001Good evening. >> My name is Shrida Chhatur and I'm president of the City School District of Albany Board of Education. On behalf of the board, I welcome you to our meeting. Today we have member Elmenavi, member uh man, secretary Kerichi, vice president Miss Wilson, uh member Savage and member Wolf Gang with us as our as is our superintendent and members of the cabinet. Uh this meeting is being livereamed and the instructions to view this meeting as well as a link to the agenda including all the documents we'll discuss are available at albonychools.org/bee. This is a good time for me to note that if you're here tonight to speak in public comment, you should sign up with our board, Miss Timmons, here to my right. And with that introduction, we invite those of you who choose
002to join us as we stand for the pledge of allegiance. United States. In addition to the pledge of allegiance, we always focus our meeting by restating the mission of the city school district of Albany, which is to work in partnership with our diverse community to engage every learner in a robust educational program designed to provide the knowledge and skills necessary for success. Superintendent Hawk Raider, do you have a report for us? >> We do and we're gonna have Mr. Leco kick us off. >> Thank you. We are excited to welcome Alb High School junior Selene Casola as our special special guest for tonight's meeting. As you know, Selene recently was selected to participate in the prestigious Conference Allstate Music Festival festivals treble chorus. She will travel to Rochester later this fall to perform. It is
003our pleasure to welcome Selene and to introduce Alb High choir director Brendan Hoffman to tell us more about her achievements. Thank you. So Selene has earned the incredible opportunity to sing in the treble chorus which will be directed by the renowned coral educator and conductor Dr. Jennifer Sangan from the University of Missouri Kansas City Conservatory. She'll get to take part in rehearsals in Rochester, New York from Thursday through Saturday, December 4th through 6th, and then perform in a concert at the uh renowned Eastman Theater on Saturday evening at 7:30. Now, typically about 6,500 sophomores and juniors from across the state of New York um all prepare for all state evaluations in the hope of being selected. and then only roughly 600 each year are actually selected for the honor ensembles that will uh participate in
004this festival. So Selene performed the Italian Arya Quella Fama Kachende by Benedetto Marello at her festival and after her performance at the festival uh the adjudicator in the room actually pulled me aside and shared with me how impressed she was with Selen's performance. uh she mentioned particularly her preparedness uh her command of the song and her presence and expression and these are qualities that I have had the pleasure to observe in Seline throughout her work at Albany High School in addition to her participation in Albanets and Chamber Choir. Uh Selene also performs in jazz with Mr. Halverson uh and is very involved in our theater program having played the role of Nautica in Bring It On last year. Selene is a very talented and incredibly capable young performer and student. Uh I am incredibly grateful
005for the opportunity to work with her and to have her as a member of our performing arts community in Albany. Uh she's wonderful to work with, contributes to the su the success of our programs with both her talent uh and her character. Uh, and I'm just I'm so proud and happy for you because I know how much you worked to get this particular opportunity and I'm just I'm really I'm happy for you. So, [Applause] >> would you like to >> Sure. Um, to be honest, I didn't even realize I got into conference until Hoff told me. Um, there's a smaller choir called Area All State and I thought I got in and I did, but Hoff told me, "Oh, you also got into conference all state." And it didn't really click with me until he
006told me. And that's when I started hooding Hoff like screaming. Um, if anyone knows the NBA, I made a promise to myself like, "Oh, if I did get into conference, I would do one of LeBron James' celebrations." And when he told me I um I would like to thank Hoffman and Mr. Dantis because they've spent countless hours working with me in school and helping me choose my song and practice and improve on my craft. I'd also like to thank my family because they've been supporting me since day one and they encourage me and they lift me up when I don't feel good enough. I would also like to thank my vocal coaches, Miss Delenor and Miss Shauna Silver, because they've worked with me also for countless hours improving my craft. And sorry, I'm >> You
007good? >> Improving my craft and helping me succeed in becoming a better singer and a better actor. >> Awesome. Join us for some photos. A reminder that the district is in need of parents or guardians to volunteer to join our health and safety committee. The committee monitors the condition of all of our buildings to asssure that they are safe and properly maintained. The close of business tomorrow, Friday, is the deadline to submit applications. You can find more information at almanschools.org. We are incredibly fortunate to have exceptional CTE facilities and faculty at Albany High and incredibly talented students as well. We wanted to note several current opportunities for members of our community to take advantage of those talents. In our construction technology program, students are building made to order aderond chairs that are available for purchase.
008You can choose cedar, mahogany, or pine. The total cost is averaging between $220 and $390. You can visit albschools.org for more information or contact teacher Arthur Herby with questions or to place an order at a rerby at albony.k12.ny. us. Students in our cosmetology program are offering free spa services for Albany residents ages 55 and older. All services require an appointment and some may require a consultation. To book an appointment, please call 518-4756393 or email teacher lquita lovel. I think my favorite email address in the whole city school district of Albany laval.k12.ny. us. This service will be available through April. And students in Albany High's culinary arts program will be making breakfast for our faculty and staff tomorrow. uh omelets to be specific. Alb High employees can get a cheese omelette or an omelette with up
009to three toppings. And it's something that Chef Valentine hopes to make a more regular part of the day for the school community. And all of these opportunities, of course, are made possible by the investments that our community has made in the incredible new CTE spaces on the main campus of the new Albany High School. We are excited to see what opportunities the future brings for our students. We wanted to remind our families that all of our schools and offices will be closed next Thursday, October 2nd, in observance of Yam Kapor. We'll be back in session on our regular schedules next Friday. And it is now my pleasure to introduce Principal Rachel Steed to tell us more about the great things happening this year in the newcomer program and the dual language program at Albany International
010Academy. >> Thank you. [Music] Hi, good evening. Thank you for the opportunity to present to you tonight. Um I'm here with two of my um incredible colleagues. So sitting next to me here is uh Miss Hannah Kringle. She is an English teacher in our high school. And we also have Miss uh Tasha Anderson who is our assistant principal. And I see that my friend Mr. Julio just walked in. Um so he's here for moral support as well. So um at the AIA um we all of our work is aligned obviously with our district vision, mission and goals um as well as our school vision focusing on um you know our multicultural multilingual learning environment and the development of language um among our students and cross-cultural connections. Um, in addition to the school administration, uh, that
011includes Miss Anderson and myself, we have, um, an amazing building leadership team, um, who are the developers and the stewards of our SEP. Um, and what's interesting about our building leadership team is we have such a unique configuration in our school. Um, and I don't think this is something we could have anticipated when we u designed our school, but um, you know, in the spirit of collaboration, um, it's amazing to see how the teachers and the staff from among the different three levels like work together and learn about like the high school teachers listening to what the elementary teachers do and and so on. Um, and the dynamic that is created and then the ideas that come from that. And so it's really kind of a special thing um about our building leadership team. With
012regard to our demographics, um we've kind of we've separated those out for you. So you can see a b a breakdown um between our dual language program and our newcomer program. Um given the the way some of the demographics have shifted, I'm sure it's no surprise to see that um we have a larger percentage of um Hispanic students and um you know that represents a especially in newcomer that represents um a big shift since um our the the opening of the original AIC in 2017 when I think we had maybe 1% of Spanish speakers. So and then you know as those shifts our demographic trends reflect the policy at the national level that obviously impacts like newcomers to our city as well. So just to um speak a little bit about our SEP focus um
013some of the highlights of our SEP this year um from among the three strategies that our building leadership team selected. The first one um centers around collaborative analysis of student learning. And so our building leadership team identified a protocol that is rooted in action research with our focus on student writing. Um and we've been focusing a lot on ory for several years in our building. And so um we thought that the next natural progression would be around writing. And there is a protocol that um engages teachers in um looking together at student work and really thinking and reflecting on practice um that then results in um improved outcomes for students. And so that's the first thing that we're going to be focusing on. Um the second goal is the MTSSI enhancement. And so we um
014as part of our plan, we're going to be strengthening our current MTSSI system with a focus on best practices for multilingual learners, especially when it comes to um like assessment systems. For example, in two program languages in the dual language program, making sure that we are um achieving equity when it comes to the data that we're looking at for our students who are learning um in two languages. And then um finally, we're gonna we invited Miss Kringle here to talk a little bit more about our third um our third area, which is going to be in a couple of slides. Um and she's going to be talking about the expansion of our social emotional learning. And at this point, I'm going to turn it over to Miss Anderson. >> Generally, we are very pleased with
015the decline in our chronic absenteeism rates, and we're excited about what our preliminary accountability data around attendance looks like. um for our first year as a school with a beds code. Um we are keeping an eye on our high school attendance in particular um around our unoccup uh unaccompanied youth who experience some of the greatest challenges around attendance. Um and I certainly want to highlight the fact that our chronic rate for dual language is at 13% this school year. >> All right, go ahead Hannah. Um, so our community circles have been, I think, one of the most meaningful parts of our school culture. Um, they're about people and they're about giving our newcomer students who are learning English and adjusting to a whole new life a safe place to connect and to laugh and to
016share. So to feel like they belong. And in our circles, uh, we come together with 8 to 12 students and two staff members. So um it could be teachers, student support members like a social worker or a community liaison and we sit in a circle and discuss um where students share about themselves. They listen to each other and strengthen connections and the circle itself symbolizes equality and helps students feel seen and heard. Um in the spring we completed a survey. The students completed a survey and 68% of the students said the circles were beneficial. 66 said they made them feel happy, more confident, and more comfortable. And I think that's very powerful feedback uh especially from students who are still developing the language to express themselves. So we have students who in the classroom might
017not say something all period, but in the circles they're laughing, they're sharing stories, they're practicing their English without even realizing it. and students who walk in carrying so much whether it's grief or change or trauma are finding a place to relax and feel safe and be kids. So before academic learning can flourish um our students need to know that they're seen and they're valued and that they have a voice. Um so I'm really proud of our school for making this a priority. I think it reflects the vision of our leadership and the commitment of our teachers and the resilience and the brilliance of our students and um they deserve every opportunity to thrive and the circles are one of the ways we're helping them do that. Thanks. And I I just want to give a
018shout out to Miss Kringle and Miss Anderson and the rest of our social emotional behavior team um who really are the cheerleaders um for you know this work and and supporting their colleagues and helping to implement that. So um they've done a really great job. Moving on to some of our um school highlights. So focusing on the magnet programming, one of the um recommendations that came from the report in 2024 from the magnet schools of America was that we strengthen some of our community partnerships that helped to support the magnet theme. So, um, last year and then this is continuing into this year, we've developed a stronger relationship with Capital District Latinos. And you can see in the pictures on this slide, the two on the far left on the bottom. Um, that's Capital District
019Latinos coming in to do Leria Night um, which is like a traditional almost like a bingo game um, that's played in a lot of Spanish speaking countries. and they came and um it was so energetic and just dynamic and fun and families came um and they played and there were prizes and we're doing it all again next Friday. So um and and so you know that came as a result of of that report um and we do want to continue to try to build and strengthen um additional community partnerships like that one. Um the other thing that we're doing um this year that didn't um it didn't happen last year as you know there were some changes in staffing in the building and so we weren't able to do our dual language advisory committee but
020we are planning to do that and that was recognized as a strength in that magnet schools report. So um that that's an important um committee for us to give us feedback on the work that we're doing and and continuing to move the program forward. And then finally professional development. Um the teachers are always asking for professional development that is specific to bilingual education and to teaching multilingual learners. And so that continues to be a focus. Um we do have a new um biliteracy coach on staff and so she's helping us to continue that work. As for newcomer programming, um we continue, we're in year three of our refugee school impact grant, which helps to fund um activities and and different kinds of programming that assist us with providing orientation and other other um educational kinds
021and cultural kinds of activities that help students and families learn more about US schools and in particular their new um city here in Albany. And so um that that we're in year three of four years in that grant. Um we also continue to build um our transition to homechools. This is a detailed transition process that begins in the early spring um and involves all you know teachers, support staff. Um we have you know um teams that will meet to dis like review academic data, social emotional data around students and then make a recommendation um to parents about you know what we're what we recommend for where the child should be in September whether it's the homechool or another year at AIA parents are um an important part of that process as we communicate that they
022have the opportunity to come back and talk more about it um you know sometimes the the recommendation you might change um based on additional input from families, but they continue to be an important part of that process. And then um we are proud of our wraparound services that we continue to have. The WOW van comes weekly every Wednesday. Um and I have to credit the great work of our health um office staff, our our two nurses who have done an amazing job of helping students um you know, not to be excluded from school, staying up, you know, up to date with with immunizations. And so our partnership with Whitney Young has um gone a long way in that regard. And then we have afterchool programming, tutoring, we have Northern Rivers on site. And so um
023you know the food pantry, we have a clothing room. And so families are families and students are always able to um access those things. In terms of our challenges and next steps, um you know, I think this is an ongoing one, but supporting the everchanging needs of our school community. Um this is a lesson that we continue to learn as our student population and their needs change. Um you know oftentimes um dictated by what's kind of going on in the world around us. Um we want to continue to build our capacity for being trauma informed. And we have a lot of newer staff and they were not part of the school district when we did a lot of the trauma-informed training several years ago. And so we've been talking about um that and continuing to
024weave um you know the trauma-informed lens into um the kinds of training that we've done. So as recently as opening day when Miss Crangle and Miss Anderson were presenting to staff on um some social emotional topics, they included that through the trauma informed lens. And then in continuing to strengthen the transition to the homechools. This is part of our design as a newcomer program and the the strength of that transition contributes to our students continued success after they leave us. And so um you know we every year we're revisiting that trying to think about what can we do better. Um and so th those things are are challenges and next steps. And then with successes I'm going to let Miss Anderson talk about the first item. We're working really hard as a school on our
025systems and structures to support students and their families around attendance. Um, in particular, as I mentioned earlier, um, our unaccompanied high school students who don't don't necessarily have the support that helps them to get to school on a daily basis. >> And then the second one, um, this is something we're really proud of. When we have visitors come to our school, they will often say to us, "There's such a great vibe here. It's so positive." what positive energy there is here. Everyone's so welcoming and so um you know we recognize that you know that is something that we want to you know you don't have to be bad to get better at something. So that's something that we want to continue to improve. Um but it has been a success for us. And so some
026of the pictures in this slide I think help to um you know help to illustrate that. At the top we've got um a really robust PTA and they have been doing a lot of outreach to different families. is in that picture you see they brought in a little treat cart for our teachers on one of the opening days when they were prepping their classrooms. Um and then we're also using the culturally responsive sustaining education framework from the state and talking a lot about um you know what what things we're doing really well and then what things what action steps we can take to continue to improve in that regard. So one of the things that staff identified um at the beginning of the year that we do well is creating a visibly multicultural and multilingual
027environment. And you can see um that middle picture is from um our annual multicultural festival in the spring. And you can see um in the in the blue um you know the the man in the blue on the left, he's our home school coordinator and he's doing a traditional dance with some of our high school students and there's like a throng of people kind of around him. Um and and that is a really fun um event and everyone loves to be able to just share their culture and also learn more about other cultures. And so, um, I'm going to turn it back over to Miss Anderson. Thank you. Um, so one of the areas where our families have needed support is just really around understanding the American educational system. And so, we work to support
028our families both returning to our school and transitioning to their home school. So, one of the things that I'm super proud of is that um, our community engagement liaison and our homeschool coordinator visit every single family in our newcomer program each summer. Um they provide them information around their new school if they're transitioning to a different school start and end times. They talk about transportation, how they plan to get the child to school. Um help them problem solve if there's um you know a transportation issue, things like that. Um but we also meet the families that are returning to our school and and provide them with information and support that that um brings them back on time in September. So I think this really it speaks to the relationships that our team builds with families.
029like we're not just the people who help them at school with their academics, we also help them, you know, in the community as well to be successful in the United States. >> And we um we hadn't selected our student ambassadors um which is like our student equity group at the time of this video, but um I did I was able to capture some student voice at a few different levels. And the first two students that you'll see to are uh fifth graders. And I thought it would be important to highlight um because at the end of six years in a dual language program is when the research says that students really start to um attain that biiteracy and the bilingualism. And so I thought it would be nice to highlight a couple of um two
030fifth graders um each speaking in the partner language. So speaking in the new language and then um we have some newcomer students um who are also sharing at the end of this I think the best part is that here in United States a lot of people talk English. So if I know English, I there's most people talk English and and in jobs, yeah, majority of people do talk English and socialize with other people is good for for you because you're not going to feel lonely. So I think being bilingual here in United States is really good for jobs. and friendship or ablan espanol in English. My name is Zakaria. I'm from Chad. When I have my friend in Chad and they need to come here and I'm going to say that school I love this
031school so much and that misses their respect and if you need help they going to help you so much and if you have a problem you can tell him that's good. I like this school. I like to be math teacher in the future and I like to be uh I like to do exercise to >> play basketball better. >> So that's just Thank you. [Applause] >> And that concludes tonight's district highlights. Okay, a very tough act to follow. Thank you to our friends at AIA. Uh number of updates and uh topics for uh discussion. Want to bring back uh to the board and the community our work around climate uh culture and retention. Uh as you know, we had a two-day retreat uh back in early August. uh that um had members from all three
032of our bargaining units and our executive team. So we had about 40 participants in total and um the the agenda for uh those two days um was really robust and what we did was we started building an action plan um for our work going forward. We wanted to make sure that that the the uh initiatives and the work uh of that 40 member team didn't didn't just end because the retreat ended. We committed to quarterly in-person meetings and our next in-person meeting is on uh Tuesday, October 7th. Uh so each of these uh team members will reconvene. are actually uh partnering with University of Alby's um EET tech center and we'll talk about that in a minute but we'll be on the campus of University of Albany and uh some of the deliverables from our
033day on October 7th are what are our benchmarks, what are our metrics, how do we know when we when we get there um and also uh an action plan for the next 12 months. So, we're excited uh to engage in that work on the 7th and we'll certainly report back to the board u afterwards. Speaking of partnerships, uh we also reported uh at our last board meeting our work uh with um building a future ready Albany in our schools. And uh our leadership week back in August as we prepped for the school year uh included presentations and partnership from the mayor's office, Department of Labor, Empire State Development, and University of Albany as well. and uh culminated with our ribbon cutting event and uh was really a a fantastic three days uh with our administrative
034team. Our work will continue. We heard from our our friends at AIA around one of the recommendations was to continue to build strengthen existing partnerships and build new partnerships. And while we always we say we're we're partnering with University of Albany, we are uh going to walk the talk a little bit differently that our monthly administrators meeting in October will also be at the EET Tech Center on October 9th. And so we've partnered with um the folks uh at EET Tech that they they'll give a overview of their programs and what they're doing in terms of uh technology and forensics and AI and all of the um recent developments over there in that building. It will include a tour of the facilities as well. Uh and we will hear from the University of Albany ambassador
035program. This basically are a group of uh faculty and students from the university that push into schools and almost a field trip on uh to the school uh about all of the different activities that are are taking place uh on campus and in the classroom. So, we're excited to u partner with the University of Albany and have our entire leadership week leadership team there. On the 9th, I'll turn it over to Miss The to give us a brief HR update in advance of her uh more formal and detailed presentation in two weeks. >> Thank you. Um so, we had a job fair at Colony Center. We didn't have it. I shouldn't say that. We attended a job fair at Colony Center last weekend. Um we had 55 visitors to our table and we're pretty sure
036that's going to lead to 12 hires. Um I was hoping it would be a little bit more than that. But the other thing that we're working on is um another sort of pop-up job fair at Alb High School. Um I had a conversation with the principal earlier today and we're hoping to do that in the next couple of weeks um to help us fill the hall monitor and substitute TA positions. Um, also the director of security conducted hall monor interviews yesterday and was able to select nine candidates to move forward. Five of them will be at the high school and then the other four in other district buildings. Um, and I'm happy that we are still contracting with CDTA to do some advertising um, for our job openings. All right, we have our first blood
037drive on Friday. Uh the high school um has a number of blood drives throughout the year if you're interested in donating blood uh this Friday. Wait, this Friday? >> Tomorrow. My goodness. Also known as tomorrow. Well, hurry up and get a good night's sleep and show up and donate blood. Um you can sign up uh online. They do take some walk-ins. Not a guarantee that you'd be able to get in, but certainly we encourage folks to sign up online. We are reminding folks about our stop arm bus cameras. This is a in partnership with the city of Albany, our transportation provider for student and bus uh patrol. A reminder uh that it is illegal to pass a stop bus, that our school buses will uh be outfitted with cameras that will record license plates, uh
038and fines will be uh divvied out to those that pass a school bus that is loading or unloading children or with their red lights on. Your first offense is $250. Your second is $275 and third offense $300. And again, uh, while we certainly support this initiative and support safety for all of our students, particularly those getting on and off school bus, it's important to underscore that the school district does not receive revenue from this. Um, the city of Albany receives revenue. Uh, we are just partnering with them to u have the cameras on the buses that we uh that we lease each year. Uh, and to make sure that all of our students are safe getting on and off the bus. Next Sunday, October 5th, uh we are also hoping for wonderful weather, is our
039fun run at Washington Park. This is a a great event for students and family members and community members uh to come out and go for a jog. It's sponsored by the booster club and you can um register uh right there on that uh big long website that I'm not going to read, but trust me, it works because we were we were on there earlier today. uh great opportunity to uh donate to support the booster club that supports all of our student athletes um in Albany. Speaking of which, uh the following Saturday and the 11th uh is homecoming. We'll have our Hall of Fame induction ceremony. We'll kick things off in the auditorium at 9:00 a.m. And we're excited to welcome these six new members to our Hall of Fame. And the festivities continue with some
040home games at 10 o'clock, girls soccer and girls swimming and diving. And we have reinstituted the parade. There will be a homecoming parade at noon that will um go up and down uh Washington Avenue in front of the high school. We'll have a tailgate party at 1:00 with festivities and food and music and a lot of uh fun and games. And then at 2:30 the uh football game will kick off against Colony. So, we hope that you can make make it for any of those uh fun homecoming initiatives. And speaking of uh our student athletes, we uh continue to um support and uh cheerlead all of our Falcons, our girls volleyball team uh got to 4-0 before uh their first loss of the match. Our football team is 3-0 and they play at Gil Gilderland
041tomorrow night and they are the game of the week. uh the um some local uh sports casters and uh meteorologists will be live at the game making sure that uh we have good weather and and it looks like we will be in the uh sunny and in the 70s. Uh and our cross country uh all-star Noah Noah Biser won the cross country meet at Broadband Perth and led the Falcons to overall victory. And there he is uh running in 15 minutes and 56.9 seconds. Um that's uh insanely fast uh to be running particularly for for cross country. They run on all sorts of terrain. It's they're not running in circles on the track. So uh it is uh certainly something that you've got to be fast and pay attention. It's not like uh NASCAR where
042they just drive in circles. Um, so we uh congratulate Noah and all of our student athletes that are off to an exceptional start this uh this school year. That concludes my report and I'll take questions. >> You better drink up tonight if you're going to do the blood drive tomorrow. >> Thank you, Superintendent. As is a usual practice, I ask you to prioritize your questions and ask your most important question first. We'll start with one question for each board member and then if time permits we'll continue for a second round. Start on this side. Mr. Wolf gang. >> Yeah, just a quick clarification on the bus one. I thought at the press conference we had went to that there was some kind of revenue sharing agreement for the tickets for that. >> Not with the
043school district. Did we have it for the cam speed cameras? >> No. >> Oh, I thought someone had mentioned that. Okay. I just wanted to clarify that. Thank you. Miss Almanovi, >> no questions. Thanks. >> Miss man, >> it's um it's it's a comment for um Miss the about um when you present in the next two weeks. Can you come and talk about um how like productive our advertising is with CDTA? >> Um I can I can attempt to. Unfortunately, I don't have metrics that tell us. I might have some because in schoolfront there is the people do have the ability to tell us how they heard about the job, but it's not a mandatory or required field. So, it's hard to say how accurate that data is, but I'll look at it and see
044if I can give you some at least, you know, kind of guesstimate. >> Miss Savage, >> I wanted to ask a question that was not addressed in your um in presentation. So I'm certainly happy to take the response in SBU if that's easier. But I know we have just kind of we've been approaching and coming towards the exclusion date and I know that our friends from AIA mentioned it regarding vaccinations and I I know that that can be a particular challenge for families that are new to the country and I'm wondering how we are doing in terms of keeping our children in school and um providing whatever necessary services we can provide to ensure that everybody gets their vaccines and can be in school. >> Yeah, certainly um we'll provide that information. What I can
045say anecdotally is this year and there could be a a lot of reasons to speculate this year seems to um to not have as as many new students registering um here uh with our registar and usually it's the new students and particularly those um that come from out of the country that we're trying to connect through any number of agencies but I'll absolutely get you that information. It would be wonderful if that information could include three years of historical data so we could get a sense of like is this an unusually high, unusually low, or just about average number. Thank you, >> Miss Gr. >> Uh, thank you. No, no questions right now, >> Miss Wilson. >> I'm sorry. Was the collaboration with the Albany E Tech Center a surprise for later or were we
046were you going to tell us? >> Oh. Oh, no. just we're hosting our uh climate culture and retreat there on Tuesday and then we're bringing our full administrative team there on Thursday to learn more about the space and the programs and take a tour. Uh so some some folks are going to dip their toe in the water on Tuesday and others are going to uh dive all the way in on Thursday. with the same topic. Um I mean there's a lot of new things and cool things happening just not just in the ET tech building but also in other places in Albany. Uh so it'd be great for our staff to see what's out there. Uh there's also all I forget the exact date but Alban is having the entrepreneurship and research week where public
047can come in and visit and see different things and it wouldn't be a bad idea to bring some of our folks there for that experience as well u because then you get firstand experiences. Hey, this is there and then we can follow up and see how many people are interested and how to tie our students into those programs. Any other questions? Um, Miss the I I also wanted to say that with with the events that are coming up like the homecoming and the Hall of Fame, uh, if we could have some of your recruitment flyers or recruitment material available at those events, uh, we can pass them out and and make sure that especially Falcon 5K too, right? You could have it right at the registration table. People come in, they grab it, they have
048information available, and then they can apply. >> Yeah, that's a great idea. We can do that. and our our flyers all have a QR code that'll take them right to the website where the jobs are posted. >> Yep. Perfect. >> Can I just ask a follow up on that? Is that sort of a normal part of the tableabling process when when we have somebody out? You know, I know we do a tremendous number of events across the the city. Do we always bring those materials and just keep them as part of our standard? Yeah. I I we we routinely give those to the folks who are organizing those events. Like I know um Kathy Edmonson takes our flyers to um the events that she's organizing. Yeah. >> Yep. >> Okay. Thanks. >> All right. So,
049moving on. This is the time um next part is public comment. This is the time we set aside to hear from members of the public. Um are there any in person? While there are no in-person public comments today, we do invite uh members of the public to share thoughts on the decisions we are facing. We accept public comments in person by voicemail and through web-based form. Information about public comment and contact information is available on the district side again at albonychools.org. And I believe there is one u public comment that came in by mail today and Mr. Wang will read it to us. >> Yes. Yes, we have one public comment from I believe the online forum. Uh this is from Joseph Lenon. Uh and his comment is that school taxes are too high. The
050school tax is the primary reason for the unaffordability of housing. Please bring school taxes down. Uh and that is the end of the comments. >> Very well. We appreciate all public comments and we find hearing from public com community members um very valuable. Our contact information for both public comment and routine correspondents is albanesechools.org. /boe. We now move to the part of our meeting we call routine consent. During this portion of the meeting, we approve routine matters for the district. These include items like contracts, field trips, personnel matters, and others. Each board member reviews each item carefully, but we vote on them together as a group. Uh this allows us to use our meeting time more efficiently. Nonetheless, each board member has the option to set aside any routine consent item in order to require
051a separate discussion and vote on that item. With that introduction, I now entertain a motion to adopt the routine consent agenda. M crson, are there any set aides? Miss Savage, >> I want to set aside the position control agenda from item two. >> So, all in favor, any others? Miss man. Okay. All in favor of adopting routine consent agenda minus two. Uh >> position control. Okay. That's unanimous. Okay. Miss Savage, >> I just wondered if we could get a little update. This is a pretty hefty position control agenda and I notice one position created and many many positions being uncreated and I just wondered if we could get a rationale understanding about what what is happening here. >> Sure. So, we um met as a cabinet over the course of last school year and made
052some decisions about the positions that we wanted to abolish. Um it took some time to identify the exact position control numbers. Uh so these aren't new decisions. These are old decisions that got added now basically after kind of working through all those details. And is the decision making and I it it may be that there's not one answer because there's you know many different situations here but is the decision to eliminate the positions an enrollment decision or is it a programmatic change? Like what is driving the decision that we don't need these positions to exist anymore? >> I I would say it's not one answer. It's a combination of all of those things. In some cases there are vacancies that just never got filled. in some cases um you know uh classes may have been
053collapsed because there wasn't enrollment in that particular class. So it's a combination of all of those things. I I do just want to be clear because we reiterated this throughout the budget process and was a commitment from the board and our team that there are um while there may have been some uh reductions in staff because of enrollment, there were no pro programmatic changes. Every opportunity that that children and students in our district had last year continues this year. And I guess I should say it out loud, which I know is obvious to my board colleagues, but for people listening at home, when a position is abolished, that doesn't mean somebody loses their job, right? These are positions. The people would be on a totally different part of the agenda. We're not talking about human
054beings here. We're talking about, and I think the best way metaphor we use is a parking lot has a certain number of parking spaces in it, and there's a certain number of cars that you put in the parking spaces. And if you take away an empty parking space, it doesn't mean that the car disappears. It's just the parking space. And so that's what we're talking about. These are not people. Um it's just the number of people that we hire. And it's an important way for us to keep our budget in line and then provide the resources that we need to the children um efficiently but also with the tools and resources we need to provide to them. >> Any other discussion? Okay. May I have a motion to adopt uh number two position control? A
055motion. Yeah. >> Uh M um Miss Man and Miss Savage. All in favor? Okay. Um I just want to call out um something that we just passed. There was a donation from the Albany Fund for Education. I I just want to call out that uh they're another partner that we have who supported our uh different programs and different schools at all the time. Um so thank you again to Albony Fund for Education and S Miss Hawk right here. >> Yeah, I would like to uh introduce one of our newest uh members of the high school administration uh our academy assistant principal Chanel Brown is with us now. Uh Chanel's joining us from Skenctity but has Albany roots. So she's coming back to Albany. And um just a a point of pride um >> last year
056uh we uh the school the Albany and Skenctity joined together to build um basically a a urban leadership cohort. Uh we realize that uh the leaders in the Capitol region, particularly in Albany and Skenctity, given uh the diversity of our communities uh and and just the size alone, that we needed to hold hands and build uh mentoring opportunities and build leadership opportunities that are unique to uh what takes place in our schools. Um something more than what Boseies can provide, more than than your typical state uh association. And um Chanel is one of the reasons why we partnered with Skenctity um because she is a one of the first cohort members of that program because we do we have staff that move. We have staff that want to work in in urban environments and uh
057understand that the work is different and um Chanel is a is an example of why we partner with with other districts to get that done. So, we are uh not just um receiving Chanel as a former employee, but uh she has some very rigorous and um uh exciting training that she as well as a number of our staff went through last year. And and uh I wanted to u I wanted to mention that to the board in the community and welcome Chanel back home. The next thing on our agenda is a discussion. Are we acting on this? Um, NESBA annual business meeting resolution. I'll let pass on the mic to Miss Savage as government relations chair. Hold on a second. I just want to catch up on the agenda because I can't remember exactly what
058we put and how we put it on the agenda. And of course, my computer decided to freeze while I needed to scroll and scrolling and freezing is not going to work. Okay. Um this is the thing we do every year at this time. the process for um effectuating the will of the um school districts of all of the state in trying to advocate for what we think is best for children is through one of the ways we do that is through the New York State School Boards Association. They have a membership meeting come October. Um and in that membership meeting, we have the opportunity as member organizations to suggest legislative priorities. They call those resolutions. Um and those resolutions come before the membership. each school district in the state gets one vote. Um, and that
059will be happening and Dr. Shadar is taking Dr. Tur is taking one for the team and he's going to be the delegate to that meeting which means we will not see him at the schoolboard meeting because somehow the schedules align and the um, NISB annual meeting is always at the same time as an Albany schoolboard meeting. And I must tell you, you would prefer to be at an Albony schoolboard meeting because there are typically 30 to 50 resolutions that are get considered by the New York State School Boards Association. Each one has a rationale. There's usually discussion. There's voting. Sometimes there's amendments. The meetings have been known to start in the middle of the day and end in the middle of the night. So, it is a big sacrifice. And we appreciate you taking this
060on for us. We do vote as a board on our positions for um what the positions we're going to take on each resolution. And we do that by reviewing what the positions are of the resolutions committee which this year the NISBO resolutions committee this year Dr. Chhatur is on that committee. So we feel very comfortable with the decisions made by the resolutions committee. So we're just asking and this is the recommendation of the government relations committee of our board that the board authorized Dr. Chau to vote along with the recommendations of the resolutions committee on all of the resolutions that are in the booklet which you can read at your leisure. Um but it's it's fairly hefty. We do have a couple of resolutions in there, including one on financial literacy that was recommended by
061board member Wilson, um, which was met with approval from the resolutions committee and will go before the board to try and increase the amount of financial literacy in the standards that exist in New York State's um, curriculum. So, and then there's also one on testing and that's it, right? Just now there's one on continuing to be, let's say, rightsizing the testing that we do for states for students across our state. Um and both of those are up for vote in this um annual meeting. >> Yeah, the the resolutions committee is trying to make that meeting not as long as it's been in the past. So I mean last year's was shorter than the year before. So I have hope. So I might show up at the tail end of our meeting. I have hope. All
062right. Do you want do you want me to call for the >> just a discussion? This is where I ask are we going to act on it too? >> Um I mean we can change the when the >> I don't remember the order of the meetings. Do we need to vote before? >> You need to vote before I can on days what's >> so we have time. So we'll do it next time. >> Okay. All right. So as is our normal practice, our agenda doesn't have any action. Most of our agenda items are in the beginning of our meeting unless something unexpected happens. We don't anticipate the board taking any further action tonight. The balance of the meetings uh including the one we just talked about or discussion. Some of these could be turned into
063an action item at the next or following board meeting. Um, moving on. The next topic is community schools update. Welcome. Good evening. My name is Michaela Townsen. I am the director of community schools and Michelle Bridgewwater is unfortunately unable to make it this evening but she sends her regards. The work of community schools represents a partnership between district leadership, principles, community school site coordinators, families and community organizations. So a definition of a community school is a both a place and a set of partnerships between the school and other community resources. It in it integrates focus on academics, services, supports and opportunities that lead to improved student learning, stronger families and healthier outcomes. Our focus is on student success through equity, family engagement, and removing barriers to learning. So before you are the elementary or excuse
064me the community schools within the district. There are eight six at the elementary level and two at the middle school level. This reach ensures thousands of students benefit directly from the work. Four of those elementary schools feed into a community middle school. Coordinators are aligning programming to ensure the supports that students and families receive at the elementary level continue at the middle school level. This is um the last year community school funding. We have 4.6 million in foundation aid. 2.4 of that goes to our eight community schools. 1.7 million of that goes to academic and supports. and then 0.5 million goes to the Albany International Center. United Community Schools is our district partner and this partnership continues to strengthen our work. So, a few benefits of the UCS partnership. We have seen partnership growth. There's
065been expansion with the regional food bank through the direct delivery of um food to our community schools and five mass food distributions at various large school events. We are also they are also doing university assisted community schools expansion and working with you Albany to build out this model. We have also received funding and um evaluation through this partnership. the Mother Cabrini grant. Four of the our schools received grant funding to support our school pantries and to support their growth and sustainability. And we also received evaluation through Medis, which provided a two-year evaluation on our community schools. In terms of community engagement, last year the New York State Community Schools Network Conference hosted their conference here in Albany and Albany schools hosted site visits to conference participants highlighting the work. Arbor Hill Elementary Spa Toast and
066North Albony Middle School hosted these visits and we received great feedback from participants who went on these site visits about the work that they witnessed. There was also um a partnership expo where 50 organizations exhibited their service and programs to create new partnerships and opportunities within with our schools. So some successes from last year, there was a 7% decrease in chronic absenteeism across the seven community schools over three years. We saw a 15% reduction in chronic absenteeism in schools with a community school site coordinator for two or more years in that position. 556 students receive dental services through Seal Smile. This is a um 25% increase from last year. So 23 24 and over 500 students accessed the food pantry and weekend back pro backpack program through our partnership with the regional food bank. 101,414
067pounds of food were distributed through our school pantries which is a 37% increase from the previous school year. And last year we developed a partnership with market 32 who donated 2576 and86 cents and food and beverages to support our family engagement events. Um so we also are working um closely with the Sunni education department and last year 36 education students provided 2,215 volunteer hours. students helped provide educational event, food pantry, and program support. Some of these students continued to volunteer once their required hours were completed. And we even had one student who wanted to do her student uh teaching at the elementary school where she was where she was volunteering, but she was going into secondary. So, the professors were like, "You have to go into a secondary school for your um teach for your
068student teaching." But this is just an example of volunteers becoming part of the school community and them becoming invested in the school. Some of the quotes after they volunteered at our schools include, "Being part of this environment strengthened my devotion to work with children while showing me the path to develop an all embracing learning environment that promotes emotional safety among students." Another student said, "What I saw was a school that was truly a community. The teachers had a lot of heart and a real desire to bring positive change to their community. I'm incredibly thankful for the opportunity I had to be part of that. Over 810 students participated in before and after school, lunchtime, weekend, and spring break programming, and over 1,790 students received during the school day enrichment with our local community partners. So
069this is just an example of some of the enrichment experiences that our students at the community schools receive. These experiences extend learning, support social emotional growth, and give students opportunities to explore interest and talents, which is really important. Um I have an example of he's current a student who's currently in fourth grade, but in kindergarten he got involved in a tennis enrichment program. And I found out that his mother and his little sister continued go as a family to that tennis program on the weekends and in the summer. And so now he's in fourth grade and continues that tennis experience. And this is just an example cuz who knows, maybe he'll play tennis at the middle and high school level, maybe he'll go pro. Um it's just an example of someone finding something that they
070like that is offered through our schools and they may or may not continue that passion um throughout the years. But at least we're we're giving them that experience. Our work is rooted in six pillars supported by more than 140 community partners. And here is just a breakdown of our the pillars as well as how many um community partners we work with under each pillar and example of them. This broad network of partners strengthens every aspect of school life and we are so grateful for their commitment to our students. A partner highlight and they were already they were mentioned earlier this evening is Albany Fund for Education. Last year they purchased equipment to launch food pantries in three of the schools. They provided funding to schools to support increases in our food pantry orders and they
071support culturally appropriate food access through grant funding. So we are very grateful for the partnership with AF and look forward to continuing and expanding that. Our look ahead for this year we want to expand and strengthen our partnership with Sunni Albany specifically in the education department. develop our partnership with Russell Sage College, specifically in the education and occupational therapy departments, strengthen partnerships with the city and the county of Albany, expand our family engagement programs, and support the advisory boards and planning for sustainability. Together, we are building stronger schools and communities, and we thank you for your continued support in this critical work. Thank you, Mr. Wolfkang. >> Questions? >> Yes. Well, I guess we'll start with an easy one. Um, so we're at half of roughly half of the schools right now are community schools
072officially. >> Correct. >> Are we looking to expand into the rest of the schools? Um, and we got one middle school left, about half the elementaryaries, and an Albony High. So, with current grant funding, and I don't know if Fred wants to chime in as well, um with current grant funding, we do have um district community school aid that supports some of the non-commun, but it's in a small capacity because to be a community school, you also get a full-time community school site coordinator and all those associated costs and the permat and a budget to support the work of the school. Um, we're always looking into grant opportunities to apply for funding um to be able to add to our community school roster. >> Okay. So, the main piece is finding more funding to support
073expanding it. >> Correct. >> Okay. Thank you. Sorry, I'm near getting your presentation. >> Just tell me. >> Thank you, Miss Townsend. Uh so it looks like there's a very direct correlation between the length of of stay that our coordinators are employed with us um and the lowering of chronic absenteeism. So this might be, you know, you might need to tap Miss Thieves for this, but how many of the seven schools that are is it seven? >> Seven. >> Eight. Okay. Of the eight schools, um, how many of our coordinators have been there for two or more years? >> So, three are currently entering their third school year. And we believe that we, Michelle and I, when I say we, I mean Michelle and I. Michelle and I were looking at this data point and
074we believe that the long-term coordinators, they have seen results because they've been able to build relationships with staff, students, and families. And they've supported the homeschool coordinator in their efforts to reduce the chronic absenteeism rate. And they've also sustained the programming to support these students. And actually, I was on um a webinar today and they said that you really start to see the change after three years. And so that number stuck out to both Michelle and I that that number three. And then we noticed this data point that these coordinate these three coordinators are entering their third school year. >> So do we have any strategies or tactics um to get all eight sites over the three-year mark? You know, that's the real question because I would like to see that 15% reduction in chronic
075absenteeism across all eight. So, we're g we got see I told you we might have tapping people. So, go go ahead. >> So, I don't know if we have any strategies, but I remember last year this came up as well. maybe not the data point um but as a leader of a school of a community school who had someone who was here for a long period of time um it takes a certain skill set. They develop a number of relationships a number of partnerships um and many of them do level up so to speak um and land in other community type positions. Um so we do work closely with them. we try to make sure they are supported in their their efforts because we know there are direct correlations when they're with us for an
076extended period of time. Um, but after a few years, many of them do find some other opportunities that lend themselves to kind of expanding this work on a a larger scale. So, I'm always thinking, if I if you guys don't mind, um, about who's coming after me, you know, in terms of my knowledge, you know, I work at the throughway, and if I didn't have folks that knew license plates as well as I did, if I left, the throughway might end up in a bad position. So, um, I'd like us to start thinking about how we can get folks maybe underneath the coordinator who watches them and uses them almost as a mentor. So, when the inevitable happens, because we do want people to, you know, keep moving up. We can't expect everybody to stay
077in their spots forever, but we're prepared. You know, we're not starting from scratch again, creating all those relationships again. And so if there was a backup, it would be, you know, I don't have the strongest relationships with, you know, these hundred folks that this person created, but I at least know who they are and we can pick up at least halfway. So it's just my thoughts. >> Planning. >> Can I can I point on I just wanted to mention on this topic. This is a tough one for me because I love our community schools coordinators. They're amazing and they go on to do so much amazing work and we're so lucky to have them going into the larger community with their deep knowledge and understanding of the district and I feel like they're really ambassadors
078for the work. Um, but it is it does feel like a job that turns over fairly routinely because of that because you get this amazing opportunity to make all these relationships and meet all these people and do this great work and then you get to do that at the next level and that's great for the district. But I think one of the things we offer here in Albany that's unique is a large number of community schools so that people do have a um a group that they're working with a team because a lot of work in education is a little isolating, right? There's only one teacher in the classroom and there's only one principal in the building and it can feel a little isolating. Um but to have a team of people working together as
079community schools coordinators, I think is one of our strategies um that we we can point to and we can look at. But I do think figuring out a way to create some kind of succession plan, not just for community site coordinators, but for all of our positions, is a wonderful um ambition for us as a district. It's something I've certainly identified in the administrative work that we do, right? There's also usually only one office manager, particularly at an elementary school. Um, and it's a big challenge for us when somebody leaves. And it's not just it's not just in this area, it's across the board. But in this one in particular, I just feel so I feel like Albany is super enriched as a city by the way some of the folks who have held these
080jobs have gone on to do other things and still um they bring with them a knowledge of of what it takes to make our kids successful. So I I agree with what you said and I just wish that I could clone people so that they could stay with us and go out and make the world a better place um outside the district too. Miss man, >> my points were covered by um board member Alman Yawi um a moment ago. Um and really about the secession planning. I think that's the that's the key to um you know creating the least amount of disruption, right? Um but I love the community schools model and I say that every single year. Um and I appreciate the work you've done and the way you've broken down this data. So
081thank you. I held the floor there for a minute. I'll pass. >> Screechy, >> thanks for the presentation. It's always really good to hear what we're doing the community schools. We see a little of it with the contracts that we passed, but it's great to hear the difference that it's made as expressed through some of the adults volunteering the schools and what the students themselves are doing. Thank you, >> Miss Wilson. >> Thank you for your presentation. And I find um so many points of pride within the community schools model. Um I'm very proud of for example that our district prior to the adoption of universal free lunch we were already doing that and you know there's additional work being done within the community schools to combat food apartide and really we're mitigating that with
082whether it be backpacks the pantries that have occurred um the food distribution. And so that's really Yman's work and thank you so much. And another point of pride is very evident and um visible is our rich partnerships. I've seen a increase in the diversity of people who or what I would say offerings that are in in the district now and um very small grassroots single soul operators, nonprofits, businesses, but our contracting is clearly not um jamming them up as used to previously and or not as daunting or challenging and evidently the community schools are very motivated for them to get through. So, it was great to see um neighbors, friends, colleagues working in our schools um with the added benefit of students often seeing people who look like them in that position and you know
083fostering that. So, that's my first comment. Thank you. >> I agree with that. You're going to see even more so as more contracts come your way and expansion of our community partners. Um and it's really exciting some of the partners that our coordinators have secured for the school year. Thank you, Miss Townson. I mean, my colleagues have mentioned most of what I want to say, but I I will still reiterate the fact that when we had our first community school at Gifin and that model was being tested and I've only seen this program grow and and students thrive under it and this is why I love our city in the fact people want to do something for our students and be part of this, right? and and and as Miss Wilson mentioned, it's that one
084person operation was like, how can I help? It's not like, oh, what's the how can I get involved? And and and that's grows and then it feeds back in in when they have something to offer, we have something to offer in return through those contracts and stuff which helps their business grow. So, so, so we're building an ecosystem. You know, there's community schools or communities within the building, but also on the larger scale in the city and and it brings people together and it's a great model and and to to what you mentioned uh board member uh Wolf Gang, I would love to see all of our schools embrace that model. uh but not every school is at the point needing of that particular model or but aspects of that model are are still being
085used in the buildings that are not technically community schools um and and you know to the PTAs or whatever you know the different mechanisms in which that community can comes together in each building um but I just love the way the the program has grown and our students have actually uh we've given them enabled them to do so much more and you can see that from an academics and chronic absent and all of those things and even the coordinators like Mav said it's it's a you feel sad that people are leaving but you also feel happy that you help them grow to something that they can go out and grab something bigger some make a bigger impact outside of our building so it's again building that ecosystem that keeps that community as a big you
086know outside inside and outside the building growing so thank you >> thank you yeah I agree and we've been able we've been fortunate enough to be able who work with the coordinators who have moved on in their new roles. So, that's been exciting as well. Um, thank you for your your enthusiasm and your um dedication to this work and your um and support and thank you for your time tonight. >> Thank you. >> All right. Next thing on the agenda, discussion, business and finance update. Mr. Caris, come on down. You're the next contestant. All right, I think I have that under control now. Um, well, thank you. So this is just a quick presentation of the business office and the uh business and finance division. So um as I'm coming into my third year, I
087have to say I'm very proud and happy about how the business office has developed and grown. Um I have to say that our positions are full. Uh we did lose a lot of history with the retirement of Stephanie, but um we have a good support staff now that I think that are very capable in moving the district forward uh in the business and finance division. Um and we always are looking for our succession planning of how do we maintain our staff? How do we get them to grow? How do we get them to move forward? Um as always, our district vision m mission and goals. Um tonight the finance division, maintenance division, school launch program, facilities planning, and our goals. Um again with our business office, our budget is $342 million as a whole. Uh
088just in the general fund. Oh, I think Bobb's playing with me, >> I guess. So I don't know why it's not. No, I think that's mine right here. Uh let's see. All right. So, uh we maintain our oversight of our $342 million budget. Our payroll and our bi-weekly payrolls is a gross of $5.4 million per pay period. Uh there's about 1,800 payments generated every two weeks. Uh that's amongst three people. Uh we have two payroll clerks and our payroll supervisor. Incredible job. A lot of work, a lot of detail. Um, accounts payable, again, it's another big department. We do over 200 checks weekly. That includes our capital projects and our vendors. Um, our tax collection, uh, this year we have our in-person tax collection every Friday here at here at Harriet Gibbons, sorry. Um, so
089far this year in two weeks, we had 95 community members that came here to pay their taxes. uh last year in the whole month there was a hundred. So within two weeks we got the same amount as we did the of the whole month of last year. Um and we also have received over 200 phone calls. So that that keeps our business office quite busy. Our maintenance department uh the slide you saw last time uh actually no this isn't last time. The next slide you'll see is the one from last uh board meeting. But we have their incident IQ ticket system. Uh we do have some vacant positions, but we are constantly doing interviews. So we're getting very close to having a full staff there. Uh we are making a cleaning program and sanit sanitation
090program for our facilities. One big thing here was the fire inspections and the uh certificate of occupancies. Uh we had zero buildings uh in the deficit this year as compared to last year we had three. So that's a great improvement. Every year we're making great strides. So, I appreciate the support and the uh the in I'm sorry, the uh focus on our district buildings. Uh this is the ticket system that we have. Uh this is the same system that we use with our technology department. uh in the last fiscal year or calendar year from September 24 to September 25 there was almost 5200 tickets. Uh as you can see our HVAC system is always the one that's on top. So that's something that we did focus on. We do have an energy specialist that is
091also working constantly on our HVAC system. And I I think it's just we are taking it one step at a time and we're making great improvement within the system, but there's a lot more that we need to do. Um this is the second year of Instant IQ. Two years ago it was all paperbased. I think then it was only there was 200 tickets for the year. So you can see that how much more people have access to putting tickets in. Um, I think for us it's great as a department because we get to see the buildings in a different light. Uh, anywhere from our teaching assistants to our teachers to our administrators can put tickets in. So, if somebody sees something, they just let us know and we try to take care of it as
092fast as possible. Our school lunch program, uh, this is the one of the shining stars I think for the district. Uh, Miss Peron is incredible as a school lunch director. Again, it's 1.5 million meals that were served last year alone. Uh that's just incredible to me. Uh the school lunch accomplishments overviews, uh rapid growth of the food service team. Aramark has been a great partner for the district. Uh we do train again, we try to make we try to give uh opportunities for our staff to move on up. Um the opening high school space is incredible. It's beautiful. If you haven't been able to see it, come take a look at it. It's just it's like a college campus. Um uh let's see. We feed our Albany panel. Uh I'm sorry. Lisa has been at
093several public relations and media events. Uh the feed al panel at Russell Sage College. She hosted Governor Hokll at the Eagle Point Elementary School and the National School Breakfast Week media event at Gifin. Our facilities planning uh phase 4 of Albony High School has been substantially completed by August 2025 and we are right in the middle of working on our building condition survey that should be done by the end of the calendar year. Uh this is another great thing uh for to me as an accomplishment. Uh, and something I'm very proud of is working with our board on our ad hoc routine consent. Um, one of the I don't know why the slides aren't moving, but I apologize. Um, so we meet almost every other week as an ad hoc committee. Uh, one of the
094biggest things that we've worked on was the uh, contract form and streamlining it through our docu sign process to make sure that everybody sees it, make sure everybody uh, approves of it. Uh, we are working on our extra classroom and field trip request form that should be rolled out, I'm going to say in the next few weeks. We're going to try to make that as a electronic form through docuign rather than a docuign form. Um and then we're also working on the conference request form that we're looking to move into my learning plan platform. So, but these are just I I think it's a great committee that we're got some good focus and great members on that we make sure that the policies are followed, procedures are followed um paper and electronically. some of our
095goals. Uh WCAP is still rel relatively new and there's a lot of I'm gonna say it's about four years old in the district, but there's a lot of stuff in WCAP that we're capable of using. Uh WCAP web is actually one of a nice feature of Wcap that we need to put more emphasis on with our employees because you get your payub, your tax forms, you see your demographic information all there. It's a um uh working with Miss thesis and the human resource department to help outline our processes for position control and to help uh between the two departments. Um again, docuign uh field trip form. I think when once that goes into the system, it'll be great uh streamlining for the district as well. and uh the my learning plan for the conference request
096forms. I think that'll give us the information that we're always looking for as well. Um so I think that's a another great goal for this upcoming year. And uh any questions? >> Thank you, Mr. G. Mr. Wolfkang. >> Uh not right now. >> Thank you. um did have actually a comment. It's less of a question. Um we'll roll into a question though. So I was at um the NAMS open house, North Albany Middle School open house. It was well attended, lots of community partners and the building was super clean >> and um the grounds were super clean. And I just wanted to give that shout out because I know incident IQ is a part of that where you know somebody can post something and it gets dealt with. So rolling into the question I want
097to know I'm not seeing a lot of grounds stuff on the breakdown of the tickets. So, is that like if there's a whole bunch of trash outside the track, for example, who's supposed to put that into incident IQ or is it supposed to go in in IQ? Like, how does something like that get, you know, noticed and handled? >> Yep. So, like for the high school, we have uh staff that do a perimeter walk in the morning so that if there's something left out or if there is trash or um anything that needs to be dressed, we do have people that walk around. But if somebody does see something, a faculty member does see something, they have access to put it into the system. Um, so let's say there's a spill of some sort or
098there there's a need for the soccer field to be cut shorter or um, so like Campella, our IAD has the ability to do so, but she also works closely with our uh, maintenance staff of grounds. We do have four people out there that do mow the grass, do pickup, do weed whack, make sure the fields are aligned. Um, just so that we're set for that. Yeah, on that on that topic. So, um, if so, for example, I'm sure you guys have a protocol about opening and closing gates to the field at at the high school. >> Um, >> do do I'm just trying to word my question here properly. >> How do we go about making sure these things are done? So, for example, I would assume that the track should be open on weekends,
099right? The track entrance, the gates to the track. >> So, I I know that we're trying to figure out a time for community um use of the fields. Uh we're supposed to be doing every other day in the early morning opposite of the swim program to have our community able to use the track and the turf fields. the track and turf are a little um we're trying to figure out exactly what the a good balance is because it is a um a surface that has a useful life. So, our grass fields are always open. So, that's a different because it's not something that could wear out or that you could damage um relatively easy where the track is. Uh you could rip the turf. You could uh rip the gum off the >> It could
100be damaged to it. >> Yeah. And and if there's nobody here to maintain it, then if somebody gets hurt on something, let's say the turf gets ripped, then another community member comes in and runs on turf, they trip on it, they hurt themselves, then we could be liable for it. So there there whereas our grass fields are open, >> the turf is a little bit more of a different >> Got it. I I would like us to explore that a little bit more. Um I've just gotten messages about things in and around the high school that people thought they would have access to, but they went and they didn't find access or that, you know, they went and found that there was trash or that there was something that needed to be done. So I
101guess the the crux of my position is like incident IQ is great internally and especially if we have these standards that you know folks are doing what they're supposed to be doing in and around the school, but how how do um how do uh folks like randomly want to come and use our field or you know notice something on one of the grounds in the schools? How how do they should they just email? Should they call? How how is what's the best way that somebody can come? >> Can I chime in just a little bit? One thing that I think is severely underutilized in our district is our contact us form on our website. There is a uh place on our website. You go to the contact us page. There's a form there. It goes
102straight to the communications department and they parcel it out to whoever it needs to go to. This is what you're asking for right now, which is something I've also advocated for is some sort of like a what we used to call in the old days web 2.0, right? some sort of like a way that I could post my concern like cclick fix does for the city right and I've had this conversation I've presented this idea and there are several school districts that have a similar thing there's one called grapevine I think is shenanoas and skenkity has one which I can't remember oh one like talk to us or something there are a couple of these and they do provide that opportunity for people to ask questions and people to respond and one of the things
103I would love us to put on our road mapap I'm not saying please go do this I'm saying let's put us on the road map of things to investigate is what did it take when the city of Albany put Cclick fix in place? How much staffing did you need to build in in order to make that a useful tool? Because if you don't have staff to respond and deal with that, um it just becomes a point of extreme frustration for community because they put things in and they don't see the results come out. And so the the city has developed an entire department, the neighborhood um services department to that really began as far as I can tell. Obviously I don't work in the city, but my my sense is it began with CC click
104fix and then oh I guess we need a community coordinator to answer all the DGS questions about when's my pothole going to be filled and then it became a oh let's see how can we do this more substantially across the city. So, it does it is an excellent idea and we should do it um in my opinion, but it does require more than just oh, let's start letting people put questions on the internet. Like, we need to make sure we can staff it and deal with it and we have the resources to do it well. Um, but meanwhile, the contact us form is online and I know that it goes um to the communications department and they um work to make sure it gets out to whoever it is. What it does not then do
105is that round trip of the answer being posted online, right? Um the other thing obviously anybody can always do is call the number for the school and tell whoever answers the phone what's going on. Um that is also always an opportunity but I understand the frustration. I totally understand the frustration of getting to a school and being like what what is happening in this school and how who do I tell I don't know. Um but but I think we should do it. Um but I think we should enter it with with extreme caution because it's it's a big undertaking. Thanks. That's kind of my rambling thoughts and question that Ann tied up very nicely for me. Thanks, Ann. Miss man, >> I don't have any um questions. I just would want to comment that um
106the work of your department um Mr. Carris is pretty amazing and it's grown quite a bit and um I like the systems that you put in place. So, thank you. Thank you. I appreciate it. Savage. >> Um, so I first of all I want to thank you for your work in particular with the ad hoc poutine consent committee which I really appreciate the commitment to trying to um bring our policies to life. I think that's something that our school district, our cabinet and our superintendent, our board and all of our leadership should really be proud of because not every school district tries to do that. like a lot a lot of school districts just have this book on the shelf and they just sort of like ignore it and then every five years they pay
107NISB a bunch of money and NISB gives them a new one and they put that one on the shelf and you're like okay great. Um but I really do feel like we're we're trying to make sure that our policies and our procedures are aligned and are working to the benefit of our students. So I wanted to to thank you for that um effort to make that really work well. >> Well, it's definitely a team effort. Um so I I want to thank you guys as well. I it's a lot of time on your end as well. So I just appreciate it between the policy committee and the ad hoc just to make sure that everything lines up. So thank you. >> And I guess I'm I'm looking forward to like this you know as we're
108moving to a new um structure for your office as Stephanie has retired and we're you know reshuffling. I'm really interested in in moving into this like higher level thinking that we know we want to do both in terms of the resource allocation work um thinking big picture thoughts about that that's the executive level leadership work that we need to be doing um also in terms of um doing really solid multi-year planning um which we'll make sure is part of our budget process this year right to really think hard because the this is this is going to be trying times for the next few years Um and also um helping the board get better understanding of the programmatic implications of grant funding. I know that our folks who were here tonight said, "Oh, we're in grade
109year three of a four-year grant." And I'm like, "Okay, that's interesting. Now, what does that mean?" Right? So, I as you know, this is not something I would say here without having talked about it with you personal privately first is we don't get all sources budgets. we get general fund budgets and it's very um we know that you guys understand the whole picture but we don't really fully understand the whole picture and it's something I'm really looking forward to and I know you're working towards in the um in this new world order. >> Yes. Um I I know uh Fred and I we've talked about it so that we are trying to get a good presentation together so that the district could see it as a whole of what the general fund and the federal
110fund together are. And one last thing I just want to point out, everybody should check their school tax bill because if you're a homeowner in the city school district of Albany, if something unusual did not happen to your house, your school taxes are lower this year than they were last year. So pull your tax bills and look. I told this to a person who many of us know who should know what his taxes are, and he was unfamiliar with the fact that his school taxes were lower this year than they were last year and was pleasantly surprised when he pulled his tax bill. that we all know what really happened, right? Our tax our taxes tax levy went up 0.9 and whose goes up and whose goes down is completely outside of our control um
111in terms of whether it's homeowners or businesses and how that works. That math is just math. But we have done an amazing job with thanks to the state for for fulfilling the promise of foundation aid. We've been able to keep our property tax increase at around 1% for a decade. That is amazing. Um, and we should be really proud of the fact that we're able to provide such excellent services for our students um, while still being recognizing our real financial needs of our taxpayers. And I I credit Mr. Carris particularly in the last couple of years for keeping keeping us honest on that. So, thank you, >> Miss Gr. Uh thank you for the presentation and thank you for uh all the work you're doing trying to uh bring more organization and structure to the
112process of running the business department. It's really helpful and I've enjoyed working with you on ad hoc routine consent trying to get some of those really complex uh questions regarding field trips and conferences kind of formulated so that they can be clear in the forms and therefore clear in the people that are filling out the forms and approving them. I think it's been a really helpful pro process and it'll pay off a lot. Thanks, >> Miss Wilson. >> Thank you for your presentation. And I don't see Ron, so I won't get in trouble for this, but I do think that um I echo also what board member Elman Yawi said about the buildings looking beautiful for back to school. And I know so much has been done over years with maintenance um to align around,
113you know, strategies and accountability. So, it's very much appreciated and it's very evident in everything. And actually hearing the community schools presentation and hearing yours, I'm curious about our messaging around um much like Kate was talking about people being hired. Um, come work for us because we need hall monitors. Just come work with us because of fiscal responsibility. Come work with us because we provide healthc care on site at our community schools and things. So, I'm just curious about our messaging about these positives that we've heard throughout the um evening as a a you know, I think there's also lore like older lore that people believe and may not realize that now we can handle um 5,000 tickets in one calendar year. So, I feel like these things can be celebrated and highlighted and it's
114just very complimentary to everyone. Thank you. >> Thank you. Um and and I'm sorry, I just want to are I I think every division I'm more and more proud of every year because I I think uh our staff are feeling better about what they're doing. They're getting happier about what they're doing. I think we're celebrating um more internally uh what they are doing and how everything is starting to flourish and they can see the difference in what they're making or the the change that they're making. Um, so is it out there being celebrated? Not as much, but internally I know that it's people are more pride of what they're showing. So it's I I want to thank them as well. >> And I know it's a culmination of a lot of work before and a
115lot of ongoing work. And I do hear in the superintendent report that we are doing all the levels of alignment whether it be leadership retreats speaking with um governmental organizations the mayor for that matter. So the word is getting out. I just wanted to highlight that. >> Thank you Mr. Caris for everything you do. I mean it's it's good to see that the district has been continuously making an effort to improve and and showing improvement over the past few years. Um will there always be issues? I'm sure there will be issues. Uh there'll be new ones, some of the old ones. Uh but as long as we're addressing them or trying to address them to the best of our abilities, you know, I'm happy. I see that, you know, yes, we have a lot of
116tickets for HWAC, you know, but considering that three or four buildings are going to be getting new HWAC systems. Some of those numbers should drop down significantly. Um and um you know and and with regards to the access to the facilities, I mean this is stuff that we've you've talked about over the years and and you explained concerns and previous administrations have also explained concerns about liability and and things like that. Uh think with respect to the uh soccer fields we talked about this last the last board meeting. Uh I mean the contractor is putting down new uh seed and what have you and so you need to wait for that. So this season we couldn't keep it open but again in future you know as soon as the graph grass gets hold um that
117those fields will be open for people to use with the track. I mean that is something that that um that would be nice to have but we need to be able to make sure that we can protect it and and take care of it. Otherwise it's not going to be sustainable thing right because we can't keep going to the public and asking for more money to put a new track field and and if you're not taking care of the one we have. So access is important but also maintenance uh uh while we have access um is is equally important and so you know stay tuned is what I would say to the community. Uh we will try make you know just like the swimming pools you know access to the swimming pools in our middle
118schools for a while. I mean the pools were down so yes the community didn't have a place to um have swimming access in summer but we made we fixed those places and remained access to to the public slowly. So uh thank you for your efforts you >> I just had one more thing I wanted to put on the on the long future roadmap. This is not like please do this tomorrow. This is like let's think about what we could do to do this and that is um online booking of resources in the district in terms of room room and building reservations. Um it feels to me like we've done so much in my time on the board to improve our technology in so many ways, but yet still if somebody wants to um use a
119gym for a practice or use a meeting room internally, there's not a good solid system where we can book things and that this is not this is not an um it's not a unique or unusual problem. You know, many many many entities have resources that need to be reserved. Um, and I would love to see us put that somewhere in the in the road map um for planning. And it's tricky for us because we do have this policy with prioritization where our buildings get priority and then the people serving children in the community get second priority and then people serving adults. So there there is a little complexity to it. It's not super straightforward, but um but I'd love to see us make progress on it. >> So I have to say thank you to
120Mr. Barber. Um he is like the pro in incident IQ. there are aspects within that we haven't even touched yet. Uh so I know that one of them is scheduling. So I think that's something that isn't too far away, but it's not something that like you said it's not tomorrow, but it's closer than it was just a little bit ago. Any other questions, folks? All right. Thank you. All right, I think that was our last discussion item. Board committee reports facilities. We did not meet um since our last meeting. Um our next meeting is I believe next Tuesday. Um so no other updates than that audit. The audit committee is going to be meeting um at some point in October. Um uh Mr. Carris is actually uh connecting with our auditor and uh collecting some
121dates. So >> policy >> hello due due to uh some problems with availability of board members and then trying to res we originally were going to reschedule for this past Monday but it was the eve of a holiday which did not work. Our September policy committee meeting was rescheduled. So, it will be taking place this coming Monday, the 29th at 5:30, I believe, at the Albany High School Library, our our new favorite uh sunlit and spacious location. >> Thanks. >> Government relations. >> Uh so, we spoke a little bit about government relations today in terms of our efforts with the New York State School Boards Association. The other thing that's happening at this time of year is we are preparing our legislative priorities to enter the legislative season which is fast upon us. I can't
122believe it already. I'm not ready. Um but we've had some preliminary conversations about that. Um we do have a very solid and quite beautiful legislative priorities document because we made a huge upgrade last year and um jacified our legislative priorities. So they are now um very uh clear and visual and compelling. So I think they are primarily going to stay the same. We will probably see some enhancement of our conversation around the implications of changes of state laws in terms of um justice involved students and what that means for our school districts um in terms of access to resources to serve those students better is some place we're going to highlight a little bit more. Um and then we will also be continuing to uh advocate for work to diversify the teacher pipeline particularly um
123recognizing Alby's unique situation with our CTE in our buildings in our school district so that we can provide an education pathway without students having to leave the uh the academic halls of their campus and we really are uniquely situated for that. So we're still pushing for that. um as well as our standard messaging around foundation aid and how it must serve the needs of the students that it is designed to meet. So those are the those are the big things that are brewing. Um we're continuing to look also at fair prek funding um and ensuring that students in the early adopting districts like ours get the same amount on a per student basis as some of the more recently adopting school districts. Um so that's happening right now and we will be you know working
124with those as always present prevent presenting you with a draft for your review um before it gets finalized. Um can I just do school visits? School visits. I appreciate um Miss Wilson and Dr. Chau have sent me their general availability and interest in schools. I encourage you the rest of you guys to do that. Um and that will allow me to kick off the process. And I've already alerted to Miss Timmons that I'll be coming at her with a request to schedule school board member school visits coming up soon. So, thank you. >> Any other topics? I just want Mr. Wolf. >> Real real quick, our next meeting is October 9th, which is after September 30th. Are we on track to swear in our new board member? >> We are. There was a a meeting
125either yesterday or today with um student government that convened just a couple weeks ago for the first time. Uh we were given some names from the recruitment effort that the board did last uh last spring, but also wanted to do one more recruitment effort in the fall. Um I think there's anywhere between 12 and 14 students interested. Uh so um Principal Comfort's going to wrap that uh process up in the next three school days because she has to. So uh at our first um meeting in October, we'll have a student board rep. >> Okay. And will we bring in the student rep as well as the alternate student rep? Get them both in here. >> I'm not sure. I I'll get back to you on that. >> Okay. Thank you. >> Yeah. I just want
126to point out that unfortunately I will not be here at the next board meeting. uh you have a conference to attend but Miss Wilson will be managing the meeting. So I I would miss the opportunity to swear in watch swearing in of those uh student board members but hopefully maybe I can meet them before that any other items okay motion to adjourn Mr. Almanavi Miss Man in favor Savage. Okay. Thank you. Good night folks.