001Very cute. Good evening. This is a regular scheduled Board of Education meeting. The Board of Education was an executive session in accordance with open meeting law 105D, discussions regarding proposed, excuse me, pending or current litigation. Medicare Advantage Plan NYSHIP, and Open Meeting Law 105E, collective negotiations pursuant to Article 14 of the Civil Service Law. Teacher, teaching assistants, monitors, maintenance, and 2627 school calendar draft review. And Open Meeting Law 105F, specific personnel matters, possible employee termination, staffing review, possible student transportation issue, and agenda review. We ask you to remain standing after the Pledge of Allegiance, which will be recited by students from Unity Drive Pre-K Kindergarten Center, Ms. Ferreira, Principal, and Dominic Santora, Center Reach High School Senior from Center Reach High School, who will sing the Star Spangled Banner. I would now like to invite
002Ms. Ferreira and her students and Dominic Santora to the podium, please. So I just want to say a few words about our students of the month. So when I asked the teachers to, you know, talk about these students, a lot of Beautiful words were said, which I'm going to let you know right now. So for Ryan, Mrs. Gorwitz said, you constantly demonstrate exemplary behavior, a strong character. You're a wonderful role model. You are kind and polite, willing to share with others, respectful, and consistently follows all classroom rules. You are thoughtful and inclusive, and you make sure that no one is ever left out, and you're always a good helper for Mrs. Gorwitz. Ellie, Mrs. Wilson said that you are always a good role model to all your friends. You are kind and always helps everyone,
003including her teachers. And she can tie her shoes. Nicholas, Mrs. DiVincenzo said, you are a very animated member of the Busy Bee class. You say the pledge every day with such great enthusiasm. You are a fluent reader, and you read to your classmates, and you are a very kind person. Zainab, Mrs. August and Mrs. Gugliero said, you are always kind to others. You follow all the rules and routines. You're always happy and smiling and you do your best work all the time and you are an amazing role model to your friends. And Mila, Mrs. Gomez said, you are always kind to all your friends. You're always willing to help everybody else. You're so enthusiastic about school and you do everything with so much heart and so much spirit. And Caleb, Mrs. Calcara said you are
004kind, hardworking, diligent, and helpful, and you are an excellent role model and a wonderful helper to all the teachers and the students. And as you can see by some of our attire, today was Grinch Day, which is kind of our kindness day. And these students, if you saw the theme, exemplify what kindness means. And they make my heart grow three sizes, as well as everybody else's at Unity Drive. So we want to say thank you to these kind and beautiful students. Thank you, guys. Now you can go back to your families. Oh, sorry. Sorry. All right. Hold it. Hold it. And just, we have our slide, our little, our slide show. Okay, we have our slide show. As I said before, one of the things we work on, and as you can see, we're successful
005at, is kindness at Unity Drive. So we wanted to showcase some of the kindness at Unity Drive. No? No. Am I supposed to do something? It's okay. It's all good. So am I supposed to do something? You are. We are very good waiters, right? We know how to wait. It's okay. It's all good. It always works out in the end. And if not, we can just sing. I can sing anything you want, Dr. Gerald. All day long we've been singing The Grinch. You're a mean one, Mr. Grinch. I know it's not the same with pictures, but if you want I can just say what we had to move it along. I could also just show you. Oh, we have a joke, right? Remember one of our jokes? What do you call seven when it's not
006feeling well? Six, seven. And what do you call a snowman when he's a baby? Or have these children? These are our Friday jokes. It's very punny. Okay, so we'll do like an old-fashioned show and tell. All right, ready? Put your readers on. Okay. So we're going to talk about kindness at Unity. Okay. That was the first slide. So kindness, empathy, and compassion are essential building blocks in young children's social-emotional development. At Unity, we create a positive and safe environment where students feel respected, safe, and comfortable, and free to explore and learn. Kindness teaches students to listen, to share, and cooperate. I'm reading a story. We do our turkey feathers for turkeys. Starting in November, our students decorate turkey feathers, and parents and families send in $2, which goes toward food baskets for our Unity families
007in need. And those of you who have ever seen our turkey, it gets really, really big. And the kids love to look at the turkey and see how big it gets every day. I know Ms. Lambert brings her class down, and they look every day to see how big it got to find their feathers. Then in December we do something similar called snowman holiday cheer where we do the same type of thing with snowflakes and the money raised also helps families in need for the holidays and again they go down and they look to see how many snowflakes are on the big unity snowman who tends to melt every day and Mrs. Gorwitz puts up a mitten tree and the mitten tree people bring mittens and hats and scarves in and those get donated to
008Lighthouse Mission And they like to come and decorate the tree. And all around, like today, we do Kindness Day, and we have our hearts grow three sizes when we walk around, and we make sure that everyone's being kind to each other, and we like to catch our kiddos being kind. And then my last slide was just showcasing our... kiddos here who are kind and generous and helpful every single day and we're very proud of them and we're very proud of Unity and Unity is the epitome of kindness and empathy and if anyone ever visits you can feel the love and you can feel the happiness at Unity Drive. So thank you. Thank you, and we will be sure to have that up on our website so that you guys can all go on or anyone
009else can go on and see it and Thank you, and thank you to the students of unity drive. We are very proud of you as well. So thank you And we want dumb we want to thank Dominic as well. You did a beautiful rendition. Thank you for that. It was very nice and now for our PTA PTSA report if I could please have mr. Michael Martin's Dean D Domenico, Vice President of Unity Drive Pre-K Kindergarten Center. Good evening. This is the Unity Drive PTA President's Report as of 12-17-25. This year has been a tremendous success as we are proud of all that has been accomplished since the first day of school. Thanks to the support of our family, staff, and volunteers, the PT has made a meaningful impact onto our school community. Since the start
010of the school year, we have hosted and provided staff welcome back lunch. Welcome back picnic for all students and families free of charge. Staff appreciation treats for each holiday so far. We did a Halloween book gram and provided each child in the Unity Drive School fall themed book. We did a fall paint night, and then we just past Friday completed a holiday spectacular, which we invite each class to donate a themed basket, and we do kind of like an auction on that. Through our fundraising efforts, we were also able to prepay. I've been on the board for the past four years and haven't been able to do this arts and education program by December of this year. which in arts and ed program ensuring enrichment opportunities for all of our students upcoming events so far
011upcoming events Santa Santa is visiting Unity Drive with a small gift that the PTA has provided to Santa Winter Bingo, which is another free event that we're able to host this year We're trying a new thing this year called the Valentine date night Which each student gets to bring a special person and they get to enjoy a slice of pizza salad and a drink And then due to great success for the Halloween book fair Sorry book gram. We're also going to do a Valentine's Day book gram where we also be providing each child with a Valentine's themed book We are busy planning these wonderful events and are deeply grateful for the support our community provides to our PTA and to the school. Finally, we would like to extend a heartfelt thank you to our principal,
012Ms. Ferreira, for her support and for making us feel welcome and truly part of Unity Drive's team. Thank you. Thank you. And on behalf of the board, we thank you and all of our PTA volunteers that help ensure our students have even more fun. So thank you. And now if I could please have Dr. Cook to the podium. This is your presentation. Are you doing? Okay. So for budget presentation number one, music and arts. I'll need it up there. There you go. Good evening, everyone. I'm pleased to be here today. And I'm also pleased that so many of our students that are in the music department are actually going to see this presentation tonight because normally they would not see something like this. I have to take this off. I'm a musician. Okay, so it
013gives me great pleasure to actually be the first budget presentation this year so that you can see our program overview and what we're able to do with the funds that we are so graciously provided. So first of all, this is last year's presentation. Can we switch to this year's presentation? Right. I did a new one. It's got December 25. No, it's December 25 on it. We're not in March. That's when I did my last one. So here's a million dollar idea. Smoke detectors that shut off when you yell, I'm just cooking. Why is Peter Pan always flying? Because he never lands. And I like this joke because it never grows old. I know. What does an escalator say when it stops working? Nothing. It just stares. How much does a chimney cost? Nothing. It's on
014the house. Oh, here's one for the little kids. I told my daughter, go to bed. The cows are sleeping in the field. She said, what's that got to do with anything? I said, that means it's pasture bedtime. Oh. See, they're leaving. What do you call a person who runs behind a car? Exhausted. What's Australia's, what's interesting is Australia's biggest export is boomerangs. It's also their biggest import. Okay. Hold on, I'm doing one more. Dogs can bark up to 500 times per day, but that's just a rough estimate. I'll be here all night. Okay, so I have like 10 jokes memorized that you've heard most of. So I started saving them as I laugh at them on Facebook. And this way I have all new material for the January 15th faculty recital. See? So plug. You
015like the plug? So January 15th, I hope you're all at the faculty recital. It's going to be amazing. Always is. Okay. So anyway. Oh yeah, these are this year's kids. Okay, thank you guys. All right, Middle Country Music and Fine Arts Program Overview and Budget. So welcome again. Just get going here. I like to show a little bit of everything we do before we get started. You see Caden up in the top left. He's our All-State student that went to All-State this year. We got three in, but one was able to go. I'll explain that later. Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa. Go back. Why did that move? I have a thing here, so I'll use it. Okay, so Caden got to go, but I want you to look at his shirt. These are the shirts
016that Arlene made happen because she said, why don't all of our Allstate musicians have Allstate shirts? So it says Middle Country New York Allstate Musician on it with the big MC new logo. And the Middle Country Education Foundation pays for them each year as a grant to the kids that get into Allstate. So I'm very excited about that. Right below it we have we did Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs this year and that's from there that I do that one good I don't say that word well Then we move over to middle school art with one of our students made that beautiful sculpture Then we go to photography the reason I'm showing photography this year is we had a cell phone committee and the cell phone committee stated that there should be no reason
017we use a cell phone in school because once you give a little bit you gotta you know you take an inch you get a mile kind of thing so Our photography classes in the past have used cell phones in order to take pictures. So instead, we've been able to get these gorgeous Canon Rebel cameras on both sides of the district, a set for each school that they share within classes, through a grant that we applied through the state that we're still waiting to get that money back. But it's one of those... Since they made the cell phone rule an unfounded mandate, well, a funded mandate, if you apply for it. So we applied for our art students, and I'm very excited about that. And then I have student artwork from Center Ridge High School, from
018the drawing and painting class. And then right above, I have Mr. Anzalone, a stitch for the day for Halloween, and I just thought that was fun because he's fun, and it kind of shows what we're doing in general music with the kids, and we're just into it. We're just so much fun. All right, so to the next slide. Our program overview, our fine arts and music program are K-12. Our theater program is 6-12. Just to talk you through a little bit of the pictures again, the first student is one of our elementary art students of the month. Below him we have last week's Ox Head concert. We do in school and evening concerts for the elementary students so that they get a run through before they try it with their parents. Then we have our
019Neskame Skamea All-County Musicians, all of whom you're gonna meet tonight. So they are all in this presentation now, which is pretty cool. Another sculpture from the middle school. And on stage we have the maidens of the Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs. I got to remember I have this remote now. So the mission of the Middle Country School District is to empower and inspire all students to apply the knowledge, skills, and attitudes necessary to be creative problem solvers to achieve personal success and to contribute responsibly in a diverse and dynamic world. I am going to spend this next, oh, seven minutes or so explaining how we meet our mission statement within the arts and that we're very excited to be able to do that. Below you have the two pictures. That's Mr. Huff and the
020Center Each Women's Choir who sing every year at the 9-11 ceremonies at the firehouse. So that's their picture there right before the ceremony. And then we have the Newfield Marching Band at the Homecoming Parade leading the parade and bringing them all home and around, being part of our community. We do bulletin boards here. How many of you have seen bulletin boards? They come to your house? Really? Pay attention. Bulletin boards? Good. Thank you. All right. So the bulletin boards we work very hard on, and we try to use them to say the kinds of things that we're doing in middle country that we want you to be aware of and that we're very proud of, which is why we put them in publications. The bulletin board that comes, two years ago I think we did,
021and it's an evergreen, which means it just keeps happening. So I was able to, and you'll see in this, just replace the pictures each year with the new kids that made these achievements. And that excites me because that means we're keeping that standard up and honoring students that are going and doing these kind of things. So anyway, we got the bulletin board. Left hand corner, that's the Skamea Peak. It's called Parents, Educators, and Kids. It's the fourth graders of the general music program, and they get to go to Northport High School with other fourth graders throughout the county and experience a music festival where they do folk dancing, ukulele, guitar, drumming, you name it. They have different workshops every year, and it's great. Right under them, the Allstate musicians. So the two from Century High
022School are there, wonderful musicians. You'll meet them in a little bit tonight. And right next to them, the Newfield student at Allstate. So we talked a little bit about him. In an earlier board meeting, you met our Long Island Scholar artists that are there. That's the picture with our newly donated piano. So I just wanted to point that out. Our art winner from last year, they are the 100 best. Heckscher Best on Long Island Show. The I Voted sticker, we started this program three years ago now. This is our third sticker. And the stickers, the elementary students vote on the winner. The high school students design it. And then in a lesson on civic readiness, we teach the students to vote for what they're getting on their school lunch or the extended recess. And it
023just really promotes the students to want to be part. of the democratic system that we have. And then above we have another student of the month from the R elementary program. So as you can see, we reach K to 12 and our students are achieving and doing and making it happen. Our fine art course offerings. Okay, so I also like to use this to sell the program. So if you are approaching high school and you have to pick classes, pay good attention, okay? So K-5, we have elementary art. It meets once a week for 40 minutes. Sixth to eighth grade middle school art, one full quarter daily. Then when you get to high school, you take those art skills, you start in studio and art, and you learn a little bit about everything to decide
024what track you want to take, where you can do a drawing and painting, photography, sculpture, ceramics, computer graphics, crafts. And then we offer two AP classes, AP studio and art, and AP art history. And also I wanted to point out our college computer graphics is through Suffolk Community College, and students can earn up to three college credits. before they graduate high school, which we're also quite proud of. And this just shows some of the things that we do in art. The first picture is our new cameras outside of Center Ridge High School taking pictures. Then our students both from Center Ridge and Newfield got to go to the Met in the city and tour the museum, which was a wonderful experience. And then I showed some middle school students and their artwork on the bottom
025slide. Our music and theater offering. In elementary school, we have elementary band, chorus, and orchestra. That's in fourth and fifth grade. They meet once to twice a week with lessons in instrumental. Elementary general music is K through five, once a week for 40 minutes. Middle school band, chorus, and orchestra is every other day, but every day in seventh grade with instrumental lessons. And middle school general music is a semester every other day. High school, they can take... band, chorus, or orchestra, full year daily with up to three levels of ensembles. So we have freshman groups, symphonic groups, and philharmonic groups, based on the level of the performer, with lessons. And then we also offer introduction to theater, theater acting and production. And our college class is, we have college music theory and AP music theory,
026full year daily. for up to 14 college credits through Suffolk Community College. So they can get seven their first year, which is usually junior year, and seven their senior year, which is fantastic to graduate with 14 college credits. And here's just some pictures showing what's going on in our schools. The first is a general music class where they're playing the little xylophones. Then we have an elementary concert, orchestra concert, elementary band, high school. That happens to be the high school chorus concert. So we can see the kinds of things our students are doing. Co-curricular after school we have the middle school art club photography club We have middle school music jazz band select chorus chamber orchestra and we have a musical which by the way are coming up in March and April So I'll do
027a little plug there as well High school art we have our National Honor Society and art clubs and high school music We have the National Tri-M music Honor Society jazz band select chorus chamber orchestra and the drum club at Newfield Which I think you've all experienced Okay See, everybody smiles when I say drum club. I love that about drum club. All right, in the high school theater, we have the National Thespian Honor Society, plus we have a drama in the fall and a musical in the spring. and then I just show some pictures of those things. That's the Center Edge High School pep band with the mascot. We've got a big cougar there. That was for the Cougar Carnival that I have to do the Connect Ed every year because of the Cougar Carnival. Okay,
028then we have the Halloween Trick or Treat Street at Newfield. The art students did the face painting for the students. Underneath, we have the Thespian Honor Society and the parade. We have the Newfield Music Department all dressed in... Toy Story outfits and there's a clip on Facebook you should see because I don't know if you realize but we did have a alarm go off at Newfield during the Halloween and Woody and Buzz came to the rescue in the back of the school and they were seen running to the school to solve the day and solve it and then one of our singers that sang at the last board meeting from the middle school chorus is there so that's our co-crew representing our co-curricular art music and theater programs Our arts department has many scholarships that
029happen throughout the year, mostly at the end of the year, but we have Scala. They do shows, and they have the ability to win awards. Hexer Museum, Long Island's best exhibit. Colors of Long Island, Middle Country Public Library Teen Show. We do a lot with the Middle Country Public Library. I really appreciate our outreach with them. And our course book cover contest and our I Voted sticker contest we do every year. If you look at the picture on the right, that is the winning course book cover. for the 26-27 school year. And at a future board meeting, you'll get to meet that student. Scholarship opportunities, the Ryan Zinner Memorial Scholarship, the Jen Mayo Wright Scholarship, the Scholar Scholarships, the Art Honor Society Scholarships, local and school contests, and much, much more. And another plug, Middle
030Country's district-wide art exhibit is on Saturday, May 2nd from 10 to 3 at Center Reach High School, and I hope to see you all there. Okay, for music and theater, we have plenty of scholarships there too. First of all, or honors, we have the NISMA All-State Honors Ensemble, the Neskame-Scamia All-County Honors Ensembles, the LISVA Honor Ensembles, Scamia All-County Honor Ensembles, Scamia Elementary Banner of Excellence, which we've won a number of times, the Long Island Scholar-Artist, we've also won a number of times, the East End Council Teeny Awards. I feel like I have to say each time we won it, so I'm going to stop saying that part. Friends of Music Scholarships, they gave out last year $11,400 worth of scholarships, which is incredible. The Trium and Thespian Honor Society Scholarships, Skamea and Lisfa Scholarships, which
031we also win regularly. Suffolk Senior Scholarships, Strings of Life Scholarship, local school recognitions and more. And I would like to give a plug to the upcoming shows. I can't tell you what they are yet because some of them we don't have the rights to yet. So just take a note of the dates. Selden Middle School starting first on March 21 and 22. Okay, that one we have the rights. It's Beetlejuice. Don't say it three times. Junior. And then we have Center Ridge's show coming up, Newfields, and then followed by Dawnwoods. So save the dates. Our district-wide staffing, we do all this with 18.8 full-time art teachers and, well, FTE art teachers, and music theater, well, because you can't say .8 and then say full-time. It kind of defeats the purpose. So art teachers, 18.8, music
032theater teachers, 28, and with salary and benefits, it's about $8.5 million, serving approximately 9,000 students K-12, which around 14 buildings worth of programs. I feel like we're stretching to make that work and reach our students' needs. If you look up at the pictures, the first picture is one of our Allstate students, Caden, with Mr. Austin, setting up for the holiday when they decorate the lobbies as we go. Then we have the St. Orange Firehouse, and then we have the Newfield, so the Seldon Fire Department, singer for 9-11 as well. So just showing the outreaches that we do. Okay, the Art Budget Overview. for the 26-27 school year. When the money comes in, and Beth oversees this and all, it gets separated into different categories, and that's how you spend it. So art is very low
033in equipment, but very high in general supplies, as you can imagine, because when you're buying glue and crayons and clay and all the supplies that a student needs in art, there's a lot more supplies needed than... Equipment would be things like kilns or printers or laser printers and that kind of thing. So that's why you see those numbers in those kind of categories. And then when you go to music, you see it a little bit differently because instruments cost more. So instruments like a tuba cost $5,000 right there. So the equipment is $46,000, but the general supplies is only $30,000. The $30,000 would be things for like reeds and neck straps and cork grease and things like that. Textbooks for music is the music for the concerts. So we can actually buy... band orchestra chorus
034pieces with the textbook budget. And we also buy Quaver for the elementary school kids, which is the general music program that the teachers like to supplement their teaching with. So we appreciate all that as we go for a total of $132,000. Now also under my purview is the BOCES Arts and Ed Exploratory Enrichment Program. BOCES is awesome because BOCES can be inside the school or outside the school. So here you see James and the Giant Peach over at the theater in Port Jeff, but then you see the Circus Days coming into Stagecoach. So we go out with BOCES programs, we come in with BOCES programs, and I'd like to give a big shout out to any of our PTA here tonight for being part of our BOCES programs. They do a lot of the fundraising
035for their school. to make the BOCES programs happen and then they work with their administrators and teachers to see what the kids should be experiencing as an additional arts experience within the building. We also can do that with exploratory enrichment programs under the same code. So I feel having gone through this, we can check off each of the things in our mission statement to show that we have reached that with music and arts because we have empowered and inspired all students to apply the knowledge, skills, and attitudes necessary to be creative problem solvers, to achieve personal success, and to contribute responsibly in a diverse and dynamic world. And finally, I would just like to say thank you to everybody. And again, to walk you through the pictures, we made cards for the veterans on Veterans
036Day. We have students decorating the hallway and the lobby for different events, so you see them there. And you're going to meet some of them tonight, too. You see our trumpet player at the 9-11 ceremony. That's Gavin. You'll see him tonight again, too. Newfield Trium Honor Society members at the Selden Tree Lighting. two weeks ago and then I just love that picture of Snow White getting her crown. So thank you very much and please let me know if you have any questions. I'll thank you for your support. Any board members have any questions or comments? Okay, just thank you very much. Yes, Ms. Parisi. I just want to thank you for all you do. I know that the kids are really getting there with their music. It's so nice to see what's happening with the
037plays, with their music, with their instruments, and really enjoying, and I know it's all because of you. I appreciate that, but it's everyone. This is a team here, and I'm proud to lead the team, and I just, you know, I love it here, so I love to see what our kids can do. Well, Dr. Gerald hears me say this all the time. It's only as good as your leader. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. And now certificates of pride. Okay, sure. Can I visit a particular order? All state. Whatever I want. We're going to start with all state anyway if they're here. Do I have three all state students here? One, two. All right. We're not going to start with all state then. We're going to start with Dr. Goldstein. Come on up. Come on
038up, Dr. G. So you saw it all over social media, and I think it's got a lot, a lot, a lot of likes and loves. But Dr. G, this past year, two, four, four years, okay, was the all-state band chair for NISMA, okay? NISMA's New York State School Music Association. So we know Dr. G here because he is so active. He was a Newfield graduate, went away to college for a few years, but then came back to us 23 years, I want to say? 23 years he has been here, making the music department magical. Again, one of our leaders is Barisi, so this is why it happens, because we have strong people like Harold and myself. I'll take the compliment, too, by the way. But anyway, so Harold expanded himself and is not only the
039all-county chair this year, he's also the all-state chair. And then he had the difficult... thing when he was the assistant chair when he was supposed to be learning the job that the chair passed away and he stepped up and did the job and he was a the the chair that passed was was well loved and well well established and um and harold picked up all the pieces and made it happen for the kids and then he continued on um to do two years of his own service um so he got recognized by nisma at this winter conference. So Harold, I'm going to ask you to give one of these to everybody that's up there because I play Vanna. Go ahead. Go hand one of those to everybody. While he does that, I'd just like to
040say I reached out to the NISMA executive director and he wanted me to share about Harold. That on behalf, yes, Dr. David Brown. Oh, look at that. On behalf of the New York State All-State Association, we'd like to thank Dr. Goldstein for his unwavering dedication to our All-State students as the band chair these past four years. Dr. Goldstein created systems where children thrived while adults felt supported. Throughout the four years, the process was seamless and truthfully one of the easiest experiences for all involved because of Dr. Goldstein. David is a new executive director. He feels Harold went out of his way to inform, guide, and mentor even him. He is a true friend and colleague. Thank you, Dr. Goldstein. So I couldn't say it any better than that. Although I said it better than that
041prior to reading this thing. Okay, so without further ado, the Certificate of Pride on behalf of the Middle Country Central School District Board of Education, congratulations, Dr. Harold Goldstein, for bringing pride to Middle Country through his exemplary service as the New York State Music Association Band Chairperson for the past four years. Oh, Harold, do you want one? All right, next, let's do Allstate. That's this pile right here. Allstate musicians, come on up. Come on up. Who are we missing? We're missing Gavin. No Gavin? He said he'd be here. Okay. That's okay. You met Gavin at the last meeting when he sang the Star Spangled Banner as the Long Island Scholar artist. Just remember that picture. Okay? All right. So, here's what we're going to do first. This pile. And you're going to take this pile
042and you're going to hand one to everyone up at the table. Go ahead. Go ahead. Go ahead. What you're receiving right now is a couple of pictures and the Allstate program. So not this past weekend. The weekend before was we brought the Allstate kids up to Rochester. About 8,000 kids auditioned for Allstate and about 900 get in. So it's a big deal when kids get in to go to Allstate. The way you get to Allstate is you need a perfect or near-perfect score on your Allstate NISMA solo. You need a letter of recommendation from your music teacher. And you need your judge in that 10 minutes that you're in the room, 15 minutes for Allstate, that you're in the room. You have to impress your judge so much that they write on the bottom of
043the form all these nice things about you and why you should be in Allstate. So it's... Can I have one of those? Thank you. No, I'm not sorry. You're here. You're wonderful. So we had three students selected this year, and I will also explain that this is one of our capstone projects this year, which is awesome. The kids can do their capstone through a music Allstate audition by performing and then writing a paper about the experience and the composer and the piece. And Trinity actually did that this year, which was awesome, and it got her into Allstate on top of it, which was extraordinary. So she worked hard to make her capstone work for her, so I'm very proud of her for that. If you look at the pictures, you see Caden again in the
044top left, but then you see Trinity and Gavin at Center Edge High School. Gavin actually got alternate status, which means he met every qualification, but he did not get to go because there's only so many seats in the chorus that they can fit on stage. The way I see it and the way I recognize it is that we recognize all of them. because they made it. They made it, they just didn't get to go. So, I want to congratulate them for going, but I also want you to look at the bottom two pictures. You will see Kaden performing on his French horn during the concert. I might have had a camera on me. And then... The other picture is his family picture in front of the Christmas tree at the Eastman School of Music, which
045is a traditional picture that everybody likes to take. I've never seen anybody do it with their entire family, though, and I was really impressed by that. So I said he should use it as his Christmas card. But I wanted to say how proud I was. So, from behalf of the board, we have Newfield Senior. We'll start with you. Caden Davis, congratulations for playing French horn in the Allstate Symphony Orchestra. Trinity was selected for the NISMA All-State Symphony Orchestra on string bass. So congratulations to you as well. And I just want to, and Gavin Wallen, who's not here just yet, but maybe, or maybe not coming, I'm not sure. He said he was, so I just wanted to congratulate you guys on this achievement. And this is the shirt the Middle Country Educational Foundation did. Yours
046is in my car. I'm going to go get it right after I present the all-county kids, and then we can take a picture that matches, okay? He needed it to go because it was cold in Rochester. So congratulations again, and thank you. Do we do a picture here? There, she got it. Look this way. Thank you. All right, next. All-county, Neskame, Skameo, all-county musicians, come on up. Come on up. There's a lot of them. Do I have any teachers to help hand this out? Harold, I saw you here. Teachers, teachers. Any other music? Oh, Harold will help. See, Harold always helps. All right, first of all. Okay, wait, I need one. All right, so. That's a wonderful idea. All up here, face your parents. You're going to block the board, but that's okay because your
047parents have cameras. Okay. So up here, face your parents. Well, yeah, I did. It's all right. I just hope the mics didn't pick it up. All right. So we're going here. All right. We're good. Spread out a little bit. Here, let him get past. All right. So I don't know if you all are aware of this, all county. The reason we honor the Neskame, Skameo, all county students is that they are 11th and 12th graders. So starting with Division I for Skameo, every school is guaranteed to get one student in. Okay? When you get to middle school, every one ensemble per school is guaranteed to get a kid in, but not necessarily every ensemble. When you get to ninth and tenth grade high school, they base it on your NISMA scores. You're not guaranteed to
048get in, but we still get a lot of kids in because they have both the east and the west divisions. Remember, in fifth grade, they had east, west, and central divisions, so we take as many kids as we can. As you go up, it becomes a triangle, and you guys are at the tippy top of the triangle because now they go purely on NISMA score. It doesn't matter. They don't try to do representation for the county. It's just purely NISMA score and what your teacher says about you. So the fact that all of you got into the 11th and 12th grade and there's no East-West, there's one division, okay? So you're competing against everybody in Suffolk County. So the fact that you got in is amazing. So I'm very proud of you all and I'd
049like to give them a round of applause. So I'm going to read your names. Again, thank you, Dominic, for singing tonight. It was beautiful. I called Dominic Brooklyn, by the way, because he played Brooklyn in Newsies, and I've typecast him for life. So you can call him Brooklyn, too. Okay. So Center Ridge High School, if you're here, come up, because I know we don't have everybody here, but we've got most. Yosheni Chen, she was in the Old County Band playing flute. Gavin Wallen, the Old County Mixed Chorus. Devin Chester. The All-County Mixed Chorus. Sharabha Joya Matrick in the Mixed Chorus. You okay? You need help? Yep. Dominic Santora, Mixed Chorus, Bass 1. Trinity Columbell. Trinity, come back up. Columbell. She was the double bass in the orchestra and also All-State. Very proud. Okay. Annie Polino,
050Treble Choir, Soprano 1. Okay, she's not here, but you did meet her at a previous meeting when she sang the Star Spangled Banner. Okay, Kaylee Hacker. Kaylee, come on up. All-County Band Trumpets. Awesome. David Suckerman, All-County Mixed Chorus, Bass 2. Christopher Morales, Mixed Chorus, Tenor 1. Those are our Center Ridge High School students. Our Newfield High School students. Joseph Strong, All-County Band Trombone. Okay, Alexander Catherine Zografis, orchestra, violin. Come on up, congratulations. It's okay, it's okay. We got this. Lily Hunter, All-County Band, oboe. Sophie Chen, All-County Orchestra, violin. Ryan Gudulinus, All-County Mixed Chorus, tenor two. Kayden Davis, All-County Orchestra, French horn. Emmy Contreras, Mixed Chorus, alto one. I've been practicing. Okay, Justin D. Rosalia, piano, alto sax, and you met him at the Long Island Scholar Artist. He's one of our merit winners. And Alyssa
051Macari, Skamea All-County Band, clarinet. I'd also like to give a shout out to all of your high school music teachers, Mr. Huff, Ms. Wesnovsky, Mr. Sevian, Ms. Bush, Dr. Goldstein, Mr. Austin, Mr. Martinez, Ms. Mike Nashor, and Ms. McCoyle for helping you get to here, along with, I'm not going to read the names, but your middle and elementary students that got you up through these years. So congratulations on being the finest musicians in middle country in 11th and 12th grade. Parents, did you get a chance to take pictures? Do you want us to go up? Okay, so you wanted them to double up or what? All right. If you are taller, stay in the back and the rest of you come forward and window so that you can be seen. So window a little bit.
052You know what I mean by window? Go in between. Go in between. Don't make me tell you which height you are. Just get in between so we can see. And then come down. Come down. Come down. Come down. Come further. Go this way. Go, go, go, go, go. There we go. Okay, now people in the back row, can you window to them? Go that way and window to them. Can you go on the outside? Outside, outside, outside. There, there, there, there, there, there. We did it. Hold your certificates up, not upside down. Me? Harold, you want the other side? Where's Harold? Bring your certificate. Let's hear it for our Old County musicians. Congratulations, everybody. We're very proud of you. Go back to your parents. Congratulations to you all. Oh, and did you hear about the
053restaurant on the moon? Great food, no atmosphere. It's quick with a joke. Thank you. Board commentary, Ms. Miller. Hi, everybody. We successfully ran Adopt-A-Child at Center Reach this past month. Each class collected gifts for children in need in the Middle Country School District. That's really all we've had so far. I hope everybody has a happy holiday and a happy new year. Thank you. Mr. Blake? Good evening, everyone. At Newfield High School, we similarly had our own toy drive this past week. It ended on Monday and it was very successful. In addition to that, we're also conducting Spirit Week this week. Today was Pajama Day, so it was cool to go to school in some comfortable clothes for once. And additionally... I feel like there's one more thing. No, that's all. Everyone have a good night.
054Thank you. Mr. Halleck? Yeah, I just want to wish everyone a Merry Christmas, Happy Holidays. Hope everyone enjoys the time off coming up with family and friends and everyone stays safe out there. Looking forward to a good start of the 2026 year for all the students and staff. Thank you. Mr. D Benedetto? Yes, similar message. Thank you to our staff for everything you do for our students this time of year. I know the job is tough and you guys go out of your way to making sure this time of year is special for all of our students. I wish you all happy holidays, health, happiness, and just a successful new year. Thank you. Ms. Mann-Rodriguez? Again, I just want to wish everybody a happy holiday and a happy new year, prosperous new year. Congratulations to
055the certificate of pride winners and for our little ones at Unity. Thank you to the faculty and staff and for everybody that just makes this community just amazing. And it makes a place where people want to stay and, you know, raise our families. JUST EXIST. SO HAVE A HAPPY HOLIDAY. THANK YOU, MS. HAGERTY. MORE OF THE SAME. JUST WISHING YOU ALL PEACE, JOY, AND GOOD HEALTH THROUGHOUT THE HOLIDAYS AND INTO THE NEW YEAR. THANK YOU. MS. BARISI. I JUST WANT TO SAY, DR. GERALD, AGAIN, THIS IS OUR STORY. FROM THE LITTLE ONES UP TO THE ONES WITH THE MUSIC, ALL OUR STAFF, WHAT THEY DO, WE NEED TO KEEP WRITING OUR STORY. AND I WANT TO WISH EVERYBODY A HAPPY HOLIDAY AND A VERY, VERY HEALTHY NEW YEAR. Thank you, miss Talamo just want to
056congratulate all of our all of our award recipients tonight and to wish you all a very happy holiday Thank you. Miss Feldman same. Have a blessed holiday Mr. Feeney, I too would wish all members of the middle country family happy holidays and a healthy and happy new year ahead I too just want to wish everyone happy holidays. I also want to acknowledge i went on building tours at dawnwood middle school and center reach high school and it was really nice experience the teachers were very nice and welcoming me into their classroom some good conversations i have to thank dr ricovi and mr congero they joined me as well and i want to give a shout out to selden middle school i was there today to take a picture for ej pjs which um They collect
057donated pajamas. It's really a great cause. And I have to say, I walked through the halls. They now decorate the hallways. It was amazing. I don't know if I get a vote, but I was really rooting for that sixth grade hallway. It looked amazing. And again, it was nice to see a couple of the teachers. And everyone seemed in high spirits. So I want to thank them. And then I just want to acknowledge and give a shout out. If both Mr. Mercado and Dr. Rella could thank the men and women who were doing the snow removal. I know that's not an easy job. When we're at home, they're here making sure that it gets cleared. And with 14 buildings, that's a lot of shoveling. You know what it feels like in your driveway and snow
058plowing so that we can come into school the next day. So please let them know that we thank them and acknowledge and appreciate the work that they do do. We have our regular minutes from, excuse me, we have minutes from our regular meeting on 12-3. If there are no comments or edits, we'll accept the minutes as they are. I need a motion to accept the consent agenda. Move it. Second. Instruction, there are no action items. Pupil personnel services, personnel instructional, personnel classified, finance. All those in favor? Opposed? Motion carries. Superintendent's report, 25-12-SR-6, field troops. Move it. Second. All those in favor? Opposed? Motion carries. 25-12-SR-7, lease agreement of voting machines at the Suffolk County Board of Elections. Move it. Second. All those in favor? Opposed? Motion carries. Policy 25-12-PO-1, first reading of the following district
059policies, 5460, child abuse, maltreatment, or neglect in a domestic setting, and 5550, student privacy. Move it. Second. All those in favor? Opposed? Motion carries. Unfinished business? New business? Committee reports? Ms. Talamo? On December 8th, the Drug and Alcohol Prevention Committee and the Health and Wellness Committee met, and they discussed goals for this coming year and looked at the, I'm sorry, talked about the elementary Too Good for Drugs program where they opted for a 15-week program as opposed to a 10-week program. So that they could include information on bullying social media and conflict resolution They are in the Planning stages of an anti-vape week for this coming March that will include four days of messages in schools and through social media posts and We discussed goals for this coming year an increased partnership with the sad
060clubs in each school and the creation of short informational videos that will be used in health classes where they can make a better connection to some of the messages of the committee. And they're looking to reaffirm the partnership with Northwell. And they talked a little bit about referrals. There have been 47 referrals to Northwell. And what they're seeing has been... Pleasing to them is there are self-referrals of students, which is a change from previous years. Our next meeting will be sometime in the spring of this year. Thank you. Thank you. Anyone else? Committee reports? Ms. Feldman? I'm going to read this because you know how I go. Hey. Okay. As a member of the facilities committee, I'd like to provide a quick update on lead testing of water in our district. In mid-July, all water
061sources were tested to ensure compliance with the new lead standard, which is five parts per billion, rather than the old standard, which was 10 parts per billion. Any potable water outlets that showed... Any potable water outlets that showed elevated parts higher than five parts per billion were taken out of service or quickly remediated. Following this, the district had the outlets retested to confirm that the remediation work. All of our potable water sources are fully in compliance with the new regulations. We were very quick to respond. Our community notification was posted on July 21, 2025. All corrective actions were completed by the start of the school. even though we had until this month to do so. In order to ensure that everyone is aware that non-potable water sources, like bathroom sinks, aren't for drinking, signs have
062been posted or will be reposted if they've been removed. The signs remind us that non-potable water is not for drinking or for cooking. In addition, you may recall that several years ago, Assemblymen Smith and Englebright secured funding for us so that the traditional water fountains could start to be replaced with water bottle filling stations, which have filters built into them, allowing us to be proactive in bringing healthy water to our students and staff. We have been and will continue to add more water bottle filler stations throughout the district. Thank you. Thank you. Mr. Feeney. Yes, the Educational Advancement Committee met last week. Mark Palios, Director of Guidance, provided the committee with an update on attendance and the work of the building attendance committees in the district. He distributed a chart on the attendance pattern of
063students with six or more absences in the first quarter and 18 absences over the last three years. There was improvement quarterly and a slight increase of absenteeism over the last three years. He then discussed the new interventions with our partnership with Northwell School Avoidance Program, which is involving 50 of our students. Counseling, parent education programs, psychiatric evaluations, and mediation were all elements of this program. Additionally, our social workers were still continuing to make home visits. JONATHAN SINGER, ASSISTANT SUPERINTENDENT FOR CURRICULUM INSTRUCTION, THEN ADDRESSED THE AIS EFFICACY WORKSHOPS, WHICH INVOLVED ELA AND READING INSTRUCTIONAL COACHES TWICE PER YEAR FOR EVERY ELEMENTARY TEACHER AND THEIR STUDENT TEACHERS. DR. KERRY SIEGEL, DIRECTOR OF ELA AND GRAND FUNDED OPPORTUNITIES, THEN DESCRIBED HOW THE BEST RESOURCES FOR STUDENTS IN SPELLING AND READING ARE BEING DEVELOPED WITH MORE THAN HALF OF
064THE ELA STAFF ALREADY TRAINED. Brian Milano, Director of Mathematics and Assessments, informed the committee about the emphasis that settled in middle school on Tier 2 vocabulary words involving analysis and evaluation that could be incorporated into teachers' lessons. Denise Ferraro, Principal of the Pre-K Center, then talked about the small group model that was going on with teacher assistants, in which they watched small group lessons and then asked the teachers questions about it. This helped them understand the objectives of the lesson, and then they received positive feedback from the teachers as they presented their lessons. Amy Pacifico, Director of World Studies in ELL, and Kerry Siebel informed the group about the upcoming third Humanities Expo, which will be held on Tuesday, March 31st at Newfield High School. We'll focus again on student work along with authors and
065historians from the Three Village Historical Society. They then described the Albany lobbying trip, which was scheduled for February 3rd. Forty-three of our students will be involved in meeting their legislators in Albany. RACHEL UNDERBERA, DIRECTOR OF SCIENCE, DESCRIBED THE HOUR OF CODE INITIATIVE THAT OCCURRED IN FOUR OF OUR ELEMENTARY SCHOOLS LAST WEEK. MS. HACKETY THEN TALKED TO THE GROUP ABOUT TWO ARTICLES THAT SHE READ ON ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE INVOLVING ITS IMPACT ON LEARNING ON THE COLLEGE LEVEL AND AN MIT STUDY INVOLVING MRI SCANS THAT INDICATED A DROP IN COGNITIVE ABILITIES. THERE WAS A BRIEF DISCUSSION ABOUT THE TOPIC, AND THE GROUP AGREED THAT IT WILL BE THE FOCUS OF OUR NEXT MEETING. THANK YOU. I JUST WANTED TO POINT OUT WE HAD, WE SAID FOR OUR LEGISLATIVE COMMITTEE WE WANTED TO GROW OUR STUDENT INVOLVEMENT. SO WE
066DID AN student ad hoc committee that is just strictly the students. And we had a meeting the other day, Monday, I think it was, Monday. We had Assemblyman Doug Smith and Rebecca Casse here, Dr. Rella. And I have to say, I walked into the room and while I knew there was student involvement and excitement to be a part of it, to walk into this room and see the amount of kids, I mean, the number is 43. So I knew there had to be at least... 40 kids in this room that day it was so impressive and so exciting for me i was actually speechless which is not an easy thing to do i know i told you that it was so nice to see the kids um it's such an important part of um i
067think learning for students is to have that civic engagement and to be involved and to see the amount of students that want to be involved and that want to go on this albany trip so i have to thank you um dr siegel and miss pacifico and anyone else who's involved IN THAT, I KNOW WE HAVE TEACHERS THAT ALSO and i know miss reznikoff has gone to the albany trip last year and i'm assuming um the same this year at least that sort of involvement from teachers so i just want to thank everyone who's involved in that because um that was very impressive to see that amount of students in here and thank you dr rella for taking the time as well and we really need to thank um our assembly um doug smith and assemblyman
068doug smith and assemblywoman rebecca cassay because they took the time out as well to talk with our students so thank you for all that you do i look forward to growing this and the albany trip so get ready dr cook get the rolos ready anyone else for committee reports liaison committee reports follow-up board discussion public input there was no public input at our last meeting public input this evening miss larkin we have two speakers this evening Please be reminded that you have three minutes to address the board. I'll use my phone, the timer on my phone, when the time goes off. Hopefully you'll hear it, and I'll hopefully indicate that your time is up. At that point, please wrap up your statements. Please also be reminded that this is a Board of Education meeting, a
069meeting in public and not a public hearing, and the board does not respond to public input. If your comments require a response, you'll either be contacted directly or the response will be made at the next Board of Ed meeting. Please also remember that the Board does not permit public input involving specific personnel or students. Therefore, not using anyone's names, please. If you wish to discuss such matters, kindly contact the superintendent during regular business hours. Thank you. So the first speaker is Madeline Rivera. My name is Madeline Rivera. I'm not nervous already. Okay. All right. Good evening. My name is Madeline Rivera. And I've been a proud resident of this district for 33 years. My three children attended Jericho, John Wood and center reach when they received an excellent education. Today they are successful adults, and
070I'm grateful for the foundation the district provided them. As a community member, I have always supported our schools through voting, volunteering, and staying actively involved. I'm also very fortunate to work for Middle Country as a teaching assistant for the past 20 years. Currently, I am a teaching assistant at New Lane where I support students through small group reteaching. I support my students with emotional and social learning during lunch and resets. Each year, I also help support families in our school community by purchasing food throughout the year and gifts during the holidays. As a teaching assistant, my salary does not go very far. I had to take the family medical plan, paying 25% for myself, 45% for the family. You can imagine my paycheck look like. I hope I wouldn't have to end up owing money
071each pay period, but I had to do what I had to do to support my family. I worked additional jobs just to help to cover the bills. Last week, the Board of Education President spoke about meeting salaries of educators within the district. However, there was no mention of the salaries for teaching assistants. You should know that after 20 years in the middle school central school district, I still have to work multiple jobs to help keep my house afloat. I am a proud middle country resident and a proud teaching assistant. I show up every day to support my students, and now I'm asking the district to support its teaching assistants with a fair contract. Just as I'm committed to my students, I'm asking you to commit to teaching assistance to help make this district strong. We
072are 170 days without a contract. Thank you. Thank you. Is Lorna Camposano in the office? Hi, Lorna. Good evening, everyone. My name is Lorna Gilbert Camposano. I am here to speak this evening about the ongoing shortage of support staff and service providers for students with special needs across our district and the very real impact that this continues to have on our students, our staff, and our families. Our paraprofessionals and related service providers are critical to the safety, learning, and emotional well-being of our most vulnerable students. When these positions go unfilled, excuse me, or the staff that is the existing staff are being stretched razor thin across multiple students, our children are left without the consistent and individualized support required by their IEPs or 504s. We are then left managing heightened anxiety, disrupted learning, and unmet
073needs that often extend beyond the school day back to home life. A particular concern is the fact that there is currently no required specialized training or certification for our aides working closely with students. These students have significant academic, behavioral, or medical needs. As recently as 2023, aides were required to attend training courses provided by Middle Country and were awarded certification as a condition of employment. Today we have individuals working in our schools without training in foundational areas such as child abuse identification, school violence prevention, the Dignity for All Students Act, or basic training in autism. These are not advanced and should not be optional topics. They are the basics, especially when working with the vulnerable population. Equally troubling is the district policy that is prohibiting direct communication between parents and these aides. Aids are the
074individuals who spend the most time with our children each day and are often best positioned to provide meaningful insight into daily progress, challenges, triggers, and also positive feedback. We are not seeking to bypass administration and poor call. We are seeking to collaborate so that we can support our children more effectively both at school and at home. So this leads to my questions. Outside of protecting institutional interests, what purpose does this ban on communication between students, their aides, and their families provide? Is there any plan to reinstate meaningful training requirements to the people who are employed to provide the mandated support stipulated in their IEPs? I strongly urge the board to consider these, my questions, and take a proactive and transparent approach to prioritizing recruitment and retention of support staff. reinstate the training requirements for our
075one-to-one aids, and the overall goal should be partnership because we all want safe, supported, and successful students. I am a product of William Floyd public school system. I believe in the public schools. I know what they can do, and I hope to see some change in middle country. Thank you. Thank you. I need a motion to adjourn. Move it. ALL THOSE IN FAVOR? OPPOSED? MOTION CARRIES. THANK YOU.