001Call the Lancaster Central School District Board of Education meeting to order. In the unlikely event of an emergency, if we have to evacuate the room, please note the location of the exits. At this time, I ask you to silence your cell phones and rise for the Pledge of Allegiance. This remains standing for a moment of silent reflection. I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America. Moving on to 4.0, we have presentations. Let's go first to 4.2. We have our art show with Ann Perry-Smith. All right. Hi. I'd like to thank the school board for allowing us to use their boardroom to have our wonderful K-12 art show, district-wide art show. And we've been fortunate enough to be able to also, because they were gracious enough to give us the beautiful art
002gallery that we have next door. So we have the artwork displayed in two locations. So wherever they are, they can't forget about us, which is pretty great. And obviously as you leave here today you'll absolutely be able to go there if you haven't already gone next door and checked out the exhibit. So without further ado, let's get started. Obviously, congratulations to the kindergarten through 12th grade students who were selected for this year's 2023 district-wide art show. It will be up from, and it actually has been up, from May all the way through to this time again, like next year. I'm a workie. And so please, obviously, join us in celebrating these young artists. This procedure is an honor that we've been able to award them this year. And our first award-winning artist at Scholey Elementary
003with Mrs. Renica is Amelia Dudziak. I don't know if she's here. Thank you so much. Awesome. Love this teamwork. Awesome. Great job. Thank you, Amelia. Are you guys... Amelia, why don't you stay up here? Yeah, you're our first. Are you still there? Okay, all right. And Cora Rizzo, first grade at Cora Street Elementary. Ms. Hafner is one of our newest art teachers, and she was also an alumni, so we're super fortunate to have her, and she's a wonderful teacher, which I'm sure Cora would attest to. And second grade at Hillview Elementary, that is the wrong, that's the wrong school, that's Court Street, I'm so sorry, is Isabel Januszka, second grade, and that's actually Court Street. And Mr. Cobelli is another one of our new teachers, and as you can see, excellent artwork coming out of
004Court Street. And this is actually, I love you. It's Josh Alanishak, third grade, and with Mrs. Russo. With Mrs. Segurdy at William Street for fourth grade is Violet Carson. Third grade with Mrs. Chambers is for fifth grade, Paige Harris. At William Street, Zoe Berg, sixth grade, with Mr. Kostecki. Beyonce, Lancaster Middle School, seventh grade, with Mrs. Broby is Jasper Sawicki. And Juliana Lamb. Lancaster Middle School for eighth grade with Mrs. Berry. She was also in our show last year because she's pretty exceptional, so we're pretty excited to have her back this year. Olivia Friedman, ninth grade, with moving to the high school with 10th grade Lancaster High School as well, and she is one of my students, and we are awesome to represent with ceramics. Got some 3D in there. Also at the high school
005with Mrs. Calhoun. Wonderful artist is Emma Platney. And she was senior this year. And she is with Mr. Mueller. thank you to everyone. Thank you to the wonderful students. It's a huge honor. They were obviously selected by all the students in all of the grades. It was a really hard choice as it is every year. And we're really, as again, like I said, very excited that they're here at the Art Gallery. They're also at the Boardroom. So it can be shared by everybody all year long in the Boardroom, obviously, and here in the Gallery through October. So thank you so much to everybody. And if you would like to go next door and check out the Gallery in real life and check out the artwork and take photos, do some photo ops, that would be
006amazing. Just can't say thank you enough so much to all of you. Thank you. Stay in our seats here. We're going to move on back to 4.1, the rightful team recognition. Mr. Gettler. Good evening to ReckonMAR seniors with us here today. Just kind of a little background. They shoot two disciplines. As far as rifle, 30 shot off-handing, which is literally standard shooting three targets, and that three position air rifle, which is shooting your traditional three positions prone, kneeling, and standing. These young men and women, over the last three years, have been sectional champions in both disciplines and state champions for the last two years. Over the last 35 years of the varsity rifle program in New York State, only one other school has accomplished back-to-back championships in both disciplines. So it's pretty impressive to what
007they've accomplished. So we just wanted to thank the board for their time and effort and the athletic department for their support throughout the seasons. So thank you very much. First up, we have Senior Brandon Leach. Senior Tyler DeKruger. Senior John Martzlaff. Able to make it tonight, we have Junior Jesse Holmes and also Senior Jay Decker. So, thank you. Mr. Gambar, students, thank you so much for doing that. Before today's meeting, they actually took us down into the rifle range. We were able to shoot some of the airsoft rifles, which is exhilarating. We got some targets. We actually hit quite a bit of the black. I think John even got maybe really close, maybe an eight or a nine. So I'm really proud of John. But these kids are hitting 10s all day long, so really,
008congratulations to them again. And we're going to keep staying out for 4.3. We've got our culture, climate, and inclusivity goal with Bonnie Blatter and Dr. Kruple. While we'll be setting that up, my name is for 27 years. For seven or eight years in there, top team leadership. And just this past July, I was... Elected. I got the job as the culture, climate, and inclusivity coordinator. And our students who are presenting today, if you could just sort of stand. We have... I'm a senior. I'm also a graduating senior. I'm Elizabeth Kamarowski, and I'm also a graduating senior. I don't do mice. ...systems, okay? ...rituals. And obviously, if you accept a day in our schools, we have a lot of rituals, especially the Lancaster High School. Holy crow. in my new year here and experience everything that's
009happening. The culture here is, it's been going on for years. It's the things that we do. It's the things that the kids respect. It's things hanging from the ceiling and not tearing them down. It's how we work together. It's how we solve problems. It's how we confront changes. And obviously with a lot that's happening today, we... We need to start looking at some things that we do need to change. We want to shape the overall environment. We want everybody to feel safe, everybody to feel accepted, everybody to be part of our school district. So then what is climate? When I say to the kids, they're like, temperature. They're like, that's hard. Some rooms are a little chilly, some rooms are a little hot, literally. Back in middle school. But it's like a socially educational climate.
010the feel of the school. Are you comfortable here? Do you feel like you are part of it? It's sort of like the heart and our soul. And for me being here for 28 years, I believe we do have a heart and a soul for our school district. And so with that, it's giving us our personal worth. It is safety, dignity, and importance. It is also creating a sense of belonging. Because there are unfortunately some kids in our school district that never feel connected. And if they don't feel connected, are they going to want to be here? Are they going to do really well? No, they're not. So what we need to start to do is to start to take a look at what you can do to get all of our kids to be part
011of our community here. So when you think of culture and climate, that's sort of what we're talking about here. We want all kids included. We want all kids accepted. We want all kids to feel their authentic self. So, part of our task today in the presentation is to review one of our goals that was set in the beginning of the school year, and you can see it. Continue to explore and review and create practices and policies as it pertains to culture, climate, and inclusivity with a specific focus on supporting students. Okay, supporting all students. Ms. Blattner did a fantastic job outlining the long history that we have at Lancaster about being thoughtful and intentional about creating a culture and a climate for which students can thrive and flourish. Because without that, the academics become more
012challenging for all of our students. Okay, so to do that in a thoughtful and intentional manner. So the why. We talk about inclusivity. Just take a moment to look at that picture. I think it's a pretty powerful picture. We started one of our formal meetings this year with our Culture, Climate, and Inclusivity Committee about discussing what that picture means. And if we were in this room, there's probably a situation which you now think of where we knew about the young child in the yellow shirt and the jeans. Okay? That's what we're trying to do is create that culture, and you'll see that Ms. Bliner talked about this. to cultivate a school community where everyone feels safe, valued, and connected. We take safety very seriously in this school district. We always have. And I think there
013was a presentation earlier this year in December where we outlined the safety. But additionally, valued and connected. Those are important things that the committee came up with to define the vision, or the mission, rather, and the work that this group does. And that's our student CCI committee and our adult CCI committee. I'm going to turn it over to Ms. Blackman and some of the students for some examples of being thoughtful and intentional with the work around CCI. Yes. That picture was me in fourth grade. Janice Ogilvie didn't let me be part of her brownie troop, and I fell all left alone. And I still remember it to this day, and I do share it with my students when I teach office, that it does have lasting effects when kids are connected. So, what happened before
014I got here? Okay? We had two outstanding teachers, which yes, we had this happening in our schools and in our classrooms prior to them me getting this job. Eric Brown, he is the athletic director and also the LHS varsity football coach. He did, they have been doing a camp with Bennett for years and years, and this time he sort of sent it out to McKinley. And with that, they did a camp, okay? And with this, of course, Hoover's involved. In order to get food, you had to find somebody from another team, and you had to ask these three questions. What is one of your goals for this season? I would like to, X, Y, Z. All right. What is one tragedy in your life or something you are proud of? All right. And then also,
015what is a tragedy in your life or something that you're not so proud of? And these are just some pictures of the team together talking, discussing, experiencing different people's lives. Okay. Some things that were overheard. We had the same goal for this year. I also regret not having a relationship with my father. And this was both a Lancaster student and the student from McKinley. And I mean the other world, too. So we found connections. And the other thing we want to do is we want to find connections, we want to find experiences to try to open up our minds a little bit more. With that, also we have Lynn Rubio. She is the orchestra teacher here at Lancaster High School. She has been doing a joint work since 2019 with the Buffalo String Works, which
016these are refugee children that they teach string instruments to. All right. And our students, even during the pandemic, would drive down to the west side of Buffalo and teach these refugee children how to. play string instruments, which is music, if you ask any music teacher, and they're going to tell you how important music is in people's lives. And also in the top left corner there, Lynn also brought Mike Block, who is a world-renowned cellist, who has played all over the world, and got experiences from everywhere he is to mold his music. And I was able to be here in this auditorium for the The collaboration that they did, they played together, they got to ask questions of FightBlob. It was, like, I'm not a musical person, I had chills. It was amazing. But then to
017go down to the Westside Charter School to see them play together, it was top notch. It was absolutely fantastic. So this stuff has been handy. So what we want to do is we want to create more of this. So what did I do when I got started here? wasn't quite sure. So I'm like, okay, let's start educating. Let's start bringing exposure to different holidays, different celebrations, different things so that all of our students feel seen in Lancaster. I started with Hispanic Heritage Month. I pointed out some notable Hispanic Americans. Raleigh, Thanksgiving, revisit it. Just sort of take a look at it. Winter holidays. Did you know there's like several other winter holidays out there? I did not know. And you can sort of take a look around. I tried to raise awareness, tried to educate
018kids. We did have videos, video announcements for Rain Street and LMS for all of these. And then also for the elementary levels, we had read-alouds, we had videos, we had different activities that the teachers could do to try to start raising that awareness. What is our school doing? What did we sort of plan out this year? And it was just a very brief, like, give me your two top highlights. We'll start with Koma Park. They started looking at Thanksgiving a little bit differently. opposed to putting a feather around somebody's head and sitting down and doing the Thanksgiving dinner, we start looking at some different things. We started looking at our Native American cultures to sort of say, what would you like to see from us? They also did a buddy bench, where if you sit
019on that bench, somebody will come sit with you. And so with that, it's just really great to see. And that is her Good Citizens Club. That is Bethany McKernan's group. And then from there, Court Street, they looked at CCI through literature. And for the five months, they did the Little Spot, which is super cute, by the way. Little Spot of Respect, Little Spot of the World, Little Spot of Kind Words, which also went around with Kindness Week, Teamwork and Responsibility and Belonging. And on the opposite month from that, they also did a CCI book to try to help raise awareness and try to start exposing us to different types of literature. And then Kelly Bates, she also did the Little Spot of Emotions, which is a whole SEL program. That goes along with a little
020spot. And she did a push in this year, I think, with a second grade class. And then from there, she's going to push out a little bit more this year, which I think is absolutely amazing. And the top left corner, or the top right corner, I know it's very hard to see, but that is Court Street altogether and their belonging on our Day of Unity. So it was just great to see that. From there, John A. Scholey, they did this huge battle of the books. And every day, there was a different slide. The kids got to go home and they got to read the book. And they got to decide. And it just kept going. going every day. I don't know how they did it, but it was absolutely amazing. They also did different holiday
021celebrations. Yes, we had our Christmas carols, but then they also had some different students read about the different holidays in there. And they also did Good Citizens Club. They did a service project where they did the tying blankets. They got to take it to Greenfields. They got to explore. They got to meet the residents. They got to sit and chat with them. And then it's creating more experiences outside of the school. After that, William Street. Two major things that they had, which I may have to send you all a link for this, the Be A Light in October, I believe it was. They did a whole Be a Light, like what can you do to be a light for somebody else? I can be kind. I can compliment you. I can ask you to play
022with me. And then we just got the wrap-up video, which should be coming out soon. And so with that, it was amazing, a little ceremony that they did that the student leaders walked around and we sort of lit everybody's light as we went around William Street. It was just absolutely magical. And they also created the Legends of the Round Table. where each student in the school got a chance to sit down with administration, school psychologists, whoever was running the group for that day, and they got to talk about what they are feeling. How do you feel in the school? What would you like to see happen? And with that, it was just amazing to hear fourth, fifth, and sixth grade students talk about what they want. And it was just... I got the chills again.
023And so with that, you can just, the pictures on the bottom are from the Legends of the Round Table, and like I said, each student got a chance to go do that. So I am now going to turn it over to Emily Kiker, and she is going to talk about our disability awareness at LMS. CSAC committee this year at Lancaster Middle School, we made sure to bring diversity to the attention of all students, faculty, staff, and administration because it deserves to be there. Each month, we highlighted new and diversity-relevant groups and colleges with daily announcements. During Disability Awareness Month, I recorded morning announcements explaining developmental and physical disabilities. We hung posters through LMS that talked about autism, deafness, physical disabilities, and disability awareness in general. But the awareness I am most proud of at LMS
024was probably the wheelchair basketball game we just had on June 7th. Ms. Edwards working with the Buffalo Wheelchair Basketball to bring a triad event after school. Faculty and staff donating towards the new sports chair got to try my favorite sport. To be able to show how disabled athletes compete in play sports at a high level was a great way to show diversity and inclusion. I am so proud to be a student at Lancaster, where we have programs like CCI and represent all groups for all people. And did I get a picture of Dr. Bailey in the chair? Did you score a basket or no? Okay. It was absolutely amazing. And so with that, it was absolutely amazing to see. And hopefully next year we can bring that up to the high school to start raising
025awareness on that too. And you can just see the excitement down in the bottom corner coming out. But it was sort of like very humbling for these, you know, like really sportive guys to be like, dude, this is hard. Like, yeah. But Emily was like, skirt run. And there she's going. And so with that, up in LHS, with our Leadership in Action students, unfortunately, Sam Skowronski is not here for this. But she, along with her co-chairs, planned the Day of Unity up at the high school, which was an awareness of the tragedy on May 14th of 2022. And what they did is, in the bottom corner, they did a video on what is respect. They sent it to all the foundations teachers and English teachers. And just basically to get them thinking about what does
026unity mean to you? What can you do to break down biases and stereotypes here at the high school? They had 1,700 multicultural hands that they hung up through the front foyers. They had the 10 victims along the hallway downstairs here. And with that, Tracy Esimus, she actually did the video in her English class, and then she did unity haikus. And then they took it out to the Chalk Walk, which was absolutely amazing to see. And there's a whole bunch of videos of that, too. Also, our CCI committee jumped off of the Day of Unity with Leadership in Action. And from there, we did a whole Day of Unity walk where we recognized the 10 victims. We also created Day of Unity posters. And it was really great to see people from all different groups working
027together to create something. And to hear their feedback from what did you learn and what can we do differently, it was just absolutely eye-opening. And this was all planned by the students. So next up, we have Emily Curl. I'm a girl. Sorry, there's a lot of Emilys here. Good evening, my name is Emma, not Emily, and myself along with two of my fellow classmates from the Leadership in Action class ran the 2023 Best Buddies project. With the help of Ms. Gladner, our project sought to further break down the barriers between ourselves and Mrs. Anspeth's and Mr. Mosher's self-contained students, which had often been separated from the rest of the student body. On March 17th, we ran a St. Patrick's Day party for the students in rooms 144 and 146. We had several volunteers hop out
028from both CCI and the Leadership Academy. Together with the self-contained students, we made crafts, decorated cookies, and read and discussed the book, All the Ways to Be Smart. Not only was this project both fun and joyful, it also gave both groups of students further exposure to one another and illustrated that even though a person might not look or act like you do, that doesn't make them less deserving of kindness or friendship. As Best Buddies was a relatively new project, my classmates and I hope that future CCI projects incorporate the self-contained students as they are a wonderful group of students to work with and are so much fun and joyful. Thank you. Thank you. That's amazing. Next up is Emily Reed to talk about diversity empowerment. Hello everyone, my name is Emily Reed and I was
029one of the co-chairs of Diversity and Empowerment. Diversity and Empowerment was a newly formed inclusion initiative and our goal was to promote cultural awareness and inclusivity. Our project consisted of four initiatives. For our first initiative, we created 15 posters containing a notable slash influential African American figure to help LA Desk celebrate Black History Month. Our second initiative was a showcase design that was hung up throughout Women's History Month. Each week, the co-chairs displayed three posters containing an influential woman, facts about them, and their accomplishments in the showcase. Our third initiative contained many different cultural-centered activities. The first was having Mrs. Smith-Mann's ELL students recite the Pledge of Allegiance in their native language. This was in hope of spreading knowledge of different languages that are spoken around LHS besides Spanish and French. The second activity was
030a culturally centered lunch menu. My coaches and I worked closely with Mrs. Aguilera and Ms. Denver to create a lunch menu for this week containing cuisines from all around the world. Food items were served from countries like India, Bangladesh, Puerto Rico, and the Philippines. Our last initiative was a supply drive for Vive La Casa, which is a refugee center in the city of Buffalo. This drive took place for two weeks around the school. We collected a range of items including kids' snacks, feminine hygiene products, and cleaning supplies. This drive took place at a perfect time. The day before we dropped off the donations, Viva La Casa actually hit capacity and was in huge need of donations. When the co-chairs sent out the email form, we were met with tons of positive feedback, but also with
031a lot of negative criticism. There were comments ranging from, Black History Month is not important enough to be celebrated at LHS, to these are temporary initiatives that do not mean anything. While these responses were tough to read, I believe that this emphasizes the need for more cultural awareness and inclusivity around LHS. I hope that one day these inclusion initiatives will be accepted by all, and I believe that we can only do that by continuing to spread cultural awareness and inclusion around LHS. Thank you. And lastly, we have Elizabeth Kamerowski. Good evening, everyone. My name is Elizabeth Kamerowski. This year, I had the pleasure of being a student co-chair for the Herman Bodeo Bilingual Academy's first-ever 8th grade prom. The Herman Bodeo Bilingual Academy is a school in the city of Buffalo where the majority of
032students come from underprivileged Spanish-speaking households. For this project, my fellow coaches and I worked directly with the Herman Bodeo Student Council to plan the dance. Since they have never done anything like this before, they were in need of some guidance, so we were happy to offer them our advice. At the beginning stages of the planning process, we went on field trips to the Herman Medeo Bilingual Academy to meet with the 8th graders. They told us their initial ideas and thoughts for the dance, as well as the theme, which was Noche en San Juan, or A Night in San Juan. In order to grab the attention of the students and get them excited about the dance, my coaches and I created 30 posters for the Herman Medeo Student Council to hang up in their hallways. These
033posters included the time, date, and location of the dance, as well as activity and the dinner menu. We also assisted the 8th graders in getting decorations for the gymnasium. However, my favorite contribution was holding the dress and suit drive. My co-chairs and I collected gently used dresses, suits, shirts, and ties from students at the high school and the middle school to be donated to the students at the Herman Badillo Bilingual Academy to wear for their dance. Being involved in this project was an incredible experience. I loved forming connections with the students and seeing the looks on their faces when they walked into the dance and how excited they were to be there. I am so thankful for the opportunity to have been involved in this project, as it has given me a chance to learn
034so much about other cultures and to help make a positive, significant difference in the lives of others. Thank you. great things, but we still have a ways to go. The four main principles of culturally responsive, sustaining education is a welcoming and affirming environment, which we are trying to start with. From there, we're going to have high expectations and rigorous instruction, inclusive curriculum and assessments, and also ongoing professional learning. And so with that, the framework for our LCSD plan is to look at governance, teaching and learning, family and community engagement, workforce diversity, diverse schools and learning opportunities, and student supports, discipline, and wellness. So to bring us back to where we started as our mission statement, our overall mission is to continue to cultivate a school community where everyone feels safe, valued, and connected. So thank
035you so much. I'm sorry I went so long. We had three amazing presentations today. First we had an amazing art show and then we got glimpse into the rifle range today. And then to round it off with CCI, I want to thank Mrs. Blatter and the young ladies that came in to speak this evening. We all enjoy when the students have the floor. It is amazing because especially here at Lancaster, the students really run the show. They do most of the work. No offense to the teachers, of course. But especially here at the Leadership Academy, all the student leader things are done by students. And I think that's just a great thing about Lancaster. So again, thank you all. Let's move on to 5.0, correspondence. We did receive one email of no. 6.0, approval of
036minutes. 6.1, can I have a motion to approve the regular session from June 5th, 2023? Any comments or questions? All those in favor? Anyone against? Motion carries. On to 7.0, items from staff organizations. Anyone from the Lancaster Administrative and Supervisory Association? Anyone from the Lancaster Central Teachers Association? Good evening. Just a few things. The LCTA would like to congratulate the class of 2023 and the graduates as they walk the stage tomorrow night. I wish them luck in all that they do. As teachers, whether you're a kindergarten teacher or all the way up to 12th grade, you're always happy to see those kids be successful in life, and they're always our students. Secondly, the LCTA, we have nine retirees this year, and we want to wish them luck in the next chapter of their life. Ann
037Burke, Joanne Carroll, Lisa Groner-Mullen, Jim Lyons, Angelina Pappas, Annette Smith, Claudia Trajankowski, Judy Zitzka, and Pauline Zydal. And even though she is no longer a member of the LCTA, at one point she was, the LCTA would also like to congratulate Terri Anamack on her retirement as an assistant principal. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Abraham. Anyone from the Lancaster Association of Service Personnel? And anyone from the Lancaster Association of Substitute Teachers? On to 8.0, Board Reports. 8.1, do I have a motion on the review of the 2022-2023 district goals? All right, so I'm just going to go through the goals here. Student achievement. form committees to support each of the LCSD comprehensive district education plan goals to maintain a focus on the continuous improvement of student achievement. Each committee will create a plan of action to
038outline the steps to help attain the established goals by 2026. All right, there's going to be eight goals in the 2022 CDEP along with five underlying themes. This year, the district administration from the Curriculum, Instruction, and Pupil Personnel Services Department have worked collaboratively with Building Administration to co-chair each of the eight committees with teachers and support staff. Their work included the formation of committees for each goal, creating agendas and maintaining minutes for work sessions, and the development of plans of actions. The plans of action include supporting students in the wake of the pandemic while helping them attain the lofty CDEP goals over the next five years. This work is ongoing. This winter, the Board of Education heard a presentation on reading and math. The specifics of each plan created by the committees range from structural
039changes, i.e. piloting chemistry and physics courses in the ninth grade, to more substantive changes, like exploring the evolution of reading instruction programs. All of the plans which will be presented to the Board of Education this summer include an emphasis on supporting our students and teachers throughout the variety of means. Continue to explore, review, and create practices and policies as it pertains to culture, climate, and inclusivity, or CCI, with a specific focus on supporting our students. The addition of our CCI coordinator and the supporting CCI liaisons last summer at the building level provided the necessary infrastructure to support our students. The CCI focus was to create experiences both internally and externally that help all students feel safe, valued, and connected to the LCSD school community. Students at the secondary level worked with CCI student committee. completed
040a variety of projects and participated in experiences that were focused on inclusivity. At the K-6 level, students focused on building understanding, developing empathy, and creating initiatives to provide all students with a voice. Like the legends of the roundtable. We are all proud that much was accomplished and a solid foundation was set for our CCI journey. But we know that there is still much work to be done to fulfill our CCI mission, which is to cultivate a community where everyone feels safe, valued, and connected. Then we have health and safety. We want to update the Board of Education and the community on the district's safety and security initiatives. Jamie Phillips, John Armstrong, Amy Moeller, John Tresman, Greg Hare, and SRO Lower and SRO Monty provided a safety update at the December 12, 2022 Board of Education
041meeting. The presentation included an overview of infrastructure and procedural efforts, the safe and loved arrival procedure, information on the district-wide and building-level safety committees, Services from Altares Safety Consultants, Rapid Lockdown Drills, Threat Inquiries, and Mental Health Services. The roles of the SROs in our schools and the Lancaster and Depew Police Department Liaison Program. The meeting was live streamed and recording is available on the district's YouTube channel for viewing by the public. Labor Relations obtained a fair and reasonable labor agreement with the Lancaster Association of Service Personnel. Her four-year contract was ratified by LASP on January 25, 2023 for a period of July 1, 2022 through June 30, 2026. Obtained a fair and reasonable labor agreement with the Lancaster Central Teachers Association. A three-year contract was ratified by the LCTA on June 14, 2023, and approved
042here tonight in just a few minutes. For a period from August 2023 to August 2026, obtain a fair and reasonable labor agreement with the Lancaster Association of Substitute Teachers, or LAST. The LAST president and the superintendent have agreed to sit down in July to begin discussions. Personnel continue to assess and improve personnel practices to advance district goals. And with the transition of the new Assistant Superintendent for Human Resources early in February, we've continued to review existing practices while prioritizing the Schoolfront platform as a mechanism to improve personnel functions across the board. Personnel has worked with all departments along with community relations to improve job postings and find ways to utilize multiple regional job platforms to maximize visibility. Negotiation of competitive labor agreements, as noted above, also was a big part of the efforts towards the
043goal of recruitment and retention of quality employees. to leverage Schoolfront to find efficiencies for various departments, including personnel, payroll, and information services. In addition to transitioning to Schoolfront for job postings and onboarding new employees, the personnel, payroll, and information security departments all found ways to utilize Schoolfront in various ways to help streamline and find long-term solutions for various functions. These departments all began utilizing Schoolfront to eliminate several antiquated paper forms, i.e. direct deposit forms, employee information changes, information security account requests, retirement notifications, and the like, in favor of fully electronic systems moving forward. More recently, open enrollment information for the district's health insurance plans was rolled out through Schoolfront. Employees were able to access information specific to their position and complete their annual sign-off directly in Schoolfront. In addition, district departments successfully transferred all documents,
044forms, and information from the staff portal on the existing district website to Schoolfront. With the anticipated move to a new website platform in the near future, this information will continue to be accessible to employees in a user-friendly format on Schoolfront, differentiated by bargaining unit and employee group. On to finance and operations. Move to December 2018, $77.1 million bond issue forward from Phase 3 to Phase 4 of construction. Phase 2 work at the middle school and Phase 3 work at Court Street Elementary has been completed. The remaining Phase 3 work at the high school, state drinking, and the auditorium will be completed this summer as scheduled. Phase 4 bids were awarded by the board in January. Phase 4 work began in March at both school buildings. This phase work this summer and throughout the upcoming school
045year includes At the high school, the site is the focus of the most of the work. In this phase, due to the preferential weather conditions this winter and spring, the project is well ahead of schedule. Long-awaited multi-purpose turf field will be installed, including the associated site drainage, bleachers, lighting, and storage building. Improvements to Stendhal Drive, a drop-off area near the field house, and a large walkway area will be made. Inside the building, several exterior windows will be replaced and additional security cameras and building access controls will be installed. At Como Park Elementary, a bus loop has been added to the site along Oxford Avenue. Mobile classrooms arrived this summer in preparation for the full renovation of the 1950s wing of the building. 16 classrooms in all throughout the school year. The fire alarm, security camera,
046and access control system will receive upgrades or enhancements throughout the building. The main corridor will receive some cosmetic work. Bi-weekly OACM meetings and daily communication with the architects and construction managers occur, including weekly updates to the board on work accomplished and accompanying photographs. Phase 5 design work at John A. Scholey is underway. Also, during the 2022-2023 school year, a district-wide camera server project was completed to replace the server head ends and enhance the district's camera capabilities. The boiler was replaced at the 295 Pleasant View. Scheduled for Phase 5 and completed earlier due to a failure. The Hillview UPK additions project, three classrooms, was completed, and a make-ready project for Phase 5 at Hillview began, and the work is still in progress. Additionally, the District Office Annex renovation project was approved, part of the 2022-2023 General
047Fund, was completed, and the personnel department is moved and is fully operational in that space now. assist in moving the 2023 bond issue forward from inception through community approval, factoring in building conditions survey from the five-year plan, the SES enrollment study, and program needs. On August 3, 2022, the architects, financial planner, and district administrators worked with the board to review the status of current capital project work, reviewed some long-term planning options based on the 2022 building conditions survey, enrollment, and program needs, and looked at the scope, timing, budget, and financial considerations for a future bond issue. In September, the district submitted an instructional space and enrollment review to NYSED, the New York State Education Department. The submission still awaits NYSED review, and the next steps, as well as the cost and scope of the new
048bond issue, are completely reliant on the review and their decisions. Oversee the creation of a fiscally responsible budget that upholds the mission and values of the school community while maintaining the integrity of the district programs, services, and financial condition. With that, the board developed a final draft of the 2023-2024 school year budget that maintains existing programs and services, expands and strengthens instructional opportunities, expands staffing levels, and meets the existing and additional needs of the district in a cost-effective way. The budget falls below the minimum property tax cap limit. And then we've got implement the... NYSOSC Financial Management Report Corrective Action Plan. Corrective action has been taken on all six recommendations. Corrective action was implemented on recommendations 3, 4, and 5 on June 30, 2022. Recommendations 1 and 2 played a role in the 2023-2024 budget
049development process and will continue to do so in the subsequent budget processes. Implementation of Recommendation 6 was completed at the August 22, 2022 board meeting and will continue to be completed each year. That was for information only. We voted on those goals last year. That was just a recap. Going back to 8, does any board member have anything to report? Yes, I do. So just a couple quick things. Obviously, it's the end of the year, so it's pretty hectic for everybody. But a couple of good things that have been going on in the district. So Hillview had its third grade picnic the other day, which was a lot of fun. The third graders, as they're moving on to William Street, get to kind of hang out with their teachers and their friends outside for the
050last couple hours of the day. It was a lot of fun. The weather held out, which was nice. The next day was field day. The weather held out for the most part, but I know some of the teachers had to kind of skirt things inside as the rain started to come down. But that was a lot of fun. And then I was invited by Mrs. Lima, who's a first grade teacher, to watch her class. It puts on a musical every year, so I went to that. That was last week, Thursday. So that was a lot of fun. The first graders do a really good job. It's a lot of singing, a lot of dancing. It was a musical about making sure that you eat healthy food. They did a great job, so shout out to
051Mrs. Lima and all the students for a wonderful job. And I hope they all have a great summer. And that's it for me. Thank you, Mr. Tallarico. Anyone else? On to 9.0, Superintendent's Administrative Report. Dr. Valli. I'd just like to thank the entire faculty, staff, and administration, and the Board of Education, of course, and another great school here that will culminate with what I'm sure will be a nice, nice graduation event tomorrow night at Key Bag Center. Next week, the Board of Education and District Office turn our focus to what is, again, yet another $15 million capital construction project and prepping for September 2023. which will start up like it'll be tomorrow, time flies. We expect that to be another exciting school year. And I hope everyone has a wonderful and safe summer. Thank you
052very much, and thanks for another nice year. Thank you, Dr. Valle. Moving on to 10.0, old business. Does anyone have any old business to discuss? And 11.0, new business. 11.1 is our personnel items. Can I have a motion on 11.1.1, the Lancaster Central Teachers Association extension agreement? No. Second. Any comments or questions? All those in favor? Anyone against? Motion carries. 1.2, can I have a motion on the superintendent's employment contract? Any comments or questions? Motion carries. 11.1.3, can I have a motion on the personnel changes? So moved. Any comments or questions? All those in favor? Carries. 11.2, education items. Can I have a motion on 11.2.1, the committee on special education? So moved. Any comments or questions? 12.0 is our business and financial items. 12.1, can I have a motion on the financial items? Any
053comments or questions? 11.2 is a policy second reading. This is for information only. Policy 5630, Facilities, Inspection, Operation, and Maintenance Information. 12.3 is a Policy First Reading, 7420, Sports and the Athletic Program. 12.4 is a Policy First Reading, 8240, Instruction in Certain Subjects. Those three will be read either once or twice more and voted on in their third reading. 12.5, can I have a motion on the contract with Clarence Central School District? So moved. Second. Any comments or questions? All those in favor? Anyone against? Motion carries. 12.6, can I have a motion on the contract for Sound Transformations Music Therapy Services? So moved. Any comments or questions? All those in favor? Anyone against? Motion carries. 12.7, can I have a motion on the contracts with BHSC Services? Any comments or questions? All those in favor?
054Anyone against? Carries. 12.8, can I have a motion on the contract with YMCA Buffalo Niagara? So moved. Any comments or questions? Anyone against? Carries. 12.9, can I have a motion on the contract with Associated Physical and Occupational Therapists, PLLC? So moved. Any comments or questions? Anyone against? 12.10. Can I have a motion on the construction change orders? Second. Any comments or questions? Anyone against? 12.11. Rachel Schneider, Licensed Behavioral Analyst, PLLC. Any comments or questions? All those in favor? Anyone against? Motion carries. 12.12. Can I have a motion on the 2023-2024 meal prices? Any comments or questions? And prices are staying flat for 2023-2024. All those in favor? Anyone against? Motion carries. 12.13. Can I have a motion on the bid award, printed forms and stationery? Any comments or questions? Motion carries. 12.14. Can I have
055a motion on the bid award for transportation parts and supplies? Any comments or questions? All those in favor? Anyone against? Motion carries. 12.15, can I have a motion on the payment from the employee benefit accrued liability reserve? Any comments or questions? All those in favor? Anyone against? 12.16, can I have a motion on the contract extension for 2023-2024 transportation? Any comments or questions? All those in favor? Anyone against? Motion carries. 14.0 is our public hearing. Any person who notified the district clerk per policy rule 1514 may speak at this time. Speakers must first be recognized by the president and then identify themselves by stating their name and address. The time limit to speak will be limited to five minutes per person. Welcome all. who have come to observe this meeting this evening. This time is
056set aside for public hearing, a time when we invite members of the community to share ideas and concerns with us. We welcome this opportunity to hear from you. Again, each person is given up to five minutes in which to address the board. This meeting is held in public rather than a public meeting, which means we will not be engaging in any dialogue with members of the community this evening. Rest assured we are listening carefully and take seriously what you have to say. I would like to ask that you demonstrate respect for us and one another by speaking to the issues, giving us ideas, and sharing your opinions, but not engaging in any personal attack. Additionally, please know, as a public school district, we are bound by various laws, regulations, and policies regarding the privacy of
057students and staff, including the Family Education, All Rights, and Privacy Act. Moreover, the board policy prohibits public comment on any topic directly or indirectly related to employee personnel information, or any topic that potentially may disclose information about a particular student. Accordingly, please do not comment on the performance or conduct of individual staff members and or specific or confidential student-related matters. This policy will be strictly enforced, and anyone violating the policy will be barred from addressing the board in the future. Thank you for your cooperation. Let's see, we have three folks signed up for this evening. Jennifer Penas. Oh, Don. Okay, I needed the bonus time. Okay, so there's this great book. It's called Democracy Schools, and it's the history of American public education as its role in democracy. So I just wanted to share with
058you a quick quote from it. And it says, schools compose that part of education not provided by experience of other institutions or families. They prepare us for the world and accelerate us to the values and norms of our society. They express our values at their best as well as their worst, since they are institutions that are part of our larger history. Because they are devoted to children, they also reveal our dreams, our aspirations, and our anxieties. At their most basic level, public schools exist because the quality of our democracy depends on the quality of our citizens. Are we intelligent and thoughtful? Do we seek the common good? Yet a democratic education comprises even more than citizenship. It embodies an aspiration. So, what I wanted to say tonight was thank you. Thank you for being calm
059and consistent. Thank you for attending first grade musicals, which I imagine was a spectacular experience. Thank you for creating an environment where children feel safe and comfortable sharing their artwork and their stories. Where teachers are free to be their exuberant selves and celebrate their students. Where parents and families can come and see their children be celebrated. And the community can feel that our tax dollars are in good hands. So thank you. I hope you have a great summer and many, many thanks for taking Lancaster towards that aspirational future. So have a great summer. Thank you so much. Second, we have Michael Manuela. It was a really nice presentation that CCI put on tonight. It is important for somebody to feel valued. Unfortunately, right now you have a student that does not. Obviously, my daughter has
060special needs, and during the regents' exams, she gets to take them over multiple days, especially when there's two on a certain day. There was a mistake made by a staff member in copying the exam that left out a question. When New York State Education of Assessments was contacted, they said, unfortunately, through no fault of her own, you have to consider that question as a blank. So my concern is that, one, there is no checks and balances, I guess, or, I guess, somebody to review that the proper exam is being placed in front of the student. Somebody who's already at a disadvantage did not have the same opportunity all of their students had to answer all the questions. That is unacceptable. I'm an educator myself, and if I had done that, I'd be at the district
061office with my union president trying to save my ass, trying to save my job, excuse me. So I guess the question I have is, how do you ensure that this won't happen again? How do you make my daughter whole? And what policies will you put in place so this won't happen again to a student with special needs? Unacceptable. Thank you, Mr. Manuel. We have Nancy Orticelli. Didn't take up any of my time, did it? Okay. My name is Nancy Orticelli. I am not a resident. I live in West Seneca. I do know that last board meeting you did allow other people from different districts to speak, and some of your residents asked if I would come and just speak on their behalf. I am the president of an organization called the Constitutional Coalition of New
062York State, and as such, we stand up for the freedoms and constitutional rights of every single person, no matter their race, their gender, their sexual orientation, what have you. But I do want to address... The issue again, which I'm sure you're sick of hearing, but I'm sick of dealing with it, and I know a lot of us are, about the books in the school libraries, and I'm not going to stand here and read and reiterate the contents of these sexually explicit books in the libraries. You've all heard them ad nauseum. But the fact that the content read aloud did not shock people into action speaks for itself. It speaks to the numbing of morality and decency in the average citizen. It speaks to the fact that the absolute sexual grooming of our children is seriously
063not a concern to the school unions who made it their mission to silence parents and organizations like Moms for Liberty, whose only motive... is to shield and protect our youngest citizens from the hyper-sexualization that is raging rampant in social media culture. I find it ironic that the public outcry against the Catholic Church for pedophilia has been at the forefront, while the fact that our schools are teaching our kids to become normalized with perversion, pornography, and sexual exploitation of minors is not. According to research, the scale of sexual abuse in the public schools is nearly 100 times greater than that of the Catholic Church. I'm not saying it's right for the Catholic Church either. I'm just saying that the outcry against religious organizations is much more than public school government-run organizations. The question for critics who
064seek to downplay the extent of public school sexual abuse is this. How many arrests need to happen before you consider it a problem? How many children need to be sexually abused by teachers before you consider it a crisis? And I do believe that teachers allowing pornography in our schools is a form of sexual abuse. That paragraph that I just wrote is based on a study in 2004 that showed that 1 in 10 kids K-12 were sexually abused in the public school system. These numbers doubled around 2017. Public school teachers' employees alone not getting into child on child abuse. There's a verse in the Bible that says, do not awaken love until it's time. So regardless if you agree with the Bible or not, I think we all agree that many of its ideologies are applicable
065to society today. Referencing child on child sexual abuse, allowing books like those mentioned by other people, absolutely awakens an urge before it's time to be. We understand children don't possess the impulse control needed to not act on those things that excite them. Once again, I think there's a misconception about what we are asking for, what groups like Moms for Liberty is asking for. Nobody's asking for the books to be banned. The compromise was to have a section in the libraries with explicit content and get parental permission to check those books out. And I know a lot of you, especially, I'm not going to address you personally, but the one person who ran the social media page for the campaign said that it's the parent's job to know what's in the books. I don't think so.
066I think it's your job to let the parents know what books are in the library. I don't think that. what books are in there, you have to pay for that. You have to pay for the list to have it foiled. And that's ridiculous, considering the amount of school tax people pay already. The trend that I'm seeing is a pandering to the current hot topic of the season and not truly representing the wishes of the community as a whole. You do not just represent one group of families in this district. You represent them all. And asking for a sexually explicit content section is a very reasonable compromise. Let me ask you all this. What does it say about your school when Facebook is doing more to protect our kids than you are? You try just posting
067the text or posting an image from those books. on social media. You get banned instantly. You get thrown in Facebook jail. Would it be okay with your school, and would it be okay with school policy to allow t-shirts to be worn with some of the text from these books or images on them? In school, would that be okay? For far too long, the citizens of our nation have allowed unions and government to dictate what happens with our children with zero input from the parents. The 10th Amendment of the Constitution of the United States says that powers not delegated to the federal government are reserved to the states or to the people. Thus, education became a function of the state or the people rather than the federal government. So until the unions and the school boards
068learn that the power is in the hands of the people, all the people in your district, not just a certain demographic, these are the kind of school board meetings that we all had better get used to. Thank you. City of NJ is responsible. I've got a lot more to say, but it's ridiculous. Stand up. Just as a reminder, we cannot have anyone speak from their seats. You do need to be recognized in order to speak at the board meeting. Anyone violating that policy will be barred in the future. 15.0 is our adjournment. Before we adjourn, we do have our next meeting, July 10, 2023. That's our annual organization meeting and a regular session, 7pm right here in the Lancaster High School Auditorium. Do I have a motion to adjourn? Any comments or questions? All those
069in favor? Anyone against? Motion carries.