001Thank you. Bristol students are identified as requiring special education programming. This enrollment reflects 22.58% of the total BPS student population. As of March 1st, 122 students with disabilities required out of district placements at private special education schools. There were 89 students requiring special education programming at other public schools. That would include magnet schools. During the month of February 2025, 39% of the newly registered students were identified as requiring special education at the time of registration. Two of the newly enrolled students required programming at out of district public school private school placements. And lastly, during the month of January, there were 36, excuse me, during the month of February, there were 36 211 and eight 911 calls. Are there any questions? No questions. Thank you very much. Okay. Item number three, public comment. Do we have
002anyone signed up? None signed up. Any online? >> No, I don't. Hold on. >> Okay. >> No, I don't see anyone raising their hand. >> 25 budget update 285. Indeed. Our fiscal year 25 balance on February 28th was7,56868,619. We received our first installment of the excess quest grant. However, our transportation and pupil personnel services operation and maintenance of plant characters remain the most significant areas of concern. The transportation permit budget is currently over budget by $369,573 due to increases in contractual obligations. Pupil services is over budget by 7,631,970 and operation of maintenance and plant are over by 367,313 and 147,557 respectively at the end of February. The three water main issues and breaks and school plumbing issues are driving these overages. We maintain a budget freeze, are only allowing purchases directly supporting their curriculum, necessary
003paper products, emergency repairs, and all grant and student activity purchases. We are actively identifying areas where we can reduce incumbrances for good and services. Currently, there are 853 purchase orders that remain open. We'll continue to work to close the POS that are not explicitly related to curriculum, repairs, or needed supplies. I'll closely monitor fiscal year 2025 costs and continue to inform you of all areas of concern in the following months. >> Yes, if I may. Um I had a question for you regarding the transportation expenses particularly where it uh involves um transportation uh for students from from their from their home school you know from their home school to banks for some of those other some of those other programs. Um how many students are are being busted that are only taking like say one
004or two classes? >> Those are the high school students and those are shuttle buses. Yeah. and um the the number of students I couldn't tell you off the top of my head, but the shuttle buses run and they're part of the tiers. So, it's not a lot of additional costs. >> Okay. Um approximately how many students are are are taking that making that transportation >> for high school for high school. >> Thank you. >> 78 for high school. >> Okay. All right. Secondary my answer. >> Yeah, that's fine. >> All right. Thanks. >> You're welcome. >> With respect to transportation, I think we've known for a while that we were going to be opening that line due to um an increase that makes budget talking about it for a while. >> Um have we looked
005at where we think we might end at either end knowing what the rates are because right now we've got almost 400,000 over And in our operating the general fund operating budget, we've got only two million excess, right? And so that's balancing against what we have down here is a $7.6 million deficit, right? So right now $7.5 million total deficit. We only got $2.2 million in additional outstanding revenue that we expect. And so we could go all the way down five.5 million where we can trend closer to $6 million. So guess >> I anticipate getting um between 1.9 and 2.7 more excess cost dollars this year in May. >> Yeah. >> Which will reduce the special ed expenditures and also many of the um purchase orders that are out there can be reduced or or brought
006down where we're just trying to get a hold of it. and find things that are actually necessary and things that are not. >> I totally understand. I think just the point that I'm trying to make is that there's basically not a lot of room left. And historically, if we looked at >> from 2022 on, right, we were able to try and balance out our budget because we weren't spending in our general fund and we kept freezing at the start of every school year, right? So, um I just kind of we've got a broad audience today. We also have a very important topic to discuss later on. And so I think the picture has to be made clear is that we're discussing other things because of what we're looking at today versus what we've been receiving
007in our revenue. Um the only other thing I wanted to take a look at I'm losing my plates. Oh um item six benefits and fix right we've got about 1.7 million in that line but we expect to utilize that almost >> 100% of it. >> Okay. So that's that's sort of where I'm getting at is that there's some shrinkage to get to that 7.5, right? But you said we've got 1.9 to 2.7 in a range, but we also have to spend out another $1.7 million. So that what what's left really is basically nothing >> pretty much. >> Okay. And last question, do we know today, I think we presented previously, but what our excess cost reimbursement is dollar for dollar. It was 69 cents on the dollar. The last time we talked >> it was
00864.8 and we are now getting 78.2. >> Okay. So that's a lot better than >> and we'll get it in the second installment. So it will be >> a good chunk. >> Is that why we got to the end range of about 2.7 versus 1.9.2? >> Okay. Thank you. >> You're welcome. Another question actually and this is me actually this media question more for Iris than it is for for Lynn and this is me just kind of like spitfall as far as as far as those students that are taking those uh you know those classes from high school to the banks. Um is it is there any feasibility to use that instead of using you know using public transportation as opposed to using as opposed to using buses. Is that is that something that would
009be feasible that they can set up for the students? >> You mean Connecticut transportation? >> Yes. That might be much more for Iris than than you. >> I honestly don't know if the buses run from there from the the high schools to Bes. True. If you had a conversation >> time frame, >> I have no idea how much a bus costs per people because I don't know how much a transportation bus costs. >> Yeah. Well, that's tax funded. So, already the fast track, >> you still have to pay for it. >> Yeah. But, you know, if it's already we have to pay for the bus, too. So, um if the if the states, you know, if it's being paid, um I don't see why we shouldn't look into that and at least exploring our >>
010depending on it could be very tricky having um children under the age of 18 riding buses without a >> well, >> that would be a position we'd have to pay for. Well, but like I said, it's something I think we should be looking um there's got to be, you know, like I said, we got to be looking at >> Yeah, I think chair back. I think uh to the commissioner is quite right to looking through a variety of potential savings that we can embark on. Obviously, with what was just mentioned, right, you have liability insurance that you have to think about with children on a public bus. uh you have other you know staff liability and all those types of things and so I think I what I appreciate is obviously the creativity that people
011want to bring to this discussion but um and certainly to look at that for another fiscal year but I think we'll cover in front of us tonight stuff that we need to be um exploring and looking at we have a presentation due to next Wednesday and so we approve a budget >> you want me to go on with the cafeteria report We didn't move that item up. So, unfortunately, >> number five. Why don't you say what you like to say? >> Um so item number five is suggested budget cuts for the upcoming budget. Um the superintendent um and board spent two workshops reviewing uh the proposed superintendent's budget which was um around $60 million proposed increase almost 13%. Um we got some feedback from folks on the city side that that basically wouldn't be an
012acceptable request on their end. Um and so what uh the chair of the board had asked to do and I know that I member of clients committee it asks the um folks at central office do areas which you know either one create efficiency or two have no choice because money is finite we don't raise and so if I understand the process if I'm wrong um metro office folks held um few meetings to review areas in which they provided us with a list of those areas. They include both positions and other line items. Uh there were followup questions with respect to those um significant cuts and line item cuts. We also received usually long lists like this in tiny print with the rale of those cuts, but we have them on our computer. Um we also
013have a budget cut rationale. There are several cuts that are listed on here. I don't know if we probably want to do this. um four of us but we can go line by line we can have sort of percent budget rale and have a discussion >> okay why don't you go >> the cuts that we've presented tonight focus on aligning expenditure with prior year spending shifting certain costs to grants and reducing non-essential expenses notably the costs are designed to preserve core educational functions demonstrating our unwavering commitment to providing the students and families of Bristol with a quality education. >> Would you want me to generalize or go line by line? >> I think you want to start with non positions. So the the cuts that are not to positions >> we have um put in
014program and staff siphon reductions. Professional development has been reduced to 15,000. Supervisor salaries elementary only were reduced by 9,152 and shifted to alliance. That's for summer school. Library media salaries it's a before and after school at high school program was cut. That was 3,000 in each high school. Co-curricular stipens for various programs, art, theater, wellness, te-awol were reduced or eliminated unless they are in the teachers contract. Professional education services in music, theater, and art are cut to previous levels. Software licenses have been reduced by 22,000, a decision made after careful evaluation of usage and the necessity to optimize the budget. Overtime in technology was cut by $2,500. In our athletics and student activities, we cut the uniform lines for the high school and middle school by 56,274 and $1,800. Athletic memberships were reduced by $43,285.
015Student recognition across various departments was cut or reallocated. Middle and high school athletic recognition was cut by about $15,276. and a bus for bowling for only one high school was eliminated, saving $5,515. Arts and music productions. The art budget was cut by $17,211 adjusted to match 2324 levels. Music equipment and instructional supplies were significantly reduced down to previous levels. Theater and music professional development and stipens were cut. What did you say that was? >> Theater and music professional development and stipens were cut. >> But can you tell us an impact on that? >> Let's go to the individual alliance. There were professional services um in the two A8 schools and we put there was um a very large amount of money put in for a theater for um Green Hills and West Bristol and they
016don't run a theater program. It was put in to attempt to start one so we cut it out because it doesn't exist now. >> Okay. >> And that's it for here. That's um yes. Okay. Transportation and field trips. Summer school transportation was cut by 25,000 and moved to a grant and field trips across multiple schools were cut or reduced to a set amount per school. The facilities and maintenance uh security repairs and maintenance was reduced by $15,000. Repairs and maintenance for multiple departments and schools were cut or shifted to other funding sources. and the vandalism fund was reduced by $14,000. Instructional and office supplies, we had textbook purchases that we cut across the district. Office and instructional supplies in schools and the central office were reduced or eliminated. Student planners were eliminated across all buildings.
017Administrative and miscellaneous reduction. The administrative supplies were cut for all the departments. membership for staffs in various subjects were reduced or eliminated and any additional new stipens were removed. That's the net effect of the three-page document. >> I just had a question >> about art and music. You said about art and music. How did they impact art? Oh, >> I just want to understand the cuts to art and music. >> There was equipment in art for kils that were being replaced that was done this year. We transferred the funds last month to do the kil repair. So, we cut that out of next year's budget. And the theater, it was mostly rents and leases, um, repairs and maintenance for art, um, middle school and high school. No theater for Green Hill and Green Hills in
018West Bristol. Uh, instructional supplies were cut for those lines um because they don't need them if they're not running the programs. And then you said 56,000 in high school uniforms or all uniforms across the district. >> All uniforms for next year for the two high schools and middle school will cut. >> And so what what will that how will that impact? Do we have uniforms that they can wear or is this going to >> they have uniforms that they're currently using? This is the replacement schedule. If >> we don't replace them, they'll just go out another year. So, how long have they not been replaced? >> They're on a fiveyear schedule for a five years. >> So, next year's replacements would be the this the fifth year. >> Cut in on that. Sorry. Well, yeah.
019But um to your question about being cut uniforms on the budget >> last year, I think the year before that. >> So like because we did have people come say that like band uniforms were falling apart and >> we fixed the band uniforms, but people who haven't lane yet could be coming if we're on year seven if we postponed the others for two years. So, I just want to, you know, pay attention to that. >> The actual equipment lines for the high schools, they've gotten all the the materials they needed this year. In fact, they're over budget because they've gotten more than they needed this year because there was an additional season of a sport that was added and they got uniforms for that. So, that line is of the budget. I guess we have
020to see which uniforms are supposed to be bought next year and if they really are year six or if they're year seven or if they're year eight before we decide. So like if they want us to decide tonight, we'd have to if we were going to cut it, I'd have to know that for me to vote on that. >> We'd have to look that up. >> Okay. >> Sure. Okay. >> Um, can we just talk to the deduction and repairs and maintenance a little bit? It looks like I think you said this and it looks like to me we've zeroed out every line on that. Can we talk to the realism of not doing repairs and maintenance on buildings that are incredibly old? >> You're the chair. >> Yeah. >> Oh, is your mic >>
021talking to the mic and it's on? >> It's on. Okay. Because we're getting we're getting comments that they can't hear you. Do I >> I can I can hear you in the room, but they're but they're saying you're quiet online. >> I can almost the mic. >> All right. It might be in maybe it's just instruction that I see on here, but >> those are instruction. >> Okay. >> The repairs and maintenance for the buildings. Um >> character four. >> Well, there is one equipment maintenance. $12,000 six billion age. >> I think it's the third or fourth page. These might be >> page. Oh no. >> No. >> They all >> bar. I mean one, two, three, four, five. >> Yep. In the middle. It's object. I can read the object code. >> Great. Uh
022573005 equipment maintenance >> 573005 that was to purchase a truck that we put off for another year. >> No, >> it's not a roof falling in. >> Nope, it's equipment. Don't bring >> questions. We have touchism which we have no control over the kids behave. Oh, on the reserve for salary changes. It's noted that it's salary changes for retirees. >> It's retirees and um anyone who's resigned this year and we're replacing with a lower salaried person. So, we're at 10 now, I think. >> So, that's going to take up 100,000. Anybody good? >> Um I do I did have some other questions if I may. Um so is this the the final list? Uh is there have any other cuts been considered outside of this? I just uh that maybe uh you know nobody was
023comfortable with or considered. This is a non position. >> Okay. All right. Um, have we considered that >> certain certain staff positions? I know certain >> that were funded by uh that have been funded by by grants. Um, no, it's not, you know, >> I don't think we got that. >> Okay. All right. We are doing Yeah. Oh. Let's get rid of the staff. Okay. In the staffing spreadsheet, which is the colorful one, you see there's 12 nonbargaining kindergarten teaching assistants that are currently in the alliance grant that previously were in effort. It's a cut of $347,792 for PE teachers at the high school. It's a cut of $262,920. Half of my secretary, $36,360. Um, climate supervisor of climate and culture, $164,689. A theme coach, $65,730. A half of an art teacher, 32,865. A half
024of a music teacher, 32,865. Um, science instructional leaders, elementary level, $4,76. Library media specialists at the high school, two, $131,460. Six to eight instructional support Green Hills 109,153 four high school teachers 262920 two from each school one 68 coach from the K8 schools $65,730 cut five middle school curriculum coordinators to have one per course per grade level 77 $727 one 6 to8 library media specialist from Greenhouse West Bristol 65730 move two administrators to 11 months savings of $30,000 and the supervisor of high school facilities $92,168. The total width benefits of these cuts is 2 thou 2,157,544. We used um M's step 465730 as the value for each teacher being reduced and um $582 for the leaders in elementary support. You want me to get first? >> Okay. So, when I looked at the list that
025was presented to us, I saw a lot of positions that actually impact students directly. So, 12 kindergarten uh assistants that are in my experience as a as a parent and an educator um dealing with our most vulnerable youngest students who are coming in. They were born during COVID, right? They um may have English as a second language. they may have not been identified by birth to three on what needs that they have and I'm I'm absolutely just not interested in cutting positions that work directly with students. [Music] >> I love that you really talk about, you know, making sure that we're maintaining any position that directly touches a student. In some of what you'll hear tonight, any of the position cuts, we really did vet it with the mindset that no staff loses their position
026and that students still have access to what they need. So with the 12 KTAs, you know, again, we were looking at the fact that they weren't budgeted for previously. They were part of an grant. However, when you reduce those positions, they do have the ability to take on a parent educator position, which we do have available, and they're able to still work with kindergarten students, and part of their responsibilities will change a bit to include things like the diapering and toileting that we do have in the PAR contract. KTAs don't respond to that. So, in our mind, we were keeping the same staff. It was just reallocating KTAs to become paras to support the students. >> But when when I looked at the precoid parah situation in kindergarten classrooms, we didn't have a par kindergarten
027classroom. >> They did not. >> So in our redesign, we would be purposefully assigning parah educators rather than KTAs in those areas because we do see the benefit of having >> but that's more cost. It's the same number of pairs that we have. So of the pairs that we'll have next year, they would assume some of those positions. We have many positions open at this time that are not filled. Our KTS can take those positions up to the 225. >> How many positions are open? >> I have to get you the number, but it's actually well over the 12. >> Okay. >> 15, I think. Have we done any have we done any >> speaking to the kindergarten teachers about how this would impact their ability and what is our class size and how this
028will change things. I mean it's hard to just eliminate 12 positions that are direct service positions and the cost of those 12 positions are not super high cost and they're pretty impactful. So, I think with just seeing what we've been provided, it's hard to make a decision to remove those positions. I think we would need more information. >> Yeah, I can only speak to the conversations that I've had. I'm not sure if there's been, you know, additional conversations because again, these these last minute changes came up within the last week. But I do know in speaking with kindergarten teachers, they really do value the additional support within the room. They really are side by side teacher. And I think as a as a educator group here, we value that service that they're providing. And so
029again, when we were asked to reduce the budget, it was kind of we could reduce the budget while reallocating, keeping students still at the center and keeping staff with their jobs, >> right? And so I guess that leads to my next. So I look at, you know, taking away physical education teachers because we don't have to give as many credits. But with obesity and activity being so necessary, ADHD, I mean, like movement, I just can't even I can't imagine removing things like that. And so the list that we were given, I can understand that there might be a plan in place, but we were asked by the board of finance to look at the things that are nice to do, but that aren't required. And we're also elected to make sure that we meet the
030needs of every student in the district. And I see the phys physical activity. I see supports in kindergarten. I see those types of things as non-negotiables. I I I I just don't see them as things that I could even consider um removing from our student body. Um and I don't see a lot of things on here that are nice to do but not necessary and that don't directly touch kids. So, we did ask for more information because we know that there are a lot of positions that are full-time positions that aren't necessarily working directly with students. And I think that's really where we're looking more to have the conversation. >> So, I'm not sure that I'm the person to present it. However, um I can say that we did talk about really a number of
031positions again with that same framework um in mind. One of the things I think that's important is that say we do look at coaches. I know coaches in particular were one of the areas looked at. We also have to remember that contractually if they were eliminated they then bump teacher positions >> and we could then be losing all of our early teachers at a double rate. So it would be the equivalent of 24 brand new teachers. Hence why we didn't look at that. We looked at a different model to maintain all of the staff. So if I if I may, however, I don't want to um I don't want to misspeak but or or take over your >> No, please. >> But when I look at this, right, I see uh one bargaining unit disproportionately
032being impacted against other bargaining units and I count I've got 13 BFG, one BAPS, one 3551, one A18, right? And so I think you know when we had asked for the coaches to be considered which was about 20 folks there's still a savings involved in eliminating the coaching positions. If you take I think what I did I do I mean we have the Excel sheet but it's it's 56 and change which is what the real savings you would get if all of those coaches if all of them decide to go back in the classroom. Some of them may just decide to move on. We don't know what their decision- making would be. That's almost that's another about a million dollars in change in savings. >> We'll also have all the people that are laid off,
033we have to pay the um unemployment insurance. I'll have to increase the unemployment line exponentially. >> Have to do the same for four folks who we would What about the four PE teachers on here? The one batch person, the theme coach. >> It's it's a much greater dollar amount. Well, I think yeah, I mean, I think we would need that because ultimately we may be back at this table even looking at this list again. But what I'm what I'm trying to say is that we've got there's still an ability to have savings without impacting your teachers. And that's what I think we really need to look at. >> I don't know if I should I don't know if you would like me to or not. I'm not sure of the format here. Um, but I
034could speak to a little bit about Dr. Hans. You mentioned what's required and I think that was one of the reasons why we did look at physical education. It is very uncommon at the high school level to require two credits of physical education in addition to an health credit. So, I think it's important for the board's understanding that students would have a consistent semester of either health or physical education uh throughout their entire four years. And I think that makes a a lot of sense for students. It offers greater opportunities within their eth period day to explore other electives. Right now what the students are getting is uh two credits. So a semester of PE and uh two semesters of health. So it is more than what required by the state. It's more than what
035other surrounding towns are requiring. It does maintain physical fitness and health education in a way that's consistent across the career the students educational career. It is not a popular course if I'm being honest. Um and it probably speaks to what you're talking about some of our physical fitness in general. Uh and it is one of our courses that is most often failed requiring additional credits in recovery on top of that even in summer school. So if we uh provide the minimum requirement for students as is expected across the state, it might more positively impact students progression across their high school career. I don't know if you'd like a perspective on coaches, but I think um if that would be useful for the uh committee and decision- making, I can provide that. >> Talk about it.
036>> Okay. So I think as we're talking about uh impact direct impact on students I um coaching has been a part of the Bristol public schools institution since before 2000. I think our first coaches at the literacy in literacy were hired in 1998. It has been a structure that has allowed us to have the greatest impact on literacy achievement and math achievement over the past 25 years. And the reason why the first investments that were made in supporting literacy were made for coaches is because they impact tier one instruction. They're most they have the broadest impact. When we're talking about what the coach's work is, they're co-eing with teachers. They're modeling uh in classrooms. They're providing small groupoup instruction. They're pulling groups of students as necessary when students are underachieving. When you have a position
037that's broadly defined like that, we have the flexibility to be able to impact a greater number of students. The in I know there was some questions about the difference between a coach and instructional support. Instructional support teachers were added later after having that base support of impacting all students when we were seating title one schools. So when we look at around 1998 2000, we were not a fully title one district at the time. And so the investment by the board at that time was really to look at how can we broadly improve student achievement by the minimum um introduction of new positions, hence our coaches. Instructional support, as you noticed in some of the um documentation that was requested, is funded under title one. And title one requires that we provide additional instructional support to
038students who are impoverished. And there the uh the amount of support that's given is based on the number of students who are in need in each building. When we look at instructional support, they do provide direct service, but the max that they could potentially service in a day in the models that we're currently using is somewhere between 47 students a day uh give or take about 10 students depending on the day and the model that the school is using. That's not enough from the number of students that we have in need. Uh we need a base of support. So these two positions really go hand in hand, right? there's like I don't know if I'm breathing hard or what but and I think another uh so to just point this like to give you some
039actual data you know I'm a data person I like to look at what the impact is that'll help as we look at what that impact is um I think one way that we could really look at the impact of coaches is that we've made a concerted effort in math coaches since 2018 in 2018 we had two math coaches and we are now up to 10 coaches. This was an investment on former board of education's parts uh to really look at our math achievement and think about how could we more positively influence outcomes in that area. We do have limited instructional support for mathematics uh at the elementary level. We only have one school that has an instructional support teacher for mathematics and two of our I think it's two off the top of my head
040uh middle schools have part-time instructional support. >> Wait, can I have a good question for that? So, you're saying I thought we had 12.5 nists. >> Um, I would have to look. I don't know that it's up to that number. I don't have that um broken down in front of me right now. The greater investment is in literacy than in math. Karen, well, I don't want to mention any names because we're in a public meeting, but there I'm aware of without looking at it. I don't want to speak to it. That's not And that's not right. I've had an error earlier today. It's not it's not mine. So um okay. So for mathematics to look at mathematics um so since 2018 we've had rising achievement in mathematics uh in most of our grades year-over-year. That
041is not where we've had an investment in math instructional support teachers. It is primarily the work of our coaches. In fact, uh both for grades 3 through five and 6 through 8, when we look at state average uh proficiency rates in mathematics across all three grades, the state average is declining. Performance is going down. In Bristol, that's not the case. Our achievement is rising. the percent of students who are proficient and advanced and mathematics has gone up in at least three of our grades and is maintaining in others I think and especially um I know we have limited math instructional support the middle level that's actually where we're seeing that year-over-year gain I only am bringing up that as a way of highlighting because it is it does allow us an opportunity to explore what's
042the impact of direct instructional support through tier 2 um I know that's educ but for as that's more intensive one- on-one or one to small groupoup support that an IST can provide as compared to providing the overall support coaching. I'm bringing all of that up because as I'm from my position as chief of academics and if I'm being asked to made make recommendations, I certainly want to ensure that everything that we put forward allows our students to meet that vision that we have for them that they will graduate with the knowledge, skills, dispositions that they need to be self-sufficient and to make a meaningful difference in our rapidly changing global community. The changes that were just shared by Miss Ba were changes that allow us to continue that because we have other individuals who could
043provide that level of support. I do feel that given looking at our student achievement over time and looking at the way in which we have invested in the past and that positive outcomes we're seeing that we could be looking at a impact to literacy and numeracy with the reduction of those positions. I just learned your chart on U math ISTs we have five right >> so we have 20 literacy ISTDs and from what I read our instructional support teachers do direct service and also can coach based on their um job descriptions I don't know if that's what's happening but that is in the job functional job description >> of one particular one that was written under title one um you You might have noticed in the job descriptions that there's an intensive instructional support teacher.
044Uh that was written in the past because instructional teachers could not coach. However, um with title one funds, there was a principal who wanted greater opportunity to use that position as a coach as well. And so they're not called an instructional support teacher. It would be hard to see in the in newness. It's not labeled that way, but there's a job description called an intensive instructional support teacher, and that allows some coaching to be a part of that position, >> but the actual job description that we received just for function just for IST says coaching. So, I don't know that that's incorrect or but it says it in it. >> Uh I would say the reverse our coaches generally provide can provide because they have a more broader description than instructional support. I also think
045um just for the awareness of the board and looking at the funding source it does we would want it's going to take a little bit more studying in that title one um as you know this year was impacted it was reduced quite substantially all of our instructional support teacher not all the majority of our instructional support teachers are funded under title one title one requires that all local and state funds be um allocated equitably across all of our schools elementary and middle any grade. Right now, all of our title one schools that serve students, they serve students in grades K through eight. So that would be all of our elementary, middle schools, and our K8s. When there are adjustments that are made, it would be very difficult to cut a position out of Title One
046and move it back into state and local funding that could pose some issues. So, I think in terms of job descriptions, what people are um doing, who they're working for, when you're looking at title one, there's some very specific rules around that. >> And that's more of the IST. >> That's more of the IST goal. >> Yeah. And then when I read the functional job description for the coach, it doesn't include direct service. So again, these are things that when you look at our bylaws and when we change job descriptions, it's important to have us vote on those things and make sure that they're done correctly because all we can go by is what we have. And so I may be a parent and be able to speak to some coaches and hear, "Oh, no,
047we we can do some modeling in the classroom and we're actually in front of kids at times." But then when I look at the functional job description, it doesn't require any direct service with students versus the ISD where it says mainly direct service with students and some coaching, but it doesn't give us any kind of like what is the percentage of time on both? And I hear you say 47 students is on average what an IST would serve a week in address >> A day. Okay. Instead of >> and it's the same students every day for the week. >> So >> 47 students total. >> So 47 students receive direct support daily, five days a week. >> Yes. Give or take. Now, I also that's why I really appreciate the opportunity to come to speak
048because I know you're talking about direct service as being impactful. One of I mean, when we're looking at the impact of roles, we can see that we have rising achievement even in math where we have very little math instructional support. So, I don't want to I let me say it this way. I appreciate the opportunity to look at what could potentially be impacting student achievement more broadly than one-on-one service. uh one of the reasons why we did invest in uh math and coaching instead of math instructional support at the middle level more fully right would have choices as we were adding math coaches we could have considered to add math instructional support one of the reasons why we did not do that is our research at the time had shown that we were not seeing
049great gains with one-on-one direct support uh with a way in which that model was working at the time and thus we decided to move to math coaching as a model so that we could more broadly impact. I just I think it's important and I appreciate the opportunities to speak to what are the outcomes for student learning and what's impacting that beyond the service delivery model. So I just I I just want to say that I think that the idea that coaches don't have an impact is crazy. Obviously we know that any of these supports are going to have an impact, right? And so we're not trying to at all minimize the work of professionals who are doing you know great things for teachers which is which is really great but we're in this huge deficit
050right now right so we're being asked to say where do we absolutely need to keep funding and I look at how many positions were added since co right so precoid we had 10 11 literacy coaches in 2008 18. Um, and we didn't go back further than that. So, I know you say that this was started a long time. I don't know if we had one or two or if we had 10. I really, you know, that's not something that's been provided to us. Now, we have 20. So, we upped it and we almost doubled it postco, right? So, that's something that I don't know that our budget can handle. Then we have um ISTs were at 18 prior to COVID. We went up to 36 in the Kaida COVID and now we're back down to
05124 or 25 to 24. >> Um, and so looking at the growth in those areas, right, I mean, it's hard because we don't have the finances. And then when you look at title one and direct services, we're going to have to look at that as well with the funding source not being able to change. I also just want to say that a lot of the gains that we're getting also not to minimize the work the coaches are doing because I'm positive there's an impact but the teachers are also making >> correct if you can't go a one to one >> I will say like I think the investments prior to were really focused on as you mentioned coming out of the pandemic Bristol was noted multiple times even by the state of Connecticut as being
052one of the few districts who were able to come back on a positive note after the recovery so I do think again the decisions to that were made in the past to really support the academic achievement and growth of our students in literacy and math have shown that they've had a positive impact and certainly it's our teachers. It's our school leadership. All of these decisions are hard. So again, I think just to restate and I don't know if this I don't know if you have other questions for me, so this you can certainly call me back up, but I think some of the other recommendations were really looking at what is currently being offered and how could we look at a way to more strategically offer that um in a way that wouldn't impact students
053literacy and numeracy. >> If you can move along on this because we be running out of time. I I do apologize. >> I did have some other things that I wanted to uh to bring up or discuss things that I think you know again getting back to that nice to have maybe not necessarily or things that either um you know uh we you know services that you know we need to keep the uh operations going but maybe necessarily can look at um you know like outsourcing or moving those other moving those other blocks. Um one of them would be it. Um I know that we had uh there's been discussions in the past about about um converging um you know uh the uh the school's IT department with the city of Bristols. I know it's
054been a discussion point um field maintenance um that would be this fall into the same thing that have parks uh you know take over the service has taken over the services for all but the high school. Okay. >> Parks has taken over our field services for all at the high school, but they took over the services. They don't pay for the grass. They don't pay for the sod. They don't pay for the clay. They don't pay for anything but taking care of the services with the machines. So, we're still funding all those. That's why that line still exists. >> Okay. >> All right. But it's still unmuted. [Music] about that. Um, yeah. So, it was my understanding that we were only doing it for the things. You're telling me now that we're doing it for
055um we're doing it for all the schools with the exception of high schools. >> The two high schools have um a service contract with the company. >> Okay. Um, other than that, I would have to get back to you to tell you what the rest of them are, but I know we do pay for all of the supplies that go into >> Well, could we not have uh could we not have the high school's contract with the with the city? >> It's not turf. It's turf. It has to be done by a special machine that has to be um and it gets vacuumed and >> Okay. >> It's very labor intensive and not cheap. >> Okay. What about it? it. We are working with Eric um the CIO at the city and we have been
056partnering with them in every way possible to save money. >> Okay. All right. That's good. And one that I think uh again this is something that um I I feel is it is a nice to have but maybe not necessary or maybe things that we could like look at like with the redistricting and that would be Edgewood. Um you know we have we have the preks. Um, I'm all for them, but do we need a do we need a school a building uh solely for that purpose? Would we not like once with with redistricting be able to redistrict prek and instead of having a K5 mile having a prek five mile? Is that something that >> maybe that's a question for I is that something >> Did we get a grant have to >> Did
057we get a grant for the preschool building that we >> we we did get a grant from the state of Connecticut for about approximately $16 million to replace the roof and mechanicals? >> No, but to take the money, don't we have to operate for five years? Isn't there a number of years? Yeah. So if once we voted to we had this vote I don't know before when it happened but it wasn't very long ago where we decided >> 2024 >> 2023 or two >> 24 was when it was um pushed forward with the state and then it was approved >> but we voted to keep the building the year that commissioner Tagriello was voted on to the board and we had these discussions and we talked about possibly closing the building. Um, there was a
058real push from members of the board and the superintendent at the time to have a preschool academy, not to have neighborhood schools. A lot of the reasons given were based on having the preschool teachers all in one place for PD back. There were there were reasons why with research and data that this was the model that Bristol thought would be best for our students. Um there was push back because there was a lot of conversation about it. Commissioner Kagella was one of the strongest people who pushed back on it at the time. Um but we were trying to listen to all voices and hear what the community wanted and they didn't want to close the building. And so the conversation led to this grant that we now have access to for reimbursing. We out of
059the 16 million we have 11 left. Did we already re have some of those resources put into the building? >> Some of the resources have gone into the building. We also um they did some different ways. They got some money from the city. They got some money from an HAC grant. >> So I think you have to be open for five years. You have to pay back the money >> and it has to start this summer or we'll lose the grant >> by lose the grant. So we put ourselves in a position where we made some decisions and it was a full board vote and it was driven by everyone. This was something that people really wanted and now to turn around and say let's just go back on that big decision and it's going
060to cost us more money than fixing the building. >> All right. But it's also going to cost us a lot of money to keep that building maintained, operated. Well, the operation once the once the building is fixed and we have $11 million of reimburseable money. So, we just need to have the money come first and then we can reimburse >> the operational costs of the staff would be the same regardless of the building itself. >> Correct. And the operational costs of the building since um the costs are specifically to that building $49,900. That's the heat and the electricity and the gas. >> Yeah. But I I guess my thought process is if if we if we um eliminated the prek uh program at Edgewood, if we funneled those children to to other area schools, it
061would help with reducing transportation costs. You wouldn't have to worry about transportation. >> It would reduce that. In some ways, it might because parents would be more likely to drive their kids to school. Um, also it would help with with administrative costs and stuff like that. You're not heating and um you're not keeping another building operating maintenance cost, all that other stuff goes away. So that's my thought process. >> I just >> just one more thing. So we we paid over a half a million dollars on shimatic designs for Hbacks. That didn't happen. Now, you want to spend millions of dollars that we received from grant money that we're going to have to pay back on a building that we would never have use of if we don't go through with the plan that we
062voted on. So, I honestly don't see this as an option at this point. Um, but I'm one of nine. >> So, sorry, Mr. Chairs. I don't want to round out conversation because we're coming up to our next meeting. Um, so, you know, we heard a lot tonight. Um, you know, I appreciate um I do appreciate the history on um the coaching. You know, I looked into the history of public education in Connecticut and you know, one of the first public acts that we had was in the late 1600s where we mandated that uh children had a right to go to uh have an education and then we continued to iterate on that time and time again. I think um Miss Wharton had an impassioned argument and I think that she should go to another uh
063committee which is called the board of finance and she should go to the mayor's office and tell why we need more funding for those exact folks and why we we continue uh we need support in our budget because there's going to be pain points regardless and tonight we have two scenarios in front of us. One is a $5 million reduction scenario that gets you to 11 million increase. The other is a $6 million reduction scenario that gets you to $10 million. I don't know a time in which the city of Bristol has given the board event a $10 million increase. And so I think regardless of how uh we decide to make these cuts tonight, we are going to be back here. And I want, you know, in my mind, I think staff needs to
064think if we're not going to include coaches in in this iteration, we're probably going to have to do it in the next iteration because my belief is that when you reduce your workforce, you have to do it both strategically, but everybody has to feel the pain. That means administrators have to deal with pain. That means psychologist staff have to deal with pain. That means teachers have to feel the pain. Custodians have to feel the pain. Because if we don't do it that way, it looks very targeted and we are going to have an uprising. Folks are not going to be pleased that their classroom size goes up when we eliminate teachers. Folks are not going to be happy that they don't have the direct supports that we're offering them if we eliminate coaches and IST.
065So I I appreciate the impassionate approach. We have a full board meeting starting now. So I think we do need to continue to have this >> move and continue on to item number. >> Yes. >> Yeah. All right. So I'll make the motion table second. >> Second discussion. All in favor? >> I hear. Okay. No table.