001There it is okay Yes, please. Who wants that for me? For one. Okay. Good evening, everyone. I call the regular meeting of the South Burlington School Board to order on Wednesday, October 9th at 6 p.m. agenda item two, announcements and amendments to the agenda. Yeah, I'll mention one thing just because we don't have a community engagement item in the agenda i did attend the city council meeting Monday evening, they had a session or a little bit of time blocked off to hear from the community on the city budget and what the community was looking for there. So it went for about half an hour or so. They did a presentation on their budget, which was pretty informative. not real numbers, we're just kind of an overview of the budget. And then they solicited public feedback.
002There were probably four or five people who spoke of one or two from online, then the rest were in the room. Interestingly, I will say that the school budget came up, was brought up by every single person who spoke as a matter of concern. in conjunction with the city budget. So I'd encourage you if you want to hear what those comments were to go back and watch the meeting from the city council for Monday night, but it was interesting that that everybody spoke to the almost spoke to the school budget more than they did the city budget just wanted to share that Thank you. Agenda item three, comments from the public. This is the community's opportunity to share feedback and concerns with the board. We ask that you keep your comments concise, two to three
003minutes. And that you refrain from using any information that would identify a specific person. Please raise your hand in the room or use the Zoom raised hand feature. We will only use the online chat to manage any tech issues. They are not able to take action on any issues brought to us during public comment. However, any board member may suggest tonight that the issue or question be added to a future agenda for discussion. We may also delegate addressing issues to our superintendent, Violet Nichols. who is on virtually the Zoom meeting. It's always helpful if you can email us a copy of your comments for the follow-up. So with that said, there's no one in the room for public comment. Is there anyone online? achievement. So next up, agenda item four, focus on student learning or
004student representative report. Thanks. Thank you. So yesterday was slam community service day um slam is a program at the high school that pairs three seniors who are currently taking the peer leadership course with a freshman advisory. And so the goal of this is to do activities with freshmen, kind of create a bonded advisory environment. And yeah, so yesterday slam groups went to places such as the common groups farm um the South Bronze in Georgia Elementary Schools and Sandbar State Park for community service and her lobbying. Yeah, and TIA Germany just celebrated 50 years of culture exchange and connection at SB High School. This partnership between SBHS and Skiller Gymnasium in Hamlin, Germany is the second longest high school exchange of its kind in the US and the longest between Vermont and Germany. So this year's
005TIU Germany group just left yesterday. and venturing to Washington, D.C, and we hope they have fun and we're glad they joined us. The SBHS club fair happened last week and students were able to speak with student leaders of clubs such as journalism, Student Justice Union, Investment Club, Dungeons and Dragons Club, Jazz Band, Key Club, Green Team, and many others. Student interest was really high despite there being no activity block this year. And I think many student organizations are finding ways to go about having meetings before or after school. And so we're really happy that there's still a lot of extracurricular school. And Key Club, a community service club at SBHS, just around the neighborhood food drive in Dorset Farms in Southville neighborhoods and they picked up and donated 733 pounds of non-perishables and hygiene supplies.
006So Gracie and I are just really excited to support that soccer students and students are still getting involved in the community. Thank you very much. Okay, next up is agenda item five, discussion items. First, we need to talk about our school board vacancy. So this is our last meeting with Elaine. Thank you, Elaine. And today, I just want to share with our community that we are preparing to go through the board member appointment process. So tomorrow. There'll be an announcement posted along with an application on the South Billington School District website. And in the city newsletter, and I believe in violence newsletter, Violet, chime in here if I'm off. That's correct. Okay, and from porch Forum the application as well as a notice that we're looking for a new board member will be posted within
007the community. Applications are due to the central office, which I believe, Violet, on the application it has information about who to submit the application to, correct? Yes, Meg Collins and her email address is mcollins, C-O-L-L-I-N-S at sbschools, plural.net. So applications to be a board member are due back to Meg Collins no later than 4 p.m. on Friday. It must be October 25th. October 23rd is the last day. And then between I need to double check that date. Pilot, our application's due on Wednesday, October 23rd? That would be two weeks from now. I think, you know, if the board wants them to be due on that Friday, that's acceptable as well. Sure. I'm just trying to think about the balance of giving the community enough time to apply, but also giving board members enough time to
008review the applications before we do interviews on the 30th. It's the Friday before enough time against board members the weekends to new applications? I think that would be enough. I don't anticipate getting 100 applicants, but they're not that long to read through right okay so we'll go ahead and say friday october 25th, no later than 4 p.m. Applications are due back to meg collins at this box. And then we'll review the applications and on the 30th, we'll build interviews in our open I'm literally thinking about November agendas right now so Applications due by Friday the 25th. We're going to review those and interview people at the following meetings and hopefully appoint some new person by November 6th. Okay. Any questions about the school board? Just in time for budget season I remember that well. Okay,
009if there's no questions or comments, anybody online. Then we'll move on to cell phone policy update. Gracie and Allie, do you guys have something you'd like to share? Yes. So last week we were able to speak to Seventh and eighth grader or no sixth and seventh graders at Tuttle and then we were also able to go into a ninth 11th and 12th grade advisory at the high school to talk to students about their views on the phone policy. And so we asked them four questions. The first was how the phone policy has changed their experience at school. The second was what positives they've noticed from having the policy in place. The third was what negatives have they noticed about the policy being in place? And then the fourth was, would you support having a loan
010policy in place next year? And why or why not? And what would you change about it? And so first we wanted to talk a bit about what students were saying in terms of their experiences with implementation of the phone policy. And so at the middle school. It's expected that no cell phones are smart or smartwatches are allowed during the school day and students are expected to place their phones in the phone home of their last class and then pick it up at the end of the day when they're in their last class. But many Tuttle students reported minimal usage of the phone homes. Most students would just keep their cell phones in their bags and just kind of either pretend like they don't have a phone or just kind of not bring it up. And
011so we heard from a few students that there were really only one or two phones in the actual cell phone home. But… We did hear that they didn't see many bones out there was just there wasn't much use in the physical home. And then when we talk to the high school, the policies that no cell phones during class periods and that students are expected to put them in the cell phone home during those class periods. And we heard the same kind of logistics stuff is that they reported that there was minimal cell phone home usage and that most high school teachers instruct the students to just place their phones in their backpack during class time and to use the cell phone home if students feel compelled to do so. So. Starting out, we kind of
012went, we took notes on all of what we were hearing in responses to those four questions I talked about. And then we kind of generated some themes. And so for the middle school specifically about how their experience has changed Students express that the phone policy has allowed them to feel more engaged and focused in classrooms and they have noticed teachers spending more time on teaching instead of membrane. Yeah, and students were super concerned about phones being stolen while in the phone call. So the placement of the phone homes are usually very visible in the classroom and they were concerned because the keys normally left just on top of the box when they're locked. Another concern was about bus cancellations at the middle school and being able to communicate with their parents about how they're hesitant
013to use the office phone because a lot of them believe that texting their parents is less disruptive during their workday and that parents don't usually answer an unknown number. So Gracie and I discussed maybe having some more about parents putting the number into their phone to be able to contact. Another concern was that they were forgetting their phone. We heard a couple of stories about students leaving their phones at the school over the weekend. And then finally, their last main concern was just about having their phones during emergencies so fires in lockdowns. We also heard How did this overall feeling of just adults not trusting them as much with the gold policy in place, especially from sixth graders, a lot of them kind of felt like administration hadn't even given them a chance. And in
014middle school, you're like supposed to have some like more freedoms. And I think they felt that they wish that they have been able to kind of show their responsibility rather than just being subject to a single And finally, we asked them about their suggestions for ways they thought they could improve it. And some students would like to have bones during lunch and recess. We also heard some students say that it would take away from social interaction and physical activity. So there's opinions on both sides. Another point was that we should allow phones in between classes similar to the high school level. There's a suggestion to remove phone homes altogether and to trust students to keep them in their bags and lockers. A lot of students were also concerned about the Apple Watches and brought up
015that there is a school mode on Apple Watches where students can have a watch but not receive notifications. Finally, they believed that teachers should have the phone home key on their person at all times so that it's less accessible if someone were to come into the classroom. And then it was also brought up about playing music and contacting parents is just one of the major concerns that they would like to. So not for the high school. With the middle schoolers, we had a very spirited discussion so we weren't like when we asked how their experience had changed a lot of the pros and cons were kind of wrapped into that. But for high school benefits, we have a little bit more clear One was more kids are actively noticing and being reflective of their own
016bone use due to the policy being in place. Another that was brought up was there's less of an urge to go on their phone when they're doing other things like not in classrooms They said that there were less distractions and more attention and productivity in class. There's no more pressure to use their phone in class as a pastime when others are doing so. And teachers are able to spend more time. And then for concerns, we heard from high schoolers that students who need phones for IEPs and have less privacy about using a phone for a specific purpose and now need to take a step of talking to the teacher for accommodations. Another one was getting a hold of parents during emergencies. getting phones stolen was brought up again. music during independent work was also brought
017up because a lot of students are more productive in that setting. We brought up, can they use school computers to play games and log into social media? That's the latest question. They also brought up the point of phone homes not being sanitary and them not being clean doing a lot of cell phones are a journey. Finally, we talked about not having the freedom during study hall when a lot of them finished their homework. This was especially common when we talked to ninth graders. And ninth graders also had that same theme of not feeling like they got a chance by admin to prove. they could use them responsibly. And then for suggestions. a lot of feedback was that kids don't want phone homes and they just want the I guess. like expectation from teachers just to
018be put in bags and then if teachers see a phone call, keep that punitive measure of sending kids to the office. Kids also really push for allowing air bonds during independent work time. Most teachers, I think, have been completely banning headphones. And I think a lot of kids do benefit from listening to music during independent work. Kids also said that they wanted more consistency from teachers if phone homes are going to be the expectation that teachers should be signing up on homes are the expectation. They also wanted administration to allow kids to be more in control for preparation for the real world. Some advocated for a difference in rules for underclassmen and upperclassmen, so giving upperclassmen more freedom. And then lastly, only enforcing phone home use for particular students who haven't demonstrative ability to use
019their phone responsibly. So yeah, those were all of our data points that we collected. We also have like the raw notes that we took during interviews if you'd like me to share that with you all. And we gave Chelsea these little note cards that we had students from the middle school write on. they gave us just more information that they wanted us to know. So I think Chelsea will share that with the rest of the board. That is so much information. I'm glad Myla's on. I think a lot of that would be operational. And so maybe if you could share that stuff to pilot and she can follow up with Admin. I think I heard a lot of the points though that we've been discussing at the policy creation level and on our timeline, we
020said today is when we would decide how much more community engagement is warranted by the response so far. But I think one important piece to note is that this is a discussion at the state level. And might be a policy that's put in place at the state level, regardless of what we do here so we're not taking any action this evening. This is just a discussion item, but I wanted to give us an opportunity to sort of update where we're at in the process and hear some feedback. I want to thank Gracie and Norman so much because i think that you have such feel for all of this the banks and you're in the trenches And I appreciate it so much. So yeah, just so. I kind of want to summarize what Chelsea did what
021i'm What I'm not hearing is revolt, right? It sounds more like acceptance. This is the way it is and it sounds like it's going along rather swimming way with the, you know, potentially a few minor operational changes Depending upon age or some other issues that violent could potentially run into. So it's great. I think that feedback is phenomenal. So thank you very much for that. It's very, very helpful. And I'm wondering, you know, Violet, if you've heard any feedback from the teaching staff on this and how implementation is going on their side. Yeah, thank you, Tim. Well, for starters, I have to thank Allie and Gracie. Your report was exceptional and I really appreciate all of the detail. Please do email that to me. We'll certainly work with our administrators on next steps. And I
022too am not hearing revolt. I'm hearing really actionable steps. I was taking good notes as you talked. And I just want to thank you for collecting all of that information. It's extremely helpful. And I also just want to note, you know, kind of with the researchers lens, the information that you all received at as fellow students, I think is really valuable. So thank you for that. Tim, I have definitely not engaged in the level of research that Allie and Gracie have. I have heard no concerns from any parents or any staff since we started discussing this in August. I heard from one parent who we heard from at the board meeting in late August. But I've heard no concerns. I've heard things are working well. I have heard that there is not an insistence on
023phones being in homes and to sort of like build the relationships and trust that allowing phones to be in backpacks and avoiding a power struggle while still getting to that ultimate end, which is reduced cell phone use has been an effective technique that's utilized. I'm hearing from our principals, same thing, you know, this is something that's been effective. And I'm not recommending from anything I've heard at this time, you know, any sort of drastic changes. I'll certainly keep the board posted on any updates I hear from the state side on potential policies. As you all know, this is something that's being discussed nationally, but given the implementation timeline of this and where we are on October 9th, would I continue to hear in reports is that there's been a dramatic reduction of cell phone use,
024which is leading to, I think, better social emotional states and increased engagement. So, you know, those were two of the main drivers of implementing these reductions. So I just really want to thank Allie and Gracie for that tremendous and thorough report. Thank you. One thing I'll share, I did happen to read, I was in Middlebury. I've been in that area for the past couple of days and I picked up the Addison Independent and there was an article they had on cell phone usage And it sounds like that area, Viole, you may be aware of this already, is tending to handle this more at the operational level as well. And I think there is some look into policies, but at this point, it's mostly operational and it sounds like there's no big waves there around it
025either so Yeah, I'm not in favor of policy for policy's sake. Policy is only as strong as the people who enforce it. So I personally at this time would love to kind of just table this conversation until January where we have asked Superintendent Nichols to do a more formal a survey of the teaching staff to find out how it's going from their perspective. And that will also give us some time to see how the legislature right the conversation as well I think that the emergent needs that parents were reaching out about and teachers as well have been addressed with the measures that Violet has put in place. So that's where I stand on this issue for now. I'm not sure how the rest of the board feels about it. I'm with you at this point.
026I don't think, you know, again, the policy at the board level, I don't feel is necessary at this point. We'll revisit it in January. at that point you know we can hear from our community again and we'll have more information on how it's going but it sounds again Thanks to your student reps that it seems to be on quite well. Okay. Chelsea, it makes a lot of sense. I'm in agreement. Thank you. Okay, next up is Wow. the listening sessions. So Laura will be holding the listening session in the quiet reading room at the library in South Rampton on October 16th. That's a week from today. And she's reserved that room from 545 to 645. So just a reminder to our community, this is an informal opportunity for you to share feedback with the board.
027She'll report back what you share in that session to the full board. Just trying to provide more opportunities for community members to Where's the word reversed first? Does she need a second person? Is she looking for a second person from the board to attend? I'm not sure if she is or not, but you're more than welcome to reach out and ask her. I'm happy to, right? I think I'm available. so yeah okay you're not doing enough for the board, Tim. Okay, that's great. You should definitely reach out to her and just ask her. Chris, I'm not sure, you know, if you've got time or want to, but I'm happy to. It may be helpful to have a second person there just because you can you know, field more questions. I'll reach out to her then.
028And she will be coming by the office. She's just got works done to me. Okay, so next up in our discussion items is the finance committee. First, you want me to take this one? Yes, sir. Thank you. Okay, Chris and I have been like ships in the night for a few weeks. So our apologies, we're getting off the ground a little bit late. So I have scheduled a meeting for the 23rd. So that I was… trying it was going to try and do it next week, but I realized the timeline was very short between when I made that decision and And when I actually could get people together, so I pushed it out a week. I want to thank Julia. Julia is on. She scheduled the library for us. And Julia, I don't know if
029you saw my email, but I'm going to push that back a week. So if we can reschedule the Zoom to the time I sent you, that would be phenomenal. I've contacted the people whose names are on the list. And I do have a question around the students and this I want to put out to the board and to our student reps We have like five or six student names on the list And I am loath to say to anybody you can't attend because I think it's potentially a really nice learning experience. So I'm not sure what the board feels. I think we have like, Chris, correct me if I'm wrong, we have five or six adults community members and then we have, I think, five or six students. But I'm wondering if people feel it
030would be inappropriate to invite the students to attend. And then based on their availability and stuff, some may not decide to attend going forward. Others might but What do we think? From my standpoint, on a community structure view, I think it's great to have student voice and also have the students be another place for community members to learn about the school budget. The only thing I would want to be careful of is having this appear as a school sanctioned event when community members were not being represented or background checked. So students are going to be present at these meetings, I would just want to make sure there's somebody from the schooling side being a supervisor. Does that make sense? I don't like to set up opportunities for students to be with any sort of community
031member. So we land on, I think, what, two students to begin with so um do you have an idea about Just balancing like I think students should be a part of this and I want to make sure that We're not setting up any sort of systemic problem for safety for students. Yeah, well, definitely. So first of all, I think having student voice in this is critically important. My, you know, suggestion to the board is absolutely bring them on. Really excited to have that interest and engagement. There are most important voices, right? So, and I can certainly work on some kind of supervision icing on the cake would be maybe their parents or guardians would attend, right? So happy to work on that for sure. Not a barrier that we can't work out easily. So I
032guess I'm hearing go ahead and invite them and who can attend can attend. Okay, great. There were some great name, integration applicants, some of the stuff that are relevant. I'm reading through it and I'm like, why? I just hate to say no, especially to students who are not for the learning opportunity. And Chris, are you okay with that as well? I think that makes a lot of sense. underline what Violet said. Thank you. So I will send out notices of just emails to those students as well and reach out to them very well. It may not be this evening, it may be another day or two before I back out of the woods to do it. Other than that, so that gives us probably the meeting will be rather short, I think. Again, we don't
033have a lot of evening time to do this. I think the library closes at 7 and that's where we're holding the meeting. So it'll be our basic like here's what we're about, kind of get to know one another really quickly, set up some times to meet going forward. And then that should What we might be able to, I'm hoping, squeeze in one more meeting before the community budget forum. I don't know if we need to discuss that as part of this conversation. I do. I think that would be part of Violet's budget timeline, which isn't how it works. So I'm hoping to get at least one more meeting in with the finance committee, Chris and I, before we host the uh the budget form. Did you go through your work on us. Okay, anything else?
034Chris, anything to add? No, thank you. All right, so next up then is agenda item six, superintendent's report By the way, if we'd like to take it away. Great. Hi, everyone. Great to be here. Albeit virtually. I'm in Killington for a business official superintendent finance conference for two days. Today is day one and it was really impactful conversation today. I'm just connecting with some really brilliant minds who are grappling with a large variety of budgetary issues. And so it's been a really productive day. And so that's why I'm not able to be with you in person. So connected to budget, the item on my superintendent's report this evening is the timeline for preparation for the FY26 budget. And Of course, our conversation this evening about the timeline. Tomorrow, I've peed up some communications in my
035newsletter where I will share kind of a preliminary, you know, some of the information we have, which is really summarizing where we landed For our current fiscal year 25 budget. And what we would need to really even break even, which we know is not a possibility given real estate inflation, a factor we know as the CLA, and the union negotiations that are underway. So trying to share a picture of what might be ahead, the most important piece of that communication, though, will be a link to our budget survey and I've had a lot of discussion about what that survey would entail. And ultimately, we've made the decision to leave it pretty open-ended. And we want feedback. So suggestions, ideas. concerns. So we've left it broad and open-ended and I'd really love to hear the community's
036feedback. So that'll be open tomorrow. And it closes on November 13th. We were intentional in having this early so that we could have information collated for our November 20th initial review of budget priorities. Dates in between there that are important, November 6th, we're going to be doing a number of financial reports from the business office, providing the picture of like a health check, right? Like a status report of where we are, entering into the fiscal year 26 preparations. The budget, the community budget forum, which will be hosted by the Finance Committee. We just need to nail down that date. And if now is a, you know, if there's suggestions on that, happy to have that conversation now or I can continue to go through the timeline. Let me know what the preference is. I think
037we should settle on it right now if you're okay with that. I am. I've got it in edit version. I'm ready to roll. I got my cursor next to November. Thank you. I think I sent a date what I sent in. Okay. I can try to dig that up too. I know there were a few dates early in November, like November 5th, 6th, 7th. Okay. Yeah, I sent in the fifth as a date since I thought that would avoid any conflict with the city council meeting on the Monday and allow us to report out the next day, right? Because Mm-hmm. we have a board meeting on the 6th right that's which we give you according to right okay so if we if we hosted that on the 5th then we could do a report out
038on the 6th. I think that sounds great. So I'm for that. Chris, I don't know if you have any thoughts on that, if that conflicts with anything on your timeline. Nope, that makes a lot of sense, Tim. Okay, so Violet, let's settle on the fifth and we'll host it then Great. I'm going to put that right into the timeline and um That sounds perfect to me. Thank you so much. I'm just going to reorder. I'll do that after the meeting. I realize you all don't have a live doc here. Great. The budget conversations, I mean, you know, the schedule is fast and furious and it's like that old adage about parenting, right? Like the days are long and the years are short. I feel when I'm reviewing the schedule, it feels this way to me.
039So the community budget survey closes on November 13th. On the 20th, we'll present an initial review of priorities. And December 4th, we will share a first budget with figures included. We'll also have a community budget forum as part of that discussion. So once we've moved from priorities to figures, we want to make sure that we're, again, engaging the community in some dialogue. December 18th will be the second presentation of the budget. On December 20th, we get a final figure from the Vermont Department of Taxes with this study and the CLA number, which is something we've been referring to as real estate inflation. This is the delta between the last, the average of a three rolling years of averages And the delta between last appraised amount and then the current real estate assessment. something we've been
040closely monitoring. Last year, some of you all recall that this dramatically changed that preliminary figures in our budget. January 8th is our third budget presentation. It's also the final date for the school board to adopt and approve a budget for our annual meeting warning in accordance with our charter. From here on out, we have sort of nuts and boltsy items on when we're developing the budget book and having various community engagement meetings. So the budget development is really wrapped on January 8th. Any questions on that? Concerns, feedback. Yeah, on the budget book preparation. Is that something you can do a mini presentation on to the board to how to look at that? It's a very thick book. There's a lot of information in it. And I'm just wondering if you might be able to walk
041through it and kind of what your layout is and what we should be looking for in it. Yeah, it's interesting. I just had a really good conversation with Julia McGuire, our communications coordinator, regarding budget books and You know, this is something that's required for us to develop and submit. It's really not the focus of what we want our budget stories to be, which is the beautiful things that we want to continue, like the TIE celebration that our student board reps discussed. This is a statutory requirement and it's really a long narrative of required financial information. And we've moved away from printing a million of these to only printing a few. It's something that the city puts out and we develop, you know, we put out with them. But for all intents and purposes, all of
042this information is shared in all of our budget presentations anyway from the school side. So it's not something that we view as a highly useful engagement or informational tool. The format is such that it's long paragraph form. nuts and bolts. It's historically been black and white and sort of void of the life that we're trying to bring to our budget approach this year. In Julia's conversation with other communication coordinators. This is something that, I mean, not all districts you know, handle this in the way that we do. But for us. you know, Tim, I'm happy to walk you through the budget book. I think from my perspective, as far as the information in it, the way it's presented in the budget book is not the most useful way. And so my initial thinking is, you
043know, we present the information through graphics and through telling our story and then through, you know, we'll talk about figures in our presentations, everything that we've put in our budget books is covered in our Slide decks for the budget. So I'm not um I'll think more about that. I wonder about a walkthrough of that format in particular Nothing in that budget book is coming to mind that wouldn't have already been discussed during our budget conversations. But I'll think more about that and um And get back to you and see how we can Yeah. The only reason I mentioned it, Violet is Okay. you know it it definitely is a community resource. You know, people will be looking at it and from a finance committee perspective, it may just be helpful for us to just have
044a short presentation when you publish it or before you do so that we understand it and are able to discuss it with the community, right? Because what I hate to do is be on the finance committee and they say, hey, this isn't the budget book and we've never looked at it before have no idea how the book is laid out or what its intent is. Yeah, happy to do that. That'd be great. Thank you. Thanks, Tim. Anything else on the timeline of that? or anything else you'd like to report? That is it for me. Thank you all. Any questions from pilot? no i think i think is it december In December, the State Committee on the Future of Education releases its initial, the 18th. So that'll be interesting as we get into the to the
045meat of this Well, very much. Megan Roy, the chair of that committee, addressed superintendents and business officials today. She facilitated our session today and it was extremely helpful. You know, big takeaways are that I think we have more in common than we don't statewide as far as budgetary concerns. And ultimately. what Megan said as chair of the committee is this is really going to come down to any changes are really going to come down to whatever appetite the General Assembly has for making modifications. But I do feel that the committee has a good understanding of some of the issues at hand. So it was a really encouraging conversation. And we discussed all of the big issues from ed quality, number of facilities that were operating, construction needs, ed quality standards, Act 173. So I feel
046that Megan and the committee have a pretty robust understanding At this point of our needs, the superintendent representative on the committee, Mike Lichlider. I also talked to for a good chunk of time today. And I think that he has a pretty good handle on certainly South Burlington, but also some of the common threads in our neighbors and beyond. So I encouraged about that. And, you know, like some of the local legislators said to us last year, like the Calvary isn't coming. So, you know, the thought that we can rely on this committee to be movers and shakers isn't the case. Legislative action is still going to be required for any modification to occur. Thank you. Next up is a recess. Do we feel like we need that recess? scheduled for an hour and a half
047from now. So we're doing great Okay, with that, let's move on to agenda item eight, action items. Tonight we are monitoring our 2.8 compensation and benefits. Has everyone had a chance to review the presentation that Superintendent Nichols prepared? Yes. Any questions? Notes. Violet, I have… One question, detailed policy number two, which is promise or implied permanent or guaranteed employment. And you have a list of contracts here, we have no employees or workers who fall outside of any of these categories, correct? That's correct. Okay, that's what I was assuming, but I just wanted to confirm that so One other thing I did know, and this is sort of a side note, is in polis in section Let's get to a detailed policy number three, establish or change compensation and benefits that deviate materially from blah, blah,
048blah. You had a couple of notes in here on some of the changes you've made financially around I think it was life and some other things. I just want to say it would be helpful, I think, as we go into budget and season if maybe we collect some of these outside of this report so we could present this to the community as well, because I think this has been an ongoing effort to save, you know, reduce costs. I just was reading this and I thought, wow, it'd be great to sort of collect this as part of our story after the community. Yeah, happy to do that. Maura, you know, and Karen last reported and they provided share out on some of the dental savings. Happy to provide any of that information. And I think providing
049the financials for, I'm just going to take a note right now, providing those financials to the finance committee, I think is really important. But this is exactly it in our efforts to just have ongoing savings and really find efficiencies, this is an area where we've had a lot of success. So I'll make a note of that. Tim, thanks for bringing that up. Other than that, I had no more competencies. Thank you. That's funny. Versus on camera, I just saw him. Yeah. Very exciting. No questions here, Chelsea. Okay, so at this time, I'm going to read the global policy statement. we're not moving around at this board meeting enough. We have our room lanes turned on. As a reminder of the process, I'll read each policy detail and then I'll ask the board if we have
050reasonable interpretation of that policy, adequate data, and whether or not we're in compliance. We can answer yes or no. And I'm going to take a note of that. And then I will read the overall policy again and ask the same questions. Are you ready? The executive limitations monitoring report summary for 2.8 compensation and benefits. With respect to employment, compensation and benefits to employees, consultants, contract workers, the superintendent shall not cause or allow jeopardy to financial integrity or to the public image. Further, without limiting the scope of the foregoing of this enumeration, the superintendent shall not, one, change the superintendent's own compensation and benefits, reasonable interpretation? Yes. Yes. adequate data? Yes. in compliance. Yes. to promise or apply permanent or guaranteed employment. Reasonable interpretation? Yes. adequate data? Yes. Yes. That's in compliance. Yes. Three, establish or
051change compensation and benefits that deviate materially from the geographical or professional market median for the skills employed. Reasonable interpretation? Yes. Adding the data? Yes. in compliance. Yes. Yes. or create obligations over a longer term, then revenues can be safely projected in no event longer than one year and in all events subject to losses in revenue. Reasonable interpretation? Yes. adequate data yes compliance? Yes. Five, establish or change pension benefits. Reasonable interpretation Yes. radical Anna? Yes. Yes. in compliance. Yes. Yes. With respect to employment compensation and benefits to employees, consultants, contract workers, the superintendent shall not cause or allow jeopardy to financial integrity or to public events. Reasonable interpretation? Yes. adequate data yes in compliance. Yes. the 2.8 compensation benefits monitoring report is approved. Thank you, Violet. Thank you, everyone. Okay, moving on. Next is agenda item
052nine. agenda planning, set agenda for the October 30th meeting I do want to note that I think what is currently posted on the documents tab for the website, I think we have updated the draft since then, so I'm not sure that's the most up to date. So if you have to Any notes, please let me know and know that I might have already changed them. Thank you. Here we have to find it. Listening sessions. First reading of weapons policy, we are reviewing our 2.1 curriculum development and review Mr. Patrick Leduc, a community member, was invited to the steering committee meeting to give a presentation to both the city council and the school board. on his organization's review of the mental health of our youth in our community He was unable to make the steering committee
053meeting so we have agreed to hear him in separate. He's going to present at the city council and those boards. So he'll be here at our next meeting And he intends to send his presentation materials ahead of the meetings and the board members can review them and have popping questions for discussion It is a really heavy agenda. But I think it's all really necessary. Also remember, we'll have executive session for labor negotiations and also to review working with our candidates and make a decision about the applicants to report so maybe a hectic meeting. Okay. I'm happy to move if the board prefers either, well, both or either the first reading of the weapons policy and or the curriculum report. let me know. There's a preference. Would it be possible to move the curriculum monitoring report
054to the sixth of November? I thought I just saw something with the budget timeline where that might actually be more concurrent with the discussion. That works on my end. I don't know if that's helpful. I think it's perfectly fine to have it in either meeting. It might be better for the sixth because I think the sixth might not be so heavy with Start. Yeah, this is our largest monitoring report of the year. So I would have concern about something that I think really deserves some attention on a day where we have such a packed agenda. So I'd be happy to shift it to the sixth Can I just agenda planning i don't really want the 30th is too late. I want to make sure we have somebody writing an article for the other group for
055this month, October. Initially, we had talked about that being potentially a cell phone article. And it doesn't seem like that's We were needed. we have ideas about what the topic could be for October? As we come into budget season, I mean, I think an article speaking to the upcoming budget would be helpful. discussions with all of the stuff that's going to be happening so It just may be helpful to get it into the paper now to warn people about the budget forum and all of those things. top of mind for so many people yeah Okay. all the engagement opportunities, feedback opportunities, and kind of the current status as well. Tim, please feel free to reach out to me or to Tim for any details on that. All right. One is doing a lot and I
056don't want him to be so over. Yeah, because you're not doing anything. Well, let me know how I can help. I have lots of materials prepared. Take it out over here. We have the folder, we've been stacking the folder for the finance committee with information as well. So that's a helpful source to mine. If you really want to write it, please do. I just feel like you've been volunteering to do everything so Okay, anything else for the October 1? Sounds pretty full. Yeah, it is pretty full. And as a reminder, that's not in two weeks, it's in three weeks. So our October meeting scheduled got like a little shifted. Okay, any future agenda items or parking lot Okay. All right, then let's move on to agenda item 10 for the Senate Agenda. Approval of minutes.
057Has everyone had a chance to review the September 4th? Yes. Any questions? And what about the September 18th? No comments or questions here. Yes, September 4th and 18th meeting minutes are now approved. Has everyone had an opportunity to review the AP orders number 1079, 1095, 1096? in 1097. Yes. I'm making a case is that tricky. 79 and 97 the same week. Everyone's had a chance to review any questions. I have a quick question. I noticed that on a number of them it says to general fund. And I don't really understand what general fund is. Do you want to stop at that? Hi, Lane. Thanks for your question. I think, so what is the what is the line item number. I'm looking at, I'm clicking sideways at Let's do an AP that says. Typically what these
058are is a transfer to the general fund from something like grants reimbursement. We have two enterprises with schools out and nutrition services, and they provide the district with some overhead monies. So typically when there's a transfer, it's a journal entry and it's grant related or enterprise related. But if you email me that number or shoot me that number, I can get you the detailed information. Good morning. Thank you. Violet, I have a couple of questions on AP 1096 Thank you, Elaine. This is the one where there are primarily tuition to private providers around early education It's all early childhood ADM. I'm not sure what ADM is, but that acronym stands for. Average daily membership. This is Act 166 related. Okay, so this is related to, so we're paying Help me understand here. So we're paying
059for preschool because of ACT preschool. one because of the act, right? Yeah, so we have like 38 Act 166 pre-K partners and some of our partners are public and some are private. Got it. That's what I knew it was statute related, but I couldn't recall. I just saw all of those providers And I was just trying to remember which statue was driving that so Yeah, Act 66. Okay. And then there's I assume this is, you know, we're looking at this for next year's budget as well right Yeah, so this is really interesting. This week I got a survey from the Agency of Education inquiring about expansion of universal pre-K. And I had some, this was not an agenda topic today, but in some of the collaborative times, I was bending the ears of superintendents. And
060this is something that for districts, it's a non-starter to expand universal pre-K to three and four year olds based on a number of factors from budgets to facilities. I mean, this would require massive facilities modifications. And so I'm hearing a lot of districts are submitting this and saying, you know, we don't have the capacity to take this on, especially in the absence of additional funding. So I don't anticipate this moving forward at a state level. So the kind of system I'll call it a voucher system, if you will. more of a reimbursement model with Act 66 and the 10 hours a week for three and four year olds. who attend pre-Ks that are approved and registered by the state. So some programs are approved and they're private and some are private and they're not approved.
061But I don't know how long this has been in existence with the 10 hours a week reimbursement, but among other things, when we talked about, I think it was S56 last year and the childcare bill, at the last moment of that bill's creation. three-year-olds were struck from that. So the conversation is now engaging superintendents around the discussion of mandatory inclusion of four-year-olds. Okay. without additional funds that we know of. Yeah, I mean, we're So for us, we're not able to accommodate additional students without additional ADM. just given the budgetary headwinds we're facing. And so I'm sorry to say I don't want to go down a rabbit hole or anything but the money I'm looking at here, which is a pretty significant amount. Did we have that in the budget for last year as well? Were
062we paying out this much money last year or is this new to fiscal year for this fiscal year. should we pay them? should be consistent. I can pull a budget to actuals on that. Will you email me? Email me. I can… No, you're not you don't need to. I'm just trying to understand if this is this is an ongoing cost for us now going forward so i'm not it should be a pretty static figure. Okay. Thank you. Thank you for clarifying that. My only other question on AP 1095. So there are a number of payments from the Howard Center for tuition, and I'm just looking in the description And I see like a a cape shows capital c lowercase A, capital P, lowercase E as sort of description I'm not sure is that a student
063that I'm looking at there or is that some because there's a variety of these and I'm not sure if it's individual students and if so, should that be anonymized a little bit better? So I don't know the answer to that. I will get back to you. We have, as you all know, seeing the different versions of AP orders that come through, we have tried to anonymize the AP orders to remove any kind of identifiable information. I imagine this is some kind of budget code. I don't know the answer to this and that really deeply pains me, but I will find out, Tim. I went down. I only ask for that rain. You win. You win, AP, Jeopardy. My first thought in looking at it was, oh, are those student initials? And can I try to
064figure it out, right? And if I do that, somebody else will. I just want to make sure it's properly anonymized. Yeah, so AP order 1095 and it's capital C. And then I'm working on, sorry, I'm just working off my laptop here. So I'm, I don't, this right in front of me. Yeah, you'll see there was a whole series of them to the Howard Center for individual student tuition student tuition sorry Yeah, I'll get back to you. And I did notice an expenditure for the book Penelope Rex and the Problem with Pets, and I decided I'm going to buy that book and read it so I really was like, wow, that sounds really cool. Anyways, that was it for me. Thank you. Very compelling title. Thanks, Tim. Okay. Any other questions? Comments, concerns about any of
065the AP orders? Okay, AP orders 1079, 1095, 1096, and 1097 for credit. All right, we have one action item. Do I have a motion to approve the accounts payable order check to the Howard Center in the amount of $89,744.58. So moved. So moved. Do I have a second? Second. Second. Okay, for sure. Or wait, do we give that to elaine as a… I did hear, yeah, it's Elaine's last meeting. Any discussion? if you order to the Howard Center in the amount of $89,744.50 is approved. Thank you. Any other listeners? Okay, then we are at agenda item 11. an hour and 20 minutes ahead, two hours and 20 minutes ahead of schedule. Do I have a motion to adjourn the regular meeting with the South Burlington School Board on October 9th? to adjourn? Elaine in seconds,
066any discussion? All in favor, say aye. Aye. Bye. regular meetings adjourned to the other one. Thank you, everyone. Good night.