Board of Education 6-28-24

001Mr grippo here Dr haran yes Mr perini here M Rosenberg here Mr White Madam Cherry thank you to the flag of the United States of America to the rep stand One Nation God indivisible withy and justice for all audience session if anybody would like to speak here we're moving on to report to the standing committee ccul is that here absolutely absolutely so we met on June 10th um we had quite a few things to cover on the agenda that evening it started off with an AP World History book and Tim galin was there to share with us um why he had selected that that's simply that the old textbook did not include all of the compon of the new AP curriculum and so he had proposed that uh we went on to talk about the

002Connecticut leader and educator evaluation and support plan um it was an excellent turnout from our teaching staff we had probably when you guess about 13 Educators here to talk about the process to talk about um the two years that they' spent really researching different models as we waited for the state model to come out and um it was nice to have so many people there that felt passionately about the work that they had done around our our new plan um we also talked about a program of studies change which was very simply a course on law that had been taught in the business department that had more of a business law Focus that is now going to be moved to the social studies Department which works out well since we have a teacher on staff

003who also has their law degree um bigger thing in in informational items was a change in our grade seven and eight math levels based on a significant amount of data that we have especially data that we have gotten at the end of the school year we're able to make a determination that our sixth grade students are really ready for some more advanced or an accelerated path in math and so we are going to have um be removing one of the levels so deling our map in seventh grade next year which means that the following year in eth grade we will have algebra one for all we have um engaged special education teachers in this decision as well as sixth grade teachers seventh grade teachers eighth grade teachers and our um department chair at the high

004school who math department shair at the high school we really feel very strongly about this um I just purchase order yesterday to make sure that um our special education teachers have access to any of the professional development they need about the new resource I ready that we begin using this year so there's a lot of good energy on this we really feel like it's the best thing for students questions I would just add um Kevin P gave a great discussion on the whole what the test course showing us being able to do this and getting it off the ground so I really appreciate that very I know it's it's a great result to be able to take the tracking out yeah and have it all eers and incidentally any student this is by Design um

005that Algebra 1 course in GR if there are students who need additional time with that they can absolutely take Algebra 1 again in ninth grade but it won't stop them from being able to also take geometry so they can sort of double up on that but have a little bit more confidence taking that algebra one course the second time around so that is something that's available as one of those safety do you have enough support Mar just in case stud struggling we do we have spent hours sort of looking at how we can reconfigure that to make sure that students in the special end classes are supported we've gone through and looked at individual IEPs so that any student who has a math um support goal has access to a teacher a par someone who's

006um expert let's say in that but even just before we get to SP yeah the general education yeah yeah in both buildings we coaching okay we do we're actually moving um one of our support people who has typically been at the elementary school sort of Shifting her over to do you may know her former um former teacher of the year B and real expert in MA as far as Retirement got to so just sort of reconfiguring where she is next year I just want to comment that that was uh so excited to hear that you guys hopefully finally kind of nailed maybe where the learning process should begin after all these years that I proposed you know starting immediately going in September obviously was not realistic happy to hear that at least 25 26 that'll

007be going so thank you yes from my own personal experience starting Elber in high school probably could have used in my case I probably would have done that second year but um you know having in eighth grade probably would have been a great help to have that because we know algebra is the basis of basically anything that's important except for addition obviously anyways but you know anything that's moderately complex you need alge for right and it's still credit bearing eth grade though I'm good awesome we're going to move on the next thing is the actual the approval of the teacher evaluation plan so I if you have I have um oh thanks um this is the presentation that we had shared at the curriculum committee meeting make sure I'm doing this so we sort of

008started by saying um the big shift in this is really that it's not evaluation in the way of judging teachers and scoring them as developing or above standard but rather it's about professional growth and again I think you all already know this but the new evaluation model is really coming out of the fact that this was legislated that the state department event needed to come up with another model and therefore districts did as well the major shifts are focusing the agency and ownership onto the teachers so that the teachers are really owning their own learning the idea is about continuous learning and continuous Improvement that results in high expectations for all students and trying to transform that process so that it's more about a growth model this I know this is a little far away

009you might not be able to see all the names but this is just sort of to um show you how many people were involved in this process everyone from Jeff and I to members of um every single different department and every single different school not just teachers but social workers and um reading and math Specialists Etc there are a few non-negotiables in this about um tying this to National or state Frameworks and standards which we're staying with the Conneticut Common Core for teaching but rather than using the rubrics that are there we've been told to use a single point rubric so we spent some time making sure we had a single point rubric for both teaching um for uh support services and for um leaders we're St we have to have a fall winter and

010spring check-in conference so that looks like a mid a goal setting mid year and an end ofe conference again mutually agreed upon goals that are all tightly aligned to the district's Focus areas so that's we're really going to see all ores throwing the boat in the same direction being tied to what the actual teachers are focused on and a big piece of this is the self-reflection at the end so we have some work to do around just supporting teachers to be in that self-reflective mode which I think most good teachers already really practi in that way the primary goal is really around pedagogy and increasing student learning growth and achievement so not about the contents that the teachers know so much as the ways in which they're going to carry that out mentioned that and

011again our district Focus areas which are all aligned with high quality instruction and results in students demonstrating when they graduate that they've achieve those skills identified in the vision of The Graduate mentioned that uh teachers are owning their own learning there's a goal setting cycle else oh some samples of evidence in the ways that teachers can demonstrate that they have um worked on this goal and achieved this goal so they could use student work um Capstone type projects they they could use student assessment data they can use um evidence of practice which could be those formal informal observations it could also Al be things like student work samples or something that a teacher has created or it could be work that students models that students have produced of their thinking while in the classroom so

012it sort of opens up this idea of what's the process along the way of the growth rather than just the score at the end of the year so this was for our curriculum team obviously for the Board of Ed we're seeking your support today we will submit this by August 1st to the State Department of Education and then um if they have any feedback they would give that to us we would submit that in September sometime but the idea here is that this is evolutionary that the way it stands can will change over time as everyone is living through the process I just what's the fre did it change in frequency I year one to year two to year three did you guys make any adjustments there the committee said if you're a non- tenure

013teacher this is how it is no matter what your years are and then if you're a 10e teacher this is how it is so that was the only differentiation in the corts so like a number of observations didn't change or anything like that okay it would be three for everyone that because it overlaps with team anyways so yeah there's also a p to support to you know that needs to be in place there'll be a support plan great oh you were there no I was not but I I familiar with the pl that was my question is is the number of observations and but so it's it's three one pretty much spring fall and time frame for all of the for all of the non 10e teach and this these teachers the sort of the

014premise here is that um it's a little less topheavy that someone's coming in is going to judge you based on this 10 minutes that they've seen right and so I think the principles and the teachers both are looking forward to the teachers being in their room more frequently to see things along the way but that the conversations that are going to exist around the teacher practice are going to happen in those collaborative group times so that there's more feedback there's feedback from your colleagues not just from a 10 minute I imagine it's a very positive thing for non-ed teachers to still be able to skills and be in position to achieve 10e rate what's the frequency for 10e teachers for a formal observation that would be something that would be agreed upon by the the

015duo that meets to set those goals so they might have a lot of other evidence and it might not include a formal observation yeah so if um previously you go in and you're observing a lesson that maybe disconnected to any sort of focused growth that you're working on here you might work you might say all right I'm trying to work on my questioning or the building thinking classroom strategies that we've talked about before you know I want somebody to come in and observe me and provide feedback on that might be an administrator might be co-workers um I know you guys have seen and heard a lot about our uh learning walks strategies that we've employed with teachers going in and observing instruction from a variety of teachers and coming back and debriefing that could be

016part of the growth uh Focus it's really oriented on improving practice as opposed to rating practice um the disconnected ratings that occur three times over the course of a year um they're not super valuable for the teacher or for the administrative team so this excited about the focus on supporting everybody's growth than you uh I just wanted to comment that I was at the presentation and I uh had concerns about accountability for those first three years and I think U your you and your team were able to answer my the questions I had um because at first it seemed like it was a lot of team building for those who are already there how to further enrich their careers and that sort of thing but was nice to hear that that accountability was built in

017because you know for good or bad but that really those first three years is kind of when you can really um affect if a teacher is going to stay here or not or if they'll be successful in our system or not so it was great to hear that that was kind of built in because at first it was like well okay it's like everyone's judging each other and how's that really going to work but you know it seemed in the end that it was you know good thank you that's sort of the evaluation process is there for those new teachers and they have a second level when they get assigned a mentor through the team so it's almost like they have double the observations and support you're right we really want to make sure in

018those first three years that they're keeper yeah but to that point though I feel this is just my opinion that the team process is we don't want to deter somebody who wants to come to the profession either and it's pretty excessive how much work they have to do to prove that you know they sure but that's the point right yes but the accountability Factor also applies to Veterans too you know yeah everybody needs to be held accountable right yes but at a certain point it's you have a lot more protections once you get past a year three or four than you would otherwise you're a bit more than that will employee before the I would just add it was very useful to see all of the folks who were here at that meeting and to

019hear their testimony from in the ranks and no one required them to do that you know I put that out to the team to say who would like to to be here well we I mean we heard from administrators we heard from um from teachers beginning teachers coaches you know pretty representative and just the comments were so positive about this collaborative Union leadership as John is here it was um it was impressive to hear and hear the actual testimony from the people in rights I I like the plan I think it's pretty clean I also like the fact you gave evidence of or at least some samples of what this looks like to because it's also hard to navigate very broad sample from the state or non-existing and the so my work for the summer

020will be to create some like sample professional goals so what does a good professional goal look like and what does it not look like so that each principal has a PowerPoint going into their year and is able to share that and maybe people want to take one of these goals but at least there's some idea there of this is not a good goal business so I would move that the chesh Board of Education approves the chesher educator growth evaluation plan has present second favor the motion unan thank you for that work Finance I'm I'm well how are you so I know one of the primary reasons of this this meeting this morning is for the board to uh review and approve the final fiscal year end balances um I will refer to the memo is

021dated June 28th and I will walk you through this um you'll see at the bottom of the page that the remaining balance is zero so the boards budget is balanced and I'll take you through some of those details so we'll come back to page one uh one of the board members if you inclined will need to read that motion on page two just this you know your rules just force The Habit ad we've been doing this a few years on page two at the top of the page just a couple of quick comments um and I think this is the most important thing that I I like to share with the board you'll see that the five category salaries benefits instructional programs Support Services operations and maintenance all those um balances on the far right

022are below 400,000 and most importantly salaries were within 7% of budget employee benefits were within 4% instructional programs were within 3.6% support services within 1.8% of budget and ups and maintenance 2% of budget so you know we I think you have to look at that and say pretty much on the mark with meeting our budget across the categories we um had a few items that we talked about throughout the year I would say they're relatively minor but Energy prices were one of the factors that we were concerned about uh as it turns out we were able to lock in pretty favorable prices for electricity oil natural uh gas we didn't lock but diesel and gasoline for our buses we did lot it was a mild winter and that helped us as well so we were

023able to mitigate that concern the unpaid balances on school lunch uh as we had reported during the year the concern was that those balances might continue to rack up to about 40,000 for the year um they did stabilize in about February at around 20,000 and as you'll see in the report the ending balance of 18, 04364 that were not paid by students parents the board is responsible by state law to repay that to the Food Service program so that is built in to our close um you know and I I do want to acknowledge that our food service staff did a good job to work to try and collect those balances without undue pressure but we did ask for parents that ow balances to pay us back um out Place tuition again that was one

024of the concerns that we had at one point we had reached a high of about 480,000 over budget um but we did have you know some students that no longer needed to be outplaced either because they came back to district schools or left the district altogether so from 480,000 of the high we wound up closing the year $242,000 over budget which um is I think you just reflective of the increase in student enrollment we're seeing increase in special ed enrollment as well so we did increase our budget for next year for that line item because I think we will need it um and so those were the concerns we mitigated them that allowed us on the last paragraph here that allowed us to uh do what we normally do where we understand where our budget

025is roughly by April so we were able to prepare and make the necessary encumbrances for year on school Equipment Technology and replacement Furniture purchases on the next page just quickly on medical benefits um through May you know we're running about $1.2 million per month in claims on average our budget was $1.1 Million that's what was expected so about 99.4% higher through May um but that overage was offset partially by higher than expected prescription rebates and um lower than budgeted administrative costs paid to Signa and other providers so we started the year with about $2 million in reserve and we're going to end the year with about $2 million in reserves actually I'm projecting 2.2 million because to close the budget the final entry we passed was 100 17,0 51855 came from the operating budget to

026fund the medical benefits Reserve so that's how we were able to get to zero and then on the appendix um attachment a we just listed out some of the summer maintenance and Technology projects I did show board members earlier just some of the pictures of the projects that are underway major projects are the West Jim Locker renovations we're doing flooring replacement across Chester High School which includes a specialist abatement we are replacing the cafeteria walk-in freezer Refrigeration equipment at the front of the loading dock area at the high school we're replacing two boilers at Dodd Middle School and also we're completing the fire alarm system replacement at Dodd uh which we've been doing over the course of the year in the evenings and then on the last page I just wanted to mention on the

027technology side besides all the maintenance work that we do every summer we are moving our work order platform from school du to a new product called ml schedules um and that that'll take effect actually next week July 1 we're also implementing Mutual link which is a school security communications platform that's not only for the schools but can be used by the police department across the town we are um making some more Replacements this summer of the old smartboards with smart flat panels like the one we have at the front of the room we're upgrading our five to sixy Old desktop PCS for the for the teachers uh we're replacing the Mac Lab at Chester high school because those Macs are about six years old uh and finally our technology staff is going to be deploying

028which is always a pretty large project to get the chome books ready for the incoming seventh grade great students and again our strategy is the students use those from grade seven till they graduate ches high school um so the summer projects are off to a very good start we're happy about that only other thing I want to mention on summer projects is the installation of two modular at Highland School which we're planning to do this summer we have rfps cominging back on the project labor July 10th that project you know is a little concerning at this point for a couple reasons you know one is you know the funding that we have and where those construction prices come in and there's also some concern about the plan that I have for using the capital appropriation

029of 450,000 plus you know operating and other funds to pay for the construction that may trigger a referendum is what was raised recently so I've spoken to Sean Kimel our to manager the finance director they're checking with Bond counsel you know even though we've done it in in the past where we've supplemented Capital with operating funds the we may not have done it where triggered a referendum so that's TBD and I won't know until after July 10th um we do have a plan B kind of ready if we can't get those Portables in this summer but we'll meet with the planning committee when we have you know more information and we'll share that out so back to page one the the final closing entries are reflected we um have to move money from salaries where

030we were under budget into employee benefits instruction support services and operations and maintenance those entries about 358,000 9036 on each side I'll answer any questions and I'll stop talking now and then the board sine you can make motion so wait V what's the worst case scenario for the high Portables we do them next summer well we decide not to do them um and we have a a plan B the only sense of comfort I can give you right now in Plan B which essentially means we'll keep all the students contained in the building and the two current Portables is that it seems that we May free up a kindergarten classroom over what was budgeted just based on where enrollment is today I'm not sure it's going to hold but you know we we'll have to

031make it work and we will you have one yes um so when I uh saw your offsets I was expecting to see like most likely the money came from like unfilled IIA positions or something like that that looks like that's not the case so that you had a lot from the teachers line which was a little unexpected so what happened there okay so a couple of things let's start with the teacher line where we a final balance available was $952,000 so we were under budget there were a couple things driving that one is we had more retirements and more savings from retirements than we had bud that was part of it not a major part of it number two is we did have a lot more leads this year than prior years and we also

032had a couple of openings that we couldn't fill now part of the teacher overage you have to look at is that was over budget $952,000 but it was offset by being over budget and substitutes by 38 right that would explain yeah so there's an offset there and also part of the teacher overage um is in our instructional program line for pupil services so to the extent that we couldn't hire a teacher or get a sub we did go out and hire some um services using Consulting money okay so that's where the teacher offsets were so it's not as Extreme as it first appears the instructional assistant line which was over budget 264,000 we did fill the instructional assistant positions last year we did struggle to fill positions this year we did fill them and then

033because of the increased enrollment in instructional in specialed students we added instructional assistance above what was budgeted really don't have a choice and then Factor number two which is a smaller portion is that the minimum wage increased further in January of this year so we did have to push some salaries up to make sure that we were needeing minimum wage um so that is the explanation on on the IAS and and to be clear instructional assistant is what we now refer to as par professional just make it sure I you know what I do need to change that Adam that well I wasn't sure maybe that's you know an official Financial term and approve that yeah I don't know I don't know if you can just change the account name don't need to do that's

034not a board action we need to take but just making sure we're talking apples to apples right cuz yeah instruct you know we we used to saying that up to a few years ago so so can you can you continue and talk about because it's looks like the maintenance is where over well overall maintenance um you know did come in within just a ,000 of budget but what we you know what we did do to the extent we had available funds as we did um encumber funds to do more summer work so we did when we approved the budget last year we did reduce the maintenance line below what was originally requested so you know like any year in our budget to the extent we have overages in some accounts you know we fund those

035areas that we need to fund you know similarly instructional Supply is over budget by 90,000 that's because we did push additional purchases of student equipment uh and Furniture because we did have some budget room to do so and I can tell you that some of the principes are quite happy about that and we did need to add a classroom set do little which we do have one more grade going in there so you know pluses and minuses per every year I would say these actually were relatively boring this year I was just thinking that maintenance is one that we have more control is that we do yeah but again reason maintenance is over it's because we are we added some of projects that we could do that have shown at that um attachment a which

036kind of help I mean to a degree get ahead of the capital budget a little bit you'll know that um we're going through the capital budget process right now with the town and they're really trying to pair down the year one projects both on our side the M Municipal side um but I think you know we met with them was it last Monday Monday I don't remember but uh you know we're making pretty good progress there to keep you posted on that that's pretty usual though yeah it's kind about having control maintenance line when things don't go WR a problem right yeah right it's been kind of I think it's been quiet not sure but for me years over come on boiler incident we've seen the pictures of the pipes bursting and I did have

037one question on the projects uh summer projects I what is the at do little what is the Polish heating oil contamination Polish Polish heating oil yeah I wasn't sure I'm like oh we're importing I'm think polish does make it so um don't worry I just yeah so that's the underground storage tank at dittle so let's just say some work needs to be done on the tank okay now I can get more details yeah is it polishing work what why is it called polish you there's some I'm assuming it's a technical term I think I know Tim were here he want know show the pictures I don't think oh I'll text a little more buiness of some of these projects so this is just a quick recap of where we are and just keep in mind

038we only started our projects about two and a half weeks ago at this point but we're renovating the cafeteria at cheser high school this is the way it looked before we pulled out all this equipment you know we're going to do um some real improvements to the area uh so you'll see those when we come back this is you know one of the areas where we do have a serving line the high school cafeteria is very choppy you have to go to different areas to get different food we can't fix that but to the extent we can make improvements not only in appearance but how we're able to serve students that's the goal of this project and this is funded primarily uh from the Food Service budget this is not the kitchen for the students

039at the high school this is The Culinary Kitchen that we have in the home economics area this is funded by grant that uh we received so we pulling this equipment out we're rejiggering the equipment we can keep Again The Culinary Kitchen will be greatly improved for the students and that's ER could be a jetti our food service director you know I guess she was helping brought you know everybody rolls up their sleeves around here everybody likes to demo this is the uh West gym lockers there's boys and girls lockers behind the West gym that are used for physical primarily although visiting teams do use one and and the other um so this is a project that was part of the ADA compliance requirements that we were cited for you know back in 2009 so this

040is the last major component of that work and I'm very happy we got it started you could see that they they have gutted the room there are some um you know there ventilation improvements that are included as part of this project we're going to have to add a new rooftop unit to replace the one that was there so this is pretty much gutted and they'll start re assembling as we go on to July the other major project this year is we have quite a bit of floor replacement at cheser high school this is one of the asbestos abatements that floor is going to get pulled up um this is another hallway section with an abatement uh this is a nasty looking floor that will be replaced under a batement i Jeff do you know what

041room that even is the no the B no that's one of the classrooms in the social studies way yeah and this is this is the band Ro so that's that's been ripped up at this point that was before and that's after the flooring gets ripped out all right this is the refrigeration units at cheser high school but they been there quite a long time not since the 50s what we were surprised and there was his best us that had to be contained there as well but what we were surprised to see when they removed the the structure is that they this was some type of a wood structure supporting the area at the ceiling then there was insulation and then there was just empty space above we were just shock that it was a wood

042structure is really what we found this water melting off is the ice that had formed above that insulation later that was probably there for a couple of decades so before they removed the unit they turned off the unit for a couple of days those walk-ins were they were not from the 50s I'm guessing probably in the 80s still Wow might 40 years right oh really is it's they would doow and I'm glad obviously we did it now um so that's them actually pulling down the roofing piece of it um so this area obviously gets cleaned up and then they will install you know brand new units in there um again most of this funded from the Food Service budget although we're doing the abatement and construction you know related work out of some of the

043operating funds that we have those are just chunks of ice it's amazing yeah wow that's how inefficient those units were yeah I mean we knew that they needed to be replaced but you know it was we would definitely we will improve our Energy Efficiency with the new new units for sure and this is one of the two cast iron boilers that um have now been pulled out of the do Park Place um saw front of the building when we to the building they're out um this is a there's a hatchway above that leads to the sidewalk and that's how they take stuff out and put it back in uh that's just against some of these are some of the old Parts but this is the crane that brought the new new units into do and

044so that's what the new units look like these are condensing boilers there'll be two to replace the two old cast iron much more energy efficient you know dot is off of oil we're all natural gas at this point so that project is going along just fine you know we'll we'll be finished by the end of the summer is is the Target and we believe we'll hit it but we we'll certainly be heating with the new boiler units by the time the fall comes so that's just a little preview of the early work that's going on I I Googled uh poish it is a procedure for PS from oil thank you appreciate that I Googled it good it's amazing Rich Google yeah try to I find all these projects over time then do you want us

045to do the motion for the or do you want to just do them all together it's just just one motion yeah I don't know if you want to move on to the increase in oh no we don't that's a separate item all right so uh move that the treasur Board of Education approves line item transfers for the 2324 fiscal year and as follows to end the year in Balance um move from salaries $358,900 36 uh move two employee benefits 59,0 3729 construction 162 47285 Support Services 1274 5365 and operations and maintenance 9,636 uh for a total of $ 35,9 36 remaining balance of zero all those in favor thank you the next item on the agenda is medical benefits which I reported on so the if it's okay I would like to move on to

046the recommendation for the school meal price increase I did share with the board a memorandum that explains um what we're doing and why but I do want to summarize you know really two key points why we need this increase at this time and the first is that the state puts out a calculator every year they did it rather late this year you know I do apologize I've been doing this today um but what the state calculator recommended Target price for next year is 385 per meal that's an average that the state provides when we plugged in our current meal prices to the state's calculator our weighted average price is $33.75 so so in order to meet the state calculator we do need to increase by an average of 10 cents so that's reason one um

047reason two is that as we got through this year we did wind up with a profit of 27 uh excuse me 29958 and we don't believe we will hit a profit next year we will have a loss if we don't raise prices so I think it validates that the state's Target price is pretty much in line with where we are the reason that we um are recommending price increases or the reason that we have to increase prices both by the state's model and what we're seeing internally is that we've seen an increase in the prices of food that we purchase um I don't think that's a shock that you know inflation has increased the price of food and most of the items that we buy go we go out to bid for so it's not

048like prices fluctuate a lot we know what we expect for next year and the second driving component is the increase cost of wages as the minimum wages increased over the years you know we are recommending you know to raise prices because if we don't we're just going to fall further and further behind the a besides the fact that we won't make a profit you know our goal in food service is to be a break even or better you know to the extent there is a profit and for next year with the increase in prices we're estimating a profit of $35,000 so I just want to make it clear that it's it's above break even it's not something that you know benefits Food Service extraordinarily to the extent that we have a profit Food Service can

049maintain it in a reserve and that Reserve can be used you know to offset not only operating needs but to make equipment purchases like some of the work that we're doing you know this summer at the high school that is being funded from those Food Service balances okay so that's the backstory the recommendation um on page one are as follows no change in the purchase price of an 8 O milk it's going to stay at 75 cents we are recommending to increase the breakfast prices at elementary middle school and the high school 25 cents per meal so Elementary will go from $2 to $225 cents breakfast at the middle school from 225 to 250 and at the high school 250 to 275 all those breakfasts come with an 8 O milk which is a requirement

050um the big recommendation we're not making is leave the elementary lunch price at 350 um and that is the highest meal C that we serve so to the extent that we have elementary students buying lunch the price won't increase next year but we are recommending to increase Middle School lunch by 25 cents from $375 to $4 and high school lunch also by 25 there are two different um meal combinations at the high school a $4 meal and $5 meal and those will go up to 425 and 525 respectively when you do the math on those increases we do get to $386 on average which is 1 cent above the 385 that the state set as the Target price which is why we're recommending that we leave Elementary lunch meal prices alone so gets us where

051we need to get um I won't bore you with all the details but on the third page shows what we where we would be without the price increase - 27,000 and what this price increase worth $35,000 we realize that you know families that you know have tight budgets this doesn't help but we are also responsible to have a food service operation that is self- sustaining this will enable us to continue to do that that's the recommendation and happy to answer questions um so for the uh reduced was there legislation this year to expand the reduced lunch program so what the legis yes there was the legislation is that anyone that's eligible for reduced price meals is free and the state is supplementing school districts to make that possible so for next year anyone that's eligible

052under the formula for reduced or free lunch it's fully free what's been eliminated just to kind of finish out the point is this year breakfast was free for all students free ruc and nonfree Ru that's limitated and in L of that reduce student meals off fre and so is our reimbursement rate uh based on cost or what we charge well no no the reimbursement rate from the state we serve a reduced or free Price meal that that's fixed we get that so just a fixed rate not regardless of cost correct so that's Revenue that we get when we serve a a free meal it's free to the student and we're getting re we're getting paid that some of it money from the state so we're not getting we don't get 100% reimbursement on a free

053um so that meal cost $4 and state usually $3 Yeah we actually I understand the point and yes we pretty much what we receive from the state is in line with that cost for that meel okay so US changing these rates here does not have an effect on that reinforement and that's all fact that right we balanced that to zero I cannot afford another chair you the budget just when we said the maintenance was good okay V so can we delay this increase so now we can we did this just last year well two years ago yeah uh and you know retrospectively it's good that we did that because we would be further on the water and so there there's two things that I would would say in response to that one is by delaying

054it the next time we need to increase prices it's probably going to be higher than what we're recommending today so you know that's something to consider uh and two is if we believe as as we do that we will have a loss for the year we need a waiter from the state to do that I don't think it would be denied but we would need to ask for a w so those are the two things that um need to be considered if we want to wave this and I guess the third option is don't do it now do it at midye next year after we get a handle on where we are for the year one of the you know one of the other things that is in the background that we're a little concerned

055about is with the free breakfast no longer offered what happens to the participation rate you know if it goes down that actually hurts us from a financial point of view so we don't know where we'll be with participation for breakfast next year we do expect it to be a bit lower but won't know but that's my concern is like now you increasing the price of breakfast the most important meal of the day and trying to still obtain the participation in so the last time we did this I think we pushed it like 3 months so that we can transition the communicated more I feel like we need to kind of do the same because it's only been two years and we're increasing prices again I I feel much better about going with this increase based

056on the fact that there's not that reduced lunch cost anymore that it's all under the free lunch so I feel like that actually this is a good handful of families that really should be getting the fre lunches and then for me the increases but I don't think the state change the threshold of of how much you know income you make that's the problem the formula did not change and we did Lobby for that we did ask our our legislators to you know those thresholds you know for the Northeast really should be adjusted they are National federally set thresholds and in Connecticut they are just too low a family of four um to get free needs to have income below 000 it's a low number it's a family of four I mean well it's not that

057now now it's whatever they reduc much so in essence they really did change they did yeah two agree two it was a compromise it is I think more needs to be done frankly but that's you know we have what we have so I understand and this is the recommendation board can make a different decision I don't I do I don't have the price increases but the issue is as impact the families that plan out those there are folks that are tight sometimes you forget well chest you receed as a fluent Community do have families that um do a we to we so I very sensitive that I don't have a problem postponing a few months to started a school year just so there's uh a heads up to the community that this is coming the

058plan for me get back from them I was like putting things out there ahead of time so people can give us some feedback and they'll feel like this is pushed on them we're not trying to do that but prices are going up this is right I'm missen 830 meeting right now we talk about some things Rel the cost and increases inflation so it's it's iny all around that's the it's not just 25 cents or 50 cents here it's costing energy eating electricity water so families do get hit around I get that I don't know how we avoid that but if you want is Play in line with the uh the population be that threshold and have a defic next year I think do this but I I okay if the board wants to postpone few

059mons we should P defin otherwise now we're having our budget hit because actually there is a loss we have to make it up by operting budget somewhere and we typically don't fund at all these F calls at oper that can get us especially the drops I think we all recognize that you know the cost is going up and this is just a question about how do we time it in a way that best supports our right so you know I think when V and I initially discussed this we thought that you know if we we put this on the Today gives us the summer to kind of educate and promote you know not promote but educate the community to create awareness about this change alternatively it's no different really it's not a problem necessarily to

060wait until let's see what the end of September brings in terms of uh practice participation and maybe that will be positive or it won't be and then we can start to strategize for a January increase and what number might that be um you know I understand V's point about we discussed this too you know if it's kind of on par with the way things are going might January be looking at in essence kind of a catchup cost so now you're going to 30 cents in January or you know 35 and the how what's the perception and impact of that versus 25 for the full year you know these are all it's an educated guess and so I think you know in our educated guess we said let's try the strategy for the full year we'll

061educate over the summer and um you [Music] know it's not exact you been trying to make a prediction if uh but if we want to wait until end of September again to review the data from the first month of school it's just we're just all this kind of shot in the dark for all of us so is the thought in a delay to let parents know that we that an increase is inevitable and that they should be prepared for it or are we delaying this because we just don't want to raise prices I I agree with the price increase I don't disagree with that I think we should be on par with what the state is recommending Target wise Barris some to what Tony said I think we're I don't want to rip the bandid

062off people at all but I do want some data in participation and so forth similar to what said right so if we can maybe push it to the end of October start the change in November but I'd like to see some raw data whether or not the kids are actually buying in breakfast in the morning so if we did that that every every day that we don't race the price creates a shortfall is essentially what you're saying depends on potentially not yeah you don't know most likely probability is probably higher yeah a little bit let's say it does we got what 27 cents instead of 25 now we're it's not going to bankrupt food service and it's not and I don't think we'll get to a point next year where we have to supplement the

063program unless participation completely falls off so I I think you can safely delay you may be pushing out the inevitable but there you there's not a rush that we have to do this today if the board's feeling is you know timing it into next year we do give families a heads up at the board you taking action we we do have to get the waiver approved by the stating I don't believe that will be a problem because we are we are pretty close I I will add some information that Erica shared with me is that there are some school districts that did not raise prices through the pandemic and so now they're looking for substantive increases well above the 25 cents that we would have to do to meet that 385 Target so we're not

064in terrible shape delay this you know to the fall you know to your point gives us some time to measure um and then we either we airm what we're requesting or adjust if we need to yeah no it's inevitable I unless costs are coming down which seem a trend anymore but yeah I I wouldn't postpone it past the fall because then we're going to catch up position I again depending what happens with with participation but participation or not heay flat told need to do this so yeah but I think the data will like many said will justify why why the rationale for increase and you know so if we can just take time to inform and then collect and then we'll start November 1st that's the increase so does that need to be the motion

065or do we make them do we adjust the motion I don't yeah we'll just review it September and then yeah if the board's consensus is put it off you don't need to do anything so we will approve the increase within implementation of November one then up to you you don't have to do that today no you we have the we can educate you know we can still say you know that this is what's going on we're going to have to tell people anyway that breakfast isn't free we're going to have to remind them of that we're going to have to make sure people are aware that um you know if you're on a reduced please make sure you submit your application because you do qualify for reduce its free for lunch so there's an education

066campaign that's going to have to occur anyway we'll roll in the idea that you know like you see at the grocery store we see prices increasing it's going to likely be necessary we're trying everything we can you to lay that to the greatest extent possible well will be reviewing in September um but an adjustment will be made in November we're just trying to determine what's an appropriate amount at this time that sort of messaging I think would be appropriate right but that being said we can just approve the motion knowing that we're going to increase it already that's all good I just need a sense of comfort that our families have enough time to get the message from you and prepare for that I would more recommend that you know we take action now and

067put it back on the agenda for September else here any time period especially when family communication schools for coming school year maybe there'll be some public comment in September 25% increase and they'll come and tell us about make a point to having our let's do so okay thank you any uh correspondence uh I received no correspondence no old business new business oh sorry actually you know I'll let oh Chairman's support I I just had it real quick on the old business we talked about chronic absente is in we have the um information regarding our chronic absentee is in District wide last year was 10.54% our team worked really hard on trying to bring that down 7 34% uh this year so a really significant decrease in the number of students who were chronically absent just

068wanted to share that positive and also the CFO yeah the the um the board the community even I would say because the Town Council very much wanted uh to see our pre-engineering and environmental science programs get off the ground for grades four and as we had hoped uh the great news is last night we had a meeting with the chesher Education Foundation who unanimously supported our recommendation to purchase um robots through this true robotics program that engage a lot of programming coding work into that students have to assemble the robots um and so they as I said unanimously endorsed the $555,000 purchase of robot for us to make that program possible so we're really excited about that firstly thank you to CF for this um is this in relation to the program that we have

069approved or is this is okay okay yep the science uh folks that were very close to hiring I just going to finalize that process probably next week I think we have them coming in um one of them was actually in attendance last night for the presentation so U cruising Right Along on that exciting did we talk about implementation in the curc meeting with the coaching model and I don't recall think so that'll be a early item in September we talking about the pre- engineering curriculum the uh environmental science what that'll all look like any other old yeah I just had a question um uh thank you the Facebook and perhaps Marty Coburn uh who uh brought up uh right to read uh and perhaps he was Awakening to it personally or others were and uh

070he mentioned an article saying and I think we knew this already that we are one of uh five uh school systems in my opinion I using my words yet to capitulate to uh the uh state Board of Ed on this um so I was just wondering if there are any updates on what's happening or we're just going to go our on way for now not necessarily you know um at the end of the day we is we talked about many times subscribe to the science of reading the various elements that constitute the science of reading uh we've spent a lot of time creating our own curriculum around the science of reading had a lot of conversations and Marin's had some conversations with uh other leaders in districts uh both identified by the commissioner of edet

071board meeting um and some that aren't um and maybe aren't really sure why they weren't but um at the at this point where we are is you know we are still reviewing our curriculum as we always do to try and identify areas for Improvement and you know where we are with phonics and you know there's not been U any sort of communication from the SD around this is how you change your status or anything like that um I thought it was interesting because we were initially identified as limited and now we're we partial um based on our last meeting we had identified um a specific program and you know so not quite sure why we were singled out like that with that group of five but I've been in worse company so so you have

072to understand where the article source came from That's So if you go back I mean it's not malicious it's just a particular stakeholders view of things right so but the end of the day I I I know so just based on other other boards have been going through through uh board members same situation it's the uh few month actually four or five months ago really just kind of sto processing waivers so to speak there nothing talking about anymore there's there's no clear path and that's one thing I legislators aware of what I'm not sure what they can do is there's no clear path on how you change status other than by falting to one of the 19 reading programs I it changes that there's program and then there's compilations of programs yeah so we'll start

073out with a handful you so but I mean there still open dialog department and it seems like that keeps going somehow chipping away fraction of that time there's that's a problem there's no plan or procedure workflow how to go from where we are to fully adopted using what we have that's the and I think what I'm hearing is folks are figuring it out there as this is keeps moving but I have not heard any District being told th sh fly or else yet I don't know if that's going to happen so we're this we're in this we situation okay everything's been done and now it's list is out there and not sure how SD is helping move this forward with anybody at this I don't think any and it's not advantageous for us to make

074it any improvements as we do in practice already there's certain areas in the state that do need to make improvements we're at a point where we we recognize some of our shortfalls and we called to you know and if you point there are some this actually helps us great you know like it just seems that once the districts uh you know are SpongeBob reference good noodle list there there's they it don't seem really talk anymore so I it's very very inter yeah oh no just for the record I didn't mean to put Marty on blast or anything Marty is a former pnz commissioner and an outspoken voice of the community I guess we could say certainly holds my feet in fire every once in a while um so thanks Marty oh great I we are

075getting he then I would we already have that so already all year so there's no future Financial impact that yeah I think we're in a good place the um Ive to a Jour I have to get up okay I don't have any new business so to her 9:30 meeting I at 7:30 I'll take that Jab