001ready to go rosa okay good evening everyone today is wednesday may 5th and i call the regular meeting of the brookfield board of education to order in accordance with executive order 7b suspending sections 1-206-1-225-1-2 of the connecticut general statutes the public will not be able to attend this meeting in person but will have the ability to view or listen to the meeting in real time by way of the brookfield board of education youtube channel furthermore such meeting will be recorded or transcribed and posted on the board's website within seven days of the meeting and made available as required by law all speakers taking part in the meeting are reminded that they are to clearly state their names and titles if applicable before speaking on each occasion that they speak individuals wishing to participate in the
002public comment portion of the meeting may do so by calling the following numbers and actually i need to just pull that up really quick okay the number is area code 301 715-8592 or area code 929-205-6099 and the meeting id is one nine 967-4308-1999 one the passcode is nine one three seven zero six okay so let's stand for the pledge i pledge allegiance to the flag of the united states of america and to the republic for which it stands one nation under god indivisible with liberty and justice for all okay we have all of our board members here tonight um so the first item on our agenda is recognition of staff and students the first i have a couple of proclamations that i'd like to read the first one is regarding teacher appreciation week so whereas
003brookfield teachers open children's mind to the magic of ideas knowledge and dreams and whereas brookfield teachers keep american democracy alive by laying the foundation for good citizenship and whereas brookfield teachers demonstrate a passion for teacher for teaching that inspires enthusiasm for learning and whereas brookfield teachers fill many roles as listeners explorers role models motivators and mentors and whereas brookfield teachers are the key to the quality and success of brookfield schools and whereas brookfield teachers continue to influence our children long after their school days our memories be it resolved that the brookfield board of education supports and endorses may 3rd to may 7th 2021 as teacher and staff appreciation week and that the board extends its wholehearted appreciation to brookfield teachers for their outstanding contribution to the children of our community and urge all of our
004members of our community to take time to recognize and acknowledge the impact of teachers on our lives so thank you very very much and rosa we have invited mr petrino i'd like to welcome to the meeting if you want to just say a few quick remarks and mr petrino we want to welcome him here this is his first formal board meeting as the new president of the bea so welcome mr petrino a whiskey science teacher the floor is here sir hi john thank you very much thank you for inviting me on behalf of all the teachers and the brookfield education association you guys uh go above and beyond as well as the teachers doing we really appreciate all the support and everything that you do outside of the classroom for us to help support us
005in the classroom uh as you know everything that you do allows us to do what we do so working together has always been such a great honor with everybody that we have here in brookfield thank you thanks for joining us rosa can i just say a little something or should i wait or no absolutely go ahead um dennis if you could just you know relay the the message to you know to all our teachers that you know we really appreciate how much you've transformed education you know thank you for sticking through it all i hope everyone has embraced this crazy journey that we've all been on and we're proud of your accomplishments in making history really and do doing the things that no educators have ever done had to do before um you know thank
006you on behalf of the board for creating a safe space and being a sense of strength for our students and most important thank you for being our real superheroes thank you very much i'll make sure to get that message out to everybody from the board thank you great okay and i have another proclamation to make uh regarding nurses day so whereas through their skill and expertise our nation's school nurses help to foster a healthy nurturing community in which our children can learn and grow and whereas most often school nurses are the first and sometimes only line of defense against the illnesses and conditions our students face making their contribution to the education and welfare of the student population invaluable and whereas the nature of their profession calls on their ability to take on roles beyond
007that of health of a healthcare provider acting as a teacher confidante mentor and friends to the students of connecticut and whereas today's society presents students with an overwhelming number of physical social and mental ills and school nurses have become an essential component of effective health programs both in and out of the classroom and whereas an overwhelming dedication school nurses show their profession and the children they care for stands as a testament to their commitment to the success and wellness of connecticut's future generations now therefore be it resolved that the brookfield board of education supports and endorses tomorrow may 6 as school nurses day and that the board extends its whole-hearted appreciation to brookfield nurses for their outstanding contribution to the children of our community and urge all members of our community to take time to
008recognize and acknowledge the role of nurses in all of our lives so thank you all to the nurses if any are listening thank you rosa and rosa we have beth o'connor our nursing union president with us and generations at this point of students having come through the brookfield public schools have had beth as the first in families have had beth as the first nurse they get to experience at center school so beth would you like to say a few words please sure thank you so much for acknowledging us tonight on behalf of all the nurses at in the brookfield schools there's nicole and bisa at huckleberry anna and patty and mary at wisconier and casey and roberta at the high school we all thank you for your support the administration the staff and the families
009we also thank you for all your support especially this year thank you and and it was if i may just you know to directly to dennis and beth and to echo some of what joy said um sometimes in the news and in different uh media forums we hear that they use the term teachers but they describe teachers and more of the staff in a lot of schools and they say they might not be coming to work or um there's challenges and issues that are not being resolved in particular districts or cities or towns or states and um you know i've acknowledged this before but on this very special evening i'd like to make sure that uh you know all of the staff uh beyond our teachers and nurses but specifically having dennis and beth here
010um to express my absolute heartfelt gratitude and genuine appreciation our staff our teachers our nurses right from the beginning showed up and it wasn't without challenge uh anxiety difficulty concern stress but we made it happen for our students all year long all of us together including the board and the admin team that's always here uh on these meetings uh everybody showed up every day and made it happen and we all we all had a big part in that but i can't take the the the nurses specifically because of the health concerns and all of the stress that's put on and our and our teachers who have been there in the classrooms masks on with all of those students in small quarters indoors that wasn't without a lot of concern at the beginning of the year
011and now we're in a very different place getting to the other side of this pandemic and also uh with the majority of staff vaccinated and just feeling a lot better about things and moving forward with vaccines for staff and fam uh for students and families as well so thank you all for everything you did sincerely it really is greatly appreciated and believe me in this entire community it does not go unnoticed at all thank you thank you thank you all maureen did you want oh sorry i thought you raised your hand okay on the next item on our agenda is the annual hra or the housatonic resource recovery authority annual poster contest um lisa are you taking the floor here yes i am all right it's all yours good evening everybody my name is lisa
012grambling and it is my pleasure to introduce to you this evening the winners of our 14th annual housatonic resources recovery authority recycling billboard contest that's a mouthful or as we like to call it the hra um i'm just gonna share my screen real quick with everybody bear with me can you see that everybody can see it okay um so just some facts and overview a little background there are um 12 districts that participate in this contest and um they give us the theme the hra gives us a theme every year this year it was recycle right so the posters have to have a connection with recycle right uh it's about a four month process usually the end of december beginning of january the templates get distributed to the students by the end of february they
013come back to the buildings uh they're judged on a local level uh first second and third place uh march those posters come back to us we send the first place winners of each grade to the hra to be judged regionally and then they have their judging uh at the middle of march and they honor all of the regional winners at their annual um uh at their annual uh contest awards ceremony which happened i believe on april 21st so the regional winners know that they place but they don't know where they place that until they um until they get there that that evening um a huge thank you that this is not possible without so many people the the building principles the teachers the secretaries the poster contest coordinators it was a little bit of a
014challenging year for us getting the templates to the students but through school message we were able to do that we set up a pickup and drop-off box at the town hall so that the students could come and get a template and have a place to drop it off um thank you to eric for setting up a special email um that the students could actually email their artwork so that was very helpful um so again a big huge thank you to everybody so i hope that uh all of our artists are watching because we're ready to begin we're gonna start with our uh with kindergarten and this is uh tyler freeman he was kindergarten first place local winner and third place regional winner kindergarten for second place we have noel french let's see here bear with
015me oh my apologies we only had two entries for kindergarten so we're on to first grade first place and second place regional winner elizabel first grade second place we have kaylee clarkson first grade third place we have lucas french for second grade we have first place and second place regional winner natalie freeman second grade second place is jason yoon second grade third place is isabella fernandez uh let's see so third grade first place we have nikal manowar and second place regional winner third grade second place we have owen clarkson third grade third place we have brianna lim this is fourth grade first place and second place regional winner zion bilal i think we had a lot of siblings this year i noticed uh fourth grade second place is stella frosh fourth grade third place is
016london brown fifth grade first place is shang dijang and third place regional winner fifth grade second place is ella frank's fifth grade third place is brooke pasco sixth grade first place is sherva kelkar and she was a first place regional winner sixth grade second place we have shalafi ghosh i apologize to any of you whose name i am not pronouncing correctly sixth grade third place is nicholas sullander eighth grade first place we did not have any uh seventh grade entries eighth grade first place we have alvina balal and also first place regional winner eighth grade second place we have quinn pinto and i believe yes that was it for eighth grade we had two ninth grade first place and third place regional winner was paulina sanchez ninth grade second place is alexis meyer ninth grade
017third place is daya girish kumar 12th grade first place we have lauren daly and lauren was a third place regional winner so that is all of our artwork that we have to present to you this evening we are um so proud of all of you you did such a great job it was a very very challenging year we had you know 43 total participants and 10 regional winners this year so we congratulate all of our winners and we hope to see you all next year thank you lisa congratulations to all the artists i always enjoy this meeting because i love seeing all the kids art it looks great all right the next item on our agenda is public comment i don't see anyone here for that so we can move on to the student representative
018report is she here tonight nope okay uh moving on to written correspondence then jenna shattino wrote repraising her children's teachers and the district's work in sel kathy lasser wrote regarding an asbestos issue and amy blatt wrote regarding the displaced ball fields at huckleberry hill okay so on to approval of board minutes i'll move that the board approved the minutes from the regular meeting on april 7th second thanks joy all in favor aye thank you uh next is the superintendent's update all right thank you rosa uh good evening all uh just a few things to talk about uh for this meeting a quick update on kovid vaccine clinic for the brookfield high school students are the first shots were available to the students at the clinic at the danbury mall on may 1st at the end
019of last week we understood that there was 54 students registered at that point we don't have account since then we were asking for that this week they were just waiting to get that information i was hoping to have that to pass on to tonight but at least 54 appointments were made we know that um there's also a very interesting we were just contacted today um if uh in the very near future i think some of us have heard about this in the media if uh 12 to 15 year olds are approved for vaccination through the fda the folks in new milford health department are working with our health department and we're looking to plan a clinic and coordinate efforts there uh as soon as possible so mrs laforge our nurse coordinator is helping coordinate that
020with uh with me and the folks from the different health departments so we're excited about being able to liaison that opportunity for families another update regarding covet i've shared with the board dr sullivan's update we continue to trend downward with our positivity rate which is very good last week we had our first week with only one case we were hoping for zero but we did have one positive case on friday uh last week but that was the first week since i think it was the first week in october where we had that low of a case number during the week so we really we you know cross your fingers we believe we're really turning the corner here uh in addition to that the schools we continue to wear masks um all the way through um
021may 20th and likely through the rest of the year uh indoors right now outdoors we've been working with dr sullivan and although um it has been discussed that may first is uh those who are fully vaccinated do not have to wear masks outdoors or if you're not near people um for spectators and so forth at school events dr sullivan has given his strongest recommended recommendation to mr belanda myself the other principals and to mr baldwin that our spectators and athletes continue to wear masks outdoors until further notice which takes us to may 20th uh of course if there's any updates we will continue to keep everyone informed also wanted to share regarding parent engagement parent education just last week we had from our special education department and mrs wygonics team there was a webinar on
022assessment training and programming for students with special needs specifically participating in the transition process as they reach the age of 18 years that was last week well attended tonight mrs wagoner is actually not with us because our special education department is teaming up with septo the special education parent teacher organization for a family health night and talk with a therapist regarding student health needs and so forth it'd be a really interactive session that's actually going on right now so we're really proud of the work that's going on with parent engagement even in our virtual covered world that we're still in then a quick update on teacher of the year and staff member of the year teacher of the year is well underway the process we have not identified not yet our district teacher of the
023year that process is still ongoing but i did want to give a shout out to the four teachers of the year uh from each of the schools center school mrs barrero huckleberry hill d pearson wisconsin middle school kayla ryan and at the high school mr buckley so we're very proud of all of our features of the year all the great work they do and certainly the recognition from from their colleagues which is always probably one of the highest honors when your colleagues recognize you as someone uh worthy of that honor and the teacher of the year committee headed up by mrs gordon is continuing to work on things for the district teacher of the year as a reminder for the board annually at the first meeting in june we get together with the teacher of
024the year staff member of the year recognition also student top 10 at the high school and all those great wonderful recognitions next the esther 3 grant uh that is coming from the federal government worth 815 uh we are still awaiting guidance and direction from the state we anticipate having that probably in the next week to 10 days and then some really great news uh mr post dr ruby myself received an email uh this afternoon regarding the sr2 grant and that has been approved by the state that's a grant for 368 thousand dollars which we talked about in great detail of the probably the i think the second meeting in march um so we're excited about that and uh when we have the opportunity we certainly will put our application in for the sr-3 grant and
025share with the board uh the plans for that and then finally uh to get us ready uh speaking of the next i think 28 school days left 27 or 28 days left it's amazing we're that close to the end um i want to share a little bit about the governor's executive order number 11. that was the one regarding um freedom of information and the ability to have the typical in-person meetings uh virtually and actually make the decisions that we've been making all year and this goes for not only boards of ed before the finance boards of selectmen etc around the state his executive order was extended uh through may 20th but after may 20th unless things change we will start to have meetings in person again we will all need to do that um and
026that would include subcommittee meetings in our regular board meetings um as i look at the calendar mrs grambling and i took a look today it does not look like uh from may 21st uh until the end of may that last session of may i don't think there's any subcommittees on the schedule our final may board meeting our next one is may 19th so we should be able to finish may with virtual meetings and then come from may 21st anything we schedule after that and including our first big meeting in june where we have a lot of people we will have to do that in person and when i say we have a lot of people as a reminder teachers of the year staff members of the year parents we recognize our high performing top students
027at the high school and so we'll have to look at an alternative location maybe the auditorium or something like that to ensure social distancing and so we'll be working on that over the next few weeks um that is all i have at this point does anybody have any questions all right thank you for the time thank you all right the next item on our agenda is our subcommittee reports and first up is facilities okay so we met on april 7th uh there's a water update regarding the middle school mr colwell con contacted contacted aquarium to set up an on-site meeting to discuss the process for considering hooking up with aquarians water line the recommendation is that it is in our best interest to connect to a public water supply because building our own water treatment
028plant would be very costly the water systems specialists are developing a treatment plan to send to the state an update with center school the specialized sampling was negative and showed no signs of benzene staffing update we still have three open positions a night lead custodian at the high school and middle school positions candidates have applied on indeed.com and our um book field system so interviews can be scheduled we discussed the list of active approved capital projects mr post and mr caldwell will meet with the principals to discuss their security needs we discussed the wisconsin wall and that information was provided at our april 7th quarterback meeting by mrs brooks we discussed the sr3 grant mr post informed the committee that the administration is considering using grant funds for indoor air quality projects such as the
029ac in the high school library and heating and ventilation units in the gymnasiums mr post informed the committee that he received notice from mr dunn that the state is making security grant funds available so he'll follow up with mr dunn about the funding of any possible security projects with that mr caldwell reported the new exhaust hood for the high school kitchen will be installed over april break and dr burl informed the committee that during april break parks and rep swept and cleaned the huckleberry parking lot in the play area so many measures and are being taken to keep the students safe while during the construction of the new school and that's it anybody has any questions okay was that um the ac at the high school was that the only facilities related um item that
030is a potential target for the sr3 grant well that's very preliminary it was just very beginning conversations that was just one night one item that they brought up as possible you know possibly considering and john you don't know of any others at the moment not in terms of capital type projects that was one we were considered an early consideration we're also taking a look at you know the data from our mid-year assessments and um you know some of the other uh recommendations that are coming down from the state department of ed about where you might want to be spending your your sr3 monies very similar requirements we believe as we looked at the the detail of the law uh to the sr2 so we're not quite there yet but working on it uh the principles
031i've asked the principals to be thinking about what are some of their immediate needs based on the data they have and certainly dr ruby and mrs faris and myself are working with mr post and starting to think those things through we'll probably meet in the next two weeks have a real sit down workshop on how we might want to uh uh use those funds to to support our students going through the course of uh also with mr complete as well for technology needs for our students um for the for the course of uh the two to three years that that those funds are allowed to be used okay thank you sure um next subcommittee is equity and inclusion okay the committee met on april 8th we first reviewed our finalized charter that a small group
032worked on between meetings and dr ruby put the finishing touches on everyone was pleased with the final version and we've all signed an agreement to uphold it it was a lengthy but worthwhile experience that set a great foundation for the committee and a strong beginning of getting to know each other and forming trusting relationships which will be crucial in our work going forward dr burrell then provided a recap to the committee of what was shared at the previous night's board meeting things going on at the district level the adoption of the equity policy our hr director mrs cavanaugh attending the minority recruitment job fair and the amazing sel presentations from each of our school principals dr ruby and miss holly and miss holly also shared how many of our district leaders and educators are participating
033in trauma training which includes topics such as how to discuss issues of race in an anti-bias anti-racist and educationally sound way and how this is a cross-curricular endeavor this led to a discussion where members shared thoughts and experiences that they've had in the community and then we closed out by reviewing the five goals the board vision and the objectives of the committee and then we went back to the jamboard tool and members added their names to objectives that they wanted to pursue and any early thoughts and ideas they have for action steps and each of those subgroups will be meeting outside of the committee time between last meeting and our meeting next week and then we'll come back to the regular committee to begin discussion on action steps and priorities at our meeting next week
034that's pretty much it amy um what were those five main committee objectives do we have that information i do yeah i mean i can read them they are okay we will create opportunities to celebrate differences in others beliefs intellectual ideas and backgrounds we will support the board's initiatives in creating community conversations and diversity and equity that will lead to system improvements we will promote an appreciation of diverse cultures groups people and perspectives we will celebrate the individual academic social and civic contributions of individuals within our school community and we will assess the school's promotion and understanding of respect caring problem solving conflict resolution anti-bullying thank you sounds like you guys are doing a lot of work so i appreciate it uh next is the finance subcommittee report by the way i love those objectives those
035are those are great so um right so the finance committee met on uh april 19th it's a little later in the month than we normally do because of the school break um it was actually a pretty quick meeting um the uh updated financial report barely moved in the month i think we it changed by about seven thousand dollars in terms of uh mr post's outlook um and uh it leaves us we're still running a deficit against the budget um of about a hundred and sixteen thousand dollars but that's well within the bounds of the discussion we had with the board of finance in terms of covering the covet costs and uh we that in our discussions with the board of finance they've been very pleased that we found savings to offset the cost of the
036investments we had to make for covet so it's been a good discussion all year long very positive give and take with our uh brethren and the board of finance so not a lot of news there we did get some new news on the budget we did finally get the real numbers in for the insurance costs and as a result they came in even lower than we had expected um so there was a hundred and one thousand dollar savings and about uh thirty some odd thousand dollar savings we heard on this on the town side so for the town as a whole the insurance rates actually helped quite a bit against our budget commission um and so we took that forward and shared that with the board of finance and their deliberations and they've adjusted our
037budget accordingly i didn't take 100 of it i noticed in their final budget they took about 87 000 i think um leaving a little bit of contingency there for us to deal with things and uh so the board of we go to referendum in about two weeks so hopefully this budget process which has been relatively non-controversial and uh the spending increases are not crazy um and i think we ended up uh can't scan on i'm looking for 10 no yeah we ended up under 3 right yes 2.85 percent 1.85 so that's probably as low a budget as uh we've seen in a while so then very positive uh interaction other than that we had an update on the esser grants which we submitted the sr2 grant and uh start i don't really have guidance on
038s or three yet but uh but at least we started talking about you know what you know what other range of possibilities there and we got an update on the uh the brick veneer project at wiscon and it was kind of early in the process we hadn't even started the discussions with the board of finance of the first selectmen on how to fund that um but that that discussion is progressing so so that's an update for finance committee okay any questions anyone all right uh the last subcommittee report is oh special facilities but you already covered that right joy no well i'll actually yeah so we met on april 28th uh eddie reviewed the high school locker room boys locker room project proposed base bid and two alternative bids with the committee so there will
039be a motion later in our agenda to to approve the base bid and both alternatives for the locker room project um just so you know the committee agreed to go with alternate one which is to begin the work this summer and continue into the fall until the project is completed and just so you know alternative two was to complete the project over the course of two summers so the committee felt that they were in support of alternate one okay uh any questions for joy i mean we'll have another discussion on the boys locker room project a little bit a little bit later but all right uh consent agenda oh we actually have none on that consent agenda oh there is okay yeah so i will move that the board approved the items on the consent
040agenda which are retirements and resignations second all right thanks joy all those in favor oh sorry really hi hi thanks john did you want to say something sorry yeah i just wanted to congratulate donnie burdick uh custodian at the high school 19 years of service everybody gets to see donnie in the evenings and he waves everybody and he's always happy and a big smile and uh we're going to miss him and we wish him luck as he finishes out the year and into his retirement so thank you donnie john can i say something about lynn just she's been 22 years at wisconier um as one of our paraprofessionals um so professional you know cares about the kids is so patient and has really been a great advocate for for students um for a long time
041at wisconsin congratulations to her after 22 years you lynn congratulations okay uh moving on to new business uh the first item is the vhs boys locker room project bid approval okay i will move that the board approved the brookfield high school board boys locker room project base bid and bid alternates as recommended by the facilities committee second thanks joy um john did you uh have um sort of like a did you bring like the updated uh plans just so that we could maybe show them to the public one more time yeah so we we don't necessarily i don't unless joy has them whether we don't necessarily have the plans rosa but we we can talk we definitely can talk about it but we have you know kind of the the with the high profile nature
042of this project and the expense of the project is so much lead up conversation and frankly we're gonna uh what is it may 18th is the referendum and it's the capital referendum as well we wanted to formally put this bid under new business um just to talk about that bid process i know joy just talked about it during your special facilities report joy was there anything additional we might want to share just to make sure the public understands the bid process or anything specific about the design um and we haven't really changed things but just so it's fresh in people's minds or can you know if any you know any of the three of us can kind of comment on that yeah nothing has really changed um as far as the plan uh layout you
043know what we you know discussed at our previous meeting so okay i think the the mbc wanted the board's uh approval of going out to bid with the the base bid being to incur overtime and get the project done over the course of the summer an alternate one as joy mentioned was starting the summer without doing overtime and continue into the fall until it's complete and then alternate two is to uh complete it over the course of two summers and they just work i believe there was um there were some savings as well maybe not savings but there was a lower cost um if we did it as one project as opposed to sort of multiple smaller projects right and piecemealing it that's that's very possible that they the tecton really wasn't sure if splitting
044the project up you know any costs you might incur doing that might offset any uh the extra costs of doing overtime in the summer so they really just wanted to make sure we had all the options at hand this way we could really analyze the cost and then analyze the impact on program and so part of the conversation to understand that uh like we do with the with the school project or anything else is you know the user groups and making sure they're involved so mr belanda and mr baldwin were a big part of the discussion as well uh so what is the date the impact on the day program as well as the after school program and so we know what that's going to look like the after talking with uh eddie and uh
045paul so now it's a matter of getting out to bid making sure the board is formally uh approving the the way the bid goes out and then taking a look at and being able to analyze how those bids come in by those kind of three different options the base and then all ultimately i do know um from listening at the nbc meeting that they they plan to award uh in june so they're mobilizing fast does that mean that they can most likely start this over the summer this summer if like right away if the price if the cost works out that is a very distinct possibility which is kind of hard to believe but i know that a lot of conversation went on to to move this back in early fall we all talked about
046this and it was like you know what let's see if we could talk to mr dunn and get this on year one agenda and here we are and it's a distinct possibility that they might be able to mobilize and get their a team out there on the summer depending again on the contractors availability um also building materials as i understand it from working with all these you know different contractors building materials worldwide um are not as readily available so that also can impact um and we just won't know until we get the bids in and then really sit down and plan things out with whoever is chosen right well the project is long overdue so uh joy thank you and your facilities committee to uh for all the work and um for everybody for pushing
047us along because hopefully we can finally get it done thank you um what exactly are we voting on this is i guess the just the project bid approval just so that the nbc can send this project out to bid and normally i don't think we would have a role in this but because it's such a huge project am i right john that this um they wanted sort of that extra level of approval yes the nbc asked me to put this on and just to make sure that the board is on board with the locker room bid project as proposed which is a base bid and then two alternative bits yeah but the way that motion reads it sounds like we're approving the bid itself and i don't think that's what our intent is is it
048it's we're approving the bid process and structure that is going on it says we approve the high school boys locker room base bid and bid alternates and i'm sitting there with that motion saying well can i see the dollar amounts um because we haven't received those bids yet all we're bidding on is the agreement to go out to bid correct and so certainly bob uh someone could have been the motion absolutely because that's exactly that's to be more clear i just found the motion confusing that's all do you want to go ahead and amend bob if there's a better phrasing uh so i'd like to make a motion to amend the recommended motion that's on the table to read that the board approved going out to bid for the brookfield high school boys locker room
049project comma including a base bid and bid alternates as recommended by the facility subcommittee okay i will second that amendment uh all those in favor of the amendment okay okay and then the second um the second just clarification point is does the approval at the referendum give us the formal town's approval to proceed on this or is there another process uh where we would have to go to the board of selectmen and board of finance and maybe the referendum for the project or is that it do we know i i i believe and can correct me if i'm wrong on this one the capital project that's one of the capital projects and so if that is voted and voted upon and approved on may 18th the the money for the project is approved um and
050then we're just going out to bid early to get a jump on things um and then ultimately uh the bids specifically a contractor has to be chosen but bob i think we're asking is the money approved at the may 18th referendum well more importantly is the project approved or does it have to go back through an approval process i i think we can go ahead and approve this motion but i'd love to understand and be clear on the process that has to go on yeah okay the old board of finance person and me kind of saying wait a minute where's the where's the project approval right and and usually specific projects above a certain dollar amount have to be specifically voted on and i don't i just actually printed out the sample ballot this afternoon
051and i didn't see any specificity on anything so i didn't know whether this needed something further but i'm sure that mr dunn has gone and you know researched what he has to get for approvals but i'm not sure clear okay we can we can ask mr johnson yeah i can follow up on that too yeah because if if it is a need a second set of approvals we ought to know what that path looks like and know what data the different approvers are going to need in order to you know give it an approval so we can feed this feed that process that was just a point of clarification more than an issue here so okay thank you okay uh we still have um the amended motion on the table so uh all those in
052favor of that okay that's unanimous thanks okay uh moving on to uh remote learning there's a long motion there so go ahead amy sorry amy no worries i will move that the board move that consistent with the interim guidance for remote learning for the 2021-2022 school year as issued by the connecticut state department of education effective with the commencement of the 2021-2022 school year the brookfield board of education shall discontinue offering remote learning opportunities for students associated with the covet 19 pandemic the district shall no longer provide students with voluntary access to remote learning at the unilateral request of students families the board authorizes its superintendent of schools to take such actions necessary to implement this change the board further authorizes the superintendent to take any emergent steps necessary relating to remote student programming associated
053with the coven 19 pandemic or other emergencies as may be needed subject to the board's subsequent approval second all right any discussion on this topic all right so all in favor all right that's unanimous thank you all right uh old business the first item is the board of education's budget estimate 21 or the 2021 2022 um we had our town meeting last night um we had no questions or comments from the public so it was a very quick and easy meeting relatively speaking um compared to previous years so um i think that's the only update right now that um that i have unless john you want to add anything obviously the referendum is in two weeks so um hope everybody gets out and votes and um anything else you wanted to add no i just
054i just like to quit since you gave me the opportunity i guess i want to be quiet and i'll just say a couple of quick comments i want to thank the board uh this board uh and thank the whole team um for working on the budget tirelessly and all the questions from the board and all the due diligence i think you know the old adage of spend seven hours of your day sharpening the saw in only one hour cutting and we really you know it's it's that that statement is manifested in some of the briefer meetings and the good will that uh we certainly garnered and uh the credibility i think uh more than ever you know we've continued to build it for years now but uh i think more than ever the board of
055finance board of selectmen in the community really appreciate the board's efforts and i think the board of finance and the board of selectmen for their support has really been a team effort um and i can't say enough about it so it's it's uh especially considering the kind of year we've had it really was nice to be able to go through the budget process a bit more smoothly than is difficult so thank you all and i wanted to say it the other night but i do want to thank all of the department heads and the school principals for answering the plethora of questions that we that we threw at you um we know that your jobs are already hard and we asked a lot of you throughout this budget process but i think that's what ultimately
056really stood out as um as showing the fact that we we know our stuff and we know our numbers and um we really really thank you for that so um i guess that's it in terms of the budget unless anybody else has any questions or comments i i just want to thank you for saying that rosa because um people have been really taxed this year with trying to hold everything together and that means a lot that you you said that because i can tell you working closely with the principals i i don't know how they do it i it's it's been monumental i mean always work beyond what anyone would expect anybody to do but this year was really amazing so thank you for saying that of course okay um we can move on to
057the next item in old business which is the new school project uh the last time that the nbc committee met was or the nbc met um uh was a few weeks ago now so um this hopefully this isn't too out of date information but obviously we're out of the bid phase out of pre-construction and we are well into actual construction um we had our ceremonial ground breaking this past saturday on may 1st and that was really exciting some of the foundation work has already begun so you can kind of start to see um some of the outline of some of the buildings and some of the arms and some of those wings that are starting to take shape in the very very early stages but it's exciting um tecton is already starting to look at
058finishing samples so those user group meetings will continue so that um teachers and and those other users will have input in that as eric mentioned there's weekly drone photos that are being taken of the site so we'll have a nice compilation i think at the end we can sort of like watch the building being built which will be really exciting um i know i had mentioned before about some of that um the soil that was at the site that was not the greatest for actual construction they had to bring in um better soil uh they're still trying to sort of um estimate the cost of the total cost of bringing in that old uh that better soil and if there's any savings we can capture by using that the soil that was there elsewhere like
059perhaps in the ball fields um i think that is pretty much it so um yeah nothing nothing too new but maureen go ahead yeah i just wanna um i'm glad that you brought up the drone and i just want to say that um mr bellanda and uh and eric and i believe it's terry parks at the high school who had to deal with you didn't even want to know what trying to get all the parts and um to get the drone project that we have going on up at the high school configured and i just think that it's it's you know these things look really cool when they're happening but i think that we have to be cognizant of the fact of the amount of time and effort that's put in by administrators and staff
060to just you know get this done so i just want to mention that and if i left anybody out because i know there were more people that were i mean this took a year and a half to get all of our drone components and so i'm glad that it finally um came about mark i don't know i i don't you know want to leave anybody out if you want to say anything yeah you you got everybody dr ruby so um it was a process and i appreciate all the support and you know the fact we're able to you know i'm able to work with logan at this point for those that that don't know i'm working with logan white our student who's the one who comes to huckleberry to use the drone um we have
061the appropriate permits he's actually currently studying we're doing an independent study to work through um an actual faa part 107 certification so he can be an actual drone pilot um you know and go beyond the typical recreational um and if there's anybody that can do it it'll be logan so uh we've got a curriculum we're working through um and he's just hit we're really lucky to have him we're sad he's going to be graduating um you know but uh he's he's had actually taught me a lot it's been a great opportunity for me as a as a principal to get back and do some instructional stuff too and work with kids like that again so uh it's a fantastic resource that drone is quite amazing um it's does so many things that we haven't even
062fully explored yet but it's great to have it as a resource and you know we're also i know eric and i were talking with chief purcell at the police department and talking about what other things we can do in collaboration with them they're looking to start a drone program and so we're gonna have more and more conversations so it's really spread a lot of great goodwill in the community and some technological advances so i'm glad to be a part of it thanks mark so that started in 2017 and we all know what the date is today so thank you so much for years of work on that so he's going to have mr beland is going to have a new title it's going to be you know principal drone mechanic you know yeah he'll be
063wanting to he'll want to use that s or money for a plane but we're not gonna all right um that's it for the new school uh we are actually at three main points already and um i think i think maybe the referendum yeah yeah yeah that's definitely important it should be something yeah any word we can get out there would be good i was thinking the remote learning too um just sort of like us that people are aware of that or get the word out yeah and then maybe the the locker room project or we could just do like facilities in general we can do locker room and new school sort it together john will there be um a separate um communication to parents about the teachers of the year from each of the schools
064we usually put that out um once we have our june meeting we put it all out i just wanted to make sure the board knew tonight because that was public information okay so question you just brought it up um the uh will we be starting to meet in person again at some near date and will we do be doing it in time for that great june meeting when we get to meet the students yes bob the plan is to uh after through may 20th um is the governor's executive order so anything after may 20th so starting on may 21st we have to have in-person meetings unless something changes over the next couple of weeks and so first meeting in june is that big special meeting i know you love that meeting and the the thought
065is maybe at the audit the bhs auditorium or something like that because a lot of parents come to that meeting we want us we want people to be there but we want to be able to spread out and that kind of a thing dr ruby did you have something i apologize oh you're on you yeah i'm you i'm sorry i i was just doing my sign language for social justice oh that's social distancing that's that's it kevin told me that was social justice well that that would be the plan bob because it's it's you know technically wired our tech team could uh you know get get that wired up and ready to go and we've got a couple of weeks to plan for that you know we've got you know and and talking about upcoming
066events in terms of there's usually a lot of june events in terms of recognition events and uh eighth grade moving up ceremonies and a graduation when will we get more information on those i believe mr renda has already communicated about eighth grade moving up but i could let him step in mr belanda is readying we were just actually talking about graduation today and the final plans is getting that ready to be publicized and go out there i know national honor society has their date they're going to actually have their ceremony on the ball field so all these plans are in place and i think to the specific students and parent groups most of the communications are already on their way out or right about to go out so maybe mr renda you can talk about
067eighth grade step up sure um what we do right now is uh we have planned for the wms moving up ceremony is for friday june 11th um and it what we're doing this year is a little different than last year i have to give a lot of credit to our pto um subcommittee that joy heads up for our pto and the amount of work that joy and other uh parents have done to put this together i really appreciate um our plan and joy you can jump in if i forget something is to have it at the town hall we are going to utilize the um where the gazebo is where they put up the movie um screen and we are going to have students we're going to call each student like we normally would at
068the high school when we do at the high school um and then we're going to just name a couple of the short excuse me the big award just a handful of awards we're not gonna make it as long and as we did in the past and then after that we are going to i have some students putting together a video um with um just pictures of all the students and and things that they've done over the years and they will play that on the video screen and they're also having um food trucks and uh maybe some other activities joy was that was that good yeah we have uh you know two food trucks coming nice green truck um chick-fil-a you know generously don't is donating chicken sandwiches to all the students um we'll have something
069to give to each of the the students also well a couple little activities but more the the students really express that they just want to be with each other you know sign your books and just to really gather you know just to celebrate so informal yep somewhat formal but keeping it simple and socially distance the park and rec has been mary's been working with us to um be able to you know we're gonna use the whole grounds we're gonna separate we're gonna have cone set up for um homerooms our students as they get called up to the you know and then having parents and families spread out to the best of their abilities on you know chair in chairs or in blankets assigned covered police yeah i don't know if you wanted to be a
070part of that signed coveted police we'll take it possibly but yeah a lot of parents have stepped up which is nice seventh grade parents uh have volunteered to help out and manage you know all the ins and outs of it so which is nice everyone's really coming together to make it memorable and dean thank you what are the dates on the high school events and how will they work sure mark can you share a little bit sure absolutely so we'll kind of work backwards we'll start with graduation which is the big culminating event that's going to be saturday june 12th there's going to be an outside ceremony but actually take place on the stadium turf field that's where the graduates and the faculty and distinguished guests will be seated on the field going backwards to
071the morning we actually are going to start with a parade from wisnier middle school to the high school very similar to what we did last year which is very well received and and students and families are very excited to have that again as is the community quite frankly so we have the official uh permit from the state of connecticut to actually run a parade on route 25 so we're good to go there uh working with chief purcell in terms of making sure that goes off without a hitch he'll have additional support um additional officers at the high school um because it will be a there'll be more people there than previously so basically um we have a general idea of how well my general idea we know what we're going to do with our students
072an immediate family that's pretty easy what we're trying to gauge is how to appropriately allow more guests to come and attend um it's it's a challenge given parking situations and also given the ability to actually adequately socially distance so we're working through some of what those things are to make sure the important people are there you can imagine um i had this discussion with with dr burrill and ken today um if i was to say something like um limit to immediate family right that immediate family doesn't go to um grandma and grandpa um then you have two sets of grandparents okay we can accommodate that but then it's the our you know step aunt is in from georgia for the weekend and she wants to come and then it starts expanding to something that becomes
073it could become unmanageable quickly and i'm i'm trying to be cognizant of that to make sure that we can have the socially distant event that we want to have the last thing i want to do is have an event as i said last year with our event last year that is ends up being a reason for transmission we have a lot of room and space in the seats in the stadium in the bleachers so that's where families will be sitting grad party which i can't talk much about i know mr beldon you've been very involved with them in the past so while it's not going to be a traditional grad party at night they're doing quite a a great job with setting up the inside of the building to do something that i won't talk
074about too much because it's supposed to be top secret um so following the parade students will process through the building and then they'll go outside on the field for an actual um a full graduation ceremony with diplomas we actually are going to have music the whole thing so that's fantastic and we're going to leave um you know do a grad party walk through and leave it open to community after following graduation so people that have donated money or want to see what it's like instead of having these saturday morning walk through it'll be a saturday afternoon walk through they'll get a chance to see what the grad party and all their efforts have gone to so that's graduation um working backwards we're going to have a senior awards night is going to be june 8th
075it's a saturday that's excuse me it's a wednesday night um and it's going to be limited to we can fit the number of people socially distanced between the award recipients and to and their parents will be able to come and we'll be able to do that in the auditorium we feel comfortable based on the capacity of the auditorium and what we have that we can actually fit uh people that we need to uh in the auditorium for just the senior awards night so that's exciting on june 8th um national honor society is actually going to take place i want to say the third there's a 20 maybe it's maybe that's the rain date that i was thinking i'm going to pull up my calendar may 20th may 20th dave everybody from writing mark if i
076may uh just to save everybody from writing things down literally mrs grambling and i were chatting today we're gonna have a communication out to each school office to get all of the end of the year dates for you so like we always do we'll be sending it to the board so you'll have all those dates and times and you know outdoor location that might be different than a typical indoor location i was just working on writing these down so i could block myself right now you're going to get all those in the next few days yep so yeah it's uh it's we're excited that we have we have a like i would say a just right size class in terms of uh graduating class to fit nice socially distance we where i was out there
077today with our sound guy working on microphones to make sure that those are going to work well and we're going to be able to regardless of and who knows what happens with the health department and cdc and the governor in terms of mass on max off covering your ears maybe over your nose just your chin whatever ends up happening we know that six feet apart is a distance that we all are aware of is is comfortable so i will be able to distance the graduates six feet apart across the board so they'll be able to be out and realistically based on where we're trending now be able to not have their masks on when sitting outside so that i'm really excited for um because that'll be such a departure from where we were last year
078so that's that's the plan um you know continue to work to make things you know the best we can possibly be okay thank you sorry to kind of get us off the schedule here guys so can can we just go back to three main points um we we said uh boys locker room and i thought there was another facilities thing you wanted to mention there well i was just thinking like the new school just so we could like plug the ground but we don't have to do that um you know it's not like it's upcoming or anything so we could just keep it the boy's locker room if you guys want to do that okay and then the referendum and the no remote learning for next year yeah got it all right next is upcoming
079events and uh amy i think um some of those have been covered for you already yes i'll say it can't be said enough town referendum for the school and the town is tuesday may 18th i'm assuming 6am to 8pm right is usually the hours on that um we do have a few things at center school friday may 7th is wear yellow for staff appreciation and it's the beginning of the abc end of year countdown saturday may 8th is the conclusion of the moveathon fundraiser tuesday may 11th is a pto meeting and friday may 14th is a remote learner lunch bunch with mrs diamond at huckleberry the smarter balance assessment is ongoing this week for fourth graders and may 10th through 14th will be the smarter balance for third grade and friday may 7th their abc
080end of year countdown begins also wisconia has the smarter balance assessment will be administered to grades five and eight the week of may 10 through 12 and the next generation science standard assessment will be administered to grades five and eight on may 13th and the smarter balance will be administered to grades six and seven may 17 through 19. and for the next couple weeks at brookfield high school the junior prom is saturday may 14th at brookfield high school and ap exams begin on may 18th and may 20th is the national honor society in deduction but i think we have a meeting the 19th so i'll mention that again and i think that's it amy i i just wanted to add for anybody who for the referendum anybody that typically votes at huckleberry school that location
081is now going to be saint margarites because they cannot accommodate voting at huckleberry good call thank you all right all right okay the last item on our agenda is an executive session um so amy would you like to read the motion i'll move that the board enter into executive session for the purpose of discussing strategy and negotiation as it relates to collective bargaining and unaffiliated salaries second okay joy uh all in favor aye okay um i'll invite in dr john burrill at this time and then this concludes um our stream so i'll see everybody else on the other link and have a good night everyone you