Board of Education

001Well, meeting. Have we heard from anyone who's not here? Yes. still supposed to be on Zoom as far as I know. That's really sweet. Like barely makes the car. I saw it last year and he's not. So when I saw it again this year, I was like [Music] Just like the open,000 but that ends up being like month. Well, that's what some other ending up It's got a $4 million. Yes. I can program. It's like it's not even You want to start like it's so it'll be when it comes to I'm hoping she just went Just kidding. Start. That's what I was thinking. started by a but just a matter of when they get to the agenda we have to have order to vote on two [Music] items that we get so we can watch

002He's he said he's going to be doing this late. Yeah, said he was zooming in. Okay, Chris said he was zooming. Oh, okay. That could be show them the whole six. All right. Perfect. Lisa is stuck in traffic. Okay. So, sorry for the wait everybody. We had to wait for a forum. We are going to call the meeting to order at 604. This is a regular meeting of May 19th. We are going to actually do things a little different tonight. Um, for our board of ed bylaws 93252, we are supposed to be reading the mission statement at the start of every meeting. I don't know if one of you, Lee or Olivia, want to read the mission statement to start ourselves tonight. Sure. East Line Public Schools will inspire, engage, and educate each student to

003become a contributing citizen, a responsible, independent, and critical thinker. Right. Everybody who can please rise for the pledges to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands. One nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. We have some special recognitions tonight. Mr. K. Mr. I'm going to turn it over to you and then we're going to introduce Mrs. Green and uh about our Dec. Um want me to do the special recognition and or first? Recognition first. Yeah. Do the first. Sorry. Yeah. Okay. Um so good evening everybody. Thanks for having me here. Um and we are very proud this evening to recognize two outstanding East Lime High School students um whose innovation, creativity, um and drive have earned them top honors first in a statewide

004competition that um eventually led them to um traveling to Florida um for uh a larger competition. Um, so Car Bologani and Kyle Miranda, both members of our DECA Club, uh, a national organization focused on preparing leaders and entrepreneurs in marketing, finance, hospitality, and management, uh, represented East Lime this spring at a state career development conference. Uh, this brought together, I think, over a thousand high school students, Miss Green, from across Connecticut to compete in a wide range of business and marketing challenges. Um, I'm sure Miss Green will tell you maybe a little bit more about um, what they did. Um, but it's my understanding that they took first place in the innovation plan category uh, for their proposal to market, produce, and deploy solar powered vehicles, a bold forwardinking concept that demonstrates their academic excellence,

005but also a strong commitment to sustainability and real world problem solving. And again, this victory earned them an invite to compete at the DECAT International Career Development Conference in Florida, which they had the opportunity to attend with their families and Miss Green this spring. So, please everybody join me in congratulating Caric and Kyle and Miss Green on this exceptional work. Do you want to get a picture? You want to say a few words, Mrs. Green, tell us about your experience. How's that? Just briefly. Come on. Yes. And then we'll get a picture. Well, DECA has been around for a long time and I took over about five years ago and then with COVID and me being new and then, you know, things not being right for a long time, uh, we've never actually had the

006opportunity to attend the Connecticut competition. And finally this year we had a group of very motivated students and we did attend. They've done some fundraising. It's also very expensive. So they were really big on fundraising and um so that allowed us to be able to go at a really small cost to the students and it was just such a great experience and I was completely blown away by all of the students especially Karthik and Kyle. Um so the innovation plan is is essentially just it's it's just a business plan. I don't know why they call it an innovation plan. I guess it's because the idea is supposed to be innovative but it's just a business plan. But uh they did such a wonderful job laying out their idea and their graphics and they presented it

007and they had every you know they had to print it all out and then present it to a judge and they like Mr. Kid said first place at the state and then going on to nationals. So it was a great experience. So very proud of them out of the way here. Let's get a get a picture right there. Oh, yeah. All right. Yeah. Put you guys in the middle. There you go. How's that? Yeah. I know. We looked everywhere. All right. Congratulations again. Congratulations. Thank you. I'm a screen. Appreciate it. Was mostly It was mostly them. I just hit submit a few times. You are more than welcome to stay for the rest of the board meeting or you can leave whenever you would like. Is there any memberations like to do public comment? Any

008member of the public that would like to do public comment? Any member of the public that would like to do public comment? Um, okay. So, AP week is finally over. Um, and I'm sure you guys heard by now, but AP Psych had some difficulties nationwide. And basically what happened was only a certain amount of people were able to take the exam because there was a problem with the system itself. So people that were able to get in had the option of staying and taking the risk of the test not saving. So then they would have to retake it. But thankfully the people that did stay um it all saved. Everything went through for everyone. But there were some people that left because they didn't want to take that risk. And then the people that couldn't

009get in just had to leave. So the retake days are going to be Wednesday at 8:00 a.m. and then Friday at 12:00 p.m. And then everything for APsych should be straightened out. Um there are a lot of senior events coming up. Senior class trip is this month, the 27th. Senior prom is the 31st at Porton Starboard. Senior awards night is June 3rd. Senior dinner dance is June 5th. Uh the graduation rehearsals are June 9th, June 12th, and June 13th. And then in the same order, 12 to 1:15, 10 to 12, 11 to 1. And then actual gradation is going to be the 13th. Um, Eastlam crew had states this weekend and all the girls varsity boats meddled. Um, yes. So, the 22nd is NGISS testing. So, it's Thursday. The 23rd is a half day. Following

010that, um, the 26th there is no school. It's Monday and it's Memorial Day. Um, NHS is having their introduction um, induction the 4th of June. 4th of June. Um the students expo is going to be held tomorrow in the commons uh from 6:00 to 8:00. Junior prom was two weekends ago on um May 10th was also at Port Starburn and as a junior who went there, it actually went pretty successful. Um everything was Yeah, everything was nice. Everything was set up. There wasn't anything any problem with it. Um final exams start on Friday, June 6th. Uh, Coach Wally Christensen was inducted into the Connecticut High School uh, school coaches association of Hall of Fame. He is one of three coaches from the East Line that has been inducted. Baseball coach Jack Biggs collected his 300th

011win throughout his career coaching baseball. May 2nd was signing day at East Lime High School. Spring sports signed um, their athletic contracts in the North Gym. And April 29th was winter and fall sports signed um their contracts also in it. I'm curious if you have or are planning uh the graduation walkthrough where seniors revisit their elementary schools that night. Okay. I appreciate the reminder on the half day because I forgot to put it in my calendar. [Laughter] So, welcome to stay or you can leave at any time. Um, we have a consent agenda tonight. Um, I'll make a motion to approve the consent agenda as presented. Do I have a second? I'll second. Any discussion? No. No discussion. Uh all in favor I. Any opposed? Motion passes. For those who uh do not have an

012agenda in front of them, the consent agenda was the regular meeting minutes of April 7th, the special meeting minutes of April 21st, special meeting minutes of May 6th, and the unaffiliated staff wage proposal for 2526. Next up is composting update. Hi, Nurse Green again. Hello. Uh, so I presented to you all a few months ago um to get approval for this program. uh I guess it was more than a few months ago last year or around this time last year and uh you obviously approved it. We went through the process of raising money for it. We were able to get the entire grant from sustainable CT. So 15 um $15,000 in total, half from the community, half from sustainable CT. And that was enough to fund the program for two years. So um can you

013go to the next slide, please? Who's who's driving slides? That's great. So, just to remind you, the idea is for it to be a studentled effort, um, which we're we're working towards at lunch. Uh, we also have the kitchen staff and culinary sta uh, culinary classes participating. Um, and then we don't actually, right, we're not composting here. It's being collected by a company called Blue Earth where it is then turned into uh, compostable, you know, compost material. So, we're just collecting here. This is a picture of two of our students who are sorting at lunch. We have four areas set up throughout the conence. We have those grabbers just in case anybody makes a mistake. Um, and the students are bringing their food to a folding table kind of like this and then student volunteers

014or teachers are putting them in the correct bins to make sure that the composted bin is actually just full of compostable material. Um, this has led to some really great press. We've been we were on the Channel 3 news. Uh that was when we were actually fundraising which did kind of push us up a lot. Um after that news clip in some some funds. We've also I've also did an interview with Oh yeah, we don't need to click on No, it's just there if anybody wants to see it. I don't I figured these were shared with everybody. So, but thank you Grant. Um and then we have uh I was I did a I was on um Kate Steels. She's not here. um she has a a podcast sort of uh YouTube channel thing that

015she does and I was on that talking about the program with her. And then lastly uh the day newspaper came in last week to take photos of the program um and they are going to be doing an article on it uh soon. They interviewed me about it and and they'll be doing an article. So that'll be some really good press. This is actually I did get an updated figure for this. So, as of May 15th, we have diverted 9,000 pounds of waste from landfills or incineration plants, uh, depending on where our trash is going at any given time. Um, and as you can see, it's equivalent here, right? So, um, obviously these numbers are a little larger because I have the main numbers of 9,000 pounds, but um, 75 gallons of gasoline burned is what

016we saved. So, you can move to the next slide. Thanks, Grant. Um, so I did some I did some kind of math to see how this was panning out in terms of finances. And it used to be the case that we had roughly 20 garbage cans spread out throughout the whole commons. And it didn't matter if it was completely full or if it was half full or a quarter full. At the end of lunch, the custodians would come and and throw those out, which you had to because, you know, there was food in there and you had to throw them out. But the problem with that was you weren't fully utilizing a trash can liner. And that's a lot of plastic to line those big trash cans. What's happening now that students are bringing their

017trash to the sorting stations is that the trash can that the sorting station has is utilized to its fullest potential. The entire can is filled up before it's then disposed of. Which means that we are lining less trash bags with plast or trash cans with plastic which means we're saving the custodial budget has is reduced by not spending as much on trash can liners. Um, that's obviously really minimal cost because they're not very expensive. Then if you look at the price that it costs to take trash away, it's $68 per ton and we dispose of about 10 tons per month um of just regular trash. Our compost though is is a little bit over one ton which means that we are saving like $68 a month essentially by having that go to the composting facility

018rather than going to the trash facility. However, if you see in the blue area, it is significantly more expensive per ton to pay Blue Earth to do our composting for us than it is to dispose of trash. So that's why I italicized the words potential because it's not really a cost-saving cost cost savings right now. However, if you look at the last area in purple, you can see that Waterford actually just received a $4 million grant to develop a composting facility. And if that uh when that goes through, it's not if, it's a when. When that goes through, the tipping fee for compostable material will be $45 a ton, which is significantly less than $68 a ton. So, if we are able to have our food scraps going to a local place like Waterford as

019opposed to W Earth, which is located in Hartford, right? Um, this could actually really lead us to some true cost savings down the road. Um, so that's why I kind of showed what water uh all of that. Um, our future plans are working um with East Line Middle School to see how uh we might be able to incorporate the same programs there. Um, in August, I am going to be attending the freshman orientation to make sure parents are aware of kind of how we do things as they're coming bringing their students into the school. At the beginning of next year, we'll have an advisory lesson, obviously more more so for the freshmen than anything, letting people know how we do things. And we plan on kind of giving some more kind of dos and don'ts

020to help us sort a little bit better because we're learning a lot about what will help us. Also, it's not um it's not required to do volunteer hours or anything like that to be a contributing citizen in that section of the Viking Voyage for the Vision of the Graduate. However, we're pushing for advisory teachers to tell their advisories that um if you, you know, if you help out at lunch, you can take a picture of it and then that can be your artifact for your contributing citizen portion of the Viking voyage. They're trying to get more students into involved that way. And lastly, um this is something I'm going to be working on next week actually is meeting with the different honor societies now that we know the students that are part of the National

021Honor Society and different things for next year. Um and seeing if it's possible to take some of those required volunteer hours that those different honor societies are required to do just by being in the society and seeing if we can make maybe just one or two of those for composting specifically. So that way we're getting some more help uh and and student there's more student involvement. We do have it's we're really interesting like lunch one we'll have every single station is is student led and then lunch two it'll be all teacher le. So it's there's a big discrepancy but we're really trying to uh especially for next year and now that we've kind of worked out some kinks figure out how to make it more um studentled. And that's my update. So if there's any

022questions you have about how things are going I'm happy to let you know. But um this was just me telling you how things are going pretty well overall via the zoom vic and establish. Hi uh Miss Green thank you very much for giving giving us the update and I'm I'm I'm actually very happy that you are you your your program is is running smoothly and we you are able to achieve the goals. Uh, one question I have is with respect to um, maybe continuing to raise money to support this this program. Um, has has, you know, are there any ideas of maybe maybe selling the compost back to the community and and maybe charging charging of course the community for whatever the cost is to buy that compost um, and making that available and maybe

023raising costs in the future. and um also other fundraising activities. Now we mean we may be funded now for 2 years but you know we have to think think ahead um and budgets are ne you know uh are are never easy. So trying to find money in the last minute is always going to be tough. So looking forward I'd like this program to of course continue and I'm seeing what I'm trying to see if what what your plans are. Yeah that's a really great question. Um, so there's actually a Connecticut law that passed in January that says if you are within 25 miles of facility and you generate a certain amount of trash, you are required to compost. That does not apply to us because we are not within 25 miles of a composting facility.

024However, enter Waterford. So, this is actually going to become a requirement once the Waterford facility is built. uh which means that there will have to somehow be funds for it because it will be required by the state. Um so I I was really happy with our two-year timeline because I I knew that this was coming and and I kind of thought well there the state is going to you know if the state has a mandate I know that the state doesn't always fund the mandates that they say. Um but the idea is okay this is actually going to be required by law and this will be something that we kind of have to figure out in the future. There are many grants available aside from sustainable CT when I was working on the pro project

025and I was worried I wasn't going to get enough money. Um many people reached out to me with other ways to get money. So I do have a list of other grants available to to fund the program longer if needed. Um like I said we still have like a whole year and a half at this point. I agree that it's something we need to look at. probably this time next year, we can evaluate what's going on with the Waterford facility, what's available for Connecticut safe funds, uh, all of that, and then kind of make a plan while we still have plenty of money to fund it. Um, but make that plan sometime, you know, next summer and and figure that out going forward. But I do have a list of grants, like I said, that

026people reached out and provided to me while I was trying to fund for this go around, um, which hopefully still exists in the next year. Thank you, Julon. Quick one. I was really excited to see a the success of the program at the high school, but also that part of kind of summer planning involves working with um I think it was Miss Sinsky at the the middle school to get kind of that cohort of kiddos involved. Any plans even at the the elementary level? I I think they're doing lots of units on that. I have a second grader who's been talking about composting non-stop recently, which has been great. Um, and I'm I'm wondering if there's, you know, down the road potential opportunities to make this a district-wide. Yeah, I mean, it would be awesome

027to have a district-wide. Then we won't have freshmen coming, what are we doing? Um, but like I said, you know, if the Waterford when the Waterford facility is built, it will be a requirement. Um, so that is coming. Uh, as far as getting it trickled down to the lower levels, uh, the reason why, uh, I've had some contact with East Lime Middle School is because a few students reached out to me. They wrote me this very lovely email. Um, and they said, "Hey, you know, we're interested in in making this happen at our own school and and they had CCed uh, I don't know how to say her last name, Sinsky. They had CCed her." And so then I reached out to her and I was like, "What's going on here?" Um, so we we

028were actually scheduled to discuss it today and in a little bit more detail and she would probably be better equipped to then be a liazison for the middle uh the elementary schools, you know, just, you know, I could kind of help her, she could kind of help them sort of thing just because we already had that kind of, you know, relationship in terms of kids funneling to each school. Um, but and I wasn't able to talk to her today because I had a student in my classroom taking a test. So, we've now rescheduled our call for Friday on the half day because we'll both be available in the afternoon. Um, but anyway, so my long story short, I'm not even I'm not like 100% sure about everything with the the middle school. Um, and I

029would definitely think that uh any way I could help the elementary schools if they're if they're on board, but definitely starting like one school at a time, I think is the best way um to do it. And then it would definitely be something we should look into and hopefully hopefully she's excited about it and wants to trickle it down. Well, it's really great even knowing that the interest from the middle school was studentled. That's that's really exciting. It it was it was really cool. It's like, oh, this is such a lovely little email from these these kids. Um but, you know, research shows that the sooner we can get the students involved, the better. And um elementary school students, especially second graders, they just want to please and they'll do anything you say. Um, so

030they find that students actually are very good at sorting their trash when they're little and not so great when they're older, which is why we have the sorting tables because we don't trust them to do it themselves. Um, but if it but if it's starting sooner, it will eventually just become a habit. And then when you come here, it we won't need anybody at a sorting station. People will just know what to do. I don't have any questions. I got to go with Kate to see the composting program. That's right. Yeah, you were here. Oh, you attended that as well. Oh, that was the day I wasn't doing it. Um, it's amazing. And the students were so excited about it. That was really great. I Yeah, I was blown away. It was was wonderful. I'm

031glad you were able to see it in action. Oh, yeah. It was great. So much stuff is compostable, too. It was It was really cool. Yeah. I have to hand it to um to our kitchen staff too because they have you guys have been really great about communicating. Um they've communicated whenever oh hey we just got this new product in uh this is now compostable and oh great and then you know I let everybody know and um just there's been a little bit of shifts uh in a couple of items that they've been using a lot um to have them you know move towards a compostable item and that's also been really wonderful. So, I appreciate your support and reaching out for um letting me know when things are noticeable and things are changing. So,

032that's been really great. Jill and Estabon, anything. I just want to say thank you. Um I like the numbers on there of like the that's been diverted because throw away so much the like amounts of garbage. It's actually insane. It's insane. And I like the fact that we're diverting it and we're going to make something good out of it. And just thank you. So just a quick I know you're not making something good out of it, but somebody else is making something good. Very quick word on that though is when we rebuild this school, why don't we rebuild with dishwashers and trays so that we don't even have to purchase all of these items that then get thrown away? Just a thought for the future, right? because there's a huge cost savings in that. Of

033course, you have to pay for a dishwasher and all that, but there's a cost savings in not having to buy all of these things that get thrown away on a daily basis that are single use. So, back of your mind for the redo of the high school. Let me come up with another question. Are you seeing more things being recycled to bottle collection for the marching band? So, uh I actually reached out to the marching band about that and I said, "Hey, how is your numbers doing?" and I should follow up with him because um I think it just got transferred from one music teacher to another when that was occurring and when I reached out it I think it was in March I asked him and he said I actually don't know the answer

034to that question because I kind of just took over and I said okay and then I I haven't reached out to him since so I should see uh but I do know that standing at those sorting stations the amount of things that end up in the canson bottles that is not cans and bottles is disturbing um So, I don't know if that affects like their ability to actually get the amount of money that they should be getting out of there. Um, but yes, those cans and bottles areas are full to the top at the end of the two launch waves. I would assume yes, but I don't have confirmed numbers. Thanks, nurse. Mr. Kid, high school presentation. All right, good evening everybody. Thank you for um having me. Um I have been sending out a

035weekly um letter to the community trying to share some of the highlights that happen each week at the high school and I'm hoping that this um presentation um is a little bit of a continuation of that um just kind of like here in person. Um there's just a lot to highlight. Um, and I think one of the biggest differences for me taking over as principal, from being assistant principal is that I get a very different view of the school. Um, it's a nice change of pace. Um, but it is overwhelming the amount of great things that are happening on a weekly basis. So, I have some, um, teachers and students who are here tonight to kind of help me um, talk a little bit about some of the highlights from, uh, this semester. Um all

036of the things that I'm going to highlight are aligned to high impact teaching um diversity, equity and inclusion and culture and climate. Um so I'll try and kind of go in order there. Um and I'll try and move quickly just to be um you know cognizant of everyone's time here. Um so I'll start with high impact teaching uh and I'm going to talk a little bit about some of the steps that we took as a um faculty um to um improve our instructional practices this semester. Um we participated in multiple learning walks this year um that brought together our CILs and teachers from a variety of different academic areas. Um and these learning walks focused on high impact teaching strategies. Um we were really looking for how teachers were eliciting student responses um and establishing

037classroom routines. Uh and each of these learning walks was followed by an analysis session where we all got to talk about and debrief um you know strengths, areas of growth um in those classroom visits um and also some wanderings to guide our next steps. We also um used our instructional coach Tiffany Cosino this semester um to introduce a classroom visit tool that our curriculum instructional leaders used um in partnership with her to observe and collect data across their departments. Um and this pushed our department leaders into classrooms across content areas uh and helped to establish some data. So that data combined with learning walks um and uh you know some of our testing data is going to be what we use to drive our PD for next year and inform our PD and our building

038needs for the year. Um beyond that in individual classrooms um there's so many great things that have been happening. I know I don't I can't go into all of them. Um but I know you guys might be familiar with our EMT program um and some of the efforts that Miss Toronto, Miss Garcia um and Mr. Vizulo um initiated this year. Um we had collaboration between the global language department um to simulate um dealing with trauma patients in a different language. We worked with um the military over at Campnet to do a mass casualty drill. just a lot of really um high impact teaching and real world learning that was going on in classrooms. Uh Miss Miss Green's uh efforts in DECA and Mr. Torano's efforts with students ended up with students um competing at the

039national level. Um, and on a more personal note, this semester I had the privilege of walking into Miss Griffith's classroom at the end of the day and seeing the entire social studies department at the end of the day and one of our school psychologists serving as an audience for Emma Frisbee um who was uh prepping uh her presentation for uh the Connecticut State History Fair where um not only did she um go to the state history, but she won um and is headed to Nashville. So, I'm just going to let Emma talk for a couple of minutes about that experience um and the help that that faculty gave her in preparing. Hi, thank you for helping me. Um so, as Mr. Kid said, um I am a student at East High School. I'm a sophomore

040and for the past three years I have competed in a competition called National History Day. Um so NHD is a competition that is designed to give students an opportunity to research a topic in history of their choosing. Then from there they have the option to write a research paper, film a documentary, design a um website. Uh what else? Oh um create a poster and exhibit or write and perform a 10-minute performance piece. Um the category that I have consistently chose is the performance as I am an artist who loves to public speak. Um the theme for this year's competition was rights and responsibilities. So I wrote a story about Alice Paul who is the passionate and determined leader who led the suffragist to victory a century ago. Um my performance is 10 minutes long and

041cites over 40 primary and secondary sources. I came in first place at regionals in March and then I proceeded to the state competition which occurred two weeks ago where I also came in first place for the state of Connecticut. Um I am really excited to be representing Eastim High School and the state of Connecticut at nationals which is in two weeks and will be in Washington DC. Um I know they're not here but I really want to thank Mr. Maddox who is a social studies teacher at the high school who has been mentoring me for the past two years and also thank the social studies department who took time out of their day to listen to my performance and give me advice and also Mr. Kid for his consistent support of me and my endeavors.

042So thank you is I just was sitting here. Mrs. Frisbee sent it to me. So, and I just wrote down I'll share that. Yeah. So, be awesome. Being someone who competed in National History Days when I was a youth. Um I made it to the state history fair um and was defeated soundly. So, I know I know all the work that it takes to to um do what you're doing, Emma. So, keep up the good work and we're very excited to see what comes next for you. Congratulations. The national competition livereamed or do we know we have details? So, it's the way like you my performance isn't live streamed. Awards is live streamed. Um I will not be attending awards because it's my finals week and I want to get back as quickly as I

043can. But um yeah, so I'll be watching that. But can we just keep it? We will keep you posted. Where's the video? So, just one of just one of the thing, you know, um you know, em this is an achievement that is it's Emma's achievement. Um but I think it's a good example of um teachers supporting students, students having good relationships with teachers. Um, you know, we can talk about the um educational jargon that's out out there around high impact teaching and and um but there's also relationships and relationships to me are um really important and I think Emma um has some really great connections with her teachers. Um speaking of which, I'm going to I'm going to bring up um Miss Alexa Kidd. Um we're going to talk and continue to highlight some uh

044examples of high impact teaching. Mrs. kid um received the instructor instructor, excuse me, award for excellence in course instruction this year from Yukon for ECE. Um that's, you know, out of a community of nearly 2,000 ECE uh instructors across the state. So, a big accomplishment for um you know, teaching and learning here at East High School. So really proud of her and I thought this was a good opportunity one to highlight that recognition but two for her and a couple of her students to talk a little bit about a project um that definitely has ties to high impact teaching and um DEI. So Mrs. Kid come on up and I know you have a couple of students with you as well. Hello. So this is the humans of Elime project and it's one of many

045projects we do in the ECE program. um projects are based off of mentors, mentor texts. So Brandon Stanton uh is an artist and photographer in New York City and he has a project called the humans of New York City. So he was our mentor and this started in 2020. I used to do a completely different thing uh in the uh quarter that I do this now, but uh 2020 hit March. We all know what happened there. um separated and then schools online for the rest of the time kind of uh but because it was a college course I still had to keep the kids producing things beyond um whatever we called those assured learning experiences. Um, so that was really hard because we were all in our bedrooms and um about a month and a

046half later, George Floyd was murdered and the kids were processing all that plus a million other things all online. And I was trying to monitor this online and I noticed everyone was having trouble communicating and listen listening uh and sharing their thoughts and feelings and um for obvious reasons. Um but I just sitting at my laptop from home wanting to help these kids learning so fast that we needed to work on empathy and genuine intellectual curiosity be a curiosity about humans that are not like us and um empath I already said that a million things. So my brain was exploding and I scrapped my current curriculum for that time of the year and started this. So it's kind of grown each year and um the long and short of it is the kids have to

047pick a human of e slime. So we have to decide what that means and then um so it's like anyone who works, plays, prays, volunteers, learns, uh shops, etc., etc. in ESLM or Salem. And so the definition is the same for all of my students, but there's a catch. the human you pick that falls under that definition, there's one more caveat and it is that their story has to be a story that uh you don't relate to at all. It has to be completely outside of your lived experience. And then that's how you get the human approved. they fit the definition, but they also have to like uh tell me that they don't um relate to their lived experience. So once they pick their human, it's a long process. Uh Yukon does projects, not papers.

048So there's all these layers. That's where the hits comes in in the classroom instruction, interview skills. Uh Yukon calls it collecting and curating. uh multiple interviews uh sometimes photography then there's the writing and we do this thing called multimodal um communication which is what how can we communicate besides using our words so in addition to language what other ways do we communicate that comes into um design uh color font text size all kinds of stuff um so lots of skills uh lots of human skills and um communication skills and then every project we do in Yukon we try to publish so uh as far as we can so our first project is published to the college admissions officers that's their own story then it's the stories of others and this is how we publish that

049and um then there are others So, uh, these are this year's humans of East Lime. There's some on this side and the other side is also covered. And, um, what the idea behind the design was create a poster that, uh, your multimodal choices have to if someone was walking by your poster in the hallway, what would make that person stop? And then that's one layer of choices. And then the next is what would make them approach and then make choices once they're at your poster. What's going to make them stay? And then once they stay and they're looking at your poster and taking in the photos and the font and the arrangement, they're so captivated and curious by your human that they want to know more. Well, great. So, entice them. come up with a

050little phrase. You want to know more? Scan this QR code. And when you scan the QR code, their published article about the human and that human story pops up on your phone. So, this will be at the student expo tomorrow uh for the public. And oh god, that's a whole set of skills we talked about. when you publish to the public you there are all kinds of best practices you have to take care of protecting identities if people don't want to be so there's some fake names on here unless people are okay with that and then how do you deal with that carefully you're dealing with people's names and lively you know stories and so many skills so uh I have two of my students here um Callaway Scott you may have heard of him

051um he is going to talk to you about his human, someone we all know and love. And Dalen also her poster is right here and she'll tell you about her human. And then um you guys leave if you want to scan a couple of posters and have some light reading tonight. Go ahead. I interviewed my coach, my soccer coach, Wally Christensen. He's a he's like an inspiration to me. So I just want immediately right when I she told us about the project I knew I wanted to talk about Wall-E because he's inspiration my life you know so I interviewed him and I knew him very well so I just like uh sorry I focused on um his how he inspires the kids he coaches and how he gets them to work hard connects to their

052life f far further than just soccer just like uh into their actual lives because I feel like he's done that for I feel like he's done it for a bunch of other kids. And uh that's all I got for if you want to scan the code, you can read it. Read about it. Thank you. Thank you. He's got to go to soccer. Um, I'm not sure if you guys are familiar with Tony D's in New London, but the owner is my boss and I figured I would interview him one because um was talking to Miss Kid about it and she said she said that would be a great guy. Um, the D'Angelos basically have their own like following in New London. Um, but also I had the idea to interview him because um, I have

053a lot of respect for him mostly because he's the owner and I know a lot of restaurant owners that um, aren't actually in the restaurant. But when I started working at one of his restaurants, I was a little taken back because he's always actively involved. He's always doing something even though if it's beneath him like busting tables or food running. There's been days where it's been swamped and he is busing and cleaning tables and cleaning up trash as the owner. Um, and I have a lot of respect for him as one of his employees, but also um, his restaurants in general really, um, like come together and they curate like a huge community and working at one of his restaurants. Um, it's a great experience and it doesn't even feel like work. It just feels

054like I'm going and having fun with some of my friends. Um, it has never felt like a burden. I've never regretted going into work. And then his other restaurant, I've made so many connections there. Actually, being at Tony D's, I know some of the staff there. I've just met some of people. Um, and it's just like it's a huge sense of community and I don't that place is like special and it has history with so many people and yeah and I figured I wanted to interview him about it and talk about it. So yeah, thank you Dan. Thank you. Right. Humans of beast slime. Um, so definitely that that will be on display uh tomorrow along with lots of other things at the um uh arts art expo. So thanks Mrs. Kidd and her students

055there. I forgot to mention it was also tapped this year to be presented at Yukon too. Nice. All right. Um okay. So, you know, beyond instructional strategies, um things going on in the classroom like um the humans of East Lime, um I also brought um asked Miss Provost, I didn't bring her. I provos to come and talk a little bit about uh a club that is just near and dear to to my heart. Um you know, we we um we have a school-based DEI committee here at the school. And one of the things that we did this year was we asked for student representation on that club. Um, and so we have students from um the Empowering Women's Voices Club, the GSA, um, the Cultural Awareness Club, and Best Buddies. Um, and Best Buddies, I'll

056let Beth talk specifics, but we we have a huge membership. Um, and what they do to promote um, you know, inclusion at our school is pretty amazing. Um, so I'll ask Miss Provos just to talk a little bit about the highlights from the year. Um, as far as Best Buddies is concerned, and then I have a few more things. I know I'm taking up people's time, but there's a lot of exciting stuff at the high school. Well, there is a lot of exciting stuff at the high school. That's for sure. Every day. So, um, for those of you who don't know me, either on Zoom or here, I'm Beth Provost. I'm the, uh, probably lesser known provost in the group and, um, the the one that can't really public speak as well as the other

057ones. So, I did write down some points that I wanted to make sure that I touched upon. Um, I have been a special education teacher at ESIM for over 20 years, probably closer to 25. And we started Best Buddies about 20 years ago, Kim Thompson and I. And we did it to really improve the inclusion of the kids with special needs. When I first came here, it was very kind of old school. My room was very close to the custodian's room. My kids were mostly taught in my room. there wasn't a lot of integration into classes and not a lot of mainstreaming going on at that point and so we're like we got to get it so that these kids are part of the school. So we developed you know we got in touch with

058Best Buddies they accepted us as one of their chapters which is really kind of a complicated process. Um now Waterford has finally gotten theirs. They've been trying and trying and trying this is their first year. So um one of our highlights this year was our um interaction with them. We were able to invite them to come over here to a Valentine's Day party. We called it a Valentine's party and we hold them a lot of times in here. We had DJ going and um karaoke and lots of snacks and had a blast. Um some other really exciting things we did. Not too long ago, maybe three weeks ago, there was a prom in Montville for the unified kids and they all got the most exciting part probably was when they had the prom posals. there

059wasn't like a dry eye in the so the you know I would say the typical p buddy asked the their buddy if they would go to prom with him in various sunundry ways and we filmed it was honestly the kids started crying it was just so very touching and really the true meaning of what best buddies is all about because the whole premise of the club is so that we could develop friendships some social interactions with students that have t you know typical needs and um special needs so they can have kids with special needs can have some kind of social life because without Best Buddies a lot of them aren't doing anything on a Friday or Saturday night and if they have are involved in Best Buddies they can do things not only um

060with their one-on-one but we have group outings. This year we did um we always have a match party in the fall where we match the kids up based on kind of what they like and don't like you know and other kids if they like that we try to match those students together. We try to get like freshmen to be with freshman if they're more mature freshman so that they can go through all the things together. So like senior proms coming up, you know, they may not actually be going together, but you can bet they'll be dancing on the floor together or getting ready together or doing that sort of thing. So really over the course of the four years, you do see true relationships developing it. At first it's very awkward, very kind of I

061don't know orchestrated and then it becomes a very natural, very kind of cool thing and it's really heartwarming. Um we also did um like we have this friends giving thing that we do every year and Mr. Kid happened to be here and all the like um we have over 40 kids to 50 kids almost every time we have an event. Our club has grown every year. We meet on Tuesdays and we kind of divided up that um one time we have just an officer's meeting to plan for the um you know the month and then we have just the buddy matches meet one Tuesday and then we have a whole club meeting on the uh third one and so we rotate through that and through that we've seen the the club grow to this phenomen

062I've never seen it quite as strong as it is right now and it's very very exciting to see it just continuing to So, so, you know, it's just been an exciting year. We have one more thing we're going to do. We're going to do a bowling party at the end of the year to kind of celebrate our year and to kind of honor the seniors that are graduating. But it is a nice experience not only for the students with special needs, but also for the kids that are not actually diagnosed with any kind of special need. As you know, we all have our own special needs. you know, the the kids that you see that are what we consider typical peers grow, you know, with empathy and they get a chance for leadership skills and

063to plan and facilitate organizations. The whole club is run by students. Kim and I are just there as kind of overseers of the club to make sure everything is going the way we want it to go. And then uh we fund raise every year to be able to send our our president to uh the University of Indiana for a week-long leadership um conference. And then um recently Best Buddies has um paired up with um Chelsea Graten and they had a leadership kind of I don't know it's kind of like a professional development for students um about leadership and how to become a leader and then they do three leadership activities for the whole executive board um during the course of the year. So, I feel like it's a really beneficial program for all the students,

064not just the kids special needs, but also the students that do not have special needs. Thank you, M. You're welcome. And Avery Sadler, her club president, couldn't be here. She's at senior night for softball. Um, but she's a fantastic leader leader. For sure. Have her come. Um so um I I prepared a lot here so I can't go through um all of this. I'm just trying to um you know be cognizant of everybody's time but um these these clubs have worked closely with our faculty this year on the DEI committee um and even use some satchel pulse survey data um to write advisory lessons based on what students are saying are areas of growth for our school. Um, so we're trying to use student voice as much as possible to build a more inclusive community.

065And really, that's kind of the point I'm trying to drive home um with with bringing Miss Provost um and and representing Best Buddies here. Um as far as culture and climate are concerned, um you know, one of my um first priorities when I became principal was to get the culture and climate committee together um and work on our um culture and climate improvement plan. Um and really for um uh teachers, teachers highlighted their um uh workload and life balance and um as a key area of growth on that survey as well as the um management of stu student behavior. Um so we have had follow-up conversations at faculty meetings. Um and I have also hosted some uh roundt listening sessions as well to kind of drill down a little bit more on that satchel pulse

066data. Um you know as we work to improve our school community. Beyond that we we already do really have a strong culture at East Lime High School. Um our teachers uh even teachers on this culture and climate committee are always um trying to think about creative ways to bring the faculty together. We've done pumpkin carving. We did a chili cook off. Um most recently we had a really robust teacher appreciation week with a lot of these student clubs contributing really meaningful things to um the teachers cards, messages on walls, um refreshment carts, so on and so forth. So we have a community that really when it's time to celebrate one another, I think we do a good job with that. Um uh with that being said, um one of the one of the other things

067that I kind of wanted to to highlight here was efforts um that teachers, individual teachers are making to improve, um school culture for students. Um and Miss Latanzy, I thought, was a good example of that. Uh Miss Latanzi recently received an outstanding emerging music educator award from the Connecticut Music Educators Association. um and has really been working to recruit new students to the music program, but also um to push new meaningful events that connect students to the wider school community. So, I'm going to have Miss Latanzi come up and briefly talk a little bit about open mic nights. And we have a student to give you a quick little bit of a flavor of what uh being at one of those open mic nights might might be like. Aubrey's going to come up with her

068chair, too. Hi, everybody. Thanks so much for having me. Um, thanks Henry for the recognition. No problem. Um, keeping this very brief. So, my colleagues and I have been working hard to rebuild our program, our music program here at Islam High School. And one of the highlights for us has been uh restoring our open mic nights, our coffee houses. And they used to be popular when I was a student here. I graduated in 2015. We used to hold them out in the commons. And I don't know when the last one was, um, other than the one we had about a month ago in my classroom in D130 right down the hall. Uh we decorated the room with lights. We sold coffee and cookies. Thanks Ashley for that. Uh and it was a wonderful wonderful opportunity

069for our students to perform in a low stress uh low-key environment and they could bring in their friends, their family, and everybody got up and performed something. So it was really lovely event. We're going to do them quarterly now for the foreseeable future. Um and it's just been a wonderful uh event. So, we have um Aubrey Dalton here today to perform on her omni chord, which a couple weeks ago was the first time I had ever even heard of one of these instruments. So, really fascinating. Do you want to say the song you're going to be performing? Oh, yeah. So, I am going to be performing My Everything by Ariana Grande. Get out of now. Hold on one second. Three. Five. [Music] I guess you are my everything. Now that he's [Music] Hello. I went

070to the first open bike night and I saw Aubrey perform and one I was like I'm going home and I'm buying that honey and it's fantastic Aubrey. Thank you so much for sharing your talents with me. Um a really supportive environment at those open mic nights. So I thought it'd be a great thing to highlight and thank you Miss Latanzi for for sharing. Um, and I appreciate um, everybody bearing with me while I try and highlight just a few of the things that are going on at the high school. I I think we could we could go on and on and on, but what I will say is that um, I will continue to try and celebrate and lift up um, what's going on at the high school so that you are aware um, and

071well informed um, moving forward. Um, lastly, what I want to kind of close on, I'm going to pass out a few artifacts that you can uh take a look at. I need them back, though. They're very important. Um, uh, I am working with Mike Huitt and the custodial team to move around some of our unused um, and overlooked empty trophy cases. um in traveling to different area high schools with Jeff this year as a part of the vision committee. One thing we noticed was that um lots of the other high schools, they may have nicer buildings than us. That's fine. Um but we can polish up and you know take care of what we do have for now. Um and what we did notice at those schools was that they have displays celebrating their school

072culture and history and traditions. Um so I recently put out an all call to um u faculty and staff that if they have any treasures of Viking memorabilia to share so that we can put them on display so that students can see where our school cultures and traditions have come from. I think that's really important moving forward. So this is also an open call to all of you. If you have any little Viking treasures um tucked away somewhere from your connections to the community, feel free to share. Um but I want to work with the um art club um to curate this display so that we have uh it to catalog and archive things that are important moving forward. So I'll just share a few things that faculty members have shared so far so you

073can get a look at what we are looking for and I look forward to working with you all you know moving forward. Um I appreciate your um inviting us here. Um, and I thank all of the teachers and students uh, who helped me um, share some updates with you all about what's been good going on this semester at East Lime High School. Thank you. Any questions? Uh, thank thank you uh, principal kid uh, for for sharing the update. I actually have a question for Miss Miss Latanzi if if if she's available. Still here. Yes, ma'am. Yeah, Vivic, unfortunately, all of our students are gone. We just have staff left. Sure, that's fine. I is here right there. Um, I I first I'd like to congratulate you on the award. That is that is a great

074achievement and I, you know, I'm happy that you you work for our district and I I wish you all the best for for the future. Uh, and and thank you for instituting the open mic nights. I think though that's that's phenomenal. I think the students do need avenues where they can showcase their talent in a somewhat low pressure situation. Students are talented but I know from from personal experience um with my son they are shy so including them is is the best way to do this. Um so please uh thank you for doing that. Um, I have a question now to my question. I know every year we send a contingent of of of band kids, u orchestra kids and um uh choir kids to the allstate um u program. Do you happen to know

075how many kids did that this year? I'm very curious because that's something I used to used to follow follow a lot when my son was in high school. I've just lost track. I'm just wondering if you happen to know. Yeah. Um, so I believe we sent about two students this year, but I would have to get you those names, and I'm embarrassed to say I don't know off the top of my head, but I believe they're band students. Um, so that's what I've got for you there. Uh, students have to have made it to the Eastern Regional Festival to be eligible to audition for All State. So that's how it works. And we had more students participate in that this year. Um, so but I don't have those families. I'm familiar with it and it's

076it's it's very tough to to get into the all state programs especially some of the more more uh selective programs such as such as jazz and and and sometimes even orchestra and band because there are only so many so many positions available for each uh instrument or each u uh voice type. So, um, but I I was just curious if you happen to know and you know, I'd like, you know, I'd like to say congratulations to those kids and, um, I hope you can continue encouraging them. Thank you. Thank you very much. Thanks. Those names are best of Jill, do you either of you have questions? I'm just blown away. I just want to say gratitude. Yeah. especially for bringing in teachers and students. I, you know, as I started to go through this, as

077I'm standing up there, I'm like, "All right, I'm gonna cut that." Um, it's wellrounded. I I appreciate that. Like, you got a little bit of everything that's happening at the high school. It was great. It's also really nice to hear directly from from students especially. So, I really appreciate the focus on on having students highlight everything that they've been doing. Thank you so much. Thanks for having us. Everybody good? All right. Thank you, High School, Mr. Kit and Mrs. Kit and thank you for everything you guys. All right. Next up is Nova Supernova Enrollment Followup. So um we have gone through a couple of presentations with the team with regards to um next steps associated with our um opportunities for our earliest learners. Um just to remind the board we did decide to go with

078I had pres the last time I presented I had presented two options option one option two opt we did go with option two which was combining our three four and 5-year-olds into one classroom going Monday through Friday from 9:15 to 1:15 um and we did we need we we did need to see an increase in the daily rate there in order to um project um you know a uh basically not have a loss for next year. So right now um with that model we have 27 currently enrolled. Um so that is actually enough to for us to provide two sections next year. Um and we'll also put us in a a good fiscal space. Um if we drop below 22, we will need to drop a section because that's the number that will put us

079in a in in that um space where we won't be able to afford the two sections. Um and if that happens, we will need to display six families um because we can only have a section of 16. One section is 16. So a total of we can have a total of 32 with two sections running. So right now we have five spots left in our program. Um, do you want to share out a little bit with creative? Um, I was just going to start linear linearly on my I have integrated first. Um, we accepted 17 new peers and we have 17 peers returning. Um, so their class sizes, I think I shared at a previous meeting, are going to start at about 12 to 13. And then, of course, with integrated preschool, we receive referrals

080throughout the year. So we don't accept any more peers typically as the year goes on because we increase in our students with IEPs. So um with the goal of them ending somewhere right around that 16 number. So uh with four classes next year they can each take three-ish students um which in a typical year we receive 10 to 12 birth to three referrals. So that's all right within the calibration. We had an outlier year a couple years ago we got 26 birth to three referrals in one year. That was staggering. So, we hope to not go back to that. Um, and then in creative in the two-day, uh, they are full, uh, with 14 students and they have 15, um, on the waiting list. I understand that this year's cohort has quite a few twins.

081So, that doesn't necessarily mean 15 families, but 15 students, which could be sets of twins. Um, they they already have at least four sets enrolled in current classes. So, it's a big twin year. Um, and then in the 3-day we are full at 16 with six um on the waiting list. And in 4day we are also full with uh at 16 with six on the waiting list. Um there will likely be some additional movement after all the elementarymentaries have their kindergarten orientation days in case some of those kids are holding a spot if they have asked for a waiver or parents are just not sure. So they're, you know, giving themselves a little insurance policy um one way or the other. So, we will still see some movement. Historically, that's always been true. And we'll

082um we did work um collaboratively this year based on our conversations we had had this spring when Creative Heather openhouse had the flyer out for Nova Supernovas as well as uh integrated and when things were full, all three programs, I think, were talking amongst one another um to share information with families so they knew all the choices they had available to them. So that's where we are. Any questions? I can do the math, but what is total enrollment across all of our prek programs? Oh, uh, I didn't math. Okay. Off the top of your head. I don't. No. Okay. Sorry. No worries. Bill, Estabbon, any questions? Thank you. Uh, next up, services. All right. Nope. Very brief. Yeah. Very, very brief. Just uh kind of catch you guys up on um things we've done in

083the spring. The May food service updates. First one is our it was our um wells year. So, every three years we have to complete the wells. Um, East Slime scored very high um, this year. Um, in practice we're doing they they had us split it up this year and we had to do one um, assessment in practice, one in policy. Um, in practice we're doing very well. Um, but we do have to clarify some of our practice in our physical policy. Um, so at some point that will be coming to you guys in policy committee to oversee. Um, like I said, everything we're already basically doing in all of our schools, we just want to make sure it's clearly outlined um, for people to see. Yeah. And we had a really great turnout for our

084wellness committee this year. We were able to get um every level we needed from parent representatives to board members to administrators um health teachers members community members supervisor mental health probably the biggest group we've ever had and our student involvement was great this year. They were phenomenal. Annalise and I will be going to Hartford on Wednesday for um the second annual WHISK conference which is whole student whole child whole child whole community whole school um conference and they invited us to be on the panel this year. So we'll be talking about the some of the um changes and improvements we've made over the last year. Um so we did first day of spring in a cafeteria. Um, we got some donations from Tractor Supply and Home Was it Home Depot or Lowe's? Both, I think.

085Oh, Home Depot and Lowe's. Um, they gave us a bunch of, uh, seed packets for the kids and, uh, they also donated a lot of things for the school garden at Flanders, um, which is underway. Um, sorry, Jamie, the garden was not quite ready yet, so we couldn't make But maybe before school's over, we can get you up. Um, so yes, so the Gary has the garden started in the greenhouse, so it should be going in the ground shortly. I think he was just waiting for this latest storm to get by and then uh he was going to start really planting in the garden. Um, and then we had a big uh end of year sports day instead of just focusing on one sport. Um, and we were able to actually great get some great

086gifts this year from, uh, the Boston Bruins sent us a signed puck for their goalender that we gave away. The Wox gave us tickets. Uh, the Giants sent us a a limited edition poster gave away. And then we also got tickets from the Yard Goats, the Sea Unicorns, the New Britain Bees. Um, and sort of all sorts of things. Yeah. Yeah. So, uh, and then the kids had a great time. We put some highlights. We actually uh used the uh East Lime Little League on ESPN last year. They made it all the way to the almost Pennsylvania last year. So, we uh we showed their highlight videos of uh their games and the kids really especially when they like saw themselves uh at the middle school and the videos, they really got a kick out

087of it. And that's pretty much it. Oh, and then finance-wise, wise. So, we're um we're definitely very secure in our budget. So they have at the end of April they have about $391,000 um in their account. Um so I think this year we hopefully will not run into any issues with Yeah. We should be right about that threshold that we're supposed to be at. Yeah. So we won't be in that extra fund area. That extra funding area. Um and that 391 doesn't include like rece on their state claim. So, we're about 88,000 89,000 um in receivables for the um state claim that's not included in that 391. So, you know, we had we re if we receive it in a timely manner, it would I shouldn't say timely, it's just, you know, they have to

088process the doesn't sound right, but you know, they're always it's always a couple months behind. So, we would have over 400,000 in there, but everything looks good. We're stable and questions online. Our student debt is about $7,000 this year. It's kind of been hovering pretty stable there compared to neighboring districts that are over 30 grand. Um, you've been pretty good at trying to stay on top of the balances. Yeah, because we do multiple we have phone calls, emails, texts that goes to the next level where the principles send emails and so it's it we're keeping it at a manageable number. Um, but for next year we do have to uh consider increasing the prices. Um, this year we went with the minimum. Um, I don't think we'll be able to do that next year. Just

089with anybody who's been at the grocery store lately, the prices are very high. Um, expensive. Yeah. So, um, the state should be putting out their tools shortly so we can calculate out what it should be and then, um, when that does happen, we'll bring it to you guys to I think last year we did it around July is when they finally had the numbers for us to process. So, we'll bring it back to you so you can make a decision on that increase. Questions? All right. Thank you. I just want to just want to thank Chris and Ashley too because I don't know you Jamie you were on the board you know 10 years ago we were $86,000 in the hole with Chartwells if you remember years ago we brought on Chris and we brought

090on Ashley to follow and such a great job and the work that they've done has been amazing and you look financial stability as well so I was just going to say the same thing like what you guys have managed to do has been phenomenal. You're at all the open houses. You're giving out food to all the parents so that they can try everything at every event. We cater everything and we that's all come back almost full circle now. It's been great. Any projects all the sports this year coming projects and um Jeff has a a week uh monthly Rotary Club now wanting to eat here every Yeah, we start next year we're going to have them come monthly and then we're going to have the food service. That's the plan. So we'll try to work

091that out so they can come and see kids and activities to school. that idea. That's right. We did one at Lily Be this year. Um so then when it was over, they're like, "We want to eat here every month." School. Yeah. No, to your question, projects, no big projects that you're anticipating. We've done a lot of the school spring sports teams both for travel um meals and in-house um like pasta supper kind of night. Say those away meals were a lifesaver when my kid was playing baseball. Those things were great. Yeah. The lacrosse mom this year, she emailed me just now. He's like, "I never This was like awesome. I just send you an email and then the food." So, yeah. No, it's it's been great. Doing um meals for project grad when the kids

092graduate. You guys did it last year for this year. So, it was great. They worked on that'll be our end of year. I think the only big project is the grease trap, I believe, at the high school because the tank is probably original. So, we uh we have to uh update that. I don't think there's any other real freezers and refrigerators. So, we got a lot done through after co there. So, yeah, they've done a great work. You guys have done a great job. Thank you. Thank you both. Thank you. Thank you. Cash balance was 321. You say 321, not 321. Said it's I think I might have probably included the uh you did include the 88. Yeah. Yeah. Receivable. Sorry about that. Thank you. Thank you guys. Thank you both. Uh next up, a

093discussion item on Salem School's cooperative agreement. Yeah, this is just more of a quick um update. Um so we've continued discussions, you know, with Salem um looking at uh that cooperative agreement. We tried to see if we could schedule, you know, another co-op meeting with them, but it just isn't going to happen by the end of this year. So, um they're kind of looking at their end formulating a committee. We have our committee which consists of Alisa and Olivia. Yep. So, we're going to be coming together um the summer at the latest, you know, in the early fall and then we want to have a co-op meeting in the early fall to reopen that uh whole agreement. Have to do it within the next four years anyways. We want to start it earlier and start

094looking at uh you know, you know, to that um so we can uh work closer with Salem and uh so plan on a meeting in the fall. Just wanted to let you know that that was, you know, kind of where we stood with Sale. Any questions? Thank you. Yes. Um, next up is discussion action item. Um, due to budget questions, we do have to do an approval of Jeff handing out non-renewals for non-tenure staff. Correct. Yeah. Um, all the letters have gone out. They have to go out, you know, uh, by uh, by April 1st. So we've notified um individuals. Again, this is all precautionary. So, you know, we don't have to bring if the the referendum fails and we have to continue with reductions, then we don't have to bring individual teachers to board

095meeting board hearing then um and remove due to you know the fiscal issues, not performance or fiscal rel budgetary related. So um we haven't done these in a while. It's been a couple years um because we felt that we've been okay with the budget, but this is a tougher budget uh going into next year. So, we did do some non-renewals, I hope, after the referendum on Thursday passes and I can simply hand letters back to these individuals and reinstate um the fall. So, that's the bland. It's just it's just a formality is what it and know this to be true. I just for the sake of teachers are aware of that absolutely that context is I I go meet with each one of them directly and tell them exactly what um there's one that Mr.

096kid did at the high school as a part-time teacher that I didn't get to, but talked to somebody I met with every other every other one and I'll go back and give it. Anyone else have any questions on this? Anyone want to make a motion? There is one in if anyone wants to. Sure. Um, I'll I'll uh move that a contract of employment for non-tenured certified staff members across departments not be renewed for the following year upon contract expiration at the end of the 24 2024 2025 school year due to potential fiscal year 2025 2026 budget reductions. Can I get a second? Second. Any further discussion? All those in favor I can't see. Oh, there he is. I see him. All right. And that's all right. Motion passes. All right. Yep. To be again giving

097those reinstatements. Um you know that we don't want to do that. That's why I try and avoid it with everything I we can and uh you know just uh Okay, superintendent update. Uh, so a couple things. Um, got some legislative information. Um, a lot will be coming forth in the next uh the session is closing uh shortly. So, uh, we'll be getting probably a stack, a packet this summer, which we always get from, uh, our legal team, um, from Shipman and Goodwin, uh, changes, but one is, um, kindergarten waiver pieces in there that the waiver is, uh, supposedly going to go as optional for 20 for next year um, for 26 and then 27 it will be um, eliminated. So stay tuned on that one. Um, we're still waiting to hear on, you know, some

098of our other costs. harmless piece. We are getting some um I'm sorry, educational cost sharing access cost is related to special education. We are going we did get confirmation actually um today this morning that we're going to get $77,000 back in the 40 million that the government released. So that will be to us by June 30th. So that helps with our end of year. So and Marion is still putting all that together. So we'll kind of know our final numbers as we move into June June as we know fiscal year. Um Jeff, what was that from again? So that was from excess cost. Uh the governor put an additional well to the governor because he was kind of against it at first but then agreed to it went through from legislation. So it passed for

099this year. Um so 40 million is coming back to districts but spread out across districts. So East Lime is getting back 77,000 additional dollars to support special education. Um reminder the referendum is Thursday. So, you know, please tell everybody that you know to get out and vote community center 8 to 8. I saw a sign out at the four corners. Um secretary negotiations um resume tomorrow at uh at 4:30. Um so I think that is um part of secretaries Eric, Alisa, and VC. So um if you're available tomorrow, I'll reach out to Alisa as well. Secretary of Negotiations at central office u might be our last uh our last meeting as we try and wrap that up. Um the high school student expo was mentioned uh tonight. So if you can make it tomorrow um

100right out here in the comments at six o'clock six o'clock. Yeah. If you can walk through um fantastic. It's always a great demonstration. And then we're just busy with you know just looked ahead of the calendar yesterday. Um and we're like wow. Uh we were talking this morning. It's like just boom boom boom end of the year. End of the year. Activities, concerts, all great. It's all great stuff. It just is like a whirlwind. Um once we hit Memorial Day, which is coming up this weekend, we have two weeks off to school. So get ready. Yes. But we're excited. We have concert Wednesday. Yes. So that's it. That's all I am. [Music] Um, so I've just been um really busy work the end of the year I meet with all of our curriculum fellows and

101CIL's one-on-one. And so um a wrap up uh with regards to each of them writes their own curriculum action plan for the school year. So it's a reflection on that plan, but also we do look at um you know we start to project out into the next year. So we look at software software needs, license numbers, um any curriculum summer work that they hope to uh complete and any department-based PD priorities that they might have. So this starts to help me formulate some priorities as we enter into the next school year. Of course, I'm also waiting for the budget referendum to pass on Thursday, so we can push the go button on some of these things. Um so right now it's just information collecting. Um I can't remember if someone me you mentioned satchel pulse

102but we did just release actually tomorrow officially opens our um third and final satchel pulse survey for the school year. This one is uh the longer more comprehensive one. It's about um between 25 and 30 questions for all stakeholders. No comments. It goes pretty quickly. Um, so that'll be open until June 8th and we will review the preliminary data with our district-wide school climate committee on June 5th, I believe, is our our third. June 3rd. Um, uh, we pushed that meeting out a little bit because of some conflicts that we had last week, which actually works out better because we'll have the data to review. Um but you know again just the you know still sort of you know finding the relationship between using the data how does it impact planning while at the same

103time you know I think I have to just circle back on some of Mr. Kid's messaging tonight is just that one- on-one the work with people the focus groups the conversations how valuable that is in conjunction with a digital survey that we're collecting over the course of the year. So, I really appreciate that. In addition to this work, our building principles are working really hard at, you know, listening and having conversations with people on. So, um there was one other thing, but uh didn't write that one down and now I circling around. 160 I think. You're calculating over there. Thank you. You say you go on my calculator like that. Thanks, Kevin. Uh just a couple things. So, um when we I had reported last we were looking at uh potentially not, you know, close

104to being uh our budget was close um for this year for current fiscal years. So, we implemented a freeze um had everyone like really review their purchase orders and we're analyzing all of the spending. So with the addition of that 77,000 that we just heard about today, we are um as I said with the freeze, we are looking um okay, you know, feel much better now. Um and as we move along once we have some other expenses that are uh have a better handle on, then we could uh perhaps lift the freeze a little bit to do. Um I know Chris's department was impacted a little bit. Hold on a few things. So, if we're able to move forward with that, we will. Um, so I just wanted to give you guys an update on

105that. Um, other item which I, you know, I've been listening to as we go through this process with the budget and um is the mill rate and there's been um so just my background. I was a finance director on the town side of things for 20 plus years before I came to the school side. So I just want to kind of just quickly I know it was kind of given out in the um update but it was like this big long thing and perhaps you know some you don't always have time to look at it. So just want to give you just a quick kind of update as to why it's not always um you can't really compare mill rates right because the mill rate is dependent on multiple things. So, it's dependent on the

106Graham list and like for example, I was joking with Jeff like I I went in and I pulled some census data and um I couldn't get average um assessed values anywhere but I was able through the census data to come up with housing values median the median so like um Darianne I looked at Darian their mill rate is like 14 I think well their 75% of their homes are valued at a million or more right which to us what we think a million dollars in our heads down there is like probably like a three-bedroom ranch or something like that. So it so it doesn't mean that just because their mill rate is 14 that they're paying less taxes than us because when I calculate 14 based on their median um house value which is like

107a million and change it's $15,000. So um tax is 15 for taxes right because the the assessed the appraised value is a million the assessed is based on 70% um and then other factors like um you know cities like Waterberry Hartford they're getting in addition to um you know their ECS grant is significantly higher so they're getting a um a lot more in grant dollars so and and again even though their mill rate like New London's mill rate is significantly definitely higher than ours, but um their housing is value, their median is lower. So when you apply their mill rate, they're paying they're not paying this, you know, because you think I think their mill rate is like 35 or 36 or something like that. So you think, oh my goodness, they're paying a ton

108in taxes and they might be, but it's not 35 com like a 35 would be here. So I just I don't know if anyone has any questions. I just kind of wanted to review that because I don't want guys thinking that like it's comparable if if you will. So, um I don't know if anyone has any questions on that. I appreciate that. Just because Yeah. So, um has any questions for me? All right. Thanks. Uh CCI was cancelled. Um yes, we're going to bring that update to the board instead the um like the board retreat um June 9th. We just didn't want to repeat because what we were bringing to CCI is going to come as a result of our climate goal work in AI. So AI is on the second and then culture and

109climate on the ninth. We'll bring some updates to the whole board on this. So FFO no policy not affiliated. We did Thursday. Yes, last Thursday. We had a great five minute meeting. Um, pretty straightforward and that was all covered in the uh consent agenda. Everything that we covered was in that. Um, K, I actually have nothing. It's kind of wrapping up everything in Harford right now, which you haven't already covered. Eric's not here for a learn update or comments or future agenda items. So there's your hand up. One, I just want to say referendum is Thursday the 22nd. I would like to clarify because I've been hearing things in the community. A yes vote passes the budget as is. A no vote sends it back for more cuts. There is not a way to add

110more money to the budget. Best passes, no cuts more. Because I've heard people saying, "I wanted to go back for more additions." They're voting no. I would just like to clarify. And no vote makes more cuts. It doesn't send it back to put more money in. Anyone else have anything? That's right. On the 22nd, right? The middle school concert is on the 22nd. Don't ask her what time high school too. There are so many things coming up this year. No, the 22nd. Uh Flanders has their concert on the 22nd. 21st. Oh, the middle school is on the 21st. Okay. Yeah. 22nd's a referendum and then something on the 27th. Sorry. The 27th, I think, is the See, that's Yeah. eighth grade concert at the high school at six o'clock art expo. If you've never been

111to I think I saw you art expo was great. The art expo is really nice. Anyone want to make a motion to adjurnn? Olivia. Everyone in favor of adjourning. So moved. Good night everyone. Thank you. Everybody