ACSD Board of Education Meeting 6/11/24

001abstentions motion passes um I'll rise for the pledge of allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the for stands Nation God indivisible and justice for all thank you Mrs Flynn can you please call the role Jennifer here Linda Gaines here Jeff ha here Larry janat here Edward mccormic present maryan Meen here e snook here Maran Quinn here Mark Tor here thank you the reading of the district Mission our mission is to empower all students to be self-directed lifelong Learners who willingly contribute to their community and Lead passionate purposeful lives can I please get a motion to approve tonight's agenda second thank you um all those in favor I opposed abstentions motion passes correspondence I I don't have any correspondence to share today does anybody else have correspondence they'd like to

002share okay great so moving on to the board president remarks um first of all I'd like to congratulate from the board all our retirees and tenure recipients from the C evening um I've always thought this was a wonderful transition uh tradition to combine these two it's very it's an honor to both our past and our future and I love that you collected wisdom from our retirees to share with our tenure recipients so thank you all again and congratulations um similarly over the next several weeks our board will be welcoming new members and saying farewell to others it's a it's a Bittersweet time for all of us in 19 19 49 when George Orwell published his classic dystopian novel 1984 he predicted many conditions of modern society remain precedent precent to today nowhere among his predictions

003however was that that was the year that would Mark the commencement of the board service of our own Ed McCormick for 38 years Ed you have shared your life's energy with all of us as a staunch supporter of public education and a vocal advocate for students and families at Arlington I can't think of a single person more devoted to public education 38 years of service is an astounding gift to our community but Ed saw that the work of public education extended Beyond Arlington's borders to get the best for our kids for all kids and also donated his time and talents to Duchess County bosies New York State School boards Association and many other worthy groups and organizations at Dutchess bosis and was a longtime board member and president among other things his stewardship of that

004organization contributed to the creation of the beautiful new campus at Salt Point that lifts up and inspires so many of our students from Arlington and from districts across our County Beyond Duchess County Ed saw that the levers of public education were controlled in Albany and Washington he accordingly expanded his contribution to include active participation in the New York State School boards Association including a term as the president of nisba anded I want to thank you for your service to Arlington anyone who pays close attention to our meetings knows that you keep your board colleagues and our Administration on their toes asking probing questions and demanding measurable results for kids I guess in the final analysis that's what it comes down to Ed you are genuinely invested in the outcomes of kids and you have truly

005and consistently walked the walk for 38 years on behalf of all of us on the board of education thank you so much for all you've given it is greatly appreciated and you will be truly missed I tell you I tell you I don't think I've ever been so happy that be is here tonight when I saw her you know uh be is is um Ed's lifelong partner and a joy we see her at a convention every year and so it's sweet to see you tonight I have a couple of tokens of our appreciation here um this is I'll let you look at this later this is a token from your board colleagues for you and have some time with that and then this is something specially sent from misba it's a Groovy Little glass thing

006and it says presented to Edward Edward L McCormick with deep appreciation for your 38 years of outstanding service to the Arlington Central School District New York State School Bo Association and I think it's got some kind of thing that stands it out so that feels like enough we should be done but we are we have lots to do let's say moving on to the superintendent's remarks please thank you um we did not plan this so just keep that in mind few weeks ago Ed um after Kelly kilinsky resigned uh you made a comment that stuck with me um you said that every Board needs a Kelly um and while I didn't ask you um I believe I know what you meant that every Board needs someone that brings a different perspective on matters and uh

007I agree with you I would also say that equally true that every Board needs an ed um you might not know this but um when the administrative team prepare presentations and we're debating some tricky topic internally and it's it's not uncommon for someone to ask what would Ed say and you know that the answer often is how are you going to measure success we didn't plan this I know we didn't we were not every Board needs an ed longevity has its place and God knows Ed has given more um than most to this community but uh what is even more important in my mind is the legacy of subtle and sometimes not so subtle questioning of the efficacy of what we're doing and the manner in which we're doing it um this cons consistent focus

008on outcomes and process that has seeped into the psyche of the organization um is there we should all be grateful for it it's intangible but it will live on I can't do justice with words to 38 years worth of service um I just it's hard to even comprehend that we thank you we recognize that you've lived our mission leading a passionate and purposeful life willing to give back to the community thank you and um when we were considering what to give you we were thinking about a groovy glass thing yeah um out you got a groy so we um we we thought that that wasn't the the right fit for you we were thinking about your service on this board and the service um at Bose and it struck someone in the group that um

009wouldn't it be nice if um Arlington could make something for ited if the students and teachers could you know get their heads together make something for you um so and wouldn't it be nice to engage our uh career in Tech our tech department in in uh doing that um so we um we I say we but John orcot made a call to Kim swack and I see Kim's uh here tonight and so thank you Kim um this is the first ever and we're going to make it the last and because no one else is going to get to 38 years got put on right made by our students I don't know I don't know if Kim wants to say anything about it but it reads on it reads presented to Mr Edward McCormick in recognition

010of his exceptional 38 years committed to the students of Arlington Central School District and on the back it says made by technology students at Arlington High School so we know you're a man of few words ad so we're we're we're we're happy if you'd like to say something we're happy to move on and we can um we can you could have the joy of grilling your last group of people as they come to the microphone uh you know it wouldn't be me if I didn't say something uh the uh uh 30 years ago I U I give credit to my wife uh she was at the very first meeting that I attended and uh she was uh kind enough to be uh to uh attend my last meeting so I I thank her for those

01130 is you just don't get a chance to serve without having support at home and and she often reminds me that how she took care of the kids while I was off the gallivanting with the board and uh so uh so for her kindness and love I I I give uh all the credit and all the thanks to her for that by thanks to the uh to you to the board here Mir and as chair as a uh it's a just a um uh someone said earlier it's bitter sweet I probably um Marian uh said that a while ago and it is uh I uh I leave with no regrets I there is a uh disappointed of course that the the ending didn't quite go according to script uh but it was an in and

012uh 38 years uh uh is uh is is enough time it seemed a very short time to me I don't as I think back on the times it's uh it seems much longer than I than you would think but I'm in a I I'm in a good place I um after all I've been able to see 20,000 plus students Crossing cross the uh uh stage receive their diplomas I've been here when times where we had tough times when when Cuomo uh cut this budget at the end of the year at the middle of the year and we were able to and uh was Z board at that time we did it totally but I was in the room at the table we were able to save our music and art programs for many Cuts while

013all the schools around were cutting uh we uh did and that is a uh that's and that's been in and that's been indicative of the district and I know that we have the talent around the table and in the district uh in the community and Community Support that will take us forward and and do the things that have always made Arlington Arlington uh Forward Thinking and uh invested in the education of children there is a uh so I so I I'm honored to be part of part of this organization part of this board part of the community I've lived in the community Now 50 years and and I spent most of my time on the board it seems but there's a so there I U there there probably a lot of things running through my

014uh through my mind at this time that I could say but Arlington is special it is uh special because of people it's special because of the uh uh the Dynamics of how we evolved over those last 38 years I've just thinking coming over that I I've seen every every construction project in the last 40 years in this district and so there's a I don't know if that's a uh a a caveat but we have been through times where we were growing by half a building a year and suddenly after that we were losing a half a building a year so so the so the challenges has always been there but there is a there are other challenges that will come forward I have great faith in people around the table the administrators and the staff

015and the community that you will meet those challenges and do uh and be and keep Arlington Arlington there are too many kids who depending on you doing what's best for them uh and and by the way it's not just kids it's Community it's staff it's a three stool that we've always tried to maintain so so the so thank you thank you I was going to tell you a story about Ellen divor six but I won't but uh she would she and I served a long time together she passed about four years ago but it was a relationship I think this what and I hope we can replicate this and I said I wouldn't Al but I will there is a she she was a she was uh she often told me she was a Jewish

016princess and and uh and she she and I was a southern fire and brimstone Christian there is a uh and we had totally different philosophical views of the world she thought that spending there was she did not see a dollar that she could not spend and she thought I was a tip W and that that I was and that I that I that I should be taken somewhere in in the back 40 and and uh receive 20 lashes but we were great friends philosophically different but committed to children at the end of the day and she was a uh and because of that uh we were able to forge a great friendship I was her kids and my family would uh we would we would come together I went to her my M uh she

017came to my daughter's wedding so but we philosophically at the board table we I don't think we agreed on probably 90% of the things but we were always friends and we we understood that people were people and that no matter what the differences are or were that you judge folks on the on the clarity of their character on the truthfulness that they have uh that they bring to the table every day and the sincerity they have for this district and for the children of this District may God bless this district and may God bless America thank you thank you so much so maybe we should have done that at the end because that would have been a lovely place to end I apologize that we need to go on so someone else is going to

018get the last word tonight and or maybe it'll be you we'll come around to Reflections again got time but um it's time for do we have anybody for public comment we do not so I will just say just because it's a crowded night and there's a lot of people here if you didn't get a chance we have two sections of public comment during our meetings so if anybody didn't sign up ahead of time but wanted to the first section is for agenda items only if you have any comments on tonight's agenda just let me it doesn't look like we have any so we're going to move on and there'll be another one for non-agenda items later in the evening and we're not going to hold everybody to the sign up I'll ask again okay moving

019on to reports and discussion Harington High School Dr salamini good evening and thank you for the opportunity to present my Arlington High School ignite presentation we titled the presentation I am an admiral Community for all because that is exactly what Arlington stands for it takes everyone to make a difference and Arlington is made up of every conceivable type of student truly AHS is a community for all we started this year back in August of 23 with the summer bridge program for Rising nth graders this was an opportunity to bring students together for the first time with learning opportunities and activities to enrich and familiarize the students with Arlington High School teachers and staff guided and worked with our newest Admirals to the community and culture of the building over the course of two days just

020a little drop in the Arlington High School ocean we take the time every quarter to recognize and highlight our outstanding Admirals the administrators in East house survey and collect names of students quarterly that represent key characteristics of an admiral as listed on the screen these are students that are humble and kind and daily represent what we want in our community another layer of recognition are the honor societies and the honor key this past year close to 400 seniors were recognized for maintaining High academic averages for the Anarchy these students maintain their average through the pandemic and during each of the semesters from nth grade on back in November we also inducted just under 200 seniors into the National Honor Society these students must also add a community service component to their academic performance we then

021all came together just recently on May 29th for 18 seniors that embodied the eight characteristics of Charlie Johnson also listed on the screen at the Arlington High School Memorial Day presentation these students are a further Testament to the power of community and character development represented at at the high school now shifting gears we celebrated 100 years at the aronian the school newspaper the paper has been the main vehicle for communicating and celebrating the community of Arlington 100 Years of student articles and research highlighting everything from new buildings programs Furniture bathrooms and the people who are the heart and soul of Arlington High School all there we go we continue to celebrate and highlight students through the mpk program My Brother's Keeper was launched by President Obama to address persistent gaps faced by boys and young

022men of color in our community our MBK program is a rich rewarding program designed with mentoring and character development sessions to push or pull our students to reach their full potential the mpk program further supports students through the fellowship program for two students with additional support mentoring and education opportunities our 20 our 2024 2025 fellows for kwami ASU and Prince hubard just last week both boys both young men I should say were inducted in Albany with commissioner Rosa and Chancellor young I would like to pause right now to allow these two gentlemen an opportunity just to share their quick experience Prince uh yes hello everybody um uh my name is Prince hbert um new was fellow and um I just going to the um the meeting in Albany it was uh really inspiring and empowering

023um I felt I I thought it was just going to be uh just talk about uh what to do but I really felt uh born again and in my own skin to hopefully Empower uh everybody I have little cousins and my little brother that I hopefully uh will try and bring them into the program as well because I really believe that uh there's there's so much potential behind this and not everybody gets the chance in my uh of my skin color and I'm just so honored to be able to have such a chance and hopefully help other people like me good evening my name is guamu at the Symposium uh it was lengthy but like it was very enriching like I met a bunch of people who were like the same skin color as me

024who like we we Shar like similar experiences right and like meeting kids who like they were doing so like so many like stage performances like I remember it was like a steel drum performance it was like all like was it was awesome man yeah but you know honestly like it just shows you like I don't know what to say I'm nervous but yeah but overall it was just a great experience right meeting speaker hey like uh him personally talking to us like just showing you like was just telling us things that like you know you know I wouldn't I wouldn't trade that experience for like anything so yeah just I linked a video within the slideshow so please take a moment and take a look at it uh thank you both gentlemen for your reflection

025now our student Equity team has again taken a lead on displaying our Rich community on the walls of the building you you may remember last year's Equity M murau highlighting the variety of students and programs at Arlington High School well this year our team move too fast our team created a graphic representation of a young woman using words that Express what Arlington High School is fun enlightened Innovative inspiring Etc these murals both of them were in the inspiration of Lucas Goodwin one of our 10th graders here as you can see on the bottom right hand corner the face is all different words used um that was done through the English Department uh collected through a Google form and then used to Painted they were just there again this evening uh painting it by hand oh

026I guess it's you only why Arlington also has um this year with a grant sponsored by the PTSA the student Equity team with ar effect created a video demonstrating providing an Insight that Arlington has something for everyone I would just like to take about 30 seconds and play just opening sequence of the video this is a rough cut unedited version uh that's pretty raw but pretty powerful e [Music] our unified program which matching students with unique needs with their peers continues to Blossom with their interact prom this past year this prom offers a safe and inclusive environment for our students to socialize and dance as you can see our theme this year was a 1950 sock hop which had our students in various stages of costumes different haird and Wayfair sunglasses fun was had by

027all Unified sports program at the high school engages our students in competing in basketball and bowling in the fall of 23 under the leadership of Coach diema we earn the highest distinction for a Unified sports program as a unified Champion school by the Special Olympics the team of students are recognized for their teamwork sportsmanship and level of play and within our own Community continuing we continue to engage in Outreach to all our students with the best buddies program over the course of the year the students collaborate and come together to celebrate and cheer on our programs through the in the Unified sports and the prompt students volunteer to share and support each other the AHS food anchor it's another one of our programs orchestrates our weekly Anonymous backpack food program providing food to students and

028families that experience food insecurity through the support of John Wilson food is picked up and then delivered to the high school to be packaged and redistributed weekly to our students the program receives donations from the staff the Hudson Valley food bank and Stop and Shop our Athletics program continues to dominate in our community as recognized last night at the sports awards the New York City Public High School athletic associations has recognized Arlington as having a large number of teams as scholar athletes 28 out of the 36 furthermore many of our teams had Advanced sectional Regional Championship competitions during their Seasons such as tennis Cross County uh cross country foot uh track football soccer wrestling track fencing swimming and field hockey in our community we also believe in growing our own through the today's student tomorrow's

029Teachers program we begin the process of recruiting mentoring and training future Arlington teachers students are exposed to the world of teaching through mentors and field trips providing real world experiences we continue that practice through the elementary science instruction program and the Early Childhood uh program and Pathways these students continue to impact the outside community and build a strong rapport in culture of educating our own the elementary science program engaged 122 Elementary classrooms throughout the year and the Early Childhood enrolled 41 students 12 in the fall and 19 students in the in the spring respectively the little ones we continue the tradition of Community Resources impacting our building and students through Partnerships and mentoring opportunities through the women in stem and the robotics program the women in stem provides relationships to impact young women women to

030enter the science and Technical field and the robotics program provides mentors as indry Professionals for our students to learn as they build and compete in competitions our school offers a rich and diverse marching band and music program nationally recognized as one of the best communities for music education for the past 25 years this past year the program was titled I am a warrior our team hosted their annual invitation on October 15th throughout the season our band ranked third in the state and the Winter Guard claimed Victory as Eastern power Regional championships followed up with securing first place as at the world championships in Dayton Ohio their performance style Lizzy was dramatic and emotionally moving highlighting their choreography artistic ability and athleticism of our students this is then coming back from Dayton Ohio so L Qui

031and one of our final pieces of the community is Admiral players which continues to awe and entertain us all with the level of professionalism and artistic expression through two stage performances a comedy titled A Gentleman's Guide to Love and Murder and a musical performance of UR in town both sides of the stage of students were incredible in pulling off the performances for all our for our full community and then on that note I'm turning it over to Kathy Bolino our social studies coordinator where she has a presentation that will out line to seal Civic Readiness and student presentations Miss bino hi everyone I'm Kathy Bolino I'm the social St coordinator at Arlington High School and I'm the Seal of Civic Readiness coordinator and what we're going to do is I'm going to tell you a

032little something about the Seal of Civic Readiness you know I was here before I was here last year with all the projects um and we're here to highlight all the students that you see behind me um and their projects prepare to be wowed um really quick so so the C Civic Readiness is a New York state um initiative to promote Civic knowledge mindset skills and actions within New York state it can serve as a pathway for students who need who did not pass a social studies regions or a seal of Distinction for students so it serves its dual purpose in a sense um we served as a pilot school the very first year that New York State offered it um and we since then we have averaged between 380 to 415 of our graduating seniors

033earning the seal every single year and we're one of the leaders in the state every single year which is fantastic um students can earn the seal in a variety of ways we Arlington social States Department the our plan we built into our classrooms so that mean every kid has an opportunity every student has an opportunity to earn the seal and that uh through our classroom teachers through projects that they do in class uh they're able to demonstrate those Civic skills what we're here to celebrate tonight are it's kind of a special project within the seal it's the high school um seal of Civic Readiness High School Capstone project and these are students that have gone above and beyond so they will earn the seal but they earn the seal in a very special way because

034they have done a Civic Action project um the Civic Action Project the Capstone project um is a large project requiring students to they have to identify and analyze a local issue or problem they have to evaluate alternative solutions they have to design or execute a solution for the problem they have to take informed action which is different from the other projects that students do for the seal and they have to reflect so a key thing for New York state is they want the students to do something and then reflect upon the skills that they learned from whatever they were doing and how they can become active citizens after they leave High School which is an awesome thing to do and seeing our students um students who earn the seal who complete the Capstone project automatically

035earn the seal upon graduation so you're going to hear from sophomores Juniors and seniors in terms of their projects but they earn the seal once they graduate it's an actual seal on their um high school diploma the beauty of my position is that I get to sit through all of their presentations and hear about all their amazing projects and from their presentations I was able to hear what they actually gained from their projects so they did the doing part of it right that's what you're going to hear tonight but in terms of the Civic skills and mindsets and actions um they were able to become aware of issues in their Community they learned how to survey members of their Community uh they were able to communicate in a professional manner we work through sending professional

036emails making phone calls they do not like to make phone calls um and all of that you know uh figuring out what business hours are you know figuring out how to find out who's in charge how to all the different things that you know really high school students don't really have an opportunity to do uh they planned a huge project that really required a lot of time management and I think that's really important for our students to learn um they were able to adapt and persevere through obstacles and failures no project went perfectly from start to finished and I think that they really showed a lot of perseverance with that uh they were learn to reach out to others for help they use their own passions and resources and my favorite you're going to hear

037about students that allowed other students that were friends of theirs classmates to be involved as well and so it kind of was like a project that's G to the community but also allowed others to participate as well this is the slide that I really when I was putting to this together I think wowed me the most so through the 40 so projects that you're going to hear about tonight and I'll I'll go quickly I promise these are all the different Community organiz organizations businesses groups that our students interacted with um our students are in the community and there's some amazing opportunities and groups and people in our community that were helping our students and they've made Partnerships and one of the things that I as my students to do is give me the contact information

038of the people that they worked with because this is a nice you know relationship that we have with different Community organizations um what I'm going to do is I'm going to call each student up I'm going to give a little brief um summary of their project and I'm going to hand them their actual Capstone certificate students when I call you up if you can come this way and if you could stand over there and we're going to get a big group picture I'll get them together also in case you have any questions about their projects great John you know your first so John bellatone he actually created a clothing food drive uh clothing Drive excuse me uh through his church St Dennis the Roman Catholic Church um John was able through through a couple of

039different events gather uh 1,400 lbs of clothing you might ask how does one weigh that if you look there's two small scales on the bottom right hand corner John and his mom weighed all the clothes so that was not a requirement of the project but that's what how they decided to do it and he donated to St Vincent dep Paul organization and it's going they're going to be distributed at local shelter so congratulations John nice job next we have Brendan Chan Brendan actually wanted to focus on um helping senior citizens with technology so he called the town the town of pipy senior center and asked them what their needs were and they actually wanted him to create informational pamphlets on um how to connect with others via the phone so group chats and things like

040that as well as Internet safety so brenon used credible sources and he made helpful pamphlets to be given to the seniors Ryan chick held a clothing Drive uh Ryan wanted to help those in the community uh so he ran a children and teen clothing drive and he donated all of the clothes to the Children's Home of pipy Dylan actually is a volunteer at the polling Resource Center so he's familiar with their needs and he said that they were running low on resources so Dylan held a food drive at Arlington High School and he was able to donate food from five different classes to the polling Resource Center Nyla from the very start said that she wanted a very Hands-On project like she didn't want to just collect things she wanted to actually hand them out

041so we found a perfect Organization for her it's Hope on a mission out of the city of pypy and what Nyla was able to do was create food packages individually food um and actually go and physically hand them to people um that are served by Hope on a mission in the city of pypy Katherine and her family has fostered dogs for a while so she was familiar with a lot of the different shelters in the area so Katherine held a h donation drive and she was able to she collected so much that she was able to donate to three different shelters um incredible pups pet Hudson Valley animal rescue shelter and The Duchess County SPCA this is our most recent project so just the other day Brianna deep frino she loves senior citizens um Brianna

042hosted a dessert social for senior citizens in East Fishkill uh she baked different desserts she provided games such as name thaton they love that and she brought tons of students to join in the fun um there was a lot of dancing if you look in the upper leftand corner own that woman is dancing so um and they had so Brianna is a sophomore and they had so much fun that they actually beg Banna to come back and so she has pledged to come back with more friends so this is another one of our projects that just finished up so Lily Hamp is a senior and she came up with the idea of seniors to seniors so Lily connected High School seniors with senior Citi in the area and they became the high school seniors wrote

043letters first and they asked for Life advice from the senior citizens and then the senior citizens wrote back um Lily has now connected to more senior citizen centers in the community than anyone I ever know the running joke is that you can find her at a Senior Citizen Center after school um but I will be honest that ELA teachers our senior ELA teachers love this project so much that we're going to look to continue it even after Lily graduates so Taylor did an amazing job before Christmas time she went down to the Maria fie children's hospital um with the AHS concert choir and they put on around the time of Christmas I don't know if you remember there's a big flu uh covid and there weren't a lot of people that were allowed up in

044the room so Taylor and the the chorus uh were downstairs and they actually had TV cameras uh videoing the performance into all the different rooms and the concert choir put on an amazing show for uh the patients and the families and the staff there and Taylor also donated a bunch of different items to the different patients there Hermione actually collected a a number of different hygiene uh products from Zoe's ice cream barn and she collected a great deal of them so she made Eye Care kits men and women Eye Care kits um that kind of bundled the hygiene products together and she was able to give them out personally to people that she saw need and then she donated the rest to Hudson River housing Cammy wanted to focus on the benefits of composting so

045Cammy worked with Mrs relli at Titusville to create an educational program she literally taught every single kid at Titusville how to compost the benefits of composting she created activities and then she held a big composting drive for months at the school where the students actually had a trash bin where they would put the composting items Cammy um Enlisted the help of her senior friends to go and pick up the compost I'm pretty sure Cammy had compost in a garage for days at a time too um but it was an amazing system um if anyone knows a farm that would like compost because the farm was no longer able to T take it um that's something that we could look to do again because it was amazing system she did a great job so nice job

046Mia actually as a former enl student um at Titusville Intermediate School we handed out a list of projects um potential ideas not necessarily projects and she's like I would love to go back and work with enl students so what she did she went back to Titusville and she served as a mentor of Swords helping kids with homework but also just kind of you know serving as kind of a you know I'm a senior in high school and look at where I've come kind of thing and she did a great job so Mia Nome is a sophomore also and so MIA um created a peer tutoring program first she reached out to Mr Richard at LMS and now she's focusing more on the high school and it's still up and running and it's going to it's

047a system that's in place now for years Mia is actually also going for her Gold Award for Girl Scouts um so she will be seeing this through her Junior and Senior year it's an amazing program where students are helping students um in terms of their classes Mia is also the new body president so Kaye sorelli so she's actually a Cadet captain in the Dutchess County deputy sheriff's PBA Explorer post 108 I think I got that right Kaylie all right and she was concerned about the decrease in applicants for law enforcement so she actually held a career in law enforcement day she used her connections to bring in a number of guest speakers and students were able to sign up for it students of all ages were able to sign up and come and hear directly

048from people in those positions Katrina Swift is Senator project around educating others on different unrecognized figures and histories of the queer Community um what she did is she actually created an Instagram account and in the videos you actually see makeup tutorials but what you hear when you turn the volume on is actually histories focusing on trans trans different moments in trans transgender history excuse me um and through social media Analytics it's the coolest thing ever she was able to track how many new like people interacted with her page and she was able to reach over 300 people within one week for with our post they're absolutely amazing you can is it still up nice it's still up so if you have Instagram check it out it's amazing Ryan Turner wants to be a teacher um

049and what he really wanted to do was recognize that fact that there's not many male teachers and male teachers really can serve as male role models for younger students so what he wanted to do is he wanted to offer a day where students who are interested in being teachers can go and kind of test it out so he worked with Miss Todd at Arthur Esme and he was able to bring students over he actually came up with lesson plans for the students and he held kind of a hey see if you like this kind of thing um as a teacher and Ryan absolutely loves um that kind of thing so I think we'll see more in the future Jake vanderark worked with Vasser Warner home in pipy um Jake wanted to have like a fun

050night with the residents of Vana Warner home and so what he did was he sent a questionnaire asking the residents what kind of games they wanted to play he made sure there was no gambling involved and he went with his friend and he learned didn't you learn how to play games you taught yourself games I think yeah he taught himself how to play the games and him and his friend went and they worked um and they had a fun night with the senior citizens so Tanya always had a soft spot in our heart uh for animals and she works at Adam Adams Fair or farm so around the holiday season Tanya worked with the people of Adams and she was able to raise over $515 and supplies for Hudson vanimal and Hudson Valley Animal Rescue

051so those were the students that are enrolled in my Civic engagement and leadership class where the the project is part of the class um through this position I'm able to meet students who do a Capstone project on their own and so the first person that's being honored is Juliana Johnson she is a student who just decided that she wanted to do a Capstone project and she's absolutely amazing I'm so glad I got to meet her um Juliana was concerned about homeless anal with homeless animals in our community particularly those that uh return pets to shelters because they didn't really realize their responsibilities so what she did she she created a children's book um illustrating pretty much you know the joy of pets but also the responsibilities of owning a pet and she went to Smart

052Start daycare she read the book she worked with the children and then she donated the book to the daycare after and the next student is Jai Mundra so ji also she actually earned the Girl Scout Gold Award absolutely amazing she created a poetry for mental Wellness project uh where she wanted to delve into the heart of the Teen Mental Health crisis uh she wanted to teach te teers how to use poetry as an alternative a technologyfree way um to work on their mental health uh she provided online and in-person workshops on poetry writing to teens at schools and Girl Scouts events in the United States and India uh John also created a podcast that featured basic poetry exercise and interviews with mental health professionals um and then she created a chatbook adding a personal touch

053to the project John also addressed the United Nations as a girl activist speaker on the International Day of the girl during her speech she asserted the need for m Health Resources for girls worldwide and shared a spoken word poem on girls gender based experiences and then the last groups that we have actually come from Miss swex engineering development and design classes so last year we were able to find out that the project that they do for the classes actually meet the requirements for the Capstone and I have to say sitting in on them my Civic scen is like completely thrown because it's absolutely amazing what they do with 3D printing and everything like that so they were able to create a product to address a community issue which totally meets the requirements as well um

054first we're gonna honor Evan Boyce Ethan ducanes Sydney Fox and chance mtry uh they focus their project on the discomfort many experien during their commute so they made a product that one can use driving to and from work uh they surveyed the community met with a marketing team from IBM and they designed the Mau seat an insert that you could put on your car seat that alleviates back pain well the next group Jason Hansen Antonio George Logan mulany and Ryan turff um they're 3D printing enthusiasts and so they realize that plastic waste is an issue with 3D printing um so they work with half field metals they designed a product that would turn plastic waste from 3D printers into filament that could be used for additional 3D printing and they already have this plan for

055the engineering um Club next year next we have Albert Paramon and Jake Short they focus their efforts on designing a more comfortable seat belt for those with neck issues or women that are pregnant they made a product in accordance with safety standards that can be added to a seat Bel to provide more comfort and flexibility and they base it on existing products and Community surveys the next group Vincent J Grasso Lorenzo stritz and Owen bik uh realizing that cable mismanagement can lead to injuries and actual mental clutter the group looked to create a simple cable management system they surveyed over 200 people about their their needs and worked with an electro electrical engineer from IBM to create a system using magnets and 3D [Music] printing good job okay and this last group is not in

056your program so I'll send you a new program um but they are up there uh Richard answorth Brian Doyle and Joseph puszi after conducting community research the group realized that a major Hazard for those with memory memory loss issues is remembering to turn off the stove when finishing using it um through the use of python software and the help of Mr O aerous in the tech department the group was able to create a preventive product through coding that would notify users when the stove was left on and that's it so those are all of our students that have earned the Capstone I those are all the students that have um earned the Capstone earned the Capstone award upon graduation um i line them up here if you have any questions I know there a lot

057of projects but if you have any questions or anything like that we could just call them up and they'll answer any of your questions so but thank you for listening and thank you for honoring them do I have any questions for either Dr salamini or any of the students well I just want to say that the it's just so encouraging the bread of the projects right and I want to congratulate the two young men who were um our MBK ambassadors this year um that's a wonderful program and we're happy to see that continuing to grow um I really love the breadth of the ideas the width you know how many different different ways they each kind of decided they wanted to make their Mark in this world it's very encouraging anybody else so thank you

058very much thank you next up we have Dr Dr Rodriguez with the equity presentation please good evening everyone you know it's interesting every before every board meeting um Paul lets us know please do not make the presentations too long so I had a nice short presentation for all of you for tonight and then I got a surprising message from from Paul saying can you just go over like the history of all the equity work that we've done over the last couple of years so quickly so we we we'll blame Paul for making this a little bit longer um but thank you Dr salamini and miss bino I'm actually very hopeful with all the presentations that um that we heard tonight um I think it's a really good segue into this Equity conversation all the work

059that we've been doing to increase opportunities for our students and and our community overall so this is a general overview of what we'll be discussing today um we'll review the Board of Education goals that were set three years ago and the connection uh to the equity work that we're currently engaging in I'll review some of the work that has been accomplished over the last couple of years years uh I'll review some of the data that we've been Gathering about how our students are feeling in our schools um and the focus of this year's work and into the future um and I have some friends from our Equity team here with us as well some uh teachers and students that will be sharing some of the work that they've been engaging in so we're really excited

060to hear from them as well so three years ago the the board many of you um were sitting over through the board retreat talking about the the goals that we were setting for the district and um these four goals were established a focus on academic growth and success wellness and belonging communication Community engagement partnership and fiscal and organ organizational management and at the time there was a lot of conversation about should Equity be kind of a a separate goal a separate Standalone goal um and in the end it was decided that no equity really is part of everything that we do it's part of academic growth and success it's part of belonging it's part of how we engage the community and it's part of how we make decisions regarding fiscal and organizational management so that's

061why you see kind of equity really encompasses all of the decisions that we make in the district and and it shows really the commitment of the board and the entire District to the equity work excuse me one second Daisy we got a little feedback on her I'm not sure it's like a high pitchy kind of thing I don't know if that's me that's maybe it's just me all right so this is theine might be these two yeah yeah th sorry so this is the wellness and belonging um statement found within the Board of Education goals and I'll just read it really quickly the commitment that we have uh to this work the ARL Central School District will create safe inclusive environments that support the mental social and emotional well-being of all students the district will

062Foster a sense of belonging by honoring the Dignity of each individual and by developing students abilities to be inclusive welcoming while affirming students personal and culture Cal identities so this is the demographics of our school district I kind of i' like to give a annual update um so this this is for this past school year um so on the the pie chart you'll see our demographics by RIS and ethnicity um this past school year we have about 59% of our students are white 24% Hispanic 9% black 5% multi-racial um and 3% asian-pacific Islander um on the right we have our other subgroups of 17% students with disabilities 3% L's uh English language Learners and 35% economically disadvantaged students um so we have a very diverse school district and it's really important that we keep all

063the needs of all of our different student populations in mind when we're making decisions so over the last two years I just wanted to highlight kind of where we've been and where we're going um we did partner with some organizations to help us um frame the work that we were doing one of them was SPN successful practices Network um and they really focus on working with lur range Middle School you might remember that we we did a lot of work focusing on improving the culture and climate um in lrange we're in a much better place currently but they really supported us over the last couple of years um particularly at LMS um we've also uh are still working with core collaborative as our main Equity consultant and they really helped uh give us a framework

064on how we engage in our Equity work and helping us really be more um solution focused and identifying exactly what is a problem that we're trying to solve and having U measurable goals that we were uh working towards um all of the district Equity work um it is led by the curriculum and instruction office so I I am very grateful that it is house it's not like that in every other District I think uh curriculum and instruction that's really where Equity should live um so myself and Dr contes that's uh here in the back so we we take the lead in The District Equity work alongside with all of our Equity uh facilitators so every school building all 11 of our schools have two District Equity facilitators so the staff members uh that also serve

065on the district Equity team um and they play a critical role in helping us um shape this work so we've been um looking at our Equity work through these three buckets um one of them is interpersonal belongings so looking at um our current practices how do people uh and next the question do the people here help me feel like I belong do the rules help me feel like I belong and do the materials and instruction help me feel like I belong so we've been looking at all of our existing practices through those three buckets and this is just a quick snapshot of the work that we've accomplished within those three uh buckets that I just described so for interpers belonging we were looking for strategies that can help our students feel more connected in our

066schools um some of our schools are doing relationship mapping where uh teachers are identifying students that they have a connection with and perhaps identifying students that they may not know as well as they would like to um and similarly students are identifying if they have an adult that they trust in the building and we're able to kind of make a match if there isn't a connection that already exists so schools have been really intentional in this relationship mapping um check and connect another great program that a lot of our schools have implemented especially for our attendance efforts so when they notice that a student that's not really connected to school and perhaps it's missing school very often they connect them with an adult Mentor that's constantly checking in and if the student is absent they

067say hey I miss you yesterday where you know where were you I hope to see you you know more often so that's been a really powerful program um of course we have the My Brothers Keeper we heard about that program today and we have the pockets so that's the female version of that uh program as well and many of our schools have engaged in becoming a no place for hate school so these are just some examples of some of the um interpersonal belonging work that we've done um as far as institutional belonging we've taken a look at some of our existing policies so last school year you may remember that we updated our um our district attendance policy to include uh being more responsive and being more proactive um to student attendance um our Equity

068team also developed a biased incident response handbook which gives teacher strategies um on how to handle situations as they occur in the classroom and I'll talk a little bit more about that um later on um we also took a look at the way students are placed into academic intervention services and accelerated classes so we've created a consistent way um to identify students that get intervention or get enrichment um where in the past that did not exist so that's some great work that that has been accomplished as for instructional belonging um we took a look at what existed or did not exist related to um seal so social emotional learning uh practices in the classrooms uh we implemented responsive classroom in all of our Elementary classrooms which is a program that helps students um build relationships

069with each other it helps them know how to talk and communicate with each other um at the middle school level we've implemented the rethink curriculum um to help students also get that uh social emotional support um we also engage in taking a look at all of our existing um curriculum resources and identifying opportunities for um for more diverse text so we've approved um many different text um over the last couple of years that have been incorporated into our curriculum appap so that's really really great work all right so shifting into the current year and into the future so some um highlights so a lot of times people don't think about the facilities plan as an equity work but it really is so thank you to to the board and to the community for for approving

070our uh educational Master facilities plan it really is a way to um have more Equitable learning experiences across all of our buildings so that's really a a big highlight of something that was accomplished um this past year um we've also created more consistency uh in our tier one curriculum so we've approved um new math curric at the elementary level science and literacy programs that now um no matter what building our students are in or no matter who their teacher is they have the same experience in all of these tier one uh programs so that's that's really uh big um our mtss plan our multi-tier system of support we've identified a framework on how students will be um identified for intervention and exactly what happens when they are actually in intervention so these are things that

071we're we're creating a system so that way every student no matter what building they're in they will have um a similar experience so I mentioned a little bit about this biased incident response handbook so this is something that we're really proud of the district Equity team spent um all of last year really developing this handbook on it was created by Arlington teachers and it was for Arlington teachers um it's about a 10-page document we didn't want it to be too long that gave teachers really immediate um response actions that they can take when something happened in their classroom in the hallway in the lunchroom because what we heard from students was that it wasn't so much the big um biased or racist incidents that happened very often it was those little things that happen every

072single day in school um and our staff didn't necessarily have a resource on what to do about it what do you do in the moment when something happens in your classroom um so we thought it was really important to create that resource and to also train all of our staff members so our Equity team and our administrators actually engage in training all of our staff members on how to um utilize this um this bi incident response handbook and I'm just highlighting one of the parts of it this is these are like the four steps that we expect all of our staff members and hopefully our community members also to help um in how to address incidents as they occur we want them to interrupt the situation that's happening we want them to question um what's

073going on and take the moment to Ed educate of why what's happening is not appropriate and then make sure that you Echo what the what the new message was right because we want all of our students to know that uh the bias incidents that may occur are not okay and we need to make sure that all all of the students see us interrupt that from happening so that's one one of the big things that we're very very proud of um so I know we talked a little bit about um Ed talking a lot about how do we measure this how do we know that this is actually working um so we have been surveying our students over the last three years um we have a belonging survey that we've implemented and it allows us to

074track exactly how our students are are feeling um and we use this framework called the dign dignity framework um as our way to measure um belonging um so there's four indicators of belonging that have to be present so students have to feel like they're they're affirmed they had to feel validated they had to feel accepted and they have to feel like they're like they're being treated fairly that's how we measure belonging um according to this uh framework um so this survey um has again been in administer for three years now um and I'm just showing you kind of the big picture data of how our students are reporting so this um survey was taken by 4,500 students in Arlington grades 3 through 12 um and the percentages show you how the percentage of students that

075reported favorably in that indicator um of belonging you can see that we still have a ways to go we're not where we would like to be however we're higher than we were right so on the right hand column you can see the increases of compared to last school year so you can see that we have increased in every indicator of belonging um so that that is something that uh is assuring that the work that we're doing is seeing an impact in how students are reporting that they're feeling all right so this school year we we're transitioning to focusing our work on the New York State culture responsive and sustaining framework it's a framework that was released by New York State um in 2018 um and it provides a framework for all school districts to follow

076and and how to really engage in this work there's four key principles that are outlined um in this framework um schools are expect to create a welcoming and affirming environment high expectations and rigorous instruction for all students um inclusive curriculum and assessment and ongoing professional learning for all staff members I know you it's hard to see this um this chart here but the focus of this chart is really just to show that every member of our community has plays a role like we all play a role our staff members our students our teachers our board board members our parents our all of our community members we all play a role in ensuring that all of these key principles come to life here in Arlington um and with the district Equity team we really began thinking

077about that well how can we operationalize that right so this framework is giving us suggestions of things that every stakeholder that I mentioned everything that we can do as a student as a staff member as a teacher as a parent um to make sure that we create a more inclusive environment so we decided that that should really be the focus and how do we make this happen and come to life here in Arlington um so to that end uh our district Equity team broke up into three subgroups so we have three subcommittees that you'll be hearing about in a minute um and each subcommittee is focusing on taking the recommendations from the cultur responsive hand uh responsive the handbook um and and bringing it to life here in Arlington um so we have one sub

078committees focusing on uh what the family and Community how to support the family community and becoming more inclusive and and welcoming um another subcommittee is focusing on teachers and staff and the third one is on students all right so I would like to invite Matt zidel one of our equity facilitators and music teachers to share about the subcommittee work for family and the community hi everyone uh the family and Community subcommittee uh is planning an informational opportunity where family and community members can learn more about different aspects of our children's experiences and how better to navigate these parts we saw a need where some families may feel a barrier between themselves and our school for many different reasons and we wanted to create sessions that could educate our families about issues that may be adding

079to those barriers we hope that through this educational opportunity that we can create Bridges between families and the school community and Empower families to communicate their needs with all shareholders in our students lives this opportunity would take place on a Saturday in September and would include three learning sessions regarding communication providing support services for your child and Dasa these sessions would all run concurrently uh but they would run twice so that people can attend two sessions throughout the morning uh and these sessions will be planned and presented by the m members of our subcommittee uh but it is our goal to also have an administrator uh attend each of these sessions just to answer maybe some more tricky questions that arise uh we are still considering and planning many different aspects of this event uh

080We've communicated with Dr Rodriguez regarding different dates spaces and funds needed and as of like one o'clock today I think that we've settled on a date actually uh we are also looking into different ways to advertise the event to get as many people in the community to attend as possible possible this includes providing transportation and translators to families that are in need and also live streaming and recordings onto the district YouTube page uh for those who cannot physically be in attendance um we would also like to possibly provide child care as well for people that that is a barrier for them to be in attendance uh we'd like to provide a small reception with food and beverage to allow for more community building and a space for attendees to ask more follow-up questions after attending

081these sessions this is also a great uh chance for our community members to uh build uh connections with us as an equity team for administrators and board members that may attend uh but then also to develop a community within themselves as well that they can lean upon if they need anything uh so we hope that this is a well attended and successful event uh so next up we have Sarah Armstrong who is uh presenting for the teacher and staff subcommittee one quick question can you just say the three I got the DSA were the first two sessions uh communication so communication with the district and your school building uh and then also providing support services for your child so what is a csse what is a 504 meeting your teacher just contacted you saying that

082we need to have a meeting about this what does that mean great thank you so much yep hi I'm Sarah um so I I'll be talking about our teachers and staff subcommittee our goal is professional learning and it's uh subtitled small steps to affect big change so the goal is to create self reading teacher safe and welcoming learning environments for all students and families by developing and deepening Consciousness around issues of equity so we've kind of broken that up into Elementary and secondary different facets of what we're looking at and then we have a whole bunch of information that we're kind of working on building together so what that looks like is uh foundational professional learning in all facets of equity for all staff so not just teachers but Tas and bus drivers and really

083anybody who interacts with students we're actually working on a kind of a course catalog of possible offerings and it's going to be tiered steps in equity so we're looking at offering a foundational like an intro to equity and then building upon that depending on how deep and how kind of vast you want to you know learn um and then kind of turn keying it as necessary um all new teachers beginning at our new teacher orientation in um August are going to have an introduction to equity at the orientation that gives a rundown of equity goals for buildings leaders plans for their building as well as a district um we're also looking at conducting a K12 um curriculum and assessment audit so that looks making sure that we're well represented in diverse texts throughout each grade

084level with a spotlight on diversity because we know that diversity isn't relegated to specific months but it's an allaround approach so Equity is not another thing to add to the plate it is the table that everything is served upon um we're looking at a spotlight on diversity equity and inclusivity so racial literacy Equity mindsets lgbtq plus and social justice additionally in order of the hded curriculum so sometimes that stuff is not upfront but it's the the stuff that's in the background so our you know girls and boys things colorcoded are the things relegated to specific months we want to make sure that we're purging materials that are not culturally relevant or outdated um and then so this is an example of one of the things that Dr Rodriguez had talked about this is the on

085sheet so you may have noticed as you've been visiting our buildings this year that this one sheet is present in a lot of spaces so this is that one place where we can go what is the bias incident and kind of like in the city if you see something say something well we're taking that a step ahead and saying here's what to say when you see these things so actually encouraging everybody to start to interrupt and act upon these things and those two two QR codes there bring you to the district Equity website than the actual um bias incident response handbook so additional action steps that we have been working on is uh in our teacher subcommittee is to meet with school librarians to see how they are already highlighting these historically marginalized communities and

086deepening those connections between classroom and Library um exploring ways to increase that authentic representation in in our shared student spaces so putting pictures of our students on our walls and how viting safe and brave spaces for students um different schools have different things that are available to families so here at the high school we have the Admiral's closet um and the care closet so unfortunately a lot of teachers and a lot of families don't know that these things exist so we're really trying to bring these resources to the Forefront of people um at Overlook we have the nest which is a community closet uh there's the backpack program at almost all the schools we offer holiday help so we want to make sure that all of our resources are available to everybody who interacts with

087these children in these buildings so we don't have to go looking for things um and then that one pager of the bias incident response handbook as of this year is an all common shared spaces in every classroom in every building in the district and we're working on bringing it up to central office and our transportation departments as well thank you very much H next is Olivia and Taylor representing the high school hi I'm Olivia Tomkins I'm a junior here and uh I'm Taylor hucker I'm also a junior I'm Josh bunu and I'm a junior as well so first oh okay that worked okay um I wanted to give a brief overview of our program that we're trying to create so we're trying to kind of create a big and little program where we pair upper

088classmen with incoming freshman so it starts um with the summer bridge program that was mentioned earlier and we kind of create like an interest form where we can match um incoming freshmen with like um seniors and juniors that have the same interest so they kind of have someone to help them like get acclimated to the school and find programs that will help them fit in and feel like they belong so that's basically so we've taken a few steps to start this project so we've created flyers for juniors and seniors as an interest form for mentors and we're offering community service hours for those who decide to be mentors we also created a form to be put out to middle schoolers to determine interest in being matched with a mentor and the date for the start

089of the mentorship program is currently said to be on the second day of the summerbridge program so this is when the freshmen would get to meet their upper class and mentors um so our basic guidelines and like training that we have so far figured out for our mentors is we're working on a presentation that we're going to giving them about the responsibilities and basically kind of like what a mentor entails cuz we're kind of like putting it as a blanket term but I feel like in general there's a lot of responsibilities that come with it um some of those can include like check-ins whether that's checking in with your mentee or your um freshman like every couple weeks every couple months depending upon what they might need um being available to answer their questions of

090whether it's like a class thing or if they need help and they're not sure where to reach out out on being available to like answer those type of things and overall just like being someone that they can look up to and rely on if they like really need it um the relationship between the mentor and the mentee we're trying to make it so it's extremely confidential and what's said between them stays between them to build that trust and that Bond so they know that they have someone to reach out to and like really rely on during the school year and then we are working to match common interests we want to try and the upper classman and the younger classman based on what entrance they already have whether it's like a club or like an

091art or a sport so they have something to like kind of Base that Bond on um so we're sending out forms to the incoming freshmen as well as the mentors as of like hey what are some of like the subjects you're interested in or like here's a bunch of clubs that we offer which ones like interest you so it's kind of like a common ground that they start on when you're starting a conversation and you don't necessarily know where to go to you can go hey what's your favorite sports team if you're both into sports um and then also someone to look up to from the club Sport Club setting or like the sports setting from a standpoint if they're both into soccer you can be like hey I was on the soccer team here

092was my experience or I know you're into theater I'm also in the theater program let me show you to it so it also like helps to find clubs which is then a whole other community that you get to kind of enjoy and bond with so yeah um so some of our future steps that we're going to take is we're going to reach out to the middle schools and I think we're going to provide like the eighth graders with an interest form as well so they can fill out their interests and then over the summer we can match the upper classman and the lower classman and that's like our big future step that we're really trying to work on right now and then as far as like our goals go and everything I think uh we're

093trying to also like sort of like start this program and hopefully do it like long term um whether it's just like through summerbridge or it's whether through starting a whole under other individual program to really like launch this um and then yeah we're trying to figure out sometimes also throughout the school year that we can check in and have days where the mentors and mentees can match up and like just have a common like talking or whether it's just like activities that they can do together to like build that Bond on top of everything else yeah that's yeah right thank you so I wanted to share a little bit about the project of bigs and little project so when we were looking at uh our belonging data one of the things that really stood out

094to us was that our our high school students had the lowest level of belonging um in the district and when we started interviewing High School students a lot of them mentioned that um they had a hard time connecting if they didn't if they were not an athlete or they weren't part of something right they where didn't belong to a club or or some other type of a school activity um they didn't really feel connected and when we asked well why don't you join something they said well I don't want to go alone I I don't want to go even though I'm interested in that dance club I don't want to go there by myself um so that's kind of when we started thinking about wouldn't it be great if we have upper classman that we

095can connect the incoming freshmen with and they go with them to these activities and help them kind of get started um so we're really excited about the this opportunity um and really thank our students for really taking the lead um I know eileene is also on that subcommittee um working with the students um to develop this this really great idea um Jennifer is also on one of our subcommittees as well so we really appreciate all the work that all of our subcommittees have been doing um we really think that having the boots on the ground really uh shaping the future of the equity work is really the way that we want to um continue moving forward um so thank you does anybody have any questions for this any of these groups I have a couple

096not to be surprised um the rethink curriculum in the middle school that's the advisory period curriculum that they're using is that do I have that right in my head so they do use rethink is also used by PPS so that our P Personnel um folks also use rethink uh for their counseling sessions okay um The Advisory program uses rethink as well but they also kind of make it their own um so our teachers also modify that okay thank you anybody else Mark you're talking about pairing uh seniors and freshman together um what happens when the senior leaves is the Freshman now sophomore presumably uh going to be the lead I know they have Juniors also involved but what do you guys think so I we haven't really talked much about the aftermath of it but

097what I was thinking was it would kind of that's like the part of the relationship where you have to keep it like you can't be like attached you can't be like forever like holding on like you have there has to be an understanding between the fresh and the senior that like I'm going to help you get introduced to the school and then you have to do it on your own like I'm here to help you get started and then it's you got this like we want to help them get acclimated so that they like feel comfortable to be able to go through the rest of their High School experience like comfortably I also think with that then acclamation and bringing other people into clubs then if you have a bring them into clubs or a

098sports team then they have that whole new community of students and then they can bring people into that club so it's kind of like building that just like Branch um to one person and them reaching out to another and kind of like just spreading that throughout thank you anybody else I just have a comment yeah um I just wanted to say in terms of this bridge the bridge program this just highlighted how important student voices are um there were a number of adults on the committee and we were all like we knew how we should go and then they were like our Compass they were like well no that's not really what we're thinking so I really think it's important that where we can bring students in and you guys did a great um I

099just have a couple anybody else I have a couple of quick comments one is um if you could for to the board a CO yeah I think we got a draft of the um the handbook at some point when it came out but if we could just reconnect with that and maybe the one pager that's hanging all just so we you know we can go we're not in in the schools as much as we like but I'll keep an eye out for it when we are just to make sure we have the current most thing and then the other thing is um I was really edified to see that our belonging servings our surveys are on the uptick I wonder if the board could receive the disaggregated data about how different subgroups are performing with

100that you know just to see where we're going with that so um that would be really helpful great right thank you oh that's me here I'm waiting for somebody to move us along and it's me um item C board meeting dates we really don't need to spend much time on this I I had um Paul and Margie move this out of voting tonight and into discussions because we haven't had a chance to talk about it there are a couple of and I don't think we're going to do it tonight I think we're gonna just talk about tell you the couple things that are kind of perking along one is that October 22nd is um the last day of of convention you know may not be the perfect day for us depending on they don't have

101the schedule for convention listed yet on the website I was going to call up there the Tois spot I haven't gotten that done yet um so we may want to Tinker with that one a little bit the other one is um we usually do the second and fourth but it might make more sense in January to do the the would be the seventh the um to move it up a week that way we'd have a little leeway with because it's a five-week break from our one meeting in December and that way too if we hit some snow we could make that up if it came to that so we may do some changes like that um and honestly I'm looking to anybody else who notices something that you know you know Marian picked up on

102the on the um on the October thing you know if anybody's picked up anything else then we'll kind of nail it down the other thing I'd like to do is get on everybody's calendar a rough a rough idea of what our cow meetings are for those listening those are Committee of the whole meetings those are those are usually the third meeting the middle meeting of the month that's generally not as formal as this it's a workshop and so you know we're working as we did prior years we're going to come out of retreat with some Workshop topics that'll then be added to a calendar for the year and it's sometimes we've been it's been problematic that those haven't been on our calendar and not everybody realizes we're going to have a third meeting so we're

103going to work on that and we're also committing to only meetings when we need them not extra meetings just for fun um so does anybody have any other comments they want to make about the board meeting dates before we move on seeing none uh new business what sure would you like me to this um you know I think we can try well we shoot for the 25th and see how it goes if not we'll do it at reor is it the 25th is the 24th or 25th our next one 25th 25th 28 25th okay so whatever the next one is I think you can yeah I I think I think we'll be able to hammer it out by then and if not we'll just kick it again okay um new business our new business section

104of 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 non-unit salary increases can I please get a motion second excellent um any discussion seeing none all those in favor I opposed extensions motion passes item C certified instructional abolish abolishment of position um can I get a motion please so move second thank you any discussion seeing none all those in favor I I opposed abstentions motion passes item D certified instructional creation of positions can I get a motion please so moved second excellent any discussion see none all those in favor I I opposed extensions motion passes moves us on to Future discussion items um we have nothing to discuss that's hanging from a

105different meeting can we does anybody have anything they'd like to add at this time seeing none moving ahead the business consent agenda 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 ensure an extensive and thorough review may I please have a motion on the consent agenda so move second any discussion seeing none all those in favor I I opposed exensions motion passes easier to work from the back here we go okay we've reached our second section of public comment we didn't have anybody has anybody changed their mind and want to speak if public comment tonight seeing none we're gonna pass right over there okay committee reports let's see policy um nothing at this time um

106we regroup at The Retreat and go from there excellent a of Finance uh nothing at this time add see um just we met on the 29th of May I sent everybody our minutes today because I like to slide that in right before the meeting so um basically that was just our groundwork um first meeting and without our person Larry our our new committee will meet in the fall at the beginning of September to talk about because I'm assuming at at Retreat we're going to regroup our we're going to get our of regroup our new group so that group whoever may be part of it will meet again at the beginning of September um and we'll really nail down what the marching orders for October 10th are committee musical chairs it's so fun party games at

107Retreat okay um health and safety Mr McCormack uh next to the last comment no report okay thank you uh curriculum instruction I believe is on Hiatus yeah nothing at this time okay uh facilities and capital Improvement uh nothing at this time okay organization reports The Duchess County School boards Association so that happened on the 6th and it was a dinner meeting or a gathering anyway at Millhouse right not exactly a dinner but it was a chance to get together with everybody else from the um the county and they're on Hiatus now for the summer and we'll start up again in the fall and congratulations to our own Marian Quinn who was nominated vice president thank you thank you thank you I was going to slide that right off like like maybe I have a little

108bit in that area but not enough not to take a little so uh I don't believe there's a Bose's update for tonight is there I don't think we have on no we didn't have anything the meeting um Arlington Education Foundation uh we had our last meeting for the year on June 5th um and then on June 6th the Arlington Education Foundation did their scholarship breakfast they um awarded over 5050 scholarships to various seniors it's I love that I get to attend to that as was part of the Arlington Education Foundation board so many kids getting scholarships and really this year so many kids that are going into uh school for teaching really I was really hard yeah exactly wonderful um and unfortunately um Amy green who is the executive director has resigned um and so

109the Education Foundation will be looking for a new executive director okay thank you we'll stay tuned for that um nothing on PTA PTSA council at this time um District he and said the JK committee has is there anybody um anybody did the Dirk anybody nope okay nothing on that um District Equity is there anything to add to our I mean I think you saw the culmination of the year last meeting is their last meeting is tomorrow okay good um District PPS not at this time we've had the meeting of the Year okay and that brings us to superintendent's closing remarks I would just like to once again congratulate our newly um tenured candidates and also best wishes to all of our retirees long healthy enjoyable retirement well deserved that brings us to board Reflections does

110anyone have any refractions tonight Linda I'll start this off the show um is it will it be a roast um I'll miss you you've always been very supportive in me in my worst times and my best times um I've learned a lot from you and I just wish you all the best for you and be your wife and I hope you have the best health and just happiness with your family it's it's just going to be a wonderful time for you um I also would like to uh congratulate all the teachers for another successful year not only the tenure teachers teaching is a tough job uh in this day and age so congratulate to every teacher the end is near for the school year and the retirees enjoy thank you anybody else have any Reflections

111tonight Mark uh I join in that that the uh the teachers that uh have retired again every day is Saturday uh Ed every day is going to be Saturday for you too and now you can catch up on that honeydew list uh and for those that and to the tenure teachers um you you've got a lot ahead of you the the people that uh the students that go to these schools in the district depend on you and you prove it every day when you give them your best so I congratulate you on your tenure and long career and that'll do it for me anybody else I guess I just have a few um I was happy to attend the distinguished graduates breakfast with um Mr PCH and Dr Salini and our our valedictorian and our

112soran and it's just a lovely event really celebrating kids from all over Duchess County and um if you you know just like tonight just like with our other students that presented if you ever just need a shot of optimism kids are the way to go um I attended the beakman Kickball for Life holy camole I don't think there was a single human that goes to beakman school that was not outplaying kickball you know honestly it was like I I guess I was expecting like a a kickball game and it was 10 kickball games simultaneously all over the place so that was a really I was really glad that I stopped by and I actually did quite well on the raffle thank you very much and um I don't know if that's legal but I did

113chip in my cash so there you go um and then uh the Charlie Johnson Awards I mean honestly it's my really up there as one of my favorite events of the year um made only richer this year with Congressman Ryan coming and the time he spent with the kids and the time he spent with all of us and the contribution of all the all the teaching staff in the um CTE programs and the and the family and consumer sciences that really had the kids come in and talk to us I mean I I learned things that I haven't heard before I was really excited about and and you know it's interesting when these young women were presenting for the equity team and they were talking about belonging every single kid that came up and presented

114at this event we were at felt that they belong through the class they were in you know and isn't that a miracle too right and and so and they and they spoke with such deep gratitude about the opportunities that I was I mean to a one and there were probably a dozen of them that spoke yeah um at least a dozen probably more right over the course of the morning so anyway I just want to shout out to the whole I think John orcot organized that day but there were an awful lot of people involved in making that day run smoothly and then of course the awards at night were excellent um and then uh finally oh I finally I really have to shout out to um music in the schools right um Chris Rizzo

115was happy to was happy to send me I I really would love to read it you know they just the you know it it's two pages long the the Honors that these kids have earned at like um you know uh music in the Parks and all these final year-end things that are going on um you on and on and on level three gold you know um excellent rating Superior rating you know I mean it's just it's just wonderful I'm I'm sure and I'm hoping that Melissa that a lot of this information will be on the website as far as the or on our social media you know the fact that all these awards that these kids have taken but again I I I actually loved your you I remember your whole comment I couldn't say

116it all back but you know the one thing I remember and the one thing I'll take away is the fact that when time got tough you saved the Arts of Music set the top of my list there you go there you go so thank you for that that concludes my Reflections anybody else Maran I would just say ditto on the whole May 2019 day start to finish everything that we did at the high school um for the Charli Charlie Johnson everything and and you're right having the congressman there was was really uh the icing on the cake was nice um my friend I'm gonna miss you I I started my career with you as a person in the audience and I used to watch the board meetings and I'd be like at least there's a

117person there who's alive at the table and asks questions because you always had a question and I that stuck with me when I used to be an employee of the district so you kept it up even once once I got here nothing changed so that's that's great and you do make us think and I'm grateful for that because sometimes I I think we get you know complacent a little bit with thinking everything's running smoothly so why are we rocking the boat but you do make us think with your questions so I'm grateful and we'll miss you but be's got a plan so enjoy it I'm sure of that Maran thank you and and also to Linda thank you very kind yeah I want toless I be remiss uh the the day with the congressman we

118were visiting all of the pathways projects was fantastic um you know I'm particularly fond of as you all know my people over in the tech department uh who also cut that tree with a laser so out of a piece of metal so uh they're responsible for that part that part of it and some of the other parts thank you to John orcot um so uh great day that day and and uh well miss you head you I guess if I could say one more thing absolutely yeah so I feel like it's not goodbye um to Ed I feel like it's see a visor recognition can't wait to hear your first comment all right well then thank you all and uh can I please get a motion to adjourn so moved second all those in favor

119I opposed extensions motion passes meeting is ajour