001not make us wait we I get to start the meeting uh we have the rest of our board with us including uh Rob NATO johnen Norm gole myself Andrea fulam we're also joined by Laura Taylor our ABA our um what did I used to call you our executive assistant extraordinaire Jody Condon and our student Flo japas uh Michael Flynn our superintendent is incredibly sick and we did not want what he has so he is not coming tonight uh and DSA Le will be here shortly so with that let's go ahead and stand for the Pledge of Allegiance um and if we want the uh character counts kids to lead us start off Al to the flag of the United States of America and to repic stands one nation indivisible all right so uh we have
002one set of minutes to approve this evening uh the regular Schoolboard minutes from February 4th 2025 is there a motion to approve those so V Second Great any discussion uh all in favor I I post motion carries um and we're going to go through our comment period and then we're going to get right to student highlights because I know that we've got some folks who have to scoot uh so with that we are at our first public comment portion of the evening we have two public comments um if you would like you can come up and give your name and address we ask that you keep your comments to 3 minutes if you don't want to comment right now we'll have another opportunity at the end of the meeting so if anyone interested in speaking
003all right great um moving on student comments student rep comments can I do it active student High sure can we're moving really quickly DL is Gonna Come and and be halfway done uh board comments I'm gonna save mine for the end of the meeting I love that Jo the meeting nope I'll save mine at the end of the meeting too let's get let's get the kids on the road I think we are excited for our student highlights and I have nothing of substance to add either so with that I'm going to turn it over to our principal car andoni uh to talk to us about character counts hi so in your board packet you'll find this lovely flyer talking about our character counts team these this is the character counts team and Daniel's going to
004be um speaking to you tonight and then team members can answer any questions that you may have and it is a student leg program that emphasizes monthly positive character traits it is completely student bled they plan assemblies they plan professional development they talk they do different types of things in morning meetings and they're just spreading positivity throughout the entire school so I don't want to say anymore um and steal their Thunder but I do want to introduce you to Bren Tori I don't see Tori Evelyn Palo Izzy SE Daniel d and so why don't you come on up good evening the character CS team is a group of students that were nominated by our past teachers to be on the team the goal of character counts is to encourage positive social behaviors first behaviors such
005as honesty courage responsibility patience and many more traits this team needs weely to plan assemblies around these Concepts we also inter and record videos of clips of MSS students and staff explaining what the trades mean to that that is followed by a trade themed activity which to that quality an example of an activity has been the honesty well where we used to draw full of water that we dropped a penny into to represent one lie or act of dishonesty then we added other coins such as quarters nickel and dimes these represented an apology or act of kindness to another person since the water in the jar made it so the coins didn't go straight to the penny it showed how many acts of kindness and apologies to make one L go away another example is
006called the landmine L where we had a student from the audience come up and direct a blindfolded member of the team through an obstacle course this will allow us to show the audience an example of responsibility as I have stated there are many traits show during these assies another thing that we do at the assemblies is the golden broom award that's right it's literally a golden but in order to help out our amazing MSS custodians we created this award we had the custodians scout out the classrooms on the lookout for the cleanest room they then make a video in the classroom and announce it the classroom teacher is given the golden broom to display in their room for that month after the assembly is concluded with a clothing chant character counts finally teachers carry the
007themes to their classrooms through morning meeting activities thank you for your time you guys mind answering a couple questions for us all right what questions comments do we have Izzy can I see that broom looks really you want the the want the yeah can you so did I hear you correctly that the cleanest janitors cleanest room where we did that the Jan business room VOR gives it to the cleanest classroom he looks through all the classrooms and then they decide who has the cleanest classroom they call him up they get to the room and after so Mr Duffy creates a video and he announces it we project the video so then the teacher runs up gets the BR and puts it in their class quite and they keep for a month yes yeah and this
008is the first you guys done correct that is completely student left so who painted ask the question she just spray painted we get dirty right we don't want you to get dirty awes so who who has the broom this month my class Mr Well's class JS and students do you want to talk a little bit about the character trades like give some examples of Trades that we've already done um we've done tra like responsibility uh courage honesty kindness um I think that's most of we done but we you know we're only like halfway through the year so we've got much more coming that's C tell me about one of your assemblies so assemblies are kind of tricky right you're up in front of all of your your friends your peers get a little nervous so
009how do you guys prepare for that and we practi we practice every Wednesday um and Friday so twice a week and our some of our last practices before the assembly are actually in the room where we conduct the assignment so we can sort heol and how do you go about like brainstorming what they're going to do for your next assembly or assemblies to come Miss L has created a that we're going to do throughout the year so just each one so how do you start the assembly what do you try to make it mirror what happen uh so we would start with the pledge first of all making everybody [Laughter] your principal we would start with the pledge um and then after the pledge we would have somebody talk about what sort of what is
010going on and we have geving such like you know pass the uh yeah so it sounds like you use a lot of different things that you learn in school all together to help lead this group and to put on these assemblies I mean you're doing public speaking you're sounds like you're writing you're connecting with other kids and they're also teaching they're teaching and their fears yeah I love it I really like that um the example that you guys just gave of the one lie and all of the things that it takes to make that right that's very powerful are you all sixth graders no and nice I think it's just it's a great Foundation you know it just doesn't start with you guys it's something that could be shown to everyone about being honest kind
011you know trustworthy everything all the traits that build into a character and I think what you guys are doing is something that will is something I hope that continues to to grow in Hopkinson it just doesn't stop at you like goes from everyone to the adults to everyone because these are character traits that we should always have and always be a part of in our community and learn from you guys and that is something you guys should realize you are the foundation to continue so great job speaking Dan really good job is there anything else that you think that we should know this is your this is your opportunity any El anything big Weighing on you they insisted on t-shirts show that I love them yeah t-shirts are necessary yeah they are excellent no I'm
012sorry that I was late but thank you for being here it's amazing this is great can we take a is it okay with the parents too if we take a quick photo yeah yeah all right okay no you're good done okay this the official one yeah so they're looking at me 3 two one all right the first so passing it back Toc next up we have Matt with the engineering design and development Capstone student all right everybody I forgot to move oh thank you Flo I was about to do that oh wow a fancy cup this is exciting like bridge building all right hi guys hi hi my name is Christie the engineering teacher of the high school um last year to give you a little backstory to this project um last year uh New
013Hampshire Department of Transportation Bridge engineer came to the careers class um Hans Weber and they did this challenge and I watched I'm not I'm going to withhold some words here but I I knew we could do it better and my principles of engineering class the sophomore level class we do bridge design and talk about structure and proces and Statics and do the math and ball and it was a little earlier in the year for them to do this project so I figured my senior level class um it would be right up their alley so I had Hans come back this year and present to them they do presentation about the bridges and what's involved and what his job is at the state level and they give us all the supplies all the Popsicles fits you
014could want um and all the hot glue you could want and we had I forget how many a lot a lot we probably went overboard on the class periods but um we went to a state competition in November um and there were several teams throughout the state there were 43 Bridges together we finished first second fourth guys are part of Johnny aen Michael Logan and Judah there's a couple more that aren't here they're at the basketball game tonight uh Kristoff and Kyle and then the girls Maddie uh Sydney and marel so yeah um and it was a different category there was most artistic so there were some Unique Designs there there was modeling it after other trust designs that are out there I push Johnny's team kind of to go after the railroad bridge here
015in town that structure and I'll get you guys yeah um so me and Johnny we finished first in competition uh we didn't hold the most amount of weight but our Bridge so they held the most amount of weight they got seven um but our Bridge was lighter so our weight to like strength ratio was better is what got us in the first place and uh yeah so pretty much our bridges were made out of a bunch of like these pieces here that were all kind of staffed together and then pretty much reinforced and yeah uh the names are here on the trophy and yeah great uh yeah it's kind of I'm Michael pant by the way it's kind of crazy that like cuz in the past look on this thing we saw like the past
016years it's like conquered conquered conquered conquered and then we're like okay the conquered kids are probably going to be crazy they probably spend a lot of time on it and then we go in here just start putting poool six other Mr CHR no offense to Mr chrisy but he didn't really help us at all we kind of just go up there like put some popsicle sticks together uh I just like copied this design on Google like a popular design um and okay not I mean they got first yes but my got second and we held 286 pounds the most in the competition yeah yeah um what kind of weight do they use like yeah what do they do like how how do they stress test so you like two platforms here um and they put
017like these what are they called dowels dowels put dowels in the bridge and then they just put weight actually no there's a scale and what you do is the members of the group stand on it and like you pull your own weight and your own weight breaks it down that's what I want to know stand on that yeah I mean probably not anymore be excited could it crushes then it'll be exciting that' be the exciting part I don't understand what's confusing I don't want destroy your Bridge we had like this it was like the whole scale and for both of our groups we had like three to four people on it it like all on it and everyone the whole crap is just like what's going on why yeah F any other coms so uh
018like unload by the way hi so so it's basically as Michael just said B got two platforms put some Dows here can they're attached to a plate just kind stand on down on snaps so our design so our design is um so we have these four like plates like layers of trusses just kind of like together two on one end and two on the other and we just kind of like attached it with and um so the max weight of the bridge is 7 gr that's basically how much bridge should be at Max and uh see we got work it was um thought it was very interesting and it and it's just popsicle sticks and hot glue how many popsicle sticks are in each one do you guys have a number so I think each
019pops sticks like 1.3 G and is around 700 lb so gr that would be so and the add stff to weight to it obviously at some point we because they had like the live leader board when the competition at some point we hoing and hoing hopping at top three pretty good pretty good okay excellent do any of you want to be civil engineers when you grow up we need L them well um I am engineering College oh R technology awesome um C mechanical SYM kind over and you want to do engineering of any kind more Elric side of engine Co take it that's great I love electrical engineering okay what about you guys yeah same okay no engineering science still engineering okay how about you I'm I'm a junior so okay number one it's just
020a j we are going to attempt this again next year the senior class again see how we can do what we can change up they've already started plotting their designs and what they can do better so yeah it's great then you just see hopkington hopkington hopkington on thing instead so we get to we get to hold on to the trophy for a year until we bring it back to them for for next year pass this around by the way yeah we're going to take a picture right yeah take picture first is this the first time we've won no I don't y this the first time we gone okay I don't think they did last year I don't think they did the competition they just kind of did the designs um put your name yeah 3
021two [Music] one new Miss flow not much no getting ready for winter carnival oh that's right wait why um because these are my favorite and so Norm's daughter selling them so his wife was on her way so I said never bring me six boxes because I bring them in the house and then they disappear so I have to hide like three of them and then I share the other my kids will just Dev him and his friends I'll start with six how long that'll get how are you good [Laughter] lost board oh my God they're both leaving Michael tell me how the game go thank you guys how much than you guys very much have to be in the next week or two bye guys thank you so much thank you bye guys all right
022all right oh wait we have to wait for we should wait for yes we're coming back all right so I am thrill to Pieces because we have a special guest this evening oh first off I'm sorry Flo would like to do yeah sorry we're sorry one pleas please I got skipped um okay so I tried to I tried to skip it wait a minute basketball game I didn't have anything okay but anyway the sports are going well the playoff game for the boys varsity basketball is today and the girls is tomorrow in Berlin and so we'll see how those go but there's it's up in the air with that um like championship games like final round playoff like uh quarter yeah whatever it is um and the senior nights were very great last week if
023you guys came there was a lot of like cheering and participation students um Nordic senior night which is a rare occurrence is happening tomorrow at the fairground at 3:00 p.m. so if you want to come out and support be great yes I know you'll do that um and I also want to thank Mr Flynn for the snow days which is two of them in two weeks but he's not here um at the school we've got course signups going on and so the guidance counselors are going around but they don't come to our classes because we're seeing it um but it's cute to see them all you know sign up for their little classes um just like you did got last year she's so adorable now um Miss cro took her kids on a field trip
024to a courthouse today as she as she always does um and so they were seeing a trial and then the real thing that's happening in the school is we're getting ready for winter carnival which is on Friday and so it's the spirit week this week today was crazy sock day and we're going to have like dodgeball tomorrow in advisory and then basketball and pingpong and then the big finale on Friday with all the exciting events um so if you go on Mr Zip's YouTube channel you will be able to see the battle of the bands probably videotape um so yeah I think we're just excited for that that's the main update and then of course we're excited for break I would like to just bring to the table that when I was a child here
025uh in my senior year we were able to include snow castles as part of winter carnival and we actually have enough snow this year that I really feel like someone should make a move to have classes figure out to do the best for that that would be very fun um the student council has worked very hard to finalize a schedule already so in the so if You' approached them multiple months ago that spotl so you can do it it next time that's great okay any other questions from the board yeah um I'm very excited to see your race tomorrow um you guys have worked very hard I ran down there this afternoon to see you guys practice and hopefully the wind's not as bad conditions are really good it's just gonna be if the wind
026is terrible so we'll see and after tomorrow you guys will know who's going to be doing uh New Hampshire yeah and and Nordic States is the Wednesday after break so we won't be in a little while be great johnon no nothing okay thanks well amazing all right um got something else but I'm not going to remember okay so next up this is someone who Andrew and I email with every single week uh so I'm excited to meet him in real life we have Dave McKenzie who is our School treasurer uh to come and talk us through the audit presentation and investment policy if you want to come and sit next to Flo okay thank you for being here oh you're welcome all right um I'll try not to go too accountant on everybody but um
027it's an easy set of financial statements to to go through um first I want to I want to mention that in the in the management letter uh they identified no no key audit matters which means that we're basically doing what we're supposed to uh as a as an SAU from the financial um so our our policies our procedures everything that we're supposed to be doing uh we we're we're doing uh as a former auditor uh what I typically look at next is the auditor's report and as always uh and we have for a long time uh get what's called a clean opinion um there's no except for or you know we're we're following gasby we're follow you know based on generally audited um accepted um so we're as a district we're doing what we're supposed
028to be doing we have checks and balances in place um and I know you two know that because uh you know every week it seems like we're bantering emails around and uh and bless Karen's heart she you know chases us down if if we need to be chased down and uh helps us to to take care of it so uh it's really everybody's involved uh to to to to get the district to to this place um the other part that I wanted to I wanted to to point out uh was under the financial analysis of the district funds um it's a it's a pretty strong statement that they that they chose to put in and it said the strong the strong financial performance of The District as a whole is reflected in its governmental funds
029as well as the district completed the year its general fund reported an increase from last year's ending fund bance of $51,000 which may not seem like much but you know if you're you're aiming to be break even and you you you you got there you didn't you we didn't we didn't overspend the district's sound fiscal uh management policies and procedures have historically resulted in positive general fund balance to ultimately offset taxes so um I mean ultimately the money has to come from somewhere and uh as a as a district we keep track of what we're supposed to be spending and we uh we follow through with that um frankly I got to say a lot of this is in part because of the the SAU the the business office itself um we have proper segregation
030of Duties we have multiple people doing multiple tasks uh which gives the Auditors Comfort uh frankly gives me Comfort uh that one person isn't doing too many roles where if they wanted to to to do anything uh with the funds and get away with it there'd be a better chance we we have a good segregation um there's checks and balances in place uh the auditor is comfortable with it I've always been comfortable with it um it's basically just a it it's easy to it's easy to look administrative stuff and decide maybe we can cut this maybe we can cut that um I've always appreciated the fact that as a district we realized the importance of of the business end of it uh and I I strongly encourage um it's basically just another another another year
031of a great performance within the within the SAU um and I know she's not here but I want to put go on the record that um I don't know if I've been treasurer for 10 or 15 years now uh I think it's not been more than 15 say say 10 or 15 years and I've really appreciated and enjoyed working with Michelle U I'm going to miss her um it's been great getting to know Laura uh I I enjoy and appreciate working working with her you too Dave uh so uh I was hoping if I get real elected then um we'll continue to work together now as that's really as a Treasurer um as a as a taxpayer you know I I kind of look at the financial statements and you you you look at the
032the sources of of where the revenue comes from uh and I mean ultimately 75% of the revenue comes from the the taxpayers it comes from the town um and probably about another 18% uh comes from the State either uh State Property Tax or advocacy BR grants or or the or such um so one of the areas that the report also uh in you know looked at was um find it um economic factors in next year's budgets and rates and there there's some things on in here that um are really beyond our control uh and could could impact us um I we we I I think as a district we do a an outstanding job working with special needs children um and I I know that we've had special needs children move in because on my
033way to work you know I know that there's a special needs bus that uh is is our gear that wasn't there two years ago three years ago um so you know the fact that we're able to accommodate the needs of these students maybe we know they're moving to the district maybe we don't um you know I think that that really says something about uh the the board uh and the and the seu office uh to be able to to do that um and you know State funding you know how much are we going to get how much we're not going to get those are always things that you you have to you know concern yourselves with when you're doing a a budget so um now I got to say that um overall and have been
034in town since 2002 my boys went through kindergarten through uh through the high school um and I've always appreciated how the the district itself's been run you know people board members come and go we all seem to get a you know a good strong passionate board uh and I think that that these financial statements although accountants don't say that uh in financial statements you know I think that it's indicative based on on on how these reports are are crafted so thank you we really appreciate it a uh it is a unsung job that we very much appreciate um any questions from the board one question Dave so on the governor's letter on page three at the bottom under School District policies where they talk about um asking us to review certain of our financial policies
035is that something we're going to talk about it in finance and a a week or two um but is that something that you are part of I'm not quite sure how we I don't know if that's policy committee or if that's finance committee La maybe you can um I think that would probably be more of a finance committee discussion along with policy um I do believe one of the ones that they mention is on the docket be reviewed this year anyway um the fixed asset policy is actually up for review so we could look at those and I think policy would appreciate recommendations from the finance committee but ultimately it's them that pushes in through yeah so we would zero in on those shoot them over to policy because we should get them updated before
036next year yep yeah the other policy that we're going to look at um updating is DFA which we reaffirm annually it's our investment policy um and I and there's been a a recommendation for uh a change about the investment of funds being um at the discretion of I opened it the um the district Treasurer and superintendent or his or her designate so we'll it'll be pass policy we have a meeting on Thursday Dave glad you're running again because you're awesome so and I honestly every time you come it's it's probably one of my favorite meeting because I'm a controller and so I'm always in the books of financials and stuff and so when I read the cover letter there are two things that stood out for me that I want to read out loud that
037I thought was extremely important uh significant unusual transactions there are no significant or unusual transactions identified during our audit to me awesome it's great to hear second one was we encountered no significant difficulties in dealing with management relating to the performance of the audit so to me it's like there's no unusual transactions no shift of money or nothing and if there was a question it was addressed from the SEO office without any hesitation those two things to me was extremely important to me because if there's a transaction that can't be answered then there's a problem and if there's no support from the seu office on anything then that's another problem and to hear that I want to make it very clear that was great to hear in the audit and I want to make that
038very clear so thank you very much I'm glad you brought that up uh in another life I used to audit anything from manufacturing to municipalities and I was I was second year in and I was auditing a city and I was the one doing the transaction testing so I pulled you know expenditures and revenue and making sure it was booked and I went to the person in charge and I asked if they had it available and she said nope I said Okay um you know I'm looking for you know keep busy and you know do you think you'll have it pulled tomorrow nope um do you think you can have it pulled by Wednesday nope do you plan on pulling it at all no wow so in in in my world um and I've always
039appreciate that about our office too is that um you you you treat Auditors like everybody else uh and if you make their lives easier they'll make your lives easier um because they can get through it's not like they're not going to look at it they're going to look at it one way or another uh but but I'm glad you brought that up because I'm sure over the years right now I read it and it's just every year that that I see that uh and it it's commendable it's awfully easy to put them in a dark corner um and and and and try to make their lives miserable maybe as they go away quicker and I think we've had a good relationship with P Sanderson over the years anyway so uh but yeah I'm glad you
040brought that up because I don't always see the anymore because it just happens uh year in and year out thank you yeah thank you thank you so much for your service appreciate it yeah see an email at the end of the week nobody usually likes to see the account oh thank you you're welcome than thank you very much question I will add the pieces that um Dave referenced are part of What's called the Management's discussion analysis which is published in the annual report so that piece of the AUD will be published when the annual report comes out in a couple weeks yeah do we have to make a motion to accept the audit no the audit is already finalized okay um that is something that Michelle does as the ba she approves it and it
041becomes final so it will be up on the website um shortly want to present it tonight here get any questions you may have and then we'll we'll publish it on the website thank you that's great thank you you thank you very much thank you Dave all right from one elected role to the next um but we're also going to talk about the school district C so for many years maybe the same range as Dave Laura bden has been our school clerk which involves thank you so much Dave uh involves uh taking minutes at our school district annual meeting uh ratifying them and submitting them to the state she resigned uh ahead of this year's meeting um and so we as the board can appoint a new school clerk uh we are lucky because Sarah Palo
042is running un opposed to be school clerk um this year elections are March 11th from 7: to 7 um and I spoke with her and she is okay with being the clerk this year if we appoint her um so I would like to nominate Sarah poo to be school clerk for the 2025 annual School District meeting to be held on March hey yeah yeah to I would like to point Sarah yes thank you so so great any discussion second yeah quick question can you just share what the role does real quick so people are understanding what oh yeah I already said it take minutes okay minutes perfect you're the best I second all right good y thank you Sirah all in favor oh and all in favor any oppos motion carries okay next up we
043have the district meeting discussion so um we actually have to this is something um they came to our attention this week do you want to kick it off I'll kick it off and then you can jump in with anything um we have to move our district meeting back a week from uh March 8th to March 15th it'll be held at the same time um starting at 9:00 a.m. um just moved back by 7 Days um we have talked with to figure out if there was going to be a different time to do it whether on a Thursday night like the town does or anything else um my instinct just so everyone knows is because the school district is made up of everyone and also parents um have the vested interest it is easier for most
044parents um to get here when there's Child Care at National Honor Society we're not competing with b b time so I think we should keep it on a Saturday and just push it back a week does that sound good great so I need to make a mo can I have a motion yep we need um we need a motion to move the 2025 annual School District meeting from March 8th to March 15th yeah so moved second but I have discussion sure um I was under the impression that the the school district monor was the one that could only Norm I was under the impression the school district monitor was the only one that could change the meeting once we said it so so the meeting date hasn't been so while it is um essentially out
045there it hasn't been published on the warrant yet so because the warrants aren't finalized we do have the right to move the the meeting okay I've talked to Dr I've talked to Legal we have the right to move the meeting okay to the 15 all right and I guess I guess my only other comment would be is checks and balances so doesn't happen again with all due respect to the district um I I will be there I have to change some things um but I just you know there's people who plan far in advance when we set the date in I don't know October so just future reference checks and balances are important for this board to accommodate the date accurately that's all okay um we have a motion a second all in favor anyos
046okay thank you um so with that change yeah um the warrants are ready to be posted so i' ask that you sign three copies of the warrants do you need to pen I okay great you can do it at the end of the meeting you can do it now I will pick off budget but I wanted to do there's a couple things we want to do we want to talk through the budget process between now and the 15th I also wanted to get some feedback from Rob following the public hearing last Wednesday um and then talk through like the next steps that we have to do as a board to get us through meeting and hopefully carry us over over the gauntlet does that sound good we were gonna maybe start um talking about who
047is going to present what warrants as well district meeting uh let's do that at the end yes um so we have a I think there's a couple things I want to talk through as you guys know we are doing a a lot to try I think to get out the vote and get um lots of information about about this year's budgets considering that we have a nice legely warrant with a few things at stake um there are three events this week that I wanted to make sure that we highlighted the tomorrow night there are two um there are two uh budget and tour nights uh at 5:30 at Harold Martin 6:30 here at Maple Street those will be with two representatives from a the school board as well as I think Joan Fallin be is
048going to be joining us at Herold Martin um and then on the 20th of 5:30 there is the same thing for a budget in tour night at the Middle High School where there will be two board members I think Chris Kelly and also Scott zipkey from the union and the goal for those is to do a tour see the buildings um from babysitting yeah and I'll get there and then ask questions um about the budget the national on society per flows points is going to be providing child care which is great so if you are a family with kids bring them there are going to be amazing wonderful students and you can come and have all your questions answered the next thing that I want to talk about is then we have school vacation next
049week and then as you guys might remember we have six potential uh events scheduled that for that week before what was going to be the date on the 8th and I wanted to ask you guys if it's okay if we move two of them to the following week so we can space it out a little bit um and so I think we keep rotary the same on the fifth and Rob that's you and Mike Jonathan you and I will still do pre senior lunch budget um we'll keep PTA because that happens once a month and muffins is still going to be on March 6 but there's two Schoolboard q&as Jonathan you and I were going to do March 4th and Norm you and I were going to do March 5th but if it's possible if
050I can work with you guys to reschedule them for the next week I think it might be nice to sort of space out a couple touch points for people depending on if people are traveling or doing whatever March 12th sure yeah what time is it at we had it at 4: 4 but I can work with you guys on scheduling and get this reposted I think yeah what is the schedule posted for this again just so this is a they were they were Cal Ines okay yeah I tomorrow so back to back talk with you after yeah um but I will I will we can clean up everyone's invites I think that we just included everyone just to make sure that people knew about it and we can take off board members who are not
051scheduled to be there and I can confirm with people but is everyone okay with spacing it out over the two weeks then to try to do that true yeah I mean I I think you know like it is a bit of a a wrench I think we all recognize that we're moving the meeting and so I think giving people more time to to understand the budget um is great yep yeah and then obviously we'll also follow up with folks to let them know that the meeting has been mov yeah doy can you just send out a master list of the dates with who's doing what yeah that' be great it's a bit of a mess in my Google Calendar right now I got you I got you yes now that we are here in past
052budget committee I think we can I can go ahead and do that yep um definitely um okay so that was one part um the second part was we have I think a pretty robust set of materials we have the fqs we have the special education primer Andrew and I have been talking about um the mailer because we want to send out a mailer and also do a newsletter the thing that we were talking about was making a newsletter that could get posted be slightly longer having the mailer be more to the point because it'll be an everyday direct mailing um that is not fully drafted yet it's on me um I'm going to crank on that this week but I think the goal is to try to get that out in the next week or
053so so people have it either at the end of vacation and then they've got a couple weeks to roll through with it um we also didn't want to said it earlier because we want to get the final numbers from last week so I think now we have everything that we need um is there anything else that people think we need from a material perspective in terms of helping we've got the primer we've got the budget FAQs we've got the presentation we've got very robust website that's all all the things yeah we will have a physical mailer that is sent out to everybody that includes all of the correct dates y we'll have the budget bulletin which will be done soon we had to just finalize this so the budget bulletin should be published hopefully by
054the end of the week y it should yep and um we also have that snapshot that's on the main you know main one pager for the site yep yeah y I think we should be and then there's all the original documents all the videos everything else in discussion really want do D is that reasonable I think we should be good as soon as we have a draft I will circulate it for um review but I think you should be in good shap all right um rob you want to give us a quick update on I think a lot of us were listening right there but you budget committee yeah swell time was had by all yeah um no I thought it you know the night went pretty well um there were a lot of questions
055about the budget there seem to be a lot more questions about the haa contract um from a lot of different angles in terms of you know scope of the raises what's in the contract for financial purposes those kinds of things um but overall I think everybody felt when they left they got their questions answered and we were in a pretty good place um sort of gave me a little bit of sense as to what we need to focus on as we move forward in terms of what to emphasize yeah um I think the biggest concern for me as always is the misinformation that also comes with those meetings um so and and how do you clarify things so that we're we're all using the same set of notes so to speak you know an example
056being that the budget has gone up 9 million ion in the last five years it has not gone up $9 million in the last five years you know so it's gone up from from the pandemic budget to this budget which is six budget Cycles we're up $6.5 million which is a little over 5% um so you know those kinds of things that are just it's difficult in terms of that that narrative but that also will play out on the field dist so that's fine too for the discussion about the teacher getting 25% you got speak low 25% raises yeah yeah yeah the you know the nuances of the teacher contract and understanding um the race to the base and the step scenario U how the healthc care is structured um why it's structured that way
057there's a lot of historical information there was some questions about the uh the H that came out afterwards but you you go back to why that HRA is there um you know at a time when the school district was staring down a half a million dollar deficit and uh coming up with a health care plan that saved the school district a half a million dollars um that was part of that package um it it stayed as I said that night you know a lot of parts of negotiations that all negotiations are incremental um you know if you think you're going to make all your major changes in one Fell Swoop well you're probably not going to have an agreement so so you know there's just a lot of the nuances that we just need to
058be clear and just keep getting the information the correct information out to the people who wanted to know it and clarify it and most importantly I hope that we you know if there is misinformation that we can make it clear on the morning of school district meeting so those are the folks that are are voting on the spot so I sat there pretending to be just Norm not a school board member nor in two weeks yeah Norm in two weeks um f norm and and I and I and I sat there as if I did not participate in this budget and process and I sat there and I said damn he's good because everything that he presented that night I thought was very clear he answered all the questions kept us kept us cool which
059is something that I was impressed with but the other thing to me was is that it was the first budget that I've seen and I can't recall that the superintendent was not part of the discussion from the beginning yeah it was all Rob Laura went up there she did a great job when she need to come in when there's some numbers that Rob didn't know but I was extremely pleased extremely pleased that how clear and he advocated for the whole district for the taxpayers um for this board and how we did things and know just a lot of credit Rob um you need to be shown I mean I was extremely impressed and um I hope that we continue that type of um communication moving forward with the budget committee and with the community so
060well done again A minus because we know teachers don't get it A's out so yes 100% they're tough to come by thank you Norm you know I think that part of it is the process and going through materials with the budget committee throughout and that's the work of everybody that's there great job you know there aren't a lot of Surprises by the time we get to the end so that's always very helpful so thank you too as Laura said the team makes us all stronger so I appreciate that absolutely she gets an A plus she does Norman God spicy on your way out yeah really nor spicy future Norman's f g to be I was the one who got the espresso shot tonight T 11 okay all right anything else before we move to the
061warrant discussion all right so what we wanted to talk through was figuring out who's presenting what okay um we have just so everyone remembers we have uh there is I think seven I think two of them are like sort of like um sorry six or seven Med media articles so article one this here reports that's a thing that's not a presentation from a board remember article two is is the school board's operating budget I would like to propose that Rob given all practice per current Norms recommendation where the budget committee goes ahead and presents that warrant article and and presents the operating budget does that work for everyone yeah yes please okay um for article three this is the haa contract I and then I'll be done sort of nominating people but I think probably
062makes sense for me given that I was in nominations with Rob um and to not have him too too back toback ones um if that makes sense that's good okay um Article 4 is if it's defeated Article Five is Teamsters sure Norm do you want to Sure teamers should be great negotiate a Teamsters yeah sure does that sound good yes okay do Teamsters okay I wanted CIP but I'm happy to do Teamsters too I can do both I love CIP okay let's see um article six is uh governing body um article 7 is special education um Andrea does that make sense okay um article8 is School District repair and this would really be between norm and Jonathan um I don't care okay all right do you want I love CIP you know that okay um
063what do you Jonathan do you have a we yeah and then the next three are there is technology trust Jonathan you want to do that not particularly okay there is vehicles um or there is all right let's have jonath let's have Jonathan do CIP do you want to do CIP Jonathan sure yes do CIP okay um and then there is technology I mean I can do techex okay then there is uh what vehicles vehicle Trust last one yeah yeah you want sure the last one okay all right and then the um and then the last one that we can think about which I don't have a particular set of thoughts about and I think we should all think about this we can talk about the next meeting is sb2 and whether or not we want
064to have a board response or not um given given the vote um but I think um I think everyone should think about the way that we want to do that as a school board um I talked to it last year I don't I think it's helpful to have a perspective um you are talking for the board I don't know if we want to do it again this year so um I'm really open to to thinking about how people want to think about it given where we are and the board we are and what we're trying to do delsa you kind of mumbled there can you tell me who was technology assigned technology was Andrea Vehicles was Norm thank you y green bag discussion it'll be final final move board member um yeah is that so
065what do people think about SP2 and we can also talk about the spe I think it's a little bit of time yeah well right I do we even speak with one person correct right right yeah right because you don't know where you are yeah yeah well I mean you know you would say the consensus more than the consensus of the board knows where they are so I would just say that you know whatever statement we make balances all of the interests and positions that are out there and why you know as Jonathan would say you know by the preponderance of the evidence why the board or you know how we've kep the scales to where we're at um last time around so yeah and me there's a couple of things that are in my head
066right now that you know have me leaning so but I still have haven't really pulled the trigger on that yeah so but we're getting close Y what do you think well you know as I think about it I think and it's an open question in my mind is whether we should take a position on it as a board like is that within the Ambit of our sort of duties as a board to weigh in um I think on the one hand you could you know make an argument that I mean we're going to do our functions regardless of the the um the structure of meeting like the procedural decision is not going to change how we approach our decisions on the other hand I don't think it's abely um value neutral also I think that
067you know there's reasons that I think many people on the board have the position hold the positions that they do and that the town's consistently voted the way it has um so these are the things I'm thinking about when I'm thinking about that question is should we um take a position yeah um you know I I mean I just seen that there's been a lot of Articles the monitor I know you read the monitor about various Town budgets and meetings going on and and um I think one I I read today or yesterday and I the town start to blend with me but um it's it's the same right right debate in every single town because of the state tax system but it was this and I can't even might might not have been the
068monitor it might have been in depth that I saw this but they were talking about this real organized effort to cut I think it was four million or six million out of the budget I want to say it was in timberlan um but it was at the deliberative session and and it was only like 400 people that are voting or something like that 500 that's the thing that I really wonder about is if you get this do less people ultimately participate that's the big concern that I have with it yeah um and so to go back to the original question that I'm contemplating is well I think as a school board it's better if we have frankly more people participating and I understand the sedu of the argument that well more people could vote on
069the budget under the sb2 but do more people get a voice in the budget under theb2 is the question I have and as a Schoolboard member I want more people to have a voice um as opposed to coming in and just voting up and down on something that they may or may not understand and sus out as as a group um so whatever I don't I don't want to rehash I mean you're asking me my thoughts these are my non organized thoughts onig no this is right I mean that's right yeah yeah so I'm just going to share a little bit more where I'm at and why I'm leaning towards staying with the mechanism that we've had for as long as people have been showing up in horses and Buggies and all that um the
070first is something that Norm said a couple weeks ago here that in our budget process things change late in the game yeah and if we go to an sb2 model and we are doing that within the time frames that those are typically done it really Cuts six to eight weeks out of our process in terms of putting a number up there um you know we saw that this year right some some things come to light and we were able to make some reductions so so that's hard it's hard enough to build the budget for something that's going to happen year and a half later and then take another couple of months out of that process so that's one piece that sort of stuck in my mind the other piece really came about after the budget
071committee public hearing and that's the misinformation piece correct because it just seems like regardless of what one says um there is still misinformation that is ascribed to as being fact and that to me is problematic and that's you know seems to be the nature of social media and how it influences our at least I say politics um but School District meeting does come back to people in the room that day hearing the same message they may still ascribe to that that's fine but everybody's has the opportunity to hear both sides yeah um versus what may end up being people just living in their Echo chamber in on either side and not really listening to what may be a fact and what may be an opinion and what may be a distortion so for those Reasons
072I'm really leaning towards I personally I would not support the SP2 scenario given those those parameters um you I think we saw a lot of that in drive-through voting um whether was you know that budget was down to like Bare Bones one one penny change and still people voting against it so yeah and you know there's been a lot of folks who I've sought counsel from in the last two or three weeks and then just the experience of the last few budget Committee hearing meetings and hearings thank you and I think to add on to that for me personally was how we respond is also what's being delivered to the community during their move in of of sb2 because there could be things that are said that's delivered at District me and that's not true
073that's not accurate like for example the fact that our budget is better than an sv2 default budget that's important to be said you know that's very important to say that we are $500,000 less than an sb2 default budget so it really determines to me what's being said for us to counter for us to have a a pre pre-made statement um it's a rebuttal yes go Laur you I just wanted to provide some numbers to Rob's point so when he says that things get move back so um the last day to hold at least one budget hearing so the public hearing we know was held February 12th on sb2 it would be January 21st um so we would have that first session so town meeting would move from anywhere between March 1st to 20 March 25th
074back to essentially February 1st through February 8th and then you would have that break in time and then you'd have your voting day on March 11th but the numbers are locked in on the ballot correct yes so like if we have an amendment that we want to go to the town and say we want to reduce the operating budget by 150 because of a revenue payment or something like that we would not be able to do that cor so that that's the variable to me that is a concern that like you said up to a year in advance making a budget when something's locked in it makes it difficult to make a change yeah so so I think I mean I think whatever if we did if we did I think we would want to
075make sure that it was something that was drafted prior similar to what we've done in the past that is approved by the board that goes through I think what we think are the most um Salient Point uh and and delivered I think as effectively as possible um I think we can all think about it I don't I mean everyone might be spending time drafting their comments over vacation but I'm imagining maybe not but I think we can talk about this in two weeks and um figure out what we want to do right um but I think it's I think it's help I I obviously delivered the the commentary last year I think it's helpful I think we could probably run a tighter tighter commentary process but um you know I'm I'm with the of the
076board so yeah does that sound good yeah you're thinking you look like you're going to say something uh I mean no it's it's been said I mean honestly um I I don't think we're breaking new ground okay okay thank you um we do try if everyone looked uh there were slides in sort of the the whole presentation that Rob delivered to budget committee last Wednesday for every single um warrant article um we can continue to revise those I think we should just try to make sure I'm going to say this for Matt we try to have that presentation to him the Friday before the Saturday meeting and we try to have any speaking notes that you want to have um done also submitted on Thursday or Fridays they can be printed to the book or
077you can print them yourself continue we need yeah get in the gym and on Wednesday set that up and see what it looks like on the screen and then adjust font fixture Etc so I will be happy to make a date with uh good Mr Stone to do that sometime during the day yeah that prior week I there's got to be a block of time when there's not a gym class and we're not I don't know we might be between sports or whatever yeah that'd be F playing pickleball I'll bring my I'll bring my P I usually set up all the with them and desks yeah but that would be and then anything that's funky we can make sure we have print up correct yeah so that week and we need to get up in
078the bleachers and look at it I do not want to be the bad teacher again it might be the winter sports awards is the 12th but otherwise like Wednesday Thursday there's nothing else happening we're in between if they're having the winter sports awards they might have the projector set up anyhow that cuz they often project yeah they do like slideshow I'll make a note thank you um okay so that's it for Budget we are we're pretty much I will say we will be tweaking stuff and editing and doing all the things and I think listening to as much feedback as people are moving through their info sessions um over the next couple weeks please let me know if there are questions that pop up because if someone asks a question we should just put it
079into the FAQ right like a classic teaching addage if one person has a question everyone has a question so just shoot me a text do whatever I mean some of some of them yes uh but uh you know as and ears I think it's a great time to to meet with with people and see her around okay um I'm also pretty proud of us that we are where we are so I think that's good okay EXC Andrea policy policy okay good yeah so we have six policies uh that are coming as finals reads this evening um I'll just read them out it's ACA discrimination and harassment grievance procedure EC buildings and grounds management ehab data governance and security jic School District internet access for students JCL student health services and School nurses and jlk which
080is special physical health needs of students um we have not heard any feedback on the is and I know folks have had a chance to take a look at those um so we are looking for a motion to approve those six policies um that have reached their final read this even so second second any discussion no all in favor I wonderful so the other thing you're going to see on there is we have an emergent policy update so this is for I had mentioned this our last meeting um this is for policy ACAC which is our title n sexual harassment policy and grievance process um because of um essentially there have there have been some changes to this policy and it was recommended to us that we go ahead and um approve the the policy
081as with the recommended ch es through the New Hampshire Schoolboard Association basically this helps the policy be in line with recent um my gosh I'm leaving my brain executive orders thank you the recent executive order um the process for an emergency po emergent policy like this is basically this gets it on our books immediately the process then is that you need to still have it go through its three through going through policy committee and and then go through its three reads within 30 to 60 days we would actually begin that process in two days on Thursday uh at our policy committee meeting um looking at the essentially the substantive changes in ACAC is removing um it's not adding language it will be removing language um so and I didn't get a chance to link to
082it are you looking for the the link I added it emergently you know I've read about this and I don't want to put you on the spot so putting you on the spot I can wait till we do it but I'm just can you just remind me of the executive order and what changes it brought to this like what what's the minutia of the details I mean I think essentially it's it's the way that um Title 9 is now going to be interpreted has changed um and Jonathan feel free to jump in if I'm you know misstating this um and it is going to take a more narrow approach um to what constitutes discrimination discrimination harassment and harassment yep and so that we need to limit um our policy I think it's also a working
083progress in the sense that th things are moving quickly so I think this strips out some language my suspicion is we may be back talking about this policy again yeah um maybe within the next year so I think this is a sort of a uh not having our neck sticking out while things are moving yeah moving um so I we are also then looking for this is why I kind of did them separately because we had our final reads which went through the full process and then this recommendation for this to be approved by the board but with the understanding that it must still go through um the regular process within a very short amount of time we already have a plan for when we're starting that um which will start in two days so
084we are going to see policy ACAC several times um as first second and third reads um so this is probably going to be one of those things where you may adamant disagree as an individual but as a board we're legally bound to follow the law is that I'm just speaking for myself is that I I think sorry no I haven't read enough to I I think it's fair to say that that individually we may have some feelings but it is about the district right not yeah not being in Jeopardy yeah yeah I think the other thing I noted was that it is removing language it is not adding language to the policy which I think makes it difference does this go to effect right now even though we done the okay yes y that's why
085it's the emergency got got it do we have to make a motion to skip the three reads and then we just make a motion to adopt it just adopt it okay got it all right so I make a motion to adopt uh policy ACAC great I'll second no discussion all in favor I wonderful thank you guys so this will come back uh at our next meeting okay with the edited language okay I um so I wanted to I'm going to kiick off the consent agenda before I hand it over to Laura there are two things actually that I wanted to clarify one is just the reason why we are moving the school district meeting um it's because there is 24 days between the budget committee public hearing and our meeting on the 8th it has
086to be 25 for the RSA so we had to move it back it's a legal requirement um secondary to that uh we have a new hire sheet which is great formatting but under the resignations you will see um that our very own Michael Flynn did accept the job uh and to be the superintendent of the Dairy Cooperative School District um he is with us through June 30th um it is uh we are so happy for him that he is moving on to this opportunity we're very grateful to him for his time with us and I think we've been' learned a lot from um his style of leadership and thinking about how we structure things as a district and develop a strategic plan and uh set goals and um I think think about our budgeting and
087I think it's been wonderful to work with him so while he is out sick tonight and I'm sure we'll say more nice things about him that will make him feel uncomfortable in June um I just wanted to talk about it for a minute all right take away Laura all right new hires tonight Robert Childs is going to be a long-term sub at HMHS um covering 8th grade English for Trish Walton who is on leave we also have a another resignation we have a retirement Holly Sharon HMS special education teacher has been with us for 25 years since 2000 and she is retiring um she is over the age of 65 so this is not an early retirement item she is has done her long wonderful tenure and we thank her for all her years that's
088awesome so Holly is a neighbor of mine and was a colleague I guess still is a colleague in many ways but uh Holly's story to becoming a teacher was quite long she started as an instructional assistant at the middle high school and worked on her degree and then came back as a special ed case manager um she's worked with you know a pretty narrow set profile of students and done an amazing job with those kids over the years so thank her very very much and uh I hope your bees do well so I can get more honey this summer thank you Holly hope do well for a lot of reasons yeah and last on our new hires resignations Uh current employee with a change to contract Megan Ean is our one of our art teachers
089of high school she will not be holding uh the HHS Art Studio which was a co-curricular that we voted on in the fall that is not running this year and so that contract is n and void okay thank you awesome um do you want to take a financials yes we do not have donations tonight okay the January financials are a new folder so far they are looking good it's very similar to what we heard for December right so revenues coming in as anticipated Medicaid is down from prior year um we have we're seeing it come in a little bit slower and lower than the past remember this Medicaid to schools program I mentioned to you was was there's an upcoming change happening it also is a 50/50 match I don't know if we know this
090so the district always has to put in 50% and Medicaid will reimburse up to an additional 50% or the other 50% so it's not certainly a dollar for dooll federal aid as well so we are seeing a lower amount of Medicaid uh we are still very early on in terms of predicting fund balance we have five months to go uh so she's got Michelle has some a conservative estimate for our EXP expenditures and right now we're estimating that fund balance is $316,000 that is inclusive of the votes that we have promised for next year okay um lastly food service is still running a bit behind so we'll keep an eye on that as we continue to move forward okay and that just means the orders are down or that yeah la the last couple years
091we had fly chain assistance so fresh you know the fresh fruits and vegetables items received an additional Federal funding we don't have that this year and so those are covered as regular food service fund expenses and I think it doesn't seem like our local revenues are down much but we are fully staffed again at Food Service which also means our operational costs are higher okay thank you any questions about any of that there are two budget transfers that I need approval on tonight the first one is 20253 we were unable to hire a psychologist at the high school and so we have had to hire contracted services and so this is a budget transfer to move that money to a 330 contracted service line from salaries and benefits and the total amount of the transfer
092is 73,8 23.1 just no applicants at all nothing at all okay yeah I bet okay the second is 22-04 which is moving the salary pool for non-union employees to their proper line so every year remember non-union staff there's a districtwide salary pool and then it gets distributed based on current contracts to the individual account codes and the total value of that budget transfer is $177,400 74 and then Paris y I don't know about Paris so give me one second pull it up it's overnight y you want me to do it yes okay so there is also an overnight trip proposal for him in the folder um it is for the um Middle High School students specifically the high school students to go to Paris um tenative trip would be for March 18th 2026 so we're
093a year ahead of time the students would go to Paris and Normandy um and uh you know it it sounds wonderful they'd be going to Loop us dors and S pompo which is fantastic and to not D I love to do this trip um but they're looking for Sher rooms I don't see I don't see L here I know that's I know exactly you would see the water loads one would think I also think that they should go to sel but that's okay they are having a fundraiser uh with Granda State chocolates for Easter chocolates I'm assuming that is this year uh so everyone keep your dollar saved that um and they're doing an exchange so we'll have the students next fall yes which is great thank you and the students do pay for this
094they do pay for it yeah we are not financing it as a district y um cool that's it okay so with that um I request that you make a motion to accept the consent agenda as presented don't moved second I don't want a second Mike's resignation I'm not gonna I may just vote no mic I was joking a little spicy tonight any but I'll say by commas when he's here okay all in favor I any opposed no okay um you're good okay so let's talk through committee updates real quick so we have we just talked to policy yep you're meeting on Thursday on Thursday great curriculum assessment meets on Thursday curriculum assessment meets on Thursday at 3:30 y c yep we have it we meet the 10th no update last the 10th I think there's
095a post yep okay um EMC uh was canceled because of the snow day and it's moved to the Thursday after school vacation um finance budget anything else going on I feel like you guys are doing pretty great we're going to meet on March the 10th to talk about the audit and policies awesome all right cool um that's it we are now on to public comment um if you would like to come on up please go ahead and do so if you would like to state your name uh address and keep things to 3 minutes that would be Jazzy Trisha Lambert 305 gping Hill Road so just out of curiosity so we didn't hear why that was moved that's a really big move for the people who vote I it was so we were trying to
096figure out what happened I appreciate the response so if it was the hearing do we don't we do this every year what what happened like I think we deserve an answer on why that didn't happen the way it was supposed to because this what's going to end up happening is that there are people who have taken off from work my son was going to vote for the first time and now may not be because he's working so this is going to affect voters in a very major way so I would really like to know what happened yes I will respond because I think it's worth yeah so I I think it was just lit literally a calculation error of the counting of the days and I completely understand okay thank you the Dr puts out
097a timeline that indicates last days and what the RSA is and that timeline indicated that the last day was February 14th to have public hearing the piece that got missed is that February 14th deadline is calculated based on a March 11th town meeting day and we were 3 days prior to that and so we are doing everything we can to stay in compliance at this point understanding that it has a significant inconvenience and we can't count the day of the budget VAR could has this ever happened before ever in your time I mean I've been here several years I've never seen this happen I mean this is profoundly hard on people already I mean this if this is not an sb2 like we want to vote and have the right to vote I don't know
098what is you would probably just because of that error have taken away a person's right to vote if they cannot make it so now everybody's got to flip their schedules I'm sorry this is not acceptable and this is why we want SP SP2 and I'm going to say that again we want SP2 because of this you we heard all these reasons on why not and about drive-through voting driveth through voting the part that you don't like is that people voted against the budget and there were a thousand people that came through those through those lines so thank you I appreciate it comment 86 Maple Street um I guess I would like to Echo um how changing this state with what two and a half weeks is is is kind of a obvious inconvenience and again
099creates hardship for people that have been trying to schedule this out for several weeks and again is another reason why sb2 would be helpful if people had scheduled off that day and then can't make it they still want to participate in the process they they should have that right and unfortunately under our current government that's not an opportunity that they have um secondly um I appreciate this little one pager that I guess you didn't really go over it I don't think in full uh about the sv2 warrant articles on the bottom it does uh disclose that the proposed operating budget is um uh significantly lower than the estimated default budget we hear that almost year after year um I don't know why that's a big driving Point here um that's it it's fine to print
100that but that doesn't change the fact that there's every year another seven eight 10 warrant articles that also affect our budgeting that people would like to vote on so um you're pointing out one element of it and I I'm not sure why that is it seems like you know it's an often argument to go to the that the default budget could be higher and I think people understand that I don't I don't I just don't get why that's highlighted and it doesn't talk about all the other warrant articles so any those are my two thoughts thank you thanks Lauren okay uh that we'll put a wrap on public comment um I don't have any other old go ahead did you have comments you wanted to say I I'm really like no no it's it wasn't
101about that it's about we didn't do our opening comments because of the students that came in so we wanted I had something I wanted sure you want to go first nor because mine's a little long okay sure so um I just wanted to pause for a second and say you know what's happened at the state level and federal level is is really starting to get to me and um I just want to make it very clear that I wrote composition of SV 283 I think it was a horrendous bill that was set forward um to eliminate civics government economics geography history Holocaust and genocide education Arts education music Visual Arts work languages engineering Technologies financial literacy computer science it it's just heart-wrenching that this is coming across our state and I just want to just
102do better this state is is is f trying to find reasons to defund public education or what they think is an adequate education so I just wanted to just encourage people to speak up you don't have to be elected to speak up but man some of the stuff I'm seeing at the state level and fredal just makes me really uh nervous so that's what I want to say so along the lines of Norm you know stuff that's coming out of Washington and out of the State House is uh mindboggling at times and the the diversity equity and inclusion you have business that's happening these initiatives um and I use the words instead of the Dei because I think the words are more important than the Dei and I think about it as from my teaching
103perspective and what this really means to me as a teacher so it doesn't mean that there's some indoctrination going on um I think about the courses that I taught you know sociology when you're talking about conflict View and symbolic interactionism or the implicit bias test that Harvard puts out it's part of AP psych or hate crimes but what I really think about you know I go way back to when did I when did this concept first stick in my head stuck in my head when I was a 10 or 11 year old boy going to coo Catholic Youth Organization uh and some some hip priest decided we should really start thinking about not bullying people um you know and that's and I think about my dad who was a about as devout of a Catholic
104as you can get and he retires and moves to North Conway or Intervale actually and then rinse the basement's apartment to a gay man I was like I think this is cool dad but what's going on he's like he's a person who needs a place to live and he pays the rent and he's a nice guy I'm like wow okay this is pretty cool um and then I thought about the teaching part and what really happens in the classroom and why it's important and the first time I think that it really stuck in my head where kids were like what happened was a guy by the name of Charlie Howard who you may or may not know but uh about 30 some odd years ago 1984 he's a gay man walking across a bridge in
105Bangor Maine with his partner and a group of high school boys and two girls in the car car driving slower harassing him decided to get out beat him up and threw him off the bridge and he died you know and that's where you start to have conversations with kids about how these things happen and then you can you know you can follow the list down you know Matthew Shepard fence posting James beer you know just this past week nordquist in in Upstate New York because he's a trans man I mean there's a lot of information on that that's still out there but you got to believe that that was part of it you know Jamesburg gets dragged behind a pickup truck for three miles like if we don't have conversations with kids about diversity amongst
106ourselves and Equity how to treat people fairly and including people then we are lost and if schools and teachers are afraid to have those conversations cuz going to offend somebody because someone's going to go home and maybe think a little differently than their parent and I don't really know what we're doing yeah I don't I'm I'm mind boggled over it so if you want to do away with diversity equity and inclusion and and the teaching of those Concepts in schools great go for it but you do that when bigotry and racis IM end when we stop using labels for people when they come into our presence a man came in a woman came in a gay person came in all you really need to say is a person came in when that happens great but
107I you know every day reading about the attacks on schools and what people think is happening and what's really happened for decades is infuriating to me and I feel bad for people that are still in the classroom yeah thanks Rob I around your great up to BU thank comments it's a good are you good I don't have any coms okay sure um thank you rob all right so with that uh we are going to adjourn our meeting we have a non- meeting to discuss um negotiations yes um that's the only thing non meetings for and thank you uh and uh that's it so we're going to goad and do I need