School Modernization Committee 5-13-20

001Noemie but if not I'm Marlene Solano the assistant superintendent of schools in Maryland call has just joined us Marilyn is the going to be taking minutes of our meeting today so let me well start first by welcoming you all to the school modernization teacher input subcommittee this is a committee of the school modernization mission committee we should all begin by muting our microphones and that will hopefully facilitate ease of this I'm grateful for you all to you all for being here today I'm sorry that we couldn't do it this in person I know we would all much rather be doing this in person this subcommittee is chaired by rich Guttenberg along with team members I am Marie Kemp and Jen Bates anne-marie is actually the chair of the school modernization committee of the whole so

002today there are they are joining us and I really appreciate them giving us the opportunity to share share our thoughts about Darcy so before we get started I just wanted to make sure that everyone knows that this is actually being live streamed on our YouTube channel so I want to say thank you to Mike Salah Meany for being here with us today in doing that each one of the subcommittee meetings at all of the schools has also been filmed and televised on the town channel so this will be the same as all of those same but different I want to thank you for being here today and I am going to turn it over to rich Guttenberg who is the chair of our committee okay well thank you all for coming just to give you

003a little bit of history you probably know the school modernization committee would start up by the new Board of Education and the town council a few months ago the idea was that we had been trying to make some headway in terms of updating our facilities and had hit some roadblocks and things weren't moving so the Town Council and Board of Ed said look let's see if we can get together we'll name a committee that consists of board members and council members and community members they had a hopeful timeline of having a proposal to the town council for September that seems very very difficult at this point in time but we continue to work we were off for about a month and a half when the virus first hit and we're up and running again through

004zoom right now this subcommittee consists of the three of us we have at times had other members of the committee sit in particularly a couple of our town council members and our job is to talk to the staffs at each of the schools and get an inside look from their point of view in terms of what is happening with the facilities we're not there to design programs or anything like that strictly to talk about you know the facility and what the facility is meeting the needs of the the instructional program we've talked to the staffs at each of the other schools you're meeting unfortunately was scheduled for mid March and then we shut down so we never had a chance to get together with you I didn't know if we were going to so I

005had talked to Jeff Solon and Marlene last week and said maybe we could at least get some email input and it was suggested let's see if we can set up a face-to-face meeting like this we're willing to take as much time as you'd like we were scheduled for about a 45-minute meeting but we've had some that have gone longer than that and particularly I think when there are some programs that are unique and I'm just saying earlier when we first logged on we spent a fair amount of time over Humiston school talking to the alternative high school people because their program is not the norm and their needs are different and we really wanted to hear that we have a report that's going to the full committee next Wednesday and we'll be talking to them

006about the things that we've learned we have a second subcommittee that's out that I happen to be a member of and that committee is was going around to different schools looking at their facilities and comparing them to what we have right now so just as a very quick update I was an elementary principal for many many years and in fact I was in region 15 and all of the preschool programs for region 15 were housed in my building so although I don't know the unique and special needs of your programs I have seen up close and personal the needs of our special needs special preschool students and all that that entails and I've been very worried actually about what happens with those students during a shutdown like this so I don't know Ann Marie and

007I Jen do you want to take a second and just introduce yourselves sure hi this is Ann Marie temp happy to be here to hear this input I am a parent in the community have been a big fan of Darcy and the programs there so really interested to see what you have to hear today and that's really it we're just really here to hear you speak and hear your concerns and I will just apologize in advance that I'm hopping off this call a little early due to a work commitment but I you have me for about a half an hour so thank you and hi I'm John Bates I'm on the committee as well I have two at Dodd and one of the high school and I'm very invested in the schools I've volunteered in

008them the entire time my kids are in school and I'm very interested to hear what you guys have to say so thank you very much for all of you for taking your time to be with us today with that said I'm gonna end if you want to end Donna Reed if you want to start us off and we're going to do a lot of listening and not a whole lot of talking so we just want to hear what's happening all right well thank you I think first thank you for giving us this opportunity it's really important to us to share a little bit about darcy and what our needs are as you said we are very unique school and we do serve the youngest students of Cheshire and we are very very proud of darcy

009we're proud of the work we do but certainly the building is showing this age I do think I would be remiss if I didn't give a shout out to rich Clemente and his various maintenance crews because they really have kept Darcy beautiful in spite of its its age it's almost like an older woman who gets made up and made beautiful and that's really how Darcy is at this point there's some wrinkles and some some problems going on but really I think we're all very proud of our school and for somebody from the public coming to look at Darcy it really presents beautifully so thank you to rich and his crews for that thanks to all of my team I sent out an email and we certainly got a lot of response I have made a

010little bit of a list just so that we can flow with it's not in any certain order except I do know a few people have to leave early so I think it would help if when I call on you you just introduce who you are and your role at Darcy and then simply state sort of what you are seen as an area of need in Darcy so really just kinda I'm gonna I was hoping that our custodian would be here because he really was going to talk to some of the real maintenance kinds of issues and if he doesn't jump on then I will try to end with some of those ideas that he had shared with me so actually I'm going just jump straight into Cindy Jackson hi I'm Cindy Jackson I'm the physical

011therapist Darcy oh probably thirty years now I think one of the things Darcy has not being there we've had in the preschool especially environments that are really conducive to being able to change environments and beam systems and things like that and those have been really important to have so that part is really great the I think over the years of ABA requirements I'm not sure that we've kept up with them in this building I have had children in wheelchairs that accessibility throughout Walda environment both in doors another playground I think needs to be assessed close I know we had a person from Board of Ed services for the blind that came and she was surprised that we didn't have the stairs particular yellow paint to distinguish things like that so I do think having a

012priority of looking at this go from an ad a perspective would be really important what areas of the building are not accessible from the main floor the building is accessible to get to coming to getting in we do have an elevator which is important I don't think all the the bathrooms and all the rooms are would able to fit like a wheelchair so I think looking at bathrooms some of the ways where we have doors that shut off they preschool from kindergarten those doors I don't think I'll have access with a button so we we have one way to get in with access to I don't think the other side you can get in with access so I found crepe so I think that our carry area downstairs that's a elevator so that that's a

013real plus but to get to get to the elevator we actually have that space as an office so maneuvering a wheelchair and I think or we'll be talking about that later because that is her office so I think maneuvering to get into the elevator is a little bit of an issue with you know with a wheelchair so I think it's you know I think it's just to really have independent mobility there are areas that are affected and if you're a separate team you know we have a hallway and to be honest we do a lot of our therapy integrated into the classrooms what we don't have is quitman readily available so I need to if I wanted a particular ball or a piece of equipment many times I would have to go outside the building

014to the shed to get it to come in to use it with a with a child so equipment storage is a significant issue for as far as therapy okay thanks Michelle I don't know if you want to just jump in and talk a little bit about sort of your therapy and your equipment just to piggyback off of Cindy Michelle Torres has left the meeting Michelle Torrance's left the meeting yeah she may have been Liz ja Claire are you there sorry okay trying to yes I'm here let's see support Liz just wondering they were talking about the OT were storage and then you had talked about the room so do you want to just talk a little bit so IT storage we have the IT rack where we have all our switches for all the the

015network computing environment and it's shared with the OT support and so a lot of times their equipment is so piled in there that we can't get to the rack so we have to move everything out in order for us even to reach the rack which can be frustrating at times because you have to keep the door closed as kids are coming in and out and trying to maneuver the equipment in what the rack is it's where we have all the network drops for computers that allows access to the network environment I knew what you were talking about okay so so that and it should be air-conditioned but it's I mean it's just a closet but in theory it should be temperature controlled and in this particular case it's you have to walk through the storage

016area of the OT equipment in order to get to that arena thanks and Lissa how big a room is that ot storage would you say maybe needing three by feet therapy storage maybe yeah it might it's one wall it's only one one site has shelving and then they're shoving on the back of the wall so maybe yeah it might be eight feet am i early enough it's not that big no Cindy shaking her head no - maybe by 5:00 is what I would say story is something that we've heard from almost every teacher that we talk to there's a lack of storage everywhere and it's storage like trampolines it's balls it's it's ramps it's very large equipment it's it could be chairs that they use for children to sit in I'm sure they could speak

017to it more about what it is but it's not small equipment it's it can be very large adaptive equipment right yeah I don't know if Michelle was able to come back on but I think you get the point that it's multi-purpose spacing which probably is a good segue to Maura aedra you have to unmute Maura just say what your role is at Dorothy yes I'm more of the speech language pathologist for kindergarten early intervention Center and I have a small office outside of where the ends to the elevator I've always liked the space but whenever people have come in from outside like the fire department or and looked at spaces it's not the best that my office is right there for accessibility purposes children that may need it for if they have wheelchairs or they

018need to go up and down using the elevator or if our custodian needs to use it it's kind of hard for him to get out of the elevator and kind of go around my desk to get the materials out so that's an issue and then as the fire marshal ever raised a concern of having a basket things like that in front of the elevator area never had a concern about the death part as long as there's clearance but I have had to move some smaller bookcases that were in the way that have been recommended but no I don't believe so we've it's already always been in compliance but she does have to kind of reduce some of the storage sometimes I have another enclosed space that I used for therapy purposes for my kindergarten children

019it's a small space it's cozy it's not quite a closet maybe a little bit bigger my kids love it and I do too however the heating situation is up and down throughout the year so sometimes in the winter we don't get as much heat in that little room so I use a space heater when that happens and then during the warmer months it becomes very hot so I use a little fan in there so you know we make it work but if you were to ask me is it you know a great space for young children to work in it's a little small and temperature wise it can vary okay do you do you do that area quiet enough one on one testing yes that's what I love about it because it does have a

020door and and I I think if we could get the the temperature gauge better I think it's a great place to work and I wouldn't want to give up the space and right outside that's face the space that I was talking about that I have my office quite a few of our instructional assistants work with at a little desk with the children so it's a great space it's just that the elevators there and it can be impacting that way okay thanks thank you sorry Ian I don't know if you want me to talk now I was having technical difficulties when called on me so I left that's okay if you could just um stay Oh Michele Torres occupational therapist and I would have to kind of just agree with what's already been said about therapies

021I think the biggest concerns have been definitely office spaces my office is above the main office the only thing I really don't feel comfortable with up there is the there's not a lot of air I mean I have a window that opens to the main office but there's no like outside access so it's kind of a space inside the interior walls and then the air conditioner I mean I I feel like I would be risking my life if I were to turn that thing on there for a thousand years so it's kind of just a stuffy enclosed area so it's I try to spend as little time in there as possible and then as far as the therapies again I think you know we don't work used to not having a separate space and that's

022why I think we're really good at working in the classrooms but not having a designated area for testing not having you know materials and the supplies at hand ready within the building and not having to leave like cindy has already mentioned I would say those are the two biggest areas of concern so I think you're gonna see a reoccurring pattern or theme here at Ace and you know we have been incredibly creative as to how we use the space and I don't want to sort of go on too much but I think there's a few other people that wanted to talk a little bit about the space piece and I'm looking at my list and I'm wondering him Kim Garbowsky our library media specialist I think that there's a couple of challenges in your space

023if you want to share your main thing is air quality because the location of the library there really isn't an airflow so right I've been blessed with the air conditioning unit that has really saved us and keeping it cool in there but I also use it whether it's proper or not and wintertime sometimes it's really hot and stifling in there I mean you just feel like you can't breathe and it's heavy I'll put it on for him two minutes just to clean out the air because there's only like one big heater and it gets really hot it's it's just being having airflo quality Tim about how large is the library media center I am not good at that quite small I would say it would be probably the size of a large classroom let's say

024a kindergarten classroom at Highland would be probably the size or something like that something like that I think that a reoccurring throughout the building is we do not have any air conditioning we have room air conditioners in units and some of them are quite old and really are not efficient and I know that that is also a concern financially when they're running single room air conditioners that really are not efficient have library media classes they go to the library for that was one other thing I wanted Kim to kind of talk about was that it's a multi-purpose room it serves as our music room our library our before and after school room we do our yoga in there and it's also our staff room for when we have our staff meetings so it really is

025a multi-purpose room which has challenges in itself that we have to share it with that many different activities which kind of brought me to Donna knotty who's the birth to three do you want to share a little bit about the challenges and I know Kim can talk to it too because she's in the library when birth to three is in their area and the noise piece I don't know who Donna you're muted I think we impose a lot of voice on the people in the library and the yoga and things that are going on the library but we have a young population lots of families and we encourage people to be engaged and it's a very close proximity to the library so I know that when people are in the library we and the bathrooms

026right there too and our families are going into the bathroom and I know that can be a challenge right Kim I'm sure well and there's also no real doors so I mean I think if there were true doors that you could shut off it would help with the sound but because there are no real doors it's one big space but Kim do you want to talk to that a little bit when you're trying to teach so it's a lot of flow of going from birth to three if they're if they're going to the bathroom the bathroom isn't sure not only with birth to three activities when they're going on the Secretary's used that bathroom after school before and after school use that bathroom there's only one bathroom so that that's an also an issue of

027flowing traffic because everybody's trying to use that one area like this bathroom appropriate for little kids can you say birthday toast well they they have to have a big step up stool in order to wash their hands and the toilet is really an adult toilet for a child which I do know and it's also not ideal to have children and adults using the same bathroom for others and there's only one toilet in there some child's in there and there's an issue in there then it's shut down and then people have to go scrambling to go to the bathroom now quite far away so there is there other or is there another adult bathroom somewhere so that was one thing that our custodian was going to speak to and I'm so I will chime in for

028him we really only have one adult bathroom in the preschool wing and one adult bathroom in the kindergarten wing and when you look at the amount of people we have here and women you know it's it's really it's not fair it's very difficult on our staff and so that is a huge concern for many people and they're both single toilet they're both they're single toilets yeah I think that the the bathroom both child and adult is a huge issue at Darcy there's not enough children bath child bathrooms the one in the kindergarten wing that is accessible to our kindergarten students is very outdated it has very high urinals for five-year-old boys which does not work very well I can see some of my kindergarten teachers going so that it so bathrooms are our issue and

029I know my secretary Tammy grey is here and I know that it's been an issue when they have to share with Children and Families that's hard off of that and I'm not sure if it's part of what John was going to talk about like storage so I know that there's a very small storage closet for for custodial items in the EIC wing and the preschool wing but then on the kindergarten side I know a lot of the storage happens in the the bathrooms there's kind of like shower stalls in the bathrooms that are used as storage so that's where we're storing extra toilet paper and paper towels because they're not as good closet Thanks all right so while we're on the topic of storage I'm wondering if well I could go to Emory Wittenberg it's

030not really storage but often space I know we've hit that but maybe you have something you'd like to share sure hi my name is anne-marie Winton Berg and I'm the reading and math curriculum support teacher for Darcy and Chapman and I actually don't have an office at all so I share space with the school psychologist last year which in itself brings up its own challenges because I am working with teachers and Disko in curriculum helping with diagnostic testing with students and and also working with students so now at the second time I am sharing a space with the school psychologist who's doing his own therapy sessions and confidential sessions and also his testing so that is difficult to share the space now this year was a little more challenging because we had some students who

031needed a quiet space for their own therapy and so the entire office was converted for student use so the school psychologist and I didn't have an office at all we would either use a corner of the art room or just find a little space to put our stuff down in even using the art room if the art teacher was there then she's having an art lesson and he and I are doing our own things if art wasn't there that day the space is also used by the special education teacher because he does not have a resource room or a space either so um so that brings itself its own challenges Kim Ambrose hello hi I'm sorry can you hear me now yeah I'm Kim Ambrose I'm a preschool teacher at Darcy I have a classroom

032that has two large storage closets but which are currently being used as community storage we have a lot of stuff for preschool we need a lot of materials and we only have one common closet in the hallway that we can use to store our puzzles our manipulatives all the materials that we need for teaching so those two closets in my room are used for other community storage which leaves little space for the storage that I need for for my classroom what sort of community storages I mean what their outside groups that are using inertia I just mean during items that all of the preschool teachers use so we share materials like school yeah I'm talking about like dress-up clothes puzzles all those sorts of things that we share yeah now the classroom is a fairly

033decent size isn't it I remember yeah that was one of the big pros as I remember walking through the there were some My Size classrooms we certainly have a couple of nice size classrooms but I think that the kindergarten teachers probably Gina is smiling Gina do you want to pop in on that one sure I'd love to I'm Gina Mauro I teach kindergarten at darcy and it is my sixth year here and we work together to kind of create this list so it's not just coming from me and mr. Guster Brooke you were actually my principal at mes I was a former cricket so regarding classroom size our rooms are very small in comparison to other classrooms around the district with twenty plus students as you imagine they grow pretty fast and trying to fit

034everyone you know for morning meeting around the carpet is it's pretty tight we make it work no idea I don't know what do you think in I mean it's probably half the size of a room at Highlands honestly the rule said Highland would probably be about 900 something like that yeah I mean I'm also not I'm married to a roofer you think I know my square footage but I'm not good at that go measure they are very small and like Gina said as the children grow we we feel it more and more throughout the year and we really do accommodate it with you know not having a whole lot of furniture and we really trying to make you know the flow as best as possible but with with that many kids in a small space

035it's hard limited storage again we have very small closet that doesn't really hold anything we have some low cabinets that are pretty dangerous to even try to open they are really kind of broken and they're attached by some glue and some spaces they're just really old and and not in great shape sharing spaces so you've heard that that's been kind of a theme of this the CAF in the gym or a shared space we don't have a gym area so that is where we have our physical education is in the CAF as you can imagine our students can't participate in the same things that other kindergartners across the district who have a gymnasium can so it is I think that's hard and it seems a little bit unfair in that sense I think mr. Webb

036does the best that he can in that space and he'll use the outdoor space as much as possible but that's weather permitting we already talked about music and library sharing the space art with special ed and multiple other people our windows are kind of tricky they are they don't have screens so imagine a fly or B coming in and how distracting that is to instruction when you have four or five and six-year-olds so that would be great if windows could be updated a bit I know the location of the office in in regards to the parking lot and door access to get into the building we've talked about so we have parents that come into the front but we have a lot of families that also come to the back door so they have to

037be buzzed in they're told to visit the office get it past first sometimes they're not very compliant with that so unless there's someone to stop them they're you know they walk down and it kind of it could disrupt you know the learning process or just just a safe safety concern really so kind of awkward with the placement of where parking and entrances are heating and cooling as an issue I think my thermostat has been changed three or four times in the past you know several years I've been there which really doesn't seem to solve the problem we've already talked about bathrooms and sinks and we would love to remove the carpet if possible I know in our in our classrooms who talked about that just having all tile and being able to put down carpets

038to create spaces rather than having the majority of our room is carpet and we have a tiny space of tile and we kind of try to work all of our tables in that one space and it that's a bit cramps and I think and unless anyone else from K has Gina before you know sure one of the things the Doolittle teachers were very very adamant about was that they really wanted the kindergarten back at Doolittle and you know they were we were talking about whether sixth grade should go to the middle school but they kept being very strongly saying you know the kindergartners and all the other schools are in their elementary schools we would like to see a K through five school here at Doolittle do you have an opinion on that I think

039I think all of our opinions might vary a little different based on our experiences I think Darcy is a really special unique place and it has some incredible things at other schools in our district don't have so I love having a place here but I also see the benefits of being in a K through five you know with with those kids one being I'd be able to see my students again next year I'm so sad that I'm not gonna be able to see them in the hallways when they go to first grade but I think we all kind of have different opinions on that so I don't want to really speak for the group on how they feel about K being in the other okay thank you thanks a lot okay Thank You Dina that

040was a nice Jeana spoke a little bit about parking and security I'm wondering Tammy do you want to unmute and jump in a little bit about security at Dorothy sure my name is Tammy gray I'm the principal secretary my 20th year at Darcy school so my concern is from a security perspective because I work in the main office and we had a guard instituted I think two or three years ago which is terrific however when a person comes into the office they scan their license through lobby guard and if we do get some kind of hit that there is that they could be suspected for something when their license goes through and it's happened a couple times falsely but it we have gotten alerts the person is standing right at my desk so kind of

041awkward like there should almost be a separate vestibule that if clerk does come up they're not already in the building the town is actually moving ahead with that I don't know whether Darcy was part of that because I think there's still questions about long-term what's going to happen with Darcy I hired an architect the architectural plans for all the other schools to create what's called a man trap and that didn't bid but unfortunately they only got one bidder so now they're gonna go out and do do a bid again but it's what you would talk about where somebody would come in they would be in between two sets of doors and they would be checked in at that point and then they would be allowed into the bill that would be great and if I

042could just give my opinion under C school because I think 20 years and I'm also a parent I'm in Cheshire when I moved to Cheshire and I heard that Darcy was just kindergarten I thought that's really odd and I kind of didn't with it until my son went through Darcy it's such a special place and we are geared for children that are from birth to five years old and I feel like for their first school experience they're only on the bus with kindergarten students they're only in the cafeteria with inner garden students and preschoolers and I feel like they're protected for their first year of education I just can't say how special it is oh that's my two cents [Music] Amanda or Rachel I see and I don't know if Eric is in or not

043I don't see your picture of any either I'm not putting you on the spot but if you just want to talk about your thoughts then do little Darcy and how that is feeling yeah I'm emeritus UCLA I teach kindergarten this is my second year at Darcy I've also taught first grade at Highland district and I've been in a few other districts I also agree that Darcy does have a very special Arab fit in that it does cater to younger children however having been in other schools where there is you know K to 5 or K to 6 or whatever it may be I just feel as though in some ways our kindergarteners are a little bit of a disadvantage having to then transition again to go to first grade so there are up there community

044like school community things that they kind of miss out on as not having older role models in the school and and things like that I just I wish there was either a way to keep it consistent so that you they're all kindergartners were together in one place or all kindergartners were at their own home elementary school so that it would kind of be a level fair playing field for them well we just started out that right years ago there was an attempt to do some new construction it didn't pass and Darcy had been actually closed down and they reopened it at that time as a kindergarten Center and I think all the kindergartens in the district were at the school at that point ruble by little they've been moved back into their elementary schools except

045for the Doolittle students because there's no space thank you Rachel did you want to say anything hi I'm Rachel Crusoe on my kindergarten teacher at Darcy I feel very similar thoughts to Gina and Amanda I think Darcy is a very special place and I just love how it is so a childhood centered which i think is just wonderful for our kindergartners you know they get a very special experience at Darcy because we are so focused on early childhood learning and development so I think that's wonderful but I also you know kind of feel like with Gina you know we'll be nice to build us to hear your students from year to year as they grow and develop you know like many of the other schools in the district and kind of keep that connection but

046also to have a little bit more of a collaboration and consistency with other colleagues such as that Doolittle mm-hmm and other activities and celebrations you know things like that so it's it's kind of a tough call you know I'm kind of on the fence in that way to where you know I do think we have a very special unique environment but it would be nice to have a little bit of a closer tie to do it all kind of our sister school I'm just kind of looking at my list you know something when we're thinking about this I mean it would be really far out there and kind of really far out of the box but kind of joining those two ideas of the elementary school and early childhood if we're really thinking like redistricting

047the entire district creating a space that is just what a man is speaking about so an early childhood school that's a pre-k through second grade where everyone in the district would go you know and that would be that building and then elementary would be say three four and five and in middle school six seven and eight so you can really capture early childhood but see it through so a few years beyond so that you can create what's so unique about an Early Childhood Center through those really crucial years and then having your elementary experience in a separate building wherever would transition at the same time I think would be a really out-of-the-box kind of way to think about it yes there are some school districts who do that I'm aware of they do a k2

048and then at three five and then and I don't we haven't had any in-depth conversations in the school modernization at this point I think for the most part we would be you know kind of led by the pool administration in terms of what we're looking for a lot of the discussion so far has been where should the sixth grade big should it be in an elementary school should it be in a middle school and that's that's been a lot of the focus because that obviously has a huge impact if if we were to look at for instance building a new middle school how big was that school that sort of thing I haven't had any in-depth conversations about restructuring everything else but that could come out of all this whatever Pentagon where the money is

049and what the facilities look like Marni do you want to talk for a minute hi I'm Manny Roberts I am one of the special education teachers in the building I have what's called the intensive IDI class I have both kindergarteners and preschoolers so I have a comment about the kindergarteners at Darcy it's a really good where my most intense needs students to have that two-year experience or that multi-year experience not all of them are ready for an elementary education system that looks different than Darcy so I my kids are supported based on kind of their developmental needs that Darcy in a way that an elementary school would have a more difficult time to do the other thing that I wanted to bring up which you've kind of heard a lot about is the special education

050K doesn't have a resource room so some of those kids don't need to be in my intensive environment but they you need a space to have air appease outside of their general ed classroom they also needed this where they can go to have a sense we break or just a time out of the room you you know have some additional instruction and that is sometimes done in the hallways it's sometimes which isn't always the most appropriate spot or most beneficial spot I think that the there is often the special education is brought into the art room when the art classes aren't there but they don't have their own everyday space and to kind of have their needs met on a daily basis so [Music] thank you I'm looking at I see Karen Clark Carrie yep

051hi everyone Karen Clark I am the building stuff for this is my sixth year there so I have opportunity of getting to work with all the students in the entire building from pre-k the EIC to the garden and I can see where some of the safety concerns are and ickerly the gates in the playground going to the parking lot the nature trail as I said I've the pleasure of being company with some very impulsive curious children that like to maybe we're trying to explore on their own and it's very easy for to opens gates so I'm just wondering if is a way to install what is seen on public playgrounds those push-button gates where they cannot reach but an adult can get to it it was part of the building or return of the building

052I apologize in the back of the building the rear entrance so there's I think at least six gates I can maybe a couple more that kids have a potential of we'd be slightly to me we do do our very best to keep our eyes on every but there are pretty quick little French dad on like exploring on their own it's very hard to catch them so just as even for kids leaving the building especially preschool with their parents leaving that back entrance team Oh numerous times I do what break free and the run back that's a very busy time of day there could also be a leaving that back just stop them so Karen kind of fading out so I'm just gonna kind of highlight I think what Karen really talked about or touched upon

053is our access to the building through the parking lots and it's really quite unsafe with our buses coming in and out and I know that in many other schools they've talked about the bus the bus lanes or the lack of bus lanes and we have a very high population of special needs so we have a lot of small minivans coming in and out of the back and that's also where our parents Park and they have young children so it's just it's not ideal and it's really not safe so um that I think is you know in a newer school they probably give more thought nowadays to how parents access the building and where the bus lanes are for schools now they separate out all the parent cars and their own driveway from the buses and

054keep those in a whole separate area you have large buses that come in the front and most learners they come in the bus the we call it the bus loop and then the small buses go to the back of the building and parents come both to the front of the school and to the back of the school especially with the toddlers and the the smaller children to the back of the school and you know it's a lot of traffic and often the cars don't stop when the buses are loading because they don't really recognize that it's a loading bus so we've been cited multiple times for parents not adhering to bus regulations so it's just it's really not ideal yeah we've had several principals express that concern that there's you know students walking between buses

055to get into the building you know things like that so that obviously is an issue one more thing in the corral were mr. Webb the gym teacher uses sometimes there's openings also to that that children can leave so if we can maybe get off openings as well and I also think the height of that fence might be a little too low because they tend to climb on top of it as well and it very easy hop over if they don't climb but I think that's another example of how Gerry Webb our PE teacher makes use of every space available and that is a space outside of our building that he can use when he can't have access to the gym so yeah and it's not compliant with any early-childhood regs as far as this height

056of the fence so yeah that is a problem I noticed that Cheryl O'Day our school nurse is on and I'm wondering if we could go to her hi I'm here hi Cheryl I'm wondering if you had something you wanted to share pretty much similar um the windows don't work the air conditioners old offices either hot or cold I'm pretty much similar to everybody else the bathroom is an adult toilet and I have three four and five-year-olds using it and at least sometimes staff can use it if the other one is busy but the sink is tall the toilet is an adult size in my office so things like that and your changing room for your children that require a changing table also serves as a laundry room and as a supply closet right that is

057correct so the nurses station consists of an office area and a changing or two separate spaces yes I have the one office where I have my desk in my file cabinets and the fridge where the ice and such is capped I have one bed in there and then there's a door into a back room and that has a Zn said the washer/dryer which has been a godsend and it's got storage of extra clothes for kids it's got a file cabinet with extra shoes for kids it's got a changing table when birth to three is hopping all the parents come up to my office to change the children and with the other things that need to be going on in my office that can be a little challenging sometimes but as everybody else we work with

058it we do work with it we we work around it is the one bed adequate for a school that size um there is no other place to put it okay I have I have one small bed and I have a couple chairs that the children need to sit in but there's no if somebody's really sick I can't have the other children coming into my office they have to sit outside waiting to come in because of the germs and such like that okay thank you I'm looking at my list Sabine are you there yes I mean yes I think Kim Crabill ski so I'm the library tech I think Kim talked about the program of isolation between rooms and you explained that the room the library used for many things many meetings so that's a problem

059aftercare noisy when you have meeting of a birth to tree a lack of isolation I think it's a problem in the bathroom of course next to the library room okay thank you Melia hi I'm Nelly Louise over at the intensive care classroom my concern is about the think that word of children will wash your hands which is going to be a must no lust let's do around this time and we have a large kitchen sink which is a double kitchen sink with a countertop that really is not conducive to children to be independent under hand-washing so we're here to get children dependent and first thing to do is to wash your hands before we start working in the classroom we need to put a block system on the floor near the kitchen sink styled where

060children can reach over and try to lift the faucet and wash hands well it within like a six by six space there's other things within that area as well like a straw junuh on the other side and the other side we have another large story cueing it so I really it's really tight so adult and children in there is a tight space and many times I it's of ten years have tripped over those blocks that blocked that that shouldn't to step on to get to washing hands and always caught myself which is good thing but I can you can see it could be a hazardous for the adults and children to step on that block and because it's not a big space that you can't really have mobile access to you know having more space

061for that large sink a smaller sink would be great child sized and get rid of that double sink for a kitchen countertop if that's gone and just a sink for children it's so much more conducive for safety and children accessing for independent washing Thank You Jessica can I just jump in on that before Jess talks yeah I'm Erica Pincus I'm a kindergarten teacher and Soni Leah brought up a point that I was thinking about and that was the sinks the kindergarten classrooms only have one sink and that's difficult for hand-washing before lunch before snack when children enter the room and also we have two classrooms sharing one bathroom so this year that was over 40 kids sharing one bathroom in the classroom and that one bathroom has one toilet and one sink where there's no

062sink in there correct that was where do students put their coats and their boots and all that sort of things you have space for those in the classroom yeah they have a cubby area yeah are any of your children sharing a cubby at this point yes I have every student is sharing a cubby and then we've ran out of cubby space actually and I had to have smaller cubbies from the preschool wing brought into my classroom to accommodate the extra children in my classroom all right Jessica I just wanted to put it out there that we had kind of talked about the kindergartens being divided up across and back into their home schools as a preschool teacher I almost feel the opposite of that I'm hoping our preschool is able to stay together as a

063unit I think the the early childhood part of things in the collaboration and the unity among that team I don't think it's enough to say there's two or three in every building it would have probably just be one in every building and that would I just don't think that would be as effective of a program if there was only one preschool in every building just to be clear I haven't heard from anybody that they wanted to split out the pre-k I just kind of hearing the kindergarten I'd kind of know well the only thing we heard when we talked to the little staff is that they liked having the students in the building from K on so that they the students had that consistency in the same building but there was no discussion that I've

064heard at anyway about moving the pre case to multiple spaces or anything you know anything could happen thinking that there's some agenda out there there I do think that we all are in the firm belief that an Early Childhood Center in Cheshire is a huge asset for the town of Cheshire you know it is Darcy is known throughout the state as a real exemplar early childhood program and and part of that is because everybody works together as a transdisciplinary team and and really when we think about early childhood it's not just pre-k it's it's birth through Grade three and you know the state and even the feds are really looking at the early childhood piece through Grade three so I think that once again Cheshire could be ahead of the game by recognizing through Grade

065three and thinking about a school that supports early childhood you know it really it's it is an amazing unique model and so that that's my pitch I know I'm on my way out so I won't say too much more but it really is an incredibly unique and special special place as everybody knows I know that the town of Cheshire recognizes and appreciates that I don't know if there's anyone else that wanted to speak I think that we've really covered all our bases I think in terms of space for staff we talked a little bit about the nurse's office the main office the bathrooms what kind of a teachers room is there in the building we have a staff lounge with it is adequate I would say it's adequate I think that one thing about the

066way Darcy has set up teachers don't have common planning time so the kindergarten teachers never get together so it's not a space that's overcrowded I would say easily but I also think that ideal model would be for teachers to be able to have common planning time and I don't know how that would look or if that's even for here the only part that is somewhat difficult is when we want to have our staff meetings we do have to have tables and chairs set up in our library and then taken back down again for the library class and then if we have another meeting set back up so it's sort of a lot of there's no kind of common space or you know for some parent meetings everything has to be set up that kind of

067thing do they cook lunches in your building yes they do it's a well the lunches are brought in from Chapman but we do serve hot lunch and there is a nice kitchen I said I wouldn't call it a full kitchen because she can't really cook she warms up but it but they've done an amazing job when we do they make it work okay I just saw Gina just just one other thing and I don't know if this is really the perfect venue for this but our traffic situation on our Road coming in if there if there's any way we could look into getting some more signage maybe possibly a blinking light I was in a pretty significant car accident right in front of Dorsey and January 3rd where my car was totaled so it's just

068it's a really tough spot I was stopped to turn and left and the person was going about 55 and hit me while I was stopped and and came running down and she you know I luckily was able to walk away from it but I think it's a really really tricky spot and I don't feel like there's enough adequate signs or just awareness of that there's a school here because it is a state road you know it's set back and people are flying off the highway so I don't know if this is a venue for that but yeah that's a state highway and I would suggest you know that and work with Vince if you know the school really wants to pursue that they need to get up to the state because it is a state

069highway so image and putting in lights anything like that they have to go through that I don't think the school modernization committee will you know be able to to deal with that sort of an issue sure okay just wanna throw it out there thank you okay Jen Bates I don't know if you had anything that you wanted to state or question or anything no I didn't have any other questions it was all very interesting and I made lotsa notes here so hopefully we'll be able to adjust these issues going forward when we decide on a plan okay I thank you all as I said you know we have a full committee meeting a week from today next Wednesday we'll be presenting our report at that time all of our meetings are available live streamed and

070I think you already receive the email if there's anything that comes up and you want to send us an email it's just what gesture let's say I never remember it we'll get it get it renal standard some staff members at other meetings who event sent some emails after the fact something that maybe they wanted to expound on or you know haven't thought of and so we love to hear from you if anything else comes up and we appreciate everything that you're doing I don't know just where we're going to go obviously the situation has changed somewhat now with you know a recession in the town and that sort of thing but we stay involved and if you have more input we would really love to hear oh well thank you rich and thank you for

071your time today this is really wonderful right