Board of Education Meeting

001get going um calling the um meeting of the the regular meeting of the Brookfield Board of Education uh to order on this Wednesday evening frigid Wednesday evening January 17th and it is 703 um please join me um rising and saying the Pledge of Allegiance Al to the flag of the United States of America and to the republ for which it stands one nation under God indivisible with liy and justice for all thank you so um we have the roll call tonight um Joy Greenstein is here and Rob Robert fetto Stephanie sakur Sarah Divine and Wendy Youngblood Rosa Fernandez halah harani and then our executive team Casey diot uh Dr jumil and Dr Anna man so good evening everybody and good evening to um everybody who has um come out on this evening to to watch

002in person and hi to everybody at home okay so we are G to start with something really cool we have a student Spotlight from Candlewood Lake Elementary School um and I I believe we have a student and um two wow uh and Dr Young Blood I I can bring Dr pep saski up if that's okay please' be great thanks we have um two very special young ladies here for our Spotlight tonight and I know Mrs Pearson our upper school media specialist is here as well and I will turn it over to Dr pep saski thank you Dr BR and thanks for I losing my voice students are very happy about that but one thing that I was one thing there I am hello Manny Mota uh one thing that I was definitely committed to was

003in with Candlewood Lake and a school that size is always any opportunity for our upper school to work with lower school kids in a mentorship way embraced it and D Pearson fortunately has 100% Embrace that so I'm not going to say too much about what she's done this time time uh but she did bring with her Rosie and Maddie who are going to share their experiences why you stand right here hi I'd like to introduce myself for those of you that don't know is that on yet yes on on is it up now it is there we go okay um I'm deep Pearson I'm the media specialist for the upper school grades 345 my partner Nicole Guerrera would have loved to have been here tonight but her daughter had her Winter concert so next time

004she promises she'll be here um I wanted to thank you for having us back and give you a little glimpse into what we've been doing with our buddy program and a little bit of background for those of you that might be new to the board so when we embarked on this journey with this fantastic new big school we were trying to find a way to let our friends on both levels work together and also especially for our younger kids to have them feel more comfortable because it is a big school and you see big kids whether they on the bus or they're in the hallway so this program is what we came up with and we started out by just reading together and then we showed the younger ones how to Bookshop how to use

005a shelf marker how really modeled good behaviors in the library then we we did that a couple of times and we tried it we've committed to meeting at least once a month then we went into the maker space and modeled those behaviors there where they can can create and design and build so that when we get to our coding unit later in the winter they'll already have that Foundation laid so what we're here to talk about tonight though is our holidays around the world project and you know communities change and evolve all the time and sometimes you have cultures that come in that are different than what you are used to in your own home so what better way to understand that than to introduce holidays and traditions and Customs at an early age so

006we had our older students working with the younger students and the kids will tell you a little bit more about that but when you think about it in our school we have Ramadan EOL fitter dewali Hanukkah um K Quanza and of course Christmas and those are the holidays we focused on however we didn't focus on Christmas as we know it we focused on Christmas in the Philippines or in China or in Egypt or in Greece where we found out the Traditions are very different and through the entire project I have to say we started out focusing on what's different but we really realized that no matter what the holiday is and what the culture is we have a lot of similarities and that's really what binds us together so I'd like my friends here I'm

007going to move this over and have them introduce themselves what's your name meline mine roodle I'm in Mrs pay's class awesome my name is Rosie Martinez and I'm in Miss Muller's fifth grade class okay so Rosie why don't you tell a little bit about what we did um so our class paired up with a our kindergarten buddies and we to teach the them the basic research and Maddie what did we do first um read a book and after we read the book what did we do with what we learned after reading we wrote two facts and we from that we learned from the book and two facts wasn't enough and we should never use Just One Source right so what did the Buddies do next we opened up the computer to learn some more and

008then after we found another fact what did we do with it we chose a third fact to write down but had to be sure at least one of our facts had was something we could illustrate and what did we do after we had all three facts write a picture to match the words and what did we do with our final projects when we were done our projects were hung up in the library for everybody to see all right so I have just a few samples up here that I'll scroll through and if anybody has questions I know the girls would love to answer them and the students were encouraged to label their illustrations as well so you'll see they have their holiday they have their holiday written um as teachers we found out when we

009first did this project um there's always something you change so on our some of the forms you will not see spaces for teacher names but then we flipped that and some of them have the picture on the second page think this for Christmas in Egypt lamb stew oh I think I know who did this one who's is this one is this one yours would you like to explain what's in your picture tell them why did you put hearts for eat all fitter um um do you remember what your fact was over there Rosie can you read it for us it is a time for thinking of others and so how did you show that thinking of others um did you dra heart a big heart right so if you get a chance to stop by

010Candlewood Lake in the next couple of weeks or so um our walls are covered with almost 500 of these so see Christmas in the Netherlands Cent Claus comes in on a boat rides a horse right does anyone have questions for Rosie or Maddie I have a question what was something that you guys found was similar through all the different holidays what is something we all do get presents there we go you think of something else that was different like with the decorations something that all of them had in common uh they were all like like fun and festive and this was a fun fact that a lot of kids enjoyed is that for E all fitter depending on where you're celebrating you might get to attend camel races as you can see we had a

011lot of fun with this what is something that surprised you or shocked you about the different holidays or about one in particular I think I'd have to probably go back with that one the camel you think of anything else that was kind of really surprising or you wish the mie that you had with your holiday tricky question huh how about the henna painting I thought that was really cool that would be fun to have and then I'll just show you a quick little picture of so this is just one little portion of them on the walls so please if you get a chance stop by and see them thanks so much guys thank you Rosie and Maddie thank you for taking some of your um time this evening to come and show us your work

012that's really really cool thank you I hope your friends at school have had um as Rich an opportunity and a fun time as you guys have and what's interesting is they are actual book buddies too it's not just an upper school lower school they are buddies they work together thank you Mrs Pearson thank you Rosie and Maddie that's great um let's move now to um public comment so I'll I'll um remind everybody um and for folks who are new you'll be hearing it for the first time um the board of uh education welcomes public comment each speaker shall 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

013at the end of each regular meeting time is allotted for comment on any item which is within the board's jurisdiction which would also also well I don't think we're going to have overflow time uh because we have a short list this evening um discussion of school Personnel individual students or of individual members of the board is prohibited um and with that um I'd like to oh and please do um say your name and your address when you when you begin to speak um I'd like to invite up um our first speaker um is it on can you hear me yeah um Andy Korea 45 West wiser Road that's a tough act to follow um having ridden a camel though i' tell you they're not as cracked up as you'd think they'd be um but I

014have a few things to speak about um one is I'm very disappointed that there is not an agenda item to discuss Legal Services um I think the board has received enough information to understand that they do have a duty I think to act as to whether we continue with the current um Council and I think we should not um and I think doing so is really a matter of it's not political there's not a side or a caucus to it it's really a matter of being an adult it's also not a a financial issue too which lawyers you pick in the future sure there should be a bake off um additionally I recommend a no vote on the budget at this time there's some answers that need to be um answered I sent an email

015at 6:30 I apologize for not getting it out earlier um there was a lot to put in there I do think the board should consider looking through it asking questions in the um you know when we have the update from the administration as well as as the budget um there's several things in there there's one I'm a little concerned about the truthfulness of some of the uh comments made regarding legal services and the level of it um we're already over budget uh I think the past two months was $114,000 in in in two months um you know and also there's been statements oh it's just a a small $20,000 budget so from a control standpoint if 20,000 is small and we're going through the issues have the issues of using lawyers the way we do

016how do you know that it won't be 40 and that it creeps up and what is that extra $5,000 so I think that the board as small as that is needs to put controls that if you know the administration needs to go over 20 they come for every $5,000 increment and why um I'm also a little concerned about how the budget has been handled is because the budget in the in the uh Financial subcommittee meeting was voted to move forward as is with changes that really weren't Incorporated from the public I recall several meetings where a veteran board member would lament that there was not more participation from the community and then once you have participation it doesn't seem to be incorporated in the I think the big tradeoff that this board should do is

017um no longer move forward with the curriculum coaches and transfer that budget to a special education I think we need more supervisors I think Bill is um or the the director is in a position where they he likely needs to fire two and hire three um and because we have an identified area of need that the special education needs are not covered in the bu from the correct report that is a good transfer um additionally these curriculum coaching jobs you know we have we do not have several schools for which the curriculum coaching yeah what curriculum coaching is intended for but we also don't have a level of quality control within the high school so the problem you're trying to solve with $400,000 in the the lower schools that we don't need I know that

018we don't need we're not doing through management uh in the high school and the board has this has been brought to the board's attention last year thank you thank you for your comment and uh next Aeron scera five Jackson Drive um let's see where are we I felt I knew I should have printed this out I felt it was imperative to show up this evening and speak about the IEP compliance position position that was brought up at the last Board of Education meeting and if the position was necessary I for one was against filling the position last year as well as adding the FIA clerk position because I did not feel that adding two positions that would report to the problem special education director at the time as well as special education supervisors who were

019not adequately doing their jobs or ensuring our identified children were properly and adequately serviced I could not understand how the administration came to the decision that spending more money by paying more people to do a job that we were already paying people to do hiring people instead of holding people accountable to do all their duties that they were hired to do does not help the bottom line or the district as a whole fast forward and we are and here I am almost a year later and I know the opposite to be true regarding the compliance position the CK review was crystal clear that the special educ department has many systemic problems that need to be immediately addressed we have a new director who will likely move mountains with the proper support and funding and we

020have a compliance person who spends day in and day out making sure our students IEPs are written appropriately and support their needs as well as ensuring that they're being serviced if the district is looking at special education Cuts I would suggest looking at the supervisors first the district has had an increase in State complaints mediation and due process hearings in 2022 23 seven State complaints were filed two were resolved with corrective action two were resolved without corrective action and two were dismissed three requests for mediation all which resulted in agreements three due process hearings which were all withdrawn before the hearing in 2023 one state complaint was filed with corrective action three requests for mediation two are still active not even on the calendar yet and one resulted in no agreement all these instances are

021just I mean they all include a special education attorney I mean they likely can be mediated by our director and it's not really being an option all these it's racked up billable hours we are already $5,000 over budget and we have six months left in the school year and this line item has stayed flat for the next year we need the right people in the right positions to move this District forward and cutting a valuable employee to our Special Education team who's not only supporting our director but our students teachers and parents alike is not a way to move Brookfield forward thank you thank you very much for your comment okay um let's move now to oh we have a we have a new person reporting so apparently for student representative Ava Canton is unable

022to be with us but she sent in her report and Dr man was kind enough to make physical copies for us um and Sarah has agreed to read it and I know I won't do even close to as well as Ava does so I'll try um past events Wellness Wednesday was on the 10th um the BHS counseling department hosted Wellness Wednesday students created personal mantras and vision boards for 2024 to visualize their goals for the new year midterms are coming up 23rd to the 29th it was slightly adjusted due to the snow day on Tuesday um NHS and student government are hosting another master your midterms event on the 18th which is geared towards ninth grade students and there will be many upper classmen there to tutor in a variety of subjects and provide some

023advice about taking midterms Frozen in time which is the canel has been canceled this just it this just iness Athletics up dance team The Varsity dance team and cheer teams are holding another showcase competition kickoff for family and friends tonight which is where Ava is um dance team had their first competition this uh or has their first competition this Saturday at Woodland Regional High [Applause] School um BHS has two All-American soccer players Riley McGee and Jack Ryan who received their awards at the All-American athlete dinner in Los Angeles this past week weekend which is an incredible accomplishment athletic advisory attended the cas Elementary leadership conference last week and educated Elementary level students on being a Class Act student productive think thinker how to be a leader and more cheer has their first competition of the

024season this weekend at North Haven High School wrestling is hosting a tournament at BHS next weekend youth commission is currently in the process of planning the career fair the date has been finalized as March 26th we're currently sending out initial emails to parents and presenters from last years are insuring to include careers that were slightly underrepresented last year such as careers in the Arts and stem National Honor Society is hosting peer tutoring at the master your midterms event on the 18th started the initial planning for the Mother's Day 5K to be held in May 2024 uh is working with Administration on creating some type of multimedia campaign to advertise the BHS attendance policies and help students understand the different attendance codes and rules and then Spanish Hunter Society peer tutoring at the master your midterms

025event on the 18th for freshmen is in um those freshmen who are in need of help for their Spanish classes and that is it thank you thank you very much that was really cool um there's a lot going on okay so uh let's move now to the next item on the agenda which is written correspondence um Stephanie what do you have for us uh we received an emails or we received emails from colet STM regarding Brookfield cares um Andie CA sent three uh as of tonight legal service regarding leg Legal Services Denise rice also legal services and Bob Beldon also Legal Services awesome um thank you very much uh so now we move to the next item which is um approval of of board minutes Stephanie I motion that the board approve the minutes listed

026below as recommended public budget Round Table 1324 and the regular meeting minutes from 1324 second okay um so the approval of minutes has been moved and seconded um are there any questions or comments um on the approval of these minutes okay all in favor please say I I okay the motion passes the minutes are approved thank you very much now let's move to the next item on the agenda of the superintendent's update Dr bril all right Dr junga thank you good evening everyone hope all is doing well and staying warm um I have uh a number of items uh but I promise I will be succinct uh HR supervisor update um we have screening interviews this Friday next Friday we have the second round of interviews uh H I believe you're on that committee as

027the board representative so thank you for doing that um we're looking forward to moving that process along um probably within the next 3 to four weeks we will have a a real sense of where we're going with the position uh kindergarten registration uh Dr P and I were actually just chatting a little bit about this over the weekend um really excited I know the team is getting ready for a February 1st uh kickoff of the registration window um I think I informed the board uh back in December or even late November of the letter that uh Dave and I co-wrote and had distributed to the daycares and prek and posted all over the place um at this time uh as a reminder there the September one uh the new legislation with September one but it's

028a it's kind of a soft rule in that there is a waiver opportunity um Dr P has reported that four waiver requests were written to him from parents so he's working with those families at this point uh parents Square um we are going to be moving forward with a new website and communication platform called parents Square um a lot of rave reviews and anecdotal information I'm receiving from different Educators and parents in this community who work in other towns in the area that have parents Square they're very excited about the fact that we're going in that direction I know Eric and the team are are really jazzed up um we in the communication platform what will happen is um the text messaging School message uh talking points all uh social media interactions te the the

029classic teacher web pages the uh parent square has bought the remind app all of that is interfaced in one platform so it's going to be really excited to get training started for kind of Tech staff um this February and then Cascade that out over the spring uh Eric is planning a a slow roll out with this we don't want to start with the new communication tool in the middle of all these different cancellations for weather and everything else kind of middle 3ars of the way through the year um we'll start really soft rolling it out so parents are aware of it and get everybody used to it and probably after the April break and then have the full roll out um come July 1 into the summer and have everybody trained up and ready to

030go for next year you we're already talking about using some of our August professional development time to make sure our staff is uh keyed up and ready so really excited about that and this spring Eric will give a presentation on parent Square so everybody has a real sense of of how it works and we did talk about that at our policy Communications meeting this evening uh legal services update um Casey and I have worked with a purchasing agent last week he has begun the process to pull samples to look at specs and get things ready so right now it's with uh juwels over on the town side who works between the town and bard of Ed with all the purchasing of rfps and and other contracts so that's started we've initiated that process it's underway

031uh Next Step I'd like to actually bring up Mr Roland to give an update on special education um we will see him I think in February and then April we have some presentations we're going to be planning for the the board more formal but he's got a little update for us tonight see is it on there we go can you hear me good evening members of the board uh just is just a quick uh update almost like a trailer of coming attractions of what's coming in in February and April um no that's right yeah it's my classroom my classroom voice though start was good evening again start again we'll start we'll start take two um good evening members of the board um this is just a quick update of uh ongoing projects and things that

032are in motion and a preview of what's going to be shown to you in February and in April um the planning has begun for extended school year um been working we had a a planning meeting last week uh gathering information on teachers and related Services folks for the summer and you know as as any of you who who are teachers know the sooner you start planning for extended school year the better off you are so I'm happy that we're starting that process now um also um the Strategic plan is moving forward uh I'd like to do a pre full presentation on that in April uh at the April board meeting um we've had uh initial parent meetings initial staff meetings there'll be more of those with kind of cesing and and putting together items like

033inclusivity and what action steps we would take to have uh inclusivity as well as um the the compliance piece and IEP uh quality which leads me to my third Point um the professional learning continues with Ed Advance facilitating uh the IEP quality training um which is in the the final stages of their their roll out with that they've done both iners and online and to connect that our septo meeting is going to be on January 23rd and uh at that meeting to uh kind of connect all of these things um our IP compliance teacher Leanne white will be there to give a presentation for parents on CT saids and how to navigate that because as we know the parent portal uh can be difficult to navigate and um to give a parent perspective on on

034CT sets because teachers have had a lot of training parents have a lot of questions we want to be able to provide that for them so again February uh I'll be giving you an update on the C report and things that we've done that are completed and in progress and we still have to do and in April a strategic plan overview thank you can I ask sure I'm sorry ask a couple question to quickly um I know I read this but I it it fell out of my mind um the the um septo meeting y you said it's on the 23d I'm sorry yeah January 23rd at 6:30 there was a an email blast that went out today yes and it will it be here or the auditorium uh actually had it in here the

035last the last Meeks um and again parents are welcome to come uh staff are welcome to come we we try to you know working with with Marty mcniff who's the the president of the sepot to have um topics that are of interest to parents and topics that we can provide information for um you know not just guest speakers but folks from within the district that can provide some information to help parents uh navigate uh the process because that it could be an intimidating process and the more we can support that the better I think we'll be okay and one one more question and but but it it like has parts so the first part is if this is too big an answer then we can save it for one of your presentations sure but if

036you can just briefly touch on what does Brookfield mean by extended school year oh extended school year is a is a a special education program that is um done through PPT recommending students who might experience regression if they don't get the ex the extra in instruction during the summer so some of our most needy students would would continue to get uh 5 to six weeks in the summer in in the small group settings uh and again the recommendations are done with the team through ppts um data is examined and especially this year we want to look at you know do students who need it get it and we want to make sure that we're recommending it appropriately both for and if you know in some cases sometimes you think they might need it but then

037as the year goes on uh students might not the regression we all have regression in September you know from summertime teachers and and administrators as well as students so it depends on what kind of regression you're looking at so in terms of regression of if they didn't have these this time during the summer they would they would regress too far for them to make that progress so that's why we recommend that through PPT awesome thank you very much and and Bill just to be clear for Wendy and anybody who might be wondering how many students are we talking about tip this isn't you know oh it's not it's not a a I mean last year we did two programs one at Center School and this year it'll be at Cs and at whis skiner so

038it's you know if I had to again it's hard it's hard to say let's say let's say 100 uh students it's small because really it's the same kind of intensive programs those students are generally recommended for I don't want to make a decision you know in on on the podium but um it's it's to prevent specific areas of regression for specific students who really need it so it's the needy the neediest of our of our students and again recommend it through a PPT awesome thank you very much thank you quick question if you have the PPT earlier in the year do you ever revisit your absolutely Yeah because sometimes you'll have annuals in October November and it's hard you can't tell at that point you in some cases you'd like to but it's we generally

039like to do like a program review review revise in the CT saids parlament now which is the new but again it's to be able to recommend it at a time when we have the data we have the the ability to discuss it and have parents have input into that as to whether or not you know will the regression be great enough that they'll need it or is this something that September might be something from June to September it won't be so great so that's again bill is a follow up on Sarah's question so if U uh child's annual was in October how are they typically going to find out out the the parent that the student might be recommended for or they're ready for a conversation with the parent in March about extend so in

040addition to the progress reports that you're getting every marking period on the IEP there would be a uh even at that meeting I would recommend that we set a time for that review revised meeting usually you you always like to try to do you know at the annual try to plan the next annual and say let's try to do this you know obviously within the date but also availability so in that annual that might happen in October or November say let's revisit this in March we put it in the notes um and then we try to set a date at that point if we can right all right thank you Bill oh thanks everybody much appreciated I know all right I'm going to keep moving forward I just have uh three more items uh Brookfield

041High School athletic program review um we we found out what I would like to call good news moving forward is that uh the CIA uh shared with us that they really they don't have the Capac capacity to send in a visiting team so like we've said before we've done the surveys we've we've uh done done a lot of good work already we've done the self-study um but we need to have the site visit and some committee interviews and things like that um we work with Mr Banda Dr man and our um uh friends up at the CIA and they've made contacts with uh New England Association of schools and colleges known as Nas neas um is going to send in some highlevel uh people experienced in high school experienced in athletics um down to help

042us with uh a visit and they're also looking uh to work with us on developing um further visiting um criteria and tools that might be employed here in Connecticut and around New England down the road so we're excited about the visit we are going to get to it we're hoping sometime in February that this visit gets scheduled uh matter of fact we were on uh we we were on a zoom meeting just uh late last week so just wanted to update you it's still there um cic just hasn't had the capacity I think that's that's part of the reason they kind of put us off for a while and didn't want to admit that it is not going to be able to pull it off so we've got some really great professionals coming down that

043we're excited to uh have work with our our teams um religious holiday addendum to the 2425 calendar just a little followup for everybody um we are almost complete with the draft of the most significant holiday C celebrated by the major religions in the United States um once we uh have that drafted um we're going to send that off to the committee we're going to have it sent to the the administrative team let them take a look at it make sure we're not missing anything get as comprehensive as we can um talk through what the operational protocols will look like when we are observing the uh uh supporting students who are observing these holidays in terms of the tests and the projects and the things we had talked about uh back in the fall um and

044we will attach that to the calendar as soon as that's ready to go so we're still working on that um it's uh it's on the front burner it's just not quite compl complete excuse me and then the final thing um I did send a note out to the board uh earlier today there's just a couple of things I I want to let everybody know we're working on in terms of the board's schedule um The Joint budget meeting of all the boards Board of selectman board of Finance Board of Ed will be here in the media center on February 6th at 6:30 um I don't know if I said that in my message but it's now 6:30 is official here on February 6th that's all three boards working together uh on the education budget um Wendy

045and I are talking about the next board retreat and also negotiations for the nurses and secretaries we're going to be working on dates for those as well and we'll communicate with those on that committee and the full board on the retreat so that is all I have thank you for your time right on I've used up all my space taking notes um so we'll move now to subcommittee reports um Rosa since you are chair of the finance subcommittee would you start us off with those please okay so we um I have so I'll just do both of them um for the special Finance uh committee meeting on the 2 we reviewed the most recent responses to questions uh and comments that were shared in the budget questions document that'll be made public uh following the

046adoption of our budget um and then on the eth we that was our regular meeting we reviewed the December financials uh we're still projecting over a $400,000 shortfall um but aside much of that being due to uh the cost for substitutes it's important to note that um the terminology that I've been using in these meetings um is I want it to be very clear um this budgetary shortfall is that's the parts that are due to special education is not Mis budgeting um this is a deliberate strategy it was created in alignment with the board of Selectmen and board of Finance to keep the contingency for special education costs within the town's funds so instead of the Board of Ed budgeting to actual historical expenditures deliberately budgeting only for known students and their expenses so that's

047what we're doing now um and that's understanding that there will likely be changes throughout the year um so keeping that contingency for those changes on the town side helps the town maintain um fiscal health and only provide the budget the Board of Ed what we need for actual expenses um and that's done at the end of each school year if necessary um also on the eth as a committee we felt that our review of the budget proposal was complete so we unanimously approved its recommendation to the full board which is later on our agenda tonight and that was it great um thank you very much um now let's move to um uh Joy can you give us a cape committee update please sure so we met on January 10th uh we received a presentation by

048Mr Hill regarding a new Math course very exciting college algebra for the 2024 2025 school year at BHS so this new course is filling a need uh We've recognized Algebra 2 students are having gaps in their learning and we thought this was a good opportunity to give students what they need as opposed to just taking what we have offered so it would be in between Algebra 2 and pre-calculus and it aligns with the math 1600 through Connecticut State Community College so there is a connection with college the cost implication is only for year one and it's for the textbook uh we voted unanimously to recommend this to the full board tonight as adding college algebra as a course offering to the math department we also got a very thorough presentation given by Miss Fus and

049Dr man that focused on the planning for an impact for the 2022 K3 reading Connecticut legislation so this is a good opportunity to keep us moving forward and it's a progression of where we planned on going anyway um this is based on the right to read legislation that was passed in 2021 so instead of implementing this in July of 2023 we asked for an extension and we were granted it and we were granted 85,000 that's to to be used by December 2024 Miss ferious and Dr man reviewed the work that we've completed so far specifically with letters and that stands for language Essentials for teachers of reading and spelling it's a K to 12 approach the presentation they outlined um they they outline current practices that do align with the um csde expectations the Open

050Court foundational approach as well as the plan for review of selected approved programs that we um that are currently being proposed and we suggested to Dr man and miss farious that um we would like them to really thoroughly explore all the approved programs to determine um if any of the programs would be appropriate to consider for adoption in the 2425 school year so we're looking for a program that integrates content and is aligned with mclass Dibbles the program chosen will ensure a systematic approach to teaching reading and it will guarantee that all our kids are being taught reading the same way that we'll recommend a program to the cape committee by May hopefully with full recommendation coming to the board of ed no later than June um Sarah how and I discussed our ideas on

051how to help the rest of the board and Community understand the value and importance of professional learning curriculum writing and the coaching model using instructional coaches so Dr man and Miss farious will come back with a series of short presentations like a Netflix series to address these items they'll also present on the teacher and administrator of evaluation support plan for the conclusion of the current fiscal year so it was a really great meeting was our longest but it was it it was it was great it was really productive and thank you Deb and Anna for very thorough pleas presentation can I can I ask a question please sure um this is on the second page of the document um down towards the bottom you talked about so I I don't really have much expertise in

052the the um younger kid um literacy programs so you guys liked the open Cor so that's something we currently use we use a piece of it okay um so we I asked them to kind of look at because would that be fiscally responsible to keep what we have and build build or are we going to um invest in a totally new program are you guys good with the the so my understanding was that initially or I mean initially there were one or two programs that were recommended or sanctioned by the state or whatever and then it moved to seven and I think now it's at like 18 or something nine and and then there are compendiums oh I don't so we asked them to kind of give us a breakdown of what you liked what

053you didn't like of the the major ones the nine of the nine oh wow all right okay like one for example you had mentioned and I did some reading up on it too like one was very heavily on technology you know the students are spending most of the time on devices so that might not be a good fit for us so that would be good information for you to hear and for us to hear about and the reasoning why we you know or exay some and supported others and talking to other districts and seeing what they use and why and what works there was an article in the paper yesterday when I say the paper it means the news times I don't don't get out very much so the news Times had an article about

054um District seeking waivers and um having various positive and not so positive reactions to what the state had to say so the these will be great we'll look forward to them um so can we um is is it too early to hear what happened at policy today we usually wait till the next okay we'll wait till the next then great okay then we're moving to um the next item on the agenda um item 11 it's the consent agenda I motion that the board approve the items listed below on the consent agenda as recommended new hires and degree changes de oh and December financials second great so it has been moved and seconded to approve uh the items on the consent agenda um new hires degree changes and December financials all in favor say I I

055okay uh appears to be unanimous the motion passes thank you so now we move to new business and we're going to begin with um uh teaching and learning update um so the the board will receive an update on uh teaching and learning as presented by Dr man and um is Miss farious here wonderful yes and so I can't do much better than Joy on the introduction that she practically just did so this is the Prelude and the overview of what's to come um but also there is some very specific information here that I think the board will find quite interesting yeah so we're not quite sure if this is mingeworthy um this whole miniseries but plus we haven't the next episodes we're not on strike or anything but the next episodes haven't been done so

056thank you sir all right so thanks thank you not on that's on 2024 should work can you hear me can you hear me now that sounds I can hear you test test it is see everyone's getting confused okay that's how it was can you hear me Seth yes are we good okay great I'm sure it was his touch okay so thank you so much for having us um present tonight uh Mrs FAS and I are here to give you the first installment episode one of um our kind of overview on um curriculum instruction and assessment and kind of the you know the the the what we're doing currently and what we're looking forward to so just a little uh kind of contextualizing this um this series uh you know the the primary goals are to

057concretize the C curriculum process you know I know that sometimes um in education we have a lot of um things that we refer to and processes that are just kind of second nature to us but we want to make sure that we are really giving all of you in the public a clear um understanding of what it means when we talk about curriculum review or um revision and the connection and the Continuum of curriculum instruction and assessment so I'm just kind of a little history to this presentation you know over the past few years Brookfield Public Schools um has really set our sights on increasing student achievement um and the foundation to that is curriculum instruction and assessment um but also enhancing the student experience and again that is that is um a an integral

058part curriculum is kind of at the heart of that we Debbie and I were talking today about how curriculum is kind of the the the skeleton of the whole um the whole backbone to the district um and then the instruction and assessment is really the fleshing out of that skeleton so we want to make sure that um we are simultaneously recognizing the importance um of keeping the Board of Education and the public um a breast of what's going on and kind of our plans for going forward so we're hoping tonight to really kind of flesh out that that process what it means what curriculum means and then that process of how things are reviewed and revised and then how it serves our students and our community um then next up in the series will kind

059of lead into the connection between of curriculum instruction and assessment and that kind of Continuum and how the instructional coaches fit into this curriculum and Continuum process um and then finally connect the Continuum of instruction to the evaluation growth and support plan for certified um Educators I've alluded to it in the past uh but you know the state of Connecticut has um updated the guidelines for Teacher evaluation and administrator evaluation and so our professional development and ass and um evaluation committee our PC is working right now on creating a new process for support and growth of our teachers and our administrators our certified staff and so that is going to work right into um the the process that we have developed for curriculum instruction and assessment so um and kind of the finally is to

060help the Board of Education and the public see the intended outcomes of this critical work um is again integral to all that we do um so kind of just starting us off laying the foundation um is what is curriculum right so do you want to speak to this or do you want you want me to speak okay yeah hello everyone um I just wanted to also first start out by saying thank you for the opportunity to um speak to you all um board members and the public about um something that we're both very passionate about which is uh curriculum so I'm not going to read this slide um because you have it in front of you public has it here on the slideshow um but basically what curriculum is it's a very thoughtful precise plan

061that really lays Out The Learning Journey for students in small steps and the small steps are basically each curriculum unit or grade level map that's kind of it in a nutshell um it refers to the knowledge and the skills that students are expected to learn and there are some key elements or components of um curriculum unit design which I'm going to talk to um in the next slide and I also just want to draw a little bit of a comparison or or um kind of uh differentiation between curriculum and curricular tools right so we talk a lot we bring forward um a lot of uh tools and that need approval obviously um from the Board of Education First to Cape and the Board of Education um one example is the illustrative math tool that we

062brought in last year so just to clarify that is not curriculum um that is a tool upon which we will build our curriculum but the curriculum is really and and we link it directly to standards which you're going to see um in the next few slides we identify skills that we need our students to be able to demonstrate by the end of a particular time frame it may be a grade level but it may be a band um but those tools are there to help us uh to help us in that process and kind of you know make sure there's that connection between the plan and the actual instruction and assessment um but we're we are not a kind of plug-and-play District uh we want to make sure that the the tools that we're bringing

063in are then being adapted to what our students need and our community expects um so just to clarify that yep very well said and curriculum is also not the same as lesson plans teachers use the curriculum to develop daily lesson plans so curriculum unit elements um as I um alluded to curriculum design is really very thoughtful and it's really done with Precision there's really um a lot of planning and a lot of precision that's involved in this process so you start with the the curriculum designers start with the standards right the bare minimum expectations as far as what students should know and be able to do by the end of the unit um standards as we know are non-negotiable um such as the Connecticut course standards you know um we've got the Next Generation science

064standards and all of the other content standards that are non-negotiable and um legislated basically by the by the state so all of curriculum starts with the standards and really what the curriculum designers do is they work in teams um the teacher uh teams as well as with the instructional coaches myself um and we really work to First initially look at the standards and bundle them or group them together in a way that makes sense to create a learning experience that has like a story behind it um that um will be interesting and engaging um for for Learners um so the standards are bundled in a way that is developmentally appropriate neurologically appropriate and again interesting engaging to students um so that's the bare minimum and then uh we start out with the why the purpose

065why is it that um teachers are teaching this to students and why is it as Learners that they're engaging in this type of learning so that's really the purpose of the you know the learning so the why starts with the big Ideas which is really teacher facing and basically that's just declarative statements um and truths um it's really again why is it that I'm engaging Learners in this learning and we use the big ideas to then formulate the student facing uh why which is the essential questions and the essential questions again are student facing um and they're meant to be open-ended where students really have to Grapple with the question and engage in really exploring uh answers to that ESS Cal question through the course of their learning in the unit and again they're student

066facing and in student friendly language depending on the grade level so the what of the unit are the standards really the content and the skills what is it that students should be able to uh what what student should know and be able to do by the end of the learning so the content is the knowledge piece and the skills are the measurable observable skills what students should be able to do and I'll talk a little bit more about that with an example um and then it's the how right how are we going to as teachers teach the you know the units and how a Learners going to um engage in the learning and that's kind of what Anna alluded to before in terms of curricular tools that's basically the activities and resources um Mentor texts

067which are texts that are used to um during instruction to um point out certain teaching points um and those activities and resources and curricular tools are really the how of the of the learning and the assessments are the how will we know as teachers whether students are learning and how will we know as students whether we are learning um and that's done through assessments which is basically um assessment evidence of success relative to the standards which might be formative or or summative right so a formative assessment is an assessment that a teacher gives in order to kind of see where students are and really inform the instruction um going forward and maybe you know going backwards a little bit and then summi of is more this is toward the end of the unit or toward

068the end of the um particular aspect of the assessment and this is where students really kind of are um at the end larger assessments I also want to just um uh make a point about curriculum authors um you know kind of who are they and how do they know what to do um you know teachers are as part of their training um you know go through curriculum courses curriculum development so that they understand how to uh use curricular tools but they're there's I would say less training about actually developing curriculum as a certified teacher um and so it's important that our teachers are given guidance when they are engaging in curriculum writing and we have ample opportunities across K12 across the district where our teachers are able to not only get this kind of professional

069development and growth but also the opportunities to actually put it into practice as Debbie said the instructional coaches are all veteran teachers who have been um given a lot of professional learning in this area working with right lot many years and with a with um particularly with Dr Alcock with whom I know that she has presented to the board in the past um and also through the leadership of the curriculum leaders um such as you know the director of instruction the assistant superintendent um and but really when a teacher uh is engaging in this work whether it is you know a small group of teachers or a grade level or um you know a particular whole uh content area Department um they are they are kind of walked through by one of the leaders whether

070it's an instructional coach a department leader at the high school one of the administrators um and so that everyone is clear on these different aspects and how where they're going to find this information and then the tools available to them so that they can incorporate these tools into um curriculum if they are revising curriculum same kind of thing making sure that they understand you know kind of what it is they're looking at and Debbie's going to get into the a later slide about talking about the different pieces of data that they use in order to look at data and I mean look at curriculum and really um kind of hold that up to various pieces of data could I ask a quick question because it's just related to this right here so when we talk

071about teachers writing curriculum are they writing like they're literally coming up with these big ideas and essential questions and then also like listing the content and skills okay yes and thank you because those are excellent questions um so the big ideas and essential questions are basically coming from the the standards so what is what basically is the story of these standards that we've kind of bundled together in a purposeful way right so that's where the big ideas and essential questions are coming from and uh what was the second part of your question I guess like sort of you know when a teacher comes in in the summer and they're doing you know curriculum writing what exactly are they doing you know what I mean so I'm I'm still a little bit mystified with so are

072they coming up with the the actual essential questions and could you give me an example of what one might be yes and actually that's on this slide here thank you for that segue R right perfect it's kind of small for the public but and even maybe for you folks but we for me to read from me yeah it is very small um but uh I'm going to speak to it just really in general terms so even if you can't really specifically read what's here um you know I can you know speak to it anyway so so there's two screenshots here this is really a sample curriculum template um or a grade level unit which is part of you know the curriculum for kindergarten Ela which is English language arts unit so the one that's on

073well it's on my left let's see it's really on your your right I guess well whatever it depends on where you're sitting um so the first one there basically you can see that there's some writing and the writing on the Le hand side are basically the six units of instruction for this particular um curriculum which is the kindergarten Ela English language arts units so each um unit has a title um and then you can see those red bars that really illustrates the pacing so what are the you know the length of the unit right so the first unit is this is an eight-week unit I believe and I I think it goes from September to I can't read that part there but I think some part Yeah so basically the red bars represent the pacing

074of that that unit so as I shared with you at the beginning the very first part of what the curriculum designers are doing are taking the standards and bundling them in a way that makes sense um across the context of the school year right the 10 months of the school year um and then pacing them out and that really creates what we refer to as a year-long context um and that's what we use to first to start creating the grade level map which is what you see here in that first screenshot so there's six units to this um Ela curriculum each one has a title a name and then the pacing of the red bars on the right hand side you can see some of those curriculum elements that I mentioned before like the big

075Ideas essential questions content and skills so what the curriculum designers what we do is then we take the standards and we develop the big ideas and the essential questions so to your question before Rosa where do you get those big ideas and essential questions from we come up with them um and it does take collaborative like to type environment exactly exactly correct um and it is you know time consuming right because you really need to be very thoughtful about it because that's really the whole why of the unit right um so the Big Ideas are created again from really what's the story here why are we um you know engaging Learners in this um learning and you can see that there's some color coding and there's a reason for that as I mentioned to you

076before it's a very precise detailed um design right so in you can see that there's three different colors in the Big Ideas and three different colors in the essential questions and the reason for that is because the Big Ideas are directly aligned to the essential question so here I wish I could read what this says I don't have my reading glasses Anna can you read that take off my glasses I can't take my contacts out so Society uses spoken and written language to communicate productively to an audience thank you and then how am I a yes y thank you for that um good job read man so um in terms of the Big Ideas you can see that it's really a declarative statement it's just a statement and a truth not something you can grapple

077with it's just that's that's what it is and then for the student friendly you know uh essential question because again this is kindergarten how am I a reader so by the end of this unit the students will be able to answer how they're readers and they'll be able to use the content and the skill that they're learning and grappling with through the unit in order to be able to answer that question um by the end of their learning right so each lesson is kind of like a little nugget if you will into that essential question um and as I said they're aligned and then you can even see here although it's hard to tell but the content and the skills are also colorcoded to that particular big idea and essential question so you'll notice that

078the content are just bullets right and again it's just really content they're nouns and they're derived directly from the standards the precise language from the standards um so the skills is ask questions about key details and you'll see with prompting and support in kindergarten all of the reading for literature standards and reading for information standards are with prompting and support um so you'll notice also or maybe you won't because it's small print um that there are alpha numeric coding in the skills and that again is part of the precise design and that is because the um activities and resources the assessments and the um learning targets are all aligned Alpha numerically to the skills because again the skills have to be measurable and observable how will we know if the students are successful relative to

079the standard so everything there's Precision in the entire design process and just a few um comments about that the essential questions are questions that again are student facing and really um specific to the students right there's not one answer to an essential question it's thought-provoking and it kind of is Meaningful to students individually towards their own learning um the other thing I wanted to point out is that you know the the curriculum um has a variety of of purposes not the least of which are to help um our new teachers come in and have a sense a game plan for what it is the expectation is that they're going to be teaching right so this should serve a new teacher um working with a mentor uh or you know with someone you know an administrator

080in the building to say okay here's what I'm looking at this is what I'm planning on teaching this next unit or from this year um but in addition it's also an opportunity for teachers to really kind of continuously assess what it is their teaching you know and that's what we're going to show as we go through this series is that this is really a Continuum you know we're focusing on the written curriculum right now but the instruction and assessment go back to inform the process of the constant reflection on the curriculum and so we talk a lot about writing curriculum but there's just as much if not more revision to curriculum that happens as initial writing for example we're going to have to write the college algebra we actually talked to Mr Hill about this

081we're gonna have to officially write the college algebra course however that's a pretty prescriptive course so there's not a ton of writing um to do um but that we'll have to get put up into Atlas and make sure that you know whomever can comes in has to can teach it but as we go through and experience it and see what the students are learning there will be revision that happens within the framework of the 1600 Math course because it is a um dual enrollment um but we will that's where that revision comes in so as much hap in the summer and maybe during the school year of writing happens review and revision happens as well and on this slide which again we will make um available to you and to the public we also put

082in a link down here from a wonderful video that Debbie created you guys hear my voice again um during I think during the pandemic right it was or maybe not maybe before before then um to kind of Na help people navigate through the website uh to get to the parent portal because we have a parent portion of this where parents can look online and see essential questions and standards and those kinds of things for the various yeah yeah you can you we have the um the portal as Anna was saying which is the public site of um Rubicon Atlas where um folks can go on and and view all of The Curriculum maps um and you'll be able to see the big the standards that are in that unit the Big Ideas essential questions content

083and skills um so I encourage you to take a look um and you get to hear my voice again and it's uh yeah it's great stuff um the other piece that I wanted to mention because you you keep hearing me talk about design and precision um you can really I hope get to see how important it is to have quality curriculum right because we're in the business of student learning and the curriculum since it's designing the students learning experiences um it's really important that it's of quality um so and I'll talk a little bit about that when we talk about curriculum revision which we're doing now there we go all right so what does curriculum revision mean um curriculum revision used to mean that you would go into this binder of curricul and um you

084know maybe annually at the end of the school year you'd kind of take a look and have conversations and revise curriculum so now it's more of an iterative process where we engage in faculty conversations about curriculum instruction and assessment as Anna alluded to earlier during professional learning um you know opportunities to really look at data in a meaningful way to inform our curriculum because again quality is really critical because it's designing the students learning experiences and we wanted to be engaging and we wanted to make sure that it's thoughtful and that it's meeting standards and frankly going above and beyond the standards right so even though we're including as minimum expectations the standards you know once we have the portrait of The Graduate skills you know iterated we want to be able to incorporate that

085into our curriculum um as well so that'll have to be part of the curriculum design so um the curriculum revision or the professional conversations about teaching and learning curriculum instruction and assessment is really done by our Brookfield Educators um in vertical meaning um you know K through 12 it could be six through 12 it's it's across grade levels basically when you use the term vertical I'm trying not to speak in educational jargon and I think I'm doing all right so far um and horizontal teams meaning within the grade level right so all either all of let's say third grades getting together or the professional learning communities where maybe you know of third grade is getting together at different at different times to really um look at the student data as well as this other data

086which I'll talk about in a moment and to have the those conversations um also again professional conversations about teaching and learning and curriculum revision um really allows for relevancy of the classroom experience so integration are there opportunities to integrate some of the content areas into this curriculum right so as you know they're engaging in the discussions oh my gosh like we could really um embed some of the social studies standards in this particular unit I think it would go fantastically you know if we can incorporate the historical figures with the all about writing and the informational writing right so the other opportunities to integrate uh Innovation are there opportunities to uh integrate some technology um that we just learned about in the um curriculum um or some you know research that we just learned about

087on best practice instructional practices so those typ YP of things are considered in those conversations and coherence um do we really have the Precision in the alignment between the assessments um in this unit and the and the skills are there opportunities to be a little bit more coherent and make sure um we have that as well right so it also centers our discussions for educators on student learning are there gaps are we seeing any gaps in learning which would would help when we look at the assessments that informs those kind kinds of conversations there redundancies and I don't mean um purposeful repetition that's done in a meaningful way to um spiral learning but are there just redundancies that we need to look at and is the curriculum cumulative meaning that um it progresses as you

088go you know across the across the year and frankly again vertically across grade levels right so those are the discussions that we have um and as Anna said we look at um different sources of data so this really talks about six types of data that we could look at usually in the conversations we don't want to um make any changes without looking at least at two types of data right so you don't want to make decisions just based on student achievement data you want to have at least some another piece or two of other data so perception data really is about teacher perception about you know what they're seeing um you know in their class uh or you know teachers um perceptions if it's a group of teachers um and then student achievement data I

089think speaks for itself both formative um data in terms of you know whether it's exit slips or just any type of student work frankly is evidence of success relative to standards right everything that students are doing um is giving you information and giving them information environmental data right I mean we know we live through the pandemic that would be very important data to um inform curriculum and some thing changes that would need to be made the macro burst right so just things that are happening in the environment student data demographic data right what do you know about about the students um curriculum data as as I was saying earlier that the Rubicon Atlas um program is the curriculum development tool but it's also a curriculum reporting tool so it helps us to be able to

090analyze curriculum within grade levels um across grade levels and vertically K12 to be able to see you know you can run a report and look at all of the essential questions for example or you know all of the standards going from grade level to grade level and seeing um you know if if they make sense um and then research data as I alluded to before is there um some new dat new research on instructional practices different best practices um Technologies Etc that need to be considered as you're looking at um curriculum and so and also at the secondary level there might be some opportunities just to kind of go back to those bullet points for um so for example with integration there may be opportunities in eth grade to do some interdisciplinary units as um

091teams get sit down right so you might have all eth grade ELA teachers but you also have the eighth grade one of the eighth grade teams might decide that they're going to do an interdisciplinary unit based on the the um curriculum that they are working on where they want to help draw those connections for students where they say oh I'm talking about this in social studies and we're doing something that's relevant in English and then we're also doing the science experiment so that's the um an opportunity for that um and you know for example um research data and another kind of like a real world example of that would be the K3 reading right that's what yeah the the state has already kind of brought that to us and said here's the research and we

092know this is important um and then based on that student achievement data which the state of Connecticut along with the rest of the country has saw a huge dip in um you know student achievement data there are two pieces of data that demonstrate you know warrant the need for curriculum review and and revision so those are some examples okay so then kind of how does curriculum you know all of this work that happens um outside of the classroom directly impact the classroom experiences so as we kind of um elucidate in these uh these bullet points you know it's really important that it helps for teachers and and Educators and administrators to identify the specific content and skills expected for Mastery so we can all have a consistent and coherent conversation right as um as the

093building uh level people and throughout the district so that when I for example one of the and I've again spoken to this before but that was one of the things I heard a lot last year from the teachers was the the inconsistency um of just knowing what's happening at the different schools and across the grade levels which I think again is something that all public Educators struggle with right I don't know what's happening in e8th grade so I don't know what my nth graders need when they come into my English language arts class um so that was the one of the reasons for the pathway uh professional development plan but it also can be um addressed through through Co those conversations around curriculum and one of our Pathways is around curriculum um it serves as

094a road map for instructional and assessment approach right so again it's that Foundation whether whatever you know metaphor we want to use um whether it's a skeleton or the road map or whatever um and then we're building the rest of the map or fleshing out the rest of the um person around that uh infrastructure um it creates consistency and transparency for educators and for the public and for the students right so that they know this is where my Learning Journey is going this is where um you know a parent can say okay so if my my child starts geometry in 9th grade this is what I can expect um of my students experience in math for example and these are the skills that my student should be able to master and demonstrate by the end

095of high school um again one of part of the Strategic plan is that assured experience for students that you know no matter who you are or what teacher you happen to get you're going to have that a series of assured experiences and having a solid foundational curriculum document helps us as the Educators to make sure that those kinds of things are happening um and so that's and and then we know that they're meaningful because of the assessment exper you know that we the assessment results that we get back it's it's assists in strategic plan measurement right we can U make sure that this is we're kind of we're using the Strategic plan to inform the curriculum instruction and assessment work that will then back inform the Strategic plan and how where we are kind of

096on that Continuum and then as we said earlier helps Educators identify gaps in student learning and then have a place to go back and address those gaps in a concrete way so that if a fifth grade teacher is working on curriculum one year and then go leaves and maybe goes to second grade but we have a new fifth grade teacher come in that person can pick up where that other person left off okay so we wanted to make sure we gave you a little teaser for the next time so that you weren't you know you you wen't didn't just forget about us after the first episode um so kind of what comes next and how do you you know what is where does this all kind of fit into the Continuum so we want to

097make sure that we really outline for you the curriculum instruction and assessment Continuum because it's not as though anyone one part of this is more important than the other it is very much a Continuum that is at the heart of what we do and is um dependent is interdependent on uh on each other we want to con for connect for you the work of the instructional coaches as well as the content leaders at the at the high school to this Continuum of in of curriculum instruction and assessment by showing you what is it that they do um on a regular basis both you know kind of like a day-to-day basis and kind of like a longer you know term basis and then um identify other certified faculty who are integral to the Continuum and the

098system so not just at the teacher level but at the kind of supervisor level at the building um administrator level and then throughout the district all right and then yeah this is a visual for all this this is also um a teaser to use Bill's uh terminology for the ne for our next episode and because you can't binge watch right we don't have that already um prepared so really this um slide really talks to the Precision um and to Anna's Point um what we're going to really um hopefully be able to uh impart uh for our next episode is really the relationship between curriculum instruction and assessment and how they really are very interdependent and and in really like a symbiotic relationship really um so again we start in the upper leftand corner and and

099you can see that we really like the color coding um the standards are the building codes right so we're going to kind of end where we began right the standards of the building codes and to use um you know I guess construction or design terminology they really do serve as that building as the building codes the foundational the bare minimum right um and I spoke about the standards being bundled within the context of the year then curriculum we we build the curriculum off of the foundation so like just like you have a building codes when you're building something and designing something that's like the you know the non-negotiables right you need to have an outlet you know in certain places then the blueprints right is really more to represent the curriculum map where the standards

100are unpacked right or bundled together um and then um you know really unpacked into the content and the skills from the language of the standards right so the blueprints more like okay um I want to design it more to represent the identity right of the homeowner right so the curriculum is really representing the identity of Brookfield right so again we'll be building in portrait of The Graduate skills um and in our current curriculum we also have built in context and some skills that are associated with context so you go you want standards to be you want curriculum to to go above you know beyond standard just the bare minimum standards um and then you have in the lower leftand corner the assessment which I um shared is directly aligned to the content and the skills

101that um were unpacked from the standards and included in the curriculum and that's where that alpha numeric coding is done as well and then the instruction is also with the alpha numeric coding we have those learning targets which um are really designed from the skills and instead of having like the oldfashioned what we used to call like the SWAT right that students will be able to instead learning targets that is student facing where we use I can statements and the derived from the skills so in the example that I gave before about you know I think it was asking questions um you know about key details uh answering questions about key details in a text right then an I can statement or a learning Target would be I can answer questions about key key details

102in a text with you know prompting and support um from an adult so those learning targets are student facing and shared with students because stud students then are active participants in their learning they're not just you know sitting there as you know empty vessels waiting for the teacher to just you know fill their their head with all this knowledge um and then you have the activities and the resources which I shared before again with that alpha numeric coding directly aligned to the um skills um and to the assessments um and that's where you know the curricular tools come in so again the curricular programs are not out curriculum but they definitely are part of um the the curriculum um which is why we have to be very um selective and make sure that we're selecting

103something that meets you know our our needs as a district and obviously our students learning needs and um so this kind of also this demonstrates our all of the different lines and how the student is in the middle definitely our commitment to the student and we are also we are a learning organization and so we have to take into account the learning needs of our adults and adult learning theory and adult learning needs do that differs a little bit than student learning needs so one of the very important key aspects of adult learning theory is that it has to be relevant and um really uh attainable for someone to put right into practice as an adult right and so with that in mind it's important as we are designing curriculum and making sure that we're

104focusing connecting the dots for our teachers that we have people to help connect those dots and make it relevant and help them um put these things into practice immedi medely with ongoing embedded professional learning so all of these different lines that are swooping around are kind of represent representative of our instructional coaches of our content leaders at the high school of our building administrators um an example the iip compliance teacher is a similar in that in that role right connecting the expectations of the IEP and uh needs of students to those teachers and vice versa that is very similar to the role of the instructional coaches and of the work that um Debbie does every day and the the uh content leaders at the high school and so in our next episode we are hoping

105to kind of make these lines come to life for you so that you can really see um how they are integral to that professional learning growth and support of our Educators stay tuned fore stay tuned all right any anytime so we are happy to take questions I will say thank you um thank you very much can't wait for the next episode um no this was definitely very helpful and I know we we talked about this in Cape when back when I was on Cape and and doing these kind of like minseries and this is exactly kind of what I needed to hear so yeah thank you great thank you for that feedback thank you I said a quick question I don't know if it's going to be a quick answer do can you talk to

106your philosophy about monitoring the pacing guide and whether you're more interested in making sure the kids are keeping up versus you're going to cover all the content for the year that's a good question spoken like a true middle thank you Sarah do I do so you know as as you know it's um it's a difficult balancing act right because you know you do need to be mindful of pacing because you know you have only a certain number of days in the school year um but it's not about getting through um curriculum okay um it's about learning it's about teaching and learning um so the teachers use the curriculum to design lesson plans and to differentiate um instruction as well so just as a short answer to your question it's again the philosophy is it's not

107about getting through curriculum check the box and turn the page and go on to the next one the next day even if 80% of your kids didn't get it um no it's about it's about teaching and learning and using evidence of success relative to the standard so using assessment evidence and as I said before um everything that students are doing relative to the activities and resources is information to inform instruction um for the learner who's an active participant in their learning as well as for the for the teacher and teacher teams um so if they need to take another day or two um to Monitor and adjust then that's what we do and I think it's also it's it is kind of fascinating to me um to look at how integrated all of the systems

108become um because you know from a from a secondary perspective you do have those very real summi of Assessments at the end of the year in an AP course or in and also you know 3 through eight we have um in our SBA so that's always that dance that the teachers have to work on and then particularly I think we spoke about this at Cape um you know the the struggle that the kids have what happens if my class is moving on and I don't get whatever the content or skill was um and that's where in terms of that integration of the systems that's where building admins can take back take that feedack feedback from that curriculum feedback that student achievement feedback and then work to adjust um you know schedules or in you know

109incor incorporate ilt for example at the high school um as well as The Home Room time in the in the Middle School um so that kids have that time to work to be able to go meet with teachers or you know set up appointments so it's really the while curriculum is kind of is that road mapap for where we're going in terms of you know instruction and assessment it has such a much larger implication and Al is the uh will be impacted by all of these other aspects um you know kind of so that's why it's that that symbiotic piece um but I think that like you know your point is very well taken that um when you have these summi of Assessments at the end you have to figure out how you're going to

110um you know how you're really going to balance that and that's another reason that Brookfield has done has you know has this commitment to student learning and all students learning and we have interventionists and we have support staff we we have tutors we have um you know all of these different aspects of so that we can work to our best ability to make sure that kids are getting what they need and and that's across the board the kids who are kind of flying through things and kids who are still need some extra support yeah probably just a couple of points probably impacts I mean as you're talking about that vertical alignment and the gaps and you know if a curriculum is written and the pacing is just too aggressive or too ambitious um you know

111that's going to impact the next grade and where where Did We End and where did we go and a few years ago I remember I'm thinking 10 years ago at least 10 12 years ago there was a a big thing about power standards you know we we do depth rather than breadth depth ra because that's what's really important is to go deep into something rather than you know trying to skim through over content you know it really depends on the discipline because in math you you have to achieve certain skills and you know in order to move on and we saw that with you know the college algebra Etc but you know in something like um Ela for example so we talk about essential questions and big ideas and I think it's really important to

112to understand that just because an we've we've identified this essential question or these big ideas or these standards for this unit that does not mean that those are not recursive throughout the year we may have you know different essential questions different ideas for for the next unit but we're still you know why am I a reader or what do I you know what what does writing do for in society or reading those are are continuous so it's very very different in in that discipline now when it comes to something like you know specific writing am I rating persuasive or informative or narratives you know those skills but we can always do that with whatever content so I think it's very also very discipline specific and I think that's a that's a point to be made

113as well and often time um grade specific because what how am I a reader can be a kindergarten essential question or a second semester senior essential question absolutely absolutely y are there other questions or comments okay ladies thank you very much thank you back a couple months we look forward to it so um is there other new business okay well then we will um move now to Old business um we've got the superintendent budget discussion um so we're g to continue our discussion on the budget and um and have some dis yeah have some discussion and maybe a vote oh sorry that's your so um let's see uh John and Casey Would you please uh recap um recent adjustments okay so um we have uh some adjustments Casey has a packet to hand to you

114uh it's an update of U the three-page uh I guess schedule we'll call it that you've had with a summary cover sheet uh in the status quo budget um we net have been able to achieve some savings um uh to the likes of about $45,000 so when Casey comes back to her seat I'll let her walk through that the majority there was some puts and takes and that's a phrase We for board members that's a phrase we've used a lot you put some things in the budget you take some things out and that's where the phrase puts and takes comes from in this case it's ups and downs in terms of of dollars and cents um the majority comes from Fuel and heating oil and gasoline you'll see that in just a second but I'll

115let Casey take over and walk us through the adjustments to the status quo section of the budget y so yeah these thank you um Dr BR uh these do all impact the uh the status quo area of the budget um there were some minor um changes to um oh oh sorry start again it's okay okay thank you um yeah all of these changes do impact the status quo area of the budget the status quo I believe in the binder was just over 4% uh or 398 it's um it's down um it's uh lower it's about 3.96 now um anyway the SM minor changes to curriculum coaches and leaders it's sort of just some refinement of stien positions um and some tutoring positions at uh whis skiner um dues and fees um were reduced very slightly

116$1,500 um water at CES uh we got our our water bill and realized um that was not in the budget because we've never had to pay for water on the Aquarian water supply um all of our other buildings are on well water so um we did add that to the budget we're estimating about $9,600 for CES for water for next year and then um in uh moving in a positive direction we did um contract with uh Mitchell oil um just yesterday um we signed that um and uh uh Julian um our purchasing agent helped us lock in um with some good prices we do um have a lockin rate for oil at 275 2.75 21 we are currently at 288 um and the uh current budget reflected a 10% increase of where we currently are

117so that was a positive savings diesel we locked in at 2.81 52 and for gasoline at 2.58 98 gasoline was also um a small savings there so um those the net changes is a savings of $45,988 which brings the um the increase uh budget request to 6.43% um the last proposal was 6.52 that is can you just that good news go over the first I'm not understanding um so the increase on the first line the curriculum leader of coaches original is 51,000 yep and so there was umcl stien yep there was a stien for the technology integrator um which was just a budget Miss in the initial proposal so that has been included now in this and so what's a stien instructional coaches instructional coaches so in go ahead I'm sorry an you can probably

118better go ahead um so these are all stien positions um part of our um bargaining unit agreement with the with the Union um they're all for the curricular leaders um at the different content leaders um at the in the different um at the high school level although the technology integrator is districtwide yeah these are for instructional coaches yep so it was just it was a budget miss when we put the budget together originally and we figured that is a stien that is paid out every year so we need to include it in the budget so the instructional coaches there's seven they receive a stipend for the additional work they do throughout the year outside of the regular teacher contract um when the original four curriculum specialist positions were in existence uh before they transitioned into

119the instructional coach role um they also had a stipid so that was part of working over the last few years with the teachers union that those stiens would stay so it's part of collective bargaining yeah right right is that just for the technology integrator everything was built in he missed it was a miss it just wasn't included for the tech integration specialist that's all and that's the largest the the the $ 4,854 is what we're we're talking about that the largest portion of that is for the technology integrator there were some other puts and takes in there $64 because I think um a couple stiens were based off of the current year rate not the next year's rate which is a very minimal change but yeah before you move on can I just ask a

120question about the technology integrator um so this is a K12 position correct okay so is this this the person who like makes sure that the smartboards are working or who trains people on um updated uh Tech pieces what what does the tech integrator do so the tech integrator is one of the seven um instructional coaches um and this was one of the three new additional uh positions when the the district moved from curriculum or content area um uh people to instructional coaches so there were the four that were already content leaders at the Elementary level in the high and the Middle School became instructional coaches and then they added in science uh social studies and Technology integrator and so this person um most all the other coaches are either elementary middle or K8 this one

121this uh particular position is K through 12 and works um same as every other instructional coach uh partnering with uh teachers to set learning targets um work on specific specific integration in a meaningful and intentional way of Technology where it fits into the curriculum um or into a particular unit or into you know so that um so some of some examples that the board has seen before um was in kindergarten a couple years back where she uh brought them a particular tool um called Book Creator and was it Book Creator or Wei video yeah this was before my time I think it was Book Creator she done both um she's done both so right she done both um and they did a whole unit around where they were it was a narrative writing unit and

122so they used that particular technology piece but they've also done she's also helped lead inter um disciplinary units in second grade last year um this year she's doing a lot of professional learning at the high school around um effective use of uh artificial intelligence and also ways that should should not be used um and so she leads uh professional learning with the uh with large departments the whole Humanities department but then also Partners um with the for example the sophomore English teachers are working on a portfolio um piece and how can she help support that as they are um you know to integrate technology into that so it's less um Hardware it's much more instructional and curriculum and it's really aligned to our strategic plan which has a major piece about digital tool integration for

123students so um she's aligned with our work we're trying to do as a district and she um bases her work off of the SD standards which are the National technology you know and so what um Dy outside of her regular cuz that's what this is for right what duties outside of her regular day would this sort of include so and that's true for all of the instructional coaches right each the instructional coaches get and that's for um leading that learning in that curriculum instruction and assessment revision you know kind of putting together professional learning around that um or supporting department meetings uh you know so at the middle school um they the all the instructional coaches lead the department meetings after school at the elementary school the they might be leading work after school or

124on a professional learning day where they are um actually preparing professional learning experiences for teachers um and same thing uh with this with the technology coach doing the same kind of thing at the high school as I said she's Le led a series of workshops for teachers on their teacher directed day on the admin directed day and the department days those are some examples of them the some of the stuff they would do okay also they organize a lot of the um curriculum revision for the summertime so that they kind of look at what needs to get done and prior help prioritize uh the projects and then um work on submitting those proposals to the building level uh administrators and then organizing the teaching the teacher teams to write those pieces and then doing that

125orientation that I was speaking about I'm doing that orientation for revision or writing whatever is needed kind of just tying this back for um sense making for everybody the the four curriculum Specialists that transitioned into the instruction coaches were always in our budget uh for many many years the three um the science the social studies and the technology that that we just talked about those were have been phased in over the course of the last three years using the rser funds and over time and that was part of um uh not creating a budget cliff and putting ourselves in a really healthy fiscal position with those federal funds that came in due to the pandemic and then phasing it in over time and this is the last year of that yes this this this budget

126recommendation that's forward this is the last year of any roll in from the federal grants and there's a section on that slide seven in our B budget presentation that explained all that and what is the focus tutors at whiner so these are the from the HR perspective Anna might be able to answer this more but um they were they were budgeted um in the budget at a at a previous rate um that is not what we are are actually paying for that for that group and um it's that whiner um I don't know if you want to talk to the focus tutors and what they do is what Focus tutors do focus focus your focus tutors yes oh yeah they don't have basically an adjustment to to the hourly rate during the middle during the

127day that we have but this is you're specifically talking to focus focus yes focus is something that we have after school for our um for our students that are we we see that our struggling to get work done at home okay um these are students that you know we we pick these students is almost like we ask that we talk to parents is there students that we've met about met with parents about that were trying to uh find a place for them to be productive and sometimes when they're when they do uh do go home there's not a productive place for them maybe or they have siblings so we give them that opportunity to stay at school and what we do is uh we have staff members certified staff and also I think we have

128one professional right now that stay up to school and help students with the work okay pretty much what and so that was just budgeted at an incorrect rate yes rate this this adjustment to the rate brings it at the um $42 an hour extended Duty rate that is also in the contract for extended extended Duty it's every day uh we do it we do it Monday Tuesday and Thursday we don't have after schools on Wednesdays or Fridays so we have it for different and so we have it for different grade levels we have it for at least a person for each grade level and we also have uh someone who also uh works with our ml students our ml students after school too so been very productive a question I do I yeah but it's

129it h it's I'm forgive me for this question but I'm getting a little bit tripped up by the word stien because I I feel like the word stien is usually you know an additional fee for like additional services like uh a teacher who gets a stien for coaching soccer or something like that but we're not not talking about coaches who teach right this that that's their their their job is they're just instructional coaches they are not also in the classroom is that correct they're not getting an extra stien for coaching no they this is their salary basically right okay yeah I'm just getting tripped up by that term that's all okay well that's that that's why it's the co-curricular on that second one item the co-curricular coaches that is that that word siphon is what

130you were just referring to yes but in in the first line oh right yeah in the first L it's not it is not okay so we're we're talking about it's the same term but two different things okay got it and same term of coaches but two different things okay got it thank you right right right right uh we when we locked in with uh Mitchell This was done in conjunction with the town at the same time okay y they have slightly different rates because they have different usage um the amount of gallons but yes we H not for everything but for oil is it better our gasoline is the same no we we we have a better R yeah we purchase more gallons of oil our volume our volume is better well if nobody else

131is going to say it I'll say Kudos I mean even though no none of us he controls like Global right pricing you know um Dynamics you uh your your action here was very prudent and it it looks to save the district what $61,000 so right on yeah that and that was weekly you know working with you know our partners on the town side um you know Marsha and Jules and um really staying on top of that so it was team effort [Music] there and then the the following Pages um is just a three-page um report the summary report similar to the um the budget document that you have in your binder this is just updated with um these changes that have been incorporated into the bottom line and as always in the spirit of transparency

132and good faith any um puts or takes you know anything that happens to increase uh from an estimate that we have in the budget or hopefully decrease in our favor um will be adjusted I I think I Ed the example in one of our previous meetings recently um health insurance the town and the Board of Ed we have the same health insurance for our employees um that we're budgeting a 7% increase there and that's working with our liaison with the Connecticut partnership plan that advised us to go with that um last year we were advised at this time to increase by 12% they thought there would be a a real double- digit increase um we received favorable news by March or April and brought it right down to 8% so we brought that forward to

133the board of Finance Board of Select and we talked about it so everybody knew and adjusted the budget accordingly yep so any any new information that comes along in the next three months as we work with everybody will be adjusted but sort of health insurance is like the big one I I think it's about $70,000 per 1 1% change is $75,600 roughly based on our current census yeah health insurance for just health insurance and so we're obviously hopeful that favorable news comes in but unfavorable news might come in we just don't know yet right I should know more next week um we have another webinar with the partners at the state um I have I have a I was reviewing the question and answer document and and for the public um people who are watching

134who might be new to this there's a question and answer document that um that Casey uh put together and of all board members have participated in um a really deep review I was counting today I think it was 60 independent question bundles and responses and I don't know how many hyperlinks to um contracts those are great and yeah those were really really helpful good um when when will some of that that material be available to the public I know I asked this in the last meeting and then after we adopt yeah Rosa talked about that during her report after we adopt um I would think really whenever it's uh prudent to do so um it could be if if we adopt tonight but the the one thing we think about is making sure it's cleaned

135up you know ready for public dissemination um in inclusion on the website and everything else and we don't have to submit we could always do earlier but we don't have to submit to the first selectman until by Charter until uh January 3 first so we want to make sure we had take the time to clean everything up make the adjustments so everything's ready to go precise as whatever the board decides to adopt right so I I just think it's really important for for the public you know um to to see that uh the a high degree of scrutiny has been applied here um and in that spirit this is sort of like tiny after talking about the big dollars of health insurance but I was reviewing the the document um today and you had the

136you had a um highlighted item about parent square and a website and that we may not need those expenses it was only $4,200 but $4,200 is still is not nothing um we'll know in March about parent squares capacity to to I think that that is that is incorporated that that is Incorporated in the budget and Eric can probably speak um better to it than I can but I do know that parent Square does eliminate the need for several other platforms um that we're currently using and so the savings was 16 roughly 12 12 $12,000 okay so this 4200 was I think it had something to do with the current website that we maintained that parent Square was going to be hopefully but you weren't sure yet um able to take on some of those functions

137so that that would be great news um we look forward to an update on that y are there other I'll just make a comment um I think really the and we'll talk more about this when we have our joint meeting with the board of selectman and finance but I think personally what I'm seeing as sort of the big story of of this budget is really the anomalies that we're experiencing this year that we don't normally do and we will have to carry into next year I mean we're talking close to a million dollar in really um I mean even if you take out there is a huge chunk right for special education outplacement we already talked about that as um just in the budget details okay so if you look at one of the columns

138where it says 23 24 budget anomalies so those are the sort of weird things that we're experiencing this year that's going to be in next year's budget that is not normally there um or to that extent right so even if you look at special Edge transportation we already talked about that as being you know the town's holding that on contingency that's not something that we should really worry about but it should be a flag in terms of um you know why is this budget so big um I mean the other things like athletic Transportation substitutes our teacher salary savings um I mean those are things that we typically don't see being this High um but are also things that are very much out of our control right and that is kind of the major story

139I think behind this budget um the rest of this stuff is I have to say like pretty pretty tight yeah I agree you know a lot of things are out our control but a lot of things are in our control um you know I'm not really looking to cut anything that directly impacts our children um but I do think there's absolutely things that we can do to you know add or enhance or enrich our current programs and course offerings that directly impact you know our students um I'm going to be honest you know I've always been a bit big Advocate by saying that you know we're really top heavy here in this District um you know we have we invest a lot of money in administrative staff coach you know curriculum coaches curriculum leaders department

140heads content leaders and there's so much overlap um and that's what I mean by you know looking to using other monies to enhance our programs our current programs or add look to ways that we can improve what we have not to look at well here's where our hands are tied in these areas um it's kind of looking at it through a different lens too was where I see that maybe we can really attack and look at it closely more closely so I I just not I'm not as I feel like all of you guys are admin or um UC Educators except for me um at least you know in grade in grade school yeah you and me but um so I would be interested in understanding sort of what are sort of the questions I

141guess that you would ask very simply like you know I'm thinking of myself right because that's my my own experience so um we don't have instructional coaches they um I'm given a hefty stien to be an instructional coach a curriculum coach um so there's different models in different districts it looks differently right in different districts um you know have we explored that have we looked at that you know CU it it works right we're the top performing District in Orange County New York so you know what we're we are what we're doing is working right in with that model um and that stien is is very different then what that model is here um and I'm not saying what works for us could work for Brookfield but well may not work for Brookfield but it

142could right um and that's all I'm saying is to you know and I look forward to the presentation in March regarding that and I I really want to get behind it um but at this time I feel like I can't it's not something that I can get behind are you talking about the Scooters or then are you talking about the tutors the in the tut instructional coaches that are correct okay um so now you're talking so we have seven instructional coaches and on top of that they're getting a stien to do extra work right so um so now you're talking more money that they're getting paid um to do this extra work what I view as not extra work that's part of their job um and that's a hefty you know stipended um not I'm

143not devaluing their work right because all that's important work not saying we shouldn't do that work it's obviously important as we heard from the presentation um but I just think at some point the level of support needs to peel back because at some a point where exceed our building capacity like we're we're keep we're always building capacity like right we need to build capacity with our new math program Le of math right that makes sense right we're investing in a new program we're going to need levels of support for that and we're going to have to build capacity for that but at some point we can't keep building capacity that's got to be peeled away at some point um we continue make these Investments you know we have to trust in our staff and know

144that we've trained our staff and we've had this model in place that now we can take those supports away because we have confidence in our teachers and our staff can I sure so when you're saying pull back the instructional coaches are you saying allocate that money to that already exist or cut that out all together and entrust our teachers to just do that to use or at least part of it like you know we we want to integrate content areas right we we push for that we push teachers to you know I'm not just a reading and writing teacher you know I teach all the content areas right when I integrate it in my teaching so have we considered you know scaling back instructional coaches and having the ELA be an Ela social studies instructional

145coach um math can stand alone if that's you know a vision that we have but um you know or science and social studies kind of integrate and the instructional coaching model we have right now is only K to8 it really doesn't meet a need for the high school you know which is a huge area of need right now is at the high school so that's something to look at too so um you know when I responded on the document about the technology integrator I think I need to have like a better you know and I explained this at Cape when she came and did a presentation it was on Book Creator which was great but that doesn't give me a good snapshot of what she does and what um value she brings to the curriculum

146K to 12 right she can't work with everybody but what is that what value and what um data can come back and say this is how it's impacting our students in a positive way or maybe that can be integrated with Ela like that cric coach does both Contents I don't know being more creative with that but I would love to use let's say for example we took two inst coaches away how can we use that to um maybe add another business course to the high school we only have offered two um you know I do try to really be reflective um I met with some of the our top 10 graduates in the past two years I did sit down with some of them specifically and I asked them you know what is one way

147we can enhance what we have here at the high school and they all said there's not enough business and they didn't go to college for business and they actually changed their Majors to business because they didn't have any exposure to what was really out there in the real world in college and what they could potential passs they didn't have any exposure to that at the high school beyond your intro to business class and I think there's one other um business class offered so looking at enhancing what we have again enrichment gifted and talented I know that's another component of it but I for me I can't get behind the instructional coaches at this time um so that's just one of you know the things that I will be you know vocal about I I think

148you bring up a an interesting point um I I hadn't really critically examined this but I was thinking that the instructional coaches were along the same model as in my district um do the instructional coaches teach any courses in their disciplines so the instructional coaches are not assigned classrooms they don't have classes um that they teach and then in like Joy was referring to and then had do coaching in addition to or have like a reduced load um of students uh in in that model if that's what you're asking that is um right so the instructional coaches as as Joyce said are are primarily K8 um so it really wouldn't work in a K5 uh situation and if you did that in the Middle School it would also throw off teams and that kind of

149it's hard to have a reduced load at a middle school based on Middle School models um and you know I think that one of the it's it's a it's it's kind of a philosophical conversation you know kind of like what are we what we kind of what's our approach I mean there are some logistical aspects of um you know if we were to to change course right now um and you know kind of readjust uh for next year's budget one of the things that we talked to Cape about um to kind of help wrap our R our minds around the series was um kind of what would help the board understand um you know the experience and and the value of an instructional coach and um I think it was Hollow who said you know

150like what would be what would happen if we didn't have instructional coaches um so just kind of to preview a little bit and to speak to that you know we are um our instructional coaches are the way that it has been kind of developed over the last three years we've really been working on developing a culture around instructional coaching um two and a half years I think this is the third year of instruction the instructional coaching model and PRI prior to that as um Dr bril said we had curriculum leaders um who were you know specific to their content area in the middle school and the elementary school so it's always been kind of that K8 model um at the high school there was a a Readjustment of Administrators to reduce the number of Administrators

151with content area and combined Humanities and stem instead of having four areas Math Science Social social studies in English um and that was prior to this whole shift um and so and the content sorry not interr can you just speak to that point just one a little bit more so at the high school stem and Humanities I guess is really so so we we have um six years ago perhaps we moved the model um it was an effort to integrate as Joy discussed uh science um and math and the humanities English social studies in the science math and Tech yeah yeah science math and Tech excuse me thank you and um also there was a request from the board to reduce Administration so we had for a long standing time English social studies math excuse

152me science department chairs we we reduced um there was a retirement there was an opportunity we reduced down to three administrative positions um and also with the three administrative positions the science math tech and the humanities that's two we had the growing need at the time which continues to grow is our ml population and needing World Language leadership and we brought in our world language ml uh curriculum leadership position which is K12 so kind of at the high school but the World Language piece is K12 we've got three administrators there used to be four that's the that's the coaching model if you will the kind of the Inception of the coaching model at at at the high school and then the K at is as Anna was explaining so as we go forward in terms

153of you know kind of what would we lose what would we not have and what we wouldn't have is the ongoing embedded professional learning opportunities that enhance that collaboration with teachers and I'll tell you that the the the difference between last year and this year in terms of the culture and climate that has been built around instructional coaching is vastly improved last year when I got here it was um the the perception I think of um from classroom teachers um at the elementary level was kind of okay this person's going to come in and help me teach this science unit cuz I don't know how to teach science I'm not comfortable teaching science that has shifted now to um the the to coaches having ongoing conversations with teachers of you know with whole grade levels

154of saying let's look at the unit let's look it's unpack the standards do all of that work that we were talking about and help lead those conversations and then meeting with individual teachers within that grade unit or that grade level and saying okay what is it where your students are how do you know that where your students are um what do you think your students need in order to get to the you know final aspect of this unit where are what how can I come in and help model a particular instructional approach um the idea behind instructional coaching is really bringing in high leverage instructional strategies so that um teachers can really kind of connect with all their kids help them with differentiation help them with you know not only differentiating their instruction but also

155differentiating their materials um being that that person who can be that continuous guide on the side and um you know I know there's also been conversations about how much time professional learning is afforded to you know dedicated professional learning time for our teachers and we have aside from the convocation and beginning of the year which is pretty much you know kind of orienting everybody to the new stuff that's happening um we have the two full days and then we have the four early dismissal days which is again pretty typical of a public school um the instructional coaches if you took them away that's when your professional learning would happen um the other time would be collaborative time kind of making sense of what is going on in the you know the unit or the grade

156level or how are we going to manage this you know uh change in um in the schedule because we have a speaker coming in um instructional coaches are able to be the person to make sense of what's going on in a more holistic way both within a grade level across the you know grade band bringing in illustrative math bringing in K3 reading um having the conversations K8 for teach you know kind of organizing that for teachers and then in addition um this year our instructional coaches are going through a series of Prof a whole professional development plan for themselves to en enhance their instructional coaching and really make it very it's all about student- centered approach so it's putting student learning targets at the center and figuring out what students need and having conversations around

157those um and in fact so we started out with the instructional coaching team and now we have brought in those content leaders from the high school so the ml the K12 uh uh leader Katherine abgo um Andrew Hill and uh Liz Spencer are now a part of that and the reason I wanted to incorporate them second half of the year is because as we're looking forward to this new teacher evaluation support and growth plan it is going to be integral that teachers get on I mean it's part of the guidelines they get ongoing embedded professional learning opportunities so that they can set their goals BAS based on student uh data um and it doesn't have to be quantitative data it might be qualitative as well right like we're seeing kind of holistically this is what

158our students are struggling with we're looking at the curriculum we're looking at the you know the the vertical alignment um and how am I going to address this as a teacher how am I going to grow in order to address it so the shift is happening from the high stakes accountability teacher evaluation where here's your student learning outcomes make sure that 90% of your kids get to 80% of the material 20% the time or whatever it used to be um it's wasn't quite like that but um two how am I going to grow as a practitioner so that I can meet the needs of the students who are in front of me every day and continuously work toward improving my own practice that's where the value if you take away the instructional coaches you won't

159have that that accessibility and that ongoing professional development that's kind of holistically and then we'll talk more about the individual use go ahead do they model lessons for them too they do they do model so what does the typical day look like for a coach oh you're going to blow my whole thing in lunch um but that's okay triler uh Trail a very inth trailer teach teach you are they pushing they must be pushing into classes I presume they're they're also you know working on on small groups so just basically depending on just yeah depending on the learning Target that might happen so they and I don't know Debbie if you want to come up at all um but they so for example um you know our instru coach for math for K5 um this

160year the uh grades three mostly three half of three all the way through five has have this new tool instru the illustrative math tool so um throughout the the whole first uh trimester there was a lot of working with the grade level bands so grades four grades five um making sure they were familiar with the tool he had I think two teachers from each grade level who helped revise the curriculum to to incorporate um this uh tool so they did that work over the summer he met with them throughout their process um but it was important and we did a lot of conver had a lot of conversations with him in the summertime it was important for us for him to coach the teachers to write the curriculum rather than writing the curriculum himself because

161we wanted to make sure that that capacity was being built to what uh to Joy's point before so that they could also then be resources for their grade level teams so he will spend it day will consist of um probably spending you know he'll a part of it will be meeting in grade level teams during plc's or clts um and having conversations about where students are based on the particular point in the unit um asking teachers to bring information about what they're seeing in terms of their students reactions or access to particular tools particular activities so that will be a portion of his day probably a couple hours throughout the day um most of the day is spent in classrooms working with individual teachers answering questions for them or giving them feedback on how they

162are organizing their lessons um making sure that they are able to manage their lot of different aspects to um the the illustrative math approach um it's really focused on problem solving and active problem solving so he will be working kind of helping to manage those smaller teams and and making sure that kids are accessing the materials that they particularly need um he spends time working with Debbie uh you know kind of checking in in terms of where sorry go ahead no say your answer in it all oh sorry I'm gonna turn it over to Debbie it's okay keep going Debbie can I just jump and say really so for math that makes sense right we invested in a new program right we need to build that capacity of um taking it over making the shift

163right it's a do it's a different way of teaching and thinking and learning for the kids um but for the other content areas right like that's these are things that we've always beening doing right the the standards haven't changed right we have our curriculum social studies has right um but essentially our standards are our standards right and we're writing curriculum and revising curriculum so um where has it shifted where we need this level of support were we so were we lacking before like you know that good question that instructional coaches needs to go into the classrooms now that teachers don't feel that they're you know equipped to was something missing before can I just jump in here just cuz like it'd be interesting to understand like because I just had a slightly different perspective just

164based on you know just being on the board when all of this came came in and I never really kind of looked at instructional coaching or coaches as more of a support to get to from A to B it was a resource a continuous resource because when we get from A to B well then we want to go to C and we want to go to D and it's a continuous process of continuously getting better and this is not and yeah and yeah capacity not just to say like okay here this is the capacity you need to carry it's sort of there's always going to be more and it's not really unique to public education I mean private corporations have have technology integrator similar to this because um people are qualified for their job but

165they can always do it better um and then when they build that capacity well then they should be building more capacity past that so I guess that's how I was viewing it um I like the analogy and I guess the um they're part of the teacher contract right okay so their day is what their day is and that's why there's a stipend if it's and that was a these positions were bargained exactly so can I ask a question regarding your next presentation which is going to be about this is there a way to get some feedback from teachers themselves perhaps anonymously so that we can get like you know not just the teachers we know are excited about it and working and it's working well for is there a way to maybe put out a

166survey to all teachers and say we want some honest feedback on how these instructional coaches have impacted your day how you feel they're working in general for you personally like is there I think we can gather feedback I mean I don't know how we will do about that you know we'll certainly make that determination but I'm sure that we can incorporate you know kind of how that would hear like directly like they across the board they're finding them to be valuable we don't want to take away a resource that they're but if there's enough saying you know well it's not quite working the way we thought it would maybe it's time to reevaluate I I want to make one clarification this isn't about fixing teachers it's go ahead no I mean first of all I

167appreciate you know the questions that you're asking mean as a taxpayer myself I I understand and that's your your role as board member so turn it on Hello all right so anyway I do appreciate the questions right and they're difficult conversations because we're talking about things that we feel you know passionate about so again as a taxpayer in Brookville myself you know I appreciate the um the critical analysis of our of our budget um as an educator that's working in the system I have I bring that perspective as well um and the instructional coaches when first of all going back to our strategic plan right which is our in the Strategic plan the vision is to create a worldclass educational system and I think it's about something about um continuous learning I I don't I

168don't recall it offand but something about continuous learning and growth right so if that's our vision then our budgetary resources and um what we do really needs to be put into that um that Vision right so that that we can um recognize it right so if we want to have that worldclass educational system to an's point what she was just about to share it's not about fixing teachers at all I mean we have excellent teachers here um it's really about a student centered partnership so coaches are really entering into a partnership with a teacher with a student centered goal so it's that's aligned to a standard and a Lear in Target and it's about student performance and student outcomes and that is what we're that's what our organization is about it's about student growth and

169student learning so it's really entering into those Partnerships the uh instructional coaches do lead um data conversations with teachers um where they get into conversations about the curriculum instruction and assessment and yes they do Provide support and resources but it's a lot more um and this year to to Anna's point that she raised before is really um the first year that we're seeing um where these Partnerships are really around student learning and growth um an example of that is um you know I know we have a teacher that is interested in exploring more about the science of reading and really supporting her students relative to the reading foundational skills so our Ela coach has been working with this teacher on a student centered goal around you know phonics instruction and you know they they enter

170into a coaching cycle so we're really getting into this into the coaching um I don't know the coaching Cycles if you will um which is really where we have the potential to really make um great impact on student learning and performance so it is an investment I do totally understand and appre appreciate the questions um in terms of how they're spending their days I think Anna answered that very very well um and it's different for the different coaches they do still get involved with curriculum work so in terms of that morph that that morph met I'm making up words now morphosis um to the to the morphing from the curriculum Specialists to instructional coaches they still carry that um curriculum specialist some of those you know tasks or responsibilities in their role as coaches um

171but it's it's changed into more of a coaching into the curriculum and the design of the curriculum so we've invested in this District a lot of time and resources both monetary as well as human um into um really looking at professional learning and into um continuous learning for you know our teachers um and as an investment what is it 80% of our budget is in human resources and people right so it certainly to me makes sense to invest in um in the people and talent uh management you know just to make an analogy with sports right um LeBron James is an outstanding basketball player right whether you like him or not you know he knows how to play basketball so you know we might say well he doesn't need a coach because he's just got

172this natural Talent like he's awesome right um but I'm sure he has a lot of coaches and they're not in the spotlight you don't see them you know on these you know broadcasts or whatever hey I'm LeBron's coach and I'm helping them with you know layups um but these really talented coach talented athletes really respect and value the coaching that they're getting because it helps them become even better right um and that's what I would think we would want for our talent our 80% of our budget um to really be able to to develop their talent so that they can then really um affect our the student outcomes which which we know is a district we we need to do right we need to do better with that so I would certainly hope that we

173would want to invest in world class um education and and professional learning um and continue on this path that we've already began because it's it's really starting to take um I can't think of the word but thank you it's really starting to take hold and um it would be it would be a shame to go backwards um yes there are districts that don't have coaches right and maybe they're um content with compliance and mediocrity um I'd rather have coherence Clarity and and progress personally so um I don't know to to add to that a little bit um thank you Debbie um know organizational Theory and research shows that it takes four to six years to shift a culture um and then we when we kind of when we talk about this this is it was

174a complete culture shift we had you know we kind of reappropriated some already identified areas with those with the curriculum leaders um where to save money right not to just add to the budget four years ago um and then use the arser funds as the way to intentionally and meaningfully build in um what was not foreseen um but is fortuitous uh was this huge shift in the teacher evaluation an growth plan and the way that again brookfield's Board of Education so astutely prepared for by putting these instructional coaches in three years ago and giving the time to build the culture where te where teachers are now trusting in the coaches and relying on the process now we're poised to really take off with this new teacher evaluation support and growth plan and administrator plan so

175because we have it built in I mean what they're asking for through the guidelines with that ongoing em embedded professional learning is what we already have so we don't have to come up with how are we going to support these teachers as they set these goals collaboratively and with each other and with coaches we can say hey there's a coach for that hey there's an administrator with whom you can partner and have a two-year plan because your goal is something that's really going to take two years but you're going to have a a thought partner throughout that entire time so that's you know it not only is it going to continue to take time and it's going to continue to shift around right I mean it's not kind of a cut and dry this is

176what these people are going to do um it's that's one of the reasons I brought in this professional learning for them this year was because they they were asking for it they want to become better and they want to be as impactful as they can to the student experience um and so you know that's that is it it's hard to kind of say here's exactly what a coach does every single day um because again they shift a little bit but that is an example of what Pro whether it's math or CLA or social studies K8 or science K8 um those are some examples of that and then there's also that kind of more kind of you know larger macro approach to what their roles are and what we would really lose if we didn't have

177them thank you are there other questions I'll just just say one more comment about the the coaches just um sort of a two-part thing um you know I I think we need to be understand that what we really invested in was that culture shift that you're talking about and we need to be willing um honestly to to give it a decent shot I mean that from where we sit at where we're supposed to be sitting at a 30,000 foot view that that's sort of where our role is right is to look at this from a very distant place and say you know this is the culture that you sold us on let's see it through um but I also want to stay critical of it right I mean that's that is also our job so

178I would just ask that in March when you come back with some of this is um maybe just some some type of data that shows that progress that you're talking about right like how are they how are they being utilized more frequently or in different ways um and I'm honestly fine with qualitative data because that is honestly what we are or after it's not just quantitative data that's important um especially when you're talking about a culture shift um but if there's but if there is any sort of um information anecdotally from teachers um if any of them are willing to come give us some of that anecdotal data directly that would be great um I think that would be sort of helpful for me I'd be interested too in the anchor texts that they're the

179coaches are using which coaching models there there are lots those so information on those text would be helpful one of the things that strikes me is that they they have a huge job in other words kr8 is huge right and there just listening to you there are a lot of tasks that they're responsible for this is not just I I do X Y and Z it's I do XYZ and you know on on and on um so the thing that strikes me immediately is um how often are the the teachers seeing these coaches because they have there's they responsibilities are so vast um I do believe that a culture shift is absolutely possible because I believe that when people trust the person who's there um that they're going to they're they're going to be okay

180with with somebody you know who doesn't want to get better sure but the other thing and this is I think a lot and I think time is critical uh at to Rosa's point we need to give them time but this is the the tough part how are we going to link the in the um the use of instructional coaches to student outcomes how do we know that it's a cause and effect that instructional coaches have actually improved student outcomes um and I think that's I think that would be tough myself you know but if there's a way to to to gauge that that would be amazing um and again Wendy absolutely like there are so many models you know what is you know what are they what makes what makes this particular coaching Tech technique

181or strategy um something that we think is going to be extremely productive for for a cohort of teachers across the board and I I'll go back to my original question I don't know why they aren't in the in the high school as well so to bring it back to budget um in terms of concrete for everybody there uh to Joy's point there are seven you know the conversation there's seven positions so it's a significant investment Debbie obviously talked to that as well um the new cost that's being asked for in the budget recommendation that has been put forward is um half of it happens to be the technology coach's salary so we've had our bester funds for three years and over time we've phased them in so and that's that's outlined in detail in in

182the budget documents so the only instructional coach cost that's new for next year is half of the instructional coach the uh technology instructional coach which is how much again just I know how 55 do you know what half is it's right here that's it oh yeah 555 is that that's um 51 106 mhm oh yeah yeah I believe right Casey yep okay yep the others have already been rolled in all seven are out of the classroom right they're all out of classroom positions coach they are not assigned a classroom similar to the ma interventionists and this one thank you yeah [Music] okay um I did ask uh last meeting for comeback from the director special ed regarding you know the IEP compliance position also to speak um to some Investments that possibly are needed due

183to the crack report sure so you want to come up and talk a little bit about the value that the I compliance teacher brings and just for clarity in public comment wasn't sure if it was uh there was a thought that the IEP compliance feure has been taken out of the budget request it has not it is in the budget so you know when we talked about the IEP compliance teacher um Dr man brought up a a point earlier that um you know functioning in within special education as a kind of instructional coach whether it's working on facilitating ppts um working on um teams with writing more specific goals and objectives um and just kind of delving into the CT sets portion and working with teams on that which is really kind of a specific

184area um that the the compliance person works on through all three schools so do you have a plan to use that position indefinitely Or is this more of a transition while we build that capacity talking about we we spoke about that last time too I think while we have the correct report and we have the correct review um both of them um in terms of implementing those pieces and recommendations towards a place where where um as uh we was was being discussed before moving towards that building capacity where that next level capacity um do I see it as an indefinite position um not at this time but I do see it as necessary for our ability to grow um within compliance and within writing more effective and and meaningful IEPs that before we get into

185a PPT to teach the the teachers and the related service staff what are you seeing with your data what are you seeing with your progress monitoring and how can we build that into the goal such that it's not um a bone of contention or or or a discussion within the PPT it's like come with something that's going to be um you know specific targeted you'll be able to say this is how it's mastered this is the progress we're using those those little items that don't you don't see in in the larger sense sometimes with APS it's both in practice and what it looks like in the classroom and how you're monitoring and how you're um monitoring it is is really the term and so I think for us at this point in the juncture that

186we're at within the special education department um it's a valuable piece it's it's a valuable position in terms of being able to support the implementation through a coaching model um that's that's what I could say for this evening it's a really important cultural point I mean those changes from the state were no small thing and and so like the IEP compliance position affects not only the special ed staff but also regular classroom teachers about what kinds of adjustments do I need to make and it's you guys were talking about you know cultural shifts and capacity building and um IEP compliance officers who or um professionals who who do their jobs well assist in bringing all professional support persons together and I think it's also a way to to bridge the the the knowledge Gap that

187exists with CT sets we we we all like I said I think I said this last month we we had IEP direct for so many years in many districts and we were all used to it we all were used to how it worked and now with this system even though we're we're in the second year and we should all be you know fully fully functioning with with CT the CT said system gets updated almost weekly there are office hours from the state that that they're sending us emails about questions that are coming from directors when we have office hours with directors from around the state so in terms of those changes my ability to implement them is directly impacted by both supervisors and by the IEP compliance teacher in an effort to take that make

188it meaningful and bring it down to the building levels and to the classroom level so that both general education teachers can understand what their responsibilities are but also that when we're in a a PPT the gened teacher can speak to that goal in my classroom looks like this um and this is the data that goes along with the special education teacher data so in terms of that it's it's kind of bringing various interest together including as you said CT saids and including staff within the buildings and being able to literally coach them through the changes that have happened thank you so what role does the the special ed supervisors play with the um you know IEP compliance I I think there's a there's a a there can be a blurring of the lines there but

189the supervisors are supervising the teachers and supervising the classrooms and um shairing ppts and I think when you look at an IEP compliance uh teacher much in the same way as as an instructional coach is not a supervisor but the supervisors are you know connecting with the teams supervising teachers um finalizing IEPs um and really sharing those ppts and the supervisors also evaluate special that's right they're evaluating the teachers as I as I and Par Educators and Par Educators within the building that's important too so again it's it's there you can see where there can be a blurring of of responsibilities but when you look at a supervisory capacity and evaluations and and and more of the legal and the evaluation end of teachers and staff versus working on a specific area of special education

190within the IEP within that document I think that's where you can see the the value of a the IEP compliance teacher so is this so because I mentioned our um Wendy you had mentioned it being sort of more of a culture thing similar to the instructional coaches just talked about okay so so that so that's what you're sort of viewing this position as like you it wouldn't be effective you're saying or would I would it be correct to say that um this wouldn't be something that could ever be sort of a stien position for one of the supervisors or multiple supervisors I think we're not there yet I don't know that I want to give you a firm yes or no on that but I can see an evolution okay of that um but I

191can also see that given the challenges of the CT said system given the challenges of the the shift in how IEPs are written and how they're delivered and and and that whole system I think within what we have right now um there is a need for that coaching model within here not to say that there isn't going to come a time where that is more of a supervisory role but I think at this time in in terms of being able to work on these specific things in each building in a non-supervisory capacity and a non-evaluative capacity makes a difference for when teams are trying to work through what the IEPs should look like and look like in a meaningful way so I think that's that's the separation that you also want to and don't forget

192we used it was Grant funds but we invested in the correct program review which talked about the quality of the IEP so that is something acute and significant that we must work on and you're talking about what what's ballpark number of IEPs that get uh written SL reviewed each year well we have 335 students with IEPs um so you can say flat out 335 annuals now that doesn't count referrals right initial testing um program reviews manifestations you know so we're we're now we're probably over 500 right um you know on a on a if if you twisted my arm I might say 600 depending on again the fluidity of program reviews and the nature of referrals and the nature of students moving in so there's a there's a you know if our Baseline is 335

193everybody gets an annual from there you can kind of grow from from where that could go so specific to the correct report there were no Investments that you feel needed to be made to improve in the area special ed as far as the budget goes I think a lot of the items that did you make requests and I didn't go through no no this I think within what we have in the budget it is aligned with the correct report and I think there are a lot of things that were again speaking to building capacity I don't think there was something where you needed to have more positions necessarily I think it was working on what we already have aligning processes across three buildings that doesn't require another person um a a a assuring that there's

194parent communication assuring that there's um a culture shift as you spoke of those were things that within the correct report and again when when I'm reporting next month we can I will be able to show you what's been completed what's in progress and what still has to be done but to me the correct report initially when I first looked at it was not about um positions as it much as much as it was about um what needed to happen within the department in order to make a more effective program for students and looking at IEPs and looking at how we delivered those services not how many people we need to deliver those Services as much as how we could um improve the quality of what we have in District thank you thank you Bill thank

195you and in uh in the budget binder um are the case load reports that bill put together for us and we're in a very healthy spot um with case loads uh across the district um in terms of our personnel I just think it's important that um uh for folks who don't work in a school um that just the sheer scale of this of hyper detailed weighty and dynamic system be be made plain I think that's really important so um uh are there other uh other items that we could go after um at this point public comment yes before public comment okay um yeah I want wanted to bring back the legal services um discussion um hold on but we're still on the budget discussion is this related to the budget yes is this related to

196the budget not officially okay um I have one more thing um thank you John for adding the addendum slide to the you know presentation that provided yeah um and looking that over it just it doesn't really you know thank you Dean for doing that um but unfortunately it really doesn't justify the dean of students position that data um it really the slide only highlights discipline numbers so you know if anything I would expect to see like a charted graph from each month and a decrease maybe in dis discipline referrals uh maybe a cross reference from previous years the slide really only tells me that we on average we have 2.74 disciplinary issues or referrals to deal with each day so um it really didn't give me any information on how the dino students builds community

197outreach and that was the huge push of why we put that position into play was to build Partnerships with parents and community outreach and I don't know if that has been attained at all so you know although the presentation that Dean gave in the December meeting um was was good in some areas it really lacked the meat and potatoes that I was looking for at least for me to get and stand behind that position forward can I say I I've read that um that addendum rather differently um looking at these data points of what the dean uh of students Miss buckton yes um has accomplished in the first 82 days I see this as freeing um the principal and assistant principal to to do the business of running the school in the way that is

198intended and not to be doing these other things uh that that she is able to capture and I hear your point that this you know it needs needs to be we've talked about this it needs to be more than just going out and saying hi to parents and kids in the morning um but to me this these data points speak to miss buckton interacting with kids in a way that not only cuts down the the friction I guess that would happen in in the office but also she comes from a social work background and I you know we are trying to help our our Middle School age kids especially learn to engage recognize engaging conflict but do it in a healthier way that but I think we need to be careful with that because if

199we're looking for a social worker then we hire a social worker U please don't misunderstand my point I um I I just feel like we're getting two skill sets in one uh position and practice here like like the the data points here are about how she is addressing uh problematic student behaviors um and I don't I don't know if that's being addressed right just because having the amount of referrals that she has that doesn't prove that she's addressing that need and every parent of middle schoolers understands what that looks like in real time because we've lived it in our homes pick up those socks put your dish where it goes that sort of stuff um but I I just see I I read this really differently and thought wow these are this is evidence of

200success for that position and joy you you just rattled off some things you were interested in knowing I'd be more than happy if you were able to send me some specific questions that you're interested in can yeah you know I kind I said that too at the end of the presentation you know it was um really like a sunshine and rainbows presentation I was looking for real data like real data comebacks of you know yeah we've had this many referrals and um with Miss buckon here this is the impact that she's had on her student body this is the impact she's had on her students that aren't getting referrals right these are this is this the Outreach she's had to parents um what was her role in the wathon nothing okay so that's one example

201but how can that improve maybe we should be doing peer leadership like they mentioned so kind of seeing how that program is going to get jump started right I know you know we're we're only in January but you know we could have a phase two presentation absolutely you're bringing up some great points that we could bring forward to you intervention strategies too yeah so real like some meat and potatoes real data showing the impact right and how our whole student body and the community outreach which was the goal of the position was to um not take what we're doing and splitting the jobs right oh I'm going to take more off Mr Bard's plate and give it to miss buckon no it was how we bring this person in to do community outreach to build

202Partnerships to improve communication and all these things not just address the referrals yeah and I thought that was in the presentation apparently that wasn't clear enough so we will we can go back andjust based on your feedback here when you say impact what how would you I'm I'm just curious how how would you measure impact like what kind of data are you looking for any kind of data that can show impact positive impact so like just anecdotal like stories of success one of the ways we measuring this uh we just like she had said an increase decrease of incidents over time but one of the other things we look at is the followup in the intervention as to what happens afterwards and if they are reist are they continuing to do the same behavior or

203is the dean interacting and you know right so student a was in my office or met with me nine times in September and I've built a great connection with their family and their parents and student a I've seen them 70% less of the time or you know was only in my office five times in October and then now has hasn't been in my office for theism rates yeah this is helpful right here this is very helpful what you're looking for I do want to say though that she did speak to the fact that like she has had students actively seek her out and I think that you can't really get anecdotal evidence on you know measure that anecdotally but can say value in keeping that in mind that if this is a person that the

204students specifically are comfortable with and reaching out to that in in of itself kind of is data that's valuable in that way yeah sure so that's maybe continuing to evaluate that piece of it and like is it because she's new and someone you know that's available now and as we go forward is that continuing to be the same is she is she continuing that relationship and are they continuing to be comfortable and what kinds of situations are they reaching out to her for because in her presentation she had said specifically there was somebody with a home issue that had reached out and she was able to counsel and comfort them and bring the family in so I feel like that's would that be the same if it was an administrator there's no way to really

205know but also or right or even know teach it to what it looked like last year right so should be even looking at that no that's a great idea compare you know to to referrals last year and that kind of thing and if we can even talk about what the guidance counselors role role and how it Chang you know if they're if they're I I mean my my own children didn't know they had guidance counselors in middle school so I don't know if that's another conversation that we need to have I also just if I could just add one piece and I can't remember if this was um presented in the um the presentation but um part of the legislation and that's part of my job is bringing forward the legislation so um forgive me

206but is the um requirement for uh a policy and a practice of restorative practices you know the boards of of Ed have to have a clearly identified um approach to restorative practices to address proactively um you know disregulated behavior um and that's coming down the pike and um my understanding was that part of this of implementing in a dean of students um was to help kind of prepare the district for those you know those different layers of um you know the compliance focus of like districtwide and then each identified person at the schools and then to implement to make sure that it's not just punitive it's a lot more restorative and a lot more which um I mean and I'm sure as you all many of you are Educators you've gone through a lot restorative

207practices training or at least you're familiar with it and there is a ton of time that goes into that it's much more time consuming than traditional punitive approach to discipline which is to come in give me your you know I'll do give you your due process here's what happens um it's a lot of let's it's a lot more counseling frankly um and the differentiation between a counselor and a position like a dean of students is super important in that because the counselor has to maintain a very clear role of the counseling piece um which is as much academic but where whereas the um administrator or dean of students or whomever is kind of enacting that restorative approach is really doing that mediation piece and taking on because there also might be some consequences right um

208sometimes the consequences are the the process um but I just wanted to remind the board of that that there is that requirement of boards um enacting that which is something that I would foresee this person and this role being integral to that as we go forward and policy we talked climate policy coming up sorry that when we invested well when it was approved to put this position into play um it wasn't just discipline like so I don't want us to harp on that either right it was the the real you know drive for this was to build partnership and Community culture culture to improve culture so you know what does that look like for this person right now how how is that how was that looking how is that improve how was what did it

209look like before what does it look like now um with the impact of this position um does that look like you know we want to implement peer mediation right as a practice to bring in she's going to bring in our students to be peer leaders and provide these opportunities to peer mediate situations that arise um with students students to student or student to teacher or whatnot so um so I just want to be clear I'm not just looking for disciplinary right data you know no and this is the accountability and the scrutiny with new positions that we have to bring forward okay um we seem to have rind this pretty fully now let's um why don't we go around and hear um last thoughts from um everybody about the budget or last questions um with

210this version uh oh darn um to recap uh we've gone through this um for a while for a while now and so um just to make sure that we unearth everybody's uh questions or or thoughts let's go around um Joy why don't we start um you I don't think I need to hash out anymore okay I didn't want you to feel skipped yeah you've brought up a lot of important points Robert I feel like I've said what I had to say as well thr upun Stephanie yeah I I feel like my questions have been answered um the document that the questions document has been very thorough I've learned a lot going through that and I feel comfortable uh with where we're at okay Sarah I'm I'm good for now okay um uh yeah so I'll

211I'll just sort of um just as joy and I are the only veteran board members here and this is your first budget so I just wanted to just kind of tell you that like tonight so I and I'm comfortable making a motion and putting it on the table let's put yeah we will um no I was I was just going to say um you know if um I'm I'm in support of this budget as is hoping that a lot of things turn in our favor um but as it is I think this is a budget that we um that I'm comfortable standing behind um and so I don't have any further questions or comments about it um did you want to say anything else no I think I think we we put forth some good

212questions and but um I'm kind of with you and I think that some of this is going to take time so I'm okay with it for now yeah um so I will actually um move that the Board of Education adopt um a budget in the amount of 53,6 24, 635 for the 2425 school year um so it's been the um second get a second yeah uh I was going to say it's been moved can we have a second but I couldn't find my words sorry okay so uh the motion to approve the um superintendent's proposed budget um which has been approved by the board of Finance has been approved by the finance by finance committee by the finance committee sorry um and so the motion has been made and seconded um who second I second

213Stephanie did sorry my mic was on I second moved by Rosa and St um seconded by Stephanie um all in favor um I um all opposed I okay so um we have uh five uh yes votes and two no votes so um this version so the motion passes okay um so with that we will move to um public oh no no no I'm sorry you that's fine I can do it after so if you want if there's something else you want to talk about you'll have to make a motion to add an agenda item which is fine I just want I want to make a motion to add an agenda item to discuss Legal Services I'll second okay so we need to have a a vote to no she can just you can just start

214your discussion now okay I just wanted to um we've had plenty of um information to um to this end and so along the lines of being having a commitment to the students um I would make a motion to um terminate the employment of our current Legal Services hire interim legal services and um while we look for Replacements do we have a second I'll second okay so um we have a second and um I'll in all right I I want well before that I have a very important question on that I would like to I would like to understand what is the rationale there has got to be a very very good reason and an emergent reason to terminate current Legal Services what is that reason I think at this point we have information that proves

215that they're not necessarily doing what's best for our students and where is this information it's a lot of it's been provided in emails that we've all received and did you corroborate any of that in what way by asking the administration the superintendent in other words did you get the full story or is something of this magnitude such a simple decision for you there's nothing simple about this decision well wait can I understand what you so what you're proposing is that we have no current legal council no I think we should hire in get interim ones in do we have like do you do we have enough information in place to have an interim Council like I'm trying to figure out what that would mean and what that would look like for like let's say tomorrow

216we needed some Council how would that be provided I don't know logistically how it would work I think it's it's an important thing to consider okay I'm just trying to figure out like if we have zero legal council and we don't have an actual plan in place for the interum like where does the interim come from I guess in your view is what I'm trying to understand like how does that look for like the next 3 weeks while we're still gathering information on like how to move forward with a possible new firm I mean I'd be like we take sorry no I'd be happy to sit down and figure out logistically how to make this work I mean I can talk to whomever I need to talk to but I didn't want another meeting to

217go by when we're not you know getting the ball rolling with regard to this so is this a a place where you would like to move to a vote or would you like to table it until you have that information which would be two two weeks or three whenever would be the next meeting I'm comfortable moving to a vote okay the motion's already on the table so unless there's any other discussion you can call the vote okay um let me make sure I have the the the phrasing of the motion correct so the the the phrasing is to to terminate the phrasing is to terminate current Council and hire interim Council immediately is that is that a fair representation of the motion okay um all in favor of this motion okay all opposed any abstentions

218okay so we have um one I five Nays and one abstention so the the motion um does not pass okay um we will move then to public comment and we have um Mr Korea [Music] [Applause] again IND Korea 45 West Road is your is the mic on I think yeah Indie Korea 45 West W Road um since the C report came up quite a bit tonight I thought I'd kind of tell kind of inform the new board how it came about so there were issues with a uh a prior District administrator is no longer here um and the treatment you know performance of the duties if you were to you know Google the administrator um you would see pretty readily that um it wasn't a very good idea or very competent idea to hire that

219person um they came into the district immediately started violating the law including have a state complaint within a very short period risk for allowing this um so there were several issues between the next school year Mr K I'm sorry this won't infringe on your time but you you can't talk about um individual Personnel it's quite obvious who you're talking about and this is It's they're not a Personnel they're not currently a Personnel um please speak to please speak to your issue and Sir so the the issue what what drove the correct report was parents coming up and waiting 3 hours and speaking 3 minutes at a time while they were cut off right the um the correct report so so on December 14th meeting you're um there was a motion there was an item on

220the agenda to have CES do a a special education report that was after several issues of parents coming to speak um at that meeting it was deter determined that there were some concerns with uh potential conflicts of interest with with senior administrators and also performance of that organization in Prior um reviews it was a $6,500 review that would cover about 2% of the student population when that information came to light it s of sort of forced the hand of the board to go to a more expansive review that's why we had the crack report you can see it in the prior um the prior board meetings if you go and look so you know as we look at public comment and getting feedback from parents getting feedback from emails coming into the board it's imperative

221that the board would start to take it seriously right if you look at the information provided to you you have actual emails actual documents um from the prior uh from current lawyers of how the the district um treated a family including trying to push a child out and silence a parent telling a parent that they cannot speak at the board of education so it's important that the board actually looks at the real information of what's going on as opposed to caucusing behind the scenes to um to try to limit parent input and understand what is actually occurring thank you thank you very much for your comment okay um you're going to move now to three main points um St have you been keeping tabs what did you have you been keeping tabs and what have

222you come up with for the three main points and I'm sorry about the mic I was thinking the three main points would be the student Spotlight from CES with the two cute umou students you give us a great little report um the superintendent update that also includes Mr Ran's update so that kind of incorporates what we have um coming up and then the teaching and learning update I a would suggest the budget be one of those feel free to take my report out of it guys sticking to three so whatever part of the budget conversation um I would just sort of more important than me I would just say like you know like our adoption of the budget the amount and then maybe like like the next steps in the budget process something to that

223effect and if you want to table us to March we're we're coming back we have a whole show so you could always if you want I we don't have to R it was a show well done great so um for upcoming events um the this budget is due to the uh first selectman before uh the 31st as you mentioned um and we've got our regularly scheduled meetings what what else is before us in terms of upcoming events oh the only thing I had on the upcoming events was actually already talked about the special education PTO meeting here at BHS um at 6:30 p.m. on January 23rd right on here in the in the media center um and just for people who are marking their Calenders at home right now um we're going to have the

224what do you call it the the meeting with the the Board of Ed Board of Selectmen and board of Finance joint The Joint meeting okay so that again is um that's the joint budget meeting that'll be on February 6th at uh 6:30 um at the High school so um is there is there anything else okay um with that uh we are not going to adjourn so for people watching at home this is where we close the public portion of the meeting and we're going to enter into executive session to discuss the superintendent's midyear goal update um thank you sorry I motion that we we go into okay I motion that the board enter exective discuss discuss superintendent great shall we vote on it yep uh all in favor I okay so we will go thanks

225for coming you guys and thanks everybody at home for watching have a good night