Board of Education Business Meeting 3-20-25

001Oh, here here. Here. Thank you. If you could join us for the pledge of allegiance, please. To the flag of the United States of America and to the for it stands. One nation, indivisible, liberty and justice for all. Well, hello to our two student representatives who will kick us off with some news we can probably use. Go ahead. Lots of news. All right. Good evening, everyone, and happy first day of spring. I hope I hope you've all been enjoying the warm weather because things are really starting to heat up at CHS this spring. Our peer health educators unified sports basketball tournament last Wednesday was a resounding success for everyone involved. I lost my spot. There we go. Players from each school had a great time with all the activities and Chesher High's volunteers had a

002blast helping run the event. News 8 even came to cover the action. This was far from our only newsworthy event from our sports though. Our cheerleading team finished as the CIA Class L runners up which is the best performance from our cheerleading team in our school's history. We can't wait to see how they do at the New England Championship this Saturday. Our fencing team also got in on the record setting action this year with our men's EPA team once again finishing as state champs and our women's saber team setting a school record with a third place finish. Our hockey team has joined the success streak by beating AMD in the CIA division division 2 semi-finals this past Tuesday, March 18th. We wish them the best of luck as they advance to the as they advance

003to the finals on Saturday. We've also got some individual shout outs for two exceptional athletes performance this winter season. Congrats to Dan Irish for finishing seventh at the New England Championship Track Meet. And congrats to Joseph Grineer for finishing for winning the Connecticut Intercolastic Ski League State Open. Turning our attention back to the classroom, juniors are getting ready for some standardized tests in the coming month. The class of 2026 will be taking the SAT in school on Thursday, April 3rd, and they'll have the NGSS assessment the following Tuesday, April 8th. We we know they'll do great. Now, many of you have seen the two of us walking around school at around 7 p.m. and asked why the heck we were at school so late. Um, many activities at our school run long after the last

004bell. And those students dedication has certainly paid off. For instance, I just came from robotics and I'm going back there after this. I'm probably going to be there until 10 p.m. And it paid off because we recently finished fourth at our regional competition in Waterberry. and we're expected to keep to compete at the district championship in Springfield, Massachusetts in a couple weeks. A long way from Massachusetts though lies an isolated town called Bumont. CHS Drama's cast and crew of Foot Loose has been working tirelessly to bring Bowmont to our Johnny Thorp auditorium where I've been living for the last few weeks on March 27th, 28th, and 29th at 7:30 p.m. Tickets are on sale and can be purchased at the door. So come and enjoy a trip back to the 80s. Also held in the

005John H. Thorp auditorium will be our annual unified theater show on April 4th at 7 p.m. We would love to see all you there to support our unified friends as they shine on stage. This has always been the most exciting part of the year at CHS and this year promises to be no different. We can't wait to see what else our students accomplish from all corners of the school. Until then, we hope you all have a great night and we'll see you at the next meeting. Great. Thank you. Any comments, questions from members of the board? Dr. I just want to let you know Lydia that I have already purchased my tickets. That's great to hear. Pre- purchase for Okay, that's just one quick clarification for the boys hockey championship. That's actually Sunday at 6:30.

006Uh it'll be held at uh the rink at Quinnipic. You can buy tickets on goofan.co or if you just Google CIA uh championship hockey tickets, you'll find it. Sunday at 6:30. Well, you just show up and get tickets. No. No, you have to buy tickets online. It's a CIA thing. So, for all of our state, it's going to sell out. It's going to sell out. So, buy your tickets soon basically. Thank you, Dr. Sen. Any other board members? Thank you for once again a very comprehensive reporting. Um and congratulations Mr. Robotics. Thank you. So you have to move on now because you have you have what till 10:00? Yeah. Okay. But you're welcome to stay even though Malachi has to go. Thank you and happy first day of spring to you as well too. Um

007next item on the agenda uh I believe Mr. Jackie will be presenting the Chester High School partnership presentation. Uh it's my honor to uh present to Dan Lee and the Ryan T. Lee Foundation uh recognition. So the Ryan T. Lee Memorial Foundation is nominated for its outstanding partnership with Cheshire High School. A partnership not only changes lives but amplifies the impact of student leadership in extraordinary ways. The foundation created in honor of Ryan T. Lee carries forward his spirit by empowering students to serve others. Under the direction of the foundation board with PE and health teachers, PE and health teacher Dian Lee serving as liaison to the school community. This foundation has become a force for good rooted in the principles of servant leadership. Everything they do centers around giving students the tools, confidence, and

008support to turn their ideas into reality. Here is what it make here is what makes it remarkable. Every student-led initiative they support is not just about one group of students make is not just about one group of students making a difference. It's about students inspiring students creating a ripple effect of leadership and service. Through the peer health educators program, the foundation helps high school students design and run leadership conferences for younger peers for elementary, middle, and high school students, including students from other schools outside of Cheshire, instilling in them the same desire to lead and serve. They support the community service projects such as collecting food and essentials for the Cheshire food cheshure community food pantry. The foundation also provides not just financial support, funding, supplies, conference materials, and lunches, but something far greater. The

009belief that students when given the right support can change the world around them. The impact of this partnershop partnership is not just a win-win. It is exponential growth. One studentrun event reaches dozens of younger students who then take that inspiration and pay it forward. its leadership compounding like interest, a positive snowball effect effect that continues year after year. Part of the Ryan T. Lee Memorial Foundation's mission is to make a difference in the lives of others and to help young people reach their goals and realize their dreams. Without a doubt, they are achieving that mission every day. On behalf of the Cheshire High School, we would like to thank Dan and Terresa Lee and the entire Ryan T. Lee Memorial Foundation for the incredible impact that they have on our students, our school, and our

010community. [Applause] You know, you put a mic in front of me. Well, thank you very much on behalf of the board members. Uh Mark Dorto is with me here today and my wife Teresa and uh another supporter Lori Dorto. We really appreciate that. Um the recognition um the partnership has meant a lot to us as a foundation. Um has allowed us to reach a number of students through our our our leadership um conferences. I think this year we'll probably lapse about 3,500 kids who have have come to our leadership conferences. We've given away about uh 15 scholarships to Chester students. But moreover, it's the partnership that's made a difference to us and uh Chester Public Schools allowing us to partner with them to create a to create a situation where we can make a difference

011today, tomorrow, and then into the future. So, thanks again. We really appreciate it. [Applause] Thank you so much. [Applause] move on to the little people. All right. So, I get the pleasure of honoring um Darcy School's recipient. Um, I'm gonna introduce uh Cheshure Public Library interim director Sandy Hernandez. Where are you, Sandy? Give us a wave. There you are. Um, she was nominated by Darcy principal Kim Dessert. Um, so Chester Public Public Library has been a part of the Darcy community this year. April and Story Anne come to Darcy to read to the children and share their love of books. They also engage the children in songs or rhymes that are related to the stories they share. These visits get the children familiar with the staff at the public library and our goal is to

012also encourage families to visit our town library together. April and story share books at that are relevant to children. One that April shared was about hap what happens when a mitten goes missing and that it is okay to wear mismatched mittens. Storyan has an amazing way to engage children in the silly voices of each character. The children love when there's a special guest reader from the Cheshire Public Library. We are extremely fortunate to call Cheshure Public Librarians friends to Darcy School. So, come on down, please. [Applause] You want to picture Congratulations. [Applause] And then next up, Dr. Solen, we're giving some German student awards. So obviously as you guys are aware we have a very robust uh German program in the Cheshire public schools and uh something of of personal pride for myself is you

013know actually my family's from Dublin but my brother took it upon himself to become a a German teacher uh and I know I get to rub it in with him given the incredible success that we have with our students. and Fraasa is a incredible part of that. Uh it's been really the backbone of our German program for many years and uh tonight she's here to recognize a number of students who performed incredibly well on the German exam. So Fraasa I'm a little shorter. Okay. Um just to give you a little background, this is the American Association of Teachers of German, National German exam. So this exam is given all over the country. Um and you can see how you score with everybody else in the country. And this year 112 students in Connecticut took this

014exam. 74 students won an award, 15 of which are here in Cheshire. Um there were two um two of the three people that scored gold in Connecticut are here tonight. Um that's Hayden Wang and Isabella Huvong. And for the first time ever, we have two freshmen who scored who won an award. That's never happened before. So I'm so proud of these kids and they just work so hard. We do have a lot of fun in class, too. Um I hope. But um these kids are really dedicated and um I thank you for honoring them because they certainly deserve it. I have awards here from the AATG as well and Dr. Soul and you have one too. Yes. Oh, okay. Certificates to go around. Yay. Okay. Um is Bisma here this evening? Oh, Bisma, come on

015up. Bisma. certificate. Sure. Okay. So, I don't know if you heard that, but we'll give everybody their certificate as we call you up and you guys can assemble up front. We'll do a a group photo real quick. Bisma, congratulations. Then we have Carly Cahill. Congrats, Carly. Sadie Icebach. Congrats, Satie. Merade Hall. Thank you. Oh, Colin Harkkins, but he's not here this evening. We have Isabella [Applause] Huang. Wyatt [Applause] Yalovix. I know. Can I see the cheat sheet? Claire isn't here this evening, but it's Claire McManis. Oh, she is here. Oh, Claire, I'm so sorry. I'll I'll find yours. Claire McManis. Yay. I should look in the back before I say sorry. Um, Nina Montino. No. Okay. Joseph [Applause] Norton. Here you are, Joseph. Bitter bitter. Yeah, it becomes my diploma. Okay. One of our freshmen,

016Zoe Ranger. Congrats, Zoe. Yep. And our other freshman, Katarina [Applause] Rutka, Eric Vong, [Applause] You can go. I'll give you yours. I have to find Carter Wang. Congrats. And then Hayden [Applause] Wang, Matthew [Applause] Wild and Christina Young. You guys want to kind of come together a little tighter? We'll do a quick picture. Actually, you're right, Jeff. I have the wide angle. You sure? I have Samsung. Not a not a lousy. Yeah. No, I got everybody except you now. No, it's okay. I'm kidding. I'm kidding. I got you. All right, everybody. Look at me. Smile. You already over there. Smile. All right. One more. Somebody else want to come up. This is kind of like a Guinness book sort of event. Congratulations guys. [Applause] Just one more quick comment. Really folks, I am so proud

017of you guys. I love all of you. Congratulations. And I'm probably going to mess this up. So, so um please correct me, but I believe congratulations in German is Oh, yes. Okay. I remembered. Thank you. Awesome job. Congrats to everybody this evening. Um, next item on our agenda is actually the audience section. So, if there are any audience members who would like to go up to the podium to make any comments, um, please do so. and we'll just wait. And you're all welcome to please stay for the remainder of our meeting, too. I just want to make a quick comments on behalf of all the German uh student family. Thank you the board for supporting German learning. Um I very grateful for frazza has uh supporting for the case not as learning a new language

018but also experience the culture and the German kids are actually I mean German ning students are going to the German trip this year. Uh they are very excited and then I thank the board for supporting that activity as well. Thank you. Thank you. All right, seeing no audience members, we're going to move on to the next item, which would be our committee reports. And first up is Miss Cullinin for the curriculum committee. Thank you, Madam Chairman. Um, our board of education curriculum committee was held on Monday, March 10th, uh, 2025 at 7 p.m. And the new business, and I'm going to turn it over in a minute to Mrs. Solano. New business, um, was brought to the committee and we discussed the math benchmark assessment, an update on that, an update on the safe school

019climate survey. Mr. Hanland went through the algebra 1 resource update and then onformational items we had two. One, we discussed proposed projects for the summer priorities for curriculum updates. Um and finally we received an update on the presentation at the Connecticut Literacy Council meeting by Dr. Solen, Mrs. Solano, Mr. Hanlin, and Pat Castle. So I'm going to ask Mrs. Solano to give us a little bit more information on those topics. Thank you. So, as Miss Cullinin said, Kevin Hanland provided an overview of the I Ready Math Diagnostic. I Ready is the program that we are using as the resource to teach our students math in sixth, seventh, and eighth grade. This is our second year with this resource. And not only did we change the resource that we were using, but we made some significant

020programmatic changes at the middle school level to the way we are implementing math instruction. And that was to move from a a tiered level of math to all uh pre-alggebra for all students in the seventh grade. Next year, all our students in eighth grade will take algebra. So the um benchmark assessment at the at this midyear point and moving from spring to the mid I'm sorry from um fall to the midyear was particularly interesting because our students did um marketkedly better this year with this new resource and with all students being in the same algebra uh pre-alggebra class than had done previously. So not only do we have two years teachers are now in the second year of implementing this. So there's that's an important piece, but our students came in stronger from sixth grade

021than they had in the past and they've made significant growth. What's even better is that the students who were in the lowest bands and and might have been our struggling students, they have achieved the most growth so far this year. So it it really is a testament to what the teachers are doing. And um I also want to recognize the work of Robin Kerry and Marie Broadway and Andrew Kof Francesco at the middle school who are all working in special ed and have had significant conversations about how we approach math support for students who have a math learning disability. And they've they've changed the way they've done things there to make sure that they are highly focused on the lagging skill in math and not not necessarily on um helping the student with work completion

022and homework that sometimes, you know, gets in the way. Um being that it's gets in the way in the in the in the manner of um it's always present. you're always trying to get your homework done and instead they've really tailored their instruction to math and those students are remaining in the classroom with the supports that they need. So, we've seen significant growth and um Chem did a nice job explaining all of those performance levels across the board. And the the reason that we do these math diagnostics is really for our teachers to see a health check of math. So not just in the overall classroom how students are doing but to get sort of an unbiased and standardized measure of how students are doing and the the teachers and the team at Dodd were

023really excited and very pleased to see the growth that students are making. So we're hoping to see that trend um for the next half of the year. So that was our math update. Um, next, Miss Cullinin alluded to the safe school climate survey. That did come up um once before at the at the meeting. So, we had gotten some hot off the presses information. So, I'm going to hand you a couple of documents today. One is the parent guardian school climate survey that has been recommended to us through the through state channels. And this document um outlines the questions that the parents would see that also identifies what the students would see. So I'm going to pass another document down to you that um this is a sample opt out form. We would certainly write

024our own, but you can see the questions on these pages that have been recommended to us. In looking at these questions and comparing them to the questions that we have used in the past, the overall general questions are very, if not verbatim, similar to questions that this district has used in the past. I know one of the questions that came up um as a concern was a demographic question. So, there's a question that asks, and this is I'm reading off the recommended question list, what is your gender or gender identity? and you select female, male, other or I prefer not to answer. In the past, the survey that we used had a question that was very similar but um more detailed. It was male, female, non-binary, gender fluid, or prefer not to say. We appreciate

025the questions as they have been written by the state department of ed and are suggesting that we use in total the questions that have been put out and suggested to us. So I'll give you all a chance to take a look at the questions that they have provided. Miss Lana, just quick clarification question. Is the delivery method a a Google survey or what's the platform? Yep. What we do is we will take these questions and we will put them into a Google form. They are all anonymous and then we're able to disagregate the data to make sure that every grade level, every school sees their student, their parent and their staff survey results. Um we always a question came up at curriculum committee as to um what is the response rate and certainly for our

026students it's above 95% higher certainly at the elementary where all students are asked to do it in class and are compliant and and take that survey. As you get up to the high school it's a little harder to get everyone to take it to get everyone to um to comply with that just because of schedules and and so forth. But everyone is is given the opportunity to take it. Certainly. Um and while it might not be 95%, it certainly is in the 80s. This similar rings true for families. Um our our parents of students in elementary school and middle school tend to be a little um we tend to have higher rates of return on those surveys and a little bit less so at the high school level. And then our staff, our staff is

027always great. We always have near 100% completion on these staff surveys. Just to give you a little background, board members have any questions or comments? Okay, I will move on. Uh the next item that was on the agenda is we have been looking at an algebra 1 resource and that algebra 1 course has been taught in 8th grade and at the high school and over the summer during the curriculum writing institute it was decided that we would pilot the IR resource which really isn't available and out there for consumers yet but because we have a relationship with the vendor we decided to try it. We've had some PD around that for our math teachers and at this point um it is likely that algebra 1 I ready will be brought to the May board of

028education curriculum committee meeting um to be discussed and recommended. So we can be looking forward to that. As Miss Cullinin mentioned we had talked about some upcoming projects for the curriculum writing institute. We were talking about, as you heard tonight with our science teachers, the um the the deep thought and really the um parsing apart of the standards that happens and how nice it is to have that collaboration as the two women this evening displayed. So we talked a lot about um what curriculum writing institute might look like this year. We are talking about scaling it back and having a smaller more manageable number of projects. We also have identified that some of the curriculum writing and revision that we've done um h has been successful and has has chugged along well and now there

029are some more tickytacky projects things that do need to get written in the curriculum but um it's it's not so much clerical but a little less creative and needing of um multiple voices and multiple representatives. So we may have a few more projectbased things than um actually re actual revisions for this this summer. And then lastly, we spoke about our invitation to present our journey with reading to the Connecticut Literacy Council. The Connecticut Literacy Council is made up of some superintendent, um some teachers, representatives from the state department of education, and they are a group that meets um to make some determinations, and their task is to sort of uh uh hear from folks about what is happening with the right to read Act. So when we first got the invitation um we were a

030little nervous because we you obviously know our path through the right to read legislation and we were asked to talk about our implementation journey and so we took the tactic of really talking about our journey. We have been really um honest and open about our program, the pros and cons of it, where we have struggles and where we have strengths. And so we presented exactly that to the committee um and along with um Southernington which which presented after us and then Old Lime and there were also um representatives there from a group called Conan um and and a few others. And when we presented our data, we talked about um the slide which I know you have all seen, but I'll just remind you there's um a a graph of all students and their their

031K3 progress. I'm sorry, their progress on the grade three smarter balance assessment and then our high need students and then our black and Hispanic students. And years ago, we started that gap was quite large. And you can see through through the years how we have have begun to close that gap and how close that gap is now. It's it's really um it's a powerful visual and this call that we were on this presentation that we did was on a Zoom call and so it was quite nice when we put that visual up to see heart emojis and um thumbs up emojis and smiley face emojis from the from the folks on the on the call. So I I did feel like we got some nice compliments for that. Um, and there were also some superintendent

032on the call who um made made comments such as if my data looked that way, I wouldn't have bought a program either. So, I felt like it was um a good opportunity for us to be very honest about what our our progress has been and what we've done as a result. The highlight of that was that we truly believe and you can go into our classrooms and see the fidelity to which our teachers are implementing the science of reading in K3. We showed them some videos and some clips and really Pat Castle, the Rams, um Kevin Hanlin, the way that this has rolled out has been truly exceptional and we feel very confident in the the reading instruction that our students are getting. We did share, as you all know, that we've had such an

033increase in multilingual learners over the years, that where we struggle, as does everyone in Connecticut, is meeting those needs with the with meeting those needs as those numbers grow. And we said that to we shared with that board that um we would be interested in in some support with that and how we could help with that. And that was an area of of struggle for us relative to to everyone else. and asked, you know, that they look into what could advise us on some areas that could help. So, that was our um that concludes our report. I just um for a minute, I just wanted to add one thing on the um school climate survey. Um it's intended, the survey is intended for students in grades 3 through 12. It's researchbased. Um there are some

034minor differences between the previous survey that we have used and the one that came out from the um state department this year. So the comm committee did discuss that at length um at the meeting tonight. Our intention is to give you this information to be able to read through it, digest, do your own research, come up with any questions you may have for the future because in the future meeting um we will be distributing the actual um Google form or a likeness of it so that you will be able to see exactly what we're asking you to vote on. So that's just some more background information. Mr. white. Thank you. With regard to the information in the climate survey, um how do you how do you clean the data? And by that I mean something

035very specific. The very first question here is what is your gender or gender identity? Female, male, other? I prefer not to say prefer not to answer. So my daughter's in fifth grade now. When she took this in third grade, she said other. I said why did you say that? She said because I felt like being silly. So what did what are the scientific processes you use to sort of clean the data to make it relevant? Because if kids are just answering for silly reasons, if 100% of them do, then it's 100% silly. Tim, we're really looking for trends. You know, we're looking we compare year to year. We look at boys. We look at girls. We look at the other category to see if there's anything that stands out to us. Is there an area

036of the building? Is there a particular grade level? Are all the boys saying that this is an issue? Are all the girls saying that this is an issue? I I'll just give you an example. When I was the principal at Chapman School, we saw that um people were talking about uh the bathroom on the top floor and that's where our um uh fifth and sixth graders were and we they were saying that that kids were, you know, wading up paper towels in there and people kids didn't want to go to the bathroom there because some kids were misbehaving is is what we gleaned from that. And so we ended up, you know, made sure that the teachers knew about this. um put some things into place, stuck another security camera in that corner to better

037watch that area and and we handled it. And the next time around we we saw that that that behavior had we diminished that it had decreased. We we had, you know, solved it basically. So that's what we're looking at. One or a number of students who fill out something or don't answer the right way. You know, we're we're just looking at overall trends and where we could make improvements. Remember this data gives us information to bring back to our safe school climate committee so that we can make changes to our safe school climate plan. So th those are the sort of the generalities that we're looking at. Then we further look at well what did the students say? What did the parents say? What did the teachers say? What are the commonalities there? Because then

038we would also need to take action in those areas. And all of this is anonymous. So it's not like it becomes tracked back to any one person that and that's really validity survey validity is a challenge in any anonymous survey anything. So you hope that the N is high enough that and you're making and you are looking for trends and outliers uh to navigate that but you know it's to keep them from all answering a on every question too. So the the vast majority of our students answer it honestly and staff and um you know you have to know that there that's why there's a um margin of error on these like you know the god's honest truth or fact right so and that's built into every year so when you are looking at trends

039year-over-year it's it's helpful and so This is going to come back to us for a vote. Is this required by state law? If I missed it, sorry. Survey is But um yeah, the per our policy, we vote on it. So it'll go through it went through curriculum initially and then we'll vote on it. But this is an opportunity for you to review it. Um and then we'll come back to a board meeting to vote on it to adopt the the question set. Okay. So let me just clarify the question. Are we required to basically adopt what the state gave us? No. Okay. Got it. Okay. Thank you. It's just it's guidance um and we felt like that it was pretty uh neutral uh and provided good questions, good good feedback for us. So, uh, this

040doesn't have to be adopted as written, but, um, we know that it's it can be a sensitive issue for people, and we felt like this was a good balance of providing us good information and, um, being sensitive to to people's comfort. Thank you. Any other questions, Adam? Um, Marlene, I just wanted to commend you and your staff as a proponent of open rebellion against right to read uh since the beginning. Uh I I just wanted to thank you for you and your staff for defending our program which is uh uh proven to be effective and to have you show the uh state department of ed and whomever else is there judging you and your staff and our program uh to show them how how good it is and and why we need to keep it.

041Um so and I think you've had the defendant for this. Is this the third time now? Yeah. So, uh, thank you for, uh, uh, sticking to your guns and, uh, keep fighting the fight because maybe it's over, maybe it's not. So, keep up the good work. Thank you. Quick question. Um, I I I echo what uh, Adam just said. You know, I I I I know the the time and effort the team's taken, so thank you. Um car out of curiosity, what is the the approved program list up to now in terms of count because there's a they have compilations of programs. So it's it's a spiderweb when you look at it, but I know we're in double digits. I didn't Yeah, it's pretty broad. Anyway, thank you. I just have two questions. Um, one

042is, um, were were you already set to kind of cover certain topics within the survey as far as in engagement, rigor, or just what are the buckets that we're looking at to kind of now populate those questions into or is that something still in the work? Yeah, I'm sorry. You're talking about the climate survey, safe schools, climate threw off with rigor. I wasn't sure. Okay, I'm not going to rebel like these two. Yes. um we were hoping to administer it after April break and our next board meeting is April 10th, right? But in the development of the survey, what are the various topics that we'll be covering via some of these questions? So, some of the questions could be in the category of engagement or um the category of rigor. I I don't know specifically

043what we're trying to target here for each. So, what I didn't share with what I didn't share with you is the safe school climate standards. Yes. So, all of these questions hit across all of those standards. I think that our safe school climate plan really does an excellent job of addressing environment, but um I'm looking forward to changing the way we produce that plan and the and and certainly we'll still post it, but um it it needs a refresh. Okay. Because I was just curious like if there's questions tailored to a sense of belonging. Yes. Within the community. Absolutely. That's all. There absolutely are. And and that certainly does get to environment and it and it also gets to feeling safe. Thank you. Awesome. And any other committee? Uh no. Okay. So the next committee

044Thank you, Miss Lo, Miss I'm calling in. Um next committee is finance. Um so Dr. Harrian So you have you have in your packets um overview of our spending for the thus far for the year and as reflected in the summary uh through the end of February our approved budget for 202425 fiscal year is uh 89,542,609 and we have expended and encumbered 79 9,969 013 um during the eight months of the fiscal year thus far uh which includes our incumbrances for our largest accounts which are namely payroll and transportation and um I am going to turn this report over to Mr. Masiana um and he will also move into the medical benefits claims. Thank you. Thank you Dr. Harrian. Good evening all. The finance report is is very brief this month. I'll just say that

045we are looking very solid. The uh non-payroll expenditures um we're allowing up to 70%. And the principles and department heads have been advised of that earlier this month. We are going to begin the prep for summer purchases and projects next next month which we do every year. We're going to start narrowing down the salary projections as we get through April and May. So, um obviously we get ready for the year end close. This year it's on June 30th. It's a Monday. I have no concerns about being able to do a balanced budget by year end. So that's the um brief update on the finance report. Jumping to medical benefits and then come back with questions if there are any. The the report that we have in the package is our medical benefits update through February

04628th. Uh as expected because we're in the new plan year and employees have to meet their deductible before the expenses start getting charged to the district's claims. Uh claims for February were $942,900. The expected claims every month is $1.18 million. So we're well below that. That increased our reserve balance by 205,491 this month. If you look at the report, you'll see that for four months in a row, our reserve balance has actually been increasing. Some of that is because claims have dropped this month, but also because we've gotten stop-loss reimbursements and prescription rebates as well. So, as we close the month of February, the reserve balance is now back over 2 million. That's about 1.71 months claims. The only thing that I will add to this is we received notice from Sigma this month and

047it's not reflected in this report yet because the payment has been has not been made. But we'll receive an additional 200,000 in prescription rebates. And if I were to add that into the balance, you know, we're at about 2.23 million in reserve balance. Our goal is to end the year where we started in the reserve which is 2.3 million. So you know things are looking pretty decent and hope hopefully March and April claims come in a little lower than the 1.18 million average expected. So you know we'll we'll have a reserve balance at around the 2.3 million mark when we end the year. And that concludes medical benefits and finance. If there's any questions I'll be glad to take them. You thank you. You had mentioned the 70% for discretionary non expenditures nonparal expenses instructional

048expenses maintenance training types expenses. That's that's where that applies. Okay. So, it was only in the past week that I came to realize just what a situation we have in that we have for our budget for next year. Um, it just strikes me as it might be something to I'm wondering if you're considering it raining in that spending and then that money could go into the medical benefit trust fund. Just I'm going to hit on that. Okay. When I get to my report. Got it. Good. Thank you. What I will say in response to that, because I know Dr. S's going to speak about it, it, you know, 70%, we have room to go higher right now. So, what we would look at as we're preparing summer purchases and projects, we would say, oh, we

049can't do all of those because we may need to add funding to the medical benefits reserve or some other reserves. I think that's what Dr. Solen will talk about later. So again, even with all that said, we're in good shape. Even with% now. Yes, I'm talking about this year. Thank you. June 30th will be here very soon. Anybody else have any questions? I would note that in our packets there are also the list of energy price locks. If anyone has questions on that, I'm sure Vin can address those as well. Mark, uh, just out of curiosity, how we doing with the lunch program? Okay, that's coming up. You're talking about negative balance, I assume. Uh, we're holding steady at just over 21,000 owed from parents. Um, as we always do, you know, parents do get

050an update that they have an outstanding balance. We are making phone calls to the larger balance parents. We got to about 24,000. It's dropped down a little bit now, so we're continuing to manage. If you remember uh last year, that's about where we ended at around 20, you know, 21 22,000. So, doing our best to try and collect without um upsetting people too much. Thank you, Mr. Eki, for jarring my memory on that topic. Um Oh, no. My only question is, so since you make phone calls, that also means that you track the students andor families that are affected. Well, not track, but you know who they are, right? Our food service director and it actually is a very limited circle of people, but yes, we do know absolutely know what the balances are. Uh

051so my question isn't one isn't one of persecution but one of uh would has an analysis been done or would someone know are these approximately the same families that were affected last year? Is there a pattern? I don't know specifically. Um and you know we try and be sensitive to each family's needs as they come up. I I know I had mentioned in previous meetings that, you know, the the thresholds in Connecticut are really, you know, way too low for families to qualify for free and reduced. And we know that some of the parents that aren't paying are, you know, unfortunately don't meet the the threshold. Um, and then yeah, are there are there some parents that, you know, should be paying that haven't paid in the past? probably are, but I I'd have to,

052you know, have somebody take a closer look at that. And and I only ask because the legislature is still in session and I'm sure they're still considering where funding goes and um if uh you know uh as we saw was that this week with town council was that okay as we saw this week uh let's see our funding has already been cut like $4 million I think for the entire town. Um, and uh I guess that means that um uh the legislature believes that uh uh regular folks don't live here and that everyone can afford everything that we have and everything's just fine here. Uh which isn't the case. And having a list like that partially anonymized uh may um help the legislators understand that uh you know regular Joe's and James also live here

053that may need additional assistance that uh uh traditionally may be uh refocused towards traditional areas of help. So, I just recommend perhaps if if there's a way to supply that to our legislature uh or our local legislature to help them uh motivate them to uh lobby for us might be helpful. We did I um when we did meet with our legislative lobby, it was on our legislative list some of the recommendations that I just mentioned to make some fundamental changes to that, but we haven't provided data beyond that. And I I hate to bring it up, but there are some other legislative proposals around food service this year in in including a a proposal in which uh school lunch and breakfast would be free for all students. Unfortunately, that doesn't come with funding attached. And

054so if that were to pass, the implications with for our budget would be quite substantial. So there's been testimony um against you know that obviously people are for and opposed. There's been testimony submitted against that. Um but that bill is still moving along. I forget the it's House Bill um 1417 or 18 I believe. The number just changed because it got folded into a different bill. the um you know we are uh in regular communication with the delegation. Um just earlier this week I emailed them all about uh I heard back from some about the U bill that was reviewed yesterday 1511 uh which addresses ECS funding. Our current level of ECS funding is about 9 and a half million. uh by 2035 it would be seven and a half million on the phase in

055plan. We're currently um about four years into that plan that has been held harmless uh for the first couple of years like uh they put it off put it off. The bill that was discussed yesterday would totally recalculate how ECS is um you distributed across Connecticut. And in our case, it would basically restore to the 9.5 million um including in the next fiscal year, which uh we're slated to go from 9.5 million to about 9.3 million. Um it's 211,000 I think off the top of my head is the exact number uh that would get reinto restored. But to your point, uh there are a lot of communities across Connecticut, um blue and red, who are feeling the impact of reduced state funding. Uh there's a great article today in uh CT Examiner on there or

056CT mirror, I can't remember which, but um I know that the legislature is feeling um the local feedback. Um, but I did make a note to follow up tomorrow. We have a massive PD day, PD day that I'll talk about later, but I'll follow up with the delegation on the lunch stuff uh come Monday. And um and I'm sure all of us here would be more than happy to submit uh written testimony if needed. Yeah, I can send you a link actually bills that are impending. Yeah. Yeah. Thank you. Any other board? Um, thank you for coming to the town council meeting. There was a question that was posed that evening about some of the efforts that we're um currently implementing to support specifically the medical benefits portion when you spoke of Sigma. If you

057can kind of reiterate some of those things that we are doing in district um to encourage healthy lifestyle. Sure. I'll start. Actually, Dr. Solen did a good job to talk about the the health and wellness programs. Um, Sigma does fund $80,000 per year that is split between town uh and board of ed and we actually work collaboratively with the town. You know, we'll use those to do some, you know, fun things that, you know, have a a health and wellness purpose like yoga classes. Um, we are sponsoring some memberships to the YMCA. Uh but then we're doing some more um specific things like diabetes management. So employees, we actually have two different programs. We have a pre-diabetes program that employees can take advantage of. And we also have a diabetes management program for individuals who

058do have diabetes. And it's not just employees, it's their dependent as well that ensures that they purchase their prescribed meds to make sure that their diabetes, you know, doesn't progress which leads to, you know, possibly different symptoms or if they have some other catastrophic event, the diabetes just makes it much harder to manage and much more expensive. So, you know, that's something that we've had in place for many years. Sigma still uh provides a health coach who's a registered nurse that's available in our town and our schools two days per week and then three days per week on alternate weeks. And you know, her name Coach Jen is is what she's known as. She'll do individual sessions with employees, but she'll also come and she'll do different programs about, you know, healthy eating. Um, she

059does this great class every once in a while where she brings these vials with fat in them and you could see how much fat is in a McDonald's French fries and you look at it and you say, "Yeah, I'm not going to eat that anymore." versus a burger and a hot dog, you know, versus some healthy options. So, there there are a number of other things that are done, but that's just kind of a a brief summary to say that, you know, we we look at claims, we also look at health and wellness to try get people to be healthier so that, you know, at some point it reduces our claims hopefully, right? And there aren't any cost implications. Not in those programs. It's funded by Sigma. Great. Thank you. Any other comments? If I

060could just jump back to Adam's point real quick about the written testimony. I will say, you know, the I know Tony's done a ton of lobbying. Uh Ann Marie, Robin, Carrie, and I met with Senator Gadcar Wilcox, what was that, like a month ago or so? Um, and you know, it's it's conversations like that that helped spur the $40 million contribution to excess cost grant reimbursement to communities. that was recently passed. So the lobbying, the letter writing, the stuff that does matter. Uh and they do listen and just want to thank Amory again for that and and Robin for taking the time. But just underscore that point that I'll I'll share out, you know, any relevant links and all you have to do is go on. It's pretty easy to submit testimony. Does that conclude

061finance, Dr. Harrian? Mr. Masiana, are you completed? I'm completed. That concludes the finance portion. You complete me. Jerry McGuire together. Thank you. All right. Awesome. Next uh committee would be uh personnel. I think I'm forwarding this to you, Dr. Solen, right? Oh, this is uh a really exciting not with all due respect to the finance report um moment in our in our meeting. Yeah. Well, the curriculum stood on its own, but um so um you know, this is a a personal thrill for me having had the opportunity to not only serve as Cheshire High School principal for four years. It was a a lot of fun, great ride. Um but also having, you know, worked closely with our candidate this evening. Um, as you know, um, back in January, Dr. Gad stepped away to take

062a new position. Um, and we knew that she had been retiring. Um, but we kind of kicked it into high gear. We were very aggressive in uh, advertising the position and had many uh, excellent candidates. um 50 applicants, which was really kind of unheard of for uh high school principal ship. And we went through the process um and got down to a really talented group of four. Um and the day after that interview, I I said to Mr. Hanland, who's the interim principal, you know, the door is closing on this quickly. Are you sure, you know, you want to be on the other side of the door? And um he said, "Well, I'm going to talk to my wife about it." And I said, "Well, you know, let me know." And early the next morning,

063he was in my office uh enthusiastically asking if he could be included in the process. Um, you know, we had internal conversations when assigning an interim and there there were other issues there and I said to um Kevin when he was the interim, you're not that Jar there to just warm the chair. Um, there's a lot of work that has to be done with a great team of people over there. Um, and we think you'd be good at doing that. So, uh, he took the reigns and apparently fell in love with it and the faculty um and students and and uh families have reciprocated that uh after he mentioned to me that he was interested. We um I met with almost every single person of the 35 or so who served on committees um throughout

064the process, people who worked and attended Cheshure High School and a the parents who were on that committee and asked them about uh Kevin's candidacy and it was uniformly positive uh and and enthusiastically so. And so, um, we interviewed Kevin, um, internally, um, and then the board had the opportunity to interview him last Wednesday. And I think, um, you all quickly came away with the, uh, same positive vision for him at Cheshire High School that so many others shared. Um, of course you know Kevin from his, you know, time as the K through8 curriculum coordinator, uh, where he's done such great work. And so, uh, that kind of, you know, outlines the process that we undertook and the, uh, sharp right turn at the end. So, I'll pass it off to personnel for a nomination.

065Thank you, Dr. Solen. So, um there we do need to call for a motion. So, if um Amory, take it away. Recommendation that the Cheshire Board of Education appoints Mr. Kevin Hanland to the position of principal of Cheshure High School effective April 21st, 2025. Further, that Mr. Hanland be compensated in accordance with the 2028 agreement between the Cheshire Board of Education and Cheshure Administrative Personnel. Is there a second for the motion that's on the floor? Mr. Grippo second discussion, comments, Mr. White and then Mr. Gerbal. I support Kevin Hanland 100%. Uh we had an interview process with him. We had an interview basically the board of ed a week ago and I asked one particular question um that I wanted an answer from and I very much appreciated his response. Um it was uh I

066felt it was potentially a difficult question to answer and he handled it I thought extremely well taking into account not just following rules and procedures but adding a human component to it and recognizing that what we're dealing with is adolesccents kids who are quickly transforming into adults But he he took I felt he he answered the question very well and like I said I'm happy to support Kevin for principal. Thank you Mr. Gripple. you. Um firstly, is the length of contract determined this evening or is it is it um is it annual renewal or So the reason it says 2024 to 2028 is that's actually the agreement we're working from. So that's the union agreement. So it's, you know, his he's on an annual contract um with tenure, but uh just like, you know, our

067teachers other administrators are. Okay. But that's just referencing the actual So we're not agreeing to four year locked in contract. No. All right. It'd be nice. It's pretty impressive. I'm sure we'd love that, but that's not how it works. Yeah. That being said, I wholeheartedly will be supporting uh Kevin Hanland's uh uh tenure as uh principal for Cheshure High School. Um as with Tim, uh I asked uh Kevin a question near the end that I was very impressed with his answer. Um and that that gave me the uh uh the hope that uh that he will do very well as the next principal of Cher High School. So I very much support uh Kevin. Then we'll be voting in the affirmative. Mr. Perigini. Uh yeah, I echo Mr. Gripple. I I already support Kevin. I

068have had the um privilege of uh seeing Mr. Hanland in action what seven years now is it six? Feels longer, right? Um in a good way, but just through curriculum. So, so, so in a way I guess you know just uh just watching in action responding to board questions and curriculum and other and your interactions and so I we had a pretty good sense of the the professional that you are. So I I wholeheartly support this appointment as well and thank you for reconsidering the position. Yeah, I just want to offer my support as well. I will be voting in favor of Kevin Hanland as the next principal at Cheshure High. Um, I really appreciated most of all your great enthusiasm in that interview and also just this idea that you really came across as

069having the big picture, the whole district picture in view and and what we can do at Cheshire High to further the whole district along in our goals. So, um, I will be enthusiastically firming your appointment. Thank you. I also want to add um that I also will be enthusiastically um supporting this recommendation. Um, I have to say we spent as a board maybe over an hour really um, grilling each other on the types of questions that we wanted to ask everything from, you know, finance to curriculum, etc., etc. And, um, you know, Kevin just sat there with a lot of grace, very calm, answered our questions even when we added some extra ones at the end. Um, and I think that's the kind of demeanor that I would be looking for in um, in an

070administrator, particularly at the high school level when we have lots of students going through lots of things, right? So, um, I wholeheartedly support this and um, congratulations. Any other Mr. Ek? Um, the thing that I took away from our interview last week, you know, the questions are the questions. But for me and my coaching background, the enthusiasm that you displayed and you're talking about your goals and your vision, what you can do at Chester High School, that's what fired me up and uh, you know, I'm excited to see what you do in this position. I'm very uh, very happy to support you. Thank you, Mr. Aki. First, thank you, Mrs. Hanlin. Okay, because we are thrilled for her input so that you reconsidered. Um, but no, I echo what my colleagues are saying up here.

071Um, you know, I'm grateful for the feedback that Dr. Solen gave us, especially from the staff. It was really comforting to know that you were wellreceived and the staff wants you there. Um, so congratulations. Personally, I'm pretty confident in your leadership. having, you know, the feedback from my colleagues and Tony seeing you in action as well for a while. So, I'm excited. Um, you've already had a positive impact on the district. Um, I'm looking forward to you, you know, prioritizing Cheshire High School. Um, and I did really in appreciate your comment about that. There's a lot of opportunity there to grow. Still, as successful as we are, there's still more um opportunity to grow. So, we're looking forward to working with you and and helping to support your continued success. So, I think you can

072probably um you know, guess what the votes will be this evening. Um but there is a section here for public comment. So, if you'd like to say something before we administer our vote, please do so. It's part of the job. Sorry. Yeah. First of all, thank you very much. um a little bit humbling to hear all that positive feedback. Uh and I think Dr. Solen uh describing falling in love with um kind of the environment and it's based on the investment that clearly the students, the families, the teachers, the staff, the administration has there and any opportunities to take next step are because coming into a place that um everybody is invested wholeheartedly in this building. So looking forward for the opportunity first of all thank you again for the comments really sincerely uh but

073looking forward the opportunity um to help in collaboration with the great people in this room and people not in this room uh to take Cheshure High School to the to the next level. Great. Thank you sir. All right we're going to get this right. Um all those in favor of the motion that is on the floor to appoint Mr. Hanland as principal of Cheshure High School effective April 21st, 2025. Um, please raise your hand. It is unanimous. Um, there's no abstensions or anything. Congratulations. Then photo up photo. Yes. [Applause] Kev, if you'll stick around for a quick photo, too, before we go. Say that again. You want to do it now, Jeff? Um, just so he could stick around for a minute. He probably wants to get out of here because we have PD at

0747:30 tomorrow. But if we could do a quick picture, Vin. Yeah. Um, do you guys want to do it with the board or? Yeah. Okay. Come on up. We'll do a quick picture in front. Oh. Oh. Oh, it's Irish dance. Oh, yeah. Oh, Carol's taking it. Check the angle. Jeez. I will wait for Mr. Matiana to assume his position for the next exciting committee report. Uh, Mr. Jackie planning. I'm going to send this right back over to we're going to talk about the energy performance contract update. Sorry, I I I did put it on the planning, but I should have given you a heads up. I just wanted to let the board know that with respect to the um energy performance contract. We began interviews this past Monday evening and we'll be interviewing the next

075two Mondays. the uh there's a working group that's been appointed including Mr. White from the board, Fiona Pearson from the town council, Chris Smith from the energy commission as well as a couple of you know um town and board of ed staff members including myself. The goal after the interviews are completed on the 31st is to select one of these three vendors to go forward and then do an investment grade study which will take about three months where they will go into every single school and town building and look at the HVAC systems, the motors, pumps, uh water usage, electricity usage, natural gas usage will all come under scrutiny before a final final recommendation is made for an energy performance contract that has multiple energy uh conservation measures. So there's the work has started in

076earnest. Um I thought the interview you know Monday went well there was a long presentation you know lots of questions and we'll see how it goes over the next two and uh Mr. White, I know that you were there, so you may have some thoughts you'd like to add to that. Yeah, thank you. Uh, I thought it went really well. I feel like the process overall is going really well. My one caution on all of it is that this is as a reminder to people, this is the second contract that we're engaging in. The first one we did is what, 15 years, Ben? 16 years? 11 or 12. Was it What's the total number of years? It was a 15 year. Yeah, it was 15 years. We're in year 11 or 12. Yeah, I was

077I was unclear about that. Sorry about that. Um Yeah, so the contract is 15 years. We can make a contract shorter than that. I don't know if we can make it longer than that. Anyway, the point is is this comes into um it comes directly into either uh conflict or confluence support with uh school modernization. And so if we end up making recommendation on you know certain certain improvements it could be for 10 15 years. So if anyone has any ideas about uh absolutely you know any of the schools absolutely changing their footprint entirely staying the same as is uh and I don't I don't know where I am. I I want I believe in school modernization, but I also, as I mentioned during the meeting, I'm just cautioned everybody about that when we're looking

078at say a 15-year improvement, potentially a costly one. And I'm not saying anything specific, but then where are we five years from now when we're talking about the doing something different with the high school or with Dodd? And I I don't have any answers on that. I don't think anybody here does, but I just wanted to point that out in case anyone does have strong feelings about any of the schools in relation to school modernization. Uh, but one question. So, is the do you expect the board would be voting on this Finn or this is only a vote by the council with a recommendation from the committee? The board wouldn't have to vote. Okay. that, you know, the next step after the investment grade audit is done is, you know, the the working group will

079continue to refine it and ultimately if there's a a you know, a program that will make energy improvements uh or infrastructure improvements that save energy that make sense and the contract can go to 20 years. Okay. Uh we if we go forward then the council would have to approve that. It doesn't need referendum because it is not, you know, a bonded project. It is turnkey. So all the work would be done by the selected vendor. Let's say it were to be Amoresco. Again, they would do all the work. Um would probably take a year or so to complete the work and then we start making the payments, but you get the benefit of those infrastructure improvements. We also have the option not to go forward. So even though all the work, you know, has been

080done, if we're not satisfied with the improvements, if you know, we think that gee, you know, we may be making some changes to Dodd, so you could just take Dodd's improvements off the list. We've got a variety of ways to go, but at the end of the day, it's the council that has the ultimate approval authority. But, you know, with Tim as part of the working group, certainly we'll continue to report back and we can, you know, work work the process until we're all comfortable before we go to the town council. Thank you. Anything else? Uh, Mr. Gripple. So, the last improvement contract, what did we improve? So the big item and what is this contract looking to improve? Is it the same thing over again or is it new things? No. No. So the

081the major improvements in the last contract, there were really three. One was to replace the electric heat at Highland with natural gas fired heat. And at the same time, we were able to air condition the building, you know, and the energy cost still was better than heating a building of that size with electricity, right? And that was built in the 70s. So we, you know, we heated with electricity for a lot of years. The back of Cheshire High School also was electric heat that was converted to natural gas. Uh, and then the third major improvement was replacing all the fluorescent lighting in the classrooms and the hallways. across all the district schools with computerc controlled LED. So those were the three big ones. There were others we did, you know, replace motors, replaced all the

082refrigerators with more efficient refrigerators across the district, replaced some of the toilets with low flush toilets. this time around um improvements to the building management systems, eliminating the hydraulic controls for digital controls, you know, that's a big piece of it. We are looking at solar opportunities as as part of this. all the, you know, all three of these, um, vendors will be making some solar recommendations, uh, and a number of other things, but those are really kind of the big ones. You know, as Mr. White has pointed out, we did all the lowhanging fruit in the first contract, so we don't have any more buildings that have electric heat. Um, I was actually pleasantly surprised though that there were enough potential infrastructure improvements that save energy that we we could have a contract anywhere between

083four and, you know, a $16 million contract. So, a lot of work to be done, but nothing that we did, you know, 11 years ago is up for a redo. I think one of the bigger pieces if I recall correctly the police department the police station boilers boilers. So it's not just the schools is the point and that's a big one for the town side. Two boilers. Was that projected in the millions of dollars for cost or hundreds of thousands? No it was in hundreds. Okay. I mean it was I think it was around 400,000. It's it's not a huge project. Um, when you say solar, do you mean solar potentially for our new schools that are 100% electric? No. This would be just for existing school and town buildings. Uh, no. I'm talking about

084solar on on roofs primarily is what was proposed originally. But again, these proposals at this point are just, you know, to engage one of these firms to do the next step. So whether or not we do solar on roofs or do solar car ports or do groundbased solar, those are things that will come in the next phase. So this performance contract would potentially allow us to do um forget the term uh capital projects without going to uh uh founding, right? No referendum required. Referendum because my brain's not working. Yes. That's interesting. We did it the first time. Yeah. Well, okay. Thanks. Any other planning items, Mr. Aki? No. Thank you, Mr. Masiana. Next item on the agenda are other standing committees. If any board members would like to speak on any other committees, I believe

085Mr. Gripple, you have a report, sir? Uh, I do. It's a bit of an unusual report, but um, so like I don't know, it's like a month ago, we get a lot of emails, and this particular email was to all the board members, and it was from like an a an event that was occurring at Arts Place. And so I found it interesting and I RSVPd because I was like, hey, let's see. And then I'm like, I don't know what I'm walking into here. if it's at Arts Place, who knows what's going to happen. Um, but so I was pleasantly surprised. Um, it was a uh a group called the uh Arts and Culture Collaborative Waterberry Region. And so the people who attended who were invited uh and attended were members of the uh performing

086and fine arts committee that we have here. uh members of uh some I guess local music groups um our town poet laurate who that I didn't even know we had um our uh uh town council liaison Mr. Wolf uh uh several of the members of the library which were here tonight were also there. Um and we and so and I was the lone representative of the board of education. Um and so firstly Arts Place which I had no idea what had been done there. It's a fantastic place uh that they I guess they raised a lot of money privately to build this wonderful space for to do any kind of art that you can think of except for maybe drama. I maybe you could fit that in there somewhere, but it's a really great place

087and if you've never been there, I highly encourage that you go. Um, and so I went with the mind of a musician, being a former musician. Um, and so and uh and I went in there and I actually saw some of my old music teachers because basically I was not the youngest person there, but close to the youngest person there. So, a lot of the people who had time to volunteer for things were uh say older than mostly older than 50, let's put it that way. Um and uh but we had a great discussion uh about mostly about how to get the word out on uh having uh more uh arts, having Cheshure get more involved in the arts. Uh this this consortium uh based out of Waterberry, I guess, represents mostly all the towns

088in the Waterberry area. And so they they're visiting all the towns to kind of get everyone together. Um, and the the main uh like kind of the main points were communication to the community since we don't have really have a paper anymore. How to communicate uh events and how to get people to Arts Place and and get more involved in the uh uh art the uh artistic events that occur here in Cheshure um and uh meeting space. And so that naturally led eyes back to me because of the schools have meeting places which we currently charge for. So that was something I had to deliver to him. It's like well we do have meeting space that is available sometimes but we do charge for it. And so that was something that I I guess would

089bring back to the I told him I'd bring that issue back to the board to discuss as far as charging for artistic events and that sort of thing. Um, and of course to get the students more involved and and I that wasn't something I could really answer to as to how involved people already were because the poet laurates suggested that she was already doing an event here at the schools, but I did not know about that. Today, okay, so maybe that was just something she was thinking about doing. Um but uh anyhow uh there was a great enthusiasm in the room and so I just uh told him that I would come back and report uh to you that there was great enthusiasm and uh that they would like to have the students uh more

090involved in the artistic community. So I fulfilled my promise. Thank you Mr. Gripple. Mr. Perene, anything from Cab? No, not a Okay, cool. Can I just go? Yes, Miss Colin. So, since Adam brought up this subject, um I was also invited to the Cheshure Town Players. They come under the umbrella of Reread Books, um new organization, and um they're very excited to engage in drama and music and those kinds of things. are having a um program in April. I think there's some information out on it, too. They had some of the same concerns like there's no newspaper. How do we get our information out? And um if we are having a play um is there space available for us for practice andor um to actually do shows? So, I just want to put that in

091everyone's because it's kind of the same thing with the kind of the visual arts and this was performing arts. So, and there's a lot of interest in it. I mean, lots of people signed up to be part of this. So, so Vim, would this go through renting the building space and so forth? Yeah. What I was going to Well, renting is the tricky word there. Okay. Well, certain groups, first of they're chaser based groups. Um, certain groups don't pay an actual use fee for the building. They'll only pay a use fee if a custodian is required. Um, and if it's a Cheshire group that does pay, the fees are typically pretty modest. Um, so any group that's interested, if you're talking to, you can encourage them just to go to the Cheshire Public Schools website

092and fill out a building use request. We will provide a price or if there is no fee, we would let them know. Um, and then related to that, um, Emily Taylor, our assistant COO, is working on a project. We have been reviewing, you know, our prices, what groups get what prices. Um, and we'll be coming to the policy committee with some recommendations for changes. And this is something that actually, you know, has been pending for a while. So, I thought while I had the opportunity, I would let you know that that will be coming up soon. So, anyone who's on policy can weigh in on the building use uh prices. So it would be just a change in pricing. We have existing language already. We're not necessarily change we're not necessarily changing pricing for the

093groups that don't pay now. We are making some updates though mostly to the groups that you know are not treasure community members because there is just so much demand depending on spaces. I mean gyms are you know very difficult to get into between our programs meaning our school programs. uh park and and wreck programs, travel basketball. So, gyms are at a premium. You know, fortunately, when the new schools open, we'll get some, you know, improvement because we'll have two much bigger gyms, you know, replacing, you know, the gym at Darcy, which is quite small, excuse me, the gym at Chapman, which is quite small, and Darcy doesn't really have a gym, and Norton's gym in the new building will be much better. So, but building use is has always been a challenge. Lots of demand,

094not enough space. You oversee the scheduling of that. Once somebody submits a request to use I I do, but I don't do it. It's I don't mean that. Yes. If I if a building use request comes in, I don't see it. We have someone in the office. But when there's a problem, I certainly get to see those. Okay, got it. But the approval comes through. The approval process is actually it's multi-layered because if a building use request goes in, it first goes to the school for review to see if the space is available. And then we make sure that all the components if you use the building, if you're required to provide an insurance certificate, that has to be included as part of the application. So it does go through a an automated routing. It's

095pretty cool the way it works. The final decision comes from your office then. Yes. Ultimately, yes. You do do something. Great. But it's on me personally. I just wanted to comment that reminded me the the uh the uh the scheduling for for building use the the new system is much improved and relatively easy to use as long as you have your insurance certificate ready to go. That's the that they stop you dead in your tracks without an insurance certificate. So anyone out there who's looking to for building use have your insurance certificate in PDF form ready to upload and then then it's pretty easy after that. So thank you Adam. Appreciate that, Mr. White. Thank you. You mentioned about policy committee. So my two cents is that just generally speaking, precedent I think means something

096in terms of what groups have done for years, decades probably for some, but generally speaking, I think covering their costs makes sense. I mean, electricity is expensive. Getting in uh somebody in there to clean up afterward. Um, and I think our budget's really going to probably be kind of tough next year in particular. But I also add that when I first had this conversation 20 years ago on the town council, I I was under the impression, the assumption that it would basically be not for profofits that do this that use facilities, maybe town facilities, I'm not sure. But there's other groups, too, like condo associations. Um, so it's not just strictly not forprofits that use town facilities. Would that be an like a revenue for us though? Yeah, it is. Okay. So, we need to

097look at it. Yeah. It's It's really not a big money maker when you consider the cost of just keeping the building open, lights, and and heating the building, but it's there as a community service. I mean, that's that's what our buildings are. They're schools and they're also community centers. Other board members with standing committees? Nope. Great. We're moving on. So, next item is to uh approval of minutes. If I can have a motion to approve the minutes, Mr. Gribble, if you can read the motion. Move that the Cheshire Board of Education approve the minutes from meetings held on February 20th, 2025. Is there a second? Mr. White, um, are there corrections that need to be made based on what you see? No. All right. Seeing no corrections, um, all those in favor of approval of

098the motion that's on the floor to approve the minutes for February 20th, 2025. It's unanimous. Thank you, Mr. Gripple. Back to you, sir. Correspondence. I have none. That was quick. Thank you. And just for clarification, the arts place is now located at the new ball and socket, right? Yeah. You went to the ball and socket location. Yes. The ball and socket. Yes. Thank you. And an amazing amazing place, especially compared to the old arts place, which is, you know, an old hall essentially. So, it definitely fosters uh the creative juices, I'd have to say. Right. Did you treat yourself? No, I'm trying to be good. So, I didn't get any I don't uh Were they open yet? I Yes, they actually had just opened. So, yeah. No, I didn't go. I'll just say maybe they

099were closed. They closed by the time we got. All right. Um, next is the long awaited superintendence report. Dr. Solen, take it away. Thank you so much. I appreciate everybody's patience. I know the eager anticipation that builds throughout the meeting. Um, if you could take one each of those documents that I'm passing down. Uh the first item for discussion that I have for you this evening is the budget. Um I know it's been alluded to a couple of times throughout the meeting. Um Marlene Vin and I uh had the benefit of presenting to the town council on Tuesday. Uh and the reality of the situation is that you know it was really kind of light late late in in coming that um the community realized what sort of budget shortfall existed. You know, there's a

100I think Adam mentioned the reduction of $4 million in state aid to the community. That's not all most of that's actually not educationbased. It's it's community based. But um the fact that the community used a million and a half of ARPA money last year that you know bit of a fiscal cliff uh the fact that um if you saw the headline in the Cheshire Herald today it's $35.5 million in um increased um grandless growth. Unfortunately, the absolute majority of that will go toward paying off for the development. So, it's in essence a wash. So, all things being equal, there's a pretty substantial hole in the budget if we were to keep the mill rate and and the tax bill exactly as it was last year, which I think people anticipate it going up, but if

101it went up to everything that had been proposed in the budget, it'd be a roughly $1,200 annual impact for the average taxpayer. So, um, we are all the council and board collectively as well as the departments on the council side taking a really hard look at the budget. What I gave you was uh the budget um presentation that I uh shared with the council on Tuesday, but I really only I mean this is all old news for you frankly um with a few exceptions. on page six. Um there are two slides there that show our enrollment. Uh we literally received the enrollment update Tuesday, I think, maybe late Monday, uh from NASDAQ. We had projected 70 more students uh for next year. It's now 154. So if you look at the bottom slide that shows

102the SLR enrollment projection from 2022, there are two lines on that graph. The green line is the high enrollment projection that they provided. The the blue line is the low enrollment projection. The high enrollment projection for next year was 4,415 kids. We are projected now at 4,411. So we're pretty much right at the high um projection for next year which um again you know it does it's on one hand complimentary because you know we appreciate that as I've said before people don't move here for the nightife but um it does put an additional strain on the system and requires additional funding. The other update that I think you would be interested in is on page 16 because um to say that there's been uncertainty around education in the federal government would be a gross understatement

103and um so I think there is anxiety around well what sort of funding implications are there for our community. that uh that chart you see at the top is the federal funding that Cheshire receives. The lion share of that 60% is provided through the individuals with dis with disabilities and education act. Uh that's roughly $1.28 million. And then you have child nutrition and other title grants and competitive grants. So, the um budget that you may recall was adopted by the Congress uh the federal budget last week that secures all of this funding. Um that is not controlled by the administration, right? So, that's controlled by Congress. Um and so when that budget was adopted that basically um solidified that funding. There is an element uh that is not part of this picture that you may

104have heard about and that's the um federal money that was provided to states around school lunches where you can um use federal money. For us, it was about $25,000 to purchase uh vegetables and fruits from local farms and we did do that um with great results. Uh that money was cut from next year's budget. So, it just means that we won't be supplementing lunch with those local produce uh products. Um there's no other implication for us. Uh the any other reductions you might have heard about with federal school lunch have to do what's called C. That's for communities um that everybody in the community, all the students receive free breakfast and lunch when there's a certain threshold for uh free and reduced lunch needs within the community. So, if 70% of your students qualify, let's

105say they the entire community receives free and reduced lunch, they've dropped that hypothetically from 70% to 50 uh excuse me, to they've raised it actually to make it harder for uh communities to qualify for C, which means less funding, but we weren't in that situation anyway, so it hasn't impacted us. Um the last uh piece that I want to draw your attention to on this particular uh presentation is page 22 where at the bottom it starts to talk about budget unknowns. So I earlier mentioned that legislation that would uh actually support our educational cost share grant uh by 211,000. It's still up in the air. the the state does not settle their budget until after the town does. So, we don't really know where that's going to land, but um you know, as I said,

106it there is a lot of momentum behind that bill and hopefully it really doesn't um impact our bottom line this year. Uh other because again, the budget will be resolved here anyway. Um we don't have the final medical benefits rate uh for next year until the middle of next month. Um, so we don't that's I think we're still pretty good in the projection, but it's not final. Same thing with other insurance quotes that we we have. Um, nor the final pension contribution amount when uh for it's a small portion of uh employees, but it's not final yet. The actuarial number isn't available yet. The other thing we don't have is teacher retirements. And I did caution the you guys know, but I did caution the council and community that back in the day, we used

107to be able to budget 50 grand per retirement because we knew that we could hire teachers um who were out of school and would be, you know, really talented people, but also uh cheaper than the top step teacher who just retired. The reality is that well has dried up. um we are more than ever hiring people from other communities who have more experience because there just aren't people coming out of the collegiate ranks. So when we do hire somebody where there's a significant net savings is really a blessing. Um that's become more the exception than the rule. Uh the only place where I would say and I shared that we have more fortune is elementary classroom teachers. There's still a pool there. So Marlene, um, formerly Kevin, um, the elementary principles would jump on that

108early and we'd hire really talented people. Um, and so, you know, hopefully that trend will continue, but uh, that's really the only well that hasn't fully dried up. The other future considerations, in no particular order, how do we close this gap, right? Like I mean we know that the town budget is not going to make that full jump. I think it's like nearly $15 million. So there are going to have to be, you know, concessions across the community uh in education. Certainly the point was made earlier. I know Tony, you know, mentioned is a 2% carryover is available by state law. The reality is $1.8 million out of this year's budget. you don't have that money. You, you know, we don't all budget that way where there's a it would take an incredible break in

109our favor to come up with $1.8 million at the end of the budget. If we were able to do that, we all did something wrong. Um, and so, um, you know, maybe we could come up with about $400,000 is our initial glance. I mean, this has only been since Tuesday and I was at a conference today. So, um, the other thing that, you know, we could do and and all these have pros and cons. Increasing class sizes, absolutely not favorable. Um, but it's one way to control budget. Flatline non-payroll accounts like maintenance and instructional accounts, increase revenues, the fees, um, or cut programs altogether. None of those are things that don't have um anxiety and concern around them. Um but they're all things that are things that we will all have to consider down the

110road. We were asked um in that meeting on Tuesday for what would in essence the budget look like if it were um flat with the exception of the enrollment increases and contractual things. You know we can't you know the transportation contract is the contract the the uh maintenance is the maintenance contract. So, what you have before you is this. You're used to seeing this um budget line. I apologize that it's in like I think it's three font. I' I've learned recently that it's maybe time to look at glasses, but um the um director and supervisor position uh because that's not enrollment related, uh that'd be a reduction of 175,000 on the um salary line. Um um and as you go down, these are all positions that uh as you go down that first page, these

111are all positions that um are contractual uh or that we, you know, we couldn't cut substitutes. We know we're going to have substitutes um and there's going to be a cost associated with that. the pared educator cost. Um we've seen uh significant increase in minimum wage as reflected in the contract as reflected in the uh 8.76% increase on that line. Um but again you guys have have all heard this um when we went through it. So the second page um it's actually labeled page three on the bottom, but um that we have estimates um is you can see that were noted as I I just covered, but you know, we're flatlining all of those uh accounts in red. Uh textbooks, library media, uh curriculum materials, uh library media supplies, testing supplies, replacement equipment, and new

112equipment. um flatlining them to 2425 numbers. Uh on the last page, we um again are are flatlining things out where possible. Um that includes rentals and leases. The costs there, the travel conference, um $1,100, um 16,000 in office supplies, uh about 4,000 in dues and fees, uh and then a cumulative roughly um 400,000 in maintenance items. The grand total of those reductions is 684,000. Uh again, you know, if we could rally 400,000 or so, I mean, we're looking at 1.1 million out of the next year's budget and this year's budget to try and um you know, come closer to what what would be palatable. So, I wanted to go through that with you and um answer any questions. This is a draft. Um, and so I think we would probably come back to the table

113when we're looking at anything more significant. Thank you. So the the uh deficit right now, including the budget increase, I'm sorry I missed this, including the budget increase is $15 million roughly. Yeah. Okay. So, if you took the CPS budget and all the departmental budgets and um the uh um debt service, the whole nine yards. Yeah. You're looking at about 15 million. How much is the debt service in there? Because the new schools, do you know? I'm assuming actually on the table in the back, it's 2.9 million. Oh, three million. Okay. Yeah. Yeah. Um, so $15 million. I don't know what the rainy day fund is. I'm sure they have something, but just say that's a few million dollars that they say they take $5 million out of the rainy day fund. Is this crazy

114for me to be thinking like this? We have a $10 million uh deficit to cover and the traditional split between the town and schools is about 2 to one. 2/3 for the schools, right? Yep. Okay. So if they took $5 million out of the reserve or state gave more funding or something like that, we're we could very easily be looking at a six or seven million deficit above and beyond the $1 million that you're saying you have an idea for covering. This is a really that would um be ultraaggressive in the sense that it you're that calculation would mean that there is zero tax increase. So I think I think what we're looking at is some combination of those items you mentioned rainy day um reductions obviously and some tax increase to to balance that.

115Is there something is this a and I apologize if I missed this. Is this a one-year is this a one-off because the mil the grand list comes back next year. Yeah, you didn't miss it. Um I I mentioned that the vast majority of the grand list growth this year is dedicated to North End. uh it's a lower percentage next year. Okay. In the third year honestly more of a windfall. Um we would be collecting substantial money. In that third year there you know there is debt service obviously on the buildings as well but the grand list growth would be significant in that third year. Wh why is that? Because the north end comes online gets a certificate. Everything is online. Okay. and you've paid off the fees to the contractor for site development. Okay, got

116it. Okay, so that makes sense. So, we're looking at a significant problem for at least two years that we need to figure out. Probably a significant problem this year, um a problem next year. Okay. And then, you know, a much better space in year three. But it's it's totally it seems to me like it's reasonable to say that we probably have to figure out a few million dollars the current budget. Yeah. I you know I think we're going to have to do something. I I don't know what the number is. Yep. Um you know it I I think it's I don't call it easy because there are there are consequences that reductions have on any right. So like these there are consequences to these reductions and it's not great but you know it's survivable. um

117plus the four, you know, we're down to 1.1 without having significant, you know, uh impact, adverse impact. But, you know, this is the stuff that we would consider valuable and necessary like the board did when we went through the process. It's it's going to be more impactful though, I'm sure, going forward. Um yeah, so a couple of thoughts. Um, first of all, when I heard you speaking, it kind of sounded what I heard you say. It sounded to me as though you were saying, "Don't worry about federal funding because it's congressionally approved." So, I honestly I kind of shrug my shoulders at this point. If that really holds true, if Congress I mean Congress could act, would they? I don't know. Um, so I do think that's something that uh is part of the equation

118over the next whatever 12 months, six months, whatever it is. Um, and the other thing I see that you put in here like for busing uh what is it? People transportation no reduction possible the and then you said I think you said substitutes. You can't do anything about that. If we literally do lose teacher headcount, certified salary headcount, and end up with larger classes, I'm thinking we probably have a reduction in substitutes because we have fewer classrooms cover to cover over the course of the year. And on something like the people transportation, if we got to the point of cutting programs, let's just, this is not something I'm advocating at least bit, but if sports got eliminated, would that had end up having an impact on bus transport? Okay. So, yeah, there are a lot

119of there are ramifications when you cut one area to others potentially. Um, sometimes positive, sometimes negative. Um, and so that's why I said this is really a draft. Um, and I think it's a at a place where um, we were asked and we would share this back with the council in that draft form. Um and I you know then I know that um we've booked another meeting with them for April 8th at 6:00 p.m. 10th 10th 10 p.m. 10th April 10th. Yeah. Tentatively the 10th. Uh that may have changed though because Yeah. I'm pretty sure it's the eth. It's the eth. It's six. Yeah. Because that I know Sean had issues with that too. So they at least Noel confirmed with us yesterday, April 8th at 6. And if that changes, I will certainly update

120you, but um I know clearly not the end of the conversation. Um and uh we will certainly be evaluating you know if if there are further reductions that have to be made you know we would put forth recommendations uh to you for consideration. Um and it's a you know it is a tough spot for everybody and this isn't because I'll be honest you know I've worked here 20 years there were years where I felt like the council was just being malicious. Um, frankly, I I haven't seen that. You know, this is this is a genuine they don't they're not looking to tag us or anybody else. This is just we we got a problem collectively and we got to collectively figure it out is the bottom line. I was going to add uh you know

121I was thinking the certain years um that million dollar cut that one year and again it's near zero you know malicious or not but I I know it wasn't intended that way. No, no, but uh sometimes it's in the delivery. It ended up working out after, but uh I'm not overly worried about this one because it is a short-term thing and you know I I was I was really surprised by the amount of um of the new grandless revenue that was going back to pay towards I did not know that huge number. I understand. I mean it's it's so I I know the town council most of the folks uh this is not going to be a malicious thing in the last several years I think the both bodies worked well together to work through

122things I know we'll work through this but I I I think without some kind of modest tax increase to offset next year or two um if that doesn't happen that makes things you know much worse for everybody but I think we'll get through it. Um, so if anybody happens to be watching, I don't know if he watches anymore, you know, don't don't get upset, but if I'm sure Sam will probably say this later, if if the public has any other ideas or things that we're not thinking about, town council, please show up to the meetings. I know, uh, they want to try and get folks to come out. So, um, please do. Your voice does matter. Thank you. Sorry. Other comments, Miss Colina? So correct me if I'm wrong, but at that meeting I thought

123what I heard and I'm referring to page three in the top there, external and internal factors, the internal ones around the contractual wage increase um from last year 3.2 to 4.59 about a 1.57% increase. Um, and I thought I heard a question posed to you around they wanted to know the exact dollar amount of the wage increase. Yeah. Yeah. I I would think that would be I don't recall that question, but Vin would would that would be in the line item on the book would be the of just the teacher salary component. I think they needed clarification on the steps. I want to say it's like 3.3. Yeah. Does that sound right, Ben? So, the increase for next year is 2.1 million of which about um 300,000 is for the new addition. So, it's about

1241.8 million is just the wage component that's contractual. All right. Okay. I see. I was looking at Well, I thought the question was around like what's the impact of the new contracts? So that would be the 1.8, right Ben? That would be the 1.8, the impact on the new contract. It it is. And if you look at the green sheet that um Jeff handed out, we you see that we haven't removed any dollars from the teacher line yet because that's a discussion we have to have. some of the, you know, the increases were for the art teacher, health teacher, you know, is there a way to actually make those reductions? So, even though they're not contractual, they may be necessary because of enrollment. So, whether or not there's some some reduction possibility, we just haven't

125had time to to work through that just yet, nor have we been able to really factor in that enrollment increase, the, you know, the additional um 80 something kids that where they attend. I Yeah, that's it could be a potential wash when we get the retirement numbers in. Basically, potential could be. Yeah. Yeah, it could be. The other thing that is relevant like you know, Tim was talking about the implications of one to the other or whatever. You know, even if we cut those positions, it's not a full pickup because we still have the sections of kids and we were paying this year, our veteran staff to cover additional sections, which is a contractual impact on that. And we So, you still pay for that. Um, and you know, we look at fees. the uh

126transition K is really below market in terms of the cost you know I mean is there 40,000 there by picking an additional thousand over the course of a full year for that which is still insanely below market cost um is that something you know so there there are so many things that we have to evaluate moving forward um and this is very prelim preliminary, but I did want to make sure it was on everybody's radar. I'm sure it was already, but just kind of like where our thinking is on all this and what we're dealing with else. No, Dr. Someone can you just kind of clarify class size cap if there is any because there was a lot of talk about or at least a comment made at that town council meeting about you know

127it's only certain number of students who you know class size should just go up for the next couple years until we get the revenue. Sure. Well, we don't we don't have a contractual cap. The only place where there's really limitations on class sizes and are in, you know, places where OSHA would influence it like a right a CTE classroom lab. But, you know, uh on page 12, this isn't our full history, right? This is only the graph would be unreadable. But the bottom graph on page 12 shows, you know, our history uh enrollment size over time. I'll tell you the 18.8 we're at right now is the highest we've been. And I know class size is, you know, um held sacrianked by our our families. You know, 18.8 um honestly is higher because that was

128um before enrollment growth. Uh so I know it'll be above 18. It's not going to be 28, you know, it's it'll be um incrementally above 18.8, but it is higher. So, we're already at that higher end of the threshold. And the other thing that we're up against, and um is really the incredible degree of dysregulation that we see among kids uh today. Um, I'm going to talk a little bit about that later on in the show, but you know, it that's a reality. So, increasing the class sizes um has an impact too on the the climate in the room. So, we're all, you know, there's a lot of variables like they said that we're still evaluating um and want to really dive into before certainly before we're, you know, on with the the council on

129the ETH. Tim, thank you. Yeah, you mentioned the class sizes and I'm just looking at the graph you had given us through the table. Do you have any idea what's driving up Dodd looks to me to be the most extreme 50 students out of the 134 154 whatever you said I forget. Sure. Um can can you tell me what page in page six page six I'm just curious what uh when who was it NISK or Nisak or something when they came back to you and they said here's the projected numbers did they give any sort of cause? No. No. They they project based on birth rate and a long and a longitude and a long look back on when numbers increase in the current enrollment. What does that how does that translate um into next

130year's enrollment? So they give us this update based on our updated enrollment. So they'll give us a projection. Um we'll we'll submit to them our data when school opens and then they'll give us a projection right before we do the budget and then you know they'll do a spring update. And so based on those updates over the course of time um and birth rates they project out how many students it's usually pretty pretty accurate. So this is a function of increased enrollment over the course of this year. Got it. You know, based on history, um Vin talked about uh the enrollment study that we're going to need. I think you talked about it. Um I know we were talking about it before. Anyway, I think we talked about it here, but I get all mixed

131up now, but um we talked about earlier today the enrollment study that is going to be conducted for our new school construction redistricting. Um that is much deeper in the evaluation in the sense that it goes past birth rate, past history and into development. What's happening across the community in terms of housing development and uh you know state mig not migration trends but uh influx of people coming into the state, people going out of the state. It looks at all of that data uh and is a a finer point detail. So we should have that actually in the fall prior to next year's budget, too, which will help us uh with the projections. But this this is based off of the kids moving in over the course of this year. Yeah, thank you for that

132because you mentioned the history of the long look back and I'm thinking, okay, well, that's not going to change, right, for from one update to the next. But the new people moving in, I'm just curious, do you have is there a cause for that? Is that the new development or people moving in? My understanding is people are moving in up in the north end. Is that true or People are moving in. We had our first buser out of the new apartment complex up there uh earlier this week actually. But um it's roughly 50 students out of those new developments this year already there already in our schools. So what um that's on page it's got to be around the enrollment page. that is on page five. Um the first slide at the top, uh you

133see like Soderman Way, we have 20 students out of that's um that's one that you know Vin and I drove out there and that's a condo complex and we said now we're univer unilaterally moving them. They're supposed to go to Highland. We had to move them to Chapman. We just don't have the space at at Highland to accommodate that. Um, so that's that's the bulk of the students, but you know, um, Hazel Drive, River Point at Stonebridge Court. Um, so we have some some folks being moving. A a lot of this stuff has not really been opened yet. So, um, we anticipate growth over the summer. And we track this uh we have um this table that we pull um and periodically update it um as our enrollment grows. So I'm just trying in my

134own words that this 134 whatever it is students projected for next year that increase is based largely on the new construction going on in town. It's based on the number of students who've moved in since the last time they got the enrollment update. So since October one, we've had a lot of students move in. Okay. And some of, you know, 50 of them are from, you know, those places. We have other students from other places. And then based on that trajectory, Yeah. they, you know, project out how many students we're going to have aside from aside from the one-off house that goes up on an open parcel or something, right? It's based on known developments that are happening. So this doesn't include like the development uh over behind CA there. I forget. OV or whatever.

135What what's the Yeah, you know what I'm talking about, right? On Academy Road, the new houses back there. Yeah, that the those houses. It's not um that's not factored in here. This is only multi-unit. So, there are other people that have moved into those single family homes that you see cropping up around town, too. Yeah. That are not tracked in here. Yeah. And there's a good number of them since I've just been around in the last few weeks. Exactly. Bush. All right. Thank you. Yep. All right. I'll try schools. I'll try and crank through here. School modernization. Uh the real highlight there if you if you haven't seen Mike Salamini's drone video on uh the website. Go to our homepage bottom left. School modernization. Scroll down. You you have uh videos. Uh the March drone

136video is really cool. Uh we are cranking on both locations. The other thing that's really neat is on March 26th, OMG, the builder along with Arcadus will be doing a presentation for our Norton students on the geothermal wells and what are geothermal wells and and you know the the they'll take a look at a well and it'll be kind of really cool. Uh we're trying to set that up for students and other buildings too to take a field trip out to the north end when they ultimately finish the wells out there too. um CEF fundraiser, the trivia contest sold out for that's uh April 5th. Um should be a lot of fun. Today's workshop I attended um Marlene and I attended a workshop um where Jonathan Height spoke this morning. Uh the governor spoke, the

137um former secretary of education Miguel Cardona spoke. uh and I had a chance to engage in a really interesting conversation with uh Jonathan height about the work that we're doing and um you know some of his perspective on on what's going on and you know the the presentation he gave was was really compelling the same way the book is very compelling about the correlation um he would tell you causation and it's a very you know he's got a great argument between the uh introduction of smartphones for kids and the proliferation of all sorts of problems for kids academic, behavioral, psychiatric just it's it and it's not an American problem and I think that's why he he leans heavy on the causation argument. It's it's universal uh places where kids have access to smartph phones all

138over the world. Sungu um was the first person to point that out to me when he came here, our visitor from Korea, like when he read Anxious Generation, he's like, "Yeah, this sounds like home." Um so, a really powerful workshop. Um and tomorrow we have another really powerful workshop. uh uh Marlene and uh Kevin and and others have put a lot of really Leslie D'Angelo as our secretary in in Marlene's office has been insane uh with the work that she's done to to help plan this event for tomorrow on artificial intelligence. And so you see this juxtaposition of technology and how challenging that can be and how powerful it can be and how do we thread the needle is an organization to best support our students. This week I had the first report of a

139student at Cheshure High wearing the AI glasses. So I mean you looked down you can take pictures of whatever is in front of you and calculate things and uh it's 300 bucks. is within our family's price range to be able to do that. So, how do we, you know, now we're going to be talking about that in policy, too. Where does that fit fit into things? Um, so, um, how do we really leverage AI to make learning so powerful? You saw the work that our science team did and, um, you know, that's the sort of intersection of complex thinking and social emotional learning that we want for our kids. AI can help us with that. So is it's a professional impact. It's it's a student impact. So tomorrow will be really awesome. It'll be kind

140of convocation light. And I want to close with um I'm sure you guys are all aware of this, but this is board member appreciation month. Um so I know that's why you ran for the board. Yeah. I'm doubling your Christmas bonus this year, Tony. Um, but we do have, you know, we we do try and take care of you guys because the amount of time and energy you spend on this is incredible and it's in so valuable for us and for our community. Um, you're the really the battery that helps keep us running and um, so we do have gifts for you that we can hand out at the end. So, thank you so much for what you do. Thought you were going to say you do it for the swag. I thought he was

141going to say the checks in the mail, but fair enough. Thank you, Dr. Solen. Any questions, comments from the board for Dr. Solen. Great. Awesome. Um, old business. Uh, it looks like there is no old business here. New business. We have a healthy food certification. If you can just um fill us in here, Mr. Masiana on this new item or I will be glad Taylor. I will be glad to turn this over. Gotcha. To Emily Taylor as a sign of something else I don't do anymore. Yeah, I know. I know. Save the best for last. Save the best for last. And I know I'm now standing between you and your board member GIF. So I'll do the abbreviated version. But the healthy food certification is actually just something that we do annually. It's every year.

142We've been participating for at least 10 years now. And what it is is a certification that determines uh the types of food items we sell to students separate from the reimburseable meals that we're providing them every day. Um and it's basically do they rise to the bar of these Connecticut nutrition standards. It's only applies to foods that are sold, not things that are given to students. It's not applicable to adults and what we sell to adults. Um and it doesn't apply to field trips. It's things that are on the school premises. So we participate in this program. talking about all the budget uh items tonight because we are reimbured 10 cents for every lunch that we serve which is about 20k in revenue for us from this initiative. So um it's you know a small

143chunk of change but we've also been talking about the unpaid meal balance being 21,000. This is $20,000. So um and what we're going to talk about and I'll go through there's three very specific motions that we need to pass tonight and I'll just kind of very briefly walk you through each one of them. Uh there's the one motion to participate and then there's two motions for a food and a beverage exemption. I'll explain that in a minute. Uh but just some comparative data in this school year there were 189 eligible school districts for the healthy food certification and 182 partic uh 802 of the 189 eligible districts decided to participate which is about 96.3% participation and that includes 130 public school districts. So people tend to renew their healthy food certification. Uh from 2324 to

1442425, 99.5% of school districts renewed for the following year. And in the past 20 years, the HFC participation has increased from 50.8% to 96.3%. So we're seeing a lot of participation in healthy foods uh certification. So the three motions for tonight, the first one is participating in the HFC initiative. It means that all food items we sell on campus uh are not are not exempted from Connecticut nutrition standards, which is a higher standard than just the the regular reimburseable meals. And it has to do with fats, saturated fat, sodium, and sugar content. There's a very uh long list of items. It's very specific. Um and this includes any food that is sold in the school store, vending machines, cafeteria, culinary, fundraising on school premises. So that's just motion one which is in your packet. The

145second motion tonight is the food exception for food exemption for the board of ed. So by participating in the HFC if we want to participate in a food exemption which means that uh there are certain foods that are exempt for events after the regular school day or on the weekend. So the regular school day is midnight to 30 minutes after the school day. And this exemption gives us the ability to sell foods that are not compliant with the HF HFC during uh games, plays, debates, doesn't apply to regular like practice, rehearsal, and meetings, but concession stands, which is also a source of revenue for some of our clubs, that would allow us to participate in HFC, but also have our concession stand. And then the third motion as your packet is just the beverage exemption.

146So, the same thing I just said except for beverages as well. Um, and the one other thing you should know is just the vending machines never get an exemption. You always have to be compliant in your vending machines. So, with that said, tried to be brief, but does anyone have any questions about the healthy food certification? Do you have samples? I don't see any. No. Then noted for next year. Yeah. That might influence the vote here. Erica always brings them. Oh, he threw the Erica always brings them line. I've wrote it. Samples. Okay. Samples. Yep. Yeah. Check in with her. Um, we're we're taking this all as a clump of three separate ones. So, you you don't vote on two and three if we don't get past one. All right. Let's pass get past one.

147So, Dr. Hurricane, let's start it off. I move that CGS section 10- 215F. The Cheshire Board of Education certifies that all food items offered, Thank you, Dr. offered for sale to students in the schools under its jurisdiction and not exempted from the Connecticut Nutrition Standards published by the Connecticut State Department of Education will comply with the Connecticut Nutrition Standards during the period of July 1st, 2025 through June 30th, 2026. This certification sell shall include all food offered for sale to students separately from reimburseable meals at all times and from all sources including but not limited to We must have had our lawyers write this. It's it's yeah very prescriptive. um school stores, vending machines, school cafeterias, culinary programs, and any fundraising activities on school premises sponsored by the school or by non-school organizations and groups.

148Is there a second? Mr. Gripple seconds. Any discussion? No. So, all those in favor of the motion that is on the floor. Unanimous. Great. Number two, Mr. You want to take that board of education not sold from a vending events. For example, soccer practices rehearsals are not regular schooles. Any discussion of the second motion that's on the floor? I think we're on the discussion. You have no discussion or comment, right? Was calling. Okay. Thank you. You're second. Thank you. Um, all those in favor of the motion that is on the floor for food exemptions. Unanimous. Third one, take it away, Miss Cullinin. Yes. Motion number three for beverage exemptions. Second. and by Dr. Herkin. Discussion seeing none, all those in favor of the third motion for beverage exemptions is unanimous. Thank you, Miss Taylor. Um,

149next item would be a chair's update. Um I don't have information but I do I I just from the town council's meeting into today um you know I do feel a little discouraged but I also feel a bit encouraged as well. You know typically the budget as Dr. or so and presents it each year is an opportunity for us as board members to support and and help the continued growth and and progress of the district and and I and that needs to continue to happen, right? Um so I think my message tonight is really um like Mr. Perigini alluded to is I really invite residents to attend the meetings that are coming up. Um please share your opinions, your ideas. you know, this is a community effort um and and a community impact clearly. So,

150um I just really strongly encourage that you um come out in support of our schools. You know, the board um we did we did our due diligence in trying to tackle every line item so that it we moved it favorably to the town council. And so from this point on, we really um are asking the the whole community to come to the town meetings um ask clarifying questions so that we can understand that the the impact that's going to happen on our community. There is a deficit. We recognize that as Mr. White said, I'm I myself am very unsure of Congress and their actions to support us. Um but at the same time, you know, there are ways and opportunities um for you to testify in support of certain bills. Um specifically the um Senate

151Bill 1511, which is ongoing discussions right now before the vote. Um obviously that's going to have implications and changes to the ECS formula. Um and also I think there was another bill that dropped today for grants to improve. Ben, if you can clarify grants for school improvement or new grants for school improvement or a dedicated fund that would uh support school updates like uh physical plant updates, building the capital budget items. So that's just another opportunity if if you can support us in that effect too. So um outside that again I wish everybody a happy spring. Uh spring is a time for growth and we want to continue to see cheshure grow. Clearly it is growing. Um and so you know there's no better better way than to um come out in support of the

152school system because as somebody once said that you know nobody moves here for the night life um or you know the other night life would be the arts obviously it's very impressive. Yeah. So, that being said, um I am going to just um announce the upcoming meetings that you can all participate in. The next board meeting is April 7th, Monday, April 7th at 7 p.m. Um it is a policy committee meeting at Humon Boardroom. Thursday, April 10th at 7:30 is the regular business meeting at Town Council Chambers. April 21st, 7 p.m. is the curriculum meeting at Humon Boardroom. And then just for the general Chester public schools calendar, March 21st is PD day. So the schools are closed um which is tomorrow. So Mr. Hanland 7 a.m. Right. Right. And then um April 14th to

15317th will be spring break. So all schools are closed. 18th is Good Friday. Schools are closed then as well. And then we go to May which is Memorial Day. Um schools and district office are closed. Um, with that, can I get a motion to adjourn? Second. All those in favor ofjournment, unanimous. Thank you everybody.