001Tex are you ready good okay let's stand for the pledge I pledge allegiance to the flag the United States and to the Republic for which it stands one nation under God indivisible with liberty and justice for all okay good evening board president to advise members of the audience that they may address the board regarding agenda items after the superintendent's report one of those members whose names and addresses are listed on the sign-in sheet available prior to the start of the meeting will be recognized during the business the chairpersonal limit discussions of any item by the public to three minutes in order for the board to expeditiously conduct its business Mr Dolan new Mike's old glasses um welcome everyone uh tonight we have a very special presentation during the first part of my report and I
002think it's a a good way to start moving forward again tonight we've asked um on all levels our esteem and Robotics students and their teachers their guides to make a presentation in addition to a robotics team that is not of officially affiliated with the school district but is an outgrowth of what we do in school and the thing you know people here Robotics and they think what you see there the um the actual robots but really what Steam and Robotics does is it's creating the modern classroom where students work in groups collectively to to have you know take a dream make a plan build it Market it and put it in place in short with the Steam and Robotics programs do is show students who are going to be working there hold your breath here
003folks these students are going to be working in the year 20 60 20 70 20 80. a few of our students will probably be working in the year 20 uh two thousand two hundred it is a look into the future and I have said this over and over again that I truly believe that the students today are going to take our world and make it a little bit better that our generation was able to do and so I'm going to turn it over who's up first I didn't get them to order a March you don't okay I'm going to turn it over to Miss Wilson to start the program but you're going to see students from the elementary middle and high school ladies and gentlemen gentlemen sit back and enjoy the show calendar apologize okay
004send this detention back Mr Lackman [Music] you guys look like students back there Days Inn so why is it important team education prepares students for the future at a young age following secondary an engineer ing other countries and Technical technicians through exposure to staff to give an opportunity to have the skills to compete on the national importantly what is one from our program team education is a student who have an integrative approach ES furthermore foreign this is the sequence of events this is the blueprints that we use in the classroom as we give challenges to our students we start asking what is the problem what are we doing we start getting the students going what are we going to do today they start imagining how can we make this what do we do at this
005point there's a lot of conversation going on in the room it's great to hear the language that's taking place we plan students sit and they think out what am I going to do how am I going to do this and they work with their teammates to do this they start illustrating designing then they go this is the fun part creating Hands-On at times they need to go back and we plan because things don't always work the way you plan them they make things they break mistakes happen now how do I fix it they may have to go back to their teammates and go uh-oh now what we improve this is sometimes we call this in my room a Band-Aid how can I improve it how can I fix it again talking to your teammates whether
006I do I need some more of this I need this at the end we take a minute and we all sit down at the tables and go hey what worked what didn't work what did you like about this what could we do better going forward and that's the blueprint that we use for all our projects now I'm going to hand it over to the students that are really going to show you some of the fun stuff I'm going to start with Aiden who is from the steam Club using the engineering design process to create a recipe for glip we ran three trials to see which recipe was the most affected as we answered various questions we learned about solutes solvents and solutions as we work to the problem solve and communicate to complete our challenge
007we also completed the Skittles challenge as we experienced the differences between physical and chemical change I'm very excited to continue this year in Steam I love steam so much and I can I like steam because I can communicate with my friends I can work on my friendship and teamwork [Applause] we explore the periodic table protons neutrons and electrons while using our math skills and Engineering designs to create junk atoms [Applause] steam Club in Steam club we just completed making our bobble heads we are now working in teams to design launchers smart houses and coding of robots to name a few challenges in this club we learned teamwork and Engineering skills we have done so many very fun experiments and will continue to do more earthquake presented Bridges together we learned about the causes of earthquakes
008the types of bridges and the world's first earthquake resistant Bridge we had to engineer and design a bridge that was 10 centimeters long and could hold 500 grams of weight as ever as Engineers we had to make sure it was sturdy stable and flexible to withstand a simulated earthquake that could hold the weight for 10 seconds thank you during this challenge we worked in teams of four one person was the artist another was the researcher and two designers we had to choose a type of volcano research five facts about it it researched five facts about it it and enter engineer designs it then we had to test which materials would make our volcano erupt the best so yeah throughout our years in Steam we had a lot of exposure to Robotics and coding here are
009three examples of our students have that our students have built and coded foreign [Applause] [Music] middle school high school together okay sorry about that that's Mr kenson his Three Sons hi everybody how you doing my name is Mr Connell I'm a High School Technology teacher and for the past six years I've been running the high school robotics program we're going to do a little presentation today talking about where our program is currently at some of the different features I have a student here that's going to talk about his his experience and then cancer is going to piggyback off of the presentation so why robotics well robotics helps students link together science technology engineering art and Mathematics steam you heard that word a lot tonight we're designing creating constructing and programming robots that allows students to
010realize their aptitude and curiosity in future job markets we no longer live in a world where robotics is science fiction it's becoming part of our everyday life and people like James could end up in a career in robotics or Engineering in the future students make discoveries and connections to subject areas such as megatronics engineering artificial intelligence and competition robot design we'll talk about the competition robotics team in just a minute um these slice of Robotics program utilizes What's called the Vex robotics design system there is a video link I want to have you guys check it out real quick does this work yeah click on the link over there okay click on that link hi everyone Tyler here with Vex V5 the robotics platform designed for stem students to help them develop crucial problem solving
011and Engineering skills that'll prepare them for the real world Vex V5 is the highest level of our pre-k through college Continuum focusing on classroom and competition solutions that provide a low barrier of Entry as well as high enough ceilings to allow even the most experienced students students [Music] Chromebooks and tablets here students are able to easily create code sequences using drag and drop blocks python or C plus programming language the Vex code app includes instructional resources written by Educators and inform both teachers and students will grasp with ease V5 also has a more advanced coding tool called vexcode Pro that mimics the interface and tools found in Industry standard development environments this allows students full control over the V5 platform while programming in c plus all while gaining industry applicable experience after your students have
012created their robot you can take their learning experience to the next level by incorporating Vex V5 stem Labs these are free activities and lessons designed to make stem education fun and meaningful to your students by challenging them to complete a task using what they've learned the best part is that these supplemental lessons are designed to work alongside your existing curriculum so your students will never miss a beat if your students are looking to take their robotic skills even further the V5 competition super kit is perfect for them to supercharge their robot to compete in the Vex robotics competition held every year by the rec Foundation in it teams from all over the world machine a robot that can Excel Within A Game's rules and regulations to score as many points as possible these competitions ignite
013students competitive Spirit while also exposing them to valuable soft skills like communication collaboration and time management in a fun and authentic way for educators Vex also offers a free online professional development course the program that we use the Vex robotics design system we've been using that for six years every the advantages of every year there's a different competition that's put out by Vex so the students design and create competition robots to play that new game and that's currently where we're at this year with robotics too I skip to the next slide um we can skip this one too all right so our current courses and programs uh currently in the high school we have robotics one so if you're a student in ninth through 12th grade you can join robotics one uh there's a robotics
014two which is more advanced level robot hello uh the prerequisite would be robotics one so if you take robotics one at any age level you can then take robotics too the core technology program is actually doing robotics this year too with the vexco robotics we have a robotics Club an after school club and then in addition to all of that we have the robotics competition team so if you're involved in robotics at any level you can be a part of the club the competition team and you could travel outside of East Islip and compete with us with our competition robot this is just a couple of quick videos and pictures from some of the things we've been doing in class um right now we didn't bring the robots over tonight because they're still in development
015but this is just a quick video of one of the ones that we're working on if you expand upon that and make it nice and big so this year's game involves this almost like this disc golf type aspect here so we're designing and creating robots that can gather those discs up off the ground and shoot them into these goals there's points associated with everything and it's a big comprehensive game that's the annual game this is from my intro class so these guys are working with smaller robots designing and creating them so they can learn a simpler game at this introductory level we have a camera in the ceiling now which is kind of neat go to the next one this is from left bottom so you can see the game was a little bit different
016last year instead of disc golf there was these mobile goals these ramps so every year the game that's played within this game field is different and the students have new challenges that all right let's get to that one and then the last one this is just a little promo video that one of Mr lochner's students created for us [Music] all right so that that's this year's game those are the advanced robotic students working on their different robot designs and it's going to be you know a long time before we compete at our first competitions in January so we have a lot of time to develop the robots uh let's skip to the next one okay I'm gonna hand it over to Mr Ken she's going to talk about the Middle School robotics program everybody's Mr
017kench in my 25th glorious year here in the East Islip school district and good news I just keep getting better every year so you can see here go ahead and start that video for us Mr lachner we're very very fortunate here in East Islip to be able to provide every one of our eighth graders with a minimum of one quarter one full marking period of Robotics I'm in a couple different technology education associations and so far what I've seen is a maximum of about two or three weeks in the robotics lab for each of those other schools that I've been in talks with their floored when I tell them I have them for a quarter we're in there for 10 full weeks doing our thing with the robots so that's like a really great thing
018that we have here I don't think people understand that so it makes for a great feeder program for us to send them up to Mr Connell with our VEX IQ system here where it's I'm going to say it's like Legos on steroids it's it's there's no tools needed everything's like snap it together and unsnap which is good because when you make a mistake and in the beginning you make a lot of mistakes it's easy to take them apart and then fix it when they get up to Mr Connell now they're doing nuts and bolts and screws and you make a mistake and now you got a couple days of work behind you have to to fix it so what we just saw there was the basic bot that is the start of what you see
019here which is the clawbot so the basic bot we play this little soccer game one on one they see who can score the most goals in a three minute period and then we move up to where we add this arm and the claw that you can see up here where now they have to actually move these cubes around and put them in different spots and move them around and then we have after this one you're going to see what's called the fling bot where we only make that in robotics Club because it's pretty involved it takes a long time these kids are in there every day after school putting the fling bot together and as you can tell once this video rolls here it's it's a million moving Parts as we look at this we're
020like wow okay that's great you guys make toys and you play with toys this is the carrot at the end right before we get to all the fun stuff right we got to learn about gear ratios and torque and figure out how uh you know wheels and pulleys and all those simple machines work and then as we move on from there then it's like all right now let's put a couple of Wheels together with an axle and I'll put a motor on now let's change the gears is it faster is it slower so as we progress on they're hopefully going to keep this stuff locked up here so when they get up to the high school they're like oh yeah I remember that and this doesn't have enough torque we got to change the gears
021and again it's we're just trying to feed that high school program and make them as you know give them as many students as we possibly can to get up there and every single eighth grader that comes through and Mr La I teach all of them except for two sections Mr lachner teaches the other two and once I leave the robotics lab he's going to roll in there with his group so then when at the end of this year we can say okay every eighth grader that just came out of here did a full 10 weeks in the robotics lab uh if you have any questions about it at the end there's uh you can just go ahead and ask Mr Connolly if you want now on our presentation though you'll see our our emails and
022everybody has parents there now so if you do have any questions please feel free to give me a call give me an email you know if you want to bounce more than willing to uh listen to you and hopefully you know take some some good info and make it work for us here on the other side all right I'm going to turn it back over to Mr Connell here I just want to give that over to James Kelly who is a senior really advanced level robotic student he's been with the program for a couple years now so he's just going to say he's a little right James thank you so uh yeah as Mr Connell said uh I'm Jim Kelly I've uh I've been in the robotics uh classes for this is my second year
023now I'm a senior I'm really looking forward to taking all robots that we developing class to the competitions in January and I think it's a great opportunity for all the students to have at East Islip thank you [Applause] yeah so there's our contact information um I just want to take a minute to thank the board upper level Administration and Mr Stanton for really supporting the program over the past couple years um you guys have truly helped it grow to where it's at now and we hope to continue that growth into the future so thank you very much you know uh gentlemen thank you very much I I did get to acknowledge Mr Jason Stanton Mr Mike Hansen and I'm Mr Richards who are here at three of our directors can we give them a nice
024round of applause [Applause] you know seven years ago we surveyed the students and this was a big uh you know this was one of the things that students said they wanted and I had never heard of it it wasn't there when I was in school but just because it wasn't there when I was in school it doesn't mean that this is going to have an impact on your life and again so much more about the learning to work together in a group setting break out of those rows you know those rows and those chairs that would lock the kids in for years and you sat there in like a factory assembly line and get them using their minds together um that's the future that's their world and we need to support them and to have
025you know adults like this who will guide them and the enthusiastic and the good news is you know we're looking at expanding we have a beautiful robotics room at the high school but we do have some room to look to make a bigger one uh and and you know things are going things are looking up in this area and we're trying to offer the courses that the students need for the future and the courses that excite them but like everything else um you know you have travel Sports yeah it's invest a lot of money in travel Sports you have extra music lessons and vocal coaches you have the playhouse the playhouse where students who are interested in those things can get something extra but um you know I'm not going to name everybody but Sunil
026come up over here and say hello um he came out of nowhere one day I'm not even I don't even remember where we first met but he was so excited and he was telling me about this program I gotta be honest with you I really didn't understand what he was talking about but I went to see it one day and I saw these young men and women doing amazing things and um you know I pulled this sort of our travel robotics because you heard it we have classes we have clubs we have a chat we have a robotics competition team but when we first tried to get robotics off the ground in schools 20 years ago it was so expensive and we overextended ourselves and it just was not feasible to continue we're building it
027back in a sensible fiscally responsible way but there's also a world out there outside of school and if this is what you love like I have three boys that each love something different trying to get them on the lecture so somebody introduce everybody and couldn't put on the show that I saw at the library a few weeks ago a few months ago you know it's uh it was actually quite a few years this we met in the library we came to the library once quite a few years ago the first time was the library and then through Colvin you just kept appearing out of nowhere no you would never let me forget about it and uh you're you're dense and your late night texts and all that yeah late night texts but I loved every
028one of it because look at the smiles I need young men and women are going to be the ones who take over our world and I am excited and you're going to do a great job so let's hear about it okay so awesome to hear everything that's going on in the middle school and high school with robotics amazing to hear everything happening at the elementary level just getting all that excitement around all these steam topics and at the elementary level we started to say hey we want to take that excitement and build and have a competition also be able to compete and then we learned that there is a competition out there and we learned that other schools are competing out there we say we want to be a part of that so we've signed
029up and joined the first Lego League competition which is regionally managed across Long Island and we compete with other teams across Long Island and it's a competition around engineering research and a robot game and rather than hearing it from me we can hear all about the competition from members themselves hello my name is sonali kamath and I'm going to tell you a little bit about first Lego league first Lego league is a competitive program all over Long Island there are four parts to first Lego League the first part is robot design the second part is robot game the third part is the core values presentation and the fourth part is the Innovation project my favorite part is the core values presentation the rest of my team will tell you a little bit more about their
030each one hi my name is Jan Elliott and I will be telling you about the first part of the Lego competition the first part of the competition is the core values the core values are impact Discovery Farm Innovation teamwork and inclusion my favorite one is Teamwork because we get to work together and have fun at the same time I miss your food competition when you're doing a comedy skit of all about the core values hello my name is section common I'm going to talk about the second part of first Lego League which is the robot design the robot design is all about having a robot and using it to complete missions to get points we show the judges our robot we explain how it works we also show them our programs explain how those work
031why we program that way and how it helps us finish those missions as efficiently as possible my favorite part is the coding because I really enjoy the versatility that you can use between those blocks [Music] came out they're a part of first Lego League which is the Innovation project The Innovation project is a challenge given by the judges each year last year's challenge was cargo and how we can deliver it more efficiently this year's challenge is energy and how we can use it more efficiently too hi I'm Nick salvader and I'll be talking about the final part which is the robot game and the robot game we have to use attachments and code that we make to do a set of missions in two and a half minutes so as you can see here we
032have our board it changes every year so we have to completely rebuild everything with our robot every year [Applause] excellent job guys so we've been involved with the FLL for over five years now across Long Island and as you can see clearly it's not just robotics it's about research it's about presentation skills there are so many aspects to this program that we think benefit our children will benefit our children well into the future and we'd love to see this come to the school in East Islip at the elementary level we're getting so much interest from different families wanting to get their children involved and we can't grow any further it's you know we can't we can't fit that many kids in our homes we're hosting our meetings so we try so we'd love to see
033we'd love to see this grow within our district there are so many opportunities this is a global program there are over 15 000 teams across the world just last year There Was 80 teams across Long Island and that is growing every single year some districts have have multiple teams so super happy to be here thanks for having us and let's give another hand to the kids here [Applause] hey thank you and you have a nice segue into the next portion of my report and you're going to notice my last few reports my goal is to let other people speak so I can listen you know look at what's on the table in front of you listen to what you know ladies and gentlemen spoke about you know who work here it's about creating opportunities for
034children so that they can learn and learn together and go out and make the world a better place but the harsh reality is you have to pay for it and we have to you know the community here has been very supportive and look I hear a lot of opinions and a lot of statements but let's just talk facts for a minute when I arrived here I was excited these types of binary rules get to work on the community um when I looked at first audit reports order is very important one of those are like the conscience of the organization I was like holy cow what do I get myself into and in all honesty we probably would receive a new minus if it was school and grade but because of the strength of the Board
035of Education you know the folks sitting to my right and you know um you know Mrs Corey Mr pediat and Mrs Mr montouri before that be happy you must call for what used to like to say we want just a little bit better than everybody else and don't waste money you know we should be very proud of the fact that since 2014 the average school tax my stress School tax I can't speak for anybody else the average homeowner which taxes for schools approximately 180 dollars yeah take a look around at the facility take a look around what this community has built because you work together and um you know we've got an order report tonight Mr Harrison into introduce uh about after the Israel report card and the folks to my left and you know
036they're the ones that made this happen the folks to my right had the vision and the folks who came and spoke tonight are the ones that care about this place and work with the kids and I'm lucky because I just got to show up every day and watch wonderful things happen um you know I forgot to mention this might be the time for the kids to go home and get some ice cream and get to bed audit reports are very exciting children but you really should be over 18 to listen to them um but in all seriousness if if we are not fiscally responsible and if we don't make good decisions we lose great programs like this it gives me great pleasure to turn it over to my friend and colleague Mr C Harrison who's
037been introduce uh thank you very much Mrs Van Dyne is here today to discuss the external audit that was conducted over the past several months uh we met with the order committee on October 12th and after the presentation accept the recommendation to accept that we have Financial results presented so without whatever we do welcome Mr Van Dyne thank you thank you so much Steve Harrison and the board thank you and Dr Dolan and the rest of the administration I appreciate all did I give you a promotion I saw all the smiles I'm like okay I just promoted you you're welcome so yes as Mr Harrison said we did meet with the audit committee three weeks ago we went into detail of the two audits that we did do one being your financial statement audit the
038other one being your extra classroom audit and you received the best opinion you could get as a school district which is called an unmodified opinion we had no problems giving you that clean opinion the books were in great shape I wanted to thank Maria brabender who's in the audience she's the treasurer she worked really well with my audit team to make sure that we got the audit done timely they worked really well together you have a business office that really cares you know I we ordered over 45 school districts and you know when we come into your business office we can tell that they want to do the right thing and they really take the audit seriously so kudos to the business office so in addition to doing our financial statement audit and giving you
039an opinion we also look at your internal controls and there again a great report we had no issues with the internal controls at the district you have very strong controls there was one minor recommendation which is a good recommendation you did receive a lot of federal monies this year due to the free meals that were given out of the school lunch program so you do have additional Monies to reinvest in the school program so I know that Mr Harrison is in the process of coming up with a plan to reinvest those monies into the school lunch program financially we also look at your financials there again we looked at the short-term goals the long-term goals and you do have a solid long-term plan both for your Capital needs and your financial needs so you do
040as you know have Capital reserves which will help you with your your Capital needs you also have other reserves that are available to school districts that will help you for any long-term expenses that may you may incur that will help you not have to raise taxes so that's really important to have that long-term plan and the district has been following that long-term plan over the years to build that strong balance sheet and then also the other thing that we were very good to see is that your unassigned fund balance which is really your savings account is at that four percent level that you're allowed to have and the financial advisors really look at those two pieces when they come in and they determine what your ratings are if you're gonna for your borrowings they want
041to make sure that you have a strong balance sheet that you have strong reserves in place you have it that unassigned at the four percent level and that does help you and as you know you have been uh going out for borrowing so that does help you with with that that impact so overall the financials were in great shape this year you had an increase of about 700 000 in your general fund this year and you know overall I you know the financial situation here has been getting better and better every year and I think it's due to the financial planning that you do do and you always are on top of that the audit committee was great we met with the audit committee you have community members on that audit committee so they were
042able to give some feedback also and we had some Dialogue on the audit so they were very happy with the results also so all in all you know a great report once again and I wanted to thank you know the school district the business office for all the help that they did to get the audit done in a timely manner okay yes uh we have a particular Community member who comes in and likes to say that we are over the legal limit in that um in that fund balance are we within the law on that yes you're within the legal limits for both your unassigned and all your reserves thank you you're welcome I'd just like to point out to get to this point there's a lot of efforts on a lot of people involved
043including Miss Van Dyne and her firm our receivers uh Mr Zachary Mrs Sasson both sit on the water committee as well as the support from the Board of Education the burden of the order really falls on Maria Bray Bender so I want to recognize her efforts during the audit process as well as Terry farro and the rest of the business office staff additionally we do have three community members uh part of the order committee Miss rice Miss Spina and Mr Madden who sacrificed their own time to meet with us at least three or four times throughout the year to get to the point of recommending the water tonight so I do want to appreciate and mention everybody's efforts so thank you to those involved and thank you Mr Harrison for all your efforts as well
044yes and I'd also like to just stress one more time we've got the D minus to the best we can get but it does not happen by accident Listen to Who we're thanking we're thanking community members who have the courage to run and sit on the board of education we heard skilled administrators who think long term we have employees who work hard to make sure we're doing this correctly and we have community members that come into these meetings and listen you know on the water committee and again you know like I said Mrs Van beIN is like the conscience of the school district and we have you know she her she takes a vow she takes an o to make sure that we are doing what we are supposed to be doing and that's simple
045facts folks not emotion it's nothing um but but I'm extremely proud to just you know like I said I showed up every day I'm surrounded by a wonderful community and wonderful employees and wonderful um uh caring professionals who look we do the best we can I'm going to own up to a very big mistake in a little while because we do make mistakes but I will tell you this we make them and fix them and to you know if you go back and look at where we were in 2010 2012 2014 and where we are today it's because of the entire Community not one person not one group but the entire community and Marion thank you very much okay thank you Marianne can we one more question so uh we have a fund to pay
046out retirement benefits yes and we expect a lot of retirements in the next five years and the board has anticipated that and I believe what's an expected expense of over six million dollars of coming in the next so you're referring to your compensated absences your vacation and sick time that you have to pay out so you do have monies earmarked for that currently you have a long-term liability of about 6.5 million dollars and you are about 88 funded in that Reserve so that's that's one thing that doesn't have to come from or increase taxes to pay in the future because we have 88 of it already put away so you can appropriate that reserve for those expenses so you don't have to raise the taxes great thank you thank you very much for your work
047all right thank you unless you guys want to say we'd love to have you can we take a two minute break so they can break down so the kids can go home I mean as much as let's do it guys thank you very much well for the presentations uh robotics teams thank you okay public comments come public comments on agenda items agenda items only in the back you want to come up when they look at the agenda okay those robotics kids did wonderful tonight so I'm here to discuss the recent draft policy of the East Islip School District's diversity equity and inclusion this draft I understand is coming to a vote soon and so we need to really take a look at this first I'm 27 years in education both the city and the state
048and I hold multiple licensing I probably also check many boxes because I have nieces and nephews who are Muslim and I have Colombian and I have Garmin immigrants first generation immigrants I could check a whole bunch of boxes if that's what you want if you want boxes I can fill them for you however our board they're not filling the boxes because they're like five white men they're not filling the boxes so I just want to make that obviously you're violating your own Dei policy right now but there are are um however they are Board of Education members that are giving their time to us and I think that they've been ceased like much of the district has so let me explain what that means is that they were told that it is a mandate that
049they file this Dei policy it is not what I just handed them is a framework from the University of the state of New York Corporation Board of Regents New York State education department and it's it's a suggestion and a matter of fact on the page one of this policy it clearly says paragraph three we recognize that the decision to adopt a Dei policy as well as the contents of such a policy or ultimately matters of local discretion there's no Landing here there's no reason to adopt it perhaps there's money tied to it that's another topic however I would like to ask if any of them know who David Kirkland is no David Kirkland it's terrible Lester Young Lester Young you know okay well Lester Young is in charge of the Board of Regents and they
050should know that since they're working for him and David Kirkland wrote this for Lester Young it's the curriculum for New York State I gave this to John Dolan last year and to some members of the board it clearly says that they are going to empower students to be agents of social change anyone coming from a country with socialism knows that we don't want this because agents of social change means socialism they want to teach the children how to Rally they want to teach the children how to protest and they don't really want to teach the children proper history so moving right along we have this issue here where we have this policy now that's forming and we don't have a reason for it because we it's it's also said here by Lester Young that all
051of the school districts are already abide by what's going on we have great diversity and we have great inclusion and he says that in here so why do we have to enforce this and Advance this is beyond me but nonetheless guess what else about David Kirkland he's a CRT author critical race Theory he's an author of that and he's in a valid Marxist he says it all over his Twitter so therefore he wrote this curriculum and he wants this implemented and he wants the Dei policy along with it and I think that might be getting into dangerous territory especially for our wonderful teachers who have been dragged out recently into cultural proficiency treatments some districts as long as four years a matter of fact North Babylon School District just pulled out 11 and 12 year
052and took them for training without a parental informed consent and they watched videos on white privilege gender and sex Theory this is what they're training the children and the parents have no clue so this cultural proficiency book is what's taught by April Francis Taylor She's the head of Dei at BOCES Natalie McGee these people come and they pull out like 10 teachers at a time so that they're in small groups and not all together and then the teachers feel kind of uncomfortable to speak out against it and that's how they get them with a nice slow boil so I think that we need to reevaluate what we're going to be implementing in this District because if you turn it into a policy it's kind of like you're using circumventing the legislature basically and implementing things
053that are not going to be helpful because we're labeling and identifying children all the time right who's overweight well what is overweight that's subjective oh who's this gender well I'm not sure because there seems to be changing gender now on a daily basis so this is very subjective and when things are subjective it causes more issues if we want to stay united we don't want this we don't need to be divided this isn't diversity Equity inclusion this is divided excluded and the word Equity keeps coming up in this di policy over five times nothing about equality which means that they're already in violation of certain uh codes to begin with like the um USC 2018 for title one they're against that because that's all about equality not about equity and they're also against NASA they're
054violating statute 13 because that's also about protecting not harassing and not calling people news so we need to be really careful about this and especially you know I notified Alexis white our Senator and she was informed by John Dolan that there is no CRT there's no CR team set but this is CRT so he lied to her today he lied to her and on top of that she was informed that there was going to be a protest here oh we were going to protest CRT I'm sorry but everyone here looks very peaceful to me so our own Senator is being misinformed our elected officials need to know what's going on and we need to stop this from happening so I ask you please board members do not be pleased do not be misinformed I don't
055know why you are being misled by other lawyers in sedone himself but this but the truth you have it now in front of you do not pass this policy please thank you thank you anybody else agenda items oh you'll be next e pluribus unum out of many one in many ways the most important of the models the United States has we have a few depending on the circumstances um our country's always been diverse from the first settlers here that's the nature of you know colonies made by religious people feeling religious persecution uh Wars and what have you um our Traditions are already drawn from many cultures right Christmas trees come from Germany uh the federal system of government is Barb in many ways from the Iroquois Jazz comes from African-American Traditions um food from all
056over the world right we have a Halal takeout place right on Main Street that's from South Asia Sriracha from Vietnam potatoes from South America we are diverse As Americans um it reflects the central truth about both nature and human society that we are stronger and more resilient together embracing all of our diversity than we are apart the underpinning of America therefore is that diversity is should be included in a greater whole as a nation as a people we are greater than some of our parts and a fundamental principle of our nation is equality under the law and in Opportunity as well which is equity that's what that word actually means therefore far from Dei being on American I would argue that is fundamentally the very core of what it means to be American uh it's
057not a secret that ideologically I probably don't agree with anybody on the board too much we vote for different parties but I do want to hand it to them that they've recognized essential truth that diversity is our strength and it needs to be acknowledged and celebrated um frankly Dei policy that they're proposing is very simple in comparison to a lot of other districts but it's a good start it's a good foundation it's a good building block um it's a recognition that our community deserves a place where everyone can feel welcome it recognizes the reality that our nation and indeed our town is becoming more diverse it means that East Islip is drawing joining districts across Suffolk and acknowledging this reality including uh the districts in which two of our sitting board members have either worked
058or are currently working I'm not sure if you're retired yet from our school district's population is non-white my son's generation he's seven is minority majority those are the simple demographic facts of the United States in the year 2022 you can pretend that's not the case all you want that's reality we can either celebrate the positive contributions of everyone and embrace that diverse future or stick our heads in the sand and draw unpleasant connections and attention to our community you'd like to sit down in cataquah have recently I don't want to think of East Islip like that I would like East Isis to be known for the good things and not the bad maybe that's just me I applaud the board and hope that they vote Yes today thank you ma'am did you want to speak
059in the back you can too Whoever likes everyone wants to step up thanks for letting me speak um so of course we believe in diversity right we believe in that like it's very important we accept everyone every race color everything that's not what we're talking about what we're talking about is a certain type of ideology that is going to be promoted through this Dei so I have a couple of questions um one is there any funding that is contingent upon the adoption of this Dei policy yes or no no okay is the adoption of this policy coming from our district itself or is it being pushed by nysad not that I'm aware of okay um is ingerman and Smith advising the board that you need to pass this not that we could really talk about
060conversations so it's not a requirement or mandate right okay great so di sounds amazing on paper um and it would be great if it was truly about everyone having to feel equal and included but it's not Dei is a lens by which the state wants teachers to teach the description of the policy is both vague and Broad which can be a slippery slope for extreme ideologies I feel instead of teaching kids about sexuality anti-American values oppression and privilege because that's what this will lead to we should be teaching them that every child has equal opportunity to be successful that's it thank you thank you [Applause] first congratulations on your audit and as tax as taxpayer uh appreciate you keeping the taxes low um without an increase so thank you um I too have some concerns
061um listen the results were just in for the and it's not just New York State it's across the board with this covered lockdowns and the reading and math scores and I'm impressed with the Robotics and that and I feel like that's those are great moves forward personally I think the CRT and the dii Dei are moves backwards okay um [Applause] I personally would like to see the curriculum under the federal law you know USC 20 1232 and that is the entire curriculum because there are things in here that are under the guise of other areas and I'm not I I have a couple of questions about this too some of them were just addressed but is there a mandate coming from the state I think you've already said there is not I'm sorry directive it's
062a directive from the state okay and have I'm questioning not the legality of you guys I'm questioning of the legality of the state enforcing on enforcing um these programs on a school district and making a contingent on on what they're dictating as what they want taught in the schools and I understand that New York State um has has certain programs tied to funding but I'd like to know how far this goes as far as funding there's no link and um you know one of the things curriculum has been mentioned a couple of times and one of the things that again I'm extremely proud of is we work together with our partners you know the teachers and the teachers union um and within that unit there are Divergent opinions and we do they write curriculum together
063and they don't do it you know under the cloak of darkness and the secret and you know we believe that everyone's creative equal and we don't we are not going to allow anyone to Force any sort of political agenda on us and that's that's simple and you know that's pretty much all I have to say about it okay well I I appreciate that because there's a lot of that in Washington DC and and in Albany um so I do appreciate just shut me off oh no okay okay we don't live in Washington we don't live in Albany we live in East Islip okay and that's what that's what I'm asking here there's a couple of things that have happened in this District that the community vote one of them we won't bring up tonight but
064you know which one I'm talking about okay different than other communities and I I think when people talk about inclusion all this they should spend an afternoon with the football team okay and and see how accepting they are they're all Brothers they don't care about their skin color they don't care about their ethnicity they just go out on that field and they protect each other and they want to win and there's Brothers there's a camaraderie so I I don't think the equality and all that is even a question in this district from what I've seen okay I've welcomed everybody into my home as my boys have welcomed everybody into their home there is nothing you know so I think some of this where this comes from or is you know it's also about people being
065misinformed okay um in my personal opinion and I'm seeing it through their own vision and some of that is tunnel vision um I'm just asking that this District because I understand there was a committee that was put together writing a policy that there were surveys put out okay that only 84 members of the community actually returned because there was a glitch in the system and it was a hundred questions and um I'm asking that we have more involvement at the community level and get everybody's opinion on this as opposed to just a select few that have an agenda and that's all I have to say about that because one more thing I think we have much bigger problems not only in the state but across the country we have kids that have been impacted by
066mandates school closures uh for the last couple of years and we have a lot of ground to make up and I think our time is much better spent academically getting back to the basics like what we learned okay and and learning our history and I'm not saying listen I as far as I'm concerned I I know a lot about what what's happened in the past and I don't think I was ever jaded or or not informed I think we need to get back to the basics and have you know a curriculum that teaches the facts okay as opposed to us trying to change those facts and and make you know some kids feel apologetic I am not apologetic for who I am and neither are my boys and we have no intention on on being
067apologetic in the future that's all I have to say [Applause] certified Personnel be resolved it upon the recommendation of superintendent of schools the Board of Education approves the resignations terminations which is absence physician abolitions employment appointments tenure appointments and salary changes in importance with applicable Provisions education law and Civil Service law as cited in the certified personal attachments taking the motion motion second discussion all in favor all right be resolved that upon the recommendation of the superintendent schools the Board of Education appeasing resignations terminations leaders of absence physician abolitions employment appointments tenure appointments and salary changes in accordance with applicable provisions of Education law and Civil Service law as cited in a non-certified Personnel attachments I get emotionally motion second discussion all in favor all right whereas the labor agreement between the Board of Education
068the east side of Union Free School District and the East size of Teachers Association expired on June 30th 2022 whereas representatives of the respective parties have engaged in negotiations for a success agreement to the expired labor agreement whereas the representatives of the district and the association reached an agreement that has been memorialized in a memorandum of agreement which memorandum of agreement has been reviewed by the Board of Education now therefore be resolved that the Board of Education of the East Union Free School District here with approves the memorandum of agreement here and above referenced and authorizes the expenditure of funds necessary to implement say the memorandum of agreement and be further resolved that the president of the Board of Education and the superintendent of schools are hereby authorized to execute the new collective bargaining agreement
069incorporating the terms of the memorandum of agreement on behalf of the Board of Education motion second discussion all in favor but if you like before I say something no no all in favor all right um we have been negotiating with the Union I think it's going on three years uh even though the agreement just expired there's one that expired a couple years ago and we worked at a little Bridge agreement and at the time when we started negotiating now the district had certain goals that we were looking to meet and the union had certain goals that they were looking to meet and it was not an easy negotiation to to fit both needs and it took a lot of time it took a lot of negotiation it took a lot of compromise and I would
070like to thank the executive committee for the union for all the work that they put in over these years to make this happen Ms Maloney and Mr nesky especially all the work they put in a lot of time and this still would not have happened without the work that they put in and the whole executive committee so thank you this was the Board of Education Mr car park and I have to mention this Carney Mr montori because it was a three-year negotiation and they played a huge part in that in the years past so um you know in the last I guess since the summer we really worked hard at it to make it happen and we want a deal that was fair to our teachers they deserved that they work hard every day and
071they've done a great job dealing with covid and educated and keeping our children safe every day so we'd like to thank our teachers and that was certainly part of the negotiation that we wanted to do and we also struck a deal that we feel as fair for the taxpayers of East Islip so we're very proud of that and again I'd like to congratulate the teachers the board Administration are getting this done because it was very difficult and in the end I think it worked out for both parties oh and by the way next we were supposed to have our attorneys here to give a presentation to inform the public we're not just going to go into the dark on this uh the attorney could not make it tonight it was last month last minute the
072deal really just came together today got finalized on certain issues so we do expect our attorney to come to the next board meeting to outline for you the terms of the agreement and the benefits and costs well Chris uh stole a lot of what I wanted to say I just wanted to say um that the the deal is a fair deal for the teachers it's a fair deal for the taxpayers um and it sets us up to be even more stable financially in the future and not really was the goal three years ago is to uh set the district up for financial stability for years to come and I just want to say thank you to uh Chris the board Mr Dolan Steve Harrison everybody on this side who's been working hard for three years
073to get this done and of course on the other side you know um it was an adversarial relationship but it proves again that you can be adversaries but be respectful of one another we've had a lot of heated discussions but it never broke down and uh you know I know Ms Maloney may take a lot of heat as a union president but uh she's definitely a uh a great advocate for her unit and um it's been an honor to uh to work with her and um I just wanted to you know I think sometimes you have to uh again we can be adversaries but we also can be respectful of one another so I think it's a good deal and I think it's a good deal for the future and that that's really what we're
074here for right we're here here to build go to the future you know our time is coming quickly to an end but the kids are going to be here and we should be thinking about them and just like the last speaker said you know that that's that's what's great about this town we all we all kind of do it for kids you know I always say the story when I first moved here and I went to the soccer fields my first day and they were thousands of people down there I said what the heck is going on here and there were adults out there and they were coaching kids that weren't their own and I said this is the place I want to be and uh you know we always seem to come and rally
075together with things like that so it's it's been a pleasure and uh I want to say thank you to the board thank you to the teachers union and uh thank you to the community you know again I want to thank everyone and you know once again Mr van and I spoke about it the long-range plan you know um this deal is going to give us something that to the best of my knowledge and I asked Mr montori our historian you know we will have what's 10 amount of two uh label piece in five years which will allow us to cement and you know allow the new programs which you know we're doing the best to invite two other programs here in my last couple of meetings uh programs that we think are good for kids
076we think that we are in a position now to weather whatever economic um Cliff where economic storm is we all believe is on the horizon we're not beholding you know we're not worried about I'm not going to sit here and you know we're not a district that hides behind oh we can't plan we're in range because of uh you know the state in its budget and we believe that this deal is good now it's good for the district now in five years and 34 and 34 years down the road takes a tremendous amount of effort and a tremendous amount of courage to do what these folks did and I am just very proud to have at least you know they allowed me to sit in on um you know again I want to stress we
077have put ourselves on strong financial moving forward Mr carplex said it's okay to disagree but please do it respectfully and I apologize I don't think I mentioned Mr Dolan when I was thanking everybody and I can tell you yeah uh he I mean he was working on this and thinking about this I I I think 24 7. and I know that because he would call me and it's not only about every day about different ideas and some of the ideas were incorporated into the deal some of the ideas were not but um every day and so um thank you Mr Donald get him out of my house he's annoying me okay and I wanted to say that on camera is she calling you now um so again thank you to all involved it was it
078was a pleasure working with you and I'm I'm glad we're able to get this done and for years now we don't have to uh you know we have a labor peace and um we're very happy to get it done consent agenda items Zachary I I think we should remove 9.2 agreed so we'll remove 9.2 consent agenda will be 9.3 through 9.20 uh well one we're gonna we're gonna read out and go um so consent agenda all in favor all right 9.1 get resolved upon the recommendation of the audit committee the independent Auditors report for your ending June 30th 2022 from RS Abrams and Company LLP be accepted by the Board of Education discussion all in favor aye again thank you to our order committee for all the work that they put in Mr Harris and
079his team a lot goes into that the resulted upon the recommendation of the student of schools the Board of Education approves board policy number zero one zero five diversity equity and inclusivity education can get a motion second discussion um yes before I vote uh I just want to first of all people that spoke before thank you for speaking up the other thing is I don't know if you actually read what our proposal was which is very different than the Department of Education um if you read that you might have a different tune there um but before I vote I believe that uh we're okay as it is right now and it's not mandated at this point it's not needed um so that's the reason for my vote which you'll hear soon yeah I also want
080to add to that as well can you guys hear me out there like anything else uh this is a pretty nebulous plan from the state and of course as always the devil's in the details unfortunately we don't know the details to what extent is teacher training tied to this we don't know to what extent is the curriculum and uh tied to this we don't know is the curriculum going to be political and divisive we don't know it's not State mandated it's not time sensitive at least so at least with my vote like not to I cannot consent to a program rooted in politics the state and National level also if you read the Dei initiative from the state I encourage you to look at the website and read it it is riddled with um pretty
081obvious to see riddled with assumptions about um about race uh racial Theory and it's hard to deny the uh the polar polarity associated with it and one of the things that I would love to see in our school is a step away from this so with my vote I cannot consent to that [Applause] you want to read it no I'm just going to read and then I think this sort of um discusses our approach because as Mr Rule and said this policy is is much different than others the board of Agents lost the initiative to advance diversity Equity inclusion schools across the state the board of Agents has directed schools to develop a policy that advances the principles of diversity Equity inclusion the school district along with the assistance of illegal Council developed a policy
082which outlines its commitment to providing Equitable assets to programs offered by the school district school district has a history of providing equal and Equitable opportunities for all students the policy does not change how the district currently provides educational opportunities to each of his students in the school district thank you and again I'd like to thank everybody for getting up and speaking um I heard some a lot of good things when you started talking about diversity and inclusiveness and who would be against diversity and inclusiveness of all our students which I think most of the speakers said as well and I I agree with them and it's my understanding that each district adopts their own policy this is not some State mandated in that everything that was read is included the district itself will do what
083this Islip wants to do and recognize the parents and their concerns in East Islip I don't think any of those other things as far as socialism want to talk about misinformation that doesn't make any sense that would not be happening if it's not in the policy here certainly you could read it you won't see anything like that so um East High School we'll do their own and we're not I haven't heard CRT being mentioned in a long time and certainly won't be part of this policy I could I could promise you that so if it passes so and well you know one way to say I think this is a good time for Mr Zachary loves when I say this the old social studies teacher in the United States you know in a week in
084a week and a half people have a chance to go and express their opinion in the truly American fashion unfortunately most Americans aren't even registered to vote and those who are registered most of them don't vote it's easy it's easy sit back and be a Critic abundant um be on either side you know um but what we're kind of you know what fascinates me is we give people the opportunity to speak and they you know they don't you have the opportunity to vote and this is your chance on November the 9th hey thanks very much I stressed I stressed always remember that it's just old on November 8th go out and vote for the candidate for what you believe and we'll move forward you know curriculum changes absolutely not anybody else well this is uh
085is obviously a tough tough vote and I understand the concerns but you know the line in the public content the school district already has a history of providing equal and Equitable opportunities to all of its students and we see that and we saw it tonight the robotics team the steam Club Sports and the policy does not change how the school district currently provides educational opportunities to each of the students in the school district so although a tough vote I like to get ahead of the state and um sometimes it's better better to get get out in front of these things than to wait for the state to mandate something that you might not want to do you know that's how I feel about it and that's why I'll vote for it Mr corporate can just
086be an interesting point um and we do have a history of this here we appreciate the local control but we also know what part of the bigger system and yes when we receive you know when as much as I like to joke around when we receive directives from you know the lack of a better term our bosses um you can follow them because then once you once you're in once once you're in line with where we're going um once you're in the arena you have a voice and I would much rather be you know the man or a woman in the arena that's Teddy Roosevelt wrote um then standing on the outside throwing the rocks in and again like I said it's okay it's very American it's absolutely American to um have debate the discourse
087and disagree it's on American to shout each other down and be disrespectful so um you know this this does not change anything but it reaffirms our commitment to being fair decent and kind nurturing and supportive of our children and it absolutely does not change a thing I'd like to also thank Mr ruin and Mr Sasson who worked to uh to build a policy for our district that is different than another state directive and it leaves room for us for East ISO to be East isil and that that was what we were hoping to do so um like I said I'm a yes but that's why it wouldn't be done unless we could be East Islip right if there was some something coming from the state that came from Albany you know this is something he
088could shape ourselves and like all the speakers said you know East Islip is diverse East Islip is inclusive and let's just keep working on it doing the same things that we've been doing and this just kind of puts it just puts it in paper but um like no I'll agree with my colleagues we we summed it up here you know again like Mr car pump pointed out in the public comment you know where it's on and I'll get closer to it so again like my colleagues mentioned uh Mr car park Mrs Zachary and Mr Williams and Mrs casson you know we we reviewed this policy we've looked at it uh you know again in the public comment it's saying here we're reaffirming our commitment and as Mr Carl puncher said a minute ago you know
089we want to try to get ahead of things if we can and I think doing this again as Mr Don said it gives us that local control to to craft that message so I'm going to be in for voting in for this policy if anything happens in it that we're not happy with again we have the power to do that I love it correct all in favor all right okay be resolved I found a recommendation of superintendent schools the Board of Education proves the attached list of appropriation changes to the 22-23 school years motion second discussion all in favor all right whereas the East Side sub Union Free School District here in after the school district has been contacted by the trustees of the Robert Kelleher private Foundation here and after the foundation regarding an
090offer to provide scholarships to graduating students from the class of 2023 and whereas the foundation was created to provide scholarships to students from the community Mr kellehart loved and whereas the intention of the foundation is to offer several scholarships to deserving students who met certain criteria including but not limited to GPA community service extracurricular activities letters of recommendation Financial need and future academic interest whereas that scholarships will range in the amount of 5000 to 7 500 and our renewable annually based upon the maintaining of GPA of 3.2 or higher scholarships are contingent upon the proof of college acceptance College registration and deposit whereas the school district will be responsible for Distributing scholarship information and application to students whereas interested students will email completed applications directly to the foundation by the November 1st 2022 deadline right
091around the corner whereas the interested students will you know completed applications directly to the foundation uh by the Again by 2022 whereas the foundations responsible for the administration have applied for and subsequently awarded scholarships resolved at the East Side support of Education hereby acknowledges and proves the new scholarship being offered to select graduating students from the class of 2023 that meet the above reference criteria motion discussion all in favor aye and very very uh special thank you to the Robert Keller private foundation for the very generous donation so in addition I'd like to thank Mr Stanton for his efforts in putting us together I know it's been a multi-year process so thank you awesome all right November 18th in case anybody to hear that so if anybody's out there interested in applying for the scholarship
092it's a lot of money it's a very generous donation and very much appreciated so please contact Administration on get an application and applying for that we resolved it upon the recommendations the Board of Education accepts the donation of approximately 8 796.44 from the Middle School Spotlight school store this donation will be used to purchase eight benches to be placed around the middle school the code to be increased is one six two zero two hundred zero eight zero zero zero zero taking a motion motion second discussion where are these uh does anyone know where these benches are going like just randomly around the school I just want to know uh they're gonna have so in the front and someone uh sung by the Bus Loop between ECC and um and middle school and then I saw
093them on the other side by the you know towards the cafeteria area I don't think they finalized the map but they're really nice benches and it would be good for the kids after school waiting you know to get picked up and stuff might seems to go on there next spring when his car doesn't work anymore to get into the building are we going to leave him out of the bench is Mr Hanson going to plant some gourds around the new benches is going to play a cactus I don't know anybody else who grows Cactus oh okay all right thank you for all that that work in the school store that purchase items there that made this donation possible so it's a very generous donation and thank you to all that put it together it was
094all the department of reconditional superintendent schools the Board of Education accepts the donation of complementary transportation service from Suffolk transportation service for the catch a career breakfast which was held on October 20th at the Irish coffee Club Celtic transportation is a member of The Business Partnership taking a motion motion second discussion all in favor aye again a very special thank you to Suffolk Transportation Suffolk is an outstanding company they do a great job keeping our kids safe getting them to school every day getting them home and they're always very generous to the district so thank you to Suffolk transportation uh a favorite be yourself that upon the recommendation the superintendent of schools the Board of Education accepts a donation in the amount of eight thousand thirteen dollars and 83 cents from the ftk foundation to
095be used to cover Transportation costs for the elementary schools end of the year 2022 field trips attaches the breakdown of the donation for building These funds will be deposited into the building Student Activity account to get emotion motion second discussion all in favor aye you want me to go first ftk is just it's a wonderful organization uh they they do a lot of events they just completed the the carnival in September and um they do there's their spring Gala is always one of the events of the year and I know Miss Pepe I know you were doing also the uh concession stand at the football game last weekend so ftk and uh are great Partners here in East Islip they donate a lot of money it's a great things for the students if you get
096the chance please go to their events because they are outstanding I guarantee you'll have a great time and doing a great thing for the district and donating to our own kids because everything goes back to our kids so thank you to the ftk the foundation the executive board ftk all the hard work you do and it's great to see um this very generous donation to go towards thank you very much Pepe and all of ftk for all you do [Applause] I think it fits with theme of the night um 50 caves founded at the darkest moment you know when when the district was faced with moving losing its extracurricular programs but from that Darkness Rose this beautiful light of giving caring sharing you know I'm going to say it publicly Joe we've had some knockdown
097drag outs we've had a lot of laughs but you know um you epitomize what they are you know serving as president you care you care and you roll up your sleeves and you go to work quite frankly you don't care who you're working next to and you even put up with me so thank you you thank you ftk and God bless Steve that's all I have to say well Cheryl's kids make up a large portion of the population here in east side as well so thank you for your support Cheryl if you ever left town uh we could close a building uh so again thank you ftk uh all business I got old business uh Mr Dolan a question for you so we had some mixed messages that were going out from the district regarding
098Halloween and costumes can you clarify for us what's what's the uh yeah you remember the part of the program where I said I made a huge mistake here's where I own up to it um there's always been to be a little bit of rancor about costumes in East Islip and quite frankly every school district I know I hear these Sunny reports from everybody from other places and then I sit in meetings with people who actually work there okay so again I made a terrible mistake I remember when I first got here we had a meeting we discussed this we had a plan and honestly for the most part things went pretty well coming out of covert this summer um look everybody was euphoric we were coming back and you know I dropped the ball no
099meeting occurred there's no explanation yes you know I am going to stand by and I and I do believe because running a school is a lot different than running your house okay there are similarities but on a much much greater scale and at any given moment adults here are responsible for several you know several hundred A Thousand Eleven Hundred kids who they care about and we don't want to see anybody get hurt and they are your most valuable resource so anyway the message went out no costumes at the elementary level but you can accessorize and it went down a long list of accessories and I have to tell you when we take those accessories and put them together you have a costume bye but you can't have any sort of weapons can't have any sort
100of you know apparatus that blocks masks ironic masks and things like that about very ironically thank you very much um you know at the elementary level what most people don't appreciate and I certainly didn't appreciate it as a high school principal or high school teacher or a middle school principal or middle school Dean I'm sorry the amount of time you spend on a daily basis wiping noses tying shoes and trying to teach at the same time and the root of the you know costumes was because it was it became arduous to try to navigate the day now I took umbrage with someone who said to me the other day we have to put fun back in school these kids have no fun I have walked these holes and I'm going to tell you something right
101now I'm seeing fun and we have three Spirit weeks at the elementary level and two spirit weeks at the high school and middle school level when I was in school we got homecoming that was it we dress up we have pajama day crazy hair day craziness day mix and match day we have an awful lot of opportunities for our children to come to school and learn and enjoy it and quite frankly some of our teachers enjoy it too so I'm gonna go out on a limb here I will stick by what we said no costumes and then I'm going to turn around and say look Monday's going to come and I trust in the goodness of his community I can trust in the goodness of the people in this community if you would wear it
102to crazy hair day or you could wear it to the pajama day and you can wear it on any of those other days let's do it if you have to dial it back a little bit it's because remember if there's God forbid ever an emergency and we got to move your kids quickly it's going to be real tough if they're wearing these costumes that we can't move them quickly if we you know if your child's sitting behind a kid in class who's got one of those big Green Day pack of cheese heads and they can't see the board that's not right but if you know I'm going to take this approach and I'm also going to volunteer what it said in the message was you can wear accessories clothing or use the example you know
103if you wear black jeans a ninja shirt a ninja um wristbands they were ninja okay those are the accessories they're very practical and you can wear the jeans other days so parents don't have to buy multiple you know things and let's see how the community does if things go well great and um I don't want people screaming I don't want people yelling I'm going to ask people to please please please use the common sense you use on all the other spirit days we have and I apologize for my mistake and my punishment is if you have to form a committee we sit and talk about this next summer I will come out of retirement and volunteer to chair that committee you're not a resident I'll rent the house I'll rent something I'll rent a room
104in Mr montouri's House but again when you read that the no costumes was designed to make sure that we don't come in with these overblown because that's what started to happen he's overgrown these things that we cannot manage we cannot handle and kids cannot handle take a look at what your costume is take a look at what you have if accessorize appropriately and we can have a lot of fun and no one will get hurt and then you can go out and enjoy the trick-or-treating or whatever else we do but when you sit back and look at all of the events that we have in school like I said you have 15 spirit days at the elementary and you have ten at this at the secondary level in addition to whatever they do on Fridays
105I'm not sure but you know I I can't keep up with what they're doing I apologize from the bottom of my heart for not being out in front of this it was my mistake and my mistake only um quite frankly one of many have made but when you make a mistake you own it you know we have a solution what the message said was can accessorize appropriately to enjoy the day accessorize appropriately to join to enjoy the day and again if you've ever been in a school especially in an elementary school and if you know if you have these long flowing crazy things and those kids start running in recess you got potential for disaster but I'll make it a point on Monday to drive around I'll go to every school if there's a problem
106you know I'm going to own it I take great pride in my principles and I understand you know they they are constantly tuned into health and safety because they know once there's help and safety they can be learning so the simple answer is please don't wear these costumes that are going to impede your Mobility impede your ability to move around um you know that lock you in but we're accessorize appropriately just like you do on Pajama Day superhero day crazy hair day mix and match day I I don't even know what other days so um so I think the summer the community wants to know what are you going to dress up as I'm actually going to put on a shirt and tie and come as a superintendent there you go perfect John's personally responsible
107for 2500 Google hits on what is a costume tonight in East Islip um nine years I've been trying to get costumes to be allowed in school when we got 60 million dollar bonds we have three teacher contracts in those nine years and I couldn't get costumes crisis there's no more Halloween it's though for him he's just leaving so so I couldn't get costumes for six hours a year but it is what it is um anything else on the costumes any other old business um one thing and it's not really old business it's business that's coming up the AmVets 18 on Carlton Avenue is having a haunted house between now and October 31st from 6 to 12 uh the articles on parent Square I think a family bundle is fifteen dollars that includes mom and dad
108and children under 15 and then there's a costume party there uh week whatever costume you want um October 30th from 12 to 5. so if you can support the vets that would be great accessories or costumes is costing these accessories are put together there's also a Halloween party at the legion hall on Saturday from 11 to I'll be there they have a dart board you can throw darts at me if you want I'm there thank you any other old business new business so for for new business I just wanted to remind everyone they've probably seen it already parents where tomorrow night at the elementary schools both for uh CES and rck they're combining theirs as well as Timber Point Jim here combining their trunk or treat tomorrow night uh so again that's for the k25
109building so I just encourage those families to come out and costumes are allowed and costumes are allowed so this would be a great event but wait a minute tomorrow night Friday and Saturday night at the middle school the high school murder on the ordering Express yes and they will be accessorizing so you can get tickets at the door our plays are amazing the kids do such a great job the kids and staff what a great job I love going to the place any other new business we got to do more that I keep saying that that was awesome those excited enthusiastic teachers with excited and enthusiastic kids the robotics thing is fantastic um did not make a message get out of here tonight anything else any other new business Miss Stephanie well there she is
110I just want to clarify at this point because it was a little bit confusing Zachary at first sounded like you were agreeing on shelving that policy with uh diversity and inclusion and then it seems like maybe you changed your mind so that did pass I didn't change my mind I I agreed with you guys when you guys all said East Side slip is diverse and inclusive already and I said let's continue to work on that yes it did pass okay um I also want to know about the hold on it's a gender sexuality Alliance Club is that in the high school and middle school that was given 800 an allocation of 800 dollars that would be the case through the Lions Club and that's U.S I'm sorry what was that okay straight Alliance that's a
111yes yeah is that in high school or middle school high school okay and I can only imagine what is uh being spoken of in there but at least make the public aware that that is a club um and I'm just really disappointed Mrs Asher yes I had the honor and privilege Tori don't go we had the uh please I promise I was at the Connecticut board meeting the other day as a clinical resident 39 police officers was not proud of a lot of things I saw you know from the adults the student got up and spoke and what that student said looked at the a couple of board members and said you know I know your kids come home to a loving and supportive family and the sarcasm was appropriate um but the student said
112you know school is my Safe Haven school is where I feel safe and supported unfortunately I might not get that at home and uh you know what I I'm very proud to have seen the evolution of that club and not just here but in Sachem and in Smithtown and what it simply is is a group of kids we're going to have something in common trying to find a way in life and quite honestly trying to find a partner that they love and they do wonderful things they raise money they do real fundraisers fundraisers donate to causes um they they took they they do not try to do anything other than be nice to people around them they don't try to influence them or exert any sort of will and I have to you know I
113want to be honest I have you know I'm not going to go into all the stories I'll be one happy and you can call me tomorrow but I will tell you something right now a public school I can't believe this first time I've ever gotten that um a public school is a place to go to allow kids to learn and grow and respect each other and that is a that is a club that saves lives my own cousin said to me my cousin was 20 years older than me he said John if I had a club like that it probably would have saved my life because he wound up in a very bad place and it's a club like any other club I said even fundraisers they take care of each other they launched in
114our parades they support our teams we support our theater and our music programs so I'm not going to sit here and let anybody anybody disparags that club as much as I mean I respect you I just wanted to be aware of it and I just wanted the public to be aware but listen I respect you I completely understand and that sounds incredible and amazing I just want to make sure that they're not actually talking about sexuality it's okay for them to have a place and then to have friends and things like that I just we have we have we follow no no no no guys it's a look look Amanda like I said you know what I think I just wanted to know Amanda let's finish this conversation because you've been a very listen you've
115been you've been a wonderful Advocate um you know and by no means that I mean to offend anyone no no and listen hey guys guys guys guys guys hey guys stop it stop it Amanda you've been a wonderful Advocate on a number of levels um and it's a learning experience so you know thank you very much all right thank you for listening to our concerns obviously we're a little upset of the way the vote went by the time thank you so much Stephanie next good evening everybody my name is Charles Kalinowski thank you for allowing me to speak uh first off steam was awesome kind of remind me of the show BattleBots you ever see BattleBots when they make the robots and they crash into each other pretty cool um I'm just going to continue
116to stay positive and I truly believe the Best Is Yet To Come God bless this community and may God bless the United States of America thank you Charlie hello um thank you for um the vote on Dei um I want to say that as a community member with a child um in the elementary school and someone who plans to be here for many years to come that I see great things with regard to diversity equity and inclusion in our school my daughter came home recently and told me about a teacher who read to her story where some of the characters spoke Spanish and she was so excited because the teacher asked her how to pronounce certain words and she came home and her identity was entirely Affirmed and as she told me Mom I want
117to learn Spanish I want to have a teacher come in and teach me Spanish it's not just enough for abuela to teach me Spanish I want you know to really have a teacher that does that and that is diversity equity and inclusion and there's a lot of talk about what it is and that is fear modeling and that has no place here and should have no place here we are a diverse Community not as diverse as the greater Society and there is a lot of growing that continues that needs to continue to happen I do not see you know a society in East Islip that is not in need of improvement we need to improve we need to do better when I see a child unwittingly in blackface when I see children peacefully protesting on
118Main Street and have adult men yelling douchebag at them I say we need to change we need to grow we need to do better and I hope that in the coming years that I live here as a homeowner as a parent as a interested Community member who is engaged in the betterment of this society that things do improve and that things do change and I am hopeful when my child comes home and is affirmed about her Spanish when I see the initiatives of kindness and healthy choices my daughter is so happy in the school she has fun you know she doesn't need to come dressed in a ginormous costume to have fun she loves learning she feels Affirmed she loves crazy hair day that's and and she loves Steam she loves thinking outside the box
119she is affirmed in her school system and I want her to be affirmed in her Greater Community too and sometimes that does not happen and we need to read we commit to doing that not just now but in the future this is a great small step and I would like to see that small step grow thank you and thank you thank you thank you for getting up there and saying that that story about your daughter is exactly what my view of what the policy is and what it will do more things like that not only for for like Spanish and your daughter but all of our diverse Community here in East Islip and those are the types of things that is why I voted yes for it tonight because that's what it will be and
120not those other ridiculous things that some people try to get up there and try to get to Rally support and amongst themselves um that's not what it will be so thank you that's exactly what's going to be and thank you for saying that thank you can I say one thing yeah you know thank you and you know sort of my last thought is I kind of move into a volunteer role sitting on a bench according to miss car park you know that last discussion about the gay straight Alliance I hear so much about the Gap and Colvin what it did the best thing for kids is to be able to come to school and feel part of something well let's just you know check your political agendas and other agendas at the door for a
121minute um I can guarantee you 've got a club like that saves lives because if a child is sitting in a room and it's in love or has or has feelings for someone and other people shout them down and tell them they can't be like that they become isolated they Drift Away and then terrible things happen and you know spend some time looking in the mirror and you ask yourself why do you why why do you know why do you have to judge other people and I will say this you know Amanda and I you know we have a lot of conversations during covert and you know that back and forth she had a question we're going to answer it you know we are going to defend everybody's right to come here and learn and
122again have a safe haven have a place they can go where they find people like themselves and you know the minute you try to force your agenda on someone else I'm gonna have a problem we're gonna have a problem with that but I can guarantee you in every school across Long Island the gay straight club is a lifesaver a lifesaver bargain and you know we can continue to move through it we said no we've already we've already said and the crew said no and I think it's you know maybe it's time to wrap it up because we can't as much as we can't listen to everybody's personal story um you know a great curriculum is written by professionals and professional teachers in conjunction with administrators it's overseen we have nothing to hide and um quite
123honestly I think you know we took a step today to to ensure ownership of our curriculum and we must be in the game to change the game get out and vote vote for the right person vote for your person but you know you know here in East Islip we will play by the rules we will play you know and we will defend the right to be East Islip but you know the one thing we probably said about these meetings and I hope it continues there were a lot of stories there are a lot of stories and I saw news clippings these meetings have been a light and respectful for the most part over the last eight years keep that tradition going please listen to each other and Enlighten each other and respect each other and
124like I said the gay straight Alliance is a life-saving club and and I will support it to the day I die no it was eye-opening because I thought we were way past where we were but apparently it shows why we made the policy maybe maybe the kids can bring home inclusivity to the parents maybe we can work it from the bottom up the regular business meeting will be held on Thursday November 17 2022 at 8pm motion to adjourn second all in favor aye everybody have a good night happy Halloween