows for board meetings to move along smoothly and effectively it's understandable that this may be uncomfortable for a member of the
007public who's expecting a response which is why the board president reads the public comment guidelines at meetings and they are posted on every meeting agenda there are many avenues for a member of the public to have constructive effective dialogue with the board or superintendent about school matters the board and superintendent are fully available to respond to emails phone calls and have in-person meetings with community members who wish to do so and in fact we pride ourselves on being very available to the public the board is proud of the way that we conduct ourselves we have effective and professional board meetings that significantly contribute to haldane's ability to grow and thrive there have been many recent examples of how board meetings can become chaotic and destructive when proper protocols and discipline are not adhered to we're
008hopeful that the community will continue to value the way the board conducts itself and if there's any questions or comments we welcome the you to reach out to us so that we can have an open and honest conversation about it in an appropriate environment so that was lengthy but i wanted to make sure i got to everything does the board have anything they'd like to add or anything that you want to say did i cover everything i guess actually i would say something so you know jen's comments mentioned that it can be it's it's not how we typically conduct ourselves right to be quiet and that it can be it's likely feels uncomfortable to receive silence it can feel uncomfortable not to say something as well and i guess i think i'm speaking for all
009members of the board the silence the the policy is an attempt to accomplish all the things that jen spoke to the fact that we are sitting here means that we care right like the fact that i run i'm here i give my evening to this i give time to this it means it means we care it's why we do it because we really care about the community and it's unfortunate that it's in turn that that silence is being interpreted differently because there's lots of things that folks can do with their time and we're here because we deeply care and i don't think any of us have done anything that suggests the opposite in any of our conduct so that's the thing i would say thank you and i just wanted to say as well you
010know sitting here as an individual as a parent as a community member and as a taxpayer i have opinions on everything that's brought up some things more than others but it's just it you know it would be hard for me to stand up and and voice my opinion knowing that it might not be what jen john or peggy or sean say as well so that was sort of what i've been reflecting on since the last board member board meeting so yeah i'd like to stand up and yell and scream and give my opinions but this is not the appropriate venue for that in that in that context okay so uh hfa negotia uh hba negotiations under update for the community but i think i'll i'll let you have that i'll just mention that we had
011our second session with a mediator last week it was a very constructive session and appreciate the hfa's engagement uh and look forward to having more to share in the coming weeks okay very good um would you like to continue well as you know our workshop meetings have quite a busy agenda so i'll actually uh forego my comments for now and i just asked mrs sniffing to come to the podium we have a special guest this evening and mrs sniffen's going to start with an introduction and we'll go from there so go ahead mrs sniffing welcome yes so uh i have the distinct pleasure of introducing miss kylie falloon to each and every one of you um i've known kylie since kindergarten um and what i can say of kylie is i am sure right now
012she does not want the spotlight on her um that would be typical she is incredibly compassionate caring she's steady she is one of those go-to students in the high school who does her thing and does it well um kylie in addition to being the student of the month at boces and her programming of veterinarians veteran vet science um she also maintains over 95 gpa here at haldane and always has through her entire high school career so i'm incredibly proud of her as i know her mom melissa and her father are as well so with that um i do believe yeah so uh kylie just bear with us we have a video so typically our boces our friends from boces will come and be a part of this presentation however they were not able to do
013so tonight but they did produce a wonderful video that i would like to share uh with the board and with our audience members and with kylie and her family so we'll cue this up [Music] good evening it is with great pleasure that i join you to announce this month's recipient of the putnam northern westchester boces student of distinction award this significant achievement is for students recognized by our staff for outstanding performance and personal growth i also want to take a moment to thank you for your continued support we value our relationship with your school district and look forward to continuing to serve your needs and now for the student of distinction award good evening i'm here to congratulate our student of distinction from the haldane central school district kylie faloon kylie is part of our
014vet science program and she's been in our program for two years kylie is an exceptional student not only does she help in the classroom but her class also attends the muscu farm each friday to help on the farm kylie is a key member of that team that helps the muscu farm family so on behalf of everybody here at the tech center we would like to congratulate our student of distinction from our vet science program kylie falloon [Music] so just switching locations briefly kylie we just wanted to congratulate you on your recognition there you are sorry my mom uh we're so proud of you and your uh how you've represented holiday not only at boces but to hear about the great things that you're accomplishing there and in addition to obviously showcasing some of your work
015on our website because this video will be posted there and highlighting you in next month's issue of halloween horizons we have this certificate here for you as an expression of our gratitude for you uh and congratulations to you and your work at boces so if you can come on up we'll give kylie a round of applause yes our student recognitions are the best part of our our board meetings sure kylie's done great work there um as i mentioned jen uh we have a full agenda on workshop meeting uh night so we'll transition right now into our detail reports if that's okay and i'll ask dr uh i'm sorry this evening's special topic is our middle school detail report so dr silke will come forward and share a little bit about uh the goals for the
016halden middle school and there'll be an opportunity for our board members to ask questions of dr selke as she's going through her report this evening with that marianne welcome and thank you thank you so much dr benate good evening it's my pleasure to provide the board with a detailed report about the middle school tonight i got i had to put my glasses on without my glasses i cannot i cannot do that um so how just a quick program overview most of you know that haldine middle school is comprised of the sixth seventh and eighth grade team teaching standards based interdisciplinary focus small class sizes authentic experience and student-centered work meaning that students have choice and voice in the work that they do so this is an introduction and overview of the pedagogical philosophy of how
017dane instruction the small class sizes of haldane lend themselves to authentic student-centered learning experiences so we're very proud of that the report tonight is organized according to the middle school's goals for this year so our first goal was continuity of instruction and it's coming into the second year of the pandemic i'm really very proud to say that halide middle school has been able and fortunate to have the opportunity to continue to provide full week full in-person without disruption education to our students because of the cooperation in our school and with our community for all of the mitigation efforts um to fight covid so very happy about that and also to point out that one of the things that we've really leveraged is an increased focus on outdoor learning opportunities both on campus and off campus
018so you know this started last year we we always used our outdoor spaces at haldane but last year tents were brought in so we had covered and we purchased furniture so we have covered in furnished areas and i'm happy to say that that has continued through this year so we're very um excited about that and i think it's something that will be a benefit to the housing community that survives past the pandemic for our second goal the strategic coherence and alignment to the haldane essentials so um some of you were part of the strategic coherence planning process and some of you are not but it was a rigorous process where many stakeholders in the community came together and it was decided that critical thinking problem solving communication growth mindset emotional intelligence and wellness were the
019traits that we want our students to learn and perfect and leave with when they are done with their holiday experience their profile of a graduate so to speak so last year in the which was the first year after these were these essentials were established our teachers despite the pandemic came together during faculty meetings and team meetings and had informal kind of introductory conversations about well what does it mean what does critical thinking mean at the middle school what does problem solving mean at the middle school and so on and so forth what does it look like in the middle school curriculum and how do we know that our students are developing skills in these areas in emotional intelligence and in wellness this year those conversations have been solidified through the appr process many of our
020teachers have set goals surrounding embedding one or more of the housing essentials into their curriculum and the exciting part is that they're working on doing so um in a organized and uniform way so what you're seeing here um and what you have access to is miss boonshoff's curriculum overview document ms boonshoft is our second secondary arts teacher so her eighth grade curriculum overview document you have access the board has access to as an exemplar of this work that all all the teachers k12 are engaging in right now and the most exciting part that i'd like to draw your attention to is that there is a piece of the work that asks for the houdini essentials that are being included in the unit so what that affords our faculty the opportunity to do is really understand
021where and purposefully and planfully establish where the essential they're working on fits into their into this unit so you know i would argue that critical thinking has existed at haldane for many years and in many different areas k-12 but doing the uniform curriculum overview allows for a meaningful exploration of how that essential plays into the work or whichever essential the educator has chosen to embed so we're really excited about that work as you remember probably from the september meeting and the great presentation that christine jammin and tara rounds gave to the board upon the board's approval adoption of the mtss plan we adopted a new mts plan this year and we're in the um the very beginning introductory awareness raising implementation stages of the mtss plan dr panante and i have had many conversations about
022how just because a plan is adopted or or or curriculum is adopted or resources adopted it doesn't mean that magically it's going to be uniformly implemented in any given building there has to be work that groundwork that's done so that everyone understands what's included in the plan and also how to implement that so we're in the beginning stages of that work it's very exciting work um at a faculty meeting the i showed the presentation of that christine and tara had done for the board to the faculty and shared the document with the faculty and we have started to use the new student support team language and the supporting details with that and we have had our first universal data team meetings so we're in the very beginning stages of this and i hope that at
023this time next year when i'm doing the middle school detail report next year i'm able to give the board um a nice detailed um kind of follow-through of what it looked like for this year and how it's growing for next year so it's really exciting because this is you know our student support uh goal from this strategic coherence plan and i just really love the idea of how they continuing their continuous efforts in reaching every student and reaching all students needs so our third goal is are comprised of our instructional goals the the structures that have been set up over the past five years are that there's a k-12 instructional council that's made up of all of our teacher leaders and then at the building level we have a middle school instructional council that's made
024up of the team leaders the coordinators for humanities math and science and representation from our special education department so together we we spend time on a monthly basis honing in what our goals are for that particular year instructionally on the building level so this year we're focusing on as always project-based learning so project-based learning is is as you know a dynamic classroom approach in which students actively explore real-world problems and challenges and acquire a deeper knowledge this mechanism for learning is so developmentally appropriate at the middle school age um during you know during the middle school age the tasks of the young mind are to learn how things work and to understand and to organize so what better way to do that than through project-based learning so president daley shared a funny story about true
025blue with us before the board meeting started and how they middle school is true blue this is our school motto it was collaboratively developed three years ago with faculty parents and and students and um it encompasses our shared understanding of how we want to show up when we come to school adults and kids alike and who we are as haldane middle school so how this plays out is that the students are explicitly instructed of what it means to exemplify teamwork responsibility understanding and excellence at the beginning of the year and then there's refreshers throughout the year so there's there's a common language and a common expectation set out from the start and then those positive behaviors are reinforced or supported if they need to be supported because um the idea is that we're all working
026together to reach this um goal of being true blue adults and students and i'm very happy that the students are oftentimes highlighted in the district newsletter that have been recognized for their teamwork responsibility understanding and excellence lastly in this goal the building level instructional goals you the board has um has been very supportive of the middle level in the adoption of a resource for the next generation science standards our full option science system otherwise known as foss we're in the second year of our foss implementation and last year the board also was very helpful and um and consider it through the process of us looking at math resources and adopting our big ideas math resource that is in its first year um at haldane and just like an mtss plan or any other plan that's
027adopted can't automatically or magically like you wave a magic wand and now that resources is being utilized to its fullest extent anytime there's um implementation there's there's uh there has to be evaluation of that implementation so one of the goals of the building level team is to get together the math teachers sixth seventh and eighth and get together the science teacher sixth seventh and eighth and have them have meaningful time to review how the implementation of the resources is going what are the next steps i'll give you an example for the full option science system in the first year of the rollout we were that spring we were shut down and then the second year we were yet last year we were we were distanced widely distanced and there was at least in the beginning
028of the year a strong there were strong protocols around sharing materials so well the full option science system the one of the reasons why it was adopted or you know why it was selected for a recommendation for adoption is because it's hands-on so um one of the things that the science teachers want to come together and talk about is you know how they capture some of the work that they did to um implement the the resource when we were in shutdown and when we were distanced and also talk to other schools about what they did for the math department they want to look at the electronic piece of big ideas math which was a big reason why it was recommended for adoption a lot there's some gamified uh components to that that you know you
029can't just open and use you have to learn them yourself so that you can teach them to the students to use and then there's also um components online components of big ideas map that allow for stretch problems to challenge students who are above grade level and skill gap closers to help students that are below grade level make achievements and close those gaps in those math skills so this year our math and science educators are collaborating to evaluate the rollout or implementation of those resources that the board was so good to adopt thank you so much i i could talk about the middle level forever as you know so i'm going to stop now and see if there's any questions for for me all right can you just speak a little bit more to one thing
030for me you mentioned miss boonshoff's uh unit overview document and you shared about the work that had been going on with all the staff this year can you just speak a little bit more to that and what the outcome expected outcomes of that are um long term or short term or both this year this year so our hope um as a district is that every teacher k-12 will complete a unit a curriculum overview document which is basically a scope and sequence for one of their courses so this will give us the jumping off point for future years of development and ideally like our big like you know when we when we think big and we really dream about how we could utilize these materials is a searchable document so if mr wick is covering you
031know marine mammal strandings in his ecology class he can search to see well where else um is this taught in you know okay what's taught in fourth grade science so maybe we can collaborate with the fourth grade or it's also taught and it's taught in this 12th grade elective on you know science and politics and you know maybe we could have those kids come down and talk to the ecology kids so it can be a tool eventually for collaboration and interdisciplinary work thank you yeah i have a quick question um i'm sure that a lot of parents out there are surfing the waves of media about impacts of covid on education and a lot of those articles seem to be written at a national level or in different we're in a very different spot here
032because we've been fortunate enough to be in person basically there were some analysis done at the end of the first couple months when we were remote and there were some um findings from that but what would you say to a parent who continues to be facing these kind of news media stories and what are you seeing in the middle school given results to date results this year implementation and any changes that you may be making excellent question thank you i think that you know it would be foolhardy to say oh well you know pandemic hasn't had any impact at haldane you know because that's that's an oversimplification i think it is true that our students fared better than most of the students in new york state because we were able to be open five days
033a week you know without interruption all of last year and interruptions continue in in neighboring districts this year and we again luckily have not had um to have that kind of interruption to instruction um however i think that it's going to i think that we'll see the strain of the pandemic in some very specific skills in mathematics and it's that's one of the reasons why i'm very glad that the board moved forward with adopting the resource the big ideas math resource because for our academic intervention services if we could have a uniform resource to address those gaps we can really do a full court press to get students that are exhibiting uh pandemic related strain on their math skills to fluency and get them prepared so that we close those gaps in middle school before
034they're struggling in in high school with it [Music] you mentioned that the it wasn't uh it was impossible to implement the new science curriculum over the past couple of years because of the distancing not with fidelity that's what i meant to not to implement with fidelity thank you for clarifying that do you think it's gotten better and the reason why i'm asking is i mean i'm just you know i'm harkening back to the day i remember like visiting you know when my child was in elementary school going into school and kids are so excited about science but something sometimes happened in the middle grades where they kind of many students become less interested in science it would be so great to have a curriculum that really keeps that excitement and engagement um around science and
035anyway i'm just wondering are you able to implement with greater fidelity at this point or do you hope to be able to assume definitely this year over what obviously the first half of the 1920 school year things were in full swing and the teachers had time and they had there was training included with the resource so there was a good launch and then with the shutdown our teachers kept excitement going despite the inability for students to touch the materials and do the labs that are associated with the foss resource and then you know this year over last year is a huge difference because there's not the protocols around materials like student at the beginning of last year students were not able to share materials in this without them being like sanitized in between and now
036we know that just the spread of covet is less likely to be through those fomites or germs on the materials so students are able to are able to you have hands-on and you see them they are really excited they're you know um almost every lesson in sixth seventh and eighth grade is hands-on and it makes a huge difference for students ex at this age accepting science and accepting themselves as scientists when they're in science class yeah thank you sean have any questions over there is he good okay thank you thank you so much appreciate it um okay so we're gonna go into our public comment section which i spoke extensively about earlier um is there any public comment okie dokie going into the information report so i'll turn it over to our student advisor mr
037pareva thank you first thing i have here the haldane ski club is having their first trip of the year this sunday so like high interest from grades uh six to twelve and then we also have two more that are gonna be planned uh throughout the year so in case you when they're able to make it on this one there's two more there and they're all gonna be uh just day trips so um additionally we saw a survey being sent out for the junior and senior class trip to dc to gauge interest for that and accounted for the possibility of 50 capacity or 100 capacity just depending on what the situation is going to be like in march uh that's planned and finally the poetry out loud was held on last tuesday january 11th where students
038were able to choose a poem memorize and recite it and then we actually had two students percy parker and sam bates who are moving on to the regional so that's happening in the future thank you so much miss jammin so the big item i wanted to highlight as we go into the next couple weeks is that we're getting ready for kindergartners again so kindergarten registration is happening february 7th through 11th prior to that our families are able to use family id which our families in the secondary school may be familiar with from signing up for sports and for field trips and such so giving our families the ability to upload forms electronically and then be able to complete the registration process partially remotely before they call or meet with ms hilka and finalize that registration
039process should hopefully expedite the process for our families make it easier for them to ensure that they have all of their forms in order and get their kindergartner registered so our information night for parents is currently scheduled for january 27th at seven o'clock we're really hoping to have it in person usually it would be an event that would be held in the kindergarten classroom to give our families a visual of what what kindergarten classrooms look like but attendance is often higher than our rooms would allow so the current plan is for it to be held in the auditorium to allow for distancing between our families but still have an in-person an in-person chance for our families to ask questions and hear from our kinder and teachers and myself however with the way things are right
040now we do have the backup plan of uh shifting to zoom um if things are still at the the high rate that they are in the community so as soon as that information as soon as we make that decision it'll get posted on the website and sent out to families but kindergarteners are still going to come next year and we are excited to welcome them into the building in something that happens in a normal fashion i want to thank our our teachers and our families for their work as we came back from break the numbers were much higher in the community but thanks to parents who were diligent with keeping children who were exposed home and being honest about those exposures and about any symptoms that their children were having we have had very few
041cases of positive students or staff being on campus so we've had high numbers but a large majority of those numbers have been home when they tested positive and therefore not continued to expose others to to any to any spread so i want to thank our families for that diligence and then our teachers for working to get those students right on to remote as quickly as possible it can take up to 24 hours as if i find out in the morning our teachers are already in the process of teaching and getting things going or if i find out late at night so it can take up to 24 hours but they've been working really hard to get kids onto remote or get them asynchronous materials to start to keep them engaged with their class and then
042on to remote classrooms so as smooth as possible given the circumstances and everybody doing their their very best any questions all right thank you so much dr silke come back talk to us some more thank you for the warm welcome to the mic a second time and i i'll keep my comments brief but i really would like to highlight how much fun the middle level is having with the pta and the pta subcommittees this year so apart from the community read that i've reported to the board the our vp jeff silverstein is part of the planning committee and and working toward having a community read in the spring in addition to that i'm we're also working with teresa lagerman in the sixth grade on friday we'll have our first learning differences project planning session myself
043and mr sniffin and miss lagerman to see what's possible for this year if you remember last year we we brought camp the documentary um to the sixth grade and full full virtual visit from the film director james lebrock as well so i'm really excited to see what we're able to do this year um and the middle level has also been working with robin mourinho and the edi subcommittee of the pta the if you haven't had a chance to check it out check out the board that is right up this staircase the edi committee has been working with christine jamin to supply materials to decorate that board for monthly for you know a month to honor the monthly campaigns native american awareness month is up there right now and i'm working with robert mourinho to bring
044an increased awareness to lunar new year this year is the year of the tiger and we're really excited to bring that awareness to our middle school students as well thank you thank you miss niffen happy new year to tag along to what christine had said we started at the high school after the break with approximately 45 students in virtual environment tomorrow we will have eight so i really do think that we i'm hoping that we're seeing that trend within new york state we're also seeing the trend at haldane high school and our numbers are decreasing i think there's a couple variables that have played into that but one of them i think we're eight is a nice is a nice number i'm excited to get zero with that um i know we spoke a little
045bit about poetry out loud but our advisors to the literary magazine miss martinez and miss pierce were also able to send three students to the boces masters writing workshop on december 7th sam bates chase coulson and percy parker were able to attend bring their work and have additional professional writers give them some feedback and help them in editing their work in addition to that there was an irish science fiction writer david rudin who gave a keynote to all involved the advisors are looking forward to in the spring when the young authors conference will take place at boces in may and opening that up to all students within the literary magazine club in addition to that in social studies if you noticed on my report we have another feature on pbs eloise pearsall who did a
046piece on issues facing students today and she will be featured on january 27th and we will be sure at the high school to post that link on the website to share eloise documentary work on issues facing students today thank you awesome thank you so much miss rounds good evening um so thinking about christine's report and thinking about kindergartners returning as you all know kindergartners with ieps students who are receiving cpsc services will also be transitioning to kindergarten so this is the time that we start thinking about answering those parents questions having them in to talk to them a little bit more about the transition and with that uh we've been working closely with teresa lagerman again from learning differences committee to develop a frequently asked questions document for all grade levels and for transitions so
047focusing on transitions so teresa's been working hard talking to parents collecting those frequently asked questions and i've been gathering questions from teachers to add to that document we're collecting those questions and and answering the questions and we hope to be posting an faq uh document on the website as soon as that's complete and as i i was writing this and thinking about this i thought you know i'm saying you know the pps department and the cpsc and the csc and i think i'm going to add to that document a frequently used acronyms list for parents to look at as well i think it would be very helpful there's so many of them now in addition to this we continue to work on developing a very robust mtss rti structure we've been working on this ongoing
048and our teachers are really giving a lot of thought to uh pre-referral interventions and our special ed department at the elementary level this month met and really brainstormed and discussed interventions that can be put in place before a student gets to the student support team so that that when that referral is made and that teacher is looking for support for a student they will have already been able to implement strategies through you know dawn rosano one of our school psychologists has offered to go into the classrooms give consultation give strategies we have the behaviorists doing the same thing and many of our other related service providers and we have some teachers who have great resources our literacy specialists shared a whole list of interventions and a whole list of short screenings that can be done
049prior to coming to the student support team so often we're able to give those tier 1 and tier 2 supports right in the classroom and often we we find success with them and we see students making progress so we continue to build on that and make it a robust program thank you thank you mr elder good evening everybody during the past two months myself and the technology integration specialist miss leah horn have been attending a series of workshops that are designed to support the submission of our district's instructional technology plan for the 2022-2025 school years new york state education department of the office of education design and technology collects and reviews key information on districts instructional technology plans every three years and the current plan that we have on file ends on june 30th 2022
050and as we have learned in the past couple of years much has changed in the area of instructional technology since the last plans were drafted in 2018 and we look forward to this as an opportunity to develop an uh a technology plan that's aligned to our district strategic coherence plan and also reflects uh the tremendous growth that many districts have seen in the area of instructional technology in the last couple of years due to the uh the pandemic so we look forward to presenting that plan to you later on in the spring when it's completed and during my last board of education in the area of human resources board of ed meeting i shared with you that i would be representing the held in central school district at the teacher diversity job fair event on
051saturday february 22nd since then actually from an email that was forwarded by ms sniffen um the haldane central school district will be participating in the suny new pulse job fair which is held on march 16th and that one will be in person and each of these heldings participation in each of these events provides an opportunity to expose our learning community to a bunch of prospective employers and allows us to kind of continue to spread the work that's going on in heldain and express our value in missions to people as well as kind of keep a nice fresh group of potential candidates should any uh job vacancies open and part of a healthy human resources development process is always having a system of interviewing key people or individuals who might be interested in working in our
052district so as vacancies arise we're not necessarily starting from scratch every time but might have a welcome batch of individuals to start calling from when that happens thank you i actually just have a quick question sorry i'm sorry to pull you back just for my from my understanding am i correct in saying that the instructional technology plan is based on how we use technology to deliver instruction rather than instruction on technology correct okay yes uh it's multi-phased the actual instructional technology plan has multiple facets to it and they keep adding on to it um in three-year cycles which is one of the reasons why myself and miss horn have been attending a series of workshops to kind of get us kind of up to speed as to what some of the new areas are but
053generally speaking yes the idea is the the ways in which the district is planning or setting goals for using instructional technology for the advancement of educational learning for its students within a district perfect thank you very much thank you mr cowan good evening i'd like to just share a mid-winter season report with you folks this evening it has been a challenging winter season for our student athletes and coaches due to covid and weather causing numerous schedule changes to practice and games however this has not stopped our student athletes from working hard improving their skills demonstrating positive attitudes and most important having fun our boys and girls modified basketball teams have shown incredible improvement since the start of the season and will play the bulk of their schedule beginning this week through february 3rd our girls
054jv basketball team is a young group of athletes five seventh and eighth graders and 4 9th graders who have improved tremendously since the start of their season they often play against teams of 9th and 10th grade girls and have risen to the occasion with multiple wins and hard-fought games our boys jv team has started the season winning six of their first eight games and doing so in dominant fashion they have been fun to watch and the thought of when they move to varsity is very exciting the girls varsity basketball team continues to improve and has taken steps towards reaching their full potential this was highlighted when after losing to croton harmon in december by 11 points our girls responded by beating croton-harmon at home last week by 24 points i have complete confidence on our
055girls and believe they will continue growing as individuals and as a team and i am very excited to see what the postseason holds for them our boys varsity basketball team is off to their best start in years winning eight of their first nine games the highlights for the first half of the season have been wins over alexander hamilton and chester opponents we could face again in sectional and regional championship games our winter track team has competed in four events to this point in the season highlighted by their performance at the dendy invite at rockland community college on january 6th luke perella placed third in the 600 meter eloise pierce hall placed second in the 600 meter and andrea vasconcelos placed fourth in the triple jump i'm always amazed at how i went to track athletes
056toughness and commitment as i watched them run in the cold daily and when i set up their bus trips they also take long trips so hats off to our winter track athletes i'm proud of all of our winter athletes and coaches efforts thus far and confident that their efforts will continue for the remainder of the season and i'd just like to take a moment uh to just say thank you to our haldane community uh for being supportive and and demonstrating patience with with um our spectator policy in the gym uh we've really done a nice job uh keeping our our teams and our fans safe so i do appreciate that thank you i just had a quick question for dan dan come out just just exactly what you said is there been a change to
057the spectator policy indoors or is it still the same with the currently we have each of our athletes at the jv and varsity levels have four game passes um that they can give to family or friends our coaches also have four game passes so it's a it's a bit more restrictive than what it was prior to winter recess and we'll continue to evaluate the numbers that we have within our community and hopefully uh within you know in the coming weeks we can take a look at taking some of the restrictions off thanks you're welcome mr walsh come on down good evening the facilities department has had a very busy few weeks we were able to accomplish a lot of work both contracted uh and in-house facility staff we had belfor restoration on site to conduct
058a ductwork cleaning throughout the elementary school building they used hepa vacuums to clean the rooftop unit supply and return duct work as well as diffusers and vents throughout the elementary school wing this is related just to preventative maintenance work and not necessarily pandemic related work young equipment sales was on site to replace the the wall panning throughout the gymatorium we're still waiting the padding that goes up above the stage we hope to have that over the next few days even and we had tbs controls on site to replace some heat valves and heat valve actuators to the heating system within the main building as for the contract or facility staff we're able to complete significant amount of work as well over the past few weeks we painted interior offices in the district office conduct enhanced
059cleanings of stairwells interior spaces clean carpeted spaces and burnished floors we've also had a few snow related events over the past few days and we look to have a few more over the next few days as well joe lombardo plumbing and heating of rockland they are the vendor of the contractor that is that was awarded the phase two of our capital construction plan the electrical mechanical upgrades they have also started physical work on campus over the break they were able to remove some non-operational equipment both in our um near the cafeteria and on our boiler room in anticipation of having those replaced we're continuing to work with joe lombardo with their schedule when equipment's supposed to arrive as well as a school calendar to have that work you know continue out throughout the school year
060that's all i have unless there's any questions thank you so much thank you very much so much going on thank you everybody uh we're going into consent agenda minutes may i have a motion please second these are minutes from the january 4th meeting any discussion all those in favor aye aye any opposed okay our committee minutes are here the technology committee minutes from december 13th for review going into consent agenda financial may have a motion please so moved is there any discussion i just had a question about um what services we were talking about from officers so uh and would you mind just speaking to your uh with respect to item j1 right maggie would you mind just speaking to how we establish health and welfare services and in particular uh with this one with
061wappingers which services are being rendered or have been rendered the um haldane gets to build health and welfare services from school districts where they might have a private or parochial school within their boundaries and our students attend those private or parochial schools but the public school district supplies perhaps a school nurse to that school so we're billed for those services based on how many of our students attend you'll see more over the rest of the year maybe from arlington or dobbs ferry or somers because our students attend those private schools or parochial schools within those boundaries thank you can we do something similar for for mana too correct and for certain services we did um over the last couple of years we have not built because we haven't because of the situation we haven't had
062to place anyone there there are other services that we provide to students that attend manitou that we would bill for because they're within our boundaries and and before you go maggie i i think since we had three items under this did you also have a question related to since anne's here first uh surplus textbook or surplus books i did i was just wondering it's it's a lot of books right for the look i was just wondering if this is something that happens annually or if it happens it happens every year we do have surplus and obsolete items that get surplus that the board would have to approve once a year i think that um there was a list that didn't make it to the board last time we we had uh surplus items so this
063might be an extra long list but um there might be some damaged books that the librarians find in the in the library um some that just no one uses anymore um if they're out of date so we do replace the ones that are damaged that we want to use but in order to get rid of them the the principal will look at the list that the librarian suggests that we surplus and some of the books are offered to teachers for their classroom library otherwise we try to get value for them there are certain companies that if we give the numbers of the books they'll buy them from us if no one wants them we try to find someone who might take the donation it is harder and harder to get rid of old books now
064because there's so many digital that people are interested in um that's what those lists are for thank you okay you're welcome and then lastly i know there were some questions regarding the sports merger so if i can ask mr cowan just to come forward and address those i've just had a few um phillipstown little league families uh mostly middle school parents who have questions about the modified team and if there's gonna be a modified team and i know you and i have talked about the modified team but i was just curious um i just had a couple questions about um the softball the varsity um what is this a temporary agreement with the contract with putnam valley hive allowing the girls to play varsity yes so um david kantrowitz the athletic director of putnam valley
065and i had a discussion around varsity softball we had at least one junior who played softball outside of school and had an interest in playing at the varsity level we are not offering a varsity team this year because of low numbers putnam valley's numbers were low as well and so david and i agreed to a short-term merger which would allow our juniors and senior players from haldane interested in softball an opportunity to play at the varsity level this year in putnam valley and the um the second year to that would be next year when we intend on having a varsity team should play should putnam valley not have enough players that we would take them on in the second year and then that would be the end of the merger and so next year they'll
066be here the the practices and it'll be sort of handled by haldane as opposed to this year where they're down in putnam valley correct yes assuming assuming they don't have enough numbers to field their own team um then we would we would return the favor next year and allow their players to come and join our team will this impact the jv team no it will not um this year we anticipate our junior varsity softball team will be um there should be a probably half the team that that's in ninth grade we do have a couple of tenth grade girls interested in softball and then we could potentially have highly skilled seventh or eighth grade students assuming they're physically mature enough participate in the athletic placement process and through that process could could be eligible to
067play at the jv level as well and then they'll still be the modified and we will still have the merger for modified with garrison uh with garrison as the host school and my last question is just with transportation i know that practices this year will take place at putnam valley high for the varsity team does holding provide transportation for practices or no so traditionally haldane does not provide transportation for for sports mergers um so the student and her parents are aware of this as well that um if she commits to playing at putnam valley that they will be responsible for providing transportation to practices and games that's it thank you so much okay you're welcome uh any further discussion or questions okay all those in favor aye any opposed all righty going into consent agenda
068personnel may i have a motion please so moved second is there any discussion i just wanted to say that um i will miss jane shanahan she's um a neighbor and i worked with her um i worked with her for working on the yearbook she and she's just always really positive and wonderful to reach on the other line of the phone so i'll miss her we've got herself 24 years two more years so two years yeah yeah we got two more years that's what she told me at least is he says that right i'm just kidding okay uh all those in favor aye any opposed all right unfinished business so um nisba area 10 director election i'm gonna open this up for a discussion so we can determine who we're voting for and then i will
069turn it over to uh catherine to read the resolution with the person we are voting in and that's when we were actually vote so um nisba area 10 director election may have a motion please so moved second so um any discussion so we have three uh candidates frank carraton cheryl brady and debbie gotti uh we thank all three of them for throwing their hats in the ring they all are highly qualified um i happen to know frank hereton through my work at westchester putnam and nisba so i was advocating for him uh with you guys at our last meeting um but is is there any feeling about that would anybody like to advocate for another candidate i think dan's i you know i spoke again just to reiterate what j what jen said like really
070thanking everybody for being willing to take on this important uh role every everyone who's running has just done so much for public education but you know if jen knows mr harrington and thinks really highly of him and and she does um that you know that sways my vote you can read a lot on paper but it's not the same as actually getting to see folks um in action and so uh and uh so yeah that's my thinking is everybody okay with that yeah yeah okay so um i should turn it over to miss platt and then open that up right okay so go ahead be it resolve that the board of education hereby cast their vote to frank harrenton to fill the unexpired term of peggy zugaby on the new york state school boards association
071nisba board of directors representing area 10 for 2021 2022 and authorizes the district clerk to execute any documents consistent with this motion okay may i have a motion please some moved subscribe uh any further discussion thank you to frank uh all those in favor aye aye any opposed okay frank has haldane's vote uh going into unfinished business um our policy review so um miss platt i'll have you read thee be it resolve that upon the recommendation of the superintendent of schools the board of education hereby adopts the following haldane central school district policies as attached 1510 regular board meetings and rules 5640 smoking tobacco and cannabis and 7110 comprehensive student attendance may have a motion please so moved second any further discussion about these policies jen if i could just make a brief comment that
072i i wanted to note that john had some feedback on policy which were minor in nature but i think good feedback so we did go ahead and i made some changes to policy 5640 which i'm seeing in my copy is highlighted in blue just with respect to being inclusive of cannabis and vaping advertisements or promotional items being prohibited on campus so just from a process perspective i i think you and and i had a good discussion around that uh and then it would be good for follow-up with me you and peggy just if there are this feedback in between first reading and second reading uh how we want to process that with the board john's feedback was relatively straightforward it's an easy fix but i can it's good it's a good reminder that i could
073envision there may be a policy in the future where the feedback is much more substantive and may delay our anticipated process of moving towards a second reading and adoption so i just wanted to make that note yeah thank you any other comments okay uh then all those in favor aye aye aye any post great thank you policy review second reading this is not here for adoption at this time this is here as a second reading of the age of entrance um the public will remember that the board brought forth the possibility of changing its policy that is currently a student needs to be five by december 31st to changing it to the student needs to be five by december 1st that is as much of a change as we are legally allowed to make with
074new york state um and it puts us in line with other uh districts in our area and throughout the state um and dr bernante sent a letter out to the community uh last week i think it was last week or week four sharing the uh board's interest in looking at this policy and perhaps making some changes or shifts um does anybody have anything they'd like to share just wanted to add that we also have provided the policy to our local pre-k providers which was something that the policy committee had discussed some time ago when we initially reviewed the policy and we're keeping it on as a second reading as opposed to adoption because we still feel we just put it out there and drew the public's attention to it we'd like to leave this potential
075comment period open for two more weeks before to see what other thoughts community members may have to share with us for consideration before moving to either further changes or putting it back on putting it on the next agenda for adoption by the board and i think it's important to note that and uh dr bernante i believe you wrote this in your your email but if there were parents because the board is uh potentially adopting this for this coming year for 2022-23 so if there were parents who this uh were expecting to be able to let their december 30th baby go to kindergarten now all of a sudden the policy changes um that there will be consideration for that that if somebody had plans to send their um child to school uh and they were born
076between december first and december 31st uh that we would we would work with those parents work with those families that's correct yeah peggy do you want to well i mean i can't remember what we said last time you know i'll be direct if i had my druthers i would push for an even earlier cutoff date i think the research is very convincing to me and i've looked at it for a while that there is um an academic benefit uh for being a little bit older uh it's been demonstrated pretty widely in quite a number of studies and i think um you know since we've had the state standards have really changed you know quite a lot we expect an enormous amount from kindergarteners and first graders um that's just my personal opinion right but but
077but so i think i want to make sure that folks understand that this policy change was approached in a thoughtful informed way while also recognizing um the potential inconvenience it should show to some you know to to impose on some parents so it wasn't something that we took lightly even disregarding though my personal informed thoughts about this bringing it in line with neighboring districts i think makes a lot of sense so it's not this was not arbitrary you know this was a thought out this was something that we thought out and you know discuss so yeah so i don't if the board has any further comments they want to make it this time they can it'll be on our meeting again in two weeks if the public has any further comments i know we have
078received one email about it if the public has any further comments or questions they're welcome to contact us dr bernante miss jammin throwing you in the mix for more information okay so we're moving on to the campus master planning committee i'll turn it over to miss platt be it resolved that upon the recommendation of the superintendent of schools the board of education hereby creates an ad hoc campus master planning committee whose purpose and representatives are outlined herein we have a motion please second is there any discussion about the committee charge in line with what we have been discussing um okay all those in favor aye aye any opposed okay very good um going into the cse cpsc recommendations ms platt be it resolved that upon the recommendation of the superintendent of schools the board of
079education hereby approves the recommendations of the committees on special education and preschool special education as presented we have a motion please so moved second any discussion all those in favor aye aye any opposed okay going into our second uh communication from the public section this is for all school district matters would anybody like to make a comment okay board committee reports uh policy committee update i will uh turn it to peggy if you have anything no any reports well our next meeting is in february um that's it that's it um westchester putnam um i wanted to bring oh my thing isn't working there is an event on thursday night that i'm attending on our behalf on all everybody's behalf but i'm uh inviting you along with me it's a symposium about the um the importance
080of school boards and um there was a quote that i was going to look up on my email but my thing is not coming right now um and a superintendent said you know what what is the most important thing what makes her what makes the school work what what turns the school around and the superintendent said a good school board does and so the um the symposium is about school board service and um successful school board service so i'll let you know if i what i learn and i'll bring it back to you um i guess i would the only thing i would add to that is necessary but not sufficient right there's this distinction like i think a good school board right is like like a foundational thing but that it's all also like
081all the other things on top that happen in the class you know that happen in the classroom a piece of the puzzle a piece of an important piece of the puzzle um and i sent around to you guys that nisba's um annual lobbying conference is now uh virtual so if that inspires anybody to attend and to advocate for better school funding and less unfunded mandates you know you can do that through westchester putnam and i can help you do that if anyone would like to do that and that's it going into board reflections does have anybody have anything they'd like to share nothing other than i didn't wouldn't want luke's third place to go unspecifically remarked upon so congratulations to you okay dr venante do you have any final thoughts just a few i i
082didn't provide covet updates at the beginning of the board report because of our student recognition but i'd be remiss if i didn't mention uh just a few uh because they're impacting some of the you've they undergird some of the reports that you heard here this evening i think i commented two weeks ago that i felt like we were entering one of the more confusing times uh in the management of the pandemic just because of the number of messages that were coming out from uh respected bodies who influence our school policies and some of the um some of the the lack of clarity around some of that messaging and i'm afraid that may have landed on some of our families as we've articulated some of uh school policies so i just want to reiterate i know
083the board knows this but that are our test to stay program so if you're in quarantine your ability to continue to attend school is really is only for students who have been identified as school-based contacts meaning you came into contact with somebody inside of school who's covered positive and the rationale for that is because we know now uh based on what we've observed over the last two years is that copit really hasn't demonstrated to spread inside a school setting because of all the procedures that are our school takes uh to keep kids safe i think so many of our families just by observation this weekend of my email inbox and talking to some of our principals have read about test to stay in the headlines and you know there is some nuance to it so
084many feel like well my child is quarantining perhaps because of a contact outside of school they should be eligible to come into school for tests to stay and that's not how testis day is set up it's not how it works and i think there's some confusion regarding that uh that being said i'm encouraged as ms sniffin uh cited uh uh that our numbers do appear to be getting lower my hope is the the peak of this was last week uh and that our continues contin our local numbers uh continue to um go down and that we won't have many students quarantining really from any uh for any situation uh we'll begin to welcome more fans back to our interscholastic sports game events and we'll again not be so worried about whether or not we have
085the staffing on any given day to keep our school opens i think we've weathered the bulk of this last week was being the most difficult week and we'll begin hopefully to move on from it we're not there yet but i think we're heading there um in these next couple of weeks lastly i just wanted to express my appreciation for the boards time this evening i know we have an opportunity opera a couple of opportunities throughout the year to spend time together in extended session for purpose of retreat the board has always taken this time very seriously i think good things really do and i hope you see that as well really do come from these discussions where we need a little bit more space to talk about policies or other matters of retreat and that
086you see how that can really that helps the administration in setting a purposeful direction in the months ahead so it's not easy in the middle of january to meet in a 4 30 in the afternoon prior to uh a board meeting i know that for all of you but it is time really well spent and it does have a significant influence on the leadership of the district in the days and weeks months that follow so thank you for that very good thank you um okay i'd like to make a motion to adjourn may i have a second please second all those in favor aye aye any opposed i dare you [Music] you