001edition of flooring replacement that's replacing carpet with vinyl flooring across the district 150 000 in Paving sidewalk and masonry repairs district-wide 150 000 to replace air conditioning units for the central office at Dodd Middle School those are 30 plus years old and fail and in the state of and failing rather um 150 000 for Mason replacement at Highland Elementary School that's going around the facade and working to stop water from getting into that structure 150 000 to do a full study of Doolittle school for potential HVAC building-wide air conditioning in in future years um 125 000 in other masonry Replacements district-wide 125 000 for a ladder Replacements which is an OSHA issue we've gone to a big long discussion of that apparently it's required um interior door replacement hundred thousand dollars worst first basis district-wide
002hundred thousand dollars for other HVAC improvements district-wide acoustical ceiling Replacements in a hundred thousand dollars district-wide fifty thousand dollars to study our Athletic Complex for future um upgrades as well as for some ADA requirements there um fifty thousand dollars to study boiler systems at Cheshire High School another 50 to study the roofing systems for replacement at Cheshire high school and then fifty thousand dollars for future roof replacement at Highland Elementary School which is currently out of warranty so if you total all that up it comes with three million seven hundred ninety thousand dollars in a nutshell two of those would be going to referendum which would be the park place for The Replacements at Dodd Middle School and 750 000 window replacements to continue the work that's been being done at Treasure High School um
003which is worth its weight in gold because if you look at some of the windows that are to be replaced those are single pane windows which were installed as building thing was added on to in the early 1970s so I think it's time to take some action with that so that is my summary I hope I did it as fast as possible I I thought that was outstanding and contention of detail is impeccable I'm serious so it's it's uh pay attention so you know it's you know for those that um don't see the very detailed list of capital projects explanations and history it's a lot to absorb so thank you Mr martellian planning committee uh before I ask for motion actually well let's get through the motion so is there emotion from the planning committee
004there is would you please like make one sure the treasure Board of Education approves The Five-Year capital expenditure plan and budget for improvements to current buildings and the total amount of 52 million three hundred and twenty thousand with three million 790 000 to be funded in year one and with annual allocations as follows 23 24 3 million seven hundred and ninety thousand dollars twenty four twenty five fourteen million five hundred ninety five thousand dollars twenty five twenty six sixteen million seven hundred thousand dollars twenty six twenty seven nine million three hundred and ten thousand dollars and twenty seven twenty eight seven million nine hundred and twenty five thousand dollars is there a second uh ten minutes Hannah first 10 seconds discussion yes um did you did you mention the second through fifth year so basically
005like a placeholder I didn't but yeah if you wanna okay yeah just so for people who are at home hearing these numbers in years two through five it's 15 million 16 million 10 million the number's relatively big to be clear we don't none of that money would be getting spent or even locked in in any serious way those projects can still move around a crack in the sidewalk maybe replace it in two years from now or fix it if it's not that bad it could get pushed out further um and of course the the money that we're requesting the 3.8 million that is still is up for discussion by the council um but yeah I mean I agree with I agree with Andrew on us having gone through this quite a bit I think that
006it makes sense to do these projects but is it two referenda question is what we're proposing to the council I do think the based on the feedback that we got from our facilities director Rich clave it does make sense to go to the voters for the 600 000 for the Dodd boiler like Andrew I don't really want to spend money until we have a better plan but this is a fairly urgent project because we can't just and just have a school shut down in the middle of the winter um and I also agree with Andrew 100 that I really want to get started looking at phase two whatever it ends up looking like in the end I have no idea but I think we need to I I do feel that we need to get
007started on that uh soon because there are so many questions like spending a hundred thousand dollars on a kitchen Renault when you're leaving the house in a couple years it just uh it's something that yeah I don't want to throw good money after bad so that's it anyway I support this motion thank you not even like leaving the house it's almost abandoning the house in some cases you know at least if you're leaving the house you can get an investment value yeah thank you um I just uh I see uh uh definitely be supporting the motion this evening I just had a question some of the uh there's definitely at least one large project uh in this uh Five-Year Plan um are is there a potential for grant money to absorb any of these costs
008going forward and the short answer is yes there is one some of the projects that are on the list you know if we if we do the projects large enough like window replacements they are eligible for Grant reimbursement the one that we're really hopeful for is the HVAC improvements of the The Five-Year number is 17.4 million dollars and we have the board lobbied you know its legislative Representatives just a couple of months ago that HVAC grant opportunities be extended there were some limited opportunities that expired December 12th we did apply for some Grant but we would like to see School Construction Grants be made available for those HVAC projects so we're hoping that whatever grants we have now actually would get expanded upon because we do have significant HVAC needs across the school district at
009this time and whenever there is a grant opportunity we certainly you know submit a grant request for it and and we generally get it but the grants are not big enough to offset what we're looking at here on The Five-Year Plan and um if we had a successful application what's the uh hopeful reimbursement amount percentage-wise it's I mean the reimbursement for renovation type projects at this point is 50 percent and again it's always 50 percent of eligible costs so whatever portion of a project is eligible and some are a hundred percent and some or less than that but 50 of eligible great thank you and if I could add and in that vein we um if you look at The Five-Year Plan you know we're planning to do a comprehensive study of Doolittle school for
010full air conditioning of that building because when the new schools come on in 26 that'll be our only Elementary School it does not have air conditioning so if you look at the plan we bumped up actual air conditioning of that school building into it was going to be in The Five-Year Plan into the second year of this plan in hopes that if this 50 reimbursement is there we do have a plan in hand in order to to put that to the voters to see hey do you want to spend this money for for do a little school and again I think that as we when I started this that knowing kind of where we're going if we know that Doolittle is going to be there for 20 years and it makes sense to do all
011these things but if duel is not going to be you know it's it's that whole discussion especially like with Dodd Middle School do we spend the money to analyze that school building to do four million dollars of window replacements on that building like do we do that do we look at that building to do air conditioning do you know so it's just all those kind of just wish you had a crystal ball sometimes so um decisions and with data you know we're spending there's 14 million dollars or 15 million dollars worth of projects in this budget and you're not improving the student experience at all you're just keeping the building going so that's all I got any other comments on the motion before us soon as there are none uh yeah and again I want
012to thank the planning committee and Mr Messianic team for vetting this through especially after a good two years where a lot of these projects would put in a back burner away in the outcome of you know our decision on phase one so some of these have to be done by necessity I don't feel any of the work that's being put forth to the public in year one is throw away money uh or year two for that matter if we get there so these are for public listen to the comments by no means are we putting forth projects where you know we're throwing money away in year one for example that would be uh better used by other parts of projects down the road that's not the case some things have to happen that being said
013it's up to the planning committee to move forward on the next phase so if the planning mini fuels you're ready to move forward we're all for it the only caveat I have is that right now the school building committee uh is you know heavily engaged which is great but CPS resources are being very heavily used as if we thought they're stolen Miss messiana and Bevy other so I am a little worried of our capacity to do a deep dive right now in phase two while they're and their staff is pretty much um engulfed in helping that Community move forward what I think is a good idea is once we get through this Capital process which will be in the next two months um we should plan on starting discussions and probably April uh May and
014may the summer be a little quieter moving things forward but absolutely and the reason why that surgeon for me is it took six years to get to this point just with phase one um granted that was looking at a very comprehensive entire school system infrastructure so I'm hopeful at phase two it's not going to take seven years to find you know hopefully less than seven months my opinion so that's very doable so yeah I think we're on the same page Yeah Tim yeah just one more comment I don't think I've mentioned uh with regard to the uh proposed dot boilers for six hundred thousand dollars let's just say hypothetically we were in Dodd for the next 10 years and then decided the town decides that we're not going to use dot anymore the boiler actually
015could be reused not necessarily just in another school building if there was new construction or something like that but it could just be used in another building it would depend on you know space constraints and all sorts of stuff like that actual gas lines um but it's it's it's something where you could still get something out of it get value out of that investment yeah they're I agree there's uh new assets that we take advantage of but yeah so I look at the end of the day you know we're probably being this drone for a long time the current board board before us and probably next door right there's our buildings are still here still being utilized um they still need work and you know we're trying to do the bare minimum to Capital Improvements
016to keep things going knowing that you know there's a phase two to be defined so um I think this is great stuff and stuff let's move forward and we'll talk more about the next steps soon so that being said the motion is that the planning committee recommends to the treasure board education the approval of the five-year capital expenditure plan and budget for improvements to current buildings and a total amount of 52 million three hundred and twenty thousand dollars with three million seven hundred and ninety thousand dollars to be funded in Year One and with an annual allocation as follows 2023-24 3 million seven hundred ninety thousand dollars twenty four twenty five fourteen million five hundred ninety five thousand dollars twenty five twenty six sixteen million seven hundred thousand dollars twenty six twenty seven is nine
017million three hundred and ten thousand dollars twenty seven and Twenty Eight is seven million nine hundred and twenty five thousand dollars uh all those in favor please raise your hands it is unanimous thank you board and as uh Tim and Andrew Dooley noted uh they're really it's year one that will uh you know be uh looked at by a Town Council and hopefully something will referendum years three four and five two three four and five is to be determined as we move on to the next year or so thank you for all the hard work on this I know it's uh but I think I feel we're progressing in the right direction so thank you again that being said we're going to move on to policy committee meeting Mr gripple thank you Mr chair um
018we uh held the meeting um on uh February 14th um we reviewed uh two policies for a first reading um policy 6140 curriculum and policy 6145 basic instruction uh I said instruction right not construction maybe it's on the instruction basic instruction yeah um they uh both dealt with uh statutory statutory changes um and uh they both dealt with the same subject uh and primarily adding um official language into our policies um for um Asian American and Pacific Islander studies African-American and black studies and Puerto Rican Latino studies um we did have a question on start dates for um uh aapi Asian American Pacific Islander uh study so we did get a clarification after that that would begin uh in 2025. um though um I'm not sure if we got clarification if that was going to
019be a full year course or not that's okay it's nothing yet but the uh the um uh African-American and uh studies and Puerto Rican Latino studies has been combined into one full year course currently right correct okay um so yeah so we just added um language um and we moved that those uh those two policies be moved for a uh a first reading uh for uh public review but again this is mostly all uh statutory uh changes or legislative changes [Music] um uh we moved on uh to uh two policies uh that we uh will be moving to a third reading which is uh strategic goal is for performance standards um and that was uh our social emotional learning uh I guess uh uh guide posts that be a right terminology uh sure we use
020complex thinking in social emotional learning we we use the street signs the crossroads yes pretty synonymously with the two that you know interchangeably Mr masciano loves that so and uh we we discussed that that uh those uh uh goals and performance standards had a full community review of both the from the board and from uh select members of the community um and so uh uh we were we had no questions and we had reviewed uh that policy previously uh finally uh was our nepotism policy that we had to um uh update after some uh I guess legal findings uh and um public hearings I suppose we could say that the changed our our policies and so we were able to um tighten up the language again uh to I guess um uh uh what's the
021word I'm looking for I guess uh reinstate the uh the intent of the policy I guess or reinforce the intent of the policy um with that said um I have a motion to read um move that the uh Cheshire Board of Education give a third and final reading to policies zero zero two five strategic goals performance standards and 4112.84212.8 nepotism employment of relatives and direct the superintendent to put said policies into immediate effect Mr White seconds discussion all right our comments are public record I guess already um here scenes there are no comments on the board the motion is that the chapter education give a third and final ring in the policies zero zero two five strategic goals performance standards and number 4112.8 and 42 12.8 nepotism employment of relatives and direct the superintendent to
022put said policies into a media effect all those in favor please raise your hands it's unanimous thank you team thank you Mr Ripple any updates from policy includes my report awesome thank you could I ask a question absolutely um about it didn't have to do with the motion but I'm just wondering why the first review the first reading of those two policies is there a reason why one is considered curriculum and the other basic instruction or is that just just how they're titled in the Cape policy manual but they don't come in different places under policy and they both follow the instruction piece oh they do yeah okay and the wording is very similar yeah make no sense to me at all they're like identical two policies are almost identical I was just wondering yeah
023thanks it's one of those things where we just like I don't question it it's just the same I don't know restating I guess as we established the last time that they were looked at was well one one we had looked at and revised in 2020 and the other one hadn't been revised since 1997. so thank you Anne thanks for I was thinking it and by the way I can uh taught the cable out maybe you know less is more on the same thought so I made a note thank you uh up next is the calendar committee uh which did meet on February 1st Marlene or Dr Sony want to give an update what the committee sure discussed and what we decided to move forward with okay okay uh so each year the Board of Education
024adopts a calendar uh for the following school year in addition we adopt a draft calendar that is certainly subject to change uh one of the things that I know I talked about with some board members is the idea that even going out believe it or not you know as we get closer to schools opening we might adopt a draft calendar and see what happens with construction and have to make adjustments to that the school calendar to accommodate you know people moving into buildings and whatnot that's that's a good problem to have so uh the first proposal uh before you was uh unanimously agreed upon by the calendar committee which is comprised of some members of the Board of Education uh representatives from various uh Union bargaining groups teachers parents so it's a good Collective of
025stakeholders we review the calendar and what you'll see is that uh the proposal for 23 24 next school year has us starting um August 24th for staff they would attend two days of professional development that week they would come back on Monday the 28th the 29th would be the first day for students who would attend through the end of August like this year we had the Friday before Labor Day off that was a really popular uh adjustment is indicated by our parents and our staff and so the students would have the first in Monday Labor Day the fourth off ultimately uh as it shakes out we would have the last day for students barring no snow days would be the seventh uh the last day of Staff uh June Sabbath the last day for staff
026would be the 10th and that's still pretty early but there is uh room for snow days in there uh to you know I have a hard time believing will replicate this year but who knows uh so that's the 23-24 school year some of the highlights there uh the 24-25 proposal is a little bit unique in the sense that we're starting uh that last week of August with staff uh the 26th 7th and 8th students would begin on the 29th we didn't want students to come for a day and then you know have the next day off before Labor Day so they'll attend the 29th 30th a two-day week that week and then start in Earnest after Labor Day with a full rest of the month after Labor Day as a result of the way the
027calendar Falls that year the last day for students would be the 9th of June uh and again these things are interesting in how they fall uh they one of the things that we decided rather than having that Friday off before Labor Day weekend was to begin the winter break on the 23rd because typically that would be like a half day we made that a full day off uh made an adjustment there because it didn't make sense to if if people were traveling to see family or whatever to have a half day on that Monday and then have the Christmas you know the winter break off so um this this is the the proposed draft for uh both years uh one question that came up after so unfortunately it was right after the calendar committee was
028about potentially reinstating the uh February break to a full week I think that'd be something that we would want to get data from our staff and parents on before we were to reinstitute something like that maybe for the 24 25 school year I know that we made some adjustments this year to the professional development calendar with delayed opening professional development rather than exclusively early dismissal and we have committed to surveying our parents about that I think it's a good uh piece to add the is there an interest in a full week for February when we survey our Stu our staff and parents again about our calendar the spring so I think that's pretty comprehensive overview of the calendar yeah and I I want to apologize miss hearing and I meant to turn over to you
029was you were delivered report I was thinking I had Dr song so uh before and after the most there's anything you want to add or touch upon you certainly welcome to my dad I just I just wanted to um thank Dr Solon for um addressing that parents email to us um because there really isn't correct me if I'm wrong there really isn't a procedure for putting things forth but if you know they did exactly the right thing they just emailed the superintendent and said what about this and then that gives us the opportunity it takes a while right it doesn't happen immediately but um to put it out in a survey as as because we need a wider audience to take a look at that but thank you for um mentioning that sure is there
030a motion but we actually have uh wants to make it I moved at the Cheshire Board of Education approves that's not it sorry excuse me I move that the Cheshire Board of Education adopts the 20 24 25 proposed draft school calendar recommended by the calendar committee I reckon we start with uh no I no I'm going to start with the earlier one the one for next year uh I recommend that the Cheshire Board of Education adopts the 2023-24 school calendar as presented is there a second Mr White just wait seconds discussion on the motion Andrew could I just ask what is um so on this motion I guess on the 23 what is the methodology of going to school before Labor Day can I just I mean every year that's what everyone talks about it's
031like oh my gosh we have to go back to school before Labor Day what like why I just know as a kid we always went back to school after Labor Day so going to school for those two days does it help to get everyone acclimated and then go in for the full month of September is that right there's two two uh thoughts behind that uh indeed it is really helpful to have students in for a short week before we get to school in Earnest because schedules routines ironing out Kinks for the schedules for you know four thousand plus students it's beneficial to have a little bit of time to work that out before students go back but I would say that perhaps what was the bigger driver of the before Labor Day approach was you
032know I think we just celebrated the the 10-year anniversary of that massive snowstorm where things were closed and and I I remember we were very close to going into July and so there were adjustments made at the time I know around that February break reducing it to a couple of days when it used to be a full week and then also uh I can't guarantee but I I want to say there was an adjustment backing it up a little bit into August to ensure that you know if there were indeed more snow days again that because nobody wants their kids out of school at the end of June it's a real problem for high school seniors who are going to college transition programs it's an issue for kids that are going to camps it's so
033it's like how do we sneak it feather it right in the right spot and when you don't know what Mother Nature is going to throw at you so those are both considerations but I think this year if we can get some survey data we can certainly include that as a component how do you feel about before or after and then we have to balance those what might ultimately be competing uh desires yeah all right thanks building off of that yeah Dr Solon would you say that the the staff has to come in for three days prior to the students as well and so there's yeah they made it's really more than two days it's it's really a week for the staff I mean it you know they may be starting before Labor day even if
034we move the students after Labor Day and you know Labor Day always falls on Monday obviously so that would be a four day week which isn't outrageous either um or we could start the Wednesday after Labor Day if we wanted to I mean but I I think you know getting feedback from the people that are most affected and are teaching and uh parents uh so that'll help us I think I earned some of these things up make more informed decision anyway absolutely uh any other questions on this promotional okay yeah just a comment I think I may be the only one in this boat Adam may still be in it summer camp getting it I mean the summer camps right now so my kids are in first and third grade and they're lined up the
035school schedule is lined up well with the summer camps around here that's just another factor that would have to be considered in I think in moving the dates around um also the I don't know how this would impact it necessarily but you were talking about with regard to graduating high school seniors who are going off to do you know for new adventures Connecticut in general is late for the country or the Northeast is so when you're talking about other I know like I have connections to Florida Texas and Arizona and they're all I think they start as early as like mid-july and run until mid-may so it's just another consideration um I do have one question on here I don't know if this is what we're voting on it but the calendar committee didn't touch
036the professional development part I see a professional development day of March 14th I I kind of like those three day weekends that's another issue that we debated um about you know staff attendance and uh student attendance and do we do uh middle of the week or uh Friday uh and what you'll see is a kind of a compromise in here so the 23 24 it falls in the middle of the week uh well Thursday and then uh on the 24 25 it falls on Friday so I think it was a bit of a compromise we'll see how it plays out we'll have data from this year um you know it pains me to say that PD Day is on March 17th which is a Friday but more prominently in my house the St Patrick's Day
037but we'll see how it goes anyway I vote for I vote for the three-day weekend over the Thursday PD day that was going back and forth yeah Stop Those there and so uh that's what was proposed for this coming school year um so we'll write I'm going to write down that Tim White prefers a three-day weekend so account committee next seriousness everyone's going back and forth that we try to do a long weekend so fans can plan better and try to weigh a balance against professional development it's just it's uh I'm finding that as we and certainly that's not the reason but we we're adding more professionals at on time because we have to and you know that's starting to really work into the weeks uh where it's more productive so we'll see what pans
038out in the next motion when the community this time next year finalizes that calendar we'll see what happens but uh all I want to say is that the Labor Day thing you know when I first got on the board uh used to hear more about why not start school after Labor Day weekend it gives families time to planner vacations and come back fresh and you know um and I think we were starting after Labor Day around back then or just thereabouts when I first got here as Dr Stone mentioned with the weather issues increasing professional development time and the fact that school year is going well into June we had to pull back and pull back February break So lately it's I haven't doesn't mean those out there we were here less about Labor Day
039weekend start but more about the February break so anyway this is going to come up again the calendar committee for 24.25 so stay tuned we'll see what we can do don't know say it obviously as we push more into June we're pushing more in June yes I we're willing to adjust but anyway the point is not as it's taken lightly so sure yeah right yeah I'm not sure if I'm not sure if I got mentioned when we're going through this uh the professional development days we were talking about the holidays but just so people out in TV Land know what we have I see five professional development days three are before school starts and then we've got one in the spring semester one in the fall semester I think the fall semester is very straightforward
040it's election day so we can't really have the parking lots full anyway with teacher cars it's just an easy thing to avoid and then the last professional development day one out of five is what I'm asking about basically but the others all make complete sense to me why they would fall in those places thank you good so unless there's a and yet scanner I'm sorry I forgot about that um I I just have one last question it's sort of I guess an out there question because it it's a statistic we we would may never even get there um but that uh has to do with Juneteenth uh June 19th um because um that's a state holiday starting this year I think and if we had lots of snow days we could get there uh does
041the school treat that as a day off or do so to extend the school year longer or how how is that treated so it's a little bit of a tricky question in the sense that uh it's a holiday in the same sense that uh Veterans Day is a holiday so we haven't made any decisions on that yet uh in the on the school side of the street and you know they're also collective bargaining implications for those days um so I guess if we were to be in school I think if if somebody were to ask me tomorrow if you you're you have school on Juneteenth what are you going to do I think we would recognize it uh with the same sort of um respect and reverence that we provide Veterans Day uh and acknowledge
042it in the school that way as of today but you know subject to change certainly as we go through collective bargaining and talk to the town about how they handle it and stuff like that I'm just do you happen to know like the last time we got to June 19th I believe that's Juneteenth I it is and I don't know off the top of my head the last time this has crossed my mind but I was like you know what we that's not a common thing in the least bit it wasn't at least I don't think so it wasn't recently I remember when we got to it but it was back when my kids 10 years ago and it was it was horrible going to school at the end of June oh it's about air
043conditioning it's not even it's just that it's just like this is summer now it's summer vacation it was bad great questions um so the current motion is that the Cheshire board education adopts the 2023-24 SKU uh yeah school calendar as presented um all those in favor please raise your hand and as unanimous thank you Miss Harrigan do you have another motion it's gonna look familiar because I already read it once I move that the Cheshire Board of Education adopts the 2024-25 proposed draft school calendar recommended by the calendar committee for a second I'll second it discussion now this is the proposed draft well I mean I'm sorry no I I'm sorry I just uh I I can't support going back to school on June 9th I think that that's crazy um well you're you're going
044the last day of school is June 9th right so you're going to leave school on Friday June 6th have the weekend and the last day of school is Monday after the weekend and you're going to school for one day and then it's summer vacation I mean keep in mind what a waste of time that would be if we have zero snow days okay and I have 20 years of Records it's uh incredibly rare that we would have zero snow days the other thing is you know based on the conversation we just had I think there are a lot of other considerations that we'll be making at next and our plan is to meet in November to give a little bit more uh lead time on the calendar uh the you know we'll probably make another
045adjustments I'd kind of be surprised if it shakes out on those adjustments that we're still on June 9th for this draft this is just okay all right I'm right okay all right the word draft was on I didn't hear that thank you Andrew yes yeah um if if February break was uh to be considered to be extended out would you be taking away uh time from April break are you to be tacking on days to the end of the year I would not be taking time away I wouldn't propose that um because in our experience there are more people who travel on April break than there are on February break in addition some of our spring athletic teams travel on April break to go play baseball lacrosse and softball or golf like in South Carolina
046or something so that would put a monkey wrench in our high school sports too so I think I I would keep that April break and adjust in some direction around if if there was a real commitment to February break but I think we have to be careful about how we ask questions in a survey do you want a full February break sure do you realize that we're either adding days in June or you know you're coming back earlier then maybe not so sure so I think we'd put that information out uh and share the implications of some of these adjustments to make sure people have a full picture of what they're actually you know selecting thank you sure okay thank you and then one other the one other thing I recall from year one of
047covid so March 2020 uh we had a discussion whether we were going to be in school in April or not and you said you wanted the kids to stay in school what exactly that meant you know sort of remote doing something versus not now part I think that was for structure um partly for mental health the kids just it's meltedness it's built into what they know so I don't think the I don't know that the February changing from a four and a half day weekend to a full week off really impacts that but I think taking that away would I imagine that would be not great for kids who are expecting that sure good point Tim thank you who new calendar committee was so interesting well I know right it's it's uh it's great and
048I think well you know I think a big part of this is now with all of us having or had kids go through you know we're you know we get to also see firsthand now um especially those are kids in the school system right now the pros and cons so all I want to say is this is a draft calendar if approved tonight it'll be published On The Board website where everybody can see it and as Dr Sullen mentioned starting sooner this year it would surprise me start getting comments after Clint's meeting we can start working on the final draft sometime between November and next February of 25 24. wow so it will change call the motion yes uh the motion is to man now I lost my question board education adopts the 20 24
04925 proposed draft school calendar recommended by the calendar committee all those in favor it is unanimous thank you team more to come on that one uh approval of minutes in our packets we do have uh minutes from the meetings on January 19th and January 30th uh is there a motion and then we can discussions Mr move that the Cheshire Board of Education approves the minutes from the meetings held on January 19th and January 30th 2023. this year as there are none the motion is closing minutes uh we do have a couple pieces of Correspondence the first one is from Mr hap Jordan who writes dear superintendent and Cheshire Board of Education on January 12th I attended your meeting on legislative priorities where you graciously allowed me to petition the entire group on what my friends
050and I feel is an urgent matter my plea was driven by the horrific event early this month in Virginia where a six-year-old student shot his teacher in the classroom my Associates at Connecticut against gun violence are urging all School communities Statewide to address the potential for tragic accidents that can result when children have access to guns in their homes three quarters of parents with a gun in their home mistakenly believe their child does not know where it is hidden in Connecticut keeping Firearms securely stored when there are children in the home is the law passed in 2019 Ethan's law specifies any firearm in any household with school-aged children must be locked up with ammunition locked up separately every parent before sending a child to the home of a friend relative or babysitter should ask is
051there a gun in your house if there are guns present ask where they are kept any law is only as effective in curbing crime and tragic accidents as the compliance every one of us affords it nearly half of All American households own at least one gun Cheshire is no exception the children in our communities are dependent on us as adults to keep them safe nothing is more important the gun safety Community has determined that school leaders would be most effective at delivering this message to parents so I thank you for considering this plea to help spread the word on the critical importance of gun safe storage throughout our community and I believe that we have just spread that message by reading Mr Jordan's letter here tonight so thank you for that hap we also received
052a letter from a grandparent about and this came pretty recently about behavior of a student at Darcy school and this letter will be also included in our record and has been distributed to the board of ed so we we've all seen it thank you thank you Anne up next is the much anticipated superintendent's report Dr Solon thank you Mr chair a few things I just wanted to touch upon the first is aces open Choice we've talked about this in the past the there's clearly uh a lot of demand in our school system right now uh strain put on by new enrollment we've had uh a lot of as you know early Elementary enrollment in particular so there are limited additional vacancies for this year we've identified two potential vacancies in grade four at Chapman three
053potential great vacancies in grade five at Chapman four potential vacancies in grade four at Norton in grade nine at Cheshire high school we have eight potential vacancies and only one in grade 10. we've worked to increase in particular our high school open Choice seat availability for two reasons we have a little bit more flexibility as our enrollment has dropped a little bit at the high school over the last several years we knew that was coming but the other really important piece at the high school level is that in conversations with them our students from New Haven have to get up at an ungodly hour the one if they have one bus it traverses the whole city to pick students up one van and so we added additional students to split and make multiple runs which
054gave them another 20 minutes 25 minutes and and that's really powerful when you're a 14 year old trying to sleep and you're here circadian rhythms and all that so that's our Aces update there I want to just remind folks that we had a Middle School showcase scheduled for the first Thursday in March that has been canceled and rescheduled because we wanted to accommodate that evening there is the Cheshire Chamber of Commerce annual dinner at which point we recognized the Teacher of the Year is as well as the firemen the policeman of the year and the business of the year as well as some other recognitions at night it's a it's a great night for our business community and for the municipal services and Cheshire so we look forward to that evening uh as well I
055believe it's Arya does that sound right all right so um and then finally you know or not finally I guess but the uh Next Generation School building committee a I I can't believe the pace at which we're moving and the amount of work that we're doing uh I appreciate you know Mr chair are you sharing that you know Mr Asiana and I have invested a lot of time in that process reviewing rfps rfqs uh for the two different projects we're not allowed to do them one for both we have to do two independent ones which means reviewing and checking to 30 page rfqs if it will you know for whatever the you know position is so right now we are in a process where we're interviewing four architectural firms that's the most that you can
056invite back statutorily uh the 28th of February and first of March we'll be conducting those interviews hopefully to have a firm selected shortly thereafter and they will be appointed uh the contract will be approved by the council in mid-march at the same time we're soliciting uh requests for qualifications for owner's reps those are firms that will represent the town through the process and kind of coordinate the work between the construction manager the architect all the planning that has to happen I think that'll hopefully take some of the load off but uh I know we're still building two schools so it's a lot and then finally we'll be moving for a construct manager that's a position where they're in charge of really the day-to-day site work at each building and making sure that the plans are
057followed and the code is met and coordination with the town officials uh to make sure that the building is going up as it was intended to so those are some of the happenings uh you know other some crazy stuff like today is uh Weber Foss knocked I'm sure I'm just telling you what you already know of course but that's um an event that celebrates like the carnival if you will of Rhineland uh for Israeli women uh can go up and cut the ties off guys so uh there were some stunned teenage faces when I went into German class pretending not to know what was going on and getting my tie cut off today and Dan tartarelli I want to shout give him a shout out the assistant principal at the high school who did the
058same thing so sacrificing some ties for our kids entertainment is the least we could do anyway CHS math team third place this season I want to congratulate them for a great effort there were 18 students on the team and they've qualified to compete for the state championship in math uh April 4th so good luck to those guys I took the liberty of sharing with the board our Cape board recognitions Awards I'm really proud of the fact that uh through the board's work this past year we were recognized by Cabe for the first time at least that you know I've been in the district that's 18 years and um I just wanted to just pass along the criteria again if we were looking to continue that I know a number of people participated in the uh
059the cab annual capscape conference again and some other things but just if you know you see anything on here that jumps out to you uh there's still time throughout the remainder of this year where we could qualify for some of these recognitions again and it's really uh a bar it's a standard for high performing school boards in our state and I'm proud of the fact that we like I said meant that that standard last year and it just gives you another glimpse into what that is last and certainly not least I want to thank Mr Martelli for inviting me for the um Economic Development Council meeting that was held last month uh I had the benefit of kind of sharing some of the things that we do as a school system as it relates to
060trades in particular uh there was some really good conversation that took place and I can update Mr Martell I know you have a meeting on Tuesday that we are holding a a round table for Cheshire high school students on March 29th at 9 00 a.m in our library if anybody's interested in any of you are interested in attending in that round table we have trade schools but I also was able to connect with Jason Viennese who's one of the owners of Richard Chevrolet and I recall the conversation we had had basically pre-covered where he was in the process of building a substantial automotive center for mechanics and the the challenge he has in securing really good mechanics and I know that's that's a top dollar position I also spoke to Doug Johnson uh at Marion
061manufacturing who shared that same desire to have talented mechanically oriented students and I was talking to one of our 2018 graduates actually is as early as this evening before the meeting about him attending he works at Marion manufacturing and is thrilled to attend and he was sharing that you know I left CHS and went to Naugatuck community and I think he was surprised to hear that we have now brought Naugatuck Valley Community College classes credit bearing classes to CHS and so we're trying to work with our community and I'll be sharing more information about some more extraordinary efforts we're making to connect into manufacturing and things that we're doing to support our local businesses but also continue to provide multiple Pathways for our students to find success after Cheshire high school so that was that
062was really some cool work and I'm so grateful for Jason and Doug and Richard Chevrolet and Marion manufacturing are constantly supporting us and I hope that they find that to be a symbiotic relationship so I just wanted to pass that information along that's it right questions oh alternative Pathways post high school thank you for working on that that is incredibly important thank you yeah it's it's certainly not a Jeff swollen initiative I mean there's a team uh Marlene and you know Kevin is k through eight but certainly involved in everything that we're doing as it relates to extending things and then there are numerous other people like Sean McEwen mayor gadd and so it's definitely a team effort and we're sensitive to that I'm really glad that we're we're making progress there absolutely thank you
063yes um I just wanted to comment that um I remember when I first came on the board um I asked an unnamed staff member I'll say like that I I asked that person um well what if a student at the age of 16 16 is dabbling with the idea of of going into uh uh you know a technical field or a manufacturing field um what would they uh do at the high school and at that time would that was back into that made us 2018. um the answer was well then they would have to go to a technical school and I think that now the answer is uh that there are opportunities here to learn and get to know things before you had to make such a big decision if you wanted to to further
064your career in that so I think that's a great step forward thank you and certainly in the technical schools remain a option for our students so we're not we're not looking to remove that option but we are looking to force students who want to stay at Cheshire high school but still continue a mechanical and I know Andrew is very close to your heart you know personally and we want to be able to offer uh internships and this is where Partnerships with our local companies are so beneficial so I'm glad that we've evolved since that time the record is that I I a nice long conversation today with Lindsay DeAngelis over Rochester High School um and in my other role with the town at Economic Development um I'm just glad that we're able to I'm able
065to help you guys and get these people in there because we have a lot of really great and this isn't like some sort of self-promotion for the town of everybody um we have a lot of really great businesses here and I don't think a lot of them have been connecting to the community and so like I've taken that very seriously to get them to the high school and I think that it's paying off like I mean there's people here like just today um Creative Dimensions which is in the industrial park they make all the desks for all the sports programs and sets everything that you watch and it has everything from design all the way up through fabrication and he's towards Chester high school and he's ready to hopefully work to replace the ram TV
066desk something that came from a major sporting event so I mean there's these really great connections right here in our own backyard so I'll throw out another plug for Rebel marketing uh on April 1st April Fool's Day no accident we're holding our treasure Ed Foundation trivia contest I know Adam's done it he's religious about it and you know it's not don't just take it from me take it from one of our competitors it is an awesome time it is so much fun like I do a lot of goofy things like jumping in cold water or whatever dressing all sorts of crazy ways and making my friends do that too but this is so much fun if you please go to the cheshired foundation website check it out Rebel marketing is hosting this year um it's
067an adult only event you are allowed to bring your own Beverages and snacks and everything people have a great time so please check it out yeah is I'm not sure if you mentioned it is there uh could you give an idea of when we might expect to see ground break on the buildings just I mean should people expect to happen this spring next spring summer not like generally speaking definitely not this spring sure the design process itself when the architect is engaged is roughly 18 months so after 18 months we're then you know I'm sure at the end of that process securing contractors uh so I I don't know been 20 24 months Maybe so maybe that this spring but two Springs we're breaking ground okay so 25 with a uh opening in Fall of
06826. okay so if we're starting in let's say call it March April of 2025 we would then open schools in September 26th okay three and a half years from now yep okay roughly thank you it goes by fast foreign people are going to be wondering oh for sure yeah we voted for that where check out you know another plug check out our website school modernization there's a band at the bottom yeah you can always click on that link it's updated regularly it's got a link to all of our meeting minutes everything I uh does it have a link to upcoming meetings uh it well it has the agendas which shows you the dates of all the meetings gotcha and a meeting schedule yeah but they meet regularly on Tuesdays every Thursday basically tonight is a
069rare night that we don't have a meeting which worked out for Ben and I because I think I think I ended up going to the town website to get it because I came to one of the meetings a week or two ago I looked at the schools and I don't think it had upcoming meetings on it that was easy for me to find at least just as a side note well yeah we'll make that easier more accommodating I thank you I just want to say uh Noni is Adam a fierce competitor and trivia but to your right yes and is I was on her team I'm still kind of hurt to be honest with you I was on her team this is a a keep it brief I was on her team the next year
070I couldn't make it back we we finished his bottom dwellers the year I competed then I couldn't make it back the next year they got a ringer and they finished second place and uh for some reason I wasn't invited back after that no so a little hurt and uh just finished with uh since we're putting plugs in for uh alternative career paths uh I am so happy to see um Bridges more bridges being built to our business community and school system I think Andrew any other folks uh I would just say this since we're talking about starting the next phase of school modernization discussions perhaps the Board of Ed looks at it uh not just with an eye of enrollment in ancient buildings but perhaps an opportunity if I have my personal way to maybe
071start building around some expanded programming around manufacturing CNC not a full-fledged technical school but there's so anyway there's an opportunity to expand that uh and Garner more business input to that process so looking forward to it it's great that it's happening though um that concludes the returns report mine's really short um really the only item I have is I attended I think that was Sony were there too uh the state uh Legislative Office a week or two ago where the Appropriations Committee was this uh having public comment on the education cost sharing formula uh I I waited five hours to speak on behalf of Cabe um which was worth it and there was a lot of people a lot of board members superintendents Town managers uh every representation you could imagine from Connecticut uh supporting
072fully funding the cost sharing formula I think what that body's trying to do is make more money available the word Equitable is being used but overwhelmingly the the folks that spoke and myself were in favor of fully funding the formula you know uh do what you're supposed to do and also start looking at solving the special education cost uh disparity so it was awesome to see that we'll see what comes out of it I think if their proposal stays the course we won't be negatively impacted necessarily positively to the tune of about three hundred thousand dollars yeah and there's some interesting calculus going on in that formula because um some school districts I think South Windsor might have been one of them but don't quote me or what is field they'll lose Millions but they're
073okay with that I because while they're getting one of them is gonna get less Revenue but also based on the formula they're going to get hit with less expenses so it kind of Nets out so again I I didn't see the final version I know this will be in the beta but anyway I I think once we have some finalized version we'll know more about it in the impacts but it was just awesome to see folks speaking out um In fairness other than that I don't have any other updates um so keep it keep it short to that the only thing I would add is maybe in the future we can put on our board event meeting somewhere in here the upcoming best generation school doing committee meetings this year can never over promote that
074that being said uh we are not going to adjourn the executive session because uh information that's that the song was open to get uh the materialized today so there's literally nothing to talk about it may be on the next agenda so we're not going to be going to Executive session um so with that being said I asked for a motion to adjourn Tim seconded by Adam all those in favor it is unanimous thank you team this meeting is adjourned