Board of Education Meeting February 26 @ Columbus Elementary School

001Good evening everyone. My name is William Inuzi. I'm president of the board of education and we are about to reconvene the public session of the meeting. Colleagues, can I get a motion and second to reconvene the public session of the meeting? >> Second, Ross. >> All in favor? >> I. >> Any opposed? Motion carries. Can we all please stand for the pledge of allegiance? I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. Hi everyone. I apologize for our tardiness. Um, we're going to make up some time right now. We're going to skip the announcement by board of education members just so we can get uh right into it. I will hand it over

002to Dr. Reynolds for superintendent's update. >> Thank you very much, President Ayuzi. Uh good evening everyone uh who are both here and at home. Uh in the same vein, I will skip most of my remarks and move on to uh please be reminded that uh the Newell Fund for Educational Excellence um is going to have their student achievement award and the foundation awards gala which will be held on March 5th at the surf club. If you haven't bought your tickets yet, please buy them. and upcoming uh school closings. All elementary schools will have a half day of school on Thursday, March 19th, 2026 for parent teacher conferences. All schools and district offices will be closed on Friday, March 20th, 2026 in observance of Eid alpheter. All schools will be closed on Monday, March 23rd, 2026

003for superintendent conference day. All schools are closed on Monday, March 30th, 26 through Friday, April 3rd, 26 for spring recess. And all district offices and buildings will be closed on Friday, April 3rd, in honor of Good Friday. We will be back in session on April 6th. And with that, Mr. Ayanuzi, I relinquish the microphone. >> Thank you very much, Dr. Reynolds. We're going to go right into our discussion items. The first being our Columbus presentation. So, Dr. Reynolds, I'll set the stage. And do you want us uh to sit up here, Mr. Gen? >> Yes, please. Yeah. Well, we'll have board let's sit up here so we can see the screen. >> Thank you very much, Mr. Gallen and Mr. Ayanuzi. So, I'm going to ask my board colleagues to please come sit uh in

004the audience so that we can view the screen. Uh please bring your microphones with you and bring your um bring your presentation. Thank you. I'm at a loss for words. So, again, good evening everyone. It is my pleasure to uh >> thank you guys >> to to be here with you in the fantastic Columbus Elementary School. >> Columbus Elementary School. >> Oh, okay. >> There they are. Thank you very much. Um so this evening we are going to hear from our leaders of the building led by our principal extraordinaire, Mr. Michael Gallant. who's going to >> walk us down our path of discovery as it relates to the learning that takes place here at Columbus. This evening is a little bit different. Usually, we're greeted by students, but you're going to see a lot of

005student work. You're going to hear a lot of student voice in what occurs here as our leaders uh uh talk with us about the learning that takes place. I couldn't be more proud of this building. I'm very happy that snow was removed for the most part. I'm so happy that we're all here. And with that, Mr. Gallen, the floor is yours. >> Thank you. That's what Kanye Corey. Good evening everyone. Dr. Reynolds, board presidenti, members of the cabinet, and of course, members of the board of education. Welcome. Welcome to Columbus again this year. It's an honor to host you. And especially now, I know the rhythm of board meetings really speeds up and you we are just one stop in many for you. So, um, it's important to us and it gives us a chance

006to pause and reflect and think of what story we can tell you a bit year to year to year to year. And that's exactly what we'll try to do today, just give you the next chapter of a story that we've been trying to tell for a few years. But with this in mind, to begin, I want to really thank all of you board members and members of the superintendent's cabinet. We genuinely appreciate your decent, professional, and compassionate motivations that are evident in my meetings with you and when I watch you guys on Zooms. Um, just wherever you are, your genuine compassion and volunteerism is evident. So, thank you so much. So, tonight I want to revisit a story that I first shared here with the board about four years ago. I'll briefly review how we

007changed our approach to literacy instruction to reading in particular and share some really nice data a really successful positive story as Dr. Reynolds mentioned the kids voices or the kids uh work will come through I hope in some of the data not too complex but straightforward real data that shows growth. Um it's a positive story and it began with some honest introspection and honest collaboration within our school. And I'll also proudly speak about eight talented Columbus staff who are all seven of them are here and who are receiving tenure this evening. But I always wish to start with gratitude and saying thank you. So I thank the superintendent's cabinet again this year for your consistent commitment to our school. I value your guidance and your faith in me and in us year to year in

008fact more every year. Thank you President Iuzi the best neighbor in the world. I thank you, but I also thank the members of of the board for your completely selfish selfish volunteerism. Say that again. What' I say? You're not selfish. You're selfless and you're all volunteers. But you knew what I meant. All right. for your selfless volunteerism. These have haven't been easy years to guide the district. This isn't an easy year to make decisions and guide the district, which is why we're starting, I'm sure, so late. Um yet your decency is imparent and felt within our buildings, particular particularly by administrators. So, thank you. I also want to thank the Columbus PTA, particularly this year. We have a new president, Miss Rosio Magayon, who partners with Myra Torres, and they've reinvented Yep. Um, those are

009all Columbus teachers who know that they deserve the applause. We, our new president has brought it and her son's in kindergarten, so we're like, "Thank you. I'm sorry." he was in kindergarten and he's such a selfless kid. He's a lovely boy. He's a good boy. He's not at all selfish. Um u but they've brought so much energy to the school. So, thank you. Thank you. I also wish to thank and so many of them are here just an amazing amazing group of teachers and support staff who year after year amaze me and motivate me without fail. Our school shines because this school, Dr. Reynolds, is their school. And this school, I'll say it again, this school is their school. These teachers adore this place and live in this place and don't leave this place and

010I'm really grateful for that. Columbus is their legacy. So, I thank again our teachers and alongside our teachers, I thank all members of the new Relle Fuse, but particularly um the Fuse leadership who's sitting here and Columbus school fuse leadership who are here. I can't imagine running a school that doesn't work well with Fuse leadership. You're an important and critical um partners and your critiques matter and your guidance and your support matter. So, thank you also this year, just one extra paragraph. Um, I want to thank our district facilities teams and our business administrators because you all just entered through the new entrance at Columbus. You walked past a gorgeous new office and this was many years in the making. Behind all that, I thank the board for um lobbying to get our our six

011minutes, 15 minutes. That's so selfish. Um for getting for the voters to have faith in you to have approved the bond that it came through with a beautiful um secure vestibule and a beautiful new office. It's sort of the last peg we were waiting for. The school is in really good shape and you couldn't have said that 10 years ago. So I thank our incredible custodians. I thank Ray Casher who I see is here and of course by extension Mr. Keith Watkins whose energy has made all of this happen. Oh my god. And our parking lot. How selfish of me. Cuz I've always had a parking space. So it didn't I didn't even I didn't even think of the parking lot. I was really mean that we have the most beautiful parking lot in the

012neighborhood. so selfish of me. All right, so here on to the on to the presentation. We begin we begin with a little bit of a sketch of of who Columbus is. We're a little bit different. We're we're a little bit different than we were even two years ago. If you've been around, you'll notice the first thing you'll notice is that we're a little bit less um just one thing, we're getting a little bit more diverse. We've always been, you know, majority Latino school, but more and more and more for the last 3, four, five years, beautiful black families are coming to Columbus, and it's really starting to feel different and look different and blend beautifully. You'll see that our school is about 11% filled with black students, and it's awesome. It's an awesome change. Um,

013otherwise, we've been pretty consistent who we are. We dipped. Our population dipped. I mentioned a couple years ago if you remember, but around the pandemic we lost over a 100 kids, but they've come back. We our high point was around 815. We're back to around 750 760. Um so a lot of changes and we're a little less um singular now, which is really beautiful. Our leadership team has stayed more or less the same. And I did some math and there are 10 people listed on this page and collectively we've devoted just to Columbus about 175 years. So the people on that page if you add them all up are 17 don't don't do that too quickly. I did it I did it like I sketched it on a postit. But I think it's about 175

014years of love for this school. And so I thank every person on this leadership team for their collaboration and contribution for years to this school. Okay. So here's the story I want to uh I want to share. It's a it not the longest story and it's not a unique story with respect to what schools have had to um I think responsible schools have had to do over the last four or five years and that's really take a a an a critical look at their own work with respect to literacy and that's really what we started to do about four years ago. This is who we were about four years ago. We were pretty solidly a school that would call itself a balanced literacy school. And the components of balanced literacy, not that I'll go into

015them, are listed around this map. And it encompasses reading and writing and different forms of uh instruction within the classroom, small groups, conferring, and different kinds of whole group instruction. And for the most part, I would say we did it really well for what it was supposed to be. and with some variation. A lot of the most of the components had equal weight and we tried to fit it all together throughout a instructional week. Starting about four years ago, however, the educational world, particularly primary education and elementary school education, you know, was really thrown a curveball with some serious research and brainbased um studies which forced many educators to just say maybe we got a lot of this wrong. And we really were right in the target for that. um the science of reading and

016the literacy wars or the reading wars. People said they were just coming like they come every 20 years. It wasn't that. It wasn't, oh, they just come and go every 20 years. Oh, they're reinventing the wheel again. Oh, this will come back. It wasn't that. It was it was based on brain um science and research and different all the MRI, you know, things that you can hook up to kids brains and watch them when they're reading. And we had to really um take a look at how we worked with um the earliest moments of teaching reading and teaching spelling and teaching writing and understand that we weren't doing enough with respect to some of the components that are listed here um with phonics and phenemic awareness. We were doing pretty well um with the lower

017elements, but we were just shooting ourselves in the foot, maybe you could say it that way, by not putting enough effort and enough understanding of the importance of the early um elements. So we started to shift and about four years ago um we again in a reflective way in an introspective way um started to shift started to learn and I to go a little bit off script really a lot of the people sitting in this room right here deserve a lot of credit for being bold enough to say this isn't working say that to the people who are in charge this isn't really working something's missing Um we learned new things about how you uh teaching phenemic awareness and a phological awareness which is thinking about sounds, hearing sounds, applying sounds, mapping sounds to um

018words um phonics instruction, making phonics instruction very very explicit. We adopted um after a year or so of piloting, we adopted a a program that's very solid and we're very happy with called 95% phonics. And we basically aligned a lot of our early instruction to the science of reading. And here's what we've become. So if we riff a bit off that basic map, the components that we worked on now don't have equal weight. Okay. Um it's sort of self-explanatory, but this is where our learning has brought us. And the instructional time that is spent in classrooms across a week and across a day have shifted as well. We spend a lot more time with very explicit um phonics instruction kindergarten through fifth grade. Towards the older uh grades, a lot of the instruction becomes about

019vocabulary and roots of words and more. But it's explicit instruction around phonics. Different components of what we of what was called balanced literacy also have taken on different levels or weight of importance. um with more explicit whole or small groupoup instruction coming to the four. So in a lot of sense I'm I'm stealing a word that became popular starting 3 four years ago. We shifted our balance so rebalanced the kind of work that we were doing. And so let's look at some of signs of uh what we can say how we how we done. So here's some of the resources that we apply in different um settings in different classrooms. 95% group Wilson and EUFly with our special uh education classes. Um and underneath all of this, our teachers have been open-minded and committed to

020their own learning. We've partnered so much with Dr. Roberts, Dr. KCO and um the you know the curriculum and instruction to support our teachers in their new learning. And underneath all of that um I want to just make a a point that none of this would be possible without our literacy coach and without the coaching that is now in every elementary school. So what does it look like? We all all elementary schools and I'm pretty sure middle schools use STAR for um a STAR is a computer-based assessment from we use for math phonics and reading. And if you look at our reading scores across the last three winters, you see some really nice growth. Um this is for the whole school. You can see that we have moved from we've moved the needle where more

021and more kids now nearly twothirds of the kids are either on grade level or right there with grade level and the the thresholds are pretty challenging. So even the children who are on watch that that's they're they're fighting at grade level they're there and that's fine. These are national percentiles and you can see that we've reduced the number of kids that are um you know at risk. Morgan, this is our local assessment star assessment. The story also seems positive when you look at state scores and now for elementary schools it's just five more minutes. That's it. So selfish. Um, our state scores tell a good story as well. As you can see, our our ELA scores for um the last three years actually have kind of rocked. Yeah, they've they've kind of rocked. I'm I'm

022going to keep it clean. There's really no other way to say this. I'm going to just watch my mouth. That's a beautiful story right there. Um, we shifted to computer-based testing. that had its own um you know dimensions to it. But if you look back and forth, this isn't an anomaly. This is who what we're doing. And it it it trends back from 3 four years. It looks even better if you start looking at the details underneath the underneath the blankets and you start looking at who our school is with respect to particular subgroups and how we perform. when you look at uh just comparatively to subgroups across the district. Um if you're interested, look at the fine print in there. But if you see how we do against districts uh subgroups and if you

023look at the composition of our school, you'll see just how amazing the teachers sitting in this room are. Okay. So what's some of the big ideas and the big takeaways? So the shift to science or reading was necessary. We we doubled our focus in some critical areas and th this focus just infected other areas of our instruction and in a positive way. And we're not done. We continue to evolve and this is demanded that we continue to rebalance and shift comprehension instruction and writing instruction and uh instruction in other areas. So, we're not done, but I feel like we've done the heavy lifting lifting of the first steps and done it well. Another big idea that I want to stress is this doesn't just happen by snapping your fingers. It happens by collaboration in the

024school. And that I hope it doesn't sound cliche because I don't want it to to be, oh, we have meetings, we meet. No, we have regular everyday team meetings, one grade a day meets with our math coach and our literacy coach and they unit plan and they look at kids work and they debate and they disagree and it's messy and none of it is possible without that. So, we continue to adjust our our work and we will continue to evolve because in the end it's about um doing everything we can to help support the development of independent and capable readers and writers. It's a nice story. And that picture in the middle, I'm gonna tell even though I know I'm over time, I'm going to tell a story. Um I I can't. That's Josiah in

025the middle. He's sitting with the glasses reading a book that said at morning arrival and he's in first grade now. And last year he started crying in kindergarten. It was October of kindergarten. And I said, "Why are you crying?" He goes, "I don't know how to read." And I said, "But it's a kindergarten. You're not supposed to know." He goes, "I don't know how to read." I don't know. And so I think this was maybe almost a year later and I walk by morning arrival and look at him. I don't know. That's everything. I mean, is the kid brilliant? Yes, he's brilliant. But I mean that's the story as well. That's desire. Okay. Um I want to talk about eight wonderful people before we go. Um and I can't look at my notes because I

026know I'm over time. So I'll just wing it in this sense. Um I'll start with Alexis Kendelario who's receiving tenure. She's receiving tenure for the second time in her life. and she's receiving tenure for the second time at Columbus School. Why? How is that possible? So, I came to Columbus in 1998 and the first person I met was the teacher who worked across the hall for me teaching third grade and her name was Alexis Candelario. And for 20 Oh my god, I did the math before I went. I've been here 30 for 30 31 years then. No. I've been there 28 years. So 29 years she's been at Columbus and for 25 of these years she was a third and fourth grade teacher. And then she very very bravely five years ago said I want

027to do something different. I want to reignite the love that I have for children teaching and she gave up her tenure and she became one of our ESL teachers and she's magnificent. She's magnificent and she is more more energized. If you could believe that people more believe it's true her family is here. She's actually even more energetic um than ever um and she deserves so much praise for the work she's doing now as an ENL teacher. Alexis Kendalli Christina Iraq is sitting here with um most of her beautiful family as well. And Christina is receiving tenure uh for the first time in New Relle. She was a very experienced special educator who's taught many different um classes of special education. Want gave a gave a shot at being a a classroom home room teacher. And

028when she came to Columbus, one thing that I remember about what she said is she goes, "I really want to get back to learning about a small group of kids and doing everything I can for a year to let them prosper." And she does that and more every year. She's a comedian. She's um she's always in a good mood, but it it she hides something. If you do anything against one of the kids, one of the classified students who she's responsible for, she'll smile, but she will kill you before she doesn't get what she wants. And it's exactly why she's here and why she's hired. She's nice, she smiles, and she's vicious. Anything anything for her children and her students. So, congratulations, Christina. And someone who knows that I'm right is her partner teacher, her

029co-teer for the last few years, Mike McGawan, who is getting tenure for the first time, who um is just one of those people. It's so awful to have to work with him because he's good at everything and it's like he's great at everything. He's going to one day be this amazing principal and great administrator and I really need to not be compared to him. but he's a fifth grade teacher. He's a fifth grade co-teer. He runs our afterchool programs. He runs our summer programs. He's a me a part of Fuse leadership. He's fifth grade uh team leader. Um there's nothing he doesn't do well. But when it really comes down to it, he's so beautifully organized and purposeful in everything he does for one reason. Every day is a masterpiece. like every 8:30 to three

030o'clock day is a masterpiece. Um he's good at so many things that I'm glad I'm over time. I have to stop. But Mike, it's a blessing that you're here. Congratulations. Alicia Parino sitting here with beautiful children and husband um knew when she interviewed that she was meant to be here and she said so. She said, "I I believe I fit here." And we knew it. But of course, you have to keep poker face. We'll see. Um, she's right. She was meant to be here. She's devoted to her colleagues. She's devoted to her students. She's devoted to her craft. And I think what she does maybe, I don't want to say better than anyone, but she does so so so well is she knows that great teaching begins with great relationships. And it's not hard for

031her. That's her that's her joy in September is learning who these kids are and learning how she can fall in love with them and she does. And then what follows is beautiful teaching. So congratulations. You do fit here. Okay. And it just gets it's harder and harder to find the right words for some of these people. Sebastian Orango, one of our um I don't know if I'm getting this right, Sebastian, but Sebastian grew up in the school. He was a student here. He was a neighbor here. His family is all over here. Even though they've dispersed to Florida and other places, Sebastian started as an aid here. Then he became a TA here. He kept studying and learning and now he's a second grade teacher getting tenure here. Um I I it's hard to capture

032who he is or what he does. Um Oh my god. He met his wife here. What's that? He runs our He did he did he had he has a lot of responsibility. He ran our soccer program on Saturdays partnering with Will. Um he sees himself in every child that he teaches. He believes in every child that he teaches and with his words and with everything else he communicates that to every child who's around him. I've never seen someone who is more excited of the next creative, curious idea he has to engage the kids in something messy, scientific, computer-based, coding based, rockets flying across the classroombased, and then do it a little bit better like next week. um that he brings so much to the the classroom and then there's so much that he brings and

033inspires that I can't really find words for and I'm sure they're words aren't even the way you do it but you grew up here and now you're here for the the long haul now you can't leave right so congratulations Sebastian and someone who uh the next person who is equally equally equally deserving of um to work at Columbus is Marissa Valencia. I'm one of the Oh, hi. I'm looking at your cousin in the back and I couldn't find you. Um I all I do most of the day is like, you know, make make jokes with Marissa. And there's nothing funny about this moment right now. There's nothing sarcastic or silly I can say about this moment right now. She's one of the most gifted um artists when it comes to working with children that I've

034ever met. And it didn't start here. She has years years working with Will and working with great mentors at the Boys and Girls Club. Of course, Marissa grew up around the corner. Her family still lives here. And her connection to children is um profound. Um, but it's only because she has this natural gift of bringing out joy inside of them. And she's done it for years. She may be new into a career. She's an aspiring teacher. Um, but you've been doing it for years. And just please keep trusting that natural instinct that you have about how to approach children and how to inspire children, how to console children, because it's going to be the the the core of whatever you need to do as a teacher. and now you're doing it as a beautiful TA.

035So, congratulations. >> Okay. Um, Ashley Ramirez is not here. She's getting married right now. She's getting married and she's been the big lottery win. Maybe the only great thing that happened with all the readjustments of staffing that took place across the spring and the summer. Ashley spent most uh for the last three years at um Jefferson School and was moved here with all our adjustments um in the spring and summer. And she's the lottery pick. She's one of the finest clinicians I've ever met. She's an incredible colleague. She is a mentor for younger teachers and teachers. She's a clinician and she goes into the classrooms and helps teachers with the most challenging students. She's um a gift the lottery win for our school. Um and she's getting married. Um but um and I hope she's

036not watching the Zoom. She couldn't be watching. Why would she? That'd be so selfish if she were she were watching the Zoom. She's you getting married. Should never do that. She's a wonderful addition to our school. Um and she deserves a lot of praise. So send it to her. Okay. And finally, and not just because she There you go. Scream for her. And finally, um, not that there's anything better or bigger about administrators, but this is this is special to me because she's my partner. Um, Francis Cruz is getting tenure this evening. center. >> Um, and and I I mean that we are not any any fact, we're less important than the teacher sitting in this room, but when it comes to day-to-day, she's more important to me. And um, Francis came from Newell High

037School and before that she for 10 years she was a special educator in district 75 in New York City in the Bronx. And I remember thinking, why does she want to come to elementary school? And when we met, she talked about how her um youth or her being raised was in part her beautiful family and in part the neighborhood schools that she um attended, a few of them. And she said, "I believe in neighborhood schools. I believe in comm community uh community schools. I believe in schools that are a beacon for the children and families that live in the area. And she lives it every day. She's the perfect match for our school. I mean, she leads basically like 70 things within the school. Um, of course, she's the go-to person for everything special education,

038but she also leads our clinicians. Um, she leaves our she leads our monitors. And one thing I just want to mention that she's taken hold of and is like a real real real passion for her. Um twice a year um dentists and hygienists come to Columbus and nearly 200 I think it's like 190 something kids get their six-month cleanings here. She organizes and um pursues families who don't return the forms. Um but over almost 200 kids get their teeth cleaned here and get referrals if needed to for other care. It's completely who Francis is. She's smart in everything she does. She writes beautifully. She thinks beautifully. She plans beautifully. I've never seen her not deal with a kid, a kid who's in a crisis. I've never seen her not deal with it well. Um, I've

039also never seen her not be compassionate with a parent. I'll just leave it at that. Just never not seen her be compassionate with a parent. She's a wonderful person and a wonderful administrator. Congratulations. >> I'm sorry I went over Dr. Reynolds. That was very selfish of me. Um but um thank you for your attention everyone and thank you for all the work and volunteer um spirit that you lend our our our city. Thank you. >> If I may um ask the board to indulge me for a minute, can you please go back slide? >> Yes. Uh, may I please invite Miss Kandelario, Miss Rock, Mr. McGawan, Miss Corino, Miss Orango, Miss Valencia, and and Miss Cruz to please come up and stand next to your principal. >> Move this. >> We would be remiss if

040we did not capture this moment uh in a photo. you can anticipate being in our next weekly newsletter. >> Oh yeah. Al Aisha, why is Alexis directing everybody right now? >> I don't know. Okay, Mina, why is your mom doing this? Please give them another round of applause. Congratulations. So, Mr. Gallen, before you leave, we're we're we are going to field some questions. >> Yeah. >> From our board members. But before we begin, I just wanted to highlight to our community, if you did not get the sense of family that is felt here in this building, um then we need to check your pulse. My first introduction to the newishell public schools was Columbus school. >> Um almost over 30 years ago. >> Um my colleague who I went to graduate school with uh in

041order to become a teacher was hired before I was and this is where she was hired and she asked me to come and help her move some stuff into her classroom. She actually still works here. >> I did not know that. won't mention her name, but >> I didn't know that. >> When she introduced me to Columbus School, she said, "The only reason why I'm here is because of the people who work here." >> Yeah. >> And because of somebody who works here, and that somebody is Mr. Gallow. But with that being said, it is about connections. Keeping in mind when I talk about our profession, it is connecting people big people to children and connecting children to their learning. So I want you to envision this. Just close your eyes for a minute. This

042is not going to work in any other language. So just bear with me. This sentence says everything that Mr. Gallen said um presented tonight about the science of reading particularly in English. Read rhymes with lead. >> Read rhymes with lead. Read does not rhyme with lead. And red does not rhyme with lead. Now if you can envision those English words, you realize how tricky the English language is. >> Exactly. >> So when we connect the way we learn how to read with the science of reading and make sure that we become experts in that, our young people who learn how to read will become our leaders. So I want to thank Mr. gallon for making that connection come to life tonight >> and showing the proof in the pudding. >> Yeah, >> when you saw

043those scores, >> you can see what good instruction leads to. >> So, with that, I'm going to turn the questions over to our board. >> Thank you, T. >> Thank you, Dr. Reynolds. Uh, any of my colleagues have any comments or questions? >> Yep. M. Ross. Uh first of all, thank you so much for the presentation and uh congratulations to all the staff that received tenure this evening. Well, very welld deserved. I just have one quick question of course >> question and really more of a comment I guess is um those were fantastic results uh in terms of the reading and you could see it across every grade level. >> Yeah. And what what can others uh what can other schools in our district learn from you all in terms of that example so that

044we can uh pass along that that sort of great uh great progress that you guys have made. How do we enable all of our other schools to kind of do the same? >> Man, that's a beautiful question. So, thank you for that. Um there's a lot of different ways to answer it right with in some and with the specifics in terms of program and do this, do that, do this, do that. Um, but I would have to say, you know, the umbrella answer I would give you to that is to genuinely commit to professional learning within the school and for the professional learning to be all our elementary schools have in a math coach and a literacy coach. Um but committing to the the daily sort of grind of um planning, teaching, assessing, um reflecting,

045remaking your plans, teaching that cycle and doing it collectively. um would be my my answer because one curious uh feature of elementary schools I maybe secondary too is that it's so easy not to have a school that looks like that. It's so easy for for you to go into your classroom, close the door and no one know what's going on. Um especially in big schools. We have big schools. So I would say the opposite of going into the classroom, closing your door and just teaching and then doing a little bit better, a little bit worse next year, a little bit better, a little bit worse next year. Whatever the opposite of that is the answer. And for us, it's once a day team meetings um focused on instruction and then our coaches get into classrooms

046and they they do two, three week cycles with a few teachers working on something specific. um multiplication in third grade um phonics instruction in you know kindergarten. So that would be my answer like the umbrella answer is teams working together um whatever the opposite of being of being isolated in your work. >> Thank you. I just thought that that um first of all the entire presentation was eye opening because um often you know when you see the big hill to climb >> you say where do we start you kind of go one child at a time um but I I will say the game changer um in this for me is to kind of check in on the students that did the um did the remarkable journey with you and because these are the kind

047of things that plant seeds and grow and we don't may not see it for a few years but then boom and they will remember you know their little reading Himalaya mountain that they had to get over and what they do remember the most is the people that helped them get to the top. So I hope that you engage that those students that were part of that journey to come back and encourage more kids so that that story um exponentially grows. Yeah, I can do it because I did it. >> Thank you. That's a beautiful metaphor for what we've done, the seeds of it. Louis, >> thank you. Um first, it's always great to be here. Um, Columbus definitely does feel like a family and everyone's always so welcoming and warm. So, thanks for having us.

048Um, I think uh just to reiterate uh what our the VP was just asking, she was these numbers are fantastic. >> Um, and I think over the years that you showed us, it only dropped in like uh two categories by race. It was like Asian students and some other category. But you also mentioned that your enrollments dropped as well over it shifted over some years. So I just wanted to point out that even though that number might have decreased from one year to the next, it could have also been an enrollment drop that year. So it's not that proficiency was decreasing, but the number of students per that category per year is what we were seeing. >> Yes. Yes. And yes. And I think those groups that you talk about there a really small end,

049you know, say sometimes it's like seriously three, four, five kids in some of those groups in this school. So yeah, you're right. And I'd still be just as proud if, you know, if the I think it's stunning that in three years that happened. It's not something we predicted and they might drop a little bit year to year, but the the story behind all that I know is real. And um the the scores don't always tell the story. There's you got to look at more than just this test or that test. But in this case, I think that the story matches up. Um but thank you for pointing that out. Miss Williams. >> Thank you, Principal Gallon, for a wonderful presentation and congratulations to all of the tenure recipients. Welld deserved. And also congratulation to your

050team and the families and the children. >> Um my comment is I think it's going to lead into the budget presentation. Um on slide number three um it states that 635 students are economically disadvantaged which is 85% of the students in the school. So 85% >> the majority of the students >> I think that's an underount too. I think that I mean when you look at the way we get it doesn't capture everybody. >> Okay. I think um so I think this is a Dr. Reynolds question. Um I have four um what factors are used to determine um economic disadvantage. >> Uh there are quite a few factors that are included. I I can provide them at a later date but there is a state um designation where they give you the criteria of household

051income. how many individuals live in the household. Um, and I think that there are a couple other variables that are included. Um, once we run those calculations based on the information that we have, uh, we provide that data to the state. The state then takes a looks at that look at that data and they are the ones who determine whether a student is economically disadvantaged or not. We don't make that determination. And the second one is um I don't have the really the words to say but um you really explained it eloquently last year and you've been talking about it this year um that we didn't receive Nurishelle didn't receive um that much state aid because it looked like um we are an affluent district but how can we be an affluent district if 85%

052of our students in one particular school are economically disadvantaged. >> Um that's a very good question. Thank you very much for raising that. Um and firstly let me start off by giving um my tremendous gratitude to our state senator Shelley Mayor. Um she is a proponent of Michelle. She is somebody who fights for our schools. She is someone who fights for our students and our families. Um just this afternoon prior to coming here to the board meeting um our board presidents and one of our vice presidents joined me well I joined them uh in a call um with uh state senator Shelley Mayor um for advocacy for New York uh for Newell schools and that exact point was made during this conversation um keeping in mind that the state that that the governor changed two

053variables within the foundation aid formula Those two variables includes our wealth ratio or our wealth income ratio and our property wealth ratio. And because more recent numbers um for those calculations were utilized, New Rashelle outpaced most of the other school districts in the state in terms of what um what our wealth is currently and that adversely affected us in the amount of money that we can receive from the state. keeping in mind that laws are are established so that we don't put our hands in our taxpayers pockets twice, right? So, if this uh community is recognized to be at a higher tax bracket in terms of how much money you pay in in in in um taxes and things of that nature, we can ask for that money to be given to the school district

054on the back end. So, as a result, we we're getting reduced tax cap levy compared to years prior. As a matter of fact, we'll discuss in our budget presentation what our tax cap levy um is recommended by the state. But at the same time, even though the state is saying that we are wealthier than we were in the past, we are seeing the number of our families who are recognized as economically disadvantaged by the state at a higher level than we have in the past. So, the two numbers kind of contradict each other and I still don't understand how that can happen either. >> And three, um, what are some funding and grant options that are available for our economically disadvantaged families? So, our federal and state grants that are provided to us as a

055supplement to our state finances is um how the state recognizes our economically disadvantaged families. Keep in mind at our last budget presentation we shared that the federal department of education was going to decrease our um grant funding by 30% between 15 and 30% um that was coming to the new shell. Tonight you'll hear a different story. We'll present that in our uh presentation following this one. Um, but all of the monies that we receive as it relates to our economically disadvantaged uh students would either come from the state or from the federal department of education via grants that we can't apply for. Those numbers are automatic like when I I shared with you the state recognizes students based on that formula as being economically disadvantaged. Then the state has to provide to us the funding

056based on the number of students that are um calculated as such. We don't apply for grants for that. So the state will do it automatically. >> Correct. >> And my last question is um I think you answered it already but I need to hear it a few times to really understand it and see like what I can do. I'm a super volunteer. So I like know um how you know um myself, my colleagues and concerned citizens um concerned that 85% of the students um or the families are economically disadvantaged. That's alarming and um we need to be able to help our neighbors. Um, how do we make the state aware that 85% of our students are economically disadvantaged and how can we get more money to fund our students in schools and um how can

057we use this to advocate for more funding? You you stated it already, but if you could just say it again, you know, give us more ideas. >> Thank you very much for the question. Please know that our locally elected officials are already on board. We're trying to advocate for us uh to get additional funding. I would recommend to the common lay person if you are interested in becoming involved in advocacy for the district, please write or call Governor Hokll's office and ask her to do two things. fix the foundation formula completely or and readjust aid to districts based on our most challenged students, economically disadvantaged students with special needs. um our students uh who are also ENL students. All of those services are outpacing the amount of money that we are able to afford in

058our budget um based on CPI uh consumer price index and the increase in in those services. We need additional funding. So it is incumbent it is uh incumbent I'm sorry it is imperative that our uh local community members please write and contact the governor to ask for additional funding for your shell. >> Thank you very much >> Mr. Allen. Thank you for the presentation. I just want to thank all of the uh tenure recipients as well. I've had the pleasure to work with some of them over the past couple years. Um I know Marissa left. I was going to uh point her out. But I've had the pleasure to know Marissa for over 10 years and she works for me next door at the Boys and Girls Club. >> Um and I was joking with

059her that I was going to vote no tonight on her tenure and she was left. >> She left. Yeah. But um I just want to um for my fellow board members really just uh impress on them how important Columbus school is to this community. I I live around the corner and I've grew up uh in this neighborhood and Columbus is that one stability for many families in this community uh especially for after school even coming for food every Wednesday uh parents coming for food and it's just it's crazy because you can see almost seven days a week there's something happening whether there's kids outside on the field even yesterday there was a whole soccer game in the snow on the field but I just really wanted to um impress upon that and just my uh

060personal uh observations of what the school is and how important it is for this community. So, I just want to thank you and all of your teachers and staff for really making it a welcoming uh community center for a lot of these families. >> You nailed it. >> Thank you very much, Mr. Galland. Thank you, Columbus School for hosting us. We appreciate it. Um we are going to ask our board members to remain where you are. And at this time, we are going to be joined at the podium by our uh business official uh Mr. Carlos Lal, our assistant superintendent for business, and by our business administrator, Miss Joy Mike, as we uh discuss budget workshop number four. Uh, so if I may, I'm going to state that a lot of the questions that were

061asked this evening have some relation to what we're going to be talking about in our budget. Whether it is the type of teacher that we have servicing our students, ENL teachers, you heard a lot about instructional coaches, um, you heard a lot about our teachers who are transitioning to different programs. uh we are looking to maintain the instructional integrity in our schools but doing so with less and less funding each year. So last at our last board meeting we had uh budget work session number four. Um, tonight is going to look almost like a repetition of that um, work uh, work uh, work session, but as we stated before, we want to make sure that we inform our public on a regular basis of any movement as it relates to our grant funding and to

062our budget. So, with that, I'm going to turn it over to Carlos and to Joy to uh, lead us through work session number four. >> Uh, thank you, Dr. Reynolds. Um as as indicated uh this is be a lot of repeat from the last presentation. There are some um additions or should I say some updates and so that's what we're going to be primarily focusing on this evening. Uh the budget process itself uh again guiding principles, our strategic roadmap, areas of focus, budget variables and then stakeholder impact um input all are combined together um to create the budget itself and then of course uh once the board uh adopts a budget that's presented to the community and the community will then make a decision. terms of our guiding principles, they're all directly related to our

063district vision, our mission, our equity statement, and the whole child. It also is aligned to our strategic roadmap with four focus areas which are student learning, superb staff, safe, supportive, and connected schools and resource management. and the areas of focus in the development of the budget itself keeping in mind a continued commitment to the strategic road map and the whole child. It's really about the student outcomes and how do we maintain those outcomes, evidence-based and data supported decision makingaking, not a, oh, I like this idea, but what does the data show is working and maintaining those programs or what is not working and how can we better invest those dollars leveraging attrition and retirement. We have some folks who have service have served their comm our community for some time and have made some decisions

064for themselves. So how do we take into account uh those positions decreasing external contracts decreasing um so that if we can do some of those things inhouse it's a cost savings to us and then of course um every attempt to stay within the state mandated tax cap that you'll hear more about from Joy this evening in terms of the budget variables that we've mentioned before uh so that everyone's in the u in the know keeping in mind that uh we are currently in the process of be or going to begin the collect Ive bargaining uh discussions with both fuse ANS um as well as our non-represented employees and then management and confidential agreements also have to be discussed and uh that will be a part of our consideration. The other things that are internal considerations

065um are the way in which we are currently supporting and managing six period assignments or we might need a person to work some additional time because uh we don't need a full-time FTE but we need some coverage. Um a building substitute model um as we're competing with other districts in the area for individuals to support us when a teacher is um absent. Um optim optimal case loads. So what is the appropriate class size? Also what's the number of uh students that an ENL teacher uh should be supporting etc. And of course that's the best practice operational ratios and then staffing realignment uh thinking about if we make some adjustments what does that ripple um look like. On the right hand side of this slide here you'll see the class size guidelines. This was a community

066conversation last year and we're continuing to use these same numbers and um for this coming school year terms of external factors and contractual obligations the teacher retirement system TRS um we were happy to find an actual negative number. Uh we were anticipating another increase but it's a negative 1.35%. the local retirement, these are for ERS, these are our noncertified individuals. Um, there is an increase of of 1.1%. Health insurance premiums, which we've been talking about for years, it's not surprising to see an increase of 11%. Uh, which is, if you think about your own health insurance, if you have your own health insurance, um, it that price continues to increase. Medicare reimbursement, retirey benefits are also part of our obligation. um staff retirements, we can't make it that decision for someone. Um but if they

067do, then we'll take those things into consideration. And as Dr. Reynolds mentioned, the consumer price index continues to increase. Everything is getting expensive. So currently, it's the range between 2.85 2.8% to 3.5%. Um that's the cost associated with an increase to things like transportation contract Bosei services. And as the community is aware, we have two anticipated um charter schools. One that has been approved and is actively recruiting in our community and a second that is seeking um approval. Um we don't know where that stands at the moment, but if it is approved, then that would be a second charter school for us to contend with. the anticipated impact as I indicated there. And then state and federal aid revenue. So how much has this will the state provide? Again, Joy will kind of update those.

068And then the projected reduction which we talked about previously of 50 to 27%. Joy will share some positive news on that front. And then um of course we all know that the Westchester County sales tax keeps increasing. Um so that will be more revenue for us. But as a taxpayer, right, it's just more expenses, more expenses, etc. And then any appropriated fund balance that again Joy will speak to. In terms of approved staffing, we shared this slide previously um so that everybody has context of where we ended the conversation last school year. Um when we talked about the 2425 positions into the current school year 2526, we talked about positions that were reduced. So if you follow the middle column that says 2526 revised reductions and oh yes okay if you follow this column right

069here um you'll notice here that we had projected a reduction of 193 positions that does not equate to people and I think that was part of the community conversation and trying to understand the difference and I believe if I'm not mistaken we ended up with a reduction about 54 actual um individuals. The others were because of retirement attrition changes where they um resigned from the district because they found other employment or they moved out of the district whatever the case might be. So, but that number reflected um again the positions themselves which was a 10.2% reduction of staffing. So this slide to show you the difference of where um the budget positions landed in terms of for 2526 what was budgeted is this column here and what our current staffing is in this column. So

070you'll see that there's a difference there. So I want to speak to that so that everybody has a a full understanding. So in the category of building instructional staff, teacher, teacher assistant, counselors and clinicians, there was an increase of 10 and that is because we have some obligations related to special ed. And from the time that we had our budget and it was approved, we needed to bring on additional staffing because we had additional needs because at that point we had other kids who needed supports in the special education area provided um by pedagogical staffing. Building administration, there was a reduction there. That number did not increase. It remained the same. Building operations and support, clerical support, custodians, food service, staff, lunch monitors, register, nurses, teachers, aids, security. We budgeted for 443. So, I'm going

071to stop here because you're going to see two numbers. The 486 represents the number of equivalent to full-time employees. If you recall from the conversation we had in the spring, an hourly employee for our purposes, we counted an hourly employee as a 0.5. So we married those to talk about what an equivalent would be. So if you were to think in those terms, the number would be the 486. In terms of actual bodies, that number was 529. So in this category here and in this category here with the increases, we were able to bring uh those positions back primarily because there was um the adjustment that was made to the bullet that we received which allowed us to bring back pedagogical positions. And then also the charter school that did not open and because they

072delayed their opening, we were able to repurpose those dollars back to supporting staff and bringing more staff back on board. In terms of district administration, there was a reduction there as well to 33. That number has remained the same. And then district operational went from 127 to 129. And again, uh that would actually those are two hourly individuals. Um again, it would be equivalent to one, but for the purposes of tonight's presentation, it's um just two individuals. Um and so that brings the new total to 1,797. So, this is our current staffing and this is where we're starting the conversation um as we continue to build the budget itself. So, I'll pass the baton to to Joy. Thank you. Good evening everyone. The next slide represents um our current year budget that we are currently

073operating under the 2526 adopted budget of 359,468,597. Um we obviously need to pres present a balanced budget. And so you can see on the revenue side for this year, majority of that comes from property taxes. We also have about 27 and a half% on state and federal aid. And on the expenditure side, same dollar amount, the majority of those expenditures are earmarked for salary and benefits as 73%. So that's the current year budget of what was approved by voters in May of 2025. Um, this snapshot is uh brought back to give you a history of our tax cap and our tax levy. um beginning in 2020 and through our current year, you'll see we had maximum percentages that um we could bring forward to the voters. Um 38% in 2020, 2.73% 2.55% 2.19% and then

074um last school year 3.95% and this school year.33%. that was the maximum that we could go to the voters for without needing an override. Um on the actual side um in 2020 0% is what we um went out with 2021 2.29 and then in 2022 and 2023 respectively 0.98 was the percent brought to the voters. Last school year was the first time in in quite a few years that the district went to the maximum allowable tax levy at 3.95% and then for this school year the first time that the district uh requested an override of the tax levy uh cap at 3.95%. So um that difference was roughly about $8 million for for this school year. Moving forward, um there was some discussion about our state aid and what those um runs look like in

075terms of our revenue. Again, that was about 27% of our revenue for the year. Those categories, foundation aid, expense-based aids, um instructional materials aids, and then other operating aids. Um so foundation aid is the aid that gets the majority of the conversation. um that is the number that's run against um our demographics in comparison to the rest of the state of New York. We we're fortunate to get an increase in our foundation aid of 1.57%. Um unfortunately our expense-based aids which are based on expenses in those categories, it has a decrease of about 11%. Uh our instructional materials aids including all of those listed above has an increase of 1.66. 66%. So overall, our state aid in all of these categories is decreasing by just over $2 million or a decrease of 2.14%. This next

076slide um is uh just bringing forward that tax cap calculation in terms of the actual um equation that we need to use. Um, we have 20 the 25 school year, the 26 school year, and then projected 26 27 school year listed in the far right column. If I can do this one. Okay, here we go. So, I'm going to focus on the projected 2627 uh calculation. We begin with the prior year tax levy at the top. We are given a tax-based growth factor by the office of real property. We have to bring in our pilots which is payment in lie of taxes provided to certain developments per agreement with the city of New Relle. We then have exclusion for a capital expenditures that were voter approved previously. Um and then that allowable tax levy factor

077which will never be more than 2%. Um, so you begin with the prior year pilot agreements and you add in the current year pilot agreements to get to a limit before you can add in exclusions. Exclusions are things that um factors that you can increase your tax levy basically. Um so we don't have any tort which is any significant um lawsuits above a certain percentage of our budget and we do have t capital tax levy needs um that again are voter approved for capital expenses. We do not have an exclusion for pension contribution because we neither of the retirement systems e whether for the teachers or for the local retirement system neither one of those rates are going are increasing by more than 2%. So our total exclusions are 10.8 million towards the bottom giving

078us a maximum allowable tax levy of just over 245 million or 1.85%. That is the maximum tax levy that we can bring to the voters without requiring an overlay an override of the tax levy. So what does that look like in terms of our general fund revenues? Um as I mentioned before, state aid was about 27% but we have all of these other categories that bring um round out our total revenue for the district. So, in that first column under adopted, okay, not that one. Sorry, I'm going backwards. Here we go. In that first column, you have um our adopted budget from 2425 and then the current year budget. So, we went from just over 347.4 million to 359.4 million. This is the year that we're currently in in all of these different revenue categories.

079Overall, we increased our revenue from 2425 into this year by 11.8 million, an overall budgetto budget increase of 3.45%. For our draft revenue for next year, accounting for all of the revenue categories that we have listed, we are looking at um operating within the tax cap at 1.85%. um increasing in our pilots for the schedule provided by the city of New Shell and um these different revenue categories charge for services, miscellaneous revenue. Um we do have uh transfers in from reserves to mitigate the impact to the taxpayer anytime you are using reserves as part of your revenue plan. We have an interfund um transfer in from the library which is a wash for their debt service and then um a 1.75% appropriated fund balance which we have been consistent with for the last couple of

080years. So under this revenue projection, this draft budget, we are looking at $369.1 million of um revenue, which is an increase of $9.6 million or 2.69% 69% increase. Okay. The grant fund revenues which Mr. Leo mentioned and Dr. uh Reynolds as well. Um this is a picture of all of the different grant funds that are in our special aid fund. So not general fund revenues but special aid. Um, in terms of our title grants that are listed towards the bottom and our idea grants towards the top, we originally had information that we were anticipating a decrease of 15% in the idea funds. That is no longer um the picture that we are projecting based on information that we've received um from New York State. And also for our title grants, so title 1, 2, 3,

081and four grants, we previously um anticipated a decrease of 27%. We are now um have information that those funds will be have been restored or that we should not get any less of an allocation than we currently have in this year. So we have made those adjustments. Uh in terms of reserve funds, this is a repeat from our last presentation. These are all the reserve funds that we have in the district and um those changes in those funds from the 22 school year through are projected for through the end of this fiscal year. Um starting with the capital reserve that was funded and approved for capital projects that are underway currently. Um a capital reserve that has not yet been funded. And then you can see the list workers comp, unemployment, debt service. These are

082all of the funds that we have that are earmarked by law for specific purposes and can't be used for other purposes. And so um in the 22 23 school year we had about 52.2 million in reserve funds and it is projected at the close of this fiscal year we will be at about 31.5 million. Um so this is just a summary again. Um we are talking revenue only. Um based on the tax cap and our state aid runs, we anticipate um going from 359.4 million to 369.1 million staying within the mandated tax cap um for an increase of 9.6 million or 2.69 incre% increase in our revenue for next year. I said a lot. I'm going to go ahead and turn it over to Mr. Leah. Thank you, Joy. [clears throat] Um, as the community

083knows, we've added more meetings or the board has added more meetings uh to accommodate opportunities for continued conversation. Um, that being said, um, tonight is February 26, uh, which is sess uh, session 4. Um, and we will be meeting for every week in the month of March. Uh so March 3rd will be session five, March 12th, session 6, March 17th um uh session number seven and then the board is required on March 26 to um take action on a proposed budget um with the budget hearing taking place on May 5th and then the budget vote on May 19th. Um so we will have to make further adjustments to the calendar. um it's always continuously evolving um and so we will make sure to make those adjustments. We ask continuously please engage in conversation with us.

084There are people who have already begun to do that and we appreciate that. Um and we encourage everyone to continue to um engage in multiple ways. This is um some of the ways in which you can do so. Uh and then there's also ways in which you can provide feedback i.e. emailing um the board at boenal.org. Um we also set up an email account the budget questions at enraalert.org. Um and then of course uh tonight's presentation that will be uh posted um on the website. So thank you and we um um will be open to questions um discussions and comments. >> Thank you very much. Um do any of my colleagues have any comments or questions? I think just the one thing for me is um I think it was the same ask as last

085year that and once we get our expenses if we can also see a comparison of different scenarios when it comes to the tax levy so the board has uh enough information to make discussion about whether 1.85 85 makes the most sense or do we want to go lower, do we want to go higher? So, if we have different scenarios to show us, >> greatly appreciate it. And we will be able to offer that at uh the 3 >> on on March 3rd. >> We'll have to figure that out if we're able to provide that by then because you want multiple you want the 1.85% and then if we were to iterations, I guess, as we >> Yeah, kind of like last year when we asked for it. Um, and then what impact that would have

086that. Yeah, that'll take some time. >> I know. I appreciate it, >> M. Williams. >> Yes. Thank you very much for the presentation. And I'm looking on slide 11 and I notice that um for the teachers retirement system rate, TRS is a negative 1.35%. And for title 1 2 3 and four is a negative 27%. And for the IDA uh section 611 and 619 it's5 um%. Um what does that mean that it's a negative%. um for our for our TRS um we get those rates from the state. Uh and this year we were pleased to discover that there's a reduction uh between what we've had to submit to the state uh for TRS uh teacher retirement system payments from this year to next year. So that's what that one point that negative 1.35 represents. will

087be paying a little bit less there. But um keep in mind that at the time of the presentation last last at our last meeting, we were predicting based on information we received from the state that our title funds 1 2 3 and four and we did that presentation at our last meeting was going to be reduced by about 27%. And title um IDA sections 1 611 and 619 were going to be reduced by about um 15%. keeping in mind that those serve our students uh needs, economically disadvantaged, um students with disabilities, ENL students, reading. Um but since then, since our last presentation, we were informed that the that Congress is moving the federal department of education to fully fund those titles. So those won't have a reduction based on the information that we have. >>

088Any other comments or questions? signal. Thank you guys. >> Thank you. >> With that, we can transition back to the deis and we'll continue with the rest of the meeting. Give it a little So this next discussion item uh was a request by several board members for the board to learn about get more information about and learn about and this was a in in it was indeed a learning lesson for myself. I had to consult with several of our board attorneys to understand uh what uh our board length uh we have currently each board member has five-year terms. Um and the conversation is what would what would happen? What are the pros the cons and what would we need to do if we wanted to go from fiveyear terms to three-year terms. So currently uh

089our current policy is I said five-year terms and that's policy 1120 uh where members of the board of education uh will serve for 5 years beginning July 1st following their election and each term will expire on the 30th day of June of the fifth year. And to show everyone this is what our current election schedule looks like. So this year we have two seats open then two seats the next year. One seat 2028, two seats 2029 and two seats in 2030. So pros and cons for some um for five years. It offers stability. It allows board members to see initiatives through planning to implementation. Reduces constant campaign distractions. More time to build a deeper understanding of the issues. And some of the cons that longer terms can discourage new people to run for the board

090because it's such a long commitment, lower electoral engagement, longer cycles may reduce community awareness, participation, slower adaption, adaptation to community shifts. And I'm getting a lot of this. This was from some um other um NISBA school board uh resources. NISBA is the New York State School Boards Association. Thank you, Miss Lewis. So, um, when this issue came up, potentially switching to three years, what would we need to do if we wanted to? And I just want to point out that this is not, no decision has been made. This is a factf finding. Um, and if we were to change it, we would have to um pass a resolution by the board followed by voter approval. So, this would be on a ballot if we were to change it. So, the voters would have to approve

091um any change to our term limits. So, say if we wanted this on the ballot in May and ask the community, it would not take effect until the next election 2027 where the terms would be three years. And so, I put this sketch together um of what potentially a three term a three-year term would look like. And it really wouldn't have any major effects until 2030 because the people who who are elected for five-year terms would be grandfathered in. So um similarly 2030 we would see four seats up and then consistently every every year would be three years uh three seats per year and some pros and cons for three years that um I found researching pros voters can evaluate board members more frequently uh lowers the barrier for new candidates to run helps the

092board adapt to changing student community needs. Some cons, more frequent campaign pressure, loss of institutional knowledge with more frequent turnover, uh potential for instability if multiple seats turn over at once. So, governance consistency can suffer. One of the things we've asked um our clerk to do some research for us was how many other districts have three or fiveyear terms? And it was actually really astonishing that a lot of seats, a lot of school districts in Westchester are three-year terms, especially some of our more immediate neighbors like Penelum White Plains, Mount Vernon. Uh, and there was only two that really had five-year terms besides us, Dover Plains and Yoners, where the board members are appointed by um the mayor. So, for my fellow board members, I don't know if you have any questions. um potentially if

093we wanted to continue exploring this issue, I would recommend that at our March 12th meeting we hear from members of our community of what they think and have a special public hearing. Um and then the board have a public discussion about whether this is something we want to see on the ballot in May. I open the floor to any of my colleagues if they have any comments, suggestions, they would want to go with these next steps or just not even explore this issue anymore. Miss Ross. >> Um I I just I just had a comment because I I've I've vacasillated between the two whether I agree with moving it or not. Um, and I had gone to I think it was a it was like a VP uh was NISBA like training uh and there

094were some uh some of these folks from one of the other um districts and when I remember telling them oh well you know Michelle has five years they're all like oh actually that's that's better because you know we're always we always feel like we have to run and that they um and I guess it's always the grass is always greener right because I think their perspective was just that they uh you could focus more on kind of doing what you're doing. It takes, at least from my experience, it takes a good two or three years to actually even learn all the things you need to learn. And it's sort of by your fourth or fifth year is when you finally understand uh what's actually happening. Um so I don't know. I I don't necessarily have

095a point of view yet. Uh but just wanted to share kind of the the thoughts and what I'd heard from some other board members from some of the our neighboring districts and even some of these I think there are a couple that are smaller districts that might they might also be appointed. I feel like one of them in here is but I don't remember which one. >> Yeah. I I think it's worth continuing the exploration. I don't think we lose anything by opening up for public discussion and continued discussion amongst us. Yeah, I I agree and um interesting like it's interesting to hear that perspective for someone of having just joined. I think that's correct that it takes time to really get up to speed and I think this is mostly it's probably mostly about

096the u barrier to entry and making sure you have candidates who are coming forth because they're not turned off by that three years. I mean, I remember running and I've told people in my family that I will be doing this for 5 years and they were just like, "What did you sign up for?" You know, but but I think that barrier to entry really scares people off. Um, so I think it's about ensuring we're like evening the playing field in that sense for candidates to come forward and then hopefully if the candidate wins and is interested in continuing, they'll give three terms of service, which is nine instead of 10, but it kind of equals out. So, um I hear you, Trusty Ross. Like, it kind of could go both ways, but this way maybe

097we're just um enticing more people to get involved. And I think at each election cycle, um maybe it just keeps the community focused and talking about the issues and raising their voices and interested. So, maybe the increased elections actually produces more community engagement. That's a hypothesis to test. >> Yeah. I don't um Oh, okay. Can you guys hear me? Okay, there's a few other people waiting uh to chat, so I'll keep it brief. Um I do encourage community members to um I like the idea of opening up to community members. They can come and share their opinions. Um for those that can't come in person, you can email us as well as with anything else we discuss um to share your thoughts there. And um I do understand the the pros and cons. And so

098thank you to to Millie to Will for putting this together um so we have something to react to. Um, yeah, I I also agree that I'm hoping that this would encourage folks that would not have considered running before to run um if it was changed to a three-year term. But it does take a long upramp. You have to be really dedicated to this position. There's trainings you have to go through. It's long hours and long nights sometimes. Um, but it's but it's worth it. So, I'm hoping maybe that also uh folks can think about the longevity and and they can be more critical about the folks that are are running because if they're not a good fit to be on the board, then um you know, they can exit quicker than staying on and doing

099more damage than then. So, um but yeah, I'm I'm totally open for a more discussion about this. >> Anybody else? not to repeat everybody, but I definitely think we should put it out to the public and just hear what the public has to say um for learning more about this and um ditto everything that everybody said and um you know I see the pros and the cons and I have my own personal opinions but I don't want to express them right now. I want to hear what everybody has to say. One thing that's great about New Shell though is as long as I've been here, a lot of um folks that do come on the board, they stay for a long time, even if their terms move around. Um this is a this is a

100kind of long hall of um the heart and I've seen a lot of people today like 20 25 years on this board. So, >> okay. Well, I think we got consensus. So, we'll put this as a special public hearing at our next um regular meeting in March. And uh Miss Mafy, I might have to bother you to see if I can add this to a newsletter and if uh encourage people to email us if they can't make it to the public hearing. All right. Well, that was um our last presentation. There are two policies up for first reading tonight. The first being an edit to policy 2300, which is our board meetings. And it's a basic change where we're just consolidating our board of education announcements with our liaison and committee reports. So instead of

101having two periods in the agenda, there would be one period for the board to give all those updates. And then the second is first reading policy 5240 of our grading policy. Uh Dr. Reynolds, if you have something to uh update us on that. >> Thank you very much, President Ayanuzi. Um, I would like to thank my colleagues in the curriculum and instruction department along with uh our teachers, our students who and and and families who were involved in um discovery of what we can do in order to make our students more marketable um and more appropriately um gauged as relates to the neighboring students uh nearby. provide this grading policy was uh first presented almost two and a half years ago if I'm not mistaken. Um it was presented publicly. Um and during that two

102and a half uh year time, we've taken uh our every opportunity possible to really research detail um collect surveys, collect responses, collect reflections on what it is that we are presenting. And we do believe that the board that the uh the committee has presented to the board a grading policy that is uh more marketable, is one that is uh more widely recognized uh by our uh local and more prestigious colleges and puts us in a position to be more easily compared uh to our neighbors and particularly our neighbors who um have a record of sending students to more prestigious schools. So with that, um, I will open it up to any questions if necessary. >> No questions, but I will just add for the public that, uh, any policy that's presented before you goes through

103a lot of discussion, um, with board members during the policy committee as well. Um, and so this is no different that we had conversations individual level like you mentioned and as a group as well. >> Yeah. Similarly, um the board has had several updates on this uh policy. We've had uh much debate uh of understanding what this policy is and um encourage the public to read it and reach out. We're not voting on it tonight. Today's the first reading. We're would vote on it on the March 13th. I would just sort of echoing as a new board member and as a member of the policy committee, I appreciated um also having joined after this was has been an ongoing iteration and discussing the level of diligence and questions that were asked and the information that

104I received and um with every change no decision is easy and I think we've looked at this from multiple different angles and um as you said we we look forward to the community thoughts. Any other comments or questions? All right, seeing none, that was our last discussion item of the evening. We are about to move into public comment. Ladies and gentlemen, we are about to convene into the public comment period of the meeting. The board of education adopted policy 12:30 in April 2022 to ensure all members of the public have the opportunity to speak at both of our board meetings each month. We believe it is crucial for us to hear from our community members about their concerns and issues. Having said that, please note that the board is here to listen. The public comment

105period is not designed to be a discussion. Accordingly, understand the board will not respond to your concerns and questions tonight. We take your concerns and questions seriously and want to have sufficient time to process and research issues if need be. We will, however, respond to your questions and concerns at a future meeting or have the proper staff and bring it back to you at the appropriate time. I also want to point out that under state and federal privacy laws, we are unable to entertain any comments or questions about school personnel and students. Please know, however, that we take personal concerns very seriously. On these matters, we would ask you to go through the appropriate administrative channels. Finally, we recognize that right now our nation, our community are polarized on a number of issues. That said,

106we want our schoolboard meetings to serve as an example to our students, that members of our school board and members of our community can deal with controversial issues in a civil manner and demonstrate mutual respect for one another. In that spirit, we will insist that all speakers and members of the audience maintain civility and respect for any divergent views that others possess. We ask that speakers please address their comments to the board directly rather than the audience. In the likely event the meeting becomes a ruly, the board will recess the meeting and return once order has been restored. Finally, I want to remind everyone that you may submit written comments to the board in L of speaking during the public comment period if you so choose. Tonight, we've set aside 30 minutes for public comment

107where each speaker who has signed up before 3:30 today has three minutes to speak. If a person requests to speak after 3:30, speakers may sign up in person at the meeting with the clerk and will be afforded the opportunity to speak. Um, we currently have no one signed up for public comment. Would anybody in the audience like to sign up? Okay, Dr. Sorry, I wasn't going to, but um thank you for for um the time. First, I want to commend the Columbus uh school for the incredible growth um in their particularly in the the literacy grades. But I want us to also think about for the legions of kids including my own who went through the balanced literacy and sort of invented spelling and um things that made no sense to me as a former

108as someone who was taught to sound things out and to try to decode. Um and so it's great that we are addressing um sort of uh the um using brainbased uh research and um the reading science approach. But I think it's really important for us as a district to then think about what are the ways that we're going to support the kids that have gone through a system that has been found to be not actually based on sound research. So balanced literacy and and the ways that we approach literacy for years was actually not based on research. Um and so I think it's important for us to think about what does that what how are the educators um in the upper grades as a former secondary educator who taught the subject not this not necessarily

109the skills um how are we supporting educators in the ways that Mr. Allen talked about in professional learning support to to teach those skills and we all you know all educators need to do that. It's not just the English teachers. Um so that's that. Um with respect to the grading policy I have to take a look at it. Um but I think uh you know there are a couple of things to also keep in mind with the grading policies whenever we have those kinds of shifts. um grades are are really about giving information, getting information as as um as educators, but also for parents as well. And so really thinking about the the lag time. Um I think a lot about the um the interim assessments or the uh the progress reports that I get

110by the time we get the progress reports, you know, there's so much time that has passed. So really thinking about how are we um where are the systems that allow parents and teachers and students to monitor their progress not just at four points over the course of the year but on an ongoing basis. So where there needs to be intervention that can happen. Um and so I think that's important. It's also going to be related to how many kids you have as a teacher. All of those things that I typically tend to stress. The last thing I want to talk about is just the board terms and certainly barriers um to participation sort of globally is important to think about but I also want us to think about the other kinds of barriers that members

111of the communities who don't have the resources that are required to uh to get your family dinner to take the time to be on the committees. Right? So decreasing to 3 years means that other parts of the community who don't have those kinds of resources might actually step up. >> Thank you very much. Would anybody else like to sign up for public comment tonight? >> Okay, seeing none, we're going to move into our new business consent agenda personnel resolutions. Colleagues, can I get a motion and a second to approve consent agenda for personal resolutions number 26-291 1-15 number 26-292 1-19 number 26-293 1-5 number 26-294 1-11 number 26-295 1-1 and number 26-296 according to the recommended action for each item. >> So move that >> second Ross. >> All in favor? I >> I. >>

112Any opposed? Motion carries. Next up is consent agenda, general resolutions. Can I get a motion in a second to approve consent agenda for general resolutions number 26-297 through number 26-300 according to the recommended action for each item? >> So moved, Ross. >> Second, Lewis. >> All in favor? >> I. >> Any opposed? Motion carries. Our next meeting will be next Tuesday. It's a special meeting at city hall. Exact session starting at 6:00. Public session starting at 7:00. Colleagues, can I get a motion in the second to adjurnn the meeting? >> Some move Lewis. >> Second, Williams. >> All in favor? I. Any opposed? Motion carries. Good night, everyone.