WSESU Board Meeting - October 27th, 2025 (Part 1)

001Good evening everybody. I'm going to call this meeting to order at 602 for Windsor Southeast and changes additions to the agenda. Um first change is policy discussion followed by motion uh F C20 transgender and gender non-perform student policy will be a second read not not an at the end that's all I have anything else okay [clears throat] approval of the minutes September 18th, 2025. I will take a motion to approve those minutes. >> So moved. >> Second. >> Any discussion? Okay. Take a quick vote voice vote. All in favor, please say I. >> I. All opposed say nay. Any abstensions? >> I'll abstain. I don't believe I was there. >> Okay. >> And that was that um September 22nd, 2025. We'll take a motion to approve these minutes. >> So moved. >> Second. >> The

002team is on has been picked. Any any discussion? Okay. Voice vote. All in favor of passing uh September 22nd minutes, please say I. >> I. I. >> I. >> Oppose say nay. >> Any abstensions? >> Me abstain. >> Negative extension. Thank you. Okay. Thank you. Public participation. Um, we ask that all speakers direct their comments to the board directly and not to the audience. Each speaker will have three minutes. No one speaks until recognized. No shouting or profanity, questions or comments about specific personnel. On these matters, we ask that you go through appropriate administrative channels. We will insist that all speakers and members of the audience maintain civily and respect any divergent views that others possess. Likewise, you may expect that any restriction will be viewpoint neutral. Please do not expect the board to respond

003to your questions and comments tonight. We take your comments seriously and we want to have sufficient time to p to process and research issues if need requires it. If there seems to be an issue that ought to be followed up on, we may respond at a future meeting or have an appropriate staff member get back to you at an appropriate time. Uh, Lori Sullivan Justice, please state your name and even though I just said it, and what town you live in. >> Hi there. My name is Lauren Sullivan Justice and I'm a Weathersfield resident. >> Can I start? >> Yes, go right ahead. >> Okay, great. Thank you. I'm speaking today to voice my support for people in the transgender community and to applaud LGBTQIA advocates and allies in this community and school district. I

004would also like to support to voice my support for the transgender and gender non-conforming students policy which is a vitally important document for protecting trans students and treating them with respect and dignity. Trans people have always existed. For example, as early as 3,000 years ago, records from ancient civilizations like Mesopotamia, Greece, and India describe people living outside the gender binary, showing that transgender identities have existed across cultures throughout history. There's no such thing as a unified radical left transgender ideology. Transgender people are not a political movement, but a diverse group of individuals who simply want to live their lives safely and authentically. Blaming violence on a fabricated ideology not only ignores the real causes of harm, but also spreads misinformation and fuels prejudice toward an already marginalized community. Trans youth is among the most vulnerable

005populations in our state and in our school systems. But we know that gender affirming schools can make a significant positive difference in trans students lives. The data from Vermont's most recent youth risk behavior survey indicates that queer and trans youth in our state suffer from anxiety, depression, and suicidal ideiation at a significantly higher rate than their cisgender heterosexual peers. Vermont LGBTQ plus students are three times more likely to report making a suicide plan during the past year compared to heterosexual cisgender students. And 16% of trans and non-binary youth in Vermont attempted suicide in 2024. Trans youth who are a part of gender affirming schools have lower rates of suicide attempts and report less averse mental health outcomes. It is essential that we create and uphold inclusive school environment to support these students. LGBTQ students mental

006health struggles are not the result of being LGBTQ. Rather, they are the result of societal stigmatization and mistreatment. These students are struggling in so many ways because of the chronic stress of living in a society that constantly rejects, harms, and stigmatizes them. The trans and non-binary policy is essential for ensuring the safety and well-being of our students while they are within our care. I'd like to close my remarks by expressing my deep thanks to this district that supports LGBTQIA plus students. I'd especially like to thank the teachers that are continuing to show up and support LGBTQIA youth during this polarizing and scary time. Now is not the time to hide. Your students need you. Read the books. Teach the history. Spread the joy. Fly the flag. Tolerance is not a given. We have to protect

007it. Racism, homophobia, transphobia, and generalized fear of the other are out in the open, becoming normalized. We can't allow it to continue. It's time to show up. It's time to lead with love and light. Thank you. >> Thank you, Lauren. Anyone else? Uh there are no other uh community members. Um I just want to do a little bit of a a repeat of the announcement that I made absolutely >> at the district level meeting, but I want to make sure it gets that at least once in each one because I've continued to see this come up and not not really understand what it's about in the community. And I just want to make it as clear as possible. Um the letter of intent between the Windsor Southeast Supervisor Supervisory Union, Hartford School District, and Mountain

008View Supervisory Union. uh that effort to show our intent towards the redistricting task force uh so that we can have some agency should that consolidation happen which is their theirs in the legislaturator's decision is not related to Woodstock building a new larger high school. Um there are no plans happening now or any plans for plans to send all of these students from WSOR to Woodstock. Um I just want to make it like crystal that that's not a thing that is happening. Um, that's it. Thank you, David. Not not a thing that even been discussed. No. Is there anyone else? >> Okay. We do our the dinner that we're the community. >> Oh, yeah. You want to announce it? >> I don't know. [laughter] Um, November 6th, the Mount School Board will be doing a community

009dinner at the >> uh, Trinity Evangelical >> Trinity Evangelical Church at 4. >> I think it's like 6. >> We start setting up at 4:30. I think we serve at 5:30. >> Yeah. 5 to 7. >> Yeah. any other board members or anyone else here who wants to show up? It is open. It's a good time. >> Thank you. >> Anyone else? >> I I have a shout out. >> Sure. >> We've had um two of our high school teams in the playoffs recently. So, field hockey um in the playoff um and they did a fantastic job, but they didn't win. And we had uh the girls play the soccer team played on Saturday against um People's Academy. It was a a really really uh great game. It it looked like a final game. Um

010both teams were really skilled and worked really hard and um our girls lost in overtime on a direct on a uh >> weekend. No, >> no, it was overtime, but it's not. We don't uh I gotta say >> it's golden gold. >> golden gold. >> Uh but they made a valiant effort and they should be commended for their hard work and their all their great seasons. I believe the football team will be in the playoffs um >> Thursday 7 o'clock. So >> just shouting out our our kids and all the hard work they're doing. >> Interesting. and they they lose with grace and um great sportsmanship and hold their heads high which I think is really a tribute to the coaching and the teamwork that they um they experience on our on our athletic field.

011So >> thank you. >> Yeah, this is Elizabeth with a clapping >> celebration emoji. >> Okay. Um Second week tonight, uh C8 pupil policy. Um pupil privacy policy. Thank you. Um not a big change. Um just the highlight bill is the highlighted portion. Is that an addition? >> It's new. Yellow is new language. Yes. Okay. Yeah. Thanks. I think the one change from last month was we we changed parent legal guardian to just guardian. >> Yes. Yes. >> Any comments other concerns from my understanding it's it's clearer language. It's also due to a pay in the law. um selection of library materials and procedures. And in this one, uh you have the yellow is the new language or is the red the new language? >> The red is the old language. >> Thank you. Yep.

012>> And this looks more like a complete overhaul in implementation. Elizabeth, >> hi. Thank you. Um, is it okay for a community member to comment on policy? >> As long as I allow it, I Okay, >> thanks. >> There isn't any stopping it at the same time though. Um, what's your opinion, Elizabeth? >> I see that Liz Frederick has her hand up and she is the librarian at in Brownsville. Um, okay. >> And I think she has a library comment. >> I I would I would look forward to hearing from Liz on this subject. Go ahead, Liz. >> Hi. >> So, I'm just reading over it now. Um I had first of all I had a question um on how Windsor is going to be able to comply with this policy when they don't have

013a high school library to my understanding. Um which you know is something that I also just want to say I really think there should be a high school library. Um >> so I just I think that's something to think about. are we actually meeting these goals at the high school level? We don't have the library and I know there's not an official middle school library either in Windsor, but um I know that that's been supplemented a lot um by the teachers in that wing. Um so I guess that's just something that I would ask the board to look at and wondering if there's a way to expand access to books in general in the high school. Um, I'm also wondering if when this was drafted, um, if you used other libraries policies to kind of

014piggyback off and like for research purposes. Um, overall I think this looks really good. Um, I'm just commenting because, you know, in the last year we had to rewrite our library policy um, in compliance with the new law. Um, and this looks pretty close. um to what we do in a public library. Um so I guess I'm in support of it. Um I just would like to make sure that we're actually giving access to kids in our school buildings equally. >> That's it. >> Thank you. I I I don't know. I know it's the same thing at the Harford High School. They they don't have a library and I think that decision was made after, you know, a few years in which no students have taken out any books because any book they need is

015in the classroom >> or online. Um so >> um is is that the case in Windsor? Because when I went to the open house, I did ask about this and you know, I do I did see the book collection in the middle school. I was told um at the open house that the book collection in the high school is not anywhere close to that. So, I'm not sure if we're actually meeting those needs >> based on what I was told there. Yeah, >> that that may be a um really good subject to um bring up at the uh Mount School District board. >> Yeah. >> Uh which has sway over Windsor Library um or Windsor the Windsor schools. Um I would to have some sort of lending library for students especially students in need um

016have access to those. I think that's a a goal that is uh worth exploring. I think it could be interesting too just to think about how we um because so many um you know formerly print resources are now stored and transmitted electronically like what is there some sort of designation or distinction about like what we're considering to be library resources versus just you know a lot of resources used for a specific curriculum or you know classroom use but yeah no it's a good good thing to bring up >> I know the um uh the Green Mountain Library consort has a special site for academic library that I know Hartford, the last time I knew that Harford was a part of that allows teachers to um take out books, students to take out books uh with

017a school account. And so there's less restrictions on how many um how many people can rent a book from their school accounts. Um, so if you have five students who want the same book, all five of them, >> yeah, they do it. The the price that the library, the uh Green Mountain Library Consortium pays for public school accounts is much less than those that they that for example they would pay for books numbing some invested in teaching books. The curriculum department for all of the schools has a new software called teaching books at the request of the librarians and it's uh young children up to young adults and there also um is a atome access for all parents um to access again it's electronic but the database also and it's full of lessons and connections

018extremely extremely amazing. website. So, it's called just for the record, it's called Fijing books. So, that word will spread um over the next few weeks that at home people can access it. So, okay. >> Yep. >> Thank you. Thank you, Liz. >> Any other discussion on this um policy? >> Okay. Z >> F5 behavioral threat assessment teams. Um I don't see any changes in this. I it it looks like um everything in here is fairly new based on the fact that most of the laws from Vermont on uh behavioral threat assessment teams is quite new. Um, basically this just lays out the uh the issues and school districts responsibility to have a uh behavioral threat assessment team to have behavioral threat assessments take place. >> Yeah. Yeah. It's something that we've been working on for

019the past few years. So we do have teams in place. we you know essentially following the guidelines of the policy already. >> Um [clears throat] one change is we have to be trained annually. Our teams have to be trained annually. So we have signed up for our annual training in November. Um each school has a team typically made up of the principal um the nurse school counselor sometimes the SRO if that's appropriate. Jen Hall says that's appropriate depending on the student um needs um and other people as needed. But that's the 14. >> What uh what system are you trained on? >> Behavior threat assessment. What system are we trained on? >> Yeah. Is it is it like a particular like >> uh the last one we went to? Yes. It was like the uh

020>> I know a is one that >> Yeah, I think that one that's become very popular. >> Our training is in November. So, we'll see if it's changed or based on what the AE decides to have us train on. >> What was next? >> Thanks. Um, Christine, is that training the behavioral assessment day that's coming up, I think. >> No, that's tomorrow. >> That's what I thought. Is anybody from our supervisory union attending that? Yes, I am going with um one of the Windsor principles and the H heartland principal. Um we kind of take turns. This one doesn't count towards our annual training. >> Right. >> So um last year uh Weathersfield and one other principal went so we try to take turns. So I'm going tomorrow with Colleen and Frank. >> It looks like

021a really interesting agenda. I really look forward to hearing about it. >> Yeah. Yeah. I've I've been before and it is it is always um a good learning experience to be honest with you. So, yep. I can report back next month. >> Thanks. >> Thank you. >> And it's free. We don't have to pay to go, which isn't always the case. So, >> yeah. Wish the uh the Vermont Fest the technology one that was free, right? Um, okay. Uh, F42 Windsor Southeast SU acceptable use of information and communication technology. >> No changes this uh meeting for the third reading. We will have changes. >> Okay. >> You some of them will be purely semantics like what nobody refers to web 2.0. >> Okay. But uh there will be other um less semantic changes that I

022will bring forward. >> Okay. >> So more to follow. >> Okay. We may want to extend this for another reading. >> We can do it for Thank you. >> Excellent. >> Um draft C80 Health and Safety Policy. Second read. So um no changes since last time. >> Okay. How is this different than the the health policy which the nurses spent so much time creating? Um, >> this one is more geared towards staff. >> Okay. >> Health and safety policy. The the other health, it's not health and safety, is it? It's got a different name. Wellness. >> It's local wellness, isn't it? >> Okay. Yeah. >> That's geared more towards um students curriculum. >> This was the policy that Okay, thank you. This is the policy we're creating because of the health and primarily the safety

023concerns of the staff during negotiations with features and support Stephanie. Okay. >> So, there's some language in the contract now. >> Yes. >> And we shared that we would create a policy and then we would take that language out of the contract. >> Yeah. So, this is the policy. Yes. >> Have we had input from staff on this? >> I shared it um at the union um leader meeting. Uh I linked it to our agenda and shared it with them and told them that it was on the um the queue at the board meeting. Okay. >> So, I haven't heard um I haven't sent it out to all staff. I can certainly do that if you would like. >> I would I'd like any staff who has an opinion on it to be able to

024come in to the third reading if they have strong feelings about it. >> And I would be I want to pass on I just like how Liz has expertise in my bra. I'd be happy to hear their opinion during the discussion. >> Yeah. >> And I I've read through it. I like it. I believe it. >> Here's the contract. >> Yeah. [laughter] >> And [clears throat] it has been vetted through our legal council. Yeah, I it uh it covers um some concerns of the legal council and that's what is what we found. >> Yeah. C28. No, I'm sorry. Any other comments on this? >> C28, transgender in gender non-conforming students policy. Second read. Um I think whoever worked on this be it someone in the district or someone outside the district I believe it clarify

025and simplify things very well. Does anyone else have opinion on this comments? >> No, I didn't catch it. There's not really any material change here. It's just kind of a >> Yeah, policy clean up. >> Yeah, exactly. Okay, then if there's no more um discussion, we will move on to administrative report. >> That was fast. Well done. All right, your screen. We have several reports tonight, so we're going to get right to it. Um, try to be as succinct as possible, but also informative. Uh, I'm going to go first. Um, so I always like to start with uh what our what our kids and our staff are doing in alignment with our strategic plan. Um, so as you know, one of our goals is student success and and engagement. And so you'll see that we

026have um some teachers working together, grade level teams trying to give the view. We had PD on October 9th and 10th and I was a data dive mostly and looking at our STAR data at the classroom and individual level setting goals around that. Um but then there was some curriculum work that continued from the fall and um staff are working on really looking at the curriculum, aligning it across the SU, which units make sense where we're teaching them which ones maybe can be combined or even eliminated if um need be. and then they're working on common assessments and so that we are collecting the same data across the SD which which we really haven't um necessarily done in the past. So we're actually really happy that this is happening and um we'll be able to

027look at data consistently across the SEO which is exciting to us. Um, we have some students engaged in small group work and some students at the middle school who are working on a hands-on activity in science class and I will say our um part of student engagement is really creating some voice opportunity um real world experiences for our kids and our teachers are working to do that which is which is a balance when you have a curriculum that you are supposed to be delivering. It's really it's really hard balance but they're working on it. um culture and student and staff wellness. We have a group of high school students this year um that are um Kate's done a really nice job. There were a lot of groups at the high school meeting and so there's

028been an effort to coordinate those groups so there's not overlap and people doing the same thing, planning the same things. um a and you know trying to be really organized and share share leadership across the um high school. So this is a group of kids that are working with um up for learning who is um helping teach them some leadership skills and helping they they were working on potentially helping devise a student culture survey. Um so that work is ongoing. The fear we've got in the middle there a student in a student leadership role. She's the greeter. So when you walk into that classroom, that student pops up and says hello and welcome and what's your name? Um which is really and I think that was kindergarten. So it's pretty pretty awesome to see that.

029And then um the last picture is I don't know it's a little bit blurry but uh H Heartland did a harvest fest uh in October and the older kids. One of their goals this year under culture and leadership is they have um partners older students and younger students. And so the younger students were with the older students doing these um various stations. It was a wonderful um uh day that they planned and that students helped plan. So really working on getting the students involved. Um uh as you know um we've been we've been really focused on behavior work across the SU. Uh Tracy's going to show you shortly an an amazing bullying prevention video that was created by the students um in each of some students in each of our schools. It's hot off the

030press. So, you're going to be the first ones to see it this afternoon or this evening. >> Um, and then we did our first behavior data dive with staff last week at a staff meeting. And when we were preparing for those data dives, we [clears throat] um we found some things in the system that needed to be tweaked. So, as you're working through things, you find things and and Bridgetette and Wendy and her team have really been instrumental in like making the changes in the MBA system so that the data is um the data that we're collecting is the data that we want and um the data we need to help make change in our schools. So, I think the staff really appreciated looking at it. You can you can see you know sometimes there

031are a lot of incidents but when you dig in it's really a few students creating a lot of incidents and those students need our support. So what is that going to look like? So those discussions have been rich and ongoing. I think we found we don't have enough time um uh to dig in as deep as we'd like. So we have to figure out um how to do that a little bit how how to make the time. Um, couple of updates that I'm bringing back to you that I've been tasked with. So, we've met with the eighth grade. Um, the math team teaches eighth grade algebra. Uh, we had our second meeting today. they uh we had we had a lengthy discussion in both of the meetings with them, but I think they've come to

032consensus that it makes sense for um individual schools to be able to figure out how to offer algebra at the school level. Um, and the reason for that is they they feel strongly that eighth grade math should be taught to all students because within eighth grade math there are there are algebra skills. There are also geometry skills or also other eighth grade math skills that might not be um might be being lost when they're just taking algebra, but they do want to offer the opportunity for kids to be able to still take algebra if they want to. So, the discussion was um it could be an elective taught by their math teacher. I understand that doesn't necessarily come with a high school math credit, but it does allow a student to then go into geometry

033and gives them more time to to fulfill the math requirements um for whatever um area they're going into. Um we talked about BTBLC being an option and I think it's going to be a case by case how many students want to do it. Um, if there are a lot, I think the principles are committed to figuring out how their math certified math teacher could offer an elective. If there are a few students, I think they are um in support of offering BTBLC the support of the math teacher. Um, so I think it's going to look different depending on the school and the year. So we also talked about, you know, maybe this makes sense for next year looking at the numbers, but maybe not the following year. So the board is okay with that. I

034think um at some point you have to vote on it. Um you voted to bring eighth grade and algebra to the SU level. You have to vote to to not. So put on a future agenda. That's okay. Okay. Um Larry and I have been meeting with the maintenance staff um as we were tasked with at the um >> retreat. >> At the retreat, we had some really great conversations. I think we probably could have made it happen with with a side letter of sorts, but um when the staff went to their serve director, the advice was not to make any changes right now due to consolidation potentially happening. So, we're not doing it right now. >> Yeah. [laughter] >> Um so, but we did have some great great conversations with them and um it was

035>> Closest we've ever been. Yeah. For real. So um and as you know there is new legislation on a cardiac response plan. So we have been I've been meeting with the nurses. We met with a representative from um the medical center um in Burlington. It's escaping me right now. The hospital uh who who gave us some draft uh policies and checklists for us to use to create our own and the nurses are working on that but we will be in compliance. Um, it's actually really important to have these plans, these checklists. You do have to check the batteries in your in your machines to make sure they're working, which we hadn't had a protocol for in the past. I mean, the nurses were doing it, but not, you know, consistently across the SU. So, >>

036you have Fletcher Allen. >> Yeah, I think. >> Yeah. Oh, UV Medical Center. I guess >> training training. We so part of um the plan means you have to have people that uh know how to you know use the machines and administer um CPR. And so we are bringing in um a person to teach the people that we determine should be required um which school personnel uh besides the nurse should have this training. And you know, we've talked about it's got to be somebody that, you know, doesn't make sense for it to be a classroom teacher really because classroom teacher can't really leave their classroom to go save somebody, you know, as fast as maybe the principal or the admin assistant or or whoever. So, that needs to be determined. And then once we figure

037that out, we're going to offer training um on our half day in March. So, we've worked out the professional development calendar so that happen. So, that's all in the works. Do >> you have a question? >> Yeah. Really? Um about like right now about how many AEDs are there in the in the building >> or I should say >> there's minimum one but there's there should be >> at Windsor now there's one on every level >> one because >> because of an incident >> they are talking about the nurses brought up in our meeting that there should be some a machine accessible to outdoor um >> the Windsor does have one outdoor. It's different in every building. So, it's good to >> There's at least one in every building, though. And there's conversation happen. Yeah.

038In my experience, that's what I what I've seen them. >> And it's great. I mean, there's a cost to it. So, >> you know where they are, you know. I mean, so at least on the ones in Windsor, if it's on the floor, >> you know, all staff should be aware. I mean, we buy you pass them, right, >> all the time, >> right? >> But there might be kids who don't pass them, >> right? Right. >> Depending on where they go. >> Yeah. It's really good work. It makes sense. So, Um, quick federal funds update. Uh, you know, the government is shut down. I just want you to know it hasn't impacted our funds yet. Um, because we're forward funded, so our funds are coming in. We are concerned about SNAP um, services. And

039those I think November 1st go away due to the shutdown. And so we are going to be diligently looking to notice if our kids need support and figure out how to offer them support. um the best of our ability. >> Elizabeth, >> thanks. I just want to say that uh the legislature is also working on this, the emergency board, which is made up of the governor and leadership from both the House and Senate and several administrators. I think they're meeting either on Wednesday or Thursday of this week. um they ha they will we already have money set aside um for SNAP so it won't be a problem to fund um uh that gap the problem is how to fund the gap um because SNAP is administered through a program called EBT which is uh >>

040what >> oh I was just saying yes [laughter] Yeah, EBT is uh >> something benefits transfer and um it is >> benefits transfer. Thank you. It's the card that SNAP funds are uh loaded onto and the administration of EBT is also uh not working right now because the um it's part of the shutdown and um it has been included in the SNAP shutdown. So, um, we don't know how the funds will be distributed, but we do know that we have the funds and we want to distribute them. And I think that's what will be decided on Wednesday or Thursday. >> That is great to hear. Thank you, Elizabeth. Takes a little bit of the worry >> off my mind. Um, okay. Just quickly, I don't have much to update on the redistricting task force. Um,

041sessions have been going on across the state. Um, we've been sending out information for people to take the survey, which is now closed. And I think the last redistricting engagement session is tomorrow. There was a virtual link. I think the right one's out there now. There was um a link sent that was not that didn't work for some reason last time. Um, so three maps are being in disc being discussed as far as I know. CTE there's a Boseis um structure that's being will be will be discussed and um strategic re regional high schools and Elizabeth has been attending those meetings for us so I think she should go ahead weigh in she knows far more than I do >> so um uh first of all at tomorrow tomorrow the task force is meeting from

0429:30 to 3:30 and then at 6:30 is the last public input session. So, I highly recommend if you have if you are of the mind and have the time um go to that. But, uh there are two extended So, they're going to on uh November 10th is the day that they will uh uh the task force will see um the actual map recommendations. Unfortunately, all of this public comment has not been about particular maps. Um, and so if you plan to go and make a comment, it can't be about a map. The maps will be finalized at their November 27th meeting. And I plan to uh do a couple of um public forums um between those two dates, between the 10th and the 27th, so that I can um give actualformational updates. Um, that's but

043also very important is that on November 7th, which is a Friday from 6:00 to 7:00 p.m., which is a terrible time and it's only an hour, but the small schools um uh the small schools committee of the state board of education, which is deciding on um on small uh the standards for small schools being kept open. um they are meeting on that day and they also have a public input session that is November 7th from 6:00 to 7 pm. Um and I will be sending out information I I'll send you information about that Christine so that you can put that in your thing. >> Yes, I'd be happy to. Thank you Elizabeth and thank you for attending all those meetings for us and keeping us updated. It's really helpful. Um >> the one one more

044thing one more thing the um commission on the future of public education in Vermont has been talking about the makeup and role of school boards and also um the role of public input on school closures. They have uh finalized their preliminary draft of their report. Their report and the task force report are both due to the legislature on December 1st. the commission um has a their draft uh requires a lot of reading between the lines. Um and they have some of some of the meetings were not very well attended although they did have a quorum. Um but they made some decisions at those meetings that uh are will have really big impacts on whatever consolidation occurs. And one of those impacts is that the new boards will not necessarily be made up of one member

045from each town. Um and that uh there may not be any real public input on school closures. Um and again when I when I have those uh public forums I will explain in greater detail but those those report that report the preliminary report is out on the commission's website. Thanks. >> Thanks Elizabeth. Okay. Um just uh let you know uh we did have we completed our audit. Um auditors were here in October for three days. No material findings again for how many years, Larry? >> Since FY20. Um we will post the results as soon as we have them. Um in the fin the final report on the website, which the other ones are on there. I just have to shout out our team because the auditors um really appreciate coming here. Everything's in order. They

046have questions. We are available Larry Mosley or Deanna or or or Jordan. And um so they've been very complimentary of the way we do business here, which is nice to hear. >> And I I think a special shout out to Deanna Croll, who does a lot of the work behind the scenes, who's you never see at board meetings, and you know, you wouldn't know about her from the website or anything, but she does a lot of the internal auditing before it ever gets to the auditors, right? >> Uh which allows us to uh you know, make best use of the tax dollars. And I think it's really important that, you know, everybody appreciates the work that she does. It's kind of unheralded work. You know, she's not working with kids, but >> it's really important

047um with the work that we do that we have somebody with her level of expertise and knowledge. >> And she sounds like a pretty >> important strategy. That's very important. >> And [clears throat] she doesn't she doesn't miss anything. >> No. A lot of moving parts behind the scenes. And that is really greatly appreciated. And it's four entities and $58 million. >> Yep. She does a really phenomenal job. So, shout out. >> All right. Uh, speaking of that, >> John. >> Yeah. The question I think it's for Larry whether or not we indeed have a second signer for our checks. >> Yeah. Uh, it's currently as of now, my understanding is no, it's it's you. And so, we need a second signer. So I I guess future board meeting we should put on the agenda.

048>> On the agenda. Yep. >> Another one. I should stay healthy. >> Yes. [laughter] >> Please. >> Thanks, John. And thanks for stepping up. >> Uh, okay. So, this is the quarterly report. Um, not I don't think there's um Gez, look at that. A just gives you a summary. I don't know what I'm saying there. [laughter] You have to report. Um so no big surprise we are um this is revenue. We are waiting for revenue to come in from the state. So you will see in the red a large amount of money. Um when you go down to expenditures by account um there there is a you know when you look at it there's some some large um in the red um amounts. I think I think we know that we underbudgeted special ed. So,

049a lot of that is actual the actual cost of what we are um providing for our students around special ed. And so, we're working to write that budget. You'll you saw that last month Larry presented. Um nothing's changed, I don't think, in that realm or too much has changed. So, um no, we're going to fix it, but you're going to see red for the time being. Anything you want to add, Larry, with your >> No, we expect uh it's very early in by 26 um as we are hiring a payroll person. We have Jordan Sergeant doing the job of two people which for the first quarter at least has saved >> some money and um so and we expect as far as uh the general fund is concerned to end 26 at the rate we're

050going similar to the way we end FY25 >> and and the way we ended FY25 in in um was we were over but we were able to >> we got extra revenue from extraordinary revenue from the balance >> and we use some of the fund balance uh so that we were not we didn't have to an FY25 dip back into the local assessments and we're able to keep it the way it was. Um we have a fund balance of currently 200,000 $30,000 or so and in the general fund and uh if we end 26 like we ended 25 that will not cover it. So we have other things we can do as we get closer which we'll know more in the third and fourth quarter. >> Still very early. early. >> All right, that is

051it for me. Passing it back to you, Bill. >> Okay, Bridget. >> Yes. >> Want me to pull that up? >> Should have had that ready. It's taking me on the agenda. >> Yeah, you guys should have gotten a PDF attached so you could look at it in advance, which is kind of nice. Um, >> just tell me what it's called. WSUS [clears throat] data is not in your should be waiting so long. I'm sorry. Okay, there we go. just advance slides as I call someone noticing. >> All right. >> Okay. So the second slide in um are the wig goals that are wildly important goals that are set at the SU level. Each of the schools also have these goals and um our goal is to have a 100% of our students grow in

052reading and math period. um it's at a low percentage point, but um we want to see growth even for our students that are um exceeding the standards. Um really think about enrichment opportunities so that they'll continue to grow also. So we'll see where that ends up, but um it's actually quite remarkable how close we are to that um which is wonderful. Um so that's an overall growth goal. uh dibbles now for the first time is our K through three uh reading assessment due to act 139. Um so and the initial fall scores are always tend to be low and there's often rapid growth between the fall and the spring. We'll look at that in a moment. But overall when we we've been measuring for our data inventory from winter to winter. So that's pretty much

053what we base our uh wig goals on is winter to winter. That's when we submit our data inventory to the state. And so we're looking at nearly 40% hopefully to grow to 45%. And that's the early reading screener um measured by um what is now called MClass Dibbles. So um we'll talk about that more in just a moment. uh third through 8th grade, we're looking at uh about 59% in reading proficiency. We tend to have decent reading scores and we want to see that overall come up to 64%. We'll break that down in a moment. Um so in math um continues to be a struggle statewide um falling in lower obviously than reading. We're looking at for having uh 43% raised to 50%. That's a lofty goal, but um we've seen great growth um over

054the past year, especially at the middle level. And we'll talk about that also in a moment. And again, these are winter to winter. So, we'll be checking in probably in a board meeting, I would guess, in March on the winter scores. Just throwing that out. I think it's >> late February. >> Could be the late February one. And then finally, um, yeah, I'm I'm still here. Yeah, the percentage of students in 9th through 10, you notice we only have a reading weight goal and that is partially be that is because we haven't we this year for the first time have a unified assessment to give our ninth and tth graders and star math and so we didn't have data to set our goal in math with, but we're well well aware of work that needs

055to be done at that level. So can be that in mind. Okay. So breaking down MClass dibbles. Next slide. Again, this is star. This is the MClass data as of this fall. And you can imagine little K's coming into school, right? And first graders. Um we tend to see a lot of need of intervention and support. Um 44% of our students um were in in basically significant need of intervention. those uh parents by law uh received a letter home and also intervention began. Um so that's like an immediate action that occurs even starting the first week in September. Um so parents are aware that some kind of intervention has begun and again in general with this reading screener we tend to see pretty rapid grow growth by the winter time. So we'll update that um

056that data afterwards. But intervention at this young age is um uh super um you know in terms of direct intervention and um the results are are usually extremely positive. So that's the dibbles. >> A lot of bang for your buck. >> A lot that's what I'm looking for. A lot of bang for the buck. So this is the suide reading data. Um and you can see uh small growth um from basically 57 through close to 59 in terms of last fall and this fall. I have to be honest with you, I'm not big fan of fall data in general because you're looking at different influencers. You're looking at last year's instructional time period, right? >> The carryover and then maybe four to five weeks of this year. So, it's not we we can't necessarily attribute

057it to one instructional experience or another, but it's a starting point. It allows us to sort of look at our winter data. Um, but that just gives you an idea about where um a group of, you know, this is better because this is the OSU um were in the last year at this time versus the current year. Um, so this breaks it down. This is reading. The good news about the reading data as we move up through 2 through five um 6 through8 and 910 is you you'll see growth as you should and this is what I mean students tend to respond with the kind of intensity occurs in literacy in those early grades very well and carrying them into the middle school. So we're looking here at again 51% to nearly 58% last fall

058to this fall. I think in general the curriculum work that's being done uh looking at how we instruct in literacy block I think we have a much more organized system of intervention going on across all schools at this point in time. I think it's paying off and um hoping we continue to see that pay off especially at these grade levels. So that's reading. Um if we move to six through eight um you're going to see what I mean. This is 63% and nearly 62%. So a 1% drop with changes in students that's um you know so close and again uh fairly decent numbers. What I get concerned about is that group of students that get stuck below the benchmark and how are we addressing that 6 through eight. I know that there's been a more

059attention to intervention at the middle levels. um full-time people person in Windsor addressing at this point in time very aware of some of the extra support needed to move um certainly our yellows up to red and perhaps our our students that are performing in the red up to yellow. So I'm hoping a little bit more attention at the middle level about intervention. Um we can not you know not only continue with the number of students at or above the benchmark but address some of the students that tend to stay below the benchmark. See if we can get some movement there. Um 910 again um this is actually tends to be usually um a growth you'll see growth again by the winter data. um this usually is closer to um in the 60 percentile. So take

060a look. I've got to drill down to look at that ninth and 10th grade data. I know this is a slight drop and figure out what exactly is going on, but again um winter data often students settle in, they've had x number of months with uh teachers who might see a a jump at that point in time on the nth and tth grade. Um the the 10th slide which is our data over time was we're following the same group of students. >> We will generally do this in the spring and not now for the same reasons I just clarified. You're you don't have a full instructional year to look at how uh a group of fourth graders responded versus a year later. And so once again, we're looking at um fall scores. So we're looking

061at experiences over last year and part of this year. So I know there's been a request by this board and a good one to look at um data over time. And I just want to say that that there'll be lots of slides about this in the spring data report is is is when we're going to put it in. But to give you an idea, this is how fourth graders responded. um in at the same time and now as fifth graders. Um but again, you're talking about fall data, so it's hard to really know was it last year that was influenced them or the f first five weeks of this year and likewise fifth to sixth. But this is the kind of report that's going to come up in the spring and we hope to do

062many grade levels um so that we see the full instructional year and how that influenced the same group of students. So, so stay tuned for that. Um, >> I I think it's important to point out that um um this has been a discussion in the past and the fact that when we're looking at six through 8 data and 9 through 10 data, um those two age groups are when they transition from 8th grade to 9th grade, it's a completely different group of students. >> Yes. Um and and in the past it's been voiced in hopes of a way to at least take a look of at ninth graders all eighth graders in the next year to be able to look at all ninth graders >> regardless of where they go. Yeah. >> Be an interesting

063data. >> And we can do that now because all of our data is an edge climber. So we're able to >> to do that. But the >> unless they come from Cordish, we don't get data from Cordes. >> We could probably, but we don't right now. >> So, do you get data um from uh the Woodstock or >> Oh, how our out how are ninth graders do? >> No, they take they wouldn't they don't I don't know what assessment they use, but no star. Definitely. >> It's a great question. >> Okay. Yeah, we might be able by PSAT 10 time if they're taking those or 11. >> Yeah. So, yeah, it's great. Um, so we're at slide 12. Oh, so this is SUI math. Um, always a little bit different result as we see statewide,

064although growth. So, we're certainly moving in the right direction. I think there's been a lot of focus. We'll talk more about this, especially at the middle level, but almost all grades right now are using spiral review, which means when students begin a lesson, they're they're revisiting concepts as a warm up rather than just doing fluency drills. That's a big change. We started that at the middle level, had great results, especially in Windsor. And so now almost all of the schools as part of the routine is are using some form of spiral review. Um, so kids just continually revisit concepts. So we're hoping to see continual growth in math as a result of of that. Also too, more of a focus on intervention, a real awareness. As Christine said, there's data dives the ninth, I think.

065And uh, teachers just are much more fluid about talking about data, concerned about data, concerned about their classroom, setting goals for their kids. And I like the fact that that's on the front of their um minds. And then continuing our um again this is grades one and two uh very young to be taking STAR assessment. Um as a side note, we are looking at using MClass math instead for this young age which would mirror MClass um dibbles. It just is seems to be a more developmentally appropriate tool. same standards measured but just in a very different way. We have found at times that even the reading gets in the way of the math and so you you skew standards if you end up having reading of a problem set getting in the way of a

066student being able to express their understanding of math skills. So we are exploring the possibility of moving to Mclass math for these young grades in the fall. So we'll keep you posted on that. But you'll see the difference in terms of math, you know, continues to be usually ends up at about a 40% to 48% or higher um as as students get older. So you'll see three through five here. Um we're all the way up to 41 and grew to nearly 46%. Again, I credit that to some of the spiral review that started the year. Um and just more of awareness with intervention. And then here's six through eight. This is quite a leap. They started spy review last year. So in a way they've sort of had a at least a halfyear jump. That's

067quite significant as you can see um in terms of growth. And then um continuing on, this is the same data that we'll look at more closely in the spring um you know, but what you want to see obviously is you know growth for the fifth and then on through six um in terms of uh more exposure and growth. So we'll save a deeper conversation slide 16 um in regards to that. And then >> Heather, >> yeah, Heather the math teacher jump in here with me. >> Um, I just have a question about the timing of your star test. And by timing, I mean, um, there's a setting where students can sort of get extra time for each question because it is a time test. And so I know that something we did was like everyone

068gets the extra time in our district and I didn't know if that was something um you guys have looked at as well because like if you spend too much time on one question because maybe your reading skills aren't so great and you're trying to like actually read the problem by the time you start doing the math they've already jumped you to the next one. I'm I'm fairly sure that K through five all timers are turned off universally. So, I'll double check on that, but I think that was agreed upon by each of the each of the school sites. >> The issue with turning up the timers though, then your um some of your data coming out uh on on grade level as well as region standards no longer accurate. >> Well, the the normative piece

069>> it mayffect National percentile effect national percentile it will not probably affect I have to think about this >> benchmark meeting the benchmark because then you're measuring can a student or not me meet the benchmark not how that student does against the nation >> right but the benchmark is based upon is the my question is the benchmark based upon the national age standards >> state standards Right. But the the the the um standard score >> is the same regardless. >> So we can set our standard score to measure the nation all the nation or to measure Vermont benchmarks. How these students do against Vermont benchmarks. It's set for Vermont benchmarks right now. All this data that we see. But does cutting off the question would be does cutting uh not having a timer effect the

070accuracy of the benchmark scores? >> I don't I don't think it does and it's a great question only because you're measuring how a student is or is not meeting the benchmark standard. You're not measuring them against anybody. So you and I definitely can dig in. I think that's a good question to dig into, but it's as if it took me 10 minutes to meet >> um a benchmark, right? Versus it took you 20 minutes to meet a benchmark. In both cases, we both met the benchmark, which is what we want measured, right? >> So, I can It's definitely worth >> Yeah, question. It is >> the data behind the scenes. Yep. Yep. And I think it's great. Um so continuing on to u breaking down this data um beginning with slide 18 this is free

071and reduced lunch um in in terms of star reading we do see a discrepancy about 8 to 10% between students who um are on free and reduced lunch and those who are not. Um so keeping that in mind just you know what how can we increase access intervention whatever that happens to be to close that gap I don't recall um last year it was about eight and this year it looks like it's closer to 10 if I'm looking at this um correctly. So it you know something to keep in mind in terms of trends. Um when we get to math it's even greater. Um so um free and reduces the first set of slides. Um so it it was 66 and compared to 53 below the benchmark last year and now we're at 60 um

072versus 49. So, we've closed we've closed that gap, right, for this year more significantly in math than we have um you know, but it's still it still is is too much. Um and it's something that, you know, something for us to look at. So, but looking at this discrepancy, this discrepancy is pretty impressive as compared to nationwide. Um, the discrepancy nationwide on on these two categories is is much worse than this. >> I just kind of want to cheer out and I like obviously we'd like it to be no discrepancy, right? So, >> progress. >> So, slide 20. um is students on an IEP and star reading. It's good to have Jen here to talk probably more eloquently about this, but I will say that some of the students that are not meeting the benchmark

073um are receiving intervention on their individual education plan as a result of not meeting the benchmark if if that makes sense. So one of the criteria for eligibility would be a number of data points that indicate um a student is below the benchmark. Um so obviously some discrepancy in in our data of students on an IEP and students are not simply makes sense in the idea of the process with which we derive an IEP. Whether or not it it it should be this large um with intervention, I think is something that I would certainly let Jen talk with um the group about. And if you go to slide 21, we see this similar pattern in math. Um, so it's something that Jen and I have begun a conversation with, will continue to have conversations with,

074um, in terms of, you know, overall as an SU, where are we at, what we could be doing. Um, but again, um, the the good news on some of this is that some of the interventions and supports are in place. um and to the extent that they need to be or that we can start to close this gap is a conversation obviously. And the other thing to remember is this is um all grade levels. So your little ones right where you need that intensive support um um in terms of let's say reading, you know, they'll begin they'll begin to bounce and make huge gains in reading with that support. This is data K through 10. Um, so just keeping that in mind. Jen, is there anything else you wanted to add about that? >> I

075mean, I think you summed it up well when you um, you know, thinking about a youngster with a disability, specifically a specific learning disability in reading or math, it's going to take them that much longer to close the gap because by definition, they have a specific learning disability in basic skill area. So, um, >> but the the term self-fulfilling prophecy is not the correct term, but >> and I don't know what the correct term is, but the fact is that these students are on this list because they're below grade level. And so when that gap begins to be closed, then those students often come off an IEP and then come off this list. >> Right. >> And so, >> and new students go on >> and new students. Correct. And so, >> Right. Yeah, >>

076this is this is a rotating group as opposed to uh the group before which those students have a tendency to remain on that list regardless of right >> their academic >> yeah and how can you break that pattern >> right >> so this I mean basically this list that >> difference will never be closed >> because of how that list is made correct Great. So, um, as Christine talked about, we have a few new systems in place. Um, one of which is MBA, um, attendance and behavior data. So, we're just giving you a small sampling of that um, tonight and you will hear perhaps deeper reports at the building level reports and faculty has had a chance of looking at this data. So on slide um number 23 this is how reports come in um

077around just attendance. So overall the district for example has a 95% attendance rate. Um you'll see um 1300 parties which might make you jump a tad but I just want to remind as was spoken about about behavioral data. If for example one student decides that their mode of operation is to be late for their classes. Okay. So seven classes let's say times five days a week times 40 school days. That would be 1,400 in itself. So it seems like a lot of tardies but when we start to drill down we just have some patterns that have to be interrupted. And you know first period is another time that we see late. you know, it's like, well, my card didn't start or you could have left two minutes earlier. A lot of first block issues. Um,

078generally at the older level, but some at the younger level. So, again, it's great because it puts this in, you know, in our in our horizon to take a look at and address. Um, we're also looking at chronic absenteeism this year. We've got school engagement coaches. Um, at this point in time, the good news it's down 3% from this point in time last year. Again, I think simply because we are addressing it. We've got school engagement coaches that are taking a look at students that are chronically absent and what those families need and making and reaching out. So, um, hopefully that 3% down from this time last year holds, but that's really good news. And, um, you know, we want kids in school, so I think that's fabulous. Um, >> do you want to say

079anything about the new um, we'll be sending out information on this? >> So, um, new plugin for parents. >> Yeah, there is a there is a coming up. Um, parents are going to be able to uh, uh, go into the portal and write that their child is out sick. It'll come right into the attendance secretary rather than relying on phone calls back and forth. So that will be an option with which there it's not have to but it's an option that parents can um just fill in that we'll have information on how parents can access that portal. They also will get alerts if their child is tardy twice. Um so there's a lot more kind of push going out. I think Hartford has a school system uh system like that. It's not uh MBA. is

080another one where if your child is um is uh late or skipped a class or whatever, you you get an alert. So, there's a lot more push data that is going to be coming um in email and and you can check there'll be a way to check this portal um for parents to see what's going on. Um so, if you're looking 10 classes, miss, where have you been? Right. So, it it's it's going to provide a lot of of information. So yeah, so that's great. >> Is there any definition? This is one thing I'm struggling with where I'm at. Is any definition between the difference between a charity and an absence? >> I think did we say 15 or 20 minutes? It's in the behavior handbook. >> It's uh well, it's actually on the admin

081agenda to to clarify tomorrow. >> Okay. Questions coming up for us, too. >> We we have no >> Yeah. So when are they late and when are they you know the class? Yeah. So yeah that's tomorrow. Um >> stay tuned on that. >> Stay tuned. >> Okay. And then the next one is uh the dashboard. This tells how many incidents I will say it looks like October dropped but we only did this mid October. So um stay tuned on that. But this it just is overall the average login um sessions per day. And um you know we'll we'll keep an eye on that. This is really great news because for staff, for students, you know, across the board, people are looking at behavior and attendance data um this year and I think that's a good

082good thing. Um it also lets you know where things are occurring. As you can see from slide 25 um most of these are in the classroom. So when we get log entries, most of them are occurring in classroom. Knowing little ones, I'm not surprised. is also on the playground and at lunch and uh in the hallway what we call the loose structure time periods. None of that is probably surprising to all of you. Um so that's kind of interesting data too. And so the teachers look at that data and they say what can we do better out on the recess field or at lunchtime to improve this so incidents reduce. So it's really pinning down. And the last slide just quickly um again we're not surprised the time of day tends to be in the

083middle of the day um where we see the most instance that's when recess and lunch occurs. All this kind of stays in line maybe sometime around 10 o'clock they're getting hungry. I'm not really sure but we can figure that out andor tired. But it's interesting um just to see that come up and then kind of come back down. But >> if they're not in school at 12 a.m. staff is learning how to use the system. That was actually that question is that just user >> error. Yeah, we have a principal [laughter] that I always apologize because we do a test students, right? And so we put in these incidents and tests and then we forget to remove them. So this child was misbehaving at 12 a.m. >> It really is. It is. It's all good.

084It is all good. So anyway, there's at a much deeper level. Teachers can drill down. they can see, you know, what what classroom it's coming out of, even what students, what can we do to support these students and so on. So, it's it's been great. >> Yeah. >> Okay. Questions, thoughts? >> This is fantastic. Yeah, >> they're starting to break it down, too. And um by gender, >> by um we can run it um by uh being reduced versus non-fane reduced to see if there's any trends or patterns, also by um race. Um, so we're starting to look at that just to just to see if we're noticing anything. >> Yeah, stop any more. >> Stop sharing. >> John, >> a question I didn't see in any of the data. uh is it collected the

085number of students percentage-wise that are on um IEPs? And secondly, um the goal when a students put on an IEP is to have it be temporary as possible and the number that we're actually transitioning from an IEP into the general educational population. Uh so uh our child count um our most recent child count uh we have 284 students between uh pre yeah prek and 12th grade who are currently eligible for special education. Um it's I don't know where our current uh complete um student population is. I think we're around 22% um special ed eligible out of the entire student population of all our schools pre-K to 12. That's a rough estimate. Um and students um you know, we always want to be able to close the gap um and have our students um sort of

086exit out of special education, but um you know, there are 13 different areas of disability and some students are far more impacted than others. Some do transition um throughout the years off of an IEP. Um and some will graduate um you know they when we when students graduate they no longer have an IEP. They um but we do have students who certainly stay on IEPs through um until 12th grade. So um and it just really depends on the impact of their disability um as to whether they're able to uh kind of grow out of an IEP or not. That makes sense. >> Okay. But I think >> is there trending one direction or the other on the percentage? >> Uh [clears throat] well so the only um data I've looked at um is just the

087current child account data that we have. Um I can when I I think I'm probably slated to speak to the board at some point and I can show you our data that um outlines um the uh number of students per uh disability area. Um I can tell you that um the primary disability is specific learning disability right now is the highest um area um of disability percentage-wise as well as developmental delay which is our three to five year olds uh followed by emotional disturbance. I think those are our top three disability areas which is not uh unusual or unlike the rest of the state um as far as uh our our count goes. >> Thank you. >> Yeah. All right, I can join. Um, I don't mind sharing my screen, Christie, but I just tried

088to join. >> Oh, sorry. >> You'd like to come into the meeting? >> For you. [laughter] >> I can see her. They just got to see the screen. You know, you >> She's coming. She's She's coming. Sorry. Okay. Great. All right. Okay. So, just wanted to give a um few quick updates. Uh these are just repeat slides. Um you know, our theme again is stronger together, thinking about different ways. And actually, these next two slides all come from working with students with disabilities. But this is one that we continue to show as a reminder that belonging is not about fitting in. It's not about assimilating. It's about being able to show up as all of who you are. And when we think about universal design, right, this I think I've shared this with the board

089before. You've probably seen this, right? It's like why not shovel the horn out first? It's like when we can center the people most impacted, we know that it's better for everybody. So, just some reminders. Um, and this is also a reminder, it's also a reminder for myself. This is something I don't know if folks are familiar with what they've been talking about with this perception gap, how we we're seeing just so much polarization and othering in our society. And this is actually showing that in reality, we kind of care about some of the same things. And so, again, it's a reminder, I think we're really um we've been pitted against each other really well. And it's nice to remember that we actually may have more in in common with each other even though it does

090it might not always feel that way. So I just thought that was interesting. And there's there are a bunch of different organizations that are doing some work around this. Um some things that we're working on this year, continuing, you know, to work on our group agreements and find ways to keep using these to build community, build culture, build trust. Um asking the question, who's missing and why? This is basically a part of using an equity filter, right? Which is also something that we are getting in the practice of doing which is just asking questions. This is the lens that um is from the AOE. And so we're bringing that in, right? Just getting tomorrow we have a a meeting with administrative team, you know, and just asking these questions. Where can we ask these when

091we're looking at the data, you know, how do we continue to surface um assumptions, right? what are our own biases that may be coming up when we're looking at um at data. So finding all the places where we can just continue to put these questions into practice. This was also um the new language that was added recently to our handbooks which I think helps support some of again the culture that we're building and some things that we are noticing in our schools. And so I just wanted to share that so far this year we've had I think 54 equity tickets submitted. And so this was purposefully created in um because of our anti-racism policy that wanted an anonymous way for people to report discrimination things that were happening. And I'll say this will continue to

092exist. But some of the work like that Bridgette and Wendy have been doing about thinking about how we integrate behaviors into P school gives us the opportunity to actually have people mark things like slurs more intentionally as they're coding it in P school. So we don't we have like three different things. You know, sometimes if it's if it's a hazing, harassment, bullying, there's a student poundup form, there's power school, there was an equity ticket. So trying to figure out if we can streamline all those things and not lose not lose anything in the process of doing that. So so far the tickets that came in, it was 52 at the time where I put the slide together, right? You can see these these same patterns. Uh I was on the call this afternoon. There's the

093HHB council that's been meeting in the state and Big Hartman was reporting from the human rights um commission. It's the same. It's an uptick, right? we're seeing an uptick in um not just incidents, but like the severity of some of these incidents, but they tend to be in the same categories, right? They're around race, um sex, gender, disabilities, like these we we know that these are patterns. And so, it's not surprising even though our equity ticket system isn't uh fully like we don't know we don't know if if we're getting all of the reports, but of the ones that do come in, this is these are the patterns that we stated. So, some of the ways that we're working on addressing them this year um has been great. I was invited to talk to some

094different middle schools. The one in the top right was weather Weathersfield most recently and these were follow-ups to the presentations that principles gave right around HH getting students familiar with the language. So, this was a more more specific around some like I just shared you know the equity tickets. I share this with students and some specific examples, right, about the things that are most common like if the the use of the N-word, right, the use of the R word, which kids are still saying I'm like, did we not stop saying that in like 1980 sometime? But like it's the same or saying not so gay, right? It's the same things that are coming up. And so we want to let them know like that's that's not okay. And yes, you're here to learn and we

095can learn together and we can also like agree to just not use these l to not use these words because you know they need to they need to understand why. So a little bit of educating and also encouraging pe like students to be upstanders, right? And so I think there's more that we can do around that. I'm excited to see, you know, maybe over this year, and I feel like we've been talking about this, if we can get our high school students trained up on how to train middle school students and younger students about really engaging as upstanders instead of passive bystanders. So, but this was really the presentation was more along the lines of intent versus impact. And even though it was for middle school in H Heartland, we ended up also putting one

096together for third through fifth grade. So, it was like, how do we adjust this for third through fifth grade? what would it look like to have that whole scope, you know, of these kinds of presentations ready to go so every year we can just revisit these same themes because we know they come up. Um, this is the video. Let's see. How am I going to be able to I feel like I might need to stop because it's not live in here. Let me figure out how I can stop sharing the screen because then I'll share. Uh, okay. This should do it. Let's see. to to to play auto you have to share the tab. >> We should be able to do this. I'll save this now. >> The volume. >> Yeah, >> the mic's gonna

097pick up. I >> feel like that's the right looks like it's ready, but for some reason it doesn't want to play. >> [laughter] >> Um >> maybe with me. >> Yeah, let's see. >> I mean, I have it pulled up in like four different screens, so I should be able to one of them. >> Yeah. I mean, that's it. So, I don't know why it's not >> It's not I don't think this is linked in the agenda, but it's linked. It's linked in my slide deck. >> Oh, it's not linked in the agenda. >> It's linked in my slide deck, which is on the agenda. >> Yeah, that's how I saw it. >> I mean, it's the That's strange. It's the link. It's just not Maybe I need to play through here. >> That's really

098weird. It's quite good actually. >> That's very strange. >> Sorry. >> Did you download it? >> No, it's on Canva. >> Trying like a couple different ones to see if any of them will work. the build up. >> You just put the link to the camera thing in the chat. >> Weird. It's the right It's the right link. It's just not >> It's linked in your report. >> Yeah, it's not playing. It's in the slide deck. You trying that bottom play button too, Chase? >> I'm trying um play button. [laughter] >> That's very strange. It's Yeah. >> Is it your last slide? No, >> it's What number is it? >> Oh, wait. >> There [music] we go. Okay, that was the one. I have two of them. >> So, I do unity day every year.

099I've done it for probably six years now at all my different schools. It celebrates the idea of coming together um against order together being our overall focus this year. [music] And I got the hand idea online and orange is the color that Pacers National Anti-bullying organization uses for Unity Day. So just made sense to make the orange hands. >> Being kind uh feels better than being bullied. Two wrongs don't make it right. Being bullied doesn't feel good. >> Do you really know them well? Because what a saying my mom always said is you don't know what's happening at their house. >> Speak up for people being playful. >> If you don't have anything nice to say, don't say it. >> Be respectful and understanding to others. >> Don't talk about others behind their back. You

100don't know what they're going through. >> Help the um person up and um help them. see someone sitting at lunch by themselves, [music] you can go sit with them. >> If you see something, say something. Tell them. >> Treat others the way you are to be treated. [music] >> You can have a conversation about your issues. >> Speak up for people when they're being bullied. >> Tell a trusted adult. >> Have a good day. It's about filling up our people's buckets um by being kind to them. If you say a compliment, you can even put a drop into other people's buckets. >> And into your bucket. >> Don't be mean to people. Don't bully others. Be kind to one another. >> Be your best self. Don't let others get to you. >> Be kind, not

101for kindness, not hate. >> Be nice to others and treat people the way that you want to be treated. >> Don't bully people for their disability. >> Disability. >> Simon says, "Stop bullying. Be kind to everyone you meet. >> No bullying. Stop bullying. >> Bully no one. And become a friend. You're not so good at drawing all the time. >> Hey, that isn't very nice. >> Okay, >> you should learn how to treat people better. >> That doesn't look like a guinea pig. That looks like a stupid weird dog. >> You're mean. >> Stop doing that. Those are mean words. Leave her alone. >> What? It was funny. >> It was not. >> I'm sorry. >> [music] >> You trace your hand and then you cut it out right like some uh things that make

102people happy. Give them compliments, uh, manners. [screaming] Yeah, and shout out to Brooke for putting that all together and to Frank Romeo for throwing the idea out there. Hey, does anybody want to collaborate around a video like this? >> Um, so trying to trying to work the themes again for the month. So, um, nice job all around on that one. >> Okay. I think I just um just a couple quick things. Um, one is that we are excited to be partnering with Outright Vermont and I would share more information about what's on the left, but we had somebody um, who generously offered some public comments that already spoke, I think, to what's on this slide. Um, so what I will say is outright is working with a group of school counselors and social emotional interventionist,

103behavioral [clears throat] interventionists, and uh, we had our first training with them, the first of three that we'll have this year. sort of capacity building which is awesome. Um and then I can not I don't have to speak to this much either up for learning. We're excited that we're partnering with them in the high school. Christine mentioned that and we're also looking to partner with them a little bit more around restorative practices. Again, one of those opportunities like if we can get students to be the ones who are also doing some of the training and these were some students um that went to the getting to Y which is reviewing the YRBS data and how to bring that back to schools and these are just some additions to the newsletters to the SU newsletters that

104Christina has been sending out. So sort of categorizing them within education quality standards and why um the education that we're doing and highlighting is around like anti-racism, anti-discrimination, right? These are all part of what our state has said that we should be doing as of this past July and then just trying to collect things to communicate through um policy briefs too. And uh I don't know if I've shared with the board that we were secured a $15,000 grant from the Burn Foundation to partner um with Clemens Family Farm this year. So, we are working to figure out what that's going to look like in terms of curriculum and um yeah, just Bridget, it's been great like working with you and thinking about how do we we're going to we're going to look at how do

105we how do we review our curriculum to make sure, right, that what we're providing um uh is presenting different people from different perspectives, right, and how we go about doing that is something I think we're excited to dig into a little bit more. and I'll report back on the how that all goes. >> And I think that's all I got for y'all tonight. Thank you. >> SU budget Larry. Okay. >> So, um just bring it up here. So, a few things that I wanted to uh that have changed since the original presentation and then kind of an overview of some new parts of the budget book. Uh first, um the budget book was public on September 18th, so more than a month ago. Um it was on the website out in Christine's newsletters, uh emailed

106to the board. So not major changes but there are some additions to the budget book and then some things that are more um germanine to the actual numbers behind the budget that I can go over. Uh the first thing is I included act 11 in the evolution of Vermont education law which uh act 11 was a um spending bill but it also included the statewide bargaining process for school employee healthcare benefits. I know that's come up at a few um board meetings. Um they uh somebody asked me for a overview of how we've been affected by the health insurance trends since act 11 and that's what I included here. So what this shows is since uh act 11 uh fiscal year 20 was when it took effect and I included fiscal year 19 for comparison

107sake. Um the chart below shows the changes in annual premiums for both the single and family gold CDHP plans. About 75% of our insurance plans are C family gold CHP um for support staff and teachers. And as you can see in fiscal year 19 a family plan cost $15,320 and now we are budgeting uh $35,117. So, uh, it used to be, uh, health plans were negotiated just like how we negotiate salaries, uh, and other benefits as part of the master agreement. That was taken away from local school districts and put at the state level in fiscal year 20. And, um, as you can see, a family plan, sorry, an individual plan went from 5,531 a year to 12, um, $677 a year. um more than doubled in less than seven fiscal year, eight fiscal years.

108Uh so that's included now in the budget book that is live, everybody can read it. Uh the second thing was um I wanted to include some things uh trying to put the um increase in special ed uh particularly around mental health and psychological services which we have seen an increase in our SU uh more in contacts with the on contacts with the state. So as you go through and you see all the um revenues and all this is all the same information that you've seen before in our budget book. I included the historical rate of increase in the program which you've again seen before. Again just the headline number is 16% for FY27 14.6% of which is special education 1.4% is administration and operations which is basically nonsp specialcial education transportation IT superintendent business office

109curriculum it's DEI etc. Vermont mental health needs in schools. Um so I'm just going to read this a little bit. uh mental health providers and services are unevenly available around the state. We are a small state. Um that means some schools have to hire their own specialists at higher cost and districts that can contract with local providers. The demand for mental health positions is more than quadrupled in the last three years compounding the impact. The chart below on the left shows AOE data of mental and behavioral health positions throughout the state. Meanwhile, the chart on the right shows mental health psychological services spending in Windsor Southeast SU special education for the same time period illustrating that Windsor Southeast SU and our me member districts have experienced a similar surge as the rest of the state.

110So if you look over here on the left, this is the AOE data from 22 to 25 and over here on the right is our data from 22 to 25 comparing budgets and actual spending. Um, so as you can see the the jump we were experiencing the same jump. So I want to make sure that was put into context as part of the uh overall increase in the special ed budget. Finally, uh what is different from what you've seen um when I presented the budget last month? Uh some minor things. So one thing for example you know I got two good news and one not I guess which is neither good nor bad. Uh so the first is um health insurance we have the vhigh um request for budgeting that we should put in for

111budgeting is 7.3%. I was using 11.9% because I was going off of a three-year running average of last three until I got the official number from Beehive, which they came in at 7.3%. So, that's good news. It's a little less. So, that has impacted the ICU budget um a little bit uh to the better. Um I also communications, you'll see under accounts down at the bottom, you'll see a pretty big increase in communications. And you know what is that for? Is that internet? that is not internet. Uh communications, those are the phones. We have new phones because our old phones are end of light. I use that as an opportunity in the budget to put that and centralize it at the SU level with the lease um for the new phones. That will be zeroed

112out of your local budgets. So that's not an addition in the grand scheme of all the budgets. It's moving money to the SU. So that's kind of a wash. And then the um to the other thing to the better is Jen has wrapped up the service plan and she in that service plan um the extraordinary reimbursement amount is $90,000. The revenue we get from the state which will be less of an impact on your assessments is $90,000 to the better of what I presented last month. So um again that doesn't change the budget. It just changes the assessment. So that's good. Um I have no other changes. Those are, like I said, everything that you've seen has been pretty minor changes from what you've seen last um meeting. I just wanted to make sure that

113uh I pointed out to everybody um if somebody asks about how health insurance is going across the state, you can point them to that page. If somebody asks about psychological services spending is up um you know a fair amount of money year-over-year and what's been going on the previous year, you can point them to that section of the financials of the budget. And that's all I have unless you have any questions for me. >> Thank you, Larry. Thank you. >> Items for discussion followed by motion. uh assumed FY27 budget adoption. Do we have a number? >> Yes, Larry. >> Yes. The number is 16,484,90. >> $484,90. Sorry. 16,484,90. Okay. I'll take a motion to approve this and then we'll go into discussion. >> So moved. >> Second. >> Okay. Second on this. >> Is it

114my imagination or this is a little earlier this year? We've got this. >> No, his it's earlier than last year, but historically it's been the it's been the October meeting. Last year, I think we went to the November meeting. >> Yes. >> Um and then one year we went into it and approved it in October and then we reopened it for the special ed uh administration position two years ago. >> I think it's helpful um for the local budgets to get started to have this ready. >> I know that was a goal. >> Yeah. And I know that um some of the local um districts would like preliminary budget in November so that their constituents have a good month >> Yeah. before the December meeting. >> Yeah. to look at it. So, yes, we we

115have um worked really hard to get this done. >> Yeah. >> In a timely manner. >> And thank you. >> Yeah. And and thanks to the budget committee who met with us and helped um look at the numbers and help make decisions. >> We have a percent increase. I know that I I could look it up. >> The percent increase is uh 16%, >> 14.6% of the special ed, and 1.4% 4% is administration operations. >> Yeah. And some of that is correcting of um budgeting of the past which >> I think it's important to note that the 14.6% of special ed which I did in greater detail at the last meeting is under the actuals in 25 and the actuals in 26. It was never we had there are increases in tuition to out of

116state placement that we have to spend and we are going to spend whether they are budgeted for or not and fiscal year 27 was the first time we have been able to budget for them appropriately. >> Yeah. >> Thank you. >> Um any other discussion? And I' I'd like to say the increase is significant. Um but I feel it's um actually look at this the prudent thing to do. It it uh it it it shows the reality of or no more have to sign back in. Um, there's room for discussion. I will take a vote and I miss somebody. I think I know everyone is here. Um, Davis, hi. >> Okay. Um, Megan, >> hi. >> Elizabeth, >> hi. Uh, Heather. >> Hi. >> Is Hannah here? I haven't seen her. Okay. Beth. >> Hi,

117>> Ann Marie. >> Hi, >> John. >> Hi. >> Sarah, >> I >> and I am an I. >> Thank you very much. >> Thank you. Um, and because of the adoption, uh, we will be working on the local budgets now. And, uh, news of those should be coming out soon, as soon as this week because it got adopted, um, tonight. And, uh, I will send an email out to the board members of the respective local boards when it goes on the website. in in motion said 16,484,90 like that. Okay. Um executive session or do we want to set the next agenda first? Uh, do you want to do the board goals or not tonight? >> Oh, sorry. My bad. Board goals. >> Elizabeth, >> I have an unrelated question. I have an unrelated question.

118>> Go right ahead. >> Who is the new chair of H Heartland's board? >> It's Beth. >> That would be Roy. >> Congratulations, Beth. >> Thanks. >> [clears throat] >> She already ran her first community engagement forum. Fantastic job. Yeah, [laughter] >> I would expect. >> Yeah. >> Um Okay. Uh board goals in in reading these last week. I think we touched on it last week. um my opinion and this is just my opinion is the fact that I I really don't see any need to to change the goals because uh even though I believe we've made progress, they're all pretty relevant to the things that we want to accomplish as an SU board. Um, but I am open to other suggestions and comments. >> Makes sense to me. >> I I'll take uh take

119a motion to renew the goals. >> So move. >> Okay. All in favor, please say I. >> I. I. >> I. They will stay on the agenda for you to ref um okay we want to set the next agenda. >> Yeah. Okay. >> I think I already asked for a couple days. >> Uh budget. Okay. We don't budget adoption. Haven't did that. >> So I have algebra for aid for Yeah. under items for action. We need a second signer for the checks. Is that the correct? >> I'm gonna work on that. I'm gonna work on that. Yeah. >> Uh you said he's going to negotiate the contract. >> Yes. For the >> Yeah. >> Um and I had that we're going to add feedback. Thank you. Policy will add a fourth. >> Okay. To acceptable

120use. >> Yeah. >> Did I miss anything? >> I don't think so. Great. >> Unless someone else has something. Okay. >> And if anything comes up during the month. >> Yeah. >> Okay. Executive session. Um I ch this one I guess. Um under title one section 313. Um we are going into an executive session to discuss um a lease agreement and um contract >> which also follow their labor relations agreements. But let me stop the recording.