001Yes. >> Good evening everybody. >> This is a call to order for the regular board meeting of the Bridgeport Board of Education. Today is Monday, August 25th. The time is 6:34. May everybody rise for the pledge. I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America, to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. >> Mr. Banah, can you do the roll call? >> Thank you, Madam Chair. Hello everyone and welcome everyone. Christine Baptist Paris. >> Aisha Casemir >> here. >> Miss Mara Same Himenez. >> Mr. William Medina >> present. >> Miss Jennifer Perez >> here. >> Mr. Joseph Suckiff >> present. >> Mr. Robert Traver >> here. and Mr. Andrew Woodson. Oh, is it Woodson? >> We have a problem with that, too.
002Um, we don't have student representatives right now because of the start of the school year, but we will next board meeting. So, we'll move on to public comment back. Miss Jess Rest. Thank you, S. Uh, good evening. I'm Jess Resto and I'm here tonight as a concerned parent. Last year, our district started with a celebration, a party that fell more about egos than our kids. Months later, critical staff were laid off and graduation fell short of what our children deserved. And this year it's starting the same way with another party at the amphitheater while real needs go unmet. We were promised change. The governor came to Bridgeport and said that we've known what we've known for years that our kids have been failed. We were told that the We were told the state commissioner would
003oversee the board, that a forensic audit would be done and that parents voices voices would finally be heard. My husband and I or I attended every cert listening session. The messaging the messages were clear. Facilities are crumbling. Funding is insufficient and our students needs have not yet been met. And yet commissioner has still not addressed the parents directly. The only time she responded was during the recent busing crisis and that felt like damage control, not true engagement. But what do our children get? Not the required funding for Paris and kindergarten, fewer guidance counselors, assistant principles, and SEAL staff. Librarians taken away in a district already being already behind in reading. Buildings that are still crumbling. Even basic necessities, fully functioning bathrooms, and safe cafeterias aren't guaranteed. No child should have to scurry from one stall
004to another to find toilet paper. School starts this week. Has anyone checked the bathrooms, the cafeterias, the classrooms our kids will be in? I'm sure parents would gladly volunteer to help if asked. It's unfair that we have to fight for the basics. And it's the t and it's the time sorry it's unfair that we have to fight for the basics and it's time that the board and the commissioner figure out how to truly engage more parents. Stop giving parties to adults while giving excuses to children. Please respect our families enough to give our kids what they need to succeed. Thank you. >> Thank you. Um the next item in the agenda is regular meeting minutes from approval of the regular meeting meeting minutes from June 9th, 2025. Is there a motion? >> I moved by
005Mr. Ben. Is there a second? Second by Mr. Medina. Um any discussion on that? Mr. Sakalic. >> No. >> Oh. All right. Seeing none, all in favor to approve the regular meeting minutes from June 9th, say I. >> I. I >> Any opposed? Any abstensions? That one passes. Um the next item is special meeting from July 21st, 2025. >> So move. >> Moved by Mr. Medina, seconded by >> Mr. Benahan. Any discussion? All in favor? >> I. >> Any opposed? Any abstensions? Special meeting from July 28th, 2025. Is there a motion to approve? So moved by Mr. Benahan. There a second by Mr. Traber. Discussion. All in favor say I. >> I. >> Any opposed? Any extensions? And the last one, special meeting from August 4th, 2025. Moved by Mr. Benahan. Is there a second?
006Second by Mr. Medina. Discussion. All in favor? Is that better? All right. Any opposed? Any extensions? Um the next item on the agenda is the chairman's report. Um so just want to provide an update on the board of education project pro progress um to the state interventions. So um the board has um completed its six train uh mandatory trainings from the state um in collaboration with CABE. Um and since then the board has worked on um establishing a vision for the district. Um so we started that prog process by hosting uh four community forums um throughout the summer throughout July. We also had a thought exchange survey that was out and um Dr. Aby's going to get me those results I could share with the board. Um they were published um from August 1st through
007August 15th. Um and the last I checked with him prior to the the end date was uh over 250 responses. Um so uh we'll we'll get that out there to everybody once we um get the data together. Um we also as a board um work with Dr. Avery on um his evaluation for um the nine or 10 months that he's been with us and um that was submitted to Dr. Avery uh the week of the first week of August. Um he has not responded so or he did he actually said he's fine with it. He's not going to request a meeting further meeting on it. Um so that that's kind of some of the work we worked on over the summer. Um we also had some committee meetings throughout the summer and special meetings um
008for just moving different items along. Um so uh this year we're really trying to work on some of the um items that we we learned through the cave trainings to implement our agendas and and really um support the the board in managing our meetings better, managing our ourselves um so that we can support the district in a in a um improved way. Um, so yeah, uh, that's the report I have. Just is there any questions for me on anything? >> Mhm. >> Yes, Mr. Mayor Jimenez, >> I have a few questions. Um the first one is around a community forum and I know um after we had the summer community forums, we were chatting about having them more frequently um and having just board specific community forums. So, I wanted to suggest now that we're
009going to start school this week, um if we can potentially have one next week or early on, the week after so that if there's any issues with um like with the schools or anything like that, usually there's a lot of bumps on the road like first week of school so that we can hear the parents what needs to be addressed, what are your concerns? And really the reason why I kind of want to push it out a little bit is because we want to give the administrators the opportunity to fix those issues, but if something is out there that has not been resolved, then we need to be looped in just to kind of mitigate that and you know try to have a smooth start. So that was one of the things. Um then two
010other items I wanted to know. So, as a result of the summer um community forums, we were chatting about potentially having some of those items as part of our strategic plan and all of that. So, I kind of wanted to know what's the status of the strategic plan. And then lastly, um the superintendent search, what's the update on that? >> Yeah, so the strategic plan would be something we collaborate with a superintendent on. Um, and given that we have an interim at the moment, we we would have to wait. We would most likely need to wait for our permanent superintendent as far as a search goes. Um, I emailed the state and so we we'll see what they say. Um, I've asked if we can um if they with their support they we can start
011a surge. Um, and so we're waiting on a response. So that was emailed about two weeks a week and a half ago. Two weeks ago um following our conversation at the August 4th meeting. Um and so it it wouldn't for for us to put that type of task in an interim and then a new superintendent comes in and wants to has new ideas and new vision. It it it kind of would make extra work for us. Um, so it it'd be critical to do it with a superintendent that's permanent. >> Mr. Scalic. >> Yeah, I believe I spoke on this in committee as well. Um, so if the state doesn't allow us to search for a superintendent for the next year, we move on without a vision. >> No, we we're still going to establish
012a vision. That's why we started it. But the strate strategic plan is more than just a vision. You're setting district goals. you're uh uh you're doing progress monitoring. There's so there's a lot more to that than just a vision. We still are going to work on a vision. That's how we started it. Um and that's something that that that we can you know requires community stakeholders and involved and stuff. self and as as I've also mentioned oftent times that um if the current interim superintendent develops a strategic plan in conjunction with the board we don't necessarily have to shift because that will be a joint >> that would be a joint thing we the superintendent we can hire can implement the board and a district strategic plan rather than coming in and changing it from
013somewhere else because we saw >> exactly what happens when somebody comes in with their own plan without any input from city. So this way we could get a head start >> and I don't think it would harm Dr. Avery either way to do the work whether or not I'm not chiming in on the superintendent search or not anything whether or not he is hired as permanent superintendent is a good resume builder as well. So I don't really think there's any professional harm to him into helping us out with that portion while we wait chair. >> Yeah. Well I think I think you Mr. you make some some really good points. Again, it's a matter of the strategic plan is a very, you know, elaborate intense process. Uh, and so I would I would at least
014recommend let's get school started. Uh, and come September, October, the board figure figures out a timeline that you want to use to move that forward. uh and then we can kind of adhere to that timeline based on that because uh yes, I have no problem supporting the work. Uh things that the district needs, I've been in the district a couple years. I can kind of guide that those those decisions around making sure that we can fill the void of those. So, sure, I think that's that's a good possibility. But so if if the board would start thinking a little bit about, you know, timelines and then you also have to figure out who you're going to solicit for to help you do that. Be it, you know, someone local, you put it out there for
015bid and then you work through it that way as well. And look at how much money you're going to spend on it because you can go from $15,000 to $200,000 if you want someone to do help do the work. So again, you got to look at the budget, look at how much you're willing to spend as a board to make that work as well. >> Absolutely. Thank you. My my intention wasn't to start tomorrow. >> My intention wasn't to start tomorrow while schools are starting, but my also my intention is the state has not been very responsive to us. They've been talking at us rather than with us. It's not really a cooperative relationship. So we don't know when they're going to get around to allowing us to do the job the citizens elected us
016to do. So yeah, so that's why we we started with the the vision at least. Um and then as we we go on, you know, the board's going to continue working towards something like a strategic plan. Excuse me. Um as Dr. Reed, it's it's a timely process. >> Thank you, >> Mr. Traver. I would agree with what has been said by all on the strategic plan. Um I do believe that uh Miss uh Jimenez, Esther Mara Jimenez also is correct about having the community forum in the relatively near future is a valid point. I I do think that we need to refer to the um uh policy committee the idea that we have floated about changing our policy on community forums to build them in more frequently. But I think that having one in the
017near future would be a a I I support her idea of having one soon. just to get uh feed to allow for feedback from the community from the parents as she described it. So, we'll move on. Um I do want to This is actually in my report. I forgot to say welcome back to the school year to everybody. We have some principles in the room. Welcome back. Welcome back to the to the school year. So, that's also uh important, right? We're starting the year. Um so happy new year. Um I'm going to move on to committee reports. Uh we'll start with finance committee. The finance committee met last Wednesday. Forgot the date um but we met last Wednesday and um some of the items that we discussed are on the today's agenda including um uh
018the lease for the adult education building that we use at um on Kasuk Street. Um and then um a couple grant applications for three of the family resource um centers. So Ca Bratalia, Dunar, and Roosevelt. Um Coulson, is this good? Okay. Um and then we also discuss the university school agreement that comes to us every year in August that's coming to day before us. And um then the Dr. Aby um has given us a uh the draft of the budget binder that um that the board needs to look at for this school year. Um are there any referrals to my committee? >> Yes, ma'am. Um, I'd like to refer the news article we read about the buses being stored and some sort of contract being worked out with the without us signing off on it.
019Um, we are bound by this contract and as far as I know, we our powers were not taking away to sign contracts. So, if this contract was changed in any way, shape, or form and it's going to bind Bridgeport Public Schools to this contract, we need to see it and we need to sign it because again, we all got the same information from the newspaper. I don't know if anybody else got one piece of extra information out of anybody, but alls I know is what I read in the paper and that's no way to do business. The state needs to let us know what we are bound to, especially since the funding is not guaranteed in the next year. >> Thank you. >> I'll put that on. >> Do the chair. >> Just for some
020clarity, uh I too don't know the details of that contract as well. these things has been made you know you know um with the te state technical assistance team and the techn I mean and the transportation company and they're working through um that process. Uh I'm not privy to the details. So I'm just being told that they were taking care of that. So I want to make for the record I I don't know. Uh my team doesn't know. uh we provided data to them uh and then they took it from there and um you know unbeknownst to me the details of that again I'm not clear as well so I will you know I'm working with the state team they're coming in I think tomorrow uh and so I'll ask that question as well as
021they finalize I know they were still waiting for the transportation company to to review the existing contract um and looking at the data that we provided them uh in looking at the comparison between the two. Um there are some options that the district can take uh about instead of paying them paying them monthly instead of quarterly. I'm thinking it is. So there was there there was some possible savings, you know, in doing that. Again, don't have the details for you. Uh but we will also I will also ask for the details. >> Any other referrals, Miss Casemare? >> Um this isn't necessarily a referral, Madam Chair, but I'll make it short and sweet. Um, during the last year, it has been repeated over and over and over again by Mr. Sakalovic and Mr. Traver that
022they never had a chance to speak at all at the finance committee meetings that I was chairing last year. So, I just wanted to make sure that I tell the public and the state that that is an out and out lie. They spoke on May 20th of 2024. The meeting September 16th, October 21st, and November 18th. So, I just want to clear the record. See, he was able to say over and over again, but when the dark-kinned person starts talking, >> it's a problem. >> So, I just want to clear the record that I have proof right here in my hand for any parents or any community members that want me to email the minutes from the meetings that Mr. Traver and Mr. Calvik said that they weren't allowed to speak were May 20th, September
02316th, October 21st, and November 18th. I have every single last word, every single last question they asked that was answered. >> That's all I want. Thank you. >> My next committee is going to be the third Wednesday of the month, September 17th. It's going to be um most likely um virtual because I will be out of town. So, that be virtual. I I let me finish mine and I'll get to you. >> Okay. >> Um >> so I'll get back to I'm just gonna say my next meeting date. I heard him. Um it'll be September 17th virtual um at 5:30 um that's for the finance committee and we could do it sooner if need be with all the different um items we need for the budget binder. Mr. Bodina referral. >> Yes. Um we've been
024waiting for quite some time. Uh so I would like you to maybe as a referral to get uh the funds that are available for the PTSO in the pack. Uh they had a district uh pack money that was never uh said what was the money or the funding that was available. Um and we would still like that information and also to find out um what is the new uh district pack funds that are available thing and we still don't have receipts of what was spent on the last uh the event that they actually did do at the end of last year. Also, can we find out what is the contract that we have right now? I know we have a convocation on Wednesday. Um, can we find out what what is being uh spent when
025it comes to the convocation? Also, >> the the convocation's not covered by the district, but Dr. We're not covering that cost. >> There's no cost to the district whatsoever from top to bottom. There's no spending there on the and the I just want to make sure if there is that's what we're that's what I'm asking for. I'm asking for what is the cost of the convocation for us. I'm not care the state issue that's between them and them whatever they did. But I know our staff and our community has been reaching out very often, more often than not right now. And you know, the teachers are just asking for simple things, pencils, paper, and folders. They didn't want a convocation. They wanted they were happy with what what the district was doing, what Dr. Avery
026and the staff was doing. They were very happy, but then they find it to be very disrespectful for anybody to step in and force us to have a convocation. And we don't know the details. But we're entering into a place vote. We don't know the details. Um, so I'm looking for the details, >> please. >> I'll put that on the agenda. >> Um, >> that's all I have for today. >> Gotcha. What else, Mr. Chamber? I'm not sure how you want me to respond given our items on the agenda tonight about board decorum, but the falsehoods that Mr. >> We'll move on. I'm ending that conversation right now. >> But you didn't end it. >> We'll move on. We're going to move on. Instruction support service committee. We're going to go instruction support service committee.
027So, I know you have something for tomorrow or next for this week. >> Should I say it in my report? because that was what was done before >> instruction and support services committee. >> So as was done before under the old order of the board um as the chair of instruction and support I could >> you guys can keep going back and forth. >> No no I no I know I don't want to do that. I'm telling you I don't want to do that. >> I'm saying I don't want to do that. That was the way we used to do business in this board and I'm not looking to do that. But somebody just was allowed to do that. And so I I resent the fact that somebody was allowed to misrepresent the crew. So
028I'll leave it at that. Given our new push in in policy on the agenda tonight >> to have decorum in this, somebody was allowed to violate that. >> We haven't passed that yet. We didn't want. So >> the instruction and support services committee will be meeting on Wednesday. Um, I sent out an email to the members of the committee and the administrators involved. We are essentially going to be recapping the items that we were dealing with at the end of the last year. Um, not anticipating any new business that would be actionable items to be referred to the board at the next meeting. More a matter of looking at things like what Mr. Medina just mentioned the pack PTSO uh expenditures at the end of the year that we were looking at at the end
029of last year. Um the student score test scores um the special ed um training that we discussed at the end of last year for the teachers at the beginning of this year. Um uh the suspensions um in the particular areas that we were concerned about last year. Um, so if anybody has anything else new that they want to refer to us tonight or by tomorrow morning, I'll be finalizing the agenda for posting tomorrow. Um, that'll be Wednesday night at 5:30 in room 305. That is the fourth Wednesday of the month, which would be our normal meeting time, which is why I'm going ahead with the meeting on Wednesday night. >> Any referrals to Mr. Chair's committee? All right, we're going to move on to um policy and personnel. Mr. Mr. Medina, >> thank you very
030much, Madam Chair. Uh last meeting we had a special meeting about 5 days ago, August 21st, 5:30 at 3:05. Many of those topics are right now on the agenda. Um I look forward to having our next meeting September 10, 2025. It'll be the second Wednesday of every month. Um we are attacking a lot of those um policies that uh the state would like us to you know look into that are seems a little bit outdated that don't match our uh our mission statement as we move forward with the district. Uh Dr. Avery and and Chris I think he's here. Uh we'll be working side by side and I hear that we have a lot of work to do. So I invite all the community to come out and speak because it's going to be something
031that we're going to literally from the foundation up start building and start working to get this done. Um and we are looking forward to the challenge. Uh also some of those policies are that we're planning to change as a board also are on the agenda today. I look forward especially with public comments that we would uh you know back up our community and our staff and our parents on uh extending that policy. Um I'll take any referrals if there's any questions or comments. >> Any referrals to policy? Go ahead. >> She has the list. Sorry. Hold on. Go ahead. I have the list and I also email it, right? >> Yes, I emailed it before this meeting. Um, and I just added another one. So, it's a list of 11. So, happy to help you.
032I'm part of the committee. So, >> yes, that's great. Um, so first thing I went through when I first came on the board, I went through and revised um did a cross reference of series 9,000 bylaws and compared it with other um towns, Westport, Darianne, Reading, and um wanted those changes incorporated as we're going through the 9,000 series updates that we'll be doing through through the next few months. So that's the first one. The second one would be finance committee a policy around finance committee approving all financial transfers over $25,000. So this I got from the forensic audit um and the state basically saying we need to have greater oversight and all of that stuff. Third, development of a lottery policy to avoid gaming the system. So this is not something that I was aware
033of until the past few months. So I would like the policy committee to work on a policy to ensure transparency through the lottery for all the magnet schools. Item four, meeting minutes policy. I'd like to see the meeting minutes. Right now, our policy is a little bit vague in terms of when they need to be posted and all of that stuff. So, like FOYA, it would be nice if we can get on our BPS website, our minute meetings, our meeting minutes posted within 7 days and then up on the website for 12 months. So if a parent is curious what happened during a certain meeting of that school year, it's there for them. This one um next one make calendar requirements for the subcommittees. Um and this one I'm a little in between. Um because
034we do have like Mr. Traber just said, his committee meets the fourth Wednesday of each month. It would be nice if we can solidify the dates similar to the board meetings. So that's kind of what that's alluding to. Um update policy around public comment. That is a requirement for all regular and special board meetings. So we would have public comment at all regular and special board meetings. And then in terms of what's required to speak, it would only be name and affiliation. By affiliation, I'm saying you're a parent, you're a teacher. That seventh item, hardened procurement policy to include all material materials purchased above $25,000. So that would include any IT related um requirements as well. There's a conversation that took place in the spring that um we ended up finding out only some things
035come to the board. So we want to kind of harden that language to say anything above $25,000 um needs board approval. Eighth item um harden the frequency requirements of regular audits. So usually regular audits of our system are done every every year. However, um so that needs to be defined in our policies and I don't believe it is and then forensic audits every year every five years or as requested. So if something happens during the annual audit that seems a little fishy, then we can request a forensic audit. Ninth, all meeting materials are required within 48 business hours of a meeting. So that's so that the board members can actually review um the meeting materials before um the meeting, especially if we have to vote on something. Um, and I do realize there's emergency emergencies
036that take place, but it would be nice if we can get them in advance. The 10th item, policies should be audited on a yearly basis for updates. Um, I got this from the fact that we have some policies that are outdated. um saw some that haven't been updated since 2012. That that's not okay. So, definitely want to do an audit of our policies every year to kind of prevent that from happening. And then um the last item, sorry for the laundry list, is increase board community forum um to potentially a quarterly basis, whatever you know we think is appropriate. You said quarterly, you said. I'm sorry. >> Quarterly. >> Thank you. Um any other And I will say that a lot of the things that or not a lot, but like some of the items
037that you mentioned are some of the things that um Dr. A is pushing out towards the board um as as a result of the of the audit. Um and so those items are going to be um triaged to make those are the first items that we need to go through is the financial oversight. And so, um, we're really going to be working, um, with Mr. Medina on like getting those items on his committee, um, sooner than later, um, so that, uh, you know, those items go go through quicker and and, um, Mr. Medina, any other Dr. Avery, >> just for just for clarity as well, the the draft budget book that I provided for you, Nester and I have went through policy and it's going to do a lot of what you're asking for, you
038know, making sure that we know exactly what we're going to do when we're going to audit. We want to make sure it transfers. All those things are somewhat in there. Uh and once we get it approved by the state, then we will work with the board and the finance committee to make sure that we train the board on what needs to happen. A lot of it is timelines and things that we need to do to keep the community, you know, a breast of what we're doing with the money and how we're going to hold ourselves transparent for doing the right thing with the with with with the funds. And so I I appreciate you following back up with that because that's going to be something that the state's requiring it as well. The commissioner is
039requiring that uh you know based on those 34 recommendations from from the audit. So we're going to we took that and we kind of you know put it together and kind of came up with a systematic way of of doing some checks and balances across the the year. We're having we'll mandate getting to the in front of the community talking about budget teaching budget. Uh, and one of the things that we're going to do with data across the district, uh, as you're going to see in my superintendent report, I'm gonna I'm gonna throw a lot of things at you guys, but I want the board to kind of give me some direction as to what you want to be meaning for you as a board member. uh and then then I'll do some things from
040the administrative staff to make sure that we push the data so that you can see so you can ask us questions about academics about individual campuses why are they not performing why are some other campuses performing and I'm going to give you a little taste of that today I do have principles here that's going to talk a little bit about um teacher attendance in their buildings uh it's a huge impact on how well a campus is doing when teachers present for our kids. Uh, and so they're going to talk a little bit about that. And we're going to there's a data set that I'm going to put out in front of you as well. So you can see from the top to the bottom of of of how teacher attendance is 94% is a is
041a national average of teachers being being present for kids across the nation. Uh, and then the ones that the the campus principles are here today are at 94 or above uh in that. So again, we're going to we're trying to I'm trying to entice you to ask the questions, you know, and make sure that you keep me myself as a superintendent, you know, accountable for the work that needs to be done or the issues where we may be having as well, right? Uh and then campuses need to have support and our job is to support them and giving them what they need to do the job, but then when we give it to them, they need to be able to produce good results for kiddos in our buildings. So, thank you for that. any other
042referrals? Um, I do want to say like the policy committee has really been pushing out a lot of um needed updates. They went the past um since March I want to say they've approved uh uh nearly 30 missing or outdated um mandated policies from state and federal um policies. So um kudos to you Mr. Medina and um and and and the executive cabinet for really um uh making that push. Um so, you know, there's a lot of um things that we do have to update and do so in a in a way that doesn't overwhelm the staff as we update policies, right? So, the mandated ones have to happen, but then there's other things that we can do in a timely way so that way when we roll it out, it it's um I wouldn't
043say seamless, but almost seamless. Um and so uh um that's the work we're going to be doing this year. A lot of policy work. Um uh you said September 10th, sorry. For the next Okay, gotcha. >> Mr. T. >> And I would venture to guess that puts us in the top 94% of districts in the state. Mr. Medina, >> maybe. Um the next uh committee is the facilities committee. We have not met over the summer. Um um we we will have a meeting. We have attended scheduled for next uh Wednesday. Um I know Mr. Garcia has some um end of the or over the summer what what they've worked on. I want to um just compliment Mr. Garcia's team um on on the work. They're doing a lot with very little staff um working non-stop
044in in all these buildings to get them ready for Thursday. Um and and um it's not going unnotice. Thank you and your team for everything you're doing. Um and so uh uh but our committee will meet uh next um Wednesday. Um any you have appear Miss Catherine? >> Um yeah, I just wanted to thank Dr. Avery for pulling together a meeting about BMA. Um in that meeting, it was Dr. Avery, Dr. Williams who actually founded DMA. Um Mr. Karafa, Commander Lip, and Mr. Pyrus uh were all there. So um Mr. Woodson and I had called the meeting because we had a couple of questions about BMA which were all answered. Um and some things that um because I know that it's relevant to the new school opening up that BMA was founded as an individual
045freestanding school back in 2013. They have 536 kids on the wait list at BMA. I think that is a that says a lot. It's the only military high school of its kind in the entire state. Out of 272 students enrolled, 247 are Bridgeport residents. BMA's graduation rate is 98.4% as of the 2324 school year. Um so they talked about how we need a new building, a new facility for it. The administrative administration is working on securing a permanent um place for BMA. It's an open choice program. students outside of Bridgeport can um enroll in BMA through a lottery admission. Uh there are some talks of possibly making it a magnet school so that BMA would be eligible for more funding sources and um and we talked about you know we want to have um definitely
046keep in contact with Congressman Hines who makes recommendations for military students to um West Point and um and maybe some field trips to West Point for BMA students. I was thinking maybe that could happen since we have other high schools that are doing field trips to colleges. So that's what I wanted to do. Just thank Dr. Avery for coordinating the team because the team that he coordinated answered every single last one of our questions. Anybody want to email me any parents or community members? I can give you more details about it. Thank you. >> Um Dr. if if we can't get an update at the next facilities meeting on BMA. Um yes, the the current situation with the um where the pro where the school is going to be held. Um any other referrals to
047facilities. All right. So again, that's next Wednesday that we'll be meeting. Um all right. The super or K report. Uh do you have anything for K report? Maybe somebody maybe somebody who went to the meeting and um what does Edge want to speak on it? >> Yeah, there was a meeting a few weeks back if anybody wants to speak to that. Um who who went? Okay. >> All right. The the CAB meeting a couple weeks back. >> Mr. Chabber. >> Yeah. The uh Cab made a we had went to the Cape summer workshop. It was a wonderful presentation about um you know the the a lot of what we're going to be talking about tonight the the benefit of working together and the benefit of of developing a positive relationship between the board and the
048superintendent. Um they had a pre joint presentations by uh members of the uh superintendents and board members um and focused on why that was beneficial. So it was uh it was a delightful it was my first time going to the summer uh workshop. I know other members of the board have gone in past years. So I found it very uh inform informative. Um they I understand that there is a workbook which you ordered from one of the superintendents. Um we were only allotted one copy to share among all of us. Uh but you I hope got multiple copies. >> Yes to the chair. Yes, I have a copy of that. We are modifying it right now. uh we'll bring that back to the board for consideration. It's just really a a >> little a manual
049for board members, new board members, so as they as they transition into the system, they have some idea, some high points, areas that need to to to be >> responsibilities, what your basic rights are and foyer laws and all that sort of stuff. Yes. All your basic stuff. >> Absolutely. >> Yeah. Um yes, they um they changed the structure of the meeting because the last couple meetings that I had been through for the summer series um they had us like break out into groups and go into classes, but this time it was different. We stayed in the same room the entire time. Um and the um the president of CADE um talked about um they did like this exercise called belonging and it really made you sit back and think as an adult and as
050a child when did you feel like when did were you in a situation where you felt like you didn't belong. Um I like to go and sit at different tables when I go to workshops. I don't like to sit with the people that I work with around this table because I can't learn anything new from them. I feel like I can learn something new from people of other districts, other different perspectives. So, I love the attendance there. It was attended very well attended. The food was great and I learned a lot. >> Thank you. >> Um well, um I know Miss Calvic um does forward emails from Cape. So, um we'll we'll look for other uh workshops that we can be a part of as well. Um Dr. Ay's report. Good evening everybody. I I
051want to uh welcome our administrators and teachers back. Uh administrator started a couple about a week or so ago, two weeks ago, teachers this past week. Uh this is a great opportunity for us to kind of uh start the PD process this school year. I think we had a pretty uh successful kickoff with PR with with administrators and with teachers. Uh our students come back on Thursday. Uh I think we have a some assignments that we'll put out uh for board members and and district administration going to visit campuses on that day. Uh so just really a good time for for us to really kind of uh really look at where we are and where we've been and where we're going to be where we are now and where we want to be in the
052next year or so. We still have a lot of work to do, guys, as a community, as a school district, uh as individual, you know, that impact this district. It's time for us to kind of stand together, stand united to make sure that we we fight the fight for the children of Bridgeport. Uh we're still, you know, the funding piece is is always an issue, but nobody wants to talk about that, you know, and I think it's time as as our legislators go into special session at the end of September, beginning of October, we need to fight for funds. Uh and and there's a lot of money that the state has. I think it's time for us to rally the troops in a way that's going to be meaningful for us to grab more of
053those dollars. And so that's what I'm hoping to be able to do as we start this whole new school year. That's important for us to um uh stay focused and not get distracted because I think there's a lot of, you know, people not wanting us to be successful. Uh but I think some of those people are internal. So, we have to be able to kind of, you know, take the distractions out of the way and let's keep the main thing the main thing and let's keep doing the work. Uh, we have the the necessary expertise to to to rally the troops and get it done. We just have to be able to stay the truth. I don't want to, you know, rehash previous years. We have to keep doing what we have to do right
054now. And let's let the data drive the decisions that we make moving forward. And so with my presentation this this evening, uh I have the the opportunity to ask three principles to come join me at the podium today. Uh Marcy Julian from Blackham, Jackie Simmons from Roosevelt, and Angelo Grafada from Scain. These these uh one of the data sources that I gave in your packet over the weekend is the ADA uh the average daily attendance for teachers. uh and I think it's important that uh the board and the community understands and knows that it takes the adults that we pay very good salaries to be in front of our children at all times. I mentioned earlier that 94% uh you know ADA for teachers across the nation is a very high you know uh goal
055to obtain and get uh and these three ladies in their buildings have have accomplished that. Uh, so I wanted them to kind of share with you. Let's give them a round of applause. And I think it's time for us to showcase principles a little bit when they are doing great things in the work. Uh, the work is difficult, the work is different in Bridgeville public schools. Uh, and I think the tenure of these ladies will tell you they've been here a long time and they've been trying to make a impact in the children for a long time. and and I I thank them myself for standing up and and taking the challenge to keep it moving. And so, uh, I want you guys to share a little bit about how do you, you know, connect
056teachers and keep teachers focused about working with your children in your building. So, uh, the floor is yours. >> Is it up? >> Uh, all right. I guess I'll start. Uh, good evening. I'm Jackie Simmons, principal of the Roosevelt School. This is actually my 29th year in Bridgeport. Um, hard to believe. So yeah, a long time. We've all been a long time, but it's honestly the best districts are going. So, um, oddly enough, we all took the same approach. We asked our teachers today what they thought when we were invited, and we found a lot of similarities. Um, the reality is you want to create an environment that teachers want to be, right? That teachers want to come every day. This is our 11th year um, over at the Roosevelt School. We actually have a
057teacher that has 10 years of perfect attendance. Um, we're doing something special for him, but I know you're watching, Mr. clampers, so I'm not telling you. Um, so that's going to be tomorrow. Uh, but very similar to some of the training we had the other day is to honoring the traditions and the rituals and the things that the staff values. Um, whether it's things like teacher of the week. Uh, we often we have school climate team meetings and we make sure that every single month we're doing something to honor the work not just of what the children do, but what of the teachers do. Um, we push our staffs hard. So, making sure, you know, at our school, nobody's missed a prep in 10 years because we value the work that they do. Um, we
058do perfect attendance certificates. We have special parking lots. Um, but some of the key words that came up if we were to do one of those weird wordle things were they want to be listened to, they want to be respected, they want to be valued, they want communication, they don't want to guess, and they want to know that you care about them as a person. And that was the very first thing that all my staff said is, "We know you care." And so when it comes time for personal days or things of that nature, they will always come to us first and say, "Does this work for you?" Which is remarkable to me. And I that means so much to me. And so we've really worked hard, I think, to create an environment and children
059and families know that that when you walk in the door, when they see the smiles on our faces and our team's faces, that really permeates through the building. And so, um, I I think I'm I probably said a lot, but I know that these two ladies can add a whole lot more. 31 years, but Jackie's older than me. I only because I started as a Pier anyway. So, um, one of the things she missed that was a hard act to follow, but basically she hit it. But I I lead by example. I am never I I take personal days and that is it. I rarely am out sick, but I come to school. I I lead by example. My car is the first one in, last one out. Um, another thing I always make sure
060I have open door policy. Open door policy. They know they could come in. And not only open door policy, open weekend policy. I'm a doctor on call. I'm a principal on call. Um, one of my teachers finally passed the foundations test. It was 11 o'clock Friday night. She texted me. I called her. And that's some of the things you have to do to keep teachers. They're my children and I if they're if I'm not good to them, they're not good to our children. So that's kind of my uh philosophy on that. Um I won't take everything. Angela, you want to add some? >> So hi, I'm Angela Garfalo. Um this is my 31st year in Bridgeport. Um and the thing is I started off at SCA. I did my student teaching there. So to go
061back there to be the um administrator has really um it's special to me. But again it's building it's mutual respect. That's the main thing. And they feel that I'm the third administrator in five years. So it's just building that trust knowing again open door policy and again modeling good attendance. I'm very rarely out too and they can contact me whenever they need to and they're there. Scain is a special place. their family and they support each other. >> Thank you ladies very very much. And and what they're going to be doing is they're going to send me their their uh their writeups of of why and how and we're going to share these with other principles because we do have principles down in the 80s and in ' 80s you know uh that we they
062may need some pointers of how and what they do. Uh and so this is a great way of providing professional development to them uh even when they don't know they're going to get it. So I think it's uh and it's their their fellow colleagues that's been in the business a long time and so being able to share is is a great way to do that. So I think thank you ladies for spending some time with me this this evening. I know it's late. I wanted you to I was going to put you up first on my report. So thank you again. If you go back to uh the the first slide, uh it talks about um chronic absenteeism. And one of the things that is going to be so so important, guys, is chronic absenteeism.
063This is why are kids not coming to school? Uh, and so when you look at the data report, I mean, I I put it out there for you, but I just what I'm going to do is summarize some significant, you know, u points that I think is very important to each one of these slides. Uh, okay. U high points. The Bridgeport Learning Center had 67.8% uh chronic absenteeism. That's a very high level. But when you look at the the kids that they serve, these are our special needs knows uh kids. But I think it's the other part of that is that we've changed leadership a couple different times last year as well at BLC. So sometimes you can see that you know the data sources that pro that will u show within an individual campus
064data that may contribute to some of that. uh one of the lowest campuses with uh absentee is high horizon uh at 16.9%. Uh and then we have a couple of campuses that has significant significant increases. Basic high school rose from 32% in 2021 to 53.4% in 2024. Uh and you know BASIC has been through a whole lot of different changes as well. Uh and so again, but but one of the things that that's that's very very important is that we're gonna I'm going to keep this data in front of you because starting at the beginning of the school year, kids should be coming to school, right? You know, but you still have kids that are so disconnected with coming to a learning environment for whatever reason and we have to figure out a better way
065of being able to approach that. Uh we do have our attendance task force uh you know it's the LEAP program that's that's funded by the state uh that's working through some of those. Uh we have targeted attendance interventions really coming back to figure out how and what we can do to uh give principles ideas of how to to to make those interventions uh again connecting with the families uh looking at family engagement and outreach and how we can do a little bit more of that uh is going to be huge and working through this uh attendance monitoring systems and early warning protocols. We have some new software that we're going to be exploring uh you know to try to figure out what we can do differently and quicker to address these kiddos uh that are
066at need in these campuses. Uh in September we're it's going to be our um attendance awareness month and we will be highlighting the importance of getting kids to school uh in September. The whole month of September is our attendance awareness month. really kind of be working on trying to uh make sure that it's out in the public. We have little campaigns that's going to go out to address uh those uh those areas. Trevor, >> I ask for the ask question one or wait till the end. >> Let's kind of for this one, let's wait till the end. And I think then I can kind of, you know, I can get my notes together as you speak and I can kind of work through and getting some of the concerns and questions or even some clarity
067if you want that as well. And I have staff here that if I can't answer, they will be able to answer you as well. Um, let's go down to district enrollment. Uh, it's the third slide I'm thinking. Uh, the district currently serves 19,143 students where the majority of those students are in elementary schools. Um some of the highlights, the elementary enrollment is 13,464. The high school enrollment is 5,679. Uh the magnet total is 4,161. And we split those out. Elementary magnet enrollment is 2,649. High school uh magnet enrollment is 1,512. Um when you look at some of the other subgroups, you know, uh in in that group, special education enrollment is 3,8 3,81 students. Our MLL uh enrollment population is 5,547. Uh and then free and reduced lunch uh you know numbers is 14, uh
06894. Um uh the reduced lunch count is 3,00 where these students pay a reduced cost for their lunches. 3,635 students. And then paid lunches, students that uh the families are able to pay for their lunches, that's 604 students that are actually um um you know are able to pay for their lunches. um some of the steps that's going to be implemented. We do have a new enrollment center that will be able to kind of capture, you know, real time data to kind of help parents as they come to the district to enroll uh outreach to families, you know, uh for early registration. We do a lot of that with our special education, child find, and our child nutrition area to where we're trying to get these kids at an early age to get them in
069our schools. Uh, and then the recruiting that we're trying to do with our magnet schools and specialized programs, really enhancing those programs to attract more families to the programs and and then having a campaign around being able to um, you know, entice community and families to be able to tap into uh, our school system. The last document here, which I'm I'm very very proud of, is the teacher vacancy. Um, and Go to the teacher vacancy guide >> the last page >> the teacher teacher vacancy this is as as of Friday and I know those numbers have changed and uh Dr. Siana do you have an update on that? No, I think this is the this is one as of Friday. We have 41 vacancies in the te in in the district and I can tell
070you board we had 30 teaching vacancies, you know, in previous years and to to have I think we had how many special ed vacancies last year from last year? Michelle, how many vacancies for special ed teachers did we have last year? 39 and as of as of Friday we have two special ed vacancies. So what that means is that we we've been pounding it trying to make sure that we get certified teachers in front of our children. Uh and so we're very very proud of that. Uh having only two our goal is to have zero but we have until Thursday. So, I know we're I think there's a resource classroom uh and a a rise classroom that we still need to have a certified teacher in. And so, we're we're you know, we really trying
071to hit that 100%. And so, um I will, you know, work with Dr. Siana to be able to make sure that we can, you know, get those two two vacancies filled. Again, we've just been doing a lot of, you know, aggressive campaigning to try to make sure that we recruit. Uh we've did open interviews. Uh we're going to keep all those things open because we need to get a pool of people that that is wanting to work. I think because of the calmness of what has happened over the last six months, people are trying to say they want to come and help. They want to do what we can to support our children and support the district. Uh so I think that's very important. But we still have an high vacancy uh area of art
072and science. We have 13 art teacher available availabilities right now in the district. and then 12 science vacancies. So those are very high needs areas for the state as well. Um and it's just you can't you know get those science teachers because they can go in outside fields the medical field or whatever and get paid a lot more than what they have to come you know to the teaching side of it right. Uh again, we have a great partnership with the universities. We're trying to do and they are also coming up with innovative ways to uh get teachers certified in uh in in content areas to to fill those those voids of um um you know those high needs areas, math, science, social studies, bilingual, special ed, those types of fields. uh again and then
073looking at you know what type of incentives that we can give especially special education teachers. One of the things that the state um notified us about is any any any high needs area teacher that is retired can come back out of retirement to become teachers uh in those high needs areas like special ed or some of the high math science whatever. So I think we have what five or six teachers that came out of retirement. But what that means is that you're paying them at that top step as well, which I would rather have a retired teacher in there that's certified that have the experience and deal with our children, support our children, than not having any of them. So, we have about six of them that came back when we we put a a
074a a an a a a Connecticutwide email to all retired teachers that, hey, if you want to come back to Bridgeport, we will accept you back in with a full salary in addition to keeping your uh your retirement as well. Uh so, that's a win-win right there. So, uh, so we again we had six people take us up on it and, uh, we're really, really grateful for those teachers that gave us and is willing to work with us, uh, to help our kids. Uh, and at this time, I'll take any referrals or questions that you may have. >> Mr. Traver, >> can you put your microphone on? >> What's the what column? >> What's the middle column? >> Bacon. >> Oh, one one rice special ed, one resource special ed. Uh there are seven bilingual
075uh Tissole is a bilingual position and then one elementary >> what's what's the middle column that's all >> these vacancies and this is >> position >> in the category open position in the categories to your >> left two bed vacancies one in resource one rise >> so it's just a subcategory so the top green spot that you see is >> ah I gota I got you yes I see now >> they're all special ed then the Elementary. >> We just broke it down. Yep, I see it now. The colors didn't catch me. Um, and um, you and I have talked about it's important for us to publicize this FedE issue um, in any way that we can. and we are we are gonna we're are going to highlight >> using the the 39 number from
076last year uh in the post. Um so I think that it is important. Um so I hope the Connecticut Post is paying attention um when they look at this um tomorrow or the next day that we only have two vacancies in sp. Um so I want to go back to the question I asked on the first page. chronically absent. Um, and I want to ask if um, it's possible for my committee meeting on Wednesday to have a monthly breakdown of the 2425 school year. >> Monthly, >> sure. >> Yep. I'm I'm asking how big a deal that is. PJ, I see you shaking your head like this and I get it. If it's too big a pain in the nee, then >> we could do it for the next meeting. But I'm curious because what
077I notice in this data is that it goes up from previous years. And I'm just curious about the why. Um, and it it may or may not be it doesn't have to be in two days. If if that's just too big. If if it's one of those things that you can click your magical fingers on the keyboards and crank it out, then it would I would be curious to look at it Wednesday. If it's not one of those things you can click your magical fingers on the keyboards and it takes a little work, then this is too busy a week to do that and so I'll hold it for the next meeting. Um, but I would like to look at it Tuesday, Wednesday or at the next meeting to see because it is weird to
078look at how many of these go up um in the 2425 year and then the question becomes why and when. And so I the monthly is the first question that hits my mind is did that rise occur at the end of the year, over the year, the beginning of the year, when did that occur? Mr. Trey, can I can I answer that question for you? I think it's important for this is this is one of those data things that's going to come before you every single month. So, you're going to get it because I want if I want you guys to help us making sure when you talk about absenteeism for kids and absenteeism for teachers in the classroom, those two things go hand in hand. If the teacher's not there, the kids not there,
079nobody's getting educated, right? And that's what is happening a lot of times as well. So the monthly report will be given to you. Um I don't know if I'm going to we we have so many things to get done between to tonight and Wednesday. So if we can get it back to you >> at the end of the month next meeting is fine. I get that. I get that and I'm I'm comfortable with that. I do want to see next year last year in a monthly report. Uh it's next meeting is fine. That's fine. I'm not I'm not in any rush. >> I'm just curious. I get that we're going to look at it progress moving forward, you know, for the rest of this year as we go through the year, but I'm just have
080a curiosity about what why this this unique bump occurred last year. Um, as I look at this last year, even higher horizon that you mentioned, it took a bump up there at 11% 7 then they bump up to 16.9. Um, so you know, I'm just that it's just a curiosity as to why that occurred for Highizon as well as everybody else. Um I do agree with you about future attempts. I'm not disagreeing. Um Go ahead, Miss Hughes. >> I can uh there were three uh distinct things that stand out in my mind that happened last year. >> Oh, I >> One was the fall. >> I can hear you. Can I hear you? >> One was Can you hear me now? >> Yeah. One was the fall with the violence that the the violence threats
081to the schools. The second one was in January with the ICE issue and at the end of the year with our half days. We had it at uh half a week of half days which we learned is probably not going to happen again because we know with half days student absenteeism increases. >> That's why I want to look at it. All those things occurred to me. >> Actually a few other things occurred to me too. >> Yeah. So so Mr. Traber, the way the state does it is every month they have what's called their monthly attendance all that we give them. Uh it's usually a week after the month ends. So the state does not allow us to go back in to their system and update anything. So if there's a mistake in attendance, >>
082for instance, um I gave Mr. Traber an absence when I wasn't supposed to give Mr. traor and absence. They don't allow us to go back and update previous month absences. It is what it is at that time. During our training in the summer, uh when we're training the clerical staff, we make it clear to them how important it is to make sure the attendance is right. We also let the administrators know the importance of capturing that attendance because we don't have a chance to go back in and update it again. Once it's submitted, that's it. Some of it, and I will tell you that we do find with chronic absenteeism, is that some of it is due to the fact that um some of our kids, especially in the September or the early months, it's
083getting them in. um there's still no shows, but they're on the register. They're on the list and our job is to call them. So, by state law, once someone registers, even in the summer when school starts, we have to go through the process of um our due process of trying to get that child back into school. They get absences. So, that attendance at this point, we start taking attendance on them even though they're not in. That's also for a child who registers but does not have their immunizations or their physical. They get enrolled in the class and get rostered but those attendants keep going on that child. So if it takes them two weeks, that child has two weeks of attendance um of absences for their attendance. So, it's not always fair when you're looking
084at some of the chronic absenteeism, but we found that it is going up in the past years. The percentages are going up slightly and I don't have an answer for that. Um, but the reality is, uh, I know we have teams together. We we know what to look at. Um, we're looking at clustered data. In other words, those children who have been absent for seven days in a row. And we could account for that because we know some somebody was either on vacation or they were out sick with with the flu. But it's those sporadic absences. Those children who are out every other week or every two weeks, maybe a Monday, a Friday, maybe a Tuesday on the week. Those are the ones that you really have to look into because right now we have
085a lot of those kids who are sporadically just taking absence days throughout the years and and and I one remember I I understand this some degree because I taught for 20 years. We had the the long-term winter vacation students. Um we had the um and then I worked truency actually in New Haven in the 70s. Um, I'm familiar with a lot of different problems we run into. That's part of why I'd like to look at the monthly data to see what patterns we see. Um, but I do understand at the beginning of the year there's also uh students on the roster on the, you know, who are enrolled that end up not being enrolled. Um, that we have to wait and see if they're really coming back um for whatever reason. You mentioned some of
086them, but there are other reasons I remember too. Um, so I I get it and I'm not if that's why I asked in in all seriousness if it's work, I'll wait. I just piqu my curiosity with the data you put before me. Um, so but if it's work right now, I recognize this is a hellaciously busy week. Um, so let's wait till the next end of the month. Um, and on the teacher one, I I I mean I I couldn't agree with you more keeping the teachers here. Um, I remember we did a comparison of the Bridgeport district teachers to the charter school teachers and there was no comparison just on districtwide to uh the charter school the our attendance rate was so much higher. So just even there that's a but here we looking
087at each school and you know I'm I was proud to see two blackham school teachers there standing up there right there um not just one principal but two two colleagues of mine from black um who know what it's like. So I I think that's very important. >> I think the other thing Mr. Traver is that we're not only going to have, you know, teachers, I mean, administrators that are high on the chart, we're going to bring principles that at the bottom of the chart. And what are you going to do differently? So, we're going to we're going to kind of make sure we mix it up a little bit. I think that's important to keep things, you know, uh, you know, um, interesting and and making sure that we support all levels. uh you know
088I think they have to sometimes you know come and talk about their their buildings and the issues they may be having and what else could we do to support them in that as well. So we're going to kind of mix that up. The data piece is a huge thing and um I meet with principles I mean on every Friday groups of them uh and they're going to be justifying because I'm putting data in front of them. Tell me what's going on in your building. Why is the data the way it is? What else can we do to help you? >> And I've not heard anything to the contrary. So, I want to emphasize your last point about as long as we're being positive in those discussions. >> Absolutely. >> Because that's the point of what
089we're trying to do is what can we do to help you >> improve on that problem and help you support you in improving that that number. And that's the purpose of >> not to not to punish you but to absolutely but to how can what what can we do to help >> and that's and that's the the point of providing you know the principle at the high on the list to go down and support the ones on because I think it's it's more receptive when they are doing it instead of be or my team is doing it. So we we we'll do a combination of it all. It's important. Um I >> think that's all I have for that. Thank you madam chair. M >> Mr. What's up? >> Um, yes. One question. Um, Dr.
090Avery, um, maybe two. >> Um, bilingual teachers, does that mean that they teach a second language or they're just bilingual? >> You I'm let I'm let Morris clarify that it's different. >> We have two types of bilingual teachers. We have uh bilingual programs in many of our schools that are K2 where we have children who do speak Spanish and other languages where they teach that class. They're not necessarily teaching Spanish, but they will be, you know, getting the children prepared to enter into grade three in these schools where English is the predominant language of instruction. We also have at Battalia a uh biliteracy pilot program whereby we've got bilingual teachers that are teaching both ELA in English and ELA in Spanish. And so the objective is for our kids to get the biliteracy seal uh
091upon graduation in high school. >> Okay. Thank you. because excuse me but you know I I've been reading a lot about education and uh and a lot that's been keeping the kids away from school the bilingual kids is the the language barrier you know a lot of these kids aren't able to communicate the parents aren't able to communicate because you know they're you know of course from a different country and it's causing problems in the school you know the the kids are getting frustrated the parents are getting frustrated and you know they they're just not coming to school just because of that. So I think us uh being really proactive and hiring bilingual teachers if that's what we're doing is a is an excellent thing and getting administrators or people inside these centers that are
092able commun that are able to communicate with with people that speak a second language is very very important to getting our our attendance up and stuff like that, you know. So um and one more question about um about our you know just just about about our attendance you know new schools help bring in the the you know students. So, if we keep, you know, this this, you know, replacing these schools and and and and building new schools, kids, I think we're definitely going to see kids coming to school more. So, as long as we keep it up and we keep doing a good job building these schools, but we we will see attendance go up. That's all I got to say. Thank you. >> Great points. Thank you, Sharon. >> Thank you, Mr. Scala. >>
093Thank you, Madam Chair. Yeah. Couple of questions. Um when you and a chronic absism could you define chronic at theism for everybody please >> what makes you chronic chronically absent >> I think it has to to be more than 10 or more absences you know over a period of time I don't have that specific definition you know in front of me but I think it's you know do you have it someone have it okay PJ >> yeah so so the definition for chronic absenteeism is if you're absent 10 or more% based on your membership days. So what that means is probably around 181 19 absences you become chronically absent. Those absences are excused and unexcused absences. That's what makes up someone a student being chronic. So there there are a couple caveats to chronic absenteeism.
094One is that they base it off membership. And what membership is basically the number of days that you're in that school. So if you're there 50 days, it's based off of your chronic absenteeism or the days that you're absent based off of the 50 days. If you're more absent 10 or more percent, then you're chronically absent for the school year. The one thing the state does uh is it also if you go from one school to another school, so school A to school B, your chronic absenteeism, let's say you were chronically absent in school A. What happens is once you go to school B, your chronic absenteeism gets wiped out. But if you go back from school um B back to school A again, then they take those absences from school A and they add
095them on to any more absences that you would have at school A. >> So So yeah, I'll follow up on that one. So >> right, >> school A student is chronically absent because they got issues. We live in a very transitory system. So the student goes to school A and is absent another 12 times, 13 times. So he's counted again, he or she is counted again as chronically absent. >> Yeah. So if they go to school A and let's say they were absent 10 times, they go to school B, they start fresh. They go back to school A again, then that 10 absences comes back plus how many more that you're absent till the end of the year. And that chronic absenteeism stays with the school even if the student leaves. >> Yes. You >>
096can't go back. >> Yes. >> Okay. That's that's one question. And um as far as the you mentioned that you're going to have the great performing schools and the underperforming schools as far as chronicism. Uh when when you say you're going to bring them in, do you mean you're going to bring in the lower performing schools to yourself or you going Oh, you're gonna put them on the hot seat over here because I don't know if that's >> Well, you you got the hot the hot seat's right here in the data. The data doesn't line. So you can you each board member will know which which campuses I probably could like categorize it from top to bottom so you can have an easier quick look at but what what I what I'm doing is I'm
097trying to communicate with principles you know but I'm also trying to make sure keeping data sources at the forefront of what what's happening. So chronic absenteeism I'll have maybe six principles in the room all different levels all different different you know uh you know points on this chart and then we talk about what's what's working good school in some school what's working and I already know which one needs support. So it's a combination of that. Uh we have a monthly administrative meeting. So we have sharing the shareepoints with groups of principles getting up and sharing with their colleagues on what they're doing on certain topic areas. So just a different varieties of ways to do it. >> Yeah. Yeah. I was just picturing up there. Why is your school like 68% chronically absent? What could
098you do better? And like have a spotlight like everybody was clapping and maybe everybody will be booing at the next one or something. I just >> I like I don't I don't necessarily say you have to be when principles see their names listed top to bottom that that's encouragement in itself and that's what we're kind of trying to produce is you know you you can be you know it's all about making sure that we we're all in this together. If one kid fails all of us fail, right? So we got to be supportive in that way. So being able to kind of have that communication piece around it and talking points around it that's the best way to do it. >> All right. Next, I want to move on to enrollment. This is probably be
099best answered by Mr. Kappa. He's probably used to these questions by now. Um, and and just through you, Dr. Avery. Um, of course, um, the enrollment we you Dr. I would like to see a comparative number year-over-year. Are we up or down? Oh, from last year. >> We can we can >> right now we're still enrolling. So, um we're we're down at this point, but um usually by the start of the year, uh we even out, but but what we'd like to do is we do have reports coming out the first day of school. We can get you those and compare them to last year so you have that. I think that would make sense. >> We'll provide that that attendance thing because every day has it changes. So, we'll give you the first couple
100of weeks of school. We'll send it out to you guys every week so you can kind of track it. Uh because sometimes after September one or after Labor Day, more kids will come. So you'll so after that that week after Labor Day, you'll see it probably go back up again as well. >> And our numbers lock in in October. >> October 1st. >> October. >> And final question on enrollment percentage of free and reduced price lunch. Where do where do we stand in that percentage wise compared compared to last year? because that is a significant component of the formula. >> Sure. So I can speak of that. Um last year we were at 87.5%. The year before that we were at 86.2. So we're increasing uh and this year we have a goal of 88%
101if we can get there. Um that's our goal this year. So again, everything locks in these data points in October for October 1st. >> That's all I have. Thank you. >> I have just two points on this report. Um um in terms of the attendance, I'm kind of piggybacking off of what Mr. Traver said in terms of having the data annually kind of want to go a step further and ask if it can be graphed so that we can see over time um the trend >> say change and >> yes the changes so that then we can see okay we're spiking in January oh there might be a flu issue if not we can really try to analyze the data in a way where we can provide support wherever needed. Um then the second item
102is around the sped teachers. I'm very pleased to see that we only have two vacancies and wanted to know if the 14 teachers that were approved to go through that summer program if that's part of the reason why the numbers are low or there's less sped vacancies. They filled some of those vacancies because they are certified teachers and we do that every year, but we added some additionals. Remember, you know, the board approved for us to get another round of them. Yep. >> They're all full filled and so yes, that had a lot to do with that was a great decision by the board to be able to work that. So, those are the types of things that we're having to, you know, if we invest a little money in getting more teachers, then it
103it's going to pay off like this has been doing. So again, I think a lot of the universities have tried to do some innovative things to try to get more people certified as well. And then I think the state of Connecticut is changing, you know, the requirement. >> Connecticut had one of the >> one of the the more strient, you know, ways or certification processes for teachers to become a teacher. and they I think they're loosening that up a little bit in order to get more people to step into the role. So >> excellent. That's kind of what I wanted to hear that because of this program it's been deemed effective that we were able to reduce our numbers. So thank you >> Mr. Medina. Can you get your mic up? >> And I'm going
104to touch starting in that section where Miss um Marissa Mais ended on that CRE program CRC just to confirm how many the crack program CRC the special ed program that we had. Uh you asked for a second round which was the 20 that we voted on to push uh for that special. >> You're talking about the sacred heart one or the >> I just know it's C R EC correct? >> I don't know about correct but we we can provide you we can provide you that data. Uh it came from I think Dom presented to the board and and requested some additional teachers to be hired through the no Mr. Bron Michael Bron >> you know made the presentation to the board like Bronson. So we'll bring that update to you and give you you
105know um >> how many individuals are and what subject areas they're teaching >> Chris get Mike to provide that for us. So, as far as we have the data right now, as of today, there are 41 vacant positions. Every other position has a certified teacher. >> Yes. >> I have a question that came up through some communications and dialogue with other people. Um, and maybe for you, maybe it's not. Um, when there is a permanent sub hired into a classroom, is that permanent sub certified through the district or through um, what's the company again? Um, >> Kelly Services. Are those certified or they're not certified? I understood that it wasn't, but I was hearing from other communication that came in. >> Stubs aren't considered a certified teacher. Now, there could be a a teacher that's
106certified that is a sub, but there's no way that we would even know because why would you be a sub when you can get paid a lot more money being a certified teacher? But some people like the flexibility of not being a full-time committed person to the classroom, you know, but they have the certifications. They just want extra extra pay. So, it just depends. Um, you know, Kelly knows that on the backside, but we don't necessarily because they're just a sub. So, they're coming in a day or two and then they go back and go from there. So, >> okay. I just wondered that because they told me that the permanent subs are certified subs. And I said that's not what permanent sub means they're there for certain amount of days and then they become
107permanent. >> Yep. That's what I understood too. Okay. Thank you. Um, and then I know Did you check? >> I think there's a a typo on that. >> Okay, that's a typo. Yeah, just want to make sure. >> Okay, got it. You want to state it or you want me to? >> You can state it. >> Thank you. Um, yeah. So, on the on the on the packet there is and and in his presentation, the packet has it thing. So, total reduced uh students on our packet data. It says is 604, but it's actually is 3,635 as stated by uh the superintendent, Dr. Avery. And then the paid is stated on the report as 3,665 is actually 604 was stated by Dr. Avery. And I just had a question about that because it it was
108contradicted to this to to it. And that is all for me. Thank you, Madam Chair. Oh, sorry. Yes. No, that is Just a couple of quick things. I just to be clear for Mr. Medina's sake. There may be certified teachers like as a retiree, I'm a certified teacher. I could decide I wanted to sub a few days a week to make a little extra money. That could happen. >> That could happen. >> So that could happen. And I I I stated it that way. May >> Yes. I want to say Yeah. >> Um so >> when I was becoming a teacher, I subbed. I didn't have a certification. >> Um >> what is a permanent sub? >> Are you referring to long-term subs? >> Same thing. >> What we used to Okay. Yeah. I just
109want to be clear. >> I wanted I wanted to check your words. >> Permanent sub. Yeah. Long-term sub, permanent sub. Um and um uh the um the one other thing I wanted to mention was on that we I noticed that one of the largest areas of of unfilled VA unfilled uh vacancies were our teachers. Um, and I I just want to comment that I have heard frequently from our teachers, we have not raised the rate of reimbursement for supplies for our teachers for 15 or more years, maybe 20. So, just on our ra I wanted to put it on our radar that that is a problem for us. um it just gets lost in the budget of overwhelming budget of all the other things we have to deal with. But they get the same amount
110of money to buy supplies that they got 15, 20 years ago. Um it's a disincentive. >> But remember that 13 is not just art teachers, it's art teachers. The seven >> the seven. Yes, the seven. >> Yes. now that you now that I understand the color coding system the seven but it it just struck me when I saw art teachers there that that's an area that's an area of complaint that I've heard frequently art teachers um just a little side aside here in this discussion that's it thank you madam chair >> Mr. M >> quick comment. Um kind of started thinking the reason why sped numbers, not the sole reason why, but sped numbers went down was because of that program incentivizing certified teachers to go get their credentials. I'm wondering if we can do
111something similar to that for math and science. Um, so just food for thought, food for thought >> and and and there there are things that the board could do to consider that, but you have to have the financial means to do it and you also have to get the agreement of the teacher union to be able to do that because it it it distinguish you're giving certain teachers an incentive to teach that area and and not all of teachers have that availability to get this the incentive. You know, some certain states will do that. they can do it without but a bargaining stay is hard to do. So you have to go and get anou or whatever to the teacher union and so you can't just the board just can't do it because the union
112will fight you against fight against that. So there's ways that we can work through that those programs are coming from the university level. So they're getting support from the university side and the school district side say if you do this you teach for us for two or three years and that's how you get away. You're not giving the money directly to the student. You're helping pay for their schooling. It's a difference. And so the union say, "Okay, you're going to help my my potential member get a certification so I can keep them." And and that's any teacher can do it. They have they have math, science, social studies, you know, positions that they can go through the program with, but but technically special ed is the one because it's high needs. So yes, there's and
113we're working with the universities all the time to to help think through some of those innovative options. Uh and we'll continue to do that. >> Awesome. Thank you. >> New business. Um the first item on the agenda is approval of proposed workman's compensation stipulation with Wallace Gratchel. Um this is item for executive session and we have um our workman's comp attorney um Yman's here. Uh, so if we go in executive session, it'll be with the board members, our attorney, HR. >> No. Okay. With our attorney. >> Yeah. And >> Mr. Mr. >> Um, so is there a motion? >> Okay. Moved by Mr. Trey, second by Mr. Bennett. All in favor to go in executive session. Any oppose? All right, we're going to go into the conference room in the office. office. All right, we're
114back from executive session. >> Motion. >> Move to approve the motion as discussed in executive session. >> Thank you. >> Moved by Mr. Traver, Mr. >> Yeah. I would like to the little amendment. um move to authorize the attorney to settle the workman's compensation case as discussed in executive session. >> So been amended. Is there a second for the amendment? >> Second by Mr. Benahan. So the new all in favor of the amendment say. >> Any opposed? So uh let's vote on the the new motion as amended. All in favor say I. >> I. >> Any opposed. Any abstensions? All right, that's approved. >> Thank you, M. >> The next item on the agenda is the approval of >> motions >> the Bridgeport Education Lease Agreement renewal at 418 Puth Street. No. Okay. It's been
115appro mo the a motion's been made to approve the Bridgeford adult education lease agreement renewal at 418 Cass. Is there a second? >> Is there any uh debate or discussion on that? >> Mr. Ben. >> Yeah. >> Can you I know we talk about this but I want to be sure because um they will still change the date because I see in the package that they still the same. What date >> that has? They say something 2024. >> No, that wasn't a >> because I see in the package. >> It's supposed to be that. >> Okay. I just want to be sure. Thank you. >> Any further debate on this? All in favor say I. >> I. >> Any opposed? Any abstensions? Dr. Hannah's coming. >> You have somebody for this one? >> Yes. >>
116Oh. Um, approve. The next item is the approval of the fiscal year 2526 family resource center grant application to the state department of education for sister Bortalia school Dunar school and Roosevelt school >> moved and seconded moved by Mr. Reina second by Mr. Benahan. Any questions on this for the presenters all in favor say I. >> I. >> Any opposed? Any abstensions? All right, that's passed. Next is the approval of the expelled students for the university school agreement. Moved by uh Mr. Medina, second by Mr. Benahan. Any uh discussion on the contract? All in favor say I. Any opposed? Any abstensions? Next item is approval of the subcontract subcontractor services agreement for Bridgeport Prospers and Bridgeport Board of Education. Moved by Mr. Medina, seconded by Mr. Benahan. Any discussion on this one. All in favor
117say I. Any oppose? Any abstensions? That one passes as well. I don't know about this one though. The approval of the draft budget planning document is the next item. >> Yeah, the draft. >> Go ahead. Dr. Avery, >> one of one of the requirements of of my staff and myself and Nester is to work with the state technical assistance team to provide the board with a budget manual. Uh mainly it's when you look at it you know mainly it's just the responsibilities of principles and directors and internal staff regarding how they are to interact with you know the team to develop a budget. Most of it is timelines you know these are the timelines that are given to us by the city of Bridgeport. uh and we just kind of integrated our timelines in the
118process. Uh and we really wanted the board to to kind of chew on it and then provide some additional um um conversations around it. There is a lot there's there's a a glossery of terms when it comes to some of the terms that we use to develop budget. You're talking about codes in the budget process. There's there's acronyms in the back. There's processes how to evaluate the budget. There's an entry of how we train administrators to use Munis. Uh is the um the software program that we used for finances in the district. Again, it's a draft and uh I just wanted an opportunity to it had to be presented to the board. It does not have to be approved by the board. Uh but we would like to just engage you in the conversation of
119good, bad or indifference of the document uh in order to get try to get it finalized to get it to the to the state whenever you have time to add value to it. So, it's not anything that, you know, Nester and I and the team went through and provided, you know, uh they provided us a sample of what it might look like and then we just kind of took that and used it for a guide for us to help you guys formulate your minds around the year-long. It is a year-long process for developing the budget, you know, but it's specifically giving the responsibilities and the timelines for uh everybody involved. So, again, that's what this is. So, any discussion, >> Mr. Saul? >> Uh, no, you pretty much answer the questions that this is the
120draft subject to revisions. I'm willing to accept the draft subject to revision when we got a little more time to look at it and have further discussions because we do have an extensive agenda this evening. Again, this is going to be more than a fivem minute discussion probably. >> Mr. Mayor, Jimenez, >> so I had um a few questions and I ended up reading this twice because I feel like the lens I was reading it from I think I was reading it incorrectly or different thoughts in my head. So I wanted to ask is this something that will be public facing? Is the intent for this to be public facing? Absolutely. Because it has dates and timelines and things like that, you know, in full transparency to the community. I think they didn't even know
121how and what the process is. So, I think it's important to make sure this is uh public facing. But remember guys, everything that we do cannot be public facing because we have work to do. Uh and we need a guide to be able to do the work. But I think for for this purpose, I think we can easily be able to put this on our uh web page and have it public facing uh to be because it's not giving any they're not giving the details of the budget process, right? It's just a process and that's full transparency and that's what the audit said. A lot of things that you see are just, you know, geared towards making sure that we're compliant with the audit. uh and every a lot of the things that's in here
122will help us uh meet those checklists of of meeting those goals as well. >> Thank you. I do have a few other comments and I can follow up over email as well itemizing it. Um but face value there was um on page one item number four on the third line it indicates that if requests are not properly submitted that they will um go unanswered. Um and I'm wondering if we can just deny them and let people know give them the feedback. Hey, this is the reason why I was denied to kind of have that feedback loop so that you know people aren't expecting an answer and not knowing kind of sitting in limbo. So, that was um a thought there. And then the second one, this is like super minor, but um on page two,
123I noticed November 28th, 2025. I want to make sure that we're instilling work life balance. That's the day after Thanksgiving. So we don't want to push forward a timeline think almost making it appear that people have to come to work. Go be with your families. So I'm proposing December 1st as that due date. Um on page five and this this might be Oh sorry I didn't see your hands. do you want to work on after Thanksg The only thing I would like to clarify here some of those dates are pretty much driven by the city the city charter so the date there doesn't really it's not binding meaning some of them say first Tuesday of of April >> so is the time to meet the deadline come next fiscal year. First Tuesday of April might
124not be Wednesday. So it might be Thursday or Tuesday. So the dates you see there will change every almost most of them will change every year because they have to follow the city the city deadline or guideline or the city stat you know the city ordinance. >> Gotcha. I was thinking that's that's the timeline. That is the deadline. >> No, it changes because by city ordinance, the mayor has to turn a budget in to the council the first Tuesday of April. So, whatever day that first Tuesday of April turns in every year. Next year, the date might be different. So, we're just going to change the date, a day before, a day after. So then I might suggest on the timeline on or to add on or about so you're not stuck to a specific
125date. >> Okay, that's fine. Um, and then I'll conclude with this comment, but on page six, I did add a a few additional steps. And it was more so because I kind of thought that maybe we should also add when the legislation session ends and how internally we're working to develop the gapsaving measures and then get those approved by the board. and then also develop that priority list that if we do end up getting additional money um we can get that to you guys and approved before school ends um ahead of this school year. So h added those bits there and that is it for for me. I'll itemize this for you Dr. Ra you >> you'll put it in writing for me. >> Yes. Thank you. >> We'll do that for you. Thank you
126Mr. Jabber. Yeah, >> you put right on. >> Sorry. I want to repeat what I said in committee. Um that I applaud this effort. Um uh it it really is nice to see it all laid out. Um as you know, we had a problem last year with the budget not being given to us until the end of March. um end of February, sorry. Um and uh that was obviously extraordinarily late. Uh and as we raised concerns over this, um the budget was not presented to us until uh way after it should have been historically. So this makes it clear. Um and contrary to statements that were made earlier, we were not allowed to speak at the finance committee meetings. Um um at that point when the budget was presented to us um we were forbidden
127from speaking at those meetings. >> Move it on. >> It's on point, Madam Chair. >> Move on. >> It's on point. >> Move on or we end the conversation. >> Thank you. Well, you allowed a misstatement to be perpetrated here. >> And so, >> may I interject for a moment instead of going back and forth on >> I I I I tried to avoid doing this and when I raised it with you off, >> excuse me, >> point of order. >> Okay. >> So, let let's get back to like the current why like let's do current. Let's focus on the the current situation. Well, I'm complimenting I'm complimenting the fact that we have a clear process spelled out for this year >> and I admire us seeing that. Um and um I did say uh
128at the last meeting and I want to repeat it and I think it's consistent with what uh Miss uh Est Esester Marian said that um the onor about concept of uh preparing with for the state and major grants that you have at the top of page five um needs to be moved up. Um, so I want to uh repeat that here on the record. We really do want to be meeting with state legislators at the same time that we're putting the budget together. Um, they are preparing their um legislative agenda uh around the holidays. So we want to be meeting with them around the holidays. um our delegation. So, I think that that needs to be fit into this process that we want to sit down with our delegation um to get them focused on
129what our needs are going to be. Um um and then as it says on page five, you know, we're going to be monitoring federal and state le, you know, what's going on. But prior to that, as I said before, that really is Janu January February as the governor lays out his budget and legislative committee start to do their work in February. Um, we're going to be monitoring that with the help hopefully of our delegation having met with them in January, if you will, February, January, I'm sorry, December, January. Um, >> I'm sorry. I'm sorry. Whenever the board feels the date they prefer, they can just add it on. I'll just add it in between. >> Yeah. I I just >> like just the date pick whatever dates, whatever time is fine with. >> I just
130think that's an important part of what we're doing. And that is where uh you you've got in here obviously because you're well aware of it what work we're going to be doing with the city leaders. >> We also want to be doing that with the state leaders. Absolutely. >> Uh because that's where the bulk of our money comes from. >> Yep. Yep. >> So, but otherwise as I started uh initially last week and this week, I really do applaud this effort. >> That's right. Thank you very much. follow. >> Yeah. Well, I was going to hold off, but since we started discussion anyway, um, yeah, a couple of points I got. I mentioned the committee. I would like to see a little more board of ed. I would like to see a little more board
131of education on there as far as the community forums. should it's gone back and forth between superintendent le forums but the board has been like intricately involved when things are mentioned about the board of ed should be board of ed should be board of ed in conjunction with the superintendent the best community forums we've had have been in conjunction a joint joint between the finance committee and the superintendent run called as a meeting and promoted and the interaction between the superintendent and bouncing off board members because there's certain things board members can say and certain things the superintendent can say and that's the best for advocacy and as far as Mr. Draber's comments about the legislations. I agree 100% wholeheartedly. We definitely got to try to catch them before they go off to Harford because
132once they go off to Harford, they're busy. They're done and they're not they're not looking back. So, we should try to get that done early in the process even if we don't have a total 100% clear picture of our budget. We will have a picture of what our proposed escalated costs are and some semblance of range with maybe $5 million striking distance. Um, I think that's all I got. Thank you >> to the chair. >> Yes. >> I for for board members if you if you guys can, you know, put your eyes back on the document again and just bullet point me the things that you would like to see added because what I can do is I can add those things. Say if say you want to see four community forms, you know, around
133the budget, you know, through the process, you can say give me four, give me three, whatever. Then we can put those in within that whatever. So, the recommendations is if you get those, I would like to try to get this updated because the state's wanting an updated copy, but I wanted you to have an opportunity to give me some feedback on it. Um, again, if it's if it's next month at next month board meeting, that's fine. If it's at the next finance committee meeting, that's fine as well. I mean, just just give me some time to get your pointers and the changes to it. Uh, and then I'll update it, >> right? Yeah. Thanks, Jim. So, just another another quick point. Um, yes. So, so far it seems like there's a consensus on almost everything
134that was almost everything I said. Just the problem with updating the document as we go along is if there's a disagreement if there's a disagreement between board members. >> I can't speak to you. >> If there's a disagreement between board members on certain issues that we want changed, it would take a vote 54 67 63. But it sounds like so far everything has a consensus that's been said so far. So I think you might be safe. But as far as the pres documents, if there's an issue of contention on any of them, they would probably need to be voted on just to be codified rather than just putting like if has suggestion that I disagree with, it needs to be debated. Same with Mr. Chabber, same with my own suggestions and debate, voted up or
135down or whatever have you because this is going to be our guiding document for quite a while. through the chair. I I think making the recommend I mean making getting your recommendations you know into the document that I think it still needs to go back to finance committee you know you know from finance committee to the full board to the full board from vote because everybody's going to have to adhere to it including us. So, and it needs to be an official approved document that we can also put on the on the our website and put part of the the the regs and processes that we're going to do moving forward as well. And I think every year it needs to be updated, you know, and brought back to the board for approval, too. So,
136uh, it's just a good practice of being able to have something. >> You want to make a motion and approval of the draft once again, the draft budget plan document, which is a living document. >> So, move moved and seconded. Um, moved by Mr. Medina, second by Mr. Benahan. Um, all in favor? I I >> Any opposed? Any abstensions? Next item on the agenda is the approval of the updated school calendar for 2025 2026. Um there had to be some changes due to a statemandated holiday that was added this year. So um PJ's going to speak to that. >> Thank you, Madam Chair. Okay. Since the last uh approved calendar on 210 2025, the governor um had recognized uh a holiday and we became the second US state to recognize this Hindu holiday called Diwali.
137Um with Diwali, the holiday happens on October 20th of this year. Now, with that being said, what we did is since it's an extra holiday, um we want to amend the calendar so that November 4th, election day, now becomes a day that is going to be an early dismissal for students along with teacher PD for the rest of the day. um we've worked with BCAST and the BEA. So we had both um collective bargaining units with us. One of the reasons they decided to do this was at the end of the school year, we did not want to elongate it. Secondly, the only other day we can really take off would be our February vacation. um they decided against taking the February vacation um day off which would be on the 12th with the early
138dismissal and the November 4th uh they just part of our conversation was what would be best for teachers. They felt that having the students come in on election day in the morning and then having the rest of the day being PD um would solve that extra day that we would have >> questions for Mr. Ka Mr. Mayor. Um, so election day, usually the schools are used as voting poll stations. Isn't that going to become like a safety situation with people just coming in and out of the building? How are you going to >> So So we've done it in the past. We we've had election day uh school where school is open and depending on the election, what type of election it is. Um, we went through that, we discussed that and part of the
139way they wanted to move was towards utilizing that day for the students to be able to come in in the morning again and them to get some activity PD-wise in the afternoon. >> Thank you, Mrs. Mr. Benahan and Mr. Tber. >> Yeah, my question was the same along the lines of Yemenz. Um yeah, presidential election years especially are kind of overbearing to our schools there. I mean there's lines and taking up um so yeah that that's a consideration and I'd like to point out that I'm glad to hear that Diwali was recognized as a holiday in the state that the holiday was recognized in the state is one as you know one of my passions is equitable holidays for all students. Um, but I just want to be mindful of um the calendar and the
140um election day seems like may may or may not be best, but I'll just defer to administration on that one. >> This year is not presidential. >> Yeah, it's not it's not presidential this year. So that was the thought process. >> Yeah, this year. So we'll be looking for another day possibly in the president presidential and then governatorial election years maybe. >> So you say it again. >> Yeah, it's a lunar holiday is what it is. So it changes. >> Thank you, Madam Chair. Um I don't know why they wanted you to November for you know election day you know dismissal when that day is is is it's a lot of things happen in school >> especially with our security people when they're running election they think our security they work for both education have
141to handle situation what's going on in the election day when they don't supposed to some security they do it because courtesy they know the person but if something happen I don't think so the people from the election or the state they're going to cover our security. It's a lot of things going up and down. It's a lot of drama. It's a lot of argument. It's a lot of fight, you know, especially to have the teachers, you know, come early and dismissal and then the students at the same time and stuff like that. This is something that another towns is no school. It's not the teachers home or in in the the students that are coming to the school. Why the reason Bridgeport had to have our students and our teachers there because for one day
142teachers are not going to get lost because our teach our teachers here and know students are very smart. They're very professional. Just because one day can take it off that's going to mean they're going to they're going to lose a lot of things. So >> I'm not agree that the situation had early dismissal when the teacher can be home with the family because another town the schools is closed. I don't know why the reason >> I can add to that, but we the we need 180 days. So instead of adding it to the end of the school year where um we we might have to add snow days and and go into the the warmer weather, they chose November 4th. We've had we've had school open on election days in the past, primary election and
143and regular elections. Um and this is in conjunction with the union. So I I think for for this year, it was a surprise holiday for us um because it was voted on this legislative session. So that it was voted on after our calendar was already released and this is the um you know the option we have this year. Next year given a it's a lunar holiday. We'll see what the day falls and and how we can um work it out so that you know we're not you know in school on on days where we have a lot of visitors. Um but I think just given that um I don't know if Dr. wants to speak more to that and then I'll go to M. >> I'd like to say one more thing. >> Yeah. You
144got to put your microphone on. >> Actually, better. Um, elections are a problem. Um, on a regular day, go to a half day. There's no lighthouse. >> It this is it's much easier when when there is a regular school day on election day. Um, you have the regular dismissal and the and the and the conflict between the election and the regular dismissal. And then you have the lighthouse pickup and the conflict which occurs as the last rush is occurring to the poll, you know, 5:30, 6:00, and when you get to a presidential, that'll be worse. So, this is going to be a relatively, you know, not a not a major election. So, it'll be easier. But in this case, it's not going to be an issue at all. So, I just think that a half
145day with the teachers only being the only ones in the school. I think it'll be a relatively easy day and and it won't be a problem and we'll be fine is just all I was going to say is I don't think it'll be a big problem and we'll see what happens next year when they when we get the new date. Um, so this will be an easier year and you guys this solution is fine is my opinion. Um cuz the election's not, you know, the the teachers will be the only ones in the building. The kids will have gone home midday, which is, you know, dead time. Um the seniors vote in the morning, middle of the day. Nobody's really out there voting. Um except a few seniors and >> Okay. >> Yeah. >> Mr.
146Medina had a question. >> Yes, I did. Uh I just wanted to find out since we're discussing it and we mentioned it. Um were there any other options that that came up through the discussion with the union and the teachers or teachers than the union was there any other options that they have mentioned? I know this one was found I guess favorable like I'm with Traver. It makes sense. It's just easier this year for that but I just wanted to find out just >> honestly it was uh February 12th and it wasn't really an option. It was something that was discussed on the table but um they wanted it to be the fourth. >> Thank you. >> Meaning the unions I should say. Yeah. To the chair. Guys, I I understand one of the things
147that especially with this calendar, we know what what happened last year when we changed all that stuff. it's important that we get the voice of the teachers and administrative unions. And so we've done that. Uh they sit around the table. We hashed it out and they like, "Hey, this is the best thing for us." Uh and we thought it would be somewhat of an easy move to get it done for this year and then this new holiday would be part of the considerations for moving forward next year as well. So again, I think >> yeah, I I think one of the other issues was that the non-certified staff inside of their collective bargaining agreements, it says if the president or the governor or the mayor declares a holiday, they get the holiday. So even if
148it wasn't the teachers, they get the holiday and there would be no support staff at the schools. That's just the reality of how it works out. >> Mr. Make a motion to approve the updated school calendar for the 202526 year as presented. >> See none. All in favor? I >> I. >> Any opposed? >> Any abstensions? All right, that one passes. Um the next item, thank you. Um the next item agenda is approval to suspend bylaw 9310 for the purpose of immediate implementation of the following amended recommended policies. Uh policy 3000, policy 3010, policy 3110, and policy 311. >> So moved. >> Moved by Mr. Medina, seconded by Mr. Benahan. Um all in favor to suspend the bylaw say I. >> I. >> Any opposed? Any obstensions? Mr. Travertains. Um so the next item and
149Miss Came um so we have approval of the following amended recommended policies. Policy 3000 the concept and roles in business and non-instruction operations. >> So move >> moved by Mr. Medina >> seconded by Mr. Benahan. Any uh further debate on that one? >> All in favor say I. >> I. >> Any opposed? Any abstensions? Mr. Traver abstains. Um the next item is the approval of policy 310 for goals and objectives. >> So move. >> Moved by Mr. Medina. >> Second by M E extra Mayor Jimenez. Any further debate? All in favor say I. >> I. >> Any opposed? Any abstensions? Same. Mr. Traberains. Um that passes. Uh, next item is policy 3110, the budget and planning. >> So move >> by Mr. Medina. >> Second by Mr. Benahan. Any further debate? >> All in favor
150say I. >> I. >> Any opposed? >> Any abstensions? Right. Uh, next item is uh policy 3111, the fiscal year policy. >> So moved by Mr. Medina, second by Mr. Ben. Further debate. All in favor? >> I. Any opposed? Any abstensions? All right, those Mr. Traver abstains from the last policy. Um, all right, those all pass. Next item is the first read and discussion of the following amended uh recommended policies. The first one is uh 301.1 or is it is that a misprint? 301 I believe internal controls. >> I believe that's correct. I'll double check for you. 31. >> Who's presenting? >> That's correct, Madam Chair. Is 301. >> Yeah, I got it. 311. Thank you. So 311. It's an individual under internal controls >> 301. >> No, it's in the committee packet, but it's
151also on the >> they added a one >> 301. >> Yes. >> Yeah. >> I'm trying to help you. >> Yeah. point out the line. >> I had it, but I think it was a brighter Sorry about that. Uh, let me go down. Sorry. This a Mac. I can't do a magnet. >> It's not a mag. >> Sorry about that, guys. The internal controls. This this policy just really kind of takes you through the board of education accepts all board members, employees, volunteers, consultants, vendors, contractors, students, and and all other parties uh maintaining any relationships with the school district to act as adequate integrity due diligence and in accordance to the laws and duties involving school district resources. The board is entrusted. It's really internal controls of what needs to happen. you know um within
152the school district. This is a this is the model policy just with internal controls. Uh it talks about the um uh internal controls is a responsibility of all employees of the district. The superintendent, the chief financial officer is what was changed. had business manager and board secretary uh shall be responsible for developing the internal controls designed to prevent and detect fraud financial impority whatever financial in and irregularities within the school district. So again it just really kind of makes sure it it it focuses in on the employees that should be working through uh the process. You'll see a lot of that in the board uh budget book as well. Um and then making sure that upon the approval of the board uh the superintendent may employ any auditing firm to conduct a complete impartial audit.
153So it's the same things that we So you're seeing this language, you know, being put in policy to do the checks and balances that we never did before and never was held accountable for. Uh so that's what that is. And so that's said internal controls is making sure that the board has a just a a policy addressing internal controls. So that's what that is. It's the first reading. Um we'll bring that back to you guys for second reading uh and finalize everything as well. My apologies I didn't have that in front of me. >> Mr. This is the first read. >> Yeah. I would like to draw the board's attention to paragraph 1 2 3 4 5. In the event the concern or complaint involves a superintendent, this concern shall be brought to the attention
154of the board chairperson who shall be empowered to contact the board's legal council, insurance agent, auditing firm, and any other agency necessary to investigate the concern or complaint. My concern with this one, as I brought up in committee, was is involving just having the chairperson informed rather than the whole entire board that there's a concern about some potential fraud or shenanigans. Not reflection on, of course, obviously the current chair or the current uh superintendent, but historically when things are hidden, sometimes they're hidden in conjunction and having more than two people know about the potential financial priority is better. Now to have it make it makes sense for only the board chair to be empowered to contact the auditing firm as in stop gap for frivolous lawsuits lawsuits frivolous investigations and cost controls. But um I
155think just having the chair and the superintendent as a backs stop in those situations is leaves itself open to a little more um potent potential for shenanigans in the future with another board and another superintendent. >> I I would recommend that you come up with recommendations of how you want the policy to change. bring it back to policy committee for review and then you know uh once you approve it in the committee level bring it back to the full board for consideration. If you want to add the language give me that language that you want to add and then we will kind of work through that language and add it to the draft and bring it back. >> Yeah. if if there's a taste for it and we could basically add the language now or
156skip a step if there's a consensus around >> what what if you did like the board the executive uh committee so board chair vice chair secretary >> or or or a simple comma after um the board and the shall notify the board and the chairperson shall be empowered blah blah blah to reach out to the auditing firm. This way the whole board is informed comma and the chairperson is I I want you to be care I mean legally you need to be careful because if the entire board hears a con a complaint then you're going to be exempt from hearing the complaint. So you so that's why it's done this way. If you look at either the the board chair or the vice chair, you can add a few more people to it to safeguard
157to give the everybody the feel that it's going to happen. But when even when you look at grievance policies, guys, some grievances don't come to the full board. It goes to the board chair and you work it comes to the board. I'm sorry, I misspoke there. uh you know there's a process for grievances just like you would have a process for here one person on the board hears the concern or you have I can I'm agreement with you about adding additional officers to it you know but when you do the full board I think you're going to I mean that's your choice you can do what you want to do but I think you're going to run it we can we can also bring about bring it to legal and say hey would you recommend?
158>> But K wouldn't K wouldn't have recommended this policy. They would have put full board in there if they felt the full board needed to hear that concern. And I again I understand history. I understand all of that. But just want you to be mindful of that. >> Right. Yeah. And um and just Yeah. I don't want to go back and forth too much. I just want to got a counterpoint to that. The grievances, the legal disciplinary cases, those are all under our purview. However, if there is a fraud or theft or embezzlement carried out, that's not in our purview. That's going to the police for prosecution. >> You still have to give the person due process though, Joe. You know, and due process means you got to go through your system that the district
159has for these types of things. >> Yes, it will go for legal. I mean for um a legal perspective as well but I think this is why we wanted to do the first reading so that we could have you know deeper conversation around it. It's going to come back to Mr. Medina's uh committee. Uh but I think suggestions around what you want to see needs to be in in in written form given to Mr. Medina myself and then we'll draft something up for the board and bring it back to you instead of sitting here trying to argue the point. I don't I mean We know what we need to do and we know what what you're wanting. Uh we'll make that happen for you, >> Mr. J. >> Yeah, I I understand your due process
160concerns. Um I'm not sure that the board is not still an appropriate body um to hear this given our most recent experience. Um, but I do understand your due process concerns. Um, um, frankly, given your own experience, um, but I do think that, um, perhaps maybe we should look at maybe the finance committee as the body for the, you said the executive committee. I heard that, Madam Chair. Um, and so we should give some thought to that because we want to make sure it's it is properly aired. We we want to make sure it gets properly concern dealt with. That's our concern. Um, but not um improperly aired, I guess, is how we want to make sure it gets dealt with. So it's easy to change and say to the attention of the finance committee,
161members of the finance committee or members of the executive committee, officers of the board, we just need to think about do we deal with those two concerns? >> Yes. >> Is there ready now? >> Yeah. I just want to make a motion to move uh policy 311 uh back to committee um for approval of possible um amendment to to the wording to possibly add uh to paragraph five uh to the attention of the executive board and then following with uh and giving the board chairperson and so on. So, uh, for us to discuss it if anybody has any, uh, ping. Thank you. >> That motion was I'm not going to repeat it, was made by Mr. Medina and seconded by Mr. Traver. Any further debate on this? Um, okay. All in favor say I. >>
162I. >> Any opposed? Any abstensions? >> Okay. All right. The next item on the agenda is the first read of 3541.2, the transportation administrative guidelines for walking distances. The only change to this policy is to for it to read uh one mile up to 1.5 for elementary and two miles up to 2.5 miles uh for high schools. and then deleting B where it just it delineates the definition of a one mile distance. We don't need that. Just take it out. >> Mr. Sakalic. Yeah, as I mentioned at the committee level, I was didn't want to brush this one past without a thorough read in a bigger body because the reason we're doing this is because yes, transportation was safe for this year only. But there is no guaranteed funding for next year in the budget
163to maintain those distances as they rescuing us this year, but there's no guaranteed next year. We don't we don't even have all the facts yet. Hopefully, we'll get some more facts on this at the upcoming meeting before any agreements reached outside of our um domain. We'll be able to see what we're bound to because we may very very well be realistically I think we're looking at maybe upwards of $20 million in escalated costs for the 25 26 school 26 27 school year. And thus far, if everything remains the same, there's no extra money in the ECS for next year. So, we're at zero. And we got three million from the city this year. So, that's $17 million shortfall if everything remains consistent as it did this year. So, we're $17 million to cut. Transportation is
164our biggest cost, unfortunately, and it's not in the classroom. So yeah, everybody got that feel-good moment and I don't want to take away from the fact that yes, the kids don't have to walk this year and I'm grateful for it, but we need significant influx of funds each and every year because our kids need transportation every year. Not just in election years, not just when there's media press and attention. Our kids need significant funding increasing on the level of at least with inflation. And that's why these updated so next time we don't have to even go through a whole thing of changing the policy back and forth. >> Mr. Chamber, >> I I agree with Mr. Scalivic, but we live year to year. Um, next year is a gubanatorial election year, so our chances are
165even better. So, >> is there any motion to refer this for a second read? What do you have? >> Motion to motion to accept the first read policy. >> You still going? All right. It's been moved and seconded. Any further debate? All in favor say I. >> I. >> Any opposed? Any abstensions? >> Miss Came. All right. Um Get out. >> All right. Good night. We have a few more items. Discussion of possible revisions of the following bylaw. So, we have 9110, the code of conduct for board members decorum. Um, in your practice, you'll see um some of the um you'll see the the proposed addition to the bylaw. Um again this is just a time for discussion and any provisions or additions that you would like to add to this. This was taken um
166you know CA developed this with other districts and so we kind of pulled from other districts that um that are using um these expectations um so that we can uh modify some of our own expectations of the board. Uh start with any Mr. Mayor Jenz. >> Um I think this is great and I did not have any additions. My only comment to this is measurement. How are you going to measure this? How are we going to hold people accountable um to implement this? Um so um that's my biggest comment. >> Yeah. And so um one of the things I would like to propose is um adding on to this um somewhere in our bylaws or document um uh board uh I don't know if I'm going to call it retreats, workshops, trainings, whatever it is.
167Um you know uh trianual three every three years. Oh no, every three uh every three or four months, not three years. We need to do it sooner. three times a year. It's late guys. Um three times a year we would have some kind of evaluation of board. So similar to what our um what we did on our first and second uh uh training with cave um my my thought process is doing a self-evaluation of of us as a board. Um at the beginning of the school whether it's beginning of school year or beginning of the year we can look at the timelines to see what works for us. Um, and in in that when we do that, we we kind of do it as a workshop and if we have other trainings that we need,
168we can fold it in there through CAVE or through other presenters. Um, and then have a a mid-year uh evaluation where we we see if we're on on goal for our benchmarks and and and our goals and then um end of the year evaluation as well. So, if we if we can put that in the bylaw somewhere, that can do the measurements that you're saying that we're looking for where we can just see if if we're living up to um the code of conduct as as board members. Um and and and yeah, I'll leave it at that. >> Mr. Chamber. >> Yeah, I see you. >> Yeah. >> Hey, you should put your microphone up first. I'm not sure that I have everything because I'm not sure what the committee structure one >> um >>
169we're just on the the first one the board. >> So um the the third bullet to focus my attention on fulfilling the board's responsibilities of goal setting policym evaluation. Don't we have other responsibilities? So that's like just one that's one part of it. So goal setting we we have that's something we haven't done right. So that's something that we would we would focus on doing at the beginning of the year. Um policym evaluation that's kind of what we're doing throughout the year anyways. So this is just putting it into yeah we have other responsibilities hire superintendent >> because as I went through all the bullets I thought okay where did the other responsibilities go? >> And that's in in the bylaws already. So, if you look at the approved bylaws, um, the ones that we
170already have in place, we have all responsibilities laid out. >> Yeah. Yeah. That's what I was wondering is I Okay, then you then you answer my I that's what I'm getting at is I read through it. I'm going, okay, wait, there's the law and what the law says we're responsible for and the bylaws listed, you know, more than these three things. Why are we only listing goal setting with policym and evaluation? >> It's already in the bylaws. This is just an addition to that. Well, that's what I was wondering is >> why is it in addition to what we already have? Why are we doing that? And so >> so this is like a a >> is this is Wait a minute. I'm still >> Yeah, >> this is a first read >> two. >>
171We're not even this not a like a actual item right now. This is just >> we're just discussing. >> Okay. And that's what I didn't understand all this because >> something like that. Yeah. >> I was sort of like trying to understand it. I got other questions. Hold your >> Do you want to comment on that? I haven't. >> Go ahead. agree with I think we should probably remove the additional language outside of >> we should probably remove the additional language since we're discussing it and if it's there's a consensus around the board shall concern itself with its responsibilities rather than administrative or blah blah blah something like that and it'll be all-encompassing as >> our responsibilities rather than just listing singularly those and leaving some out just leave it overly broad and not specific
172>> to understand what her thinking is on this so That's all I'm trying to do is asking why she focused on these three points here. So that's I I missed the discussion last Thursday, so I'm asking that question here. So I just wanted to know that's what struck me as I read through these. Um um so I get it. I'm I'm not sure. I I need to see if it sits right with me. when you get to your comments, you can explain what your point of view is having had the discussion last Thursday. Just I let me get because I want to go through a few other questions. Um I had some concerns further down and I I can't count the bullets but further down where it says respect the rights of the minority while
173working towards the will of the majority and recognize the importance of achieving consensus as an important tool in community building. I do I do understand that. Um I I I sort of do >> I'm old enough to remember the clamshell alliance, which none of you do, and how they floundered on consensus. So I I do I I understand that we all would like to hope that we all agree on every issue, but it won't happen. So I I I just wanted to I just put a little ambivalence there, not a concern. I just wanted to mention >> that, you know, I had some hesitation on that. And then on the second page, uh the bullet says take no private action that will comp compromise the board and the administration. It sort of I think Miss
174Amoritz's point about consequences because I can think of some actions that were taken um in particular the one that brought the board to the state department of ed down on our throats on our back that I was thinking of. What's the consequence of that? Um um and then in the meeting protocol, hold on one second. the concept of circulating proposed motions and amendments whenever possible at least 48 hours before a meeting. That was like oh really pie in the sky sort of struck me because so much is sort of fluid as we Yeah. I Is that your work? >> No. behind you has >> no mic. Grab a mic. Grab a mic. >> I could hear >> the mic is standing out to me in that particular language, especially now that we're I'm kind of
175looking at board book is in doing board book, I can put in proposed motions. So I can it just kind of struck to me. So when you guys were approving the lease, I can put in the proposed motion approval of the lease in board book and you guys could see that. So I don't know if that's what it's related. >> Well, no, I can see I can see that because we know that we put it as an actionable item on the agenda. We get that. But when we're like having a discussion and decide on you know there are there are there's a fluidity to a discussion that arrives at emotion. >> Um >> well I that's thinking that must pertain to >> especially to amendments less so to emotions. >> That's what I was thinking.
176Sorry for interrupting. I'm that's what I was thinking it it must >> this is the fluidity. >> Yeah. that it must pertain to because again like in board book if I put those in you guys should be able to hopefully you should be able to see that so when that meeting set you could see your proposed motions ahead of time so hopefully we have it in 40 48 hours that almost makes sense if that's what it's pertaining to. >> So those are those are my only thoughts in there. >> And again this is like I wasn't >> I just want to clarify like I >> I wasn't sitting here and like typing all this. This is like we Danielle and I worked with um CABE and and pulled out from the best practices from other
177districts. >> Yeah. >> Um and this is why we brought it to you so we can play around with this. No, >> I understand. >> We don't really like how this works. >> I understand now. I didn't understand when I read it. >> I understand now. >> Um and I also want to clarify um that this is just kind of like um a a social contract of sorts. like we're we're we're saying that this is how we're going to behave at meetings and we know our responsibilities because that's also outlined in our bylaws. So, this was something that I think on our second meeting with CAVE, they kind of showed us something like this. >> Um, yep. And, you know, we're just we're just holding ourselves accountable and that's where, you know, we do the
178measurements like the the the the >> the three times a year meetings, workshops for professional development and and stuff like that. we can kind of see how we are holding ourselves accountable um so that we could achieve the business of the district, right? >> And that I I support you with that. I'm not I'm not >> that I I'm not I like that idea. >> Yeah. So, yeah, some of this stuff might not work for us. Um it might you know, this might be from a different but but these are like kind of best practices throughout the area. >> And you know, I I agree with uh uh Mr. Sakalic on like maybe focusing attention on the board's business, board's responsibilities um and leaving at that because that sort of covers everything. So, um yeah,
179Mr. Kalic. >> Yeah, as far as the proposed motions, if if we do accept that, I understand uh Mr. Traver's point 100%. But I I I've seen it on other agendas, proposed motion. I've seen it on a state board of ed, but however, he is correct that is fluid situations. However, if we do incorporate it into the bylaw, a bylaw, a rule, and a policy is only as good as its enforcement. So, if we put this as a bylaws that it should be ready, who is going to be responsible for constructing the suggested amendment? I mean a suggested motion. Will it be additional duty upon the office staff? Will it be an additional duty upon the chair? So I think if that thing does stick that it needs to be the responsibility for that needs
180to be delineated to a specific individual. >> I think we can um look at that when we go back to committee on this because um if board book has that option where they kind of make the proposed motions for us that that'll take a lot of work off of the staff. But um but we can see um you know if if it if it's not and if we have to put that on somebody we we can kind of discuss on if we want to do that or not um because that and on a day like today that's 11 over 11 different motions more than that because you have the sub items right so um so that that that is timeconuming so that's a good point too on on if it's an automatic thing that board
181book can do I'm for it but if it's something that >> where we the proposed motions. >> So I put it in this. >> You typed it in. >> You had to type it in. >> But if board book can do it automatic, that would be different. >> So board book I I have to put the agenda item in. So you your agenda item is referral or approval of the 428 that could suit lease, right? I can just copy that and put that as my proposed motion and take and just it because it's the approval that's your agenda item and I can just copy it right over. So it's not an extra typing. It just copy paste done. >> It's Yeah. >> And again, they're proposed motions, so it's not like we're we're stuck to
182them, right? We can we would be able to discuss them and you know, especially like some of our executive sessions, those are those change a lot. So um so so yeah. Um Madam Chair, >> yeah. See what you want for like language on that and bring it to committee like when we go back to committee on that one. M. >> Thank you, Madam Chair. If it pleases the board, um I I would entertain a motion to send this back to committee. That way we can all dissect this document a little bit more. I know it's a intense document um and we can go through that. >> I second that. >> Want to make a motion to bring this back to committee. >> I second that. >> Please um if you made a recommendation today, please
183get that to u Mr. Medina and CC Danielle on that so we can and myself so we can add incorporate those recommendations into um this document so that at committee we already have the red line items. Um the motion's been made and it's been second any further debate. Um and if you didn't make a if you did not make a recommendation just for them that information too if you if you look through it and that way we can add it to the um language. All in favor say I. >> I. >> Any opposed? Any abstensions? All right. Um the next item is uh meeting conduct of public address. And so um what we discussed in committee on this item um some board members would like to um amend. Do you want to speak to it
184>> please? Thank you madam chair. I appreciate it. Um so yes this brought was brought up by um by the committee itself also especially through miss uh with hearing the public uh and the community forums that we held and everything and discussing about uh public comment to adding it uh instead of two minutes to changing it to three minutes um making a full board uh public comment 45 minutes. I know that we we discussed uh changing it not only that but also saying what came up through the committee and discussion was to changing it to three minutes but also just at keeping it at 30 minutes was suggested making the number of uh public comments down to 10. Um and I'm bringing it I brought it to the full board uh to the committee to
185have it for three minutes. total of 45 minutes for the 15 total keeping that understanding that not very often do we have 15 uh and then I know that we can always add through vote of the board uh to extend public comment if there is a room of you know 40 50 people that would like to speak through the board so I don't think it's going to be any it's just 15 minutes if we have the 15 people on that any particular day so I don't think it's too harmful and um I think our our parents and our community deserve it and that's uh why we brought it forward to the full board for discussion and for possible approval. Um, I wanted to say that I I do I like the idea of the three
186minutes. Um, but my recommendation was to keep it at 10 speakers to keep the timeline um that we have already so that um we can get through the business of the district as well. And our current bylaw says that if there are more than 15 public speakers um then after number 15 at the end of the meeting there's still time on the agenda for them to speak. So they they wouldn't be cut off. They would still be able to speak later on and that's what our current bylaw says. So if we cut it to 10 with three minutes each um um it still gives us the same amount of time in in that front end of the meeting. This is after we already have student representatives speaking um for three I can't count how many
187high schools at this point BMA the three fair child central Harding Bassic um they're all speaking and then you also have um our reports referrals I mean I don't think we went to new business today till 8:15 so that extra time where we have that 15 minutes is crucial because we also not to mention we're paying a court reporter to be here We're paying security to be here. We're paying it to be here. That's all overtime. Um, so if if we're if we're thinking about that when we're holding when when we're holding a school and stuff, we're we're we have to pay overtime for a lot of the staff. I'm not saying that we should completely limit their conversation to just two minutes. I'm saying we can still do three minutes with 10 10 speakers
188at at the front. And if it's a big night where we have if if it was tonight, if if that money didn't come through for transportation, I was expecting a big a full house here tonight, right? So something like that, of course, we're going to hear from the public um and allow that to happen, but we could also move that according to our bylaws to the end of the meeting as well. Um and I did like what Joe said last in committee, how you know, you know, city council will have public hearings when big items are coming up. And that's something if we can incorporate that into our bylaws where we know we we know the budget's coming up and we're going to have cuts, have a a forum where we just have um folks
189speak on to the budget, right? Right. And we're just listening to about that where um so that way we're not cutting off time or or anything like that. We can allow everybody who wants to speak to speak. Um but at a regular board meeting, my suggestion would be to give them three minutes, but give give it cut it down to 10 people to keep it within the same 30-minute timeline. Um I saw hands. So Mr. Salvik, Mr. Traber, Mr. Benahan. >> Yeah, I like the idea. Three minutes. Um three three minutes or 30 >> 30 minutes and I think the only thing we should do be changing in this policy to effectuate that is change A1 and B1 the first word from two to three and leave the rest as is maximum for that takes
190care of everything right there. um our public they they don't really come out and when they do come out in mass this board in the last I don't think I've ever seen it in my entire tenure where there was a motion made to expand public speaking that it was denied that it failed we give our we give our public an opportunity to speak each and every time not even everybody takes their two minutes some people take a minute a minute and a half it'll it'll all balance out and give the public more of a voice um because some some thoughts on complex issues you can't get out in two minutes. So, so I definitely would support and actually I would like to um make the motion to revise word one in public address A to
191three and word one in section B to read three. Second >> B1 and and A1 three. Okay. >> Motion was made to revise uh section A1 and B1 to say three. Um and second by Mr. Medina. Any further debate on that one? Miss Mr. Mayor Jimenez. >> This is going for the first read, right? >> Okay. >> Mr. Oh, >> this will go back to um >> it would go back to committee. >> Okay. Thank you. >> It's not on the agenda for first read, >> but it's on the agenda for revision >> and that's what we're doing. >> Oh, yeah. I'm sorry. Yeah. So, we can we can um go for first read. Yeah. >> Any further debate on that motion? Okay. >> On that motion to revise it to three minutes. >> So
192the motion I'll tell you what the motion is. The motion is to revise it. >> So there is a motion made. We have to vote on that motion. The motion is to re um to uh revise line uh section A1 to say three >> section A1 >> and section B1. We're we're on public hearing. We're on >> meeting conduct 9160. We've been on 9160. >> So um to say three. So that's the motion. Any further debate on that specific motion? Yeah. Because we'll take a we'll take a vote on that motion. on that motion. Okay. >> No, the motion is to just change the word two to three. So, it would read three minutes will be allotted to each speaker for an unlimited number of speakers. Once 15 speakers have provided testimony, public speaking will
193be suspended for the purpose of addressing the rest of the agenda. Yes, I speak. >> Can you put your mic on for a job? >> I concur with the chair that 30 minutes should be the limit on the public speaking. We have never I go back to what you said. We have never failed to allow everybody to speak when there was a full house. And so if we still want to try and maintain the 30 minute cap, we have always extended the speaking time when there was a full house that wanted to speak. And so I think her proposal of saying 3 minutes in the 30 minute period maintains some limit on the speaking. And you're talking to the person who spent 10 years or more till 11 or 12:00 at night here in this
194room. Um uh when we had 3 minutes and and 45. So, I'm not I'm really not opposed to what you've proposed. I just think that what the chair addressed was trying to have some handle on it, some ability to control it when there was a need to control it um by limiting it to 30 minutes public speaking at the beginning of a meeting. For some reason, somebody at some point did that. And so three, if you want to extend the speaking time by allowing 3 minutes, then you're going to limit it to 10 speakers in the bylaws by saying let it be 2 minutes uh 3 minutes in a 30 minute period. Um but we still have the power as a board as we have always done to my knowledge in my experience to say
195you know a motion would move to allow all people to speak who signed up to speak and not make them wait till the end of a meeting. I do remember in the 90s when we all everybody spoke at the end of the meeting. that was when we actually got to change the board to change it and let us speak at the beginning of meetings. Um, so I do think that it's reasonable to say we're going to dedicate 30 minutes to public speaking at the beginning of the meeting. Um, and if we want to change it to allow more people to speak, the board has to take a a vote to extend that speaking time. Any other question uh for this item, this motion? Mr. Medina? >> Yes. I know everybody keeps on referring to it
196and I'm just wondering where did anybody um read anything here that it was a limit of 30 minutes and it was referred to a few times and and multiple times. Today also >> two minutes for 15 speakers is 30 is 30 minutes. >> Look, it says and I'll read it. Two minutes will be allotted to each speaker for an unlimited number of speakers. Period. Once 15 speakers have provided testimony, public speaking will be suspended for the purpose of addressing the rest of the agenda. Once the agenda has been completed, public speaking will resume for all remaining speakers before the meeting is adjourned. So, >> so again under that >> the 30 minutes the 30 minutes is right there. We said you just said it two minutes for 15 speakers. Then the additional so speaker number
19716 will go at the end of the meeting. So for that time at the beginning of the meeting that's 30 minutes and then after that at the end of the meeting everybody still gets a chance to go in our bylaws but at the beginning meeting it's just 15 minute or 15 speakers at two minutes each that equals 30 minutes. >> Right. >> So it doesn't specifically say 30 minutes but it says 2 minutes for 15 speakers. So that's 30 minutes >> right? It doesn't say 2 minute for 15 speakers. It says after the 15 speakers then we will continue with the agenda and then public speaking will continue after. So it doesn't say anything about 30 and you can't add you know because you're saying two minutes it says it here then it's a there's
198a period then it says 115 and you're saying okay two * 15 people is 30 then it's concluded because again I just want to make sure it's clear >> is not concluded after that. Public speaking still happens at the end of the meeting. So if there's 18 members, if there's 18 people in the public want to speak at the beginning of the meeting after um the student representatives, there is a time allotted for 15 speakers to speech. If there are 18 speakers, the last three speakers get to go at the end of the meeting. If if we don't suspend the bylaws, you know, if we suspend the bylaws and say we'll all speak at once, then then that's then that's 39 minutes of speaking. I'm just >> Mr. Chamber. >> I I believe Mr. Medina
199is correct and you're correct. >> I believe that the old language said unlimited speakers and when they modified it to limit it, they failed to take out unlimited. Um some sloppy work there that was done in the past. I do believe you're correct because it used to be unlimited. Um, and that they decided to limit that and push the the spillover into the end of the meeting. Somebody should have taken that word unlimited out and it didn't get taken out. >> No, because it is unlimited speakers. So 25 people can come in here and say we want to see. >> I'm I'm not I really I think Mr. Medina's point is correct. That word should have been removed when you decided to limit it to 15 at the beginning of the meeting. But I it
200doesn't matter. I just it it's it's a bit of a a sloppy writing, but it you're correct about how it's been done and that's how it's been done. It's 15 now for a half hour and that is correct and I'm I'm supporting the way it's been done. Um it's been a half hour now and that's the way it's been done consistent with the others. So it's just I'm >> the question is whether we do three 45 minutes or a half hour at the beginning of the meeting. >> And I'm opposed to Mr. Sakalik's extension of 45 minutes. Now, >> Mr. B. >> Thank you, Madam Chair. Just to listen to all of you and I'm going to say this very clear and for the record. Um when when um people parents come or whoever come
201to speak to us, okay, we give it two minute to three minutes. I'm very glad we give it three minutes because sometimes two minutes is not enough because I have the experience standing there for two minutes sometime is not enough. Um I don't know what is the issue if we see we have more than 15 people to um to speak and I know sometime we can um break you know um suspend the law because I know we did it before. The only thing I can say we need to we need to listen our parents we have to listen to them. We elect officials because they vote for us. I don't I'm not agree like that to cut it or you cannot speak you're not gonna that's the issue have it before and that's the reason
202parents come to the our meetings upset because they don't they don't listen to them board members they don't listen to them born members they don't speak to them other people they don't listen to that's why they come here they come angry because I know parents call board members and sometime I don't have time for you speak or they sent back you know with attitude or anything so when parents come here we have to listen to You know, that's the reason we are the way I see it that I see as a board member. I work for them, you know, because they let me, they work, you know, they work for me. So, I'm very glad that we have to listen to them. If we more 15 or something like that, I know we can suspend
203the law and we listen to them. If we listen to them, then when they come, trust me, the numbers going to go down because they that's what we're going to hear. They don't want to get ignored. And I don't like to ignore my parents. That's what I'm here for. For work and listen to Thank you, Madam Chair. >> Yeah, I don't need to speak. >> Okay. Any further debate on the motion to change um A1 to 3 minutes and B1 to 3 minutes? I will just say if you change B1, it says a maximum of 30 minutes there. So, you would have to change the language of that whole. >> Um, I'm okay with leaving it >> I'm okay with leaving it like that because that B1 is a special meeting and special meetings are
204never really had public comment before. We brought it up in the last revisions and that's an additional thing and it's to agenda items only. So I'm okay with leaving that right there unless somebody else wants to change it to make >> my only thing is what you would you would have to change since it says maximum of 30 minutes you have to change maximum 15 speakers to maximum 10 speakers. >> You are correct. >> Yeah. We need the language. Um, >> do you want to >> So, I got my amendment. I'd >> like to make a motion to amend the amendment in section B. The word, what's the word? I'm sorry. >> Thank you. >> Appreciate you. I got it. Okay. >> Okay. There's A1 there and there's B1. Oh, >> would like to make
205a motion to amend my amendment to include row section B subsection one to read instead of for a maximum to leave it as a maximum max. Oh, okay. I see. I see what I got. Okay. I'm sorry. And quotations or close brackets maximum of 15 speakers to a maximum of 10 speakers. >> Okay. So, I'm going to reiterate >> that was flow. >> A1 is the amendment is >> Oh, yeah. Second that. >> All right. So, the amendment to the amendment is to um change uh two minutes will be allotted to each speaker for a maximum of 30 minutes, maximum of 10 speakers. So is there any further debate on that? All in favor say I. >> Any opposed? Any abstensions? So three people have that one. So the amendment's there. Um now the actual
206motion is the amendment of or the revision of the bylaw to say three minutes um on A1 and 3 minutes on B1. Any further debate? All right. All in favor say I. >> I. >> Any opposed? I oppose. Any extensions? >> Say Mr. Traber stains. So the new language will read in the first read that goes back to committee will say three minutes will be allotted to each speaker for an unlimited number of speakers and three minutes will be allotted to each speaker for a maximum of 30 minutes maximum of 10 speakers that's going to go back to our first read >> that consider a revision we were doing or we're what we were doing there because I want to make sure we were talking about that earlier that this was a revision so it
207doesn't need to go to a It could be, but um it's probably safer just to do the first read and the second read or do a revision >> or much like we did today, wave the first read and just bring the back break it back before the board for a second read. >> That makes sense. >> Got it. Um so that one is three minutes and then the other one is a three minutes with the 10 minimum and beat right to there. Thank you. Any further comments on public comment? All right. The next item on the on the um the last item on the agenda is the uh committee structure. Um this is just again um more of a conversation with you guys so that we can develop a committee structure similar to like what
208we saw in the model. There's nothing in your we don't have anything yet because legal legal is working on something for us. We we do have yeah so for this item we do have council looking at our current um committees and and defining them for us. So um defining standing committee versus um you know special meetings and and whatnot and um so but with the board we would like to you know bring something to council to kind of help us along. And so this items on the agenda just to um talk about the current committee structure, what you want to see um you know just in general I was looking through other um large cities in Connecticut and um something that Miss Esther May Jimenez brought up earlier was that committee calendar and I believe
209was uh New Haven laid out the the dates for finance committee throughout the whole year, right? the dates for their um teaching and learning committee throughout the whole year instead of us maybe the third Wednesday and then maybe that doesn't happen because there's um a a spring break that week, right? So if you lay out for the year, you're looking at the calendar ahead of time and you know if there's any conflicts already. That way we know for sure that committee is still going to run. Um so I like that idea that Miss um Esther Marnez brought up and I saw that on another uh website. Um and so yeah, this is just a conversation about how we want our committees to look and then we'll draft something up and bring it before the board.
210So, oh another thing was um defining what the committees do. So like on the website you'll see like you know my idea is like you know you know finance committee is going to look over the x y and z right so that people know when they're looking up the the items. So if we define it in our bylaws that would be helpful as well. Mr. chamber. >> Would this include how we decide committees? >> Yeah, like uh votes on like taking a vote to um expand committees, disband committees, whatever. >> Yeah. Ad hoc, permanent. That's, you know, as we discussed in the training. >> Yeah. >> Um you know, we had this conflict apparently um that dates back prior to most of us being on the board. um about the formation of committees. Um uh
211I'm I'm going to try and do this as neutrally as I can. The debate was that there had been the elimination of one committee unilaterally. It led to the elimination of multiple committees unilaterally. Um and so the process of how we decide and then when you became chair the elimination of the the addition of a committee unilaterally. So the process for which how we determine committees as a board we need to lay that out clearly in our bylaws. >> Yeah. Um, so I think that we all understand how that should be done because it was apparently not clear as to how that should be done. I think that's as neutally as I can say it. Um, so that we all know and understand the process in which that gets decided uh and voted on by
212the board. Um, so that nobody is confused. And then I agree with you. We should decide what we agree now should be the permanent committees, what are the most logical ones and how they get scheduled and all the stuff that you just mentioned. >> And and one of the things that um you know we we went back and forth with Keebe on this and one of our trainings is like what's a good number of committees because we know that nine was a lot for this district, right? >> That was the first unilateral meeting was nine was too much whatever it was. So, you know, I know um uh Nick had mentioned three. I think Jod had mentioned four. Um so, you know, that's something we can we could discuss um and and really define. Okay.
213So, when we meet with finance, we're really going to talk about um these contracts, this this binder, like making sure that our our budget's moving over that oversight stuff. When we meet with uh teaching and learning, we're going to talk about X Y and Z and and >> well, I think policy or governance. Some of that came up in the summer conference. >> That's why, you know, I want to, you know, I think the the book that we were just talking about the sort of how they're organized and how they how they operate as a board and the committees came up. So, we need to, you know, sort of bring that in too. Um uh but yes, what what we think what we think is a a good number, but also what we're trying to
214accomplish, what we want to deal with. And then as we talk about what our goals are, you know, what we want to deal with, well, is something really permanent or is that more of an ad hoc mission? That's something that we want to deal with temporarily and we want to make that an ad hoc committee that will function this year, but we don't want to see that as a permanent committee. >> And I would say some other larger districts, they have um maybe say they have four or five committees, but there's certain committees that meet every month, right? And other committees that don't necessarily mean to meet monthly, right? They're going to meet quarterly or every other month. So there if you look at other districts, you know, if you do have um >> you
215know, if if if there's no business to discuss um you know, for months at a time, then that might be a good quarterly meeting. Yep. >> Committee if we're going to keep it a standing committee >> or just move it to ad hoc. So that's kind of what this discussion is about. So um I I I don't I I think there is a sense of urgent there is a sense of urgency, I should say, for this to be done. um this is a state required item that we need to really outline our committees but we also want to make sure we're doing it that works best for us like the district um not really us for the district um and and put it in place um I I will say this needs to be done
216soon um so like yesterday so that there is a sense of urgency um and so you know I I know we don't have anything in front of you today but that's why we have to have this agenda so we can really discuss this >> it seems to me we want to have it done um in the next three months in the months >> by December. >> Oh, >> no. Like this month? Like September? >> Like September. It needs to be done. >> Well, I'm just saying. You understand what I'm saying? That it needs to be done. >> You want it done before new board members come on >> before Well, by the next administration, right? Well, when we would normally change committees, change, >> you know, >> this is something that was on our agenda
217back in June. It should have been kind of worked on them. I'm not I'm not arguing. I'm just saying we need to get it done. The end date is >> that when committees when we want to have the rules in place so that when somebody might be changing committees and committee assignments, the rules are in place for that. >> Yeah, definitely. >> Um Mr. Scholic. >> Yeah. Um the sense of urgency definitely is surrounding the committees and the definitions, not so much of adding and subtracting committees. That's could be the three-month timeline. But as far as defining the committees and their goals, that's something the state has insisted on seeing. So, um, we got to start having a discussion about what the board does. And I scratched some stuff out. It's been in my mind
218for a while. So, I just like to get us started, I would suggest that the finance committee concerned itself with budgetary issues and any other contracts that won't be covered by another committee. Um, that'll become clear in a minute. Instruction and support services will concern itself with curriculum, textbooks, education related um issues, field trips and student issues and any other contracts related to those. Um policy and personnel will consider concern will um deal with policy hiring recommendations and personnel contracts. um facilities. We'll deal with building related issues, contracts and security. Security has been traditionally under facilities in the past and we need somewhere to be able to discuss facilities and and and that's just to kick us off to get started. So, we have a little jumping off point. This is this has been traditionally
219what they've done before before the contracts became a committee and of the self the contracts were to this people who specialized in each area. So because finance looking at um a teaching and learning thing and you got a teacher on teaching and learning no teacher on finance we're looking at contract we don't know if it's best for people choosing between two contracts to push forward or what have you so that would be best handled in teaching and learning same thing with building same thing with and the finance being the catchall for all the rest is somewhere else everything else needs to go and that's just to get us started Anybody else want to add to that? Um Oh, that's what it was. Um can you repeat policy for me? >> What you had for policy?
220>> Policy. Policy and excuse me. policy and personnel concerns itself with policy hiring recommendations and employee related um contracts. Can >> this is a this is a suggestion um that >> policy becomes a committee of its own >> because of um the what we need to do right now in terms of the fiscal the fiscal policies that we need to change but also the over the next two years we'll be up we'll be going through all our series and I think there needs to be a lot of focus in that committee on policy and I think personnel this is just a suggestion guys personnel might need to be its own committee as needed. So it wouldn't be a a monthly committee because we're not doing we're not hiring executive directors every month, right? So we
221wouldn't need that necessarily every month. Um so my suggestion would be that personnel becomes um I wouldn't say either ad hoc committee or just a quarterly committee or as an as needed committee. We could kind of define that um tonight I guess but separate that from policy. one of the policies that we're going to be working on and and is an urgent policy is our hiring practices. So like that's that's something that's going to go before um committee soon um because of all the issues we have in the past um even this past summer with with that comm with that item. So if we could put personnel as its own committee and not not a monthly committee that's a committee that meets quarterly or as needed depending on the the need to hire an in
222executive cabinet or principles I guess Mr. Sal. >> Yeah I I I agree I agree 100%. it should be um decoupled from it. And I suggest that as a ma make it a committee make it a committee at a whole because then we get around the portion where we could all make the recommendation to the superintendent what we would have on who to hire and what have you and we could all be in executive session as you know we all can't be in executive session now at this point in time due to state statute. Um, so yeah, as far as putting quarterly and putting a date on it is I guess we just list it uh put it on the website as needed basically rather than try to set a timeline. >> Yeah. Um, did
223you say there's a state statute about executive session? >> Yeah, there's a there's a state statute that this allows non-committee members from entering executive st session. It was brought back couple of couple of years ago. So that's why you only see three or four of us when we had the meeting and other people had to stay sitting out and uh but that'll be a great way not not around it but to include all board members in the decisions that affect the board and affect the city because we are all elected to make these decisions and it's not it's not to get around for you it's to work within the con the confines and restrictions of foyer for the betterment of inclusive Anyone else? So, what I have here from the suggestions that were brought up
224um is to and this is something we'll send out out to our council to kind of run through the the bylaws for us is we have um four committees, facilities, finance, instruction, support services, and policy. and then one committee of the whole personnel that would be as needed. But those four committees would be um defined monthly monthly meetings and um can we add in that language about creating a calendar for with specific dates? Um >> go ahead. >> I was waiting. Um, we voted um two summers ago to create an ad hoc committee on staffing. Um, which never happened. Um, it was in the summer of transition from Miss Parent, Superintendent Parin to Superintendent Levy David. Um and it was based on something New Haven had done. Uh it was uh uh the ad hoc
225committee was designed to be uh um uh members of the BEA. The the BCASTs and administrators to what New Haven had done was it it said look if we had all the money we needed what how many what's what what would we be doing staff-wise? What would be the ideal staffing? to do what we wanted to do and New Haven went through that. And so, you know how the police department says we're 300 cops short all the time. You know, we're short staffed. >> Mhm. >> Well, we need to be able to do that. We need to be able to say that the concept was we need to be able to say that if we had the resources that we need to do >> and New Haven can do that. New Haven can tell you
226what is sorry I'm asking Dr. because I I thought we've had a conversation and so what Mr. was saying is that >> New Haven New Haven can tell you how many people they need, how many people they're understaffed. >> So, >> um, and they did that study three years ago, I believe. And so, we I had spoken to the board member who was involved with it. Um, and we passed a resolution to set up a committee to do that here in Bridgeport. Um, and we passed a resolution to set up such a committee here in Bridgeport to create an ideal staffing model for the Bridgeport Public Schools if we had all the resources we needed, all the money we needed. How many administrators would we have downtown? How many administrators would we have for the
227buildings? How many teachers would we have? How many, you know, it's the ideal staffing levels. Um, how many paras would we have? How many secretaries would we have? How many cafeteria workers would we have? How many custodians would he have? How many staff people would George have? You know, how you know, all that stuff? Um and it and so that was what New Haven did so that they could say this is how many people were understaffed in this area. Um, and it just gave you the ability to do it gave us the ability to say this is what we really need if we had the resources that we and I know we don't have that. We have none of those staffing models that and most districts have those. You know, if you had a 500
228members campus, you should be able to get this, this, this, and that. You know, we don't have any of those things in practice right now. >> No, no, I know that this I'm just saying we did pass that resolution two years ago and then it floundered in the transition from >> technically you don't need a resolution for that. That's what you pay. >> We had we had a committee that was going to >> the HR department is one who does that. They make the recommendation and then we bring that back to the board for consideration. But we're we're so short-handed in HR, you can't even begin to have >> Well, that would certainly be one place that you would >> It's a very intense process to to be able to come up with those. Now,
229we can we can take there's models out there that we can grab and use, but >> I don't see that. I I don't see as as a former president of one of the bargaining units, I don't see that as strictly in HR because the teachers and the social workers, the these different people have different >> But but that's what the superintendent does though. His that's what his cabinet does is to to look at those areas of >> I understand that you professionally have that point of view. I do. I respect that and I I would respect your point of view on that and your opinion on that. But you also understand what I'm saying that that professionals might disagree with your opinion on that. Um, a professional a professional social workers association might disagree on
230what proper social work staffing is. A professional psychologist association might disagree on what the proper staffing level is for psychologists. Uh, you know, I'm just saying that that was the point was to to have a crew of people sit down, a committee of people, and hash it out what the the ideal staffing level would be. And that is what they did in New Haven. It was done by a a committee of people. And I'm and I'm as I I'm curious to to kind of because I wasn't I don't have the historical piece on that. And that's probably one of the reasons why it it went to the wayside is because it's very intense to be able to kind of bring all of those together. I respectfully understand >> went to the wayside here because lots
231of people wanted to participate and then we hired a new superintendent >> and she didn't want to do it. >> Oh, this recently? >> No, >> in 2023. >> Oh, 23. Okay. uh but >> so that is what happened. So I'm only raising it as a possible subcommittee ad hoc committee for us to to uh >> so I think for the purpose of this we need to define what standing committees are and then ad hoc what an ad hoc hold on what ad hoc committee is and then once we define an ad hoc committee then we can go back and say let's start our career committee on the the staffing and start that but right now just be specific on like we want to start ad hoc committee on x y and z we don't
232even know what ad hoc committee is because it's not defined in our bylaws. I >> I don't disagree with you. You were already discussing specific ad hoc committees. That's why I raised >> No, those are those are the those are those would be standing committees. These would be standing committees that we're talking. >> You were discussing a personnel >> as a standing committee. >> Yes. As an ad hoc. >> No, I said as a standing committee but quarterly or something. It wouldn't be a monthly meeting. >> I misunderstood you then, >> Mr. Sakalic. >> Yeah. Um, I think we should accept as a possible first read at the at the very least tonight. So, we got some forward progress the decoupling of personnel >> from policy. >> Yeah. >> To make it a standing committee
233that meets as needed. >> Committee of the whole. I second that. >> Any further debate on that motion? >> All in favor say I. >> I. >> Any opposed? Any abstensions? Is there any other motions that anyone wants to make on on these items? Uh yeah, I'd like to make a motion for well I can't compel the board to do anything to add to my suggestions by email and bring it back to the next meeting so we could have fully defined committees to push forward. >> Yeah. So you want to make a motion or just ask the board to do that? >> Yeah. >> So if you if you guys everybody who just >> added something tonight, send an email to me. Can can you send an email to me? Um, and I'll I'll work
234with um our council to kind of define everything and and make it into our bylaw and it'll come before the the board again as a first read item. Mr. Cmir, what we decided today? But so it'll be as of right now there there's the finance committee, instruction support service committee, policy, facilities and those would be monthly committees. So standing committees and then the personnel committee will also be a standing committee but that would be meeting as needed >> as a committee of the whole sorry that's important part piece. um also added um in that we would um put into the bylaws that we would create a calendar with specific dates for each committee um to be posted to the website. Um and that could if we need to do additional language that can be approved
235by December when we when we or January 1st or whatever when we create the committees we can create a date I don't know when when would that be by the first board meeting of the of the new year. So that would have to be because our committees change in December in early January that would have to be said there like the calendar would have to be approved then. Would that make sense? We should have a date on when we should approve the calendar. That way we're not creating these committees that say, "Oh yeah, they're going to be on the calendar and then come March we still don't have the calendar." That's what I'm trying to say. Yeah. So I'll put with a with a with a date. We could decide the date later. We'll work
236on the dates. >> Yeah. Any Was there anything else that I missed? So, we'll put that language in. Miss Sister May, >> I have um something for Dr. Avery, not related to the policies. >> Okay. So, we're gonna um any So, we'll move on from that and then so we'll add on to what you have to say. Go ahead. >> Okay. Thank you. Um so, I had two items, Dr. Avery. Um the first one is about the silent panic alarms. So, I wanted to know, we chatted about this in the spring, sometime in the spring, and wanted to know what the what the plan was for potential implementation into the schools. >> Yes, we we talked to this prior to the end of school year. We talked about and we demoed it and gave you
237guys a a preview of what that actually is and what it does for the campuses. Uh I am going to suggest to the board that we have a um an executive meeting with uh assistant chief uh Greck. Uh it is a a potential district protocol for safety and we don't want it out in the public in a way to where we we kind of compromise what we're doing. Uh but it I think it's a a a strong possibility to be able to implement that pretty quick. uh you know at a I think we can we could run as as starting as early as probably September October you know have a couple of pilot schools that we can start it with there is some protocol involved because the panic button can go directly to the police
238and fire and all that we may not want to you know we may not want to implement the fullfledged but do some practice things within the demo you know our pilots to where there's an incident happens in a building, they can punch the building for a fight or a leak or something like that to where we can get staff to get used to it. Uh there is also about $2 million available through the state for grant purposes to purchase and to uh solidify that. Uh the grant funding uh is not um we're still right now waiting for um the a funds to become available. It was passed in the legis legislative session. The grants department is watching and getting ready to make sure that we we we we can apply their competitive grants. Uh but
239I think we should be able to get some dollars to support the implementation of it. Um, again, the request for um the monies is not out there yet, but again, I just think assistant, you know, Chief Gret could kind of give the board the pros and cons of, you know, what this system could do for the district uh in making sure that we we understand the magnitude of it because it's now the state of the state of Connecticut and the governor is promoting it as Well, for schools in Connecticut, that's why there there's two $2.6 million available. >> Yeah. Just a point not on the agenda. We like >> this is into a discussion about this. >> Yeah. So, this isn't Yeah. So, this is just a recommendation. This is a You want a recommendation
240for this one? >> Yes. >> Okay. Um, any other any other recommendations for anything because we're going to end the meeting soon, but >> I have one last recommendation for Dr. Avery. Um, which would be the potential looking at or the grants department to potentially do fundraising. Um, I know that's a tall order to ask, but I got the idea from one of the community um forums where someone said, "Let's go to Greenwich and get that 1% money." So, that's kind of where my thought process was going. Not sure if the grants department is the best place, but I kind of wanted to look at additional monies coming into the district. >> We could Yeah, we could refer that to a finance committee. Um, you Mr. Medina, did you have something? >> Make a motion.
241I did have my hand. >> Okay. There's another point of or something point of privilege, but do you want to make a motion adjourn? All right. Somebody had a point of privilege. So, Mr. Banahan. There's any further Mr. Benahan, do you have something? >> Yeah. Right. Thank you, Madam Chair. I'm going to brief I'm going to be very fast because what I'm going to say is because a lot of people they think that the boardation of the cabinet of the staff we was not doing nothing in the summer. And the reason I'm saying this is because one of the big things is because I know we do a lot of thing in the summer and I can say the uh the community forum you know we did at four um I know um sorry Mr.
242that Trevor said about the the cave when when we went to Westbrook, you know, it was amazing. The tack force of special education, the Dominican parade um walking through the bassic bridge elevate when we go to gala, they recognize a lot of students for Bridgeport school. um Puerto Rican pre when we they see us was very happy to see the board for the third year, you know, and you know, and parents and student was very happy that um the new center, you know, we cutting the the the other day the the um the ribbon, everybody was in enjoy, everybody like it. The one of the last one was the Dumbar school and I like, you know, um Saturday parents came uh the staff came, you know, and why I'm saying this because people they think
243we're not doing nothing. your staff that day every Saturday and Sunday like they was working. I came because the day we put the raising the flag of Ecuador, you had two staff getting out of that building because they were trying to do everything done for the week and I respect that because when they supposed to be home and relaxing, they was working you know and I I like to acknowledge that. Um one of the big things Dumbar School um former chair and vice chair Mr. Hernand he worked with a company called Breedor with the human resource. They donate almost 350 book bags for the students only for Dumbar. And the last thing I'm going to say this, one of the last thing that is thank you for the staff because they do an amazing job
244now in the summer and they don't never give up. And I really appreciate that. People they don't see that people like to talk you know think they don't supposed to talk but they don't come to you and ask you Dr. Avery what they doing or what or they ask one of the board members what the staff they doing. wake up because if they come and talk to you and they ask you, they will see what they doing. And I'm I've witnessed that. And one of the last thing is, and I was supposed to say this in the beginning, but everything was so fast. I like to have before we meet um leaving a minute of silence because I know we had two staff pass away. One of them was Mr. Vehio. He was a crossing
245guard of Bridgeport Public School and the second one was Isaiah Visan. He was the security of Curry School. Two amazing phenomenal people, two gentlemans. They work very good with Brisb public school, support the parents, love so much the students. And I would like to have a get a minute of silence for them, please. >> We'll have a moment of silence. >> Thank you, Madam Chair, and thank you everyone. >> Thank you. I just want to remind the board that tomorrow we have um the ribbon cutting for Bassic High School at 1:00 p.m. Um I think five of us went today and Miss Cmir, Mr. Traver, Mr. Medina, myself and Mr. Woodson were there. Um and it's a and I know other board members have gone to see the school and it's it's really um an
246amazing uh thing that it's it's amazing the school. So um so I think you know there I know there's a lot of issues still with the traffic concerns and you know the environmental concerns there but with giving the students this this opportunity um you know we had to thank the board members of the past who who voted on that um um because I think it's an amazing opportunity for them. So please come tomorrow if you have a chance at 1 p.m. for the ribbon cutting and then our convocation will be on um Wednesday morning at the amphitheater. And then the lastly, if you if you can visit schools on the first day of school, please reach out to Olivia. She's reach she's been reaching out to some of the board members. Um if you're able
247to see like visit a couple schools, she has she's going to kind of divide us up so that we're not all at one school. Um and and put us with some certain staff members so that we can so all the schools are touched by somebody in the district on the first day. Um so reach out to Olivia. She's working on that. Um she was working on it today. So um is there motion to adjourn, Miss Point? No. There was no motion. >> Small point of personal privilege. >> I just wanted to make sure our very to acknowledge our very own Alicia Parin is now the new assistant superintendent for instruction and leadership and school improvement up in New Haven. So I just want to shout out and make a motion to adjurnn. >> Second by
248Mr. Shakalik. All in favor? I. >> We're journing at 10:20.