001So, welcome to the Fedona Central School Board of Education meeting for Tuesday, May 20th, 2025. Uh, we start each meeting with a pledge of pledge. So, if you please join me to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. Okay. Well, um, so Miss Morris is is down. Miss Morrison is down working the voting, uh, in the cafeteria, so we need a, uh, a motion to appoint Mr. Forbes as our clerk. So movement. A second. Oh, wow. Okay. You three are going to be very busy today. Okay. Very busy with motions. Um, all right. All in favor? Opposed? I was going to ask if there was any questions on that, but he's good. So, we're good. Um,
002let's see here. What's next? I got crisscrosses all over the place. Um, we need to add an addendum tonight, which I think the addendum, yeah, it all falls under consent. So um I'll speak on the agenda in a minute but uh we also need to approve the agenda uh for the regular meeting of May 20th 2025 including personnel excluding C and new business excluding I have a motion for that. Thank you. Is there anything that anyone would like pulled out a consent or the addendum to good? Okay. All in favor? Opposed? Okay. So, uh is this correct? It looks like now we're moving into comments from the public. Those wishing to address the board are asked to stand, give their name and address, and limit their comments to five minutes or less. Concerns and comments
003during this session should be directly related to the agenda. Is there anybody like to speak tonight to the board? Looks like a few of those seniors want to speak. Yeah, you know, last year they all sat in the back, so don't do that. Just an improvement. It's great to be up through uh up close. Um okay. Well, then we're going to move on to the minutes. And we have three minutes to approve tonight for housekeeping. Uh first is to approve the minutes from the facilities meeting of April 29th, 2025. Have a motion for that. So move. Okay. Second. First and a second there. Um, any comments on the facilities meeting from the board? No. All in favor? I next we need to approve the special budget hearing meeting of May 6, 2025. Motion sounds a
004second. Thank you. Any questions on that? All in favor? I opposed. And finally, we have to approve the minutes of the regular meeting of May 6, 2025. A motion for that, Mr. Marshall. Second. Second. There you go. Evening it out. Um, any questions on that? All in favor? I opposed. All right, moving right into financial treasures report. I don't think we have a treasures report tonight, but we do have one item to approve a 31-day emergency uh transportation contract. Motion, please. So, move on. A second. Second. Thank you, Mr. Ba. Uh, Mr. Forbes. Yeah, this is you're allowed to have two 31day emergency contests for transportation. So, this is the second one of two for the foster student who's currently residing in Jamestown. And then when you run to the end of that, which is
005May 31st, then we have to go next to that. Any questions at all? Okay. All in favor? Opposed? Uh under personnel we I think we have one item right one item it's 6 C uh extension of probationary period for teacher under the jewel agreement motion please so move a second second Mr. Marshall Dr. Zoex, can you expand on this what this means? Uh yeah, I just wanted to u make it clear this is kind of a unique scenario. Um you might remember Miss Krenzer was a science teacher here in the middle school and was uh awarded tenure a few years ago and then she decided to switch to technology which would put her back to a probationary non-tenured position. Um, under COVID regulations, there was some leeway with certifications, and she's been working on her
006certifications, but that's taken a little bit longer than we anticipated. So, um, she should have her, um, certification wrapped up in the next few months, but it would wouldn't be before her tenure date, which would be the end of this school year. Um, so we're just extending, uh, the tenure date one year in order to um, allow her time to get certified. So, This is just an adjustment to um adapt to the situation and does not signify that anything has not gone well or there's a problem or anything like that. It's really just a certification issue. Great. Any questions on that? Okay. All in favor? I opposed. All right. Uh and then uh that's it for personnel and then I think it's new business. new business. We have one item. Um it's a resolution declaring
007the district's proposed capital outlay project uh to be an unlisted action under SEC law and authorizing and directing the inclusion of the funding for such project in the district's proposed 2526 budget. I have a motion to bring that to the table. So, Mr. Marshall second. Thank you. So, Dr. Silly not only clarification with the board, but for the public, I guess. Yeah. So, a couple things here. So, this is not the outlay project that's going to occur this summer. Again, that involves accessibility to the main campus playground as well as some flooring at the elementary school. This is the outlay project that will happen um next summer, a year from this summer, that would involve improvements on our softball field and also some more flooring um in the elementary school. So, this is just a
008resolution um that uh outlines what the work will be um done and is proposed and um all the legal legal language that would go along with that. So this is nothing new. If you look back at our older um board agendas, this would be the same resolution you see every year and just sort of the the scope of the work has changed out. Any questions at all? So this is just an an this is an annual one as opposed to prop one which is was voted on December. This is a separate entity. And how much is paid for by New York State on this? Yeah. So the same so um just as a review. So each year we have the ability to do what's called a 100 100k $100,000 outlay project. Um it can't exceed
009$100,000 and typically when you factor in um engineering fees, some architect fees. Um, if you do work outdoors, you have to do at least $10,000 of work indoors. Um, so the bulk of the project in this case, which will be on the softball field, will probably total in the $60 to $70,000 range. Um, another $10,000 for the work that will be done indoor. Um, another 10 or so for those um fees and services. Um and the good thing about this is this is aided just like a capital project. So we will get 82.7% um back on the work that is done. And you mentioned history that uh this the one that we approved last year is for adaptive playground at Main Street. What was it before that? What was the year before? Um I think
010we did paving at Wheelock the year before for the most part. I think Say it again. flooring. Yeah. And I think the one before that was the entryway that got a little interesting, but um the entryway with I don't know if there was anything else with the entryway. Yeah. Okay. So yeah, I think it's it's standard practice in most districts to do one a year seeing that the bang for our buck is certainly worthwhile and that you know um ultimately you know as long as that um project is 100% aidable and we typically work with young right to make sure it is um you know you spend $100,000 and get 827 back. Okay. All in favor? I I opposed. All right, moving right through it. Um come to our second round of public comment. Any
011I will repeat. Uh anybody like to speak to the board on any general topic? Okay. Um so we're into the superintendent's report. Yeah. A few things. um not to uh belabor the point, but I did want to mention, you probably noticed in personnel, we had a couple um resignations um one for retirement. Uh that's Dev Tubio um teacher aid. I don't know if any of our admin wanted to speak to Amy just disappear. She had a phone call she took and I know Deb's been in her building, but I've worked closely with Deb over the years, too. I didn't realize she was retiring, but she's been a longtime employee here. She's awesome. Always reliable. Um, and I I was caught by surprise. I didn't know that she was retiring, but I'm really happy for her
012and she's awesome. So, I don't know what Amy would say, but just really good person. So, she's been, um, definite asset to the district. Appreciate that. Yep. And also, um, you probably remember, um, Loretta Lucy just join joined us this year and, uh, you know, plans change and people go in different directions. Um, but I appreciate um her coming on board, especially into um a position that was vacant for a period of time. I don't know, Miss Paulus, if anything you want to share about. She's done a great job um on in 8th grade in particular, but she's done a great job building relationships with kids, the team, and their families. So, as Dr. Zelat said, plans have changed and circumstances change, but we have very much appreciated the work that she did while she
013was here. Absolutely. I also just want to acknowledge uh the budget vote that's happening uh currently opened uh Mr. Pashki opened the uh voting at 2 o'clock today. Uh it'll end at 9 and uh you know we did our best to communicate um the details of our budget and also just encouraging people to um participate, have their voice heard and uh try to get to the high school cafeteria tonight um to cast their vote. So, um we'll be hopefully finding out where we stand a little bit after 9 tonight and uh we'll obviously share that out with the community um as soon as we possibly can. You also might have noticed um a article in the observer. I believe it was back on Friday um related to um water testing that we need to do
014in the school district every five year five years that is pertained to um any lead that's found in the water. So um we are required to do testing every five years. Um we did it in 2016 then again in 2021 and um we are in the midst of completing it right now. Um in talking with other students who have older buildings, older districts, buildings that haven't been built in the last really 20 um to maybe even 30 years. Um it is not that unusual to see um some traces of lead in the water. Um obviously we don't want anyone to be exposed to that lead. We don't want anybody to be drinking water um that contains traces of lead. So if um any of the testing came back above the threshold of five parts per
015billion um which is the cuto off by the state um those outlets are initially shut off and then there is a sign posted that no one should be drinking that water. Um what we're required to do after that is retest all of those outlets um and verify that they are indeed over or contain more lead than the state um allows. And then we need to make a good faith effort um to not only educate um people about the lead testing. And um recently I sent out an email um to our teachers that um asking them to share information about the lead testing with the students as well as just reviewing even if it's pretty obvious um the stickers that we have on outlet saying do not drink the water. Um but just making sure everybody's
016in the loop. Um ultimately if in the retest those outlets test over again um it's our obligation to continue to mitigate. So, um, usually the first step is to change out the fixture. Um, part of the reason, um, an outlet could test over the limit is that back in the day, um, plumbers when installing, um, fixtures, faucets, um, whatever it might be, used actually solder that contained lead. Um, since then, you're no longer able to do that. Um but that would be our first step in looking at is this coming from that fixture and where the solder um contained lead and that is producing these results. So this is something we take seriously. Um again it's not um too far out of line with what other other districts are seeing. Um and we'll keep our
017families and district aware of what's happening. I did communicate through email internally to everybody who works here. We sent another communication to our families uh through our um mass communication system. Um I did get a couple calls with people who were concerned and I just explained to them what we're doing and how we um try to mitigate the situation and uh make sure that everyone's um in a in a good place and healthy within the district. So, this is a work in progress at the moment, but I just wanted to address it. Um, since there was an article in the paper, I don't know if you have any questions. Um, regarding our water testing, it's great that we're testing. We wouldn't know unless we did that. So, exactly. Um, the other thing I wanted to
018mention real quickly, if um you look up the screen um behind me. Um at the beginning of this year, we really sol solidified a long-term plan for the district and we had some focus areas there, literacy, curriculum, intervention, um leader and me and focus on the cubby habits as well as working on a capital project. These were things that we identified in the district through a very collaborative process. Um, sending out surveys to the community, bringing a group of stakeholders together to discuss this and land on these common themes that were in the feedback that people believed were really important to our district. I just want to share a little um short update tonight. We've been working on this for about a year now and we made some good progress. Um, you know, in the
019past in the district in terms of literacy, um, we had a lot of people doing a lot of good work and a lot of good things, but we were lacking some consistency and some unity around how we were instructing um, and literacy and um, what resources we were using to do that. So what we did this year is took a step um and we got involved in a pilot of a um reading pro uh product into reading um which we've been working with for the past year. And this is not only getting us to think about how do we align from teacher to teacher in terms of our reading instruction? How do we align from grade to grade in terms of our reading instruction? And how also do we align with the science of reading
020which um the governor and uh state ed is saying should be at the heart of the work that we are doing now. Um you've probably heard Dr. Wright in these two meetings now talk about um a literacy at a station um that she is leading. I appreciate her help and guidance here. Um that is asking the district to demonstrate that we're making strides in this area and that we are aligning um our instruction um to the science of reading and this pilot is helping us do that. the addestation is helping us move forward a little bit more quickly than we probably would um if there wasn't this requirement for the state. Um in terms of professional development um to support that we continue with letters training which is training in best practices and how to
021instruct uh reading and also aligns to the science of reading. Um and we've had um a number of our especially at the lower grades teachers um not only participate in year one of this training but also now in year two. The feedback on this training has been really um complimentary um which isn't always the case when we do professional development and teachers are feeling like this is really worthwhile and they're gaining a lot of knowledge um from these experiences. So, um, we're happy to be moving forward, um, in this work. We're happy to have our curriculum in curriculum council involved, um, in these conversations, um, not only to bring general understanding to the group, but also to have them be become familiar with the work that's happening across the district. Um, that wouldn't necessarily be
022related to some um, parts of um, our district. Um, again, this is mainly at the lower levels right now, less at the middle school, high school. Um, but that's part of the long-term plan. Um, that's just one piece of the update, but I thought I'd pause after each one and give you a chance to ask some questions. So, we're a little ahead of the game because the states requiring reading started for this year. Is it this year that they're starting that requirement? Um, to aren't they focus Yeah. Yes, absolutely. Um with the addestation work, I'll let Dr. Wright speak to that. Um Sure. Sure. Happy to. Um so the the new requirement by the state is um this prek through through third grade. And that's the first time that early learning has ever been included
023into an initiative with what they consider to be school age or compulsory education. Um which is really grades 1 through 12. That's what's required. Um, and so it's been really wonderful to be able to have those conversations um, with the teachers of our youngest learners all the way up. And literacy is huge. Literacy is a huge, huge, huge thing. And I invite any admin to jump in here too. So when we talk about reading, reading is part of literacy. We talk about talking, part of literacy. When we talk about writing, that's literacy. We talk about sounds, literacy. Those squiggles that make up letters, literacy. So again, I think you you see that, you know, people often interchange the words reading and literacy, and that's not really true. Um, literacy is huge. So, it's a huge
024huge thing to tackle and to align because you're doing so many different components of that. Um, right now the state has a new requirement out that requires every single district in New York to attest to the certain components of reading um that are in the district and that they are aligned that every single teacher of prek is doing them kindergarten, first grade, second grade, third grade, and then we believe they're going to be pretty soon requiring that of fourth, fifth, and sixth at a minimum, which is elementary education. Um, and one of the interesting things about this is that um, and I I'll certainly um, you know, defer to Mrs. Piper for more specifics, is that when you have a universal pre kindergarten program, which we do, UPK, and you'll see that up there we
025have the the PK, the state, it's also an addestation of PK. But if your district has a universal pre kindergarten program, which we do, that's where you accept some federal funds to help offset some of your um universal pre kindergarten and it must be open to all children. There's a lot of very specific requirements. One of those requirements is that you also have a communitybased organization or a CBO in the community in addition to what's in your school. It's a requirement and we have to give some funding to that from our aotment of those federal dollars. Well, if your district has a UPK program, then they have to be part of this add astation. So, we have to because you're the overseers of those curriculum, we have to work with the CBO to ensure that
026they are also aligned to the next generation learning standards that all of the components that we have to meet that they are meeting also with what they're teaching. So it's a huge requirement of school districts to meet this addestation. We are so fortunate and any more in the um with this add astation team. I'm just so so so proud of the amount of people who are are participating in this. We have representation from UPK all the way through sixth grade ENL special education um which is just fantastic. um response to intervention which you can see are all the components of our district plan looking at this and one of the other things we have to attest to in addition to the components um has to do with professional development. What is your district doing to
027support the professional learning in these literacy components? So that's where we're quite ahead of the game in the sense of we've been doing these letters trainings, we've been offering these different aspects of science of reading and that's sort of the buzzword right now. Everything has to be aligned to the science of reading. What is that? The science of reading is not a curriculum. It is not um the science of reading is actually um brain science. How does the brain take in all of those components of literacy I referred to and how does it do it specifically at the different developmental stages. So science of reading isn't something just for little kids. C certainly we can learn how do our youngest learners take in those things and are we aligning to those those aspects of it
028are we following the science of reading and that's where I think sometimes you know when you hear about professional development in school it's so important well as new research comes out we have to learn about it and then we have to make sure we're sharing that learning so all of our teachers know it to be able to do that if you were to say that you know a doctor who learned a surgery 20 years ago go. Wouldn't you want them to be on the up on the latest and greatest of those? Well, it's the same thing with this. So about 15 years ago, brain science came into how people learn. And so now we we have this and it's something that we didn't learn in college. So now we're able to take that and that's
029what letters training is. It takes how the brain works, science of reading, how we take that in and puts it into a way to understand it and teach it to the youngest learners. funological awareness, sounds, breaking those down, the um the connection of reading, writing, and so what we're doing with the addestation team is we have to look at all of those components. We not not only have to attest to what we're doing here, but is what we're doing aligned to the science of reading, how we learn. Is it aligned to what the science of reading says is how you teach those things? and are the materials curriculum that we're using aligned to those as well and how are we supporting our teachers in using those things. So, it's a pretty big ask of the
030state to self-examine when you get down to it. And so, our teachers are going and talking to their counterparts and coming back as a representative body. Um, we have the spot where we're putting it. We've had a great today we had a meeting actually. We had a great discussion. Um, and so I applaud Mrs. Piper, Mr. Jollinger, and Mrs. March. Um, Mrs. Marsh, our um assistant principal for middle school who are all you know um part of this as along with our teachers. So that's that's the big answer to um three little letters the sor science of reading. Um but it applies to everything. It would be how you would answer a question like well how do I work with you know this adult who you know is is unable to read at a level
031that helps them in their daily living. Well that's science of reading. Let's learn how adults take that in and teach in a way that matches it. So it it's not something that has like a grade associated with it. Did you say there's an outside group that you partner with that gets part of the grant money? Who's who is that? It's Children's Educational Services or better known as Little Seeds that's probably left with us. Yeah. It's a great program and we've been able to partner and we have informally partnered with them. Now it's more of a formal process and they're great. Win-win. Um the second focus area was really around curriculum and in particular um our curriculum review process. Um we've learned a lot over the last couple years by again um a couple years ago
032looking at Envision Math um and now working with this um pilot um in literacy over the last uh year. And I think by doing so again the conversations has been at a particular grade level. What does instruction look from teacher to teacher to teacher? Are students experiencing um similar instruction and is it consistent amongst that grade level? And then when they move on to the next grade level, everybody has a clear understanding of what the students experienced, what they've been exposed to, what they've learned um and what materials were also associated um with that instruction. Um so by working through these two areas we've really developed a model for looking at how do we review curriculum? How do we pose these questions um how do we get input um from the people working in the
033field and the teachers in the classroom. Um and this is definitely a work in progress but the next step would be to select another content area that could be science, social studies, math, English um and follow this same process in one of those content areas. And again to really think about um consistency to really think about um what a student experiences from PK to 12 um and are those experiences similar um and as we're teaching, we have an understanding of what's happened before a student has got to us and then what will happen after a student's got to us. So, um, we are kind of solidifying that right now and then would like to think, um, a conversation with our IIL's and hopefully that somebody might be excited and be willing to sort of be
034the guinea pig for this process, um, and might volunteer their content area um, for the first run of this outside either of these two um, recent experience that we've had more as a district. So, we're excited about that. Um, and then ultimately the goal is to be on a cycle of if I'm a social studies teacher, I know that every four years or every five years we'll engage in a curriculum review, make sure things are up to date, make sure in line with what the state is asking us to do, make sure we've implemented any changes that might have happened in um what we're being asked to teach or the assessments um that we're looking at to um demonstrate that students have learned. So all of that's in play and uh I would say this
035one is more in the work in progress category. Any questions regarding curriculum review? Another thing we've done we've made good progress. Each building has really um clarified how they're approaching intervention and thinking about when students are struggling um when they're not doing as well as we would like. How are we assisting um those students? And each building to varying degrees is doing something um that includes these steps steps um administering um some type of diagnostic assessment and I will speak to where what's happening at individual buildings um collecting that data and then organizing that data in some helpful and understanding way um reviewing that data either during data team or committee meetings. Um looking at how our students compare to other students either locally or nationally and then really using those results to determine what
036students might benefit from some intervention um in that particular content area. Um oftentimes uh buildings have intervention interventionists who specialize in this. A good example would be Mrs. Sil um at wheelock or Mrs. Tesset and Graham at the elementary school who then implement evidence-based strategies um that will really benefit um those students who might not be progressing as quickly as we would like. Um they monitor progress uh weekly. Um they reassess after six weeks to determine if the student should exit, continue or we should adjust those interventions. Um in a wheel lock they use a number of things to do that. FastBridge three times a year. They also use um Dr. Strong's assessment. Um that's aligned to New York State K standards. Um as Mr. Dinger um has presented a couple different times, use the
037I Ready Diagnostic um at the elementary. Same uh for the middle school use of I Ready. And for the high school, a lot of these products like I Ready don't expand extend past 8th grade. So uh Mr. Pashki along with Lisa Reinhardt who is technically the response to intervention the RTI instructional leader have really brought common lit on board to think about um where are students in terms of their reading level and what areas uh are strengths and areas of growth within their reading and then how can really teachers support them and help them in content areas at the high school level. So, this has been an exciting development over the past couple years. Um, and I know she has spent a lot of time um assisting teens and other instructors uh at the high
038school level. And we're really happy um to not only have some of this clarified, but also be moving forward in areas that um ultimately results in students being more successful and more productive in their time with us. Any questions on the intervention piece? Um, another aspect um of our long-term plan is this idea of leader and me and really focusing on the CVY7 habits. Um, again, this looks a little bit different at each building, but at Wheelock, um, and we've talked about this a couple times, but each building has what is called a lighthouse team, which is really just a group of individuals from that building thinking about how can we um, learn more about this, how can we implement um, what this process is about, and how can we really make this work for
039the nuances of our particular building. So, at Wheelock, they continue to meet um with the lighthouse team as well as um our leader and me coach who's been very helpful. Um they're moving forward with implementing at UPK and kindergarten uh leader and me curriculum within the classroom instruction for next year. So, that'll be happening at Wheelock. Similarly, at the elementary school, um they've added in their schedule um thanks to Mr. drowning a um dedicated time in their master schedule in which they will have time to do what leader and me would say direct teach or incorporate this into their instruction. Um this will be fully implemented in the fall um with 35 weeks of lessons um with four leader only lessons each week. So nicely done there. Um at the middle school again uh they
040have been meeting with their lighthouse team at April staff meeting. They focused on next steps as a building as well as allowing each staff member to have an opportunity to identify what they are currently doing and how are they connecting to the concepts that we've already learned. Um there's also a meeting in late May where they're going to continue that conversation and really um think about what exactly are the next steps and try to bring some clarity before the end of the school year. um at the high school. This is where leader and me suggest really involving students right off the bat. So, uh Mr. Pashki has been um asking students uh who would like to be participate in the student lighthouse team um trying to get that group solidified and they would hit the
041ground running at the beginning of next school year. Again, thinking about how does this work for our high school and what would this look like in our school. Um all of this has been really great progress. Uh this year has really spent focusing on the adult aspect of leading our making our adults aware of what these concepts are and engaging them in training and as you noticed especially weak in the elementary school starting in the fall with instruction. Any questions about Yes. I wonder when we get a new teacher, how do they get brought up to speed? That's a good question. So um part of that is tapping into our coaches and leader and me. Um we also uh have new teacher orientation, which this will be um a piece of that. There's no way
042to get them caught up on everything, but that would be a nice introduction. Um, and then just having follow-up trainings um, for those people who were not here as it was implemented and needing to to dedicate some time to make that happen. So, we're excited about that. Um, you know, it's also interesting that um, some people just randomly from other districts have some experience with it, others do not. Um, but we want to make sure everybody's up to speed. Um last focus area was really thinking about and making a concerted effort to upgrade our facilities. Now you know um we recognized that um the capital project we put forward earlier in the year was not as totally successful as we had liked. We had three propositions. One of them was approved, two was not. Um
043but that one proposition does involve $22 million of maintenance work. Things that will help keep our students and adult warm, safe, and dry. We absolutely appreciate the community supporting um that proposition. Um and then we also start getting into these outlay projects, these $100,000 projects that begin to chip away at some of the things um that were not approved. So um the first place we're starting is with some of our athletic fields and uh we'll start with our softball field and I think those fields will continue to be part of those upgrades we do um over time. And you know, Young and Wright has proved to be a really good partner um with us, bringing a lot of knowledge, ideas, and expertise to the table. Um we continue to think about what this looks like
044long term for our district in terms of our facilities um from a scope of work point of view and also from a financial point of view. So that's been an ongoing conversation. Um it's going to move a little bit slower than we were hoping it would. Um but we are making progress and we are chipping away at those areas of concerns um as we engage in this work over time. Any facilities questions? Thank you Dr. Zelox. Um it's exciting to go into the second year on this. Uh this is big picture proactive stuff which I think we all like. We all like to be proactive. So, uh, looking forward to year two and further progress on these. Um, so that's great. Uh, so, um, the next regular board of education meeting will be Tuesday, June
0453rd, 2025 here in the high school library at 6 pm. Um, so any closing comments from the board members? Student member, no closing comments. Okay. Thanks for coming tonight. Um All right. Um so let's move around. So Mr. Pashki, we have a concert tonight at 7:30. We're going to make it. Yep. So we'll make it. It'll be my last high school concert. So looking forward to that. It'll be be a joy to introduce that for the last time. Um, we have uh today we had our college and career portfolio awards breakfast in North Buffalo. Normally we have it kind of in West Senica. It was a little closer. I was a little surprised it was a bit further of a drive this morning. Um, two of our students were honored at this. This is mostly
046Erie County schools that participate in this. And uh, these are schools that not that don't just have business classes like we have that have businessmies at their school. Um so it this represents like the best of the best business students and they're invited to this uh where they find out after participating in a quite a a process of having their portfolios evaluated and going through interviews with like high ranking business officials in the area like the vice president of Mnt Bank in Buffalo and things like that. It's it's highly competitive. Um and two of our students were selected to attend today. Uh Emily McCann and she won a $250 scholarship at this which is outstanding. Um, and Cassandra Kramer, uh, she took home the number one slot, $5,000 as a scholarship. We've never had anyone
047win the number one slot before in 24 years of doing this. So, just congratulations to both of those young ladies who did a fantastic job. Um, I just wanted to mention that our track team, uh, on Friday the 16th at the Super Eight meet of champions, the girls 4x400 relay broke the school record. Um, it was Mariela Russo, uh, Caris Labar, CC Tanelli, and Delaney Kaiser. They ran a a 40896 if that means anything to anybody. Um, so that was that was great. Um, and then just last, I just wanted to mention that um, we gave our AP exams. AP season is kind of closed. However, on Friday, there was like a national outage of the internet and the AP psychology exam had to be cancelled. Like the kids were all sitting there trying to
048log in and at the beginning of it the college board was a little I think a little rough on the kids. They're like if anybody leaves you're getting a zero and you can't retake this. And you know kids are like I've got to go to work. I can't wait here much longer. You know it was kind of like upsetting to I think our kids. But finally they came out and said look you guys can just go and and so we rescheduled that for this Friday. Um so our kids will be able to retake it on Friday. questions asked and hopefully we'll have a better experience than they did uh last Friday. That that's really all I have, but I just wanted to mention with with regard to this uh roll out going back to the
049literacy piece and the curriculum after going through a lot of these things through decades really here. Um, this is the the first time that I think the state has done this the right way where they they're starting at the lower levels and they're going to build the program up because so many times we've been forced with a situation where like at the high school level that they're it's like, okay, we're just going to plug this in now and now you have a new algebra 2 class. And I know the kids didn't have the new algebra 1 class and they didn't have any of the stuff in the middle school leading up to it, but they're doing the new thing this year. So good luck, you know, and so at least this is a program that
050is starting with our youngest kids. It's going to follow them all the way through and it's just to me that's just the right way to do it. So I'm glad that that's a piece and I just wanted to make sure that people understood that that hasn't been the norm. So it's it's very appreciated and certainly the work that that our team our admin team Margie especially has been doing on this to make this happen. So thanks. Yeah, it's very powerful coming from you with so much experience. So you know sequential working roundup. That's great to hear from you. It is. It's It's really important, you know, and it fit fits really well with the leader and me thing and we're all doing that together. Just one just I guess I'm going long again. I'm getting
051I can feel the stink guy behind but um you know to Sheila's point that uh when we onboard new new teachers I know in the high school like immediately since we're bringing our our kids on board, the kids are going to be teaching stuff to the teachers. So, as they as they have these kids that are already immersed in this in their classes, they're going to be able to get them up to speed just as well. So, that's that's a nice component of at least the high school section starting with the kids. Yeah. And you know, you only have a couple left sessions, so feel free to go as long as you want. Okay. I'm going to have bruises in my back. I' got to be careful. Um, I just wanted to highlight. So, Boseies
052runs monthly forums for different content areas. This one in particular was around technology integration and we happen to house it here in our district. So Derek Cook, who's one of our seventh grade English teachers, was able to take a team of our students to share with the group, the representatives from other districts, um some of the great things that they're doing around the instruction for literary elements and how they've incorporated digital resources like even video gaming and how that can help to support some thoughtful conversations among kids. So, I think it's great to sort of highlight that what our kids can show that we're doing well within the district with other and share that opportunity with other other district representatives. Um Kristen might touch on this, but next week uh is Special Olympics and some
053of our service learning members will be attending to help to support that um running smoothly as well as cheering on some of our, you know, districts representatives. So, that's exciting. And finally, the big 4-day expedition is underway starting tomorrow. um you know just months and months worth of preparations and efforts and poor Steve and Sue Cobb have had to work tirelessly both yesterday and today to create some backup plans and ulterior options um or alternative options rather just considering the weather forecast over the next few days. So we shall see how that goes. But certainly they have put in a tremendous amount of effort to help help it be as successful as possible and the kids are going to have a great time regardless. But um you know definitely a huge kudos to them for
054all their work. The last time I went on a one day hike and it was raining and my feet were soaked but I was having a great time. It was fine. Yeah. It was much easier. Makes for good stories. Exact. Oh, a lot of stories. Yeah. Thank you, Mr. Um Yeah. So today we um welcomes half of the kindergarten class to the elementary school and we give them a little bit of a tour. They meet the teachers. They see where the bathrooms are. They play on our playground and um we welcome some student leaders. So we had some fourth grade kids kind of lead some of the the things and that's under the guys of leader and me and we really try and build those kids up. So it was really wellreceived. Uh we've got
055the second group of kids come in tomorrow um and they really have in general a good time. So that was a lot of fun doing that today. And then we excuse me continue to reward reading. Uh this Friday we do a popcorn and movie for kids who have met the certain criteria for the month for reading. Um, our June award is a dance. We're bringing back a dance, which is kind of fun. We haven't had one of those since uh my first year, which is six years ago now, which is kind of cool. And then we conclude the year with our reading um awards ceremony. And this has kind of grown um with the help of our teacher leaders, the RTI department. They came to me one time and they had this idea to reward
056kids with like a you know, like an award ceremony thing. And it started real small in your gym and we had like a handful of kids and now it's in the auditorium and like almost every kid gets an award which is really pretty cool. And then um also within the past two years we really wanted the kids to own their data. So at the start of the year you know I've talked about I these kids get a number. I'm a 480. Well it didn't mean anything to a kid. So um so what we do is after they take the beginning of the year I ready. You print them a really colorful card and it shows them what their score was and then it shows them a goal for the middle of the year and a
057goal for the end of the year and then it also shows them um a stretch growth goal. So then um the kids just understand it because at the end of the ready when they click submit you got a 490. In years past it'll be like okay what does that mean? Well now they have their goal card next to them and like oh I'm so close to my goal or I didn't quite make it. What can I do differently the next time? So, and that really came from Leader and Me because one of the big things is having kids own their data. Um, and another thing that we did with that was um we display in the cafeteria all the kids who have met the different levels of points, 100 points, 200, 300, 400, 500 on
058the five pillars. Um, and then these are the kids that will um, you know, they can see what level they're at and how many books they need to read through AR points to get to the next level. So, this is really all come out of the leader. I mean, it's been pretty good stuff. Um, so that's what we got going on in the elementary school. Oh, the data that that's novel novel idea. Yeah. Got a lot of parents like to see what their kids are doing at the dance and uh, you know, that's really cool that you bring the kids up move up day. Yeah. Yeah. And uh, you know, so they're not so nervous in the Oh, yeah. in the fall. Great idea. Great idea. Thanks, Miss Farrell. Thanks. Um, I just wanted to
059say a quick word about Loretta Lucy. even though we touched on her earlier in the agenda, but she was uh she's still with us a special education teacher um on my team as well with the eighth grade cohort of kids and um she brought a lot of great energy to us and just a really unique perspective on things, great relationship builder. So, I just wanted to acknowledge that I am sad that she's leaving us. Um I appreciate the strategic plan review. I think that was really um good information that we've shared and it really just ties into all the comments other people have made. So, I think that was a nice overview. And um next week on Wednesday, if you are free, sometime between 9:15 and about 1:30, please stop over to uh FW State
060Steel Hall and the Dos World if it's nice outside will be used for um the local Special Olympics event. We have including I think tens of is it called learn and serve still? Service learning um kids from the middle school and uh Mrs. Forbes who coordinated that. We also have those 10 and about 60 student athletes participating, probably 25 adults all heading over there. So, we have really big contingent. So, stop by. It's a great day. Great. Um, what what day is it again? Wednesday the 28th. Wednesday. Okay. Hopefully, right, we're getting out of the way this week. Miss just a few words about Mrs. Tobio. What a loss Mrs. Toby has been in our district for many years. She's worked with us in kindergarten, prek, um, across the elementary school, but just a kind
061kind soul. She's nurturing to the students. The kids love her. You see her in the morning, just kids hugging her. She gets kids that come in that might be feeling a little sad and she brings them around. She just is a gentle touch. So, it is a huge loss. We're all feeling very sad that Mrs. Topia is leaving because she's been a big part of El. So, we'll miss her very much. Um, we are having our parent orientations. We had our prek parent orientation uh a couple weeks ago. Brought on in the new parents that are very eager to have their students start school and their first experience in school. And we had our kindergarten parent orientation last week. And again, nice crowd of parents that are really excited to hear about what the expectations
062are at kindergarten and u what their children can expect and talked a little bit about the jamboree too which is always nice. Yeah, it's cool. I do want to add too about um the leader me the lighthouse team part of what Kubby says is everybody has genius and we really have embraced that at we lack that everybody has genius that's part of our mission statement we have is that everybody has genius and part of our uh lighthouse team which is the leadership team at each building we have not only teachers but we have several aids that are part of this as well and they are so motivated and it's really brought us a great feel of the entire district entire ire staff what the needs are for the kids because the aids are the ones
063that are right there with the kids on the floor with them knowing what what they need and what's happening. So I just have to put kudos out to our lighthouse team especially Margaret Gray who's amazing and she is a big leader in that as well as Cassie Frell. They're really running with it. So kudos to both of them. Great. Thank you. Thank you Dr. All right. Thank you. Um, one thing I want to do a couple shout outs and one is to, um, Sarah Corors, assistant principal at the high school for all of her work with coordinating the APs, um, the AP exams and troubleshooting everything. Um, just the the yman's task that goes along with that. This is all through college board, which is very, very finicky, very finicky. Um, and it requires a
064lot of work. So, I just want to do a shout out um to Sarah and um highlight Amanda Pachinowski at the middle school innovations teacher and she did a really neat event with her seventh graders where she invited anybody to come to the middle school and see um the product of that project which was the students had to create an app to solve a real world problem. And um when I popped down to kind of peek in um Margaret Gray was there with her STEM class bringing her young students from the elementary school in there to tour. And it's neat to see the older kids and younger kids talk to each other. But then in came second grade teacher Missy Carmelo with her class. And um there there's some reading buddy things that go on
065there too. But, you know, it was it was great to see the kids see these um seventh graders in a different light and to go up to them and to um you know, the kids had to do a presentation and talk about it. And they all sat there and they had name plates and they had their app out and what the problem was it solved and the questions and seeing the teachers coaching on both sides how to ask a question, how to answer a question, how to, you know, and it was just really fun to see. So, I want to do a shout out. Um it was open for a chunk of time. I don't know what other classes may have come through to visit, but um while I was there, those were the two
066grade levels that that were there. And there were some really interesting um some ones. I remember one of the apps had to do with um if you you don't have any um money, but you need gas in your car to get home. And it's a kind of like a a debit pay ahead thing. And it was uh so that you would do that, it would put a hold on your bank, and it was very intricate. And I was like, my goodness, look at this. I was just like, really? And I'm like, tell me more. you know, and it was just funny because I was like, "How'd you come up with this?" Like, well, sometimes you don't have money for gas. This is very true. So, it was just really neat to see some of the
067thought process behind this. That was a lot of fun. And then um we do have our new faculty orientation um coming up in August. Um the first day of that is Monday, August 18th. We switched that to the week later and we switched it to Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday because the week that we had been traditionally doing it also is the nice the teacher union conference. a lot of our mentors and FTA leadership are at that. We don't want to compete with that and we want teachers, you know, our new faculty rather to have their mentors with them. So this will this year it will be Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, August 18, 1920. And of course on the first day we invite the board of education on Monday, August 18th to come have breakfast with our newest
068faculty members. That'll be from 8 to 8:30 and meet them. Um and last year we incorporated some of the seven habits and this year we will be doing even more. And the great thing is with our partnership with Peter and me is we have online access to the courses. So we can have um our new faculty um signed right up there. We get their login going and they can take spend some time in those seven habits. They have that tool with them as they get ready for the school year. So excited about that. Yeah. I have to say the administration with leader to me it's you can feel it. You can feel the excitement which the body language is good. It's uh that's great. And At the end of May, we're all running low on
069energy, but you can still see the energy in this group. It's great. It's great. Mr. She's not here. Okay. Um so, um we anticipate the need to enter into executive session tonight to discuss personnel and collect the bargaining agreements. Do I have a motion? So, moved. A second. Second, Mr. Marshall. Thank you. All in favor? I opposed. All right, we're in the executive session. Thank you everybody.