001Welcome to the Fedonia Central School Board of Education meeting for Tuesday, April 29th, 2005. Start each meeting with the flag of friends to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for it stands. One nation under God, indivisible, and justice for all. Okay. So, um we have an addendum tonight. Um it's all under consent. I think it was sent out this morning. So, we get an addendum. We also have to approve the agenda for the regular meeting. Uh consent also with consent including personnel excluding A1 and new business excluding A and B. Uh is there anything that anyone would like to pull from consent agendos? So next uh we have uh public uh here for the public. The board is reserved this time for hearing comments from the audience. Uh, those
002wishing to address the board are asked to stand, give their name and address, and please limit your comments to five minutes or less per individual or group. Concerns and comments during this session should be directly related to items listed on the proposed agenda for this meeting. Is there anybody like to speak tonight in public comment? Round one of public comment. Okay. All right. Um, so next, uh, we need to approve the minutes of the last meeting, the last regular meeting of April 8th, 2025. Could I have a motion? So move on. A second. Second, Miss Fner. Thank you. Uh, any questions on the meeting? Minutes. I'm sorry. Um, all in favor? I opposed. Uh, we also have to approve the minutes of the budget meeting of April 24th. Um, have a motion for that. So,
003you're here. I'm here. Uh a second. Second, Miss Warner. Thank you. All in favor? I opposed. And we're right into our first presentation, which is uh a presentation of the elementary school, middle school, 3 to8 data with Mr. Goinger and Miss Bahus. Thank you. Do a quick intro. We also have uh Mrs. Marsh here, our middle school assistant principal. So, thank you to all three of you for being here. We're excited to kind of get back and re-engage in some of these conversations at the board level. And not that anybody at our building level has not been processing data, looking at test results, whether they're state assessments or local assessments, um those growth measures that we've been involved with, things like I Ready. Um but as COVID kind of crept into um our functioning as
004uh organizations we got away from some things and part of that was um presentations like this tonight. Um you know we had at least a year where there was no state testing and then we kind of got back into it and there's been a lot of adjustments for students as well of adults during this time. Um but tonight uh represents u the beginning and sort of the re-engagement of these kinds of conversations at the board level. Um in chatting with Jamie, Mark um and Andrea in preparation for tonight, we recognize this is not a comprehensive conversation. We were not um in any way looking to include everything that we could possibly share regarding 38 data but we looked at this as a a step one um of a larger conversation and uh starting to re-engage
005around these concepts. um they have asked that we run through the presentation, let them kind of um complete the slides and then we can go back and follow up with questions and maybe even importantly uh the question is what else would the board like to know moving forward? Uh we recognized again this is just a first step. So, uh, we are more than willing to follow up, um, formally and informally with additional things that the board would want to know or or have, uh, part of the dialogue as we, um, work through this. Later on in the year, Mr. Pashi is going to come forward and share some information about our regent exams. U, Mrs. Piper is also going to share some information about the assessments that they do at Wheela. Um so again we're
006trying to come back to this part of the um collaboration between the administration district office and the board of education. Anything else I should have hit on here? Think we're getting started. All right. All right. So I'll kind of roll through there. We go our agenda of the things that we'll be talking through today. Okay. Um, but just to give you a little highlight of where we are currently as far as computer-based testing for this spring, um, the elementary school implemented and administered the ELA in computer-based testing before break. We will be starting the ELA actually tomorrow at the middle school tomorrow and Thursday. The math will be next week for both middle school and um, elementary school. Um, but as we roll through our presentation today, we'll kind of talk through and give you
007a brief overview of just the general testing design. um a review of what those performance levels can mean because of course they're scored on a scale of one to four, not a typical numerical out of 100% or something. Um a timeline for computer-based testing and the expectations from the state and then just go into some brief um overview of results, some highlights and some strategies that we have incorporated and enhanced throughout both of our buildings. And then as Dr. said an opportunity for you to ponder some questions that you might have about some additional information that we could share for you. Okay. Um a little bit of background on how the test is designed both for ELA and math. Um this tests are standardsbased based on our New York State next generation standards. The next
008generation standards have been around for about three years. The design started before that. Um but this will be the third year that the next generation standards are being tested. So in ELA we have big broad anchor standards which are things like reading, writing, speaking and listening and language. Um so then at each grade level it gets a little bit more specific. So um I picked a reading standard just to give you an idea of how it changes from third grade um to seventh grade. So determining a theme or central idea and explaining how it is supported by key details, being able to summarize. Then when we jump up to seventh grade, um determine a theme or central idea of a text and analyze its development over the course of the text. So the complexity changes
009a little bit um each year as the students progress through the standards. So that's a little bit about ELA. Math is a little bit different um because there's two strands. There's the third through fifth and then the sixth um through eight. So um again broad expectations, operations in algebraic thinking, number and operations in base 10, number and operations, fractions, measurement and data and then geometry. And then when we get into the older grades, ratios and pro proportional relationships, the number system, expressions, geometry, statistics, um and then again from there we have um clusters that are more grade level specific. So that's this all of the questions that are designed come from those standards clusters. Um okay this is what the number of questions that a student would see. So over the course of the two
010days there's a variety of multiple choice and constructed response. Constructed response is where our students are typing their answers. So starting in third grade they're doing 29 multiple choice. eighth grade, they're doing a total of 40 over the two days. So, a little bit is added each year. Um, and then the constructed response, you can see that in third grade, they're just doing two-point responses, but then fourth through 8th grade, um, they add in a four-point response, which is more like an essay, um, where they're they're citing multiple texts in their answer. And then in math delay every um and then for math same thing there's multiple choice and constructed response. A constructed response on math is where the students are actually solving it. So being that it's CBT the students have the opportunity to
011show their work right on their device. Um and then those are scored using a rubric. Okay. Performance levels. So in New York State we have four performance levels. We have a four, a three, a two, and a one. Um so a four is great. The students are excelling. Um they are more than sufficient in the expectations. A three, which is what we consider proficient, is still really, really good. Um that means they're sufficient for the grade level that they're at. They're meeting all the expectations of the grade level. A two is partially proficient. Um so some of the things I underlined there partial but insufficient for some of those expectations. So in some areas they're um being proficient in other areas they're not. And then when we have a one um that is below proficient.
012So the expectation they're insufficient for those expectations. So that is how um the students are scored briefly. It can get pretty deep on how it's actually how the exams are actually scored, but those are the levels. So, like all things that New York State um implements, the expectations are designed um and shared with districts through a timeline so that districts have an appropriate and adequate amount of time to prepare both themselves as a district. um you know if there's technology devices and other materials that need to be purchased if teachers need some professional learning obviously if there's impact on instruction for the students um and this is how it has been rolled out over the past couple of springs so by you can see that by spring of 2026 the expectation is that all students
013in grades three through eight will be taking their assessments over the computer in ELA math and science now at the middle school we've been doing um computer-based testing since 2019 19. Then of course we had that gap because of COVID. At the elementary school, third graders piloted computer-based testing last year in preparation and anticipation for this year when both grades will be completing the assessments um on the computer. Great. That's embarrassing. So I'm over here. I got to do a little zooming in and things like that. So we know what the test looks like. We know uh some of the questions and thanks for talking about the levels of proficiency. So, what we're going to look at are some percentages. And what the state gives us is the percent proficient. And what they consider proficient
014is the number of two I'm sorry, the number of threes and fours combined. But it's important to note that when you were defining the level two students, it still says if you're a level two student, you are on track to meet high school graduation criteria. So, I think we got to shift our focus from like these are the kids that pass the assessment to not pass the test to more of their language percent proficient. But keep in mind this doesn't include those twos which are still on track to meet high school requirements. So, um how we're going to break this down is by years 24 through 22. Uh the first thing we're going to look at is the district performance. That's the percentage of kids in grades three through eight who met the level of
015proficiency for uh the ELA. and then we will um compare it to the state and the county. So, uh last year 44% of percent of our students, so that's all of our students in grades three through eight for their ELA were proficient. And then let's compare that to the state because if we don't do that, it's kind of like hard to compare it. So, in the state, 46.4 were proficient. And then if we get a little bit closer to home, we can kind of look at our county. And this is all the schools in our county uh was 42.1% proficient. So, the next we can kind of ask ourselves is are there any trends? Well, let's look at the past uh three years side by side to see if there's any kind of things that
016we can glean from this information. Um just a real quick glance is it kind of looks like um there's not a lot of changes uh in the past three years. But when we look at this information, it only tells us just like a little bit of what we can learn from these assessments. So sure, we've got a number of kids who are proficient, some who aren't, but how can we grow as educators? So what the state does or what our local Boseies does is something really cool and they give us um principles and teachers access to something called the level one data warehouse. I always thought it was like a real place but it's just a website but it's really pretty cool and from this website we can access data in any way that you
017can imagine. And one thing that I share with the teachers and Jamie and Andrea do as well is we break down the test. So what I'm going to do is we're going to click this. We're kind of going to zoom in real quick and see what we can glean from this assessment. So, this document that we're looking at right here breaks down the test first by standards. Like Andrea said, it assesses standards. So, if we just go from left to right, this is a fourth grade ELA. Here is one of the standards. They have to simply summarize a test. Well, how did the test uh assess that? The page is irrelevant, but it was question number 20, and it was a multiple choice question. Well, how did our kids do? 55% of our kids got
018it right. And we can kind of scroll from left to right here and and get a little bit of more information. So, there's your choices, A, B, C, or D. We saw that 55% of our kids answered D. That was the correct answer. But then they give us a little bit of more information, which is kind of cool. They give us this thing called gap to district. Well, there's only one elementary school in this district, so there's no gap to district. But they tell us a gap to Boseis and then gap to region. Our Boseies is all the schools in our area to Kataragus Boseies. So let's see how we did compared to those kids. So our students uh were 5% better than the Boseies kids. And compared to the region, I don't know what
019our region is, but I think it extends over to Bingington's bigger region, but as you see, there's 37,000 students in the region. Uh we did 8% better. So this would be an area of strength. So overall our kids did better uh than the Boseies. We did better than the region on this particular question. And what's really cool about this is we can click this and we can actually see what was question number 20. It was multiple choice. We did well with that. So this is information that we share with our grade level teams. We do this in the elementary school. They do it in the middle school. What the principles get to see is individual teacher performance as well um for the in for the specific question for their class. So then what we can
020do with that information is say, "Wow, this teacher was incredibly strong with teaching kids how to summarize texts. This teacher need a little bit of boost." So maybe let's have a team meeting and let's share our ideas. Let's see what we do so we can improve. Um and then what we can look for is areas of growth as well. So what we would look for is a negative uh percentage. Something more than 2% would be more statistically um you know relevant. But as you scroll down, you see here's a strength right here, which is 11%. And here might be an area for growth. So in our team data meetings, we would look at that specific standard. We would look at the question, and we' say, okay, 36% or 36 students answered this question. Uh, but
021a lot of kids got distracted by this one. Let's look at it. Why did they get distracted? What did the question tell us? And those are conversations that we have about the data. So it's kind of cool. So we can do this with ELA. And then we'll jump back and we'll take a look sorry at what did we do here? There it goes. Cool. Thank you. So, just like we can do for um ELA, we can do the same thing for math. So, now what you're seeing is the past three years uh grades three through eight, the mathematics percentage. We take a look again at our district compared to the state and compared to the county. You can kind of take a look at that data. Um I don't know what happened in 2022, but
022we weren't alone. Um you can see the state, the district, and the county all kind of had a little dip there. Um maybe a question I would ask is what did the previous couple years look like? So that one we need a little bit more work on. So just like we can break down the the assessment based on the standards, you can do the same thing with the math assessment and we won't go into it. Um, but just like we broke down the ELA by the specific spec specific standards, you can see how our kids performed and you can take a look at gaps between the region and the district. So those are those are our results. That's some of the information that we get and this is some of the things that we do
023with the data that we have. A few things to highlight are some top performances that Fredonia's had in the past couple years. Specifically last year, um, our fourth graders cracked into the top five into the county. So, what you see here are all the districts in the county. I blocked out their names because it's not uh I don't own their data, but I'd like to share the Foni's data. So, our fourth graders performed pretty well. We're in the top five in the county for fourth grade math. And Jamie and Andrea would click to show you some highlights from seventh grade. Our seventh grade ELA from last spring actually was the top performing in the county. So, this is of course shared with teachers and departments. And of course it's it's also noted that you know
024this is a testament to all the hard work that has happened prior to them entering seventh grade in addition to the work that they did in grade seven. Um similarly with math we had wh sorry an high performance in grade eight math there we go. Um again top performing in the county as a result of our eighth graders who took the math assessment. And I will say one in interesting thing about the grade eight math assessment in particular is that we do have a cohort of individuals that took the algebra exam in the spring. So those individuals are not a part of these of this data. So it was just sort of kind of an interesting thing for us to think about. We had a whole handful 25 you know 20 25 kids that didn't
025even take it because they were taking their regents instead. Just sort of an interesting thing to note. Cool. and we'll kind of wrap it up with some key strategies. Things that we do uh in the building that uh you know help us with this information is our data meetings. Um at the elementary school we have data meetings five times a year. Um I facilitate those with our RTI team which is the response to intervention team. Um and we look at the data just like we kind of did today. Um what can we tease out the test to learn to grow. Uh we use I ready. We use that in the elementary school and the middle school as well which is a nice um continuation because we get to see the history of performance in both
026math and reading. Uh we have we have teaming so our teachers have uh 40 minutes every day uh to meet with their teams to talk about things like this and what strategies they're using that are effective. Uh we've sent some teachers to letters training which is based in the science of reading to help them continue growing professionally. Uh we've updated our curriculum substantially within the past couple years. um specifically since Margie came on board with the addition of math first and now reading. Uh our RTI team um pulls kids out of class um either five days a week for a half an hour or uh three days a week for a half an hour for small group targeted specific instruction and reading. Um our second step, it's important to not forget the social emotional side
027of instruction and then our counseling team uh who meets with you know a wide variety of kids. Mhm. And similarly, I mean, I won't review all the same things that we do, but um at the middle school, we also have I Ready and data meetings. We've even worked with a specialist or an expert through Boseies um to help us just sort of analyze the the data at a more at a deeper level. Um we too have teaming where our grade level teams are able to have a common planning time every day and then weekly team meetings in addition to their monthly department meetings. Um and we have even smaller learning communities as many of you know um at fifth and sixth grade where we help to bridge the gap from what our fourth graders their
028only experience in school is one classroom teachers. So as we bridge that gap into middle school they have a team of teachers, two teachers, one for ELA and social studies and one for math and science prior to that their transition into seventh grade when they have a different teacher for content. Um we have some additional instructional time for both math and ELA. Um similarly we are part of the updates in the curriculum too. Uh we also have some enhanced learning experiences where students can apply the things that they're learning and some of their contents into some different ways to show what they know. So success skills um also implement some social emotional learning. We have our innovation and turning points where as I said they can apply some of those critical thinking skills. They're doing
029a lot of project-based learning, some hands-on activities, and sort of enhancing some of the content and foundational skills that they have learned in their other classes. Our counseling team also meets weekly both Andrea and myself along with our psychologist, social worker and counselors and we talk about um the building as a whole but individual students also and how we can help to boost some of their successes and bring their families along with us how we can work together as a team um to attack some areas and again boost their successes. And as Dr. Ziliac said, you know, if you've got questions or additional information that we could provide from you. I mean, that data warehouse is just an abyss of data that you can pull so many different types of reports. Um, lots of things
030together. Thank you so much. This is so interesting. Um, I guess the first thing that comes to my mind is so that we saw the on the uh bar graph levels three and four proficiency, but I think it would be interesting to see because you said if you're in level two, you're still possibly on track what would be the breakdown of our level one and level two. That's super easy to provide. So, it takes a minute or two, but we could give you that. We could combine the twos, threes, and fours. That would be interesting. And then the other thing I'm curious about is um when you look at those numbers, how do you set your goal? Is it to be just incrementally better than you are? Are you comparing yourselves to the state, the
031county or the Boseies or the Boseies area? Like how are you deciding what your goal is? So, one thing that we do at the at the elementary school at least is we take a look at the previous year's roster. And what we can do is we rank all of the students from the highest performing student to the lowest performing student. And within there is the levels of one, twos, threes, and fours. Um, but there's also a variation. You can be a high two or a low two. So, what we do is our goal is to take some of the kids who were a high two, target those kids. Let's look at their tests specifically. What did they get wrong? What were their areas of strengths and weaknesses? Let's target those kids through RTI services because
032they're the uh maybe easiest to move to the next level. Um but we do that in conjunction with our RTI uh data which looks at three points. The local measure, the state measure, and then a district created measure. And we um give those guys uh either tier two or tier three services which are either five days a week or three days a week based on um how they perform on data. And I think for our for our building too when they meet as either teams or as departments, it's important to look at some of those specific questions and the standards that they're addressing. So if you notice that there's a theme where all of the questions under you know this standard the three or four different questions we were underperforming some of those other comparison
033categories that would be an area that we want to look at instructionally. What do we need to do to you know have more of an impact in this particular area and then what standards are we highlighting that we're outperforming those whether it's the region or the Boseies that type thing. How can that inform our instruction? Thank you. You're talking about the data and you go in and you analyze the data. Can you talk about the process? When does that happen? Is there a formalized process? Is this a committee, an individual? I mean, for us at the middle school this year in October, and I should say too that the data is not released to us until it would be great to have it over the summer so that that can inform some of our inservice
034days. That's too big to be true, but for us, we typically get it sometime late September. So we try to have in October um a faculty meeting where we are again just kind of anchoring ourselves back into reviewing and analyzing the data because as you can see it can be very complex um and every year we have new staff that join you know join our team. So we start with some introductory this is how we analyze and what we can glean from that our inservice day in November was completely dedicated to data conversations. So both for us at least it's both departmentwide and then they dial it into some team team conversations too and we wo in some iwiting conversations into those data those data chats but that was the the focus of the inservice
035day. We also printed a variety of different reports that they could review. There's the clickable links like Mark said too. So we shared that as well. Other questions? So one of my question kind of bridged between um the first two questions with that cycle. So Mr. Dander, you mentioned about looking at specific students. So we're not getting that data until October, November. So we're, you know, we're missing a good chunk of the year to say how are we really using that data to change real time how we're we're servicing these students and and really helping to to either shore them up or um continue. So in the beginning of the year, we rely heavily on our IT. It's the diagnostic at the beginning of the year. We administer that um the first full week in
036the school year. Um and we and we have a couple other assessments that we do as well. So, you're right. Our first data meeting, which happens usually mid to late September, doesn't include the state assessment data, but as soon as we get it, we do add that in. And we do have another data meeting towards the end of November. Um, I wish it could be more timely, but and that's where perhaps looking at some of those larger areas where you can focus on standards, maybe that would have a similar impact on individual students when you're focusing on those standards where we just didn't meet the mark and we were underperforming some of those other areas that at least can be a focus for some of our summer inservice work and then our initial conversations in
037the fall. The other question I had, I know that we looked, you know, probably a little bit for ease of the conversation tonight, but we looked at three through eight combined. So, do we see that we're like kind of consistent across grade levels? Do we see any grade levels where we have differing results that need to have more focused, you know, attention at or So, I I like operating that website. So if we want to do specific anything that you can dream of like you asked but we can prepare and it's fairly simple to just get credit. Yeah I think it would be interesting to actually see you know the the different grades versus you know once it starts to get together you start to see some some you know blending and and maybe not
038as discreet data. first thing, you know, you seem to be both speaking the same language, which means you're collaborating somewhat between the buildings, which is really good to see. Um, as they transition through, um, you had a list of key strategies up there. Um, you know, I'm sure they're all very important to you, but are there a couple that stand out to you like compared to the others like that have really made a difference or is it all pretty much even? I think it's all I mean I I I know for us just those conversations that teachers are able to have both at their grade levels and with their colleagues as they're you know planning and implementing and instructing and that type of thing. The additional instructional time for ELA and math has definitely you
039know contribute have been a solid contributing factor and I think all of them sort of work well together. all of the strategies can kind of holistically yeah the I just think it's important to um yeah collaborate but I think the curriculum piece is important and then you have to make sure that it's uh implemented with fidelity because it's hard to compare um things if you have one program on the surface but if it's put into practice differently that's tricky um so I think that's where it's important to have our team time where our teachers sit together they talk about uh what's working well with the curriculum pieces. Yeah. And I was kind of writing over there a little bit. You mentioned the team team uh concept. Could you kind of elaborate on that a little
040bit? Yeah. So, we have grades one through four in the elementary school and every day they have a 40-minute period where they have um team time where they get together. So, they all have prep uh period at the same time. So, all of their kids are either at gym or special. Um and that's when I generally meet with teachers and things like that. So um sometimes I facilitate the meetings most of the time the teachers do that uh but this is when we have our our data conversations is during that time it's a it's it's pretty important for teachers to have the time to uh within a grade level to work together. Um so they get together and they discuss the data they discuss kids and their classes. Yeah. There's nothing we can't bring to
041the table. That's every day. Every day. Yeah. Uh, one question. Can you explain again? I was a little confused on the slide. What grades are optional? What is what is a required? Trying to figure out if my kid's pulling a fast one on me because I'm pretty sure she is. I mean, the New York State assessments. Yeah, I you know, we hope that all students participate in in those assessments. Um but I think as far as this in implementing it in computer-based the state is saying that by next spring every district yeah next spring. So that is but that is just to take it over the computer. There are still some districts that could be administering a paperbased test for us. We have elected to administer it and through the computer for the middle school
042since 2019 and then for the elementary school too. Thank you. I'm a competitive person and I would love to see the graph for Williamsville schools and parents. We do the same thing. And the funny thing about it is we actually calculated how many kids would we need to move in proficiency to to be the top performing in the county because it's easy because there's approximately 100 kids in each grade level. So those numbers are the percentage is the same as a kid, you know. So if we want to move up three percentage points, it's only three kids. Um, so we do that and we we certainly pull priorities there. We pull Williamsville. Um, it's fun to look at and we can certainly do that too. So that's more that we could look at. Thank you
043so much. Thank you. Thank you. It's it's great to have some data to work on and uh, you know, we're a new strategic plan in place. You know, we want to this will be our benchmark and move to greater heights. So, thank you so much. Thanks for giving us that data. Okay. Uh okay. Financial report with treasury report with Mr. Ford's budget investment revenue status reports. Yeah. Kind of do is a blend the dashboard and the other reports. Um the big tickets for March was we got our our regular schedule state aid and then they also gave us what's called the spring sustaining advance which essentially is the May and June payment. So we took in between basic formula lottery aid and Bosey's aid about 6.5 million during the month of month of March which
044was good because we're starting to get down on the tax money that we collect in the fall. So this allows us to continue with the investments in the treasury bills. The rates are decreased a little bit. uh they were running 42ish, now they're in the 4.17 4.18 range, but still much better than they had been a couple years ago. So, continue to do good there. We picked up 14,000 of additional revenue during the month of March, which left us at 190 for the year and several months to go, we should be in the 220 range, I would think, by the time we get there, which is all excess revenue, and that helps with potential fund balance at the end of the year. As far as the dashboard goes, uh didn't really make many changes. Everything's
045tracking about the same as it was in February terms of expenses and revenues other than I tweaked the line for use of money which includes the additional interest revenue that have any comments. Any questions comments? So running about 550k ahead in revenue it looks like 250k in no you're about 300 300 revenue about 300 over invenue 600 okay fund balance 750 right we had 750 but this doesn't reflect a couple things that occur at the end of the year do some audit adjustments with our retirement system allows them and final health insurance numbers. So, we're tracking. Okay. Not not great, but okay. Okay. Good. Thank you. Um on the treasures report, I have a motion bring that to the table. Mr. Marshall second. Thank you, Mr. Fors. Anything there? Nothing there. All in favor? Opposed?
046All right. Moving the personnel, we have the pleasure of um approving the recommending to approve the appointment of Ron Tanelli to a probationary position of high school principal commencing July 1st, 2025. Can I have a motion to bring that to the table? So move second. It came very quick. As once again, as you know, Mr. Pashki a few months ago decided to move on to his next phase of life in retirement and we certainly want to always uh recognize his contributions to the districts in so many ways. So thank you once again Mr. Ashty. Um and as part of that process we uh you know run our hiring process this year we added a couple layers thanks to uh Dr. right? Um where we had students directly involved um in the process as well as
047a separate administrative team as well as a separate faculty and staff team um who all met with the candidates and um through that process and oftentimes this happened one candidate um becomes a clear choice for us. U Mr. Tanelli um as some of you might know has worked for Don Prior as our high school assistant principal. He also parent in the district of two here tonight, the three wonderful uh children and we're happy to have them with us. He's a resident obviously of Fredonia and has also really had some unique um and positive experiences in the last four years working in Casadega as um high school principal um or is that technically middle school? Gotcha. Yeah. Um, and at the end of the day, we just try to process all the information that comes forward
048during the interview process and make the best decision we possibly can. The idea is always to select the best candidate that would be the best fit um for us here in Fredonia. And at the end of the day, Mr. Towning was the clear choice. We're excited to have him coming on board. U we look forward to him joining us uh July 1. Um, we're going to enjoy our remaining time uh with Mr. Pashki here at the end of the year. I hope you enjoy your time at Casadega as you wrap up things there. But we're excited and uh want to welcome you to the district. Thank you. Great. So, we'll formally approve you and then we'll take some comments. Sure. All in favor? Opposed? Welcome, Mr. Tanelli. [Applause] Mr. Sure, absolutely. Do I need the
049microphone? Can I just not We're good. Okay. Um, this is I first of all, um, the the nicest I think inception because I think the first time I got hired here, it was over Zoom because it was 2020 and then when I got hired at Cassadga, I was allowed to, uh, come into the door, take my mask off, say hello to everybody, and then walk back out the door. So, this is really nice to be able to do it this way. Um it is also a little bittersweet um putting four years in to to another district and in forming relationships and and all those things that go with this job which are really important. But like on the flip side of that for me um being able to do that here in my home in
050the district in which we all live um is really really special to me. So I'm super excited about that. Um I obviously was trained by some wonderful people here um who were all on the admin team when I first started here. Um, and so I appreciate everybody uh, giving me their vote of confidence. Um, making me feel welcome already. Walking into the interviews, um, and just kind of knowing people and feeling comfortable obviously plays a part in that, but um, I'm so looking forward to getting started on July 1st and my my one day off on June 30th between I do appreciate everything so far. Great. Thank you. Thank you. Congratulations. Any comments? Um, well, we're excited to have you back. Um, good to see your face. Thank you, Dr. I should introduce my family,
051too. This is my wife Amanda, my seventh graders, Estella and Leo, who are twins. Um, and I have a ninth grade daughter, Cecilia, who is at a soccer practice tonight, which I could say most nights of the week. So, that's great. That's great. Welcome. And, uh, or welcome back. Um, and you know, it's great because you you've been here so Mr. ask you, you know each other, the transition, transition is always very important, you know, so it's great that you know, you have somebody you can transition through with and uh we're excited for it and we're uh we're also very excited for Mr. Pashki to have a great retirement, too. It is great. I know that firsthand. So, um great. Thank you. Um so now, uh we need to move on to uh Oh, that's
052except for personnel. Um, so we're moving into new business. Um, we need to approve uh the ballot for the election board members to the board of cooperative educational services and it looks like we have to do one vote each for five vacancies. But our life is fairly easy because uh we only have five candidates. So all we need to do is go through the uh the formal process. So um do I have a motion to bring that to the table? So moved. A second. Second. Thank you. Um, and the candidates are Linda Hoffman, Ron Catalano, Kathleen Shetta, Dwight Keven, and Anita Ray. And Anita Ray is an old former board member. Board member. So, that's that's pretty that's pretty neat. So, uh, yeah. So, all we need to do is approve that. So, all in
053favor? I opposed. Okay. And also we need to adopt the resolution for approving the 2526 tenant of Bosey's administrative budget in the amount of uh 4 million bear with me $4,36,957. Could I have a motion to bring that to the table? So a second second Mr. Marshall. Thank you. Any questions on that? All in favor? Opposed? And that brings us to our second round of public comments. So, it's basically the same as the first except it could be on any any item uh any topic. Uh if you give your name, your address, and please limit your comments to five minutes or less. Are there anybody like to speak to the board tonight? The states have my phone here. Okay. We know why, right? I got to put it someplace convenient here, though. Yeah. Well, uh,
054I'd like to acknowledge, thank you for, well, acknowledging my letter that I sent to the board. I think I had heard from you about my letter with my suggestions related to the budget and the school climate. So, thank you for acknowledging that. Um, I see in the paper that when you passed, I guess it was just last Thursday to put forward the budget before the public. I thought I missed that meeting. I was I went to Utah for a week to visit my son and family, but I see that you had on Thursday. And had I noticed, I was back. I was back Thursday. So, I am a little perplexed of um why you had that meeting on Thursday. I know in the paper it said that you had a timeline and so on and
055so forth. I certainly understand that, but I don't understand why with the time crunch you couldn't have done some preliminary discussions earlier like a plan A, B, C, you know, according to the what this the state aid. Um, I don't want to think that spring break played a part in that because as the CEOs of this company here, certainly you wouldn't have that same kind of a break. But, um, to a point out in the paper, look how big John, you came out in the paper. In the paper though, I was a little taken aback by I'm sorry, I have to find it. My time is getting eaten up here. where it said uh the superintendent cautioned against cutting any of the positions especially without further evaluation with the district and the time why can't
056you explain clarity on state aid decision need to be made that night on the final budget and tax increase I what I want to know is without further evaluation I don't get that about cuts because you've known you've known a year ago about my own position okay not to replace it so I don't understand in an organization why you wouldn't be discussing that all along like plan A b kind thing. Um, and then the board shared a desire moving forward to have earlier discussions in the coming years to evaluate staffing throughout the district. Additionally, the district will continue to evaluate the budgets for each building principle along with any potential staffing cuts moving forward. It's like, when did that stop? When did that go away? Um, isn't it ongoing? I I don't Of course, you
057should have I I'm surprised the board hasn't demanded it of ongoing discussions throughout the year. When did it go away? I was always under the impression even experiences with January you're talking about okay the numbers are low here maybe have to make some transitions so that's a little embarrassing I think for the district to even have made that statement about without further evaluation I was told last year when my job was like well we got to think about it some more well you've had a year so um in reference to just taxpayers in general is um the two I'm going to say again I mean The voters are angry. I don't know if the the budget will go down or not. I mean, you got your capital project, you know, the phase one, but they're
058angry. Okay. And of course, then, you know, Fernonia's tax is going up at that astronomical rate. But those two teachers, you know, that the prek has only like 64 students or something. That means you're going to have to have a massive kindergarten roundup to even get close to 90. Okay? You don't need that teacher, which who knows what the prek is. The same with the fifth. Okay? You didn't need to replace me last year. Okay, so there's 120 moving up. Have a sixth grade teacher move down and have one of those. Last year, the teachers even amongst ourselves were talking, oh, they're probably not going to replace her. We don't need her. One of us could be one of us could be self-contained, which is grades five and six are elementary certified. I think some
059parents and students would welcome having a self-contained classroom. Would be a very good scenario. I don't know what that big deal is. those two teachers, okay, top level are over $100,000 in their benefits. You're up close to a quarter million of dollars. That would have been a very easy cut for you. You no one's losing a job and boom, that's a gift to the taxpayers. So, I I don't it's smok and mirrors or something to say that you that you don't you don't see those numbers and and you see that. Um, so again in my letter I had also said I still encourage you to do a survey. Do a survey of your of the teachers independent of administration in the union. They'll be tempted to filter something and you'll find out about climate and
060waste and you'll find out where the weaknesses are. If you give that the teachers a chance to do that with some kind of confidentiality. So those are two that if it goes down, you should be able to do that. We've been so easy. And you know in my letter I mentioned other positions that really do not affect student achievement. I won't say it again. I made it as a record last time. One being assistant principal. You just don't just don't need them. You've got to get it's something so archaic about continuing to go to the property owners to you need to live within your means. Okay? It it just can't it can't always be. I was talking to my neighbor before I came. We have a sick cow and we're just like having the vet
061there and I'm talking about he goes it's like they're slitting our throats. You you there's something archaic. you have to figure something out. And um therefore I would encourage people that people I know are voting no on the budget because you had the opportunity to make reasonable very reasonable cuts to meet the reality of where the community is today. Their economic challenges and people are tired of the the same old excuses. Oh, you got to study it out this and that. It's it's there's just something very backwards about it and um just living within your means. You had the opportunity, you didn't do it. And I still say that should be plan A, B, and C. And the board, why you haven't demanded this before? I don't know. It was always ongoing. My time is
062up. Okay. It was always ongoing. Something we did. I don't want it stopped the last 5 years, 10 years. That was always a thing of discussion. So, okay. Thank you. I'm within 44 seconds. Thank you. Thank you, Mace. Um, just one comment. Uh we you know we did follow up on uh the survey idea and uh New York City Schoolboard Association they said that you know it's it's not our role to you know directly um poll the staff. It's it's not our role. Um but um thank you for your comments and you know if you didn't finish please leave it with us or email us again. Uh I'm happy to have a conversation. I I did leave. I'm sorry. I kind of missed the time that you sent it back and then I went to
063Utah, but I missed the time when you voted for it. But, you know, if you know, and maybe Dr. Zulas, you could follow up with Miss Stace and uh yeah, I'll have a couple comments and she knows I'm always open for discussion if needed. Okay. Well, thank you for your comments and thank you for the time and uh thank you very much. Any other comments tonight? Yes, Mr. Kevin Martin. Uh, just be very brief. I wanted to take a chance to take a moment to introduce myself. Uh, I'm a resident here. Just submitted a petition to run for the board. So, I'm looking forward to a future working with you guys and trying to bring this school to where, you know, where it can be and where it has been. And I don't want to
064say that I have any concerns. I want to sit down and listen and see where you guys are at. and um lived in the district for four years now. Um but uh was a tuition kid a long long time ago and moved back into the area uh for work and then kind of retired. But so I've got some flexibility now and want to have some um have some involvement in the community that I didn't get a chance to have when I first moved back 10 12 years ago. So um my family lives here, two kids in the district. It's it's a you know it's an honor for me to be able to do this and I just wanted to take a second to introduce myself. Thank you. Thank you for coming to Mr. Martin and
065uh you know thank you for putting in your uh your uh putting your hand up to be on the board and volunteer your time. Absolutely. It's a rewarding you know thing. It really is. So thank you. Any comments at all? Thanks for coming. Um okay. So, let's see. Are there any other comments from the board tonight? Um, all right. One more superintendent report. All right. Thank you. Um, just to respond to a couple of the comments here uh during public session. So, the reason the the the meeting we created an additional meeting on the 24th is that we needed to make a decision on our budget by the 25th. And unfortunately, New York State still at this hour, although it sounds like there's a verbal agreement that they have a budget um that we should
066be getting information about um New York State despite the April one deadline, still hadn't given us um final state aid numbers, and we felt that was really important. We were trying to wait till the last minute. We recognized in our meeting prior to the one on the 24th that it's a little bit unusual to have a meeting over spring break. Um but we were announcing it then um it's been on social media um and through our other communication channels um trying to wait for that final number. The conversation around staffing is absolutely ongoing um and it it's really a cyclical conversation that we go through um even midway through a school year as things eb and flow with our student um population. So I think the reason that you thought there was some um lastm
067minute conversation about and I can't remember what what was the quote you used without further review because at least in my mind we came into the meeting with a certain number in mind which in in my mind would not require any staff reductions. However, in processing feedback from the community, there was a decision made during the meeting to lower um the tax percentage from 299 um to 259. And we were processing in real time where would that money come from and recognize that I don't know if in this meeting right now we want to make a decision about staffing and we got into some conversations about equipment. Um but really what we're doing here and what the board does is approve that final number. And once we have that final number, we'll figure out um
068with that change near the end of the process um where that money might um come from. Um I'm proud of our district. I'm proud of our faculty and staff. I'm proud of our administration. I'm proud of our board of education. um to think that we would be embarrassed about the work that we're doing. I I can't feel good about that or that comment. Um I feel like we're all working hard and I feel like we're all trying to do the right things for students. Um you had mentioned a few meetings ago that really where the rubber meets the road and where a difference is made is by the classroom teacher. Correct. So, in my mind, we're fighting to keep that strong instructional program that we have um and are trying to do it without taking
069away those people who make a difference every day in the classroom, in the trenches, in the daily grind, doing great things for students. So, you know, I understand we're in a a difference of opinion here. It doesn't necessarily mean you're correct and I'm incorrect. It doesn't mean I'm correct and you're incorrect. It's two schools of thought and for the moment um this is where we are as a district. And part of um my entry plan, three things really came to light that um people felt were really valued and didn't want to see um go away in Fredonia. One is student teacher relationships um and people felt that they were extremely positive. The other was the strong instructional program. the other was the wide variety of extracurriculars and other experiences we offer students. So yes, I
070will acknowledge here in public session um I am and we are fighting to keep all those things in place um despite some variation in state aids and despite inflation, despite all the things that we see happening around us. So um you know I think we're transparently and honestly trying to do the best we can and the right thing for the students in our district. So, um, I appreciate your comments. Thanks for being here again tonight. And, uh, I'm more than willing to have a discussion off the grid at any time, um, you might be interested. Um, beyond that, um, there are some exciting things happening with facilities. Prior to our meeting tonight, we did, uh, have a board of education, um, facilities committee meeting. We ran through the major things that are happening, but I
071just want to review some of those. We've talked about almost all of these before, but this is a good time to review. Um, this summer we are doing a $100,000 capital outlay project. Um, that mainly involves the playground here um on the main campus. The main um rationale for that work is really making sure that playground is accessible as possible to all students. There's also a small amount of work in flooring that'll happen within the district. But on those $100,000 projects, we are aided um exactly the same as a larger capital project. So 82.7 um cents on the dollar eventually come back to the district. We are also looking at an additional um project the following summer. So not this summer, but next summer. And one of the things that we recognized is that um
072and we appreciate Proposition One being passed and supported by the community. Um we recognized Proposition 2 and three were not. And one of the things that was the focus of Proposition 3 was our athletic fields and how we can really upgrade those facilities. Um one of the ways in which we can do that is through the outlay projects. Um we are looking at doing some work for our uh to our fields um down the road um through these projects. We're also looking at continuing to partner um with other organizations um who have facilities that might be useful to us and our student athletes as well as our coaches. um that would be part of um what's coming forward in May um to uh be voted on by the public um after the conversation with the
073committee. Um we are looking at really upgrading the softball field initially. Um we feel like that's a field that can benefit most from the amount of money that can be spent through one of these projects. Um, for instance, like the orange bowl would be um a lot more difficult to upgrade, needing more work um having a lot of other things involved in that facilities compared to um our softball field. So, um our planning for that is moving forward, but that at least in the moment is um where we're headed. As I said, we had Proposition one um approved. We are moving forward with the planning phase there. Um in phase one of that project will be the um resurfacing of the track, the um new playgrounds at Wheelock as well as the roofs at Willock.
074Um, in phase two will be all of the other work which really represents the majority of the work. And again, most of that work is maintenance and things that we're really doing to maintain our facilities, keep our students and our adults warm, safe, and dry. Um, and that's a little bit further down the road, but we're really moving forward um with that Proposition One phase one work um as soon as we possibly can. We are also thinking about you know what do our projects look like down the line and um you know what would be the sequencing of projects in the future. We will have some debt falling off around 202728. Um at that time we'd be able to do about $4.4 million project with no tax impact. Um and then again in 2032 333
075we also have some debt falling off and that's a little bit further down the road but we'll have be able to do some work that would not have a tax impact as well. So we're excited about what's coming with our facilities. Again we appreciate our community for supporting Proposition One. We're glad to have some other options for how we can make some upgrades um that aren't addressed in Proposition One. And uh if the board has any questions at this point, another thing that came up in conversation um recently is the state put information out about what's being called literacy at astation. Dr. Wright's been doing a lot of work in this area. I was just asking her to hit the highlights tonight, maybe two, three minutes. Um just reminding the board what this is and
076what the work we'll have to engage in to uh produce what the state is asking us to do. Thank you. Yes. Yes. Um I gave each of you you have in front of you um what Mark and um Andrea Marsh assistant principal at the middle school and myself met with all of the grade levels UPK through six and special area teachers um to ensure everybody's understanding of this. And right now the state is only asking for UPK3, but we really believe that pretty soon that'll go fully to um elementary 6, which is sixth grade, and then likely it'll continue, the thread will continue up. Um and knowing that, you know, elementary does go through sixth grade, we want to make sure that those conversations are happening not just horizontally, but vertically. So um as I
077shared before, we attended the live state Zoom where they shared these for the first time with us, and they said they'd be giving us a rubric. um where we have to attest that's the add astation part of this to what we are doing in literacy here as a district in each of those grades UPK K12 and three um and that's based on six pillars and so at the time when we had this webinar they said that they'd be sharing that rubric in February and so we really wanted to wait to have those meetings so that we had this rubric because we knew that would be the question well what is it going to look like so they didn't come out in February they were supposed to come out in early March we had paused the
078meetings things and finally I said we're just going to go ahead and meet and share what we have and so all of the groups had this along with some other information and then the rubric came out in April. So one of the things was the feedback the state got was that writing was not evident here. They weren't looking for any kind of addestation writing and that was actually a big concern in our district as well. A lot of teachers were very concerned that writing had been left off. So in the rubric writing has been put in there. However, the document you have, the original one shared with us back in January was the original six pillars. And so, you won't see the writing components that are there. They haven't released a document to show us
079what exactly they're looking for. All we have is is this this new rubric. Um the rubric is in what's called the state portal, and that is something um that I have the uh good fortune to get to go into. Mr. Forbes and I do a lot of work in the portal with all the various reports and and requirements and things like that. So, it isn't something you can click on and see, but you can go to the state website and you can go to the office of early learning and you can look at any of the things that I passed out um to you to see. We presented at curriculum council today what that rubric looked like and we offered to any teacher um UPK through six special area ENL all of that um to
080join what we're calling our add astation team and that will be the representative body to really dig into this rubric to go out and get the answers we need come back and see what they need to be um and then we have to submit this at a station um by September 1st. So our first meeting is actually next Tuesday, May 6th, um with the addestation team, and we are going to just dig into the rubric and see what do what do we need to find out. Um when the state presented this rubric, you'll see that the charts talk about um fully developed, kind of like the rubric you saw with the testing, fully developed, partially, or not at all. And that they said that the addestation would match that. Well, the addestation is very much
081all or nothing. either you have every single component of the pillar or you're a known. So, it's a 100% or not, you know. So, um that'll that'll be interesting to dig into a little more to see exactly what this is um what they're asking us for. But what all you're doing is saying what are you doing? You're attesting to what you do right here, right now. The exciting part is is our literacy pilot. We're in year one of the pilot. Next year it'll be year two of the pilot is the HMH into reading series and HMH into reading is fully aligned with the science of reading and fully aligned to these pillars. In fact, they actually um I had reached out to them and they shared with me their guide to how HM directly aligns
082to these PK3 literacy best practices. So that's really exciting as we dig into it more. We continue our science of reading learning. Um, as I shared, um, Andrea and, um, Aaron Henry, who is a sixth grade teacher, I have that correct? I keep calling her fifth grade. I don't know why. Sixth grade teacher, and, um, April Power, first grade teacher, are part of the Erie Tubosi Science of Reading Symposium. And so, they've been doing a lot of work and bringing that back to the school. They're making a lot of these resources available to to us, excuse me. And one interesting thing that was not present there but is present in the rubric is that we have to attest to the professional development that we're doing in these areas. Um so which for us is actually
083exciting because we've been doing a lot. Um so so it's it's new. Um it's like I said brand new. It's going to be something that every single district in New York State is required to do annually, not just once. Every single year um by September 1st. So right now we have um four meetings planned before the end of the school year with a goal of having it completely done. Um we may have one day in early July and then what we want to do is submit that so that if there is something that they need fixed or changed or whatever that we have it back and we can use that as a platform for summer curriculum writing. So we really do have a proactive approach um set that Mark Andre and I sat there and
084you know kind of hammered out how can we do this do it early so we can devote the time we need um kind of like with the presentation with data that was shared with you um you know it's frustrating to not get that state data back but luckily we do our benchmarks in spring so we have this end of the year benchmark for students they do it as you heard first thing in the fall so we can compare that to see any summer regression um any gains from summer school or over the summer um you know and then we do use that early in the fall um professional development inservice day specifically targeting on data. So so that's where we are at. Great. Thank you. Yeah, you're welcome. I look forward to the leisure reading.
085Yes. And you'll see those are designed by pillars which is kind of nice. So you'll have like the first pillar I believe is um phmic awareness and just the grade levels it impacts and then you'll have the next one and it'll go through all the grades like that. So you're not flipping back and forth between all the grades. So that's just how that one happens to be defined, but any other material you want, happy to provide it for you. Great. Well, it's great to have your data in the future and look forward to seeing what it is. So, thank you. Yeah, you're welcome. Last thing tonight, um before at least the board members, we have a draft of the calendar for the 25 26 school year. Um there's a couple things I'm looking for feedback
086on. As you probably are aware and remember, uh our calendar is jointly created. at least the proposal that comes to the board of education uh between district office and the FTA. Um I'm meeting with Michelle Green, the FTA president um on Thursday this week to hopefully um solidify um our proposal to the board. And um two things I'm looking for feedback on. Um we've talked about half days a number of times. Um and the initial thought a couple years ago that we added four half days because we were fighting for professional development time. Um especially with our work around literary and work that was going to be coming with leader and main um we felt like we needed some additional time. Um in this calendar this year we reduced that to two days and in
087the proposal that you see right now in front of you there continues to be two days. um one is on November 25th, the other is on February 13th. Um again, the reason that we're suggesting that and I'm asking for feedback is we try to build in some additional time for professional development. At the same time, yes, we want these days to count as instructional days um towards our 180 count and that's where we have students in the morning and that time counts for a day of instruction. Um there were some good questions asked and Mr. Paskky shared some preliminary data with us um last meeting about the attendance on those days and we definitely do see a dip in attendance. Um what I provided for the board tonight was from this school year, the two
088days before the half day. Um and then the half day itself. Um in the um February day, our attendance on those first couple days, 92 93 dropped down to 84%. Um across the district, this number is a little bit um less significant at Wheelock and Elementary, gets a little bit more at middle school, and then we see the most absences at the high school level. Um, back in November, 92% 91% then down to 75%. So, I certainly um recognize um the decrease um on at least this example that you have before you. Um I would like the opportunity to try to think about how we could encourage students to come to school on those days. um communicate with parents that we're valuing um these half days and really encouraging them to um get their students
089to school or encourage their students to come to school, whatever that relationship might look like. Um but we're trying to still maintain a couple days in here or additional days in here for professional development. However, um we're at the draft phase. Um, again, this is a proposal and I'll have a little more conversation Michelle on Thursday feedback from the board. I'm more than willing to take to that meeting and share. It's the February 14th. That was their vacation day the next day because 11:26 that was probably Thanksgiving, wasn't it? Yeah, that was the last day prior to Thanksgiving. Didn't see Break that Tuesday. And then February, there's always a holiday then. It's before the president's day. So it like I don't think you can look at that and just say, well, they were half days,
090therefore attendance dropped so low because now that we're looking at the dates, it's like those are kind of natural days when people might pull their kids, right? I'm just acknowledging the attendance is low. I mean, it's If we said, okay, you know, are we taking days away from the December break? Are we taking days away from the April break to say what professional development, you know, leave those as full days somehow or what what are what are the op what are the options other than encouraging attendance? So I [Applause] think I I might have under I don't know if I misunderstood your question, but what my initial thought was so with Lunar New Year and with Junth and some other holidays that haven't been part of our calendars in the past, um we're really tight
091on days in terms of um meeting the 180 days, also building in the idea of the potential of emergency days. So were you asking if we didn't do the half days, would we then do a full day of professional development somewhere else? Well, right. So if we said the if you wanted to leave those the half days, call them still professional days, then we would have to have students back in the classroom, either take a day away from December break or spring break to have students back in class to meet the 180 because we would have we would have to meet 180. We're saying we're we want professional development. We're not going to have school and we're going to add back in a full day instead of a half day. Okay. Yeah. We would have
092to take from a date that currently we're not in session. Right. So it would be like December or spring break because we don't have time at the end of the year, right? Correct. There's no more time. Yep. No one wants that. Mrs. Sport I'm evaluating options, right? It would be an option. How many professional development days do we have? Um so we have five superintendent conference days which is unique to FW. Four of those can count towards the 180. Um by FTA contract we have a provision for five days. So technically one of those days doesn't count towards the 180 because you don't can only count four of those. That's just a side note. Um and then really in terms of straight professional development, these would be two additional afternoons. Um the other half days
093that we have are designated for parent teacher conferences um or exams. So that brings up a good point. You have the data for the professional development, but um it' be interesting the parent teacher conference half days Where are we? Do we have that data to see what that looks like in terms of the attendance on those attendance on those because they don't they don't uh fall on a vacation day the next day to see how that compares. Yeah. Last year, although they do tend to be on Fridays, um October 10th, October 17, and another day March 20, which are all Fridays. Yeah, let's see those that they um I mean I think it's you know I agree with Mr. Johnston. We're pulling out two of the half days out of multiple half days across the
094year. So I think it's it would be good to understand that data but also when you're looking at the middle school or the high school I mean we're losing a quarter of the high school on the two half days that we're showing right now. So, are we losing a quarter now across? I think we're missing a half or not quite a half. 142. Kind of close. 60. A third. A third. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. So, thanks. Thanks, Mr. Um I'm just embarrassed. I was wrong, too. Um I agree. If we're if we're losing a third over five half days, you know. Yeah. Right. And uh it doesn't seem to be as much a problem down in the elementary wheel like that's I'd be very interested we like weak in the elementary for those other half days
095um to see uh because it wasn't so much on 214 February 14th elementary we lock but a lot more right before vacation. Um, so yeah, I Yeah, I can definitely add that for you. I'm sure they have 45 day tomorrow. Sure. Um, any other questions or I don't want to give up professional development either. I I think it's it's important, but you know, how do we how do we find that balance? Yeah, sure. Yeah, I'm with you. But because that's a large swath of students to be missing. Is there any strategies that the administration might have or staff on how to increase attendance? Maybe we can look at there's any strategies that some administr you know others have trying to get the kids in. It's that's that's really problematic. Um you're missing out on the
096kids. Well, I think we've done we've done some things that, you know, different things that happened in the morning that are definitely have been more appealing to students um over the last couple years. Um kind of tapping into um some of the more fun events um connected to our pride initiatives. Um you know, I don't know how much we've reached out directly to parents and said, "Hey, here's what we're trying to do. We could use your help by make it a focus." Actually, I'm not going to put you on the spot right now, but we've got a student right here. You know, you know, she probably comes to school on those days, but maybe she has some ideas on why others don't. And you know you don't have to speak now but maybe we could
097glean something from our students. Second piece about the calendar is there's always been discussion and we're more half days here in June. There's always some half days with the middle school high school that are more for exams. Um for the elementary school, they are more geared towards thinking about um rostering for next year, creating reports that can be passed on to the next uh teacher of the students, um wrapping up data at the end of the year, so on and so forth. We have four half days designated for we lock in the elementary in June. Um, one of the requests or suggestions from the FTA is that those days are the last four days of the school year. So, in this calendar, if we had done that, um, it we would not have a half
098day on the 5th or the 12th, would it be the 23, 24, 25, and 26 of June? Um, that's a suggestion that's come forward recently. I don't know if you have any feedback on that. I know we have transportation for kids, right? But I just I do wonder if that's a burden on families. I don't they're not expecting that much shuffling with kids day. So I don't know. Is that worse for families to do four days in a rowce? I don't know. Probably a case by case scenario. I don't know if there's a correct answer. doing a lot of packing of other rooms at that time and preparing for next year like kids perhaps um you know there there's some of that that happens at the end of the school year but a lot of
099the the work um on these half days is more around the I was sharing which definitely takes time implemented like a pretty robust process for fostering the next classes and that takes time um same with thinking about, you know, what does that configuration of students look like at the next grade level um I had another thought there was a lot of discussion a lot of data and it's also the half days allow the other grades to talk to each other so first and grade and second grade can get together third and fourth grade can get together and you know fourth and fifth can meet together you know and that isn't something we can do when we have students because no I I think I I definitely appreciate the the value of the half days. I
100think it becomes the that point of the family like to to make arrangements one day a week or you know whole week and it probably is a mix but but it's also I mean it's the last week of school so they're they're transitioning into summer for their kids anyway. I don't know. I have no objection to it myself. You know, if I could just put one thing out there, and again, this is very centric to the high school, but the the readings exams during those final days would not have busing home for the high school kids for the late exams. If we do four in a row at the end, just there's only one Friday where there are weakness exams. So, it' only be one day where we have to struggle with busing versus three
101of those four days who would struggle with busing for their kids in the afternoon. But that's I mean we've dealt with it in the past but I just want to put that out there. It's a good point. That's a good consideration. Thank you. And Mr. Forbes we would basically need them on Wednesday. I have an unrelated question for June. Um, I've heard recently a lot of high school graduations the week before like on the 20th and 21st. Is that has that been considered? Um, we've talked a few times about um different dates, you know, um there's pros and cons to all of that. I don't know if we've ever talked about a date prior to the last day of school. I think we've primarily talked about um would Friday um be helpful? Saturday be helpful.
102Um, you know, again, pros and cons. Um, I think, you know, we probably would need to think about from you all processing information at the high school and I know we don't have a lot of kids that kind of go down to the wire, but I know we have some and we probably need to think about what that would look like or what probably what is our ceremony actually representing. Maybe it's prior to that. You know, this might be a great conversation for our our new high school principal to start on July one. So, it's July basically. It is. So, a lot of those kids are done. Amazing. I would love that. I thought I you know, we run into traditionalists. I guess that's always been the last Sunday. Why? I guess does it need
103to be that day? Yeah. I imagine we get more staff members, too. Oh, agree. That's been an argument in the past. It's always nice to have the staff there. Yeah. People leave. You know, it's the last day of of their responsibilities Friday and many plan to go vacation on vacation. So, it's not that we have poor attendance, but I think we would have better attendance. Right. I mean, but even the week before, even if a senior has a regent later in that week, you don't have the result anyway. So, it wouldn't have a bearing. We we do pretty much within a day of Well, so we we get them by the day after usually. So, I don't know if that would impact it, but just something to consider. Yeah, I think it'd be hard to
104adjust for this year. I mean, we at times have people who contact us. Oh yeah. I mean this year throughout the year it's too late now. But we can think about it for next year. Yes. Yeah. Lot of things tonight. It's on your shoulders, Mr. All right. July 1. Okay. Um all good there. I'm good. All right. Uh the next regular board of education meeting will be Tuesday uh May 6 at 6 pm here in the library. We're on the general comments and so we're late actually any comments from the board. Any general comments at all? Thank you for the presentation. Yeah. Yeah. Thank you for the presentation. That was great. That was great. Back to you, Mr. Bashi. Mr. Tali, first some advice. uh your fellow administrators love it when you have a lot
105of things to say during this portion of 10 to 15 for 30. It's it's usually appreciated. But seriously, um I just want to start off congratulations to Mr. Tenelli. Um he was fantastic when he was here. Um I was really sad when he chose to go to Casadega, but I'm thrilled that that you are back and I I honestly can't think of a better person for the job and I mean that from my heart. Uh, Mr. Sally is gonna do great things for our district and uh, I'm looking forward to seeing what great things come. You know, as some people have asked like, you know, Darren, is it weird, you know, Ron's coming in and you're kind of you're on your way out and be honest, I'm excited. Um, I I think that uh, you
106know, there are better things coming and that's that's kind of our goal, right? We want to always be moving in a positive direction and I think that that Ronda, you're going to bring a lot to our district. So, welcome and good luck to you, my friend. Yep. Um, we have a lot of stuff, so I apologize. I do have It's under 30 though, I promise. Um, AP exams are starting next week. Um, our kids will be going over to JCC, uh, here on Route 60 to take their exams. Um, I just want to thank, uh, Sarah Kineseski for all the work and and learning how to do the AP exams this year for the first time and structuring all the stuff that needs to go into that. It's it's it's quite a process. So, she's
107she's done a good job getting that done. Um just right before the board meeting, I was on my phone. This gentleman called me. Um he graduated in the 1970s and there was some sort of sport. He was trying to tell me what he was in and I think it might have been baseball um that they won like a state championship and there was something about it being like the only time something had ever happened in history. And he has a Fredonia Letterman jacket from that team that he's going to donate to our school. um and he said some other sports memorabilia that he thinks would be really cool to display that has actually been on display at a museum somewhere that he's just getting it back from that from that display and he wants it
108to be part of our Fredonian history. So I think that's amazing. I'm going to meet with this gentleman on May 9th. Um speaking of May 9th, we have our our unified assembly, our unified team. I don't want to take any of your your glory off of this one, but our our kids are going to be we're going to have an assembly that day where we're going to stop classes around 1:00. We're going to adjust our schedule a little bit and our unified basketball team is going to play against another team in front of our our whole school. We met last year, I believe, for the first time. It was amazing. Our kids were fantastic. It was just what a great experience for all of our kids to see and participate in. So, very exciting. Um,
109senior decision day is this Friday. Um, if any board members feel like showing up uh wearing any of your regalia from from previous lives in college or or wherever you you'd like to if if you didn't go to college and you are in a profession, wear that. But please show up. Uh we've got senior breakfast at 7:30. We'll be celebrating from 7:30 to 8:30. Seniors will all be in the cafeteria. We've got balloons that say 2025. We've got lots of food and the kids just have a great time with it. It's it's a wonderful day to celebrate with our seniors. Um we started kicking off leader and me student lighthouse teams this week. Um today uh staff information went out with our our first newsletter. Tomorrow information goes out to kids on how to sign
110up to be on the student leadership team. Um and then they have an option to fill out uh an application form. We're going to ask them to do a a teacher recommendation as well to submit. and then we'll be selecting team members to get started uh as a leadership team for me to to make good decisions for our high school. And I'm going to leave that to Mr. Tanelli uh to work to work with those kids and he has some experience with this. So I'm excited to have him here for that as well. Um the good news continues. Um I want to congratulate our valadictorian Ben Fight and our saludiatoran Andrew Cowan for this year. So that is formally announced and I met with their parents right before break. So it was it's a joy
111to always do that. I'm excited to to them at graduation and celebrate them. Um, I want to congratulate and thank Tom Donovan and Carrie Swatman who helped with the uh the game day that we put on over the break and it was successful. The kids came and had a great time. We ate pizza. We drank way too much pop and it was just a fun day. Um, super huge congratulations to Ray Dy. Um, if you remember Ry last year, I think he came in second in the country for the geography be and represented the United States in the global uh geography B. This year he was in the varsity version of that. He was like a JV last year and he came in first in our country. So, let's clap for Ray. Over the summer,
112he will be one of four uh students from the United States who will represent our country at the International Geography Olympia in Bangkok, Thailand. So, what a what an amazing option for him. Just just super proud of of everything that he's done and that suits have here. I think that is all I have. Again, appreciate you. Thank you. Actually, what's the date and time for the unifying meeting? Uh it is May 9th and I'm not sure it's I think we start at 1:00 in the afternoon. Okay. So we're going to squeeze all of our classes together. Uh be a little bit shorter so that we can all break at one o'clock and that's going to be in the high school gym. And senior decision day the day. Senior decision day is also the night. Oh,
113sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. It's not the night. It's this Friday. This Friday. This Friday. Sorry. Yes. And one thing, do you I don't I don't have an opinion about this one way or the other, but I'm just thinking the fellow who's donating. Should we do something a little more formal around it instead of like just accepting the donation? Yeah, I think that would be if we could invite him. He lives in Chief Dwaga, I think said. So, he's like coming down to the district. It's not a problem. So, like I'm going to meet with him on the 9th. That is the night. And uh we'll discuss what he wants to do with it. And then maybe it'd be cool to have him formally at a board meeting. uh come and do a little bit
114of a presentation and and have cake. Cake is good. Nice touch. Nice touch. Great. Thank you, Mings. Yes. I want to echo um Mr. Pashki's congratulations to Mr. Telli, too. We I'm equally as excited and he will slide seamlessly into our admin team. So, we're excited to have him join us again. Um we're kind of getting back into the swing of things with our state testing kicking off tomorrow. We um our quest has their one-day hike on Saturday and you might remember before break I think I had shared um kind of our pride and leader in me. We had done a pride madness challenge. So we're working through some details for what our next sort of challenge is to implement in our building keeping those pride characteristics at the forefront of our kids' minds. The
115committee met yesterday so we're working on that. And as far as leader and me, um I forgotten if I had shared that as a continuation of our greeters, we do have some applications that we're reviewing now so that we can expand the number of greeters that we have within the building. Um it was definitely a very exciting opportunity for many of our kids to at least throw their name in the hat. Great. We're excited to review those. Exciting and busy. Mr. Jo, we're just getting going again as well. I'm struggling to think of things, but I do want to thank the Lions Club. They sent We used to do like a mission screen a couple years ago. stopped with COVID. Um that that lady came in and they screened all our kids and that was
116a nice wellreceived thing that the parents uh appreciated like a free vision screening. So we thank the Lions Club for that. Um and I also want to acknowledge um the Girls on the Run program starts very soon. They have a 5K coming up which is always exciting to do. And then um that's all I have. Sorry. Thanks. Appreciate it. Everybody appreciates. Thank you. Thank you Sam. Thanks for coming. Congratulations to Ron. Um, just like and I really don't have a whole lot either, but I did want to say that the first unified basketball game was tonight at the college. I believe they played Dunkerk and they pulled out a win 48 to35. They came ended while we were sitting here. So, I got the score for you. So, so congratulations to them. That's really all
117I've got. And I imagine for State students, they the athletes showed up again. Yeah, I wasn't able to get there. I had some obligation between here and there and that game started at 5. So, um, yeah, I think it was a big event. Sorry, they missed it. Always appreciate the the athletic department if you're going to state having them cheer for the for the kids. So, that's great. Pizza for everybody, too. It's crazy. It is. It's It's an electric atmosphere. It is. It's huge. Next year, we should not do a board meeting that night. We should not No, we should not do that on on this night. No. I always thought that should be the last year because yeah, I think it's been in different places over the course of the season. Happened to be
118the first game, right, Dr. Dr. Right. All right. Thank you. Thank you. And extending congratulations again to Mr. Tanelli. We're really excited and it was really um great because we had high school students as part of the process as Dr. Zilak said and uh we had done a survey. So, thank you to Mr. Newell and Mrs. Moon that helped me with crafting that survey to send to students. I think I shared previously and if I didn't I apologize but I want to applaud the students. We had 297 students complete the survey and in that survey they could submit an original question if they wanted to and a 100 students wrote an original question. And then we also put in there you know uh what you know would you like to serve on the student committee
119if the date and time worked for you and um we had um 48 students say they would want to and we had 18 students participate as part of the student committee. Um, and they were very excited to see that the the hundred questions that were submitted, I give Mrs. Moon all the credit in the world. We looked at them together and they really were five specific themes. So, she took and morphed them into questions and the students were ecstatic to see their questions as part of the process. Um, and I know that they really really authentically enjoyed participating in it. So, I just wanted to to share that too. So, Mr. has that knowledge of kind of behind the scenes what was going on and the kids were really uh thrilled to be part of
120it and that really aligns with with you know our leader and me um mission with student agency and having students as leaders. Um and when we did that you know we had the faculty meeting the admin team or faculty team admin team and um the student team and then we took a break and we all ate dinner together in the cafeteria. So it was a really nice um experience for everybody to feel as part of one group and on the same team and part of that process. So really trying to show um you know what it means to live out those seven habits, what it means to be a team, what it means to be together and something. So that was really exciting. So it's it's really wonderful to have the you know board approval
121tonight and the the full full circle of the whole thing. So we're again very excited. So Dr. R, if I may. Yeah, I I just need to thank you. uh for doing a great job with that and I wanted to communicate to this publicly because a lot of my teaching staff came to me and said Dr. Wright did such an amazing job with this process and we don't always hear those things and I don't know if you've heard it so I wanted to make sure that I said it because there were a lot of compliments from my staff about the the job and how well it was put together. Oh well I thank you very much for that and please send my my thanks to your staff. Thank you Mr. Forest. Congratulations to Mr. Tennelli
122and Darren used up all my time. So, Miss Forest, welcome to to Mr. Tanelli, of course. Um, other than that, I'm good. Great. We're at the end here, except we have executive. Um, but before we go to exe thank you, Miss Days, Mr. Martin, Mr. to know that you're coming and students and apologies a little extra long for you tonight students but you made it through and uh anyone anyone up here can sign your forms. All right so uh could I have a motion to uh we anticipate the need to enter executive session to discuss public bargaining agreements. I have a motion moved. Thank you and a second. Okay. All in favor? Opposed? Thank you. Drive safely. Thank you.