001good evening i'm nita singh and on behalf of the pittsford central school district ptsa i'd like to welcome you to our meet the candidates evening we're sorry for the delay in starting we had to work out some technical difficulties but we are here this forum will provide you with an opportunity to meet and to listen to four to our four board of education candidates respond to questions submitted by members of our community our candidates and all of the tech support as well as the hosts in this room in this evening are all following covert safety protocols this form is scheduled for 90 minutes i am happy to introduce to you our moderator for the evening sherry johnson she is currently the executive director for the monroe county school board association and has served in this
002capacity since 2015. prior to becoming executive director sherry served for 18 years on the churchville chili board of education nine of those years as an officer during that time sherry was also an active member of the monroe county school board association serving in a number of roles including association president i welcome and present to you ms sherry johnson thank you anita and i also want to say good evening and welcome to the pittsburgh beat the candidate night and we will get through all of the questions that we have set to answer so bear with us as we walk through this a little bit later than we planned before we ask the candidates to give their opening remarks i'd like to speak to the work of elected board trustees as said in the title board of
003education members hold the public trust while they are locally elected officials those in our suburban districts are non-partisan and unpaid these elected volunteers will need to devote hundreds of hours during their term to learn about their roles and responsibilities and they must also make sure they are available to their community by serving on district committees attending and participating in district functions and events so i want to thank each of you for making a commitment to pursuing this important avenue of service to students and the community with that said let's learn more about those who would like to serve the pittsburgh community in that role there are four candidates here this evening for two open seats and in ballot order and just give a little wave when i call your name miss nancy clifford lewis mr
004dave burke miss emily k and miss tricia gonzalez johnson so candidates you will be given two minutes to provide an opening statement and after the prepared questions a two-minute closing statement i'm going to use the ballot order to begin the questions but then i will rotate the questions so that each of you will have the opportunity to answer a question first me get my pages i do want to let you know that i am happy to repeat a question and i want to remind you to look at the timekeeper so that if you see a yellow sign that's 30 seconds to start closing your 2 minute answer to the question and red means to stop i'm happy to repeat the question finally i do want to thank the pittsford pta for their work in preparing
005for this important event and the pittsburgh technology team who has worked really really hard the last hour um to get this set up for all of you so i'm going to move on to the opening statements so nancy if you want to give your two-minute opening statement we'll begin thank you good evening i am nancy clifford lewis and i am asking for your vote on may 17th as i seek a seat for my first term on the pittsford board of education i grew up in this remarkable town i'm a mother of five children and an active member of the church of jesus christ of latter-day saints on craig road in my professional career i spent eight of my 12 years as a procedural nurse leader at rochester general hospital in the cardiac cath lab i
006worked alongside the most talented providers and staff to love and tirelessly serve the diverse population of rochester in my role as a registered nurse i am trained to assess symptoms based on acuity and to work cohesively with members of a multi-disciplinary team to create and implement treatment plans for each patient individually based on specific needs as a member of the board of education i will bring my honest and fresh perspective and the assessment and communication skill set i possess to advocate for each student and family based on specific individual needs i commit to collaborate respectively with all board of education members and put policies into place that yield the best outcomes for each student thank you and dave your opening statement please uh ultimately what i found was three themes the first was we all
007want what is best for our children and the majority of our community shares our values the core values of our district the second thing that i found is that while there's always room for improvement our district is doing a very good job i believe our students are safe i believe they're being challenged academically to reach their potential and finally i believe that we have a very strong leadership team having worked at a number of different organizations i know having a strong leadership team is very hard to build and it's even harder to recreate if we lose it and so my professional experience has taught me that being a member of any board public or private requires a diversity of experiences and perspectives in order to enable a leadership team or administration to do their best
008work and i believe i can bring that diversity of perspective so i hope you'll vote for me on may 17th thank you dave because your mike wasn't on they weren't catching that can you give us like the first couple paragraphs of your opening statement just to give you the opportunity to introduce yourself sorry about that um thank you uh ptsa i'm dave burke i am seeking the first uh term to the school board my wife and i both graduated from pittsford sutherland 2002 and we relocated back to rochester during the pandemic in 2020. we spent about a year looking for a home in pittsford because we're very committed to sending our children owen and harper burke to the pittsburgh schools while i was away from pittsburgh i earned a degree in economics and political science
009from the university of vermont i also studied at georgetown and the london school of economics over the past 15 years professionally i've worked in operations uh management and leadership roles at a couple of different technology companies both in new york and san francisco my interest in the board really started uh during covid when i began to see a lot of the national discourse uh spilling over into uh school rooms and school boards across the country and i want to understand what's happening locally and so that led me to start attending board meetings meeting with different members of the community parents administrators teachers to try and understand coming out of that experience i ultimately found that you know while we all very much want the same thing for our community and we share the core values
010uh that we've posted in our district thank you emily same thing and if if i don't see you reach for your mic i may give you uh just a nudge so that you would make sure you get recorded thanks thanks jerry i'm emily k i'm a proud product of our pittsford schools k-12 and together with my husband andrew also a sutherland grad i have two kids who now attend my old elementary school mendon center and a preschooler who can't wait to join his brothers there by this point i know our district pretty well as a student i sat in the back of board meetings and took notes as my mom kathy ziegler sat on the board and as a parent i still attend our board meetings regularly sometimes to speak but usually just to listen
011to our district and to our community members i also make it a point to attend our equity power hours curriculum reviews budget workshops and any other forum that our district provides i'm a proud member of our ptsa and i currently volunteer at mce as the secretary e-news editor room parent yearbook staff like the loop volunteer classroom volunteer and i'm a member of ptsa quest through these experiences i've seen how pittsford's unique culture of collaboration between teachers parents administrators students in the community has allowed us to maintain such a high standard of excellence year after year on a personal level i'm a logical and analytical person i've worked in data analytics and i believe in data-driven solutions i'm not going to fan the flames of outrage and i'm not going to be reactionary when something inflammatory
012comes in front of the board i'm passionately invested in finding the right solution but i'm intentional in doing so over the past few months i've heard this question a lot why run for school board and the answer is simple i am fiercely protective of what we have here in pittsford when i left our schools i saw what an incredible advantage my pittsford education was for me and i feel passionately about ensuring that asset is passed down to every single kid who goes through our buildings but a school district of pittsford's caliber doesn't happen by running on autopilot it needs a constant stream of stakeholders who are committed to growing our standard of excellence in all areas for all students in the coming years i look forward to continuing to step up and help this district
013create the most collaborative inclusive and academically rigorous experience possible for our kids thank you and trisha your two minute opening statement good evening my name is trisha lynn gonzalez johnson i used to hear pronouns i acknowledge that we are lucky to be on the land of the holdings sony i want to thank the ptsa for hosting and organizing this event on top of everything else they do the pittsford school district for creating the space to come together sherry johnson from moderating and my fellow pittsford residents neighbors friends family and colleagues past and present who have been supporting me on this journey and encouraging me to be myself so that i can best serve them as well as our future leaders here in pittsford i am a parent of three amazing children in the district one
014attending crms and the other two attending sutherland high school they are involved in various aspects of the pittsford educational system ranging from individualized education plans to dance music and theater why do i want to run for the board i am a student-centered educator that has worked for 17 years making sure that i connect with people and communities across all disciplines and cultures so that i can ensure an amazing future for my children as well as all of the future leaders that come into my life i want to be who i needed growing up i know that i can communicate in ways that reach across all political barriers because i'm currently involved in all aspects of education from state testing to curriculum development to the next generation standards to the cross-curricular implementation i can clear up
015misconceptions and bring us back to what is actually happening and supposed to be happening in the classroom i can guide offer suggestions and even create what is needed to move us forward i am always learning i will admit mistakes i will listen affirm i will take action then i will reflect on the actions i take i will speak up if something isn't right i do voice my opinion and i work with i will work with all of you to make things better i will build upon what works already and i will take apart and get rid of what isn't working i don't have enough time to share all the things that i've been a part of but with everything i do i'm always learning and aspiring to make my surroundings a better and more inclusive
016space for everyone i'm the newsletter editor for amnest the mathematics association for new york state i sit on and have sat on the executive board for the past eight years and we follow robert's rules i've been a part of the new york state cap team for social studies i've been involved in all aspects of new york state testing from when pearson did it all the way into now questar through all of these adventures i have built connections and resources a toolbox if you will that can enable me to give back to the pittsford community in ways no one else can i have the skills the experience and the knowledge of how to be an effective transparent and collaborative board member will support our children teachers administration staff the varying beautifully diverse community voices and the
017district i will voice my opinions and work with all perspectives that exist i am not a head nodder i know real relationships are essential i'm a bridge builder i'm a change maker i would really appreciate you to vote and vote for me as well thank you now we're going to get to the questions i do want the community to know that there are pages and pages and pages of questions um but the questions that i am asking this evening are direct questions that the community submitted except for maybe the word the or uh or something that i thought would be more helpful the content of the question is as written so the very first question we'll go back in ballot order so nancy you'll get this first again two minutes make sure your mic is
018on what is the biggest challenge that you see for the board of education in the next few years that's a great question i feel like the board of education at this moment in this season is challenged with so many diverse voices we have so many needs and so many students and families in our district who feel like they are marginalized like they are not being heard like they may be unsafe in our school system and as a board member it is my role to listen actively and to communicate with each family and make them feel like their concerns are the most important because in that moment their concerns are the most important i will take those concerns back to the board of education to our superintendent and be active in creating policies that will protect
019our students and make them feel loved and heard and valued as well as their families thank you thank you dave same question so uh the question being what is uh the most important thing the board of education needs what are the biggest challenge what is the biggest challenge that you see for the board of education in the next few years yeah so i think the job of the board of education is to empower the administration and the best way to do that is for us to ultimately be able to we have to be able to give the administration the opportunity to communicate effectively to our school and all the students there and we have to be able to give them the tools that they need um and listen to them effectively thank you emily same
020question um i think that coming uh moving forward especially moving out of covid i see sort of a two-prong issue on the horizon in terms of mental health and physical safety i think we're already we're already there in terms of mental health um coming out of covid we have a lot of mental health issues among our students and among our teachers um we have been working toward addressing these we've been partnering with pittsburg youth services with golisano with the u of r but there's still a lot of work to be done and when mental health is something that isn't being addressed that always puts us in an issue where we need to be worried about physical safety um you know no one likes to think about the worst case scenario of an active shooter but
021i do think that we need to get back to thinking that this is something that could loom on the horizon especially considering where we are in terms of mental health thank you trisha yes thank you for that question in education things are always coming right um coming from the state changes but really i i feel it's communication that will get us to where we need to be so we need to have crucial and critical affirming conversations as a community in order to best serve our children and families approaching these difficult discussions with an appreciative inquiry will allow us to move forward one proactive thing we could do is have more public forums create space and opportunities to hear from parents and community members in a transparent responsive consistent way our schedules always allow for that
022but to really make sure that we work that in we can focus on continuous improvement create cohesive action plans that we can reflect on later we can collect surveys and anecdotal notes from meetings so that together we can begin to identify the needs and come up with the next steps to address them i think in cycles and i had to make a little template which i can share later but basically like listen affirm plan take action reflect repeat and if you have that full cycle in place then we we can do anything when all of the restorative practices are in place change happens i believe in that i've seen it for the past 17 years this allows for both parties and their families to feel like cause and effect happened as well as reflection and
023renewal when people are held accountable for wrongful actions and are allowed the opportunity to apologize and offer ways to make up for the harmless cause everyone walks away being heard and having learned from the experience students want to know what is okay and what isn't okay they want to feel supported heard and valued its cause and effect we have to recognize that mistakes will happen they're okay and we learn from them if we work together and build upon what works and get rid of what doesn't then we will already be heading in the right direction thank you that's the first question second question dave you get this one first and just as you will see a theme these ones these questions are related to board service more specifically how should board members address differences of
024opinions amongst themselves so dave you get that question first um in terms of expressing differences opinions i think it's really important that board members have a diversity of perspectives uh and opinions one of the most important things for a board team or any teams to be able to establish a foundation of trust so that they can have hard conversations with each other and disagree um but still you know work to move forward uh in a unified direction uh and so i think when you have that uh type of foundation of trust that's where you'll be able to address those issues collectively as a board team thank you emily same question how should board members address differences opinions amongst themselves um i 100 agree with what dave said in terms of you need a foundation of
025trust and respect among the board members um everyone has to feel that they can voice their own opinion there will still be differences of opinion and i believe that in those instances more information often helps people to at least understand other perspectives and find a common ground that you can move forward of things aren't going to always be unanimous but i do think that if there are differences of opinion if more information is provided to provide to give more context to those opinions it's going to be easier to resolve them in a respectful way thank you trisha yeah so um again communication but i also think our board needs to represent our entire community so it's okay to have completely different opposite points of view as long as you can communicate effectively and have those
026critical conversations i like it's accountable talk in the school lingo like being able to affirm each other's voices i heard you say and really like work on that and establish relationships because relationships are key if people feel heard they don't go to the next level they just communicate back and forth with you and obviously it's really hard for the board the superintendent to talk to everybody in the community so if we all have different perspectives and we all talk to our constituents our stakeholders our friends our relatives our neighbors right if we talk to them and we bring it back to the board then we can have those critical conversations and make decisions together thank you nancy i agree with what said previous i feel like trust and respect amongst the board members is crucial
027i also think that we need to focus on what is similar between us our goals are the same i've been saying it consistently for these last few weeks we might have differences of opinions and our different vantage points of how to achieve a goal but the goal is the same and so as long as we are rooting for pittsford we are doing everything we can to support our educators our teachers our support staff our families and our students we will achieve that goal and each vantage point is crucial to achieving that goal so we're making sure that we are accommodating all of the diverse needs of the district and not just my own specific so being an active listener and respecting my board members and keeping my eye on the prize is what is crucial
028to maintaining a cohesive collaboration amongst diverse voices thank you so the next question emily you get this question first and the question is what do you believe is the board's role relative to the role of the superintendent so the board and the superintendent the board needs to support the superintendent the analogy that i heard i believe that the um candidates seminar which was incredibly helpful is that the superintendent is the pilot flying the plane but the board or the air traffic controllers the superintendent cannot do his job without the board looking out for him looking ahead seeing where he's going what might lie in the way but at the end of the day the superintendent is the pilot he is dealing with all of the minutia that comes up but i i think that the
029board's role in terms of the superintendent is to definitely make sure that he has that aerial view um so that he can deal with all of the tiny things that come down the pike thank you i was apparently loud so they've moved me away a little bit so trisha you get that question next okay so the board of education is the official policy-making body of the school district it is responsible to the state of new york into the local school community for the education of public school students school boards must carry out the laws and regulations pertaining to the education of our current children and future leaders but what does that really mean right so we support the superintendent we support the community we are the voice when people can't be present we represent the
030community and we bring back those voices back to the decision makers the school board but we do support the superintendent and we help make him stronger and him because we have a male as our superintendent thank you nancy same question hi at the monroe county school boards association seminar that ms k was talking about earlier we talked about the role of the board of education as being a supervisory role to the board or excuse me to the superintendent the superintendent is the board of education sole employee but as in our role as the board of education it is our responsibility not only to support him but also to hold him accountable or her accountable to their role to make sure that the things that are going on within the school district are matching policies that
031are created and that we're able to attend to the needs of the families and students specifically and we do that by advocating for those families through the superintendent making sure that he's aware of what's happening so that he can best govern the schools thank you and dave last word on that question yeah i'll agree with many of these statements i mean ultimately the superintendent is the ceo of the organization right um this is a 140 million a year budget um 5 500 students 1100 uh faculty and staff and so uh the the superintendent has a leadership team that they need to lean on to set the trajectory the goals the priorities for the school the board's job is to help them think critically about external factors and to be able to help them hone their
032thinking to provide them with additional perspectives and context to make sure that when we set a plan when we set a budget um we decided direction for our school and for our students uh we've really stress tested that and and uh sharpened our thinking there and so that's why i think the board can have the most help in terms of supporting the superintendent thank you so trisha your turn to answer the first this question first it is a two-part and again i'm perfectly comfortable reading repeating this all or in parts what is the one thing that you think pittsford central school district does well and what would you want to see continued and what is one thing that you believe pittsburgh pittsford's central school district could improve and how would you work with the board
033to achieve that so one thing that you like that you want to see continued but one thing you think the district could improve on and how you'd work with the board to achieve that okay thank you um what do what does pittsburgh do really well pittsford shows up time and time again pittsford has varying voices diverse voices um people come when they're upset people i see that as a positive they come they show up just by driving in here and watching the signs like to see that many signs all of us represented tells me that there are people that are actively involved and i feel like they want what's best for the community what could we do better so a lot of my training and experience i had to do a lot of thinking about
034this right we can come together by having the same focus being student centered focusing on our i call them future leaders because that's what they are and everything they need to be successful beyond graduation and i'm going to give you some terms that have been really like hitting home with me and i have them here so part of my education is this are these um letters but i'm going to just say them all right so grade level instruction students meet our expectations and thrive when we provide them with instruction aligned to grade level standards but i'm not going to just stop there imagine if we have individual goals that enable them to go even farther so the grade level is like your baseline and you want to push them farther you want them to meet
035their individual goals engagement enables students to be involved engage in instruction maintain students beliefs about who they are where they come from and what they can be teachers who enact engage in instruction have an awareness of an accountability for the curriculum demands for rigor and productive struggle okay affirming instruction acknowledges that and honor students ethnic racial and linguistic identities and their current historical experiences within the context of grade level work teachers who provide affirming instruction articulate or demonstrate how students can use the learning in their world and their larger world and then meaningful instruction look at the world students will be able to look at the world then decide including critique how the knowledge can move them the learner into their world they'll be interacting with the people around them thank you nancy same question
036are you good with it you want me to repeat it something that i like and something that i think we can improve on what do you think that the district is doing really well and want to see continued and then what would you like to see improvement in and how would you work with the board to achieve that thank you for clarifying pittsford consistently is top tier it's again two percent in the nation for producing free thinkers who are successful at the collegiate level which is remarkable considering what we pay to live in pittsford i would say that we have the most remarkable pittsford pride people love to be in pittsford we have four candidates for board of education this year who graduated from pittsford schools are products of these schools and wanted to come
037back and raise their families here because of how marvelous pittsford is i i love that i love that people want to raise their families in such a well-rounded established community that offers a remarkable education the one thing that i would work on as a board of education member is transparency i feel like as i was communicating with parents and teachers and administrators these last few weeks preparing for tonight's event and for my board service there was a lack of understanding of the chain of command of questions parents didn't understand who they needed to speak with if they had a concern about their child's curriculum if they had a problem with something that was going on with a classmate they thought that all letters needed to go to the superintendent and the board of education that's
038not really the case we would start with our school teachers our school principal and move along along a chain of command and so i feel like as a board member we can work to actively engage the community so they understand that their questions are being taken care of in a prompt effective and concise way so that all the needs of their families are being met at the building or the district level thank you dave the same question thank you um in terms of things that i think the the district does very well i think we really live our core values organizations that i've been part of view core values as a decision-making framework and i think that's really important because as a board member as an individual you have many different perspectives and views but
039as a board member you have to sort of put those second to your priority of really doing what's best and making the right decisions for your kids and and everyone's kids in the community and our core values um are really lived uh in the context of how our administrators our teachers really look at decision making so in terms of being student centered you know the decisions we've made to continue to develop and push our curriculum forward in a way that is tailored to what our students need as well as inclusive of the broader student body and i think the other area i've seen us really continue to you know push forward i do think is around continuous improvement as one of our core values and understanding you know and being able to respond to the
040academic uh challenges that we're getting from uh different bodies from new york state or um the evolving nature of how we're kind of improving our curriculum over time uh and so in terms of areas where i think that we have opportunities for improvement you know i sort of think about the way that the the school operates the foundation is is really safety both the physical and mental safety and wellness of our children that's absolutely our first top priority and we have to really think about that particularly coming out of um covet and a really challenging time and we know um that you know nationally we're dealing with mental health um in a big way and so that's an area i want us to continue to really focus on and really dig in and make sure
041that we're prepared and make sure that we're you know taking care of both our students and our staff in that respect thank you emily last word on this question um i agree with a lot of what was said um i think that another thing that really needs to be mentioned that we are unique in how well we do is collaboration between our administration our teachers our students our parents the town and the village i think you know we've seen just in the last number of weeks when the water mains broke at the two high schools and we had such a continuous relationship with the town that we were able to partner with them to get that fixed and the kids back in school as quickly as possible um and we couldn't do that without a
042culture of collaboration i also have a lot of respect for um like our district planning team and our inclusivity advisory council those sort of committees that advise our superintendent and they include parents community members teachers administrators we really try to make sure that we have all the stakeholders accounted for in terms of those decisions and our relationship with our teachers you know the way that we are able to go through negotiations without things getting acrimonious the way we are able to solicit input from our teachers and and really um you know try to make sure that we are all on the same page doing the best things for the children is is unique and incredible um one related area that i actually do think we could improve though is in terms of informal input from
043the community um i've heard a lot of parents specifically feel like the process to get involved or to get their voice heard is kind of opaque they could stand up at a board meeting but that's not a conversation they could um you know go to an equity power hour but it's again sort of writing down a question or writing down a comment um on a note card it's not really a conversation and we have a lot of representation on these fantastic committees like district planning team but those are pretty coveted positions and and not uh easy to figure out how to be on one of those and not easy to be on one if you want one so i do think that having more informal input would be helpful thanks thank you all right we're
044back to the top of the order with the next set of questions some in the community nancy you get this one some in the community feel that an emphasis on inclusivity in pittsford schools undermines our long-standing tradition of academic excellence do you see these two goals as conflicting or do you see them as complementary i see them as complementary i feel like it is our role as board of education members as community members as parents teachers and administrators it is our role to make every child feel welcome heard valued included and respected and so that's in no way conflicting to any of the things that i believe and we shouldn't be using this word in any kind of a divisive or or negative way it really needs to be seen as a way for every
045student and family to feel like their voices matter and that we will make strides in every way we can as board of education members and in building level to make all children feel welcome and valued and heard thank you thank you dave same question yeah i strongly agree i think um not only is that uh concept of inclusivity um complementary but but i think it's a really important aspect of teaching our children to become critical thinkers um we need to be able to and going back to our values you know creating a supportive environment for all of our students you know focusing on inclusivity is absolutely consistent with that value set and so our our ability to teach kids how to think more critically to seek out different perspectives to be more empathetic you know
046that gives them the tools that they need to look at information and situations more critically and you know these days it is there's so much information there's so much it's so difficult to sort of um find the signal and get the right information and more than ever we need our kids to be able to think really critically to be able to you know form their own perspectives and opinions and so i think inclusivity is a huge piece of that puzzle um and i think it's a really positive focus for our district thank you emily same question i completely agree with what is said i mean inclusivity and academics have to go hand in hand we can't expect all students to do their best if all students don't feel that they are welcomed and affirmed and
047their families are welcomed and affirmed and they see themselves represented in school and they feel like people know and appreciate them for who they are we cannot expect these kids to be fulfilling their academic potential when they are not feeling uh when they're concerned about anything else when they're not feeling totally accepted in any other way i i do think it's really important to note as well what inclusivity and equity are and aren't you know equity is a rising tide that raises all ships if we are maintaining high standards for all kids if we are helping more kids reach these really high standards that's good for everyone you know it's not cutting down the tallest flowers it's not pulling down kids to a lower level it's raising everybody up and that helps every kid who
048is in that classroom thank you trisha yeah to go with that it's not pi right sorry but it's not pi so if somebody gets some more of something over here it doesn't mean less for somebody else and i think that's a lot of the confusion that comes in the new standards are coming out i'll speak specifically to science i know there's a lot of confusion about if you get rid of the honors program that sounds like it's a trigger right it sounds like you're getting rid of something that's really high in here but what they're finding is um the new standards are actually raising the bar right i would be more asking the teachers how you can differentiate like the standards allow for differentiation but how you can do that like that should be the
049question right not worrying about getting rid of because you have ap programs that are there they're not going away you know and this also allows more students to to be able to get into ap programs because sometimes that title of honors kind of got in the way and i know that's kind of a trigger word and i love how you all defined it because that's really what i was thinking was this idea of diversity equity and inclusion is the new york state initiative but why um it's becoming a trigger word it's becoming political but that's also because they want you to click on it and they want to make money off you right it's not because they're focusing on students so diversity is acknowledging our differences embracing our various strengths and encouraging others to reflect
050on our weaknesses equity this idea that different people may need different support in order to reach their individual goals right they get what they need to be successful inclusion fostering an inclusion cl an inclusive climate you and i work together we are not the same and being different than one another is okay the more our children can learn to value the world around them and understand that we all come from different backgrounds religions families cultures the better off they will be when they leave here right this small town it's actually very small amongst this giant world and better to enter the workplace because in the workplace they're going to be surrounded with people that are different than them and so you have to affirm them and if your basic needs aren't met and i could
051totally speak to that um then you're not going to care about the learning environment right so you have to be safe your basic needs have to be met you have to build relationships and know your children and their families and there you have it thank you thank you all right dave back to you for the next question first do you support changing school start times and if so how will you work with the board in the district to get those implemented uh great question i i think school start times are very tricky um i know there's a lot more there's a lot of studies that have come out that have said particularly for high school students later start times uh kind of work better with their sleep patterns and circadian rhythms and so they'll be
052more active and more engaged if they're able to sort of start school at a later time i think the challenge associated with that is um it is a district-wide initiative so for example uh twofold one is there's a ton of after-school activities right so if for example we start pushing back the start time you know an hour or two for our high school students we're going to push back all those after school and extracurricular activities um sports outdoor activities back that time as well and so i think that creates challenges additionally we have a single fleet of buses that services all of the schools in our district and so we would also have to rework all of the bus schedules which i think would be very disruptive for a lot of um our parents and
053students uh as well and so i i think there are a lot of good reasons to seriously consider uh later start times but i would say today if i if i had to take a perspective i i don't think would be something i would prioritize and i would probably want to push that out to a later time because i just think it's a very challenging and disruptive thing to actually execute thank you emily same question um yeah i agree with a lot of what dave said i believe we had a committee that looked at this years ago and at the moment they didn't have enough information to work out all of the kinks i think the science does show that it would be better for um our adolescents to start later because the way that
054their sleep rhythms shake out they tend to get their best sleep later at night so even when we send them to bed earlier it um doesn't it's not really the best thing for them scientifically um webster i believe tried this right before the pandemic and so i think uh everybody's sort of watching and waiting i think if we wanted to move forward with this we would probably want to try to move forward as a county because if our sports teams are playing later at night if our extracurriculars are later at night we're going to need to coordinate with the rest of the county so they have someone to play um so i i do think as we sort of see how things are going in webster we could think about looking as a county at
055maybe this being an option thank you trisha are my children watching that's all i'm going to ask right now um i have both my babies and sorry jackson my big boy since seventh grade that's more embarrassing sorry jackson and my oldest ones are in high school um we my husband and i take turns waking them up and he's much better at waking them up than i am i will tell you that we already have different start times because i watch the buses go by and when i go to work that's when the elementaries are coming through and i would love if we could just flip flop and have the elementary schools come in a little earlier just because i work in elementary and i see them and they are more wide awake and my students
056where i am get on buses and they're on the buses for an hour right and they are wide awake and ready to go high school kids it doesn't matter what time i ask them to go to bed isn't there how many reminders i give them it is harder for them to wake up it is harder they want to they work better at night when they're doing their homework i see it in action it makes sense that the science works but even if you just flip-flopped you wouldn't have to change much and it wouldn't be a huge amount of time but obviously that's my opinion so i would love to actually throw that question back out to our community and see what people really wanted and then come and discuss it because i tell you right
057now that my high school kids would love it if they could just go a little bit later right often they are trying to run to the bus or stumble and trying to eat a bagel on the way and it's really hard for them to get what they need and get to that bus on time and then get to school on time nancy same question i agree with what's been said before me i especially agree with what trisha just said about flip-flopping the elementary level and then the high school and middle school times with making it more conducive for the high school kids to have a later start time and having our younger children at school a little bit um earlier i also am concerned about transportation i feel like our transportation is spread so thin
058especially right now post coved we have such a bus driver shortage that trying to navigate an entirely new bus route and bus times would be really challenging not to mention what emily said about correlating activities with other school districts especially in monroe county and of course family time if we have a later start time children won't be able to work after school they won't be able to participate in their sports and that cuts into time that they would otherwise be spending with their families so at this moment i feel like i feel like what we're doing is working but if we were to try something flip flopping elementary and the high school would be a great next step thank you emily you get to go first for this one and a couple of you touched
059on this but it certainly was brought up several times on the questions how will you work with the board in the district to address the continued mental health needs of our students so this is a this is a big one um you know i this is something where i would want to see what specifically is needed um because i do think that this is something where the students and the families and the teachers because the mental health of the teachers is also paramount and um it has taken a hit during covid we have really stretched them incredibly thin um you know i i have heard that our partnerships have really been fantastic in terms of mental health our pittsburgh youth services partnership has been great golisano i believe has set up a room where we
060are able to have our students and families sorry work with someone from golisano in just in terms of mental health we have a relationship with u of r um i think that looking towards these partnerships would be um really a great continuing step we can take and making sure that we have room in the budget to address mental health making sure we make room in the budget to address mental health thank you trisha same question okay this one hits home but i really think like as a state i get to watch because i amness i get to talk to teachers across the state and during the pandemic obviously um a lot of a lot of um nuances were noted right and everybody knew there was a problem everybody saw it um and then i kind
061of feel like i don't know how to say this but we kind of went back to the old school ways of just get back to school just get back to school just do it you know as if nothing happened and i know at least for me speaking for me growing up it's like oh rub some german get up keep walking you know laugh hahaha if you get hurt that's not like you know so now i awkwardly laugh if i get hurt and i'm like no i'm really injured but um i feel like if we had just paused a little bit and really you know like hey what just happened and have those conversations with children and allow them the space to just talk about it instead of getting right back into it as if nothing
062happened but putting that aside i think it's about building relationships and really knowing your students i believe in restorative practices i believe in morning meeting i believe in after lunch circle ups i believe in all of that but really getting children and adults to talk about it that this is this is an issue but it's always been and it's okay it's okay to not be okay and just actually affirming people with where they're at and what they're doing and talking about it and making it okay to talk about it i think that would be that would be a huge step in the right direction of course making sure that we have the right supports counselors and social workers and the hospital programs but again if you don't talk about it then you don't know that
063something's wrong so there's daily check-ins when when the children get off the bus when they you know there are people and adults situated so they can be that go between before they even get to the classroom you can spot that child you can have the conversation and just having those systems in place would make a big difference thank you nancy i was reading an article today that actually talked a great deal about mental illness and the cdc cites that between 2009 and 2021 adolescents who feel hopeless and without purpose went up from 26 to 44 in 2001. and they attribute it to be device use because children are using between five and seven hours worth of devices that's perpetuated a lot because of what we've done during covet we relied so much on technology during
064covid that now it's a commonplace in our families and our homes in our hands and i feel like as a board member we need to step back from technology technology is wonderful it certainly has a place it allows us to be connected and to be together but interaction together being present when we are present is such a crucial part of mental health and to mental wellness and i feel like we've lost that we've lost that general ability to communicate well and effectively in person and eliminating or eliminating in mass the amount of time that we're on social media the amount of necessary time on devices would be amazing for the mental health and wellness of adolescents as well as adults thank you and dave's last word on this question yeah so i i've also read
065the study that nancy cited and you know this is a national issue that we're seeing across the board uh and that means it's certainly happening here for us as well and i do think devices are absolutely a big contributing factor um and we have to continue to learn and evolve how we work with devices uh because you know technology is a critical component of uh how we're gonna deliver education in our schools but at the same time we also need to make sure that we are giving our children the the space and the ability to um to have a diverse learning experience that's not entirely tied to devices both at school and then outside of school um i think in terms of you know how do we deal with uh mental health we have to
066be both you know proactive and reactive i do think pittsburgh's done a great job in terms of our efforts around social emotional learning i think this is a very proactive measure that incorporates throughout a lot of different aspects of how children are interacting and learning within the school setting and so i think that's a great place to start and then obviously uh as tricia had mentioned i think you know making sure that we have the services the counselors um available to people is is really the way when we start to identify those issues so i think those are really we should continue to focus uh from a student perspective but i also think from a staff perspective it's really important i know our teachers are understaffed we're having a hard time hiring and i think
067that's probably really stressful i think they have less slack time and less time to focus on you know their their lesson plans um they're you know they have less substitute capacity and so we're putting a lot of downward pressure um on our staff and i really think we need to do what we can to ensure that we're we're giving them the space as well um because i think that's a big piece of the puzzle thank you okay question number eight trisha you get this one first this last round and then we will go to closing statements and we're doing really well on time so um the the question is as a board member what are the kinds of evaluation measures you would like to see to determine education success in pittsford and you're totally talking
068to a teacher um we have a lot of benchmarks we have progress monitoring we have that i'm a data queen but um when you're talking about the success of a board is that what you're saying well what as a board member so wearing your board hat what would you like to see as like the benchmarks the measures that would determine education success i well i personally love data and putting together data to show and always reflecting on the data to make your decisions but what i would really love added would be your parent surveys family surveys the questions coming up with as a board with questions that represent to our families and really just asking them how they're feeling what they're thinking um and also collecting that data because if we can find that there's
069a common question um we can then create a plan just like you would when you're teaching on how to address that because if one person complains right it might be that one person if two people complain it might be but when you've got a large community um a group of students a group of parents complain there might be a problem right and you have to address that so you come up with an action plan so honestly i would love to see more engagement with families and parents and surveys it could be google it could be wherever we could actu we could reach them you know and hopefully not the census because i saw them nine times this year okay thank you thank you nancy do you are you good with that question you need to
070repeat it would you please repeat it yes so from a board perspective so as a board member what are the kinds of evaluation measures that you believe you would need to see to determine educational success thank you for clarifying for me so up to this point that two percent national rank that pittsford holds so dearly this year is actually based on college readiness and math and reading scores and i would love to see included in our preparation college retention we get kids ready to go to college they are successful free thinkers from pittsford schools and i would love to see how many of these students stay in college stay on this trajectory that they have set from their education and we would know that as tricia said from surveys and following through with where children
071are after they graduate from our schools thank you dave same question thank you um yeah i agree with nancy i think when you look at um evaluation how do you benchmark how do you collect data how do you know if you're doing a good job there's leading indicators and lagging indicators and so leading indicators are tell us that you know we are moving in the right direction lagging indicators tend to tell us that we went in the right direction after the fact and i think it's one of the challenges with the rankings because the rankings are always going to be lagging indicators they're going to tell us after the fact you know that the things that we did whatever 6 12 24 months ago actually worked out well in terms of college readiness or in
072terms of um ap um you know number of students in aps or the number of students who've made qualifying grades in aps and i think it is really important for us in terms of lagging indicators to look longer term both in terms of you know what percentage of kids are actually completing the college programs they go to after school and also what percentage of the kids are maybe not going a traditional path um i think we you know part of kind of personalizing education for our students is to recognize that they're going to have many different paths not always necessarily a four-year college and so we have to think about how are we serving all of our students and i think having more dimensionality or understanding about that is really important in terms of getting
073more leading indicators which i think is really important because that tells us in real time how are we doing um i think it's a little bit about maybe what church is touching on in terms of being able to get a sense or a pulse from families um you know how they're feeling and i think from an assessment standpoint and it's often called like formative assessments um that's where i think we have a real opportunity particularly as we start to evolve and roll out new curriculum being able to know in a much kind of faster feedback loop if that curriculum is working how kids are doing on it how they're feeling about it not just necessarily how they scored perhaps on an exam or a test i think that's going to give us a lot more
074kind of fidelity and understanding about how our students are doing uh and i think that's going to help us get better results thank you emily last word on this question yep um i agree with a lot of the things that are already said um i do kind of want to look back to what nancy was talking about though in terms of our um our stats after we get them into college right um this is something that i did have opportunity to look into recently and i was incredibly impressed the national student clearinghouse um gathers all of all of that data for us and they also slice and dice it by all the demographics that you could want um and our freshman to sophomore um retention rate is really good like mid to high 90s which
075i was really impressed and actually kind of surprised to see that we are really doing so well and um that sort of paired with something else that i had heard mentioned in a recent board meeting which was the surveys that we give our students 18 months after they graduate and then another five years after they graduate and looking in at those reports it's fascinating what we ask on them and what they say at the 18 months we look by every single subject area as well as sort of soft skills like critical thinking how well they feel they were prepared and i really enjoyed seeing especially the soft skills side of that because that isn't something that i believe we have any sort of quantitative measurement on the five-year ones um they not only asked how
076well they thought we were we prepared them in terms of different academic subjects and soft skills but also how what they felt they used in their daily lives in their new in their new roles right either in graduate school or in a work environment um so i would really i i think that we are doing a great job in getting that post-grad data i would love to see that actually publicized more and i also think it would be really helpful to see a similar sort of depth to the younger grades making sure that we are preparing our elementary schoolers and our middle schoolers for what they need um you know when they're in middle school or high school um especially in terms of some kids that are looking to go in you know something that's
077not just taking an ap and a core academic subject if you have a kid that's really into music are we preparing them to join an orchestra or a band or you know a play um and if we have somebody who's into science can they get into the science camps they want thank you all right thank you very much back to the top of the order for the two minute closing statements nancy go right ahead thank you sherry and thank you to the ptsa for hosting tonight's event and for all of you watching thank you for your time my husband zach and i and our five children live in a multi-generational home with my aging parents in an effort to keep my parents in the home they love as long as they wish it is my
078commitment to you my pittsford community family of students educators parents and stakeholders that i will serve you actively listen to you and promote a supportive safe environment for all of our students in school because pittsford is the home that we love please email me any additional questions that you may have at nancy lewis for pcsd.com and i will respond as quick quick quickly excuse me and thoughtfully as i can because that is what this process is for me earning support through trust continually please vote lewis on may 17th thank you dave thank you sherry thank you meredith anita and our tech support team and the ptsa for uh setting this up and managing this and um getting it getting it done so um i wasn't able to complete my opening statement so i'll kind of
079reiterate a couple of the thoughts that i had there which is um as i've spent a lot of time learning more about our district meeting with different members of our community one thing that is very clear to me is that we all want the best thing for our children we all live the core values of our district we are doing a very good job there's definitely room for improvement there's clear areas for improvement but across the board i think we are delivering on our mission and our vision on behalf of our students and i think a lot of that is a direct result of us having a really strong leadership team i think getting a really collaborative leadership team that trusts each other and can work together and solve problems is it's hard to do
080it's something we really have to um be precious with and we can't take for granted in my professional experience i've had a lot of exposure to good leadership teams and not so good leadership teams and i really think we have a good leadership team here and my hope uh if i am elected to be a board member is that i can bring my set of experiences and perspectives to help empower and enable that leadership team and continue the sort of continuity and collaboration that we have and i think it's really important as well as a board member obviously and as a parent you know you bring a lot of your personal perspectives in um but at the same time you have to put the collective community and children first that's your number one job and
081so putting that board member hat on being objective um is really difficult to do and i think that's something that you know i can really um do on behalf of our community as part of the board so i hope you vote for me on may 17th thank you thank you emily um thank you so much to our district ptsa for hosting this event especially to me to sing the vp education council and to meredith graham our secretary for coordinating all of this um thank you to sherry johnson for moderating and to varsity media for broadcasting this evening i also want to thank the pdta for their endorsement the support of our incredible educators really means a lot to me um i hope over the course of this evening i've been able to show you how
082deeply i care about and believe in this district and this community what we have here really is truly unique i am fully invested in helping this district to keep moving forward guided by our mission to collaborative collaboratively inspire and prepare our students to be their best do their best and make a difference in the lives of others whether i'm elected or not i plan to keep working to make sure buildings are the most supportive inclusive and academically rigorous environments they can be thank you so much for listening and i hope i've earned your vote on may 17th thank you and trisha hi thank you to all of you for being very patient for me even they didn't let me sing in the beginning it's fine um all of you honestly thank you for the process
083and i just i okay i don't think i never really understood what it was gonna be i didn't understand how involved this was gonna be but i just it means a lot to me to be a part of it and to help and give back to my community the way that i'm able to do on the state level and and through the districts so i just thank you so much for being so polite and caring and open-minded as i fumble through sometimes this process um when making decisions with regards to our schools i will prioritize the needs and lift up the voices of our children and their families ensuring that all perspectives are heard and affirmed i will support the teachers as they transition to the next generation standards as they face the obstacles and
084challenges that come their way our way and i will be a transparent communicator so i can help begin to build that bridge our district needs in order to come together for our future leaders there are two positions available on this board and i'm asking all of you to make sure that your neighbor a local mom a pittsford graduate rochester-based educator that is also involved at the state level someone who grew up here faced numerous life traumas that have enabled me to have this innate ability to connect with people from all cultures occupations and across all stages of life i'm asking for you to look past the status quo i'm asking you to embrace differences i'm asking you all to come together and make the choice to place me in just one of those seats i'm
085also challenging our entire pittsburgh community to vote to show up at the polls in numbers that will blow all previous elections away i know you care on may 17th show this community that we can come together and help me take the first step thank you and that ends my portion of the candidate night i am turning it back over to your ptsa so on behalf of the ptsa i would like to thank all of our board of education candidates for participating this evening i'd also like to thank sherry and sherry johnson and meredith graham as well as all of our technical support that helped us to coordinate and make this evening possible and available to our community the recording of this forum will be available on the pittsford central school district's youtube page within 48
086hours the board of education election is scheduled for may 17th it is in the gymnasium at barker road middle school from and the polls will be open from 7 a.m to 9 00 pm thank you again for joining us this evening and good night