001okay okay good evening everyone we'll open the meeting up can we stand for the plate 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 right okay uh we have a public hearing tonight for the district-wide safety plan so as you know I've been letting you know the last couple of meetings the district-wide safety plan has been updated with the new SRO contract for the 23-24 school year also the um required emergency plan should we ever need to go remote had to be included this year this has been on the website for the last 30 days and uh with Bill is the contact and I don't believe as of today he's received any uh concerns
002so we are ready to move on that okay does anyone have any questions or concerns I look through the document the uh you know updates were highlighted I appreciate that and Paul ceilings the public all right we'll move that in new business yeah on the board of education at the end of course okay open a meeting up to public comment I will close the public hearing I'm sorry to close the public hearing and we'll open the meeting up to public comment okay no public comment we'll go into our special presentation direct committee update [Music] thank you so thank you so much for giving me this time to talk with you this new thing um if most of you know me but my name is Harriet Meyer I come to English from high school and I
003was the two years now as our District's diversity equity and inclusion and I'm going to talk to you tonight a little bit about what the committee has been up to this year but also specifically about our jobs um so I wanted to start with our mission on the diversity inclusion and racial Equity committee which is to identify and disrupt systemic barriers eliminate disparities based on student and family characteristics and create a safe School climate where all students feel safe that we can thrive this is the mission statement that our committee worked on when we first began working together in the fall of 2012 co-create and was really representative of what everybody wants to see happen at that time and in thinking about what this work has come to mean in Highlands the first thing that
004I think of is a point that made me really proud in our Panorama survey data this year and that was a series of questions that we're asking about how respectful teachers were students and the extent to which when a teacher asked a student how their day was they actually wanted to know the answer and when we ask those questions we found that 69 of students in grades three through five responded favorably 87 of students from grade 6 through 12 respond to free Berkeley and 76 of parents and family teachers were training children students and that was true across demographic groups I think this really speaks to what makes Thailand so strong and that we are a school system of immense and genuine care that teachers and school adults really care for students and in my
005view what the equity work aims to do is to leverage that care for better serving policy as well we have seen significant improvements in areas like students feeling empowered to have conversations about race in the classroom to have sometimes difficult conversations about current events still do see disparities in gaps and that growth hasn't necessarily been shared across all demographic groups so especially in terms of categories like sense of belonging in terms of rigorous expectations we see that our black and African-American students and our Latino Or Hispanic students report significantly lower favorability ratings when it comes to their sense of belonging in the schools and also in terms of the expectations that their teachers have from them so I'm sharing that just to say and just sort of anchor this evening by saying that really the
006work of equity in Thailand is just beginning so before I get into the policy that we worked on this year I just want to very quickly talk about some of the things that we were working on this year on the direct committee so this year our building level committees were really building capacity so our elementary school middle school and high school level committees were really becoming the engine of this work on the ground level really thinking about what this work is going to mean in each of those buildings at those different developmental stages um we also had one one thing that I felt was really successful was we had some district-wide professional development based on the Panorama survey data so really giving teachers the opportunity to work directly with the data and think about how
007that could shift their practice how that could inform their teaching thinking about what our students are saying and how that can help us to better serve them and currently we have some summer work um building we had curriculum review that many teachers took advantage of based on the New York State culturally responsive sustaining education framework using a review tool that Highland teachers made in 2020 and we also had two summer book studies one on Dr Jennifer eberhard's book biased which explores the social psychology of implicit bias and how that impacts our various institutions not least about education and we also had a summer book study on not light but Fire by Matthew RK which is about but really the biggest thing that we were focused on this year on the direct committee was developing draft
008board policy on equity and we took that on because of guidance from the state so in May of 2021 the New York State Board of presents issued a policy statement on diversity equity and inclusion in New York state schools this statement emphasized that the board expects that all school districts and institutions of higher education will develop and Implement policies and practices that Advance diversity equity and inclusion and that they will Implement such policies with a sense of fidelity and purchasing it's a statement outlined that such policies should consider governance teaching and learning family community engagement Workforce diversity diverse schools and learning opportunities continue supports discipline the policy statement further explains that a growing body of research declines that all students benefit when their schools Implement strong DDI policies and practices including academic cognitive Civic social
009emotional and economic strong di policies in partnership with parents and families Empower students from all backgrounds to visualize successful futures for themselves and provide them with a sense of belonging and self-worth these benefits can lead to improve student achievement which in turn can lead to better outcomes in other areas of their lives including work through simplification this is true regardless of the school's geographic location or the demographic composition of its students and faculty so following this guidance from the state the New York State School Board Association created policy 0105 and Erie one of those who's created draft policies 3430 you have copies of both of those in your pocket and the direct committee you refer to both of those resources as well as others in developing apology that was still tailored to our destruction our
010community so many school districts in our area have already approved and are implementing Equity policies and many more have such policies in progress or working towards approving these so these are the ones in Foster County in Dutchess County in Orange County Department you can also see the date that they approach Community policy of each district so we on the committee would really love to see Highlands be the next District in Ulster County to approve board Equity policy and the draft policy that you see before you that you received a few weeks ago and also that is is copying your hands out is really the result of a year-long collaboration so this was a process that truly was Grassroots it was drafted by our stakeholders by parents by students by teachers um and we went through
011several iterations I know those of you who were on the committee were familiar with that process that we we really worked collectively to create this a policy that we felt really met our needs so the question might arise why is it necessary to approve policy right we already have this work ongoing absence of policy policy the districts already established a diversity equity and inclusion committee which is part of what a lot of these policies have done in other relationships is to establish a community um in our view on the committee it signifies a commitment to impacted stakeholders to students and families who have experienced inequity to really make clear that the district is serious about this work I think it also ensures longevity of these initiatives wanting that you assessed on the committee was making
012these priorities for the district Outlast current Personnel or sort of Shifting priorities in education and also one thing that's really important about this policy is that it creates clear structures for accountability that ensure that this work is Meaningful right that it's not especially going through the emotions right but it's actually making a difference in students lives um so I'll just very briefly talk through some of the main points of the policy draft I know um you've all seen it and it is in front of you in full um so there are basically five main sections of the substance into a section of the policy um the first four are based on our four focused areas on the direct committee District climate and culture curriculum professional development and staff diversity so and the fifth section is
013about accountability transparency and review which I'll talk about in just a moment um so the district climate and culture section really establishes priorities for creating an environment that is free of racism and discrimination of any kind where students and all families and all students feel welcome in the district the curriculum section centers teaching and learning that is culturally responsive that is education that treats students diverse cultural identities as an asset rather than a deficit when it comes to learning um that looks at ways of giving students here and window opportunities right opportunities to see themselves reflected in their curriculum to see that there is a place for them in literature in science in math and also window opportunities so opportunities to understand empathize with experiences that are different from their home culturally responsive education also
014seeks to empower students as agents in their own learning and equip them with the tools of critical thinking that are becoming increasingly essential not just for College and Career Readiness but also for informed citizenship um and the professional development portion of the policy discusses the provision of training for faculty and staff to equip for the above goals so in order for these schools to be met when it comes to climate and culture and curriculum there will have to be developmental stacked in those goals and finally the staff diversity section commits to a hiring process that is rigorous fair and Equitable and over time will attempt to cultivate a staff that is more reflective of increasingly diverse student body here in Thailand and the final section of the policy is the accountability transparency of your resection
015and this section formalizes the process and the goal of the direct committee which has already been existent now for three years and and it also qualifies the role of the diversity equity and inclusion liaison the other thing that this section says is that it establishes a protocol for the annual reporting of data I think this is a really powerful part of the policy um in that there would be an annual report presented to the board to the direct committee and also to administrators that would uh provide automated data when it comes to achievement and so things like GPA course placement graduation rates and also disciplinary data so things like suspensions and referrals and also would incorporate responses from any climate survey so right now that would be the Panama survey would be included in this
016report and uh it would also include a report on any initiatives that are ongoing So speaking on behalf of the committee I think that putting this policy in place would really help to establish this accountability and to really provide some valuable tools for the district to ensure that this work is Meaningful so I'm going to close for this evening with this quote from Maya Angelou who says that every person needs a place that is furnished for me as a teacher education is all about the future right it's about informing our students with a vision of their own future that is bright and for which they feel well equipped and it's also about giving them the tools to imagine a collected future uh that they have the power to shape so when we first began work
017on this policy on the committee I asked our community members to imagine that it was the first day of school in 2032. and I asked them what looks different what feels different I asked them what does a Highland Central School District in which diversity inclusion and racial Equity are prioritized look like and their answers became the vision section of this policy it's important that's materials and what they said was they began to describe a place where students felt home where students could advocate for themselves and for others and a place where students felt comfortable taking the academic and personal risks that are essential for growth and learning their answers described in other words a place that was furnished with hope so that is where I'll close for this evening and I'm happy to respond to
018questions now or as they arise thank you Harriet has anyone have any questions at this point Mike it's the dialogue thank you and thank you for coming in tonight to present this to us when I look at your the draft policy of the committee and I look at the structure from the state and just policy in general there's some differences there that usually our board policies very broad they don't have visions and all these types of things um so how do you how do we reconcile the two right so if you look at the structure and I'm very familiar with policy structure um and I look at the draft there's just differences there's differences in headings and that kind of thing so you know the policy committee might take some time and massage this one
019so we certainly incorporate all the good that was uh handed forward but still is policy it does a spillover into admin regulations and that heavy detail those were some of the questions oh go ahead Camille you got a question for Harriet I got a question but just I know that I was um at some of the meetings so we did reference other school districts so someone that was bottled at other school districts so they found ways to kind of make this work um as policy so I know um I'll take a look if you like reference the ones that we looked at the sunflowers that we looked at yeah I can't remember the top of my head I believe Erie one is your framework so we did before I started with Gary one and the
020inespa framework but there were also one along a specific school districts that we referred to um I don't want to say the wrong District but I can definitely share those and and as you get the policy committee gets together for this work I'll do my homework at a time no problem yeah what I mean everybody knows I mean one of the major functions of the board of education is policy so this being um like Mike had said most of our policies are somewhat brought this seems and I just glanced through it you know more specific so I think we have to vet this uh I would refer it to our policy committee but Mike being the lead of that policy committee would you want to refer back to the entire board having discussion at several
021meetings to kind of uh or would you like to vet it and then come back with some of your recommendations based on the committee to the rest of the board I think uh for now let's put this under new business and then I'll look to kind of report out back what I found and uh you know what emerges and then we'll shift it to Old business but eventually we'll come up with something and do a first read second read and get that going and then as far as legal as legal reviewed they come back with yes um they reviewed it and actually it's a quote they said it was one of the better ones they have seen they've seen several submitted to them over the past couple of years um and there were very few
022recommendations for changes from their perspective what would be a recommendation well one of the recommendations that they had was the um Harry what was there was only two or three one was about the liaison and what type of compensation that that he or she gets um um it was explained it was reminded that that's not part of a board policy it's more of a part of a contractual Collective Department agreement so that was one of them another one was one of the definitions um was um it could have been misconstrued at the last few pages of it or definition so one of them was just tighten up the definition I think we took the term out actually I think we just redefined it yeah yeah there's a few wordings yeah but those were the two
023biggest recommendations that they had and that was cool through our district legal counsel VES would be interesting they do represent a lot of the school districts they do right and uh how many of them might be on this list how many aren't yeah I don't know I I do know that I'm one of us when I had the conversation with the attorney she told me that um a beacon had just approved theirs that she had reviewed that was the most recent one um which actually did is it on the list um that was the only one she had referred to during my conversation but um I don't know how many that would be we can get there we could probably get that information though yeah it's just you know it's a point of reference yeah
024you know thank you yeah I mean it's going to be a tough decision with the board moving this forward if there's any any kind of tweaking to it because as we all know I mean we have quite a few policies under uh the district and uh some of them are simple and not as broad as this so This encompasses a lot and there's a lot of language in it so I think we have to take our time to kind of sort of dissect it a little bit make sure that we are comfortable moving this forward as people were policy because this will be a major move in in the direction of equity occlusion Etc in our district so I want to make sure that we have enough time to vet it and to be able
025to understand the implications it will have on our district moving forward so I appreciate all your work the whole committee over the years and I know we'll have continuous discussion moving this forward thank you thank you Harris thank you it's good for a meeting did she say no thank you no she said thank you that's I should grabs the bag okay moving on to consent items um from fa1 to B 2.1 if anyone has any questions you want to pull anything out and have a separate discussion and vote we can do that I think Lindsay gave us enough backup information under that business and operations uh the restricted Reserve plan and reauthorization for the tax cert and the issue with vineyard Highlands Associates uh if you want to ask Lindsay any further questions regarding that
026we can before we move it forward but otherwise I'll take a motion to move our consent uh agenda items forward motion by Tom second by Camille everyone's okay with taking it as a complete block yeah looks good good to see that we're hiring a school bus driver I know there's a big need for those I did have a pla a question on the reserve and I know that's a reauthorization but I just was asking and I'm I'm kind of keyed in on The Bold areas that end like addition to ERS Reserve Edition and TRS Reserve because that represents increases for the up goals for the upcoming year right um what does it mean so additional funding on the Capital Construction reserve it says fully funded what does that mean down below fully funded means that
027we have put we will now have put three million dollars into the capital reserve so we can no longer put any more funds into the capital reserve it's not a up to 3 million at any point in time it's 3 million over the past the aggregate yes so okay so what the Auditors have suggested was um opening up a new capital reserve at the for this for the next budget cycle and then we could roll the funds that we currently have in the old capital reserve into the new capital reserve if it were to be approved authorized by uh our Auditors and even legal that yes I thought we had it when it came to the sunset of that you talk about the building capital reserve the building capitalism yes we can roll it into
028it I was told that if we do open one up prior to this expiring we could roll do they have to approve the opening up of the new one yes yes so it's the same thing it just gives us a chance to support that money but it was explained to us that that kept like whatever was in that initial fund needed to be fully expended that was my back seven years ago that we had two years when it came to so we had to expend that money and then establish a new one but if we can roll it over that was the information that I received that money gonna offset the cost of the existing Capital project it's um it can we only use that 1.5 yeah yes ten because that's what was um voter
029approval um with the um transportation initiative that's happening those Capital to open up a new capital um reserve for those purposes we could do that for the infrastructure so we have to have a purpose for the capital all right right um the electricity that might be something we talked more about um I also gave the audit committee a list of different reserves that we could um also open up we have the sr3 grant is coming to an end after this year which these grants have done as well because they've given us the ability to fund these reserves but once those grants stop then you know we will be using the reserves more than yes thank you for that's going to be on our agenda at some point yeah Boston capital reserve forward saying three million
030good for us helping the community out absolutely it's ensure you know additional ensuring of assets the operations so no it looks real good and I appreciate what well and it was it was a good um it was a good point during the the promotion of the project that we had put some money away so we weren't oh yeah everything up the folks that I did speak to they were very happy to see that we were thinking ahead so little skin and that type of thinking ahead I think is important as we move forward Mark you mentioned moving forward with the establishment of that reserve for electrical infrastructure site in the district correct one one example of a need that this is that that's the need and we did talk about it um and that would
031be for on-site within the district you know near the buildings that kind of infrastructure no that's good as long as the infrastructure coming up to the property is in place oh well I'm sure this is going to be talked about at support sir there's a whole year yeah is the intent to establish this Reserve when we say this year during the budget vote cycle it would be another option okay so yeah because we will most likely at the end of this year be able to still contribute to our reserves because we have the grant available to us so this will be this will be benefiting us for further down the road but we'll be able to contribute to it now if the life cycle of the reserve seven years or we can establish you can
032it was well it was 10 years but we funded it so we'll have the ability because of the grant to fund a reserve now um so it would probably be in our best interest to look into it for this budget to establish it yeah you established this May 19 2015 by voter approval and it's fully funded every Mill in there and if this is something that the board wants to look further into I can get more concrete information but based off the phone conversations I've had with the Auditors and the attorney we were able to move it over as long as it wasn't expired yeah sounds right sounds good so maybe maybe I'd misinterpret back then that maybe if we didn't if we didn't expend it all at the sunset then we had to if
033we weren't going to establish a new one moving forward and all of that yeah well when you're establishing one in that resolution it'll probably talk about the transfer similar to what resolution okay and then we'll have to have some clear promotional materials within the budget presentation to explain that and make sure that the newsletter speaks to that yeah absolutely that's I think that's the way you sell it yeah okay moving on Dr Boyd here um resolution by Tom second by Camille all those in favor aye opposed so Perry six zero now you're up I'll be uh brief tonight um I know Mr zero is going to talk about uh new teacher orientation um but I was able to meet with uh as part of the orientation all of our staff members and talk about what
034EPS is and does uh through the school year so it's a great chance uh for some of those teachers that I don't always interact with to get to know them because they will come across the students that we are working with um so it was a it was a nice opportunity to work with them I met with the PPS administrators throughout the county today um this afternoon we don't typically meet during the summer but we did get ahead of looking at the year upcoming regulations and trying to plan for the county and the upcoming changes there's a lot of talk about what preschool will look like in the future um so trying to be prepared for that um we are anticipating we don't know when but we're going to be taking some more of the
035burden there so just trying to be mindful of that um we continue to handle our transfers that are coming in and out uh so that we are ready for opening day uh each year there are always some last minute uh registrations that we'll get on that Tuesday or Wednesday right before the students arrive so uh trying to uh have the rest out of the way uh and situated so we can handle those as they come in so we can get kids in as quickly as possible uh lastly one of our policies states that uh we need to have a special education District plan approved every two years so we did do that two years ago so we'll we'll be sending you uh our updated District plan over the next few weeks for your review for
036uh for approval to meet the okay any questions thank you Patrick Mr Zimmer good evening everyone uh we had a great two days last Wednesday and Thursday right in this room with new teacher orientation um 12 new hiries got uh attended and they got to meet secretaries from across the district as well as uh any administrators that were here and also they had lunch with their HTA Union leadership moreover there were presentations from um Rich Fisher from the technology department Carly Jacobson did a presentation about Dr Boyd did the presentation Harriet Meyer and Julian Sam from the business office um so it was a jam-packed day with a lot of information and um and it was great welcoming the the new teachers um we heard a really strong group of teachers this year and I'm
037confident that they will accomplish great things here in Highlands looking forward to working with them I'm happy to report that where we are ready for computer-based testing otherwise known as CBT for all of our grades three through eight tests the math and Ela on both Mr McCormick at the elementary school Miss Coburn at the middle school are ready to go as is Rich Fisher and our technology department um I know Megan and Ian are going to a conference next week that outlines and provides some support with that um so we'll hear more about it as the year goes on but we are moving forward with that all ready for it and finally we heard from the New York State education department and our application for the Seal of Civic Readiness has been approved not only
038does this provide our students one more Pathway to graduation but it formally acknowledges our students all of their work surrounding Civic issues I'd like to thank Christina saller and Barry and Ali two of our social disease teachers for their hard work on this application submitting it and for a job well done so we got the approval and we'll move forward with that I plan on asking uh Chrissy seller to attend the board meeting in September October to do a brief presentation about um really what it looks like at the high school level so we're excited about that and that's all I have for you this evening any questions for the computer investing especially as familiar with the computers is there going to be more kind of questions on the math side of things and the
039writing I mean yeah so there will be um there'll be a little more instruction within the regular classroom as well as in the stem classes they'll be um keyboarding instruction as well as navigating the computer and how to get around that was already discussed with um some of the teachers and with the administrators there there's also some pre-tests built in yeah which would be most likely though right they'll let them just get a little more familiar with it yeah um so that's great for a Serial Civic Readiness what what where are we at with Lucilla by literacy and we we haven't applied at this point not yet yeah it was one at a time yes um that wasn't something that we we had discussed since or since I've been here so but you can certainly
040look into it and move forward with that being given what we offer I'm sure we have a lot of kids that will qualify for that very easily yes I believe that too I will uh look into that Bill thank you Joel all right so I always start out and say I'm not going to say much and then I end up with four pages so bear with me for a couple of minutes uh I attended the Ulster County superintendent's Retreat uh August 8th or sorry August 9th to the 11th um say that was there uh letting us know what their uh focuses are for the upcoming year including uh literacy standards looking at those again certification Pathways graduation measures uh they have not taken uh their eye off of the inclusion work so the equity and
041inclusion works so it's good that that ties in with this this evening and uh and then support uh creating a support line for computer-based testing prior to the init the rollout for a district or um Statewide so um that is something that is was very helpful and and good to hear that there would be um someone to call when things might not go as as you might expect we also went through a recalibration for lead evaluators for principals and uh the BOCES uh superintendent talked about about the different BOCES offerings that they're looking at for the future I also attended the Mid-Hudson Catskill Council of school superintendents and we had our initial meeting for the summer we have another one coming up in a couple of weeks and that we're focusing on uh leadership across
042the board District leaders and building leaders and we will be hosting Peter DeWitt someone who's written many books on leadership out of the opening area he'll be coming to the the Four County JMT they call it uh sponsored by the Mid-Hudson Council that will be in October um just as an update on the building project phase one rfps went out last week and put I know I put this in my update but there will be a contractor walk through at the end of this week and we also have Chenango Contracting coming on 825 to complete a survey of the existing field conditions to help in the design phase of phase two uh and bid opening is set for September 15th I know we mentioned that at the last board meeting at 3 pm I do
043want to recognize Bill for the hard work that he put in to get new teacher orientation off the ground uh really reinvigorated that program so um teachers walked out with a plethora of information ready to get started so thank you for the work you did on that um also when I was in uh uh or at the retreat with the superintendents uh Ellenville and rondout talked about uh the use of a BOCES grant for threat assessment work uh they were part of phase one in 2223 so I expressed interest in being part of that Grant work uh BOCES has applied for the grant and they're doing it in in phases so I asked to be part of phase two so for the 23-24 school year I have not heard back from them as of yet
044but I will follow up with them again at the end of the week our opening day letter will be going out later this week another shout out um here for Jessica Murray if you've been face uh watching our Facebook page each of our new teachers is being highlighted um with some background information about them so that was a nice touch that we added this year and she's the one who is getting all of that information together so if you haven't seen it or you don't have Facebook I can show you before you leave tonight it really is a nice it's a nice feature uh tomorrow night we have uh sixth grade orientation for over two sessions four to five fifteen and six two seven fifteen at the middle school Wednesday night we have seventh and
0458th grade schedule pickup from four to seven Thursday night we have uh Grade 9 orientation at the high school from four to six our superintendents conference days are uh well underway and being planned um those are scheduled for Tuesday September 5th and Wednesday September 6th um we will be also holding two sessions of kindergarten orientation on the sixth and the first day of school with students will be on September 7th um on Tuesday uh tomorrow Lindsay Pete and Kathy will be meeting with Andrew balone from Central Hudson with the school Fleet assessment uh Team regarding electric buses so getting that uh assessment underway and just a final thing here just thank Kathy mcculic for getting those bus routes out to parents via email and the social media um and she is trying very hard to
046fill any remaining driver positions uh just a quick story on that I came in to meet the new teachers last week and I did my and my normal Spiel and I left and I'm like oh wait I was going to talk about bus driver so I walked back in and I'm glad I did because I mentioned if you know anyone who has a CDL and can drive School Bus we are hiring and one of the young young men said that his brother was possibly interested so over lunch Kathy got the brother's phone number and called the brother and said your brother called and said you're looking for a bus driver position come and see us so I have not connected with her to see if that's all worked out but uh we'll find people in
047the strangest places I know I told this story last year but I found somebody when I was on the rail trail with my bike last year that guy did not stick around very long um but he served us well for a few weeks and Kathy picked up the phone and asked him if he was still working or interested in uh working and he was coming in to meet with her I think today so things are going I think it's important for all of us as a community to constantly talk about those possibilities and options we've uh we've done the the Flyers at Hannaford we've done the email to parents I know any parents that are in the room you've seen the emails come absolutely and we'll continue to do that over the next few weeks
048and hopefully we can Garner a couple more candidates that's what I have any questions for Joel you don't know um how many plan holders currently on on the project they give you an update on that no yeah I'm like wait I remember talking about plant holders okay what do you what do you have like uh a list or when we have a list of who we uh plans out to probably tomorrow or Thursday morning and it's obviously it's ongoing as yeah be interested in a second so I can I can include that in my Friday update as those come in so you can get those to me that'd be great for a universal Pre-K how is that the round yellow yes no news is good news everything is over moving forward well two thumbs up
049okay uh we'll move on to Board of Education new business our athletic code of conduct policy handbook it resolves the Board of Education upon the recommendation of the superintendent approve the attached Island Central School athletic code of conduct policy handbook as presented to the board of this meeting have a motion please motion by Janine second by Camille discussion yeah just a comment so you know the updates aren't many in that policy and they were also highlighted just you know I crazy about zero tolerance policies unless it applies to physical violence and this so you know a child makes a mistake with tobacco or other and they're this policy allows for them to be excluded for the rest of the year discussion I just felt that's a little harsh Zero Tolerance except when it applies to
050physical violence it's kind of the norm you know I don't I don't know how the board felt about that well from a past experience I I do believe it's harsh but um it was experienced uh quite a while ago and I know other student athletes had experienced had zero tolerance and in fact we had one parent uh petition us and came to one of our executive sessions to try to sway your decision on that so um I know initially it's it's harsh but I think when it happens I think the student athlete really you know takes it to heart and eventually developed themselves into a better person from what I've seen with what happened over the last 20 years that I've been on the board I mean we've had calls back it's always been in
051the policy as it was highlighted or it was applied that way it was in the policy there was there was first and second offenses for out for tobacco but not for alcohol or drugs gotcha there was a time also years ago when you know parents were renting hotel rooms with kids going partying it was that was happening about 20 years ago or so and there was nothing anybody could really do it was on site it wasn't anybody's house it was you know hearsay and this and the other thing was proven you know that was happening but it created a situation where the district we only couldn't beat out any um I don't know in the last three or four years I don't think we've experienced anything like that led to that Zero Tolerance where we
052excluded one of the student athletes from participating I don't think just a comment no I mean just I'm going to support the group if everybody looks like they're going to support it was was the absentee and the tardiness that hopefully we address I know bill was principles and several years that's being addressed yeah again sure that you know a student athlete would not show up for today or come in late and then coming at two and be ready for the big game an hour later I got you yeah okay fair enough I just wanted to float that out there it seems like there's some what's here yeah thank you yeah I think it's given where we're at with um The Vaping and everything like I'm with you with the zero tolerance but I think it's
053like you're you know playing a sports a privilege um so I think you know that's kind of where I'm at like I know it's an issue um it's been an issue so I feel like actually you don't have to play a sport you know I would hope that if we're taking that stance with the athletes I'm hoping to that mistaken I'm still nursing until when it happens just in the classroom because I think we should you know that's that's like zero tolerance but just make a pitch know that we're not um tolerating the drug alcohol drug abuse and then I just I did have it's talented it's senior year um gets caught in a vape situation and now this policy says they can be off for the rest of the season hey drug test you
054in college though but I know that they drill them I know that they announced this to parents and students so yeah I mean you know you know what you're up for yes I think drug test in college yeah okay okay we're good then just the question I had um just like who who does the just like I like like with the attendance and academics who monitors what and how does that so you know if I miss half a day or a school um or more than that like who's going to tell the coach because their coaches are not all here in high school they don't know who's asking so just curious like what's that what's the protocol or the process to ensure that it's being here to simulate with the with the academics like who's
055monitoring so I don't know if it's still going currently going on but I can speak to when I was principal that um the coaches would check in with the athletic department and Elizabeth saliniti would give them updates about that they would check the coaches would check the attendance it is true that several of the coaches if they're not employees of the district they don't have access to our student data management system so they can't look themselves so very often they would check in with Elizabeth those who are coaches in the district have access to see oh I'm sorry those who are teachers who are employees of the district have access to see the attendance um so I believe that it's still consistent like that I certainly hope so that I that I do know that
056the coaches that are employees in the district they would check in in the athletic office each day to and Elizabeth selling entry would uh look up the student so that Alex was that and Crosses that they have to check in are we hope that all right you know it's a very good question let's let's ask the ad that in his next update to include how the athletic right because you know Bill kind of knows but doesn't know but the A.D should right I hope it still as consistent as it was I I can't speak to that though we're at the beginning of a school year so no better times then just the other question we're going on this tonight so false uh fall Sports started today and I know we need to go and um
057so called family ID and you say yes I could attend it so I just put I guess one let's just go into effect when we already went into as parents went into the um foreign meeting and that's why it was important that this get approved this evening so that all parents would get this at that parent meeting I don't know the exact date on that Tuesday I think it's next week it's one Tuesday yeah yeah 29th yeah we're good a little favor aye opposed so Carrie under old business uh we had the public hearing district-wide safety Plan B results Board of Education on the recommendation of the superintendent approved the 2023-2024 district-wide emergency response plan as presented to the board during today's public hearing kind of emotional motion by Mike second uh Janae discussion all
058those in favor aye opposed so carry um under miscellaneous we are going to have I'm going to schedule a board retreat in September of time I'll I'll check with everyone and see what's a better day and then we'll go out to a venue and have our board retreat and just curious did anyone see an article last night on I think it was NBC News uh regarding cell phones in schools now there is a somewhat of a push Nationwide with cell phones in the school where to not use them or not have access to them there's a company out there that developed this pouch um so Middletown when you walk into the school is that is that the same one yeah welcome to school you put the phone on a pouch and when you leave you
059have to hit a electronic uh release and it releases the little lock on it and you take your cell phone out if they can carry it around with them you know the pouch yeah it's it's called Yonder y-o-n yeah so they'll do with an article last night carry their own cell phone they interviewed several District superintendents out in South the Midwest and they felt one principal felt that uh students weren't engaged because they're more on their cell phone than being engaged in classroom discussion uh I'm a firm believer I mean if a parent's going to say well we need it for an emergency I mean I'm old school I went through there's a way around that we always called the district office or the school office and you got in touch within yeah is it
060you know for a lockdown do you want to notify your parents that there's a lockdown I don't know if that's necessary I really don't but again I'm old school we had some younger generation parents here so um I can't speak to so uh School in the area that has it so the high school hasn't started into February and the students when they walk in they have their pouch phone goes in the pouch so I'll make sure that it's actually closed because we close it um and it stays like that the whole entire day when it comes time for this missile the mat the um the magnetizing stations are you can slide them off you know slide them onto the wall they're put in around all the different areas and then they unlock you know they
061unlock it they take the phone out they go home and then same process over so so we've seen it decrease um and just distracted Behavior because of it so it does take time to get used to not having your phone um it's a Middletown dust the earbuds and uh earbuds and the phones watches are fine if you misplace your cell phone you thought you lost your firstborn that's how bad it is that's how we are and there's devices inside the offices employees yes I mean so it's it works you know yes it's a fight because everyone's not gonna be on board but that's I guess that's but I mean it's working right I brought it up a bunch of years ago in regards to that and and some teachers came back and said they utilize
062them in the class but now that we're issued devices to every student there's not the needs curve that cell phone to it's just my opinion I'm not forward or against it but I just wanted to throw down and that's in that situation if a student doesn't use it still you find them on their phone then looks uh what would be a consequence for that yeah so so it's um it depends I don't know it depends on how often it happens yeah certainly just a conversation um but it is true so I mean I could I could bring in a pouch and a man if you wanted to see a next meeting I can grab like one in I think it's great because it makes the kid responsible you know they have it I know my
063son said you can't use it I like it I'll tell you a funny story this is true it's one of our staff members told the child to put put your cell phone away your cell phone away you said it like four times put your cell phone away all the student go to the nurse's office it's a nurse calls him up the classroom said why'd you send Johnny down here can't hear him anyway uh anything else for good welfare in the district which is an obstacle course is that gonna be fixed before school starts hopefully okay I was just kidding we need about five million dollars and we can fix it no uh Channel Lloyd uh grounded out last week and uh tabloid and the kind of sofas Highway Department is going to pave it hopefully
064before it rains this week oh okay because I was here and it was fine and the next time it came and I was like oh when did that happen wow because if we didn't do anything this year we probably would have plowed about half of it away I was just curious okay thank you what they milled is was all because I know there's other areas that you try to do each each year email to a dollar amount we could Mill a lot more yeah yeah we milled the dollar amount the more spots if they can't even get Town ropes done and they're doing that no it's all in the silver thank you okay I'll open up the public comments is it possible so we do a lot of recognition for the um the all right
065oh my gosh fine um but so we recognize the students every month is it possible too like we have a lot of kids that sell in other areas like music um you know sports but just to recognize some of the other kids that are also doing certain things outside of that to just kind of hoping that we can see more kids recognize each month for other things kids are going to the Nissan different levels like that but we don't really hear it much about this I've seen it I've seen some things on Facebook or um or just one word of mouth but just for us to recognize them a little more publicly okay we're good um like we want to go into exec correct for yeah brief uh yeah brief discussion on contracts okay public
066comment promotion to adjourn to go into public executive session for uh contract discussion and we will not be re-entering session motion by Heather second by Mike thank you all of the favor aye so okay