WSESU Board Meeting - May 20th, 2024

001e e this is Beth I can't hear a thing that owl was muted okay thank you Beth how do your vote she doesn't know what am I okay uh basically we're doing the minutes of um April 22nd I will obain I wasn't there okay um and Nancy came up with a issue in which it was just her name it didn't say that she had second it so we're going to edit that that um anyone who now can hear me um have any discussion on uh the minutes I kind of go back in time here as we had a technical difficult okay for approval Mark how your vote I Sarah I Lindsay no Lindsay's a principal oh yeah I I keep doing that uh and Marie Marie okay yeah that's it okay and so that is

002unanimous no it's not it's not oh with uh with one exstension thank you is it Monday okay um public participation public comment is not legally required but we believe it is crucial for us to hear from our community members about their concerns over issues through these meetings are board models for our students how to conduct public discourse and that the board and members of our community can approach controversial issues in a civil and constructive Manner and can demonstrate mutual respect having said that please note the board is here to listen the public comment period is not designed for discussion please start by identifying yourself in what town you reside in public comment we have members here from the public okay hi we're Eric Britt from and and I'm Jenny mcau we're from Heartland and I'm

003feeling super self-conscious because I'm used to being on a webx where you can only see me from the neck up and I have lots of splashes from my kids on my shirt so I feel like I need to go like this a little bit but um we're here because we wanted to bring to the board our experience and thoughts around the kindergarten entrance age policy um and essentially our uh our fourth child lynon is a September baby she's we had thought for a period of time was going to be getting ready to enter into kindergarten she did daycare in New Hampshire where the entrance date is the end of September so we had that in our mind we along the way learned that our date here is earlier and in doing some research over uh

004a couple of years um believed that the spring and the winter time before her entrance year was the time to come forth and talk about it and learned about the changes in the policy and the new current policy that's been set through that process um and wanted to talk about the policy tonight and um and lyndon's situation so I think uh our uh and doing some other research across the state it looks like the Department of Education has as I'm sure you all know a very broad window there is an assessment done in September of 22 where from an agency standpoint this wasn't determined to be a priority but the recommendation was if it was going to be changed they would move it to September 1st with an assessment process through the month of September

005and I think that what we'd like to talk about is what we've we are grateful to have been able to explore at least initially with our school which is what that assessment process could look like if there was a policy change so Lindon was able to go um to the Heartland Elementary School kindergarten assessment day I think Eric and I are really looking for basically a supportive process for a child that's in this really awkward year where we have an August child and so she's the youngest some of her closest friends are the oldest in the class and we know that that could go either way for her and um it would mean a lot to be able to have a path for families with September kids that are on that awkward cusp to talk

006about it with their school and to come to a decision based on that individual child um and so that's I think what we're wanted to bring forward and I don't know if you have something to add uh for what Jenny was saying um doing our research and looking at the uh the legislative report from 2022 went a little bit deeper and went into looking at all of the uh supervisory unions across the state and found one of them I believe it's uh Addison Northwest uh covers uh ferrisburg and virens and they have a process and they bring in the parents they fill out an an application there's a questionnaire on the back where the child is assessed and then a conversation is had between the parents and the principal and the and the student counselor

007I believe it is um to determine where the child Falls in that assessment and then the child's observe and then the final determination is made but they go all the way to the 15th of September um and there is I believe uh South Burlington that goes through to the end of September um same uh process there's a questionnaire an assessment and then a final conversation so that's kind of where we're looking at it seems that this is very um this process there's no Avenue when you have these children who are caught in this gray area between being the youngest being the oldest where do they fit where do they uh invest what's the best situation for them do they start with their peers what they perceive to be their peers who are maybe a couple

008of weeks older or do they go with their uh with students that are younger who are coule a couple of weeks or a couple months younger but may still be on the same uh academic level thank you I'm not looking at anybody I mean this is public participation I have a lot I could share but this isn't really the time and the place to to discuss it I but I am open up to bringing this to a discussion at the Su board um at some point before so then my question with that would be what would that timeline look like because as as to create aine so know that your timeline here we're in may we have June July August here's your retreat and then boom right into September that's a good question so that's

009probably the first thing that the Bo has talk about is what sort of timeline we want to have one of the things that I hesitate on not really hesitate but if if if the policy is going to change from my educational experience it it it's going to have to involve some sort of summative assessment um the the uh AOE has a Early Childhood assessment that is inade in many ways so um so yeah on that assessment it says this is assessment should not be used for any placement sure no I understand that I think we realize that too and that's why what we would hope for would be because it's not right for everybody just because the date might be might have flexibility doesn't mean that it's the right thing for any particular child we

010have four we at least can try against it might have been a different decision for any of the four of them so I think that what would feel like it's honoring the student and the family is the chance to have the dialogue because we've been able to start that but I think because the policy is still there everybody's still navigating that you know gently as is understandable but it's hard to get to a what's the right thing for this child and that's what we really want is the right thing for her knowing that there's a lot of resour our es that help assess and support kids that are in lots of different situations and and what you know will help them on their success in school and this feels like a light investment in this

011particular population of kids but when when looking at assessment that would satisfy breaking changing the policy there's a cost involved let me give you an example my son Daniel came up for kindergarten was way within the age limit um and his kindergarten assessment came back and it didn't make sense so being the son of two Educators we had him assessed cost us $1,000 and it clearly placed him definitely in where he was supposed to go into kindergarten creating a way to have a assumi of assessment for every kindergarten student probably not or so that a lot of discussion will have to happen so yeah understood I think the examples of the school boards that we talked to didn't have that same sort of feeling of that it needed to be that formal that it was

012much more of a dialogue and some basic Behavior social academic preparation yeah very few school boards have members on it with my level of expertise so I that's why I hesitate to say oh yeah well we'll make it flexible we made the policy for a reason to have an actual cut off date um so what led to the decision around that particular cut off date sorry yes it was I was just going to say that even if we had even if we were if we were able to decide today that we were going to pursue a different policy which we can't do because we already agreed to the agenda at the beginning of the meeting but even if we did we would have to have a discussion about it at this meeting ask Christine and

013others to come back with the policy at the next meeting and then it takes three readings and those are each a month so so I will say this when we asked initially we've been looking at this for years and when we were first advised to not bring this up until late winter early spring so now we're working against the clock on advice that we were given or else we would have had this conversation 68 months ago and we would have been easily within your yeah so because of that because we took we went on faith of what we were advised and coming to this board so then what we then just I'm not I wasn't saying that to try to block you I just tring you were what I'm saying is that it seems the

014September 1 seems a bit arbitrary I'll be honest because there's a broad window September 1 to January 1 and even your own legislative report within the agency of Education says we would give consideration for September children so why if you have a September October November December four month window or quarter of the Year sorry the third of right third would you uh move right to the front end of that and adhere to that so concretely given that there are children who will go one way or the other very fluidly within that time span that's a good question can we pull up our policy yes we know what it is could we pull it up anyways it's September 1st okay yeah and that's that's the cut off dat and the policy there's no leway it actually

015doesn't indicate specifically that there's no appeal appeal or waiver process it doesn't speak to that it doesn't speak to any no it doesn't and so hence why we're here the peel W person I were you the parents who emailed me no okay we've had a few we a few had a few yeah and so so my advice to them would to uh get a medical report and then uh from a pediatrician and a suggestion and then first bring it to the principal of the school and then the local school board and then they could decide to uh bring it to us for a waiver but that was just but when we had we've had this discussion at the non Ascutney school board and it didn't come up to the Su board it was a decision

016by the local board oh yes we didn't have a policy that's why oh yeah we we had a policy we Sunset every District had policies we Sunset them all and then that one got missed so we didn't have a policy last year um okay then we adopted this the board adopted this policy I don't know February this year it was at some point over the course this year yeah if I may why were those policies lowed to Sunset uh because um we merged yeah and they're they're all at the Su level now okay which I think maybe I mean my advice was to come to the Su board because Su board sets the policy um the Heartland board had a discussion at their last meeting because you know Jenny has been in touch and Eric

017um and their advice was come to the Su board that's the board that sets policy and there is nothing in the policy that allows for or allows or prohibits wa for wa right so I don't know what happened to to the other parents but uh you had an email from one this morning actually or yesterday Lindsay and I with a similar with a similar scenario similar question I think the most important thing is to to have some hard data for the that really is I think the the first step and that's kind of where we were going in our approach to the board is to look for that hard data as well that you have or that you don't have if you have it if we looking for um an assessment that definitively will say

018yay whether the child should move forward or not none of us yeah and that that that assessment is cost money at that level so I I think that there um so I guess if it's collection of information and if in the absence of a permission or a a um refute of a waiver um I mean we can continue to gather that and I guess we at this stage are really still looking for a a open conversation with our school and people who would help say you know what she's best waiting a year we think she'd be better off or she feels really ready and like she's going to be set up for success for going and we know that that decision or that that conversation could go either direction and would be comfortable with either

019direction we would just like to be able to really have that and for everybody to be able to enter that in good faith and give honest input without feeling like it doesn't matter hamstrung because there's a policy and we don't want to go against the policy um so if what I kind of just heard you say was that in the absence of something that says you can't request a waiver to bring forth hard data that I am interpreting as there might be a little bit of space to really have this conversation I'm in I'm in the middle of negotiation so I use my compromise okay chrisy and I will meet we will view the state law we will riew the policy and we we will see if it would be appropriate for us to entertain

020a waiver with the way the policy is written now okay okay y that would be great and in future I guess bringing this forward knowing that it's Lyndon that is we're on a timeline for her but there are other kids and families we just wanted to offer support in continuing to work on this regardless of the timeline and if we can be helpful and we've appreciated some openness to try and have a conversation and that's just what we would hope for everybody okay thank than you for coming I do appreciate yeah I'm wash my shirt and we um is it fair to say that I can reach back out to them with what we come up with yes yeah thank you for listening yes for okay um is there anyone else that public particip and

021I apologize that that took so long but um at the time I felt it was rather important to take that long with parents who actually come to the board meeting um superintendent report yes let me get my screen sharing with you all right okay good evening how is everyone it's been a day it's only Monday we were talking about that as we came in um so my report tonight starts with two procedures that are in the portal um the procedures for student athletic clubs and activities we actually worked on earlier um so it's not really changed but wanted to I'm just going through each one I did want to report back that um I did catch up with uh superintendent Renee Sanchez who Elizabeth pointed me too yeah we had a good conversation I didn't

022know he was leaving but he is he is yeah no where's he going uh he's going to be a consultant so yeah he's he's great but um so the process that he shared with me about how they um adopt policy and procedures is they do it in subcommittee um so the board there's a a it's a warrant meeting there are some board members uh Administration and other groups that are might um the policy might pertain to that enter those meetings um and then when the policy comes to the board it's pretty much just adopted because the committee's already um looked at it so I don't know if the board is interested in that kind of um scheduling for for policy work and procedures I know that Tracy and I have talked at length because we

023know we need to write um some procedures for the transgender um policy and so what we would like to do is um and Tracy can I'm going to get this wrong because I don't have my notes in front of me because my other computer wouldn't start um we're trying to partner with outright Vermont outright Vermont next year and what we're hoping to do is work with outright Vermont and some students and other stakeholders in crafting those procedures for that policy next year so we think that makes sense we know it's going to take a little bit of time but we think it's really important to get it right and get um voice from lots of stakeholders so so you're just talking at this specific will be about c22 no those are just the procedures that

024are in the portal for this month for you to review I'm just talking about in general because um Elizabeth has asked about a kind of a implementation procedure for policies and um and procedures or an implementation plan so I spoke with Renee on her um this group assist with that outright Vermont will help us with the um transgender um oh okay procedures not with all of them but but but with that one in particular so that's our plan for for next year we're hoping to partner with them we'll know later may I heard from them last week and they said it's taking a little bit longer but um we should hear from that in the committee so we're hoping to have a a year-long partnership with ideally yeah they partner in a lot of different

025ways but we could have a yearlong with a dedicated cohort of folks across the Su who are working with them on a regular basis I think it's eight sessions two hours each so there would be a dedicated group of folks meeting with them building our capacity and working in that direction for other I mean some procedur don't need that like they're pretty standard um but some do so in that you know policies as well uh it feels like what we did for the um hiring recruiting you know we we worked together brought some recommendations to the board um and we did that with the transgender policy as well getting feedback from different stakeholders so it was a great conversation sad he's leaving too but he did share his expertise um I want to just update

026you on a couple of things this summer we've got um Katie has got Summer Academy up um and planned and she's hiring staff currently as we speak I believe getting that all set up getting have staff all set all set a couple more support staff are probably needed as we get more rolling Admissions and we're I think we're at 80 students now from the time I gave you yep yep an increase we'll have an email going out in or in all the newsletters of the openings we have per grade level I'm going to do it this time and so for families who haven't signed up or didn't get invites it can be first come for serve there's others that would like to attend and it's 8:30 to 12:30 breakfast and lunch served um students they

027have an opportunity to stay in the afternoon at at btg Brian's running a steam camp in the afternoon at his school um so we'll bust kids back to that and uh Heartland kids get bust back and they go to the r in the afternoon but Wednesdays will be um field trip day and and Katie's using some of the ACT 166 Grant 112 112 there's too many to help fund those um kinds of enriching activities for the kids in the summer so very excited about that um and we are also working on um running an SE boot camp Jennifer Aldrich has pretty much taken the lead on this this one we'll run two sessions for our seis um and this idea came out of just um the fact that these people are doing really difficult and

028challenging work sometimes with our most challenging kiddos who are struggling with things and there's just not enough training for them um so we we not me I think it was Sergio came up with this um idea of a boot camp it's optional they're going to get paid they can choose one of the two dates to come and we'll be working on uh they'll be working on um relationship and skill building through restorative and reflective practices trauma informed practices collabortive problem solving and then um working with students um with with the bcba team they'll be there to help so what is bcba board certified behavior analyst and they're often doing the functional behavioral assessments writing the student plans that the seis often help Implement so it makes sense for them to be there so that's very

029exciting we're happy to be able to being being able to do that here comes the unhappy news um I think I passed these out we have some resignations and retirements um you have a packet with three of them not all of them are resignations some just didn't sign their contract so the first one is Jean Morse um I don't I mean be surprising if people don't know Mr Morris he's just larger than life kind of guy he's been with us for many years um I worked with him at Heartland I had the honor of working with him at Heartland for my tenure there and he was amazing school counselor I think two years ago he wanted to start to part go part-time and um was certified to be a school psychologist uh I get that

030right and so he's been working under Katie parttime for the last two years but he is going to retire at the end of this year um I will say he is a man that puts his heart and soul into what he does and if he feels like he can't do it at 100% it just drives him a little bit crazy so he's gonna he's going to retire so we'll be looking for that um approval later on the next two Katie can speak to um both Sarah and Tyler um both are are not returning next year because they're moving far away one really far away with an ocean between us so um we're sad to see both of them go they've been a wonderful Edition actually they both happen to be at Heartland as well um

031to rest assured it's not Heartland it just sometimes happens in a bubble um and the next two um we have resignations from Craig who you all know who's um built an incredible Food Service program independent cons service program for our um Su and after I think this is his sixth year with us he is um going to leave to pursue other opportunities that he has and a short time after Craig resigned um our assistant food service director Rodney also resigned so we're very sad about both of those um uh Larry has met with the staff reassured them that we're working to hire another independent food service director we have the ad up I don't know I haven't chatt with you about any any um applications yet but um we have applicants on met with the

032uh oh great food service team and uh you know I um there's some other avenues we can discuss um and uh I think it was a good meeting I think they appreciated it uh I learned a lot and um they're going to be on committee that will hire and I said we're going to find somebody that you're going to be proud to work for and uh and we're going to move forward and the question that came up was what what if we don't find somebody by September that's right uh and I said I guess I'm going to be meeting with the lead Cooks weekly if that's what it takes because um we you know we're going to take our time and find the right person right fit so those are those are um what we

033have for tonight for retirements and resignations Katie has been working diligently on hiring so I want to give her a chance to just talk about who she's got lined up um Frank Kelly is coming to us with many many years of Middle School uh teaching um in all certified in all subject areas which is pretty amazing um and he's joining us as a special interventionist within the Windsor Ace classroom um specifically working on the on the job training um Community Building skill of our um high school students who are now transitioning to um looking at Workforce and those skills we have a critical mass of those students are now reaching 11th and 12th grade and that's part of their transition program and or 12th plus um so um very excited to have him join our

034team uh two special Educators one will be familiar um start Donna and hatch have been a special educator at Haron school for a long time went and is doing intervention work as a teacher and now is coming back to special education so we're thrilled um so that's an easy switch um Patty fish is right now working with us remotely and um doing tutoring other things because she's out of state and she's joining us in person at Heartland um in the elementary so um we're very fortunate to have her um and Jeanie Wade is also a local special educator um and act just all these people are Vermont folks so they know which is nice um not starting from scratch uh jeie is coming to us from another Regional um partner um and we'll be doing

035the paperwork special education work that we will short that person this year and the last one that um Thinking Out of the Box remember I don't have one um remember how we talked about Leota doing a leave of absence um so Leota is no longer going to do the leave of absence thank you for entertaining that conversation when we did it I just put that out there um all of the bites I had directly for school colleges work for remote and then we had light bul moments because this is what happens when you have a little time um Leota and this other school sites including Jean we all met and chatted about opportunities um so Leota will be doing a lot of paperwork um including counseling um and um some of the meetings quite a

036chunk of it things that she can do remotely from where she is um and it works out really well um the other and I think I had mentioned this at the board meeting we be looking for an educational diagnostician that could be a special education teacher and um been speaking with one person we had interviewed that's very interested in doing that and now that I we have a for format we'll be moving forward with that so testing will be taken care of um it's just going to take some creativity on the part of um both Leota and our other school psychologists the global past to do next year um so I appreciate them greatly to think no boxes so um did we apply and he said yes and um Bill I just did notice that

037that there's not an action for those on the agenda approving those hires approving those hires we'll have to do that okay that's s about okay um I don't have the question of the month survey results for you yet because that survey on the continuous Improvement plan is still open but I did want to follow up with you on uh a survey that we gave to the staff it was the cell phone follow-up survey I know we had a lot of conversations about the cell phone and procedures that we're going to put in place and I wanted to follow up to see how they worked so um the graph I'm sorry it's small um so high school is blue Middle School is red and Elementary is the yellow orange color so that was just the grade

038level that you teach we had a we had a big we had a good response 101 um so the first question was in your opinion did the no cell phones out in school protocol reduce cell phone disruptions in your classes or in your work with students one is a no that was about 9% of the folks said no two um four was yes so in between no and yes um two uh almost 22% of the people that responded scored that at a two almost 20% at a three and about 50% at a four so 50% of the people that responded felt it it did reduce disruptions um so went a little bit deeper how often do you have to report a student for not following the procedures uh blue is multiple times a day that's

039about 20% one time a day is red more than once a week orange uh once a week green more than once a month purple one time per month turquoise and then never is the is the pink there um then we asked you still find cell phones to be a problem in school and we were split there 42% say yes and 58% say no and I did I don't again I don't have my notes in front of me because I'm sharing but um let me see if I can look back hold on as I did oh I can't I looked at I broke it down between elementary middle and high school so the biggest um complaint is at the high school level there were some Middle School teachers that said it was still problem but it

040was a small number out of the out of the people that took it but there was a much larger number at the high school level that are are saying that cell phones are still an issue at the high school level so um the next question I asked was do you think we need additional measures to prevent students from using cell phones in school example I don't know if you've seen the Yonder pouches advertised I can explain quickly they're just a pouch kids come in to school they put their phone in the pouch they still have their phone on them but it gets locked it's like a magnetic lock so their phones are still with them but they're not accessible so they're not able to use them when they leave the school they there's like this

041magnetic Hub where they unlock the pouch and take their phone out and use it so um the staff uh said 45 45.9% said yes 54.1% said no again that was mostly high school so the high school said no or high school students yes the high school staff seem to be wanting something more okay so what Hartford that was they have about 10 of them y pouches at the yeah middle and so they use them for students who are repeat offenders okay um does that work pretty well well it's it's sort of in in a beta program so y okay well I don't have an answer for you tonight I just wanted to bring it to your attention because um we did Implement some you know stricter guidelines this year and had some success but not

042it feels like not enough at the high school level so I'll keep I'll keep you in Lo when we figure out how to move forward yes Davis yeah I'd be I'd be interested in having more of a conversation on this at some point um really focused on the middle school and high school data because my my understanding I don't know if we had a policy before but I never got the impression that this was really a great school issue no um so to have that data in there it's that was you read my mind because like I feel like this is skewed of that many like 50% respondents for allary school teachers um so Y and I mean it might just be interesting to hear if there was more like kind of narrative response from

043high school middle school teachers and any ideas or I mean I I'm not surprised that it's still an issue there because we're one year into a policy that's impacting the use of extremely adic and kind of devices so I think it's going to be a multi-year process to really figure out what the approach is and it's probably going to be a you know trial and error there G be trial and error and I don't think that there is a permanent solution to it I think it's just something we need to remain engaged in um and so yeah I would love to continue that conversation I just have a quick question does this include um like smart watches yeah they're not supposed to be using them during the day I was just wondering if that was

044part of this data that I think is more the smart watches are definitely in the elementary school yeah I just was curious was part yeah yeah wow not like necessarily Apple watches but but yeah yeah okay um wanted to invite you all to the graduations that are coming up um Windsor High School is 7th it's coming right up I can't believe it at 7:00 Weathersfield on the 10th at 6 ABS at 9: on the 12th heartlet at 4 on the 12th WS are at 6 on the 12th the 12th is going to be a busy day but hoping that you can sorry Elizabeth I'm writing your Vantage Point hoping that you can attend one or some or all if if it's possible um and then that is Larry's report but he's after Tracy so I

045will stop sharing and let Tracy present unless there are questions for me right Tracy do you want to present your screen wait wait I'm sorry what about the um Sur from Mike Nicholson yes he is coming um to the June meeting so he was going to come tonight but he is coming in June um I'm going to confirm that with my meeting with him tomorrow so he the survey ended on May 15th and he has pretty good turnout so he's analyzing all that data and he'll bring that too he wanted to come actually and present it I he's not going to come in person but he's going to come to go through that with you it's it's pretty important daa will we be able to look at it before ask him sure I'd love to

046be able to ask questions y I will ask him tomorrow when him thanks yep all right um Bill back to you really back to me well you you can send it on to the next thing all right I'll take you um uh apologies for not sending out a notice to say uh no need for any pre-work because uh tonight I just want to share um I had promised back in the fall maybe to have a plan for you know to share about what are we doing with diversity inclusion what is that going to look like so that is what I will be sharing tonight H along with a couple of spotlights these are just a few highlights for some things that have happened over the last couple months one is I want to share there's

047a coition that we're now part of the Great Schools partnership started this diversifying the educator Workforce I might have mentioned this it's a process they've been doing in a number of different states and so they started doing this in Vermont and calling together a number of folks representing a lot of organizations across the state to uh set a goal and think about what is it that we're trying to do in the state of Vermont to increase the diversity of our educator Workforce which is great timing because it's also we're working on hiring practices so this will feed into that and I also heard that like BPA and the education Justice Coalition are planning to put together a whole package of materials like by next hiring season to share out that will help support seus and

048thinking about what we're doing to not just um recruit but retain promote all all of that and so this this is H there's a report I just pulled out one image from that is so if you can see the image on the top left it shows the demographics the racial demographics of students versus teachers in Vermont this is just one of the things that great school's partnership had in this report so what it's basically showing is that the student body is a lot more diverse than our teachers um and so uh it's evolving work they're continuing to have meetings so I'll just update you all as needed on that but it's pretty cool that they're doing it is there any data that you could get this is fascinating but I I think this like a

049third you know what's the what else do they have the diversity of the entire population uh I don't know what else they have this is what they had in their report so that probably exist somewhere else see those three up yes and uh among adults there's about 4% uh uh black indigenous people of color population and among students I think it's 22% yeah and it's much higher it's definitely Chang yeah I I think Vermont too it's like right now I think there are seven states that are what they like minority majorities right that are no longer white majorities and I don't know like 2042 is the anticipated date where our country will no longer be a white majority and I think Vermont is probably sometime after that would be my yes probably like 2060 or

050so uh I think that was Oregon so I'm guessing maybe about that yeah and Never Bleed projection 2060 be alive yeah more more babies what was it in 2019 I think it was in 2019 where there were more babies uh who were babies of color who were being born on my babies so demographics okay so I'll keep you all updated on this uh this was also just wanted to highlight B shout out to them the Vermont Student anti-racist Network they had an advocacy day at the capital building which was pretty cool and I will note that um although we didn't have any students who came with me uh I did run into someone who I know who's in a similar position in mine in the school and she had like 12 middle school students with

051her and she said uh it took me three years so if not next year you know I was like okay there's some hope and and there there are a lot of things I think that you'll see in the plan for next year that could be like providing some of those Avenues to really be able to know who some of these students are who are interested in attending things like this um and this is H I wanted to share some pictures from this is from the group of eighth graders at Heartland who have been they are the ones who did the equity audit of their building to see who was represented in the building and then as a result of that they came up with some designs uh that they they they came up with them

052to to like for welcoming people into the building um in different languages and um anyway they came up with three different murals that they're on the process of painting so this was during their process and I'll be in the building next week for I'm posting like Drop in Dei days in the schools and so I'll be there to actually help some folks contrib like students contribute to their murals during that time okay those were just again a few spotlights I know there's always more going on um in our school than I share out so just okay and this is just continuing I think I shared this a couple couple meetings ago but I'll keep sort of tracking like here's what we're doing here's what we've covered as the board because one of my questions is

053is this working uh 20 minutes in each board meeting is that do you want to continue with that is that something that you'd like to change up so I can keep this going as long as we do and the slides are all linked so another question is how are you bringing like new board members on you know how are you sharing all this information with them so just to keep track of it all in one place okay so now on to some of what we uh pulled together this wasn't just for Dei this was really um across like looking at our strategic plan how are all the things that we're doing aligning with that fitting in and where does Dei show up generally across all of these so this is a theory of change I've

054shared before just looking at okay if we really want change to happen and be sustained like how do we look at it across institutional cultural and individual practices so although it didn't fit like we talked about well how where how are we we realized that a lot of the goals we were talking about already exist in the Strategic plan right so it's like goal one goal two go three it seemed like a lot of the Dei things we were talking about really fit within goal two uh that's culture and then we added like student and adult Wellness so generally this is just kind of showing you how this where this fits but it's not only here right I mean there there are policies right which would be more institutional so anyway for what it's worth

055if you like the visual this is a way just to think about how although a lot of the Dei General like work is supported by culture it's also has you know uh implications for individuals and institutions that'll share just um so essentially the goal is the overarching goal is that students teachers staff family community members are safe and supported bringing their full authentic self to the wssu contributing to a culture of belonging um that we build and sustain a community of understanding awareness and accountability through individual cultural and institutional measures and just putting a note in there too um for anyone who who believes that Dei is a set thing uh I don't know that it is I mean in my understanding of it it isn't a set thing isn't a particular thing this is

056what it is and what we will be doing so we'll approach this from a broad perspective um continuing to look for gaps centering those most impacted like we talk about in policies um which had me thinking about too it even the school AG children like were parents who had children coming of age to enter School they involved in the in the development of that policy so as many times as we can be asking I was thinking too are there filter questions that the board can be trying on as you all are developing policies that will help surface some of those um considerations so anyway approaching it broadly thinking we've been talking you know reflective restorative collaborative trauma and form practices all generally within this umbrella of De so again institutional individual uh things to and

057so there are really like three main goals that we came up with within this sort of broad culture of of Dei and I'll go I'll just touch on each of these in a little bit more so you can see what some of the some of what we'll be doing include so the first one is that all staff students teachers administrators and board will participate in ongoing capacity building training and support and so there are a number of things here that are things that we're already doing things that we need to do more of right like we still know that there are a lot of people in our buildings who don't know about our policies they don't know that we have an anti-racism an equity transgender policy so part of this is going to be um

058we need to make sure that that's all happening that we have staff meetings that are dedicated to these kinds of topics and I think the biggest news is that we're actually adding the equity coaches for next year and we have confirmed commitments from people in all the buildings who are who are not like they're excited to be Equity coaches and so I'm super excited we're going to have like a more of a team approach which gives us more opportunity to align like every building has a different culture but it's going to give us a little bit more of an opportunity to align and share and Resource One Another which is great yeah so the monthly all staff meeting is that required for all staff yeah I mean they'll be within the school buildings and some

059of those will be supported by Equity coaches it's it's a teaching staff and next year we're excited to be able to um uh offer we haven't had support staff haven't been paid to go to staff meetings and next year um Katie has figured a way that they can get paid to attend staff meetings so they are invited but not mandated to attend those staff meetings um it's an hour week they can attend meetings one we're asking on that be a staff meeting the other one can either be a meeting of choice or a meeting that they've been asked to attend um and so regardless of how many hours they are we they can choose or not choose we we can't mandate it just because many people have set schedules other reasons but as close as

060we could get to getting people there and feedback has been really positive about that y being able have that flexibility there I don't know Tracy if it's on here for you but we have built in some um dedicated professional development time as well for the year which they would be attending without Choice without Choice okay so can can you just tell us uh on average in the 2024 measures lead measures h on on average how many how many people from across your Su the supervisor Union come to the monthly meeting with Equity coaches so there so this this is breaking down a couple different meetings so I'm going to meet once a month with Equity coaches across the Su so I'll meet with them as a team and then they will have they will support

061the all staff meetings in their schools and then I will also be having monthly meetings with um our administrative team like continue to kind of like coaching our like principles and and and administrators continuing to meet with them um so these are your meetings some of them are and I tried to I didn't want to like put too much information in here so there is more like behind the scenes information about who's responsible for some of these things so I didn't include that on the slides because it was a lot of words but um yeah so some of these are me meeting um with the team and then there's also you know responsibilities for building administrators right to make sure that that time is on the agenda and we have like in the the third

062column there um just shows where this aligns with existing policy so you'll see like anti-racism 12 15 16 there it links to the policies which have been numbered so that we can see like are we missing anything that we said we were going to do so like Equity policies seven and eight gender policy one and then there's also from the equity audit recommendations there's numbers like 1.1 1.3 those were all listed in the recommendation section of the equity audit so making sure that the things that we say we're going to do are actually things that we said we were going to do that we may not have gotten around to doing yet um but there is more I mean if you want more detail I'm happy to share more detail about about this but this

063one is really around this comp capacity this ongoing capacity building training and support so do you are your monthly meetings with with uh the admin team for example yes that's one of them um so does that come before just yeah before there's staff meeting well so here's the So the plan right this is the plan is that we have June 19th as a full day training for all Equity coaches plus administrators so what I'm what I'm imagining is like and we're going to have um I'll have an I'll have a day with Equity coaches August 6 but then throughout the year throughout the school year we'll also have three full days with Equity coaches and administrators so those are going to be dispersed so that like the full day June 19th my plan is let's

064experience some of this content try it on together like for the things that we're going to also then be bringing back to school so that the full days like uh will happen between some of those staff meetings so that folks feel like they okay well I experienced this thing now how am I going to bring this back to my school and then we can have the monthly check-ins to see how that's going in between like shifting and content so like the first few months of the year next year is really going to be I think around um having some kind of agreements right like what how are we doing that in our schools we share agreements that they're being used different ways or we're not using them to actually hold people accountable to things like

065to actually agree like we agreed to listen to understand you know not to advocate for a specific point of view whatever it is somehow like actually getting to some point of agreement that's culture building right so the first few months may be around that in the schools again schools are in different places that they can resource each other with some of what they've been doing like Heartland has been having more conversations about agreements um and then how if we can do that the January inservice day is going to be right if we can keep holding it as a full day Dei day so that you know for those few months leading up to that we're really thinking about um about our culture about agreements about identity values and how that also connects with the new

066eqs the education quality standards are going to be asking Educators like how how are you in reflection right around your own cultural identity and identities of your students so it actually ties to that so get everybody all set you know January have this inservice day and then after that we'll see have some thoughts about what might happen after that but maybe if we get through next year you know and continuing to plant seeds for an equity filter which again is just a set of questions that we can be using consistently so kind of Chunk it out with time to really actually spend doing doing the work putting it into practice is that okay I can also I'm like I need a visual for what that could look like which I don't I have one in

067theend plan it feels so good to have a plan forward and it might not seem complex and complicated but to bring all those pieces and parts together Tracy's Tracy's been doing a phenomenal job so because there's a lot that's just all over right and even thinking about how do like how do those norms and agreements align with some of what we're doing with leader and me leader and me we have classrooms that are cre creating their classroom Mission but we're not actually looking at where are the shared parts of those missions right so we we're like what could be cool right next year maybe we look at winds or midal I was talking with Colleen about this and see like what are all the classrooms coming up with what are the two or are there

068two or three shared agreements across those classrooms what about across Windsor what about across RSU and then we can actually say okay you all came up with this you know and now how do you hold yourselves and each other accountable to the agreements that you're setting for yourselves so something that can be both like macro and you micro but that we can really use for that accountability and maybe then the next year we take those and maybe we put them in the handbooks people have to sign off on them or you know find ways to keep integrating um those parts of accountability so I know we're going to be uh got about three minutes left so I'll just share kind a high level on these uh sorry this one I mean again it's just y

069all have the slides so you can look through but it really is taking all the things that we said we were going to do and trying to bring it together um what else you got to get to the graphics yeah I mean in this one you know the last one was building and sustaining the dedicated team right so this is having the equity coaches who can then be building the equity teams so these again are all the things we said we were going to do and we're finding ways to do it that actually connect with some of the other things that we're doing so we're not competing with you know the the culture team for leader and me and Dei team it's like we're finding ways to hopefully integrate and try this on next year

070uh this is just some other goals right that didn't fit in like the culture one but show up maybe in other parts of our inst of the leadership plan so like like teachers trained in cultural awareness culturally responsive teaching practices poor competencies looking at how they show up K through 12 where is empathy where are students learning about difference right those kinds of things part of it too Equity coach this is just in here if you want to see but it's just a an overview of what the equity coach they'll be like an instructional coach I'll be working with them so it's in addition to what their job is and what's really cool is that we have people who are classroom teachers we have a social emotional interventionist we have a counselor so we have

071a good representation of different roles in our school and then just some examples of uh what they'll be doing but it's really just being a person who's serving as that point person within their schools um who can help with some of this alignment sharing resourcing all this is the only this is the graphic that I had which again it's like some alignment again like I was saying if we're working on Norms and agreements identity values you know then may like we can all be moving in a little bit more alignment with each other across theu is the is the Hope and that we can you know like we've been doing with these meetings I remember offering when we first started it was like here are all the things we can do and I think it

072was Nikki who said well maybe we can just sort of see what's needed and so it's going to be a little bit of that also is how do we Flex with whatever is coming up and still take into consideration all the things that we know are happening and how we can address those more strategically our schs so that's the plan and now I'm about time so I'm not even gonna ask but maybe just to think about next time we meet is you know again like we've been you know we've had 20 minutes each meeting is this useful is this valuable um or is there some other way that you would want to um continue to learn together so I'll pause it okay aniversary okay yeah yeah for sure all you all right all right so

073uh just give my uh annual report to the board for finance and operations just as a reminder um I know it's small text up on the board but uh over 300 uh employees three member school districts Su almost three4 of million square feet building space 30 Acres of property 3,000 Network devices, 1500 users over 200,000 student meals annually and uh $25 million of budget capacity with the uh General funds closer to 40 when you include all the other grants um our human resources so what we uh new initiatives this year is uh HR and payroll been using inte gred ticketed system um we've had over 185 tickets uh from the employees to HR and payroll with an average resolution time under three hours our next step is to integrate the system with the onboarding system

074when so when somebody's onboarded uh there's a lot of things that have to be done to ensure that nothing gets missed uh with all our different systems we could create separate tickets from each onboarding form that's filled out that they can do um again making sure that our process is efficient and nothing is getting missed when we on board new people with Frontline Power School Google and more we introduced uh the first annual employee anniversary recognition program which was held the opening in service to recognize the many years of consecutive uh service of our hundreds of employees across the Su uh was greatly appreciated and I know we're looking forward to it already for August uh for buildings and grounds we implemented in facilities request form of serving over after school events it includes a

075two-step approval process and it's integrated into Jim's calendar so he doesn't have to do anything he just it goes to the building approver they approve it it goes to Jim he approves it and then it's in his calendar so he knows how to take care of the event we also have the ACT 72 facilities assessment we have uh assessments for all four buildings which will drive uh our fiveyear Capital plans uh per rule 100 which I'm going to talk about later uh for it we upgraded our core switch is over 10 years old um we uh through attrition not an additional FTE we've been able to hire a communication specialist which many of you know to satisfy goal three of the Strategic plan um we've ordered many interactive board displays on the top right I

076have the uh statistics for IT services um tickets are down um I think some of that is the bullpen uh SLA percentage is down uh up slightly what's the bullpen so the bullpen is all of our texts now are in the same space that was the outcome of Co um during Co we put them all together uh and um once we came back from remone and uh we feel that it has helped um get things done better because they're together um Food Service uh maybe You' noticed a theme food food request form um a way to do uh catering for all these special events whether it's an administrative team meeting whether it's a uh Retreat whether it's um a field trip um box lunches etc um over 188 events um a vast Improvement allows faculty

077to know if an order was confirmed it allows Food Services to standardize the menu of requests so they weren't getting you know I like uh certain beans and certain what it's everything standed they get a choice um but not complete choice right so it's Freedom with instructure uh a free breakfast and lunch act 64 over 54,000 as as um since September 1st to today 54,000 breakfast and 103,000 lunches have been served uh free to students our business service um all budgets adopted and passed there's a revote and a week for one of them um a want to thank Ed Connor for uh his work with the building's principles uh the local budgets um our fiscal year 23 audits came back without any findings and they all been posted to the website uh Deanna crl spends

078a lot of time working with the Auditors it's a um and she's getting ready to do it again now for the fiscal year 24 which is what we're in right now audit um this is many consecutive years of audits without any material findings uh purchasing agent Kylie has processed over 12, 1,200 sorry purchasing requests thus far and um Gail McCoy and Kylie tap both handle uh accounts payable and they processed over 4,000 invoices for all our schools and the supervisor Union and um I wanted to add something to this year's report that I think is important and every bullet you see there obviously I think our staff members and I know you do at the board level are aware of um payroll and how payroll works and I'm sure you're aware that there's W2s that

079have to be reported Etc um but there's many state and federal mandated reporting that we have to do that goes on behind the scenes that I don't think any um uh staff members are aware of um and maybe even some board members so I just want to I want to put it down these are monthly reports we do and uh quarterly and ual and and the annual list is very long as you can see um and these include everything from the business office to it you know as Bill knows about dco4 dc5 dc6 Etc this includes um theability report which is Food Service all the Harvest reports which is the state food service system so I think there's a lot of things um I think it's important to understand in the central office that goes

080on um that is a lot of work and it never really goes un um applauded I guess is the lack of a better word you don't see it because uh it's not as um uh visual as making sure the kids uh students Wi-Fi works or that a student gets a free lunch these are things that um we are required either at the state level or the federal requirement to do um on a regular basis is it just those two women who are doing who's doing all of those so it's so it's it's Ed Connor it's uh Deana most of this most of the things in these bullets are business office uh Kylie and Gail now most of this stuff that you see here is is Tina de and Ed um and myself I'm taking over

081some of this stuff um the DC reports were are me and Ryan um and we're rolling out the new advice system you don't have the uh federal civil rights reporting up there no I'm sure I couldn't I'm running out of a semiannual yeah even though we've done it for the last two years um so the other thing is speaking of you know mandates I thought another one that you all should be aware of is that um uh rule 100 which includes the district quality standards so you might have heard about the education quality standards the district quality SCS are due uh July 1 2025 so we have some time um but uh Christina's tasked me to help make sure we meet these requirements and uh they're around three basic things business operations Facilities Management safety

082and governance and the uh numbers next to each subcategory are the five are the tasks the deliverables that are due that we have to show around budgeting and accounting um risk management internal controls we're going to talk more about this as the year goes on because it's due july25 and there are some things in here for you as an S4 which is the governance part um priorities protocols processes so this won't be the last time you see by rule 100 but I wanted you to be aware of it that this is uh going to take up some work uh and I'll be reporting out on how we're meeting these new rule 100 requirements um again June July 2025 facilities management for example is every school has to have a Five-Year Plan um which again we're

083doing pretty well on risk management internal controls around business operations some of them were already meeting obviously um with our Gap accounting and um our audits uh personnel management Etc so just want to give you a heads up that this is coming down the pipe and um I'll be spending a lot of time on that U moving forward here's uh my plan for the next 12 months or so I want to uh the purchasing request form s similar to what I did with the food service request form is that it goes into a black box they fill out a Google form and the faculty and Kylie does a great job of fulfilling everything and following up with faculty if if something is not available anymore um but I I'd like to automate that a little

084bit where um the teachers can get feedback that something has been ordered something when it's shipped it's been shipped and there so that they're aware so it's not just the black box that they hey I put this order in it's been three weeks where are we you know am I going to get my markers or whatever um integrated onboarding form which I've already talked about the new sters boarding system with a head by data validation um I've already mentioned some of these other things before you can look this over I'm not going to read every bullet but uh the communications for the Strategic plan or launching a new website this summer um the facilities TR ticketing system we're going to bring that inhouse um rather than using currently we just they use essentially a ticketing

085system that is basically emails and we're going to take that and make that a real uh ticking system for facilities um and Jimmy's ready to make that plunge so I want to thank for that uh slow and steady right and um I want to create an ebal system for finance and operations I'm going to start with uh my direct reports and hopefully they'll filter down uh I think everybody deserves an annual review and that's we're going to try to create for the people within finance and operations I've already mentioned the facilities assessments uh obviously the fall and the winter is taking up mostly around budget season um we're going to be working on the Su budget and then I'll do uh all the local budgets for fiscal year 26 um our phone system is end

086of life in May of uh June of 2025 and we're working on that um these are all the employees under finance and operations over 45 employees and uh really just uh appreciate all the work they do every day and obviously they don't get to see through the board but as you go through each building you you see them um and I just want to thank them uh they allow uh our teachers to do what they do best which is teach students to do what they do best which is learn and uh so it's really important that uh we have a um partnership with finance and operations if you have any questions I here so I I I I'm happy about having the the ticket system to roll out especially in HR and for for grounds

087I at hard reuse a Google form that I created it it's it works but it's not really sufficient this is amazing yeah yeah I oh are I'm done um I see that corners and planfield are going to consult L some money there yeah we are as um they've hired a director of Technology um who happens to be Tina Canfield's husband um they stole him from Woodstock and um he is doing a great job we knew going into that as they uh were ready to have a IT director that they would use us less so I we're under a year one um of a contract this year which I created a step down plan so it wouldn't be a big loss in revenue for the Su we are going to lose Revenue yeah but um um

088we're trying to create a step down so it goes from 25,000 to 15,000 and then uh eventually to zero now that being said the superintendent and Corey do want to keep us on retainer so what kind of Revenue dollarss it's a small amount of money that'll look like for the Su budget is to be decided but there will be uh I feel pretty confident we're GNA have a future contract with cor and Playfield just as a like a tier three status essentially retainer thank you items for discussion followed by motion if needed policy F40 procurement policy this is the second reading but at the same time though it's still my understanding while reading through this again we're changing the dollar amount to match the state law the state law um and so with with that

089in mind I'm I'm going to take a motion to approve and what you're saying is that everything else in the policy is as it was justdating some numbers we updating numbers for sealed bids and for competitive proposal to match state law and micro purchases yep can you just remind me what we're changing from and to I have to look at the old version but I believe the old version was competitive proposals was 15,000 or greater and now uh according the state it's 40,000 or greater so we're just match in the state sure and the other one is uh uh sealed bids is at excess of $200,000 yeah which would be like Transportation right yeah I I mean that makes sense to me if we're not materially changing anything other than just getting Li State this

090came from the audit uh not a finding obviously but they said you might want us update your policy to reflect state law the state just updated it I think a year or two ago so it's relative so do I have a motion uh yes I I move to accept uh the procurement policy F40 as yeah quick question does this procurement policy also like include all our food procurement yes if it's a um if it's it depends if it's if it's a competitive proposal so if it's something over $40,000 he'd have to give multiple bits so like we did this for um the obviously the uh the best example I can use is uh although it came under abilities of Grounds was a high school cafeteria yeah um the serving line at Windsor came in under

091the 15,000 so it did not was not affected by this under our old policy I think I there's just rules that you need to follow within the Food Service program of requiring bids within certain procurements of certain products and things like that so that's that's all covered under this because it doesn't necessarily have to meet $40,000 but you still have to write specific requirements to procure objects so if you want to buy only local Tomatoes you need to make sure you put that on your specific bid when you go out and are looking for it um or else anybody can sell you tomatoes and they're cheaper yeah it it it basically what this does is it allows school districts to buy things purchase without uh things with larger larger amount of Monies this is a

092less restrictive policy than what it was before not a more restrictive policy because they raise the the dollar amounts for the restrictive purchasing uh be kicked in I I understand I understand what the policy is I'm more saying the there's more restrictive policies within the Food Service program usually that we just need to follow those rules because they're Federal requirements so we just need to make sure what policy like that this one doesn't Trump that if we have to actually do certain bids for smaller amounts no my understanding is federal any federal policies Trump all these policies and then that's we could have a less restrictive one which we did yeah but the auditor suggested going to the state law which is 16 BSA um so yes that in so far as federal policy is

093tighter um which we do for uh certain grants um sure like title and Etc they don't anything that's more restrictive we have to go with a federal but for anything for our policy um again an example would be switches or something you know Network switches yeah yeah you got it the federal a federal policy is the floor yes so we can make things more restrictive but we can't make them less restrictive yes yes so do I have a second second I said second thank you any discussion any further discussion so Larry am I correct basically raising the dollar about makes this policy less restrictive yes matches state law so okay if now anything with been 15,000 but now you have a window open instead of 15,000 up to 40,000 you wouldn't have to get competitive

094proposals okay that's down on your your process time yes okay any more discussion we'll go around vot start with online uh Beth Roy Ann Marie hi Sarah I Mark I now who am I missing Nikki hi and Nikki you're here I'm here okay outstanding um I think that's it on line Mar got Mar right got y Elizabeth hi Nancy Hi Megan hi Davis Hi and I am an I thank you Christin are you gonna let L know y yeah I will thank you everybody I I felt it important to get that out of the way seemly coming to the end of the school year um Su budget committee members um bill you skip yeah the resolution the resol oh I'm sorry I did it's just one word I hard okay so Larry handed this to

095me they he actually got it on the agenda uh short notice this is a resolution for um the first light purchasing um and unexpectedly they requested that we do it with a resolution um we're going to pay it anyway we're under a five-year contract year two we're heading into year two of a contract so I've signed the contract everything but they asked for I'm not first like our consultant through usack which is the eate part of the money kind of like what Beth was talking about earlier they've asked for a board resolution to confirm what we're already doing so my my ask of Larry is that we bring this probably vote on it but then ask confirmation of why it needs to be in a res we've never have been asked to do this before

096so is there any change in federal law for for funding and so forth that requires this and if so then we can put it into the turnning wheel of administration of the school board so to pass this resolution which is uh to be resolved that the governing board of for Windsor Southeast supervisor Union and that's highlighted and underlined one authorizes the filing of FCC form 471 schools and libraries Universal service program Services ordered for the fiscal year 0 uh 0701 2024 to June 30th 2025 two authorizes payment of the applicant share subject to the following condition one one approval of funding of the discounted portions by the schools and libraries division s of the universal service Administration company USAC and two rece receipt of services during the fiscal year uh July 1st 2024 to June

09730th 2025 so that's the resolution I'm not exactly sure what it all means with the acronym and everything but can you give me a very brief overview of what what first light is something so first light is our ISP okay first light's our ISP usack is the FCC arm of for eate and eate gives you a discount on your internet um based on your free and reduce lunch count of your Su and for us that discount rate is 7% so so basically in short they're asking us to have a resolution so they can give us a bunch of money and I'm not they've never asked this before and we have no idea why they require it but I suggest we pass it and then find out why they require it I've already followed up to

098ask them why why now but I just brought it to the board yep so go ahead so moved okay so moved do I have a second second any discussion as interested as you are to find out why they want us to have a resolution to do something that seems pretty routine my only fear is that if we don't pass the resolution they won't give us that money I mean yeah that's yeah that's yeah okay uh all in favor um and I will go uh through the internet again and Marie hi Sarah hi Mark hi Beth Beth you're welcome just to give a thumbs up hi I was Nicole hi that it yeah okay Elizabeth hi Nancy hi Megan hi Davis Hi and I an I passes y okay while I take care of uh signing

099this Su budget committee members where we at with that uh anarie for Weathersfield has um volunteered and Sarah will be the backup if need be and um uh Nikki confirm it was Hannah right that um agreed to be the budget F budget committee person that's what I'm remembering Hannah it's okay I'll remember and um for the monney board I don't know that you've made that uh decision yet have you SC any board I think so it it was Rebecca it was Rebecca yeah didn't you vol I don't remember I'm sorry I don't think that we did I remember Elizabeth volunteering so I remember thinking it was going to be cool to be on the thing with her it could be uh it could be that I volunteered to do it until January I think that's

100right yeah actually I think that's what y so you got that l anarie and an Elizabeth yep you got it and Sarah's a backup for anarie if you need be okay Sarah's back yep and maybe we can get Amy to take over in January uh yes I mean well we don't we won't need to go past January oh I hope that hopefully the not historically it's not the latest I've ever done the Su was yeah yeah I I hesitate to do it because I also have uh those reports support staff oh right that's right I'll be sending an email out in August September around that time frame and uh probably Clos to September and'll usually meet Friday mornings on Google meet uh thank you child air tax Where Do We Stand everybody all the districts

101have supported the full um okay cost yeah great okay guess I asked something to talk about that Thursday um introductory discussion do CES hes hes do you want to talk about it this time or I I think we should wait until it's been signed into law and right I thought by now it would be because it's but it's not quite there it's cost saving measure so it should be something that the governor signs into law but it is not yet signed into law and it is also not on the override list so uh I think we should wait wait till June yeah think it be done okay well um override date is uh June 7 and 18th so yeah by then we should know yeah because we made the fourth yeah yeah okay which does

102make sense that means that all the bills have to be signed before June 17 introductory discussion supervisory Union Partners something we've been kicking around for quite some time um I on Bo being able to to partner in certain areas with surrounding ases and also you know uh just as a background it was on page 84 of act 146 it was the last thing on act 146 that was never followed through upon um was merging supervisory unions and they had us paired with Springfield automatically with no discussion and uh now that the Blue Ribbon commission um will be coming forward one of the things that they are bound to discuss is merging supervisory unions and I thought it would just be a good idea for us to talk about who we would consider our potential partners

103and if we did consider potential Partners uh what we could do with that because there are things that we could do right away with it so let me ask a clarifying questions when you say potential Partners do you mean two supervisory unions becoming one supervisory Union with one one superintendent well we could I mean I mean that that's a merger pardoning to me sounds like something different but um well I mean start with partnering right which the boses will will enable um but it to my mind are thinking about partnering with both uh Mountain View supervisory that's correct that's what St m y I know but they're not a supervisory un they're a unified un and both uh yeah they're both they both are yeah but uh uh we could increase our we could increase

104our pool of for example maintenance we could bring down cost of certain maintenance projects we could bring down the we could have more buying power with food we could have more um buying power power in certain areas um we can come up with us uh agreement on um teacher contracts so we're not competing with each other before out of the districts looking at just a few things that you said I think Mountain View as in food service makes sense um I think in technology it makes sense just because I think the next state reporting shift is if if if you don't have power school or INF the campus it's just your workload is going to be huge because they're the only two that are really moving forward with uh the new uh State reporting moduls

105right now um I'm not sure I want to didp my two worlds together with right now well I out but but uh I mean looking at the merge side of it uh when looking at um the end date of high schools um and and merging suus to create a um Regional High School and both Springfield and Harford makes complete sense to me because both their buildings are end dating within the next 30 Years um so death this seems like a much bigger deeper discussions for the last 20 minutes of a board meeting um is this something that would be worth putting forth like for our for a retreat but we yes we were going to we were going to talk about it at the retreat but I thought it would be a good idea to

106agree in principle that were interested in it before we discuss it at the retreat because if we're not interested in it then there's no point in in discussing at The Retreat so I it be a waste of time I think that before I can decide if I'm interested in it or not I need to understand functionally what it means because right now I've heard I've heard it in terms of merger or a partnership and we're talking about working within some way another Su which I think like on a very high level like and just as a gut thing it's like yeah sure we should work with people around us but without any degree of detail as to what that functionally means and and and a more substantive discussion of what that that would look like

107it I don't really feel able to sign off on any sort of even even like an agreement of purpose on that um because it's I mean again fundamentally that immediately came up are we talking about merger or partnership and and I don't think that question has been answered in the last five to 10 minutes so until we can clearly Define that kind of stuff I mean I think that we need to maybe come at this with a more somewhat more concrete solid idea of what the discussion is and then we can kind move so let me break down my vision of this okay I think if we're g to discuss about merging um I think the only thing we can decide is hey it's something to explore because merging two SES is a minimum of

108a fiveyear discussion among yeah the partnership is AEP towards considering merger I mean it's not well it may not necessarily even be a step forward it may be something a shareed resource one example is one area that we are hurting in this issue is food management and so the possibility of merging on some level our food programs to expand our buying power and to share uh management of the the different cafeteras at a higher level to create a hierarchy um could be really beneficial for this Su because of all the paperwork involved or menu creation under federal law via state law and things like that it may be something that would be beneficial for our two districts and Mar do you still have a question oh I think you do have a question um I

109don't so much have a question is just um I think it is a good idea to start talking about this and to start making plans because like with act 46 we actually ended up in a really good place because we already had some sort of plans or some you know ideas of what we wanted to do before it happened so we weren't forced to emerge like some other um you know towns were just kind of told like who they're going to be with and there you go you're we are we sort of got to choose and I think it would be a good idea again to um get ahead of it and you know choose who we want to partner with um so we don't end up just kind of stuck with maybe a community

110that doesn't support their schools as well as ours do uh so I just think that we should definitely at least start thinking about it and I love the idea of uh getting together and working with mountain views for uh the food service so on a on a counter side as well an Marie is starting the discussion so uh we can uh weed out all the bad reasons to merge as well as the good reasons so if the state does come to us we've had all the discussions we created all the research we have more of a facts to present a case for what we as an isue want as opposed to what the state wants because it's coming down the pike at some time in which they're going to again try to find some forced

111monetary savings which the last I think three things that they've done have been a complete failure um yeah since uh Food Services talked about a few times um I I was going to save it for executive session but so just stop me if I get too close uh so we're looking for food service director Woodstock is about 10 days ahead of us Y discr is moving on and um I've been in talks with Jim Fen I've had a couple meetings with Jim who's sorry Jim F's a business manager my counterpart over it what's up Mountain View Mountain View that's you and um and they like I said they're 10 days ahead of us as of then they had uh they didn't have any applicants that they're ready to move forward with um we have some

112applicants and I am working on a committee to get together uh we don't know if they're the right ones um and something that Jim and I discussed a lot was um and uh I also met separately last week with uh with Jim um the Addison Northwest at Mount a suus who share Food Service like as we're discussing um and one thing that came up in that discussion that Jim and I both agreed on was uh it may we may find a food service director that can handle 1100 kids and three kitchens and four schools and an Su style and all the other things that go along with being the director of food service but to find somebody that could handle seven kitchens or eight kit and 2500 kids uh we would have the economy of

113scale to offer that person a salary commensurate with doing that work um but they may that we may not find the right person so right now where we are with Jim is um the very early stages of possibly if we can find the right person that's something that I would bring back to the board um but right now we're looking for a food service director for the wind of Southeast supervisor Union and Jim's looking for a food service director for the mountain views that's you if we can find somebody who could do that and that may be down the road even with a person under our ospice um we will do that but right now though and that would do more of a partnership right I'm sure in the suus that share a food service

114they're managerial administrative structure is probably significantly different than a single Su yeah so Mount Addison is an Su and then mount a is a district and the person that that person is a mount a employee and then they back Bill the nor Addison Northwest Su their portion of her salary yeah but all the other staff cooks and Lead cooks are employees of their respective Su right it doer so we're all thinking along the same lines yeah I mean it's the same thing if we look at merging a a special ed structure um between two suu it would it would create a much larger and robust um administrative team um and there from that there may be some U cost savings but more importantly administrative Savings of scale um but with that in mind it would

115take about that would take several years to to to be able to move in that direction uh but on a similar not looking at um maintenance tapes you know to be able to create uh shared maintenance responsibility you you would create larger more efficient Crews to go from building to building to be able to support each other but one thing I would say about maintenance is it's important to know the Food Service would be more ready to do something like this because Food Service are LSU employees and our maintenance while Su while abilities and grounds uh I manage with uh Jim who manages a team uh that is Jim is a mney employee yeah and not an Su employee just want to be clear on so I think that's a great idea and it may

116come down the road but it would behoove making the bildings and grounds director an Su employee to allow that for the future if that's something the board wants to do so based on everything I'm hearing I I appreciate this conversation because it gives a little bit more detail as to like on on a programmatic basis where opportunities to and I'm assuming it would be service agreements anduse that kind of thing we've had for corners for years yep yeah program by program maybe and because we're still waiting for the bosis bill to to get some clarity on that because that's still in the process maybe the way that we move forward with this conversation is to to look at this on on a program by program basis because when we talk about partnership not getting flal

117merger idea yet because it I think focusing this conversation on partnership makes the most sense right now right yeah maybe we we do that we get that program by program picture of like what it would look like to share resource x with District a versus District b or that kind of or just to get a rough idea so we can get a more detailed Global picture of what we're what we're talking about I again I think that my my knee-jerk and my gut is that like yeah this is something that I'm interested in in learning about I want to sign off in it but I also want to have a better idea of like what what exactly what's the broad view of the different programs and services that we could enter into service agreement ceremonies

118with other other districts or SS with and then if we decideed we want to go there maybe prioritize like make a kind of running order like how do we want to structure that how do we who do we want to start talking to how do we want to start doing that Outreach um and I think other questions will come up throughout that process right that's just that it's how my brain works right is I think that if we if we have a little that kind of swwa of information before it it little be easier to sip through it and have a more substantive the other idea is is a look at a 20 or 30e plan in which um you know that if the fact that we have two school districts who still have choice

119if their voters get to the point where they don't want to deal with the fluctuation of tuition okay and they just want those high school students to come to one location the reality is in this Su we do not have room for them okay we don't have the room for all our high school students take that with the mind in that Springfield and Hartford are buildings that were built in the 1960s okay average lifespan of a of a school building is 35 years and so that kind of put you in the mold where they're at um in 20 years these buildings are probably going to be in the same condition Woodstock is uh which is not good which is not good um so one partner which is a common throughout the country is creating a

120Regional High School and the reality is we have three suus that can't afford the $80 million price tag that it would probably cost as opposed to building a single high school um whereas all the high school students are within a 30 minute drive it's geographically it's possible um and so to be able to merge not just two uh three high schools but to merge two um technical schools which are really under um under constructed Hartford in particular I don't know particular but I know that Harford has a much higher demand for enrollment than they can take they can take around 3 students and the regional demand is is easily within five six 700 students and so to create a new building that has a new tech center a new high school state-ofthe-art and an oncampus

121College um facilities as well and that would enable students to start college earlier for those that are able I I I just think it's a vision worth discussing in pursuing so that in the next 20 or 30 years we're prepared unlike situation that Woodstock's in where they're really crappy situation and uh because they have a building that's not functional so that's that that's another thing that I feel very strongly about discussing at this level and then seeing where we want to go with it start discussing with other issues nearby there are two two places in the state ofana I'll keep going before we go see we have to go executive there's two places in the state ofana that are right for merger um the i91 quter and the I 89 quter especially around the um

122the Barry Millar area and right here along the uh Harford Windsor Springfield and then further south you have have um the me falls down into area or right for mergers because you have the highway thankew Eisenhower and I would rather plan for that long term as opposed to doing nothing and taking what we get with that said any other discussion about this do we need Executive well setting the next agenda take action on the H the resignation oh absolutely sorry Megan is that what you okay um right can we list out those names of higher yeah okay um there oops that is the list for uh hiring do them all at once if you so choose I move that we approve the hiring of Frank Kelly Patty fish Donna hatch Genie Wade and leoa Tucker

123seconded do we have any discussion we're excited to have applic yes can I have my visual again yes I really do need to have both computers but there you go um all those in favor of hiring these individuals which we are very lucky and honor to get amme hi Sarah hi Mark I Nicole she may be eating dinner oh um bethan go h Beth is gone uh and this is Nikki and I'll say I you guys all froze so I don't even know if you said anything did you get Sarah yeah y I got Sarah we didn't hear from Beth she's gone there there's a lot going on this evening for people picking up kids Elizabeth I'm Hi Megan hi this hi okay do you um these are the resignations Jean Craig and Rodney so

124I think you need to approve those okay I will uh make a motion to approve the resignations of and retirement I'm sorry G was a retir uh the retirement of Jee Morse and the resignations of Craig L larno and do we have to approve retirements I mean technically no no yeah okay it's the same as if somebody didn't sign there so I'll resend my motion and I will move back up there yeah I move I I I will move to approve the resignations of Craig larno and rodne claro second any discussion I mean I I just want to recognize uh What uh you know Craig and Rodney have contributed to our Su um I mean I think that our the current state of our food program I I I have not been here for the

125entirety of uh of CRA and Rodney Center here but uh I you know I just have memor the food service was like you know Circa 1995 2002 uh it's very different now and is qualitatively leaps in bounds above above that um and I and I I'm aware that you know they really have a lot to do with that that change so you know they'll they'll be missed I think they'll be really a really strong Legacy of uh you know providing nutrition and some nutritional education and information uh to our students so that they can do their best learning and uh and being in our school environment so thanks to both of them yeah they've done they've really done a remarkable job and I mean from the Albert Bridge side um where we because Rodney lives

126in in brille he makes sure that the food gets to the school hot and fresh and get set up and serve properly and it's really it's a huge huge huge difference in the nutrition but also in the uptake um so thank you both very very much I deeply regret yep all right all in favor of uh accepting these two resignations even though it's acceptance with a heavy heart and Marie I with regrets yes Sarah I with regrets Mark I with regrets Nicole I with regrets as well Elizabeth uh I with true regrets because I know that I I suspect I it's because of the cuts that we had to make from our supervisory level that's leading to this and I I truly do regret that Nancy I with a big thank you yeah hi hi

127Davis you're shaking your head so did and I am an i with um the best of luck to Future setting next agenda think we're pretty set for the yep yeah for June yes we've got um again can't pull it up because my I'm on the computer but we'll put the bosies on for June do you uh want to save the um partnership conversation for the retreat in August okay um and we'll bring back the um local wellness policy yes in June they'll have that writing okay which is one reason in mind when you start talking about having a sort of a pre policy yeah committee that that really makes sense yeah and they've been working on it um what came out from the AOE and now merging with what we had in our local wellness

128policy that's what Katie's working on with the team of Health Educators and E teachers and nurses so um grateful that they're tackling it okay and then my report um Tracy will come back with what we want to do for the future of the board with um Tracy next year and um Katie will do her Mer seclusion how many people are trained report let do at the end of the season and Angie will come back she's on for the curriculum and data report she's being bry right now um and she will be coming back with information on the continuous Improvement plan next month that's all for my memory not bad huh and also uh uh what's his name oh and Mike nichelson Mike will be here y um and I think Bill that Larry would like

129to go into executive session just for a quick quick few minutes and share as well under contracts and contract it'll be uh Larry will talk about contracts okay that's why we're going in okay um so I will take a motion to go into uh VSA 313 or discussion of contracts I say that right so moved okay all in can I can we just do a voice over on this yep sure all in favor of uh going into executive session please say I I hi so uh this always freaks me out a little bit so I'm gonna stop recording firsteps okay thank you everybody for uh the being patient with us with this late night I will take a motion to end this Su board meeting so oh sorry you both moved it sobody need a

130second okay all in favor say I thank you all right stop recording