001chesher High School showcase meeting to order I get to do that uh Mr jinsky can you uh take the roll call please thank you could we all stand for the pledge please I pledge leave States thank you I'm going to Pivot to uh Dr Solen for the student recognitions thank you Dr herrian good evening everybody thank you for that warm welcome um it's okay this evening we are excited to share a variety of things that are going on at chesher High School uh I'm momentarily I'll invite Dr G up because we have some special recognitions this evening before we roll into our overview of What's called the Alice protocol it's a new response system we have for um dealing with crisis situations and so without further Ado please welcome welcome CHS principal Dr Mary [Applause]
002G thank you Dr solone thank you so much for coming and for giving us this opportunity to present a few uh achievements with you and then to talk about Alice so I just wanted to share a few highlights for from the 2023 24 school year uh in November of 23 we were awarded the school of Distinction by the Connecticut State Department of Education for achievement uh we have some faculty recognitions Michelle KUSI who is our director of School counseling uh and also executive director for the Connecticut school counselor Association was appointed to the Bergen commission by the House Majority Leader Jason roas uh that Bergen means it's the be the building educational responsibility with greater Improvement networks commission um Gina curado you may remember her as teacher of the year in 2020 she was selected
003from over 1,800 teachers of Yukon in instructor award for excellence and course instruction in her ECE college experience Spanish class Julie Barker was similarly honored as a silver jubilee recipient so 25 years teaching uh ECE physics at the high school and Donna Carbone one of our English teachers published her second novel of lies and honey her first novel all that is sacred won the 2023 American fiction award for inspirational fiction the 2023 literary Global book award for women's fiction the 2023 Firebird book award first place for inspirational fiction and friendship fiction and her new book of lies and honey already won the 2024 Firebird book award first place for women's issues so Donna Carbone is actually teaching creative writing to our students so we have a sitting author award-winning author teaching our kids that's pretty
004amazing um just some academic highlights we have two National Merit Scholarship finalists seven students named National Merit scholar command ended for the class of 2024 39 AP Scholars 21 of whom have honor or distinction and you've heard from our national results of our national German exam before but three we had three gold Awards um and three Silver Six bronze so a few more highlights from our service clubs um our business department has sent students to uh FBLA and deca competitions and you can see behind me the the numerous awards that the students have won placing third first for startups business plans and accounting our music students went to cmea uh and and had fabulous experiences and just one last piece um each year we host leadership conferences we have had a high school leader student
005leadership conference for the past 12 years and actually Jeff really was responsible for that and supporting that process getting off the ground when it began um and we have we've been running a middle school and Elementary School Conference and this year we had over 500 students from 20 different schools from across Connecticut uh come to the high school and work through leadership challenges and hear from panelists and work with our students but most importantly it's all student Le 100% student Le they're amazing and finally last but not least some athletic achievements and you may notice a collection of young men over here uh we've had a three national Signing days 2 students committed to playing Collegiate Sports at the high school uh and there were eight division one programs that students accepted their placements uh
006so just two examples yell in the Coast Guard Academy our girls volleyball and cross country are 2023 SEC Champions indor girls track and boys ice hockey 2024 SEC Champions and even though I bar there it is I can't you know we have our boys ice hockey team 2024 state champions and I'd like to ask Mr John Paris to come up and say a few words about our amazing team thank you Dr dad um so I am very proud to uh present to our board tonight our boys ice hockey team uh it was obviously a very special season for the team they celebrated the 50th season uh in program history during their their run this this year they uh have accomplished quite a bit on the team was the southern Connecticut conference Player of the Year
007our team was coached by the southern Connecticut conference coach of the year um we also have the C State player of the year on our team so that was the number one player in the state um and then as a team uh this team accumulated the best record uh in most wins in program history with a record of 24 one and one and as the slide says they were Southern Connecticut Conference champions in division 2 state champions all the information that I shared with you about the team if you follow our Sports programs on Twitter or in the newspapers uh you would know and and we're very proud of those accomplishments but what I want to assure our board is that we can be very proud of this team for their accomplishments off the ice
008uh the first interaction I had with our hockey team began early in March this year as I walked in our East gymnasium and I saw the boys hand inand with our best buddies club and the boys ran a clinic with the best buddies and celebrated inclusion and students of all ability levels in athletics that's something they did on their own time the smiles on all the kids' faces uh was remarkable and it it is a day that I am as proud proud of as the day that I got to see them accept their trophy for their state championship throughout their season as well they continued the theme of inclusion celebrating a best Buddy's night uh so their parents were heavily involved in decorating around the arena with purple balloons and inviting our best buddies to
009come out to the ice and have a ceremonial puck drop and then also among the team five students were recognized as uh SEC scholar athletes meaning they had to carry over a 3.66 GPA and I think the rest of them fell just short with a 3.65 right boys so um quite an accomplished group on the ice but also off the ice we are very proud of them so gentlemen at this time I I would like you to uh come up and and get to be recognized by the board [Applause] pictur St there you [Applause] all right at this time I'd like to welcome back up Dr Gad for the remainder of our showcase thank you Mr Pary Applause to you they're amazing kids and I think what really stands out to me and what I
010was thinking about um as I was thinking through our presentation to share some heavy information with you about Alice um I really wanted you to know the the power of our school culture and we really are interdependent and connected and that is what drives everything that we think about when we think about our primary responsibility which is keeping our kids safe and it's in that context caring about these kids so much seeing them grow oh my God the growth they make from grade nine all the way to this this their senior year is remarkable and so that's that's the the the place from which we come and think about safety and it's this deep sense of caring and preserving this amazing community and we were just talking briefly uh when the kids came in about
011how supportive the community has been to them but to all of our teams to all of our students when they succeed when they fundraise it's powerful so to start talking about safety I want to give you a little bit of uh context about some things you may know and you may not know about this school although if you have come and walked the length of it you know how big it is so we have you know our roughly 1,200 students are actually formally assigned to at least eight teachers or staff members each semester and one advisor or one school counselor students move between at least four to six locations every day between four to six adults in a formal or even informal setting our kids engage in multiple extracurricular activities and that's critical because that
012further extends their adult network and we have over 200 adults employed at the high school including six Hall monitors and our school resource officer officer Mike Khan um there are three floors at the high school so navigation is interesting uh there are more than 130 separate classrooms offices spaces including this Auditorium and two gymnasiums but there's also a comprehensive camera system in all of our hallways throughout outside the school covering doors interior doors exterior doors parking lots and Fields So within that big picture uh we have routine daily and monthly security practices for safety and for social and emotional learning at the high school first and foremost we care about our kids and we get to know them and build trusting relationships and that's primary uh we've been teaching team mental health as you know
013first aid for the past two years to all of our grad 10 students uh teachers have also over 60% of our staff have been trained in youth Mental Health First Aid we monitor our entrances and exits physically and with cameras halls and grounds are we we do Hall and ground uh sweeps daily indoor and out uh Mike KH gets his steps in every day uh we take attendance every period to further accountability we monitor cameras throughout the day we have a course like everyone else does our routine monthly drill s district and school security teams visitor monitoring system but also that active School counseling support that is an incredible tool to make sure we know how are the kids doing who might be in trouble what's what's happening with our students um another critical feature
014behind our Safety and Security practices is of course adult training and that's not just here it's districtwide um there's required annual online training modules that support us in identifying and responding to Social and emotional concerns uh and also our modules include Alice training and every single adult in this building in every building has been trained in a very active training for Alice so learning about what all of that means and how you develop the skills to respond in a non-routine moment a non-routine threat and new new employees also are trained in this active response so what is Alice and you may know this acronym it stands for alert put it in this context if you hear something say something lock down stay where you are only if evacuation is not possible and Harden that location
015inform very critical when we talk about inform and this is something we'll highlight with the students you want to give the most specific information you can to emergency Personnel or to adults counter these are actions that you'll hear about in the video that we're going to show our students it's critical for us and for them to know that that is only and thought about as an absolute Last Resort it's not something we're going to train the kids in uh and evacuate obviously get to a safe location that is the most important one if you can go go so what do adults know and do in an emergency it's really about teaching awareness and active response in the face of an emergency so all of our training has been focused on how do you recognize a
016threat and then the the absolute limits of a traditional lockdown in the past students were taught get in a corner get out of sight huddle together now they're taught spread out in the room think about if you can't leave the room how do you lock the door how do you barricade it you know what can you do in that in that moment um and again evacuation is the most important is the most important step if you can get out so really this is about decision making and helping our students to understand how their teachers have been trained in making those decisions so that they know they can rely on the adult in the room in the event of an emergency so how are we going to inform our students about Alice and how did we
017develop the plan um we met with Jeff and I and um officer Khan uh Mike Woods officer Rivera met with two student separate student groups and shared with them script that had been previously vetted with um teachers of the year across every single grade level to make sure that the language in that in in that script was really pertinent for young people and then we brought it to our high schoolers and worked through it with them got their feedback about what they were hearing how it was delivered and talked through our plans to develop a video and how would we want to conduct inperson SE to inform our students about all this information so our kids were really clear they said we can we do small groups if you put us in an auditorium with
018300 other people it's going to get lost so can we figure out a way to do it in smaller groups that's been logistically interesting but done um they also want to be able to have discussion but knowing that this can be complex we're when we send the letter to parents tomorrow uh we will offer them an opt out as well well so students don't have to do this if and we will also take into deep consideration any of our students who may be really upset or concerned by this kind of of information right now it's information uh what we'll do is we'll show the video that you will see shortly and then students will be able to ask questions and present in the room will be an administrator um a a a pup Personnel Services
019professional and also an officer so that they'll have support across Ross all of those domains and the kids the kids were really uh really vocal about can we please have a police officer it's really important we thank for everyone to see that our our cheser police are with us so we're doing that and three of our officers are here with us right now I'd just like to introduce them before we go into the video uh and these officers have also worked with us and helped to train uh we have if you want to stand we have officer Khan who is our high school school resource officer give wave officer Rivera he is our middle school resource officer and Officer Steve lespier and he is another person who is he's not a school resource officer but
020he's one of the trainers that we've worked with over the years so we're going to show you the slideshow of the video and then uh share a little bit more [Music] hi I'm superintendent of schools Dr Jeff Solen I'm joined today by chesher high school principal Dr Mary Gad and chesher chief of police Mr Neil D this video addresses a serious topic school safety throughout your time in Treasure Public Schools you have had many drills including fire drills evacuations lockdowns and storm emergencies today we're going to discuss a different way of thinking about safety drills this video is not necessarily intended to train students and what to do in every situation but to inform you about the changes we're making in how we respond to each emergency situation previous lockdown trainings have asked participants to
021gather in a corner away from the doors and windows law enforcement agencies are now recommending that we train in a different way today you will learn about the other options and actions your teachers have been trained to take to keep us safe at CHS over the past 5 years at chesher Public Schools staff have been trained in how to identify communicate about and respond to emergency events that training is called Alice Alice is an acronym that stands for alert lock down inform counter and evacuate think of this acronym as a menu of options that you your teacher or your classmates can choose from they're not presented in the order in which you should respond these options which you will hear more about shortly are skilled skills for all of us to use in school but
022could also be applied to any situation where there are concerns about safety these are not just School skills they are life skills while it is unfortunate that we're in the position to have to educate you all about this topic we know that you should be prepared to respond in schools commercial settings and workplace settings having multiple options helps us to protect ourselves and thus increases our safety these options help us to provide First Responders and our school Community with accurate information and they Empower us to respond in a manner that will keep us safer we must reiterate that we have trained teachers administrators instructional assistants secretaries custodians bus drivers nurses and Hall monitors every adult that works in the school system and in any emergency situation the adult in charge knows the variety of ways
023to respond of course there are situations in school and life where there isn't an adult available in those cases you will now have more information if you need to respond this information is designed to help all of us make the safest decision let's review the five options our own senses play a huge role in our response to emergency if we hear loud noises that are not the norm or we hear more familiar noises like broken glass that we would not typically hear at school we should take in what what is going on and act in a manner that will keep us safe if you hear loud noises or see things that are not typical in school you should move away from that sound or visual to get to a safe location and it is important
024to let an adult know it is important to stay alert to your surroundings we have all experienced lockdown drills since elementary school where the class would close the door and move to a corner out of sight regardless of what was happening the Alex strategy calls for a different set of actions if we have information that there was Danger on campus that is not near our location you should evacuate the building in a direction away from the crisis until you reach a safe location if we are aware of danger close to our classroom and evacuation through the door is not possible rather than lock down by hiding Alice teaches us to lock down our room by creating a barricade changing our action during a lockdown allows us to better prevent access to the room by utilizing
025furniture and other objects in the classroom to barricade the doors we will no longer Gather in one common area of the room but rather spread around the room we can also use objects to put between us and the source of danger it is vital that we inform others including our First Responders when it is safe to do so about what we hear and the direction we hear it coming from or what we see and details like where when what and who we inform if and when we have Vital Information if we have the ability to provide details in locations of where an incident noise or concern is occurring we should do so if you hear something or see something concerning tell your teacher or the nearest adult you also have permission to utilize your cell
026phone to call 911 to better inform police and crisis response teams the counter option is the only letter in the acronym that we should never consider unless it's an absolute necessity countering is intended to confuse distract and limit the progress of a threatening individual countering can involve throwing objects who yelling making loud noises and remaining in motion May distract the person who is a threat the option is not something you're prepared for or rather you respond to in the moment it is a lash Resort the safest response is to move away from the crisis as quickly as possible based upon your alert reaction or information provided by others we know there is a threat and we have determined that the crisis is a distance away it is recommended that we Evacuate the premises to find
027a safe place safe locations near CHS might might be bartand park or the stadium area even after we've evacuated we all should remain alert and listen for directions if you have important information such as injuries or knowledge of individuals involved you should also contact your family to make them aware of your status but please do not encourage vehicles to come to the school as they may only make it more difficult for First Responders as you can see from these options our response to crisis or emergency situations is very different from our previous training we will still have fire drills and practice evacuating the school in an orderly manner we will continue to listen to adults if they are given directions but now both students and staff will act together using Alice options in order to
028make our school safer in a crisis ask me anything I've been trained I've been trained in Alice I've been trained in Alice ask me anything I've been trained I've been trained ask me anything I've been trained in Alice I've been trained ask me anything I've been trained in Alice ask me anything I've been trained in Alice ask me anything I've been trained I've been trained in Alice I've been trained in Alice I've been trained ask me anything we've been trained in [Music] Alice thanks so our students will see that video and then we'll have time to talk with them about any questions um when we meet in small groups something that the student groups that we vetted all of this through and worked with wanted us to be sure that we talk through what a
029barricade could look like that teachers know that there are tools in the room that they can use to to make the door difficult to open uh we have new locking systems that prevent people from being able to open them from the outside we want to talk through what does it mean to inform what does that actually look like how how might that look and that's something that when we get into training um when we get into actually doing uh Alice drills we'll run through what we call a tabletop exercise where we take small groups and offer a scenario and then work through what the decisions are that the group would make and we'll do some of those small steps and then move to training the larger the larger population but it's important to talk through
030what would I do when I inform can I use my cell phone yes of course you can you know what don't don't not don't avoid sharing something because you think it might be wrong share it um and then again reiterating that countering is a last resort we are not going to be training our kids in counter measures um but letting them know that you can of course throw things at someone you you know but the biggest point is to get away so those are really our our next steps um and now if you have any questions I'm happy to answer them pardon me because I and because I've been trying to ask me anything that's a great question so um Adam asked would we be training the kids to go to either the field or
031to the park we're telling them where specific locations are but the nature of this is if there's an intruder in the back of the building you've got to make a decision we don't want you to go in the back because that's where the Intruder is so it's really not a specific everybody if there's a problem you're going to go here these are the areas where you can go if you end up there what do you do and that's some of the process that we're going to want to go through with our kids so the schol am yes they are we don't want to say to kids go through a window yes was going to say this might be a record they manually push it there's a button right there but we tell them all to
032keep their door typically what teachers do and it's a pain in the neck when you're trying to come in and visit but they typically keep their doors in a locked position all the time yeah yeah okay thank you very much thank you for that Dr G that concludes our CHS showcase this evening and um I am here to inform the board that we are going to um do I need a motion I'm looking for a motion to go into executive session uh to discuss the superintendent's evaluation it will include the board and the superintendent Mr White second Mr per J second thank you very much um all in favor then we will be moving into executive session and with no action to follow so have a good