001e e e but I look yeah sorry okay so fourth which is amazing um and I'm not aware of other um championships that were happening this week we number of kids are getting ready to go have the track Champions coming up swim championships yeah so still happen yeah and um and congratulations we had a second uh robotics team qualify for the state championships which are next weekend so that's very exciting for them and I don't if anyone else has any uh events they've attended or anything just thank you to our pto's and our building Administration and congratulations to our student scientists because it is both throttle science fair season and we've all experienced some really enjoyable and informative science fair experiments in your buildings this week so thank you so much for opening your doors
002and inviting us to support your students it's been great and we're looking forward to the Musical coming up so I think probably before we're back again next time the musical will occur so it's an exciting upcoming event of the high SCH so I guess without further Ado start sure so um as we know the last time we came together we're looking at the non-instructional side of the budget and then tonight we'll go ahead and be looking at the instructional side so we have our uh Administration here from the buildings as well as our special services and our Athletic program so we going ahead and turn over Lisa and then we'll go ahead and start again getting into that kind of third goal area for the board looking at the kind of fiscal stewardship So Lisa
003um thank you everyone for coming tonight and thank you to all of our our building principls and directors for joining us on the instructional side of the budget um and it's much of the beginning you'll see is the same as we've seen and we've talked about these um the goal board the leadership as well as our 2030 plan and um fiscal stewardship um do again we've gone over these the last couple of times and Ray did you want to talk about and so thank you Lisa and then just thinking about here as we can um are coming back on the 13th we'll be identifying the kind of those pillars as we look at coming out of the visioning work and so thinking about the work that you'll see tonight and the alignment of supporting IDE
004about empowering all of our children as well as of our adults to make it the best learning experience that we have inside of our schools and that's where then as we go to the next page we'll go ahead and look at the drivers so tonight we look at the school programs the professional learning that supports that and then the enrollment and class size that drives that uh across the district K through 12 and then so we'll go ahead and start on the next piece here about again developing the budget as we worked through uh thinking about the budget conditions presentation that we looked at last time and then as we look again at the non-instructional now shifting to the instructional and then right off the bat we'll go ahead start with that idea about uh
005professional learning and again as we look at the March 13th we will see that this is an area that so uh supported across the district and necessary that is is identified as one of our six key pillars in the organization so that's right thank you so um a huge thank you God bless you uh to the board and the Greater Community for supporting the budget to enable all these awesome things to happen in the school this particular slide is a snapshot just a snapshot of some of the things we've been able to do at the district level to support the schools uh which you'll hear and see a little bit more throughout the rest of the presentation um again uh thank you for your support so some of the slides feature um glimpses of some
006of our pbl work that we've done with the high school we sponsored a schoolwide training for them in November in February and more coming in June which is awesome and then we have a ever growing and expanding relationship with the Specialists of bosis who are really helping to um enhance our instruction across the content areas they have a number of excellent content Specialists who we partner with on a number of occasions whether it's through Innovation like with people like Diane Cunningham um mapping like curriculum mapping we've partnered with someone for the middle school and high school World Language um departments social studies whether it's designing capstones or exploring textbooks um as you'll hear about and math Lely has been um an area we've really um taken a deep dive in at the high school level
007and also at the elementary looking very closely at the Next Generation uh learning standards identifying learning targets there so some really great stuff um in the beautiful picture of step ciciliano in the top left he's going to kill me sorry Stephen that depicts one of our districtwide curriculum Council meetings that takes place in this very space but again a thank you to everybody who supports the budget which enables that structure to exist which is curriculum leaders integration leaders liaison grade level reps it's a way that really helps support the expansion of our work so we're thankful for that um that team in that picture is is unpacking PLC 101 something you've heard a lot about this year the budget has also afforded us the opportunity to partner with Dennis King and as our consultant to
008really expand both our understanding of plcs as a district guiding Coalition but also bring that down to the buildings as recently as uh Valentine's Day on superintendent conference day February 14th um so that's been wonderful another thing pictured here in the center there um is a day at increase Miller where Carrie and I participated with our advancing literacy consultant there and their focus this year is on vocabulary very deliberately decided among uh the elementary leaders and uh we at for in this experience she met with us and the teachers beforehand demonstrated a lesson and surrounding her which you can't see is all of us the teachers taking notes and then at the end in the bottom right we're unpacking the student work that was a result of that lesson talking about what went well what
009can we replicate what can we change so some really great learning has been happening with them this year also funded through the district um professional learning for the coaches themselves the instructional coaches so that they can be the best uh instructional coaches they can be um and collegial conversations last but not least that bottom left a lot of professional learning happens when you partner and network with people and that's a picture of people from sers coming to visit our Middle School staff and um muting with with our technology department to unpack how we've used technology in school AI in specific in the classroom which was really great opportunity so this is just a snapshot um but again so will take it from the district level to the elementary and you'll get a chance to hear
010some of the ways that they really meaningfully integrate belonging into their work at the elementary school all right I'll get us started um so creating communities of belonging at the elementary schools is is really important we do it in a variety of ways um one way is through Community reads where uh every class at the school has the same text and we select those texts to represent diverse experiences diverse cultures with the hope of cultivating empathy and understanding of different viewpoints and uh these books are primarily purchased through our budget so thank you and it is um one of the key ways that we uh Foster belonging in our schools by having this common common read and and a common sense of understanding and knowing and conversations that can take place across grade level classrooms
011and across grade levels articulated vertically as well do you have those conversations so like the whole fifth grade for example will get together and you pair up different kids that are not yeah we do it in a variety of ways sometimes it's just the classroom itself sometimes um across the grade we'll share sometimes there's some buddies um buddy classes or buddy situations that are going happening and they'll use the community read as as the impetus for getting together and having discussion so it's teachers do it in really creative ways that's great just to hear that like you're just not classroom and so you're building more of a community which will help Drive the belongings right and it's usually connected to the the a theme so the theme is embedded in our bulletin boards and our
012good morning messaging and our assemblies so the language often that we find or the vocabulary that we're focusing on that we're finding within the community reads is something that's shared and it's common across the school I should add I neglected to say the vocabulary focus is K8 so inclusive of the middle school with advancing literacy sorry but that was a beautiful segue to bulletin boards wasn't it yes hi good evening everybody uh so we incase we call them learning boards and I think like we pretty much call them at the elementary because it's an opportunity for classrooms to like visit and talk about the work that's posted there and so um we basically highlight Heritage months and um so the children get to see the different Hispanic Heritage Month or like this coming month Mar
013March is women's history month so it's their opportunities to kind of highlight some of the conversations that are taking place in the classrooms and the visual reminders I think are really important for elementary students and um our impact our impact team at increas Miller I impact and then Compact and then bam are all part of those conversations and planning some of the work to create a sense of belonging as well and like chrisy said it will be um some of that work will also appear at like a School assemblies or we all three of us have sharing assemblies each month and it highlights um some of that work as well in addition to the Social and emotional learning themes that we have in each of our buildings as well and then the Buddy classes that
014chrisy had mentioned um there's a picture there of some of the children um reading I think was yeah there's a buddy picture there and we buddy in different ways like in different schools like we kind of we have K to three and then we have 1 through four and then 2 to five or different configurations sometimes K to five the IES buddy up together it could be the common read and and any kind of learning activities are really engaging to build that sense of belonging in community and but children get really excited like especially like when they they see each other in the hallway or they see each other at different opportunities during the die sometimes siblings cross over too so the Buddy classes is really a great way to to talk about that and
015also the assemblies we also talk like highlight the buddies at assemblies to so another way we build belonging is through our morning meetings I think I think some of you have been participants in our um daily morning meetings but the students get to greet each other share something about themselves um do an activity get them up learning about each other um and then learn about the schedule for the day so it's really a great time um to also involve our inclusive practices as well so before you go to the I think we're going to the academic side right now yes so the morning meetings I I think there's a there's a way that like belonging us and saying hello and stuff it's like a micro wave yeah oh a microwave yeah that was pretty it's
016awesome it's been a long day know I was like y So reading reading to the kids not too long the kids they gave me a microwave I thought was pretty cool I just want to say like all of the pictures both from the the teachers and the staff and the children it just looks like everybody is having so much fun learning and it just that's really coming through that what you're doing is working thank you just also want to mention the morning report I think is such a great piece um sort of the the morning news that that shows across the whole school and there's so much that that gets Incorporated the kids get to be a part of making it I I love that thank you okay so so instructionally um you um most
017likely know that we started with an amplify science curriculum last year so we're in year two of this phenomena based science curriculum um which is aligned to the Next Generation science standards um it's a blend of Hands-On realworld investigations and exploration is very literacy rich in its activities and they have interactive digital digital tools as well um students really are empowered to think read argue like scientists and engineers um and there's really high level quality of materials that we purchase um through the budget so thank you for your support um we also wanted to thank you for um the decodable texts we purchased a lot of those especially for our K1 2 sometimes three classrooms um in these decodable texts they you know phonics driven but you see in the corner there's a a student
018there um reading a jump rope reader and we've all purchased jump rope readers they have fiction and nonfiction so you get to meet the characters Tam and Nan um and so the simple CBC words um they the characters grow and develop as they're learning their phonics and their tricky e and their vowel teams so you really get to learn about the characters and not just think about um the phonics but also the comprehension piece as well and uh math standards as Julia mentioned we've been really trying to take a deep dive into the nextg standards I'm really thinking about math Big Ideas you also see a picture of students with math math manipulative so really thinking about how to bring math to life and Hands-On through we've purchased um pattern blocks and base 10 blocks
019and Counting tiles um and all supporting students understanding of of math and uh the renovating and adding academic spaces so first of all thank you um for helping to support the bond vote and all of the great projects that are taking place across the district um and so we've been really fortunate to have um new flexible furniture furniture purchase for each of our schools um whether it's in the common areas that we have where kids um engage in some work or whether it's in the classrooms uh new lighting new flooring and it really does make a difference in children's learning environment and spaces so that's really been been wonderful and for the staff quite frankly as well it's really um a great like um space to learn and grow and then um in terms of
020focus on vocabulary um as Julia had mentioned before one of the six components if you will of New York State learning standards is vocabulary so we selected that as a focus this year and there's book studies that are happening at the elementary level I think at the secondary as well and so there's professional books that support our learning as well as the Consultants that we have to focus on vocabulary even today we had some virtual learning happening as well through advancing literacy as well as like in-person learning so um and faculty meetings as well that we conduct um in our meetings on a monthly basis so um yeah so there's a lot of great things and and I'll will just add that the decodables and the focus on vocabulary all like are really evidence-based research
021based practices that we're trying to expand and you're doing an excellent job of so thank you okay and before we dive into the numbers I mean lorine I totally agree and just entering the schools all the all the schools here uh just all the beautiful work that's going on and just how much fun teachers and staff uh teachers and and our kids are are having and thank you to everyone hard work here just describing all the beautiful work that's going on and in such vivid detail with with beautiful pictures and now just a pivot to what this looks like for Staffing and for enrollment uh this first slide is really just to uh remind the board and the community of our contractually obligated U goal and range uh by grade level um and then you'll
022see in the next few slides um that we're well within the goal and the range uh across the system and we'll just start off with um kindergarten and then into our Elementary before breaking into uh the Middle School Neil just a reminder the range is the absolute highest we can go to and the goal is what we strive to meet yes and you'll see that in in elementary we'll review that first and you'll see that we're just about at goal or even below goal in some cases uh but we're we're not at the range really anywhere uh maybe one spot we're at the range but still um well within our our favorable class sizes here uh so just a a a view for a districtwide kindergarten enrollment where we were in October of 24 and
023where we project to be in uh September of 2025 at 208 students and we project that to uh be the same number of Staff members at 11: uh and we have help from our demographers and I'm sorry Le I don't remember the name of the demographers but our demographers help with these projection numbers correct so this year yes we utilize bosies this year um but yes so these numbers do come from our demographers and we do look at you know multiple they look go back and look at all different type of data so to get these numbers so so the first slide and we did show um kindergarten overall in the district uh but we were also breaking out kindergarden each one of our elementary schools um you can see there's a slight increase in
024the total number of students projected at uh increase Miller that light blue down there in the lower right hand corner um is that uh current fourth grade class uh um now cohort going into fifth grade in September and requiring us with those numbers of uh four staff members bless you uh four staff members which increases the total number of Staffing from 23 to 24 at increase Miller so it's our recommendation and our at the moment uh to increase uh at increase Miller one um ft and you can see and um Ling back to your question about the goal and the range very favorable class size is from the average class size there can I just ask a quick question on the projections yeah kindergarten always seems to be you know a reasonable percentage higher than
025last year and it never seems to manifest come October right I so whatever demographers whatever but third grade fourth grade and fifth well third grade and fourth grade it looks like we're bumping up so it was third grade was 96 it's going to go to 98 fourth grade was 84 it's going to go to 86 do we know that there are new family coming in with third and fourth graders or are we just projecting based on historical realities that's they they Project based on historically looking over three five seven years as far as changes in um okay in movement and people are moving into the district and everything else okay so it's yeah it's it's an extrapolation of what we've experienced in the past basically we don't know that there are two more kids coming
026into fourth grade I'm just because I'm I'm trying to do the math to look at the average class sizes with the with the um goal and range in mind and so it's just helpful to know whether because those numbers could land in any grade really right and it could go the other way where few kids move out of the district I mean we you know I me is it possible that any of those are actual current students because these the the leftand number is the August 20 I mean sorry oober October 2024 so yeah it's sometimes those are that's not the actual size right now I don't know if that's the case for any of those yeah if you do if you carry those across diagonally so 67 in kindergarten this year projection of 70
027the numbers you're talking about swinging plus or minus to one way or the other are are very nominal um and so that's that again 82 will go to 82 next year and next grade 83 and second grade goes to 83 96 goes to 98 84 to 86 you're talking about two or three kids perhaps a grade level they're just looking at overall projections that they believe will come so which would necessarily impact the Staffing way for that yeah yeah we always we write the ship closer to the time right so these are projections so that four number like an average 21 in fifth grade seems like it's getting towards the lower size I I realize you probably can't get away with three there but if in the event that it took manifested that there were
02882 kids or 80 kids we'd reconsider that right in August or so we're we're showing you and in the community here where we were in October and what the projection is how and and this makes it look like this is a once or twice a year Endeavor which is not we we're constantly looking at enrollment we constantly talk about FTE um our registar is very dutiful in providing US Reports and actually giving us um just the heads up that there's um incoming students coming in and anything that she's hearing um she's been really uh Victoria Freeman's been very helpful in that regard and just communicating with um the school and the school secretaries um so it it it's a year round Endeavor and we do report on it a couple times a year here uh
029but it is a total topic of conversation we've had a pivot in summers where we've had an increase in kindergarten we've had to ask for another kindergarten section in in the spring of of certain years after um you know the budget so so that's happened in the past as well okay and I and I've already taken a sneak peek ahead here and I can you just help me understand so it says staff at the top of these columns but those are actually sections right and there may be more than one staff per section so if we're adding if we move from a three to a four it's not necessarily one additional person it could be more than one person to staff that classroom yeah it depends on the grade right it depends on if there
030if if there's may be a co- teach involved but overall that would be the FTE allocated to that particular classroom okay so it be it would be one yeah then I'll have some more questions on an slide sure sure so for Katona Elementary uh relatively stable number from 405 to 403 and we are um looking at that blue again and again it's the third grade cohort for next year that we're looking that would be four um staff members or four sections uh that would be that we're recommending and asking for as you can see this current year uh there are 60 students in that third grade cohort and with three uh staff members uh for those 60 children um and then if you look take a look at the first and second grade and then
031and the number of Staff um this year and projected for next year there's a flip-flop there of three and four respectively in first and second grade and 43 for the projected year which um we are projecting at this moment uh an increase of staff from 20 to 21 can I just on that for a so sure it the number has actually gone down right it's gone down from 80 to 76 from the pre previous year so current grade 2 is 80 we're projecting that same cohort to be 76 next year so it's actually gone down so we're saying that the increase is actually in third grade but the increase in the numbers to the extent there well there isn't really one here maybe on the previous slide is actually on kindergarten like to me it
032all just rolls forward so if you had 80 you're going to have 80 next year you're going to have 78 or whatever and and and that's where I think mean the cohort that's you're just loing the number up if there's a higher number at the bottom it's because kindergarten is larger typically agreed and that's where the demographers provided that number we don't necessarily agree exactly with that number so we're more than likely thinking we're going to land at 80 there's no reason that tells us any of our families right now we're going to be moving out of second grade coming to third grade so again if we go at 80 then we're starting with roughly 26 right off the bat yeah in that year they level thank you okay on to Meadow Pond um unlike
033um the other schools we're not asking for any recommendations here relatively stable um staff uh staff per grade and and average class size you can see um at at or below the goal these are great class sizes yes they really are very favorable yeah and and I would say that as well as is all of our schools and I think that that's the piece where even some of those numbers where you're looking at if you started right off the bat you'd be starting right at that 25 and knowing just one or two other students may bring that down so and in particular and some of our schools are not don't have that many rounds in a grade and so um sometimes it's like oh wouldn't that make more sense to you know bring it down
034number but soon as you do those numbers quickly go right up to 30 and uh and again the things we saw this evening and our connections with our faculty and staff that's what ends up you know kind of being L there so yeah but some of them are really on the bubble right I mean you see that 49 in kindergarten is going up to 55 again demographers if that were 49 I know in in first grade we probably don't want a class size a 25 but arguably you could have two sections there rather than three not suggesting for a second that we would do that but as fiduciaries for the district it makes a big difference right if we have 17 kids in a class or 25 kids in a class sometimes not always so
035I mean for me I do think the numbers are great because they're low but low isn't always necessarily better no I think that what some of the research will tell you here the numbers we're looking at here are at a spot where they actually can have a positive impact on student learning yeah because we're looking at some numbers in some areas where they're in the high 20s close to 30 I was actually talking with a colleague today who uh who um came to our district from not too long ago had 30 kids in a second grade class that's different experience than kids are looking at 22 to 23 not just from a teacher's perspective but from a learning perspective to the kid thinking if I'm a teacher I'm oh great I'm going to have four
036reading groups or five reading groups okay I can do that with four kids like I I don't know how to do that with 30 kids and so now I've got six kids in the reading group the reading groups aren't close enough so then it's kind to pay me an now pay me later because it's like then if I can't do that then we're going have to have more medial Services more as services so that number allows us to let those teach have a reasonable ability to break those kids into differentiation groups and things so we're fortunate very much for the community support to be able to do that um because the reality is as those grow it's just harder to keep track of exactly what those different students are think about a first grade classroom
037where you've got students who still might be at a early literacy learning skill and some other kids who maybe a year or two ahead of time and so how can you manage that if you're not able to break those into strong uh you know functional level reading groups or math groups and things so I follow yeah got a question the the rain is by contract or is a state mandate so State doesn't mandate size it's just for contract contract right and honestly best best practice is exactly where that goal is that you're talking about and actually you know we're just a little bit underneath there in a couple of spots and so um and the more complex our children are coming to us with different learning styles and different learning needs it's all more imperative
038that we keep those numbers in charge yeah yeah and we'll talk a little bit about this later as we look at some of our numbers at the middle school and the high school where because if you're a generalist then that's that that numbers your kids all day long but if you are a teacher who has you know five sections then if you got 25 kids at a section you're supposed to know 125 kids is it's kind of hard so try to keep those numbers down into that you know maybe you can average closer to 20 in there and so you got a number that's a little bit closer to be able to manage that cuz building relationships and belonging is exactly what we talking about so yeah so I'll be back a little bit later
039to talk about the Middle School en um but at least I think you have the next slide about elementary budget yes yes thank you m um yeah so the elementary budget and um I just wanted to say and I I didn't say at the beginning that you know this year like we've trying to show just not the numbers but also like where like you know what not what's not you we have budgeted the science budget but exactly what does the science budget where do those dollars go what do they look like um both on the social emotional side as well as academic side of the building of the programs but uh specific to the numbers here um so on the salaries um lines you will see an increase there that is is partially um contributes
040to contributed to the contractual increases as well as those two FTE now later on we will you will see how we do balance that out we can you know traditionally um we do budget for four contingency positions and since we're kind of really already allocating some of those contingency positions we are balancing that in the budget because we do know that it can go either way that there are some classes that could change and maybe it may not be it will maybe Net Zero FTE increase in one of those buildings um depending upon how everything how enrollment falls out at the end so um but we will talk about that later on in um in the presentation um and and then again as I had mentioned last time um Ry had um charged all of
041us with looking at the non-instructional components the or the non-salary parts of our budgets and really keeping them relatively flat so transferring between those lines because as we know um we have a you know major decrease in our revenues we have contractual obligations so we want to try and U minimize any impact in direct classroom so we we try to do our best to make any you know keep our other budget other than salary budgets relatively flat so equipment wise um there are there is no equipment requests for next year contractually again relatively flat is just really has to do with any just m minor contractual increases changes in um those contracts supplies is um is just a decrease and it's just again because we shifted um monies into the textbook lines um you'll see
042a difference between 23 um 2324 and 2425 again last um year we um because of some changes and projections we did purchase a number of textbooks at the end of last school year but again we need to incorporate those those pre- purchases that we kind of had done um last year for this school year we need to incorporate those back into the budget so that is primarily what you see there is that increase is um the purchasing of textbooks for next year and they're just regular the necessary textbooks for the program the decodables the classroom libraries all those pieces but again primarily the changes that you see are both contractual as well as those increases in FTE and some of the supplies from amplifies purchase in 20 oh and I'm sorry thank you for reminding
043me and then there's that big number in 2324 in supplies so um as we were going into the bond and we started you know discussing things with our colleagues and we saw everyone seeing great escalation and construction costs so we began a couple two three years ago to purchase those flexible furniture that we were going to use as a part of of the changes to our buildings and our classrooms so actually that's two years of purchasing flexible Furniture it just has to do with the accounting and when items arrived and when they're booked and you know and you actually have to charge it to the year that it's received and the invoices received and it's just how just the accounting General acceptable accounting practices that's what that is so that is three buildings of um
044of flexible Furniture over 2 years as well as a couple years of amplify U materials because a number of those materials as mentioned um are instructional materials if they don't fall under textbooks it's just again how State Ed classifies them because we receive different Aid on textbooks than we do instructional materials so that's just for the classification so it again a lot of that is um expenses that were maybe be a couple years expenses that just happen to be booked in that one school year do you ever do you foresee a point in time and I know it's probably more difficult at the elementary level that we're going more into digital texts versus actual books for some things I was going to say we we have both right now and some some of the expenses
045especially for science to is the digital access for the students um on their iPads so especially in like the upper grades and things since we've kind of shifted to computer-based testing which is a requirement of New York State I think we want to make sure that we have those opportunities for kids to do some of their learning on the iPad in addition to also still going back to like you know actual writing and and and workbooks and things like that defin like holding a book I know yeah it's true like the decodables too so like there are things that are digitally we access the math science um and some and some read decodable some readers as well some of the teachers guides as well you have teachers who are like I need the book in
046front of me with the paper and some who only want the digital version so we have both of those as well do you find that the digital version um is sometimes less expensive because they're able to push out updates easier and you're not know paper or is it kind of they chares pretty good for it's buying a Kindle book it's like you know a quarter of the price of buying a hard some of the particular the teacher resources and things those are always being updated so those are coming new so it's usually a subscription price that we have in there and then again as we look at also I know we're about the reading side of literacy house today but in the writing piece that we want to ensure that our our students are writing
047uh with pen with pencil there's the res is very clear that there's a lot more activity um um cognitive activity that takes place when students are writing and taking notes even as they get older and things like that too so you may see digital inking now that's that's a very different than typing and so but you're writing and that active doing that erasing and those thoughts and drawing so those are some pieces that you know as we think about the opportunities to to use use technology in a way that still gets students to actively engage is what we're looking at I'll just add which will segue us to the Middle School like um it's one of the social studies resources that the elementary schools used as TCI and social studies is an area where it
048is helpful to have digital resources that can be updated with changes and borders and names of things and Etc so I like how she did that something like that yeah exactly um and that is something that the social saiy department is piloting at the middle school so let's talk about the middle school before we do that i j so the the total increase in the salary line I think includes TRS and and Healthcare benefits and other benefits for teachers right salaries is is just salaries the benefits would be um 800 codes so but yet so not here right correct and you're looking at 2fd in this number to we talked about increas no I get but that's about 4% increase year-over-year right so I don't think two FTE counts for so is that contractual increas
049contach plus the two FTS is that all plus the two FTS yes exactly and and our contracts um with the way they're established with um steps and increases their changes incremental changes are different depending upon where they are on the steps in the cont that actually makes sense so it's probably more aggressive the elementary schools that it would be in the high school well it's not by grade it's by where they are on the steps like number the number step yes yes I think yes but I see what you're saying but yes but the number where they are and there's probably other factors that play for the other schools but I'm looking at the overall increase increase on the salary line out of school by school because I feel naked without my budget book so
050I don't know where these numbers are coming from coming in a week I know well you know so usually we have it in front of us and we're like oh okay I I can see where the difference is here I don't know what's driving that 746,000 which is a sizable increase if we took a ballpark number and looked at you know between a step and an increase of maybe 3.75% in the average you're talking just about $600,000 $550,000 just for that movement and then you have some FD on top of that with two additional and that's basically where you're making up the difference yeah okay so maybe we'll come back to this when we look at the other two schools but I think in my mind I think the steps are probably I I have
051to go back and review the schedule think theive are going through the St the Elementary at the elementary levels at the senior it right now we have we have a little bit of movement certainly at at the elementary piece but again that in general in any of those step pieces in between there plus the increase on top they roughly a 375 uh% increase and so putting that on top of here you're getting correct okay okay gotcha thank you you bet all right Jeff second time around I just wanted just to just so as you go sorry um no I just wanted to add that also as if you are looking at some of the other slides just so you know um also it impacts also is retirements which building people are retiring ATN I don't
052have that yeah so and that's not necessarily we have that in the budget book but that is like in the buildings you will see that the buildings we have more retirements you'll see much decrease because we're placing and we haven't gotten there yet and yeah okay thank you that's helpful all right now so thank you at John J Middle School um we are really going back to the elementary presentation uh just thinking about like all of the great community experiences the students have we try to take the next adolescent version of those events at the middle school we think about the academic behavioral uh social and emotional aspects of what it means means to be a teenager especially uh today uh so uh following kind of again our our elementary counterparts um this year we
053really put a focus on having CommunityWide monthly events as well uh so you can see some pictures of that uh in the left side was our October uh door decorating contest so all home bases decorated a door we had um prizes for kids and you know named door winners Etc a nice way to build some belonging um and the upper right hand corner that is our new inclusive playground if you haven't stopped by and seen it um we have some students uh who use that every morning on their way into the building their parents might drop them off and there's some spinny chairs makes me a little bit nauseous looking at them on the chairs but it just it gets out some of those emotions feelings about the day or just some of the um
054other parts that you about what the kids are and how they tick so um love that piece um so thank you again for your support there and thank you for um your continued support um with budgets um other pieces here we have uh belonging in the lower right hand corner around our um pep rally uh so we had all students come together we celebrated our teams we celebrated our clubs uh in the center you can see one of our clubs our Animal Care club uh that started a number of years ago now has continued to grow uh yesterday we had the sbca there uh with a puppy you know and and our kids just love that and they feel the sense of belonging so again even thank you for supporting our schedule be our organizations
055are allowing students to find each other um even if it's cross grades Etc it's an important part of adolescence uh lower left-and corner is our annual Veterans Day assembly uh where our entire Community comes together we celebrate our local community members in that it's just such a fun event and um most of our veterans leave just very happy uh if you know a veteran you might know that people were not treated well when they came back back had ill feelings of a lot of Wars so we get those comments every time as as our veterans leave so um all of those are are part of our monthly experiences to allow students to feel like they're connected in those disjointed three years um of adolescence so uh thank you for that we gave a recent study
056um about the feelings of belonging Etc that students have so we asked how many of you feel connected to at least one adult in the building could be a staff member an administrator a teacher Etc uh 94.9 % of our students said they felt connected to at least one of the adults um we we made it kind of like semi Anonymous so we didn't we didn't break down anwers by students but we did connect names um with our um counselors so that other 5.1% are counselors have reached out to the students to find out why they don't feel connected or if they might feel connected Etc so uh that's I think important work that we're doing and really just centering the idea of belonging at the middle school I said to the group before or
057um I don't know how many of you would go back and do middle school again but we're hoping that the feeling of belonging will allow kids to want to come to school and then learn and contribute to our our school in any way that they possibly can in any of the examples that you see there um just before I move on sorry I just made some other notes Here some of the other monthly assemblies um we have done a play preview in the fall uh so we just do one scene where the kids come together each grade comes comes in sees a play preview as like a teaser for the play we've got the next one for the Musical coming up next week um so the kids come in by grade they do they're going
058to do the big number uh from Greece uh coming up and so again trying to get our students involved see their classmates in a different way uh we talk about the door decorating and then in January when we talk about um uh New Year's resolutions we kind of bring the students together and say we just go over expectations again so schoolwide here the expectation it's been a while since we talked about it in the first day of school when you're all nervous and anxious to see each other so we just say like remember he are the expectations as we go into the second half of the year so those are our some examples of our monthly experiences for students again following in the uh footsteps of kids coming together monthly at the elementary level thank
059you um so some of the academic highlights um very proud of being in apple School of Distinction this year um again not something we were necessarily like pushing for in our work um but with then when you look in the lower leftand corner and you see students um podcasting so uh that came out of a science lesson uh what one of our teachers was curious um by one of our professional developers like let's teach kids like how can we do this in a different way and the recommendation was to take the science curriculum and say what do you like about science what do you want to research and then create a podcast so podcasts have to be about 2 minutes students have to create the music that goes in like the intro they talk into
060it they worry about their levels and what that looks like and what that sounds like so just a great experience for students that we're layering in the technology uh with the curriculum so really proud of that work um in the upper right hand corner um is our math an example of our math classrooms all of the math classrooms at johnj Middle School have vertical whiteboards that accomplishes a lot of different things so it's started in a um a text that our our faculty read a book study about building thinking classrooms uh really bringing um math thinking just kind of like off of your own paper making a little bit public so you have to think about that piece and then you get to learn from each other so if you're stuck you can just look
061across the classroom and get a hint from a a classmate or something like that um so that's really really important work for us and it just gets kids up and out of their seats and active which is another important part of adolescence um the middle one again thank you for supporting our schedule B our first Lego League I think you'll hear in a little while I think you heard earlier about our robotics team um at the high school uh Steve Zer one of the teachers at the middle school now brought down the idea of first Lego league and I think that might even be working its way into the elementary school um but just like allowing kids if you knew the kids on that in that picture you I mean these kids qualified for the
062state like it's an incred incredible accomplishment uh for that group of kids some of them to work together some of them to stand in front of um other people and share their ideas uh it's really quite an accomplishment for that group so we're really proud of them and again schedule B position so thank you for allowing the um students and the teachers to come together that's really a great experience for them um the let's see where we're going to go next uh lower lower middle the ancient Egypt project you've had a child go through the middle school you probably remember that or maybe the China Museum ancient China Museum Etc I'm really talk talking about students with public speaking students practice and practice and research and practice and try and get feedback from their teacher
063and they they work on uh just improving some aspect of research skills and public speaking skills and that's really an important part of again uh coming finding your own skin and and speaking publicly and then the last thing um on the lower right hand um we're very excited um to propose to you uh the idea of increasing one FTE to get teams into eth grade um again we've talked all about belonging and so belonging in that last year of really adolescence before the rubber really meets the road with the academics in the high school allowing us to catch all those students and kind of like um put interventions in place if needed uh challenge students if needed will be really important for us um the uh bonds will continue to grow on on the work
064that you know we have within students one of the things I'm really proud of is that students will be replacing a study hall sorry Ian if you had a study hall when you were in eth grade um but a study hall with more time for academics Ray talked earlier about um two of two of our teachers social studies and ELA teachers last year or actually currently yes um are teaching five sections next year with the addition of teams they have four sections so more time with students getting to bond with students knowing a a smaller case load of students students and being able to challenge them so we think about things like the Capstone project there's time for that in our Ela classrooms and in our social studies classrooms so again we really appreciate that
065um that support and I believe that that is it chrisy great job thank I concur it's really exciting to see the changes in the Middle School um and it it just seems like the kids aren't as lost as they were when my kids were kind of going through and it's really exciting to see how you're doing this with all of these different activities it's it's really encouraging it's a really hard time yeah yeah thank you Jeff and just as a as a visitor to the middle school it's been so amazing to see those events come to life and see uh the kids especially in that agent Egypt project couple of us had a chance to visit that so that was that was really fun um so just pivoting again to to the numbers and and
066by grade and projection from um 2526 and where we are in 2425 um really about the scene uh for the Middle School hovering uh just around 630 students um in that lower quadrant there that lower left uh graph there you can see where we are as far as a number of sections um per grade as well well as the projected average class size any one of those grades Jeff did mention that we do have a recommendation uh for eighth grade teams and uh we'll we have a slide toward the end of this presentation that we'll kind of put all the staffing recommendations increases and uh recommended uh reductions all together um in one but we'll we'll come back to that in a little bit um but I think I'm handing this over to Lisa to
067talk a little bit more about the budget and so now again um with budget with salaries it's contractual and again you know as far as percentages if you're looking at percentages we do have a number of uh retirements this year in um in the middle school so that is why um you'll see the difference and just as a reminder that you know you'll see a change in benefits though that's reflect on the other side because when someone retires um we you know they have a retire they have um benefits in retirement as well as we're picking up new benefits so wow we may see a decrease here here we you know we'll see increases in other areas of the budget um and then as far as equipment there aren't any changes um in relatively small
068changes in equipment and um contractually again nothing um really just kind of staying status quo there just some small changes for supplies um nothing um major changes there and um sorry I can't see this textbooks thank you and um in Texas books um the increase there in textbooks is that we are um changing the social studies curriculum for um next school year so that's investment that you see there and the increase there and then overall um the change again is mainly contractual changes questions good evening no Jeff I would not put back to Middle School bullied my grandmother my grandmother brought me Jord Das jeans after before making good progressing like yeah it's a good story first I'd like to thank the board for your support in US transitioning into the block the amount of
069learning professional learning that we have to do to make this work can't be understated so again I thank you very much for the the time that we've had with pbl Works doing what we call that slice training we had 70 teachers who received a slice of what it would be to teach in a block and giving them the experiences of what it's going to feel like as a student to be in a block so everyone agrees 82 minutes of lecture is off the table so everyone recognizes that uh recently on February 14th we had olster bosies come in Al working with the the team in terms of teaching in a block not just Project based learning but also how to use the time productively we recognize that every unit cannot be a project we just
070don't have time for that but part of this work is going to be identifying those Core Power standards that now those important um projects will be based on so that work is coming and you never know how the staff is going to connect with a staff developer who comes in from outside the district but I'm very happy to report that our social studies department for example was really they connected with oler very well they would like to perhaps work with them again before June and then what we will have in June uh 24th through 26th will be pvl Works where all the staff members will now have that intensive coming out with a finished product here's the template here's how you do it and so then it's going to be maintenance continue to uh let
071them have their Growing Pains also going to be a part of it and it's also we've had three years of restorative justice training and so in some of the the photos that you'll see up here I know you the board is aware of restorative circles and the impact that it's having and I'm glad that you know Middle School is also you know working with that so that becoming part of a district culture so thank you again very much that recognize it's a budget presentation but I think it Bears stating the belief that time outside the classroom can also be an investment so when you take a look at you know some of our Traditions here witer Wonderland for example community and culture day now had its second run and students are becoming very enthusiastic about
072it and it's nice to hear especially some of our top performing students say I so look forward to this day and so that that's great to hear Ian I won't put you on the spot but if you want to say something um yeah I mean it was our second year um I was a part of the group that planned it um Lee John J it was still a newer thing last year it was Community Day and then culture day as two separate things so Community Day um each class would come together in the gym we do circles and play games and then culture day was more about um I guess like ethnicity and Heritage there was basically a whole day presentation in the cafeteria everyone was free to drop by when they had a free
073most teachers understood if you didn't have one they just let you go go again if you did have one um so by putting the two together I felt like it was a great opportunity for everyone to learn about each other on a personal level but also I guess a more Collective level and understanding the cultures that people come from and how those shape people as individuals it was a great day I learned a lot and enjoyed a lot of delicious food too yeah it was great thank you for that thank you very much um again you see what's out there the different communities that are represented um again we've talked before about you know some of the lessons of Co that the students just crave relevance give me something that normally we don't get in
074the school curriculum so I think this is where the attraction of Workshop Wednesdays why it's still continuing to hold so these are things that again we are grateful for the time to do that uh what isn't pictured and probably has certainly helped students feel a greater sense of support as well as belonging has been our Student Assistance counselor and admittedly we weren't sure what we were getting uh when she came on board but uh the statistics are very very impressive to me since September she has seen 251 students and about 49 individual and small group sessions and of the 49 you know a majority were were either self-referred or referred by friends and so I think that's very very important so in addition to pushin work that she has done in health classes uh she's
075created groups for new students coming into the high school or into the district uh she's also now going to be reaching out to seniors soon who are now entering the second phase of the senior year and all the things that that brings with it sometimes The Angst and giving them a soft place to land and also developing those relationships and she's been responsible for helping us get some great assembly programs we have another one coming up at the end of March so we're we're looking forward to that and so I say with great confidence that thank you again for making that investment and it has shown just terrific value moving into academics once again I frame it in terms of Investments and what has now happened in in the most recent history again we we've
076gone through the the school profile our our students uh results are are well documented we are a high performing High School we're very proud of the work that we've done but the board of aded helping us make investments in programs that are now paying a dividends Deca for example that we brought back into the the business program we were at sort of a Crossroads were we going to invest resources in the business program or we going to look to divert those resources elsewhere so we took a chance on bringing in Deca and I'm just so pleased that we have 33 students that enter to Regional competitions this year at Rockland County and we have nine this week that are going to Rochester to compete in the states with the first place winners get to move
077on to Orlando in April no Lisa we didn't budget for that one there's no line in there Rory's my I got I got an old pair of Jord Das I can so students have embraced this program I think there's been a value ad here in that the we have Microsoft Office training so it's been broken down that students who were in business Dynamics they will get certified in word uh those in accounting Excel of course um law PowerPoint and in marketing canva so even though that is not directly a Microsoft Office they are working that out so and they are really taking to it they have their own Instagram account I'm told and their their tagline is not in Deca what the [Laughter] hecka I like this robotics as also emerged as a student favorite
078we are now up to three sections we have started with one probably up to 50 students beginning with two female students up to 13 so really and the success that they're having the the bonding that they're having the the work that's done but it's also it's an investment so again thank you very much for for making that investment and we see that uh is doing what we want to do uh so we've grown from two teams to four and so we're going to have 28 students going up to udica with another potential trip to Houston quieton we have a problem we money can't find the wallet these things work out they they will work out and is the robotics team still going into the elementary schools to show the kids I the other night yeah
079I think the connection with the Middle School in terms in like that the Middle School LEGO League we hosted a tournament the kids yeah the this I can't remember her name mced it and she was she was a high school robotics student she was amazan like funny and charming and um they're very involved in it it's really it's awesome to see the show showing the younger ones where they can go with it absolutely you know again even the you know this year's drama program of 42nd Street it's a it's a big risk for them it's it's heavy tap it's it took a lot of of dedication and uh but again it's a great investment it's not a large program by any stretch but what is there really works for these kids and it creates that
080sense of community for them and so we're we're happy to do that so thank you I don't want to steal Chris's thunder so he's going to come out tap later is that what you're telling us well and also thanks to Arts live for supporting the theater Productions they do a lot behind the scenes for that absolutely okay thank you Stephen very exciting yeah yeah for sure at the high school again back to uh Staffing and uh enrollment more enrollment GE um you can see in the total uh looking at the upper uh leftand Corner the total right now at the high school is about 912 students and we're projecting to decrease to 874 and as you can see um this year uh the ninth grade cohort is at 244 and next year's cohort um little
081more than 30 students um less and then you have your seniors who are going out and the seniors that are uh coming in for this coming school or for the 25 26 school year and that explains a lot of the difference of the 912 to 874 on the lower right uh we have the projected uh number of sections by department and the projected average by department and um Stephen can tell you much better than I can but they're high school still in the in the midst of um understanding where students are enrolling and and what classes they're going to take so these could fluctuate a little bit um but for for right now this is where we're projecting for 2526 we're in that waiver period And so we'll see where things shake out sure thank
082thank you and now to Lisa to talk about the high school budget so again in salaries um again we have a number of uh retirements um that's coming for June 30th this year as well as there were a couple retirements um at the end of last year that we were not aware of at time of budgeting so it's actually quite a number a different um quite a number of retirements between the two years so that's why I see just a minor change there in salaries and I just wanted to mention I know Jeff mentioned schedule b a couple times before just for those tuning in from home schedule B is um is the sitiens for our clubs for um for for those folks so just so so you know what that is and those are
083all those different clubs that everyone's been talking about and and musicals and everything like that so that's where that comes and that is a part of the salary line as well in equipment we have a decrease but that um you know the two years prior we did put um quite a bit into both the robotics program and the Business program so um you know so for next year we are we don't we're not um we don't need to purchase as much but that is the um thei two prior years that the equipment purchases were contractually again it's just a um small amount just has to do with contractual changes um a part of that contractual part is our Student Assistance counselor that is a contractual part of um a component of a contractual of that
084supplies once again because we had um some increases in other areas we um Stephen you know was able to reduce in some of the supply areas uh textbooks we do have uh quite a bit an increase there in textbooks and that is has to do with the World Language textbooks um and as was mentioned before um you know the thing is with digital versus our textbooks if you will hard cover textbooks is that you know hard cover textbooks you can keep for a few years so maybe while a digital textbook May cost less year by year at the same time every year you have that cost where when we you know if you replace you know physics hard book you know you may have classic physics for quite a number of years um but then
085when we have the digital version every year we have that cost um and most of our curriculums to have digital versions of the texts in the high school and so that's a really substantial increase percentage year-over-year are we anticipating you said we languages we're not adding any new world languages is that because we're now purchasing digital textbooks versus we or purchased both for World Language so is there like a is there an increase in purchase this year that represents that 85% increase there it's yes they're the textbooks the textbooks for World Language but we will have that would we anticipate seeing that again next year guess question so we're buying sort of hard textbooks and well yes and workbooks also in foreign language go get a lot of use so that's we pay for those
086every year replaceables so those will be that is something that we do have World World Language we do use now they use workbooks so that is something that will be purchased every year can't be reused correct how long do those books last how long will they last World Language books kind of depends upon what the state is doing with standards um so if we're if we're in a time of relative calm you can probably get five to seven years yeah all right we're off to support services thanks Megan all right well good evening everybody um so I'm here to talk about special services so I think in looking at this first slide you can really see the joy and the variety of experiences that our students with disabilities do experience in our program here in
087the district from gardening to reading to the aquarium to fun holiday experiences the teachers and the staff and the building Administration have really worked hard to bring all these rich experiences to the children and um it you can definitely see it and feel it when you walk into the buildings uh which is really nice to see so the budget has allowed us to develop a comprehensive Continuum of services here in the district and the Continuum allows us to plan and respond to a wide variety of student need in the district so we do have consultant teacher direct resource room in integrated co- teing and special classes uh and most of our buildings and you will see from the variety of services um there in the chart the services and the programs are related are listed
088you can see for related Services we have speech occupational therapy physical therapy and counseling and we do also provide some more specialized services such as teacher of the death behavior intervention services and assisted technology so this chart shows us the number of students with disabilities across four years and the numbers do show some slight variability but overall have remained mostly stable and so the top part shows the numbers for our school age students with disabilities and the bottom part of that slide shows our uh preschool students with disabilities and again that number has remained relatively stable over time as [Music] well this slide shows the level of special education of special services Staffing so again we have a wide variety of expertise in this area and some of our sta members do fall into two
089buckets so for example our chair our cpsc chairperson and our CC chairperson our um also psychologist and our board certified behavior analyst does fall into the special education teacher line um so they fall into a couple different buckets and we have four administrators in the department uh We've also been very lucky um to provide a lot of contracted professional development to the department and so our G&R Consultants provide a lot of professional development in the area of integrated co- teing they've also been able to provide support to our special area teachers at an elementary school uh to help our um special Area Teachers learn how to more effectively meet the needs of students with disabilities in their classrooms uh and for our integrated co- teing teams G&R provides a lot of uh coaching on best
090practices um coaching unsp specialized instruction data informed instruction through coaching sessions and a lot of followup so it's it's a really rich experience for those teachers um and we provide a lot of professional development for our special classes with their star and links curriculum as well as special education coaching for our special classes and for students who are considered twice exceptional um we are also very lucky to have a lot of expertise in the department so we're able to provide a lot of In-House professional development so um Dr Mary shoner who is our bcba and Ellie heighton who's our ass assistant of Technology Specialists have been hard at work during superintendent's conference days and half days providing professional development um Monica burmes also provided uh professional development to our teaching assistance and AIDS on the
091last superintendent conference days helping them Co better understand safety plans care plans what are the differences and what their roles are in that so that was that was very well received in addition to that we do um Monica burmes and I are certified uh CPI um instructor so we can teach we can provide the instruction in the classes in the verbal deescalation as well as the advanced physical skills uh We've uh Miss bermes has also done that for the bus drivers and monitors provided that um the verbal deescalation technique so again that was really well received and and I think um very appreciated by the bus staff because they do encounter some tricky situations on the buses um and then you'll see there is a variety of other in-house professional development in the area of
092consultant teacher direct um and also for our special class Continuum K12 thank you any questions questions it's encouraging to see the um rly Place numbers are decreasing despite the total number remaining class yes encouraging this thing yeah that's a very good point yep thank you and um to budget for um special services uh again primarily contractual changes um there really isn't any um FTE changes in that we anticipate in Special Services um you know and as far as contractual um a number of some of the contractual items have moved um to in District for example a couple years ago we were Contracting the bcba we've brought that position on in District um and so we've also like done a thorough analysis just to you know ensure that we're budgeting it um to meet all the
093needs of our students and everything but still um you know being fiduciary responsible um tuition um the tuition so the first line for tuition is um you know public placements for our students and the second line is for these placements and that is just something that's going to fluctuate based upon the needs of the students where they're placed and we also um have utilized begin to utilize some of our grant funding um our Ida funding also to offset some of those costs so um and so the decrease primarily is is just due to as you can see from actual expenses budgeting um just trying to balance between we always we can always anticipate um the needs of students that we do not yet have in our district so we have to budget for that um
094and just trying just to have that balance between um you know ensuring that we have everything we need for every student even those who are not yet with us and um you know and again just being responsible with our budgeting questions about special services okay great uh good evening uh first for the record for my next Board of Ed presentation I am going to use Steven jordash guy killed it tonight um so this first slide had an effort to reach as many students as possible and get them to participate in our program we're very thankful that the board um supports our ability to offer 78 teams which is a obviously a huge number uh and reaches so many kids as part of these we even Branch out to merge programs but when we don't have
095enough student athletes to participate to fill a roster and uh it not only allows us to compete in a sport that we wouldn't be able to compete in but it also changes the experience for individual athletes so give you an example like our swim team we only have a small number of swimmers if we competed in our league schedule we would lose every single every single meet simply because we don't have enough scoring individuals but we are combined with uh Fox Lane and we were the league champions so pretty awesome experience and then you also get that camaraderie with your neighboring school um and it also allows some of our uh individual kids to team up with students from Fox Lane in relays and qualify for the state championships which has happened so uh it
096really is um a robust program we're really appreciative of of all that you have provided us um these uh can you go back one just for a second so these pictures are our raing section champions for uh this year so far uh our men's ski team just won recently uh our women's ice hockey team which is a which is a combined merger they actually went to the state regionals um then you have our our two top Sloan werman and Andy Conan who won the section championships and then we're on to go second in the state both of them so incredible um as well as yep our women's volleyball women's volleyball women's volleyball team who actually competed for the first time and r ray was with us in the County Center when they brought it back
097to the County Center so it's a great way to uh to welcome the County Center back with another dub um you can go to the next slide now thanks so um here's really some numbers that are that are great here um in addition to the um couple big things here is that the full yep all right so if you look at our number of athletes in our uh from our previous season and our current season if you actually add up the the numbers of the first two sports season they are identical I think it's 671 so we are on an exact pace for that we're waiting for our spring season registrations and then basically once those happen what you'll see is those numbers will just kind of shape shift and shift down a little bit
098as we get now we'll get some three sport athletes will get less one sport athletes and and more two sport athletes so we're literally exactly on track from where we were a year ago it's an amazing number like our student body is nine was 912 it's all it does include our modified program so it's a combination of the two but that's still amazing and and it's an outlet that you're giving the children to blow off some of that seam and mental health ability and it's it's just a great program all around but and you've got some great caring coaches yes in the program we're very proud of them and appreciative of what percentage of our student body are are in athletics uh I'm not exactly sure it's just figuring out the math from what's behind
099you I was if we're looking at the high school only we're about two two3 about two told 6% of our are on an athlete at the high school are participating ethics again like Christian was saying before um kids now are access other programs that we would just wouldn't have an opportunity and go into something they said with a sister School District right next to us knowing that hey there's the opportunity here compete and compete and perform very well again kudos to Christian and the team to allowing to do that for sure and even as we started this year you know we weren't sure with our men's hockey team right Christian in the team partnership with his athletic directors we had to pull together and you know our kids were able to compete out there and
100do do very well they just they just actually lost three to two in the semi-finals of section tournament so uh they had a great season and a great experience more importantly which is what they all shared how many of the one sport athletes do you lose the club programs hence they're not multiport athletes yeah so you get um there's the number is a little bit larger than you might think we have a anyone of our students who is really hardcore about a particular sport we have volleyball athletes uh soccer athletes swimmers where they'll continue on the next season it's hard to say what the actual number is but we do have a large number of kids on independent study so they instead in L of Varsity option if they're in a a program competitive program
101like that they do that in in Li of their PE class um so it is a pretty a pretty strong number do you allow a athlete to do uh Club Sport and play a sport so as long as it doesn't impact their ability to you know do their part in the team absolutely yeah and certain sport Sports um it's a necessity like ice hockey because those Seasons run simultaneously um if you didn't do that there would really be no no program so here's the numbers and so what you're seeing is is last year's numbers and then you're seeing where we are so far today as the numbers are coming in I'm really excited you can look at we had two All State athletes and we already have seven from the fall and we actually are
102going to be adding uh a large number from the winter so that number is going to grow um in addition to the the New York The Scholar athlete team so you see that's that's really something we're super proud of and last year we were a school of Distinction uh and that's when um having 100% of the varsity teams qualify and receive the scholar athlete team award which is that 75% of the team of the individual rosters having a 90 average or better so we are 100% compliant with that which uh allow us to be I think one of two schools um that were schools of Distinction in in section one so it's a a great honor for and a testament to our kids ability to balance the two so our Unified sports has been probably
103uh one of the most powerful programs we've added in the past couple of years um our numbers continue to grow the excitement around the program continues to grow um we are excited with the potential of possibly offering flag football come next Fall that's a new program that's coming into into the section um unified is is a is a special education Special Olympics I'm sorry program that allows students with and without disabilities uh to represent their school and play on the same uh team together uh it's a powerful PE me peer mentoring opportunity uh whose goal is to promote social inclusion and understanding and I can tell you it's uh if you've been to those games if you have it I recommend it it's incredibly powerful we have a really exciting um prospect that we're they're
104going to play in front of the entire School body during jfest we're inviting a school during the school day uh we we did this with bar Hills last year and it was amazing uh so we're excited that they're going to kick off their season to start our jfest weekend and conclude our our festivities uh with the pep rally and stuff like that so we're really really um excited for that of my favorite games of the year and I've had three athletes myself pictures you see here is that team playing uh one of the guys giving high fives is Lucas to jakamo he's not only our leading scorer uh but a fan favorite so shout out to Lucas so we we talk about def finding success that's really our one of our biggest challenges and in
105doing our work with inside out coaching uh Joe man to National program uh that has really been really powerful in working with professional development with our with our coaches it's ongoing um we talked about how do we define success and this is when our students athletes can say within their team roster do I belong here am I valued am I creating these lifelong memories and friendships you know and can I do this am I receiving the support to feel that that I can be successful here and find a role and I think when our coaches look at it from that perspective they start really understanding that our most successful programs begin with relationships um and then those relationships turn into the work and the grind and the grind turns into the success on whatever Court
106mat field wherever you are um and so I think this is a big part of our work moving forward this is a work in Pro we're working towards you know creating the best experiences possible so we're very excited about the professional development that we've been working on so what you see is just a couple pictures number one um and a huge thank you to our Board of Education uh for our newly installed bleachers in the high school gym if you haven't had an opportunity to go down there um it's a college setting now we've uh We've really been able to change the experience to certainly a much more comfortable experience um but it's also incredibly functional um and we really it has a catwalk at the top which not only provides additional seating but we
107also have a Press Box area but then below that we have a one-of-a kind um area for storage that's lockable and so now all this equipment which used to be out in the gym is now safely tucked away not only it keeps those space safe but it also keeps the equipment uh in better condition because it's not getting the wear and tear being out just like that things that tend to happen so we're really excited about the space is completely transformed um the gym and and uh I want to get a special thank you um to when we this shape shifts in a given time and I know that we've had a wrestling tournament most recently that was an incredible experience and really upgraded um the the experience for everyone that was involved um but
108our custodial team led by Matt Richie they transformed that space back and forth and back and forth literally in minutes and it's just been incredible and has allowed us to do so much so a really big thank you to him um also our scoreboard project which has really been a game changer um Lorraine and I you know work together on this for started five years ago um and the booster club was able to make a very significant donation teamed up with our Board of Education and now we have really the best scoreboards around um it really has created a multimedia Center and can be used for so many different things so uh we're truly truly grateful for that and the the other piece we want a big thanks to um Mike Lavoy and his operations
109maintenance team and uh Paul Nell and Technology their behind the scenes work is what made the project come to life and so we really appreciate their Partnerships um and lastly I just want to say this is an incredible example of what can happen when our booster club and Bard ofed team up and do something really special for the community and uh we're reaping the benefits of it every day maybe a technology Club coming back in the high school to help run the graphics that would be fun I'll tell you the teams that come in to this facility and to our campus are blown away they're in awe there it's jaw dropping it's really really impressive what you've done um and here um on this slide is um com combination of both Athletics and health services
110and so for health services that would be our nurses for salaries and uh just some contractual changes and any changes that um are related to again if there's retirement in there um and um contractual changes mainly associated with our athletic trainers and increase in in those contracts um and so those are just primarily the changes that you see in this budget and for bosies that line is for the um the officials that come through bosis as well as the um live streaming of the games this does not include coaching stipend right no this doesn't have coaching stipend no Chris could you talk a little bit about the the health services piece of it and sort of how many nurses do we have and is it pretty static now are we any change since Co and
111so uh so we've been pretty static we have uh two nurses in the high school two nurses in the middle school and then we have one at each of the elementary buildings um what's Chang what continues to change is the needs um we do have a lot of students that are medically fragile that need uh a lot of care throughout the day so you know they're incredibly busy throughout the day each of those I know those Elementary offices have been incredibly busy uh with high volume at the high school middle school so that that's pretty we're we're seeing a little change in the volume has has definitely a postco Spike remains with us um but that all depends on you know the the group of students that are coming through at a particular time yeah
112that makes sense but we're we're adequately staffed for yeah yep yep always our biggest challenges around um subs and fing them and things like that so we continue to work on that but as far as from a building perspective we're in good shape well and the extra staff allows us to find Subs within the district so sometimes our our like second nurse will go to the elementary school but we know that there's an absence so they get to know the kids manage it internally we're not looking externally so we do everything we can to make sure every building always has a nurse present uh during during hours so we'll pull from the high school middle school if necessary um if we're if we're not finding Subs to make that happen okay thanks and I I'm
113sorry Ro I to double check this does have our coaches in it it's our nurses and our coaches in here coaching stons are in okay helpful thank you okay as promised uh we'll bring it all together with staff and changes on back again uh so the following slide U just reflects the budget to budget changes and we we'll go through those one by one so if you want to live so as we mentioned earlier with Katon Elementary and increase Elementary uh with an increase uh in staff there at one at each School uh we are recommending a total of an increase of two elementary teachers uh again one at KAS and one at increase Miller we also talked a little bit about the middle school and um the addition of e8th grade teams currently we
114have a 0.5 Ela and a 0.5 social studies teacher those positions would need to go to a 1.0 to make the great teams possible which is a change of 1.0 um FTE increase and for those at home or don't know the parentheses are the reduction so in the next line down uh typically as the board knows and and some community members know uh we typically recommend four contingency positions and we've talked around this table about how helpful that is and we do thank you for that support uh we're recommending three going to this year not four and one of those uh we're going to use um as right now as it stands uh for the uh one of the elementary tees right I didn't know if did you want to say anything no okay um
115leading us to the next line and we want to make it very clear that that this five to seven number of reductions uh really has to do with attrition and staff that are leaving the system for whether it's resignations or whether it's retirements uh we're looking very closely um and we'll continue to look very closely um at uh people who choose to lead the system and whether uh we replace them or not um and again we want to make sure that everyone knows um that they're non-classroom reductions non-classroom teacher reductions which is a tentative subtotal of three to five reductions and I think over the next few weeks we're going to fine-tune that and um just present a little bit more about where they might be coming from so with that yeah thank you NE
116and I think that's the part where as we talked with the board the last board meeting we've identified what our current Revenue stream is and then the expenditures that need to match with that as I mentioned before again post $850,000 unanticipated drop of the revenues from the state and so that was kind of from those initial runs to then what came afterwards as far as some of the AAL raos dropped in particular from the wealth factor and their enrollment in the area so that's where these pieces are and again as Lisa spoke before as well staying as far away from the classroom as possible and then we will watch again enrollment numbers in particular grades or sections and things as we talked about tonight if something swings one way between now and the end of
117the year then we can adjust off of that um the same thing will be at the middle school and the high school as we watch those enrollments as those numbers start coming in the high school our children just went ahead and basically registered for what they believe they're going to be doing for courses next year and so as those numbers start getting crunched there and we'll make some adjustments between this spot in there I do anticipate we may get some additional retirements we now the end of the next year year so every time a position becomes open we bring it back to kind of our administrative leadership team and talking about are there other things that we can Flex inside of here again to meet the needs as best as we can the children meet
118this new um unfortunate very aggressive number with our increases in there and revenue being dropped and so that's a piece where we'll be looking at but we know the target we need to meet from an overall expenditure and we will we will meet that I think also the the um planned classroom sizes for this year are very favorable so I think it's I'm comfortable that the three contingencies instead of four is reasonable you know like we we've had other years where the projected were more cuspy in their size and so it felt important that we'd be able to respond to that but you know when we have like a 17 in a classroom you'd have to get 12 new kids to even you know to affect that so I think that's a it's a good
119place to to you know reduce if we can make sense yeah just great that despite these challenges that we're able to keep the class numbers that that's really an advantage agreed all right we're off to the last slide I think we've got um com up here again the 13th and I think that's when we'll we'll be able to give Rory his his back everything coming so we'll be able to get that to the team and again I really appreciate you know the board and my ad Ministry of colleagues being kind of open to the possibilities how we might just you know adjust this a little bit I hope tonight uh what you heard and felt and saw was the power of what's happening in our schools and everything that we talk about here and what
120we're trying to have the experiences be for our children from an affective to an educational and cognitive level is is um evidence and then when you get a chance to visit schools you'll see that as well and so absolutely we have a special community that is asking us to do everything we possibly can for our children and seeing the things and the success that our children are finding and the challenges they're putting forth um is because of the financial support that we able to go ahead and provide to our staff and so when we come back in the 13th again we'll take that next letter detail but our hope and desire is you had a chance to kind of dive pretty deep to see where there's any of those major changes were and again we
121looked a little different tonight by just breaking it out by building so we could kind of see as we talked a little bit before so one building may have for whatever reason a few more retirements so that's going to have a little different impact on the salary line item versus others that may not have that as yet and then even some text box changes like we T talked about this evening so we get a chance to look at that we'll look at the 13th and see how that budget presentation goes and then we'll kind of go from there at least I don't know if there's anything else you wanted to close as we down thank you I just have one question for step while we have you here as you're talking about block scheduling and
122students have just how did that go how how was the feeling in the school for from the students about you know were they anxious about they had one less class they could sign up for or were they excited been a little bit of everything I think for the most part they're kind of making peace with it and they all just say the same thing please promise US you're not going to talk for 82 minutes and I think that's a reasonable demand of theirs and and we'll meet it that's great thank you can I just make one quick comment too I noticed this year that all of you made a point of thanking the board and you know we've seen that from time to time but it was very obvious that everybody made a concerned effort
123to say thank you to the board uh I just return that gratitude it takes a lot on each of your parts to come up with the types of programming and to come up with those ideas and to bring them to whomever they get brought to you know whether it was Andrew in the past or Dr Blanch and to the board eventually and it really is our distinct pleasure and to see the return turn on that investment because you know we we get ideas regularly and we typically try to fund everything that comes from the school districts but to see the manifestation of those things and to hear your words and your enthusiasm is really super encouraging so thank you guys uh very much for your really wonderful ideas and and what you're bringing forward to
124us thank you so I mean I think the other piece of it is it's really thank you to the community right know we're the stewards of of this process but ultimately they're voting yes and they should be really proud of what they're supporting um and I think you know Ray proposed we're we're getting our uh budget binders at the same time as we normally do and Ray sort of asked that we sort of decouple talking about the programs with the sort of review at at the more detailed level so that we could really engage with what you're presenting us and I do think it had that effect so thank you for for doing that I think it was really nice to just sort of have a conversation about fundamentally what are what are the core
125pieces of this budget and how does it support children um and you guys evidenced that to us beautifully so just really thank you for for bringing us your stories and and um for your work and you know we're excited to look at sort of more granular stuff um but I think it's been really nice to see that sort of high level um process and and what it's bringing to our students and I I want to specifically say the Middle School really um for the district has been an area of um opportunity for us and I really you know thank you for the work that you're doing because I think it it seems to really be coming together into a place that's really supporting our kids through those three years that are awkward and um and
126getting them to the high school in a really really nice position so thank you for that work thanks I was just going to say this is obviously my first year going through this but one of the things that I think is really excited along the lines of what Warrior was saying in terms of bringing new ideas they're not small ideas there's so many big ideas from block scheduling to the professional learning communities to the Project based learning so there's a lot of Big Ideas that involve a lot of people and a lot of coordination and we just see a lot of enthusiasm and commitment to making these things work and ultimately to the benefit of children so um really appreciate everyone's um eagerness to to to engage in these big ideas and and and big
127changes thank you Julie thank you everybody appreciate being here tonight so thank you thank you right everyone can go but uh I got we have questions thanks everybody the MERS thank you guys you thanks again everyone we really appreciate you being here so um this takes us to item 7.02 which is a resolution regarding a decision from our school physician and wonder if someone would like to move the resolution to um uphold the decision of the school physician motion by Rory seconded by Lorraine all those in favor 70 great thank you um and this brings us to item 8.01 which is the opportunity for public forum um and Craig Carol is I think the only one signed up um so please join us and um as you've heard me say before Craig this is an
128opportunity for us to listen to um your thoughts um you have three minutes and um you know if you can just introduce yourself that would be great I think everybody knows who I am but my name is Craig Caroll my son attends increase Miller this is my fifth consecutive meeting where I have expressed my concerns and advocated for the safety of our students despite my ongoing efforts to address these safety matters my efforts my efforts are in vain no one has reached out to even arrange a meeting with concerned parents regarding bus safety and the need for an SRO allowing the situation to persist at each board meeting underscores the lack of leadership when I inquired about the possibility of assigning seats on the bus the district responded we will not be assigning seats as
129we want to balance safety with a sense of community and Independence for all students this does not appear to be a balanced approach ranking student Independence over safety it is unreasonable that one must submit a foil request to obtain budgeted figures for security and monitors allocated by the by the district this information should be transparent and easily accessible within the budget yet it is not the line items for security and monitors are not clearly outlined for taxpayers as other districts clearly do why was security not covered in the budget presentation perhaps because dedicating only 1% of the $124 million budget to security and monitors is an is an embarrassment after publishing a letter to the editors and local newspapers this past week I have re I received messages from numerous parents many whom I have
130never met yet they have raised similar concerns about incidents their children have experienced only to have their voices ignored no one from the district has address my concerns regarding unlocked doors in fact they're still unlocked here tonight apparently it was permissible for nearly 75 guests to enter a school during an active school day without proper identification was this prudent in today's world this District clearly prioritizes kindness openness and inclusion over safety this is an issue that could easily be corrected yet after raising this critical issue it continues to be ignored I and many other taxpayers look forward to the findings of the Alaris assessment collectively we trust the district will be more transparent with them the district must prioritize student safety by implementing assigned seating hiring bus monitors and ensuring the adequate security measures are
131established immediate action is required to effectively address these concerns your Hands-On approach was mentioned during the last meeting following the budget presentation should a student sustain a preventable injury on one of this this District school buses or should a serious incident occur at one of the district schools rest assured the district Hands-On involvement will be unavoidable and just lastly this is my fifth meeting here fifth meeting that I've attended I hear a lot about students student uh enrollment staffing issues health insurance issues I think I listened to a whole presentation on solar panels which is all great stuff but I rarely ever hear anything I don't think I've ever heard anything about safety or security other than the assessment that's coming this spring and that's concerning thank you thank you I'm going to close public
132comment and that brings us to the consent agenda would someone like to move the consent agenda move by Barbara seconded by Bill all those in favor 70 great thank you this brings us to item 14.01 which is an opportunity for any board's dialogue or discussion I know we had a pretty rich discussion during the budget presentation know if anyone has a the other thoughts or com I just want to say thank you to Ray for bringing this new format with sitting in a circle with instead of the podium I just think it has really lent to that richer discussion that you were trying to bring and I've really enjoyed it thank you R thank you that brings us to item 15.01 which is all of our future meetings so um on Friday Mar well um
133so we have a meeting scheduled for Friday March 7th for the sustainability committee that may be rescheduled um but currently it's rescheduled at 8:15 on March 7th in the district office but that that might be rescheduled um on Thursday March 13th is our next Board of Education meeting here in the library at 7:30 on March 20th uh we have a meeting scheduled with the Board of Education here again um at 7:30 in the library and again on March 27th March 20th is an opt is a meeting that may um we may defer to the 27th we like to have additional meetings during budget season in case we have um questions that we want the um Administration to bring back an answer for us so we have time to do that so we can um discuss
134that on the night of the 13th whether we want to do both the 20th and the 27th and then on Friday March 28th we have a policy committee meeting um in the morning at 9:00 a.m. in the district office conference room and that brings us to item 16.01 which is your opportunity make any comments no I just want to thanks again for tonight and hopefully as you know um our colleagues here tonight the uh welcome that you provided to them the opportunity to have that free flowing conversation is exactly where I think it creates a Clarity of of what we're doing now and where you can see we're heading and that's again the idea of this was exactly to do that and then as we come around and talk a little bit more of the
135numbers it doesn't kind of uh conflate with those to so so thanks again board for the opportunity thank you someone like to make a motion to adjourn for joh I was gonna call you po all is in favor great thank you thank you thanks Jor thank you