Board of Education Meeting 3-25-25 7 PM

001[Music] You're going to meet the uh upstanding bunny. It's the [Music] uh the uh whatever it is. I need no listen to me. I'm tired. There's one more place for you. Right here. Wait. [Music] Perfect. So I can't finishing the [Music] [Applause] Wow, that was amazing. All our board meetings should start that way. Hey, good evening everybody. Resolve that the board of education con uh reconvene to open session. The time is 7:05. 705. Do I have a motion? Motion. Mr. Gratchic. Do I have a second? Miss Spiel Vogle. Um all in favor. I That's unanimous. Wonderful. Uh will everybody please join me for the pledge of allegiance? for which stands on before we jump into presentations. One more round, please. That was amazing. We loved it. We loved it. All right. Excellent. Okay. Okay, on

002to presentations tonight. Uh we will start with uh fine and performing arts K through 12 curriculum update. Uh Miss Nace, Miss Walters, and I guess Miss Dr. Kirkus to start. Good evening. And yes, I'm with Mr. Oay. That is one way to start a board meeting. Really, really put us all in the great mood. And you'll hear more about our arts program tonight from our uh two curriculum leaders, um Mrs. Nace and Mrs. Walters along with some students that will share some of their work tonight. Joseph Reena, Ethan Mombatha, and Julian Bergd Doll will be um sharing some of their experiences with our art program. Before I turn over the art program to the arts and music program to um our curriculum leaders and students, I just want to provide a little snapshot of the

003enrollment in our music programs. As you know, we we've seen a great um improvement in our facilities that have focused on the arts, and you'll see through the presentation to uh tonight just what these arts programs mean to our students. So, I'll start with music. And what I have on this first slide is a snapshot of the enrollment in all of our bands, um grades 5 through 12, uh broken down by level. Um what you'll see here the first column basically uh designates the band the level of the band five band six 78 pep band jazz band and concert band um and each of the grade levels that uh are eligible to participate. You'll also see the total number of students in the grade um towards the end of the right side of the the

004chart and then you will see the percentage of the students in that grade that actually participate in band. Now, mind you, students can participate in more than one ensemble. So, I'll just use uh band six as an example. Um there are 37 students in band six. And then if you read across the row, you'll see the breakdown by um by subgroup. And then there are 86 students in sixth grade. So, you see that 43% of our students in sixth grade do in fact participate in band. And then you could see that you know as you go down the chart at the different uh levels for band. The next slide talks about the coral program in our district. We have chorus 5, chorus 6, chorus seven and eight combined and then we have the high school

005chorus. You'll see that the the table is broke down broken down the same exact way. we have the total number of students in that first column that are participating in that particular chorus. If you read across you see how the group is uh what what makes up this group and then finally towards the right side of the chart the number of students in the eligible grade. So again if I use let's use grade five as an a grade five as an example there are 30 students that are in the course in grade five reading all the way across there's 79 in the grade. So we have a roughly 38% of our students in fifth grade that are participating in chorus. Now many of them are doing both band and chorus. The next slide is our

006strings program and as you know this is a fairly new program here and we're very excited at the growth of this program. Um we start our instrumental well this is orchestra and uh band lessons but the main focus of this slide is on the the string uh string instruments but you'll see that in grade four is when we introduce um band instruments and you see the number of students that are participating and then the next level below that is the elementary string lessons. Um and that's available to grades three and four and again students can do both. They'll be busy, but they can do both. Those students actually uh ride the early bus in the morning. They take their lessons before school starts and then they are busted back to the um the elementary school.

007And you can see we have a nice healthy percentage of students in each grade level that are participating. Then finally, if you look at that last row, the middle school orchestra combined. At this point, it is grades five through seven because as I said, this program started just a few number few years ago. Next year we'll have eighth graders and we're going to see this program actually continue on into the high school. You'll see in our orchestra combined uh this year's grades five through seven there are 41 students that are participating out of a total 250. So we have about 16% of our students that are participating in orchestra. Next the next slide here talks about the music electives that are available in our high school. just to give you an idea of you know

008what are some of the options for students um that are interested in um participating in in music programs. Um we have we have guitar, we have music theater 1, music theater 2, uh music technology and music theory. Now these are available to all students. So that's why if you look at the the right side of the uh chart, you'll see that's out of 360 students in the high school. So the percentages look small but just know that it they are available to to all students. Um and we see a kind of a nice variety of uh students that are uh interested in participating. Many of these students are also participating in band or chorus. Some are not. It really depends on their interests. So this next slide or the next two slides will give you

009a picture of the percentage of students at each grade level who are participating in at least one performing group. So this first slide you'll see um for grades five, six, seven, and eight. I'll use grade five as an example. You notice the blue section, there are about 76% of students in grade five that are participating in at least one. Again, some are participating in two, some actually are doing all three. And you'll see as for each grade level, I've kind of created the same uh type of piraphph. This next slide is our high school. Now with this slide I also included those um electives that I mentioned in the prior slide the music theory music technology etc to give you an idea of the students that are interested in pursuing something musical or want to

010take um courses that are focused on music. So you'll see for example in nth grade we have 45% of our students in nth grade are participating either in an ensemble or in one of those elective courses that I have on that previous slide. and I broke it down by uh each grade level. So now if I move on to the art program on this first slide, uh these are the different art clubs that are available to students in grades 5 through 12. For the middle school, there's a an art guild for 5 and 6 and an art guild for 7 and 8. And then we have art club in 9 through 12. This is a similar uh chart to our music program um charts that you saw before. You can see the total that are

011participating broken down by subgroup. And again I have out of the total number of eligible students for that particular um program. So for example, I'll use middle school art uh art guild grades seven and eight. We have nine students who are interested who are participating out of 164 seventh and eighth graders. So we have 3% of our students are doing art guild and 78. You look at art guild and 56 you have 31 students interested and then um out of 165 so about roughly 19%. Now the last row on this particular table talks about middle school art enrichment. This is available to students if they can choose to participate during their uh recess time. They can actually come and do art enrichment with their art teacher. Uh that's become a very popular program. You'll see

01259 students are choosing to go to art rather than doing uh recess going to recess and uh out of 360 students total. So roughly 16% of our students in the middle school are uh taking advantage of that middle school art enrichment. This next slide with the blue blue uh banner on top that is the art electives in the high school. Um we have drawing and painting. We have drawing and painting too AP studio art and studio art. Again similar chart this will give you an idea of the number of students that are interested in in uh participating in art. High school students need to take an art credit. So, it could either be art or the music uh slides that you saw before. Again, as students get older, they get more and more choices and

013it, you know, things are get a little more complex and trying to fit in schedules. And I know our high school um guidance uh department and principles spend quite a bit of time literally handcheduling students so that they can as much as we possibly can allow students and and get students into the courses that they want. So on this next slide, I wanted to just give a little uh snapshot of uh achievement in on the AP. We have one AP uh we have AP courses in art. Um what I did on this slide is I combined the three most recent years AP uh art has been offered. Uh n 201920, 2020, 2021, 2023, 24. Those are the last three school years. um AP art was offered. Uh the total number of students that uh took

014advantage of AP art we had 10 and that is kind of the the score breakdown for those 10 students over those three years. I can't break it down by subgroup because obviously that would be very identifiable students who took the courses. So this just gives you idea uh an idea of how our students are performing on AP art in AP art. Similarly, I created a chart here that gives you an idea of the percent of students in each grade level participating in an art class, elective or enrichment course for each grade level. U like I mentioned before, students in high school need an art credit. Most of them do take it in nth grade. That's why you see the chart for grade nine being, you know, uh having I think it says 54% are participating

015in art in nth grade. And then you'll see the other grade levels it drops off. Again, it's all about choices. There's many more APs offered. There's many more electives offered. So, some students are just trying different things. And finally, this last slide provides information about the number of students and percentage of the students in the middle school and high school that participated in our play. If you had the um uh advantage of seeing these plays uh this year, I think you you see how wonderful they they are. They've become over the the last few years. Um in the middle school uh for grades 5 through 8, there were 44 students who participated in um the middle school play out of a 329 in the school. So that's roughly 13% of our students did participate in

016our play. And then in the high school pretty similar number uh for grades 9 through 12 you see 38 students did participate in the high school play at out of 360 in the high school. So roughly 10 and a half 10% 11% of our students did participate in the play. So I just wanted to give you a snapshot of of the students interest in Pauling and uh where where we're seeing program growth um the offerings that are available to students in our music and arts program. And I'd like to now turn the presentation over to our K12 uh music and art uh curriculum leaders who can give you a little better uh deeper dive into the program itself. So I think Alicia starts. Yes. All right. Here. Thanks. All right. Dr. Herus. Thank you. Good

017evening everyone. Um my name is Alicia Nace. I am I serve as the music curriculum leader for K through 12 music. Um, as well as I also teach band here, grades four through six, as well as sixth grade general music. Um, before I go into my presentation, I just want to say a sincere thank you to the middle school jazz band, um, who is under the direction of Mr. Alex Gray, um, for providing the music before the show. So, um, we're going to go right into our music department. So um our music educators here at Pauling are Brienne Chaznoff, Jeffrey Easter, Alexander Gray, Joseph um McKichchen, and myself. In addition to our roles as teachers, we are all active musicians performing in various ensembles and contributing to a range of music organizations um beyond the

018classroom. I'm going to be going into our offerings here in Pauling, starting with the elementary school. Um, at the elementary level, all students in preK through fourth grade receive music instruction that includes singing, dancing, composing, music history, and basic music fundamentals. In addition, students in grades three and four participate in chorus, which performs two concerts each year, one in the winter and one in the spring. Students also have the option of joining the instrumental program. In orchestra, this starts in third grade and fourth grade, and is done during the school day. uh band grade four with me is held before the elementary schedule. They actually come here to the middle school for my first period class and then we bust them back to the elementary school just in time for their school. On a side

019note, I just don't know if you guys saw the posting. We just had our big music performance down at the elementary school where we got to perform for the third and fourth grade and that's kind of always a highlight of our year going down and playing for the kids. At the middle school, um, students have the option to participate in band course and orchestra ensembles as well as general music classes. Students have the opportunity to join several performing groups allowing them to participate in band course and orchestra all during the same school year. Within our performing ensemble curriculum, we host a winter and spring concert showcasing students growth and development. Our general music curriculum includes studies in Latin drumming, various musical genres, and exploration in music technology. Additionally, middle school students can take part in

020extracurricular um opportunities including the jazz band, pep band, and then musical theater. At Pauling High School, students can participate in band and course ensembles with the additional course offerings of music theory, music technology, guitar, and musical theater. Extracurriculars are lab band, pep band, and musical theater. Um, as a note, we are very fortunate here in Pauling that we can help provide instruments uh for students that want to participate in the ensembles through the district's support. Um, families can apply for consent to disclose granting access to an instrument. We encourage kind of spreading the word that we can really give students instruments if they really want to participate and it's something that maybe they don't think they have the opportunity to do. So again, it's just an amazing opportunity because we've supplied so many instruments to

021many students and I know there might be other ones out there. So make sure we spread that word. Um, overall in music, we uh took on the board goals, our new goals, and I just wanted to kind of show just how music how we've really kind of taken these goals and put them into our curriculum. Just like quick samples. Um, starting with goal one, we demonstrate in several ways. For one, promoting collaboration and teamwork. An example of this is in our seventh and eighth grade band where there are assigned section leaders who support their peers whether by helping with notes, rhythms, or just distributing handouts when needed. Fostering peer mentorship. Students are paired and grouped to learn from each other to assist building a supportive learning environment. Encouraging student voice and choice. Many of our

022programs are student driven. For example, our fifth and sixth grade concert theme is magical and myth mythical which was selected with student input and they also chose many of the pieces we we will be performing during the concert. Supporting creative expression, we offer opportunities within our ensembles to incorporate student suggestions into musical pieces and experiment with them. And then collaborate and reflecting. We actively seek student feedback on how to make our space more inclusive. We also celebrate achievements in class like the Bach Award given monthly by Miss Chazinoff to a class who excels in listening, participation, and musicianship. These efforts help ensure our program is a welcoming and engaging engaging place for all students. For goal two, students actively explore music, technology, and performance through hands-on creative projects. Our music courses incorporate various software programs

023to enhance learning and creativity. In sixth grade general music, students designed their own video game using Scratch and then composed original soundtracks to accompany them. Um, in many of our general music classes, we use a uh program called Music First. It's a cloud-based program which features many applications such as Sound Trap, Sight Reading Factory, and No Flight. And in the high school musical theater course, students are currently writing and composing an original musical, developing the scripts, songs, choreography for a live performance planned at the end of this year. These projects represent just a sampling of just how we integrate technology into our music curriculum. And actually on the screen right now, here's a picture of the musical theater. They were sitting at the piano planning out, okay, who's singing here? What's this line going? So,

024they were actually practicing this and they do meet every day to plan out this musical. Um, on the right hand side, I'm just going to show you a little sample. One of my uh students created this game on Scratch. And I I think they try to challenge me by making these games really hard that I can't beat them. But you can see they did a very simple where it spins and when you hit the space button, it's supposed to be in the right place. But you will see I did not win. But they also use music programs to kind of make that soundtrack. So see first attempt didn't work. Nope. Two. Nope. Three. I will tell you I didn't win. So something just basic where they're using that Scratch programming which they've been doing since

025elementary school and just adding that extra element where hey you you know you can play a game but how many video games do you play and there's no music playing. For goal three we foster community connections through various performance and events. For example, in the community, tree lighting, we're always there with the chorus singing. Holiday brass choir where we take our brass kids and we travel throughout the district. Memorial Day parade, music performances outside Pauling. We have the upcoming Renegades baseball game which a lot of kids are very excited about because I think excited that they're playing, but they're excited because we got invited to a day game. So uh also obviously NISMA and our county affiliated events. Students can also audition for ensembles including all county area all state all state and other honor

026groups locally. Additionally we encourage to participate in NISMA solo festival where they prepare and perform eval for evaluation. We have a very strong annual participation in these events and of course another fun event coming up music in the parks where they get to play for adjudication and then they get to have some fun at Six Flags. Evening at the arts is a collaboration between high school music and the art department that happens every spring during the spring concerts. And then of course our musicals and if you haven't if you didn't get a chance the two musicals this year were just phenomenal. And then this is a picture of our area all state participants, our junior high as well as our elementary allcount participants which I do have three of them here who are going to

027come up and just speak about their experiences in the music department as well as outside festivals. Good evening. My name is Julian Bergd Doll and I'm going to tell you about the All County Festival that happened earlier this month. All County is an all-star band that students got an audition for. It's a lot of work and you must stay after school every day, almost every day with your music teachers to practice audition solos or concert music depending on if you get in. I got into the band with on the clarinet along with Joseph Reena who plays the trumpet and Ethan Mamba who plays the bass clarinet. On Friday the 7th, a superintendence conference day, we went to John J High School for rehearsal that went from 3:30 to 7:00 p.m. On the Saturday on that

028Saturday, we rehearsed one last time and performed our concert. We were amazing. I felt honored to be given the opportunity to participate. I'd also like to thank Miss Nace for staying after school with us. She has put in so much time and effort to get us ready for the concert. So, thank you, Miss [Applause] Nace. Good evening. My name is Joseph Reena and I'm from the and I'm in sixth grade at Pauling Middle School. For me, music and art are essential to fueling my imagination. When I joined band and chorus, I got the chance to show my skills at playing the trumpet or singing the song in front of an audience. And last year, I took the next step and auditioned for all county and planned for all state and nisma. These give me a

029chance to play with a big band of students all around New York. In my experience, I've joined all county two years in a row along with a couple other my of my friends for their first time. I plan to also do NISMA so that I'm eligible for junior high all county in future [Applause] years. Uh hello um my name is Ethan Mambata. You may heard it before. Um I'm in sixth grade. Um I participated in all county and it was a really fun experience. I'm in all three of the music programs. I'm I'm in band, orchestra, and chorus. And if you may have heard, um I was in the jazz band playing earlier. I play bass clarinet. Um I know what you're thinking. That sounds like a lot of work, and you're right. But honestly,

030it's also amazing to participate in such an amazing music program. Um well, maybe it was a little hard starting band because um originally I played the clarinet first, then I uh then I moved up to the bass clarinet, so I got I leveled up. Um, so yeah, I leveled up. Um, it was hard at first. The notes were the same, but with a bigger instrument, it just harder with more breath and I had to learn some new notes with some new um buttons. Player has a lot of buttons like a it's like a um Yeah. Uh so but I just kept on practicing practiced every time I could went to every band lesson and eventually I I am better. I am really good at the bass clarinet than I was before. So, practice, practice makes

031better. There's no such thing as perfect. Um, band class taught me that when you're not good at something and now just practice and you'll get better. Uh, I'm now going to talk about orchestra. I played violin in the orchestra. I just started this year and it was really hard at first because like all the other kids were like were like start were at least in orchestra for like at least one year. So, I was like I was like the newbie there. Okay. Um um actually my first my first orchestra class my friends already said to me, "Wait, Ethan, you're in orchestra?" It was like It was like um it was like crazy for them. So, but I did not give up. I went I I basically did the same thing for band. I just I

032was I just was really committed and I um I just kept practicing at every chance I could. And now I'm pretty I'm pretty proud of how well I've done so far in in orchestra for just like I don't know like three quarters of a year. I'm I'm really impressed with myself. Um of course I couldn't have of course um in orchestra I learned that um new things take time. So so just just take time and eventually you'll get it. I mean you basically have to. So, um, now I'm just going to finally talk about chorus. Um, I've been in chorus, um, in middle school since fifth grade. At first, I was a soprano or high voice. Then finally, I'm in sixth grade. Right now, I'm a low voice or an alto. Um, it was kind

033of weird because at first at first I got so used to singing soprano and then all of a sudden I had to sing this like low voice and especially when I'm singing songs like I know the melody but then it's like ah no I have to I have to sing in a lower voice and it's like ah it's so hard but um but it was it was hard. I can't I can't lie about that but it was hard. Um but with practice and with the support of Mr. M um Mr. after Easter, I was able to do it and I've gotten better. Not perfect, but better. Um, chorus taught me that, uh, everything is important. Um, so it doesn't matter if you're an alto or soprano, whatever. Uh, everyone is important in something. Um, so

034finally, I just want to thank all my music teachers, Mr. McKichchen in orchestra, Mr. Easter in chorus, and Miss Nason band. Um, and Mr. Gray in jazz band for uh helping me and coaching me uh with all my instruments and um with learning how to sing. So, thank you board for uh listening to me. Have a nice [Applause] day. That was that was pretty amazing. Thank you guys. very inspiring, creative students. Um, my name is Crystal Walters and I teach middle school here, um, middle school art here in Pauline. And I'm going to tell you about the fine arts. Um, I'll start off by introducing our staff. We have, uh, Sarah Peyton teaching elementary school art and then also Carrie Penelli teaching high school art. Uh beginning our first slide here talks about the fine

035arts curriculum at Pauline has an emphasis on genuine studio experiences that encourage students essential studio habits of an artist. We've listed some of the habits that we go over. The habits that we foster in the classroom are creative brainstorming, researching, sketching, skills acquisition and practice, problem solving, creative processes, revision and self-reflection, art criticism, and then every student has the possibility for displaying their artwork throughout the year. In each of the build the buildings, uh the art teachers have displays of artwork all year long. We also participate in a budget vote uh that we have an art show that goes on along with the budget vote. We have a learning celebration that happens here at the middle school which has an art element to that as well. And then we also have um a night of

036the arts at the high school that the music department collaborates with the art department for uh Mrs. Peyton at the elementary school. She focuses on uh experimentation, material exploration, and techniques to develop student voice. She has found that students are more likely to take risks and make good decisions when their projects are choice-based. Up here, she has an image of a student that's working on a community projects that they do where they make artwork based on their community in their homes. In this one, there is another community-based project as well as choice-based centers that she sets up for innovation and for risktaking and printmaking. Uh at the middle school, we have several possibilities for students to participate in art. Each student does receive one credit of the art um of art in grades 5 through

037eight. They also have extracurricular opportunities which include a fifth and sixth grade art guild, seventh and eighth grade art guilds, and also as Deb mentioned earlier, art enrichment, which has become one of our most popular uh choices for students to take because it's during the day and it doesn't conflict with other activities that students might be doing after school. Uh this gives students the opportunity to develop skills and knowledge that's beyond our core curriculum that we participate in the classroom. Um, students can sign up during recess or during their academic lab. And one of the most popular things that students like to do is working on the pottery wheel. It gives an extra opportunity for them to do that outside of class. Uh, this painting here, students were working on a mural that's actually hanging

038outside of the cafeteria, a Kandinsky inspired mural. Um, students have lots of opportunities for collaboration in the art room in the middle school. So here again is Julian with a group of students working on the mural. Uh we also have examples in this slide of our clay studio, our drawing and painting studio. This is one of our eighth grade students actually through her 20 time project. We're doing a collaboration where she comes and helps students working with their drawing skills. We also have a um fiber art studio here where a student is you using the sewing machine which is a new uh art material that we got last year. And then on this slide we also have another uh we've got collage studio and we also have digital art in the upper leftand corner. If

039you see, we've got three students that were working with the digital 3D printer that we have. And then on the right, a student is working in Tinkercad, which is an online software where they can design things in 3D. And it's wonderful because it's a student application that then can transfer into AutoCAD. So, students really enjoy building and creating things in that and then they can send it to the 3D printer and we create the 3D form. Um, in the middle school, we focus a lot on what's called TAB, uh, teaching artistic behavior. So, it's an entirely student- centered uh, art classroom where they get to choose what studio area they want to work in. They set their own goals and objectives, create their research, and then they self assess when they are finished. Students then

040coordinate and decide how they're going to display their artwork when they are finished. I think that this is a good technique because it teaches students how to be an artist. Oh, and in the center there, I I forgot to mention a lot of students enjoy the fashion studio as well. Uh sewing and working with the dress form to create outfits. Another popular thing. Uh the next slide we have here is talking about the high school uh fine arts. Uh at the high school, all students must take one credit to graduate of the arts. The elective choices that they had this year were studio art, drawing and painting one, drawing and painting two, and then AP art. Students also had the opportunity to participate in art club after school. Uh here are some images. They had

041a great uh field trip this year where they went to the great swamp. uh students were drawing from observation and making sketches and then they later participated in an art show where some students were highlighted. There's also photographs here of drawing and painting class where students were doing portraiture and um learning how again how to draw from observations. I now would like to turn the floor over to Joseph again who's going to come up and talk about some of his art projects that he's working on this year. We're going to start with this one. classes allow me to use my creativity to make projects such as a digery do a pinhole camera. I enjoy having the freedom to control what I want to make. I 3D printed this digy zoo to see if the sound

042could be accurate to a real instrument. Then I made revisions to print the tube larger. I learned that the sides of the instrument and the tube change the sound because of the air movement. These French horn button extenders allow the French horn buttons to be reached easier. I love using the 3D printer to make parts, accessories, or projects that solve a need or problem, especially when it allows me to use my creativity in both art and music. My experiences have led me to learn a lot about myself. [Applause] Oh, there it goes. Okay. Uh, it's been really nice to collaborate with the music department. You can see these 3D extenders that Joseph helped to design and we printed out and then uh, Mrs. Nace used them with some of her students in a lesson. Uh

043we're going to end tonight with a video that we created uh by doing a poll and interviewing students in the elementary, middle school, and a high school and asked them why they believe that we should have the arts in school. So we titled this why the arts. [Music] I think it's important to have art because you can like learn what you want to do and you can um you can like get better at like stuff you want to do. at the chorus concert. At first, I was nervous, but then once we sung at the end, I felt proud and more happy and confident in myself. And I think that art is important cuz you reveal more of your creativity. You can express emotions, you can express feelings, you can express express anything. Art is everything

044in the world. It's like literally every it's all around you. So, I think you should do art. Um, music has made a difference in my life by making me like have I have more hobbies and more things to do other than work and it's just really fun. Playing an instrument to me is um having passion and joy and having fun with it and um expressing your emotions through um an instrument. I think it's important for students to learn like arts in school because as you get older, you lose key creativity that you don't have when you were a kid. And taking a hold of that when you're younger and learning how to use that creativity for amazing things is super important. There's been like there's a lot of community surrounding like when we when you're

045doing shows and when you're part of like a band or chorus and it like there you have friends cuz there's so many people involved in making it happen and you all share the common goal. So it's just like a great community to be a part of. Thank you. [Music] That's our presentation. Do you guys have any questions? What does a digue sound like? Uh, should I simulate it or like think of the recol commercial if you remember the the it's like a it's a it's an aborig instrument from a uh Australia. It just has a It's a It's a very unique I Do you want to try playing it? It's the answer I was looking for. There we go. [Music] I I don't have a question. I just wanted to um comment on the students

046who spoke. I mean, first we saw you play and then all three of you came up here and spoke like this was very easy for you and it was really amazing. So, thank you for doing that. It takes a lot of courage and you you all nailed it. [Applause] I echo that sentiment. The students and presenters were excellent. Um, I wondered as you both look into the future, um, you know, if if, uh, budget wasn't an issue, do you have areas of growth you're really looking for, things you're interested in, things you see our students interested in? Start. I mean, first I want to say that at Pauling, anything that I imagine or dream or hope for and I talk to administration about, they are so supportive and helpful with anything that I've tried to

047make happen in the art room. So, we have added on a lot of different elements, but I think we're thinking technology a lot even within the arts. That has been one of the most popular things this year. We do have personal computers in the middle school that students use working on Blender, Photoshop, um the 3D printer that was brought up several times. Um, so I think we're definitely thinking towards even, you know, 3D drawing and and headsets and and kind of thinking into the future like that as far as the arts is definitely more technology I think in within our classroom and and I'll also repeat that I mean we're we're very supported here. So whenever we need instruments and all that we're usually it's not an issue to ask. I mean in music I

048think things that could be helpful is in the technology department especially like during in our auditorium sound systems and maybe more training in the sense of how to use the sound system or even having probably technicians come in. Um that's just been one of the things that that's something we've been focusing more and more on. Um just because we want to make sure all performances are just flawless and have no issues in that. And then for that that's a lot outside our realm. But we there are professionals in that. But when it comes to just the basic needs and that we're we're alling takes care of us. I'm happy to hear that. Thank you. Anybody else? No. No. Well, I imagine that we're also pretty excited about the new spaces that we're going. I didn't

049have to ask. I'm getting a new room. So, space is appreciated. I'm excited about it for sure. So, thank you for all of your work, both of your work. and uh as we look forward to the capital project, there's been a lot of investment on the part of the staff and helping to make sure that it's the best uh opportunity for the students it can be. So, thank you. Yeah. And I just want to add um it's clearly evidence that art and music really help with cognitive development, time management, teamwork, perseverance, creativity. I mean, you name it, you guys had it all in spades. And we're so proud of you. We're really looking forward to see what you guys are going to, you know, continue to do with your music and your art. It sounds

050like we have some definite plans to keep things exciting, keep growing the program. Adding technology, I think, is fabulous. Um, to the degree that you make that um at the heart of your efforts moving forward. I'd love to see the numbers go up um you know, as as students get older, right? because I see a lot of early participation, but I know um you know there's a lot more divided attention, sports, athletics as they get older, but the program with technology can be really really exciting and I hope that that translates into increased participation in the um upper grades as well. So, thank you both. Thank you to all the students that came in. Um so much appreciated. [Music] [Applause] All right. Now, on to an equally exciting presentation from our folks at Boseis. Welcome,

051Mr. Meder. Good evening, Superintendent Fontan and members of the polling board of education. and I'm the business official from Duchess Boseies and I'm I was thrilled I got to see that presentation and going to try and bridge some of that to uh some of our programs here at Boseies. Um I'm here tonight really to talk about the 2526 administrative budget. I also like to talk about the capital and rental while I'm here. Um I'll do this in summary. We'll talk about the you know the effect it has on polling and I think it's it's better news for polling than some of the other school districts this year. I'm happy to announce that we have a superintendent uh Dr. Jod Deluchia has been appointed. Uh she normally accompanies me to these meetings, but she's u you

052know, she's required uh every month to go up to Albany for two days and and this fell on that calendar day. So, I'll try and do her piece. Uh I'll do justice for that as hope as well. So, this is our our current board of trustees. Um we have three spots available this year. We have one vacant spot. So, there's two incumbents and uh and one vacant spot. the highest two vote getters uh will get a three-year term and the uh the third highest uh uh vote getter will get a two-year term to fill that vacancy. Uh the election will take place by our component districts uh board of trustees on Tuesday, April 22nd. This is just a little timeline of um kind of our budget process and a and a little bit more than

053just the administrative budget as well. Basically, in January, we send out our service requests. uh they've gone to the business office of all the component districts. It's really their opportunity to see what services you're going to participate uh in Boseies from for the next year. We're going to collect those April 4th. We're going to collect them all back and that's going to really develop our entire budget. I'm focused tonight on the administrative piece and the capital. But I think it's important to understand that there's a lot of services that we do and and like I said, that's going to the business officials and and we'll get that information back. April 2nd is uh as I just mentioned that you know the component votes on a administrative budget as well as those uh board members and

054then June 11th is really we take all this take all the service requests we develop a budget and that's really our starting point for the year. We know it's going to change because um you know the the programs enrollments and and participation go up and down but we have to start somewhere and that's what we really do on June 11th at our board meeting. So when we look at the um you know just to make some assumptions about Boseis we're really I think have a lot of momentum right now. Our enrollment is really strong in our in our three big programs CTI uh special ed and the alternative high school. I think there was a little dip after the pandemic. Uh but you know we're seeing like CTI numbers that have moved from the mid500s

055up to 800. Alt High School has gone from about 75 to 150 and the special ed building has has moved from about 125 to 150. I'll talk a little bit later about some spacing needs as well, but it's, you know, it's a good sign. I think the trades are a good alternative. We certainly know that students have have some struggles coming out of the pandemic. Assuming a 7% uh increase in health insurance. Um, I mention this every year, but this administrative budget has to cover the retiree health insurance. My example is always we have a special ed teacher that works at Bosey's for maybe 30 years and while she works in that program for special ed that's where the retirement costs are covered but upon retirement it has to come into this administrative piece and

056this really consumes like 70% of this budget. So it's it's quite a burden on it. This administrative piece is funded by the 13 component districts of which Pauling is one, but we do do services to other districts outside of Duchess County. What we try and do is bring in an administrative fee from those other programs. So, if I'm going to go back to that special ed program, the rate that we charge polling as opposed to say Highland, for example, and Olster Clowning, we're going to we're going to raise that rate a little bit that we charge them and we take that margin and we bring that into the administrative budget to kind of help control the cost when we can. We're going to continue to focus on our facilities and, you know, keep our buildings

057maintained and uh we have a real focus to to talk about safety and security and and kind of improve our efforts there. I'll speak a little bit about that at the end as well. So when we look to this slide, we see that um you know in total the budget is up uh 4 and a.5%. The non-retirey piece is actually down almost close to 2%. That's really the cost for the board of education, the clerk, uh the business office, the superintendent is all there. where I think it's defendable. We will take a full-time equivalent, which is really, you know, a full-time salary is one. If we can take a a portion of somebody's position to move it out into one program to another program for their cost, we try and do that. But you can

058see there that the majority of this budget is really the retirey health insurance. And uh you know that like I said, we have an increase there of 7%. So now when we look at the revenue that has to support that, we're going to balance that with a 4 and a.5% increase as well. But majority of this is the component charge and other revenues primarily is interest earnings. And we really just don't project that the interest rates are going to stay where they are and we don't really have the investments really to hold that line. So we're going to we've decreased that a little bit this year. So we're going to have to make up the margin there in the component share. This really outlines the each of the districts um share of the administrative and

059retirey health insurance cost. We can see that Pauling this year is I believe it's trouble reading the screen. I guess I should have brought my distance glasses. But um Paul's up just about 5%. So that's actually less than the increase of 8%. That's really a result of the arwada, which for this conversation tonight is um a a state aid generated number. When the business office at the school district submits their state aid claim every fall, they they put in this number and it's weighted. It's not doesn't match enrollment because the grades 7 through 12 are are rated at 1.25. So every four students students actually turns into five and the K through six students are are basically at one. But what we get to here is that polling's arwada for this year actually declined. Went

060from 1,112 to 1,087. The county as a whole went up. So when we divide the cost for polling this year, polling's got a a little bit less share of the pizza pie, as I like to say. So you're not going to see an increase of the 7.95%. You only have a 5% increase. It looks like it's an $8,700 uh increase for next year. Like to always mention the capital and rental when I'm out here at this presentation. Although this isn't voted on, I think it's an important piece that the districts need to be aware of. Once again, it is fully funded by the 13 component districts. We're keeping our capital contribution at 1 million. Uh that's where it's been. That really is to kind of keep the facilities in order. It may be roofs one

061year, maybe renovations to classrooms, things like that. And then the rental is actually going down $5,000. So, there's a little bit uh less this year. We still do have uh two districts that we have in district uh program set up. And that's a spacking kill, and we have one classroom left in Red Hook. So, that's really what that money goes to. And that's a decrease this year for polling of of approximately $1,000. We always like to touch upon this slide. This is really illustrates what the 2324 polling's book of business was with Boseies. And this is going to be inclusive of those contracts that may go to another Boseies whether it's platinum or alter Boseies. It was just under $4 million. It returned a surplus of $400,000 and it generated Bosey's aid of a million3.

062So kind of a return on investment of uh about $1.7 million. and it almost kind of matches up your Bosey's aid uh aid ratio which I believe is about 45%. So there certainly is an incentive if something is does receive Bosey's aid for you know polling to do to do business with a with a Boseis. Here's your counts uh in our programs. We like to share this every year. So there's uh 10 uh really special and alternative ed. Uh there's six at Salt Point Center and there's four at the alternative high school. and we have uh 27 uh at the at the career and technical institute. And I'm curious to see that six down there at the bottom are in various other programs. And I noticed in the presentation before that the art class did

063a little work with fabric. And we do have a um a design class that started about three years ago that seems pretty successful. So maybe a pathway there for someone. But as I mentioned before, you know, the the the career and technical uh institute has really taken off since the pandemic. I think it's a nice alternative. We all understand the the cost of of uh going to college and sometimes falling into trade might be a great opportunity. So, as we look forward really uh you know, I know Jody uh new superintendent really these are a lot of her goals, innovation, growth, and partnership to really continue that. We want a self and welcoming and respectable school culture. Want to treat other treat everybody kindly uh when they're with us. And that's important too. We want

064to we really do want to focus on security. We've spent a lot of money the last few years uh with with putting installing cameras and we want to continue that. But you need to find that balance of security and also having it be welcoming as well. Uh space utilization. Um, you know, we finished the capital project a few years ago and the enrollment numbers were kind of down after the pandemic, but we really have run into a space issue already. We were really uh our classrooms are full. We're we're struggling to find uh places to hold them. We, you know, we're going to have to think about facilities or the facilities department takes a wing at a special ed building. We need to find a place for them so we can recover some classrooms there.

065So, so very quickly it it got filled up which is a good thing. Effective communication and collaboration between uh key stakeholders. Um you know we really want to plan for a multi-year state-of-the-art uh facilities for learning. You know I think a lot of our our current technical classes I think they could uh probably use some new equipment and and and generally things like that. And we really just want a purposeful and robust community partnerships. I'm happy to take any questions or if there's um if you can think of one afterwards, my email is on this last page if you'd feel want to reach out to me. But I thank you for your time and uh we appreciate your support. Anybody have any questions? You know, I was looking at the presentation from last year and

066it looks like your proposed budget for 2425 is actually at about the same level as it is for this year, but your actuals seem lower. um what happens to that money actually it's uh so it's it's returned in the surplus so um at Boseies we don't maintain a fund balance so at the end of the year we close our books and they they take the revenue and we we want to have a surplus we never want to be in a deficit situation that's not a good conversation I would have with Mimi and uh and then that really goes back in a check in January good question so the money does come back to the district yeah and that was really on that slide um it was the 419,000. So that's all the programs though. That's

067just not the administration. That would have been all the programs that you did with, but that would have been that would have been the surplus right there. Okay. Thank you very much. Thanks. Have a great night. Oh, real quick. Sorry. Can you just give even just a couple sentences on um specifically the alternative education programs? How is that different from special education? What type of student would go there and and what can they expect? So, the alternative high school, I think, is has um I'm going to use a couple terms from my superintendent from uh two times ago, Richard Hulie. He would mention uh uh lions and lambs. And it's just a it's a it's a I think a more welcoming environment for certain kids that go to the alt high school that um you

068know, they're a little bit smaller classes. And there also is a piece of that where they're they're special ed students as well. So, I think it's just to I think it's just to give them a better a better environment. They might get into a high school at some of the districts and it might be overwhelming to them and there may be things that are intimidating to them. And I think by coming to our alternative high school, I think it's, you know, it's it's more fit to to kind of help them succeed. You got me out. I got me in the program side, which always gets a little nervous for me, but are both general education and classified students at at Alt High School. All right. Thank you very much. Thank you very much. Okay. Now,

069uh going to welcome Mimi Heslin and Superintendent Fontana for budget recap. Good evening. So, uh, Mrs. Heslan and I are going to present, uh, the recommended budget for 2526 tonight. And, um, like Mr. Mezer, I'm working at a little bit of a disadvantage with optics, so I hope you'll bear with me. Uh, it's actually we're going to present this in four parts, three parts, five parts. Oh goodness, I'm only responsible for two of them. So, here we go. I'm going to share our district-wide budget uh principles that guided uh this budget and u in my remarks later so I don't repeat this twice. I'm I am going to um really credit the many many people who were involved in putting this budget together, but I'll save those for later. So these are the principles that

070guided the development of this budget. We sought to develop a spending plan that's focused on the attainment of board and district goals and the delivery of a highquality academic and co- and extracurricular program. We sought to present a spending plan that balances student needs with the ability of community taxpayers to support the proposed plan. And we wanted to ensure that the spending plan is fiscally responsible for the long term and remains within the tax cap. In addition, we always want to maintain and enhance student performance and achievement via quality of instructional services for all students, including applied opportunities in steam. We want to continue to provide opportunities for students to pursue high levels of academic challenge by maintaining access and support to high school coursework in middle school and a robust array of course offerings

071in the high school. And we want to continue to enable students to select programs that support career, college, and life readiness. Finally, we want to continue to properly maintain district facilities and support the implementation of the five-year facilities plan. Continue to align the district curriculum with the New York State Learning Standards and the New York State Culturally Sustaining Framework, the recommendations of the Blue Ribbon Commission, including the Portrait of a Learner. And we want to continue to provide professional development aligned with district goals and priorities including in literacy and steam. So after um a lot of collaborative work by a lot of people uh the budget that we present to you tonight does maintain all academic programs. It continues a focus on welcoming and supporting all learners. It continues a focus on improving opportunities for

072academic challenge. It enhances opportunities for applied studies and it maintains all fine and performing arts offerings, maintains extracurricular programs, it maintains a structure for social emotional wellness and it does remain below the allowable tax levy limit. And I won't try to illustrate each one of those points, but I'll just reference a few things that are pertinent to the presentations that you've heard tonight. So, for instance, enhances opportunities for applied studies. Mr. Mezer shared and um I think the board well knows that the appetite for career and technical education continues to grow. That has budgetary consequences. We've seen our budgets grow for career and technical education over the past several years. Um it also applies to the recommendations of the Blue Ribbon Commission and kids uh students access to all of the realms of a portrait

073of a learner. In addition, this budget creates some opportunity uh for us. Um I have a a hope to present a part-time position uh to the board that I think will further support our work between school and community in terms of giving students the opportunity uh to be out in the field and gain more experience in the community. It's a very minor budget item, but it falls into this category and I'll be sharing that u subsequently. But this budget does allow for enhanced opportunities in applied studies, not just maintaining them. You heard from our students tonight about our fine and performing arts program. As you know, we began an orchestra program only three years ago. I do believe we are the smallest public school in New York State to have a string program. I'm very

074proud of that. Um, all the extracurricular programs have been maintained. uh we continue to be flexible with those following the interests of students and we've been able to fund the programs that the students um are interested in having and we have a regular process of ensuring that what we offer has a relationship to student interest. Um Mrs. Nay spoke about our long-term practice of making sure that families who choose to disclose their economic disadvantage to us are able to have a variety of benefits from the district including access to um both string and wind instruments. And I think um as you look at the data that Dr. Kirk has presented that data is vastly improved in terms of the participation of students with economic advantage over what it was before we had this practice. So

075it's something that I think the board should be very proud of. And again finally um this budget uh maintains the structure for social emotional wellness. Um as you know during uh the pandemic we sought to bring an embedded mental health clinic into the district. We knew that it was going to be a challenge to maintain that because we initially funded it with federal funds that were apppropo of uh COVID but um it was our long-term plan to do that and this year we have again been able to maintain that embedded mental health clinic as well as many other structures to support student wellness. Um so just just a few illustrations of what these bullets mean. So, enrollment and staffing. Um, as a small class enters a building and a larger class leaves, sometimes you see

076some minor shifts in enrollment. Um, overall, our enrollment is projected to be steady. Last year, when I stood before you, I said we had the most difficult budget that Pauling had ever had since 2008. And that's because we had to add six positions for what we anticipated was going to be a very sizable enrollment increase. Not all of that enrollment increase has come to pass. Uh but nonetheless, we have retained all of those uh positions and you'll see some of that in the class sizes that we're projecting. Um but we did look at um we looked at the class sizes and uh we feel very positive about the decisions that we've made. Um and so in general, our enrollment next year, this year is essentially the same. Um these are our anticipated class sizes. Of

077course, pre kindergarten is dictated to us by the state. Um and you know, we always fill those classes. Um but our remaining elementary classes in part thanks to the addition of the positions last year are um certainly very modest. And um that's what I want to say about staffing. And Mrs. Heslin and I will take your questions after we get through parts four and five. You Dr. Fontana like to say that. Okay. So, now we're going to um dig into the the numbers part of the budget. Um and you know, as Dr. Fontana said that, you know, we we did spend a lot of time with our administrative team um putting together the numbers to determine how best to support our programs for our students. And that dollar amount is reflected in the superintendent's recommended

078budget, which you see not there, here. Okay. So the total for the superintendent's recommended budget is $49,89,437. This represents a dollar increase of $1,830 $830,791 and that is a percent increase of 3.82%. Um, one of the ways that we look at the budget is to break it out into these four uh function categories. Um, and as you can see, the instructional function section, um, is the largest in the budget, as of course it should be. Um, and that's at 51.1%. The next largest section is benefits, transfers, and debt service at 31.9% of the total budget. General support is 10.7% of the budget, and that's actually a decrease from this year. We were at 11% for this year. uh transportation accounts for 6.3% of the total budget. Um and I just want to note that um

079it's important to understand that districtwide the personnel costs which basically is equivalent to all salaries and all employee benefits accounts for 70% of the total budget. But of course that makes sense because uh we're we're uh in the business of uh we're a very employee oriented business. Um, and so our success is driven by our human resources. So that's where we direct our funds. Ultimately, it benefits our students. Okay. So now we're going to look into each of those four different function codes um in a little more detail. So we'll start with instruction. Um, and the recommended budget for instruction portion of the budget is approximately $25.5 million. Uh that's a dollar increase of just over 787,000 uh% increase of 3.19. And this particular area accounts for um about 50% of our total budget increase.

080So again, you can see that we're really directing our our resources towards instruction. Um 70.9% of the instructional portion of the budget goes towards salaries. Uh the next portion uh next largest portion for the instructional budget um is BOSIE services. So you you heard Mr. Mezer talking about that um this evening and um basically the bulk of the Boseies um costs that are in this section of the budget really are for our special education programs for students, occupational education programs or CTI programs. Um and we um are able to serve our districts through not just Duchess Boseies but also Putinham Northern Westchester Boseies. Another large uh item that we purchase through both Duchess Boseies and also through the Mid Hudson Regional Information Center are technology related services. So mostly that's hardware and software. Uh in

081addition um we also purchase other instructional services um such as arts and education services. Some of those we saw with uh or some of them are related to our arts program that you our kids that you saw tonight. Um there's a lot of professional development that we purchased through Boseies library resources um and also our officials for athletic events just to name some things. um the contractual part of the instructional budget at 6.9%. Basically, that's where you're going to see that we fund our field trips, um conferences, textbooks, special education tuition for outofd district students that don't go to a Boseies, uh professional services for our special education students, um some software that we don't get through Boseies, um and entry fees for athletic events. So you're you're going to see contractual um comes up

082in all the different areas of the budget and it's always very different things but so I'm trying to just give you a sense of of those types of things. Um supplies accounts for about 2.7% and mostly it's teacher requests and technology needs. Uh and equipment in uh next year's budget for instructional includes shot clocks for the high school gym. Um, and also we have been working on a 4-year plan uh for district-wide technology infrastructure upgrades and we are in year two of that four-year plan. So that that is included in the budget as well. Okay. Now we're going to look at uh benefits, transfers, and debt service. So, um, this area accounts for just under 15.9 million, represents a dollar increase just over 700,000, uh, from the current year and a percent increase of 4.61%.

083In the area of benefits, um, specifically for retirement systems, we do have some shifts in, uh, both of the retirement systems. So our our TRS rates are actually decreasing slightly uh and our ERS blended rates um are increasing um by about 1.3%. Um another impact of course is as we have increases in salaries that means that we also have an increase in our social security cost because they're tied directly and uh as far as health insurance is concerned um there is an overall increase although it's it's um it's It's minor. Uh, but basically this includes um health insurance coverage for active employees, for retirees, includes our health insurance buyouts for people who choose not to take our insurance. Um, and Medicare reimbursements and all of these things are contractually required. Um so another part of

084this section is the debt service and we do have an increase in the debt service and in fact that accounts for most of the increase in this area of the budget but we also have uh an increase in building aid that offsets this. So um and that's on the revenue side of the budget. And all of this is something that was planned for as uh back when we approved the capital project. Uh we had a we have a 15-year plan set out and it would show that as the debt service rose so would the building aid and so those two would would cancel each other out. Um and we also have uh interfund transfers are actually decreasing uh because our food service program is doing so well that it needs less money from the general

085fund to support itself. So that's good news. Okay. Now we're going to look at the general support portion. So this accounts for approximately $5.3 million. uh represents a very modest dollar increase of just under $46,000 um and a percent increase of87 so less than 1%. Similar to instruction though this area also includes a lot of salaries um and in this case it's uh mostly for our support staff um and that represents 48.8% 8% of this particular portion of the budget and the majority of those salaries are for employees who are part of our CSEA unit. Um the next largest area of this particular section is contractual at 33.3%. So again wide variety of things covered here. Um, it's uh it includes our annual audit. It includes district-wide general and liability insurance. Um, legal services, posting

086and uh postage and printing costs, fuel, oil, propane, and electricity, uh, repairs and maintenance contracts for all of our equipment, rent for our district offices, two full-time school resource officers, and professional development for our non-instructional staff. So you can see there's a wide variety of things all of them very critical to our functioning though. Um also uh as a followup to our visioning process for this year um we have allocated funds in next year's budget towards a uh strategic planning consultant. Um and that is also included in the contractual costs. Um we also use BoseI services uh to support this area of the budget. Um, some of those services uh would be claims auditing, actuarial services, uh, public information, telephone and internet, safety services, um, and the, uh, costs that Mr. Mezer was speaking about

087tonight. Um, the administrative costs that are required to pay as a component district of Duchess Boseies. Um supplies in this area of the budget are you know basic office supplies but also copy paper for newsletters. Uh in this particular area I would say the largest portion of the supplies is um or for purchases of cleaning and maint and maintenance for all of our buildings. Uh our general support equipment includes um funds for a replacement dump truck that also serves as a snow plow. And I have to say that I held Mr. Green off on this particular truck last year and I can't do it again or it'll kill me. Um it it's getting to the point where the truck for safety reasons needs to be replaced. Um and uh much more exciting than that um

088we are funding some adaptive uh playground equipment for our special needs students at the elementary school. Um we have also budgeted money for um a building condition survey. So this is something um that is required for all districts to do every five years by the state the state education department requires it um and our near our year is coming up um actually 2025 is our year. Um so basically this is 5 years ago we did this and that's what led to uh the whole plan for uh or started in in conjunction with our visioning process um led to the whole plan for the capital project that we're in the process of uh of carrying out now. So we will see what that brings. Um, and I just I do want to mention that um, you

089know, back in January, we had a really great proposal from our school communication specialist, Laura Fashine, who was here earlier this evening. Um, and you know, she had some ways that we could uh, enhance our services and unfortunately we weren't able to include that um, in the budget. We're still including our our existing services, but we weren't able to fund the enhancements that she spoke about. Um, also, Mrs. Rivas had asked for a new new stage curtain uh in the multi-purpose room. Um, and we're going to squeeze that into this year's budget instead of putting it into next year. So, we're still going to get it done. Okay. And the last of those four sections is transportation. Um and that section accounts for about 3 point just under $3.2 million. Uh res represents a dollar

090increase of just over 298,000 or 10.4% increase. Transportation um also includes salaries. So 63% uh of this particular section pays for our bus drivers, our bus monitors and the people who run the transportation office. Um as far as equipment equipment is concerned, this is another uh large portion of their budget and basically this is for the purchase of buses. Um so we're looking at purchasing two 36 passenger buses, two 66 passenger buses, and this is of course in line with our 10-year um plan for purchasing buses. Um and we're also budgeting to purchase a hybrid SUV. um you know, sometimes we're driving to longer distances outside of our district and we're bringing one or two kids to to a particular location. So rather than, you know, spending the money on driving a bus, we can

091use the SUV and it's a it's a more cost-effective way to to do things. Um and we're able to purchase a hybrid version um at an affordable cost. Transportation supplies account for uh 9.4% 4% of the transportation budget. The bulk of that goes towards the purchase of fuel and bus parts. Uh now transportation expenses are eligible for state aid. So anytime that we can identify costs that are specific to transportation, we always want to put them in this section of the budget so that we can generate that aid. So um a lot we see this mostly in the area of contractual costs um because we'll take the portion of the electricity and utilities and we'll assign the portion to the bus garage and charge it here. Um we also take the uh from our insurance

092um the automobile insurance piece for all of our buses we make sure is charged to this particular area. uh the same with software. And then there are certain vehicle repairs. We we have our own um bus garage, but we can't, you know, our our mechanics can't handle every single type of repair. So, if we ever have to send a repair out, you'll see that in contractual costs, and that's something that we're also able to generate aid on. Um and our current transportation aid ratio is 51%. So, that's not a bad return. So in addition to looking at the budget with those four different functions, um this is another way to look at it and this is actually required by the state education department to present the budget in what's called the three-part budget. Um and

093those categories are instructional, capital, and administrative. And the state education department is very specific about what line items we have to include in what categories. and all school districts have to do it the same way. Um so for us the largest part of the budget um is instructional of course at 73.09%. Capital uh makes up 16.97%. And administrative is the smallest part of the budget at 9.94%. on this slide. Uh, basically it's a chart showing the history of budgets since the 2019 2020 school year. And next, we're going to talk about um the different resources that we have that fund our budget. So, the three main categories that we're going to break this out into um is local, which includes our tax levy, state and federal aid, and fund balance. And then I'm going to

094talk about each of these uh separately. So, we're going to start off with the local sources of revenue. Um and in Pauling, the tax levy is our largest source of revenue, both local and total. So, uh, real property taxes account for just under 65% of our total revenue. Um, I'm going to go into details on how that gets calculated a little later on. Um, we also receive small amounts of revenue from uh a variety of of sources including a pilot that stands for a payment in le of taxes and interest and penalty on taxes. Um, we have other miscellaneous sources of revenue. Some of those include um uh we get reimbursement from other districts because if somebody from outside of our district sends a student to a private school in our district, say Misentop, uh

095we have to provide health services to those students and so they have to reimburse us for those those services and we of course do the same to them. We have an item in our expense side of the budget where we pay other districts. So, um it works that way. Um and we also plan to utilize uh funds that are available from our workers compensation consortium next year um as a source of revenue. Um so we're continuing to see strong levels of interest income. Um and I know that Mr. Mezer said that they were actually reducing um their portion of the budget for that. But what I will say is that what we budgeted this year, we have so far exceeded and it's only March um that I'm actually increasing our budget in interest income for

096next year and I can't imagine that we're going to have a problem uh reaching that. Um also another thing that Mr. Mezer talked about um he talked about the fact that we had received 419,000 in our Boseies refund this year. That was an uh that was an inflated number. That's not what we normally receive. So for next year and there were reasons for that. It had to do with some administrative things that they needed to do at Boseies. We knew it was going to be higher this year and budgeted accordingly, but we also know that next year it's going to go back to normal. And so I've I've actually decreased the anticipated budget for Bosey's refund. Trying to be realistic. Okay. Next, we're going to talk about state and federal aid. Um and in total,

097this accounts for approximately 23% of our total revenue. Some state aid is formula based, um such as foundation aid and instructional materials aid. Um, based on the aid runs from the governor, we're receiving a 2% increase in foundation aid for next year, which is about $120,000. Um, some others types of state aid are expense-based. Um, so basically aid goes up or down each year depending on eligible expenses from the year before because you always get the aid the year after. Um, and also it's it's dependent on our aid ratios. Um some of the aid that falls into this category would be Bosey's aid, uh building aid and transportation aid. We are expecting um increased revenue as I mentioned before in the area of building aid and that's because um we're starting to see the aid

098flow from our our uh phases one and now phase two of the capital project. Um but we are expecting decreases in Bosey's aid and transportation aid in part because our aid ratios have actually decreased in those areas. So after all is said and done um for this from the state aid uh perspective we are budgeting an increase of 2.14% for next year. Um, and that also includes a small amount of federal aid um that we receive for um Medicaid reimbursement for our students who are eligible for Medicaid. Okay. Next, we're going to look at um fund balance as a source of revenue. So, every year we assign and appropriate a certain amount of fund balance um to balance our budget. Um and we plan to continue to budget $2.6 $6 million in assigned appropriated fund

099balance next year. We've been pretty steady in that throughout the years. Um we also plan to utilize a transfer from our debt service fund to help balance the budget, but when we consider all of these forms of revenue, um we still have a a gap for next year. So, as we did for this year, we're going to look towards assigning reserves um to fill that gap. Um we did so as I we did start that practice of appropriating some reserve funds for this year and it actually has worked out well. So I'm comfortable in um following that practice for the 2526 year. Something different for 2526 though um we're actually going to increase the um the use of our TRS reserve. Um, I'm sure everybody's aware there's been all kinds of talk about the the

100status of the state education or the federal uh department of education um and what's going to happen with grants and funding and all of that kind of stuff. So, because there is uncertainty there um we are going to actually increase the expense side of the budget to cover expenses that we would normally pay for with federal grants. But of course, if we're going to increase the expense side, we also need an increase on the revenue side. And that's where the increase in the use of the or I should say the allocation of the TRS reserve comes in because hopefully the grant funding will come through and we won't need that that money from the TRS reserve. That would be the best case scenario. But of course, we have to budget on the safe side. Um,

101and I, you know, I would really be remiss if I did not mention, um, that it really is because of the, uh, responsible fiscal stewardship of this board and previous boards um, that we actually have these reserve funds available. So, we're very fortunate for that and I thank you for that. All right. Now, we're going to get into the details on the tax levy calculation. So um as we've talked about in previous in other years um basically the tax levy calculation is based on in uh a formula multi-step formula um and it's it's math. So for that formula basically we start out with our current year's tax levy and then we multiply that by what's called the taxbased growth factor. Um, for our purposes, we get this number from the New York State Office of

102Real Property Tax. Uh, and they have determined that our factor is 0.51% for next year. Basically, the taxbased growth factor represents the district's growth in full property value due to any new construction um or additions and improvements to real property. So, that's what that number is about. From that result we add the amount of the pilot from this year and we subtract the amount of the capital exclusion from this year. So just as a point of reference again pilot stands for payment in lie of taxes for us we have one pilot and it's for the hamlet at polling not the woods at polling. So, this is the original um group of of uh of homes that were in that uh and basically that pilot is actually going to be in effect until the year 2046.

103So, that's going to be with us for a while. Um and that really the our budget for that remains steady uh from one year to the next. So, ultimately it has no effect on the tax levy because we um we add it in here, but we're going to subtract it out later. So um and then the capital exclusion. So this is always equal to our total capital expenses minus any offsetting revenue that we have available. We'll talk about that a little bit more when we get to the this year's capital or next year's capital exclusion. Okay. So then we get back to the math. We take that result. We multiply it by the allowable levy growth factor. So this is something that's determined by uh the New York State comproller and basically there's a formula

104for this. It says it's equal to either 2% or the rate of inflation whichever is lower. Uh and for these purposes they have calculated the rate of inflation at 2.95%. So that means that our levy allowable levy growth factor is going to be capped at the lower uh 2%. So this is where the term uh 2% tax cap comes from. It's the o it's one step in the formula and it's the only place where 2% applies. Um it doesn't mean that taxes are going to be capped at 2%. You know it's kind of okay so we continue the formula. So then we subtract out our anticipated pilot and we add in our anticipated capital exclusion for next year. Um so again I said the pilot is is a wash because we use the same number

105on both ends of the formula. Um and again capital exclusion is total expenses. So for us that's our debt service and our bus purchases. Um and then we subtract out any offsetting revenue. And for us next year that offsetting revenue is going to be our building aid uh transportation aid on our bus purchases a small amount of that Bosey's capital aid that Mr. Mezer spoke about and then also we have to factor in the interfund transfer from the debt service fund that's considered money that we have to pay for our capital expenses. So, um this the result of that is um an allowable tax levy limit of 32,227,415. That represents a 2.25% increase from our current year levy and a dollar increase of $79,717. So, we have budgeted for a little bit less than that.

106Uh our budgeted levy is at $ [Music] 32,224,475 and that represents a levytolevy increase of $76,777. That's a lot of sevens. Um and that is a percent change of 2.24%. Um so that means that our proposed levy is below our current year increase which was 2.25% 25%. And it's below our allowable levy increase which was also 2.25%. Um, so you know, here's where the frustrating part comes. So, as usual, you know, we really can't calculate what the tax rates might be until May 1st because we just don't have enough information yet. Um, we need uh at this point there are some updated equalization rates, which is one of the pieces that we need, but they're not finalized. That could change between now and and May. Um, and even uh then hopefully by May 1st, we'll

107have some up updates to assessed values of property, which will get us closer to a calculation. Um tax tax rates really are based on assessed values in our five different towns, equalization rates, and then the amount of the tax levy. We have no control over assessed values or equalization rates. So until we have that information, we we really can't come up with a rate, you know, where we think it's going to land. But um we will have better information come May. So, by the time we do the budget hearing, I can give you some kind of a an idea. We'll get pretty close at that point. But in the meantime, um just as a point of reference, this is not written in stone anywhere. Um but if we look at our tax increase for this

108year, it was about $694,000. So, very close to the $77,000 that we're looking at for next year. Uh that resulted in tax increases of about 2.1%. So on a home assessed at $150,000 in the town of Pauling, uh that was an increase of about $170 uh for the year in taxes. So just as a point of reference. Um okay. And then here we have a history of our actual and allowable tax levies going back to 2019 2020. Okay. And then um so I want to talk a little bit about the capital portion of the tax levy which is the same thing as the capital exclusion. So uh back in 2020 when we were having conversations about our capital project and what kind of an impact it would have on on taxes, we talked a lot

109about the fact that the capital project would not increase the capital portion of the tax levy. So um again that capital portion is the capital exclusion that we just talked about. So in 2020 2021 that was when our baseline was established for the capital exclusion. And you can see here the amount was just over $2.3 million. And you can also see that in each of the five subsequent years um we have been below that baseline. and it this will of course continue into the 2526 year. Um so basically we're very proud to be able to say that um our promise that uh that that it that the capital project would not impact the capital portion of the tax levy has held uh has held true. So, um, and I just I do want to also

110mention here, um, the capital project is a completely separate budget from the one that we're talking about tonight. Okay? The capital project has its own budget. Um, there are just a couple of pieces of the capital project that you see in in the budget that we're talking about tonight and we actually have already talked about those things. So, on the expense side, it's the debt service. Um and on the revenue side of the bud budget it's the building aid. Okay. So those are the only places where you'll see the capital project uh impacting the general fund budget at all. Other than that it has its own separate funding mechanism. Okay. So next steps. Um given you a lot of information to digest tonight. Uh, and I'm also going to be handing out to you a

111uh a detailed line item version of the budget. So, if you can't sleep tonight, you can just take that out. Um, but if you have any questions regarding uh the superintendent's recommended budget, please send them to Dr. Fontana and myself um by the end of the day on Sunday, March 30th um because we want to be able to uh take any questions that are out there um and then uh answer those questions at the April 8th meeting, which is our next uh meeting, our board of education meeting around the budget. We're hoping at that meeting to have a final review of the budget and an adoption of the budget. So, we really want to get your questions and make sure we can get them answered so that you can make an informed decision. Um, and

112then April 22nd marks the uh the required date for the Bosey's budget vote. Again, as Mr. Mezer uh mentioned, on May 6th, we will have the public hearing on the adopted budget and hopefully some updated information on assessed values and equalization rates. And on May 20th, all of this will culminate in our annual meeting, budget vote, and the board of education election. Certainly take any questions you may have. Thank you very much. Does anybody have any questions? You would like to start with anything? I actually have a question uh with regard to the EV vehicle or the hybrid. Um a couple years ago there was a mandate that we had to have a certain percentage of the buses be EV. Can you talk a little bit about that where Sure. So uh the existing mandate

113from the governor is that beginning in uh on July 1st of 2027, school districts can no longer purchase non electric vehicles. Um so that would be buses. Um, well, I shouldn't talk about cars, I don't think, but just buses. Yeah. Um, and then by the year 2035, our entire fleet is supposed to be electrified. Um, so all of our all of our buses should be uh electric at that point. Um, we are in the process of having what's called an electrification plan done. Um we interestingly we thought we had um done what we needed to do a couple of years ago. Um and we went to a uh a forum and found out that that report that we received from that didn't really tell us what we needed to know um as far as our

114readiness is concerned. So now we're working on an electrification plan um which is the thing that we do need. Um and basically this uh this is to tell us how ready we are for um you know to be able to accommodate electric buses uh what kind of costs we're going to have um for creating the infrastructure for that as and then of course there's the cost of the vehicles. So um we are certainly not alone in um where we are in this process. Uh there are very few districts across the state who have even um attempted to purchase electric vehicles. Um they're very electric buses are very hard to come by. Uh they're just not being manufactured in any any large numbers. People are waiting well over a year for a bus to come in.

115Um I think that the governor recognizes this because last year we had to start um filing an annual report on where we are in the process of electrification. Um and you know we have been doing everything that we can uh up to this point and um we'll have to see how things unfold. natural question. Um, someone might ask, why are we purchasing diesel buses this year? The fact of the matter is that because of the shortage of electric vehicles, we need to make sure that we have buses at all and the life of those buses is only 10 years, which is within the period of time when we will be able to use uh diesel and gasoline buses. So uh we're trying to make every decision prudently and I think we all anticipate some adjustment

116in the mandate just based on the exigencies of manufacturing and uh the capabilities of uh the electric vehicles even were they to exist in the volume that they'll be needed. So we're trying to hedge all of those considerations but uh being mindful of it. I actually wanted to say one thing about Mrs. I want to thank Mrs. Teslant for a very very clear presentation of the budget as you always do. I I noticed one potential misunderstanding and I just want to clear it up. I don't imagine it's a misunderstanding for the board, but it could be for a member of the public. We talk about um using our uh reserves as as part of our sources of revenue and Mrs. Keslan thanked uh the you know the previous boards and the current boards for having

117the fiscal foresight that we have such reserves and she particularly talked about hedging the potential loss of federal funds. So I want to make two points about that. We um we receive many more federal funds than we chose to hedge with this um increase. So, in other words, we're not um we're trying to be prudent in the use of those reserves because we're thinking only of those federal funds that we could not possibly manage to do without. So, we've already made that calculus. The other thing I want to emphasize is that um the particular reserves that we chose are the TRS reserve and the ERS reserve. And I want to make sure that the public understands that those are reserves for the district to manage the costs of rate increases. They have absolutely no impact

118on the solveny of any employees retirement. So that's an easy confusion that someone could have. So um we're not spending money that belongs to our retirees. This is money that the district has held on to in case we experience uh tremendous rate increases in the contributions we must make as has been seen in the past uh 20 years or so. So I just don't want anybody to be confused about what those monies are. Thank you Dr. Fontana. And that is simply um a budget line item for in case we need it. Okay. So, just wanted to make sure that we were also clear. Anybody else have any questions um regarding budget? Uh no questions. I just want to reiterate uh what you said, Miss Heslin, you do such a nice job of presenting this to

119us in a way we can understand it. Um and that's much appreciated. I want to encourage all of my fellow board members to submit questions. I think that was really helpful last year when you answered all of them. I think it was probably helpful for the public as well. So, we appreciate all the work that you put into that. We're all looking forward for the line [Laughter] item. All right. Thank you. All right. Moving right along, Miss Ken. Good evening. This evening you have my report, but I'm going to go a little bit off script tie into some of the things we heard this evening. It's a very busy time at the high school. I like to say it's the forced march to graduation. And right now, our counselors along with our teachers and our

120students are involved in the course selection process for next year. Again, choosing some of those courses that you heard this evening. And so right now our counselors have gone into classes. They will be meeting individually with our 9th grade and 10th grade assuming that our 11th grade are pros by now. Of course if they wish an individual conference they can get it and they choose their courses. Then what happens is by May 31st we send out notification so that parents can see what classes their students have chosen remembering that there are some classes that they have to take and some that they might wish to take. That's important because when we come back from spring break is when I am is sconced in a room with the counselors and we create the schedule for next

121year. We make every effort to build a schedule based on what the majority of our students want to take. I want to clear up some what possibly could be misconceptions. I think when you were looking at some of the arts programming, probably when you looked at musical theater 1 and two and saw two students in musical theater, you might have had a pause. When you saw drawing and painting, you might have also thought, "Wow, that drawing and painting too is a smaller class." We've been very lucky because our teachers are so accommodating. We really work with our teachers in some classes and those are two perfect examples where Mr. Easter and musical theater and Miss Penelli and drawing and painting one and two actually condense and combine those classes. So, they really differentiate. So, it

122is one class period where she's essentially and he is doing two curriculums in one. That's also what you see when you saw that three-year span over four years of AP. There was actually one year where Mrs. Penelli, God help her, did AP art, drawing, and painting one and two in the same room. She won't be doing that again, but however, she did attempt that. And so what happens is we come back and we're going to build a schedule based on next year. I'll take a look at how many students asked for some of those classes. That's the time where I have to make some tough choices and decide whether or not we really can run something. You'll see another example in the presentation this evening was musical theory. That's a class. This is the first

123year it's run. We really want to build it because we can see the time and attention that our music department is working to build our program. We believe that we're going to start having more and more students wanting to take some of those musical offerings. So that might be somewhere where I know I've said before I like to have about 10 students in a class. If I could maybe get to seven for music theory, I might say, you know what, it's worth it. and what we trying to build. So that's what's happening. It's also the time of testing at the high school. I'll tell you, we just administered the PSAT9 to students who registered. We're going to be doing our advanced placement exams. We will be administering 14 different exams to our students as well

124as students in AP art who have to send in portfolios. That will be in May. We're going to be administering the NWEA testing in the spring right after APs to our 9th and tth graders. We've also been chosen again by New York State to do field testing in the area of physics and algebra 2. And then finally, we'll be administering regions exams in June. will be will be administering the new life science biology and earth and space sciences as well as geometry the first week in June while full day classes are going on and then we'll do the rest of the regions later on in June when we were at the visioning and I know some of you were there I know Judith Wilson talked about the fact and I know I do that sometimes

125when I come up here we talk about that 25% of students who are really engaged and we can't forget the 75% others and it's something that we do think about and I want to give you some examples that we've tried to do and when I say we I mean the entire community at the high school I want to give you a couple of examples that also tie in with Boseies as well. So, our pride class that you know was our life skills class, the teacher applied for the class to present at a seminar, a sustainability seminar, and they were accepted. So, in another week or so, they're going to be presenting Miss Dumont and her staff as well as the students on the hydroponic project that they have been working on. We also have the

126student innovation fellowship. We've been part of that. That's done by DC Boseies. So over the years, different classes have decided to partake in that. So for example, one year Mrs. Horn and her AP US history class decided to take that on. Another year we had a regent level US history. Well, this year the our English language learners in one of our US history classes, they decided they wanted to take on the project. And it's another example, I think, of our ENL staff and five or six of our ENL students who have gone on a monthly basis to DC Boseies and they've been working on a project of their choosing and on April 4th, Dr. Kirkus and I at least will be attending the presentation with other schools from Duchess County as our L students with

127their teachers present their problem and their solution. And then also we I received and I thought I'd like to I received this from the principal at Putnham Northern Westchester Boseies this evening. You had the the gentleman from DC Boseies. As you know, most of our students attend the career and technical education programs there. But if there are programs at Putnham Northern Westchester Boseies that DC Boseies does not offer, we allow our students to go there. One of them I'm always intrigued by it is urban forestry. I received this the other day. Good morning, Principal Kalen. It makes me sound very official. I am the career and technical principal over at Putnham Northern West Boseis and I wanted to reach out to express a positive note about Jake Guyger a student from Pauling who's in our

128urban forestry class. I had the pleasure of observing his class and saw Jake in full action as a class leader. Out of every student I have interacted with this year, Jake truly stands out as an exceptional young man. His ability to not only collaborate but lead his peers during a very complicated tree felling project truly blew me away. I don't normally send emails like this but I was so impressed I felt the need to reach out. So, of course, I actually spoke to Jake because I wanted to see him to say, "Hey, I got this great thing." And I said, "You know, I have to speak before the board of education next Tuesday, and I think it's important because they're going to be voting on the fact that we send our students there. So, I'm

129going to mention this and can you tell me exactly what you did because I don't understand." And so the next thing I got a Google doc from him because as he said I wanted to make sure you really knew what you were talking about. So I I want to tell you because quite frankly I was quite prepared. I don't know if I'm going to read the whole thing but I'm quite prepared. In my Boseies class we've been learning how to fell a tree. I bet you you didn't know your students were doing that. Fell or flop is a common name for cutting down trees. Before we even start the felling work, we start hope hazard obstacles plan and equipment. This hope is even used by Navy Seals and taught in training. And then he goes

130into all the different things they need. And he said, "After we were done with hope, then we started to make our face cut at a 7 degree degree angle, making sure we lined the felling sight up and making sure to leave 10% on each side of the face cut to control the fall. Then we do our other face cut at 20° angle. That creates an open face cut at a 90° angle. We already had a climbing line set in the tree. It was about a 90 foot spruce tree and it had died and it was right on the edge of a parking lot and we dropped it back in the woods. I ran a running bow line which is a knot had about 10 guys on the pull line, did a plunge cut and the

131tree fell right where we wanted it. Then we bucked it up, chipped it up into mulch, and then we put the chips on the walking trails in the woods. So I think that's an example as well again about what the opportunities our students are having and what they do. And I would like to say kudos to our math department because I think it also gives the underlying importance of the classes that may not be as exciting, but that are the building blocks that our students must take in order to be successful when they want to do some of the exciting work and the work that really they have a passion for. And so kudos to Jake and all his other students. And then finally, if you looked at my if you looked at my board

132report, you'll see some of the exciting learning experiences that the teachers in the high school are still making sure that our students are engaged with. You see that Mrs. Horn brought her AP government class to the FDR Museum and Library as a culmination of their unit on studying the executive branch of the government. You see that Mrs. Horn and Mrs. Decker in their AP humanities class put together the roaring 20s right within a projectbased learning experience that then they brought into our cafeteria and they were able to go around and see all the projects and their learning. You if you were me this week you would have seen finally our drone in the robotics class. If only I could show you some of the videos. Some of them I can't, but when I want to

133have a laugh, I just play it over and over again. But again, this is something new that we spent our money on to buy students the materials. We went from robots now to a drone. If I they are so the students themselves are putting these things together. They're working out the probabilities and they're getting them to work. Now, they're in a controlled environment right now. Eventually, they're going to go up into the sky, I think. So, I'll let you know when that happens. Just this week, I was a partner in Romeo and Juliet as there was one part left and I was able to get it in a class in 9th grade English where they're learning to interpret Shakespearean language, where the students play the parts, where Romeo kills Tibultt, where the prince comes in

134at the end, where then you have students that are watching and are able to interpret line by line exactly what's going on. And so I think at that point I will end my presentation but say there are a lot of exciting things going on. Coming up will be our cape class. Coming up will be two of our students who are heading to the state math competition and they qualified. And then also I'm happy to report that our chess team came in third place in the league. Some of those exciting pieces of news I will include in my next board presentation. And then finally just to clarify a little bit because I think it's important alternative education that's an important it's important piece of Boseis they now have kind of renamed it resilience academy and so

135occasionally there can be a student who maybe falls a little bit behind in at that time in really close collaboration with the counselors with families they can kind of catch up with their cohort by going to the alternative school. They can always come back to our high school, but many times they choose to remain there. Lots of times they will do a CTI um a CTI component as well. But a student who may go to the alternative high school is a polling high school student. They will graduate with us. They will walk in our ceremony. And the other piece that's part of that is some students do choose smaller number to do a GED component. So you could have half day working towards your DED and the other half still doing a career and technical.

136But again those are some of the some of the programs there that some of our students have taken advantage of. Okay. Anybody have a question? Sorry. Yeah. Thank you very much for that. Um, you know, I just want to highlight how important it is whenever we talk about budget. You know, we look at numbers, but you know, instruction, you know, the bulk of that money goes to, you know, to people, right? The people that make this stuff happen. And it's just, you know, fantastic to hear, you know, all of the really wonderful work that's being done. Um, you know, speaking of budget, maybe we got to get Jake to take a look at our budget just just in case. Sounds like he's very thorough. Oh. I'm glad I didn't know that they were actually taking

137down 90 foot roof. Now that I do, I'll be a little nervous, but but I think it I just think it's important to highlight that our students and he's just one of many really have wonderful compliments and are really doing great things and it's a credit to all of the education that came up in the elementary and middle school as well to get them to this point. Thank you. Anybody else? Aren't you going to tell us what part you were cast in? I was the prince at the end. The students love the bloody part where they have to play with they actually get to play with swords. It's wonderful. It's very exciting every day. It's exciting. Thank you, Miss Kellum. All right. Um, moving along. Uh, agenda order. Right. So resolve to approve the following

138additions, deletions and changes in order of the agenda as presented. Um do you want to read those? Yeah. Added um to the executive session pending litigation. We added a guidance aid in a resignation. We added an appointment. Okay. Thank you. So be it further resolved that the Pauling Central School District Board of Education approves um of a 0.25 um FTE leave of absence for Christine Belchure who I'm supposed to read that in. No, no, you're supposed to get a first and a second. And do I have a motion? Dr. Wall have second. Miss Kasakria, all in favor? I All right. Thank you for clarifying. All right, visitor comments. Uh, and these are on agenda items only. Uh, and it looks like we have Mr. Harvey Mikovsky on budget. So, I'm just going to read this

139um for the record. Um, you know, we value uh everyone's input and that's why we welcome public comments. Uh, here's a quick recap. Uh please introduce yourself by stating your name and address and let us know if you represent an organization. Remember uh there is a time limit so each speaker has three minutes. Unused time cannot be given to others and we respectfully ask that you direct your uh comments to the board president. Um also remember uh we're here to listen. We may not respond tonight uh to any comments, but if necessary we'll follow up later. Um, and we just ask that you be respectful and avoid discussing individuals by name due to privacy loss. Thank you, Mr. Mikoski. Thank you for the um I I must admit I I came here tonight um with

140concerns um um for the budget and um myself and um Mrs. uh Burker and Mr. Asher um o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o over o over the past half dozen years um spent um quite a bit of time on on a committee um run um by um by Mimi and um um the the the um the making of the budget is very complicated with a lot of um considerations, pros and cons and um it it it's it's I I I I was wondering considering ing what's going on in Washington and the expectations of budget um um cuts um h how how you guys were going to come up with um this um to two two to two and a two

141two and a quarter% and I was very very pleasantly surprised. Um um let uh let me go to um social media um misstatements that's going on. Okay. Um Mr. Rikovski um this agenda this is regarding the budget. Okay. Okay. The the budgettobudget changes will occur every year. Over the past two years they were extreme. They were 7 8%. And that's extraordinary. This year the budgettobudget change is in the three and a half% area which is in the line with what's been going on for the past 10 years. So there were exter extraordinary circumstances for the increases and not going into that. We don't have the time. Okay. Um uh I'm talking about the building aid and and and the and the cost of um the um bond issue and and why we voted for and

142and who's going to pay for the wonderful things that that have been done. Mimi has explained it. I I I will go into something that the the the um the offset to the increase of of interest on the bonds is now happening in terms of building aid. We're finally getting to be eligible for the building aid which will offset the interest on the $45 million bond. By the way, we were very lucky uh skillful lucky in getting the bulk of the bonds issued before interest rates started going up. That that's due due to our talented many. Um um um the use of reserves um it's it it's always been criticized. We hey, we we don't need to the the TRS. let's put it towards um reducing the budget. Well, this year it's proved that this

143is exactly why the board um and and our and Mimi's advice and our little committee decided let's have the reserves and use them when we need them. and now they're available and it's allowed us to stay within the two the the two and a quarter percent um um increase. Um I again um I I have to compliment the committee whoever was on it um in working with these numbers and getting um now it's now the truth has got to come out to the to community on on how the um board of education is handling their their tax um money. That's what they want to know. Um there's there's a lot of other things I have here, but it's getting late. And um those are the the two main things. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Mikovski.

144Okay, on to board remarks. I'll turn it over to my fellow board members if anybody has any comments they'd like to make this evening. Miss Cascaria. Uh Mr. Mine and I had an opportunity to attend the visioning in-person um two-day event and I it was it was a it was amazing and um I think Mr. Mine would agree just the communication happening in the room, the collaboration um was exactly what I think we wanted to see. And so I wanted to thank the community for joining and all the stakeholders that joined. It was so wonderful to talk to so many different people and really work as a team. Thank you. Anybody else like to chime in? No. Okay. No pressure. Dr. Walsh has plenty of comments to make up. You give me a lot of

145eye roll, so I'm going to be try to be brief. Um, good evening. I do want to extend my congratulations to the new Dr. Fontana, who successfully defended her dissertation yesterday. This is a huge accomplishment. It is no easy feat. Requires a lot of self-discipline, dedication, and a lot of resilience. Um, just some updates on some other things going on since we last met, which has been a while. Um, the elementary school celebrated ReadAcross America Week and Dr. Seuss a few weeks ago. The eighth graders um attended their 9th grade orientation uh Thursday, March 6th, and there were a lot of current high schoolers present to tour them around and give them insight. Last Friday, the middle school student council hosted a carnival dance and I noticed a pickup. Uh there was a tremendous number

146of students, all different ages. Um funny to see how the boys dressed versus the girls. Um but the reports were really positive. I think the kids had a great time. So I want to thank all the teachers and adviserss who gave their time that evening. Um, I want to give a huge congratulations to the cast and crew of the high school musical Mean Girls. They had three incredible performances. Um, and as you saw tonight, for such a small school, we really have tremendous talent. Um, it did not go unnoticed to me that there were so many teachers from all three buildings in attendance. There were administrators, there were support staff, there were coaches, um, all there to support our students. If you were lucky enough to be there at the second or third show, you

147even saw a cameo by one of our transportation department members. Um, as a parent, I can tell you that the best part um is watching the camaraderie among the cast and crew and the way the older students really act as mentors and role models. So, I want to congratulate all those seniors. Um, we acknowledge our winter athletes last Thursday at the winter sports awards. Many of our teams, as usual, made it to sectional play. We had a lot of all league, all county, and even an all-conference athlete. We also had a strong showing of scholar athletes who maintain a high average of a 90 while participating in their sport. Thank you to the Tiger Club for sponsoring all the decorations, raffles, and prizes. We are now in the spring sports season. Um, I will spare

148you my list of games because I know we are short on time, but please be checking the athletic calendar. There's uh events already happening this week. And in the spring especially, be mindful of weather. You just go to the main website, you click on calendars, you click on athletics, it's right there. Um, the kids love to see you there. Even if you just stop by, we have beautiful fields. So, I hope people can make that happen. Uh, since we last met, the PTA also held their spring dance. Um, I know the students had a lot of fun there. We are looking forward to a new tradition where the seniors will be passing the torch to kindergarten students at one of our April lacrosse games. So, please stay tuned for that and have a great evening.

149I cut a lot out for you sometimes. Thank you, Dr. Walsh. We're still comprehensive. Dr. Fontana. Okay. Um, I want to I really have to thank Dr. Kirkus, Mrs. Hesland, the entire administrative team, Mrs. Banano, Mrs. Generoso, and the district office staff, uh, for all their help while I've been recovering from eye surgery. I walked out of a budget meeting three weeks ago tonight fearing I had a detached retina, and this is my first time back on campus since. So, I appreciate the many kind notes, cards, messages, gifts, and I know the kindnesses I've received are very much in keeping with the character and generosity of the PCSD family and in fact the larger Pauling community. So, I guess I'm just reminding us that we all benefit from a caring community. I'm just perhaps the

150most recent beneficiary. While we try not to call attention to individuals on the agenda, I'd like to take a moment to thank everyone who participated in the process that led to my recommendation of Dr. Katherine Sweeney is our new probationary director of pupil personnel services. This is on the agenda tonight. Dr. Sweeney, our interim director, found herself in a very competitive group of qualified candidates with like her considerable experience across all of pupil personnel services. When Dr. Sweeney came, I let her know that we do search every probationary position in a rigorous process and she was at that time prepared to participate in an open search. Having been through that process with multiple stakeholders including almost every board member, Dr. Sweeney emerged as the best choice for Pauling and I'm pleased to recommend her to

151you as director preserving our current administrative structure. I also like Mrs. Kazaka want to thank everyone who participated in the visioning process last week. The core team members are providing feedback on the draft and working through a back to the future protocol. We'll have a draft version and action steps under the priority areas later this spring for the board's feedback. Um, I'm going to be very brief here because Dr. Walsh has already mentioned these, but uh the musical uh all reports were that it was uh fantastic. It was really hard for me not to be there. I would have been lying at 90° if I had been there, but I really wanted to be. But I I have heard from so many people how wonderful it was. I too would like to congratulate the athletes

152who were honored last week uh for the winter sports awards. Um I always like to particularly recognize uh or let everyone know that I always pay attention to the sportsmanships awards. Um other people may notice the fastest and the strongest, but that really matters to me and I appreciate those students who demonstrate uh the best character on and off the court and the field as well as our scholar athletes. I want to thank our partners such as Mr. Mezer tonight all of our partners at Duchess Boseies and congratulate Dr. Deluchia on being appointed as our district superintendent. Partnerships with Boseies have never been more important both in terms of budget and in terms of the range of experiences uh that we are always trying to uh provide for our students along the lines of um

153uh the blue ribbon commission's recommendations and our our hopes and dreams for our students. I also want to thank everyone who participated in the budget development process. of course, most notably Mrs. Heslund, but really all the administrators and staff who work to make this budget one that we can be proud of for what it has sustained for students and for its fiscal prudence. I believe we have struck an appropriate balance and I know that the amount of work that has gone into this budget is probably unprecedented. I mentioned that last year's budget was the most challenging we'd faced since 2008, mostly because of the positions we felt we had to add to meet the needs of our students. This year, we didn't have one big challenge. We had hundreds of small challenges in trying to

154squeeze every possible savings out of each budget line without harming programs or our ability to fund future budgets. It was hard work but good work and I truly want to thank everyone involved. Those are my remarks. Thank you Dr. Fontana. Moving to consent agenda and resolve that the board of education approves all asterisk items as the consent agenda. Do I have a motion? Motion, Dr. Walsh. Do I have a second, Mr. Gratchek? Sounds like you need to get your doctor in as well. Uh do um All in favor? That's unanimous. Okay, I think we're down to Oh, resolve that the board of education approve the minutes of the following meetings. February 25th. Do I have a motion? Miss Spielogle. Do I have a second? Kazaka. All in favor? Abstain from that. Okay. All in favor.

155So we'll we're going to take a vote and then I'll ask for abstension. Three, four, five. All in favor? I. Um one abstain. Mr. main. Now we're down to second reading for clarification for the public. It's because I wasn't here. Okay. Not because there's anything in there. That's typically that's typically why somebody would abstain. Yes. Thank you. Mr. Gratic, would you like to take the lead on this? Sure. No problem. So you guys can see the uh second reading and adoption of the following policy result board of education wave the first reading in policy 6240 which is investments uh as it's written out here on the agenda. This is due to no changes in the policy uh and go directly to second reading and adoption. So again no changes in that just taking this sample

156taking what we have and moving it forward to um second reading. So nothing of note there. Yeah, I was going to say so. Do we have a motion? Uh, Dr. Walsh, we have second. Miss Korea, all in favor moving it to uh second reading. I I that's unanimous. Okay. And then the second item, uh the first reading of the following policies. I'll start with 6410, which is authorized signatures. Lucky for us, both the changes in these policies are quick. They're pretty straightforward, so shouldn't take too much time. So regarding 6410 authorized signatures, uh again the changes are very straightforward. Pretty much what we did is we changed the language to match the positions that we have in Pauling and what's required uh regarding authorized signatures. So for example, we changed language uh from superintendent to

157the deputy treasurer. And we changed language from uh what was listed as like extracurricular funds uh to what the position actually is to which is quote the adviser of the extracurricular activity fund. So again, both changes represent the practice that we're doing in the district. Just now policy aligns with what we are required to do and what we are doing. So again, no changes in that first policy that are really substantial. With the second policy 6700, the purchasing again we pretty much took the NISBA sample and just adopted language that applies to our school district, vast majority of it. One language that we did uh one piece of language that we did add in regards you know preference to buying American salt as we uh theorized in the policy committee it was probably from some

158salt lobbyist in the Syracuse area or something but nothing again nothing that binds us to that the language just says that um that there would be a preference and when the ability is is able to do so we would prefer to buy American salt. Um so again very straightforward nothing of note uh in the change a lot of it just follows what we are already doing and uh again just language that applies specifically to our our school district from the sample. Okay. So so that's first read. We're going to move that to second for next. Okay. We'll see that at the next meeting. Okay. Unfinished business. Does anyone have any unfinished business? Actually, maybe. Okay. Uh, any new business? All of this information regarding the Bosey's vote and who the candidates are. I don't have

159the um ballot yet. We'll get that on the night of the vote. And basically they have three seats that are open and you can vote for up to three people and we do that that night. We do that that night. I just want you to know that in this packet it tells you who the candidates are and so you can have some idea of who they are before you get here at that meeting. Okay. Thank you very much. Yes. Second visit. We're down to second visitors comments. if there are any. Okay. Um I already read visitor comments, Mr. Mikovski. Now I get um the chance to get on my soap box and take care of my constitutionally guaranteed first amendment rights. Um regarding um um um controlling social media, it's my understanding that um I

160I don't know the details that the board um has made some comments um trying to rein in statements made um on social media. Uh um um it it it it's um um some of the outrageous comments uh um um u made um um unblaten lies that that were refuted with facts regarding um exchanges of money and um and salaries to certain individuals that were outright refuted in black and white. and the board sat and said nothing. It I don't understand that. My Mrs. Mattsky, my mother, brought me up to defend people when they were attacked blatantly with the lies. The the board had an obligation to make some sort of statement um on refuting the blatant um um um um lies that came out notori many many times by very few people. for granted, but

161um they were uncalled for. And um I I I I would hope that um I that this does not occur in the current race for um um board members um coming up the um and and um if it does, I I would hope that the um board would act responsibly in refuting u um similar statements that that that would that could have been disproven just by but by showing statistics some numbers. Okay, thank you very much. And oh, one more thing. Um um nobody in here knows as a fact what's going to happen with cuts in um in federal aid. Um there's the statements made um about the board of education, the the the uh um the department, excuse me, the board the department of education being um eliminated. That can't happen. Only Congress can

162do that. changes can be made. I would strongly suggest after the board the dust all settles and we find out exactly what is going to occur and harm these students education in Pauling that we you they get together frame a letter send it to m Mr. Michael Lawler, who is our representative in Congress, who will have a vote on determining what um changes, if any, will be made. Um, in the past, the um the board on on an on on other issues has gotten together with other school boards and and written to our um elected officials, and I would hope that this would occur again. Again, nobody knows what's happening. nothing's been done as as to the best of my knowledge as to all it's it's all conjecture and um I I I hope um

163we all um land on our feet for the benefit of the students of um Holland. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Mikovsky. Okay. Um it has been a long meeting though pleasant as it was has been long. Um, so I will keep my comments short. Um, you know, there's a lot of gratitude that we heard tonight. I want to jump on that bandwagon. Um, you know, I know that there were board members, Miss Kazaka, Mr. Maine, that you know, that helped with the visioning, um, committee work over the span of two days. Um and you know certainly from on behalf of all the other board members here, thank you for you know putting in your time and your efforts on that. Um it is important. We do this is a volunteer position. Um and so the

164time commitment that we make um is you know is very much appreciated. So thank you both for doing that. Um and also there's a lot of budget work that was presented this evening and there's a big group um some of whom are here and other folks in the community that helped out with budget advisory um and so we want to extend our gratitude for all of their work um as well on behalf of the community. Um this board is single-mindedly focused on doing the work of the district on behalf of all the children. Um and so we will continue to do that because our task is to empower student success. Everything else um I'm not aware of um the things that happen necessarily outside of this meeting. So, you know, we will remain focused on

165on the work that we do here. Um, and so with that, um, I will end my comments and thank everybody for coming here. I want to thank again the kids. They were fantastic and it was an amazing way to start this evening. Um, and so now we actually will reconvene. So, result uh to executive. So, resolve that the board of education reconvene to executive session to continue the board self-evaluation. No action will be taken. Do I have a motion? Dr. Walsh, do I have a second? Miss Fogle. All in favor? Great. That's we'll be back. Thank you. All right, everyone. Resolve that the board uh of education adjourn this meeting. The time is 10:33. Do I have a motion? Mogo, Mr. Gratchic second. All in favor? I I Good night everybody.