Board of Education Meeting

001God indivisible withy and justice for all so in terms of roll call we have a full um board assembled today uh everybody's here thanks everybody um for being here on time and getting ready to go uh we're going to begin today with the uh recognition of staff and students so um I have for you a well I'm going to start with a proclamation let me see where we are about teacher and staff appreciation week so um it's kind of long but it's heartfelt so um this is a resolution whereas Brookfield teachers open children's mind to the magic of ideas knowledge and dreams and whereas Brookfield teachers keep American democracy Alive by laying the foundation for good citizenship and whereas Brookfield teachers demonstrate a passion for teaching that inspires enthusiasm for Learning and whereas Brookfield teachers

002fill many roles as listeners explorers role models motivators and mentors and whereas Brookfield teachers are the key to the quality and success of Brookfield schools and whereas Brookfield teachers continue to influence our children long after their school days are only memories be it resolved that the Brookfield Board of Education supports and endorses May 6th to May 10th 2024 as teacher staff appreciation week and that the board extends its wholehearted appreciation to Brookfield teachers for their outstanding contribution to the children children of our community and urge all members of our community to take time to recognize and acknowledge the impact of teachers on our lives so that is it and I understand that Mrs niggard is here Mrs nard and Mr K are here to accept the well wishes of the board that's wonderful so much

003thank you thank you thank you thank you great to have you here thank you so much thank [Applause] you sweet and the good news just keeps coming because we also have a proclamation about School nurses day and we understand are you are you Ashley nurer stand here just get get the whole thing for yourself absorb it and then share it with your wonderful colleagues okay so uh I have another Proclamation equally heartfelt whereas through their skill and expertise our Pati School nurses help to foster a healthy nurturing community in which our children can learn and grow and whereas most often School nurses are the first and sometimes the only line of defense against the illnesses and conditions our students face making their contribution to the education and Welfare of the student population invaluable and whereas

004the nature of their profession calls on their ability to take on roles beyond that of Health provider acting as teacher Confidant mentor and friend to the students of Connecticut and whereas today's society presents students with an overwhelming number of physical social and mental ills and School nurses have become an essential component of effective health programs both in and out of the classroom and whereas the overwhelming dedication School nurses show to their profession and the children they care for stands as a testament to their commitment to the success and wellness of Connecticut's future Generations now therefore be it resolved that the Brookfield Board of Education supports and endorses May 8th to 2024 as School nurses day and that the board extends its wholehearted appreciation to Brookfield nurses for their outstanding contribution to the children of our

005community and urge all members of the community to take time to recognize and acknowledge the role of these nurses in our lives thank you very much than for being here thank you very much thank you that's really awesome so the board and superintendent would like to recognize the students you may have noticed there are students here who participated in the 17th annual hrr which is the honic resource recovery Authority annual poster contest um Dr BR are you prepared to help out with this absolutely you ready for me to to do that okay thank you Dr yabut so um I would like to invite to the podium to get ready for the presentation our annual and 15th presentation Mrs gramling how lucky are we the superintendent and the board's wonderful secretary thank you everybody it is

006oh thank you so good evening everyone and welcome to the 17th annual honic resources recovery Authority or the HR as we like to call it uh annual poster contest winter celebration I have practiced that for a week that is a mouthful it is so great to see all of you here tonight my name is Lisa gramling I'm the secretary to uh superintendent burill and I'm also the regional coordinator for this poster contest um I just want to give a little overview on the process uh the hrra gives us a theme that we must follow every year and this year our theme was keep it Loose don't bag or bundle your recyclables um we had almost 90 entries this year and seven Regional winners so you should all very proud of that um some new changes

007to the contest this year the HR really up the ante um giving both both the designated Town coordinator and the teacher each a $250 prize um and instead of one grand prize winner they offered four this year uh which each received $500 so grades K to2 the grand prize Regional winner won 500 uh grades 3 to5 uh $500 grades 6 to8 and grades 9 to 12 so um we send the templates to the schools and they pass them out to the students and the students have about a month a month and a half to um do their posters and then they're judged on a local level in the building first second and third place for each grade um after that the first place winners come back to our office and then we package everything up

008and we send it off um to the regional meeting and then they're judged on a regional level so there's really a lot of incentive here um have to say this year the entries that we got were absolutely magnificent um you should all be so proud uh of your work um a huge thank you to the principls and the secretaries and coordinators the teacher honestly there's so much that goes into this and this could not be done uh without you so um we really really appreciate your help so without further Ado we're going to get going with our winners here and we are I'm going to ask Dr pep saski to come help me you remember the order that we went through so let me just grab my sheet here okay so for kindergarten first place

009and second place Regional winner is Everly hoy for kindergarten second place we have Carter [Music] Harding for kindergarten third place we have ay yang [Applause] I'm going to apologize with the names I'm going to do my absolute best I did practice that for two weeks okay first grade first place and third place Regional winner dwan Babar so um just a point of order the regional winners um you should have received your posters um the HRA does an annual celebration on or around Earth day they had that last week so um those of you that are just getting ribbons only should have received your uh your posters already so thank you so first grade second place we have ailia Mackie that's first grade third place Uma [Applause] Burger second grade first place and third place Regional

010winner Santiago deio he so cute second grade second place grayan [Applause] Korea second grade third place mohill bsar [Applause] third grade first place uh yayi [Applause] hun third grade second place Ethan herel [Applause] third grade third place Sophia [Applause] [Laughter] Borges fourth grade first place and second place Regional winner Hannah mlan [Applause] fourth grade second place natal zigel Meer fourth grade third place we actually have a tie for third the first is Reagan [Applause] Mano for fourth grade third place Eliza [Applause] Bal fifth grade first place and first place Regional winner Al Mukerji better than I know aren't these P these poster entries are absolutely amazing fifth grade second place Elijah huling and fifth grade third place Owen balish okay Mr Renda you're up yes oh wow look at that so sixth grade first place

011and first place Regional winner Amber Jang sixth grade second place nikil manoir seventh grade first place and third place Regional winner Zion balal Artic seventh grade second place Stella Drago seventh grade third place yina [Applause] hun and eighth grade first place Elisa so once again um we just want to thank all of you for being here um for every student that um sent in an entry you guys did a fantastic job thank you to all of you um and we will see you next year thank you so much they don't have to a second for the room to clear [Music] out or we could just that little boy Carter is the cutest whoever Carter is the cutest or is his grandson congratulations he's coming good to see you sir she told me stories she told

012me [Music] stories byebye have a good night everybody really beautiful and Wendy if I could share one thing before we move on to the while we're on the spirit of appreciation and recognition very important today was also principal day so we want to recognize our principles out there yay principal principl principal day happy princip day principal day and as we're putting together the the different recognitions uh Mrs gramling also at the end of this year will be celebrating 25 years with school district so I had to say that right on right on well let's let the uh good news keep on coming and the next item on the agenda is the student representative report so Ava what do you have for us tonight I have a lot of updates tonight actually as we get toward

013May and June there's all these end of year things so starting off AP exams are coming up over these next two weeks so they start this Monday May 6 and go until May 17th um the counseling department just sent out the schedule with all the days of the different exams some of the exams are on a digital format so students have started to download that program on their computers senior prom is going to be on May 24th it'll be at the Waterview in Monroe students have a scheduled half day half day that day so they have to be in school for the entire half day in order to attend seniors also have some other things going on we have a senior class trip to Holiday Hills that's going to be on June 3rd so those

014tickets are on sale Mrs geneves is amazing about advertising all of these scholarship opportunities so she's been getting the word out about a lot of those recently for seniors on May 15th of representative from the Connecticut state will be at Brookfield High School to answer all questions about nguk Valley community college and that application process just kind of helping kids through that if they're interested and decision day would normally be today May 1st but a lot of things have been pushed back because FAFSA is being simplified and reorganized so seniors are going to come to school on May 15th and rep all of their um colleges on May 15th instead for athletics I have a bunch of updates last Sunday Carter sarowitz got the National Football Foundation scholar athlete award and on Monday Carter sarowitz

015along with Philip Ferrara were honored at the aquaturf and received the CIA Unified sports award on Thursday Sunny Williams and Katherine Sosi are going to receive the S swc leadership award at a banquet in Stratford and Jack Morlock and Ahmad Hashi will receive the same will receive a s swc leadership award for Unified sports at the same banquet on Sunday Sasha gelfan and Ava wouth will be honored at the cia's scholar athlete banquet and last Thursday we had the annual College signing day here at the high school for all the student athletes committed to play their Sports in college so I'm just going to read off the students who are committed Mr Baldwin gave me a list of everyone our commits for baseball are Sam consalvo and Nick Peta for basketball Valentina iello and Shane

016Weber for cheer Alyssa Eaton for lacrosse Carter sarowitz Caroline Korea Brett Palmer and Liam McCurry for soccer Jack Morlock Austin holey Riley McGee Courtney St Abby Crist and Ryan sharp for softball Kaya Zimmerman Katherine Brooks and Izzy barrero for track Olivia Walters and for volleyball Ryan Doo on May 23rd Brookfield athletics department will be sending 25 female scholar athlete students to the women in leadership conference and on May 17th Vanessa Greenstein will be making a presentation at the Connecticut Association of school in chesher on behalf of the CIA State student athletic Advisory board for its culminating presentation focusing on CIA Class Act initiative designed to empower schools and particularly about students taking ownership for issues related to sportsmanship Brookfield is the state leaders and athletic advisory Mr baldman wanted me to mention that um and

017Mr bla and Mr baldman will be there for that presentation on May 29th Ava wouth will be presenting at the Connecticut Association of schools on behalf of the cisa student Equity Advisory Board which focuses on student initiatives aimed for fostering inclusivity and embracing diversity in con Connecticut schools this year so this year the topics are mental health and social emotional learning equality in coaching facilities and Equipment advancing representation of people of color addressing racial disparities and gender disparities and providing support for students with disabilities Mr Baldwin and mrbo will be at this presentation at the end of May our athletic advisory officers will be going to whiner to make a presentation to eth graders about Class Act and all about what it's like to be a high school athlete kind of just give them some

018advice as they're about to go up to the high school um and the athletic advisory is also going to be running field days for Candlewood Lake Elementary School in early June finally for some of the clubs that I'm in NHS we have some end of year things coming up we have our banquet which will be towards the end of this month our Mother's Day 5K is going to be on May 12th so we're organizing getting things together for that and like I've mentioned before that's all those proceeds are going to the Connecticut Children's Hospital we're also going to be volunteering at some Brookfield events such as the Brookfield block party some YMCA the healthy kids event and the master year finals event that'll be here at the high school we are also having a blood

019drive on June 18th at the Congregational Church of Brookfield finally for youth commission we've just been recapping and reviewing our career fair that we held in March just going over the student feedback we've received and maybe planning some changes that will apply for next year's event I know that was a lot but that's everything thank you thank you AA um I I have a question when is the blood drive June 18th yeah okay and I um I'm trying to get back in that habit what what are the dates on that the the I'm sorry the times I apologize um I'm not exactly sure what the times are they just announced it at our meeting today um we've had a couple throughout the year they've been at there's one at St margarites one at the high

020school I'm pretty sure it's an all day event but they they're working right now on getting people to sign up and just getting the word out great thank you questions for I have one Wendy Eva so I've been waiting for a couple of weeks she just told us she gets two more weeks two more weeks so so no she was going to tell us tonight I know but she just said because of the PSA got to push you can't tell us yeah I just committed to University thank you thank you I'm really excited it's going to be a great congratulations thank you thanks wonder have a good night of course have a great night that is Splendid all right so now we'll move to the next item which is public comment um the Board of

021Ed welcomes public comment each speaker will have up to three minutes to provide input to the board at the start of each regular meeting a maximum of 20 minutes is allotted for comment on any item included on the agenda for that meeting at the end of the meeting um time is allotted for comment on items within the board's jurisdiction which also includes overflow time although we won't have that this evening um discussion of school Personnel individual students or of individual members of the board is prohibited and the first person up is um Mr Highland actually he had a topic that wasn't on the agenda yeah I'm sorry Mr Highland uh my my bad yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah thanks Mr we've we've been discussing it thanks everyone um so Mrs Korea Irene Korea you're up

022first please um hi Irene Korea 45 West whisky near Road um on tonight's agenda there are two meeting options for the 2024 25 school year one option is 16 meetings and the other is 12 meetings for the 2019 2020 school year the Boe had 18 meetings on their schedule this District this District needs more oversight and not less the turnaround to tackle problems meet objectives update policies review budgets and react to the issues facing a 3,000 person organization cannot be reduced the board has not updated policies that c recommended almost three years ago how can you update these policies when you meet less often I think the current schedule of 16 meetings is not enough to help fix this district and Get It On Track we still have issues with special educ ation building conditions

023and stagnant test scores I ask you to scrap the 12 and 16 meeting schedules and go back to the 18 meeting schedule thank you uh thank you very much and um the next person is Andy Korea Andy Korea also 45 westwest Road um so I agree with ir about the Boe meeting schedule there is not enough oversight fewer meetings is left less oversight she mentioned um policies that have not been updated I mean the policies that were not updated for quite some that recently updated and were not for a while were like when we had a board member was focused on policies for like 6 years and they missed the grading policy graduation requirement policy a bullying law for 2 years so this is like really basic stuff um the other thing I want to

024speak about is the the process for the evaluation of the superintend um I've received the evaluation of the superintendent uh from last year right and when I look at it there's some things in there that just um just are low quality from a process perspective so for example one of the objectives was to build excitement around school start times that's not the sort of thing that you can measure right also well it's great if people like the school T star times it really doesn't really Drive anything to move forward nor is it an appropriate objective at the superintendent or executive level it is more reflective I think of maybe a personal uh preference of somebody who maybe drove that project I don't think that's a useful use of the board's um evaluation policy process there

025also was no mention um you know through midyear uh of adding an objective to fix the special special education problems there was some mention of you know how hiring went and those positions were were referenced but for something as large that was in the paper quite a bit that drove incremental spending for a study should have been in the evaluation it's also 15% you know of the population and there's federal laws around what you need to do so that should be in there um also in terms of the feedback of some of the board members there was one board member that gave input that the athletic website didn't have player bios and they were focused on or had a comment about how they heard about the cheer team's swc Championship ad nauseum so that was

026the first time they've ever won the the uh a championship and the year before there was some bullying issues and useum means to the point you want to throw up so when you go and you look at the superintendent's um performance please take it seriously and not focus on personal issues but rather systematically you know how do we manage the district as a whole to make sure that we're getting to outcomes I will send you the information I have from last year and I'll point out the problems I find with it I also sent you an email I intended to have given you more Headway but the meeting agenda comes out so late um You by law you have 24 hours if you know you're going to have what's going to be on the agenda

027you have it 3 days before I think it would be meaningful for the community to put it out early and then I'll be able to get you an email earlier but if you look through the email I've laid out what I view are concerns with performance that I think to be addressed thank you then this is not on the okay so I think I think that those are u based on what's on our um based on what's on the agenda I believe that those are the only uh pieces of public comment that are pertinent to the agenda the other ones will be um after the meeting so uh let's move now to uh written correspondents um Stephanie what do you have for us um the following people wrote us emails Christina Zimmerman background checks of

028BPS employees Foya employee substitute subsidiary payroll question Aon Scalera whis ker website Kim gerardi June 19th the federal holiday Matt Grimes complaint under policy 1312 all right thank you um is there any discussion about those okay let's move to the next item which is the approval of board minutes I move that the board approve the minutes listed below as recommended regular meeting on 41024 board retreat on 42724 great the um motion to approve the minutes has been um made and seconded um all in favor I any opposed okay so the um the motion passed es uh unanimously the minutes are approved next we'll move to the superintendent's update all right thank you everybody good evening uh lots of lots of great things going on um wanted to update everybody on the swatting Grant we're working

029with uh emry burnhard from Connecticut Center for school safety with a few districts and uh building in some training and getting a grant on swatting it would have to do with software as well as 2 to three days of training which not only involve our staffs at the school and at central office but sro's so hopefully we'll receive that Grant and be able to move forward on that either over the summer or in the fall something like that so just keeping you updated on that um I want to thank uh the team uh our special education department whis skiner uh Nicole buckton our dean of students for putting on the parent of University a couple of weeks ago at whis skiner uh top topics covered were managing anxiety peer relations body image organizational skills and

030strategies special education rights social media and building assets I think we had 35 to 40 parents attend so we're really excited about about that evening um I know um uh there's a lot of pride in what happened over there at whiskin Aire so thank you all for putting the time in for that um I now would like to invite Eric to the podium he is going to share with us some really exciting updates in technology uh that were conducted over spring break specific to kendlewood Lake but also some updates that are going on with technology at both uh at the district level as well as the high school and middle school so Eric please thanks Dr Burl U yeah very excited to be here to give you a quick update on uh what was a

031very busy spring break and a very busy spring as we uh head into the end of the school year um one is is is not the most exciting to the uh the end user of computers but we did have an ongoing Network issue at CES that was impacting parts of the building um thankfully with the with the break we were able to have a day with no students take everything down and get that back and fixed and we've been reliable uh on that ever since um so uh it's it's a great opportunity for us to work through that kind of stuff um the clees multi- room uh multi-purpose room projector um has not been finished but over spring break it was um part of that involved um moving the screen they lowered the screen they

032lowered the projector so now um that's another location where we can do presentations and and do all that equipment the interactive floor projectors they're called beam Pros they have been installed in both the multi-purpose room and the gross motor room um we have been uh impatiently waiting for those they're very exciting uh and next steps are us to get trade learn how to use and manage and maintain the system and then and then get the kids to start uh um having some fun um there's a lot of great lessons and activities built into those uh that'll be great for PE classes and Beyond um along with that in that same vein of thought the L interactive gymnasium system the one that we really have been talking about um that has the big wall projection um

033that was finished over the spring break as well and again we're waiting on some training and um and uh information on on getting that up and running um and we uh look for an opportunity to showcase that uh it's a really really exciting piece of technology uh that we've been talking about for a while um also another big one digital signage there's many TVs and projectors around CES that have been um off for some time um those were worked on the um digital signage devices were installed over spring break um we're just waiting from the vendor who actually emailed me earlier to get access for us to start programming those and within the next week or so um we uh anticipate having digital signage around the building I know uh Dr P and his staff

034are really looking forward to having that signage around the building um and so are we um in the vein of in the same concept of of digital signage today we just uh were informed that we were awarded a grant of just over $220,000 from the state um to build uh to but digital signage in here at the high school and at whiskin ear um and Our intention with that is to is to match what we were had installed at um at CES and so we're going to start with our main entrances and and upgrade some of the TVs and the signage there and and again we're really excited to have a digital signage platform throughout the whole district and uh you know thanks for the state Grant to helping us move that forward uh new

035bell and paging systems were installed at whiskin and the high school over spring break the paging and Bell systems uh well The Whisky didn't have a bell system uh didn't need one um but the high school had a aging Bell system and both p uh paging systems were were very old um and so the same vendor that did our phones came in and upgraded those and uh uh Mark and Dean I could say everything everything went uh very seamlessly the vendor did a great job and they're already using the paging system we have training scheduled for next week um and we can learn how to use them uh the Bell System uh which is going to be a more user friendly than what we had at the high school before uh earlier this week the

036district received 800 new Chromebooks um a lot of them are stacked out there locked away um this was the last round of the emergency connectivity fund Grant the ECF Grant um these are much needed and we look forward to getting them out to mostly clees and and whis Ander um the purpose of them is uh for students to use in and out of school and we look forward to coming up with a plan to to get more devices into more our students hands um you know when they need to use them we recently received final specs in pricing on our new contract for our copers uh we are in year six it was originally a 5year we extended one year because of the opening of CES um and the reason why I bring that up

037is um just a little background for many of the board members six years ago when we did this we went from a fleet of 320 machines down to 72 we were able to fine-tune the opening of CES helped us learn what we need what we don't need and we dropped that even more and now we're down to 52 machines districtwide um based on our needs and and layout of the schools and uh we are very excited to move forward and and continue working with Canon on that um finally the last one I have for you is uh the townwide radio project for the Board of Ed portion which involves handheld radios um for for the new staff and and integration with the town uh that system was installed uh before and during spring break with

038the exception of one antenna that still has to be installed at kwood Lake School once that's complete they will deliver all of our um handheld radios um and do a training and we will have a brand new radio system and then soon enough um I don't have a timeline on that now but soon enough the town will be on their new system and it will be one integrated system um throughout the town before spring break the IT department went to the headquarters of the radio provider we got a training and a demo and and we're really excited to to bring this um forward great great for security and safety that's all I have excellent Eric thank you so much Eric does anybody have any questions about technology for Eric while we have them up here

039I know there was a lot there but I wanted to make sure he got a a lot of thorough information there Eric thank you can we make a proclamation for technology director Appreciation Day May 1st I have one so thanks Eric um continuing on um for the CES parking lot we're going to have an interim plan for the spring uh matter of fact today we actually met with the contractor with the MBC uh School administr ation and uh the police major chief and uh the SRO over at kandlewood Lake the transition to the interim plan will happen um in two Mondays May 13th uh Dr P and the team put together a site map with arrows and it's colorcoded with explanation of where and we'll have a fleet of Patrol officers to help us where

040parents are going to have a new drop off for the five to last five to six weeks of the year and staff will be transitioning from the temporary parking lot to the north parking lot in a little bit of the South lot while the remainder of the south parking lot uh gets a lot of work started uh before we uh End School over the summer a lot of the sidewalk and concrete work in front of the school is going to be worked on and the South lot will be completed um for those of you who have driven by you'll notice the new driveway at the old Huckleberry cutout for the driveway is essentially complete the curving is in the asphalt you see is is the base coat of asphalt that you can paint and you

041can drive on on in a temporary fashion um it will get a full uh final coat probably in early August over the summer and a repaint so we're really excited we're getting there there's there's a good six seven weeks of work though over the summer to get the parking lot sidewalks Etc really up to par to the vision that and and the design that we had uh have always planned so look forward to everybody seeing that um kindergarten enrollment uh very quickly uh 113 students are fully registered for kindergarten in the coming year 17 of the students are students um we their birthdays after September 1st and they've gone through the waiver process with the administration and the staff um Food Service we're going to be transitioning to Chartwell so I'd like to turn it

042over to Casey share a little bit about that sure so um we've been talking about this um over the last several months at the finance committee um that as a result of um moving from the four school buildings down to three we did have to go out to bid again for our food service manager or uh prog vendor and um so that process completed we did have three qualified um um bids that came in um the scoring team was uh myself uh Joan Reynolds our accounting supervisor and Julian kidos who's our purchasing manager with the the board in the town um it was a very intensive uh scoring process we had a whole half day of training through the state that was required um to sit through and listen to live there was no going

043back and watching a video um and um and then we essentially the three of us met we we sort of reviewed the criteria um there's many different areas it's not just lowest and best um price and cost is the most heavily weighted um factor that we did score the the the proposals on um but just so you have an idea of the comprehensive um packages that were submitted and what we evaluated price and cost was highest um High highest weighted but then there's experience references and service capability Financial conditions stability and business practices accounting and Reporting systems personnel management and training Innovation and promotion of the school Food Service program involvement of students staff and Community menus concepts of food food quality and the use of USDA foods and finally support for Connecticut's Farm toch

044school program um I think the three of us um Jules Joan and myself we went into this you know we've been very happy with with witson we didn't really expect that we would you know necessarily make a change at this point um there nothing that was glaringly bad about witzens we've been very happy with them um but the the really the second sort of half of the SC the scoring process is really where Chartwell sort of scored higher um in more in more areas and um so surprisingly I think at the end of it and we scored it all very independently and then came back at the end of the day and said let's add up our points and when we we were a little bit surprised um how that came out but we thought

045it was very important it's a very um it's a very prescriptive process that that has to be followed and it's very specific that we we evaluate these proposals on the content provided in these um packages not on what we personally know to be true about our current um program and so um in doing that we did um award um chart Wells with with the um with the contract the contract right now is at the state it has to be reviewed by the state and check all the boxes um we did um give an a letter of intent to Chartwell so that they could start you know all their process they have a a lot of work to do it would be a July 1 um contract and um so we look forward to bringing that

046to you for for your approval and I think that contract would be brought for the May 22nd absolutely yeah hope hopefully we don't have it back from the state yet but by then we we certainly should so yeah and and oh I'm sorry no go ahead no please I just have a quick question did they is any part of what's being considered a food waste portion like did they build in any kind of like food waste program where they collect everything's prepackaged is that yeah that wasn't necessar not that's prescriptive in the scoring um and I have all these bid proposals in my office you're welcome to for through them there really is so much information and it it gets you a little excited about what the possibilities could be um so we are looking

047forward um you know as hard as it was to make a change like I said we're very happy with with witson and they've been great Partners um but but but we're we're excited to to see what's what comes next thank you yep um I want to ask about um I mean I'm sure you had this on your mind the budgetary implications so the Food Service program is um separate and independent from the Board of Education operating budget it's its own fund and it's um essentially uh you can bid it different several different ways with um a for-profit or a uh budget neutral we are budget neutral so um B essentially the vendor has to guarantee a break even um and and we get the the um reimbursements from the from the state for the uh

048free and reduced meals it really sort of manages itself yeah absolutely in Casey there'll be no new cost to family we don't anticipate no we don't and no everything was bid on the the current existing um cost of lunges yep and I I could share um from other professional experience working with Chartwells they've done a great job in a former District that I was in so you know again like Casey said we're excited for that happy with witson but excited for chart walls as well and the school bux will work the same um yes as of right now yep absolutely okay all right so I wanted just to to talk briefly about it different committee meetings and so forth and maybe um with the full board uh the district uh we are going to be

049moving as as most of you know at the high school level we go through the New England Association of schools and colleges um accreditation process um it typically a decennial process and then there's interim um uh progress updates and so forth uh that we go through in terms of assessment and uh Dr man and Dean and Dave have been doing some work over the last year and we we want to move to using that framework um through the whole District so not just at the high school but K through 8 and so Dr man could you share a little bit about that and actually Dr man's coming off the heels where she led uh a visit at Middletown High School I feel like I'm I'm still on the heels actually I just came from Middletown

050High SCH so where I was theair of a visiting committee for AAL visit so um so as you probably know and I will make this very brief because there'll be a lot more information forthcoming but we did want to just let the kind of give the board a heads up as Dr burill stated um our high school is currently accredited by Nas which it is affectionately referred to New England Association of schools and colleges um and the uh it's a standards accreditation right there are five standards there are principles related to standard foundational elements that are requisite parts of each of those um standards um and the process is essentially self-reflection in preparation for a collaborative conference which will happen in 2026 that's when our collaborative conference is as of now sometimes things change um

051like a pandemic but hopefully we won't have that um so in 2026 we'll have it's almost like a pre-conference a pre uh you know uh reference point and then um from that collaborative conference we will set some priority areas for our our um for what we're hoping to do for our district so about 10 or 12 years back Nas expanded um from just public secondary schools to K through 12 so they do now do accreditations of full districts um and the the benefit of doing a full District accreditation is that it is becomes in line with our portrait of a graduate um which is a prek through 12 uh document or will be a prek through2 document and it helps um with that continuity of um vocabulary of expectations um for our schools right so

052that everybody's talking the same language and we're all kind of just like we have our standards based curriculum this is essentially a standards-based uh process to hold all of us accountable to ourselves and to our peers with best practices and um expectations so that we can have the best District that we can possibly provide for our students and it is not um it I don't it's not particular we do have a cost to to uh subscribe to Nas the cost is not you know hugely different um it will be an increase in cost for district accreditation because we'll be accrediting three schools um but our next piece of the process is to fill out a an application for accreditation um which I will be working on now that I've gotten through the desal visit that

053I had to lead and um we will then after we submit that there will be a visit from the commission of which I actually also sit on obviously I won't be the visitor um and they will come and discuss our accreditation application and ask us why um so I probably will be asking a few of you to join us on that um and then it will go to the full commission for essentially acceptance for the whole District to go through the accreditation process so that'll happen over the next six months um that whole process so we'll begin the process now for district accreditation application thank you thank you Anna any questions yeah um great you mentioned a cost what I know mention is not maybe significant but what is it I don't know what the

054current um cost is to belong to Nas I think it's around $2500 so I we will research and make sure we budget it for we wouldn't have to pay there would be no cost to us next year or okay the year after it would be the year after that when we go through the district accreditation okay so we'll build all of that into the budget budet okay yeah and have that conversation with the board for the conversation okay so this accreditation doesn't happen in the next school year no no no it won't that all we're doing is beginning the process for application to see if we get accepted to have a district accreditation okay I just wanted to point out that I can't believe that you are this Lucid after the gring experience and you

055shared it that's that's a lot of work well thanks thank you for the compliment can I ask a question certainly so CES doesn't have any sports currently sports teams how does that so this is not a this has nothing to do with Athletics although what Mr Banda is going to be referring to is so Nas is New England Association of schools and colleges it's a really good question and it's actually a good segue eventually when we get to him um they are they have been the um standard accrediting body for public schools and private schools actually and um Independent Schools and colleges um across New England and actually internationally what they the reason that the nas folks came for the athletic audit is they are partnering with Connecticut to actually make a New England um

056accreditation for or component of accreditation as through Athletics okay so Connecticut currently has a model that they adopted and they are trying to to um expand so that it's it's applicable to all of New England um and actually the entire country uh the country uh National crediting on that I'm sorry that that we were we were really the first to go through this process so this is something that Nas is looking at for sports isn't what we were just talking about see that yeah I just want to make sure we're clear because that's the only time we've talked about it to become a model for New England and ultimately the nation so you know we're really at the Forefront there in terms of the Athletics but for academics and organizational uh support we're talking adding

057ka yeah the high school has gone so the quick and dirty about me ask accreditation every 10 years up through um is when you go through the big huge self-reflection the whole school goes through it using these standards to reflect on the various aspects of school the the high school has been doing it for a long time um but we and now they've changed the model so that it's not every 10 years it's actually much more often so it's really you do you kind of reflect on these standards on a regular ongoing basis and the process is much more collegial and collaborative rather than just coming in and giving kind of like a summi of assessment you're accredited or you're not which is hard to be not but um because there's a lot of different

058aspects that go go through um but it rather than going through um just that you know kind of one one and done for 10 years and then people often tend to forget about it it it becomes much more cyclical it's every two or three years you're thinking about it referring to the standards it it's and a lot of the standards I mean one of the main standards is curriculum instruction and assessment um and then there's a big huge portion of student um well-being and safety and then you know facilities and those kinds of things so sure and I'm happy to share with the board the link to the 2023 standards so you can have a look and see what we will be holding ourselves to all right Anna thank you for that my pleasure so

059so next we're getting near the end here I promise um I wanted to share actually Casey would you mind passing out the the book to everybody so I wanted uh I have a copy of a book for the Board of Ed this is a book uh called the anxious generation that um Dr man and I have already gone to the bef and we're going to be uh writing a bef Grant um for uh uh one of the main pieces is to get a copy of this book uh for every family uh of students here that's what we're going to ask for we'll see if that happens or not but we had a pre-con conversation with the bef thank you yes for H or for Rob um and uh it's really important this book The anxious

060generation about the great rewiring of of America and of children's Minds it really has a lot to do with it has everything to do with social media and the transition over the last 15 years from a play-based childhood to a smartphone based childhood um and the concerns I think all of us uh intuitively um know that um there's a lot of ills to social media and the it's probably at the root of a lot of the anxiety depression body image and other concerns we know we have with our students um in addition to that I think we instinctively feel it and then of course as Educators as parents we see it and um there are things we can do um if people really take to heart and read through this book uh that that don't

061cost any money that we could develop as a community as Norms of how we approach social media how we approach smartphones maybe have Collective Community agreement um because peer pressure is the biggest piece with families and kids I'm left out I don't have my smartphone of when kids should get a smartphone when they should start on social media and certainly when their brain is more developed so uh there's a lot to this I remember in my uh gosh almost 20 years ago now when Myspace first came out and other things I remember handling those issues that were going on with families and students more neighborhood issues and fights and stries that were going on that all of a sudden were leading into the school I'm like what the heck is this Myspace stuff and since

062then it's just continued and we can't keep up with the technology it evolves so fast so there's some some things in here that that Dr uh height talks about um I think everybody will find it absolutely intriguing and everything is backed up with his studies there so I just ask everybody to have an open mind give it a read uh the cabinet the administration we've all read through it I'll be talking with the folks at speaks tomorrow and providing a copy to them um and then uh we'll be writing up a bef Grant and hopefully we can make some Headway on this in addition Dr man and I have been in touch with uh Dr Height's people um thinking if we can get him in here for some parent workshops and so forth uh he's

063quite expensive I don't know that bef will cover all of that if we're able to pull it off um we even you even invited him in for convocation um but he's a reg he's a regular guy he he said no I can't do it I'm bringing myself to college that that that day so it doesn't work for me so that you know he's there with us you know but he did say it's the kind of thing that he loves to do and he's so excited that we're making this yeah so um he's all over the place you go to YouTube you see Ted Talks everything he's all over the place and it just it's just common sense in a lot of ways but I think everybody needs to just not worry about Solutions right now

064and just read the book and get a handle on the topic so we're talking the same language and then the final thing I just want to remind everybody last week the oh sorry Stephanie say something really wait till late so I after the BF cuz I'm on the sub committee for that so after the BF presentation I had already seen a video that week about it and so I was like oh my gosh this is there's actually a community group there's a nation group but we have a community in Brookfield called wait until 8th and it's about waiting to give smartphone and social media to kids until after 8th grade is kind of the push for high school but wait till 8th sounds like catchy um so there is a community group there is a

065movement in Brookfield I've been part of it for I mean I have a little still so I'm at the beginning of that like wondering and I can't imagine having an adolescent and trying to manage this so for me the thing I loved most I'm already halfway through this and the thing I loved most about it is he gives so much sort of info that you graphs and things that you can actually like are tangible are understandable are not high level like he he explains everything and then he's like if you refer to the graph on you know this situation it's real information that again like you said we know we know in theory like something changed but the way that it's changed not only the way that our kids have changed but the way we've

066changed in our community and the way we parent and how it affects our kids just to like have the phone around them it's so so valuable it's been as somebody who's you know already on the bandwagon it's been like a really interesting sort of I didn't think about that or it's not just about the cell phone it's not just about social media it's about the way we teach our kids to move forward through navigating social relationships with kids that don't have you know I'm the only I've heard my son say I'm the only one in Brookfield who doesn't have and I'm like let's let's actually investigate this and he gives real tangible ways that we can immediately change our family life our community group and then the bigger suggestions for schools and stuff and it's

067so very passionate about this I think everyone should read it and definitely investigate the way till 8th if that's your thing because it's you then you I mean I have an automatic community of people with 8 to 12 year olds and Beyond who are giving great advice that you can kind of connect with so and there's another notion in here that he talks through which is um the concept of overprotecting in the physical world and under prototec in the virtual world very interesting to to read about that as well and and he's got this very salt of the earth way of explaining and articulating those things we we we we we instinctively kind of yeah there's something going on here and the studies have been done over the last 15 20 years so he refers

068to those because I I vividly recall early uh earlier on in my career talking with parents talking with colleagues saying what's going to happen to the kids who have all this access and uh especially when the social media push outside of the internet came out and what's going to happen childhood is changing right before our eyes and now the studies are in and the kids have gone through puberty at the end of gen Z are coming through now when we're seeing the anxiety and the depression some of the other things but one of the things I think is really valuable and that he does really well is he doesn't make anyone feel guilty he talks about real ways that we do have the power to reverse even in older kids like simple simple things that

069can really like it doesn't it's not condescending it doesn't um make you feel bad about choices that you already made it's and he talks about globally how we really it's we're not isolated it's not just us we're not alone that it really is this like bigger Community as well as local so anyway so I think things we can do so anyway I I offer that to you tonight so thank you for that and then the last things thank you Stephanie was just uh last week uh Lisa had put together the end of the year activities that are important for board members to at least know about feel free to visit and you know set up appointments however it works we'd love to see you there so just want to make sure you know that so

070that was a lot tonight does anybody have any questions thank you so much I just want to verify that the the meeting our next meeting is in the a in the auditorium oh yeah oh you don't have it on there oh but it is yes oh we put it all Lisa add it it's not on my copy yep next meeting will be in the auditorium because we're lucky tonight it's still cool outside it will be very hot at the next meeting so we'll have air conditioning in the auditorium awesome all right anything further okay let's move then to subcommittee reports and let's start with um policy and Communications holla so the policy and Communications committee met before Spring Break um April 9th to be exact uh the day before the board meeting so I did

071update the board on April 10th and there's been really nothing new since then but you do have have uh two submissions for a first read tonight so we'll get to those a little later great thank you and um Finance Rosa you have the floor so we last met on Tuesday April 9th which was a really long time ago it feels like it was um at that time we went over the March financials um first we went through the check registers so uh we reviewed checks over $1,000 and asked any clarifying questions um but no followup was necessary in any of the items that we saw in that report uh the March financials uh Mrs de summarized that the committee had reviewed those um financials and the projected net budget shortfall is now approximately at the

072time of this report was 666,000 and it was due to uh primarily three factors um the leave of the assistant principal at B s with pay plus the cost to fill in um an interim um also the a change in the liability insurance for CEST um that's at about a cost of about 20 23,000 um that is net cost after a refund that we received due to the closing of hhds so even though it's like kind of you know it's at this time March um it just does take a while for that to to reconcile properly and then lastly um a change in special education transportation duee to one of the runs being need to split into multiple runs um going to the same location um for student and bus driver safety um and also

073a par educator being added to another run um and Mr Roland was actually at our um meeting so he was able to provide some really helpful context to that so we were able to understand that um situation a little bit better um just to be clear there are other contributing factors to this year's budget shortfall um where long-term short-term Subs um special education tuition and also electricity as you know is a big one that we were watching um all of those are detailed in the financial report that you have um and a budget savings was recognized due to budget um budgetary freezes and also some um Savings in various accounts like health insurance and leaves and vacancies um okay that was that was the financial report the old business that we went over was uh

074the 2425 budget which we will talk about later tonight um so I'll leave that discussion for then and the food service RFP which Miss D had already covered um miscellaneous discussion just to note the town's budget referendum is going to be on Tuesday May 21st so please everybody get out and vote um and that was it we had a short executive session um um for the purposes of discussing strategy and negotiations as it relates to a collective bargaining um issue and then that was it yeah so other than budget which we'll talk about later that was it any questions so okay okay so um Joy you have the floor yep so we met on April 10th we received a presentation from Miss FIS and Julie Von on ckla which is a K3 reading program and

075that's in the agenda later on so I'm not going to kind of go over that they'll go over that later um but we did um vote unanimously to approve that recommendation we also so the majority of the meeting was spent on that but we did kind of get to squeeze in um a new platform that we're going to use at the high school for post and secondary planning Squire um it's a platform in which parents and students will interface with College and Career programs so we're moving away from using na'vi um many schools are moving away from navian it's significantly cheaper um squer doesn't have a middle school component but we really don't um use that so um we're looking forward to those good positive changes and also since we won't be offering a American

076Sign Language next year um we did approve to pay for three students to who are um enrolled in that asl1 course this year to continue their requirement through an approved online course for asl2 for next year so we didn't approve for those three students to have that course that's about it any questions um not I don't know if it's I don't know if it's a question for you or maybe a question for you guys but um since ASL um you know since that's not going to be running I do remember we had as a board said that we wanted a third world language so is there talks about discussing maybe a different language that we can offer like maybe I know we had surveyed a long time ago like you know is it time for

077maybe another survey or we take you know some of that data and say like well you know Mandarin was a really popular choice like do we start exploring that like is that anything you guys have thought about yeah so I don't know if Mr Bando wants to talk or not but I can just yeah I can pinch it um we I I've been speaking with misso about that and um it's certainly based on I mean we have to kind of look at the at the reasons that I mean partly ASL the reason it probably has kind of dwindled in interest is because of the difficulty of finding a teacher uh on in-house and then getting kind of building that program so we want to make sure we don't put ourselves in a similar situation with

078a another course that would be hard or another language that would be hard to find but certainly we are going to continue to explore to see um what would be efficacious for the students and then also the school and the organization but keeping and I we're not closing the door right Tech it's not going to run next year it's just okay technically it's still an an option it's just not being offered next year got it okay okay I think that that's another part kind of another part of that is to research again to see if there we could partner with somebody be creative with how we could you know have a kind of an on-site class yeah because that's one of the reasons that interest has fallen mhm all right thanks everybody let's move move

079next to the um consent agenda SE I move that the board approve the items on the consent agenda as recommended resignations new hires March financials 2024 second okay so it's been uh moved and seconded that we approve the items on the consent agenda all in favor please say I I I okay uh so that passes unanimously and the consent agenda is approved let's move now to new business um we are going to start with um probably what's going to be a really fun report I hope from Mr belanda about the um Brookfield High School athletic program review good evening Mr blinda all right let make sure we're on all right here we go I know uh Mrs Ferris is wondering which is going to be more fun her presentation mine so she wasn't sure who

080was next I think hers is going to be much more fun uh and I will just make a point I know we're talking about Athletics I want to let um the committee know that score now has a 6 through eight that they're rolling out in July a program that we talked about for the Naviance transition they do now offer a 6 through eight I just found that out this week so I just it's not related to Athletics at all but I thought I'd share it while I had the mic just to we are looking into yep absolutely all right so thank you uh I got feedback from the superintendent uh to make sure that this is appropriately length uh an appropriate length presentation uh so you won't be up here forever listening to me talk

081but I will share certainly the highlights um I'll talk about the process really quickly which is something that luckily Dr man has talked a lot about already in terms of how this works I'll go over some uh accommodations that came in the draft report recommendations and then talk about next steps so the process um as Dr man said um we've worked with Cass and CIA uh to come up with this this is something they've done these Athletic program reviews for several years they have a set of standards and shockingly there's five standards just like there are for nask um and so they've been looking and working to see um with nas to see if they can incorporate that process you know this took a lot longer than expected uh CIA took a long time to

082get back to us uh Dr man was uh very forthcoming and saying let's see if we can facilitate this uh sitting on the commission she knows that neas was also looking to get involved in an athletic re program review so they actually merged um and so what we did prior to that merge uh was we reviewed the standards we did a self-reflection uh of each of the five standards um there was parent surveys there was student surveys there was coach surveys and then a whole uh set of um other standards that we reflected on as to how well we met them uh then we sent those into to CIA they actually sent us draft responses and we're waiting for this on-site visit and that's what really took a long time this facilitated with Dr man

083um actually the CIA and Nas representative so we had uh George what's George's official title oh he's the um he's the CEO of right CEO of of of of the nas commission so he's pretty high up there in terms of that um from that perspective he came down along with someone who's also uh Regional athletic director in Massachusetts also happen to have the same last name as Baldwin that wasn't too confusing at all sitting in the same room uh and then we also had a local athletic director was there as part of this uh on-site process on March 5th and 6th and then we also had Glenn larini who is the president of cast CIA were also there so we had all these people together that did a two-day um site visit and then they're

084working on the final draft of the report I'll share that at this point I Have A draft copy of it I can't share that yet but I am going to highlight some things and I imagine the next couple days I talked to uh Mr Edwards the other day he'll be able to share that stuff so commendations there's a lot of them and I'm not going to read to you but you can clearly see and I I underlined some words and I'll just share with some of those things like in the accommodation sections about leadership that shows up multiple times Class Act athletic advisory and our Unified sports program those things came up student voice and Leadership right these are all commendations Rapport was in there communication Equity cooperation the the statement student athletes how important

085that is to us support caring dedicated um these are all things that were commendations you can see the length of these it's actually two columns it was fun formatting and I'll be able to share this with you so they had a lot of really good things to say over the course of those two days when the visiting committee was here they looked at our self-study report asked questions to confirm or deny whether what we said was actually in existence and then they wrote the report and commendations there was a ton there's also recommendations which is really what we were looking for we're glad to celebrate the positives the things that we're doing well but we also want to continue to build and expand our program to towards continuous Improvement there's a couple recommendations and there's

086only four that I'm going to share with you that they shared with me so um one was the responsibilities of the athletic director um the large scope of what he has to do in his role as working prek K12 um health and PE and athletic directing so that was the things that they ask you now they don't tell you what you have to fix they make suggestions explore look into evaluate they'll never going to tell us exactly what to do they're going to make suggestions about what you could look at and areas to take a look at so they asked us they thought we should probably look at the responsibilities of the athletic director they also asked us to look at coaching stiens right and what those were uh in terms of you know the

087value of coaches with the co the time and effort that coaches put into the program versus what they're actually paid uh there's a significant difference between what happens in and around the state and locally so they asked us to take a look at that um they talked about facility management repair and Improvement that whole process making sure that it's not just outside it's also inside we have a unique Dynamic with Park and wreck working outside and then we have some fac facilities inside which are not not parking wreck so it's really about how do we continually improve the places that we have for our student athletes in the community and the last piece easiest way to summarize it is spending protocols to make sure that we're aligned and we make uh our communication in terms

088of how to spend it you can imagine every single and most of some of the board knows every single sport has its own Student Activity account right and then there's budgeted line Imes there's a lot of money right in different pots and different places and they want to make sure that we follow those right protocols to make sure that we're all in alignment to provide the best possible experience for our athletes so those are the four recommendations essentially they're a little more detailed in the report and you'll be able to see that as soon as I share it at the end I don't have it here but when I do have the final and the next steps really are once I get the report I'll publish it I'll share it with the board I'll share

089with the superintendent the community so they can all read and see what the report was obviously we want to celebrate our commendations there was a lot there I breezed through it we want to make sure we celebrate those good things cuz there is a lot of really good stuff going on in our Athletic program here and then explore implementation of recommendations again they recommendations they're not requirements for things we need to do but it strongly suggests that we take a look at them pretty closely because this this this uh visiting committee and all the things they saw said these are some things you really should take a long hard look at and see if you can address those things as issues because they came up likely in multiple areas when we write reports and I

090was on a collaborative conference visit several weeks ago at Bell High School uh and when we write our reports we always have to cite if it's accomodation or recommendation or any statement we're making about a school or a program we have to site multiple sources of evidence right that's that's best practice so we make sure when they do these recommendations they're citing multiple SP sources of evidence it's not one person saying oh by the way you need to fix this there's multiple people having these conversations or they it comes up in a report somewhere else so that's where that is and that's the conclusion of my report had Dr man not said so much about neas already I think it would have been a little bit longer um but they're excited you know it was

091a pilot program for us um they had Nas had never been a part of this right so this was written by George Edwards typically CIA would send somebody to write the report so it was great to see that collaboration this interstate you know somebody from Massachusetts and Connecticut that the same positions working together and it was a it was a fantastic experience so thank you Mark are there any questions from the board no I just wanted to say um I think that this shows um really reflective leadership you know um and and that you are not dismissing the commendations but like because it takes a lot of energy to sustain those um please tell Mr Baldwin that we uh send our thanks will um and we would like other leaders here to note that that

092was under eight minutes was excellent very informative I have a Qui question yes um the final report that we're going to be ending is that going to be made available to the public like on the website plan was to have that final final version tonight and have it embedded into the uh PowerPoint so we will make sure as soon as we have it we'll get it out message we post it everywhere so everybody has and so just so you also know if you if you went to the burfield high school website you'll also see our two most recent Nas reports of the last 10 years if you ever wanted to look at those if you have a spare three hours to read you can go through and do that but standards have adjusted a little

093but there they are the most up and just to reiterate What U Mr Banda mentioned that one of the beauty beautiful things about Nas and even in this process is that it is there are other Educators across New England who come as the people who do these visits so um in this situation you know we had uh Mr larini Dr larini from C from Cass C Mr Baldwin was actually is actually his counterpart he's the MIAA um director so they were able to partner together so we have you know kind of two um peers coming to to look at our programs so it was a really nice opportunity for us to be a part of the Forefront of this and we talked about reciprocating moving forward if they as they move forward with Athletic program

094reviews if they're interested and having you know principles or athletic directors be a part of that because we always learned so the athletic director that was there from a local school in Connecticut said had had conversations Mr bald and said I'm going to bring that back like that's a really good idea let's try that and so we learn as much just like when I'm to Bell I learned something and I'm sure Dr man's gonna come back with something from Middletown she wants to talk about so Mark thanks so much all right you're wel appreciated okay so we'll move to the um next item of new business um it's uh well Stephanie go ahead I move that the board approve the ckla science of the reading program no sorry board approved the CK klaa science of

095reading program as recommended by the cape committee second so is there um do do you guys have um questions or discussion about about this which is also embedded in your in your packet it's in the packet we have a brief slide deck for you tonight and uh we're going to beat M Mr band's 8 minutes and by the way you were up here a little bit longer toward the end so I get a little way to go we can name that presentation in six minutes now all right good evening oh sorry I was just gonna introduce um Mrs fias and uh Mrs vau um who are going to give you a kind of truncated presentation that we went through at Cape a couple weeks back um but we're really excited about um this has been

096a long journey uh couple you know a year and a half long journey since the Mandate came down from the remember this is part of the K3 reading mandate from the state of Connecticut but um they have done a ton of work and shown an amazing um shown amazing leadership and we're really excited to share with you about what the decision has been way folks all right well first of all thank you um Julie and I are actually very excited we were really looking forward to tonight to have the opportunity to present to the board the uh culmination of a lot of efforts from our curriculum review team um to make the recommendation the formal recommendation for the adoption of CK core knowledge language arts um in K3 in alignment with the state mandate um

097right to read legislation so uh yeah set the timer so um these are the uh folks that were part of the curriculum review team as you can see um we had a um really a representation from all of K12 teachers coaches and administrators um so I'd like to publicly thank them all for their dedication and efforts in this um task that we really enjoyed and uh we're really excited about Al righty so um as uh Dr man stated we the state really already vetted these programs that were offered in their menu of options to select from um so they of work for us which was great but we certainly wanted to also vet the programs as far as what what Brookfield really needed what did our students need and to make it a data informed

098um decision so um basically in a nutshell we were looking for a program that was not only aligned to the science of reading and aligned to the standards but was going to provide an engaging uh context um in order to be able to have students build background knowledge to apply the skills that they were learning about reading foundational skills into a real you know real world context so that they could really um enhance skills in vocabulary language um comprehension in addition to um all of the other big five of reading foundational skills uh also we were looking for something that was going to be student teacher and familyfriendly um in terms of the navigation um and um CK uh checked all of those boxes for us um this is just a really quick graphic that

099kind of encompass is the research behind the science of reading and the idea is that there's two strands that need to be functioning equally as well for skill for students to be strategic and skilled reader um the lower strand is all of the word recognition and the upper strand is all of the language comprehension so all of the components that factor into reading uh this program really covers with the skills Strand and the content knowledge strand um so that was a really big part of what we were looking for um in the program so it provides support for all Learners there's a lot of ways to differentiate and support students at all levels of reading development there's an assessment and Remediation guide for each unit that really helps teachers Drive differentiated instruction there's a glossery

100of vocabulary words provided in 10 languages um to support our multilingual Learners an intervention toolkit that addresses all five areas of reading so uh teachers can really pinpoint um areas that students need to work on and go into this toolkit for resources to help support and differentiate their instruction uh fluency passages and then there's also challenge options and knowledge lessons to really build and extend kids knowledge for those who are ready for more and really make it more engaging um and enriching we were looking at that it's very comprehensive it aligns with our mclass tibles assessment we have the um the Amplified platform which will house C K the Boost reading as well as mclass so it's all on one platform which is really user friendly for um students to with with the student interface

101but also the teacher side um and there's a really nice PD library that supports uh teachers getting oriented with the program and its different tools so it was very supportive on the back end as well with supporting teachers and how to use um all of the features of this comprehensive Suite that we will have after this implementation all righty so not going to read all of this on the slide basically this slide is speaking to some Reflections from the team in terms of uh what we were looking at when we looked at uh cka and also the opportunity that we had on our visit uh to reading Elementary School where we had an opportunity to see uh their CK um pilot that they were doing in K5 and also the opportunity to debrief with some

102of the teachers administrators and literacy Specialists afterwards um I also had the opportunity to speak with the uh principal of poke Elementary School in Watertown who uh actually adopted CK in its entirety for all of their K5 um and basically um you know just to kind of summarize all both of those well the the conversation and the um experience that we had at reading Elementary School is um the rigor is is there and the students are able to access grade level curriculum and students meaning all students because of the explicit and systematic instruction um that it really scaffolds so that all students are accessing uh grade level content um also um the big takeaway for us was really that their data from beginning of year to midyear they saw incredible growth um and they really

103attribute a lot of that to the knowledge domain to the knowledge component in addition obviously to the reading foundational skills but it really provided that context that we so badly need um in terms of the vocabulary piece and the background knowledge um to be able to then use those reading foundational skills um in context so uh we're really very excited about this um probably as excited as as Stephanie was about uh you know the the book yeah so just to speak a little bit about dollars right because certainly we also wanted to be conscious of uh of the dollars um cka uh costs about these are estimations $150,000 uh boost reading which is the um personalized digital um component uh will be given to us for free for the first year um and therefore we

104you know will not need Lexia um you know for next year um and boost reading actually fits really nicely with the CK core instruction as well as going with the um mclass assessment system so we're excited about that as well um we have been uh participating in the right to read Grant and will receive $885,000 uh toward the expenditure um so a total budgetary impact would be $65,000 and that's already been included um in the budget for the 2024 2025 uh school year so in terms of what that looks like going forward in terms of you know student consumables Etc um the Student Activity books for both the skills and the uh knowledge domains are around $23,000 and that would be an annual expenditure uh boost reading should we decide that it meets our needs

105and we'd like to continue with it we we be somewhere around $20,000 um so the the $43,000 would be um an annual uh estimated expenditure um that's not in addition to what we're already spending because as you can see here in this year 2023 2024 we certainly have an expense um for uh consumables for our reading foundational skills So currently our open court activity books are $18,000 we are spending about $133,000 on Lexia uh reading so we're currently in our current year we have $31,000 uh as an as our annual consumable so we're looking at about $112,000 of an increment um going to cka but we're we're getting in return is that whole knowledge domain that we don't have right now and one of the other things to just speak very quickly about in terms

106of the reading elementary school as well as in the Poke Elementary School is they're really seeing an increase in just the use of vocabulary both in oral language as well as in written language so so we're really looking forward to that and come on over and ask because we're going to be ready for you in 2026 um so thank you um any questions any questions time time how we do have some questions sure they have questions okay I do have some questions um first on on budget so the so the Open Court Lexia are those costs going away they are okay so that was one question the other question the right to read Grant that's just for next year right start so so for the 2526 budget will we have to that $150,000 okay that's

107just no that's the $43,000 so we would have the the activity books and if we wanted the Boost reading so about $43,000 okay this is the initial onetime process start correct and that Grant can't be like split up over a couple years right no it was um it was a grant that actually was from last December through this next December and it was just because of this leg legislation they put the legislation out everyone you know hemmed and hot and then they put that in there right and and we will I mean we we're talking about the K3 adoption right now we would have intentions of rolling out to for that was my next question so we will have to budget that in for those initial um but you know and we'll have to see

108one we'll get some data back from our K3 um folks but we'll also you know we would be obviously judicious about how we and Ros that was one thing at the joint Board of selecting Board of Finance meeting we talk about the budget we talked about a four or five implementation plan going forward so that they know that that would be the probably the biggest investment going forward that we see right now and it would be the same thing where there would be an initial startup cost and then we would have our smaller incremental regular ongoing costs okay and then um the only other question which um I know I know a little bit about but what were some of like the other options from the state that you know you guys either took a

109look at or initially just dismissed and maybe why M so there are nine programs and a whole slew of compendiums which is really kind of like a a a a bundle if you will of different tools that you have to use together in that bundle so we uh Julie and I and and Dr man really look we did look at eight of the nine we tried to do all nine but one of them didn't didn't get back to us and we did put forth to the full team three of the of the nine approved programs thank based on what they offered and you know kind of how they matched with what we're doing and yep these are the ones you this is the one you liked yeah the best will four and five have any

110program changes within their current what the current programs that they use based on the fact that the significant change is coming to K through3 like will there be they'll still be using Lexi and all those tools but will there be like will the instructional coaches or any of the fourth and fifth grade teachers be instrumental in trying to adop some of the right to read changes that we know are effective yeah and we've already begun that I mean we've really been moving toward the science of reading for at least six years now in terms of professional learning and have adjusted our curriculum that way I mean we still will have the same curricular tools so yes we still will be using Teachers College in grades four and five to a certain extent but we've already

111adjusted to some of those and they still will have the Open Court word analysis um kits so that in terms of the reading foundational skills that still will be taught in the systematic explicit way and part are any of the fourth and fifth grade teachers in the right to read training or in letters training right now uh not at the current time but we're hoping that for next year yes do you think fourth grades already expressed interest in um kind of using the model of the knowledge strand to build context into their current TC units so I've touched Bas with some fourth grade teachers already to try to build some of that that context in into their their units in TC so if they're doing you know the American Revolution how can we expand on

112that and use some of the model of how it's handled in um CK so they sort of have that the kids are getting that experience building more background knowledge and content through the units that they're currently doing so that's kind of already in the works the teachers are really excited about it so and the way that um Debbie and Julie put together the whole uh you know curriculum review team um by making it very there a lot of uh stakeholders K5 but then also including some of the Middle School folks and even the high school um instructional coaches from across all content areas has been has served to create a lot of excitement about this and they're they'd like to get on the bandwagon too so we're we're coming as fast as we can lots

113of changes the last couple years thank you ladies that sounds like really awesome planning really great thought leadership thank you very much thanks for the leadership jul much appreciate it do to um to the my Hasty action the motion is on the table and it has been seconded um would you guys like to discuss further ready V yeah okay so um all in favor of approving the CK CK La science of reading program as recommended by the cape subcommittee uh please say I hi hi okay so that's unanimous much very much awes right the um uh reading program has been approved wonderful all right so the next um item is the 2425 uh meeting dates so please find um do you want to discuss first you want me to move a motion make a motion

114or you want to discuss first disc well we should we should have a motion on should we okay all right discuss all right so I move that the board approve the 2024 2025 Board of Education meeting dates thank you the so the um the motion to appro uh to approve the uh meeting dates has been put on the on the table we've got two versions and we've heard some public comment about these um and so this is a discussion time uh I'll just ask Robert would you like to Kickstart discussion well so we get to choose between we have an option yeah yes yes just make it sure I and Rob just for history this is the first year we've done this I I heard some uh I had some feedback over the the year

115that perhaps with all the subcommittee meetings and the various special meetings we have throughout the year that perhaps one regular board meeting a month is the way to go like a number of districts in the state um or continue on uh kind of the first and third for the most part um so that's why we just put Lisa and I put this together to put two options out to the board for consideration tonight I like that option because the subcommittee meetings got sorry can you explain why there's only one for September and October is I there's got to be a reason for that um the beginning of the school year usually with Labor Day and and just the wild first week of school and then um October recently we moved to one meeting November most

116of the time we've done one in my last 10 years nine 10 years here November because the short month with Thanksgiving um and then in February with the long weekend and also budget meetings there's one meeting similarly in April with the the short month that that really was the reason for that summer traditionally has always had one meeting in July and one meeting in August and actually I I'll just kind of add a little bit more context to that a couple of years ago when we um it used to it used to be two meetings every single month um and we shortened it except for December because of budget January because of budget I think March also maybe because we would maybe have to have budget conversations then and certainly in May so I think

117budget was generally reason why we would we were at the time having like longer conversations and so we knew that two meetings were necessary but um at the time again this was years ago um you know we felt that condensing to one meeting a month we could do since most of the work is done in committee right that makes sense can I say something about this so I kind of look at this when I was thinking about it um I kind of look at it as we're doing the same amount of work are we wanting to do it all in one night and sort of just like like be there we're already together you know we can get through kind of a late night one time a month with all of the subcommittees that were

118on do we then take a whole another night to you know away from um other commitments you know family things like that and I personally um feel like we kind of build a momentum we have a lot of the agenda but it's we you know we can get through it and so it's not outside sort of our ability to go to one meeting a month because we also do have the ability to put a special meeting on let's say the budget comes around or a specific issue or an approval needs to happen that and we don't have a meeting coming up for a little while I definitely feel like we can you know we're all communicative enough and can just be like hey you know what do you think about putting a special meeting on

119for this and we've been able to pretty much find dates on the Fly for stuff like that so I feel okay going towards one meeting a month with the knowledge that we could you know put in meeting on here and there read yeah I think that's a good point well I was just going to say um Joey you haven't asked for the floor but you have um years of experience with this um do you have thoughts what are your thoughts um I I agree what you said Stephanie um I think we've done a good job with um maintaining our business within the one um I think though some months were more heavy than others right it's like that student thing right you kind of like lose focus after a while um it's challenging after working

120all day and things like that so um I do see value in the one a month but I also see value in sometimes at certain months right too so I kind of like the hybrid um actually in my opinion I would rather look to add meetings for the subcommittees like having being on policy for the first time I feel like I need to meet like every week for that like to get you know we don't really get to delve into it enough so that's where I would really want to put my effort in for the subcommittees yeah can I speak PA did you want yes um I I I would have to agree with you on that I think that again what Stephanie said a lot of work is done in the subcommittees and you

121know people may not see that but we come to this meeting with updates um we ask you to uh take some make some decisions based on some of those committees and I would agree that I don't know if every week but I would agree that um adding uh subcommittee meeting dates and I know policy is super important Cape is super important those happen to be two that I'm on but you know the others of you can weigh in um I would absolutely go with that I think that's a great idea what about making policy meetings not on Board of Ed meetings or giving us more time time like we have like you know some of them are sandwiched right up before the Boe meeting like our bigger meeting so would it I mean again then

122it's adding a different night but for some committees maybe adding an extra half hour if people can manage that or a different night if we're going to add like a meeting like do two for policy committee for example maybe we do one hour the night of the board of aded meeting but then we add a night where we have an hour and a half so that we can go a little longer without feeling yeah well I think um I think that's up to each of the subcommittees and maybe maybe I know that we've got that on the agenda about this yeah the next item on the agenda is the subcommittee meetings and maybe it would be worth it to um individually meet with our subcommittees and see what works for each of those so maybe

123yeah so maybe the next item on the agenda doesn't necessarily have maybe it needs to be tabled I'm just putting that out there I I I would I would encourage not tbling these this discussion tonight and making the decisions but subcommittees could always you know set meetings tonight and then you can change meetings and you also could have spe again subcommittees could have special meetings as well don't forget that so as the subcommittees talk and start to look at the calendar uh at a more granular granular level you make decisions I'm going to go to a different um angle I think no one has really talked about public comment and Community involvement and I think getting them here on a regular basis and keeping our our lines open I think a lot happens in a

124month and just giving Comm um committee reports we don't really get get much interaction that makes for a long long meeting so I think the hybrid is going to be the way to go because it I mean the meeting the meetings are very meaty I love when the you know the kids showed up today things like that I just feel like there's going to be a lot more back and forth if we do them more regularly when you say a lot more back and forth you mean that in a productive capacity hopefully yeah but yes um and I I think that we benefit a lot I mean it's it's hard for some of us many of us because we're new um but the I I can't tell if I learned so much in the December

125and January meetings because of the phenomenon of being new and going through the first budget or if it was the regularity of the meetings I mean I did feel like we had a meeting almost every night for a couple of weeks yeah it it was it was a lot it was a lot um but I I I wonder that may be inescapable around the budget you know yeah I mean looking at this um where there are a couple of meetings a month if you really count them it's only four months out of the 12 that we have two meetings and I don't I don't think that's insurmountable it's only four out of the 12 months true and is May sorry I didn't have youa is May because of the budget referendum because we need an

126extra one in there why is there an extra one in May I was curious that it's also a longer month that doesn't have a you know got it there's there just more opportunity in there to to the point people are making absolutely and Sarah I think going back to your point I think it's really important that we do hear from the public specifically regarding the budget I mean everything else is is very important and um we we need feedback um from the people who are living the system um but around the budget it's like that's so time bound but that's what I think makes those months critically important um yeah please go ahead I would say if anything maybe the January 2nd seems kind of silly because we're meeting on 18th that's late in December

127and then we're going on winter recess um and given people might still be on vacation and whatnot so I was going to say I already know I'm not going to be here for Year enjoy to your point on January 15th we'll go through the budget and then there's still time the next week for example to have a special meeting to prepare and we budget we have to get the budget the budget and get it we certainly have special meeting in January to get ready to get it over to the first you're right coming right on second that first night back I don't know how productive that is only three months with two meetings yeah what's that there's only three months with two meetings and if we do that but then that's that's without special meetings

128those are like regular meetings um so can I ask you a question yes please um is do you see any this is kind of like our default like the one with the 16 meetings so that's what we did this past year but um do you like do you see any other like meetings like I'm thinking of like October cuz I feel like that's when we get test scores and we talk about enrollment and we get all the reports from like technology and Athletics and it's like a meeting heavy night report heavy is that a month where we maybe put another meeting like break some of that up the building we do a first third there in in October yeah we just followed kind of this year's model but we certainly could with all the different

129reports we have to you know the enrollment report case study report yeah we do have to wait wait till after October 1 for the enrollment report um the the student achievement report information is coming much more quickly now because um everything is online and so I could certainly you know prepare that for earlier August or um September I so that that is not that historically was in October because it used we didn't get them until late August up until this past two sorry 2023 so now that we get the results back much more quickly I'm happy to work with you on when you like to because I think some of like the August meeting I feel like is going to be light you know we I mean October 2nd is still only 3 weeks into

130the school year you go October 2nd and 16th that get you to the first and third Wednesdays that might be a month that we want to do two meetings as we look at this the the more hybrid uh chart here we take the second off but then put it back in the October 2nd meeting Maybe what if we is what if we look at December at sort of splitting the difference and doing this the the second week in December not doing December 18th or January 2nd and then coming back a week earlier in January to jump like to kind of bridge that holiday Gap so we can still have like November 20th to December 4th is only two weeks but if we push it one more week I was looking at bridging it to February

131the same idea I feel like a big gap in January um and actually there's January is five there are five Wednesdays in January the problem is one of them is a holiday but I'm wondering if do we then bump it to like the 8th 22nd and that's what I was saying Sarah I agree with you that I think whether we put it on as a regular meeting we're going to need a special meeting for budget there's no doubt about it because um just the time elapses and there's decisions that need to be made and new news continues to I mean you think of all the news that is evolved the budget since December 6th when I first presented this past year I mean everything so many changes thankfully most were for the positive um a

132lot happens so maybe if we start with October people comfortable with the two meetings in October doing October 2nd and 16th okay yeah that's the that's the plan I like is is getting rid of January 2nd and instead moving to October second mhm and then were we altering any dates in December January February or I think we were we were thinking about adding something between J uh between January and February 19th so that there remember taking away January 2 and I want to say holl it just says everybody remembers in February that's where there's a joint meeting yeah at least one joint meeting board of Select and board of Finance we're going to have that so there's a second meeting for the board being out for for the night in February in February that always

133happens in February for sure what if we leave it as is and do a special meeting for this year to kind of see how that plays out and then when we look at next year's we can be like oh like with that in mind this is how we should adjust it I like that I like making that one change for this year and seeing how it goes um knowing that the joint meeting will definitely be in early February and that special meetings are available to us as an option should slash when the need arises yeah but I but I still think that January 2nd is going to be a problem got it we October and keep December as it is so there someone can summarize what we're going to do so Lisa can get those

134minutes down so Lisa amended would be great um Lisa it's actually we we we talked in a in kind of a circle but it looks like we came up with a pretty clean solution for for next year's dates and that is to add a meeting for October 2nd and then to take off the meeting for January 2nd and I think those are the only two alterations to this list um but we all know that we'll have the joint meeting and U then the possibility to add special um meetings as needed okay I'm sorry do I need to amend the movement sorry I didn't over no I don't think so I I actually would suggest that we do um but I'll just I'll I'll move to amend the motion to add the words including the 16

135meeting dates as discussed and that's it second okay I'm just counting to make double triple sure all right so all in favor of approving the um the amendment to the motion about the 16 meeting uh date say I I okay so it passed unanimously and with much gratitude now you do like the the full motion I think oh okay okay so now now we do the the full motion okay so um it's still on the table so you can okay then then we just yes um so all in favor of approving the uh Board of Ed meeting dates for 2024 I passes unanimously if without Elegance thank you very much okay so the next item on the agenda is the subcommittee uh meetings and um Lisa I'm sorry Alisa and Dr bril um brought to

136my attention a couple things I'd like to discuss but let's get the motion on the floor and there are some things that I can point out to you guys I move that the board approve the subcommittee meeting schedule from July through December 2024 I second great so the uh motion has been made and seconded um to approve the um subcommittee schedule here are the things that we could consider uh right away but then we we've already had some pretty robust talk about how we might um make some changes to the subcommittee meeting schedule so um first I'd like to point out that um August 14th there's a cape committee meeting and there's a board of ed meeting for that same day and so do you want to do you want to move it that's one

137consideration um or and yeah and often cape has not met in August so you can put it on and then make a decision um all right so then if you look at the facilities meeting in October um it's October 2nd um and that's rash sh uh we just put rash so um we just put right put it on that was did all that work that's why we took off why we a second off of this one yeah so stay on this we'll go back that's that's why we had it all see we think of these things in advance we start talking about them and forget that we already planned for this right right right right there's a reason for these things okay all right so let's see if we can find the next snafu here

138um if you look at the facilities meeting for the next month on November 6th um that's the evening conferences for grades 9 through 12 and that's that's obviously some several of you guys um November 6th that's a facilities meeting um so for the folks who are on that committee you guys are all parents right and um something to be mindful of you know be G he graduates depends who's on my middle guy I should be all right I should be all right okay okay okay you guys could also choose when you get closer to that date choose to move it and just technically it would be a special meeting then but okay you could do that is this where I tell you I'm I'm not going to be here for a date I already know

139I'm not going to be here for August 21st for the polic Communications meeting so that one would have to un if you guys are available then you can meet without me MH I mean things come up during the year so we may not know that we are not going to be here so we we'll we I think we'll de we'll deal with those as they come up I don't think it's a problem I just want to point out there's no issues with Finance you know I can just remember which whether it's you know 6 o'cl or 7 o' okay so then um so then are we are we ready to move forward all right um all in favor of approving the subcommittee meeting schedule for July through December um 2024 say I I hi okay

140so it passes unanimously I think we we yeah we'll cross that bridge when we get so is this the time do we need to to yeah do we need to Circle back okay back for second yeah okay do we need do we need a motion to I move to another we need add agenda item okay so um I can I get somebody to um I will I will do it um I will move that we add another agenda item um under new business under new business um to be discussed right now after item D um to reconsider the 2425 Board of Education meeting dates second great and so um all in favor I considering okay um so the board has voted to or the motion to reconsider um the approval of um meeting dates for

141next year uh has passed okay so um let's get what if we split the difference and do the week over the dates the 9th and the 23rd yeah we move everything down we one then the next one would be yeah I think one thing we want to be mindful of is when bard of Finance meets and other things like that in terms of getting our reports to them just to be thinking about doesn't mean we can't do that we need to right um about what about October 30th anybody interested in October 30th I don't think there's a conflict on that night in in L of the the fifth Wednesday so you stay with the 16 do 16 30 take the second off that actually would be good I think because then you have three weeks

142until the November 20th meeting spreads it out a little bit more MH and you only have the one in November so that's yeah you're right up against November though right mhm yeah okay so take off the second and add the 30th add the 30th instead of the second that's all you do okay keep the 20th of no do you feel comfortable with that with like all the stuff you were talking about in terms of recoring and everything yeah yeah okay so the um dates have been reconsidered we've found a solution that seems to work and now um it would appear we need to we need to move to approve these uh revised dates I move to approve the revised Board of Education meeting dates second okay so uh we've moved to rise the uh to

143approve the um revised dates of adding um oober um 16th yeah October 30 thank you thank you very much um taking off taking off October 2nd all in favor of this change say I okay great it is passed unanimously and now Lisa got it she's got it thanks everyone okay well thank you for that catch uh because we would not have wanted wanted to find ourselves in that space okay so uh Now we move to um item e uh of new business which is approval of policy um 6162 um 51 survey of students I move that the board approve policy 61 62. 51 survey of students for a first reading as recommended by the policy Communications subcommittee second okay so it's been moved and seconded uh to approve of this policy about the survey of

144students policy 6162 51 um is there [Applause] discussion um may I speak oh yes I'm sorry please the floor is yours R so the only comment that I have um that I already shared with Hela um was that I I was not in favor of any changes to Lang to the language in the original um policy um this just seems like a pointed effort to barricade certain uh one very particular study um and I'm just I'm not in favor of it so um I'm there won't be any there's no changes to the original policy that I would be comfortable with I have the floor uh yes please H the floor is yours so I will just maybe clarify some of the discussion that took place um around this policy uh this it was not really

145about the research purpose it was mostly one there were two concerns one being the age um of students having to submit to this policy and we added the language that would involve students under eth not would not involve students under the eth grade because if you take a look at some of these um items I think it would be awkward and very difficult for some of these kids to to respond to these that's one the other one really involves instructional material um and that is not prohib hibiting uh surveying uh for educational purposes but it does say that parents have to be made aware of it so think of it this way in a classroom setting where students are being asked uh things regarding their political affiliation or religious uh affiliation or whatever the case

146may be religious practices uh for breaking them up for a lesson for instructional purposes um that might also get a little bit awkward and maybe parental permission would be or parental awareness might be in you know might be appropriate in those instances that's it but otherwise there really hasn't been anything that was changed just those two concerns that were addressed it's not and in in an educational setting it's really not for research purposes anyway it's really it was really for more instructional purposes and I think it sort of goes along um the same thinking as uh R-rated movies that are shown in the classroom I mean right now uh teachers get parental permission for that and so it's not denying it it's just saying that there has to be awareness that's all and holla this

147is a first read so um when would the committee want feedback from the board uh the next mon yes before next and this this will be brought up for second read um at the it won't be at the next meeting because we we wait 30 days so it'll be at the June meeting for second read or final read so everybody knows um actually would you like the floor I I just wanted to share one of the things I shared with holla after the meeting that didn't occur to me that I don't know if it needs to be language built in or if it's assumed but one of the things I wanted to make sure of that I didn't think until after we discussed was making sure it didn't affect teachers ability to give questionnaires at

148the beginning of the school year let's say asking like what's your nickname or I don't I don't think that like we kind of talked through that and I we kind of came to the conclusion we don't think that but I just yeah if I may respond to that it was it specifically says in the language that the elements listed in a through H so that would I mean you know yeah to get to know you kind of questionnaires really wouldn't fall under this not yeah I hope it wouldn't fuel any kind of yeah so I have I have kind of a different um opinion on this and I I see what you were talking about I understand the points that you're making um but I see um that is instructional and not survey a survey

149is from from my perspective is something that comes from an educational like think tank or or um other organization that's trying to aggregate gather and aggregate data about um the actual lives that students have so that they can be met where they are and it's difficult even for the adults who who are around them and live with them and interact with them every day sometimes to know the truth because um kids have lives that well we're not sure how fully we we see them and so that's that's why I think that that full access like I I don't even agree to the the language about the um the age because I trust and I don't when in saying that I don't mean to imply that you do not trust or that anybody putting forth this

150policy does not trust but that's just where I'm coming from I trust the professional decision-making of the um uh guidance counselors or the um principles or whoever whoever the facilitators and um people who are going to work with this data I I I trust their judgment on this and so that's that's why I don't support other the changes to this language I think that these can be awkward topics especially for kids who are you know um pre-teens early teens I I don't even know I mean I'm kind of imagining all over the place what kinds of questions could be asked um but I think that if the Educators wonder what the realities are they should be able to use tools that gather that information and I'd just like to point out I I believe that

151there's an opt out um option for parents um but anyway so I I'm I'm not inclined to support the change to the policy can I just ask you to clarify um what purpose would you see need a teacher needing to find out their students political affiliation which is item a um so I don't just as an example just to clarify what you said sure yeah um I I don't see these kinds of surveys being drawn up by teachers I see them coming from like the um yeah from Brookfield cares off the top of my head or from the US Department of um education or from um I don't know would ETS be one educational testing Ser I mean probably not but like they they want to know are we are we closing the gaps of

152achievement um by racial group or or a socioeconomic group and and so surveys are one of the tools that um organizations use to gather that data and these are my understanding is these are always Anonymous um and I don't think I don't think that I think that we're talking about two different things you know what I mean yes but not what we are we're we're talking about the same policy because this talks about all instructional materials it's not just talking about surveys like Brookfield cares or other entities it's the instructional materials that teachers are using in the classroom so so I think it's naive to say we need to trust the professionals there's plenty of professionals plenty of adults that don't make a choices there needs to be guidelines in place appropriate guidelines a through

153H being inappropriate to ask children these items because you're claiming that we should trust that professionals are using this data that they're collecting to gain the information that they want I just want to point out also that um the original policy did include the language about instructional material the only thing we added was involving a throughh just to clarify that that that these would be the topics covered but the language already included all instructional material regardless of format uh including teachers manuals films tapes or other supplementary material shall be available upon request for inspection etc etc so that was already in the policy so that doesn't change it was there um the only thing we added was if they would specifically involve these so we're almost we're almost making the policy a little bit more

154liberal because if they don't involve a through H then it would be okay and I think one of our intention uncomfortable one of our intentions also was in that Clarity Hollow that you describe is to make sure we weren't confusing folks that think when there is and being very rud M when I say this a survey on what the mascot in the school is going to be that we have to have parent permission to do that you know it's not that kind of stuff it was involving a through AG to your point H thank you for clarifying Rosa can you repeat what you said and just I need I may need some clarity yeah no I think that um this policy which we've been talking about now for over a year um is a very

155pointed effort to not allow the Brookfield care survey to be deployed in our schools I think that's that's very clear to me um and I think that attempts to keep inserting language to block it is clear to me and I don't think policies should be written that way so I mean we're talking about this language about uh or who is in a grade lower than eighth grade so to me that makes it nearly impossible for Brookfield cares to deploy their surveys to seventh and eighth graders as they usually have so we don't get that information from that survey and maybe that's okay maybe that's I do think that that's exactly what the the motivation was but as Wendy said I've heard from Mr Renda I've heard from Brookfield cares the reports of that survey and

156the usefulness of it in students those ages and I think that that information should still be surveyable again parents have always had the opt out and so when this first came to review it was oh but they didn't have enough time to survey the study okay fine add language to the policy that gives them plenty of time then that wasn't good enough because ultimately what it is is that that survey doesn't you I don't I don't think I think the motivation is to block that survey and so I don't I don't agree with language that does that I'm sorry you feel that way but that was not the intent of the Comm and you're welcome to sit on that um the fact that we've been going at this for over a year um most of

157our discussion was not even in reference to the Brookfield care survey um this doesn't just talk this isn't a policy for Brookfield cares it's a policy to deal with all surveys instructional materials what's going on in the classroom so um it's unfortunate that you have that mindset because that's not the positive intent that we had I wasn't here a year and a half ago when this all started but I would have to say yes that was not the intents of the policy and um you know for an 11-year-old or a 12-year-old to be asked about their sex Behavior attitudes I think that's a little uncomfortable um I and I don't know if all of the kids at that age would even be mature enough to answer a question like that uh I do think it's

158extremely important for kids who are you know reaching adolescence and I think the schools absolutely need to have information in the community about what's going on um I guess I could be swayed but I'm I'm really I'm I think I would be uncomfortable asking those questions to kids of a certain age that's all that was that was the intent but like I but but it is a first read so anybody who has any comments or would like to give Fe feedback you've got a month to do it and this is this is what we're proposing and this is this is about making the the particular survey or materials available to the parent not not doing the survey or using the materials about making them available so parents are aware and then there's then there's opt

159out options and different things like that that are discussed here so just so everybody is aware that that part of the discussion as well which is in the policy would it is it reasonable or would it make sense to have maybe like the social worker the guidance counselor Mr Renda somebody who's like at the middle school level weigh in because we're making a policy for I mean I don't know I thought it's like to Joy's Point like the Val or to Rosa's point the value of and and Wendy's point the value of that information versus Joy's Point like and holl our point that why would you ever ask below eighth grade that information like I we haven't been here long enough to know the history but also I mean I would have no OB to

160that people who are experts in that age I would have no objection to that but I'm just saying that this was the intent of the policy that's it and um any comments are welcome and we'd love to have those comments in a month that's it yeah you've given me a lot to think about so I want to spend some more time um on this but but for the moment um we have a motion um on the table and it's been seconded uh to approve um policy 6162 .51 um for a first reading um all in favor of approving I for first reading I'll go with I to so um any oppos say nay n okay so uh it passes um the board has approved um policy 616 2.51 for first reading okay so now we're

161going to move to uh the next item approval of bylaw 9324 meeting purpose I move that the board approved bylaw 9 324 meeting purpose for a first reading as recommended by the policy communication subcommittee second great so we have a motion on the on the floor and it's been seconded um Ed can we open discussion um actually yes um I would actually like to move to strike the words said station and insert the words on a regularly scheduled oh sorry strike the words on a regularly scheduled rotation B said station and insert the words at the board's discretion and further move to strike the words at any time by anyone it's sort of in that last paragraph there um I'd like to ask you your thinking on the by anyone at any time is that

162it sure yeah um so the way it looks to me in this policy is that because it says it needs to be available by anyone at any time that we are that we shall post them immediately because they have to be available by anyone at any time and I think that some of the conversations that I had um especially regarding the digital content that in you know of recently that we were talking about um needing that flexibility of maybe not posting immediately or maybe restricting who has access to it like maybe only people that are in Brookfield um you know having to be like on maybe like a list that gets sent out the meeting minutes either you know I'm not suggesting any of that I'm just saying having that flexibility within the policy to

163me is important this to me restricts and makes it something that we shall do on sort of like an immediate basis I I was just going to say one of the things so we had focused so much on the meeting about adding online streaming streaming service we sort of at least in I missed the scheduled Rotation by said station because it doesn't match up with so it was unintentional I think on our part that that doesn't that language doesn't match up so that was going to be what I had said as well as my language was maybe at the discretion presented on a regularly scheduled rotation or on a regularly scheduled basis at the discretion of the board of bed or the board of bed chair and the superintendent to kind of make sure that

164we build in language where if there's an emergency there is some actually point of order sorry um the motion that I made was that seconded yes it was oh okay okay so then did you want are you just to clarify are you amending that motion or can you read yours again sorry I wrote down um where did I put it you're just striking it out um striking the words on a regularly scheduled Rotation by said station right and inserting the words at the board's discretion the board's discretion okay and then further moved to strike the words by anyone at any time that was the full motion okay so it reads and be presented at the board's discretion yeah yeah at the board's discretion the's discretion and all all of this um this for people who

165are watching at home and have no idea what we're talking about um this was a learning curve for those of us who are new uh this came about as a result of the um the March 20th was it March March 8th um uh meeting um which was not immediately posted to the YouTube channel and was put up the meeting was yeah the yeah but it was it was posted a few later um from circumstances that no one could have predicted but it it helped us see that that policy 9324 is out of date the language reflects the system that existed um gosh what was it Mr Belin you're in the audience it was what like eight years ago longer than that years ago okay so so a really long time ago when when the the

166board was relying on a public access station and so this really is an opportunity to update um this policy and and I I like the the phrasing in the first sentence of via an online streaming service because now we we think of YouTube as being for forever but who knows who knows so I think that this language gives us the flexibility and um also I think for people who are concerned we have folks in the community who are concerned about um uh transparency of board activities and and so it it might seem at first blush that taking out the language by anyone at any time could reduce Public Access but if you look at the way that sentence would would roll without that language there it's actually um it's actually uh very very open it

167says recorded meetings are available to view on the Brookfield District website which is the current practice um they they they reside there um for for anybody so um let me let me read out the the version that I have and then we can all be on the same page and then this would be the motion on which we would be the language on which we would be voting well first you have to vote online you're only voting to accept first read tonight you don't have to vote on policy okay so do we not have the same you have to just we have the same language um oh okay so you wrote down what I wrote um the yeah yeah yeah sorry go ahead okay so this is this would be the language um all meetings

168will be recorded for broadcast via an online streaming streaming service and be presented at the board of Ed's discretion or the board's discretion regation the board's discretion not regularly scheduled rotation because they would just be we don't have like a rotation cross it all out the board discretion period um exactly yeah can I just let me let me just finish this recorded meetings are available to view on the Brookfield District website Etc Hala you'd like the floor it sounds awkward to me at at and be presented at the board's discretion I would say all meetings will be recorded for broadcast via an online streaming service and will be available and recorded meetings will be available to view on the Brookfield District's website period um and be presented at the board's discussion I I'm not really

169it doesn't really make sense to me you're you're right it it sounds like we could just put this into one sentence so it would read all meetings will be recorded for broadcast via an online streaming service and will be available to VI to view view on the Brookfield district and the recorded meetings are available to on thei District okay so I'll make an amended motion then okay so then I'll move to amend uh my motion so that the language reads in its entirety all meetings will be recorded for broadcast via an online streaming service and will be available to view on the Brookfield District website a second okay so we vote on the amended motion yes all right um all in favor of um the language of the amended motion say I I I I

170okay any opposed so the um motion as amended passes and um leis we have the language for you it's been scribbled but it's here then again policy committee the next time we meet can make sure it's comfortable and then if we don't talk about this again until the June meeting for second read to see if we're going to actually adopt the okay great all right and so we come to uh the final item of I think it's the final item of new business um and that is a consideration of a complaint under 1312 and for this I'm going to um relinquish the chair to the vice chair Rose Fernandez okay um just so uh the Public's aware and just so that we all get on uh the same page um the board alone has discretion

171over whether or not we consider complaints made against us as a board collectively uh or as individual members um and we also have complete discretion um when not superseded by law as to how we deal with those complaints um so um I'd like to ask every everyone here tonight um if considering the address um if we want to address the refiled complaint um against Wendy Point by Point um and so um rather than open it up to for discussion like I did uh the last time I'd like to ask each one of you individually to weigh in on that so Hala do you want to start us off would you like to go through the complaint Point by point I would um and I'm going to um ask the board to bear with me on

172this and I apologize ahead of time because we've been talking about time and being brief but I think it's really important to talk about this and to um kind of air our particular positions in voting the way that we did so if everybody remembers and it's in the minutes um at our last meeting April 10th we had originally voted four uh four people voted to dismiss the complaint and three people have abstained one of them being W Wendy youngl she abstained from that vote um and the the what what was presented by Rosa at the time was that policy 1312 does not apply um I'd like to talk about that for a minute before we're going into the particulars of the complaint itself uh in Mr grimes's language policy 1312 is Broad and sweeping those

173are his words um I think there may be room for the board or the policy uh committee to consider being specific or adding language in that policy to address members of the board but having said that this is an awkward policy to apply to um a board member a complaint against the board member there is no question having said that that the public has the right to complain about a board member and Mr Grimes used the appropriate channels in um sending in a written correspondence that is how we receive complaints that is how the board reads and considers them and in accordance with policy 131 which Rosa Fernandez just read it is at the board's discretion whether or not they will um take action on that claim or how to handle it okay so that's

174the first uh that's the first item there so again to reiterate the public absolutely has the right to complain they can complain through written correspondence the board has the dis discretion to handle them as they will now this policy 1312 is a procedural policy regarding regarding how complaints are submitted and what channels they go through it specifically indicates that a complaintant first goes to a building administrator if they are not satisfied with that response it they can write a letter to the superintendent if it is about the superintendent then they would write a letter to the chairman of the board of education um as it goes up the the the channels um in this case as you can all see it would be very awkward to write a a letter to the a chairman of

175the board when the complaint is about the chairman of the board so it's it's kind of an awkward policy however he has the right to complain okay so we go through that now let's talk about the comp the particulars of the complaint itself they are twofold the first is about suspension of the live streaming of the March 20th meeting and Mr Grimes um specifically states that bylaw 9314 was violated and I quote um bylaw 934 14 states that policies bylaws and regulations shall be subject to suspension for a specified purpose and limited time by majority vote of all members of the Board of Education he he his claim is that this policy or this bylaw was violated because a vote was not taken the issue here is that there is no policy or a written

176policy or bylaw to violate the closest one that comes to this is the policy that we looked at today which is 9324 which we just amended however even the way it St it stated um the way it was before we amended it is that all meetings will be recorded for broadcast and that they are available to view okay we've we've just discuss that language the meeting was in fact recorded and it was it is available to view therefore I don't feel that any policy there was violated um I don't want to overlook any portion of Mr grimes's complaint so I am going to say that he specifically said or implied that that he understands there is no policy but he says that it can be reasonably interpreted because the practice has been going on for

177years that it can be reasonably interpreted as falling um subject to the suspension bylaw while um Mr Grimes has sat in our seats not too long ago he has self-identified as a recovering board member so I think he understands that we are presented with challenging issues um very often and that we operate with the written policies and bylaws and if it is not written I think it's very dangerous to interpret and um and decide that a practice becomes a policy okay so the second portion of the complaint deals with um public comment and uh he believes that the it is a violation of um the bylaw which states that uh 91 well I'm sorry 9325 that the chairman will not respond to public comment except to clarify issues I remember the March 20th meeting quite

178well um but because I didn't want to trust anything to memory I went back and viewed the public comment portion and it is my opinion that everything that um Dr Young Blood said in that public comment section was in fact for clarification purposes so I also feel in my opinion that this policy was not violated so taking into account having noted uh Mr grimes's uh concerns and having reflected on these policies which I do not believe are violated I would continue to vote that this complaint not be active acted on thank you um actually be just before you start I just wanted to make it very clear that Wendy's not going to be participating in this portion of the discussion but I'd like to have her still here at the table to answer any questions

179so of course make as many comments as you want but if you have any questions um for Wendy she's here for that purposes only um so Rob that's fine I'll be very quick and brief as well because I think Hala outlined everything and I agree with pretty much everything that she said I don't want to sit didn't repeat and beat a dead horse but uh just that we do recognize the complaints we do hear them and that we we are here to address them and as a board so that and I I think it was very well Set uh the way H said so I don't really have too much more I like the way we handled it last time to be with the way we took care of it just a little bit of

180language that we had to work on so I guess my take is separate from the policies um as I went back after the last meeting and I realized I didn't say anything and I was trying to reflect on where this all came from um and some of the misinformation I personally separate from complaints or policies I personally reached out to um when and said I didn't feel it was okay for her to make a decision without all of us we had it back and forth um so I never questioned why she made the decision in terms of what to let the safety concerns of the live streaming I only said to her where my only contention was I don't want her to make a decision without all of us I wanted us to be United

181for front I wanted us to discuss it I thought that we could all benefit from having a conversation and and then there's now there's policies and complaints I don't I don't think it needed to get to this point I just wanted my my original concern before the meeting happened was we all we should all be making a decision together not have Wendy make the decision for us so I mean there's a policy about and I don't want to go into all of this what the chairman is allowed to do and everything like that but my whole thing I don't want to move forward thinking that our discussions and our opinions aren't going to be part of decisions that are made okay Joy yeah so um I would agree that um I think it's an important

182practice that for important decisions such as that um and it's not about the actual decision it's um we need to not make have one person make a unal unilateral decision for the board um for that specific policy it's very clear um on that's how I read it and that's what I do feel that policy was violated um I too gave my feelings on you know it could very simply have been a special meeting before our meeting to have a discussion about it um to be forthcoming about any information that um Wendy got from the police department um I think that the roles and duties of the chairman are very clear and one of them is not having the power to unilaterally make decisions such as that um so I think it's an important discussion to

183have and it's important for moving forward um as a a joint effort and unified Force together as a board and not one person person asserting their power over the rest of the board okay um I will just add some of my own um comments from um I I think my my opinion on 1312 is clear um with regards to policy 9314 I didn't feel there was any violation 9110 no violations um I do think with uh policy 9325 um uh Wendy was in my opinion acting with the best of intentions to protect the impartiality of the board which is her responsibility um by interrupting comments that attempted to identify School Personnel quote by reference which tends to identify an individual so that's important it's not just about mentioning names but if you are mentioning positions

184that maybe only one or two people occupy that is a reference that tends to identify people which would be a violation of the policy and I think Wendy was trying her best to um maintain the impartiality of the board um in that respect I don't think she violated the policy but rather upheld it um when it it sounds like there's a lot of um sort of comments about the decision to live stream the meeting record it post it um again I think the situation that we found ourselves in was new um we had advice from police and I think that Wendy acted again with every good in ention to protect students staff and board members from future violent and very graphic threats of actual murder so I think to start talking about you know this

185is so important that we need to have a special meeting before the meeting is making a mountain out of a mole hill when in reality what needed to be done needed to be done swiftly and that's my that's my take on on the policies I don't feel that there was any violation and I think that in at every turn Wendy acted with the best of intentions so would you like to add anything I just have one thing to add one of the things I highlighted when going through 9110 which is duties of the chair in 9110a number three it says the chair will confer with the superintendent on crucial matters which may occur between board meetings so to me that it was a definitely a crucial matter she didn't make it alone the decision to

186not live stream was made in conference with the superintendent and the recommendation of the chief of police so I don't think her intention was to make a decision to have un unilateral control over the board I I don't I don't fault that decision being made in that situation um and I do think under this particular policy statement that situ in in my opinion that I highlighted it and and pointed it out because I do think that was a crucial matter in between board meetings um in terms of all the other policies I holla said everything uh that needs to be said I don't think there is um weight to any of his complaints in terms of not that we don't want to hear complaints but under the policies that he specifically stated for his specific

187reasons um I think it can be dismissed the way we handled it last time also want to say one go ahead um to me I I don't I think crucial is a very strong word um I don't think that was a crucial decision that needed to be made um it wasn't a state of an emergency um yes it was very unfortunate very negative um but it's not to say that people weren't recording it on their phones or that information wouldn't have gotten out anyway um to me that wasn't an emergency situation that is something that we could have dealt with together as a board um well informed about the same information and then made made an informative decision together as a board um also PA I just want to verify clarify what you said so

188if if somebody makes a complaint the expectation is they yet to make that complaint through written correspondence is that I think that I mean that's how we have received complaints I mean they any member of the public has the right to complain and they can do it through written correspondence and uh we handle it as such it's not that Mr Grimes does not have the right to make the complaint of course he does he of course anybody has the right to complain against a board member or anything else um it's just that he decided to cite a policy you you don't have to you don't have to site a policy to make a complaint that's that's that's the whole point and I just want want to add and this is just on a personal note

189I actually thank Wendy for um for taking making this DEC I mean it was a terrible time and yes we can argue we can discuss whether or not it actually provides any safety um but if a police chief and we can we can we can say that people can stream it sure they can we know that do we know that it's going to keep us safe no we will never know but if there is one little iota of a CH that this has enhanced the safety of our children or of any member of our community or our school Community our board then thank you for for making that decision I just have if you had it to do with ver again would you do it differently um perhaps I I'll think about that and I'll

190chat with you about it okay um does anybody have any other comments or questions that they want to add at this time so um just one more thing sorry um you know I'm not looking to rehash what happened in the past I'm always looking want to look forward and I just hope that moving forward um that we stand United as a board and discuss things as as a board and if there's information that's so crucial and so important it needs to be shared with all the board members and we need to collaborate collaboratively work together and decide courses of action I don't think it should be unilaterally left in the hands of one person okay so hopefully everyone's gathered enough information and everybody has spoken their piece uh regarding the complained violations brought forward by

191Mr Grimes is there a motion for any action regarding this complaint I would move to dismiss the complaint and take no action pursuant to the citizen complaint under policy 1312 do I have a second thank you Hela um I do want to clarify here that we should all be prepared to actually vote on this if you feel like you have no conflict of interest and you're still feeling like abstaining then please by all means now is the time to get any information that you feel that you need to vote so that being said is there any further discussion on this is everybody prepared to vote Yes okay so all in favor of dismissing this complaint please signify by saying I I I all those opposed I please signify by saying Nay n okay so that

192the motion to dismiss passes uh 42 and one oh I'm sorry abstentions I okay so 4 two one abstention all right um Wendy the chair uh chair is back over to you okay um so uh I now GNA we're going to do uh same version um we're going to um discuss the complaint against um Rosa uh she will made on sorry sorry um thank you very much Kathy uh we're going to discuss um the citizen complaint um made April um 11th I believe um from Mr Grimes um against the actions of Rosa when she assumed the chair um in our last meeting I thought I could do it for memory but I have to go to my um text okay so um just a second all right so first um I'd like to know if

193the board uh wants to engage in discussion of this as we just established um it is completely within the purview of the board to decide whether or not to um take up a complaint and if so to do it um the discretion is wholly ours so um first I'd like to I'd like to hear from you whether you'd like to take up the complaint of we started on Holo side last time so can we start with you this time uh I feel the same I don't think that we should consider it and I would choose to dismiss the complaint and move on um I don't have the language in front of me I think the the nature of the complaint was that um that um Miss Fernandez displayed behavior that was um biased and unfair

194I believe that's or unfair and biased I believe those are the two uh key terms um I mean depends on what part you yeah yeah you have the language of on this matter in terms of our statements uh yes thank you thank you very much so um having a pres Prejudice or bias um in terms of you said in terms of her statements okay in terms of her statements thank you very much um so I'm sorry Stephanie just to recap you said I I mean I I have nothing to say at this time um come back to me cuz all right I I have um I I don't believe that's what she did and okay I don't have any reason to think we should consider it or move forward with the discussion okay um but

195I don't discount my other board members needing to do that certainly um Joy do you have um thoughts or discussions well I was just going to say in the complaint it says they want they are requesting how a citizen should file a complaint about a board of education member and H that would be the right um I I can't speak to if she had pres pres Prejudice or bias on a matter so it's nothing that I would want to continue okay um thank you uh Sarah the floor is yours um yeah I I mean it's not the last meeting the policy was the one that we were questioning so now we're saying we can just maybe we just have to make sure that it's clear that if anyone wants to complain they don't have to

196mention a policy because that used to be that tended to be the hangup last time so I guess we just have to make sure that our communication is clear going forward but as far as this is concerned I think um we have to move on Robert I agree I I didn't think any Prejudice or anything was displayed and I'm I'm okay with moving on as well thank you H I'm just going to read one other part of Mr grimes's uh complaint and that is um quote I am not as concerned in this complaint as I am with the complaint filed previously and with respect to this complaint I request the following um a formal acknowledgement that uh 1312 does apply or alternatively um how the public might have the right to complain and I think

197we've already addressed those issues so I would also uh be in favor of dismissing this claim this a complaint sorry okay and I I would say just for the record that my thoughts Echo uh what Robert expressed um okay so then um is there a is there any further discussion or shall we put a motion um I'll move to dismiss this complaint and take no action okay so can we have it all together I move to dismiss complaint and take no action I second okay just so we're all clear right all in favor of the motion to dismiss and take no action I I okay um any opposed please signify by saying nay and any extensions so the motion passes um the board has agreed to um dismiss the complaint and take no action all

198right so now we are moving to Old business um the we're going to uh discuss or continue our discussion about the uh adopted budget as needed Mrs diad have you something for us um sure um nothing nothing too too specific other than there are still you know some um what we call puts and takes um in different um you know budget areas as Eric mentioned earlier we um we are finalizing our new lease with Canon for our copier um Fleet of copy machines um that will see um an increase in that line um uh there's ALS but then there's you know on the other side um changes in Staffing with uh retirements resignations and how that might impact um as you know we did have a reduction of the technology in integrator position and so

199who that who that actual individual in the bargain unit may be still can change between now and um you know the end of this whole proc process so there's a lot of um there's a lot of moving parts and we we are tracking it and um we'll have more to uh a final you know um list of changes for you to vote on um in the coming weeks yeah and and at the last meeting we presented that list to everybody which is really a very meaty list a healthy list that really we don't anticipate a lot of change there that's a substantive list um but any adjustments we certainly will bring forward um and as a reminder our next board meeting is May 22nd uh we will assuming uh hoping uh that the vote is

200out there and favorable and the budget passes on May 21st when we have the referendum the board we will have on the agenda a motion to adopt the changes to the budget to fit within the reduction of the $700 plus th000 reduction from the January adopted budget that the board report all right um are there questions the budget any discussion okay um actually just one sorry um so so we don't actually I'm trying to remember but I guess like haven't done this enough um we don't actually need to vote to make those reductions until after the referendum we we could vote now if someone wanted to put that on the table but it's we don't know what's going to happen on May 21st so why do it you know have to do it twice you

201know the next day we can make that decision and what happens there is that really triggers for us a movement forward with lot you know job certain job postings perhaps and other things to move forward U with our our teacher contracts and uh unaffiliated uh decisions we still need to make and so forth as a board and we could do all those decisions on May 22nd um and give our finance department time to make the adjustments before July 1 again assuming the budget is favorable and passes yeah cuz the bottom line budget number you know what that is right so so really it's now just where is that going to be spent very specifically and um you know almost the more time we have to fine-tune that then the the less variances there will be

202you know once the the year starts so but do you think it's useful though to reiterate where those where you know we're thinking of making those cuts because you know there's not going to be another meeting before the referendum the um Board of Ed meeting before the referendum so um is it worthwhile to go through what those cuts were so that people can make an informed decision about you know what they're voting on or I mean if you I'm just saying if you wanted to I didn't go through it in my financial report because I figured we'd be spending time doing it now but if you wanted to they are in the minutes of to say of that report um and I would encourage anyone from the public to take a look at that document

203and see where some of these cuts are being made um we went over that in detail at the last meeting can find it from last meeting we could pull it up on the screen and go through it again we also did put it in three main points so it is out there it may have been out there in a letter I sent to parents as well to post it on Facebook walk through sort of the the big the main areas to yeah I I don't think it would hurt to do again I don't think there's you know I think this is like something that is important for you want the top as you can see on the website very first um Link at the top of the budget the historical budet awesome so Casey question

204absolutely so um the way this the way we've uh sort of bucketed these reductions um are um from from order of operational which is um you know not that we have no control over this but we really literally had no control over the health Insurance uh rate that came in um that was the largest reduction to the um operating budget in the amount of uh just over $300,000 we initially when we developed the budget back in December the estimates from um the state PL partnership plan was uh an an increase of 7% um the final numbers came in at an increase of 2% which was was um you know it significant savings it we I also did update the Census Data from December to um I think or early March so it is the most

205accurate information we had at that point in time another adjustment in our electricity we did lock in at a um rate of 988 kilowatt hours for um the next 3 years so that brings us through I believe 2027 um December of 2027 when we budgeted it was 11 cents per kilow hour so that was um a good savings workers comp compensation um a slight reduction there um so those are the real the the operational Cuts that's just under $400,000 of the $728,000 uh reduction that we needed there were some changes in special education um and this again is at the point in time where where the budget is developed um this is the the total expected cost uh for our um special education tuition and transportation and then the net impact on our excess cost

206grant that we receive and programming um we did side uh because we do have a lot of other investments in this uh this Budget moving forward enrollment um or rolling in um ARP eser funding and and arper grants and things like that um we did decide to scale back the enrollment study and instead of doing the comprehensive uh $15,000 um enrollment study uh just a an update to the the birth rate study um by uh Peter praa um which will will give us good information but it's just it's just scaled down and then some other changes in programming um and really just fine-tuning based on student usage and um what is used in the district things like Lexia um ST Math mclass intervention formative those are all different programming um things that we have we

207have removed because either they aren't utilized enough or there's some overlap overlap in some other um protocols and and assessment tools that we have we made a reduction to um library books across all three schools um and again this was all done working collaboratively with uh building principles um so there was no surprise to any of these reductions um moving along to the more harder um the harder uh changes we had to make in reductions um were related to Personnel um we did decide to reduce the technology integrator position um which is a 1.0 FTE position as I said before it it doesn't mean that that individual that's in that role um will be the the individual that's uh leaving the the district um it's it's all done through the collective bargaining agreement um and

208so the last person in that has the certification um will be uh you know that comparable to this will be um the person that would need to leave and with retirements and resignations coming up again we don't know how that's going to um play out in the end of the day um we did have a retirement in the secretary's un um bargaining unit and we have decided um um now that we've had a year under our Bel at CES there may be able we may be able to shift um a secretary um in that area to to cover a need elsewhere we're not going to replace the um retirement uh that we that has that has occurred we also have a point5 um nurse uh position which is actually um Services uh students um at

209um Christian Life Academy which is our this is one of your first learning things in the budget process is that we are we are required by State Statute to to um provide those services to um private schools in in in the town of Brookfield and so we are thinking um with the reduction of fifth grade moving from WMS to um clees we we lost a lot of students there we kept the Staffing um the same both in our with our secretaries and our nurses and we're thinking we may be able to utilize um uh some some of those you know our current existing employees to cover the needs over there it's not a full-time need over at CLA CLA so um we believe we can do that then there's some so the total Cuts were

210$783,000 offsets to that were in operational increases for liability insurance which Rosa had spoken about um adding CES to our policy did increase um our liability insurance some salary some you know small fine-tuning to some salary adjustments and then some programming increases while we are eliminating the tech integrator position um we do still have a lot of uh goals in our strategic plan um around technology and integrating that into our curriculum and so we did um add about 50 add $115,000 to the budget um for professional development um for staff at all three schools um as Joy mentioned before we did add um American sign language so that the that there's three students in year one of that program we want to make sure that they can see that through um and so the total

211increases uh were 55,57 and that gets us um you know within a few dollars of of where we we need to be thank you you're welcome thank you and and for people who are still watching um they have just gotten a reminder of the the difficult cuts um and hopefully this budget will pass so that the cuts stop here Y and I just wanted to add that it's it's really important to to talk about timing because I think in the community there probably will be messages floating around out there that you know considering you know the nearly $800,000 that we had to you know cut from the budget that this money was somehow magically found it was so easy and there wasn't you know but when the budget's presented and adopted in I mean it's

212presented in December but it's adopted in January and really mid January um it's incredibly early and so those estimates and the budget isn't entirely an estimate um those estimates are extremely conservative and those numbers are expected to change um obviously in some ways in a very great way and other ways not so great um but those conversations have been had with the board of Selectmen and the board of Finance throughout their process of determining what is appropriate level of a cut for us and how they it helped them reach their decision um so the money is never magically found it's a part of an ongoing conversation so I just wanted to make sure that that was kind of very clear add to that the estimates are strong estimates I mean the we talked to our

213health insurance uh adviser to get the estimate in you know November for what we present in December so nobody's picking these out of thin air or really uh uh it's math at the end of the day that's all this is is math and we make our estimates based off of that and the advice we get uh from our different uh advisers and partners thank you thanks everybody so that concludes old business and now we'll move to public comment and now Mr Highland you've been so patient you're up sir we get there eventually yes sir so you were here for the first reading of the guidelines on public comment um three minutes per person please state your name and your address um thank you very much uh my name's Tom Highland I live on Freddy's Lane

214in Brookfield been living here for about two years uh raised my kids in bethl so we started out over there they're full grown adults now and just in a public form in an educational setting I wanted to speak to what's going on on college campuses right now I think it's shameful what's going on the anti-Semitism that's obvious sorry that can't happen here my father's generation was World War II my father-in-law World War II three of my uncles my youngest uncle died in the war that cannot stand in this country there is no place for Jew hatred or hatred of anybody based on their ethnic background or on their religion it just can't fly and people need to speak up about this and not just sit there watch the news and let it roll over them

215I'm not a public speaker I've never stood up in a forum like this before and had anything to say to anyone I see a lot of good people in this room great kids great parents he said the Pledge of Allegiance which is awesome I appreciate that but there is just no place for this in our society so what I'm thinking and I could be off base and I would love to know what you guys think separately or together has di Dei gone sideways on college campuses where inclusivity is not inclusive where diversity does not include diversity of thought I'm not in favor of shutting anybody down period have a First Amendment right now this country to speak your mind and you have a need to do it to be a good American to not stand

216against anti-muslim hatred anti-jewish hatred anti- anybody it should not flaw in this country and that's what caused World War II was the crap the Nazis were doing in Germany with the Jew hatred which set everything off that led with Japan and all of that stuff stuff that went on that was such a terrible thing that we never want to end up there so I've kind of said my piece and I also want to say one other small piece on this and I'm all done I know you're all tired I have concerns with Equity going sideways Equity means equal outcomes that is Marxist theory okay just so you guys are aware of that I know a lot of people will confuse equality with Equity they are not the same thing America stands for a quality of

217opportunity not equal outcomes which is round pegs into square holes and square holes or Square PS into rounds thank you for thank you very much I appreciate you hanging in late at night and hearing you out thank you thank you Mr Korea is it on uh anti Korea 45 West W Road um just a couple of points of what I've observed for the um some of the discussion here um so it's a violation of the code of ethics to sit at the table while you um while you have to recuse yourself from something that you're that you you have a conflict in so tonight we had two violations of the code ethics there's a reason for for rules you know sometimes the rules here we see we have rules changed policies changed to avoid a

218situation that happened in the past um so you know the respondents of those complaints could easily come up here and answer questions on the mic but what you don't do is decide what you want to do at the time you follow the rules personally I think it makes sense to have not broadcasted meeting right um if there was credible evidence you know I would think you would probably have two or three people that wanted to broadcast it by four four or five that that would say no it's not there's been a ton of discussion the easiest thing would have been don't broadcast the first few minutes and then add to the agenda a vote should we turn the video on it's really simple most of these issues are super simple if you're not like in

219a caucus deciding you know chess games about the silliest little things you know just like managing people right if you're violating law and you are not providing services to children for special education what you do is you don't shut parents off after 3 minutes you figure out what's going on and then you go fix it a lot of these issues could be solved if people just figured out the information looked at the actual condition built a plan plan and executed a little point of clarification is uh you know MC Rams was on the board of education 20 years ago so not just a few years um the meeting videos are not on the district website there's a link to the YouTube link there is still references to channel 194 right um the policies that policy

220that you went over that is so outdated you know there's a ton of them that's the work you're supposed to be doing right the the proposal to have 12 meetings verus 16 meetings is very important because that reduced the number of regular meetings which you have public comment by 25% right that public comment so so if you added special meetings you're structurally taking away public comment because special meetings don't have public comment unless you put it on the agenda and you only put it on the agenda related to those specific topics so there has been a lot of um operational things around reducing public comment what there hasn't been a lot of operational focus on is fixing the problems that parents come to speak to you about if you just do your jobs as opposed

221to move the chest pieces around to save face things will go a lot better I would like to not come here every other week right I'd like to come here a couple times a year and say what a great job you're doing because if you were just like I come and tell you in detail what you're doing wrong I would do the exact opposite for what you're doing right now thank you thank you and um the fin public comment is Mrs scol sorry guys I know you're tired I am too um Aon Scalera 5 Jackson drive I'm here this evening to clear the air about a few things I was disappointed but not shocked that the board retreat on Saturday some members were actually complaining that the same parents keep showing up with the sole

222purpose of getting rid of the superintendent and then questioning why the few parents continue to show up as the board did what they what we already wanted them to do was get rid of the old special director for starters I've not stood up here and asked to do anything with the super superintendent but stated over and over that the firsthand struggles that my child and family have experience and sadly continue to experience is tied to the lack of oversight monitoring and Leadership to ensure that every child in Brookfield is is afforded an exceptional education but even more a free and appropriate education I've shown up for quite some time to voice my concerns with special education and I will continue to do so until my child has an appropriate program where data and progress is

223collected and growth is seen I will also make it very clear that this is not an arena that a parent would choose to stand up and voice continued problems and failures within the special education department yet every other Avenue to date has been a dead end road so I guess I have a a standing date for the foreseeable future to wait for 3 minutes praying someone does something to make a difference for not only my child but every identified student who is receiving a far Le far less than what they were legally entitled to this isn't about more money it's about oversight Contin continued meaningful targeted training and most of all immediate accountability for all service providers I ask each of you while anyone that that puts themselves out here and is willing to stand

224up and speak to put yourself in their shoes and would you be happy if it was your child or your family that was affected by whatever they choose to speak about my child to date has no required testing nothing's driving instruction we have no data we have no trials by the people providing the instruction or Services he doesn't have an OT which is required for his disability and and yet the supervisor in charge is nowhere to be found I can't get any answers so that's why I'm here so maybe the administration should consider bringing in special education coaches I mean that's the model we're moving to maybe we need coaches instead of Supervisors maybe coaches can help Drive instruction and show these teachers how to progress monitor how to give our kids what they need

225so they can make they can make grow thank you Mrs Scalera just um one note on that um for clarity I I I think it needs to be said that that we the board hears the frustration um it's it's consistent and and um easy to track but by law we have no role the board has no role in the special processes um you you can talk about uh your your child um any any person can talk about their child but uh but by law uh we cannot respond other than providing resources um that the administration requests so um anyway that's that's that's the point for this evening okay so um now we're moving to the three main points um Stephanie what did you gather and then we'll give you some input uh so I think

226a budget update with a reminder to vote on May 21st the BHS um Athletics report and the CK science of reading program I was thinking since the up since the sports update is not official yet maybe like the technology update is more important because it's not final yet yeah people want to know about that yeah the technology update technology update instead of what Joy instead of the athletic update final just a draft and we'll we'll post it anyway can we put get it what about putting um public comment on just addressing the fact that we're listening and just mentioning that toing sent because that also came up when we were adjusting the calendar for the for the dates of our meetings could you go a little bit more into into depth like the what what

227the point is like that it's valued or it could be it could be a summary it could be a high level but just some sort of acknowledgement I just feel like that might be the time that maybe instead of Technology update I don't know um we have the ca I definitely think is and then budget update with a reminder to vote since it's our last meeting I mean just a thought going out there I'm okay um I want um I I just want to say for the record because we' brought this up a couple of times um there's continued uh cons consistent effort to address the concerns that are um shared through email um to the board and um so I think because often those are paralleled you know the public comment and the um

228Communications we've been receiving there um but I don't know that that'll make the three points this time because I think these are three very high priority items I would agree I think like the the the point of three main points is if you don't want to watch watch 3 hours 4 hours of a video and the minutes don't tell you enough what are the big three takeaways what is what's the main business that we conducted at this meeting so in keeping with that spirit I think the three points that you know we discussed was most appropriate Robert got anything okay um upcoming events the only ones I had Ava already listed which was prom and graduation okay so for people watching at home um this concludes the public portion of the meeting um uh we

229are going to hopefully be moving into um executive session um I do have one minor change for you guys so could we get a a motion I move that the board enter into executive session for the purpose of discussing the superintendent's goals evaluation unaffiliated salaries and contracts and um shoot shoot shoot all right that's okay no no no because I screwed up I screw up am the I I'm going to move to amend the motion to add the words to add the words and attorney client privileged information which didn't make this um I'll second okay thank you thank you um all in favor of amending the motion to add the words and attorney client privileged information okay so that passes so then the um motion as amended um I'll just move that the board enter

230into executive session for the purpose of discussing the superintendent's goals and evaluation Affiliated salaries and contracts and attorney FL privileged information it's already on the table so you're good no second need all right um so uh then can we move into executive session with all in favor favly thank you all right folks go to the accompl he [Music]