001a slightly later start time due to technical difficulties um agenda review does anyone have anything they wish to add or change to the agenda seeing none we'll move right on to a public address I know here if you wish to speak please raise your hand on Zoom or in person you would have three minutes to talk about issues not related to other items on the agenda the things we are going to talk about later I'd ask you to save your comments for that specific topic so you have a question on a different topic please raise your hand now or stand up right seeing none we'll move right along to the February princess report no are things happening at the ray school always oh good yes happy to report out um I just got kicked out
002of board docs again so I'm I'm in Google Docs reading my report okay um and happy to revisit it if people can't go into it because usually I do sort of the brief overview because it's right in front of you but we need to revisit it happy to do so um so as of this morning our enrollment is 441 students we gained two since the last time I reported out to you those two were one in kindergarten and one in second grade um still continuing to be staffed with 26 classroom teachers um class sizes have remained largely the same because enrollment has not been um really changing very much uh some important upcoming dates we have our district voting day our upcoming February break and then also two half days which are noon dismissals this
003is for the ray school only within our big SAU those two noon dismissal days are March 13th and March 27th um there's also a link to all of the fun events that are happening within the district you can access that link and see the other things that are happening um no changes in Staffing for educational assistance since the last time I reported out which means we're still looking um I gave an update around our marry and cross and Ray school science collaboration and I am probably again stealing Robin Thunder lucky me I get to go first all right feel like I'm yeah um and so this is a our next session um we're continuing to build every time this is a huge developing units that align with the Next Generation science standards is a huge
004undertaking the professional development that goes into how we're teaching these standards um we feel fortunate that we have these Wednesday collaborative afternoon times because there's just no way we could cover everything well in depth in an engaging way um in in one whole day and we we just simply don't have the time so what we've loved about having these Wednesday afternoon sessions is that we can take one specific part of ngss in this process and really dive deep into it so that leading up to our March um professional development day throughout the district where we don't have students in the schools we can take all of the discret pieces that we've learned about and practice so far and do it all together on this one day so we're really excited for this culminating experience for
005specifically um February 7th um we in the previous session talked about a phenomenon we experienced it um we did a gathering ideas discussion um and so this time around we were talking about our driving question board um and the purpose of a driving question board is that it builds engagement it reinforces science as inquiry um and helps students have ownership in their learning and also um helps the teacher do sort of a final review of what's Happening um in students learning so that also gives um misconceptions come to light on the driving question board um and and it helps us Bridge the phenomenon in the story line to the next thing that we're going to be exploring in our story line so basically the next phenomenon so our next session together um we have two
006of them in March one of them is a full day professional development session and the the other is another Wednesday afternoon collaborative time um and Beyond just the science work itself having time to work collaboratively with our Mar and cross colleagues and sort of build those collegial relationships um and that that collaborative um work time together has been really powerful uh it's something that I feel like we've we've missed and we've started to build that with our mathematics work we've been building that with our science work um and it's felt pretty powerful to be connecting with our friends across the river um you have you can see it's hard to read the Post-its but there is a picture there of our driving question board our adult driving question board um that will lead us forward
007um you all were updated about our staff meeting that included a presentation around the Strategic plan survey um but it really did happen and there's your documentation so everybody engaging in small group work um really looking closely at a series of questions a subset of questions that they could become the experts or at least be able to share out their noticings wonderings and you know possible actionable pieces for their subset of questions so we started all together broke down into smaller groups um and then came back together and shared out some of those findings it was really productive it had a lot of positive feedback and I included some of the key takeaways um and then it was fun this evening to also listen to our parents um and Ben and Jay and and think
008about similar takeaways that we were hearing um from the other stakeholder groups parent teacher C Es as I mentioned are coming up and then wow we've already made it to the 100th day of school lots of celebrating counting math our favorite um hat parade um and then uh just wanted to mention if you ever wonder Who's Who at Ray we're really excited that our who H Ray Ray board is up and running again it's updated it's in the front lobby it's really nice when we have visiting parents you know to be able to come in and say like this is our staff and this is what we do um in a in a school where we have over 100 staff members it's also really nice when we're on boarding folks to be like don't worry
009this quiz later we provided you a cheat sheet you can just go and you can look at our lobby so it's a nice reference too for folks that may not interact um as closely uh throughout a school day as um people that are within the same grade together how is it organized it's organized by grade level or subject so why do you have like empty spots just people are still putting pictures up or probably separation from grades yeah two things so it could be a separation of grades and two we um the the designation whether it's a grade level or a department area um is written on sort of those black strips Y and year to year we have different numbers of teachers and educational assistants in each grade level so depending on how many
010slots we have available and how many people are working in that grade level or Department we may have some open areas great and then um yes we celebrated a fabulous Valentine's Day today lots of love and kindness and out Outreach and service happening in our classrooms and then gratitude to our families in PTO for spoiling us as uh teachers and staff here at Ray we were so appreciative um of the gesture and the delicious treats any questions for learn from board members or the public I just I have a little not shout out because that's s of silly but I was in a first grade classroom on day 100 and I said to the students I'm about to go see my mom for her birthday guess what birthday you think it is but be careful
011this is a trick question so of course they all said 100 and I said no keep going and so when they found out she's going to be 101 they immediately started talking about how it's a pal drone and then I said and I call my mother mom and so it was just fun to see them clicking on that but it was it was really cute there you go anything else for Lauren great thank you Lauren as always M right along to the business requiring discussion so the annual meeting hopefully it's all on your calendars and I think we already talked about she was talking about witch warrant article and some and similar things is anyone have any questions like our newer board members on what to expect or anything like that will miss the meeting
012oh that's right you're going to miss it right Jamie yeah so I will send out the um little uh informational bullets that are usually shared each year for you with you know the historical information of what's going on or what the levels might be anything that's relevant to what you're speaking to thank you for that and I think can one hand yeah that's not a question question yeah I mean I'll probably prepareing usual slides I will say I'm a little behind the eightball on that just because of kind of what's going on on the Dresden side of things and and usually the Handover presentation we talk about the tax rate and all the all the details and stuff like that so I just um a little bit behind schedule but I also do want to
013include um kind of the quality of life kinds of things the snapps like Snippets of like what it's like to be at race I'm kind of looking at Lauren to make sure we can send some some good things I usually pull from these principal reports um in the absence of anything but um you know if there's anything that anybody wants to hear like like let me know I'm happy to include anything and and Lauren I would Echo that that these these reports are read with interest so thank you very much for for efforts on those and thanks for Kim for doing the budget type stuff and speaking of attendance I heard someone is not going to be at the annual meeting do they want to talk about that sure I I can uh I could
014share my my personal plans here yeah so since I've been in education and my wife's been in education we've had we worked in different districts and I've never had a vacation at the same time and so we have an opportunity to travel to visit my daughter during the instead of my plan is essentially to work during our vacation week and then to take the subsequent week U to actually be able to spend that with my wife for once um and Robin has been kind enough to assume my duties for our our annual meeting which is to introduce the administration that's my only speaking role thank you Robin and I apologize I will make sure that somehow we don't have this happen again next year but but um this will be my first first time missing
015this in well my seven years here your presence at the end of being is supervisor for us also keeps us on our on our feed and of course it's a very deep source of comfort for us good very grateful to to Robin for picking up the slack for me so thank you and know Jamie will be there thank you Jamie don't worry it's it's a little print on board Docks but just a reminder that since um I'm on the ballot and Kelly's on the ballot we won't be able to count to help with the counting of of votes I don't think it's going to be an issue because I don't know that we have anybody planning to write in they do need they do need do need to be there yeah and I will be
016there I heard Tony just now um Rick Kim you're welcome to if you're able to and I think we have a couple norch people if you let um if You' let um oh my God carolo know that would be great because she was emailing and myself to find out if we were going have enough or or if it's easier if you just if you just I'm sending a note to myself right now if you look at the minutes from our budget meeting it has everyone listed there on what they're doing for the Handover meeting except for article three it says garbled that was de that's me that's you okay in on the moderators one so I'll send you a copy of the moderator when thank you for that c thanks for that reminder too because
017I had a note from Ryan any other questions comments about meeting for or the preparations for the annual Mee we'll move right along then to a legislative update from Kim I think I hear things are going on down coner oh and M unfortunate yes and really sincere apologies this is hot off the press's stuff because they were um executing bills today so watching these live things on YouTube um so I don't have a power presentation or anything and I was going to actually to talk about some of the bills that were being presented but I'm really glad I didn't waste those time because what was being discussed today kind of just threw up some of those things in the air so um hooray for procrastination um there the only things that I have really been
018tracking um since you know a lot of the budget stuff kind of Falls in my court um are looking at the bills associated with response to the adequate educ ation um piece there are of course a lot of every year there's a lot of other education bills I have not been tracking that um uh as I have in other years just wanted to let you guys know there won't be anything on that but I did want to talk about the five bills that are out there that have been exact in some form and I just want to give you a summary on what's going on so um and a lot of these build numbers sound very similar so so I will say this so the first one I want to talk about is HB House
019Bill 1583 um this one um is about adequate education and it kind of originally was simply uh increase the per pupil base amount which I think we've all kind of understood what adequate education links on the board um what how do we calculate that with those different categories thinking about our existing formula but instead of it being $4,100 as a base which is kind of what it is now it would increase to 10,000 um which is huge right I mean that's and it would be above the what the judicial branch said we had to um this was amended today um to actually have bipartisan support what as a I know I was like I I saw this 10,000 and thought Oh this will never and then it said it was amended um you'll hear how
020it's amended but it was amended to stick this is at the house education committee so obviously it's not the house floor still a lot of ways but this is kind of where the thinking happens in these bills and so um just to kind of give you a sense so there was a bipartisan Amendment um of a 16 to4 yay to support um and this basically changes the 4100 of the base not July 2024 which is what normally these bills would be effective it would be effective the follow following year July 1st 2025 and it would raise the 4,100 to $444 for people but it's an increase um and the point being we are working on getting toward um to that judicial uh un unconstitutional decision uh not that they were unconstitutional but the the current
021system is um and then the second part of it is is that there will be a um uh oh and so that total amount just from a state's perspective is an additional $34 million um the rest of it which this is the whole package this bill would be $199 million the rest of it would basically be things that really um well one other thing affects us and most of it doesn't affect us it's on the right hand side of the formula those the fiscal disparity Aid that tends to not favor our district we don't tend to receive anything from that side but the base amount we do um the other thing so that's so that's the first thing second thing is that they're increasing the fiscal disparity amount um and they are increasing it's an
022enhanced free and reduced lunch reimbursement again about 4% of our students fall into that category so this isn't a large um ad for us likely um and then the other thing as part of this bill okay that that was it and the justifica I think this is important to think about the theory on how did we get to a bipartisan support to increase base how how do you get to the formula when some people were saying we really stand by $4,100 despite what judges say because it that's the bottom up you know one 500th of a principal salary you know one Whatever of a super attendance you know kind of that cost up approach and they basically said well when we were doing the math we realized we didn't actually have the right amount for
023um the minimum salary for teachers um and so they made that adjustment and that's how the new number has been Justified um so just to kind of get you a sense of like how these arguments are being made um now keep in mind that that $100 million nothing is how it gets raised it's just what the state would need to contribute um and so that's that's the first bill the second Bill kind of gets into a little crazy so um okay so that's kind of the first bill and frankly that's probably the most important bill for this session based upon the General's consensus um the house education committee because they were very these five bills are all kind of similar um created a subcommittee and work together and they really liked this model that they've
024created where they've included people from the Department of Revenue and you know it's not just a policy subcommittee and so I think this will continue into next year when they're thinking about how to keep the progress going in adequate education um okay so that was the first bill the second bill is um is HB 1586 and this was the one that I had the most Goosebumps over um good Goosebump not good Goosebump um this this went to interim study and so I I don't want to talk more than it needs to this session but this bill is the most comprehensive reallocating how funds are raised in to fund State education and would get to that um you know $8,000 per student amount or that minimum amount that needs to be done it was kind of
025the only comprehensive solution to get there um and it is uh spearheaded by the lawyer from um Claremont and has has basically gained the support and it's been spearheaded in the by the basically the Democratic leader of the House Education committee um and so this is this was a really important bill it frankly took up 99% of the air went in the subcommittee talking about what it is um the takeaway um it was voted 19 to1 to interim study that one was somebody in support of continuing ending moving this scho bill board um and the theory was Rome wasn't build a day it's very complicated but this is a bill that has an impact that could be very similar to what norch is feeling in hand like what we would feel what no norch feels
026um and so I just I just want us to have that on our radar um and know that this it's funny how this the state could send more money to the district yet then turn around and say you will pay you local you'll have a local minimum tax and you will get it from your own resident so in a sense where we currently get you know $4.2 million that's considered to be from the state which is like that $4,100 roughly per kid um you know and then we raise that locally most of it couple hundred thousand we get back from the state because it's not enough they're basically saying you don't get credit for any of that money is locally you got to raise it twice and so it could be anywhere in the $4
027to8 million um additional tax per year if this particular plan goes through so again don't want anybody to freak out like I was the last week or so um but you know I just want to let you know that that it's out there and it's the only comprehensive plan out there for um next one is HB 1656 um this is increasing adequacy Education Services um for special ed so if you're thinking about the formula right we talked about base and then there's those other categories like special education the current Formula has uh doesn't matter what the special education need is of the child you get it's like $2,400 in additional per student payment this would basically differentiate um into three categories so if you have a specialist student who 80% of the time are in
028the classroom um the regular classroom you would get um according to this 60% of the $4,400 additional bump up and then you'd have increasing weights in the other two categories that have more significant needs this category C the last one being Residential Services um and so that also um sorry to bury the lead that also um passed it was voted to ought to pass with a 19 to1 vote so these are very like strong things are moving um because so many things were moving forward it was hard to say to me if this means these things are going to pass or these things are just going to have a different place to die you know right it just felt like everything was kind of being really kind of just like pushing through and maybe it's
029the Senate's issue I don't know but um just and that that alone that bill is $35 million um I should add that the $99 million one um a lot of it was uh planning to be paid out of the current Surplus in the uh education Reserve fund that the state currently has so um you know they're using their own resources to to pay that um supposedly but then there were questions in the committee about okay is this sustainable that's good for one year okay hopefully this is interesting I'm trying to um so then the the whatever we on the fourth one is HB 1517 This was um this was no recommendations was a partisan bill um the you know 10 10 y 10 Nays and this was um to so the state has to provide
030the adequate education and funding for it 40% of what the state has is collected via this SWAT right our Statewide education from property taxes the rest of it 60% comes from other things like the business Enterprise tax Lottery whatever um the the purpose of this bill was to take um if there was a surplus in in Lottery specifically in games of chance um and that it basically if the revenue that came in from this Lottery what exceeded what they needed quote unquote from the education trust fund that it would automatically be used to um reduce sweat so make that 40% of property and basically give like a property tax set um for that so that's kind of what it would be being used for um the reason why it's somewhat interesting is because some groups
031of folks in our house um are trying to they're looking at that education trust Surplus and wanting to use it for other things they want to take it out of education and use it for whatever anything else um and so the an argument would be to keep it but use it for tax property tax cuts you maybe can kind of figure out who's on what side of that um and it was a partisan bill so that is no recommendation and it will be a half that means it moves the house to discuss um and then HB 1686 is the last one and this um the other so the other judicial case called the Rand case and this is for excess sweat um that basically the ran decisions that you towns which does not hand over
032but towns who collect more swep than they need right they don't have they currently don't have have to send that extra money back to the state but the ruling with of that process is unconstitutional and that they would basically this bill would say you'd have to start those towns who fall into that category would have to send it back to the state there's also it has two parts the second part is there's a Prohibition of negative tax rates on real property there are some very small districts and municipalities that sometimes find themselves in a situation where I think this is maybe easier to think of of in an educational context where you might have one student in a district um and may you might have to send um and at the special education student of
033which you get funding the year after but maybe your student moves in you have a residential special ed student you have the expense in one year but then you get the reimbursement in the next year but you say the student moves away they would actually have a negative tax rate the second year because they' have so much revenue um and so there are some very small districts around here that sometimes um or municipalities that have these things and it would basically saying you couldn't have a negative tax rate so there this this bill kind of has two parts to it and it seems like maybe that second part because there's valid reasons for having a negative tax rate may fall away because it's complicating what I think more people are focused on which is rectifying
034the excess swept part um this was interesting also a no recommendation 10 Y and 10 Nays but it was not hard ofen um there were Republicans and Democrats flopping sides on who saying yay and nay so it can't kind of was an interesting vote um and that there will be a debate on the floor um if it's successful likely wanting to go to Ways and Means Committee um there was a lot a discussion in committee um that kind of revolved unfortunately kind of about towns against one another um and they are expecting a lengthy debate on the house floor potentially a half day and people talking about how this is what happened in 2008 and there we go so that's kind of what's happening on on Ed on adequate education I mean there's there's a
035lot of moving Parts on this um but it is something that we really should keep our eye on um and kind of contribute you know I will just also add that I um in the 1586 one the one that could make us you know I I you know could could be really substantial um I I reached out to um it's because it boggles my mind how you could incre like double your per people student funding from the state yet receive zero out from outside sources and have to fully fund our entire education ourselves it's wild um and so I I reached out to the Levon School Board um chair just because I just in personally and just said hey like how do you know what's going on with this because they actually party to the
036lawsuit to increase the the student funding um and you know good to know that you know it's on their radar too and that they would have a similar negative outcome if that would pass so there are other towns out there that we can kind of partner with and um discuss if that particular plan goes um anywhere far but just wanted to throw thank you Kim for that detail um lots of the process there any questions from for Kim from board members or the public knowing with these of course are ongoing issues and Kim may not have I don't know anything this happened today any questions or comments on those from anyone see n we'll move right along then to the school calendar which you can look at the uh attachments one of them got I
037will say ried into a different format so we take a look at that Jay you want to walk us through the formatting yeah if uh yeah I I want to thank Ryan for this because immediately turned Rick's suggestion of a nicer format into reality and um so we have an excel-based calendar Feer review as well as the traditional one you can decide whether you like this or not if you if I get a head no from the board we'll go forward with a colorcoded one I'm assuming theoretically they're both the same in terms of D information they are we do have a bat so this comes in a two it's a two spread this is the public facing spread we also um Kim had requested uh the the day and hour count which we we
038have available I don't it's not here um but uh Ryan was just uh verifying the hour count with our data specialist so that that would be available as well on this there is a way for us if we wanted to we could publish it with that account but it comes up as a separate set of of um cells that that have little their own little column headers and uh explain the days and the number of instructional days per month and then the number of instructional hours per month so keep ran T and I'll know for people we're thinking about the calendar committee about adding or changing the dates for days off that would be for the following year not for this year Tony I'm guessing this is a just a function of when Christmas Falls
039in 24 but I can tell you that if my kids were younger the thought of a two week break to what's anticipated here would be given a heart palpitations I me now they're old enough I don't have to worry about child care but two weeks is a long time if you get two or three days off got this longer than usual J so that that was discussed at the in our Hartford meetings Hartford took decided to take the full two weeks we did originally have a draft last we looked at had students coming back for that Thursday and Friday and we've had a number of folks ask why we're going to we're going to have AO a week with just two days of instruction and so we we modified it in final draft to to
040be in alignment with Harford um the other the other change that is represented in this last draft is um there had been a an interest in moving the teacher the original draft we we first started this process had October 11th that Friday off a teacher in service and then in their administrative meeting the high school had asked if we could move that 11th day the 11th to the 15th and it had something to do with PSAT scheduling but as it turns out we have a lot of flexibility around the PSA PSAT some folks had asked if we could do the go back to the 11 um and uh and so we decided that it made sense to make that switch and um so those are the two changes that are actually in the calendar draft
041you have before you Kim um first I just want to thank you for the new colorcoded kind of thing I think it is way easier to understand thank you so much um I I will this is not a criticism but I will add that for those who are red green color blind this might be a really hard thing to read so um no I just want to maybe some Nuance with the colors but Jamie also there are I think on the old one there are number totals that we used to use for he mention oh yeah we're we're build we we're just verifying the hour count and that would not that we had number totals underneath each one of the of the months like the old one says January and it shows 19 right right
042that's what I'm talking about there's a separate little breakout that shows each each month with the um with the number of days the instructional days and then the instruction use that Finance yep absolutely any other questions about this from board members of the public regarding the format or spe or questions about specific days any concerns about the longer twoe period I know my kids will be ecstatic see n we'll move right along thank you Jay and thank you ran that should happen once every seven years okay makes sense right moving along to the board survey I hope every filled it out you'll notice it it doesn't look like there's an attachment but actually is um so you can go to that yeah you might need to refresh I just okay show up my yeah I
043got it and it looks like five out of seven members spilled it out so thank you to those five and horrible shame on those two it's still open we can update it and talk about it again so uh this is the first time I've seen it so thank you J for putting it in there um so I I have no comments because it is so new Jay anything you saw that's of a note so I I just scroll through and look look for yellow okay um and and if you go down to I think the first item that has any yellow is question seven the non-share work that we undertake as a board is shared equably and that gets that gets four out of five respondents said had mixed feelings about that can I yeah
044please go ahead I had mix a mixed response to that primarily because I confess I don't know exactly what fellow board members have to do and the time commitment so I was sort of concerned that even taking it even though the question I believe said don't count the chair is that correct the amount chair work but I still thought I don't think this is necessarily all even but I could be wrong Y and the hard part two is that this is also specific to Handover and some people may be lighter and Handover but stronger than or vice versa and so in terms of the availability of what each board member does or is theoretically doing that information is seen at Four Chairs when we put together sort of the activities and committee memberships for the
045following year but you are right that I think the four separate boards do not do a good job of showing that kind of when we do the reorganization so maybe in oh we have that Master spreadsheet yeah I think discussed that at each board it's more kind of a four chairs discussion and a brief sa discussion and and my concern quite honestly is a almost a protective one you know is somebody doing way more than they really should be asked to do that was that was the source of my concern y that was a nice little grin ton this is just making me think I I think it would be a good idea to have on the I don't know what website uh for Hanover and then for Dresden what all the Committees are and
046what the membership of every committee is because I frankly don't know I'm not even sure what committees I'm a member of until I get something saying You're expect at a meeting but otherwise I don't remember um but if somebody hadn't in the public had an interest in particular May it'd be nice for them to know what board members of who's on that committee I don't know why it would be a secret um and it would be more transparent to everybody what committees everyone's on it was just accessible by committee not by I know Ryan keeps the spreadsheet it's kind of like the holder of information but I don't see any reason why it wouldn't be publicly available used used to be on the website we know do we know did it disappear or is it
047not as accessible I'm looking right now okay I mean the fact that we don't know to me and don't know how to find it or where it would be is you know if it's out there it should be somewhere that you know anecdotally there's obiously stronger periods and not as strong periods like for example in a non-chair capacity and I spent eight hours with Jay so far since Monday morning um and it's Wednesday night yeah of which I think what an hour of that was specific to the chair yeah so um it's you know but then there's times where I don't see him you know for a month and he's happy but it is something that it's mixed I think it's and we've always kind of been mixed on this one I think all the
048boards frankly are probably pretty mixed on this one and I think it's hard to fix yeah really I think well so um what I don't know if it's 100% up to date but where you can find that information is on board docs if you click on library and go down to board members you see all of the board members and then it says what committees that they are on um including if you were of the Vintage of which we were asked to provide a biography which I realize as I'm looking at this I might you're the daughter the I am I am and other people nothing this is your life so I'm not on any I don't I think it's stop being at the you see like yeah I mean and I'm on committees that
049I I'm on risk management apparently you can also click if you went to the website you could also click on folks names and then it brings you to board docs but it does it's you know several Clicks in to get that information and maybe not as updated as we'd want it to be yeah everybody there's work we can do there little introduction like K has everyone okay for J and move on to other I was going to say I'll talk with Ryan there a couple different places you also have the board number contact information now there's like a little card that comes up on the website itself and we could we could actually put the committee assignments there yeah okay let's see any other yellow or similar type concerns any and I I also want
050to thank the work for this feedback and some of it is really nice to hear particularly compared to some of the other boards that present ex I love that every single person said I always feel comfortable about feeling comfortable expressing my opinions I know that in previous years other boards have not had that so I appreciate the board's candidness and also that dat everyone feels comfortable and to the two board respond I hope you are also com Jay any other uh questions or any other um survey aspects that we want us to touch we should touch on hold on one side looks like question 10 has a little bit of a mixed respones question 10 had a mixture talking about training that that seems to come up every year yeah and the only training I'm
051aware of that we we do together is when we have our board retreat so maybe I mean if that's something that the board wants to do we can certainly um talk with nhba and have them well they offer many things are offered they offer online stuff that I think it was mandatory when I first started you had to do I can't remember what classes mandatory but it's offer it's strongly encouraged it's like intro right to and those are still offer yearly I it's one of those things where we know we are elected officials you know what are we required quotation marks to do if anything versus we can't we can strongly encourage and voters can or cannot notice whether we do those things but there's only so much that we can mandate Tony I think
052I probably should have I don't think there is an option here for don't know because I don't frankly I don't know what classes other board members have taken on correct I don't think there's any way to tell I think hsba so this is all perception moduls okay that's a very fun too I I don't have any other way around that short of self-reporting I guess to Ryan maybe I mean or maybe the I don't know if the question has to be in this format but it's very difficult to answer accurately like had to pick something that there wasn't I don't know what other other board are or maybe taken classes I have taken I have taken a class Serv more than whatever so Ben yeah I think if I recall correctly I think this was
053one of your one of the first surveys you and I worked on um I think you were part of that too so yeah we I don't remember touching this we never did we weren't doing this survey and then we realized we were supposed to be doing that survey and uh this is because some of the wording about like I can't remember excruciatingly was so so it's your Sur so we can absolutely like times you know time change time changes things so if there is other information you rather be asking yourselves um we can certainly modify the survey I could even modify it and reissue it this week Jake and we add a note to next February we can kind of go through the survey either as a board or as or you and I are
054whomever and kind of do some rewarding and seeing what stuff like that we can do I'll put that in administrative content right now we have been saying a lot of could be improved but works well looks like a 4 to one thing all right um on question 11 so four people are saying it could be improved does anyone have a specific idea for how it could be approved to balance member Duty and time and know that's a tricky one I'm seeing no one and nothing from public okay looks like attendant no one has any concerns with attendance no one has concerns about being prepared for meetings or making sufficient progress or slow and steady prog progress and Jay were there I I see that there were no free text comments at least not on here
055did anyone put any free text comments igal does anyone remember skipped five there so maybe everybody skipped it I don't see any no okay all right any other questions comments on this before I move on right seeing none thank you everyone for filling that out and now I'm busy looking at board members and board do take back to the board meeting all right now we have our um annual parting words from a retiring board member for those who have not done this before um I C I craft a resolution using some free-standing text and added my own additions to a departing board member for those who do not know our esteemed addes and chair Rick is choosing to step down for some reason um and so we have a departing resolution and then after that
056Rick is invited to speak a few words if he so chooses and we read this resolution out loud into the record so everyone bear with me so whereas one person can make a difference through service to one's community and whereas Rick Johnson served as a member in good standing of the Handover SAU and dresen school boards for more than six years serving from 2018 to 2024 and whereas Rick Johnson served on numerous committees during his terms of office including the four chairs strategic planning Handover budget dreaded intuition and governance committees and anything else I missed and whereas Rick Johnson has also served as a member of the dresen and seu Boards in good standing including as chair of the dresen school board and whereas Rick Johnson has been a tireless Advocate and spokesperson for matters
057on efficiency governance and using military time and whereas Rick Johnson's unwavering principled stand on numerous topics that served as an example for all board members and whereas DRZ the handle where schools not only Main maintained but also in many respects improved upon their quality during Rick Johnson's years of service as a board member in Handover and Dresden we the undersign the six of us extend our heartfelt gratitude and deep appreciation for the difference Rick Johnson made in the lives of students in Handover New Hampshire during his years of service and for many years to come thank you very much just need a break have any words you wish to speak yeah I actually wrote some all right so it's been an honor to serve our school district's community and most importantly our children for the
058past seven years reflecting on my time on the board change has been the only constant over the years I've collaborated with a number of talented and dedicated board members witness turnover in leadership and staff but at the same time seeing our schools continue to improve and support our kids I I owe immense gratitude to many the Handover voters who entrusted me with their support the community for its un wavering Financial backing and dedication to a top-notch educational program and the dedicated individuals from the bus drivers to the staff to the teachers who are the backbone of our districts I'm especially indebted to my wife Lisa for her unwavering support through countless hours of meetings and when I say countless I mean countless though there is much left to accomplish we've achieve remarkable milestones in student
059achievement and District growth as new members join I urge them to remain steadfast in our commitment to Excellence and prioritize the needs of every student over the past seven years we have successfully faced a number of challenges and learned some important lessons from the pandemic the takeaway is trust the science from from The Angst caused by our commitment to diversity Equity inclusion and belonging the lesson learned is for you is you are never going to find a right way to do the wrong thing our commitment is just in right as we strive to build a more inclusive and Equitable Community where everyone can thrive from the bad laws that are being proposed and enacted and conquered and and that harm our children and communities the takeaway is stand up and fight for what you believe
060in and this is what I believe in school vouchers undermine public education by diverting public funds to Pro private institutions and leads to discrimination and economic segregation book Banning is wrong as it violates free speech and expression stifles education and learning promotes ignorance interferes with parental rights and leads to historical and cultur eraser allowing guns in schools is idiotic the potential risk in negative consequences outweigh any perceived benefit instead our effort should focus on implementing comprehensive safety measures promoting conflict resolution and mental health support services and creating environments where students and Staff feel safe and supported in closing I leave you with a Timeless reminder from American educator author Forest witcraft 100 years from now it will not matter what my bank account was the sort of house I lived in or the kind of
061car I drove but the world may be different because I was important in the life of a child thank you for all your thank you for the privilege and pleasure of serving on the school board see you next week at then I'm not a huger moving right along to business requiring action um these are all sort of our standard things note that um oh there is actually a resolution about uh gun storage on there and that is part of the consent agenda if someone wants to pull that out feel free to let me know there's yes it needs to be amended I believe the the pleasure of the board was to delete the sentence in the next to last paragraph about a letter requiring the sign correct so I think it just the resolution needs
062to be amended to that and so and that is the resolve further par uh as me of people making note in the amended no taker yeah it's it just needs to have and requiring a signature acknowledging awareness of secure F responsibilities that just needs to be deleted okay so for the person making the motion they could say for for as amended and we are saying that in the attachment for the draft resolution to remove the second class paragraph the paragraph starting with the B the text resolve further don't remove the whole paragraph just that one so you're adding the part where it says and requiring a signature acknowledging awareness of SEC just strike that part the whole rest of that does anyone have a concern with that change I think that was what was was
063requested okay all right so amend my comment I'm I'm just making for the Note Taker and as usual making it harder okay do we have a motion ref first there anyone wish to pull out that resolution right seeing none then can I hear a motion for items B through F de I move to approve items B through oh wait dang it my thing just changed a second as amended as amended thank you all those in favor and I will note for the notaker that chair chairperson board member Kelly McConnell is not here okay all hand all those in favor of approval right it is unanimous thank you everyone in terms of report of the chair as some of you saw uh Jay Lauren and I gave a presentation to staff members a couple weeks ago
064and to parents uh just now about the survey I surveys I believe both of them went very well neither one of them were re Ed but all the feedback we heard of is universally positive and please feel to reach out to me ear if you have any questions on what happened there and I don't think I have any that chair has anything else to report on any Handover specific committees typically we don't have many But Ken usually has something um so this is an update for the cipc the capital Improvement program committee um which is the long-term capital planning that's developed that supposed to develop the capital budget for the town of by RSA statute uh we have to have a school board representative on this committee um even though it's a town purpose committee
065um and we've been working for the past um several months um and actually I will say that you know John Doan who's a member of the public on the Hanover finance Comm has done an amazing job hurting all the cats um for leading this this project which is great and I hope he will be interested as we want to do something similar next year to help lead us because he has done a ton of work so um the the committee um kind of home we still have meetings including one tomorrow Friday um but the uh kind of a lot of the the hard work as far as prioritizing with which fy2 projects would be recommended by the committee and which ones you know kind of are more on the delayed that type of work has
066been completed uh we as a committee will deliver an advisory report to the select board detailing all the things but I thought this group might be interested in hearing kind of what some of those recommended Town Projects would be or like what the total amount kind of would be now keep in mind that this is the first year in a very accelerated process that the town you know has has a vision for a better better version next year but kind of for what we could do as a committee um I personally think it's pretty admirable especially in the municipal Community time meeting every week and actually like getting things done every week is kind of amazing um and so just just so you know that this committee was was not tasked to figure out how
067to fund these things or if it's the right amount to fund that will be improved in a future version but it was just more kind of consolidating the projects listing them and really kind of call the ones that didn't have enough support um and so of of note so in total for the recommended fy2 CIP projects for the town um it would be an fy2 in total which may be funded differently over different years but in total these projects would be 2.5 million um which 433,000 or 177% of that would be to replace the how Library building envelope um this one's a bit interesting because the relationship in the town what the town provides maintenance but the how Corporation has a bigou that kind of says that they support Capital type expenditures and like sighting
068is it maintenance or Capital expenditures so there's a little bit of a question on who pays for what there um and then other kind of bigger project is um replacing water meters for 420,000 in total waste water and water um and then there's um for 93,000 a shared Street Vision plan and Street concept designed for hand this is there's there's been a lot of projects proposed about improving bike walk um in various parts of mainly the downtown and this would kind of be in that bike walk special project infrastructure piece um and a couple other things on like heat pumps for the fire department access roads those are kind of things those would be for this year um for we ALS this committee would look multiple years so for projects of note for FY 26
069to fy3 um they are um you know keep in mind these are not recommending to occur in FY 26 right these are just projects that were kind of out there um and really have no recommendation from the committee these were more strong like these were supported they have actual proposals and that kind of a thing but there's some very large dollar amounts that I just want to make sure our district is aware of um including for South Main Street um so we're basically talking the area between so Main Street the area from like uh Handover in you know the tip of Handover green to like CVS and maybe slightly below that to that basically that stretch um and and kind of re redesigning that with either having um there there hasn't been I mean there
070there have been plans but I wouldn't say anything that's being specifically proposed currently right this is why it's a future date but that is a estimated to be a around a $14 million project um the there's a Greensboro Road Great Hollow Road and Etna Road ownership transfer so kind of who owns what part of that would be a $16 million project um and there are are other projects that um so so anyway so those are those are the main ones the rest are kind of small potatoes and have largely been reserved over the years um and so that's any those are kind of the big on the horizon projects that are currently being discussed um happy to go into any more details on that but I thought that would be at least somewhat interesting um
071what I will say is that it actually wasn't even discussed in the CIP because there is no actual project um but there is a potential warrant a draft warrant article that the select board is currently considering for the May town meeting um which uh hasn't been approved right so it's still in the draft still in the consideration of finding more data but that would impact the school district um so they are looking and I'm happy to give more information I don't necessarily want to go into a lot of detail because I don't have a lot of detail um but what was presented at the last select board meeting was um a a warrant article that would propose to do a a tiff um which is now I'm blanking that stands for taxable uh in in
072taxable incremental tax increment fund um thank you and so so what what this would do would be for what they're kind of calling the Handover Gateway area um and there's there's a lot of details on the spefic spefic proposal which I don't feel comfortable going into I really don't know them very well um and there actually isn't a budget anyways for the project but what a tax increment fund is is that in practice you create a special tax District think of it like creating like invisible fence around a certain taxable area in our town and any future growth that happens property value growth that happens so say that you establish it this year you look at what the property values were this year and freeze them and they the the property values will still get
073reevaluated they'll still increase if you build in something new on top of that but any of that additional growth instead of going to the general funds to the school districts to the county to the municipal at the relative same level percent is keep in mind that 60% of our local property taxes raised go to the schools um instead of that going 60% going to schools for instance um depending on how that relationship works and how that Tiff is created any any property value that increases during this time um would go to a special fund um that would be used to only support inside that invisible fence to do to fund Pro and typically they're done to to help fund projects that you want to do a revitalization a reinvestment a replace and this is where
074I don't want to go into the specific projects because I I don't know but you can imagine replacing sidewalks burying electrical lines replacing sewers you know whatever to create a an area that is now and this is time limited you would do it for like 15 years I think the maximum is 30 years and then after that then you kind of release the invisible fence and then you hopefully have invested in projects that are now more have improved the economics of the area and so that property value is now more valuable than it was um these These are common um we've H we have a tip currently in Handover this one feels a little bit different than the one being proposed because um it was to build the parking garage down in Handover but Handover
075the town owns it so like we're kind of paying ourselves in a way like it it's a it's a tiff thing and actually in 2029 is when it would go away so technically that parking garage taxable value that would go to the schools we currently don't have I think it's about a $5 million assessment you know but but these would be a little bit different because they'd be privately owned and that area so sorry I didn't even say where the area would be it would be the Gateway to Handover from the Norwich Bridge all the way up the hill to the dth green those um uh residential and it would be for to improve residential housing um it would be the point of it um so you can imagine that there's a lot of questions
076um by Statute they have to come to the to the school board to um discuss we do not have any sort of veto power if they decide to go to the town we don't AAL power as a school as a school board I mean we can we could be vocal we can also have Revenue sharing um we can engage and saying hey great create the Tiff and 60% of the Tiff will go to fund schools you know as an example right like that's that's what could happen the people who in the Tiff still have to pay their taxes um it just would go to a separate fund um so I it it's rather complicated um and I'm really grateful for for folks like K asmus who helped me understand some of these things and we
077spent a good part of a weekend figuring this out so this information came out on a Friday um was not discussed in the finance committee or in the cipc meetings um and it was discussed you know at the select board meeting early in the week um so it yeah so I I think there's a lot for us to think about um there are some benefits there there's some considerations um and it could be for a vote sooner than later for the town to decide the town gets to decide whether a tip gets created as soon as even though the project may not be happen because there is no project on the table there's no 14 million I mean that that South Main Street I could tell you what some of that 14 million is going
078to include what would be included along that stretch of West we loock I couldn't there's some pictures I wouldn't say that but it's it when I asked the cipc why wasn't that discussed in the cipc it was well there wasn't enough of a project to discuss at the time but they're asking to create this District which immediately frees property values and we know that there have been several permit requests to develop larger high density housing owned by Dart and private citizens in that area already and if those happen before the tip is created then the school district and the rest of the municipality the general fund could capture that growth and that growth in taxation capacity would be less valuable if you tied it after those projects were already built so just want to kind
079of I hope that was syct enough um and I you know what what I what I need us to know is that that's the town has to come to the school boards to discuss this both Handover and Dron um and I didn't want us to be like as surprised as I was than I saw in the agenda so um hopefully that gives us a little bit of background and um thanks for that information Kim and for those who want to read more on the concept the Wikipedia page on taxing financing is actually very well done in my opinion so feel free to take a look at that and when when they do come to the boards uh let's try to be prepared with some good questions that does have strong relevance for future funding stuff
080and like Kim mentioned we as a board do not Ino power as private citizens we certainly raise our hands at annual meeting and do all sorts of stuff there people so choose T's your hand up yeah where can we read more about the projects that are being proposed as they get brushed out yeah so um so I would say so one go to the the last select board meeting and I think they're usually on Mondays and I think the last one was last week February 5th Fe February 5th um you can see the minutes there there's a p there's a slide um kind of that describes a little bit this tip in particular would be scheduled for 15 years um as a basically locked for 15 years and then in year 16 would be released
081to join the rest of the rest of the properties um it could be so I would go there um uh I'm trying to avoid those details that I want to share um the other point is um you can also watch the discussion which I think is really helpful um the it's those are on YouTube through Junction arts and media I think we probably know how to find these kind of public Meetings online but um for those who are also interested um you know look at the February 5th meeting um and this is most probably of the meeting discussion um it's quite complicated it will it should if the town Administration is looking to continue to ask for the question um the in particular one select board member asked for them to kind of create a
082budget for what this public investment project would be because we'd have to borrow for it anyways you wouldn't get all that immediate new taxable growth if you don't Revitalize the area you know so um so I would say watch that look at the um I would just also do some research on tips there's some really just easy like YouTube videos I have a couple of PDFs um just to kind of learn more about them I will say that tips are really interesting um they they typically why do you typically tip versus just Bond like just go out and borrows you need to have $20 million to redo roads whatever just why get all fancy about it you still have to raise taxation locally for your schools anyways why would you cut off part of it
083um and the usually tips are used when you have an area of your town that is core performing and it's often like if you have like a you know a a contaminated area that needs to be clean um it the word is blighted like it's usually needs to be blighted in somehow you know whether you can make the argument that West Wheelock is a blighted area right I mean I think we could think about it but in New Hampshire there's no law that says it has to be blighted for you to be able to take um I'm really curious just because those properties are in the process of now being being revitalized without this particular investment and structure in place by the town right so it's really interesting and and there was no particular projects
084that were identified for that particular stretch that is undergoing rev I think they have I think they have ideas to be fair I think that like like I said I've heard the bearing of the ele but there's nothing that like you could see as a right there's some pictures again I don't want to say what is or isn't correct because I think that's not fair I just don't know um but you know it's it it wasn't part of the let's do this in FPL 25 long-term project um and and you know so one the blighted part is usually what a lot of these tip laws have two there's a but if or or not if you know only if like only if you cleaned up this contaminated area could you have this project and so
085if except for the municipal government coming in to do something it would then Revitalize but if it's going to happen anyways yeah right interesting so you know it's there there's a little bit of that but again that's new does have that requirement so I don't want to say that that's a fair thing but that's just typically nationally how they're used thank you Kim uh any questions for Kim see none uh J you g to cover four chairs in your comment you want me to you can be that okay then for my report chair I forgot to mention that this morning there was a four chairs meeting where the primary subject was the Norwich Moler Educational Funding concerns and obviously that's an ongoing thing where the information seems to change daily but the four chairs will
086keep meeting as did and I will bring stuff to Handover specifically as did obviously it's going to be more of a Norwich and Dron thing but indirectly there could be ramifications for Handover as well so it's in flux I think that's all prob we have to say on that sure Jay how about the superintendent report okay so I was remiss uh January was Schoolboard member appreciation bond we were wondering probably wondering what I do next year for for Schoolboard member appreciation month I'm going to get you all seat cushions for theseal I'll be sitting in my bar I'm sure watching the videos live I'm sure but on that note to just to just sort of C quantify actually my appreciation I can say that I've met with every one of you over the course of
087the past two weeks outside of this meeting in either the fledgling um non-union compensation committee the calendar committee the policy committee the Strategic plan steering committee the four chairs um any number this is just in the last two weeks and um I I said this last year I'll say it again I'm amazed at the amount of time that you give to this community and to our schools and um I'm sure I'm not the only only one who appreciates it but I'm sure that most people don't quite understand it or know it I see you walking into the school every day seems like um and then in terms of just sheer quantity calendar year to date um you've all been part of 46 regular board meetings and hearings that's just through your roles on hen over
088Dresden seu boards seven independent seven separate budget some of them were sort of piggybacked but seven budget committee meetings and um so that's 53 meetings that's not counting any of the committee meetings negotiating sessions for multiple unions uh it it really is amazing it's hundreds and hundreds of hours um I I know you are richly compensated for those hours but but uh but I really am amazed at the the time you get and what's interesting to me is working as a superintendent and working closely with boards I don't think I could do it um and so but but thank goodness people do and you're those people and thank you so so much um some of our staff do for other boards right oh yeah yeah yeah exactly we have people that attend all these board
089Me In Their Own communi board meetings um I know I work with two of them very closely Jamie and now Ryan has joined her select board oh my God she must have do that yeah so wow well she she didn't join it yet she's running unapposed so so Bravo her she I also kind of in conjunction I want I want to also thank Lauren and her staff for being willing to be guinea pigs flexing right down to the last minute to schedule and execute the survey review that we did with the staff um and uh just have to say I was it's one of those things where we hadn't done it yet we were trying it out it could be perceived as really dry stuff but I was just really happy about how how well-received
090it was I felt like bended an outstanding job and kind of bridged the gap between being a school board member and um and Survey researcher and a comedian and actually kept the the staff entertained and um it went really really well and so now we can and then we had the parent meeting tonight while granted it wasn't very well attended on Valentine's Day but um but the the few questions that we did people were engaged the the people that were there and and and this is relatively old survey data and it's it's so wide ranging um it just it it it's shown me that we can be really specific I think in the future about uh identifying things that we want public in input on and and if we don't stop at giving the survey
091and then reporting out on the survey results at a board meeting and and do this sort of um you know roll up your sleeves and let's analyze this stuff stuff together we've missed opportunities and I think we're we're we're seeing how how important that could be if we actually really work with that data so um so again thanks it was great I I don't know that we'll change much when we take it to RMS and the high school and and Maran cross so and with that um we've got breaks coming up for people I hope everybody has a great uh a great time bit of time off and and I will um um add to the resolution my appreciation for Rick Rick it really has been great working with you um we will definitely miss
092you and uh I know where you live the so yeah may get a knock at your door at some future uh prior to some future election and thanks thanks again thank you that's my report any questions for J from anyone thank you how about you how about you rob what's going on just a few things here and there um I also want to say thank you to Rick for your support and serving over the past few years I know I've only been here for a few years of it but thank you for all that you've done and the time that you've put in it's been great working with you thank you um I also want to thank Shane Clifford he has been presenting our science PD on the Wednesdays every every month and we'll be
093doing a full day as we move into March and he's done a wonderful job and he as you know is one of our fifth grade teachers at Ray so I just want to publicly thank him for stepping up and doing that because that can't be easy in front of your peers from both schools but he's done such a nice job of bringing the schools together and um allowing the teachers to work together and it's been exciting to watch very engaging I mean I've been engaged in all of the activities that he's done so just a big thank you to him I've been continuing to do some work on the grants one of the things that's been fun this year is seeing the new um professional growth system that we put into place last year we're
094seeing the fruits of that starting now with our title two grants we've been able to fund some of the book studies there's one this year going on um with some of our teachers around um executive functioning skills so that's been great and there are about 12 teachers participating in that so we can see the work from the professional growth committee you know being put into action one of the other ways that we've used that funding is last year we started to fund a group from Ray to go to the mtssb conference which is multi-tiered systems of support and that's really looking at Behavior programs within the school looking at interventions and it's been a group comprised of n um teachers that are working with behavior in the school teachers across the board some of our
095special ed teachers so we had one group last year and then another group has continued this year with some new members and that's been really fruitful as well and we were actually supposed to attend one of the sessions yesterday but that got snowed out not really but I canceled it the day before thinking there would be snow so another um way that we've been able to fund using our title two funds and then we will continue with the kindergarten camp this summer that's through our title one and we are continuing with our K through 12 meetings those are happening monthly we can not have a meeting this month because of the break next week but those have been going well I think they good feedback from staff and from the leadership team that have been
096leading those I've been working with the nurses they've been lovely and they looked at the Strategic plan and are looking at all of the policies related to health and nursing so they're being very helpful with that um we have continued with curriculum work that that has affected the race School in our elementary schools last month we I worked with the PE teachers the World Language teacher teers and the library media Specialists so we're making progress in those areas as well and I did learn the other day at our nhsaa meeting that we are receiving funding for the eclipse classes so I asked for 500 of those so we are supposed to receive all 500 so thank you very hopefully that will arrive soon but that's my report great um at both the staff and the
097parent survey meetings there were questions about the curriculum on when it's going to be made available online we have updates for that yes I do I have updates so we've been having the teachers have been filling in all the Google shared documents and we have scope and sequence and unit plans and then I started working with Karen Wright this year who does our website and so she started researching different schools and formats and so we just purchased the soft Ware through final site and I'm going to work with her on coming up with a template for the teachers because it will be more limited than what we have for the teachers to share with one another um but hopefully we'll be able to get quite a bit of that work done over the summer so
098yeah so we'll start working on a template and then I'll ask people to fill that out and hopefully we can get some good progress on it over the summer and maybe I don't want to be too optimistic and say it's all going to be done by the summer but we'll get started so which was I said three to five years really we've been working on it for a good probably two years now so think we're making progress good progress now Tony I saw the the review of illustrative ma implementation and I wonder if if there's been feedback from the teachers on it or we could get at some point yeah I can talk about that a little bit now if You' like um it's been nice watching the transition because you know we started the
099process three years ago of just really looking at different programs and putting a committee together and just that alone was you know a major process for us to go through and then last year implementing it for the first year it was really difficult it was hard because it's really the first time that we've had a comprehensive K through six program in both elementary schools and it was very different from what had been happening previously so it was interesting watching as we did the professional development the year before and last year and getting feedback from teachers because we started meeting in the grade level teams and talking specifically about the math curriculum last year and seeing how people were doing and it was it was difficult and one of the things I heard early on was
100just the language um the heavy language emphasis especially at the younger years like the K12 grades and that was hard for people in the beginning and this year I'm seeing really honestly a total transformation in teachers the in the way they're teaching it the Comfort level um I am really impressed at how far we've come just in two years I never expect this to be at the point that we're at already which is this year we're actually even looking at Common Assessment data and I thought that would be a huge next step for us probably starting next year but it's already happening this year and that's really thanks to our math coaches in each of the buildings they've been working with grade level teams they're digging into that Common Assessment data at each grade level
101and looking at that and seeing Oh my class is doing this you know we're doing well in this area but not doing well in this area what do we need to do to change that so I think we've made tremendous progress in two years and I'm really pleased with that and a lot of times what you find is that people in the first year if it's hard they want to start moving away from it doing different things and bringing in their own materials and resources again and I'm not seeing that and that's also thanks to the support of the principles who are also you know have been helpful and encouraging and really providing teachers with that time and professional development so I'm very hopeful um our math data this year was really very good very
102positive and I saw some big increases at certain grade levels like third grade in our math um FAS data at the state level so I think we'll continue to see that and I think ultimately it will help us in the middle school because we'll have kids going into Middle School having common experiences in both schools so and I personally have been seeing it in the math classes I mean it's so exciting for me to go into a classroom now and see you know all the first grade teachers are teaching the same lessons and I'm seeing kids work at very high levels it's more rigorous than what we've had previously so it's hard but the teachers are doing an amazing job so and the principles are we gonna have any SAS comparative data gosh I hope
103so I didn't actually look on uh the doe this month I usually look right as we're planning for the agenda I didn't look this month which means it's probably there so I will I will take a look and I will make sure um that as soon as it pops up and we can do that compar that I ready to go right andway any other questions for Robin thank you very much Robin you're welcome and then while Jamie get we have a couple quick announcements that we forgot about Jay anything you want to add yeah I want to add one thing um I'd like to introduce the board to Bryant Patton our new Director of Education Bri also filled in help with the meeting earlier today so thank you very much for that Bri yeah and
104Bryant is preparing a his he will have been here for his 90day onboarding in time for our March meetings so he's preparing a presentation about sort of the State of Affairs and it uh what he's working on and what he what he sees as priorities and he'll present that probably at the SIU or I think you meeting in March want do that welcome right thank you very much and de was there anything you wanted to add yes um this is just relative to the gun resolution that we passed I thought we were going to have at least a minute of conversation about it and so I apologize but I I wanted the board and any uh people who look at the tape of tonight's meeting to know that shortly after our Dresden meeting last month
105which was after our Handover meeting the White House issued an executive uh I don't know what it's called um action calling for all School principles to promote safe gun storage across the country so I like to think that we are ahead of that and it's it's a point of emphasis for the entire nation and their statistics Echo the ones that we looked at in preparing the resolution or discussing the resolution I also want people including our board members to know that next week on the 21st at 4:30 in the afternoon the director of the Bureau of Alcohol Tobacco firearms and EXP explosives is speaking at Dartmouth College and in their promotional materials Steve debach is a member of the class of 88 at Dartmouth so I think that's obviously why he's coming to the Rockefeller
106Center but in the promotional materials the very first sentence says that the that gun violence is the number one cause of death for children so I I think I want to thank the board but I also want the community to know that we are working to address address this issue too so thank you sorry those delay Jamie sorry any bus admin we need to change that rotation we used to go first okay all right so um preparing for the annual uh meeting uh working through a lot of changes and the legislative things on the on the uh norch side that doesn't really affect Handover Direct but could indirectly with the cvas or other additional articles that are being looked at um working on the budget books the last uh the budget brochures the last couple
107of weeks um they are at the printers um they are being pred today uh there was a little bit of a snafu in communication between them and our office at SAU so we had hoped they would have run Handover already because we were holding know whiches until we knew what was going on legisl but for some reason they run them all at the same time so that it a little bit um we're hoping they'll be sent to the post office who is waiting for them to come everything's been paid for so they should hopefully be there by Friday so they should be out over the weekend they are posted on the website they are very streamlined um we're very open to any changes they do not have a lot of Art in them they have
108any any art in them um there's no color I'm sorry and so I know you asked Kim did ask but it was on version three yeah I know so so next year right there is we do have the ability to expand that by one more sheet which would make it you know and we could add art back in so um that's something to think about you know we went kind of from one extreme to the other so we got to find the middle right um but we did include some information about SAU which had not been included been included in past one so um the annual report should be posted onto the web I'm going to say by probably next Wednesday I think again we're probably just holding back a little bit because um actually
109no that's just Handover addressing so that could probably be posted as soon as M most all the information is over to just matter it is vacation week so I don't know if she'll be working on them um we're meeting next week on Tuesday um Tony and myself that's your maintenance director to go over all of the items that we still need to address here at Ray school for this fiscal year and what we're looking at for next year um to try to be sure that we're as as um efficient as possible in making sure that we spend out all of the monies that have been attributed for Capital Improvements um and so Lauren will be sharing with us with her team you know any other new items that might have come up um and also
110are we doing I think food service is going okay because I haven't heard anything other than maybe a few there's often or once in a great while there's a few things where you know a child get charged the wrong account and that happens and then we take care of it people just email and we take care of it so it does happen um in transportation I think we've calmed down a little bit for this year although H1 is you know that's a rough one and with two board members on the route so um we've been fortunate this year with the weather that it hasn't been hopefully too bad for you all out that way um there are some roads that we just do not go up if it's storming U mon view is one of
111them in New Hampshire and then we have a couple in Vermont that we just don't do uh the parents have been very good um we've been working through our new notification system that we've gone to and we have actually have a we have a Mont view um list so that we can send out notification right away even if we don't delay or cancel school and I think that helped um I don't know what tomorrow's supposed to bring that was this morning right it pushed back a little bit so I think tomorrow's okay okay so that's food Transportation maintenance custodial we're doing well yeah and so great crew over here I think they're all fitting together nicely and uh things are working out okay haven't heard any bad things um still looking for a half position
112that we are Outsourcing here so if people are interested in a part-time position have one available um I think that's it for Ray school I think everything else is we're doing okay right oh I'll bring you a financial update probably in April because we'll be closing down uh spending probably right around the time that your meeting's going to hit in April end of March Middle April and we might have some discussions to happen will our board members be on the ballot will you what just had that issue last your board members are on the ballot oh that's good and I'll answer right now because people are gonna say why are they not in alphabetical order is there a reason for that there is a reason that then it's uh every year every bium every two
113years the state of New Hampshire puts out the directive on what order that people's names are put on the ballot because they want to make sure that there's equity and voting because there's these people think that the first two people are always the first you know just look whatever because you don't know who you're voted for so um this year you were to put it in Alpha order remove the top one of the alphabet and put it last and then the next one is the first one so this year and we fixed it so that it so that in the mailer it's in the same order that it will be on the ballot so nobody got confused um so unfortunately that means Marcel goes to the bottom and then Kelly would be the not what
114theer says block Meer has Anastasia being BL oh does that okay then we fixed it then we fixed it in the annual report box okay yeah the flyer maybe didn't get caught but the annual it it might have I don't know when that was posted on there okay so I'll double check that yeah this is a V4 I don't know yeah there's a lot of these so um so anyway there is a method to that there's a there's a method and New Hampshire determines what the method is um so so that was followed so that there would be no um you know nobody contesting it any questions for jimy all right we do have a minor need for a nonpublic to cover two two Personnel issues so if I hear a motion under RSA that's
115a c Personnel from someone move to enter nonpublic session at 840m under RSA 91-83 we have to do this individually so starting with Rick uh Johnson seconds it and Johnson is a yes thank you yes Nelson yes there he is be back's and we're going to wrap up the jam Zoom due to the need for Jam to depart so thank you very much everyone there will no be further votes or anything apart from the zoom zoom is done yeah