001we are live to [Applause] the ready go [Laughter] [Music] yeah good evening everyone uh I'd like to call the C Bo of Education meeting to order I'd like to welcome all of you here it's it's a a very refreshing change to have so many folks here in the audience so thank you for coming out tonight and if we now would stand for the Pledge of Allegiance Simone's going to lead us to the flag of the United States of America theu for it stands one nation God indivisible liy and jusice for all in case you're wondering I'm not the normal chair of the Board of Education uh L Daniels is Lou is home uh the health considerations but he's uh he's with us in the digital video so and and uh our first order of business
002is a report from the board chair which I don't have one but Lou do you have a remarks to make I I actually don't Joe tonight for the first time I have no no nothing really to to go over known L for many years he's never been at a l of words before so this is a unique moment think we had the night off super thank you Mr sh welcome everyone to the October 10th Canton Board of Education meeting I'd like to welcome Mr dep pipo our high school principal our assistant principal Dr Ruth Kidwell our outstanding uh field hockey coach to honor tonight for 100th win and a special Welcome to our all our families and students here tonight for a new tradition within the cam public schools to at a regular scheduled board
003meeting to honor students so we're very excited that you're all here the this evening last week I was able to attend the Canton Intermediate School 2023 gift eveing of a little free library in partnership with the seventh graders returning to CIS for the unveiling of the little Free Library that their class gifted to the school students involved in the project gave speeches it was a wonderful event to have the community gathered together last week the high school had their National the national induction ceremony for Science and Mathematics it was a wonderful event that I was able to attend where we were honoring students for their outstanding achievements in math and science a special thanks to Michelle a and Gabrielle Henson and Mr RI was there for their work in the program and continued support for
004our students some of those students I know I believe are here tonight that we're honored congratulations to all those students on the one wonderful achievement over the summer the Subaru program adopt the classroom reached out to Cherry BR Primary School we're excited to share that Subaru has adopted all of our kindergarten classrooms for the 2324 school year each teacher rece received a donation box of various materials and a $500 credit towards the adopt the classroom so that's very exciting for our kindergarten classrooms meetings are being held on a regular basis regarding the space issue at chbg primary school I'd like to thank board member Russell Bush for attending a meeting last week to really discuss um some considerations that we're looking at regarding cherberg primary school and like to thank Our Town CAO Bob Skinner
005for being involved for the possibility of uh installing module classrooms at the school in the future I want to remind the board and the public that there will be a tri board meeting meeting next Monday October 16th at 6:00 p.m. I would encourage all board members to attend that tri board meeting it'll be an official board meeting for us I anticipate that that meeting would be an hour in the focus of that meeting will be on the financial forecast for the fiscal year 25 budget the Board of Education next meeting will be held on Monday November 6th please note the Monday excuse me the next please please note the Monday date because the election day is the the normal Tuesday so our next meeting will be Monday November 6 and then upcoming I will also
006be holding a virtual superintendent Community conversation on October 23rd at 6:30 p.m. I'll take any questions from the board out of the superintendent's office at this time anyone did you say the tri board is p.m. 6 p.m. thank you Community Center thank you anyone else thank you Dr grman U next on the agenda is our assistant superintendent report I'm sorry to say Mr Bishop is home under the weather so we will not have that report tonight uh student refs Magie Simone Juliana what do you have for us um I'll be reporting on Ken intermediate school this week and in the month of September they have collected 660 star cards for students making responsible respectful role model decisions they celebrated start with Holo week through a series of activities to encourage students to be inclusive and
007they culminated that with their first advisory meeting of the year uh the sixth graders had the first session in their two-part leadership series with Empower leadership and the first session was held at CIS and the next one in the spring will be held at an Adventure Park in stores so that's exciting um the fifth graders had a field trip to Gren to participate in Fric oceanology and the weather was beautiful and it was a day of Hands-On learning and like Dr Gman said last week CIS unveiled its new little free library and a portion of the cost of the library was raised by C students last year and last year's sixth grade class voted to support the remaining cost as their class gift the current seventh graders walked over for the unveiling and after school
008activities have begun at C they have year-long activities such as art Club Global Citizens and we speak as well as the fall s of theater Club newspaper and disc golf and their annual Fright Night will be held on Saturday October 20th from 6:00 to 8: which is going to be earlier this year to avoid conflict for with other towns and sports events thank you okay um so I will be reporting on J Brook primary school on Friday September 29th uh they had an all school meeting where after two rounds of voting uh they decided to name their new mascot honey which is such a cute name and um Miss card and the fall um cbps singers launched their fall session last Wednesday and they will be collaborating with Miss card their music teacher and other
009special guests uh kindergarteners are near their end of their first reading unit called we are readers uh students learn to love reading while also um learning beginning of steps how to read first graders are near the end of their reading unit uh called building good readers during this they practice good reading habits like reading for Long and Strong times and they also worked on solving hard words and working with a partner second graders they uh finished their reading unit called becoming a big kid reader and they developed routines for uh recording book information and habits like uh reading with a partner and learning how to do like uh talking about books with their pregnant third graders are at the end of their first unit of reading called uh building a reading life where they devoted
010time to building strong reading habits including uh choosing books that were fit for their level and that they would be interested in and keeping track of how reading is going for them and addressing any problems along the way great um tonight I am uh reading about the middle school and the high school um for the Middle School the field hockey team recently participated in play for the Cure and it is an event that fundraises for cancer research um the middle school also held student council elections they celebrated band books week with a button making activity and the theme Let Freedom read um they also honored Hispanic Heritage Month with a trivia challenge they returned also to C for the unveiling of the little Free Library seems like it was a big event um they held
011a parent meeting about the 8th grade field trip to Washington DC and the signups have officially begun for the High School open house was September 14th um muo Alpha Theta and science National Honor Society induction like you said was October 5th um the chamber singers had a field trip to the University of Harford on October 5th me and Juliana participated in that and it was great um PSATs for students great 9 10 and 11 are tomorrow October 11th uh we have a music Coffee House on October 20th where students will be showcasing any Talent of theirs while there's hot chocolate and stuff like that um we have a homecoming dance on October 21st and our spirit week in game day will be throughout October 20th and October 27th with the home football game at Canton
012on October 27th um National Honor Society inductions are happening November 1st and the fall play rehearsals are underway for the November play uh the play that goes wrong thank you very much uh I know it's extra effort on your part to get uh a report from every school and it's very much appreciated by the board and you did you've done a terrific job with that so I hope that continues and board members you have any questions for student reps oh thank it was a great job I appreciate it uh as Dr G mentioned a few minutes ago uh we have a a new uh plan to recognize and celebrate student accomplishments this year uh rather than a a end of the year assembly uh Dr Gman and the principles are going to bring some students
013and their parents to us frequently as the year progresses this is the first one of those this is can celebrates for Canton High School so uh at this point we will turn the meeting over to uh Mr Depo or you Mr depo and Dr kwell Good Evening For Education good evening to all the parents here tonight I'm so proud to be able to recognize and celebrate so many of our outstanding students I'm very appreciative of this opportunity so early in the year to get our good names out and to recognize so many students as the as the school year begins um the only downside that it's so early is the fact that you know as a school year gets going more and more opportunities for students to thrive um come to fruition and we have
014more to recognize but we thought we'd start this this outstanding evening by um recognizing certain students that helped us open a school building this year um with some outstanding service and also uh recognize students for continuous work as musicians in our school they received some awards last last year but maybe not recognized in this um in this type of of um celebration and also some um through lines with some students who have consistently shown high achievement so to begin the evening I'll ask Dr kwell to speak on St students who show great service to our school right good evening everyone so I am honored to speak about some of our student council members tonight and um just so you have some of the context our student council is truly the leadership of our high school
015um they are involved in so many different aspects of the school of creating activities of coordinating with teachers with class officers for their grade level and just planning all sorts of different events and activities to bring the school together in true leadership and spirit one of the first things they do and it starts planning probably in June and all the way through the summer is help represent our ninth grade orientation and so at that um we end up having probably anywhere from from 12 to 15 student council members who coordinate um different activities to help our incoming nth graders feel more comfortable they do tours of the building they work with them in small group settings to just answer questions that they might have coming in they help represent um Club fairs and different events
016and they're just part of um making sure that some of our students who are whether they're just coming up from eth grade or if they're new to Canon in general feel comfortable and welcomed um and then we continue to look for their service is anytime that Mr Dio and I you know say we want to reach out to the student body and speak to some of our leadership we'll look to them um they offer us input into so many things we're just so proud of them and their achievements so I'm going to recognize a few students that we have here tonight for their um service to the school so we'll start with Madison [Applause] sedor yeah and Simone [Applause] Mesa Lucas [Applause] M Abigail Kim Juliana Kavanaugh [Applause] yeah and then is Isabella Maza could
017not be here with us tonight but we'll also recognize her am we're going to take a bunch of pictures at the very end so you will definitely get your photo up I see the camera's ready to go this board wants their photo off too so we'll make sure we make that happen than so um sort of flipping the idea why don't I invite our students up first and I I'll I'll speak LLY about them so I'd like to invite some of our outstanding musicians from Kon High School Grace Asmar Nikolai marinan Lauren Mary and Kayley trainer to the podium [Applause] please so as I said earlier this is a really a great opportunity for me to speak on behalf of of some of our outstanding musicians as we all know K really a flagship in
018our uh the music program as a flagship in our community and you know we have great um I guess contributions from everyone in in and around our town and I know the board um thinks very highly of making sure that we dedicate everything we can to support our students and and you know I'm not sure you know with all the different types of of opportunities they have to perform how well or clearly articulated um you know their awards are to the community we have several concerts throughout the year we have prisms um but we also have students who go above and beyond that and these are these students in front of me um last winter this group uh was well represented um in the 2023 Connecticut music educators Association Northern reg Regional Music Festival essenti
019essentially you know this group made it to the Regionals and performed there um this was the first year they had regionals uh since Co and um Mrs antonucci our K12 director spoke very glowingly of the fact that we had representatives in the areas of coral instrumental and for Canton Orchestra um these students were selected by audition so they earned their way they were sent music to prepare um last November um they had to learn the piece they had 10 minutes to show the piece in January uh in November and then they were selected and rehearsed January 13th and 14th and performed in a beautiful concert on January 14th of 2023 so please join me in congratulating Grace Asmar for trumpet symph Orchestra congratulations Grace Nikolai marinin for base voice in mix fire congratulations Lauren marsy
020for percussion in the counter fand and kayy trainer for her voice her Alto voice in miqu congratulations so before we sit down in addition to this honor um I'd like to actually just go a little bit one beyond for grace and Nikolai who were also selected um in the 2023 Connecticut music educators Association all state music festival so a very similar process they were selected out of the regional process um and even though they were you know worked extremely hard through their junior year um they took this on um as a challenge um to learn the music prepare thoroughly In audition yet again and that took place during uh you know from February to April of last year and as a result of being named to this all state Festival they had a wonderful weekend
021March 30th through April 1st where they stayed with other musicians um in the Marriott downtown and performed at the con uh for a concert at the convention center on April 1st so special congratulations to you for that honor as well great job everyone and we look forward to our first concerts coming up on November 20th and then again on November 20 29th thank you [Applause] again grace before you leave I need you to come back on up here and Arty can you join us as well so um I also mentioned uh you know strong academic achievement we have two our most outstanding Scholars here at Kent High School both seniors Grace Asmar and Arthur Hayes and I'd like to recognize them tonight U for receiving a letter of commendation from the National Merit Scholarship Corporation
022as commended students they are recognized for their exceptional academic promise demonstrated by their outstanding performance on the qualifying test which is the PSAT so we're taking that tomorrow in school all of our students they took it exactly one year today on October 10th last year so through this process of of performing at a very high rate both Grace and Arthur are among the top 5% of more than 1.6 million students students who took this exam they are among approximately 34,000 commended students Nationwide who have shown this amazing academic promise so for your performance on this qual qualifying test um you are uh recognized as commended students which is uh unbelievable credit to you your efforts your hard work your diligence to your parents who uh support you and really it it really is a Shining
023Moment for our entire School community so we appreciate you guys recognizing or allowing us to be recognized through your achievement so thank you so much for all your hard work and [Applause] congratulations and lastly I'd like to um recognize one of our great staff members Miss Margaret Bristol if you'd like to come forward please I know it's your favorite thing sorry all right but for those you who don't know um Mrs Bristol coach Bristol is one of our physical outstanding physical education and health teachers here at both Canton High School and Canton middle school she's been a teacher for 21 years in 19 of those years have been at Canton and about N9 years ago in addition to her teaching responsibilities she took on um really the role and responsibility to be our field hockey
024coach and the nine years have been extraordinary and tonight she's being recognized for really um one individual thing but to me it it really speaks to her um commitment to the school to the students and to the teams she's been recognized for 100th victory tonight which is no small um task at all I mean it is it is hard to do that it shows again a diligence and a consistency and a pathway that that she brings forward every day um she's truly an outstanding coach in fact she's been recognized two times um on the state level as being the most um the class Estate Field Hockey Coach of the Year back in 2019 and again more recently in 2022 this season uh the teams have an outstanding year they're 9 and0 so you not only
025have 100 but you must be on like 103 or four by now something like that yeah 100 yeah six seven maybe just keep it going but again I think what I I enjoy mostly about marketing getting to know over these years is it is about field hockey and it is about teaching but really it's about people you know she cares deeply about everyone she's involved with and I've seen her going above and beyond for people all over this community so there a nice recognition for her on her 100th win but it's an excuse to just celebrate her so congratulations Mar so if we could get can you make a quick comment of course you Dr G speaks I just wanted to say to the students and to uh uh coach Bristol uh how delighted we
026are here tonight how proud We Are of your accomplishments and the the kind of uh young people and students that you are becoming and I have become uh and it's it's wonderful for the board to be able to celebrate you and and see a small piece of the fruits of our Labor uh come true so thank you so much for being here and congratulations as well Dr to Bros so if we can bring all our students up M we'll do a separate picture with you so if we could bring all our students up and let let's see if we can make it happen around here if the board can get in and everything like that so students don't be shy students come on up this is the first time we've done this so so you're
027going to stand in front of them like in front of the table M the cord so will this work yeah we're going to make it work okay parents the a PHA it'll try getbody no they're not going to see us we're MERS let's we'll make it work let's try to get two lines if we can with students I'm gonna block Ruth you should be in here Ruth come on in you should be in this ising do we want to try to get this move the screen okay do we have everything [Music] perfect it all look wonderful keep [Music] [Laughter] smiling everybody good [Applause] [Music] congratulations [Music] good got [Applause] it well most people find our meetings unbelievably interesting some people you are more than welcome to stay welcome to home and do your homework whatever
028else thank you so much for coming in welcome to stay [Music] [Laughter] [Music] got Mr Daniel I'm sorry I should have asked you to make a comment and my apologies that's okay I I just for the board and I know many of the folks left but I just want to mention to the board that um what what just happened here tonight is is actually what makes Canton a great community and I was I was listening and I said we talked about Student Government we talked about music we talked about academic achievement we talked about sports those are just a few of the ingredients that make it great make us make our school district great but the three things that really drive that is really the parents that were there tonight it was so great to
029see so many parents there the teachers and the coaches that participate and and and finally the administration I just wanted to compliment Ruth and and Drew on you know the environment that they've created in that high school and uh I'm just so grateful for it and I think we as a board have a lot to be grateful for our students our parents our teachers and our administrators so that's that's kind of what struck me as I watched this as we watched it uh as I watched it on video tonight but thank you Joe I just wanted to mention that to the board I'm sorry I didn't ask you to say that really as the board I just I think we're on the right track and um that this this is the proof of the pudding
030I greate uh don a business manager report okay all right um okay you can see in the packet the first day well first of all I should say that we we uh went and and met with the finance committee this morning and reviewed everything in detail um uh so they approved that this morning uh I can go over the the highlights memo uh that we provided to them uh the fiscal 2324 end of year is forecasted to be 32 million 604 887 which is unfavorable to budgets by $858,000 796 uh if you look at the month over month uh as of September 30th uh we are 496 294 less favorable than the forecast of last month uh the major components uh are as follows uh you can see in certified salaries um the are there's
031about 40,000 uh in wage differentials of favorability uh as well as the uh Speech and language pathologist that we actually spoke about last month this was budgeted for 76,000 uh in certified salar so we have the favorability there you're going to see this offset down below for the cost of 69,000 which is the actual cost because we had to hire a third party SLP so not the same numbers but they're they're still uh uh valid numbers uh so um we also have no change in the month over month forecast for that for certified salaries um certified salaries in regular education uh they are less than anticipated due to the math instructional coach Coach position at CHS and CMS and the amount that was budgeted for 57,000 as far as wage differentials between separated retired staff
032and new starting wages um there are differences in month over month uh to new Inc conferences for meetings that uh uh that took place in August and September uh and also uh some other coverages that you'll see reversed next month it was encumbered but we uh won't need that encumbrance as of next month so you'll see next month a little bit of favorability there month over month uh substitutes the anticipated overage uh due to wage adjustments for permanent inhouse Subs uh the reduced month over month uh is due to vacant positions not being filled uh for instance uh we have uh a couple of uh open positions that we were hopeful to be filled but haven't been filled to date for in-house Subs so therefore um I went ahead and reduced our forecast that may
033go up again as availability for in-house Subs uh comes into play uh the special education purchase services you can see the offset and sped certified salaries above like I I talked about for the SLP Services um and then the balance is due to additional needs to meet student needs uh Transportation regular education uh this was uh the same as last month the additional van for preschool needed at cost of 44,000 because the program was split into two locations uh transportation for special education uh it's anticipated favorability of 33,000 due to changes in transportation needs since the budget um so that uh that um you know does uh fluctuate from time to time based on the transportation needs of students in special ed uh special ed tuition uh there is some unfavorability here um during the
034budget season um there the PPS director had proposed a budget of approximately 2.8 million uh and that had a uh a reduction of almost 700,000 uh so uh if you look at where we're at in special ed right now um we are closer to that 2.8 that really should have been budgeted um would you like you to go through the detail page no Russell all right so any questions on that Russell anything you want to add no we uh we met this morning with Donna and Dr Gman and yourself and we approved the financials for this month board members questions L Felicia no thank you that that uh the numbers are a bit troubling for sure U and we'll need to keep a special careful eye on things as we proceed I think the the
035uh you know we're dealing with same issues that virtually every District in the state is dealing with special costs are high and can vary wildly month to month week to week uh and you know vacant positions uh we're in actually very good shape in terms of vacant positions but not perfect shape uh you know 10 years ago you'd never consider having a a job unfilled but times have changed so uh thank you Donna any any other comments or questions thank you uh at this point we move to a public comment uh the goal here is to give community members an opportunity to share their thoughts uh about any issues that they uh wish to talk about uh we would ask that the uh the comments be restricted to about three minutes or less uh and
036we remind folks who we may wish to comment that it's not a dialogue back and forth uh with with the Board of Ed this is an opportunity for you to speak and for us to listen and we're not going going to engage in a debate that's not the purpose of public comment uh with that said uh is there anyone in the audience who would like to say something we'd ask you if you do to please uh give us your name and your address seeing none uh list of folks online is pretty small there but either of those folks interested in making a comment joining us online you can use the raise hand feature of zoom and I will call on you by your Zoom name and you can make your public comment no raise hands
037seeing none uh this point we'll ask uh Dr Gro Dr so yeah let me uh set the stage a little bit because this is new so showcase schools showcase schools is the opportunity as you can tell this is a high school evening so showcase schools is the opportunity for the principal to bring something to the Board of Education mostly the students talking about what's going on in that school it could be related from a academic standpoint an activity standpoint so this is the first showcase school that we have so I'll turn it over to Mr the pipo thank you again Dr Gman and the board um I would like to I guess carry on uh Mr Daniel's comments um for sure um when we were highlighting some students we talked about our music program an
038Athletics coach and our high achievement but as I've said to the board often you know there's so many other things that happen there's so many nuances in our school there's so many opportunities within our school for students um to uh be a part of something that they're passionate about to offer opportunities to um get back to the community and to invest in their own learning and um you know I'm particularly proud about that and last year uh as we were meeting with the board of aded reps Simone was at meetings and it struck us that um the board didn't really have the maybe the opportunity to hear from students very often and and we were we were very much informing the board of things that students were doing and asking um potentially for some budget
039funds that that might support Student Activities or for further stipends and uh I think last year we actually started with Simone talking a little bit about some of the activities that she was a part in so I thought as it was the beginning of the year I thought it would be really prudent to bring students forward so they could speak for themselves this is um kind of a broad brush of students meaning they're involved in different activities in school I probably could have selected a another 20 students to to be involved tonight but based on our time frames I thought these four would be spectacular so I'd like to invite these group this group students up I will introduce you once you get up here but when you come up and join me and and
040and we'll move on with with our presentation someone can join as well so if we could Advance this slide real quick um you know I've shared this with the board before you know this is a not an exhaustive list but it is a list of extracurricular clubs activities that students are um able to take part in at K high school and some of them are living in breathing some of them might be dormant for a year or two and uh then they might pick up um in future years and and we're always asking students to to add to clubs um we hear a little bit about Dungeons and Dragons that is a Mainstay Club in our school but two years ago it wasn't part of our school this year we added a book literary Club
041Maggie Bishop was instrumental in making sure that that was kind of her idea that she brought forward and guarding some support from our staff so all we really require is a staff member willing to be supportive of the student group and then at some point when it gains enough momentum we add it to the budget we ask the board for support from a s in so really what I want you to what I want to do is stop talking what what I want you to hear from me is this wonderful arave students we have Mr James Barker hello James um we have Lauren marsy all right we have Miss Garcia as well and Sama alhad who's also here so um I'm going to turn the program over to them you can advance it one slot
042and um we can begin all right so as to P said my name is Emily um Emily Garcia I'm a senior here and I'm involved with a lot of different clubs at the high school but specifically I'm going to highlight Leo Club and new paa which we talked about earlier um Leo Club is one of my favorite clubs at the high school um one of the reasons I love it so much is actually because of our passionate advisers you know they um Miss Mrs a and Miss manini they always come to the club prepared to you know give us a lot of service ideas and service projects and that's another reason why why I love being in the club because there's so many things I can do in my free time to like benefit the
043community with my friends um as you can see on the slideshow um the picture with the purple Banner that's what we did last year the walk for Alzheimer's um I believe it was in Bristol um a group of us you know handed out water or flowers and we participated in the event um one of my favorite activities that we do each year is Bo bows for veterans so that's what we're working on now in Leo Club on Friday mornings we're um making bows for veterans and at the end of the month we're going to drive um to all the veterans in Canton and put the bows on the mailboxes um another favorite activity of mine from last year is making crayons uh we had people in the high school and really just throughout the whole
044Community uh donate broken crayons to us we sorted them in colors melted them and put them in new molds as again it's on the screen and we donated those new crayons to a women and children's center and we also do um other activities throughout the year like wear red day um we also participated in a mid midwinter conference last year and um even this weekend we're um volunteering at um Collinsville to assist in some Halloween um activities as for Mu patha that's our math Honor Society here and um I personally love math so that's um one of the reasons I enjoy it um as mentioned earlier we had our induction last week and currently we have around 20 members um throughout the year we mostly do activities concentrated in the high school specifically our factoring
045B and last year we did a Pi Day competition so um reciting the most digits of pie that you can we also um do activities at CIS like last year we did a mad minute competition and um when invited we do um fun logic puzzle nights at Cherry Brook so I'll turn it over to James then all right thank you um hello all uh my name is James Barker uh and I am a head dungeon master and drama club officer here at Canon High School being entirely honest I could talk for hours about both of these things but I've been informed that I only have about 2 minutes so I'm going to try to go fast let me know if I'm going too fast um so dun in the dragons uh as some of you
046may know uh is a tabletop role playing game uh where you have a lot of little dice which go from four-sided dice to 20-sided dice you create characters and then your dungeon master or yours truly um brings you through a story you've all heard of uh Choose Your Own Adventure books same concept except you're with a team you're collaborating and you're creating this story as you go along the dungeon master describes and narrates everything that is happening in the game and the players go through that Adventure they can make make any choice they want um and it gets really fun chaotic uh exciting thrilling um it can be downright scary sometimes uh that is all up for the players and DM to decide I'm going to take a leap here and say that you've all
047probably heard of The Wizard of Oz um would you believe me if I told you that that story was actually based off of a dungeon of Dragons game you shouldn't because it's not true but we all believed it for a second same basic concept wacky characters going on a fun adventure to a magical end goal um and also a small uh add-on for drama club and our school's Productions uh we are doing an absolutely incredible play uh called the play that goes wrong um it is supposed to be a classic murder mystery such as clue that we did a few years ago but a lot of things don't go according to plan uh I hope to see you all there if you can make it uh it's going to be a great time that's all
048for me thanks okay so hi my name is Sama and I'm a junior um this year so um I'm here to talk about Model United Nations and this is a very academic based Club so we usually have a couple meetings per month um actually today was our first meeting of the year um so we have about three three trips per year we visit Yukon we visit the University of Hartford and we also go to Yale on an overnight trip so what model un basically is is a a series of debates in which we are students are chosen to represent a country in a real world problem in which you have to debate and solve that problem in like drafting a reol a resolution and so um there's usually about 15 to 30 people there needs
049to be like a minimum amount and a maximum amount because it's um we're we're like traveling so um I very much enjoyed it and um I would say that Yukon was my favorite trip because of just the people and it was very fun but you do have to like prepare for the um the debates because you it it can be very much a lot at times and so without knowing what you're doing you won't know how to craft resolutions and collaborate with others so there's also um a another thing when you're debating for model un they have a thing where you compete for best delegate in which you have to draft um two position papers about single space one page long not a lot but this is where you basically show your um like where
050you demonstrate your knowledge of the topics and so for example what I did was um I debated for the Russia and Ukraine war in which like you have to like make sure that you're following your country's policies so if you're like biased toward one country you can't show it through your speeches because then you're not following your policy and so yeah it's a very fun trip and um you can be more um can be more like chill with it or like maybe more um strict with it it really depends on how you want to proceed with the debates okay awesome so my name is Lauren um I'm a senior and I'm the president of science National Honor Society um as our student Representatives talked about we just had um our induction it was a um
051a joint induction with muaa beta and science National Honors Society um it was wonderful to be able to recognize all of the new Juniors and seniors who are inducted for that night so with science National Honor Society we focus on scientific excellence and also inspiring the new wave of scientific thinkers from kanton high school so that's one of the parts that I love about snhs because I get to work with other um high schoolers who are as passionate about science as I am so it's great to just be in that room with people who will collaborate you on projects and who also share that same interest with you um we meet bright and early on Wednesday mornings um we do a lot of stuff in the high school we do um tutoring here in the
052library every single day for anyone who's struggling on assignments or lab reports and we also do one-on-one tutoring sessions by request and our biggest event throughout the year is astronomy night um this will be coming up in the winter where we um actually Mr Tucker helped us last year with some students to set up um telescopes and different equipment outside to be able to look at the stars and we also have astronomy themed activities inside in the science Wing we had um twister based on phases of the Moon last year we had an Oreo um phases of the Moon activity and we also had um glitter jar making station which was a super big hit with all of the little kids who went so it was just a great um Community science night getting kids
053excited I always just love seeing that like spark of inspiration that the kids have when they like shake the glitter go jar and they see like the vortex inside of it or and they learn the names of all the different phases of the moon it's just amazing to see those connections in their mind so I just absolutely love being a part of the club so thank you so much for hearing about um our side of what we do at Kenton High School and I'll turn it back over to miss thank you amazing students and um as I said you know we could have chosen others but but it was very intentional to kind of bring the this kind of grouping together I I hope you noted the differences amongst the things they were talking about
054between you know academic competitions versus a passion in a particular interest area that they can share in the community um you know versus some leadership opportunities in the school as well as pure fun and enjoyment in in camaraderie around a particular um idea so I'd like to open the the to the board some questions if you might have for the students anything that you might want to to know more about I'd just like to make a quick comment if I might thank you so much for sharing that with us uh it's so important to hear that and your enthusiasm is is pretty self-evident uh I would never diminish the importance of academics schools are about academics but the clubs and activities ities uh have such value uh such learning can go on such relationships can
055be built such connections with school can be built and those things are are very very important to the success of a school to the success of students and and you're obviously you're your commitment to those activities and your leadership in those U is is pretty terrific uh I'll just share a quick aside that I happen to be talking to the family of a mner one of our malen stars uh from BYO years who's now in college on the model un team and and at his college they treat it like an inter Scholastic activity they pay for the transportation the housing the meals and and he's built on his his uh academic experience in kitten but his his M Club experience too so there's there's a future in some of those things as well so thank
056you so much lest I make the same mistake twice Mr Daniels are you there I I I am I'm just so amazed at the mentoring that goes on and I think that's so important because younger people look up to the older kids and uh I just think this is fantastic and Drew and thanks for bringing everybody out so that we could see this because this is this is what it's really all about so thank you Joe um great job everybody and and our thanks to the advisers too because a lot of these things right maybe none of these things happen without faculty advisers board members no thank you thanks for coming great job Felicia trying to figure out how to unmute myself here no I I think this is really great um actually it's funny
057that uh science astronomy night my daughter attended uh that picture like with four of her friends there and they loved the interactive um activities that you had there for the younger kids and it was really great to hear about um Dungeons and Dragons it made me feel like I wanted to get involved James right so thank you so much great thank you guys very much appreciate it thank [Applause] you so as as they're packing up just a transition now uh we have two outstanding student council members here and um Simone also uh Simone and Julia and uh Simone had also mentioned student counsel and spirit we Conn just sort of left a list of of to kind of close out the idea of how students are you know driving our school in so many different
058ways um we're really Reviving uh under the leadership of uh Reviving The Week under leadership of Miss Rich um we're sort of stretching the week out to have sort of athletic events throughout the week we've add at a coffee house in the dance um which wasn't there a few years ago and uh the daily activities that students will have leading up to game day and know will have a ton of enthusiasm an advance of having a little bit later in the school year really give the classes a great amount of time to get organized and together and um you know we're really looking forward to the school sort of coming together at the end of the first quarter which is about the that timing um to really celebrate you know um everything that you know
059these wonderful students had talked about but but really with each other and kind of build on um you know a memorable experience with your classmates so um you'll be hearing more about that at the next meeting because I think that's in November and Simone can out on that then all right thank you TR you're welcome and thank you to you and Ruth for your leadership and making these things happen happy to do it so fun folks are welcome to stay we would love you to stay but if you want to slip out that's that's fine four of us had an opportunity four board members had an opportunity to hear about the high school's continuous Improvement plan at at length uh a terrific morning uh Dr Gman super so just for the board just a reminder
060that we did change our continuous inent planning process around that the the ultimate goal is that week or two before the board meeting you you'll get the continuous Improvement plan so this week or early next week you're going to get the Middle School continuous Improvement plan and our pupil Services Department uh continuous Improvement plan with the goal that we're hoping that you read the plan and with each of the schools you're going to be invited to the schools to do a walk through with the schools and really bring the work we're trying to bring work to you but we also want you to come in and we understand that time is valuable and we're trying to get you into the schools as much as we can and Mr dep pipo and Dr Kidwell did a
061great job with with the board uh last week so tonight Mr depo's quickly going to go through his high level goals that align with the Board of Education goals and the superintendent goals so just a reminder that we're trying to line everything together so you have the Board of Education goals the superintendent's goals align with the Board of Education goals The Continuous Improvement plans align with the superintendent goals and the Board of Education goals so this way everything aligns with one another so he's going to quickly go through his goals at a high level highlight a few things and then really to open it up to questions that you may have relative to his goal plan but also allow the the board members that were on the visitation last week to also provide a little
062of their thoughts also if that works for you Mr sh it certainly do Mr pipo uh thank you for um the introduction Dr brosman and and again just as the building principle it is really outstanding to um have the board goals well established and articulated so I appreciate the board round around rounding about getting to um you know something that that I think we can all agree upon and get excited about and work towards um in a really transparent and clear way so thank you for that from the high school level as you know board goal one is student growth and achievement and really um we we thought about this in two ways we almost have sub goals here um and one is is really about achievement based on progress through um our standardized testing
063those members of the Board of Education all of you have been here for a few years we've cled this goal before it's a similar pathway goal that we continue to sort of build upon year in and year out as kids or students move from 7th to 8th 8th to 9th 9th to 10th 11th to 12th we're looking for progress in the areas of the skills targeted in the PSAT the SAT and now what we have is star but essentially it's Reading Writing and math and we have all of these metrics to to help us move along with the ultimate goal of identifying students who are struggling assuring that they have oppes to rebuild skills they might not have gotten along the way and to um again identify students um really I guess maybe I should
064say throughout to to to continue to see if we are our instruction is informed enough our curriculum is informed enough to move students so there's a lot we can do with this goal the second part of that goal is really about our our actual program of studies in our off offerings and we're looking to advance some of our offerings and this is new for us this year to advance in the areas of students receiving potential college credit or dual credit for taking a high school course um we have several AP classes and ECE classes but working to advance that this was really it's a goal this year you'll see this goal for several years um because really um it's it's more like a 3 to 5e plan um um because there's some easy things to
065do and some things that will take some time to work out and um but we are dedicating uh via the goal um to real um focus to assure that our students can all of our students can can walk out of Kon high school with some level of college credit to move forward to our second goal Partnerships and Community engagement um as as I spoke to the board last week I think this is a a strength for our school I I I do think we communicate um and partner with with um you know our stakeholders well but I think the difference really where I just want to pull out is sort of not what we do but how we do it here you know um we have our community uh Communications coordinator Kier here that can
066help and support our some of our messaging we want to work more in the past years that we have with student council we've invited students on to be um some of our uh our committees that are um traditionally led by staff um and we're looking to bring parents in more than we have in the past so it isn't just what we do but how we're doing it I think is really what this goal is about the third goal um is around um Financial sustainability and efficient operations you know I really look at this goal is something that quietly we've always done but I do like that it's so transparent because uh with uh Dr gan's leadership we're really looking to maximize and be efficient with our planning and I think from a board perspective you
067appreciate that and it forces us to be more thoughtful and planful so again it's not like what we're doing but sort of how we're doing it um Dr Gman is asking for three to five year plans for textbooks and replacement Cycles meeting with u Miss mikoski next week to talk about uh Capital um small Capital large Capital Improvements in our school and creating like long range planning for that that's exciting for us um this helps us stay forward and focused um so again there's a couple operational pieces in there but again I I think this is one that we've sort of done quietly but I like that it's out in front that we can all be talking about these things and I'd like to turn over the the rest of the presentation to Dr kid
068um so the next two goals really U focus on school climate and culture so goal four specifically looks at us creating a positive learning environment and um we opted for the high school to really kind of focus in on div vision of a graduate attributes and taking a look at how those will help embed themselves in all classrooms and so we're looking at teachers using attributes of the vision of a graduate personal thinking creative thinking collaboration communication as um pieces of their actual professional goals as well as us looking at um being compassionate citizens across schoolwide practices we're looking at and have started the idea of pairing upper classmen and um underclassman in chat groups kind of as Mr Daniels mentioned almost a mentoring possibility to just build some of those positive relationships between all
069students different grade levels the fifth goal is about embracing equity and so again you can go in a lot of different directions for that we're looking to highlight student voices and to bring student voices and student backgrounds and experiences into the school in a more relevant and inclusive way and so we're looking at um opportunities for students and leaders of clubs much of many of whom who we saw today are different leadership roles within the school to take on different activities maybe building into our advisory periods or otherwise um and then continuing as a school to look at school climate survey data and how we can work to improve some of those aspects and I just to finish up there is a board goal on Workforce Development that in my mind is is really about
070how we support our staff and again I I think quietly we've always we in overtly we've always looked to support our staff and and this again asks us to articulate some of the action steps to do so which is really about building solid professional development based on the goals that have been um discussed here and it really makes us look at our meeting times and opportunities so I want to thank the board again for the continued support of different levels of meeting times that we haven't had previous to a few years ago um feels like there's never enough time but by by um articulating the time that we do have it it allows us to plan appropriately and accordingly to meet our needs um and so really you know this Workforce Development is really about
071how we use our meeting time how we develop you know our our veteran staff some of the things that we do for our our new staff and and reconnecting um in budgeting appropriately so so they can have the resources they need to be successful so that was you know a quick drive by the uh some of the board was able to hear similar similar words last week I know you've all had a chance and an opportunity to kind of review it we're happy to answer any questions that you might have at this point well thank you uh very much it's a terrifically well thought out and prepared report I appreciate it I thought we'd give the uh board members who weren't able to be here last week the first opportunity to ask questions so uh
072Russell or Lou or Felicia if you have questions or comments Drew and take them the only the only comment I have I mean this is this is a wonderful plan and uh I don't know if this is the right word to say but I'm I'm embarrassed I don't have more dollars to invest in what you're trying to do so I guess the question is can can you get there from C can you get there from here with what you have and is there anything else that this board can do to support this Mission as you guys outlining so L I don't think you should be embarrassed at all I I I the board's transparency and support of the high school um is clear and and um appreciated I believe that um through um the support
073of of the overall plan with Jordan's leadership in terms of having having us really prioritize and be thoughtful I do think we can get here um with the given budgets um and I think it the the movement in in terms of the plan again helps prioritize the needs and the 3 to 5 year planning involved helps us to understand that maybe not this year but next year and maybe not next year the year before so I do think we are in a in a really I'm believing that we are in a really good process to to assure that we have exactly what we will need and then things that we might want in certain years can also be added and we understand the es and flows that might happen in our community so I I
074feel very strongly that that we have what we need um and and the communication about the non the the the non-financials I think is really important as well I think the idea about professional development and the days and the calendar are are essential to to to helping us so I do feel like you've done an awful lot already and we're feeling really good about it so how's this message getting out to the staff teachers how is this being consistently reinforced well you can start I like to sure um I I think in in much of the same way as there's been a really clear vertical design from from the board goals through down um um we've attempted to do the same kind of thing where we're working directly at staff meetings and with all of
075our teachers um to inform them of our goals we're working very directly with department leaders and they're actually working on action steps to see how their individual departments can help um move us forward in the schoolwide goals and what their ownership and action steps for that will be many of these goals have um pieces of it embedded into their into teachers professional goals there's their um their slos their professional practice goals and that sort of thing so it's being reiterated in a few different ways that way so Luke new for us and Ruth said it but maybe just to clarify a little bit we've never really been able to well um with transparency really stand up in front of our staff to say this is goal number one this is goal number two this is
076goal number three this is what we're doing this is how we're doing it we've done that at our initial faculty meetings with department leaders we've said here's goal number one you tell us how your department is going to help us with with Goal number one here here's goal number two tell us how your department can help and they they've created a mini action plan so it's all sort of top down all the way to the teacher level and and not to just restate what Ruth said the teachers really own a lot of this through their own professional goals they're invested in vision of a graduate as an example um they're invested in the use of the data around PSAT and and um star data as part of their goals to move their student sitting in
077front of them forward so you see an N number but they see a face and they're working with that student so those are a couple ways that I do believe more than ever we're we're we're getting it down to the teacher level so this is the first time that I can remember where board goals are linked through the superintendent on down through the administration into into the uh right into the staff which is which is phenomenal and uh I wish we we had thought of this sooner but th this is what U this is what's going to continue to keep us tight and focused um because it's it's coming from the top all the way down and we're all aligned and I think this is the first time that I can remember that that's that's
078really happened it's been really sporadic and shotgunned and uh but so this is great thank you for for that presentation those are my questions thank you thanks L uh Russell or or Felicia I'm good Russell good I don't have any questions thank you okay thank you uh and and I would ask each uh member who participated in the the meeting with the administration and the walkth through to to share a thought I would I would like to say how much fun it was and Simone was our guide she's very helpful and knowledgeable um the classrooms were physically inviting which was wonderful um there were interesting challenging lessons and uh there was student engagement and participation and uh student collaboration so it was terrific and I highly encourage um I think we have five more meetings
079to to go through these walkthroughs in the course of the year I believe for each seven s seven okay so if you missed one you really should um come because it's it's sort of it shows you what we're doing here but for the kids in school so that's the fun part almost made me wh wish I was teaching again but not [Laughter] quite yeah same sentiments as um Peggy it was wonderful and thanks for welcoming Us in and um that's that's the best part of the the board is when you can be there and see the students learning and actively engaged and we've had some discussions over the years about technology and finding a balance and that was something that I raised a lot of questions and concerns about because it is a different world
080and students are on technology a lot and it has its purpose in its place but you know there was concerns about overuse but it was so great to see the different modalities that were being used the teachers the students were actively engaged walking around colored pencils dry erase boards small group work um they were really actively engaged and it wasn't on the the Chromebook it was real activities and lessons and um so it was it was was wonderful to see then they were all like on task I was kind of I don't know if you cracked them before but you we we were open to anything we I appreciate the transparency and and Jordan setting it up so you know consistent that we have that ability to go in um because there is nothing to
081hide you know and and we expect to see real real life whether whether it's a challenge or not a challenge good we didn't see any but um so thank you and I just wanted to ask one question um you know we talked about the top top down um and we we have the goals and I'm so so pleased with how you know it's set up this this year um but do you get a lot of feed like do you have opportunity for Teacher feedback teacher input to you know we have the goals and and they need to be what they are but and you you said they create their own action plan but it you know we have surveys I know that go out to staff like how much do you value their input and
082their feedback for anything positive negative for for for making change and and adapting that's tremendously yeah um and there's a few different Avenues um I think when we mentioned before the department leaders really kind of taking ownership of some of their part and their action steps they're doing that through their collaboration with their individual teachers in their department so some of that feedback is happening directly with them and then coming back to us um we have meetings with with various teachers and some of it is truly just informal you know walking around being in the classrooms being in the space talking to people um you it's always always room for more but I think we definitely are able to hear from people thank you thank you K Erica um yeah I agree with everything that
083was said I appreciate you having us it's always fun to be at the high school and um you know I realize not everyone is here as much as I am but and you know when you when you don't have a student at the high school you don't it doesn't necessarily all come together to to see how all the people work and to know the the classes and the teachers and the students and the curriculum and everything and so the being able to do these walkthroughs I think is really helpful and really advantageous to just bring it all together and I just wanted to share one thing that Mr Depo said that um stuck with me um he expressed that this year the students have really turned a corner um since the pandemic and uh you
084know a lot of students were somewhat withdrawn or in their shell socially and he said that students have really turned a corner this year so really great to hear as a parent and a board member and I just wanted to share with everyone so that's thank you I'll second what Peggy said to the folks that weren't able to make it we all recognize that it's during the school during the day so there'll be days when you can't may may never able to make it but it's a it's a really worthwhile experience uh we got to sit down with uh Drew and Ruth for a kind of relax hour and they took us through the uh continuous Improvement plan there wasn't the pressure of what's next on the agenda and how long can people stay out
085at night um it was a uh and as I said a few moments ago it's an impress impressive and thoughtful document that addresses uh the board goals and how they're going to be implemented at the high school uh what are the needs of the high school what are the needs of the students and how we're going to go about meeting those needs it's a very very wellth thought out document uh that clearly is translated into what goes on in the classroom what goes on with the teachers uh the the the second hour was spent as a walk through the the school and you you're not evaluating teachers you're not evaluating lessons we were in classrooms for five minutes but in those 5 minutes in the eight or nine or 10 classrooms that we were in
086uh I came away with a feeling a really positive feeling about student engagement about relationships between teachers and students uh about productive work going on it wasn't staged by any stretch of the imagination uh was just a good feeling I think it goes back to what Erica concluded with in terms of uh the kids are back uh and the teachers are back uh and and that that's a reflection of the administration and the staff when when kids feel that way uh so it it was a a very very impressive day and left me and I think the four of us uh with a very positive feeling about uh the very difficult uh work that you guys are doing at the high school and and the likelihood of success so I thank you as well I
087forgot about our student rep did you have anything you wanted to ask or is a good experience yes thank you for your your assistance there too best tour guides around yes so thank you drew and rth appreciate it thank you for all the support we appreciate it uh okay uh committee reports uh I assume Finance you have nothing to add Russell no um so meet the last uh curriculum Erica yeah um so we met the n of September and um that was our first meeting just a I'll share a couple of things um we reviewed the legislative updates from the state and I'll give you a couple examples of what is included in there uh there's an Asian-American and Pacific Islander what oh um studies requirement there's a personal finance uh area that's going to
088be a requirement now um there's going to be a camp or Vision uh that's the Canton Mastery Program that's going to be revised but they're not sure exactly how yet um and then there's the play based learning that our own Kim Sullivan was involved in so um those are just a a few of the legislative updates from the state we also um talked about the status of the reading program and uh we had filed our waiver last year and we are expecting to hear by November but still kind of up in year um and then lastly we were we are working on a list of topics for our monthly meetings for the year um we're hoping to have that finalized by our October meeting and um some of those highlights are a physical education and
089health standards review a social and emotional learning curriculum update and the middle school program needs review that we brought up last year and they got sidelined so we're going to revisit those this year um and our next meeting is going to be October 25th at 9:00 a.m. so but and it's really uh I'd just like to add it's really nice to have Peggy on the committee she joined us this year so it's Felicia Peggy Kim and I thank you yeah and questions for Erica yes l so uh Erica you know given the fact that you meet once a month and you have what six or seven uh meetings rest of rest of the year what what are the three top and maybe you don't have those right now but I mean you talked about a
090lot of stuff and I appreciate all that you have on your plate but are there three top priorities that we can look at in June you say check the box check the box check the box are the three things that we should be Focus focusing on from a curriculum standpoint you don't have to maybe you don't have the answer tonight but um I'm I'm just wondering how we measure our our progress on curriculum when it comes June yeah um that's a good question we uh we have certain things that we have to do every year um we do the new course proposals we review those and have the teachers come and EXP explain those to the committee um new textbook reviews and um the summer program update you know there's certain things uh that we
091have to do every year and then and then there's just certain areas that come up maybe the year before that we want to take a deeper dive into that following year that's how the PE and health standards review came up um but you also have you also have some state things that are asking you to to kind of dig down into so I mean this is all I mean is it do you have enough do you have enough folks on curriculum to help you with this do you need yeah I mean whole you know John Bishop our assistant superintendent is the driver of all of these things so you know we are he brings it to us to review but he's he's the main okay work course behind this so um I guess if we
092felt like we needed to add a meeting in we would be able to do that yeah we can usually cover a couple different things at every meeting you know we meet for an hour maybe a little bit over an hour but you know like I said it'll be really helpful to have another uh board member on the committee and we I'm not sure I'd have to think about a way that we could evaluate in June whether we've you know reached our goals it's mainly just if we can go through our calendar and say that we've covered all of the reviews and fit in where the state had the requirements some of the state things are should do or could do yeah we have to figure out if it's a must or if it's optional there's
093certain things that are optional but U Mr Bishop does a pretty good job of going through all that I mean he's already on top of the uh legislative updates so the so the good news is well I I think it's good news um we're operating as a board of education of eight people when we're supposed to be operating at nine I I anticipate that to change in November so if we get a little deeper bench strength it'll go right to curriculum so that'd be great thank you Lou other questions for er uh polia Communications sure I can give a brief update um we met on October 3rd um happy to say that there's been uh text integration within in the district I know it's something that we spoke about in the past so we have
094about 1,700 people that have opted in or 1700 numbers I should say that have opted into that communication districtwide and we may be doing some further communication to um put that information out there to see if other people are interested in taking part in that uh Kira is working on a newsletter with the valley press that will go out in November not sure the exact date yet but that will include new staff updates for each school as well as information on the student reps and our next meeting is on October 31st great thank you questions thank you Felicia going to hold sorry question someone no we're going to hold the uh policy report uh till we get further down the agenda and just a couple of minutes uh calendar of events Claud will I don't
095see that in the packet Claud will send that out at the end of the week and updated uh calendar from events uh any board member have any announcements comments to make seeing none uh the consent consent agenda two items on it approval of minutes and a donation Dr br oh I'm sorry I need a motion that the K board V approve the consent agenda Kim second Erica okay just a few comments approval of the minutes and then there was a donation of $3,000 from the Connecticut Dance Academy and Cel manufacturing to be used to replace soccer goals at can Intermediate School the these these are regulation soccer goals for that specific age group which that's a very nice donation you don't see that too often at an elementary school regulations soccer goals so um when
096they called me up I I thought it was a wonderful donation um discussion do do we do we thank them yeah the the board will uh write Mr dangles will write a letter on behalf of the board is the goals something that we're unable to provide just with our limited that wouldn't be even anything you know you know I'm former College woman soccer coach I I wouldn't even propose the type of goals that they are recommending for for that because it's not a field that is used for well we don't have a team over there number one but one of the things that they may be able to use is uh on the weekends they they may be able to work with the Rack or the travel to possibly use that field now for that
097yeah yeah it'll be the removal of the old one corra go n Field's probably in the best shape it's been in in it's way better than it was that's for sure yep sprinkled yeah it makes a big difference of course it sprinkled every day thanks to other nature this summer but uh that makes a big difference in the long run uh other discussion or questions all those in favor please say I or raise your hand opposed extensions please you voted in the affirmative correct uh seven nothing Kim uh I'd like to entertain a motion that the Canton board ofed approve the Canton High School uh field trip to Puerto Rico from April 5th to April 9th 20124 Russell first and the second Kim yes uh Dr just real quickly this this is a trip to
098Puerto Rico I reviewed this uh trip with Mr dep pipo in the world language Department this is a trip that has the superintendent support some major questions they may ask uh right now if if a student is in need of financial assistance the administration will work with the the the students and with their families and with the advisers to see if we could uh assist it in that way and if there's a question regarding travel advisories or anything at that time to uh Puerto Rico or anywhere that is something that the administration will follow up to make sure that it's safe for those students to attend uh so this has our our support at a superintendent's office I just have a comment sorry um so I I was looking at that information in the documents
099uh submitted in regards to the trip and it has it States international trip to Puerto Rico and Puerto Rico is not International correct so that was something I noticed on there when it said you know to give experience of international travel correct so I just wanted to point that out thank you Felicia thank you Felicia uh about how many students are they expecting they they put it in here I want to say it was 20 could um let's see number students up to 14 14 two sha rooms is for those chaperon say what is is there a lottery to be a chaperon I'm putting I'm not too sure I think they probably have them uh all those in favor please say I raise your hand uh a 7even nothing thank you uh last item uh
100is the policy committee report regarding the shipment and Goodwin policy recommendations if you recall from our Retreat uh back in August uh the issue of uh taking a holistic look at all of our policies and which are very very very numerous and uh adopting uh policies from Shipman and gowin policies that Shipman and gowin wrote uh so that we'd have more consistency that we get rid of duplication that we'd have a fresh start uh that we'd have policies that would be pretty much guaranteed legally defensible we discussed that we decided to proceed with that the policy committee has met three times now and discuss that each time and and I should point out that John Bishop has done the tremendous amount of work uh to make sense out of this Forest uh it turns out
101there are uh about 95 policies that Shipman and Goodman is recommending we adopt that we replace almost all but not all of our current policies many of them are the same uh they're just better written they're current uh uh they're more concise uh they they they take some of our policies which duplicate themselves and get rid of that so we only have one policy about item X and that all of that I think we'd all agree makes makes good sense there are about uh 15 or 20 policies that shipment that we've adopted over the past uh decade that Chipman and Goodwin doesn't have policies for uh or they do have policies for but but they our policies are specific to our needs in Canton and to our values in Canton so we feel that those
102ought to stay uh and there are a couple that are optional for example uh there's no state law requiring a civil discourse policy two or three years ago we adopted a civil discourse policy after much discussion uh and we all deci decided that was an important thing to have there's a selection of educational materials policy that we adopted last year after a tremendous amount of discussion and work well there isn't the state law requiring you to have that but I think we all agreed uh that the policy came up with was we came up with was pretty darn good in a state so that's the that's the 15 or 20 in summary that that aren't part of the shipment and good one package a couple of those we've already asked them to review in terms
103of well the uh soci education materialist policy are we on firm ground here and they may have some suggestions for that uh so where are we with this the committee is recommending that we adopt those the move to shipment and good one while maintaining the uh uh 15 or 20 of our own policies that aren't in the sh the good one package that we adopt that whole package at the November meeting that would require us to First agree to that that would require us to wave our uh bylaw which says policies uh should be introduced at first the first meeting for a first reading and then adopted at the second meeting that make any sense to everybody okay uh so before we we go any further with that we need to know where you guys
104are where everybody is on that the committee is unanimous was Peggy L and myself uh are you you guys were supporting that yeah are you supporting that or or do you want to you know do you want to have two meetings to adopt it do you want to our policy meeting she was asking we agree oh yes I'm sorry so Shipman if you agree to that Shipman would write a motion for us for the November meeting to say that you're waving um two readings and you would do it in one I think that that's the question Mr sh's asking asking that um do you want to wave that at your next meeting we would send you the policies before you get in in a link um before the packet goes out that if you you
105review them and then you would vote it after one read rather than two we're not adopting any new policies we're adopting newly currently written policies that we already have and we're getting rid of stuff that that is duplicate duplicative and we're keeping 15 or 20 of our uh policies that should doesn't have which we can you know look at as time goes on we want to change them or not those were all fairly or very recently adopted yes so ones we've really worked on the past we don't want to just throw them out and start over right right that's a little bit complicated so yes I would be okay with that as long as we have enough time to review their policies and and also look at a list of the 15 to 20 that
106we want to keep what would you consider enough time for that two weeks yeah yeah weeks couple weeks would be fine for me I mean I don't if other I don't want to speak for everyone but more than just a couple days I know John is not with us tonight but do you think that's possible back it's going to be close so I I if we can't get it with the two weeks because it's a lot of work administrative work on our end that if we can't get it within two weeks then the recommendation would be to the the chair and vice chair would be to do a first read on um November and then hit it in December um so we'll do our best to get it to you as quick as we can
107the the link here is developing a a website so as soon as that work is done and we'll meet tomorrow that if we could get two weeks we we'll do the best we can if not the worst case scenario you adopt for um December I think that's makes a lot of good sense yes Kim when you know the policy you mentioned the link like last year if parents wanted to if I you direct someone to a policy the website cuz I think we were locked into cave in the state we will so now we will be the host we will be the host so we won't have to rely on C to do our policies K is going to be doing our policies on our own website and that's more stable and consistent someone wants
108to see it they online they go to lre correct we'll control it and if you recall you may not uh I believe twice a year uh shipment a good one update policies as the laws change correct or or as they feel they ought to be updated and that's important as much work as the policy committee has done in the past four or five years it's very very difficult bordering on impossible to keep up and to go back and figure out which policies are duplicative which ones might even contradict each other it's just a bigger job than we can do so this this does make a lot of good sense but we have to be comfortable with it yeah so we'll let you know in our weekly update this week or next week if we can
109hit about a week and a half to to two weeks of um before the board meeting if not you know be December makes sense okay other questions thank you thank you AR uh I would entertain a motion to adjourn at 836 Peggy second Erica we are return thank you all very much night everyone nice job Joe