001the United States of America and to the for it stands one nation God indivisible andice Louisa could you do the roll please Al present Teresa present Michelle here Kate here glis here Dr Cronin here Lauren here Lita here Richard here and okay thank you we have all war members present tonight okay at this time we're all excited we have all these beautiful young people in our ERS to be recognized and we are so happy on behalf of the board to see you here and the the administrators that are working with you and thank you so I that this portion of the meeting I'm going to turn it over to our uh superintendent so we can do the recognition good evening everyone um hopefully all of the uh students and the parents who are here tonight
002to receive um their child to have their child receive the cave award I just want to make sure that the folks that are in the hallway that they don't miss their moment so if you can make sure that they're in in the board that would be great room thank you it's amazing to see all the beaming parrot faces out there see a lot of um Apple cheeks that of of proudness uh for the students tonight um we had an amazing year of uh our students excelling and achieving and there are some of these uh students tonight are going off to some wonderful places for for the next level of schooling and um have created amazing opportunities for themselves so um I also want to thank the principls of the Middle School School alternative program and
003and the high school for being here tonight and supporting and their students so I'd like to read a little bit about the first award it's called The Cave award the cave student leadership leadership award recognizes student achievement and Leadership qualities leadership is a quality that is hard to Define and not always demonstrated by all citizens cave developed the below criteria that is helped define leadership and our principles have selected these students based on the following skills and characteristics willingness to take on challenges capability to make difficult decisions concern for others the ability to work with others a willingness to commit to a project diplomacy the ability to understand issues clearly and the ability to honor a commitment so those are some pretty special qualities so the students selected tonight demonstrate and embody all of those
004characteristics I'd like to call Mr Dave Kimble up to the podium to introduce his two students good evening everyone um what I want to do is present and congratulate the two students from PR so I'd like to call up Zoe Pitman and Christopher PES [Applause] they're lab thank you stick around we're going to take some photos at the end here next up principal Rogers Park Middle School Dr chrisy Ela [Applause] sop next up Westside Middle School Academy principal Miss Jennifer [Applause] blue good evening everyone I'm here to present to ro D and K Roy and next up Danbury High School and principal Mr Dan Donovan we always got a little something at the end of ours but our two students here are maram and James Rivera maram going to Yukon on the engineering Tech to
005finish up there and James is going [Applause] toaster wonderful and the Alternative Center for excellence Mr John Leber evening everybody proud to present our two recipients from AAR Dr and arest [Applause] [Music] thank you very much and there's some wonderful writeups that are on the table if you get get a moment to take a look at um some of the the backgrounds of the students that just received those Awards and some of their accomplishments I think you'd be very impressed we don't have time to read them all tonight um but certainly we're very proud of our students who have received the cave a work thank you very much going take some quick photos um in the back here yep so we'll start with an order that we presented so we'll start with Broadview then go
006to Rogers Park Westside gbury so we'll take some quick photos with the students the principal and the parents um with our board chair and and myself so come on back try to try to do this relatively expeditiously [Music] it's Prett sh sh thank you very much I said yes you should yeah take [Music] enjoy High School [Music] yeah [Music] exactly I got a student my one my classes so to we had a little scenario we had teaching resol [Music] there's more [Music] exactly [Music] it's SM thank you parents thank you for your patience everyone okay we have one more round of awards so we had the honor of attending this ceremony in the Amber Room just the other night it was a beautiful ceremony for students selected um from around the state who embody amazing
007characteristics in scholarship um so we're very proud to present um these students tonight um so we'll sort of follow suit again with the awards ceremony in terms of uh presenting a from front and then we'll take pictures again in the back so the Western Connecticut superintendent Association or caps program um is in the Western Connecticut portion of the state and each year they host an award ceremony for outstanding students in each School District based on three criteria community service and service to others academic prowess which is relative to ability and Leadership service to the school Community the following students were selected by our principles and recognized at the recent Awards we've invited them back here tonight for an additional Board of Education recognition I'd like to call up again Broadview principal Dave Kimble to present
008the Western Connecticut superintendence Association award to their student [Applause] once again very proud that two individuals are coming up now and i' like to present this to oliviaa and kamos congratulations Rogers Park principal again chrisy Z [Applause] Westside Middle School principal Again Jennifer [Applause] blue award Anderson and Xavier pasel [Applause] congratulations D High School principal Dean do uh presenting two of our finest here for you Mr Pearl Chia who will be going to Brown University in the fall and Steven polios who will be going to Yale congratulations and last but not least the Alternative Center for excellence John Weber I'm happy and proud to present the for superintendent to Cameron Maloney and our Board of edre Casey that is absolutely wonderful and again congratulations to all the recipients tonight um we'll do some quick board
009um photos in the back again we'll get one more snapshot and we'll get you on your way you're going to go home and study tonight right all right we'll start with broce but than [Music] think [Music] I'll volunteer okay I'll [Music] disgusting it's [Music] con I [Music] and I am coordinating [Music] she's slouches one night out all right it was this this definitely need that biger okay before we start into our meeting we would like to welcome [Music] Julie um before we start our meeting for public participation we like to welcome Julie Moro for uh taking the seat on the board and we're excited about her coming on every so Julie on behalf of the board thank you next [Music] agenda public participation laen would you read your script please the board welcomes public participation
010and ask that speakers please limit their comments to 3 minutes speakers may offer objective comments of school operations and programs that concern them the board will not permit any expression of personal complaints or defamatory comments about Board of Education personnel and students nor against any person connected with the vur public school system our first speaker is Janice Anderson thank you good evening everyone my name is Janice Anderson I live at 25 East skate Road I'm here to speak to the board tonight about two things first I want to express how extremely disappointed I was that the board has chosen to do a regional search for superintendent instead of a national one while I understand that the board has some legitimate reasons I still think the decision is shortsighted as every one of us knows in
011this room our district is trades on many levels to bring it back to the Brank and build it into the district we we need someone with the skills track record in doing just that and turning a school district around while that Talent May well be sitting in the room with us it may also be somewhere else we need to cast as wide net as possible I realized it was probably too late in this process to RSE this decision but I felt it was important for the board to hear this it may be that the perfect Cy was within the board's reach Beyond its Vision second I want to address the distressing situation where for at least the second year in a row there is no summer school available Middle School to go the district official
012while faing two more classes might mean that we can go to the Great Dance promotion ceremony all students are expected to go on a high school Jun this is an extreme disservice to students on many levels while some students like my amazing daughter who I'm so pleased for and proud of to see your recognize tonight for many accomplishments are trans motivated to learn others are not but due to a diagnosis of neurod Divergence or otherwise they need extrem factors to motivate them to succeed some these kids are very but they know that if they do the bare minimum that it doesn't matter that's all they need to do and not only that if you think about it it probably seems to them that they don't matter after all what's the point we're failing to give
013them or the teachers that teach them the extrinsic motivation to F those success even wor of the students who are not doing who were working their hardest and it's still not enough for them to be able to understand the work in pass the district is simply pushing them forward too not preparing them to succeed when I express my wores about son who's in the former group I'm told in serious tones that he should be forewarned that high school will be different to that I say it may well be too little too with that comment I also see that the district is failing me as a parent since the day my children entered School I've had the school districts back I've had the teachers back if there was a call home there was a consequence at
014home yet when I needed the district to have my back to give my son and others like him the additional motivation to do well and really the most basic consent in School Passing I left hanging I'm apparently to be I'm apparently to be it's apparent that I'm to be sued by the fact that it this District policy not to cons students lesson a 50 a grade which ensures that even more students who shouldn't pass do I can still hope that maybe it won't be too little too late but his intelligence alone will be enough to bring them up to speed and reset the tone but for those who the district is pushing forward but little chance to catching up it certainly is too little too late at the high school information session this spring parents
015retreated to the horrifying statistic that 1 to two years ago 26% more than one and four of our freshman did not have enough credits to become sophomores I.E they did not pass enough classes by the end of their freshman year to rise to their sophomore we're also told that moving successfully from nth grade to 10th grade was highly correlated with whether a student completes High School all is any anyone looking Excuse me yes three minutes is almost up okay is anyone looking at how many of these 26% do not pass sixth seventh or eighth grade what are we doing to our children and even to students like Gabrielle who work hard pass the dist district is sending the wrong message as well on the same level they are being told that what they do doesn't
016matter everyone gets a trophy everyone moves on I hope as we address in many aspects of the budget crisis that face this District we look at the issue both a funding perspective finding money from middle school summer school and more importantly they we looking at the message that we are sending moving kids forward when they are not ready thank you thank you for bringing your concern to the board and okay three [Music] minutes cannot hear you at all good evening my name is junor School part [Music] of excuse me can someone fix the microphone we canot at all you got to get closer to the mic and speak [Music] louder the purose of is and Avil we came together because weol anded stud [Music] and in 2024 we as all students in class High School
017to complete Club design 356 students who are enrolled responded to the Ser that's over 50% of multilingual Learners in Esa classes to responded to our reading interest of these students over 70% reported that they enjoy reading in their free time in addition many students reported that they prefer to read in other languages than English therefore to promote reading for pleasure and to provide students at De high school with book in all languages we decided to to buy books that we will then make available to our student as a result of our efforts we were able to raise $880 we are here tonight because we wanted to highlight the effort and dedication of the students in the multi book grp thank you for your time and for all that you do on behal of all students
018in our scho dist [Applause] uh good evening good evening everyone my name is I'm a teacher at ESL teacher of den high school and just for some of the students uh uh us ESL students who as they said uh they saw a need in their school they actually uh similar to a Capstone project they identified a need which is uh although they're learning English they want to continue reading for pleasure in their own languages so we have a wonderful group of students MLS who got together and they raised the money $880 which they are going to use to purchase books and and and to make available to all the students so I do want to uh them they were very nervous we've been practicing um so I I recognized uh their effort and their desire
019to come up here and share that with you uh I also want to say I've been as you've seen me I've been coming to the board meetings on a regular basis and I was not expecting this but every time I come here I hear all the wonderful things that all our students are doing and and advocating for and it's just so inspiring and I want to thank you for giving that opportunity to young people to share with you their concerns and what they're doing with that I would like to um extend an invitation um uh tomorrow uh night as you all may already know is a ESL awards ceremony at Dan high school starts at 6 o' uh we have over 160 students uh and Ms who have attained a GPA of 3.0 in three
020consecutive quarters who will be recognized in addition uh we have six uh ESL students who participated in the AP Spanish independent study program for multilingual Learners again uh they met every Wednesday for this whole Academic School year from 2: to 4: to prepare for the exam and they just took it last Thursday they too will be recognized tomorrow evening so if your time allows we would love to have you here and celebrate us all the wonderful things that are happening at DHS and in our again thank you for before you leave I would just like to say on behalf of the board thank you and uh thank you for bringing the young people forth to express themselves and I know sometime we you know we are adults and we want to listen to We just
021wanted to hear the good words that they were saying and we appreciate you saying the good words and making them feel comfortable to come here because we don't get that all the time and we certainly appreciate that thank you so very much thank you they've been asking me I've been meeting with them to practice pronunciation they they I appreciate all their effort and some of the other members coming out here tonight to support thank you thank you thank [Applause] you we moving on down our agenda consent C Mr Janelle make a motion that the Board of Education we need to hear you Mr give you a microphone again I make the motion that the Board of Education approve the consent Cal exhibits 24-18 and 24119 as recommended and in accordance with motion made by Mr
022janelli could I hear a second to the motion second um second by Louisa are there any discussion on the consent Cy seeing none all in favor can I hear I I oppose motion so we have anyone from the education staff here tonight our students anyone from DHS Ace sorry [Applause] good evening of M cabinet community members thank you for allowing me to represent and speak on behalf of the Alternative Center for excellence on Saturday May 11th from 1:00 to 4:00 we held a barbecue to appreciate Jo p and a we had guest speakers including former staffa Mike Chapman members from the old Association and the Brian Cody brothers and sisters Foundation there was music pain painting in alni 10 hamburgers and hot and a merch 10 thanks to everyone who attended the event um to
023support family Ace Ace would like to extend an invite to Cabinet to the ace graduation on June 11 5m at the aori a special thanks Toby for allowing us to hold our special event in our Auditorium Ace po accompanied by danela ESO and Diana Fe in Washington Connecticut during the H they for talk texting or music in order to listen to the sounds of nature and what they heard and saws will share their work and have this is the 201 asy DJ Jimenez and Alissa vac will be taking 15 students to the annual whitewater rafting trip up the Hudson River in Upstate New York this out Adventure event is much anticipated and will be a wonderful example of exper fial learning for outdoor adventurers the students believe a going stay May 29th and on Friday
024May 31st Ace coffee house on Thursday June 6th from 5:30 to 7:30 we will have our 21st annual Ace coffee house we begin with Burger refreshments and fellowship the highlights of the evening are the student poetry readings and musical performances we meet at the pavil at Park all are welcome thank you for letting us share the special opportunities that are happening a great great end of the school year does anyone have any questions no thank you you're welcome have a nice [Applause] evening we have rep from Dan High School okay good evening my name is and I'm from G high school as president of board of governance B um so basically from past we've had AP testing which was wrapped up last week we've also had spren sports that are currently wrapping up and the
025ones that are moving on are entering their championships season um our last principal's breakfast was May 16th in person in Harris Cafe which gred an attendance of 25 people we recently had Teacher Appreciation Week where there was a PTO staff breakfast for appreciation Nurses Week where students appreciated teachers with various projects uh as well as May 13th we had NHS inductions 75 Juniors were inducted to be in NHS for their next last high school year your Senior Pro senior prom is this Friday in the Amber Room and Junior Prom was last Friday I believe um May 10th in Portuguese Center their theme was Hollywood and our theme is gods and goddesses for the senior prom um Junior Prom had around a 275 attendance I believe and senior prom should be more around the 600 mark
026As for more fun events we have cot Festival June 1st at DHS and we have a lot of upcoming senior events um we get out of school June 5th for seniors our graduation is June 13th and before that we have June 3rd our senior award Night By Invitation where 92 seniors are being recognized for their achievements at De High School on June 10th we have our C down distribution June 11th through 12th we have graduation practice um June 6 we have the senior barbecue and June 14th will be the last day of school for the rest of DHS other than seniors we would DHS would like to invite all of you guys to our graduation on June 13th if you're interested um it'll be at 5:00 p.m. in the field stadium and that's pretty much
027it um any questions thank you so very much [Applause] board subcommittee community relations uh my report be very brief this evening because the two committees that I am shairing community relations and policy have not had a meeting since our last board meeting so I have no updates at this time CC um I as well have no updates we have a next week for curriculum committee thank you finance the finance committee will meet tomorrow night at 6:00 um as I mentioned earlier I would recommend that as many the board memb I can make this uh please attend it will deal with essentially the reconciliation between the superintendent's budget of $131 million down to the Appropriations amount $167 million that's the $10 million given to us by the city and the extra $7 million that we anticipating
028um I just want to say that this piece of work that will be presented is fantastic the job done is is tremendous I want to thank Dr Cas and her team Mr Spain for the work and the detail that went involved in presenting this particular presentation and I also hope that the superintendent will give us the opportunity to understand what the impact of these cuts are and the fact that she has saved so many jobs um I think it's an incredible task so thank you thank you Mr G um s for Louisa thank you uh we met um last night and we were able to uh move through the new Ed specs for the Career Academy so that passed committee last night um which is on the agenda for today also uh we were able
029to discuss a couple other issues that were happening up at the high school one being the um towel dispensers turning into the hand blower so that was discussed um with more information to follow at our next meeting I'm not sure we have anything scheduled for June but if anything comes up we will GL any questions to any the committee members chairpersons yes I have a question about the edpc uh it was brought to my attention uh through the paperwork here that there's the proposed uh 7th Academy we have not even approved that Academy yet yet they're going into specifications already we have it has not been brought in front of the curriculum committee so I'm I'm really uh looking at it as the cart before the horse mam yes uh I just want to acknowled
030that Academy was part of the original design we having to remove one of the and I'm not sure if it was a budget based decision or there was some other reason behind it but that was part of the original I no we only voted on six this is the seven so I just I just want to clarify that the that the the original so the ects that were approved long ago included a clean and renewable energy pathway and so when an opportunity presented itself um to save several million dollars by converting the middle middle the middle school portion of the project um to to not only save money obviously as a result of some of the prices that we're experiencing but also to have a better return on the investment for how we're using the
031space so the space in that location um originally have was supposed to 360 seat student Middle School um not only did we kind of determine that the that that was a extraordinarily costly expense for a very small school um without any kind of econony of scale but that um you know with the with the number of additional staff that you would need to staff that building and keep everyone separate that there was a better use of with there be a better use of space and so some discussions ensued there was a small window with which to make an adjustment to make the special legislation deadline to make an adjustment for the state of Connecticut and so the whole thing happened very quickly I will say that and so um but given the fact that we
032had already had an um I think you may have just have walked in just a few minutes past the yesterday when we were in sites and I did show a graphic the original graphic that showed that there are um three Pathways across our Academy except we have this one hanging chad pathway um which was the clean Ren energy pathway it was the only one with four in it we built a greenhouse for it and had hoped um that was sort of the next one that we really wanted to develop those were kind of early on in the original Ed specs that we had those conversations I I respect I respect that history but the bottom line is it still did not go through the curriculum committee for any um detailed approvals we only approved originally
033sixms that might have been a hanged chair but we only approved six and now we are talking about a seventh one and all the curriculum specs and I feel like the curriculum committee is being bypassed again um so the seventh Academy was already presented several years ago correct so could this have been before Teresa was before Teresa was on the board it was approved and then that space was used for Middle I'm re clarifying you were saying so this could have been something that was approved before you were on the board correct right so so the topic the pathway the clean and renewable energy pathway was something that was already in the in the original edx this is an expansion to use the space to take that pathway and to expand it into the it's
034not a full the other the other academies were 450 students is about this was a 360 seat slot and so this is an expansion this is taking that fourth pathway and filling that pathway with the 360 not quite the 50 like the other ones but so it's this this pathway itself had already gone through multiple discussions along with the with with the cies that were that were laid out here and we didn't necessarily let me just clarify approve um the acmy per se in terms of the topic we improve the concept and the and the designs that had been placed um before it so I was here when we uh got the Cardis building and set up the academy specifically with six and now is this an academy or a pathway it's a pathway that
035we're expanding to to to its own so that wasn't approved that was not has not been presented in that manner I'm sorry I feel like you were always putting the cart before the horse and not thinking this through I understand sometimes be frustrating that um when we come to the table there's information that we haven't seen before or that um has is has been presented in a different fashion um but I I do just want to reiterate we had discussions for example about the solar cells on the roof of the building I remember questioning um Antonio came in to to talk about the building specs and to talk about the education specs with us so um I I understand your concern but person support the expansion of this particular Academy um every time I'm looking
036at the paper and seeing new information coming forward about how GRE energy is going to be a huge source of jobs in the future um so to me this is an investment that you know I I feel that we're fortunate to be able to make because we're taking a space that would have really not yielded much in the way of benefit from the district and converting it to a program that's going to provide aot students with an opportunity to access jobs that would be there in the future I just want to exess my personal support that's all believe me I love green energy I used to have uh solar panels in my that's no problem problem is here we have not uh approached this uh where the stats for jobs uh in this state in
037this local uh economy what percentage of jobs will this satisfy uh it has not on through committee that's my bottom line and I think the curriculum committee was more appropriate that's my bottom line okay um it's Louisa and then Wanita okay and then Mr Jan um I just want to just go over a little bit of the time constraints that we would put under in order to get these plans approved um I think in all fairness Cara and her team have spent endless amount of hours in trying to get these done and to us because as of tomorrow this needs to go to Antonio and get to the state or we lose a lot so I I understand people's frustrations as sometimes that the way we get to an end result might not be perfect
038but at the end of the day considering what we were up against I absolutely am you know very impressed with how this all came together and how how well it came together and how how much work was put into it so I do I'm full you know I'm full support of this um and um you know I understand the frustration but I I think that under the circumstances it was we had no choice but to move through this as quickly as we did his hand so I'm I'm listening um to the concerns that Teresa is bringing up and so um my questions a couple of things at the meeting uh yesterday the focus was on repurposing um of the uh the rooms we went floor by4 um the modifications to the spaces and it was
039it all centered around the um the academy for clean energy and uh Green Design it did not um so is it my assumption that the program itself and the curriculum is already established so it's an expansion sorry it's an expansion of the clean and renewable energy so all the same topics and content that were planned for this pathway will still be found in what is now be titled an academy because it'll hold 3 students so the the original the solar the clean energy the greenhouse which is which already exists it's all of the same content is is applicable here it's it's an expansion of the number of students and dividing them into three groups so to take those topics topically and divide them into three different groups so that we can get kids into courses
040and sections appropriately so it was programming curriculum that originally had been presented or had gone for the curriculum committee at some point coming on the curriculum committee in general is a relatively new group we have not right and so the Ed specs um the original date of the the but it definitely was um workshopped I believe and we went through the full board similar to the other emies there are being addressed right that whole process went through the ects the content those all of the the all of these went through the full work the programs correct Mr just want to call your attention to the motion calls for the approval of the educational specifications has nothing to do with any type of programming or curriculum or anything like that so just want to see you
041do the the idea here is for these specifications not necessarily for the idea or the concept of so just just clarify one of the one of the charges was to make sure that we weren't doing anything too different than what we were already doing um because that would definitely throw a flag in the state in terms of the approval process so even the Ed specs by Design so it was really a matter of changing the footprint of some of the rooms to make sure that it was um now all high school usable space and that the labs were in the right spaces for the for the program I just I just wanted to say that there's some confusing confusion on what the role of the curriculum committee is and we're looking into that and we
042will be going over that um so it's the curriculum committee started in 2022 so we are in our second year of that and we will be going over what our roles and responsibilities are during that commit like that committee meeting coming up I thank you if I can just add also at that meeting um it was clarified that um what had come up was what was the cost impact with the so that did come up um and will be addressed and also the request was made for the updated budget for the D cies as well as the Staffing projections I heard you talk about I was concerned too about the jobs available uh will we have jobs for our graduates in that field I mean it's it's a discussion I'm not saying you know I'm
043just objecting to the fact that as our duty as a board of ed the state statute says we have to review Comm uh curriculum and I haven't seen that I haven't seen that that's all I mean it's wonderful but I want to see if there's jobs as far as I know the health um the health uh field there's 16% of the jobs in the state of Connecticut were loan 16% in the healthcare field that's important I mean I I want to see I want to see backup for this important I love the academy but I want to have more thoughtful input from the board in the curriculum committee I mean this discussion should have been in the curriculum committee and not at the board meeting I you know I just want to say that you
044know and I think Louis said it clear and and also somebody else said we know that things should go straight in the path but I totally don't feel that the curriculum committee when there's a decision to make and it has to be done and we have everything lined it up and we have a CEO that's making the decisions and the Committees and everyone working together that we have to move forward you know I I I hear what you're saying it should have been brought before the curriculum committee but if the curriculum committee objected to that then we would have lost the specification to move to school because we have to move on this tomorrow I understand but we weren't even given the opportunity that's all that's all I'm saying ter Terry I I respect your
045position and I understand and I think you know this is part of you know kind of understanding and working as we go forward on how what it is that that is important to folks and how we things this did happen very very quickly um and so I think you know an assumption that these are all things that we've all discussed before in the past so I I do you know I I do respect and understand um how how you feeling about this and I I do agree that you know perhaps we should sit back and look at some of the roles but also to to make sure that you know we're all moving in the same direction together so this move quickly and I we can work on thank you I kind of want to
046just back up uh Teresa here we haven't had the conversations um there was I think it was sever we ago maybe a couple months ago that we talked about signage and there was a change there as to Westside middle school so it almost seems like the conversation might have been happening sooner at least that's what it sounds like to me and perhaps it hasn't it just from one meeting to another there was you know2 and A5 million dollars eliminated the Middle School like a lot of work and we were meeting each other every day so it just seemed like there were some people that were more in the know and others that weren't and I am on the curriculum committee so I was surprised you weren't here that night that such a drastic change had
047been made um and we were only being presented at the I I I have to agree with Teresa thanks okay Dr could you just remind us um when when the brainstorming was going on for the original cies can you talk about um how came to decide what Pathways and would thank you and again this goes I think to you know we had different iterations um of board membership over since the beginning of of this conceptual design and so very early on we did we did do several presentations we have those maybe maybe we should revive some of those at some point um that we used National Career Cluster information so where are the career clusters um in the United States where is their demand for those and what what is emerging in the labor market
048we then looked at Regional career clusters as well and then again in the Connecticut and local Northeast and we work with our Northeast Regional Workforce board to help identify those areas we also use the Department of Labor statistic to to research the job outlooks in the job area and we also held held some industry um design Sprints and and Brin Sprints to understand where the jobs and the jobs in the local market are um in in the instance of the um on the green Academy for instance it's really it's not just that um you know the Western Connecticut does necessarily need to have a a windmill um or a solar Factor here for for folks to learn about the engineering Technologies you can grow those Technologies anywhere you can build application to help monitor echo-friendly
049Solutions um for companies to to bring companies online to help reduce their carbon footprint most uh most companies now have a huge investment in reducing their carbon footprint people don't want to invest anymore it's a very sensitive issue they don't want to invest in companies uh that that um are considered wasteful or you know have a large carbon Booker for example so um the area the state in general um we're seeing there's lots of um there's so many grants that are being posted in this particular area in green and energy area um because of the workforce uh shortage in this area so the the the job to and and the skills um that folks have there's a there's a a gap between those and so when you see those types of gaps um government tries
050to fill those with initiatives with grants with Workforce um you know development initiatives we're seeing that at the at the United States and federal level we're seeing a lot of federal grants in this area coming through the register we're also seeing our own Governor put putting money towards towards these areas as well so um I do want to rest have you rest assured that it is a viable area it would not have made our cut list um if it wasn't and we use the same due diligence when researching the other the other U topics as well and so all of the ones and we work very closely with J steel from ncac who presented to us um so beautifully and he's a National Premier expert we vetted all of this through him and with him
051um to make sure that we were nailing the areas that were going to be um you know have an opportunity at the other end of of this high school diploma and so that's really what this is about it's great making sure that we're positioning students for jobs and for areas that a they would not normally be exposed to in high school um but be that there is some sort of connected opportunity whether it be high wage or high demand any other question concerning any of the committee chairs or that particular committee saying none we move on to action item got take a vote on he a committ we don't need we moving on okay we're moving on to action item uh a I make a motion that the Board of Education approve the education specifications
052dated May 22nd 2024 for the danber Career Academy project as recommended by the sites and facility committee and in accordance with 24- Z thank you motion made by a hear a second to that motion I'll second uh second by Mr janelli in discussion any questions could we all vote all in favor could I hear I oppose motion so car action item B Teresa B April 2024 financial report motion that the Board of Education accept the April 2024 financial report as recommended by the finance committee and in accordance with 24-21 thank you Teresa motion May by Teresa could I hear a second second by Kate in discussion concerning action item B seeing not all in favor could I hear I oppose motion so car Kate policies I'll make a motion that the Board of Education accept
053for second reading and adopt the following policies for exhibits 24-12 24 131 as recomended by the policy committee and in accordance with thetion motion made by Kate second secondly by in discussion on enery policy they were lengthy and we had them in our package to read them and so we had and discuss them we can uh ask those questions at this time everybody's comfortable okay all in favor could I hear I I oppose motion so car thank you committee chairs and committee members action item D har Board of Education regular meeting scheduled motion that the Board of Education accept the Board of Education 20242 regular meeting schedule in accordance with 24132 motion made by what need could I hear a second second second by L and the discussion on the meeting dates seeing none all
054in favor could I hear I I any oppos motion so Carri superintendent's report thank you um I'll be I'll be brief because we're going to probably go into a lot of this in detail on um at the financial uh committee on Thursday um but just to give a an update um you know we've spent the last week or so notifying staff and working with them it's been a challenging week in the district to say the least um so even though we only have two true um inli employees if you will through the process um it's still a lot of movement and a lot of uh change for many folks in the district so we had about 50 positions in the district that were open due to resignations um and retirements and vacancies so here we
055instituted a bit of a a bit of a u a freeze um early on kind of coming out of late winter winter when we had some Financial uh concerns to close the year and I believe some of that strategy helped to leave some positions open to help aid in the process um through this reduction so we had about 50 vacancies retirements and resignations so those were positions not people in them and then we had about another 48 more positions in the District where we reduced eliminated or made a programmatic change and so we did have to find homes for that second group of of people um but because we had so many vacancies um and available slots uh we were able to match the the folks who were reduced into other positions for which they
056were certified so it was a very detailed process we worked very closely with the unions to do that to Ure that we follow the contracts all of the different contracts that apply um to be able to offer um offer our folks a position um in another location somewhere else in the district so as you can imagine um you know we had everything from a sigh relief to um you know folks who are upset that they had to move schools and grade levels and and leave their co-workers behind um and maybe start a new a new program so um we're very sensed to that right now we're working with our staff we're going to have um more conversations coming in the next week we have some professional development coming up so try to invite people in
057we have a a big PD day on Friday and so we're we made offers to folks who were making some transitions to come and meet some of different departments and attend professional development schools where they'll be teaching if they choose to accept those positions um so we're working through that now so um you know we're we're really U thankful and grateful that we have so few actual uh folks losing their their jobs but it is a difficult time still in the district right now I um it will be so for the for the next few weeks until we close the year and start the year our main concern will be making sure that we open up school with a full staff so when you move a lot of folks um and plus you have a
058a tough budget cycle um it can scare people off so we want to make sure that we're able to still attract um folks to come to Dand for any continued openings that we may have and also retain the staff that we have that we just offer those positions to so we hope everyone stays with um how's that impacting our teacher diversity plan that's a great question um I I don't know if if it impacts the plan the plan to plan to create more diversity is still the plan um but I don't I don't think um actually we in this process we're actually putting more bilingual and and teachers particularly Hispanic teachers into grade level classroom positions um some of the program changes so that that does change things up a little bit but doesn't necessarily
059affect the plans that we have in place to continue to um increase the diversity in our LS can I yes it doesn't um do we have an update on the um AIS numbers we're in much better shape than we were I can give you I don't want to teach the parents who confirming this week but uh we did have I'm not sure if I I think I reported out that I did brok a deal with some local superintendents to increase the number of students that we were getting so that we can get that state aid and then both seats so um I believe we had 17 more come in and we're confirming so we we we invited them to come in off the list but now accepting so are you still interested you apply please
060take so we have U one of our one of our wonderful assistants Calling daily to remind to police confirm so um I can get an update and I can put that in our board I just wanted to let you know that I did see the um ad on TV yeah that's good that's good great thank you that's might got that out there for us I was concerned last time when you said you'd have to go ahead and see it so sure that we're getting our money's worth on the UL thank you now I know chel yeah okay and then the last uh piece really on the financial side you know we're going to be going over more numbers on on Thursday in detail so I'll be plent of time to ask some more questions there
061U the last thing is really about um update on pck and teacher evaluation so um there's been a lot of changes in teacher evaluation and the state has U set forth some new guidelines and so we have been meeting um sure Al your Stanford is probably notifying you and doing some different things so we're working very closely with Ed Advance uh L the corpo who's doing uh training with us we've evaluated um several different educational uh teacher valuation models incurring our own including our own current D model the rubrics everything that goes with that um we are going to have to submit um a plan that follows the guidelines and this board will have to review the plan and adopt the plan and that goes to see uh goes back to the state and they'll
062review it um again and give us back on it if we need to make any changes but we anticipate starting training with our administrators first um so we can be ready to start rolling this out with all with our teachers so um so you'll be seeing that at some point soon and U our P committee uh is meeting let's see when our when is our next meeting it's coming up in the next couple days first week of June we're going to have another meeting and we have start some training so uh once we nail down the pieces and the details we'll get that to the board for for your review and any questions that come with that that's it are there any discussion items as any board member like to bring to the front now
063I just have a question gladus on the future meetings June 11th we have the superintendent evaluation but that's also we we going to re that okay okay okay um so we move on to my report and I think I asked early how many people going to be able to participate in Memorial Day Parade only if the skies are clear no way so so far we have about five six people and we need to find out what time that we need to be there and we don't want to disappoint the group Lauren husman has worked hard to make sure that we have a nice Flo I've had a conversation with the um superintendent uh that we need to set up with this group and we might not be able to do until September uh just a
064special Workshop I was hoping that we could do it before but we know that the summer months we're all busy all the different graduations and people are going away but I would like to have that special Workshop set up before school Clos so I'm just asking you to keep a open date open please I don't know what date but I think that we need to do that we talked about earlier briefly the survey that uh um a presented to the group and I sent that survey over to the superintendent and she went through it and then she said you know she didn't see any problem with it we want to get that done and we would like to get that out to members at least before school Clos so that's a goal then the last
065sort of those goals tie in with what I'm sort of thinking and we need to have at least three to five goals of this for to sort of work alongside the superintendent now if you go back to January we sent out a list what do you what how do you feel what are the top priority that you want to deal with this year we started out with budget okay so now I need to pull that list back up and we have a overall discussion as to how those discussion and those goals going to work with the superintendent so I don't know who's going to be around this summer but I know I can't go anywh because there some other issues but you know we can have U Zoom we talk about certain things and so
066when September come we we can start moving on okay and even if you're on vacation you still can zoom so there's some a lot of little bit of work that we got to get cleared up and I like learn um the explanation so when we start having committtee meeting so everyone will know what their role is so every committee is going to bring their role when they set when we have our committees and you start your committee meeting so that's another thing that I think that we want to work on and then we can understand what our roles are as board how much important we can do as Bo okay uh Kate and the community relation committee we had talked about this earlier I had a conversation with the with the superintendent um I think
067with September the that we was talking about Community Affair engaging parents and students and everyone uh we need to have a conversation about that you and your community relation committee or whoever wants to participate in so we can have that set up for SE time okay so those are a couple of things and that's that's enough for me tonight so we'll get this information out to you have Cara put it in a form so um we can look at and again um Teresa we did the scheduling for our graduation and everyone should have received that and she did it by date right by date uh so everyone has it on their account I'm so yeah I I got to be logical so thank you anyway okay um if there no other discussion no other communication
068you all had communication at your desk please read it and act appropriate um I need a motion to enter into the executive session for the purpose I need a motion I'll make a motion of the Board of Education recess into executive session for the purpose of discussing the performance of in superintendent Dr car with possible action in public session motion made by Kate secondment by Mr janelli all in favor could I your I we're going to take a e e e I need a motion making a motion okay uh I'll make a motion that the Board of Education hereby Dr carmir to serve as superintendent of schools for the period July 1st 2024 through June 30th 2026 and I'm further move that the Board of Education authorizes chair person to execute the related Employment contract
069with suggested Corrections and the related memor of understanding on behalf of theard a second motion made by Kate second by Al could we have a roll call Al approved uh I'm sorry okay Al approve okay Michelle um State we're going to be presented with the final cont clarification okay is there going to be okay so you up okay I have questions yes okay y okay Louisa yes okay yes yes I'm calling you Mr J Mr Jan Mr Janell I'm sorry yes okay I would like to okay thank you okay okay could you to up the uh tally of yes yes so nine yes two extensions okay okay uh at this point we have appointed Dr C may as our superintendent um uh we have extended a two-year contract to her at this particular time and
070we like to say thank you welcome [Applause] I just I just want to say thank you very much um this has been a challenging and unprecedented year um and I I just want to say thank you for trusting me to lead the district um and I I will work very hard uh for you and for the the students and families in this District so thank you very much to working with all of you thank you first before we all I know we all trying to get home and I I want to thank everybody and this has been a very challenging year we've done a lot we had the budget we had all kind of you know flares went they went down and they went up some our hairs got wet and then we straightened it
071back out but we all are here for the same reason and that's make sure that our district continue to move forward and be a strong district and that we support each other and work together and there's no we all are going to have differences but we have to work out those different differences to move forward and I can tell you I'm not a drinking person but everybody want to have a hot cup of coffee with me okay I need a motion to make a motion to adjourn thank you move by Lisa second by F the