Board of Education Public Meeting | Live Stream | July 10th, 2025

001come up first and then we'll get you going. Okay. All right. Good evening everyone. It's a little bit after 6:30. Uh we're going to call this meeting of the City School District of Albanesey's board of education to order. My name is Paul Malloy. I'm a shareholder with Honeywell Law Firm, PLLC. Uh we are legal counsel to the City School District of Albany. And on behalf of the board of education, I welcome you to our uh meeting this evening. This meeting is being uh livereamed and the instructions to view the meeting as well as the link to the agenda including all documents uh we will discuss are available at almanschools.org uh backboard of excuse me, BOE. Um, this is a good time for me to note that if you are here tonight to speak in public,

002you should sign up with Miss Timonss, our district clerk, who is across from me. Um, with that introduction, um, I would like to invite those of you who would like to join uh to join us for the the saying of the pledge of allegiance. I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. In addition to the pledge of allegiance, it's now a uh a tradition here in Albany that we focus our meeting by restating the mission of the City School 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. All right. And

003having done that, this is our reorganizational meeting of the board of education as well. Um I need a motion at this point in time to elect me as chair prom of this uh meeting. I see Dr. Chhatur. Uh second uh board member Wilson. All in favor? Okay, that's unanimous. All right, having done that, we have a new uh board member elect um in our mist um Mr. um Austin Wolf Gang. If we could please uh Where is your He disappeared. And we also have the honorable Joshua Ferrell here who's going to administer the oath of office to Austin. Oh, you have one? I do. Where? Uh, right in the middle. There you go. Before we administer the oath, I just want to personally say, Mr. Frell, Judge Frell, we're going to give you a microphone

004because the people at home cannot hear you. Thank you, uh, board member Savage. Uh, I just wanted to say thank you, Austin, for taking on this extraordinarily important role. It's very difficult work that all of these board members do and I know that you're up for the task and especially you want to make this place better. So, thank you. I should probably say the oath into this, right? Uh, so Austin, please raise your right hand uh and repeat after me. I, Austin Wolf Gang I, Austin Wolf Gang do solemnly swear that I will support the Constitution of the United States that I will support the Constitution of the United States and the Constitution of the State of New York and the Constitution of the State of New York and that I will faithfully discharge the

005duties and that I will faithfully discharge the duties of the office of board member of the board of education of the office of board member of the board of education for the Aubony Albony City School District. for the Albany City School District. According to the best of my abilities. And now you are a board member. Congratulations. [Applause] All right. Thank you, Judge Ferrell. And um congratulations board member Wolf Gang. Uh now we need to move forward with the election of our officers. Sorry. Uh yeah, ultimately uh do we have a motion for Excuse me. I need a nomination for president of the board of education. Point of order. Mr. Aloy, do we need to uh provide an oath of office for our other newly reelected board member or are we not doing? He's going to

006be Well, I guess we would. Let's see. maybe how the slate of officers turns out. I don't know if there's a need if it's going to be a retention in our current order to take two of them. Sounds good to me. Thank you. Okay. All right. So, do we have a nomination for the office of president of the board of education? Uh yes, board member man. I would like to nominate my colleague Dr. Chhatur. Okay. Dr. Chhatur, do you accept that nomination? Okay. Any other nominations for the office of president? Okay. Uh so I think we then need a vote. Um all in favor of uh Dr. Chhatur being the board president for the 2526 school year. All right. It appears unanimous with one abstension. Dr. Chhatur. Congratulations Dr. Chhatur. I need to swear you

007in. So if you could stand for me and please raise your right hand. Yeah, I'll take care. All right. Um, so please repeat after me. I, Dr. Dr. Shar Chhatur, Dr. do solemnly swearly swear that I will support the Constitution of the United States that I will support the Constitution of the United States and the Constitution of the State of New York the Constitution of the State of New York and that I will faithfully discharge I will faithfully discharge the duties of the office of president duties of the office of the board of education of the board of education of the city school district of Albany the city school district according to the best of my ability All right thank Thank you. I now seed the chair to the president of the board. I'd like

008to nominate board member Wilson. I do. The question is we need an an oath for the vice president. Yes. All the officers will need to take an oath as well. Okay. Miss Wilson, repeat after me. Okay. I, Tabitha Wilson, do solemnly swear that I will support the Constitution of the United States and the Constitution of the State of New York and the Constitution of the State of New York. and that I will faithfully discharge and that I will faithfully discharge the duties of the vice president of the board of education of the Albany City School District in the Albany City School District according to the best of my ability according to the best of my abilities. Congratulations. Thank you. [Applause] May I have a nomination for secretary of the board? I would like to nominate

009member Ellen Cr. Mr. Cree, do you accept? Yes, I accept. Are there any other nominations? Hearing none. All in favor? Congratulations. [Applause] Screechy, please repeat after me. I, Ellen Crerachche, I, Ellen Crerachche, do solemnly swear that I will support the Constitution of the United States and the Constitution of the State of New York and the Constitution of the State of New York and that I will faithfully discharge the duties of the Secretary of the Board of Education for the Albony City School District for the Alb City School District. district according to the best of my ability. Congratulations. [Applause] [Music] Now we shall go to board member statements and we'll start with our newest board member Austin Wolfkang. Um, first let me say thank you to everybody who has helped me get to this point. Obviously,

010the biggest ones are my parents who are standing in the back here tonight. Um, my grandparents, uh, and my two brothers, um, who dealt with a lot over that month and a half. Um but you know uh they stuck with me and have uh done so much to turn me into the kind of person who can run for an office at 23 years old and win and then serve his city. Um the city he grew up in, the schools he went to school in, uh and the people who helped raise him. So I'm so thankful to my family, of course. Um, I also do want to shout out two of my friends who did a lot uh helping me out through that month and a half as well. Uh, my friend Liam and my friend

011Jennifer who were with me a lot. Um, and then of course uh Monik who uh had to step out as well. um and just all of the board members who uh welcomed me and gave me their advice uh as I was, you know, expressing my interest to run um and who have welcomed me with open arms uh especially at tonight's meeting, letting me ask tons of questions. Um but yeah, so I'm just so excited to get the opportunity to make our schools a better place. Um, you know, these schools, these teachers, um, they did so much for me, for my friends, for my siblings, the rest of my family. Um, and I'm so excited to be able to support them, um, in the work we do to give the best education possible to our students.

012Um, I have obviously a lot of things I want to work on. Um, and I'm going to rely both on this community that helped put me here and my own experiences as a student in this district. uh to to make this district the best that I can. Um and yeah, uh there's a lot of things we have to work on. Um I'm going to save some of my comments about, you know, some recent things. Um the only other person I really do want to thank uh is former member Smith. um both for uh you know speaking to me and encouraging me but also um for the work that she's done over the past decade on this board. Uh there was nobody I heard about more when I was out knocking doors uh than Vicky Smith.

013uh whether it was immigration related, CTE, JOTC, uh there had to be at least a dozen people who specifically told me I need to go speak to Vicky Smith about something uh cuz it was important to them and she was the one leading the charge. Uh so I do want to just shout out her decade of work on this board. Um and recognize, you know, the big shoes. I know she says I don't have to fill her shoes. I got to make my own, but the big shoes I got to fill. um and just keep bringing that energy and attention and dedication that she did. And I'm so excited to be able to do that. So, thank you. I'll turn it back over to you, Mr. President. Thank you, board member Wolf Gang. technology issues.

014No worries. Mr. Almanavi, would you like to make a statement? Or would you like me to pass to M? Yeah, sure. I can do that. Miss man, so I always enjoy this meeting because um it's probably the shortest one of the season. No, in all seriousness, um this is another year that we're um going into and uh my commitment is to um be consistent um with uh my support of our teachers and our school administration. Um we are and our students and our families. We are dealing with some things that we were not dealing with five years ago. And uh I don't want to get into a lot of details, but um there are some issues that we're dealing with uh this school year that um we haven't dealt with before. Um, and so it

015is going to be important whether we're talking about um cell phones not being allowed in schools, whether we're talking about um immigration issues, whatever the matter, this is a year where we're all going to have to buckle up and um and I intend to uh to buckle up and um be a part of the solution. So, Thank you, Miss Man. Are you ready, Mr. Almanovi? Admittedly, I'm not logged in to the digital meeting, but I'm happy to give my statement. Um, so I want to reflect on my time as a board member. Um, I've been on this board for five years now, and it doesn't get any easier. It really doesn't. Between celebrating amazing accomplishments of our students and our staff to giving condolences to parents who have experienced things that nobody should ever have

016to experience. Um, it's been really eyeopening. As somebody who has lived in this community for 25 years, I thought I knew everything about it and you really don't. Um, so I'm learning every day here. And the more I learn, the more I realize that the school board is really a foundational block in our community, in our government, in our country. Really everything flows from this room. Believe it or not, we take care of people's most important, loved things, humans, their children. And I have been proud to serve on this board and proud to send my two children to this district where they have learned so much. They have made so many different friends. They've made friends from all across the globe. And in this time um that we're going through right now, which I will

017just we all understand it is an extremely turbulent um unjust era of this society. And I just want to acknowledge that this unit is what is protecting our most important resource, our most important possession, if you want to put it that way. We are doing everything we can to keep our children safe, educated, protected. you know, when when they say it it's much easier, the saying goes something along the lines. It's much easier to um you know, raise healthy children than fix broken old folks basically. And that's what we're all doing to the best of our ability. And I would implore everybody in this community, everybody in the city of Albany, whether you have a child or not, get involved with our unit of, you know, our board, um, our schools, our city, because when

018we all stand together, that is when we become the unmovable force um that we need to be right now for the people that are less fortunate, the people that are oppressed in our community and um everything everything we do is for the betterment of the kids. It really is. It's all about the children. So, I'm going to do my best this year as I've done every other year, but with a little bit, you know, more knowledge tacking tacking on from the five years, I'm going to do my best this year to fight for our children, fight for their safety, their rights, their their peace of mind, because our children do not deserve to be going through all of the traumas, all of the existential crisises that are happening right now. It's not fair and it's

019not healthy. So, I know my other the other six board members on this board are going to do that. Austin, I look I member uh me member Wolf Gang now. Um, I look forward to doing that with you because you've got such zeal and, you know, power in in your youth and your um your outlook and I really love that about our youth that they have they are always looking on the bright side and they're always positive and they can do everything and anything. So, I'm going to go I'm going to go as far as I can doing this job for the benefit of our district and our students and our teachers and our community. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Minabi. Board member Savage. Interesting timing. the most junior board member, the second most junior

020board member, and I think this is my 11th, 10th, 10th or 11th chance to give these remarks. So, that's kind of an interesting place to be. It is a period of reflection at the beginning of every school year. I always find that funny that July feels like the beginning because for the rest of the world, the beginning is September, but for us, the beginning is July. As I was thinking about this coming year, the thing that comes to my mind is transition. That this is going to be an incredible period of transition. The turbulent behavior at our federal government is going to create transition after transition. That's what we're going to be facing this year. That is the reality. I think Mr. Mawi did a beautiful job saying so eloquently the commitment of the people

021in this room, the board, the cabinet, and the many people who work in this district to ensuring that our students and staff get as much support as possible to reduce the impact of those um turbulent behaviors on the ability to have a safe and um positive educational experience. So that's going to be a tremendous amount of transition. In much more positive news, we are of course welcoming our new board member tonight. Welcome Austin. Um I was thinking about the fact that families whose oldest child started maybe first grade when Mr. Elmenawi started are now having their oldest child enter middle school. So most families of younger children have never seen a new board member here. That's how stable this board has been and that's brought us some wonderful things. Stability has been very good for

022this board. We needed that for a period. But having a new board member is going to be terrific for us. We need those new ideas. We need that new energy. We need the new questions being asked. It's really the a great time for that. And as I've said a couple of times, we're expecting to see much more turnover in the board for the next couple of years. So, if you're inspired by the remarks you hear tonight, start thinking about next May because we will be looking for uh we anticipate a a new board member to to run. Um in addition, we are also welcoming in addition to a board member, we're are welcoming a new cabinet member to her first full year as a permanent um cabinet member. Miss Hulahan is starting. It's funny for

023me to welcome her as she's been in this building for 25 years and is not exactly new to the district, but she's brand new in this role and we're excited to have her permanently. Later this year, we're going to have another major transition as we are still soliciting um candidates for assistant superintendent for secondary. That person oversees half the student body and a lot of other important office offices in our district. So, that's going to be a huge transition. Um, we are watching the transition to new graduation requirements and building and preparing for that. That is a huge change for all districts. We are going to be transitioning and have already begun transitioning to this new cell phone policy which we had been talking about for some time but are now implementing and that's going

024to be uh a new thing for our students. And we will finally finish the many many many transitions that are bringing us to the end of the Albany High construction project. So that is going to be the last of those transitions. But it's not all transitions. A lot of things are going to be not transitioning. For example, our new superintendent is going to have to start just being our superintendent because he's this is number three. And I think that's about the end of being new. Our new feeder pattern is just our feeder pattern. We graduated this past June. the students who entered school in the new feeder pattern for the first time. So that is not going to be a period of transition. We enter the year with settled contracts with all of our unions

025particularly with our teachers. Um and that was by all accounts a new process that was incredibly successful and effective. So that is puts us in a good period of stability. So we have areas of stability, areas of transition. It always feels like that's a good tension to have, right? you've got both new and stability. And so I'm really excited about this year. I feel very optimistic that the team both at the board level and throughout the district is prepared to the rise to the challenges that we are going to face this year. We know it's going to be a very challenging year. But from the teachers who are in the classroom every day to the non- studententfacing staff or to studentf facing staff who are not teachers to all of the people who make the

026district run through the human resources and business office and transportation and food service and all of the people that make it possible for there to be teaching and learning here. We have a pretty great team assembled and I have incredible confidence that 2526 can be a really positive year despite what I know is going to be um a tumultuous one because of the things that are outside of our district um that we have no control over. So, I'm excited to have Austin on board. I welcome you and look forward to working with you and I'm excited to continue the stability we have with the other board members. So, thank you very much. Thank you, Anchie. Uh, thank you. As I enter uh this will be the beginning of my 10th year on the board and

027I'm thinking more and more about how we function as a board as a political and governmental organization and how we both function we have been functioning as good government both in terms of regulating the school district but also trying to serve as an example of of good governance and how people can work together for for our students and for our community as a whole. And that's something that I think has been really important and becomes more important as civic discourse nationally and locally becomes more fractured and more confrontational. So I think it's really I I welcome new member Wolf Gang as as we become a a very tight and cohesive group that worked well together. However, we we did also need new ideas and that sort of transition of bringing in more recent graduates. It's

028really fantastic to have a 21st century graduate join us on the board to share his perspective. And I'm glad to have one new member at a time so that we can absorb them and everyone can learn learn to work together because there are so many moving parts to this job. It is truly one of the most challenging things I've ever done, but it's also one of the most rewarding. And I would highly recommend to anyone in the um physical or virtual audience. If you have ever despared of being able to make a change in your community, if you felt that marching and carrying signs is great but futile sometimes, if you really want to make a hands-on difference, please consider uh running for the school board. It is a place where your voice will be

029heard. uh you have real opportunities to make positive changes in the life of children and families. Um I highly recommend it. And one of the things that I'm really excited about this year that none of my colleagues has mentioned yet is that we will be joined uh later in this year by student representatives. And I am so excited to have our students participate firsthand in that participatory democracy. I think it's critically important. Um, one of the things we've done over the past few years that I'm really proud of as a district is um, become involved with the state seal of civic readiness, which teaches our students about how to be citizens in our country, in our city, state, and country, which is fantastic. And I know there's more work to be done in terms of

030educating our students about civics and social studies and history. So I think that's something that we we got a recent news story that we do have um improvements that we can make in that area. So I think that can be a focus because it's really vitally important that our students are historically literate so that they can understand uh the position in time we're at where how we got to this point and understand parallels of where of what could happen depending on what path we go down in the future. But overall, I am so very proud to be part of this board. I consider it an enormous responsibility. I thank my colleagues for electing me secretary again. And I hope to make I hope I hope to make you proud in the work I and the

031work I do on the board. It is so the work is so important. It feels every year we say to ourselves it's never been more necessary. Um, but it feels like over the past decade, sometimes the decisions become more and more really fraught. It's not even just about the reading and writing arithmetic. It's about the safety and the well-being, the physical safety and and the well-being of of our students, of our families. Um, and it's just important to keep them safe. It's important to let them know that we love and trust and respect them and important that we as a community and as the staff in this in the schools uh can work together for the betterment of these students. So thank you. Thank you Miss Crson. Good evening everyone. So, as we close another

032school year and begin yet again, I reflect with both pride and urgency on the work we've done and the work that lies ahead. This year, we continue navigating a world that is changing rapidly politically, socially, economically, and environmentally. In a time when public education is too often the target of division, defunding, or distrust, our district chose to lean into unity, investment, and trust building. I am proud that we move forward with intention, centering students, uplifting families, and strengthening the foundation of our school. Serving as a board member is more than a volunteer role. It's a lifestyle. Seemingly 247 365. Austin, once um many years ago, I was like you. I joined and you know had a very similar experience where you have your first executive session, you have your first board meeting and you're sworn

033in. And it's funny looking back. I was single then I had no children. So it's been what I think you counted 11. I'm thinking eight years. Doesn't feel like that though. Feels like you blink and we're here. Um ironically a fellow proud Falcon like you and I have a future Falcon starting kindergarten this September. That's so yes, blink and you'll miss it. However, this work does attract a person with the desire to give back and do good. It's an extension of my lifelong commitment to public service, to equity and education, and to creating systems where every child, regardless of background, ability, or zip code, has what they need to thrive. This year, we have given students more support for mental health and wellness, made sure families and community members could share their voices and ideas,

034helped students become leaders, and speak up about what matters to them, and been honest and clear about how we make decisions within our school district. So, as a district and as a board, we are answering the call of the moment to not only educate, but empower, to not just manage systems, but to reimagine them. We are choosing courage over comfort and collaboration over competition. This is what it means to build public trust and work in terms of what Ellen was mentioning on participatory government. In the coming year, my focus remains clear. I want to see us build continue to build a school system where joy, curiosity, and justice are non-negotiables. Where education is not only transactional but transformational. where students graduate not only with diplomas but with their purpose. And to my fellow board members

035and to our newest board members, thank you so much for your partnership and commitment. To our educators and staff, thank you for being the heartbeat of our district. And to our families and students, thank you for reminding us why this work matters. Let's continue to work with intention. Let's keep building together because our children deserve nothing less than a future that is bold, brilliant, and beautifully theirs. in partnership, purpose and with gratitude. Thank you. Thank you, Miss Wilson. You know, all my uh colleagues have said so many things so beautifully. I'm not sure there's much for me to say, you know, but it's truly an honor today to be before you u for reelecting me as your school board president. Thank you. I want to also sincerely thank each one of you, parents, teachers, staff,

036students, and community members for your ongoing trust and support on this board. Your commitment to our schools has been a driving force behind our collective progress. Reflecting on the past year, uh you know, I'm I'm very proud of what we have accomplished together. We have successfully navigated another year of educational adjustments, ensuring our students continue to learn and thrive despite unprecedented circumstances. Furthermore, we prioritize equity and inclusion, implementing initiatives to make sure all our students and staff feel valued and supported. I mean, our our fair contracts that we've negotiated are are proof of that. Uh the dedicated staff have worked tirelessly and their efforts have relieved resulted in improved academics outcomes and a stronger sense of community within our schools. We had 620 students walk through those uh through you know walk across the stage

037and graduation. What a beautiful moment that was. You know we also made significant strides in expanding mental health resources fostering a safe inclusing environment for everyone. Our students made the spotlight in sports, music, arts and CT programs last year. Um the high school project has been going as long as I've been on the board is almost coming to completion. Can't wait for the ribbon cutting there. So, looking forward, I'm excited about the opportunities that exist before us. We will continue to prioritize student achievement, support our educators, foster inclusivity, and strengthen our community partnerships. I'm excited to have our newest board member, Austin Wolf Gang, join our team. I'm I'm eagerly waiting for our student board member to join us as on the team uh once school starts. And as always, my colleagues and I would

038be committed to transparency, collaboration, and to listening to your voices as we shape the future of our schools because this is the campaign I ran on. We have to make sure our schools are great. If our schools are great, people will want to come to this community because they want their kids getting educated in our schools. People come to this community. There's a market for, you know, companies and stores and businesses to come. and we are at this cusp of a big transformation for Albany. So, as a school board, I can say that we are going to do our level best to to make sure that you know there is no chance for failure, right? Uh and so once again, thank you for your trust. Together, we'll continue to build an exceptional educational experience for

039all our students. Thank you. A quick board picture. We have a little bit of a change in our usual protocol. We have a action appointment designation authorization uh section before public comment today. I can't s we have a little bit of a change in our u usual we have an action item coming up first which includes appointment designation authorization bonding these are typically uh designations that we have to appoint somebody to that particular title to handle everything for the rest of the school year. So may I have a motion to approve uh the appointment designated authorizations and bonding procedures that are on our agenda. Miss Savage seconded by Miss Cr. All in favor? That's unanimous. Okay. Now Okay. Do you have a report for us, Mr. Superintendent? I do. I have a brief report. As

040we heard from some of our other board members, really this is the beginning of the school year, uh, July 1st. And, uh, Miss Timmons will bring up our PowerPoint slides. [Music] Okay. Okay. And as we always do before our presentations, we like to uh remind ourselves of our vision, mission, and goals. And um three topics uh reminder uh around our cell phone updates. We heard around uh heard about that earlier this evening and want to communicate with everyone's summer meal program. And yes, we're already talking about fall sports. Uh so um just some cell phone updates. As everyone uh is aware, uh this school year statewide in public schools, uh there will be uh no cell phones um with uh very few exceptions. And so we know that uh the school district started studying this

041well in well in advance of the governor's um statewide mandate. And we know that uh what research tells us about um uh limiting phone use and how that uh impacts the learning environment. Uh and so we sent out uh a very diverse committee to start reviewing what um cell phone use or restricting cell phone use could look like. And then as uh as I mentioned uh the governor announced uh earlier in the spring that all schools in New York would be a cell phone free environment. So, our teams have been meeting to uh implement um and create our policies and practices uh to make sure we comply with the uh governor's mandate. Uh we decided to implement uh and test out some of our systems uh this summer during summer school at our high school

042and at our three sites for our middle schools. Um we do have some kinks to work out. We have discussed pretty pretty broadly as a board uh in these forums that while we supported um our own uh quest to uh limit cell phones in the governor's uh cell phone free environment, we also knew we had some scalability uh concerns. Uh we we are one of the region's largest high schools. Um and there were a lot of really good questions and dialogue whether they were in our policy committee meeting or certainly at the board table. So, we wanted to use this summer as an opportunity um to think about scalability and look at our systems and structures so that um we have uh students entering and leaving the building in a in a very efficient way.

043And as we open summer school this week, uh we're very very thankful for everyone's cooperation that we have so far had a very smooth roll out. So a reminder that at the secondary level um electronic devices these include phones, earbuds and smartwatches will be put in a yonder pouch. Uh they will remain uh with students throughout the day and they will be unlocked uh at the end of the day. There are opportunities for students to access uh their cell phone for uh any number of reasons. Um and those uh regulations are getting worked out by our committee. Uh we will uh also uh provide students the opportunity to bring the yonder pouch home with them and then when they come back into school to lock up their devices. At the elementary level uh we still

044um have a cell phone free environment. Uh we require students to have them off and away during the day. uh as we finalize our our regulations and certainly test out some of our implementation uh at our four schools over the summer that will uh provide some additional information for um what our roll out would look like in early September. So we are currently scheduling a number of community forums uh throughout our secondary schools. Those will take place later in August as we get closer to launching the school year. Um, and uh, we're going to invite parents to any number of in-person and virtual discussions so we can share with them uh, what the intentions are at all of our secondary schools. And you can find out more about that uh, at our website. Summer meal

045program. Uh, we are very very uh, fortunate to be able to provide meals for our students outside of the academic school year. So, uh we are providing breakfast and lunch uh for students at 11 of our school locations. Each location is open to city residents 18 and under every day during the week, Monday through Friday. And we encourage folks to go to our website to find out where they can go to pick up um their fresh meals. We also uh are partnering with the Albany Fund for Education, the Regional Food Bank of Northeastern New York uh and Hatus uh next week. This is a a program to fill the gaps for our families and supplement um supplement meals uh throughout the week. We have a number of volunteers that we would like to commend, but

046want to make sure that folks are um reaching out to our community engagement coordinator, Kathy Edmonson, uh so they could learn more information and certainly want to thank Kathy for her tireless efforts making sure that no student uh in the city school district of Albany goes hungry this summer. And it is time to start thinking about back to school. Uh we will open our school doors in in about seven weeks, but uh it will be in about five weeks that uh some of our athletes, particularly high school athletes, will begin practicing. So uh we have open gym for a number of sports. Uh and please uh go to our athletics website for more information on where and when to be able to work on your skill throughout the summer. Uh and registration for fall sports

047begins next week, July 18th, uh and 10 days later for modified. And a reminder that August 18th is when fall sports practices begin at the high school level and modified will begin uh 10 days later on August 28th. And that concludes my report. Thank you, Superintendent Hawkriter. As is our usual practice, I ask my board colleagues to prioritize your questions and ask your most important question first. We'll start with one question for each board member. So, everybody has an opportunity to ask and then we can go on for second round. So, as per our new process, we'll start with board member Wolf Gang. Uh yeah, just a quick one uh for the over summer cell phone update that we just got. I know we'll uh deal with the policy. I think Not tonight, maybe a

048different night. Um, how are we handling the students who do have devices for uh medical purposes? Like are we giving them some kind of card they can give to their teacher to kind of stop that bad interaction from happening? Yeah, we have an application process and um uh we have worked on that application process with uh I know one of our attorneys and looking at best practices of other school districts so the immediate staff would know who those students are that can access their phones. Okay. Thank you, Mr. Almanavi. Uh, no questions. I just want to pump up the summer meals program again and encourage the district to maintain, you know, a constant, I guess, notification, you know, a regular notification to uh the folks of the city that there are lunch programs available at,

049you know, these specific sites. So, um, none of our students or none of our community members go hungry during that time. So, um, I'm really happy to hear that we're doing that again this year. Ma'am, sure. I don't have any, uh, questions. I want to piggyback on my colleague, board member Almani, um, in regards to our summer the summer meal update. um the more information we can get out or continue to get out um the the better. I think it's uh I know it's actually wellreceived in our uh in our community. So that is all. Miss Savage, thank you very much. So agreed on everything on food. Thank goodness we feed all of our children. I love that this responsibility falls to us and that we feed all of the children, not just children who

050are in our schools. Any child that's in Albany who's hungry gets food. That is how it needs to be and that is how it is. And it's a really wonderful program that is not just our district, but it is a supported program across the state and I think federally, but it's fantastic. I did have one question about cell phone. Um, one of the things that's in the soontobe adopted policy is that um districts need uh each school in the district has to have a mechanism for families to be able to reach their student and students to be able to reach their family during the school day and that that needs to be communicated to families. And I was a little surprised not to see that in the notification that went out about the summer school

051program because I think it's just as important during summer school to convey to families just call the district office. It's okay. You're going to be able to reach your students. Um but particularly that we have some mechanism for our families that speak languages other than English other than English um and um have for them to have a mechanism. So, I hope that the district will take a careful look at the policy, which I know is not formally adopted yet, but it's going to be. Um, and it would be great to see that being implemented more fullthroatedly because this is the big concern that families have because they've been all these kids are digital natives. They're used to being able to reach their families, that families are used to be able to reach them, and we're

052not going to prevent that in a necessary way. So, I would like to see us just be clear about that from the get. Miss Cr. No, thank you. Um, member Savage asked the question I was going to ask about how we can communicate uh the protocol for parents and students to communicate with each other in case of emergencies during the school day. Other than that, no other questions. But other than and again to echo my other colleagues, it is fantastic that we have the meal program and that's the backpack program is in addition to the meals, you know, the prepared meals we serve during the school day. The backpack meal is is meals that students and families can take home that are easy to prepare each shelf stable, easy to prepare meals, which is a

053fantastic thing uh to have available. So, thanks Miss Wilson. nothing at this time. Okay, thank you. Um, so talking about the food distribution, it's a great thing that we are able to do. Uh, but I know that AF and other uh social page on social media, they've they've links for how you as a community member can sign up and help with putting the food packages together and the distribution. So if you have the ability, if you have the time to donate, uh please do sign up. More hands make light work. Okay. This is the time we set aside to hear from members of the public. While there's no public comment today, I believe um we do invite members of the public to share their thoughts on on the decisions we are facing. We accept public

054comments in person by voicemail and through our web-based form. Information about public comment and uh uh contacting our the board is available at albonychools.org. We now move on 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 the like. Each board member reviews each item carefully, but we vote on them together as a group with no discussion. 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 a separate discussion and vote on that item. With that introduction, I now entertain a motion to adopt the routine consent agenda. Mr. Alman Yawi second, Miss Cranchi, are

055there any set aides? Seeing none, all in favor of adopting routine consent agenda. That's unanimous. Thank you. Now, typically this would be with Oh, Mr. Yes. Uh with that action of the board, uh we would like to welcome and bring up to a microphone our new um career and technical education director, Maggie Palm Mary. Maggie is a um I had this script. Let me let me make sure I know. So, we we talk a lot about uh in our district about growing our own and building a pipeline and and trying to be able to um promote from within. And when we can't do that, um the next best thing are for staff who have worked with us to go off and have uh what I like to call a worldly experience and then come back

056to Albany to um impact uh our students, our programs, and and our colleagues with things that sometimes can only be learned somewhere else. And uh Maggie joins us and and will begin her work with us as the district's first ever CTE director. Uh she'll join us in uh in early August. And this really is the culmination of a huge commitment we heard earlier from board members u around stability and vision. And um this position is really one of the one of the final finishing touches uh on a commitment that this board has made to CTE. Um it has been a long-standing uh priority of our school district uh but um most recently um given the uh significant um uh renovations to the high school and if you have not been into our CTE uh learning

057spaces and Maggie was in there earlier this week. Um we're really really fortunate uh our students are fortunate and certainly we the school district are fortunate for our community's um support to be able to provide worldclass facilities for our students. And we're excited that uh Maggie will be able to uh expand on our outstanding programs and uh be able to work with our friends at the elementary and middle school and our business community because they are looking at us to make sure that the next generation um of workers um are coming from our pipeline. And so I'd like to welcome Maggie up to introduce herself a little bit. uh this sort of is a a welcome home and you could give a little uh background as to your experience in in Albany and then we'll

058we'll let you go. We'll send you on your way. This can you hear me? Okay. Good evening uh members of the board superintendent. Thank you so much. Um like the superintendent said, this is an honor for me. Um I feel like I would be remiss if I didn't explain how I started in Albany in 2013. So I uh the summer of 2013, I had a job somewhere else. I got a call from Albany and I just felt compelled to attend the interview. So I actually had to resign from the job that I never started. Um I was drawn to Albany. Um I just something about it was really compelling. Uh I started there as a family and consumer science teacher at Hackett Middle School and I think that's history. I never looked back. Um I

059was in the district until 2019. I had such great great relationships with my students and families. Um now some of my students are on the board. um congratulations. And uh they babysit my daughter. So it's it's really been quite the journey for me. Uh I moved to Skenctity and most recently I've been at Boseies. Um I've learned a great deal the past year. Um I am so excited. Like the superintendent said, I just was in the new facilities the other day. They are amazing state-of-the-art facilities. Um our students are very lucky. I look forward to the work um that we have ahead of us. Uh, never could I have imagined that CTE could have become so big, right? The portrait of a graduate and really dismantling what people think of career and technical education, right?

060Um, that holistic idea of a learner and being able to offer our students these great pathways. Um, I know that we have shortages in all sorts of areas and I really look forward to partnering with our students, our families, the community to really bridge that gap. Um, so thank you so much for the honor. It's it's a little you added a little bit of pressure now. I know it's the first, right? So, um, but to me, this is really coming home. So, thank you so much for the opportunity and thank you for having me home. Thank you. Welcome back. So, so normally this is when we have policy. I just want to clarify and make sure that we don't we're not uh discussing the self because last time we discussed it and I the next

061portion would be the action on the cell phone policy in the code of conduct. Are we in time for the printing of the code of conduct? Yeah. So we're going to approve those policies uh on the 24th. Okay. Yep. Just wanted to clarify. So, so as is our normal practice, we had arranged an agenda with all the action items at the beginning and unless something unexpected happens, we don't anticipate the board would take any further actions tonight. The balance of the meeting will be items for discussion, some of them which would which might lead to an action uh either at our next meeting or in a future meeting. So, that brings us to the topic on instructional division update, elementary and secondary. Come on down. You're the next contestant. Good evening, President Chitaur, Vice President

062Wilson, board members, Superintendent Hawk Rider, colleagues, and community members, Mrs. Brown, Mrs. Hulahan and myself are excited to present our elementary and secondary division update tonight and share the great work that's been happening at our buildings and the district level. Next slide. We have some slides. We'd like to acknowledge and thank the dedicated sports staff, teachers, students, support teams, and administrators without whom we would not be able to work toward our district vision, mission, goals on behalf of our students. We begin this evening with reviewing the division goals. They are centered around the four key areas. Building instructional capacity, advancing equity and culturally responsive education and practices, supporting social emotional learning while maintaining a laser focus on student outcomes. These four goals shape and guide our ongoing work and strategic decisions. Good evening everyone. As

063you'll see on this slide, we continue to center building the instructional capacity of all staff. During our district administrator meetings this year, we use a portion of this time for professional development grounded in a problem of practice protocol in which administrators collaboratively analyzed and began work around addressing challenging issues that we face in finding solutions and resolutions. In this work, our equity professional development with administrators also was grounded in our unbound ed leadership institute learning of finding justice in the details of teaching and learning which I know we've talked about um at previous presentations. We also continued our working partnership with NYU. We engaged in our instructional leadership model through the year, conducting learning walks in elementary buildings, and engaging in peer administrator walkthroughs and visits through K12, helping to establish a shared understanding of

064highquality instruction, fostering consistency across all classrooms. Also, as stated in the last bullet, we have been and will continue our week-long new teacher orientation at the start of the year as a start to our commitment to supporting the growth of all of our staff. Next slide, please. Next, you know that equity continues to be at the heart of all of the work that we do here. All buildings have student and building equity leadership teams. Our building teams are either standalone committees or they are integrated into our building student leadership teams. District and building administrators in conjunction with building leaders examine equity issues within their areas of responsibility this year, delivered professional development around building identified focuses or did book studies with their teams to build staff capacity around this work. This year we also held

065an equity summit for building teams to share the equity work they had been implementing this year. We spoke about that at a previous presentation as well. The process allowed for best practices and common challenges to be shared and problem solved across staff of all buildings. Last year we reinstitated reinstated our partnership with um NYU Steinhart around this work. They trained a new cohort of leaders this year and we continued work with our administrators. We will continue this effort next year as well. Cabinet has also been involved in a resource allocation review with the state this year that will continue. It involved a collaborative inquirybased approach to examine how resources like funding, personnel, and materials are allocated and whether they are effectively supporting our student outcomes. The goal is to identify and address inequities and resource

066distribution particularly in schools identified for comprehensive or targeted support. Um the board you also haven't been involved in this work with us. Through this process we are developing a leadership profile to develop and support administrators in this um most important work. Next slide. Our social emotional learning continued to be a focus this year at all levels. Ruler is an evidence-based classroombased program that systemically promotes students social and emotional competence. We continue this this year and this summer we will continue to review our scope and sequence for better lesson integration in classrooms. We've done work in our elementary ELA pacing maps to make text connect connections between our ruler lesson themes and our units. PBIS positive behavior interventions and support integration is also work that we did last year and our teams will continue to work

067through this summer. Staff had various opportunities to learn more about and utilize the data of our behavior screener. Our student risk screening scale internalizing and external externalizing um behavior screener. Student support teams received consistent training and support in looking at the student data and three times a year proactively address student classroom and building needs that came out through the screener. In addition to this embedded professional development, this screen screener data has been integrated into our tier one plans to identify strate strategies that support student needs. Next slide, please. As you all know, we continue to be focused on our student um improving student outcomes. MTSS, our multi-tered system of supports, is a comprehensive framework that provides instruction and support for all students, uses data to drive decision-making in and implements interventions based on student needs.

068It takes a whole child approach. We continue to develop our tier one plans and monitor them regularly to make needed instructional adjustments based on student data. We're committed to systemically better integrating both academics and behavior responses to what this data shows. This year, we did have three MTSS PLC's on the elementary level to work on aligning our processes better across buildings. This work was supported by our district MTSS coaches who not only support the district level work but rotate within buildings in common planning times to participate in the process in real time and provide feedback and recommendations as we do this work. We continue to revise and refine our approaches based on current researchbased strategies. We had a number of staff engage and complete the new Paul's science of reading micro credential this year. That

069is work that will continue into next year. Common planning time is structured across our system to review and respond to various assessment data. Our middle school and high school's common planning time remains based in the action research cycle and building schedules are also built in a way that provides opportunity to respond to the various needs of students including our enrichment acceleration and intervention block on the elementary level. Next slide, please. So, next you'll see captured is our classroom visit and walkthrough data on the elementary level. This continued to be in to be instrumental to understanding the strengths and needs within our buildings as well as assisting in the continued growth of our instructional practice as a division. This year we leaned more into our class visits doing work around our alignment of instructional look fors

070to identify those trends. We are still working towards getting better at this but are committed to being in classrooms consistently providing feedback and engaging in consistent conversations around how to improve instruction for students. This year we completed 1568 class visits as compared to 115 in May of 2024. Now class visits are shorter in nature. We're only in the rooms for about 3 to 5 minutes and this is really to identify trends across the building. Um they also help in identifying the promise promising practices as well as gaps that help inform our midcourse corrections. Now, while you'll see the number of walkthroughs on the screen are less than they were the previous year, these are longer visits um that are very focused on specific feedback and growing teacher practice. Um based on our classroom, our class

071visit and walkthrough data, we did see consistent grade level aligned instruction across all elementary building and classrooms. Um, we remain steadfast in centering our instructional work in the Gleam Unbound Ed framework, which is grade level, engaging, affirming, and meaningful instruction. Our approved digital platforms were consistently being used across all classrooms, though we do continue to monitor for overusage in some spaces. Um, we've done a lot of professional development around our tier one engagement strategies across content areas. That's allowed for more opportunities for student voice, dialogue, collaboration, productive struggle, and student engagement. And while we are seeing more opportunities for student voice across all buildings and classrooms, there still remains a need to release learning to students more across classroom spaces. Next slide, please. Good evening everyone. Shifting to secondary. Um so our instructional leadership model

072is a K12 model. Um there are certain nuances that are different uh across the elementary and secondary level. Um but how we define a classroom visit, how we define a walkthrough, how we define a cycle of inquiry um is sort of a really wellestablished practice that we've been um engaging in for multiple years. Uh this year we completed 995 classroom visits and 211 walkthroughs. At the secondary level, much like elementary, classroom visits are typically 5 to 10 minutes. They serve really three goals explicitly. Um one is to have administrator visibility. um in classrooms with teachers, with students, um building those relationships and showing support. Um and while uh in the room, the goal is always to interact with some of the students while we're there. Um we also are uh focused on in the classroom

073visit, lifting and celebrating uh teacher strengths and building upon them. We have sort of a we always leave a a post-it note before we leave the classroom and it's formulaic and approach to say you know that what identify a teacher asset and to draw that connection which comes from uh Fischer and Frey research around when you did this thing like this was the impact it had on students when you um solicited students to answer questions um without relying on volunteers you amplified the voices of those um who may not be raising their hands etc etc um and so the third really um focus much like at elementary of classroom visits to identify trends um to inform our professional development. Much like at elementary, walkthroughs are are a little longer. They're 10 to 20 minute visits.

074Um and their purpose is really to engage very specifically um in deeper discourse about practice and engage in two-way feedback. Um research is really clear that it is the learner to teacher feedback that has the most impact. Um and so in this case, if it's an administrator and a teacher talking um about practice, what the teacher offers to the leader to inform how they best support the teacher um is really powerful. Um and so while again both much like elementary you see lower numbers um in some of the cases, one thing I really want to emphasize is that years ago when we first really implemented this instructional leadership model, the goal was really to create presence, right? And to get teachers and administrators in classroom or get administrators in classroom with teachers and really having

075a strong sense of of curriculum and instruction. Um, and so that emphasis on quantity can at times affect quality because someone's just trying I want to be on the leaderboard, right? Like they all can see who's been in what classroom and etc. And so we really wanted to sort of deemphasize some of the quantity in favor of engaging in more um robust conversations with with teachers. Um what's also embedded at the secondary level within the concept of walkthroughs and the 211 we completed is this notion of a cycle of inquiry where one teacher is experiencing a a cycle of walkthroughs where um the discourse is is amplified a little bit and there's um some discussion around setting goals, right? And what is that one thing we're working on and one thing we're looking for? That's

076sort of the highest level of support um that we offer to teachers, which could be a probationary teacher. It could be somebody who's who's been teaching a long time is just interested in working on a particular goal. Um, and there's opportunity for discourse, you know, within. And sometimes those cycles uh are two to three walkthroughs and they wrap up and sometimes they go on longer than that. Um, much like elementary, we identified particular trends. Uh, the strengths we identified are certainly evidence of social social emotional learning through ruler. Um, it's evident in many classes, most classes. Uh we find very consistently that the overwhelming majority of students in most classes are behaviorally engaged. Um particularly in classrooms with strong routines that 98% is an accurate reflection of of us looking to our instructional framework and

077and sort of um rating that in alignment with particular success criteria that's grounded in the ruler principles. Um and then um you know positive caring relationships are always observable in many classrooms. Uh our instructional focus for the past several years has been cognitive engagement and student voice. And you'll note the the degree to which we identified proficiency so to speak in alignment with our success criteria which is aligned to our instructional framework. And we know that that's work that we have to continue to do um and will continue to work on. Um but we've seen a lot of growth um in those two particular areas over the last several years. Next slide, please. So the timing of this presentation was a little tough for for us because this is normally a presentation done in April

078that um is really meant to be a look backward. As we mentioned earlier, this is the start of our new year. So we are well planned, you know, like to focused on on this coming school year. So this shifted our focus a little bit. Um and so we're really eager to share with you some of the, you know, preliminary um goals we have. We have a presentation later this summer um on our DIP and our SAP. So, more to come on that, but um we're really excited about some of the the work we've done in preparation for the DIP and the SAP implementation. Um equity is always our guiding principle. Uh we've done work in equity in a variety of ways. uh the work we've talked about in relationship with NYU and Steinhart and our

079um our uh cohort model and our leadership has really been a lot of hearts and minds work, right? Um because that's an important part of being culturally responsive is is shifting mindsets and and um having folks understand uh the lived experience of our you know the students in our system, our employees in our system um etc. But that it doesn't just stop with the hearts and minds work. Um because there's the notion of educational equity that every student has a right to grade level learning. Um and and that is something that comes out of our work with Unbound Ed and our connection to Gleam instruction. And then most recently we've really been diving into um resource equity and the notion that every student needs equitable resources to access grade level learning. Um, and that I

080think is is shaping a lot of our work this year and our focus this year. Next slide, please. And when I say this year, I mean the year that just started like now. Uh, the other thing we've spent a lot of time talking about in our like instructional division with our SEP teams with our uh instructional supervisors is really thinking about the collective student experience. We are such a large and bureaucratic at times organization that everybody has their you know responsibility and what that can do sometimes is is really get folks working you know in their silo right in their tunnel vision in their sort of role and responsibility and it's important for us to pull back and think about the collective student experience. Um, we set a goal, I think it was at the

081beginning of the school year two years ago, to really be thinking about every student reading and writing and computing on grade level, um, and every student graduating ready for what's next. So, that will continue to be a thread of our, um, our goal and to really think about the collective student experience. We have a real opportunity, as you know, board me board member Savage mentioned earlier, one of this major transitions will be New York inspires and portrait of a graduate. Um, there's a webinar coming up in two weeks. We're excited to see what updates we have. Um, but the focus of the work thus far has really been on integration, right? Like the collective experience of students that is not necessarily just content knowledge, but thinking about content area knowledge and skills, college and career

082readiness, so social emotional learning, culturally responsive and sustaining education, career and technical education, and experiential and work-based learning. and how all of those things like are intertwined and work together um to define the the collective student experience and ensure that our students are leaving us graduating ready for what's what's next, whatever that might be. Um and so and that whatever it is should be driven by choice, right? Our students should have choices when they they leave us um based on their experience here. And then lastly, we know that we need to do some work focusing on key transitions, our preK to our K, our 5 to six, and our 8 to9 uh as really critical pivotal points in in our children's um educational journey with us. Um next slide, please. So, our set priorities, uh

083the template shifted a little bit again. Um but we're always ready for that work, right? because the the goal is really the goal doesn't change. What strategies are we employing to seek improvement to positively impact student outcomes and so um the commitment is no longer it is now you know strategies so which is great. Um and so we did a lot of work with our teams to think about the strategies that are most impactful based on what our data tells us in terms of achievement based on our survey uh outcomes of our stakeholders. We annually survey all of you know our families um our students and our staff and we then conduct focus groups um within particularly our identified schools. That's part of the the requirement. And so um we really have you know we're

084continuing to refine our work in this regard. Uh we'll be focusing on our instructional framework uh our tier one best practices which are kind of an arm of the instructional framework. Uh our MTSSI as a key strategy. uh the state added the I which is not surprising because we used to have like RTI and we had RTI A and RTI B and then there was the pressure push you know like need to really look at thing like look at children holistically right look at the whole child but then we had MTSS A and MTSS B and you know we were still struggling to like make that connection that it's all integrated and connected, right? If students are maybe not experiencing academic success, we're likely to, you know, maybe see more behaviors. We're likely to see

085a decrease in attendance, right? Um and so how are we ensuring that we're not um that we're not analyzing things like the chicken before the egg, so to speak. Um and so MTSSI I stands for integrated and that is really our focus this year is how to integrate the work we do on the social emotional side of the house with the work we do on the academic side of the house. Um and then where applicable uh there's a non-instructional strategy in our SAPs for those schools that are identified as community schools. Our monitoring and support system uh is not changing much except to deepen our support. Um we added uh two years ago at the secondary level we added district liaison to help build coherence and function as sort of a thinking partner in the

086work. Um and we added those uh that dimension to our elementary steps this year. Um and we're really excited to to continue to build cohesion around that work which leads us to our DIP. Um the DIP has a new template. This is a drastically different template. We had the choice of using the old template or the new template. This one is a systems DIP which really seemed to be in alignment with the work um we were already doing with our resource allocation review um and really thinking about um you know we had again as you all know the unique opportunity that Elizabeth and I kind of did a K12 thing this year and it really we learned a lot about where we don't have great alignment or you know we had some work to do

087with alignment. So the focus of the DIP will really be around the three strategies we already mentioned and what the district's support is for that work. Um and then building cohesion. Uh as we discussed I think at the last board meeting um when we uh adopted uh approved the ABSTA contract the theme of that contract negotiation was really around collaboration which then builds cohesion. Um, so I think you'll hear us very intentionally this year using words very precisely around administrator versus leader because not all of our leaders are administrators and um, teacher leaders have always been a bit of a sleeping giant, right? Um, they have can be incredibly impactful. And then really thinking about where we have leaders across the system that, you know, in the spirit of grow your own that we can

088tap to leverage their talents. Um and so now we'll really be focused on some intentionality um around what collab what collaboration looks like um and what leadership looks like um as we implement our SEPs and our DIP. Uh we're going to be doing you know some focus on culture and climate. I think that collaboration is going to very organically and naturally strengthen our culture and climate. Um we're doing a lot of um looking at our professional learning and uh how the professional learning is designed very explicitly in alignment with the DIP and the SEPs. Uh we we're going to have two sort of new committees so to speak. One is a function of coming out of negotiations with ABSA and the other is coming out of the resource allocation work where we're really focused on

089teacher development and leader development and having the stakeholders at the table who um can sort of represent the larger unit and think about how we best support teachers and how we best support leaders in alignment with um what I would say is the success criteria associated with evaluation. uh both APR and MPPPR are now um steps. Uh and so that law has changed. 3020D is now 3020E and we have um we have a bit of time to adopt our system. But we are anxious to do that work and really think about um how we can marry the existing evaluation system that we have uh and the success criteria the MPPR rubric the APR rubric with how that success criteria aligns with our own instructional leadership model our own instructional framework so that we haven't built

090a separate system outside of evaluation so that we can think about what it what it means to be what does the leader profile look like in our district? what does a successful teacher look like in our district? What is the very clearly understood success criteria for that in alignment with our framework? Um so we'll be renegotiating both APR and MPPPR which those terms will go away um as the year progresses and we we reach um agreement um with those. Um and then lastly, you know, as we have mentioned several times, our resource allocation review uh is work we've done in partnership with our board and uh we are really excited to continue that work. I think in a couple weeks. Um and uh I I know we've lifted this before, but um Doc Lyn Wells

091has shared with us we are the only district in the grant um working with our board on this. So we are really grateful for that partnership and opportunity. And I think it speaks to our goal of cohesion and collaborative leadership. Um and with that um oh and we're focusing on two of the dimensions. were the school funding dimension as well as the dimension three which is school leadership quality and diversity I think last slide please questions for us Mr. Wolf gang. Um, I mean, great presentation. Uh, not really a question so much as just kind of a suggestion. Um, that, um, and I do this cuz I work for the state, too. But when we're using a lot of acronyms, maybe we could put kind of like a key at either the beginning or the

092end of the presentation, so people who aren't familiar can, um, you know, figure out what those are without having to go through the multiple layers. Um, like ruler, it took me like two, three searches to actually get that ruler because obviously rulers are a thing. Um, so just a suggestion, but otherwise great presentation. Thank you guys for your work. You know, at one point in time that used to be a quiz that board member candidates had to know. I remember that from my campaign. Mr. Alvi, I'm still learning some of the acronyms, so it's okay. Um, I on the acronym piece, I'm actually I'm less interested in the acronyms because I know that's your expertise. My interest or my, you know, my wish is to hear more things like getting every student to read at

093grade level. That is something that if that is one thing we can do, I want us to do it. If it's just literally one thing we can do, it would change lives. And um that is, you know, if all of this, you know, which is a great presentation, it's technical. If all this comes out to that, sign me up. I will be there. I will I will do whatever it takes. Um and of course all of these pieces, the social emotional learning piece, the ruler piece, PBIS, they're all, you know, steps in a ladder. Um, and I'm glad to see you guys starting to piece these um, strategies together, but that is I mean that is the one thing that I would love to see this year. Miss man, I'll start with great presentation. Um,

094but I also, you know, when I when I when when when you all shared the number of walkthroughs, I was really struck by that. Um and uh and I know they're only three to five minutes, but that's still um pretty powerful and a lot of walkthroughs, you know, and um and um and I I believe that our teaching staff feel quite supported when when that occurs. So, thank you for that. Um and you know, and I'm always struck by we we've been doing this for a couple of years now. Um the slide that starts with equity as a guiding principle, right? uh in a uh uh in in some circles equity has been known to be negative but it's really not and it raises all of our students and so I appreciate uh I appreciate

095that and that is all I have to share. Thank you. So putting together the questions that have already come with something I wanted to just sort of comment on. Um, I really appreciate always the depth of these presentations and one of the things that it always gives us is like, oh my gosh, how are they doing all these things all at the same time? There's just so much happening all the time and it's always very very impressive. But it is um it is challenging I think to follow the thread, right? It's like and I there we used to talk a lot about theory of action, right? And there's a really clear theory of action built in here, right? which is like we believe that if we have strong instructional capacity in each building that we

096have a strong emphasis on equity in CRA that we focus on social and emotional learning and that we focus on student outcomes the following things will happen children will begin to read it uh third grade but you know the following things will happen and I do feel like it's it's hard for you guys because you're so into in it you know the why the why is self-evident right but it is helpful I think to to restate that Why? Um, and the other thing I I was thinking about is um the way things are oriented in time, I remember this from my very first year on the board is is nutty um because of the state's accountability timeline doesn't uh work with the budget timeline, doesn't work with the school planning timeline. So it's just like

097upside down and backwards because clearly if you were planning really you would complete the DIP before you complete the budget for the following year because the budget should support the goals rather than completing the budget and then creating the DIP. So it doesn't really make any like sense from a planning perspective. And so part of what I feel like we need to do is restate that theory of action because it really informs all of those things and it's underlying the MPPPR, the APR, the DIP, the SEP. That's what's causing all of those things to happen. And I do think we have a strong theory of action. I just don't think we can convey it as clearly as we could. and not for bad reasons, just because again, people who are really embedded in the work

098know that that's what they're doing. Um, and so I I know I've mentioned this as superintendent that I feel like our community would really benefit too, not just the board, from understanding what we're doing and why we're doing it at a super um, understandable level. Miss Wilson and I used to talk about having a very clear message map for the district to help convey that kind of what is why are we doing all this? So that was really my comment. It's not really a question except for to say thank you for trying to make all these things that are really upside down and backwards because of the way the state timeline works actually work to the benefit of our children. But you know it does always we know what our numbers are. We know, right?

099We know that you know that there's plenty of room for improvement. Um, actually, there was one other thing I was going to say. I'm sorry I'm taking too much time probably, but another thing I would love to which is built into equity, but I would like us to keep focusing on. I've seen some numbers that are not, as far as I know, public yet about how well our students did on the AP World um exam, which was, as far as I can tell, exceptional um well beyond what the state and um country levels are doing. But then I've also seen some numbers about how we didn't do so great on the regent exam for um one of the history exams. So that always that's the equity question, right? like this is Alban's reputation as having

100two schools, right? And are we able to serve all of our students and what can we change so that we can um and so anyway that's me being all reflective because it's the organizing meeting. Feel free to comment or just pass on by whatever you want to do. I would like to say we actually just today and many days talk about the why and how sometimes one of our reflective moments as leaders as administrators um and leaders is to think about how we communicate the why. Um because and you can feel it sometimes when you folks are perhaps fatigued or overwhelmed and they you know just tell me what you want us to do. And when you hear that that is the trigger that they've lost sight of the why because we've lost sight of

101how we're communicating the why. And so we have spent a lot of time talking about that. I just um as by way of sending an email. Yep. So I had I sent out our professional development calendar uh to the the administrative team and uh there are several as a function of negotiations changes and I wrote what the change was and then I wrote why in capital letters and explained sort of through the lens of interestbased bargaining how we landed there. Um and I actually got you know several folks wrote me back today. It was great with some feedback around like thanks for just saying why that is because some of the changes people are going to like well why that doesn't make any sense why are we doing that and so it it is something

102we do think about and talk about a lot but I to your point around we're doing so much when we move too fast that's when we fall down from our why so that's really great feedback thank you so much missy uh thank you I really appreciated I really appreciated your presentation and your focus on both your goals and the focus on some some quantitative details. Um, one of my questions was to kind of better understand the context of the numbers for the classroom visits and the walkthroughs. Maybe it would be helpful to understand how many classroom visits to how many teachers and how many walkthroughs to how many teachers. I assumed based on the numbers that every teacher gets a classroom visit every every year. Am I correct in that assumption? I can't speak to

103elementary. I'll leave that to Jasmine. At secondary, every teacher uh is visited in the first five weeks. So, everyone gets one in the first five weeks. And then from there, you know, it it could range and depend. Um and I would say the walkthroughs um tend to be focused on where our probationary teachers are teachers who may need a little bit more support. Um, but we try to endeavor to ensure that we don't have teachers who are like rocking and rolling and doing awesome things like that they never see us after the first five weeks because that's not everybody deserves to see their their administrators and support and um and just get the attabo that they deserve. The walkthroughs are the same as a secondary um classroom visits on the elementary level. The goal is

104that every teacher has a visit at least every month um by someone. Doesn't necessarily have to be the building administrator um but it should be some ad administrator. My second question about numbers, it's a quick one is you mentioned that some of the big goals are uh demonstrating evidence of cognitive engagement and fostering student voice and you mentioned that those are growing. Is this the first year that we've measured those numbers in that? And if not, is there a way to show a two or threeyear uh cycle to show that, you know, if it's student voice is only at 52% now, but it's up from 25% 3 years ago. I think that's important for us to know and something that we can celebrate. Thanks. I can't speak to the exact numbers, but it absolutely has

105gone up. Um, and I think our understanding of what to look for relative to cognitive engagement and student voice has deepened. How we look for studentto student discourse, right? What opportunities do students have to talk with each other to work with each other? Um, the cognitive engagement piece really is grounded in our conversations with students and understanding, you know, what are you learning today? Why, you know, what so what are the content and skills? Why are you, you know, why are you learning about this? What's the lesson purpose? and how will you know my words that you learn the thing you were supposed to learn which is them understanding the success criteria associated with the proficiency. Um and so we've deepened our understanding of what to look for and how to look for it as

106well as seeing which informs our professional development and getting better at uh working through those things with folks and also um just seeing that shift to more studentled instruction. So may but also possibly harder to compare apples to apples from 2022 to 2025 or 2026, right? Because in 2025, you're saying your administrators are better able to detect it. Okay. Thanks. I think one of the things that we didn't show you on on this presentation that you saw last year was you saw you saw the dashboards that each one of the buildings have. those dashboards we can go back and we and we can actually see from year to year to year where they are percentage-wise in in all those different areas and that's what that's what very helpful for our building leaders and for our

107BLTs for their teams to be able to look at that data uh in a snapshot and be able to see it but we just felt like it you've seen it before so we left it out this year on the elementary level we would not be able to go back that way we did a lot of work um this year was with Miss Miss Wolf on the um technology side so that we can get to a place to capture it. We talked last year about that. Um so we have worked with the dashboard. We collected a little bit differently on the elementary side around our look fors but it is still not collected in the way that it is collected at the secondary level. That didn't necessarily work for us. Um but we're still working through

108how to better collect that. Um, so we have some quantitative data around our our trends in the way that secondary does. Okay, Miss Wilson, good evening and thank you all for your presentation. Um, I'm trying to ask my question so that I'm just trying to make sure it's distinctly different from an and I did also um earlier someone mentioned that equity can be unpopular and I find that that may be true but often I find that equity is sometimes weaponized against people. Um, and often in a way what I think they mean is equality. And I I find that to be a great opener to actually talk about equity with people. So that was just sort of a tail end to something somebody mentioned, but equity as a guiding principle with as far as resource

109equity. I love this slide. It's the epitome of less is more. I feel like when it's sort of laying out, yes, we have an overall mandate for everyone to have a free public education. And I think breaking it down to resource equity in my work, we often talk about making the case and I feel that that gives us that opportunity to make the case at all levels with our community, with legislators. So um just being very complimentary about that, but also using that lens, have you found that to be true also in this case either as far as making the case or it being um difficult or any barriers to doing that? I think when we started our journey something um with our work with NYU and Steinhart um and the initial training and and

110to the you know to this day continues to be um some of the the hearts and minds work right with our cohort because we we have to we have to ensure that folks have the mindset that is grounded in all of our students can and will achieve and it is in fact our responsibility to make sure that that happens and when it doesn't it is a reflection not necessarily on them but on us um and so but I I remember spending some time with Dr. Wilson Turner around um our cohort model and um our facilitation of our cohort model and our leadership training and uh a lot that came a lot of the feedback was really strong but it also was about well okay so what do I do right how sort of how do

111you actualize it how do you action that and I think that that that's where we landed with unbound ed and standards institute right and really thinking about what what does it look like in the classroom room. Um, and so that's really, you know, I think that work, uh, you know, started back in, I don't know, 2018, 19ish around building our capacity with standards institute. We definitely have a critical mass of folks who really understand the work of Unbound Ed um, and have been attended and and understand that as Mrs. Brown quoted earlier, which is a Lacy Robinson quote, justice is found in the details of teaching and learning. Um, and so it's about um the the standard, unpacking the standard, understanding text complex, both text complexity and task complexity. Um, what we're asking students to

112know and be able to do uh relative to that complexity, how we know that they've done it successfully and proficiently. And so that work is grounded in our framework, our you know researchbased strategies, how we differentiate, how we engage students, etc. How we question students, um the rigor associated with our questioning, how we pace for rigor. Um all of that is really deeply embedded in our curriculum maps and our curricular resources. And this resource equity is that next step as a district, right? really thinking about um how we allocate our resources, what it looks like um in our you know, we're focused through our resource equity work on the elementary level, but throughout the system around who gets what and why. Um and and what sort of baseline formulaic approach can we take to that

113in a way that um you know demonstrates how our funding supports students equitably. Um And I think that's an area that we're we're working with Lyn Wells on and Ashley will be meeting with her on Monday to really kind of delve into that a little bit more and really be able to when we meet with you again um you'll see kind of the idea that we've come up with for resource uh allocations. Great presentation and great questions. um you know all the way from Austin's question on the abbreviations acronyms to this thing about resource equity and you sort of set the stage for what I wanted to ask is if you know we talked about the why and you and you throw the term resource allocation review a lot of times in your presentation can

114you tell us how for the benefit of the general audience uh the general public as to the work that we've been doing why we we s we sort of know why we're doing How is it going to be implemented? just a cliffnotes version of you know in the classroom versus the building versus the uh elementary or secondary division you know different levels there are different ways uh perspectives at it right if you could just summarize that so I think that's what we're still exploring um I don't think As I understand it, I came in, this process started in the spring of 24 and I joined the cabinet in October of 24 and came in. So I missed like the foundational part of the work sort of the which was a lot of the why, right?

115A lot of the research, etc. Um, but I also was able to come in sort of and make sure I understood what was going on because I I I wasn't a part of the work. Um and but my understanding is in order to even apply for the grant, we had to conduct sort of a needs assessment of sorts. Um right and then we because we did that, we were eligible to apply, we received the grant and now that we have this and can start to plan about what it actually looks like and how um we're going to do it. We've talked about a lot of things. We've talked about funding formulas. We've talked about um enrollment, right? um talked about our lottery process. Um trying to think I I think we're still on the journey.

116Yeah. Um of figuring out exactly what this looks like um and how it becomes embedded in our not just budget process but the way we do business um in Albany for the for the sake of resource equity for our students across all of our buildings. Um and I think one thing we've through the like leadership development which is a part of the work um the dimension three we've talked about um our hiring practices um our recruitment and retention and our support and development of both our leaders and teachers but specifically dimension three is leaders. um how do we become an attract you know an attractive place to work um an exciting place to work and and so that we retain those folks and we um have the diversity in our leadership and our teaching staff

117that reflects um our our community. Um we've also talked uh through the the leadership perspective of where we kind of have married the resource allocation work with our um leadership institute through unbound ed is thinking about the finite resources because the tension with equity right is if everybody gets what their needs there's finite resources right and we've talked a lot about the resources of people money time and power um and that was the focus of our work when we did the leadership institute and we've turned turnkeyed that throughout the course of this year. Miss Brown mentioned that at the beginning and we're really poised to engage in that problem of practice work with our leaders. Um and hopefully we'll have their feedback to offer us of how we can best support them um through the

118lens of how we budget in what I imagine will be I don't know a lot about budgeting. I'm learning as I go. Um but so I don't have a lot to compare it to, but we'll from what I understand will be, you know, a different way of of really looking how we budget. Um and I'm eager to learn about it. Great. You know, and when I Not sure if I answered your question. No, you did. You did. um when we were when I was in policy committee um you know we we had the equity policy and then since then we've been every policy when we do a review we are using that equity policy you know the equity lens to look at these things to make sure that all our actions you know whether in

119in terms of spending hiring whatever it may be that it is equitable distribution right and and so it's not necessarily a bad word though you know people people who don't understand what it means get turned off by it. But the more they understand it and they realize why it is is actually benefits everybody everybody you know you you you raise the collective whole uh so um I I'm very hopeful and I'm I'm very appreciative of the work you guys are doing with the board. uh we are walking on this journey together and learning new things as we go and at some point in time and I would like when when we are more closer to completion it's it's a long I don't think it will ever be done but the closer we are towards at

120least getting a good understanding of what is it that we need to change the way our practices are and u is do we do a a report out to so that people who are not in that room get to see what is the work that we've been doing and how is that work actually tied to the actions we're taking in this room um and and in our buildings. Uh so I think people we communication is a key to success to get people on board. I mean when people don't understand there's always that confusion and that's where you have the divide but the more people who uh more we can get to other people to understand in whatever terms they may need to understand why we're doing it how we're doing it and and does and

121of course there's always the public comment period where people can give us feedback and there are other methods to do it too um I I think we'll get more of our community on board and and we can we, you know, move that needle the way we want it to move. It's been moving, not as fast as we wanted to, right? Uh, so thank you all for everything you do. Great presentation. All right. Board committee reports. I'm not expecting any. Government Relations Committee. Thanks you for approving the New York State Schools Association's resolutions without as much notice as we normally would like to give you. Um so we appreciate that. U Mr. Leco will be submitting those to the New York State Schools Association and Dr. Chur will see them pop up um in his role

122on the resolutions committee and then we will have more information for you. And we have new assignments for people on committees and stuff. So I'll I'll forward that. We'll have a board action at future meeting to to change the distribution. Um any other business? Oh, Miss Kie, sorry. Um policy committee report which is uh I apologize because due to m miss mised communication um I did not realize that we were supposed to have those additional policies on tonight's agenda, but they will be on the agenda for the 24th and we will be meeting on next Wednesday at 5:30. Um, please stay tuned as to location, whether it will be here or the beautiful, spacious, and well-lit Albony High School library, which has been a fantastic location. And we are looking we are looking forward uh

123to a new member potentially. Um, so thank you. Any other business, Mr. Almin? Uh, there will be a facilities committee meeting on Monday the 14th. It's usually Tuesday, but Monday is what worked for everyone this week. So, just letting everyone know. Thank you. All right. And we have an audit committee meeting in I think it's is it after the summer? September. Yeah, it's September. Okay. So, Okay. All right. May I have a motion to adjourn? Mr. This man all in favor. Why? All those hands went right up.