ACSD Board of Education Meeting 1/7/25

001you a second thank you all those in favor I I opposed abstentions motion passes um can we all please rise to the Pledge of [Music] Allegiance the United States of America and to the republ for it stands Nation God indiv Mrs Flyn can you please call the RO here here je here Donna Logan here maryan here here sorry I'm organizing my space still sorry about that um the reading of the district Mission our mission is to empower all students to be self-directed lifelong Learners who willingly contribute to our community and Lead passionate purposeful lives um the approval of the agenda um first can I please get I have to I'm doing a walk on can I um for a new business item item number the G G I think it'll be item G is that

002right did I look at my thing right ABCDE e FG yep I think we're g so um we can talk about it more but we're going to add item G um be it resolved that the Board of Education in consultation with the superintendent of schools hereby elects not to participate in the regionalization planning process and any other requirements as set forth in the commissioner's regulations at 8 nycrr 124 D2 um sorry had a funny little whatever it's all good um can I please get a motion to approve the agenda as amended so moveed than thank you um all those in favor I I I opposed extenstions motion passes the agenda is approved uh correspondence I don't have any correspondence to share at this time does any any body El have any correspondents God bless you

003that they'd like to share at this time seeing none um board president remarks God bless you again um I wna uh wish everybody a very happy New Year and thank you to LMS and their community and their PTA and whoever did such a lovely job setting up Refreshments for us I really appreciate it um and uh and the only other thing I want to comment on which is really more of reflection I think we'll hear more from Dr Dr bante is you know um you all received a a a notice that that a student of ours who graduated a long time ago received the Medal of Honor last week and we are also deeply moved here it's a it's it's a celebration of his remarkable selfless act on the battlefield but it's also a beautiful

004illustration of what a teacher can do with students and I know you'll hear more about how uh Arlington was involved in some of the of some of this person's um heroic um Deeds being recognized appropriately and so we're all deeply moved and and very proud um that's all for my remarks right now and I move on to you well good evening and it's great to see some of our families and students here I know our students are part of uh Mr Richard's presentation so thank you uh for being here this evening and thank you for your patience it's going to be a minute or two before we get to Mr Richard uh and hear some things that are going on at lrange middle school but we're all really enthused uh by your presence here at

005this evening's meeting I have uh two things uh that I'd like to just share with the board before we move along uh first marann I want to uh just acknowledge your remarks here it was a remarkable weekend uh for Arlington and for the Johnson family um so I'll start that uh many years ago more than 20 years ago one of our teachers Andy arenson who was a social studies teacher at Arlington middle school I had heard a story uh about from his colleague Don dingji who was a math teacher at our Burlington Middle School about how his father uh was rescued by one of his classmates uh so his life was saved by one of his classmates in the Korean War and Andy and uh his students as he had a way of doing just

006bringing students to the center of the research it was a way of making how he made social studies come alive uh in his classroom uh they they went further and researched the story of Charlie Johnson and uh I'm not going to do the full story Justice and uh for sake of time but I I do just want to share a little bit that uh Charlie uh was a graduate of Arlington High School in 1951 uh one of his classmates was a gentleman named uh Don dingji uh Charlie Johnson uh was a standout student in our school he was a musician uh he was an athlete he was our class vice president and um uh as he uh went off the college he eventually enlisted in the service shortly thereafter uh did not finish college but

007enlisted in the service and one day found himself on the other side of the world and uh uh realized that one of his classmates was there with him Don DJI uh and what's interesting about the Korean War uh that I learned of late I did not know this that the Korean war was one of the first uh was the first uh armed conflict in which uh service members of A different race uh were uh integrated into the same unit all uh combat operations prior to that uh were segregated uh so here you have Charlie and Don uh serving together and one uh day uh came into combat at Outpost Harry uh which is a a Bor campaign that uh if if you go to you know West Point you learn about in school because of

008what happened there um and the strategies that were employed and uh Charlie um while uh is credited was saving not only Don's life uh but with the lives of uh the lives of at least 10 other men uh that were in his unit and if you've ever been to lington high school you'll see uh Johnson Hall where there's a bronze statue uh depicting Don Charlie pulling Don out uh with his uh by his belt uh and uh again as he went back in uh to see if he could help or hold off the enemy uh he lost his life now the Medal of Honor uh had the prior law uh stated that the any uh recipient of the Medal of Honor had to be awarded within 5 years in which the event occurred so Korean

009War uh Charlie lost his life in 1953 um the story was discovered uh again in the early 2000s um it was a story that uh Mr arenson really felt the need would say to breathe life into and did uh with his students uh they created a play uh that was shared with hundreds of Arlington students uh over the years uh a children's story was created by several of our teachers that again was shared uh throughout our school district and um as more people became aware of the story uh more of a desire to to help uh see Charlie recognized uh for his act of heroism uh in the years that followed I'll fast forward in order for Charlie to receive the Medal of Honor the law would need to change and in 2020 or around

010that time uh legislation was introduced uh uh by Antonio Delgado who was our representative uh at the time our federal representative and um uh ultimately approved uh so the law changed and it's been four years since that law changed where the family received word just a couple of weeks ago uh that President Biden uh before he left office uh was going to honor Charlie and uh six other individuals uh with the Medal of Honor which is the highest military uh distinction that uh in service that one can receive so I had you know I represent the district on a lot of things and I would say some are not uh that exciting but that being said having the opportunity uh to go to the white house uh to be a part of the ceremony or

011attend the ceremony on behalf of Arlington along with Mr Carol uh Melissa Earl Bacher uh and then members of the Johnson family was absolutely uh uh just incredible uh in a real honor and I have a photo here to Liam if you wouldn't help me so this is a picture of Charlie uh you'll see a picture here of Me and Dr Carol from the high school Melissa um our former executive principal uh Dr fui who's the tallest one in that photo so he's easy to point out uh next to our repres current representative um Pat Ryan who's just so accommodating of our group uh at the Congressional office and uh has taken the time to really learn uh Charlie's story and uh his actions he also attended the Medal of Honor ceremony uh we felt

012it appropriate to take a trip to the uh Korean War Memorial there you'll see I don't know whose hand that is but pointing to Charlie's name on the uh the memorial uh Liam if you wouldn't mind and here's uh President Biden uh on one of those photos there uh with Charlie's sister uh Wanita Mendes Dr Mendes uh who has been very present uh at our recognitions here in Arlington uh for we have the Charlie Johnson Award that we give out uh or honor several groups of students for their character uh each year uh Wanita has been a part of that ceremony here for several years uh and uh this is our group uh if you will with Ricky Davis uh uh M of the army as well who's come back to speak to our students

013several times uh with Wanita and you'll see there that Wanita is holding uh the Medal of Honor uh that was um um awarded to her her brother I think there may be one or two other photos here Liam if you don't mind uh yes so in the second so we were at the White House on Friday on Saturday there was another ceremony uh that is the Secretary of Defense uh there in that top photo um again uh recognizing Wanita uh um as a representative of her family for Charlie's actions and that's General George to the right he is the uh ranking officer in the US Army he's the highest ranking officer in the US Army he's someone who's part of the Joint Chiefs of Staff um you know if you ever watch a movie and

014see these military folks in the The Situation Room he's he's that guy um really impressive individual who uh just was so interested in hearing about uh Char not only Charlie's actions but his connection uh with his classmate uh in Arlington which is depicted there uh in the um uh uh the uh program uh that they had as part of that ceremony and you'll actually see an image from of Johnson Hall there and the memorial that we have at Arlington High School so it's just been uh as we were talking in a executive session prior um about you know the actions of a small group of people uh having an influence not only on changing uh the world but there were I just would point to and the secet of Defense really highlighted this there were

015several other individuals or six other individuals who were honored uh five of which I I would say would not have been honored or recognized had the law not changed uh and Antonio Delgado when he introduced that legislation uh several years ago uh introduced it because he was familiar with this story uh so to think of not only Charlie being recognized but several other families uh and soldiers obviously uh many of whom were uh since uh passed away um or died in action um being recognized and to know that will continue now uh uh moving forward I just think is an incredible part now of Charlie's story uh and and I don't uh I don't want to lose the emphasis here of of Charlie and his family but I also just want to emphasize that there's

016been many people in the background uh here in Arlington and Beyond who have helped continue to uh make sure that this uh story uh receives this attention uh there were many points along the way as I was going through some of the materials that uh particularly Mr Carol had compiled um that many points along the way that had he and Melissa and again several others not continued to nurture uh this that it would have it could have fallen away uh Charlie was recognized postumus with the Silver Star back in 2010 2011 they could have stopped there and I think everybody would have felt great uh there was a time where there was the concert on the lawn where um you know uh uh there what happened at Outpost Harry uh was uh retold by Dennis

017Haber and um who's the Gary sise you know Lieutenant Dan from Forest Gump for those of you who seen the movie told Charlie and Don's story we could have stopped there uh at that point it felt really great uh but it's a story that's continued to uh been told and I know that again I just don't want to uh underemphasize underappreciate uh the the folks who have worked behind the scenes uh because we wouldn't have been at the white house uh Charlie wouldn't have had this recognition not only Charlie wouldn't have but many others wouldn't have and won't wouldn't have um in the future had we not continued to nurture this story uh in the ways that we have and that's a credit to Rich uh Melissa and again several other members of our community

018who've done so over the years so uh it was an honor I just for the board I'll I'll pass this this around uh these are the materials that rich had compiled I I read this on the train I'll just uh we have copies of this but I just want uh board members to have an opportunity to flip through it during the meeting tonight uh while we're paying attention to the other presentations of course that are going on and um I tried to grab extras but everybody was really deliberate about making sure they took their program from the right White House home uh there weren't any extras left on the seats after I left so this is my copy but um you know we're going to do something with this uh just to appropriate this will

019be Arlington's copy that we'll have on display with some of the other materials we collected but uh the center fold uh is the recognition of what President Biden had read uh at the White House on on Friday so I'll pass this around and yeah they at the White House they use really nice stationer so you know you'll feel that right away yeah that's the good stuff so I'll pass that around for folks to see and and really just an exceptional uh exceptional weekend for the Johnson family and for Arlington with that thank you Liam uh I'll move on other great news uh we have a student of Distinction that we'd like to recognize this evening uh so with that I'd ask that um uh we have some members of the Bose team uh that are

020going to come up to the podium welcome and one of our students Lily Andrews welcome Lily uh it's great to see you uh and we're going to learn a little bit about Lily and some of the contributions that she's made to her school community at Dutchess County bosis hi sorry I'm a little good evening turn this down good evening I'm Melissa Murphy I'm the principal at Dutch Asos you Sal Point Center Tim Sheen is uh one of our special education teachers he's also Lily's teacher and I'm here with Lily Andrews her family and Mr Sheen's family as well so um tonight I have the privilege of speaking about someone truly special Duchess Bosie stallo Center and Arlington student Lily Andrews she's not just a student but a shiny example of kindness courage and positivity she

021has touched the hearts of so many at SBC and it's an honor to recognize her Incredible Journey Lily has faced challenges that most of us could never fully understand as a visually impaired young lady yet she has never allowed those challenges to Define her instead she's shown all of us what true strength looks like facing adversity with Grace determination and Unstoppable an Unstoppable Spirit ready I'm going to talk about music music has always been a huge part of who Lily is whether she's singing dancing or sharing a favorite song of the moment her love for music has been a way of expressing emotions and bringing people together it's amazing how music has become her way of inspiring those around her reminding us that beauty and Talent come in so many different forms she could give

022you a song from any genre from over the last five decades on Q right what makes Lily truly Unforgettable though is her kindness she has a heart that seems to have no limits whether she's cheering someone on after a tough day making a new student feel welcome or simply sharing a genuine style she's shown us all how powerful small acts of kindness can be her Magnetic Personality draws people in and she has taught us that true friendship sees with the heart and not with the eye Lily you have reminded us that our differences make us stronger and that challenges can become our greatest teachers your positivity resilience and kindness Inspire us all and we're so lucky to have you as part of our school Community thank you ly for being a role model of kindness

023and courage you've made a difference in my life and I know you'll continue to touch the lives of everyone you meet congratulations the copies of your G okay hold I'm gonna put this down so yeah wait wa okay all right here we go hi here all right hi my name is Lily Andrews I'm 13 years old I'm a student at SPC which is Sal Point Center and I'm in eth grade my favorite things to do are singing and listening to music I use braille instead of a pencil and paper to write things down thank you so so very very much for the award thank you Lily now Lily before you before you leave the microphone I I learned something about you what uh when we met earlier if you wouldn't mind I I wanted you

024to share it with the group and I learned from you and and um Miss Murphy that you you think of an artist or a musician when you're learning someone's name which is a great strategy uh yeah and you mentioned to me that your current Superintendent at Bose uh there was an artist who's uh who who you think of when you think of his name can you share that with us wait Dr Bon jobi yes yeah Dr Bon joobi yep and then when you heard my name you thought of another artist that Beyonce Beyonce I think it's great I think it's it's okay if I sing Halo and I told you my favorite song by Beyonce was Halo yeah I think that's great now that's a great way to remember people's names and also I appreciate

025our uh I appreciate your uh love of music and that's something that we share uh Lily would it be okay could uh I have a certificate for you as well from Arlington that I'd like to present to you and maybe me uh you and uh Miss Murphy and your teacher here can uh have a photo together before we move on to the next segment of our uh of our agenda tonight is that okay well I'm going to go after the picture okay that's fine you are more than welcome to go if you let me sing that is that's okay all right it's okay if I take a brief res great thank you that concludes my remarks thank you very much um moving on to public comment for agenda items only um this is the first

026of two opportunities for people to address the board when your name is called from the speaker list for agenda items you may speak for up to three minutes on agenda items only your remarks must be addressed to the board all speakers must conduct themselves in a civil manner although we do not engage in dialogue we are listening comments about individual District Personnel or students are not permitted um if you leave your contact information with Mrs spnn our district clerk or the super the superintendent or one of his staff will contact you as soon as possible Mrs Flynn do we have someone this evening hello hello good evening um I'm I'm Curtis doer I live in pipy and my daughter is a student at Arthur S may Elementary School I want to Echo the board chair's

027thanks to the PTA for the snacks tonight which I commend to the audience um I'm I'm looking forward to hearing principal Richard's presentation tonight uh just this week the New York Times published a story about how giving students opportunities to show initiative in shaping their educational programs positively affects outcomes in school and in life and the um passion projects program Mr Richard will describe thus puts lrange Middle School at the Forefront of current educational practice and I'm excited to have my daughter start at LMS in two years I might not have said this just a few years ago when the prospect of going to LMS did not always evoke such positive expectations under previous leadership there was a continuous stream of reports of violence harassment and sexually inappropriate behaviors coming out of this school uh

028for me as a member of onp par Partners Against Racism in Arlington uh the reports of racism and racist violence were particularly disturbing now my white daughter would probably have been fine there even in those days but we should judge ourselves by how well we serve the marginalized and I hope it doesn't go against the policy to comment on individual people to praise principal Richard's leadership uh on that point and under his leadership things have gotten a lot better at LMS as I learned when I participated in his shared decision-making committee last year and I think his work at LMS really exemplifies the role of leadership in making our school safe and inclusive for all students uh unfortunately not everyone in our community supports policies that Foster that ideal the most obvious example um is

029the ongoing campaign in school districts including locally to ban books portraying diverse sexualities from District Libraries I won't speculate about the intent of such campaigns but the impact when these campaigns have been successful is to send a message message to any child who isn't straight and a certain kind of Christian that their identity is shameful depraved and unwelcome in those districts incidentally it also forces students seeking to understand their emerging sexuality to turn to the entirely unregulated internet rather than to authoritative and age appropriate materials carefully selected by our professional Library staff this board has shown leadership in the past in rejecting the misinformation fear mongering and intimidation that such campaigns even even as boards in neighboring districts fell for it so tonight as we recognize and celebrate the role of courageous leadership in making

030our district safe and welcoming for our diverse Community I call on the board and current administrators to commit themselves really to recommit yourselves to such leadership in the face of any hate and intolerance that comes before this board in the coming year thank you thank you Mrs plain do we have anyone else okay um moving on to reports and discussions lrange Middle School presentation Mr Richard hi everyone right we'll get started um this was a great opportunity I think this year to um highlight something from our building that we wanted too in the past I I think we last year with our ignite presentation we presented a lot from L GRE Middle School uh within the 20 slides but I feel like um to do a deep dive in in one particular topic is is

031helpful to us as a community uh so tonight I chose to highlight the LMS exploration into passion projects in sixth grade two years ago I brought this idea to the LMS staff and a team of grade six teachers understood the educational value of this learning opportunity and implemented a pilot program although the idea may seem simple to implement it is a very difficult task in a traditional public school system for reasons I'll discuss later tonight I want to share the idea of a passion project and share some of the experiences from our LMS students my goal is to help everyone understand what a powerful learning experience these projects can be it is important to note that other teachers and teams at LMS facilitate projects and Project based learning however these passion projects are ult ultimately

032meant to be fully interdisciplinary um as we're uh watching this presentation we have student um pictures that are up with some of the projects that they chose uh this particular student is no longer at school but she had an excellent project studying fashion design as you can see uh in the picture sorry this slide shows our LMS goals for this year which have not changed dramatically over the past two years passion projects can positively impact all of these specified goals students being more engaged in school can help improve attendance and reduce negative behaviors parent Partnerships are strengthened through the creation of the projects and an invitation into the building to be part of the project presentations each project is individualized and with the proper support can be a powerful learning experience that students and families

033remember forever I think this is a great quote by Albert Einstein passion is recognized as one of the strongest motivators for us humans what makes it interesting is that each individual may have a different passion that they are innately in tune to the source of passion comes from the individual's nature or their personal experiences are both passion is a word that creates a feeling of intensity enthusiasm excitement accompanied by a sense of drive or commitment to pursue it it is the power of passion that we are tapping into to help students learn and grow also wanted to be um purposeful in putting our district Mission uh on this slide that does talk about leading passionate and purposeful lives uh I think that's a major theme to this entire presentation passion projects uh were born from

034Google's 8020 principal also known as 20 time or genius hour Google allowed employees to develop ideas that they were passionate about one day per week it's an amazingly risky strategy for a company to take however it was genius to tap into the passions of each individual team member to Spur Innovation and creation you will see some of our students passions on the slides throughout this presentation like this one studying the science of a great baseball swing so why is Middle School the perfect time it's the perfect time developmentally for students to explore passions and practice skills necessary for project management and completion understanding the whole child in our work we must recognize each student's interests and passions and hopefully leverage that motivation into deep learning opportunities there's so much educational value to these projects especially

035if they are created with purpose unifying the skills and content of four core disciplines as well as a special areas such as art technology hacks music and World languages all can be integrated into these projects when we talk about stem or steam activities many of these projects could qualify is that type of project our hope is to create a maker space in the future building r inovations uh to help promote this type of learning these projects aren't meant to be easy anyone who has ever tried to create a deep dive into a particular topic and then present your work in front of a community can understand the many challenges and roadblocks learning through some of these challenges with trial and error in a supportive environment is a great way to learn as I mentioned before

036part of the building upgrades is to include a maker space we are discussing this currently with the Architects as many schools have already taken this direction there are challenges with creating this space though including Staffing and inventorying the space and we will work through it teaming is also a really important concept uh that is needed in order to carry out this work it is difficult to support these projects without the flexibility that pure teaming can provide the sorry uh the top 21st century skills for college and careers include critical thinking collaboration communication creativity adaptability media literacy and technological proficiency these projects can address all of these skills with a correct prompting and organization I see that my my print out is different than the slideshow so I apologize for maybe talking about a slide that

037was not the same uh that what I have in front of me so I apologize for that I'm already talked about this one going to go to the conclusion uh passion projects Foster creativity build skills and make learning engaging and fun they prepare students for the future and I'll end on this slide with a quote from Ben Franklin tell me and I forget teach me and I remember involve me and I learn passion project involve students in the learning so that's the end of my presentation but I have some uh students here that would like to share their particular projects and what they thought was exciting about the creation of their projects so hello my name is Evan cave and I'm in the seventh grade the project I chose was the history of the trumpet

038I chose this project because it is Meaningful to me and I play the trumpet also choosing the trumpet gave me the chance to learn more about something I love to do during the creation of this project I realized I can make it more interesting to me and others by incorporating auditory examples like popular songs from different genres that feature that featur the trumpet and and sound clips of instruments that evolved into the trumpet such as the chaar the bugle and the rotary valve trumpet uh I believe that I did an amazing job in this researching and and recording data a skill that I learned was to find something related to my topic that I enjoy like for me using Spotify on my phone because when I'm on my phone I'm hyperfocused on whatever I'm doing

039on there and um if in the future if I had to do another passion project I think I would continue this one and um I think school should offer more opportunities like this because it engages kids creativity and um there um thank you for inviting me and listening to me tonight hello my name is Owen Hastings now I'm in seventh grade at LMS my passion project was about climate change and its impact on it on our Earth i cho I chose my project because I realized how important it is to know what the future holds if we have to do if we do nothing about it outcome of my project was positive I got to have my conversations with my peers and community members about the impacts that we face now and will face in

040the future during this project I learned the importance of researching accurate information and being able to present clear clearly if I was able to do one thing differently I would have made my project more interactive like my friends who had made dog treats for my peers and they were able to bring some home to their dogs I think this goool I think the school should offer more opportunities like this so kids can share a perspective to more people and hopefully their ideas will be acknowledged and kids will choose what they want to learn about thank you hello my name is Zen Walker um I'm currently in the seventh grade I chose to do a project about Aerospace and how airplanes fly um I chose this because I have an average interest for flight and the

041mechanics f um it it came out pretty well but I wish I had spread the workout a bit more I learned how to uh summarize a large amount of information if I was able to do it again I wouldn't uh read the whole seven paragraphs to my poor peers um it would be great if LMS would provide uh more opportunities like this it was a great experience thank you hello my name is Jackson West and my passion project was I have made a video game because I liked about because I liked how people also used to make video games which turned out to be pretty cool and also how people love playing video games a lot and I thought that it was really really good and I hope I could have done a little more

042but it was really good for the first time and the first thing I learned was how to like code and stuff and use like different programs to use this and I wouldn't really use a different project but this was the really best one I could have done because this was a really good idea when I when other people did it it really gave me inspiration and I would love people and I would like the school to have more opportunities like this thank you hi my name is anaka and and I'm in seventh grade my passion project was about dog health and diet I chose this as my project because I have dog dogs and wanted to learn and educate others about how to properly care for them I think my project was helpful and had

043relevant information for dog owners while doing re uh research for my project I learned about a dog's body language I would add more information if I had a chance to do it differently or over to each topic I think this I think the school should offer more because more opportunities like this because it gives students a chance to think on their own and be more creative thank you students you did a great job um that was really clear and concise and I think everyone understood um the passion that you put into your projects so any questions from yeah I'm sure we have a bunch of questions Linda uh thank you Mr Richard it was a wonderful presentation by yourself and especially the student presenters thank you so much um the student show showcase the passion

044project showcase when is that and can you please invite the board so uh yeah absolutely I know uh Dr bante um is is was part of it I think last year maybe or maybe the year before as a parent as a parent yep um so uh we will send out the invitation than having it it's right here in this room anybody else Aran sorry Maran so I I know this is a fairly new um idea to LMS I just wonder these are individual projects is there any thought that at some point several students could be passionate about the same thing and that it could be a group as opposed to individual projects absolutely actually had the same uh kind of thought myself is um we do talk about collaboration and how it does help uh

045we I think that's a a piece that we can expand upon is allowing students to work collaboratively but without taking away from maybe the impact that it can had on individuals sure sure I just wondered thanks thank you great job Mark and then Donna hey what kind of uh um percentage if you can put one on there are students uh more involved than than the the teacher is this something that they take the ball and run with it and uh secondarily any thoughts to bringing in experts from the community on some of them that's a great question um I don't know percentage wise but I think it would would grow as we learn about how to implement these projects um you know because the teachers are learning at the same time the students are and

046I think as we're um moving forward in in making it a more complex project um that maybe has specific areas uh for that can showcase the mathematical part of the project and um pretty much if we were to be creative we could figure out um where each of the projects that we even heard from today um connect in each of those disciplines uh and then really purposely work to expand those parts of the project so I think um we're looking at hopefully a 5050 type of um support slash independence with students where they're being supported half the time and half the time they're um working on their own and being independent Donna I just had a general kind of question uh I think we mostly heard from seventh grade students I wondered is there certain

047grades uh and how did students are did everyone have the opportunity is there students how did they take the opportunity Lear kind of yeah thanks this is a doing it it's a um sixth grade uh the one of the sixth grade teams really took part in the in the pilot program and have continued it um so that's their projects were done last year when they were in sixth grade um it does get harder to implement as you go up grade levels um eighth graders have Regents classes that they're taking and you know beyond through high school that it does get difficult so six and seven sth grade um is a great opportunity and we're hoping to grow at kind of Grassroots where teachers also buy into the um the importance of this type of learning

048and uh can can kind of create their own uh Team individuality to the projects as well thank Jen had a question and then Sophia yeah I my question was about the peer teaming can you explain that a little bit more and how that would help um you had mentioned something about pure teaming um so yeah pure teaming So currently right now and this is probably a topic for another um another time but pure teams meaning that we have right now we have um two and a half teams in each grade at LMS because of because of our um numbers and so this year we're we're not pure teams to where all of the students on one team have the same teachers it's not pure that way um a pure team would be 100 students have

049the same core teachers four core teachers purely um and that's hard scheduling wise to do especially with our two and a half team model that we're at now uh but we're hoping to make a few changes next year to get more towards pure teams sopia I um the creativity point that you have been making is so important for this age in particular critical thinking Etc gets influenced by creativity so I think it's a great a project how do they choose like what is the menu do you I would love to understand how do you make them find um their passion if they don't have one already that that they have about so part of it is uh the teacher share and feel free to correct me any students if you want on this but um

050as we're going through the years with passion projects there's more ideas that the students who chose projects add to it so I know teachers share um what other students have done in the past and that continues to open up more doors and ideas for for the current students uh participating ien um so when you look at these projects you can tell that they're interdisciplinary um can you just talk a little bit about the nuts and bolts like does this happen in the literacy block is it happening in multiple blocks how is that working so again I think it would depend on the team and how they would want to do it so I know that the team in sixth grade that did it um were sharing uh between the core teachers uh sharing time from

051each class so optimally that would be um one way to do it another team may choose a different method or a different model to um allow access to work on the projects um I know that uh in some schools that it's it's through the English class that that the um projects kind of originate from but again back to the teaming piece um the goal would be that if there was a a period let's say period three is a core instructional period that that team can choose what they want to do and where students go during that period um rather than just have their typical classes so uh the creativity of the team being able to utilize time together um connected to the pure teaming would is is where it can it can be really flexible

052can I add on to that what can I does somebody else have a question I want to add on you have another question is that what you're saying course I want to add on to it of course okay you can add on okay um so as it our like the different teacher you have Mike uh a social sites teacher and English teacher they're all taking responsibility for this yes is it is it like a culminating project end of the year after they've already learned yeah so this was um it it is we've actually gone back and forth this year on what it looks like so in the past these fashion projects I believe were done maybe one one day a week um over a couple of months and they they work on it we've actually

053kind of tossed around ideas of um taking a two- week block of time where students take take a deep dive during that two weeks creating their projects and we're kind of going back and forth on that on that um idea not sure where we would land but um right now I think it's it's kind of similar to 20 time one day a week uh in in one of the classes thank you you're welcome um I had a question um how much of the work on the projects is done in the school and how much is expect to be supported at home by the families and are the materials and things that I saw there were some very nice like boards and presentation materials is there some you know um equalizing effect and making sure that

054all the children have what they need yeah everyone has access to boards um the goal of the maker space would be to expand what the presentation options are so someone may want to create a model which would be great um or some sort of other type of advertisement or some sort of some way of displaying um their project in an alternative way could even be a digital way they could create a movie to describe it they could create a video um it could be any any like the goal would be that students have choice in how they're presenting their project as well right it leaps to mind when I see them you know from from the dist they look like great quality projects congratulations it's also really hard congratulations to all the students for coming

055and talking to us it's not an easy thing to stand up in front of people in a microphone you all did an excellent job you know it occurs to me that they they remind me a lot of science fair projects or pro pro that be very appropriate for the MST Fair which then can be selected to go to The Duchess County County Fair and there really a variety of topics it doesn't have to be purely science you know and I just we're always looking for opportunities for kids gives them more presentation opportunities and that sort of thing I don't know if those Avenues have been explored but I'll just throw that out there Mary and I actually had the same thoughts uh before this presentation that the science fair is very similar to this type

056of work and we want to encourage as many students as possible to to take place in that uh type of um project as well well as we're looking at that we you know we periodically get updated from the Architects on all the plan design so we'll be looking for your stem space we'll be looking to see what you're getting there so I know I've been happy to hear from Dr bante how they've been meeting with this with the you know School leadership to find out what the needs are in the building and I mean certainly that's what our community wants that's what they invested in they want the things that are really going to speak to the kids and improve their experience so we'll be looking for that thanks again for the opportunity to uh

057share our passion projects anybody else are we good again thanks to the kids okay where's my agenda Kevin's presentation we are oh Kevin budget presentation welcome to reality we've had a lovely reading all these up topics welcome Kevin Kevin's gonna take us down a not shet Kevin they're heading for the chores yeah you know how they clean clear a room Kevin I certainly do yeah that's great yes Kevin's passion project the school budget as Kevin's getting ready just to present here I I did want to mention to the board that uh later on on in our agenda is the board uh budget outline uh for presentations that'll occur starting with tonight's budget overview that Kevin's providing uh going through uh the budget presentations that are going to be provided uh by the other leads if

058you will Department leads uh cabinet members and such and in the background I wanted the board to be aware that uh I started this week or we started this week meeting with our building principles uh to discuss um their programmatic needs thoughts ideas reviews um what are we doing that we want to continue to do what are we doing that maybe we want to stop doing or re-evaluate uh and what do we want to start doing so we started uh we've had those meetings with the High School uh with the Middle School princip today uh and uh the elementary principles will be later this week so a lot comes together in a relatively short period of time uh but for our newer board members uh these budget presentations will become a regular part of your

059evening and we'll start with Kevin yes so that we look forward to every time Kevin every time thank you so uh tonight is the first night of the budget process it's a process that usually runs through the end of March middle of um April time frame so this is just the first start um and we usually start with like a a differential but um I really just want to stress that this is a process and that at this moment we have a whole lot of assumptions built into this and they're going to start changing and uh if you looked at the presentation that I put out earlier and had published I've already changed it for tonight's presentation um and one of those assumption was I was carrying the dehi holiday and the dehi holiday is

060a special event that happens with uh our health insurance Consortium and for the last four or five years we've been able to use uh uh been able to budget with that and I think that that's probably optimistic this year so I I I removed it to start from a more conservative standpoint it doesn't mean that it's off the table entirely it just means I don't think I want to start from that perspective and that's why I I made the change so if anyone's listening out there that that's why we we made the change um so uh so the current shortfall is around 7 million uh 7.2 million last year we started at 8.4 million as a as a differential just to give you a frame of reference of as as to how this process will

061go um currently I'm at a state aid estimate of about 2% but the governor's state aid estimates don't come out until the end or the middle of this month so that really helps us start defining what it is that we can expect for a revenue so that's one of the first big uh pieces of information that we're looking for uh then once the governor gives her proposal the legislature will work through a process through the uh the dis the state's budgeting process which goes from April 1 to March 31st their fiscal year goes April 1 to March 31st and they in the legislature will set the final state aid that we can look forward to and then right now I've currently built in tax increase at about 2% we will do later on uh in

062February or in March we will do something called a tax cap uh formula and we will determine what the tax uh limit can be without having to get a majority a super majority type of it's not even a true super majority but uh a 60% vote to to get it passed if we want to exceed that limit so some other assumptions that we've built into this model so health insurance is probably going to be at a higher increase from year to year than it has been in the past so that's going to put pressure on some of our expenditures and I'm carrying it currently at 8% hopefully I am either spot on or it will get better from here but uh but right currently we're at 8% uh the Staffing obviously a huge portion of

063our budget it's over half the it's over half the the value of the budget so uh that's the thing that Phils working through with each of the principles the programs and and so forth so so Staffing is under consideration still be in the process and we'll we'll unfold that as we go through the process I wrote 0% increase to TRS and ERS rates meaning that we get charged a rate by the ERS and TRS that they determine right now they have given us a range of 9.5 to 10% for TRS that rate currently is 10.11% so it's a slight reduction so I wrote zero like our because wages go up the rates staying about the same or going down uh there could be some Savings in there we'll see as we as we'll as as

064we go through the process but currently i' I've got it kind of flat as as we're going through this I'm going to recommend that we probably don't put any money on the inter fund transfer the capital although that's not a hard and fast we got that's also going to be incorporated as we learn information and go through this we do have some things that we have to work out on the capital side but just to give a flavor of what's going on Capital wise we're still finishing up the 21565 which is just the roofing at the three uh the three secondary schools we're still working through that we have about 20 million going on in inter fund transfers already so that's Overlook Arthur smme High School bunch of those and then we have of course

065we're building the the project for 179 mil 600,000 so we've got already got a lot going on on the plate for what's going on in capital but we do have some additional needs we have the parking lot here and we'll talk about those in a minute let me let me go to that so so we're going to have to so so in order to make the balanced budget to to reduce the 7 thou 7 million we're going to either increase our Revenue assumptions we're going to decrease our expenditure assumptions some combination thereof or we're going to adjust the amounts that we may use from special sources like we can do some things with fund balance we can uh you know there's some other things that we can do if we're close and we need to

066push this thing over the finish line so so those are the types of things that they're mainly looking at as we start the process we're really looking at either increasing our Revenue assumptions decreasing our expenditure assumptions or some combination thereof Staffing obviously a huge piece you're going to hear later on from the special education department the CIA Department the technology department so all those presentations are coming we have some considerations so we have propositions so the proposition for the budget we have the proposition for buses and operations and maintenance Vehicles those are typical we do those every every year we're going to have to add to that electric buses what we want to do with that what we how we want to incorporate that what do we want to do there um we also um

067have the LMS parking lot which is not currently part of the 179 but can play a role in that project we have an HVAC need at the high school that's been identified that may be as much of as a million and a half dollars um we do have some brick work at Veil Farm although uh I've listed it here we've identified it but we may be able to fix that in other ways so so I'm working with John our operations and maintenance director to see if we can't get that removed from the list but those are just some of the things that we're going to have to look at so there may be a an additional proposition that we might want to put out to help the building project as we as we go forward

068and make the plans for the 1796 this is just a rough uh way of looking at the revenues and how it matches up with the expenditure plan so um that's this year's budget it is in balance with the expenditure plan so the revenues are this if you added up each of these these numbers in this column here they would equal this which equals the expenditure plan I'm currently anticipating that the expenditure plan is going to be up about 3.36% to about 270 2 859 and currently we're projecting the revenues to come at 265 so that's a differential of 7.2 million and uh those are the increases and decreases but but these revenues may be higher based on the the uh the state's projection um we may be able to do a little tweaking with tax

069levy we like to stay around 2% but we we might be able to go to I don't know 25 24 something like that whatever whatever we all feel comfortable with and we could play around in in in these areas here as well in fund balance tax reduction and those types of things but understand that those are onetime dollars not recurring dollars Kevin and this just starts the process Kevin the um the difference we see in 24 25 and 25 26 on other revenue is that uh the what you had anticipate or we in the past have anticipated as the uh holiday for yeah so so if you looked at the the prior presentation that I put out these two numbers were almost identical a little bit different but when I took three A5 million do

070out I also adjusted another Revenue there that I think is going to be slightly higher than that it has to do with the amount of money that they've been collecting for um the the the uh after after school program at night for the for for the for the parents in in the community uh they've been doing much better than that so I raised that a little bit so that's why you see a 3.2 instead of a 3.5 negative there Kevin what what's the uh the uh dollar amount that 1% will give you so to to so to get a flavor of what this 7.2 million means in totality it's less than 3% of the overall budget so 1% on a $265 million budget is about 2.65 million so if you took 2.65 and multiplied by

071three you'd get 7, 950,000 thereabouts which is uh obviously more than the 7.2 so we're we've got a we've got a uh increased revenues one% or so 2% something like that and then we got to decrease some expenditure so uh but you're talking about less than 3% differential between where we need to be and where we currently are estimated but got to understand these are all estimates it's a process we don't have major building block numbers yet we don't know what health insurance is we don't have final TRS numbers we don't have state aid so there there's a lot left to learn before we go so I I just thought I would I just wanted to lay out the building blocks of the things that I think that are important for us to understand so

072so it's the overall budget it's Staffing it's uh the overall Revenue picture it's the propositions that we wish to to put in place it's electric buses those types of things those are the things that we got to focus on as we work ourselves through the process is there a new deadline on the electric buses no the rule the laws have not changed the only change that I've seen in the law since the beginning of this process is that there's an amortization schedule for the rep for the uh state aid that you get on a bus it's currently five years for a conventional bus which means if you were to buy a $100,000 bus you're going to get aided $20,000 a year for five years to get up to the 100,000 and it's 20,000 times whatever

073your uh rate is so our rate's like 70% give or take uh so we'd get $144,000 per year for five years and and that would be what we would get back for purchasing a bus the electric buses are proposed to be funded over 12 years and the change in the legislation went from 12 years back to eight years but still that's not five years so they're elongating the process in which they're spending they're giving money back to you uh and and the price of a bus is much more so if if as I stand here and we want to talk about electric buses a little bit it's a really daunting task like like like we order 25 to 30 buses a year I ordered one bus two years ago and it just got here today

074and we still don't have it running because we're still working out the difference between the electric and uh and the in the charger situation two years to get one tiny little 34 passenger bus if I put 30 on and Whoppers puts another 30 on and the neighbor puts on another F like like I don't see it like I don't even know how it can physically be done like I don't think that the the the lines are big enough I don't think that the production's there so and then the then then we've got other issues like so one of the major bus manufacturers is byd I don't know if you know about that company but it's a chinese-based company so you know and um New York state school buses are built to the highest standards in

075the nation the reason why we have such a good traffic record in New York state is because our buses have extraordinary requirements in the way that they are built they are double railed this there are they have every safety feature built into these buses that are not necessarily in other states so I don't know if foreign buses are going to meet these standards like there's there's just a whole host of all kinds of problems and then you have laws so in order for us to buy a bus we have to pass a proposition or we have to put it in the budget uh currently our proposition has grown from about $2 million to 3.1 is what we did last year and I'm proposing about 3.5 this year so if we went to electric buses we're

076talking about 10 or 11 or1 million not three and a half so these are really big numbers and in order to get a bus you have to have the authority to do it which means it's either in the budget or you pass a proposition our neighbor just went out to try to pass a proposition and it and it failed so if the if you're forced to buy a bus and you're only allowed to buy a bus but then you don't have the authority to buy a bus which law are we going to violate so so there's really difficult issues with this there's logistical issues there's pragmatic issues there's dollar issues there's Grant issues there's just fraught with a lot of issues from a guy from my perspective but from a guy that's trying to buy

077them for you and make make that work it just has all kinds of and I don't want to recommend it and take money away from children like like like this is this is directly putting money against student programming simple as that and do we have any idea what the insurance costs are going to be on these buses since if one of them goes down they've got to replace it here here's my equation it's three times the cost for onethird the D for for onethird the distance so if a boss a bus cost you 150 now and it cost you 450 for an electric if you were the if you were the uh insurance company and you had to insure it what would you do I'd multiply by three or more as you can sense Kevin

078steeply passionate about electric no we love it I was gonna ask you one confounded I'm confounded as you have your hand up Mark has been asking questions but generally we do try to hold to the end so why don't you go Sophia and then we'll let him finish his slides no it's okay it's okay it's just that uh I didn't I didn't ding you should have dinged you no um no it's just because it just helps everybody move along go ahead it's good good I was just going to make a comment about the statement of taking away money from one to to the other one and there will be another point of view saying that we are doing it for the future of those same kids right what so it's just a matter of the

079perspective and I know that your reality is the down to a reality of how do we make this work so I really appreciate all your efforts and and the thought that you're putting into it sure thank so let he's got one slide let him do his one slide then we'll do as many questions as anybody got uh this is just next steps which is basically outlined in your uh budget calendar so if you were to look pull up your budget calendar it would basically say these things so I just want to point out the next steps can you go back to slide yep great um last year's my first year seeing all this stuff and when I saw the shortfall number it was I thought overwhelming to me I was wondering if you could share

080with the board especially for the new members to see where we were at this point last year and where we are now so we can all be a little bit more comfortable with the work that you do sure so so last year we started this process and that that that slide would have showed $8.4 million as the differential so uh $7 million sounds like a lot of money but this is where the size and strength of an Arlington comes into play and it may and it's a little hard for us to wrap our heads around because we're dealing with very large numbers and when we in our personal lives were were're you know our numbers are much smaller than that so when you look at this that's why I try to talk about it in

081terms of a percentage differential it's less than 3% so if you had a $100 budget you would need to shave $3 off of it to put that in perspective okay and I just just I I apologize for for talking about our procedures but um you know it's like sometimes we can't hear or it's unclear and it's okay to like tweak things in the middle for that but if we can hold our questions to the end we found over time that it makes our evening go a little better um anybody else have any more questions for Kevin Dr bante yeah Kevin I I appreciate the question Jeff just asked and it's my first time going through uh with you uh for Arlington's budget this year um given that perspective that last year we were at $8

082million or so deficit do you see any variables uh that maybe played in our favor through last year's budget development process for those board members who are a part of it that may not be playing uh in our favor in the same way going into budget development for this year yeah I I think that um last year we we did well in health insurance and I think there's going to be more pressure on that line than there W than there than there was last year and what about Aid because we've gone through a process where we've seen some significant increases in state aid but last year maybe it didn't hit us quite like it did the years preceding that I I just speak to that the prior two years we increased over 10% and then

083from that that prior year to the current year that we're in right we only did like 1% or or or less and now and now I've assumed from this year to next year it's going to be 2% but there's some signs behind that number uh I believe that we will we will be able to do do that um but there's quite a few things going on behind the scenes that are going to be influential in the next four or five years and so we wna you know the process that Dr benante is entertaining at the moment is the important one I think it's to really take a look at the programming that we have I think it's to really look at the the Staffing that we have and try to marry those up and be

084conservative at this point because when the 1796 starts kicking in in about three or four years from now we're going to want to use our more oneshot availability monies things that are things that we can get to to help us not feel that impact until the aid starts flowing on those projects now we're going to have some other projects are going to come online and we're going to start getting some Aid on those and that's going to help because those will be done and we'll be we're filing final cost reports now so but there's a lot there's a lot going on behind the scenes with how we want to time some of these things out when we want to process when we don't when we want to use one shots when we don't so so

085we do have a lot of capabilities but what we want to be looking at our programs we want to be looking at our staffing we want to marry those two together and we want to be conservatives as we move forward for stability as as as we go along and just to clarify if I Absolut um the when you say the 179 million coming online three years from now if you could just speak to the fin how the financing for the project because I think many are community members who be watching say wait we we passed that isn't that something we're financing now but could you just speak to yeah how we did a couple of things so we were fortunate enough to be able to apply 10 million s maybe or I can't remember the

086exact number but we we put a fair amount of cash into the project to reduce our borrowing requests but it also does a couple of things it gives us seed money to pay all of the architect engineering develop costs and all of those things out of cash and that means that we don't have to go out and borrow so borrowing also costs money to do and it also starts the financing process so we won't actually have to start borrowing money on the 1796 until we actually start going out and start building and so that uh so right now we're in the design phase uh and we will then go into a phase where we send it to the state for approval that'll probably take another six months to a year once we get the approvals

087then we out to bid once we get the bid then we start making contracts with each of the contractors and then we set up a schedule to start actually doing the building once we start doing the building then we'll start getting bills from each of the contractors and then we'll start needing to either use up the remainder of those cash dollars or we'll set a place in that we'll start uh borrowing and we'll do it in temporary so there's there's things called bans which is a acronym ban which is a bond anticipation note as opposed to a bond which is more like a permanent financing like a mortgage that you would have on a house over 25 or 30 years so we'll start the process with banss which are temporary financing and we'll only borrow

088that which we need to get through the projects that we have and anticipate over the next year that ban will show up as an interest payment could also be a principal if we chose to but it'll be an interest payment in your regular budgeting process so when all of that starts those things are all mixed together and and that's part of the tax cap and and all of those things that are going on as well but those payments those interest payments and principal payments are already part of your debt service and we've been working with our fiscal adviser to keep those as flat as possible and to and to keep those as sustained as we go but when the 179 starts to kick in in full motion those are going to go up thanks Kev

089Jeff I've learned a lot from you over the last year about state aid and you know Aid projects and things like that the Architects and all those fees are they aable correct they are okay anything attributed to the project is aidable but they put caps in it maximum cost allowances and things like that so they they do other things that way but as long as it's uh as long as it's an aidable item within the project it's aidable I have a question um are we going to talk about a delightful subject of electric buses uh at the next meeting with the transportation budget that was my plan okay and then um the board all right so then that's that's enough for now yeah yeah the the important part part about tonight was to say that

090this is a process it's a long process there's pieces of information that we need to wait for and and get once we start getting those pieces and they do the work that they need to do then we can coales this and and get to a number in in late March yeah and maybe do you do you have um like I know that through like judges County School boards and through other kind of things we've talked kind of extensively more like complaining or whatever and delving into you know the nuances of each district and how they're being affected by the electric buses in you know I would like everybody to TR to be on the same page about some of that information but I don't know that we really want like a I mean it's complicated

091and there's a lot of issues and um is there kind of a primer or something that that uh that can be shared I don't want you to I'm not asking you to make something that's a lot um so or or at some point maybe we just have to talk that'd be fine we can just talk about the things you were alluding to today like and and then we aren't we didn't we pay for a study that we're going to get for free when when is that coming and and will that be they're in the process of studying that that probably won't be ready by the time we're even through this budgetary process right um but yeah there yeah so so you know much of this is predicated on it being grant-based so you know with

092a change in leadership at the federal level who knows what's going to happen with the funding source there uh the of money that I've heard as as being available for grants for electric buses was 100 million and then they said they had 500 million um coming but if you take 45,000 45,000 vehicles in New York state that are buses that are school buses and multiply by 450,000 it's about $ 15 billion dollar so so the math is not there um the dollars are not there and I'm not sure how all of this is going to work out I'm just a you know beam counter you know accountant type person but I can't make sense of the numbers yet so and it's not that I'm against electric buses in the sense that I'm against environment I'm

093not um but there are a whole lot more than 45,000 vehicles on the roads in New York so you know they need to provide a different funding stream because there there is no way that it doesn't come out of our kids and and it's I don't know it just is so much money and uh and just the distance issues and the multipliers of the buses and the spaces for the B what on and on and on I mean it's just uh I just keep thinking someone will blink up in the state like when is the blink point you know when is the point that they so what when is the time we can no longer buy regular buses isn't it coming up so theoretically here here are some dates so in 20 27 yeah you're

094no longer allowed to buy anything but an electric bus and I am telling you as a person who buys buses I don't know how the industry is going to be able to produce that many electric buses that just and if they do I I would see no reason why if I'm producing those electric buses and I know that my customer is forced to buy them that I wouldn't Jack the price through the ceil yeah so uh so that's one uh number two we're supposed to have the entire fleet turned over in eight years after that which is almost 50% more aggressive than than our current plan so we have some buses on a 10-year plan we have some buses on a 12-year plan so we're almost like at a 10 to 12 Fleet turnover ratio

095so we've been working on on changing our diesel fleet to a propane Feet Fleet for the last eight years and we're still not through it so to step up the amount of buses that need to be to be changed over in an eight-year time period you're not going to buy 30 buses you're going to buy 40 buses you know you're going to buy a larger number so so the problematic piece is that they're very expensive I don't know that we're going to get that much back in in Grant the whole Grant process is a is a is a it's just a nightmare but anyway like and then and then where is the where is the state aid on the buses that we have to buy ourselves like how big is the pool for the transportation

096Aid going to increase that it's not going to affect the other AIDs that they give us you know it's all one pie right well I think that that's why they they've stretched it out from five to eight because they because they're could so if if if they were if they used to pay this much in five years right they can take those dollars and stretch them divide by eight so now they can now they can Aid you know their dollars go further because they're giving us less but that doesn't help us on our end correct like our end and so the thing I would you know the thing the challenge that you guys you know boards are going to be facing is that all of our other costs are going at a higher clip than

097what it is the revenues are so here's the basic equation so we're basically living in a 2% world still so you have the 2% that everyone feels like is the tax cap even though it calculates just H could be higher could be lower but you're still basically in a 2% world they're capping they're they're they're setting off state aid in that 2% realm too so the other thing that you've heard about is probably the foundation Aid formula has been under review and theyve provided the report by December 1st they're still chewing that over I have no hope or no doubt that that will not be part of this year's budgeting process my initial read on that was where I could read about Arlington was we were almost dead in the middle which means we're not

098going to get we're not going to get taken away from so I don't know that even the the recommendation from that Foundation a is going to really change much for for Arlington I'm hopeful it will but I I I I at this moment in time I'm I'm not predicting that so there's a lot there's a lot going on and so my point is if you if they have extra dollars give it to us on the budgeting side because we're struggling there isn't a union here that isn't going to be like look I paid $3 for eggs now they're $6 like you got to pay me more so everywhere we look we're we're you know employees are looking for more dollars because they're feeling the inflation the inflation they pay and everybody's feeling so if you're

099under those types of pressures and that's 80% of your budget and health insurance costs and everything else is going at eight% think of that like you know it's a $45 Million number in your budget eight% you're going to get 2% on $150 Million number yeah it's great but they don't they don't keep Pace with each other so that's that's kind of the so so when I when I pit buses against that and I'm transporting children it's hard for me to say that I'd like to spend all of that money over there when I know you're going to be facing these all these problems over there so that's that's that's the Run sorry to be the no no I mean I just think it's it's important that we all kind of understand that because then when

100you present what you want like so what are and it's not tonight and I'm not asking that but like so what is our philosophy about walking slowly towards this you know and how we integrate it with with all our other needs and how we kind of weigh like with with Mary and the work she's doing with the you know um advocacy you know what we can get our legislators to to say and to really understand that this is untenable and that it doesn't mean that they can't have a goal but it they have to they have to you know change the goal to be realistic so I I guess um yeah agreed I don't it's interesting to me and you know maybe Marian knows more about this you know that that the legislators haven't gotten

101such an earful that they aren't like pushing back in some way against the timing of the initiative not the fact that there's an initiative at all you know because I think everyone agrees that we want to do things to improve our world you know that's never the question and our envir I think um I think when you speak with them they admit that there's probably a cart being put before a horse even to the level of the infrastructure that our community our state needs to be able to support all of that electric stuff so it's it's bigger than grid you mean like the grid right you know if you were to speak with Central Hudson they're not ready by any stretch to have charging stations and have the the electricity ready to roll for that

102kind of things so the the legislators will say that to you but I haven't heard yet where they're yelling yeah that's the interesting part loud and strong to it's been a couple to our governor that this is not tenable yet I'm I mean I I'm hopeful that it's coming right right oh sorry Chen I just have a multi-part question but I'll okay okay how often are we placing the buses currently like every year we every year we buy some and and and so some some are about 10 years every 10 years and some are about 12 years so a bus is gonna La last yeah so so take a minivan that does about 30,000 mil a year it ends up with about 300,000 miles in 10 years that's how that's some of that's what some

103of our vans are doing because they go down County they go all over take a big bus and we try to get about 12 years out of it so because they don't go as far and they they don't whatever but we've been switching those diesels over to propanes for the last seven or eight years yep go do we know how long the electric buses are unproven technology in my in my in my estimation like we're being asked to to purchase buses that we don't have a a national or a a history with like like in in the use for a school environment here you know just some logistical problems if Phil calls for an emergency dismissal at 11 o'clock and the bus has just got back and he says get them over to to so

104and so we may be in trouble if the if we sustain six nights in a row of sub 10 degree weather our batteries may be in real trouble so you know and I'm not talking just like you know one or two we can deal with but but if half the fleet's out what do I what do I do I call the superintendent say we're not going to school like I like there are some massive logistical problems with some of these things that are not resolved they're just not resolved just to highlight a little more what Kevin's saying the districts that have a vehicle or multiple vehicles are noting that the range of the vehicle its ability to travel is is significantly impacted by by the weather or the temperature more so than the weather um

105and there's enough in the um General market I would say personal vehicle Market to you know understand that a little bit but it seems to be compounded uh by the size of a bus as compared to someone's electric car right uh and then the maintenance piece which you haven't hit on yet but that's I don't want to further there are other issues I know this wasn't part I know that you're you do this all the time so I know you've got a lot of this just in your head ready to come out in like an explosion but you know I just think it's nice for the full board to hear at the same time like some of us have heard at different points or read different things and you know and you know so I

106appreciate um I appreciate you letting us go a little off script and and and talk a little bit about it um did you have another Point yeah I thought so I thought it was a third point I felt that one coming I'm sorry so we're PL theoretically we have to change the buses over are we thinking about adding an additional power source to are we thinking solar to to help offset the charging costs we we tried to do solar and were not successful several years ago so I don't know if solar is going to be the solution um I think the the one of the issues with the electric grid itself is that um whether whether or not we would have an independent source to provide electricity to charge buses is one thing but the

107actual lines if we're dependent to connect to Central Hudson uh the the especially the lines that are at our um lrange facility those are more those are more residential lines the ones that are in Arlington by pipy are going to have more tendency to have commercial ability so we are starting and we are and and and where we put our first uh uh charging station is in Arlington because that's going to have the capacity to do that but we're talking one bus at this point I mean we have 10 call it 130 bus at at each location not quite that perfect but it's about 260 buses in totality about 130 at each location so when you plug in 130 buses at lrange you're gonna you're you're gonna Brown you're gonna Brown out every house in

108the neighborhood I think that I remember sitting in a presentation about this Kevin so not only simultaneously do we have to build the infrastructure on campus the infrastructure has to be put in is not yet in place in in the lrange garage or area is a good example of that to support the Capa or the demand that we would place on it um at that's a great example that there's not enough power there right to to actually power our buses when out right currently what's that big brown out will happen in the range when we plug in all our buses so well well enjoy talking about this again on the 21st um but it's nice that everybody has some like you know seed information in their head to kind of move forward with that as

109we hear what you propose so thank you very much okay let's see okay new business our new are we for time we're good our new business section of the agenda lists several items for individual resolution approval documentation concerning these items has been provided to our board members in advance to assure an extensive and thorough review um Item B Trip approval Salem Massachusetts can I get a motion please so moved thank you thank you um any discussion seeing none all those in favor I I opposed abstentions motion passes item C affiliation agreements um can I get a mo please so move second um any discussion seeing none all those in favor I opposed extensions motion passes item D classified administrative Le um can I get a motion please move thank you second thank you um any

110discussion seeing none all those in favor I opposed abstentions motion passes item e Civil Service settlement agreement um can I get a motion please so moved thank you second thank you um any discussion seeing none all those in favor I opposed extension motion passes item F memorandum of agreement Arlington Teachers Association can I get a motion please so moved second uh thank you um any discussion seeing none all those in favor I opposed abstentions motion passes and then the walk on and because it's a walk- on I'm going to read it again item G be it resolved at the board of education and consultation with the superintendent of schools hereby elects not to participate in the regionalization planning process and any other requirements as set for in commissioner regulations 8 n ycr r124 D2 um

111I get a motion please so moved thank you and I have a second as well between the two of you I think I do um any discussion seeing none all those in favor I I opposed extensions motion passes moving on to the business consent agenda our our consent section of the agenda lists several items for approval by a single motion documentation concerning these items has been provided to our board members in advance to assure an extensive and thorough review may I please get a motion for the consent agenda to move thank you second thank you um any discussion seeing none all those in favor I opposed extensions motion passes thank you okay that moves us along to Future discussion items um we do not have any items to clear at this time does anybody have

112any future discussion items they'd like to bring up at this moment Mark uh I wondered about the law that uh is going to be instituted next year uh about having a student member on the board uh and what my thought on having a discussion about this is that uh hopefully we could set some parameters for uh students to you know ultimately apply and that if somebody is going to apply it'd be good for them to come to our meetings now so they get the flavor of what's going on so next year if they're actually a member on the board they'll be able to participate a little more effectively if we began that process now as opposed to waiting to the summer yeah I think it's on our radar I think we had brought that up

113I think we were going to talk about different ways that can be and if we were going to do like multiple kids because it's a pretty big commitment um you know as far as attendance and stuff particularly for some of the the kids that are involved in a lot of things at the high school so I think we were going to regroup on that and get back I think we were thinking of it as a spring thing but I hear your point about having kids wanting to show up and at least getting out feelers to the high school so maybe we'll um I have it as an item as followup for we said in January we would start talking about it examining what options the board has uh in considering how they want to have

114a student represented because there is some flexibility with uh What uh what form this takes right and uh so at some point uh I'll work with Maryann and Linda to decide which uh board meeting I'll present some options to the board we can collect that feedback and then go ahead and Implement whatever the process is for determining who students will be um so as far as our future discussion items procedures are you comfortable if we just stick with what he's doing okay so then I'm not gonna necessarily I haven't heard anything about it and that's why I brought it up okay okay good all right so then we I'm not going to necessarily attitude we won't be discussing it at the 21st but we will be discussing it shortly thank you okay everybody good with

115that excellent okay U public comment um non-agenda items do we have anyone tonight oh okay sure is there anybody that wanted to address the board and public comment for non-agenda items thank you okay uh moving on to committee reports let's see advocacy um nothing scheduled calendar wise um for our particular group I was just going to um throw out a few dates you should be getting um General emails that come either through nisba um or the lower Hudson education Coalition I believe sends the emails to everyone so just for your calendar your thoughts um with your free time um the lower Hudson education Coalition is doing a virtual legislative Forum um we haven't gotten a formal invite from them yet it will come this month the actual um forum is January 30th from 7 to

1169:00 p.m it's a virtual thing um so if you're interested you can sign up we do pay to be part of that group um in Arlington so you are allowed to attend any of those kinds of things if they Peak your interest um kind of along the lines of waiting for the next shoe to drop um Tuesday the 14th is the governor's State of the State address um so maybe that's where we'll hear about the electric buses being to the curb or something I don't um to Hur we will we will be listening obviously um as will nisba and all of our legislators particularly to the education related things that she may let us know about and hopefully in a positive way um but January 14th 1M stay tuned um and then nisba has two

117um advocacy things going on I know a couple of us have already registered for February 7th there's a virtual Capital conference which we'll go through the legislative priorities uh they'll review the executive budget um as it is in its form at that moment in time um and then there will be some legislators and state um policy makers offering up their thoughts on how life will go budgetarily so um that's a virtual thing and then the following Wednesday the 12th um is an in-person Lobby day which I'm hoping to going get myself up there are you are they going to are they going to have a contingent go this yeah okay yeah that sounds good we did get that Forum in our email today the one on the oh the invite the official invite okay I

118stopped being on my computer partway through the day so okay the January 30th one you mean okay cool thank you that's it for me you know and that um that Capital conference used to be in person it used to be Sunday afternoon you'd stay over and the lobbying day was the next day so you'd stay over up in Albany and then you go over and they they really do a nice job so if you're you know even if this isn't your you know baywick being on the advocacy committee if you're interested you know there's some very um there's usually somewh from State Ed there there's like different people who present and you know you can do it in your jammies at home so can't be beat all right um audit Finance Mark uh nothing at

119this time is too to be determined okay Mark Cy uh Cathy we uh will be meeting uh Thursday February 6th at 10: a.m in the CAO and that's our tentative schedule for updates on capital projects as well as facility improvements excellent thank you policy we are meeting January 15 3M at C thank you okay organization reports Allington Education Foundation e uh there is a meeting tomorrow okay um and there's nothing really new at this point um the foundation has had a few resignations over the last year just people kind of Aging out that type of thing um so they put out a call for new people to apply and there are five candidates right now so oh nice yeah that's good oh good look forward to hearing about that um D County School WS Association

120and and B's updated applicable um so several of us tuned in uh last week it was January 2nd so it was like a little surprise was like a week in January holidays are over and here we are how much earlier can that meeting come about but anyway um that was David Shaw uh helping us through some collective bargaining highlights he is usually the person that speaks on that topic and so I I don't think I mean unless one of you ladies that was there felt there was something that we really needed to highlight I will just leave it at that he was the uh the speaker for that and did everybody get the slide deck today I think Kelly said this or last night did she send it last night was it it did come

121within the last you're interested you can at the slide deck um The Duchess County Bose's update was minimal um and it's just really to tell let us know that they are generating a calendar that has deadlines and initiatives that will will get shortly I guess um and then I guess just the idea that you know some of these Hot Topics that we're discussing uh came up from other districts the electric buses Hot Topic um and the cell phone usage another topic that various school districts are trying different things um in Duchess County all kind of as a pilot at this point in time um some successes were noted and then some um kind of similar to us that still in the informational Gathering and reaching out to their um administrators teachers trying to figure out

122what what the thoughts are going to be um moving forward so those were the other topics that came up at the end under uh concerns from members and I think that was pretty much it the two dates again we threw out you know all of those dates that I already mentioned to you um and then the next uh Duchess County school board's meeting is the 6th which is the day before the capital conference okay thank you so much um PTA PTSA do you have anything done I was looking I think is the next one um it's is it a Monday again I think it is no I see the I see the Wizards poster over there excited about the Wizards event although I didn't I don't know did we miss the opportunity to get our

123tickets I'll have to scan way tickets are on sale now I believe yeah they were going to I think they were going to let us know okay all right Jen is saying that it's January 13 at 7 which is a Monday right okay perfect thank you okay District health and safety just got email with an invite I think it's in three weeks the next meeting okay great um and District Equity I um the last meeting was when I wrote down the next meeting is the n9th um of this month but we did meet in December I want to say like the 12th December 12th um and you know those the meetings are jam-packed at this point um there was a report out we I talked last time about the intersection of the content team which

124looks at our curriculum and the um Equity team um and so that work has begun um there's they're looking at new course proposals um one of which is AP African-American history um Spanish for for the speakers we kids are taking Spanish but they may be speaking Spanish also at home so looking at a course that rather than teaching them the basics of Spanish which they actually already know they would be um elevating that the language would be different the the pigor would be different what level class would my goodness I'm sorry what level class would that be was that a high school class or when they started that in the middle school I'm not sure J is at high school for our viewers at home no I mean the microphone thanks for the wave thanks

125for the shout out I meant the microphone try not to dip my tie in the hummus um High School course the the intent though is to also encourage these students in the middle schools to try another language so we'd be looking to they don't not forcing them into it but with the with this in place at the high school encouraging them to try French or Italian um so they can you know just build on on their language skills and then we're we're also looking down the road at the Seal of by literacy and this would give us this is a critical piece to get that in place terrific looking forward to hearing more about that can I make a comment about this what can I make a comment about this okay this is such a

126fabulous idea I'm a mother of two kids that went and enrolled in Spanish to get an ECA who can blame them really I mean Hest without me knowing of course I learn after the fact so the fact that you're thinking about this multi-dimension of Spanish speakers at home and how do we help them to be better at school I just like so impress thank you so much e if I could just interject I'm sorry just because you're on you're talking about new course proposals and I just it was an opportunity um I just want to make sure we touch base uh about what process the board would like uh in terms of receiving background information on new course proposals great because John and I talked about lining this up for the next uh regular board

127meeting perfect um but what again form that takes I just want to make sure uh we're doing so in accordance with the board's expectations uh I know in the past there's been presentations I don't know if every new course or textbook you want the presentation or you just want uh background information from John so we can talk through that and then you'll have an opportunity to hear more uh about some explain I'm sorry e it just was a bit of an opportunity we've got a very exciting presentation I we're all jumping in I gu yeah I don't know I was a little get a motion sorry got to pause you there can I please have a motion to extend the meeting until 9:10 so moved second um all those in favor I opposed extensions motion

128passes Eileen all right also a project-based economics course we talked about Project based earlier today um so fits right in and a course on hydroponics o yeah so we'll hear all more about that um where there was a a lot of uh a lot of time was spent looking at protocols that would be used to review um colle course proposals courses uh and um textbooks that we might use and also policy that gets made and procedures that get made in ensuring that um Equity is one of the lenses that we're using so the the um I did get asked from some of the equity members if the board takes that into account as they're um rewriting and writing policy developing policy so I did send the protocols to to Dr bante and to Linda gains

129as our policy head of our policy Committee just so that they could look at them and know um what what we looked at in equity um and then the the groups that have been working continued to work um the family and Community engagement group that has had done some work last year um was still is still looking at what support our parents need particularly the um parents of the our enl students our Title One students um and also the student group there was last year um the students that were on the equity team had thought of the need for mentors from the seniors and juniors to the fresh incoming freshmen and that kind of got stalled with some changes um last year but they the seniors that that had talked about that are really involved

130in it um and so my bad is this mentors like Broadley or mentors for people that are student on the student Equity team uh mentors broadly so freshman coming in like think like tagging on to the bridge program that we're already doing right um and so that there was you know more uh work about that and then one of the things that the board should should be aware of um teachers on the equity team particularly I think at the elementary level but I think this happens everywhere are are looking for guidance on how on on what resources they can use for read alouds in this in the climate of book Banning um parents parental rights um teachers aren't necessarily sure I I have this book that talks about this particular subject should I be using

131this book and if I am using this book how should I use it I know this came up before before I was on the board there started to be a list of books that um could be used um in those areas you know like maybe um in the area of LBGTQ what right I think we talked about what you know we can think probably should talk about again we talked about the fact that without guidelines people's self censor even if there isn't censorship from the district that there's a self-censorship when there's not clear guidelines right because they don't want they want to know that they'll be defended if they do use the material right yeah yeah ex prob seems like kind of yeah am I am I saying this right do mrut this conversation will

132continue I think you teachers are really they want they want to support their students right um and they want to know that they're supported in doing that so I think that's something that the equity team will continue to look at okay okay um I think that's it okay thank you all right where are we um superintendent is closing remarks I was just gonna oh did you have a point I'm sorry no I just so what so how can we help I think um I think I think letting first I think letting it play out in the equity committee is probably the the first thing to do and let teachers kind of let um let their administrators know what they want and then that'll get then we get that information and so and yeah and then

133we can help I don't have any closing remark okay then um board reflections Eileen this fits right in with what I just said about Equity I was going to I actually I thought about whether this is part of the report or whether it should be a reflection um the beginning of the equity meetings is always a sharing out and for me when I think about Equity I was thinking more the things that I just talked about where in the curriculum are we may are we ensuring that things are Equitable um where are we looking at marginalized groups those types of things but what you see in those meetings in the share out is what's happening Grassroots in the buildings and being Equitable is making sure that all the needs are met right you can't kids

134can't learn if their basic needs their basic Foundation isn't met and in each of the buildings I'm just blown away by the level that teachers and staff and administrators are taking in the care of these kids and one of the one of the best examples is what West Road did this winter um some of you may be aware um West Road with their Equity team and it was really pushed by their student Equity team um had a um they called it a thrift a winter thrift store they had uh all winter clothes you um coats boots um mittens all of that stuff um out and available for their Community but they made it really festive they made it like a winter festival um the Pleasant Valley Fire Department got involved came um with the fire

135trucks the student Equity team read had winter readal outs for the kids there was hot cocoa and then families could just go and shop and get what they needed um and you see that if you were to go to the equity meetings you would hear this type of thing Time After Time After Time so kids are you know we talk about um educating kids whole child in the buildings they it's not only educating whole child but it's also looking at whole families and how we can support families with dignity and um just looking at what they needed and so I thought that you should all be aware of that thank you thank you thank you very much for that report actually that was a reflection thank you very much for that reflection anybody else have

136any Reflections seeing none can I please get a motion for adjournment so moved thank you second thank you um all those in favor I opposed extensions motion passes thank you all very much I'm gonna get a snack