5-27-20 Danbury Board of Education Meeting

001liberty and justice for all Joseph Britain presents Rachel to Liske yeah Kate caneta here Gladys Cooper yeah Lauren dealer I don't know if you're on view I just want to make sure if you hear we're counting you not present Joseph desilva's president Catherine Hudson here research Nellie I can stretch your muted but I see you cat Cathy Molinaro okay well I don't see her on here does anybody else [Music] al Russo yeah and Amy's foligno here so I've got Lauren Daly and Catherine Molinaro currently not here we all get an opportunity to meet fabulous young students and our schools so we're gonna do the recognition diverse air [Music] dr. salia muted I do my best work okay I'm sorry all right you real can I get association public school superintendents out of the 169 districts

002that have an award that they that they they support and they sponsored we in our region do it together we normally have a gathering where we present this to the youngsters along with their families and it's it's a special award for community service contributions of the school contributions also to the academic culture of the school and leadership proven activities they've demonstrated in the in the schools through leadership activities that they may take on different projects so community service academic preparation and leadership are the key elements of the award and tonight we'll be recognizing students and what I'll do is I will start this time with ace with John Webber and then we won't go to Dan and then Westside Rogers Park Dan bread broad so are you with me John Webber yes I am thank

003you joy okay so it's two students that are being represented tonight our first is Madeleine joiner and Madeleine is a gift to the Danbury community as a member of the ACE family for four years she is a constant participant in our program she was a face painter and many of our annual holiday celebrations and as a driving force in our after-school art in music plugs she's taking advantage of many opportunities that expand her view of the world and that we offer it ace such as poetry hikes poetry festivals field trips and performance opportunities he'll casing her beautiful voice Madeline's generosity of her time and resources extends beyond EA's family that generosity extends into the greater community where she's volunteered for years with the local football organization as a cheerleading coach the commitment and time and

004effort has enhanced not only ace but other people in community she's volunteered for various other community events such as Halloween on the green for two years and has volunteered at virtually every fundraiser that ace holds Madeline has grown in her four years at Ace and the greater community has and will continue to benefit from the treasures of this young person in this small nurturing environment she has found her voice regardless of her challenges a voice that she will use to care for herself celebrate the accomplishments of others and be a resource to us all congratulations Madeline Alyssa yep so Alyssa Kubis never really needed aces and academic support she came to ace with a very supporting parent and a grade point average well above 3.0 that grade point average she maintained until graduating in January

0052020 a semester early academics has always been her anchor in high school and it continues today as a freshman in college however in the environment that's nurturing at a solicitor in many ways this shy woman with a long smile became a source of support for herself and others ace gave Alyssa Kubis the ability to recognize that she was a superpower and that the world has too many superpowers her superpowers can be seen in her leadership by assisting coordination of many a side cookies she made difficult decisions around friendships or overall well-being and she's an ambassador of goodwill by reaching out to others in a crisis and making sense out of chaos always maintaining her allegiance to the mission a vase by being a supporting and carrying agent of change Alyssa's greatest challenge has been to

006celebrate her own superpowers she is highly deserving of this award because she shares her superpowers and all aspects of her life Thank You Alyssa for being you Oh a green face that's good okay Dan Donovan Denver High School well good evening everybody we were here two weeks ago I brought you two fantastic students from Danbury High School and I'm gonna bring you two fantastic two more fantastic students first up is uh will go ladies first is Claire who is a senior at Danbury high school and although she has never been greatly drawn to sports or instruments she has always been drawn to the community at a young age she started going to church and that's what sparked her love for the community as a result she's been going to soup kitchens helping out at Jericho

007doing tag sales to raise money not only has Claire been involved in her community the church but in school as well she has earned the the opportunity to be part of the Key Club the National Art Honor Society Board of Governors and our district's portrait of a graduate the Board of Governors is an achievement of hers that she is most proud of not only because of position is vice president that she has found very rewarding and what they have achieved some of those major events north of Spirit weeks the homecomings all the different flexes that they run the virtual spear week that we had she has also spent time as I mentioned before on the steering committee of the portrait of the graduate which works with the entire district schools and businesses and more to

008learn what tools are needed to help students graduate high school and be successful in life and we wish her the best of luck next year I'm not sure if she's on but she deserves a round of applause anyone the next young man is a one of those unique boys or girls that come through the Danbury Public Schools Tyler Warren who's had brothers come through the district and the family very involved is a scholar athlete who strives to make a difference he was recognized as all FC AK all state all New England soccer player maintaining a four point two seven seven GPA he was named captain of the DHS varsity team in his junior and senior years which helped them to improve his leadership skills tyler has also helped lead the DHS unified basketball program with

009Miss Maisie for the past two years where he was able to help kids with special needs play the sports they loved while improving on his skills of communication patience and interactions while these two extracurricular activites attest to his willingness to help others and to be the best Tyler has also been involved in several other extracurricular activities such as a National Honor Society the Leo Club peer leadership varsity applause and varsity golf unfortunately their season was canceled this year despite being being busy participating in extracurricular activities he has maintained a high GPA has always remained paramount to him due to his commitments of both education and extracurricular he also happens to work at Dick's Sporting Goods because he delivered something to my car the other day appreciated Tyler and with that Island will continue to play

010soccer next year at Northwestern University graduate I hope you charged you've doubled in yes I was asked would they like to say something say something okay Madelyn would you what like to say something I just want to say thank you I just like helping people and everything so thank you for recognizing that and I appreciate it thank you it's also Madeline's was her birthday on Sunday and about a month ago I sent her an email saying happy birthday and she's so polite that she said thank you and then told me you're a month early yeah I was good to see you it takes the other day to mr. Donovan you charge them double digit Tyler he doesn't know really and thank you very much mr. Donovan you're welcome sir you deserve it you've put a

011lot in your parents have put a lot in it we appreciate him now did you say you go northwestern last next year yeah Wow they lived in Evanston for a long time no it will really and it's a great academic place but wish you the best thank you very much okay okay we have dr. LeBlanc ah Frank LeBlanc oh the Westside middle school I'm gonna recognize first Dylan Hannah see Dylan is uh is a 8th grade student at Westside missile Academy a mallet I'll never forget when she was in sixth grade she walked into the main office and she informed us that she was gonna be President the United States one day so much as she is the president of our student council and she's the vice president of our National Junior Honor Society holding

012those leadership roles she's made the school a very friendly and bright place to be she's also a dancer or would have been a dancer in our school musical Beauty and the Beast and she's participated in our other musicals as well she's really one of the most hard-working students and always willing to volunteer to help out others all this has a great smile as well as she's been on several of my evening shows that I've done for the students in my school so congratulate Dylan and I thank her I saw her parents as well Heather Michael are out there as well so darling congratulations okay and then second I'd like to recognize Christian for Nia he's a great learner as well and he's always willing to offer his helping hand also part of the National Junior

013Honor Society and you know honors the whole GPA of all times as well he's done multiple volunteer events with our school as well helping the Alzheimer's walk with West on these wrapped holiday gifts for the damage from all and of course he participates in our program we do with no Ridge reading to the k3 students up there dr. Seuss day Christians also pull across athlete and we want to congratulate him as well and I saw Christian there with his parents Richard and Christine what they like to say off you worse or just say hello so Dylan you wanna say anything and Christian we ready to go next we have ducted Zuleta at Rogers Park Middle School two students recognized was not able to make it but I do see that my second student read into

014aa no first he's an eighth grade student at Rogers Park he works hard at being a leader in our school community but showing kindness and supporting other students he's received many words at Rogers Park most importantly our pride award for helping others he's learned to realize that asking for help when trying to understand a difficult concept is a lifelong skill he tries to reinforce this with his peers at home he's taking karate for many years persevere when things become he is a great role model for other students at Radford our second student is kamila Dominguez kamila really epitomizes the superintendent's award criteria service academic promise of me she has been an honor student at revenues Park for the past three years she has consistently worked in service to others in academic matters from the peer

015tutoring and support as well as in a community manager matter through her active role as a student ambassador and a member of our Latinos of action class you know Latinos in action class she and her classmates tutor elementary students and our new arrival students her leadership skills of health charts would seem student director and this year's musical theater production of raging here and in addition she was voted by her peers to be the vice president for when he's in action class I was lucky enough the great pleasure of spending the day with her and her mom at great weight wake me in college back in December when Camilla and I sat on the panel still seated by M Henderson author of beyond the Big South discussing family in the intimate connection she did an amazing

016job representing her stuff her family and our schools Milla never backs down from a challenge nor hesitates to jump in and help teachers administrators and peers I have no doubt that she'll be one of the students advance talking about believers thank you thank you YUM I definitely want to say thank you for the opportunity and the encouragement you've done an amazing job so I definitely appreciate everything so thank you thank you congratulations thank you yeah terrific and we have our internet star coming up that's dr. Thomas that broads you middle school she with us how are you I'm real fortunate I think my guys are here Alex so you hear just one mutant say your ear because I hate talking if you're not here Alex yeah of course you're here thank you so much for

017showing up like somebody I have two students that are just extraordinary students I mean they're just excuse me Alex al-'ardi first of all she's a model student embodies the characteristics of diligence persistence kindness she excels excels like academically and she stands out I was a leader in the classroom as well as extracurricular activities this is evident because she was elected co-president at the National Junior Honor Society she participates in our unified sports program also she would have been the narrator of into the woods we missed it by three days but you know it is she got something she can carry with her also alex is kind she's assuming she's collaborative and I love the fact he has such a quiet confidence about herself I just think people really come in its very relaxed around her

018she have such passion for anything but I love the fact that she has a passion for global climate change alex is probably the only kid I know who will send you an email and asking permission and she can stage a walkout and that's exactly what she did she sent me an email and she planned it so it was during the lunch break and I figured out she was really trying to determine you know get her point across and that if kids would leave lunch to support a cause like that then she knew that she had been and what she did is she had almost all the eighth graders when I on the walk out and then she did a presentation and our team is always on um on climate change so she just possessed his

019determination to do things currently she's interested in being a special ed teacher so miss Thompson please keep that in mind so I would like to present Alex Alex you want to see something real quick yeah I'm very honored thank you for all of your support I've had like the best teachers and the best overall experience that brought you so thank you for supporting me you are so gratulations thank you and the next is a young man not many principals get to say they had somebody from kindergarten all the way up now activating from broad view as an 8th grader Matthew just has a love for learning he demonstrates his passion by his approach and execution of its edification I was in a class observing Matthew one day and he just happened to know all the

020branches of the government and knew who was in every branch and I remember one little girl turned around and looked at her I do know that and his response was I'm an informed and I'm an informed kid and I thought that was a perfect response he's a high honor student it's just now that it's just what he does when doing ever since he's good at bribe you he's constantly challenges himself academically to be the best version himself every trimester he seeks just volunteering volunteering opportunities in the community he not only helps but he also takes it on leadership roles he is a member of the National Junior Honor Society at broad view and he leads by example each and every day and he's very important he's got very supportive parents just like elect a liqu

021s' and we all know Bridget Girish used with supports our dam break public schools from this family museum ful is his dad who's a wonderful police officer and always helped us out at Pembroke so I just wanted to just take time just to acknowledge him you will see them again I guarantee you so Matthew want to say something you didn't fall asleep on me did you Matt I [Laughter] can't hear you Matthew thank you so much for everything you've done incredible pieces that years and I'm just Thank You congratulations Matthew yeah mom and dad as long as we're doing some recognitions here dr. LeBlanc oh did you just get an award about I know everybody would like to hear about the magazine would you like to announce that sure we've actually had some other some

022good news at Westside our we had three students in the state literary magazine receive publication state literary magazine and that's really exciting and then recently also we had a group of students qualify for the Nationals for National History Day and we had two of our students qualify for the Nationals for The Invention Convention so all those events and publications are virtual this year unfortunately the kids are not able to travel to the locations very proud of accomplishment of the students that are strong I just received it but all that's the other principle is anything you'd like to announce this opportunity anything in particular no okay all right well yes can I just say something very quickly just while I have the principals on I just want to say thank you to the secondary principals all

023the principals really for how hard they work but dr. Lebon can in particular was a real real help to me during the distance learning shift and I know I've sent a few emails but I just want to thank him publicly for his efforts and his support with helping to organize super-users and adding to the philosophical understanding of some of the things that you've incorporated into our program so I just want to say publicly thank you dr. before your hump it up thank you okay all right that's it thank you thank you participation sandy yep we have one as of right now one public participation from Dana O'Rourke the DHS PTO president she says good evening the Danbury high PTO would like to promote our light up the city blue and orange program we would like

024to see the city of Danbury in blue and orange from June 5th to June 12th to celebrate our class of 2020 we are asking all Danbury residents and businesses to show us their blue and orange it can be lights signs balloons streamers or anything else that you're welcome and that is it for a public participation tonight thank you okay real quick class and read that disclaimer okay okay due to the unique nature of the kovat 19 crisis and the limitations of technology members of the public who are Danbury residents are invited to send brief comments and questions via email in advance to DPS underscore public comment underscore b OE at Danbury k12 dot C T us we're gonna move forward okay I'll make the motion the Board of Education approves the items on the consent

025calendar exhibit 20 - 55 through exhibit 20 - 58 as recommended second of course it's Joseph Britain I reach little Eskimo hi Kate caneta I Gladys Cooper I Joe DaSilva all right Catherine Hodgson hi Richie Ginelli I Cathy Molinaro al Russa Amy Spoleto I I know the leaders is Aaron here deli I guess not she's doctors ladies you doctors ladies so on here you would you like to take this opportunity okay okay let me get my heroes back on it make sure I'm on there's some other things that are going on I'm in fact I will tell you then and I mentioned to you that I'm hoping that's fine that we have some regional approach to reentry things are evolving every day the rumors are going all over the place because we're hearing things about

026who's coming back next year and how many youngsters can be on of us and how many days will they be back who's kind of mantis is learning what are you providing for these are all things that are that we're dealing with and I will tell you it's quite perplexing for us and challenging and you know the issues are simply don't know what we're doing we have not explicit information so with that we still have to do some preparatory work so you know we have a group that we that that's meeting we've encouraged a regional group and they've met and I've asked Kevin to give a presentation they went through a few scenarios as possibilities I think they're coming around and focusing on the known Danone being what has been put out to us regarding social

027distancing and if we would have summer school what that model might look like and kind of overlay dad as a possibility but I will say with all candor to all of you we have no direction we are hoping for direction my sense is as we may find something out on Friday all that Kevin speak to that but we just can't sit and wait Courtney's had set aside money in a budget as you will see in order to purchase things he may need or provide transportation depending on what we get but we do have the workings of some guidelines let me say that that would be applicable to a plan if ending all we get from the state of which I hope we get very soon with that Kevin I'll turn it over to you is

028that put some on line yes yes and so miss Cooper we I know we still have students and families probably still on line I didn't know I know usually don't afford maybe we let them know they can leave if they wake up just didn't want them hanging out all night if it was unnecessary so I just wanted to provided a visual for the board in the community about re-entry recovery plans and update as you heard as you heard dr. Tsao mentioned we are current waiting for feedback and some formal guidance from the state and I just kind of wanted to walk the board in the community through kind of kind of the flow of information as we understand it so one going from left to right the the State Education Department receives information from our

029area near West around the state and so Sal has appointed me to represent Danbury with Ed advance with it advance there are a number of different representatives from the respective districts and in those meetings we are making recommendations and and reviewing you know multiple considerations for um how a reopening can look that information and if you go all the way to the right that information is brought to is eventually brought to the Commissioner of Education and he shares that information with the governor's statewide reopen task force and so and so we're hoping and expecting some official guidance as early as this Friday and my understanding is the commissioner's office as impressed upon the governor's office that it's necessary to have this information for our planning efforts and as you guys are probably aware you know

030a lot of our expertise and capacity will be leaving soon for summer vacation you know elementary principals teachers department heads etc and so for our planning efforts it's it's critical that we that we're aware that we're clear on what our guidelines are for the fall so I just want to bring everyone's attention to the middle we've had two kind of formal reentering recovery meetings and honestly we have focused on kind of the mitigation strategies or protocols that are going to be necessary to ensure the safety and well-being of our students and staff so everything from what you know what are the day-to-day operations look like in a classroom are we cleaning in between periods what common spaces be wiped down regularly what does this mean for when kids get off the bus so all of

031the questions that are coming up in a community where all kids wear PPE equipment will staff be required to wear it so we're reviewing all that information and and it's informing purchases for the district and how we're going and to make sure that you know our staff has the proper supplies to protect themselves and protect the greater greater school district like when Excel opened up as he opened up earlier we're anticipating some guidance from the state this week we feel like this information is critical to our planning efforts and once we have some updates will certainly be sharing that with the community and the board when it's available so that we we did hear Kevin that Friday may be a time yes okay so anyone at the state in a bad place and put Friday

032but yes isn't 213 they will change every week urgent but the regional meeting do you have another one scheduled regionally yes so we have a regional meeting we had one on Tuesday and another one on Friday at the Tuesday meeting and Friday meeting we reviewed five or six different scenarios of how schools can look when they reopen in terms of instructionally but the business would look like how many days kids would come to school what grades would actually come to school and you know what the costs associated what that might look like and see if it's reasonable I it's in that work I mean going from left to right in that diagram that PDF that I had up for you that will inform that information will be brought to the directors they were coordinate all

033of that information bring it to the deputy commissioners and the Deputy Commissioner will share that with the Commission of Commissioner of Education and if the governor is going to refine his guidance in any way it will probably come from it I don't know any questions would be a good time chorus if I'm sorry I just I guess I just want to express some concern over this I mean is looking over the operating budget which we're gonna be getting to for April and I know we're running at a deficit on transportation even though we haven't been bussing the kids because of that enrollment we had and year and if the restrictions that they're they're talking about you know or the guidelines that they're talking about for how many kids are supposed to be on transportation occur

034I am concerned that that's gonna really [ __ ] our operations even if we were to hypothetically do this in sessions which I'm I'm just throwing that out there I think it's gonna it's going to be a real problem so I'm just wondering if any of that's been communicated to the mayor's office loudly and often okay as recent as this morning Kate I talked to the mayor who I guess you know I guess this advisory group they call down to the mayor's then one that they need to make a decision either way we're going to do a or B or C and then when that decision is made you may have just heard what Kevin said one thing that they are doing they're attaching a cost to all of these plans you know most of the budgets

035around us have been reduced and we're all wondering the same thing how how can we possibly you know move into that that culture with the budget that we have we do have some money I think in our case if almost so it I think it's somewhat of acidity at one point three million dollars it's part of the covert money but that something could be encumbered for many different things so I we've asked for if you do this what can we expect what kind of money you know can we expect the reimbursement so my guess is if I were betting I would say that you'll probably see something different at the elementary than the secondary but transportation will be part of it also have social distancing as part of it where classrooms will have to be

036divided with Kate is another expense terms of who's gonna be with that you know who's teaming with what Kate sound and Kim to make these things happen so as buses it's cleaning it's all of them so we've communicated that Kevin's on that committee and he asked but that's as far as we've gotten and just one one additional question for you both thanks dr. Sal I appreciate that [Music] in terms of and I know that this is the conversation whether or not there's gonna even be school in the fall if this becomes a situation that's financially not feasible for us to execute does that mean that we're gonna be looking at whether or not we're going to be putting kids physically back in these buildings or does it mean we would be looking at spending money

037upfront to you know try to meet all the guidelines and get kids in the physical school building in the fall do you have a sense of that yet did you need to clarify that for me please I guess what I'm wondering is if if the guidelines come down and these decisions are made perhaps by the state about what we have to do in order to maintain a safe environment for the kids and that's not a financially feasible thing for us to do for whatever reasons I'm wondering if that means you know we would look at at doing additional remote learning in the fall or if we would push to have you know in in person learning until we don't have the budget to operate anymore well let me come back around to your first question

038when we spoke to the mayor two weeks ago that was on the table if in fact they come back to us and we cannot handle it almost what happens do is in August that we're going to go back and answer something there isn't any way that the board is going to be responsible now the answer I don't know okay is that if the if the come if the boy if the State Board makes a decision like you will that's one thing if they say you would have the option to do it now that's a different thing so I don't know if he'll permit a hundred and sixty nine towns to make their own decision so that that that's exactly where let us know if you're going to give us guidelines or mandates and then if

039they gave us that that we can intellect intelligently answer that question you know you'll have a cadre of youngsters who whose parents already have indicated on a survey question whether or not they wouldn't feel comfortable in sending their youngsters what do we do at that lunch and then you have similar you have staff that has our challenge yeah you know what do we do with that step so we can't answer it until someone says this is the direction we need to go that's why we need something so badly so that's the best I can do with that that's that's great thank you yeah in my I suspect from Kevin and cell both of your comments that we don't know the answer yet because we don't have any answers we don't have any guidance it is

040there anything you need us to do or other than scream at all of the powers-that-be state local in everywhere else we can find them that we need more money is there anything you need us to do or not yet I think if anybody has up to talk to our delegations who they've always on the same page with us we've never heard for them to say look you know have the folks please give a decision to us because we've got a plan the best night I think that would be helpful yeah I think that's under I think that's understood by the delegation I'm not sure that that's the governor's office and I don't know what the time schedule is there but I'll certainly happy to pass it on as much as I can't do that that

041would be that is the deal right there thank you for doing that if you do just a quick question I know we're planning for the unknown their plan are their contingency plans in place for after we reopen and let's say we have two reclose well let me just go to your second party if we close we will go back to March eleven which is distance learning that would and we would do that better I mean just okay but it's we don't know how to get there if that in fact does happen because that's been the conversation I know some people talking about should we start earlier there's a wave and if that wave comes and you have to close you know it's all the big if but you know if God forbid something happens and

042we do return and we have to then go back to the distance learning that would be our option there was their only option Rachel some some of our protocols that we've that we've landed on we feel like you will position us better moving forward so if there is an outbreak of some sort in the community the contact tracing protocols we feel like we'll be able to nail it down and we you know we may not have a choice but to close all schools but we feel like the contact tracing will give us the ability to just close out some schools if it's if we feel like it's contained so those that some of the work that's happening now okay I'm glad to hear that there is a combination of the other piece just to add

043is that we're also starting to engage in the feedback from the school level administration on like what went well with distance learning what maybe could we build and improve upon so we're already looking to put those plans in place so that we can do distance learning you know better than where we left off at the end of the year which is another important component just so we're ready to roll it out if needed absolutely thank you and if I could just add to that a little bit I think one of the that we had a you know probably at least a couple dozen if we had a had a couple do-overs in March what would they be if we had just two or three more days what would we do with the kids differently to

044prepare them and so we have been making a list of those things in terms of training kids and how to use some of the programs you know with adult help and show them how to navigate some things where you know once they got home they were frustrated or they just couldn't quite do it the parents weren't quite sure so there definitely is a list of do-overs and we'll be concentrating on a few of those right when they come back if we come back to so you know if something should happen and they pull the plug on us attending in person that we would have a front-loaded a few of those pieces in before we let the students go back you know back home we also talked a little bit about briefly today we had a

045conversation around summer school and we talked about you know maybe finding a way to send kids home with with blocks for modeling a composition notebook things like that the kids just didn't have at home and I'm you know we're wondering now if it's if it's feasible maybe to create little individualized learning packs for kids if they go home with they take every day back and forth just you know some modest things but definitely tools so if they're in class they're using their own we don't sanitize them but when they go home if they shouldn't come back they have some learning materials in their bag that can support our curriculum so there's a few things we're tossing around now and you know we're looking some of those that out in anticipation of you know having to

046shift in either direction yes ooh me have in elementary school a specific class give it a twenty it's I'm assuming there's a distance requirement let's assume that there's six feet yes it would seem to me that generally speaking the classroom would encompass perhaps two clatters because you can't maintain that distance among classrooms and then who would teach those two classrooms plus the element of parents who don't want to send their kids to that class don't want to keep them home teaches them how do you break out teaching three parts where you had one teaching only teaching the entire twenty kids now you got three separate areas who was teaching no words setting up model classrooms I'm to go and to set them up to see how exactly if what six using that use the current

047protocol six feet of ours what are we talking about my assumption is the same as yours probably to classrooms if that is the case and we will have a team teaching situation that team would may be complete have to work with our union obviously that team would probably made up of a certified teacher along with the instructional a paraprofessional that will be deploying the plans to the to the to the let's say the two sections of kids that the teacher is planning for that would be the kids that are in school the youngsters that would be home would not be part of the classroom that that particular class even if you split it somehow it wouldn't be half at home and half at school because that would be certainly problematic these are some of what

048we've done which we've kind of played out some of these scenarios but as someone that think was Kate asked me about the transportation if you think about doubling your staff you have approximately a thousand thousand teachers I'm gonna take a shot at this and maybe 750 or so maybe classroom teachers so you're gonna need you know all of them assign someone to work with them so it'll be in a whole hands-on approach but they will not be all certified but we got to work with the union come around so in conclusion in answer to my question my summation would be this is the stupidest thing that's ever designed your thought oh did you through all these hoops her all these enormous cost taken away from education as opposed to continue with the development of the

049sophistication that you've done with the online learning for a number of months until this thing gets into hang I mean it sounds to me that there's nobody that's in control and it's it's ludicrous absolutely ludicrous I don't know how you're gonna measure any kind of student performance it's mind-boggling absolutely mind-boggling and I don't know who you talk to or who talked to whether it's the governor or your Commissioner then these people shouldn't be an educator I mean it's absolutely stupid you put it aside like you said close to a million dollars you're taken away against out of Education dollars stupidity absolutely stupidity and what happens with public what happens in public opinion let's say a good part parents don't want to send their kids to school what do you do then then you print your

050plans are more complicated because you've got as you said the distance the physical distance that you're creating with Jalbert plus the other fact of having to dedicate the kids at home it's mind-boggling just mind-boggling preaching to the choir doesn't man all right I mean it there's no getting excited because nothing's handed you might as well wait till something handed down to him saying it like we just don't know who to I think utility I know as I said about 15 minutes ago I can't wait we have to have some of these scenarios the bus company is waiting I mean here's an example if they split us how do you do it if you have an elementary kid and you have a middle school kid and they're on different days so that we do this by

051alpha we can't do it by sector of 10 there's so many things we got to talk through that we need to apply on what what it is that they want to see you know it's my concern is I've seen I've worked with Courtney and I've seen these budget numbers we every year we begged for money we go one step forward and two step back when we're putting we're putting aside a million dollars for nonsense that's taken away from our education budget 1 million dollars but taken away from occasional and and that's only and a guesstimate it could be substantially more and we don't know who's gonna pay for it if the state has that much more money to waste on stuff like this I mean something's wrong it's finish it it's anything else it's fair

052to say that no matter what we do we're gonna be wrong because if we don't go back to school in the fall parents are gonna scream that they have to go to work and there's no daycare and then if we send the school kids to school there's gonna be risk and if the split session there's going to be risk and parents who were stuck because there's no insufficient take care yeah and if we don't do that there's gonna be people who are uncomfortable about sending their kids to school there's no right answer especially we're right now into the fact that we don't know the guidance I mean if school had reopened this spring I wasn't sending my kids I would like to err on the side of safety I guess out you're absolutely correct you're

053correct and and I agree with that wholeheartedly and whatever we do we need to do the safest thing and I am happy to tell Sal and Kevin I'm happy to tell you what everybody else that I will back up whatever the safest decision you guys believe is the safest decision I am going to support and as a parent you guys have done a great job on distance learning so far it hasn't always been smooth but you built a plane while flying a plane and I am amazed by how well it's working especially this how badly it could have gone but no matter what we do there's there's no right answer and there's no wrong answer it's we're gonna be right no wrong or is a wrong answer Joe I love those wrong answers for sure

054but no matter what we do we're gonna be solid he's not gonna be we're not gonna be real course someone's not going to be happy we can't make everybody happy that's for sure so we air on the same kid children kid get the Tonopah CS fever the bus driver leaves them at the bus stop and says goodbye so what do you do with those I mean for the educators and I don't know whether this is Kara or Kevin or sell any one of you pedagogically speaking is it different I have to assume that it's better for elementary school kids to be there more and it's easier to have high school the middle school kids a B or you know alternate days or something I'm like crazy on it we've talked about it sure you know

055the youngest kids struggle the most so your kindergarten first and second grade and particularly because they didn't have a lot of Technol we didn't our k5 level was not flooded with technology prior to this so they weren't facile with some of the tools and navigation you know some kids are naturally at home things like that but by and large we had greater saturation level at the secondary level so kids kids just knew how to do certain things and it was much easier transition and many of our teachers at the secondary level we're using Google classroom anyways - - so they're compare familiar so and then you know grades four and five not not as bad but when you get down to the little ones you know it you know submitting work and trying you know

056trying to explain how to click on something and find something with a kindergarten I love a second grader yeah so it becomes very challenging and so again if we had some time with them before this happened and we had these devices in their hands and they were used to using them and logging on one of the greatest barriers with getting kids on in the beginning was just great you gave me a laptop I have an email address I have no idea what I'm supposed to do next Oh energy so those are some of the challenges and again if that's part of the do-over we if we got our young young ones in but to your other question though along the lines we do a lot of small group instruction at the elementary level because you

057know the differentiation needs and developmental needs vary and so doing that in person with young young kids is important so you know in this environment our youngest learners we would you know definitely love to have them in person if we could our ESL and our special education students course yeah thank you we would like that but children haven't even reached the age of reason how do we get them to play by the rules while in school of course I think to Kara's point just to highlight there are some special populations such as special education that even though they may be I played students we're going to have to think about a little bit differently um likewise you have ESL students with different levels of language proficiency that need more support so there's certainly you know

058Elementary versus secondary there are some common themes there as far as what's good all kids but there are certainly special populations that are gonna have to be thought about as we unroll this lamb thank you very much when we figure out what it is they ask then we can start you know shakin and bakin I guess is the best I can say thank you thank you action item a some motion that the Board of Education accept the April 20 2008 results analysis in accordance with exhibit 20 - 59 second any questions Courtney can I just ask you a quick question because I was I was looking and I mentioned before I was looking at the transportation budget and that's that's a little bit more than we were expecting to spend when we got that appropriation

059for the emergency appropriation from the city where the transportation costs factored into that in the transportation that exceeded the credit we got for the closure yeah so so you can see that there's a gap in the transportation budget this year and I can just say typically what we had been doing in the past was when we had an experiencing insurance that was better than expected we used that to cover some backs okay so and we had we had added additional busing after that ad you know the enrollment ad that we got was the one point six seven five I think about 300 300 k was used to offset the transportation cost but when we talk through next year's budget you'll see we did shift the money to account for what we expect next year and

060we're also getting a credit from sta for what we negotiated for during the closer towards next year's budget you know which which when we go through it in the Finance Committee tomorrow I'll point out you know it does build a challenge for us the following year so you have to look at it from a multi-year pickle okay thank you any other question seeing none could you do the roll call for tonight Joe Britain i retook Zaleski kate caneta i Gladys Cooper aye jotta silver all right Catherine Hodgson hi rich Ginelli hi Kathy my attorney hi al Russo L your muted I think that's an I wait okay yeah Amy's ballina I all in favor motion so Carrie Thank You Rachel could you do our action item be sure I move that the board of education

061except for second reading and adoption policy six one 14.8 emergencies and preparedness as accepted by the policy committee I will second that second meant by K any questions to my knowledge we didn't receive any feedback I know scare abound on Oh Zandra so I haven't received anything seeing none all in favor - motion roll call Joe Britain I reach out sir Leslie I Kate caneta I Gladys Cooper okay Joe de Silva is not there right now Catherine Houston hi Richie Ginelli hi Kathleen arrow I purchase al Russo I a miss ballina i I guess we're gonna mark Joe's an abstention perhaps because he is not there okay okay emotion so Kerry thank you action item see on the commotion that the Board of Education except for second reading and adoption policy to one 31.1 appointment

062of a designee for superintendent as amended and accepted by the policy committee motion made by cake again secondly by regional any questions again I haven't received any feedback on this just so you know I know Kara has not indicated to me that we received a feedback yes okay Joe Britain i rachel cholesky keep caneta i Gladys Cooper hi Joe de Silva all right Catherine Hodgson hi Richie Ginelli hi Cathy Molinaro owlusa I Ami's Polina aye motion carries unanimously the motion has been care okay so continue report thank you thank you let me start Danny you're still here dance oh yeah there he is then thank you dan you have a I know the knee ask reporters comments it kind of goes back and forth so drift but there were some staining recommendations I just thought

063perhaps you might give him a thumbnail sketch over that blue find clues you ask stuff I will start by saying that Danbury high school did receive its full accreditation yeah we have not received the full report yet the summary does state that we have been accredited once again ongoing accreditation which is a real positive thing for us so for the next ten years we are in a credited high school and that's a you know that's a lot to do with the leadership at this level all the way down through administration to our teachers who work with our students every day and our students would do a good job the knee ask committee was impressed with Danbury high school one because of its size and how it was run and how well it went but just

064the atmosphere that was in it and some of the I'll give you a brief update on some of the stuff that we were commended for a lot of it had to do with rubrics and personalization of instruction our small group which Kara had mentioned our small group instructions at the high school are formative assessments that we use the communication and the safe and positive school climate that they found Danbury high school to have you know and I wish I could they loved our open enrollment flex our health services the coordinated efforts that we had the dedication of our custodial staff you know our new shiny building in the back and the black box on the side they were impressed by all that stuff you know so with a lot of great things that are happening

065at Danbury high school that we control up there are going well and the committee saw that and a three-day visit it gave us great commendations for things like that the Commission did express concerns for several or I shouldn't say two different categories of one of which they ended up putting us up on warning and warning is is is not a good thing there's different levels to Annie asked report and warning is one of the lower ones that means if we don't fix this we have to write a special report by February 2021 and if we don't fix some of these things that they sent us then our credit a ssin can be in jeopardy so the big ones that they said that we off the top are you know staffing levels materials technology equipment supplies

066facilities they do not support the full implementation of 21st century curriculum overcrowded hallways inadequate uneven heating and ventilation plumbing and bathroom issues 88 compliance and elevated risk furnitures and fixtures insufficient science labs inadequate space for deliveries and student privacy and deliver services for students and health services outdated corrosive toxic chemicals insufficient technology and support for that technology excessive class sizes and teacher student loans in an adequate number of licensed school counselors insufficient funding for operational supplies so for the standard on curriculum community resources we were put on warning so what has to be fixed by that time is that you know class size and the student loans must be reduced certified licensed counselors an adequate number the sight and plant support delivery of high-quality instruction overcrowding inadequate heating as I said repair two pipes and

067see building bathrooms that are fully functional and things like that so while we're doing a lot of great things up at dam your high school there's a certain level of frustration that comes from me as the principal because a lot of those things in the warning I just mentioned I do not control so I'm gonna look to you as the board Sal dr. Sal as the superintendent and the city to get a lot of these things resolved in a very quick time I don't know how we do that I know what the budget problems what we're gonna do about that but these are things that I don't control I don't control the piping I don't control you know the bathrooms and things like that so they're there's things that we need to fix but overall

068Danbury high school did get accredited as I they were very impressed with what happened and was going on at Danbury high school so we are credited for the next 10 years they may have any questions I can't Kate I'm just learned we get a copy that list mr. Donovan I think that would be really helpful absolutely fell husband thank you we just got it a little while ago did we say that list to all the board members please Dan would do me a favor please send it to Kara yes appreciate that would you please do that okay let's talk about the moving up ceremony and graduation update sure so one we have a number of elementary schools who are requesting to bring some closure to the year in a safe way we are reviewing the

069the the k5 principals request and reviewing reviewing those requests with the Department of Health this week and then our principals will be able to communicate something to their respective community soon for graduation I know principal Donovan's talked about his school last week and in plans for Danbury High School in addition to I know John Webber had also shared some plans he had we are reviewing region it reaches graduation plan and so that will be part of the review with the k5 moving up ceremonies and then in addition to that we have Terrans on the line to speak to how Adult Ed is planning to move forward with their graduation good evening everyone actually for we normally have our graduation at Western Connecticut at the Performing Arts Center but we were told that facility is not

070available to us so I reached out to Dan Donovan and we spoke actually earlier today but we're going to do something very similar to what the high schools doing we're going to have a drive-through graduation ceremony at Danbury High School tentatively on the 18th of June so we are working out the details right now like some of myself and Dan earlier today and he said that that should be fine we're going to honor and celebrate our graduates we have nearly 40 a potential graduates at this point and we're going to work that so we can honor them and their accomplishments this year so dan could you please go over the high school I had a nice meeting with chief Ridenhour kara pronti and chief wheedle earlier in the week to solidify our plans and ask

071parents just mentioned it's somewhat of a drive through we are trying right now and we're hopefully after you know tonight we'll be able to send out at gasify over the instructions and you get a couple of Google map drawings that we're gonna have for people to understand it but essentially the front entrance to de Vries will be closed everyone needs to go to the light and come through East Gate down the parking lot side up through the do not enter and they'll get out at the first stop sign right by the big crosswalk your graduate will get out we have it we're gonna have it roped off and marked off so everyone's six feet apart and stuff like that and when it's the their child's turn to go their car will pull up to where

072the handicapped ramp is one person will be allowed to get out of the car to take photos but we will also be streaming it live with sterling Miller and taking pictures with dr. Oberon it doesn't normally of me on the stage with the graduate handing them the cover you know if anybody wants to come down they are more than more than invited to come in there because there's no way I'm possibly standing there from 9:00 to 3:00 in the middle of June so if anybody wants to come down and wonder why so after that they take their pictures they leave the stage they walk down to the auditorium entrance actual get the actual diploma and the reason we do that is so we we can't know who's coming up to the podium before they get

073there but they can hear their name and have that ready for them when they get down to the end then we're gonna have another kind of picture stationed right by that little garden outside and then they're gonna get in the car at the stop sign with their family and they're done we have to get through forty-five students an hour which doesn't seem like it's a lot but you're trying to take nice pictures and you have diplomas and organize and parking and stuff like that you know a minute 15 seconds per student is not a lot so it's going to be hopefully a steady flow there will be if the board gives permission to go ahead and do this there will be a letter going out tomorrow like I said with directions and all of that

074I was just waiting for tonight to go through and have all that it's gonna be controlled for about 45 people I said per hour starting at 9 o'clock in the morning and at at 3 o'clock in the afternoon on June 10th 11th and 12th you can't control the weather we do have tents that we can use to cover graduates and things like that we believe we have a pretty steady plan with the police have it with our safety advocates and some little volunteers that will be there helping us and a class advisors and a question Dan are you limiting it to a certain number of people per car one car per family are they is everyone wearing masks one car per family you know and no oversized buses or trailers or anything like that because

075you'll never make the turn you have to go out that do not enter make a pretty sharp left-hand turn so they'll never make it you know if if you have a Honda Accord or you know you're gonna have less people than you do if you have a suburban but not everyone's gonna be able to get out of the car anyway I don't see that happening so that's gonna be a problem for us there everyone will be masking gloves the students are allowed to remove their masks to take pictures standing next to me it'll be a table between me and the Graduate where you know we're not going to be handshaking like that but we will then handing off the diploma case to them and stuff like that was concerns from chiron t proximity of people

076how many people on stage we are gonna track which graduates do show up on which days at what time so if there is some sort of outbreak or they can trace something back we can say what people were at their high school at this day at this time we're also taking precautions with the custodial staff to make sure that we every after you know midpoint in the day we have a little bit of a break we're going to wipe everything down and then at night again I have a question Dan it's Catherine Hudson are you talking about the area near the black box no right in front of the school by the flagpole so you're talking about coming in from Eastgate Road no instead at the front of the school yep the farthest schools gonna

077be closed off because what it can do is it allows us we measured it out the other day we're gonna do if anybody's ever been to the ferry it takes you're over to Long Island you know they line you up in rows there's one thing we're not good at at Denver high school especially those kids driving is backing out there we go okay even backing out so we're gonna line you up there's two rows of ferries and if we do that between the blue lot which we call it which is right in front all the way back to the where that little S curve is we can jump we can fit 88 cars we only need 45 per hour so I think we have more than enough room and then they'll send 10 cars at

078a time around that curve and we'll just keep it flowing okay we'll be out tomorrow I don't want to take over the screen no that's fine so you won't be known who's gonna be graduating I'm sorry I lost it hello cigars yeah glad as we lost you she froze them here there you go here you now there you go we can hear you okay Mike are you going to know who's going to breath way only so you know ABCD coming on the one day CD no you're not doing it that way here we are we are doing yeah a through a through f graduates on the first day okay and then she threw oh great Sunday - and then he graduates on day three we have them broken down within that day - nine to

079ten slots of nine to ten 10 to 11 11 to 12 to 1 1 to 2 2 to 3 and within the lots of kids are assigned for there's 45 kids purse first lot I have a question Dan so Amy it's too early I asked this question but I'm gonna ask it so how can we help how can happen board members help I can't like I said you're more than welcome to come but again I can't invite everybody to come to everything I don't know if you'd want to but because we're only a lot of certain numbers of people you know they don't want more than you know five people around the staging area any given time so let's say if dr. Sol wanted to come down and take some pictures with the kids I

080have to land the stage because on the stage there was a lot of supposed to be on the stage and that proximity with their masks off or me in the Graduate so I mean I don't know if there's much you can do my administrative team has done a fantastic job with going through this and researching and looking and taking all the things that have been sent to us from you know staff members parents friends my relatives who are saying hey this is a great idea we research that we take little bit from each one I think the biggest thing is is you know we don't know how this is gonna go we think you have an awesome plan it's gonna go so well so I imagine we may make changes as the days go on

081if not from one day to the next but we think we have a pretty solid plan on how this is go but there's nobody around here or aren't too many schools that graduate seven hundred and you know basically seventy-five students so we don't know how it's gonna go did just for clarity then so then on Sage he's got a pearl said I think that's what Amy's wondering of how we can help but just so that we we have clarity on that also are you saying if it rains it's a go yes we don't have the time to do it again I mean obviously if it's thunder and lightning it's we're not gonna go but if it's just remaining we have ten setup for everybody and things like that so I know people are anxious so

082it'll be good I think we have a letter going out this Friday so all you want to include something in there we'll make sure that we send it out to parents with a brief description that'd be great yeah we're planning on I mean that's the problem we're having is the brief descriptions like four pages long of instructions well yeah no I think you just do some both we will be graduating over three days it will be reckon one two three four more details we'll come to the high school parents that's where we're good to go I think tomorrow we're gonna unleash the plan of that you know the other one is the car parade cap and gown distribution which will be June 5th did you want the board tell the board what it is the

083June 5th is the day we're gonna be giving all of the seniors their cap and gowns that is going to also involve a car parade for we limited the DPD limited to a hundred cars starting at Rogers Park coming up Main Street at 11 o'clock to Danbury high school I've invited the DP other DHS staff to come and park and stay at their cars one spot away from each other and kind of quote unquote tailgate and say hello to the graduates as they drive by and pick up their and grounds and we have about and I spoke to Kara Protea about this about groups of five working at different letters of the alphabet and each person's kind of assigned to boxes so you're not having people rummage through other boxes you're assigned you know box

084a through a b and your job is to get those out to people and things like that we have another good that's a lot of details to that one but we have a good plan for that but i see that one more as a party atmosphere a good time for the kids let the staff say look I can't have the staff at graduation because it's too many people so that one will be a little bit more hectic than graduation but it should be a fun time and a good way to celebrate our seniors I have invited the class of 2020 parents to decorate signs no bigger than 30 by 30 and plant them on the hill in front of Danbury high school to see if we can fill up that hill with congratulation signs we

085have you know because we didn't have you know the giant stage a smaller one the sound person all the police that we need we've taken some of those expenditures and we're buying you know these balloon towers and more balloons and banners and things like that to try to get the front of Danbury high school to look as festive as it possibly can for three days so let me ask a question the on that day people are going to be lined up can board members and line up and sure they can maybe a me maybe that's today to do it yep it'll be there from 9:00 to 2:00 the parade you can jump in the car parade if you want the parade starts at 11:00 so I imagine they'll be at the high school 11:30 and

086I expect that to be the busiest time you know that and we're just either you can stay by your car or you can plant six feet away on the sidewalk in a lawn chair along as your masked and gloved and you can do whatever you know and just big signs that say congratulations and wave to kids that's good thank you okay thanks Stan I'm sorry someone had a question I'm not sure I it was Katherine Hutchins again so Dan what you're saying is they're starting at Rogers Park yes and they're going to the high school yes and they're gonna just come through the front like normal and just get their cap and gown there nope they're gonna do the same plan as graduation the front top one's gonna be closed they're gonna go through East

087Gate okay you pull into the high school from East Gate you make that first right into a parking lot and we're gonna line them up just like that if we have an overflow of cars we're gonna use then use the black box parking lot and what we refer to as Alaska which is the new parking lot because it's so far away right and then we'll have them there and if it really gets super crowded we were going to use the student parking lot with staff and safety having it help to hold students there and then send them around to the front and so you only need the students doing this you don't need the parents correct unless they're being driven right I don't need parents blasted that the parents actually drive in the car parade

088okay you know as I mentioned before we have trouble backing up at Danbury high school right it imagine streamers you know noisemakers waving to their friend like that you know the over-under was for rear-ended accidents we thought so we want I would you know we're hoping it says it in there the parents drive and allow the graduate to have a good time right okay all right that's what I wanted to know I was worried about that thank you okay Dan great good job let's hope it goes wrong it does it rain thank you Kovu protocol for staff Kevin D we have something like that or Kim yeah so um we put something out last week actually I just want to say I was listening to Dan talk about the numbers and I'm gonna go tell

089my kids this is why you need to learn math there it is right there in real life so we were asked to or we decided to put together a protocol because what started to happen for us in the last couple weeks is something that's going to continue to happen to us as we continue to roll forward and that is that some of our employees employees are coming to work on site and it is inevitable that some of them will come and report symptoms for contact with someone who is kovat positive so about a week ago we rolled out a protocol for our administrators so that they would kind of have a cheat sheet for what to do if someone does approach them to share that information and just so you know what we've done for

090right now is it rests heavily on notifying the HR department because we do have someone wholly dedicated to leaves of absence and illness and also Kathy O'Dowd who is our health coordinator our nurse coordinator and together the process of assessing who else might need to go home in an area that decision is gonna be made in as much of real-time as we can make it so we thought it was important to really get something out in writing to these folks so that they would know how to react and what to do on the spot so it's the kind of policy and I think it's a good example of what we were talking about at the beginning of this meeting that these are living breathing documents they're gonna change with every twist and turn so the

091more folks we bring in the more that policy may change but we're starting to it's an example of how we're starting to layer in some basic policies that Kevin's been talking about so that ultimately by the end as you noted Rachel if we have to pivot at some point we're gonna have and of our documents ready to go so I see it as kind of a slide up and down but I think we just want to let you know that that's an example of what we've been doing that's gonna as I said morph over time as we get more information from the state and local leaders any questions thank you can I have two items madam chairman may I bring him up please yes we were there was a request that possibly our broadcast be

092you know multiple language we are looking into that Kara has found the option on Google gets got to work where translator but that's going to be possible as we move along with these distance learning so that's we couldn't do it tonight but we're working on that just let you know that was a request thank you also just in general facilities I just want the board to know we did I asked actually this morning Kelly how is Granville coming along sorry um so they are on schedule um they're working on the rooms they've received the permit approval from the city and I have been regularly communicating with Bob who is the builds are there regarding for example actually between yesterday and today they did some walkthrough for the kitchen where the install needs to go with

093our staff we have the post things up for the staff that we need to be hired for the build for next year and knock on wood I'm hesitant to say it but I think we are on schedule to enter the building the third week of August is our anticipated entry day okay also for the board we did mention we have Sacred Heart we know that one we're also looking at house one Street huh Cosby Crosby Street there Bobby renewing after two years that's coming up so we have some cushion also you may recall before we left before all this happened we were looking at various facilities you know you heard that knee ask report right about facilities and crowdedness you know we're trying to deal with that and so that that's ongoing so there are

094some some of the questions that came up what's reimbursable if we purchase a building versus building going so I mean there's things like that going around the state has not said anything but hopefully they will shortly they had promised to come down and look at some facilities to see if they would do that but you heard Dan you know we like to solve some of these space problems if we can and that would be one of the things so Jo at some point we'll probably even have to have a meeting it says we get some clarity on what the state might don't want to do for us I don't know do we have anything else about facilities that we're working also on on the place it's across the street from the central office for storage

095it's coming available so that we could have some storage areas I think that's worked out so we seem to be ok everything anybody anything they had the facilities I don't want to forget anything I'm the facilities decided while we're just quickly on the subject so I was we had another like a community meeting and some of our legislators were there from the Danbury delegation and I was communicating to them just kind of what we've been doing with the Osborne tree with the ED specs and and everything like that and forgive me if this information is stale it's been like a week or so when I brought up the Osborne Street project they said that there wasn't gonna be reimbursement or they heard the legislators heard that there wasn't gonna be reimbursement for the the part

096of the project I was for like the office space and you know and then we Antonio at the facilities meeting said that there was gonna be no issues with the reimbursement so I don't know if you know if there's an update I know I do I just got something so you just got something today from dn that we had to send them the approvals that the board did know that to file the application but I will ask no I didn't hear anything okay they're the legislators are gonna go get clarification from from Casta to see if anything changed but that was just something that was was weird because now there were two things going on about the reimbursement no no I didn't hear I didn't hear anything you you know I think one of the

097requests you're gonna hear from Danbury is to do what they did when the MV addition into high school to see if they'll Bonin up to 80 or 90 percent but I didn't hear anything that was born wouldn't be covered I don't know if anybody on my cabinet is hurt or anything but I I will ask Kevin any information around that hearing none okay but I'll check Joe you know and see what I can find out awesome okay we have the budget discussion okay well I will turn it over Courtney but I will to learn I talk some of the things in here are need some explanations and more depth and we'll do it just know that Dean had pointed out a few things that we've incorporated in the budget and we'll talk more we had

098started on it this year there's some things that are lingering that I don't know what those solutions are but things that the board can put into our our plan we've tried to incorporate Courtney is going to explain how we asked for X amount and we're at and how we're braided our funds so with that Courtney can you kind of go over what we're doing here please so tonight I'm showing you can everybody see the screen is it bigger I see Kevin shake his head yes okay good there was a recent confusion about this the what we talked about the other week about the braided funding strategy I want to first just share some numbers with you about the resources that we're using for our budget next year and then talk to you broadly about the

099strategy and then we'd like to go into greater detail during the finance community tomorrow about how that differs from the budget that we proposed a few months ago precoded and what we're looking at now so basically you'll be familiar with this first column column C which is the BOE request this was our this is our current budget and then this is the enrollment Edition that we were given mid-year and then we also asked for another nine point nine nine five million which got us to it and asked of 146 million two hundred and fifty four thousand one hundred and twenty nine dollars where are we now so everybody was right to point out that's a very vast difference from what we're currently getting in our budget so the mayor's budget is proposing what 136 136

100million seven hundred eighty six thousand so that it's a big difference between our ask and we what we have is resources now on the city side we're taking a braided approach so I want to point out that from the BOE request to the total funding that we have available to us this year you'll see it's 146 and 146 so that seems almost too magical and good to be true it is a challenging budget it's a challenging time but I'm going to talk you through what allowed us to do that as a braided funding strategy and so you'll see Alliance money you know that our alliance budget which is part of the ECS funds the UCS funds being part of our overall operational base budget that's growing every year it's funding that comes from the state

101and it's about 2.7 million every year that we've been getting for the past few years and will continue to get so we're using that as part of the funds that will support both our base operations and some additional things that we're going to propose to do next year there's Kerr's funds which you've heard us talk about but I wanted to just briefly pause here because this is brand new to everybody this is federal money it's called the Elementary and Secondary School emergency relief fund ESS R that's about 2.3 million dollars that we're going to be getting from the state it's we haven't received it yet we have to have it spent by September 2021 so we have about a year to spend that front those funds and we're utilizing those one-time funds as a source

102of being able to do some things in our operational budget that we need to do as well as what rich mentioned earlier we had to practice add some money for kovat related activities to ensure the safety of our students which includes you know sanitizing potentially PPE potentially bussing as dr. Sal mentioned you know there's a lot of different scenarios out there that we have to be able to plan for there's an additional additionally we have grant carryover funds the grant carryover funds are as a result of under spending this year as a one-time allowance this state is allowing us to roll over our grant funding state funding that we didn't spend this year we typically only get to rollover between ten and fifteen percent depending on the grant this year they've said that there's no

103gap on that now there is some risk to that you know dr. Sol spoke with the mayor and the mayor called the governor because we didn't hear you know final word that that's available yet so we need to clarify that we're planning it in our budget because that's what we and all the other districts that Connecticut have been told so we need to confirm that and then we have a city fund balance that you saw in the latest budget report that I presented today the city fund balances are our unspent funds from this year that we can roll we can utilize with the city's cooperation next year so what we're going to propose to do with that is to set up reserves for some unpredictability so all of those pieces five one four hundred and

104forty six million which happens to be equal to our B request the city budget is short of the one thirty six point eight the proposed budget is a braided funding strategy that will put them at one forty six point six in place to address our needs in 21 it requires a reprioritization of the Alliance expansion funds which we present it to the board when we initially presented the budget it includes the one-time funds of the cares money that I just mentioned grant carryover and the city but fund balance it's due to because it's due to only these funding streams associated with the Cova closure that enables us to reflect the most crucial needs in the next year's plan and it also enables that best to set up a reserve for future uncertainty the budget also

105includes no proposed cuts to current staff or contraction from contracted increases the addition of kovat related safety and school opening activities to be planned for in some portion of our DPS priorities that we're able to put forward strictly due to these new revenues associated with the pandemic it's not our ideal budget it's the best best budget we can put forward now although it does not require a reduction in staff there are some changes in positions I've been asked to present this revenue picture that allows us to build the budget but tomorrow we'd go through the budget in tell at the Finance Committee and I wanted to mention the city is aware of and I'm bored with this approach and also recognizes the fact that we'll have challenges in the subsequent fiscal years that we need

106to face together because as you know you know we had it we have an increase to our budget just associated with doing business we shifted some of that increase into these other funding sources to be able to afford what we need to do for next year so I want to highlight some of the big things that the budget will do but I'd like to save that space during the Finance Committee so I give it we give it the time and attention it deserves other questions Gladys I have a question when you have a second okay go ahead Courtney I'll save a lot of this for tomorrow night's meeting so it if you don't want to answer this tell me to save this question for tomorrow night and I will happily do it it don't feel

107bad about telling me to leave it for tomorrow night but the way I'm reading this is it looks like basically we're braiding together money from a thousand pots or wherever we can find it or save it or collect it to get us to where we wanted to be anyway is am I reading this spreadsheet the right way that we're getting to the 146 just not the way we were originally intending and probably not spending it the way we originally intended it either because we now have new things to spend money on that we weren't originally planning yes I want to focus on that latter point that you mentioned it's not the same right because there's new things that we have to do as a result of the pandemic but it is challenging because we had

108to use a lance funding that you know to support some of our operations that we would have normally supported you know some expanded projects that we wanted to do the cares money we have to dedicate some to addressing social emotional needs the safety that rich mentioned earlier it should be education dollars yes this is federal money though in that statement the pair's funding it's a pass-through sort same same number not same purposes correct tomorrow high level highlights you know we're still doing direct student supports through Student Support Specialists in the elementary school we're still adding ESL elementary teachers teaching staff at the Middle School in high school I mean we're gonna go through it in detail there are some of the priorities that we're still able to do with this budget yep so thank you

109thanks for your question any other questions for Courtney we know that we have a son that's meeting tomorrow you can see are you finished yes I am yeah I think we're not I'm not gonna go through the detail until the Finance Committee tomorrow okay no I I think you know it's it's been a it's been a short and someone said before what can we do to help you to get the legislators to tell the Commissioner just so everybody knows has recommended these these carryovers and everybody's expecting it and I guess the governor needs to tell OPM so you want to tell our constituents shaky bake it would be helpful because that's we're waiting for it but tomorrow night we'll talk about the some of the ways we had to get here by shifting priorities reducing

110not filling positions and things like that so thank you Joe the soup served on that committee and on behalf of the board I certainly would like to thank you and Joe could you just briefly tell us your experience because you know that was your first time and I know Amy and Kate both have sent me emails that they would be willing to do it and you were selected so could you just briefly I was a very interesting experience the panel was great the people that were selected to serve in the panel were fantastic Kristi's letter did a great job running it she kind of quarter backed it because it's a little weird doing that by zoom the most impressive part about it was the applicants without getting into the detail they were amazing they were

111awed they were fantastic they were all in our district already um we would have been all four of them were fantastic and I said it that day and I think I said it he's the applicants and one way or another I think they were great we should be very proud of our system we should be very proud of the district that we had for internal candidates that were that good um so no it really it was a good experience we got good hires and just about it that I thought was that so thank you very much for pointing me to appreciate it I'm happy to do it again in the future if everybody needs help do you want to do the program curriculum update quick yes I'll be brief okay so just a couple of

112things pretty things actually so we are moving ahead so even despite some of our challenges we're still moving ahead with putting in a new phonics program at the k5 level we'll be switching to a program called being a reader for K one and two and we're going to be bolstering our intervention for k3 so we'll be making that's part of one of the purchases and her and me in the in our budget this year and we have kind of doubled down a little bit on some of the intervention programming to help shore up some of mitigate some of the loss that we think students will come in during this time period so we'll be staggering some of the intervention by levels to make sure that we have the appropriate materials at each level to service

113the kids so we're really excited about that we're we're still a little bit up in the air about the rollout depending on how we are reentering school and what that training is going to look like but were quite excited about that and we've had some wonderful partnerships with the special education department we met today specifically around collaborative training on these programs the alignment of the programs and the systems that we expect to see flowing between regular and special edge we need it just being familiar with a lot of attendance and the assessments it's going to be a huge piece so I welcome the increased collaboration with special education in regards to this as well and so we'll be making that purchase very shortly and we'll be hoping to train teachers when we get back in

114the fall should we get back in the fall and if not may perhaps late fall so that's one one good thing we have another silver lining to sort of the disruption is that as you know we talked about expanding and improving our ESL programming and we were moving forward with a program called elg which is a systemic eld English language development program and we were going to start with six schools the training is rather expensive and so that's why we were going to only start with six but because we are now switching to a virtual training the trainers can now accommodate more folks in in in that training and we don't have to pay for transportation costs and flying them out and housing them here so we will now be able to with the savings

115be able to expand that to all 12 schools so we're really happy about that and there was a few added expenses with a few extra materials for the schools but mr. Gomes was able to absorb some of that in in some of our title grants so that is very good news we're excited about that and then the last just sort of update is just a little bit of a one regarding math and we had sent a letter out to parents and this is just to update the board that we're going to be shifting our acceleration practices in mathematics to starting in eighth grade instead of seventh grade so in our long-standing history here in danbury had some legacy practices of advancing students in grade seven and we started that practice eat long before Common Core

116came into town and we've maintained that practice of accelerating students to the next level of math starting in seventh grade but through a lot of work and research and tracking our students over time we realize that a lot of their proficiencies are what we call fragile proficiency so they may be good enough to pass some some tests and to do some things but they don't have deep solid foundational working knowledge that comes back - I'm not gonna say bite them down the road but certainly having those deeper foundational knowledge and sprayed seven before speaking on accelerated courses is a much better route so we'll be changing that to grade eight starting in the fall of this year we considered waiting another year but when the disruption hit we realized that no one was ready for

117acceleration next year and that we would advance students through accordingly so I'm just a brief just a brief change there and students will still be on track to take advanced mathematics at the high school should they choose to do so you know that we just haven't moving a board meeting in June to June and night versus attack because you know graduation and we just thought it would be you know sort of odd to have a board meeting so instead of having me to join the night okay carry over it become a special board meeting which means we can only cover what's on the agenda just so we all know that that's fine I'll tell Cara mrs. Ginelli has some no earlier that you know on behalf of the board we were certainly not staff teachers

118students and parents but a team were doing trying to help us through these unchartered times that will face them and thank you to our guidance counselors and other non teachers doing online learning and on behalf of the board we would just like to say thank you thank you so very much for everyone just really working together as a team so that's my maker entertain a motion to adjourn so moved move by Joe Silva second by second debate everyone good night tonight