001I'd like to convene this special meeting of the Watertown Board of Education at 7 p.m. Please rise for the pledge of >> allegiance. I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for it standy and justice for all. >> Roll call, please. >> John Gales. Karen Hoski >> here. Cindy Thailen here. Christine Fessa >> here. >> Jason Malagoodi here. >> Karine Bellica >> here. >> Vindy Davidson here. Elizabeth Lton here. >> Sher Martino >> here. >> Moving on to item E, student recognition. E1, Connecticut Association of Schools. Oh, my apologies. I missed the minutes. Board members should have received the meeting minutes for February 9th which includes well which includes the minutes uh the minutes from February 9th of our meeting dated as such. Uh do board members
002have any questions regarding the minutes? Okay. Do I have a motion? >> Yes, Mr. Chairman. I make a motion to approve the minutes of the regular board of education meeting from February 9th, 2026 as presented. >> Do I have a second? >> I second. [snorts] >> All those in favor? I >> I opposed abstensions. Motion carries. Now moving on to student recognition. E1 Connecticut Association of Schools HSR award winners. Uh I will call up Mr. Perini for Watertown High School. [snorts] >> Good evening everybody. Thank you. Um, I'm Giani Perini, principal of the high school, and it is my pleasure to announce the Watertown High School student art and music award uh recognition winners. Um, both students cannot make it tonight. [laughter] Um, one is, um, playing in a in a state tournament hockey game
003and the other is not feeling well. So, but it's still, uh, nevertheless, they're still very deserving. I'd love to read about them. The first student is Kendall Croak. Kendall currently is a senior at Watertown High School. She's taken art classes throughout all her four years uh at WHS, is a proud member of the National Art Honor Society. In addition, she served as a teacher assistant for two photography classes, and has helped paint sets and props for the Watertown High School Theater productions. Kendall enjoys working on a variety of visual visual art mediums. She's channeled her creativity into designing her own greeting cards, generously donated artwork to local fundraisers, and beyond the arts. Kendall is captain of cross country, indoor track, and outdoor track teams here at WHS. She has also used her artistic talents to
004design team apparel. Kendall is a member of our link crew. She has been a moderator for the model UN uh nations and serves as vice chair of the Watertown High School student athletic advisory board. After graduation, Kendall plans to study um psychology and eventually attend law school. From Mrs. Urase uh who nominated Kendall for this award, Mr. says that we chose Kendall to represent the art department because she consistently challenges herself and develops unique creative solutions to our project prompts. She has taken numerous art courses and consistently produces exemplary artwork. Very deserving. Congratulations to Kendall Croak. And our other student uh representing the music side of the award is Maya Gothier. Maya is a senior at Watertown High School. Music has always been a major part of Maya's life, especially throughout her high school years.
005She has performed on flute, obo, and piano in the pit orchestra for fall plays and spring musicals since her freshman year, and is currently learning to play guitar here at WHS. Maya participated in the Western Connecticut State University Honors Musical Festival last year and will attend again this year. In the fall, she also auditioned for regionals. Maya enjoys performing in the PEP marching and jazz bands alongside her peers. In addition to her music involvement, she is a threeseason athlete and a member of multiple academic honor societies here at WHS, including Tri National uh Music Honor Society. Maya plans to major in mathematics in college while continuing to pursue her passion for music. Maya shares that she is deeply grateful for this honor and for all of the musical enrichment opportunities here at Watertown High School
006and all that that have been provided here. From Mr. Zilziki who nominated Maya for this award, he says about Maya that Maya embodies the true meaning of excellence both in and out of the music classroom. She not only demonstrates incredibly strong musical skills, but also has helped create a community within the music program that will will be remembered for years to come. Congratulations, TAMAYA. >> I'm sad they can't be here for their their spotlight picture, you know, but anyways, thank you very much. >> Thank you. >> Moving on to E2 Pulk Elementary yearbook finalists. Uh, can we please have Mr. Hogrief come up? >> Good evening, board of education members and Miss Becketty. Uh, Tom Hogre, principal at Poke Elementary School. Thank you for allowing me the opportunity to speak tonight and recognize our Poke
007students. Tonight, we are proud to recognize the Poke School yearbook cover contest winners. Each submission reflect an incredible amount of creativity, effort, and school spirit. While one design was ultimately chosen for the official yearbook cover, every finalist being honored tonight has earned recognition for their talent, dedication, and willingness to share their creativity with our school community. Please join us in celebrating these talented students and the hard work they put into making this year's yearbook special. When I call your names, please come up to Miss Martino and she will provide you with a certificate. Our third runner up, Zoe Leitzki. [applause] Our [applause] second runner up wasn't able to make it tonight. That was Dylan Webster. [applause] Our first runner up, Shelby Lomax. [applause] And our winner of the 2526 poke yearbook cover contest is Marot
008Charara. >> Congratulations to our recipients and to all the students who participated. Thank you. bring this [laughter] >> we liked him there. >> Hey, we did. >> Yeah, >> there you go. >> Maybe these are future cast award winners, right? In the same night. >> Okay. SHOULD [applause] I say before? >> Um, anyway, unless they want to stay, they're welcome to stay or they need to leave, that's fine. >> Okay, I'll just let them. >> Uh, members of the public are free to leave at this time if they so please. If you guys want to stay, more than willing to have you guys. Not trying to kick you out, but giving you that option. Moving [clears throat] on to item F, student council report. Hunter Nicole, please. At John Trobo Primary School under curriculum and
009instruction across JTPS, students are building and strengthening foundational number sense and computation skills. In kindergarten, they're developing fluency with partners of 10 to support and build a foundation for early addition and subtraction. In first grade, they're deepening understanding of place value and building identifying and comparing numbers through 120. In second grade, they're extending addition extending addition strategies to solve problems with multiple twodigit numbers and demonstrating increased flexibility and accuracy and computation for PO under P elementary school for curriculum and instruction. They've teachers had a professional development session where they were analyzing midear I ready diagnostic growth and performance data identified instructional priorities to support continued student growth and develop targeted action to step steps based on data finding. They had collaborative data discussions where they examined trends strengths and areas of need across grade levels
010engaged in thoughtful team-based conversation and ensured instructional alignment and responsiveness. The instructional impact is focused on keeping instruction targeted and student centered, strengthened alignment between curriculum, instructional strategies, and student needs, and positioned teams to support strong growth through the remainder of the year. Under school community leadership visit, Pulk welcomed the board of education members, town council members, and Miss Fecky for a walk tour walking tour of Pulk. They showcased classroom action, highlighted students learning through throughout the building, shared strong instructional practices taking place across grade levels, and demonstrated alignment between our strategic priorities and daily classroom experiences. Pulk is grateful for the opportunity to highlight their work and is thankful for the continued support of our students, staff, and community school community at Judson Elementary School under curriculum and instruction music education grade 3 through
0115. Students across grades three through five are building strong m musical foundations. Grade three three is developing soulfledge and rhythm rhythm skills, recognizing music patterns, and preparing for upcoming recorder sessions. In fourth grade, they are mastering soulfledge through movements, reading and writing notes on the staff and singing in rounds. In fifth grade, they are preparing concert music, exploring song structure, and identifi identifying musical themes and developing ex expressive singing skills. under school community. The St. Jude's Tim dis discon teleathon performance. I apologize. Fifth graders will perform in this annual St. Jude's teleathon. Musicians from Judson and Pulk School will perform together. Judson fifth grade singers will also perform. The event takes place on Sunday, March 1st at 10:15 a.m. at the Torington Intermediate School. This event supports the important work of St. Jude's Children's Research
012Hospital. The teleathon will be livereamed for families and community members. There's a special thanks to Miss Borbis and Miss Samatis for making this opportunity possible. And lastly, 2026 Winter Attendance Olympics. Judson is hosting a 2026 Winter Attendance Olympics. Classes compete weekly for the best attendance. Each class is striving for the go for the gold. I apologize. I'm going to butcher these names really bad. It's okay. >> For the bronze medal, it was Miss Miss Grunner's class. For the silver medal, it was Mr. Terz's class. And for a gold medal, it was a tie between Miss Hart's and Miss Schmer's class. >> Did well. [laughter] >> Under Swift Middle School for curriculum and instruction, grade six students are transitioning into a unit on ancient Rome and social studies. Students will be exploring key concepts and vocabulary
013related to Roman government, engineering, expansion, and cultural influence. Throughout the unit, they will discover Rome's lasting impacts on government systems, architecture, language, and inventions. Students will also continue to develop critical thinking skills through map analysis, cause and effect discussions, and primary source exploration. Under school community, students, families, and swift faculty have begun reinforcing the connection between school attendance and student learning. On Friday, February 13th, students were recognized for accomplishing 100 days of learning this year. There were 49 students who were recognized for the accomplishment. This is only possible as a result of a strong connection between home and school. For upcoming events on Friday, May 15th and Saturday, May 16th, 22 students cast from Swift will be fulfilling their rules in the high school musical junior play. March 3rd and March 5th will be parent
014teacher conferences. The portal for for signup opened up on February 24th for Watertown High School under curriculum and instruction. WHS will be hosting the eighth grade music festival to strengthen program continuity. On Wednesday, February 11th, 8th grade band and orchestra students from Swift participated in Watertown High School's first annual in-house music festival. The program is intended to strengthen the bond between Swift and WHS music programs. Swift students got to rehearse alongside high school students experiencing WHS's culture and facilities firsthand. EMTT Drake from the University of Hartford assisted in the day's instruction as a guest clinician, bolstering student success. This transition network helps build confidence, relationships, and a sense of belonging as we prepare to introduce Swift students to WHS. Under school community, Watertown High School is recognizing two outstanding students for their achievements within the
015arts. Kendall Croak has been selected to represent the WHS art department for her creativity, dedication, and exemplary work across multiple visual art mediums. Maya Gothier has been recognized by the WHS music department for her extraordinary musical prowess, leadership, and enhancement of the band and theater programs. Both Kendall and Maya should be congratulated for representing Watertown High School Pride. for upcoming events. On February 15th, there is a district coffee house at 5:30 p.m. in the WHS gym, auditorium, lecture hall, and main hallway. Also on February 15th, there is a PTO meeting at 6 p.m. in the WHS library. From March 2nd to the 6th is National School Social Worker Week. On March 3rd, there are parent teacher conferences from 8 am to 3 pm. And on March 5th, there are also parent teacher conferences from 5:00
016pm to 7 pm. >> Both of the February bit dates are supposed to be the 25th, but I think they also both got rescheduled. >> They did, [laughter] which leads to my comments. >> All right. Thank you, Hunter and Nicole. Moving on to item G, acting superintendent recommendations, reports, and updates. >> Thus, my comment. I'm very tired of the snow [laughter] as you could all imagine. Um, let's hope that today was it because this has been a really difficult winter. Um, and later on this evening in the agenda, we do have planned to discuss the calendar and April vacation because I know that that's a question that a lot of people have since we've racked up three snow days this week. So, um, that will be something we'll discuss a little bit later in the
017agenda. Um, my remarks this evening are are really brief. I the only thing I really wanted to mention um was that it was my absolute pleasure uh to um go along with the board as they um traveled through both Poke and the high school. It's funny because I lived at Poke for a lot of years um and I'm in the schools and I'm at the high school all the time and when you kind of walk side by side with people you kind of look at things through their lens and I was just so struck um by how wonderful both of those spaces were and I feel like the board um really got to see a lot of wonderful things in both spaces and Mr. Perageni gave us a dissertation on everything the high school. He
018prepared lots of information for us and and really was able to let us in on all the things. So, they were really wonderful events. We'll have to reschedule Judson and then we have the other schools coming up which I'm very much looking forward to. That's it for me tonight. >> Awesome. Thank you. Moving on to item H, acting superintendent's proposed budget presentation for 2026 and 2027. >> Okay, I think Michael's pulling it up. Um board members, you'll see that I did provide you um with a hard copy and I also included speaker notes um because I figured after tonight's presentation, you certainly um may have questions or take it home and that way you have an artifact to look through. I will also post um the recommended budget slides on the website tomorrow for anybody
019that is watching or that would like to see um go through it for additional information. So just making that note. Um, so I'd like to start tonight by just thanking um everybody in the district, all the staff in the district, including the administrative team and and cabinet who I just about drove crazy. I thought we were going to bring Cats into my office for Marie, Jen, and I. Um, but I'd like to thank everybody really because we did change the process this year and whenever something's new, it it's a challenge and everybody really hung in there and and tried hard um to follow some of the new processes that we put in place. So, I want to thank everybody for their hard work in developing the budget this year. Technical [laughter] difficulties. >> Get to
020the computer. >> Michael, you're going to have to click for me. There we go. >> Try again. >> Nope. And adding to the budget is a new remote for [laughter] presenting. >> Dollar amount 12. [laughter] >> Try again. >> No. Go. >> Something just happened. It happened. >> Battery. >> Nope. He said he'll manually. >> He said he's gonna Oh, he's going to manually do. Okay. So, go back one. >> Thank you. Okay. So, to start off, um, one of of the things that we did in developing the budget this year, um, was look backwards. Sometimes it makes sense to look back and learn from history, um, in order to productively move forward. Next slide, Michael. Um it's important to mention uh that rising costs and unfunded mandates really have historically put a lot of
021pressure on the town and the school district um with budgeting. And one of the things that has occurred because of those uh mandates and the rising costs is that the pressure has been put on in creating specific budget drivers like utilities, insurance, transportation, salary obligations, and special education costs. Unfortunately, at times those drivers have been um at the expense of some other areas in the budget, creating some significant reductions in particular in the areas of maintenance, facilities, staffing, curriculum, and instruction and professional development. Next slide, Michael. This slide is very detailed. Um it may be one that you want to look at on the website. Um but I did include it because it provides a very detailed historical picture of the budgets going back to 2023. um from what was proposed to what was adopted,
022if there was an appropriation, and then what was ultimately finalized. Um so this is just anformational slide so that people that are interested can have a really um detailed look at the history of the budget increases and drivers. Next slide, Michael. One of the questions that's um come up this year and I really have tried to take in information from some stakeholders that I've been meeting with so that I could proactively put some answers into the slides of questions that I've been hearing floating around. Um one of the biggest questions that I think the board has heard um is about the MBR, the minimum budget requirement and about appropriations. Um so I thought I would just spend a minute kind of providing everybody with some background about those two pieces. So the MBR um is
023the minimum budget requirement and what that means is that for any fiscal year the least amount of money that can be spent was the total budget from the previous fiscal year and that would be considered the minimal budget requirement and that is typically the starting point and [snorts] then anything above that would get added on. Um, I think that there is some confusion sometimes when there is an appropriation. And over the past four years, I believe that we've had two budget appropriations. And I think the question was whether that appropriation becomes part of the MBR or not part of the MBR. Um, and it does become part of the MBR. It actually becomes part of of the base. Um, so what happens is that when you get into a point where you need to cover
024costs and in particular the two appropriations we had to seek in the past four years, one was for special education costs and one was for health claims. It means that what you've budgeted cannot um compensate for your operating costs. So then it gets woven into your budget. The idea there is that it's not a oneanddone piece. It means that your operating expenses exceeded the amount that you had budgeted and that doesn't necessarily change from year to year. Typically, as we all know, even in our own homes, prices don't go down, they often go up. So, that um appropriation becomes part of the minimum budget requirement for the next fiscal year. Oh, Michael, sorry. Next slide. There you go. I keep pressing the button. Um so, just uh taking a look like this is this is
025one of the questions that I've heard. um well if if in FY25 the board of ed was u awarding an appropriation shouldn't that be a natural increase that they can they can count on versus having to increase the budget year after year and this slide just represents um the fact that when that appropriation was provided in FY25 it was spent in full at the time to cover operating costs in particular the insurance um it wasn't placed in an in a reserve of any sorts so there that money is now gone um it does become part of the base because the overall cost to run the district increased and that's why the appropriation was sought. Um and then you can see that that um is added in as your floor because that's what you need to
026maintain what's currently happening in the district to maintain current levels. Next slide, Michael. This is just a nice visual to see um over the past few years which years we've requested um an appropriation. And so you can see in FY23, the first bar represents what was requested at the time of the budget development by the superintendent. The orange represents what was adopted and then the gray bar represents what was effective with the appropriation. So what was ultimately spent in the next fiscal year FY24, there was no appropriation. So you can see those bars are the same height. And in FY25, you can see the request, the adopted, and then the effective with the appropriations. So, it's just a nice visual to kind of see. This next slide um unpacks um year-over-year. [clears throat] Another uh
027question that I have also been asked recently is about the percentage increases and what they are based on. So, if you take a look at this slide, it explains um that because appropriations are added into the budget, it does change the percent increase um from one year to the next. So, if you look at FY23, the all-in budget was 52 million. And when we moved from FY23 to FY24, it was a 2.28 increase. From 24 to 25, it was a 2.5 increase. Last year, moving into this year, because the appropriation was requested for the insurance benefits, it raised the final budget. And so, the true increase from FY25 to FY26 is 21%. Um, so this slide just illustrates how that works with respect to the percentages. And if next slide, Michael. And this slide just
028unpacks FY25 to 26 um specifically so that you could see that was the adopted increase, the appropriation, the all-in budget, and then the increase from FY25 to FY26. Next slide. Um this slide is included um again going back to just the historical implications of budget drivers. I pulled um information about the areas that you could see on the left side of of this diagram um which is facilities, equipment and construction specifically in the facilities lines and then you can see the curriculum line and then each of the schools and athletics. So if you look across these three fiscal years, the first um row or column rather is what was proposed. The second column in the darker blue shade is what was adopted and then the orange column is what was expended. So if you look
029at FY23, you look what was proposed for facilities that year, what was adopted for facilities and then what was expended. You might be wondering, well that budget was appropriated, so why wasn't it utilized? Well, if you look at the top underneath the fiscal year, we started this fiscal year of 23 on a freeze on um September 2nd, which means that any possible thing that was bought for the district was an absolute essential, meaning that people really didn't get to expend what was originally budgeted for. Um, and then if you look across FY24 and 25 are set up the same way. One of the things that I would like to point out to the board and to the community is if you look at the facilities budget, that's for construction projects and leasing of equipment, our
030footprint is five buildings. This is the amount of money that our facilities director has had over the past three years to make any of the needed repairs in our schools. We have PL playgrounds that need work, sidewalks, asphalt, lots of of projects that aren't big projects that are uh captured under the capital project. And I'd like to take this moment, by the way, to just express the heartfelt thanks for the capital projects um that we've partnered with in the town. It it is very much appreciated. But this is more of the day-to-day money where Luigi Valardi, our facilities manager, can go out and kind of keep up and maintain our beautiful spaces. Um I'd also like to point out the curriculum and instruction budget. If you look at FY23, we have 2500 students in our
031school. The curriculum and instruction budget for FY23 from the general fund was $0. Anything that was purchased for those 2500 students to educate them by way of instructional materials, professional development, and anything else needed was achieved through grant funding. If you look at FY24, you can see um the amount there for the curriculum budget. And then FY25, you can see the curriculum budget there as well. And then if you take a look at the schools um you can see again looking at the proposed adopted and expended um there was a freeze in FY24 in December and then FY25 we spent the entire year in a freeze from July 1st. So you can see um how much of the adopted um budgets were able to be expended um from the schools. The reason why I bring
032this up is because part of what I discovered and and although I've been in town for a long time, looking at the budget through this lens is was very new to me. I knew my curriculum lines and I knew special ed lines last year when I was the interim director, but looking at the budget and the totality um was new for me. So, I took a lot of time just looking and thinking about what was experienced, what the numbers were saying. Um, and it just struck me that these areas um really need to be prioritized and this cannot be the place no matter what happens with the budget this year where there are reductions. I'd also like to briefly point out, please look at athletics, case in point. Um, look at FY25 athletics in the
033orange. I have nothing against athletics. Both of my children came to Watertown public schools, played multiple sports, and I would never ever um look to decrease the athletic experience for our students. However, if you take a look at the amount of the athletics budget versus the amount of the curriculum in the facilities budget, it does tell a story. It tells a story that we need to rethink things a little bit about where we're appropriating the funds that we have. Um, and I know I spent a lot of time on this slide, but this very much is is the crux and the idea of of what I'm looking to accomplish through this budget this year. Next slide, Michael. Um, this next section of the presentation now is just giving a snapshot look at the district as
034it stands now. Another question. Again, I put a lot of frequently asked questions in here because I thought that might be helpful given, you know, some of the questions I've received from the community and parents and the board. Um, so one of the questions that we're often asked is about class size. Um, and sometimes I I think that there is um misunderstanding that our class sizes are really what our student teacher ratio is. These are publicly reported numbers and I think it's really easy sometimes when things are in the paper or going to a website that you cherrypick a number. Um, so I just wanted to make the distinction between these two specific areas. Class size is when a student is actually in the classroom with the teacher. That's how many students are there with
035that teacher for that section or that subject or that grade level. And Watertown's class sizes range from 18 to 25 depending on the grade level. The other number that I think sometimes people confuse is the studenttoteer ratio. That's a little bit different. That is all of the staff that works with our children. Um that includes special area teachers, school psychologists, that includes um you know, anybody else that works with with students in our district that is not a classroom teacher. And that ratio is a 12 to1. Um just important to note that Watertown student teacher ratio is very much in line with the state. Um and we're at about the center, the midpoint of the DUIR. We don't have huge class sizes. We don't have small class sizes. We're right in that kind of middle
036point. Next slide, Michael. I broke down class size a little bit more for people just so that you can get a sense. You can see in our younger grades, we try to maintain smaller class sizes for developmentally appropriate reasons um and for early intervent early intervention and early literacy skills. So in kindergarten to grade two at John Trumbull, our average class size is 19. From grades three to five, our average class size is 20. And in grades six to eight, our average class size is about 23. This slide is specific to the high school. Um, again, I just thought I would talk a little bit about the high school because this is also an area um that I think is easy to to wonder about. So, on the left hand side, you could see the
037number of students by um grade band. And then the distinction at the high school is that we our goal is always to have anywhere from 18 to 22 with a max of 25 when possible as our class sizes for core classes. CP, honors, general electives. Those are the classes that everybody um kind of has to take for their graduation requirements. The places where we do have some smaller class sizes is in other offerings such as advanced placement or early college experience or specialized electives like I think um you heard when Mr. Perigini spoke tonight about Kendall um taking some specialized art classes and taking guitar this year at the high school. Those are the specialized electives that you're not going to have 20 20 students in or foods is another good example. There truthfully in
038that kitchen isn't enough space to have um that many students in in a foods class. Those courses are important because they make us competitive and they raise the value of that Watertown High School diploma. If we had not have those courses, it really puts us in a different place. it doesn't put us in a position to be to be competitive and to offer the diverse experiences that our students deserve. Um so next slide, Michael. The next um slide talks specifically uh about schools. One of the initiatives over the past few years has been building our indistation programs. I would just like to specifically mention because I mentioned special education as a driver and I never ever want anyone to confuse and think that when I say that special education costs are high and that they're
039a driver that that is something that that is distasteful or honestly it it's quite the opposite. Um the special education all students are our students. Um one of the things we we've been able to accomplish over the past couple of years is to create more indist programming. >> [snorts] >> I think that that is an important accomplishment for a number of reasons. One, certainly it's more fiscally responsible than outplacement. But secondly, we can develop very high quality programs in our own district that the outplacements don't really even match. And we keep our students with us. They're Watertown kids. They belong with us. They belong in their community. And so we have really made some strides in developing in district special programming for special education students. So each uh school there lists the special programs that
040they current have for FY26. So at John Trumbull, we have a social and emotional learning class and an autism spectrum disorder class. At Judson, we have an ASD class. And at Pulk, we have the SEAL class. So there's a little bit of of a split there with the programming. At Swift, we have an SEAL class and a life skills class. And at Watertown High School, we have an SEAL class and a life skills class. Moving into FY27, we have students rising and there will be some shifting in some of those special programs. Um, the rest of the slide just gives you some basic demographic information. Again, our enrollment. The only other piece on this slide that I wanted to point out is the circle at the bottom for free and reduced lunch. I think sometimes
041this number is a little bit surprising to people that in our community that we have 40% of our population of students that have free and reduced lunch. Um, I will tell you from my years here that I 100% believe that that number is actually understated. I think that we have a lot of families that are food insecure in our town that don't fill out the paperwork or they're just in that band um where they they're just above that threshold to be able to see to receive free and reduced lunch. So, I just thought that was an important number to um point out. Next slide. This provides the numbers by school of special education students. We have 19% of our population is special education in the district. Again, just some demographic information to share. Um so
042moving forward um and taking a look at the history and taking a look at the now then the question is well what is our problem of of practice? What is it that we are looking to accomplish? Next slide. We know from our own households that costs are rising. I know from looking at every requisition this year [laughter] to literally um that costs are rising for us in in the school district. This is just a fact. And I do think that we and I personally took responsibility as did my team of being mindful of the impact of our budget on taxpayers particularly this year where there's some special circumstances um that are in that may also be built into to um what is being charged to families. Next slide. I think it's important to just kind
043of take a look at this point. However, even that though we know costs are rising, um there's some things that we just can't accommodate for or we can't try to to save on. Um so these are our fixed costs for FY27. Um and they're broken up by category. So, uh, contractual increases um for student transportation at advance out of district transportation. We joined a consortium in an attempt to um save money, which has been very fruitful for us as a district. Employee benefits, the range is 12 to 15. We have 14 there, but we're really hoping that number comes in at 12.5 based upon what we're hearing. Gas and oil, 5% increase. Electricity, water, and sewer, and then outplacements. So the number all the way to the right is the dollar increase in the FY27
044budget as compared to the F FY26 budget. Next slide, Michael. So then in thinking about the problem of practice, um this is really to me the question, how do we balance fiscal responsibility while still moving the district forward beyond the basics even if only incrementally? So that really is is the question at hand. I am very much invested as is my team in being good stewards um of finances and fiscally responsible and partnering with the community, with the town, with the town council. Being fiscally responsible is important to us, but we also have to balance that with how we can move um the district forward. Um even if just incrementally each year, adding something in um perhaps that has been already reduced or something that we greatly need to just improve the student experience. Next
045slide. So now that we've identified kind of the challenge, if you will, the next piece is deciding well what what do we want that to look like? Working backwards, what are the outcomes that we want? So next slide, Michael. Before developing the budget, um I spent a lot of time thinking about what I would I was hoping for our district to accomplish through the budget process. And these are are the six specific items. first is just demonstrating fiscal responsibility and then underneath that is building trust and shared ownership through the budget. I'm very much an honest and transparent person. Um, and I'm very much looking forward to getting out there tonight and in future uh meetings with the community and sharing the budget and opening up the books and and showing the real numbers. So,
046these two pieces are are hugely important as we move forward um together as a unified town and school district. Um, next two are allocating resources equitably. I talked a little bit about that earlier when I showed you that colorful slide in some of the areas that I hope to put funds towards. Um, and then empowering school leaders, teachers, and um, making sure that everybody feels recognized. Um, it it is very difficult, I think, for our principles and for some of the departments across our district to develop a budget and and say, "I need these items to be successful in my role." and then you're told, okay, that this budget has passed only that to them being in a freeze. Um, and and that doesn't help with people's agency or the climate in our district. So,
047it's important to me that people felt honored and respected throughout this budget process. Um, and then maintaining current staffing while strategically adding some high leverage roles that strengthen our system. Again, not looking to add 50 positions, that's not realistic, but certainly trying to maintain our current staffing. Um, and then looking to just incrementally slowly start to add in some of those other positions that we very greatly need. Um, and then just communicating challenges opening and clearly and focusing on solutions. I'm not looking to provide scare tactics or to weaponize anything. Um, I'm really just interested in communicating clearly and openly um about what our needs are and where we are. Next slide, Michael. coupled with the whole piece about budget development and fiscal responsibility, we have to remember that we're here for kids. Um, and
048it struck me as I was looking through the slides to prepare for tonight that if you look at student experience, teaching and leadership excellent and systems and resources. These are what we believe and our strongest tenants. Yet, these are the areas of the budget that year after year have have been the parts that have been reduced. Um, in particular, I think of professional learning. Um, it is very much a needed area to be fully funded this year. Um, and then community and collaboration. These are our our beliefs in our budget needs to feed into these. Um, and this isn't necessarily to to blame anybody to blame, oh, we didn't get enough money or, you know, we applied money the wrong way. It's more just taking a fresh look as a team at the budget and
049thinking about what did it look like? What do we really need? and how could we be smarter moving forward? Next slide. So, the financial strategy isn't about feeding one branch. It's about feeding the whole tree so every part of our organization can grow. And this was the backdrop of of the development of the budget. So, moving into budget season, I developed a three-prong strategy to attack the budget this year. Um, first is developing um or creating a new budget development system. Um secondly is finding creative cost savings and then rethinking revenue. So starting with budget development. I know people have heard the term zerobased budgeting year after year. Um and the truth of the matter is that you really cannot do a zerobased budget with everything. It doesn't make sense. It doesn't make sense for
050things like fixed costs. You're not going to say, "Okay, I'm going to start with a drop of oil and then keep putting more drops into because I need this many gallons." It's like those things are not zerobased budgeting um by any means. You have to look at what your past three years of costs were, use data to figure out what your percentage of increases and then predict what you think the cost is going to be the next year. But there certainly are areas that should be zerobased the uh subject to zerobased budgeting. Those are more so the areas like curriculum and instruction, your school budgets, supplies, instructional materials. And that means that you don't just say, "Okay, well, I kind of got 5,000 last year, so I'm just going to ask for 5,200 without any
051justification or specifics behind that." And so we did do zerobased budgeting for those specific departments where it lent itself to doing so. We also coupled that with two other pieces this year that were different. One of which was realistic spending caps. Instead of saying to people, here you go, go create a zerobased budget without giving any kind of parameters, then people come back with I don't know what. Um, so what we did was we tried as a cabinet to look through and say what is a kind of a realistic amount of money that we might be able to afford and then hear a department please [snorts] build a zerobased budget but don't exceed this because there's no way that that is going to be a reasonable number for us. Um, we also required strict prioritization.
052Everybody had to say whether their items were a one, a two, a three. One, I cannot open my doors if I don't have this. Two, my instruction will be effective if I have this. And three, this will enhance my instruction. And so, if things didn't have the priorities, they weren't considered because the direction was to please prioritize your items um and to stay within your cap. Next slide, Michael. So this is the process once everybody was done and kind of putting everything together where we started to build. Um and this is the process we took. We started with this fixed costs. We folded in the capped and prioritized items from the departments. We considered and prioritized the requested staff additions and then we identified the prioritized area which is tier one instruction. The things that
053hit all 2500 kids. That's what we're going to prioritize. Um and then facilities and school budgets. This slide um is designed to just give a picture. I showed you the fixed costs earlier and the dollar amount that that um came to. This slide shows you that if we were to keep every single other thing in our budget flat from last fiscal year to FY27 and we just had the fixed increases, the fixed cost increases, the budget percentage that we would request would be 7.83%. Um certainly not a number that I'm coming to you with today because that is not a number that's sustainable for where we are here and where we are now. Um but I think it's important to keep that into perspective. Next slide. Coupled with that um I'll take you back to
054this uh information that was on a previous slide. I think it's important again to look back at the history. If these were our percentage increases um how would would 7.83 83 be something that's even remotely possible or sustainable for this fiscal year. Next slide, Michael. So, we started with the fixed costs and then step two was that we folded in all of the other requests from the departments. Next slide. Then step three was to consider all of the requested staff additions. Some of these were requested by um administrators from buildings. Some of these were requested um by cabinet members. So you could see this is quite an extensive list of of staffing that was being requested. Um and many of which if you see the word restore it means it was a previous uh cut
055from a previous fiscal year. Um again not reasonable. So then step four next slide was to take a realistic look at these staff additions and decide what has to be prioritized. So, if you take a look um the legend at the bottom, if the position is blue and underlined, it has been incorporated into this budget. If the position is um italicized, we found a workaround, a way to reallocate existing staff to achieve the same result. If the item is orange, that's the next level of priority. So, if I were to win the lotto and donate the money to Watertown, that is where I would go next. Um, one of the things that I will stop and just mention on this slide because it's another question I I often receive is about administrators. There seems to
056be a lot of administrators. You know, we've cut teachers, but have we cut administrators? Um I I do think it's important to mention that as we've expanded in particular special education programming across the district, you cannot sustain and be legally compliant with all of that programming without expanding the administrators that oversee that programming. I will also 100% stand by the 2.0 administrators for curriculum and instruction. Um, not this year obviously, but I will tell you that it is very difficult as a one-man show to oversee all curriculum and instruction for grades preK through 12 for 2500 students, high school English class to kindergarten reading class, one person. Um, and that one person, which was me and is now Jen, also does um human resources. It's split with the superintendent. It's a very heavy lift and
057there is I I don't necessarily feel like we need administrators at the cabinet level but certainly um some middle management positions perhaps even at the AP level that could really help um to oversee that work. It's one of the reasons why I feel like we've been stalled because it's just not sustainable with the people that we have to do the work. Um step five was to identify those priority areas. You can see in the orange the FY27, these are the numbers that I'm committing to. They are certainly in particular the school budgets, not high numbers. Um especially if you look back to some of the previous years. Um but I felt like let's be, you know, sustainable this year. Let's look at if you can have your money principles all up front and not have
058it be frozen. That's a little bit better than than having a bigger amount and having it frozen and then and then you can't use it for um just as a point of um information. This year I I came into a budget that I inherited. I released 50% of the school budgets um that principles were able to spend and then we stopped there um because I just wanted to wrap my head around the budget and make sure that we were coming in on budget um and it will be tight but they've only received 50% this year to date. So next slide. Um what resulted is the priority areas. Retention of existing staff and class sizes, restoring some positions that are much needed. Recruiting for some new positions which I will get into. Professional development which we've
059discussed instructional resources which we've discussed. And then facilities a more robust and realistic facilities budget. Next slide. I'm going to pause and just talk a little bit about facilities, construction, and equipment. Um, and looking at this area and working with Mr. Valardi and Mrs. Kushuba, um, what this is my plan to try to get as much work done in facilities as possible this year. We're hoping to receive drip grant funding. If we receive that drip grant funding, we'll be able to use that to replace the to to fix the both the Poke and the John Trumbull Primary School playgrounds. Those must be fixed. Um it it is hopefully it's looking very good that we will receive that trip grant funding. So that will fund those two projects. Um my plan is this is assuming some
060risk. But my plan is to apply for a competitive grant, the the DAS grant. If we get that grant, we will get 60% reimbursement on some of the other construction pro projects that Luigi needs to complete, including um crack and seal replacement, asphalt replacement at all schools and sidewalks at all schools. If we get that grant, we will be able to use what I've um proposed for facilities to receive to do all of that work. If we don't get that grant, we'll do as much as we can this year and keep looking for other grant opportunities. Um so it will be a wonderful world if we can get those two grants and get a chunk of those projects which have been sitting in his budget for four years. Um and then equipment just to give
061everybody a picture of the age of some of the equipment um that we use to take care of of our footprint. Uh the skidsters are about 22 years old. The John Deere tractors are 17 and 25 years old. And then mowers are always something that Luigi's looking for. They seem to hit rocks and need replacing. So, um, curriculum and instruction again we talked about, but I really very strongly feel that the professional development plan that we have needs to be funded for this year. Um, I I have heard people ask the board of education h has a good budget. Why aren't kids making progress as fast as they should be? This is one of the reasons we're not putting the funds towards the touch points that get to all students. You have to have the
062instructional materials and you have to have the professional learning if you're going to be able to move students. That's my theory and that's my platform. I'm sticking with it. Next slide. Okay. Next part of the budget strategy is creative cost savings. Next slide. This is when we moved in the CS. We conducted a detailed audit and tred up 1,030 budget lines. Um we went back three years and we tred up every line. Um, every line that's in this budget is because we looked back three years. We used data to decide what we thought the percentage increase could be would be and then that's the amount that we went with when we were budgeting. Um, so just important to mention, next slide. We then looked at um creative cost savings in particular um related to positions.
063So we completed a costbenefit analysis on many key expenditures to see if we were being fiscally responsible in the direction that we were moving. We um optimized scheduling and reallocation of staff. We targeted recruitment um and we looked at any external funding sources we could find. Next slide. These are the positions that I'm advocating be restored next year. Last year um through the budget, three um unified arts teachers were reduced from Swift Middle School and they were actually placed at at the high school. This very much greatly impacted the student experience at Swift. Um there were originally these positions were back in the budget to be restored. I didn't think that it was feasible to add these positions this year. Um, so what we were able to do, and I thank the Swift teachers and
064the Swift administration, we were able to take a fresh look at scheduling and the reallocation of staff so that we can create a more robust experience to compensate for the unified arts teachers that were lost last year. This will have no budgetary impact. Next, um, item Oh, no, back one, Michael. We also had a 1.0 library media specialist for elementary in the budget this year. Um it was a cut from last year. [clears throat] Um we were not able to fund that this year. Um but the workaround was to secure our library clerk. This will allow at the three elementary schools there to be somebody that staffs the library so that our youngest students can go in and take out books from our libraries. Again, um this was this was a definite need, but we
065couldn't afford the library media specialists, so we went with a clerk. Um this will add $65,000 to our budget. Um, but I think it's an essential and it also allows us to keep the wonderful steam experiences for the elementary um, specials that have been built in. Next slide, Michael. The new positions being added um, are two ASD positions for next school year. We need to add an autism spectrum disorder class at John Trumbull Primary School for students rising from preK and we need to add one at Swift. Um, these two positions will have no budgetary impact. They will be funded through grants. I'm proposing that we add a 1.0 secondary general education teacher at the Watertown Alternative Academy so that we can expand that program. I'll talk a little bit more about that when we
066get to revenue. Um, and that will not when you do the costbenefit analysis for the WA, that will not cost the district anything. It will actually achieve a savings of $8,400. >> [snorts] >> We are also I am also looking to add one board certified behavior analyst and 10 BCBA assistant positions across all ASD classrooms at John Trumbull, Judson, and Swift. This will be funded through the non-renewal of contracted services. It will fully cover the cost of all of the positions and it will actually generate an additional savings of $776,000. And then last, I would like to add a new prek4 position. I think this is huge for our families in particular since they've changed the kindergarten age. Um we had quite the waiting list this year. So there is a demand. Our families um
067this is great for us, great for our families. Um actually we were able to uh look into some grant funding. Um and then it would also bring in some further revenue. So this would actually be a revenue source by adding a prek of $96,000. Next slide, Michael. Cost benefit analysis. As I indicated earlier, we did a costbenefit analysis for several of our programs. It's always good to keep yourself in check and see if you are being fiscally responsible and making sound budget decisions. So, if you look at the WMTA, I thought this was important to just um take a look at. Right now, we have our own in district transition academy program over at the Seaman Company for our special education students ages 18 to 22. the alternative um to having that program would be
068to outplace those students were required by law um to provide education to those students up through the age of 22. Um so I just went through and made sure that it was prudent. We also expanded that space this past year and I wanted to make sure it was a prudent decision um and and that we were being responsible with our funding. So you can see here if we were to outplace um the students in that program it would cost significantly more money. And so truthfully by having our own IND district program it is a savings of about 1.3 million a year. Um this was programming that has developed over the years. I would like to mention um and I will talk about it again when we get to revenue that we do have one tuition
069paying student from another district at the tune of $133,000. It paid for the rent and part of a teacher for the expanded space. So next slide. Same thing with the Watertown Alternative Academy. Um, is it prudent to continue to run that program. Um, and so knowing that we will only have two students next year, I wanted to check to make sure in this program, although there could be more at at any time, um, I wanted to see if if it was um within our best interest fiscally. I know it's in our best interest as far as the students because we provide a better program both at the WTA and the WA. those kids would um go to an outplacement and most of their learning would be digital if they weren't with us. So, it's a
070better experience. Um but it is worth it. It it makes sense to maintain this program and um at the tune of I know although modest savings of 8,400 but again we could always add students there. You never know when when students might be added to that program. Next slide. This one's a little bit tricky for us in a little uh tear at the heartstrings. Um we have very for a very long time had a wonderful working relationship with Aspire um living and learning for our autism programs. They are an amazing organization. Uh we talked last year when I was the interim director we talked with Aspire and indicated that we wanted to try to start to fade um from them. So we had a blended model this year where their staff worked alongside our staff
071so that we could build our internal capacity. So moving into next year, um it is time at least for this program to not renew that contracted service and to um pull in our own staff to run those programs across John Trumbull, Swift, and Judson. Um so you could see there the Aspire contract, it cost the district 1.5 million. By hiring our own staff, it's a savings of $776,000. Next slide. And this is the prek we talked about, teacher cost, grant offset, and then tuition revenue. So, it is actually um revenue of $96,000 to add another prek. Next slide. I did also um make some staff cuts there. There really wasn't a way to necessarily get around making some staff cuts, so or reductions, rather. So, we went through um and and did our best to
072find places where it wouldn't um you know, the least disruption possible. Um so, at this point, we will be cutting one uh district AP. Um which I I think is is a little bit contradictory to what I said before because I said we needed more administrators, but I'm also very understanding of where we are right now um financially. And so, um, this isn't the year, um, maybe a future year as we can, you know, continue to to be more cost-effective to add that position back in. Um, we did have a floater this year because of a leave, so that was, um, removed. Um, we're reducing by two unaffiliated tutors. Um, looking at class sizes, uh, we are looking to reduce four teachers. This assumes risk because if we ever have increases in a section break
073that means adding another teacher but based upon the numbers right now we can um reduce four teachers and I am really hoping to achieve that and the pair of educators through attrition. So when people either resign or retire um not filling those positions which which frees up money for to cover um for these four um and then para educators there will be some cuts in in pared educators um and then athletics cutting the strength and conditioning coach and freshman sports except for basketball which is a carryover from this year. um basketball just has a very large demand and I just don't think it would be fair um for that many kids not to to have basketball. So that savings is about $951,000. Next slide. We also went through and re removed some priority three items.
074We made some further reductions into athletics. We were able to find some additional cost savings in special education. um technology has been reduced, contracted services, and then facilities. This was facilities, budget was that plus what what he he was given. Um and and every penny definitely needed. He has all of the costs broken down. Um but I'm really hopeful that those grants will help us to get the maximum amount of work done possible um with the funds that we're able to provide. Next slide. Just like to mention that we're always looking for ways to cut costs. Um, it's been maybe six months in this job. I'm looking forward to continuing and to exploring some of these things that that you can't kind of accomplish necessarily in in in a few months. Um, so one of
075the things that we're looking at is um reducing the bus fleet and exploring the waiver option. Again, that's on the table to look at. Um, we're also looking to purchase a district van for the WTA and smaller athletic teams. I started to do a costbenefit analysis for a van. Um, I think it would be worth our while to look into. We um if if people don't bulk order, Marie goes and knocks on their doors and says you have to bulk order. Um we're looking into some solar opportunities with the town. Um we're that every little bit counts is 100% that should be our motto. Um minimizing color printing, unplugging electronics, vetting vendor pricing, um trying to use more digital correspondence. We've also rebuilt our internship program which is a cost savings um because they provide
076substitute coverage in in needed um help at the schools and it's it's either equivalent or less than what a sub would cost. um also fully implementing our residency policy and that is something that you know has has been mentioned multiple times at board meetings and then um looking at contracted services either vetting vendor pricing or replacing contracted services with our own. Next part of the the three-prong strategy is rethinking revenue. Next slide. Just a little information um also I think is important um is about what are the funding sources for Connecticut public school systems. So we have federal funding in the way of grants. We have local funding from the taxpayers um and then we have state funding and then district initiate initiated revenue which we are very very much aggressively seeking the grants and
077revenue sources. Next slide. The state provides two um different pathways to receiving funds to offset costs of school district budgets. One of them is excess cost. What that means is for special education students when what it costs to educate that student is four and a half times more than our per pupil expenditure. We get money back from the state to cover those costs. That's already built into the budget. The other part that we get from the staff is called from the state rather is called educational cost sharing. >> [snorts] >> um that is uh determined by the state using some voodoo formula that they use. Um but those um funds go directly to the town. In other words, they don't come to the board for us to expend or take off of our bottom line.
078They actually go directly to the town. Next slide. This slide gives a little bit of a historical picture of educational cost sharing by year. So if you look at FY23 as an example, our final budget was about 52 million. the town received in an ECS funds about 11 million um which accounted for about 22% of the budget and then what was left as a cost to taxpayers in the general fund is the 41 million. So you can see how that plays out for the next four years. Um moving into FY27 the expectation is that we will get approximately 13 million in excess uh in educational cost sharing that the town will receive about $13 million. Next slide. Again, we expect about 1 million 1.3 million in excess cost that's already deducted from the budget that
079you're seeing. And then the educational cost sharing you will not see in our budget because that goes directly to the town and they remove it or they add it to the general fund. Um, next slide. Grant opportunities. Um, we really aggressively pursuing um grant opportunities. We're also looking to fully um collect all tuition and one of the initiatives um and what I have baked into the budget is to try to add two more tuition paying students to the WTA as a revenue source. We can also take a tuition paying student in our paths program. So, we will market that and we will also be able to take students in our WA program. All of those programs are statecertified outplacement programs and we're able to take tuition paying students. So this is a way if we
080can market ourselves to have our own agency and try to build in um bring in at least some of our own revenue. Um and then uh we have we have another board policy that we have not been enacting and that's our facilities policy. And so another source of revenue is just following our own policy and collecting facilities fees as the policy is designed to do. Um and then fully collecting all the pay-to-play funds. So some of this is just enacting current policy or enforcing current policy and then some of this is is looking for some new creative ways. Next slide. So our anticipated revenue sources for FY27 in grants were expected to bring in 1.4 million tuition 726,000 and then facilities paytoplay 175. So that's about $2.3 million in anticipated revenue. Next slide. Um, looking
081into the future, just like with cost savings, we're looking to expand that WAA. Um, we're looking to expand the WTA and preK and continue to collect tuition as some revenue sources. Um, some other ideas to be explored is we have um a really robust structured literacy program in our district. So perhaps next summer we can offer tuition paying program for structured literacy to area districts that don't have as many teachers in that area. um looking at some before and after school opportunities where they um they they [clears throat] collect payment but then they also give money back to the school as as a revenue source. So looking at some of that before and after school enrichment programming where they they pay you to be able to utilize your space. um professional learning academy. Uh eventually
082that's probably a little bit more ways out. Um but we're developing some really strong skills and there are other districts that in the summer will will offer professional learningmies for other districts to send their teachers and then we talked about beginning to own our district owned bands. Next slide. Um the the amount in the middle to be clear is not this year's budget. Um the amount in the middle is before we uh took off any grants or revenue sources. The purpose of this slide is really just to show you by category um what makes up the bulk of our budget. So you can see that that dark blue salaries makes up the largest portion of our budget followed by benefits followed by special education and and then um all of those other little pieces are
083the small pieces of the pie that [snorts] make up our budget. Um and and those are two fixed costs. salaries and benefits. Next slide. Um, this slide shows how funding sources are applied to our budget and and 100% we recognize that the majority of our budget is paid for from the general fund and the taxpayer. Um, but we do also receive that uh educational cost sharing. And then all those small pieces of the pie um they are efforts that we can continue to try to expand on to bring in our own revenue and and grant opportunities. Next slide. So the goal is financial stability um sustainability and student success. Um we're trying to avoid any unnecessary cost shifts to the town and the taxpayers, but we also have an obligation to grow essential services and
084supports for our students. Um we're trying very much to increase our own agency to work and to bring funds into our own district or to cut costs and to judiciously allocate resources um and always to be transparent and an honest partner um and good fiscal stewards. So next slide. If this budget um is passed as is, this is what we will be able to achieve at all schools, maintain class sizes, sidewalk repairs, asphalt repairs, fully funded school budgets, more robust job embedded professional learning. At John Trumbull, we will able to not replace but uh fix the playground, add a.33 library clerk, add a prek4 section, at an ASD classroom. At Judson, we'll be able to add a.33 library clerk. At Pulk, we'll be able to repair the playground, add a.33 library clerk. At Swift, at
085a point, we can then take our existing library media specialist and split that person over the middle school and the high school. So, that means Swift would get back a.5 library media specialist and the high school would get back a.5 library media specialist. Um and then Swift would be able to offer those additional courses um to fill the gap from the UA decline. And then they would also have an ASD classroom um the high school we mentioned and then the WTA WAA would have a general education content area teacher in a van. Next slide. This slide represents um the all-in budget request for FY27. I ask you to please consider the green banner on the left. Those were the fixed costs in that original number that I shared with you at the 7.83. If you
086look to the right, all in priority areas, fixed cost and all other increases amount to that 66 million. With the staff reductions, the grants, the revenue, and the additional cost savings, we were able to find the final total is 60,221,211. That's about a 2.6 um million dollar increase and a 4.55%. Um I thank you for listening. I know that was probably a little bit lengthy and a lot of information. Um and I am more than happy to answer any questions. Um even if they come to you after this meeting, please feel free to reach out. I have an open door policy. I am more than happy to to answer questions or t take suggestions. Um, oh, as a matter of fact, I forgot to mention one thing. On our walking tour, there was a town
087council member with us and he said, he we were talking about grants and I was saying how difficult it is sometimes to find grants. It's not even the writing of them. It's the finding of them because it's like this great sea abyss of of grants. And he's like, "Did you ever think of of hiring somebody for grant writing?" I'm like, "Well, we don't have the funds for that." He's like, "No, you could do it by commission." I thought that was a fantastic idea. I actually added it in the slides. I'm also open to those types of suggestions um if people have them. Um anyways, thank you. Any questions? I'm I'm happy to answer. >> Any questions, Mr. Superintendent? >> Uh just a comment. I I commend you and and the others who work diligently on
088this. I I think it is beautifully put together and presented. It is thorough. It feels fresh. Uh like it was like an overhaul where you went through every single thing. And I've been talking to you a lot. I know you did dig through every single thing there. [snorts] Um, and I love how you rep prioritize some of the things there, especially with the additional funds going into the curriculum. I think your wealth of knowledge within curriculum is a big help for putting this budget together. And also want to say uh just speak to like the value of the visits to the schools. Uh we set that up just to to get not only board members, town council members into the schools to see when you know it's one thing to hear all this stuff, it's
089another thing to witness and see. Uh, you know, Miss Plord and and Giani over there, their team working on cutting down on absenteeism, doing a tremendous job with that. Um, a lot of good things happening at the high school, showing that test scores, SAT scores are improving. So, it's not just being said. These are the numbers here to support it. We are seeing positive momentum. And the Pulk School was another wonderful visit as well where board members actually saw pictures of the decaying playground there. So, we can see with our own eyes what needs to be done. So, I commend you and your team. Thank you very much for a budget uh well put together. >> Thank you. >> Yeah. And thank you, Lisa. I mean, all the meetings that you had, you know, with
090stakeholders, members of the community, and just, you know, I've only saw the surface of kind of what you guys have had to deal with. Honestly, you guys put in so much time and effort into this budget. >> I could see, you know, the mountains of paperwork and folders and stuff you guys had piled up on [laughter] just nonstop. Every single time I walked in, Lisa is like, I got the number down more. Like >> truly this was a all hands on deck effort and you know I couldn't be prouder of the budget that was put together by you and your team. So thank you. >> Thank you. >> When [clears throat] will these be available to the public posted online the presentation? >> Well Mr. Dalton that'll be my request if he could put it
091up tomorrow. Yeah it's the slides are ready to put up and the speaker's notes are there so there's some explanation. >> Thank you. >> Yeah. Um, and next week on Wednesday for the public as well, we are going to be having a uh budget and finance subcommittee meeting to where, you know, we're going to have a Q&A just to talk a little bit more about the budget. So, if anybody wants to come by and see that conversation, potentially ask any questions, you know, that will be an opportunity as well. Um, are there any other questions or comments? Okay, seeing none, moving on to item I, public participation. In accordance to policy number 9050, participants must state their name and address for the record and limit their comments to three minutes. The board encourages speakers to
092refrain from making defamatory remarks about staff members or individuals associated with the Watertown Public Schools. Please note that questions or issues raised during public comment are not typically addressed during the meeting. However, a member of the board or administration will follow up or respond as appropriate. Do we have anybody from the public who would like to speak? Seeing none, moving on to item J, communication secretary, Miss Davidson. >> Yes, Mr. Chair. The district received an email from Kelly Lambert regarding her concerns related to the recent events countrywide about the federal government's response to immigration enforcement and how it may affect the students sense of safety in our schools as well as an incident regarding student attire. I'd also like to take note that Miss Lambert sent this email back in late January. However, it is
093only being noted now as my email was incorrect on the district website and I did not receive it. This has since been rectified and I apologize for relating her email so late. >> Thank you. Moving on to item K, report from the board chair. Um I do have um one more business to handle tonight. Uh with Mr. Gavales away for medical reasons and with his consent, an interimm chair of the budget and finance uh committee uh will be appointed this evening. Uh that's going to be uh Mindy Davidson. And with that, there will be an opening of facilities which will be uh appointed and filled by Sher Martino. Um, we wish John the best and we send our prayers and, you know, we hope to see him back very, very soon. >> Moving on to
094item L, committee reports, curriculum and instruction. Miss Hosking, >> no report at this time. >> We have to add an agenda item. >> Okay. Um, we'll do the motion after the committee before I don't do a motion to discuss which ones. >> Okay. Just doing that. This is the information board. We need to discuss item. >> There's We didn't add an item to discuss this. Sorry. >> No, no, horse. It's all good. >> Policy and labor. Mr. Malagoodi. >> No update [snorts] at this time. >> Budget and finance. Miss Davidson. >> Yes, Mr. Chair. Um, we listened to a wonderful presentation from Miss Becky tonight and I'm looking forward to going through the town with her and um going to PTO meetings and everything else hearing um what the public has to say. And once
095again um we are meeting next Wednesday night um for the Q&A and that is here in the lecture hall. So I invite all the public to come out with all of your questions so that we can answer them for you. [snorts] facilities. [clears throat] Um, Miss Martino, again, sorry to put you both on the spot. Again, putting you both into [laughter] your position. I do apologize. [clears throat] Um, so I mean, Mindy, since you were the facilities subcommittee chair, would do you want to give the report on behalf of Miss Martino? >> Yes. Um, I can absolutely do that because Mr. Valardi and I um have been texting back and forth about some things. Um, in in general, we had some things to talk about, but then the the um district got hit with a
096several snowstorms as we know. So, our meeting was pushed aside in order to prioritize. So, I'm sure that in the next week or so he can meet with Miss Martino regarding that, but for the most part, um he he needs a little help in his budget and we're working towards getting him that. >> Thank you. [clears throat] Already appointed to the committee. He had a report within a minute. Very impressive. Moving on to governance and community engagement. Miss Lton, [snorts] >> just wanted to reiterate the comments earlier and thanks for the building admins who are taking the time to open doors and give the building tours um and being able to welcome Mr. Coachola from the town council who came to the first two. We hope to welcome more town council members. Um nothing really
097compares [snorts] to getting to see firsthand the boots on the ground work. Um it really doesn't compare to seeing presentations. So we look forward to making these more regular part of our our annual schedules and we appreciate the time that goes into opening the doors. >> Awesome. >> Thank you so much. Moving on to just want to make sure that moving on to item M action items. Uh adoption of items to be approved by consent. Okay. Uh, consideration of approval of an out ofstate uh, field trip to Worster, Massachusetts. I believe I pronounced that correctly. >> Worster. Okay. >> Thank you. Uh, do I have a motion to approve the out ofstate field trip? >> Uh, yes, Mr. Chairman. I make a motion to approve the out ofstate field trip to Wora, Massachusetts from April
0983rd through April. I work with a lot of folks from Boston through April 5th, 2026 for approximately 10 Watertown High School students for the first um F FRC robotics competition. >> Do I have a second? >> I second. >> All those in favor? >> I opposed [snorts] abstensions. Motion carries. Secondly, consideration of approval of an out ofstate field trip to Springfield, Massachusetts. Much easier. Uh do I have a motion? >> Yes, Mr. Chair. I make a motion to approve the out ofstate field trip to Springfield, Mass from April 15th through April 18th, 2026 for approx. >> Oh, go ahead. I'm sorry I cut you off. >> for approximately 10 Watertown High School students for the first New England District Championship. >> Do I have a second? >> I second. >> All those in favor? >>
099I >> opposed. Abstensions. [snorts] Motion carries. Moving [clears throat] on to M3, consideration to approve donations. Let's see. The softball booster club has donated $4,476.20 to the Watertown High School softball program. Do I have a motion to uh approve the donation? >> Yes, Mr. Chairman. I make a motion to accept the donation of $4,476.20 20 cents to the Watertown High School softball team from the softball booster club and that a letter of appreciation be sent to the donor. Do I have a second? >> Second. >> All those in favor? >> I I opposed abstensions. Motion carries. >> All right. And see, moving on to M4, consideration to approve a donation. The War Oak Circle of Sports has donated a swim court and wireless adapter for the scoreboard at Watertown High School with a value of
100$2,141. Do I have a motion to approve the donation? >> Yes, Mr. Chair. I make a motion to accept the donation of $2,141 for a swim cord and wireless adapter for the scoreboard at Watertown High School for the from the Water Oak Circle of Sports and that a letter of appreciation be sent to the donor. >> Do I have a second? >> Second. >> All those in favor? >> I opposed abstensions. Motion carries. Moving [clears throat] on to item N, future agenda items and board member comments. Um, so we want to talk about >> and could we talk about that? >> Yes, I I was talking to you. We can we can do the motion. I think it's forced though, isn't it? >> You can do a motion. So we can bring up the motion.
101So we can do a motion to add after item item N to be new item O. >> Okay. >> Do you want to make the motion? >> Yes. Just adding the agenda item. >> Yeah. And it'll be the new O and then making >> an agenda item to make the appointment. >> No, no, no. To to discuss the uh >> the calendar >> calendar. I'm sorry. Okay. Uh yes, Mr. Chair, I'd like to make a motion to uh add an agenda item uh prior to O or replacing O there on the agenda to discuss the calendar. >> Do I have a second? >> Second. >> All those in favor? I >> I >> opposed abstensions. >> We have All right. Um are there any future agenda items or board member comments before we move on
102to the new item? >> Yes. The chair? >> Yes. >> Just quickly, I wanted to Is Mr. Valardi still areas? I just wanted to thank Mr. Valardi and all of Watertown Public Works for this week and this entire winter IN GENERAL. [applause] YOU KNOW, you guys often hear negative comments um people complaining about what's not done and I just really I having now this winter a child who is doing snow removal. I have such appreciation for you guys just being away from home for days and nights on end away from home and in the cold. So, thank you. Everything is done impeccably here in the schools and in our town. >> You're here, >> Mr. Chair. >> Yes. I would be remiss as we have more people in the audience than I've seen in a
103in a few meetings to not remind everybody that sister act is coming up. [laughter] So I invite you all to come. It is March 19th, 20th and 21st, the 19th and 20th and 21st at 7 p.m. and also on a Saturday at 2 p.m. Please come and support the arts. Um these kids work so hard on these musicals. And um I can tell you that coming off of winning the best musical in the state last year, they're working even harder to impress you for this year. So please join us. >> Thank you. >> Any other comments? >> Okay, moving on to the new item O, the school calendar. I'll toss it over to the superintendent. >> Yes. So board members, I've uh passed out a little document here for your review. Um, as you know,
104this week has brought us to six snow days, which means um that we're slated, according to the calendar that was adopted last year to start to cut into April break. Um, so the item for discussion tonight is is should the board of education amend the 2526 Watertown Public Schools calendar um due to the number of snow days. Um, so what I've included in the packet for you are some of the statutory requirements that we need to meet. So districts must um schedule a minimum of 181 student attendance days between July 1st and June 30th. We currently have 181. Districts may hold um school on legal state holidays Junth and Good Friday provide as long as we provide a suitable um educational program included in observance of the holiday. So, those are two important statutes that
105we need to keep in mind um as we go through and talk. If the hund if if and I'm proposing that we consider cutting the 181st day, if we cut the 181st day from school um the district would have to come to mutual agreement with the teachers um on how they would make up that day because that day is in their contract and we would need anou. So, that's just a little contextual background. Um so, option A is to keep the calendar as it is. Um, and if we keep the calendar as it is, we I think we're cutting into April break for for two days if I'm not mistaken. Um, the issue with that is that I think we haven't had a winter like this in a very long time. And so I think
106people have made in particular families have been asking, they've made plans um, scheduled flights. I think we'll have a very large absenteeism problem if we try to hold school during April vacation. So, I think it's just um perhaps we might want to think about how we can uh shuffle some things um to make up the days potentially and not um interfere with April vacation. So, one of the things that we could do is um take off that 181st day. We would still be compliant with the statute. And then what we would be able to do is um either take March 3rd or Junth or both days and um use those. And then what would happen is that we would actually get out of school on Friday, Junth and then graduation could be on Friday, Junth.
107Um that is if we don't have any more snow days. Um so that works out well because how lovely to have graduation on a Friday. Um it also um works out out well that we had those two dates that we can kind of play with. We would have to add school back in um on those days because their scheduled days off which would mean amending the calendar. So that is one option. Another option um would be to just tack on the days um at the at the end in June. So in other words, we're already pushing out into um we would be pushing out into the week after June 19th, the week of the 22nd, 23rd, 24th, etc. We would be pushing out into that week. Um by statute, we can go to school up
108through June 30th. Um I think the the back side of that is that um it is so hot in the in the schools at that time. Every week that you kind of extend the heat becomes more of an issue. And then also there may be families that have made vacation plans. So that might be an issue there um as well. Um [snorts] so those are just some options of what we can do. We don't necessarily have to take a vote uh tonight. I think we can kind of explore the options and then have some discussion and then perhaps at the next board meeting decide what would make the most sense. We would because the calendar is a board adopted we would um have to take that through in to a board vote to amend the
1092526 calendar. >> Jen, did I forget anything or say miss anything? >> [snorts] >> student. >> So if we took off the 181st day and went to school on Junth, we would end on Friday, right? >> That's what it looks like. >> Yes. >> But we haven't had March yet to know if there's any more. That is correct. So that assumes risk that we may not have another snow day. Correct. But if we did, we could also take off March 3rd as long as the snow day Tuesday. >> That's just >> which is Tuesday. So we have to make sure we're going to do that. >> So we wouldn't probably be able to do that at this point. >> We would have to do a half day and reschedule conferences, but it is an option
110of a day that we could come to school to make up the days. We could do that day and not Junth and save Junth if we did have another snow day. That's another way. But we would have to make that decision tonight because it's >> actually yes we would if we did the third we would have to make that decision tonight. >> March third could do we could do an early release date for students in a half day for conferences. >> Correct. >> Which is a model we have done in the past. >> Right. >> Yeah. >> That's an easy quick fix. >> And then if we take off the 181st day >> um that would bring us to graduation on Thursday. >> If we had another snow day we could come to school on
111Junth. >> Okay. Any other contracts that are affected by >> I think it's just the paras and the teachers. >> Oh, the secretaries. >> Yeah, I'm pretty sure Junth is in their contract. >> Okay. [snorts] >> So, I I think it's a matter of working with our unions to figure out what would make sense. Um, do we feel like Tuesday is really soon to change plans on people that have already made arrangements or made plans based on having the day off? >> Maybe yes, maybe no. Or people will be super excited that their kids will actually go to school [laughter] tonight instead of being home again. >> They may or they may have already taken vacation time. They can't go back and make plans with their kids. >> They they may have, right? Jen was
112gonna wait in her loop today at her kids school and just insist that they open >> 15 days >> and they didn't open the doors. >> I mean, what do board members think? I mean, just open it up. I mean, >> I mean, that's probably I don't know. I think it's soon. I think less than a week notice to change a school day and send kids and people have already kind of had to make accommodations as a little quick personally. >> Okay. So then we could do the Junth route hope that as an option and hope that we don't have any more snow days. >> I mean I don't that's my >> if I could comment um while I fully [snorts] appreciate Liz's comment, haven't we all been making plans and changes because of snow
113days at the cuff. So it's not any different than what we're doing. So I don't know from the flip side of it to save time at the end of the school year. I don't know. I think it's it's a most likely and I don't want to put it out there but we probably will have another snow day >> which we actually might next week anyways because there's another something coming. >> The other option um we we are also not up >> I'm going to say that wrong. We also can have school on Good Friday which I I know is also an issue but I will just throw it out there. If there is school on Good Friday, just like with Junth, the requirement um in the law is that you have to do something educational
114related to said holiday. It it would be it would not be religious. It would be more historical in nature. So, I mean that's not ideal either, but just so that everybody knows all the options >> that can be thrown into option B possibly >> potentially. >> Um through the chair, >> well, I ju just so everybody knows what we're looking at. Miss Fecky did a good job of doing the structure, the pros and the cons there with everything kind of timed out and it's a difficult spot as a board when we face this juncture almost every year because uh I I know the importance and how much people appreciate having the graduation on a Friday. I also know how hot the schools get the later on you go and I also know how disruptive it
115is if we start cutting into April break too. Uh, personally I I I I like what option B lays out there, especially if you can pull Good Friday in there. You may not have to take action on the third there. So we basically have two days to to play with there. >> So you could say Junth and then if we need to Good Friday, >> correct? >> Okay. And then leaving the third alone >> and leave the third alone. >> If like your other board members thoughts, >> does does Good Friday fall the week before spring break? >> It's not attached to spring break. It's like we difference >> through the chair. I just have a um is there any like feedback from staff? I don't know how this really like you know I think
116of it from the family perspective. >> Um in speaking with the only um person I spoke with really is is the WA union president. I think that you know >> the hope was not to have to cut into April vacation was the consensus. Um >> the only thing that I would worry about with Good Friday is I I think that might be a day that people might have plans to go away for the weekend to see family. Um whereas the third I don't know that share. >> Yes. >> I like option B. Mhm. >> I think Good Friday should be put aside for now for at this point because families are traveling maybe for the the spring break and on March 3rd if you know if it doesn't work for a family then your student
117doesn't come to school. I don't want to say it that way but that's what it would come down to. >> Um and I think a lot of parents they're not they're not looking at the calendar till the week before and then they're saying oh there's a teacher conference day or there's um a PD day and [snorts] my child's not going to school. So, I think option B makes a lot of sense to me. >> Yeah, I know. >> Okay, but Good Friday is not attached to spring break. >> No, it's not attached to it. It's there's a whole week. >> Good Friday is a tough one. I'm just going to say that. I think that's going to be harder. Maybe we save that for later >> for desperado times. [laughter] >> There's two more three
118more days. >> Um I mean, I guess it then comes down to are we are we thinking that at the very least like B it's more about the days? Is that kind of what we're thinking as a board? option B, but what are the days that we're willing to come in on? >> Okay. If that's the case, then it's the discussion of the third, I suppose. And I mean, what what is the board's opinion about [clears throat] I mean, I know Liz does bring up a good point that's short notice, but I mean, at the same time, I mean, do do we feel that we should use the third? >> So, if I may, I think there's two options. it. I think I think one is you say we're not going we're going to have
119school on Junth. If there's a snow day, then you and you wanted to not extend into the next week, you would have to then reconsider Good Friday. That's one option. The other option is that you do the third, you'd get out of school on the third and the Thursday, but if you had another snow day, you still have Junth to play with. Like those to me are the two options on the table. So, it's either the 3 or Junth one is less likely to impact Good Friday. >> You see, I I I like I do understand short notice. I just usually don't like playing with the holidays and I feel like when it comes to Good Friday and worry about absenteeism and and concerns like that, I I think it will be a pretty big
120deal for our families. Um I'm more willing to take the br the anger for the third than I would be for Good Friday. >> Um so I mean >> half a day, right? >> Yeah, it'd be a half a day, but I think somebody said there was like an adjustment or a specific way that we can do it. I think somebody was mentioning that >> so it is a conference day. So we would actually make we would have kids come to school, but it would be a shortened day so that teachers they would have to reschedule their conferences. Um but they would hold conferences. um it would allow for time to hold conferences if we made it a added it back as a school day but a legal length day or a shortened day. >>
121Yeah. I mean I at least personally am of the opinion of we use the third. I'd rather be safe than sorry and try not to mess with the holidays if we can help them. That that's that's my opinion. >> I agree. I think the you locked in the third and you still have the safety net of Junth >> for something else because March >> hasn't even begun yet. >> No. >> Any other comments, discussion, concerns? >> Okay. >> So, my question actually I do my question would be how um how you make the motion perhaps. So I think that it would be to remove the 181st day and then add school on March 3rd. Would you make a motion now to also leave the door open to be able to add Junth or that would
122be a separate motion? I'm just curious. >> Separate motion. Thank you. Just curious logistics. >> I think at this point we just have to get through the next week. >> Yeah, [laughter] at this point >> we could always revisit. >> Yeah, we can revisit and get through the next month. >> Okay. >> And then we can finalize hopefully. I don't know if we'll make it by the 9th, but we can certainly do it on the one after the 9th. >> Hopefully the 9th we can solidify graduation [snorts] >> um if I may for the third would we have a traditional early dismissal date or would we do it as an emergency dismissal time which is a little bit earlier to provide more time? >> We could do that. We could do an emergency dismissal. So
123now we [laughter] so families still have to take the day off and we've eliminated their ability to do anything else with the day with six days notice. >> I'm not love it. >> But >> I think that I think that's a little bit confusing for families. I think we should just call it a regular half day. >> That's just my opinion. I think you know I think calling an emergency dismissal is going to make people like go oh my goodness, you know like where what time does that mean? What does that mean for busing? You know, at least for with kids that go to daycare and stuff, it's a half day. They just go at their normal times. Just my opinion. >> True. Families do have planned for those days because we have them. They
124usually have a contingency plan. >> Yeah. >> Okay. >> Any other questions, comments, or concerns? >> May I ask Miss Gay, would you reschedu a second half day? >> So, there already is a second half day on March 5th. Um, that Thursday, >> right? But they're pretty much already planned out, right? So >> they are um we'd have to work with staff to see. We find traditionally there's lower participation rates for our spring conferences. So typically fall every family comes in um and in spring there is >> so there may not be a ton of rescheduling. Okay. >> So do you want me to make for you? >> Sure. >> Okay. All right. So Mr. I make a motion that we go into session for a half day of school on March 3rd um and
125that we remove the 181st day of school in order to continue on in the school year. >> Okay. Do I have a second? >> Second. >> All right. All those in favor? >> I [clears throat] >> opposed. [laughter] Abstensions. >> It's okay. >> All right. >> No, no. It it it is it is a very difficult decision. I mean, I I more so air on the side of caution when it comes to the holidays, but 100% understood with that. >> None of it's ideal. >> Yeah, it is not. It's like it's kind of >> what's the least of the worst. >> Yeah, I know. >> If it snows again, >> we need to do prayer circles. Uh moving on to item P, adjournment. Do I have a motion to adjourn the meeting? >> Uh yes,
126Mr. Chair. I motion to adjourn the meeting at 8:40 p.m. >> Do I have a second? >> Second. >> All right. All those in favor? I opposed.