001e e e okay good evening I'd like to call tonight's meeting to order today is December 12th 2024 welcome to the hard Park Central School District Board of Education meeting um let's see at this time can I get a motion to adjourn to Executive session for the purpose of discussing a tenure consideration and dis suspension dismissal or removal of a particular person or persons and consultation with legal so moved maret any discussion all those in favor I proposed motion carried we're now on Executive session e e e okay good good evening everyone um at this time I'd like to return to open session and if we can please rise for the Pledge of Allegiance un States thank you all right uh we Have No Agenda modifications so can I get a motion under 4.3 to
002adopt tonight's agenda so move tiits second Margaret any discussion all those in favor I opposed motion carried upcoming events okay okay Friday December 13th K through 12 2hour delay staff professional learning all schools per schedule Monday December 16th uh HMS Winter concert strings this is at havlin at 6:30 p.m. Tuesday December 17th havin Winter concert band is at havlin 6:30 p.m. Wednesday December 18th Hy Park Education Foundation meeting that's at HDE Park Elementary at 6 PM Thursday December 19th is the Violet AV Winter concert at Violet AV at 700 pm. Monday December 23rd through January 1st District closed for winter break and happy New Year all buildings and then Thursday January 9th uh Board of Education meeting will be at Ralph R Smith and that'll start at um 7 PM any other upcoming events um
003on Wednesday we will have a Winter concert at the okay Wednesday a Winter concert at FDR do you know what time um I think 7 or six I I'll repeat around 7 7 7 p.m. Winter concert at FDR the Community Schools Family Resource Center has a holiday event this Friday starting at 600 p.m. at HP and there will be lots of toy giveaways and fun activities for families okay anything else okay moving on to 6.1 Pride good evening everyone uh really excited to be sharing first and foremost if you take a look at this space this space has been renovated thanks to to our amazing Community who has supported a capital project uh everything from the seats to the ceiling to the Halo to the curtains everything has been restored in this amazing uh facility
004so just want to say thank you to our amazing Community for that support uh clicker oh yeah yeah yeah sorry about that um so at Violet Avenue on November 12th in the 13 uh Violet Avenue students 1 through five were able to go to Maris College theater and watch Beauty um watch their live play of Beauty and the Beast bed and breakfast um they were able to entertain all age groups and they offered um opportunities such as discussing the character settings problems and solutions um some some students were even had the opportunity to go up on stage and tell jokes um students got to also meet the characters after the performance V avue wants to thank mayor's college for providing this community uh this community with this service project uh the fifth grade students at
005VI Avenue and staff also traveled to Ellis Island and the Statue of Liberty on Thursday November 21st they had a wonderful day exploring immigration to the United States and many thanks to the community found ation of the Hudson Valley who helped to make this trip possible fifth grade classes also participated in December 2024 12 days of kindness they supported staff members in the building by volunteering um by reading stories collecting trash um Distributing breakfast organizing materials and handing out snacks and goodie bags to staff members students have expressed that it feels good to help others around this time and hope to motivate the vi Avenue Community to be kind to all in Netherwood third grade third grade students spent two weeks working on Cultural Arts um in their res Residency program uh vanber uh carvan
006world dance and the Music Company uh students were able to learn about the cultures of Mexico and Kenya through ART and dance classroom teachers and special Area Teachers supported the project the students also performed daytime dance performance to the students and then a nighttime performance for family members it was a fantastic show and they are very proud of the third graders for their hard work and at Netherwood you families can continue to view some of the artwork displayed in in their main lobby arafa Smith uh Jen House house uh their PTA or organized a movie night on Friday um the 6th students watched ice stage in the auditorium and the PTA provided snacks and hot chocolate for any families they also um NE Ralph far Smith will also like to recognize cim Lawrence for organizing
007and executing breakfast and books there was about 50 families who came to the building on Tuesday staff members volunteered that their time to read stories in the library and art room and the fourth graders are doing their annual trip to visit the uh New York City oh New York State Museum in Albany they went yesterday at FDR um our very own uh FDR senior Jason Yang participate participated as a violinist in the prestigious Conference of all state Symphony Orchestra in Rochester New York he rehearsed with his Ensemble about six hours per day for from Thursday to Sunday ending in a final concert the selection process for all state is highly competitive with thousands of students across all of New York State auditioning for very limited numbers of positions in the eight vocal and instrumental ensembles
008students must be High School juniors or seniors an audition at the nisma spring solo Festival the previous school year and even a perfect score on their solo doesn't guarantee selection so this is a significant accomplishment as part of the orchestra we're very proud of Jason and I myself had the opportunity to be a part of the school's Orchestra for eight years with Jason um so we're very proud of him uh also at FDR we're having a Spirit Week um next week starting Monday uh there is also we'll also have the um a repeating badman tournament on Friday and there is a George Deck rting contest between all the teachers so they're decorating their doors and seeing who decorates it the best for the holidays also on Saturday December 7th um all the classes participated in
009fundraising fundraising for during the craft fair um there was help they were helping vendors unload and load their cars with all of their merchandise and also there was there was concessions run throughout the entire day so we're very proud of all the classes for their hard work thank you think you're up now all right so I have the distinct pleasure of sharing some of the amazing pride in our district we have 14 FDR students participate in the New York State Music Association Zone 10 area Allstar Festival uh during the weekend of November 23rd although the students missed out on rehearsal time on Friday due to snowy weather they perform impressive concerts on Saturday so we had senior Taris roer uh was given the prestigious position of second chair chist while seniors Riley Dobbins and Tommy
010aario were selected for uh vocal soless so congratulations to our Scholars and thank you so much for exhibiting your music genius uh with the with our our our community and also our state we also have we also want to recognize Jason Yang uh who was selected to to the All State uh Orchestra um if you if you've ever had the chance to listen to our musicians perform they are they are amazing and so we are very fortunate to see these Scholars and musicians grow over time uh from the time that they were in elementary school I didn't get a chance to hear them during that time but I hear the progress that they've made has been extremely remarkable so kudos to uh our Scholars and our musicians and uh we also had oh I didn't
011see this picture oh that's a that's a great Photoshop so um so at Violet uh they actually have an annual uh Turkey Trot and so um the Turkey Trot involves the students participating in a health and well Wellness Fair where they're actually running around uh on the fields doing several laps and collecting feathers and um I had the distinct pleasure of of walking not running one lap and I was done um but it was it was a great time great time seeing the community come out we had the fire department the police department and all of our Scholars out there uh working um and and and just having a good old time so uh kudos to the staff over at Violet AV uh Elementary School we also want to recognize uh the students over at
012Violet again uh the students um participated in the student advisory uh Council and so each school has a superintendent student advisory Council they are identifying ways that we can continue to improve our schools these are our student leaders and so we're very excited um that this particular group has selected to increase the number of activities outdoors that the students can participate in so they really want to look at the black top and see how we can do more games for the school so that students have an opportunity to exercise and uh work together uh outside during recess and at this time uh I'm going to pass it over to to our Deputy superintendent good evening board uh superintendent Dr Roman and our guests in the audience as you know the Arts are very important to
013supporting a well-rounded experience for our students and each board meeting we highlight an artist and musician of the month so on the board you on our presentation tonight you see maybe shonan who is our artist of the month she is a seventh grader at havin Middle School an awesome student who's always putting her most creative artwork forward you can see the amazing picture there beside her photograph she sets a high bar for herself in each project and always reaches it maybe says whether it was coloring in a coloring book or scribbling on a piece of paper all over with my cray are always made me happy a piece of advice I would want to give to you is to never give up on Art no matter what anyone says about it keep on doing what
014you love alongside maybe we are recognizing our musician of the month Elizabeth Schmidt who is a Ralph R Smith fifth grader Elizabeth is a hardworking and enthusiastic saxophonist and the Ralph arith Advanced band she is consistently well prepared and always strives to do her best Elizabeth always does a wonderful job applying musical Concepts in general music and Elizabeth says I like band because it is really fun and a good challenge so please join me in celebrating our musician and artist of the month next one of the things that we've start we started last year was honoring and recognizing uh students from each building as our our portrait of a learner and also employees of a portrait of an employee of the High Park School District so principal Shaw will join me at the podium good
015evening it is my absolute pleasure to uh introduce to you two of our students who were selected as a portrait of a learner for havlin Middle School um I'm going to ask if I could be so brave Kenya if you could stand up for a second so Kenya is a sixth grade student nominated by her teacher Miss Eastman who's sitting over here and Miss Eastman shares that Kenya Hudson is a well-rounded polite friendly and kind sixth grade student she is always helpful to other students and adults whether it's working in small groups in science class with a partner in math or just helping students in the hall who may have dropped something or do not know where to go when students may be having a hard time asking for help Kenya will be the advocate
016she'll find an adult for that student Kenya always has her hand in the air to participate in class and ask clarifying questions regarding assignments and activities she has made a great transition to our building and to hav middle school we want to say congratulations Kenya yep next I want to welcome two people actually to the mic I want to welcome uh Miss matz first Miss matz is a teacher who nominated our second student eighth grade student I want to welcome Emily Javier France um good evening um my name is Christine Manz and I have the honor and privilege of com coming to this beautiful historic building every day um and working with such amazing students uh like Emily here so I'm going to read what I wrote when Mr Shaw put out the call for
017nominations um Emily came to the United States from the Dominican Republic at the beginning of this year speaking almost no English from the get-go she did not shy away from attempting to speak and write in English and has moved up to proficiency levels in the short time that she's been here this year Emily tried out for and made the modified volleyball team her skills improved dramatically throughout the season and she has a valuable opportunity to create bonds and friendships with girls outside her normal Spanish speaking Circle also this year Emily joined the creative writing Club her first writing project was an amazing piece that was introspective thoughtful very detailed and all in English Emily is willing to advocate for herself and asks for help whenever needed for example she needed help registering for the Washington
018DC trip and reached out to me multiple times until the process was complete Emily is a leader in her enl class and is helpful to the newcomers even though she is relatively new herself Emily is the portrait of a h High Park learner and personifies all five attributes in the most positive inspiring way congratulations [Applause] Emily take a picture probably the board President right we're just going to do a little photo op with Dr Roman and the board and our students like maybe right behind the stage go [Applause] in addition to our students we always honor our employees who demonstrate and exemplify the same attributes as our portrait of our learner through our portrait of their employees thank you so I have a pleasure of announcing two portraits of an employee this evening our first
019portrait of employee recognized tonight is Michelle Neiman Miss Neeman would you stand up I asked our staff to anonymously nominate colleagues for the portrait and we have the attributes and staff members wrote that Miss Neeman embodies the core values of the High Park Central School District's portrait of an employee demonstrating an un unwavering commitment to our students and colleagues her dedication to her work is exemplary she has consistently goes above and beyond to ensure that every student receives the support and guidance they need to succeed whether assisting a struggling student providing emotional support or partic ipating in leadership activities Miss Neeman is always willing to lend a helping hand Miss Neiman's positive attitude to supportive nature creates a welcom and inclusive environment for all students her colleagues rely on her for her expertise and her
020willingness to collaborate students in particular appreciate her patience her understanding and her encouragement congratulations Michelle our second recipient this evening is Mr Brad Phillips Mr Phillips are you still here come on down Mr Phillips Mr Phillips's commitment to practical skills development is evident in his approach to teaching by incorporating projects like CO2 rockets and cars he provides students with the opportunity to apply their knowledge and develop critical skills in engineering design and problem solving these experiences equip students with the tools they will need to succeed in a future academic and professional Endeavors Mr Phillips is more than just a teacher he's a mentor who genuinely cares about his Student Success his ability to form lasting relationships with students is truly remarkable I've even heard stories of current students sharing anecdotes about their grandparents I believe
021who've had Mr Phillips as a teacher in class this speaks volumes about the impact he has on students lives Mr Phillips is just an amazing human being and cooworker he's always ready to lend a hand when needed he knows more than anyone else about the history of this historic building and even when he's busy which as always he's there to help congratulations Mr [Applause] Phillips e any more Pride from anyone okay moving on to 7.1 our Capital project update at Violet AV with Tom Chester from Palumbo group y how's that there we go um so right now at Violet Avenue um we're wrapping up the HVAC renovation um all the heating is on on the refrigerant side for air conditioning in that building will be done uh in about a month and a half and
022then um we should be in good shape at Violet Avenue finishing up we finished this space that we're all in right now uh pretty recently it came out incredible and um it's very sensitive so uh Violet's taking a little longer than we hoped um but we do have a 100-year old building that is going to be fully air conditioned which is pretty cool um and that that building is all going to have a modern uh HVAC system in a very old space so uh we're looking forward to the finish of that and uh FDR is next the finish of FDR any questions about Violet did you say a month and a half left so end of January for yeah middle end of January okay yeah and we'll be back there in the spring making sure
023the hbac is the AC side is working when it's warm out so yeah okay any other questions for Tom thank you thank you uh moving on to 7.2 superintendence Report with Dr Roman just have uh two announcements uh the first one is I want to to thank all of our uh class leaders uh this past weekend on Saturday and all of the support staff that put this event together it was a holiday celebration with with uh crafts that were uh uh being provided by various vendors uh at FDR it was well attended it was a huge success and I know that there were numerous individuals that put that together including Bobby Goodman um so just want to say I if if you haven't had a chance to experience that space you have to attend next
024year uh and you have to come early because all the parking spaces were occupied and I intentionally went in there with with the intent to leave just with one bag I actually left with about six bags and did most of my holiday shopping so I just want to congratulate the students that were there uh they did a phenomenal job Elizabeth was there I saw her along with several other of our Scholars and just want to say thank you for all that you do for our community uh the second thing that I do want to uh share uh with the board is the foundation a update uh so the Rockefeller Institute issued uh several recommendations to change the foundation Aid this is the way in which schools um are are funded um and to to better
025understand um the recommendations I kind of just wanted to summarize five key points so they looked at uh phasing out the save harmless which is a provision that districts with declining enrollment um it prevents schools with declining enrollment from losing additional funds uh they're looking at updating the data uh so some of the data that they use is poverty and other factors that are very outdated and so that is something that is is being looked at uh the third is just the nuance calcul ations that are involved in creating the foundations uh I'm sure Linda really enjoys uh helping us with that uh calculation uh but the report suggests more Nuance calculations for funding based on students um with disabilities so including those the needs for students with disabilities in the calculation uh mental health
026supports uh the report recommends providing new support for mental health services and um and just overall uh it's just being the the formula is calling for more Equitable resources to be distributed to our our students and our our communities and so we're going to wait to see what the governor uh adopts in terms of those recommendations right now the governor has been vocal about uh the same save harmless um that's not something that we have to worry about right now but um we're going to see what all of these recommendations kind of play out and see once they start to be implemented to see how they're going to impact our district and we'll continue to input uh provide our our our board and our community updates on that uh that concludes my items okay thank
027you Dr Roman uh moving on to 7.3 our havin Middle School up update with Eric Shaw good evening to our Board of Education superintendent Roman Deputy superintendent Turner assistant superintendent lawon Steinberg and to our student board member Elizabeth to our faculty of Staff audience members here and online good evening it's with great pleasure and pride that I provided this opportunity to share with you some of the experiences and growth that our students have realized over this past year I have to and want to begin by thanking our teachers and staff for their daily efforts and supporting our students it's through their efforts that our students grow and find success at their level each and every day thank you to our building for demonstrating daily what it means to rise above we have a special treat
028we're going to be talking about our big read today tonight and we have some student presenters I'm G to ask our student presenters to maybe come up in the order what you're going to speak and come up here I'm just going to introduce to Big Reed and then we'll turn it over to you guys so if you guys want to stand up and come right up here second so this year's Spotlight in academics we we chose to do our sixth grade their participation in the Mid Hudson Library systems big read this is at least our seventh year with this I should probably Advance this so we're doing it together having the same problem thank you this is at least our seventh year with this collaboration which has brought many diverse reading experiences to our instructional
029program with all sixth graders participating in the big read I want to thank our teacher leaders for their support in making this experience happen thank you to Karen Armstrong for developing the curriculum and resources for instruction thank you to Dylan Shilo who couldn't be here this evening for bringing his collaboration with the artifact from pyy in to support our students for the the second year at row and thank you to miss Eastman and Miss Johnson for your support in readying our students for the presentation tonight and I I just want to thank you guys for continually to demonstrate what it means to rise above in all aspects of the work that we do so for me it is with great pleasure and on the on the screen here you you see a little bit about
030what what the experience was so I'm just going to give you the the um the high level look and our students going to share with you what it meant to them and what they learned through the process but this really is a collaboration with the mid huson Library System this year we had lots of choices our school chose to read the uh One Crazy Summer by Rita Williams Garcia and we also coupled that with a author's visit with Lisa Klein Ransom now not the author the book we read but author of the book that was chosen for the little read which was similar in in kind content as the big read and a collaboration with the AR effect of pypy which is really a two-e residency in teaching students how to make stopmotion videos related
031to this year's book quotes things that resonated with them and we do have a video to show at the end and now I'm going to provide an opportunity for our students to share a little bit about some of the uh experience they have with the uh big read and you can adjust that Mike how you need to all right go ahead and introduce yourself my name is Patrick Eastman I'm on the CIA team with Mrs Armstrong and Mrs Daniels the whole sixth grade we at One Crazy Summer it was about three girls from Brooklyn who live with their dad and big mom who is their Grandma they go to California to see their crazy mother Cecile who doesn't want anything to do with them Cecil has the girls attend a black panther Day Camp so
032they are not home with her the book talks about how the three sisters learn that living in Oakland with Cecil is very different than living in Brooklyn with Dad and big mom in the late 1960s at the end they also find out that Cecil isn't so mean and crazy and they might just come back next summer my name is Gabby I'm a sixth grader on the CIA team there are many young instructors who introduced my class to visual arts and media it helped us learn how to use animation to bring a scene to life I learned that there are people that can help you make a short movie like the one my group and I made with the help of an app this experience helped me learn that I could do more than I thought
033I could do some students didn't know what they are capable of creating and the artifact helps you learn what you can do hello sorry hello I'm Kenya and I'm representing the mayor's team the artifact was a great experience for everyone but especially for those who school is not easy for you could see them actually enjoying what they were learning and feeling included in a welcoming Community even shy ones came out of their show and we got to see their personality in a whole new way I think it brought School into a new life for everybody as well School can be enjoyable but you have to find things you enjoy and people to enjoy them with and no matter who you were or what race you were everyone felt open to express their thoughts feelings and
034ask for help without feeling ashamed for a lot of people this was an amazing experience and it was also a sentence starter which may seem insignificant at first but if you really think about it this was a topic that led to new friendships and for those who already had friendships grow stronger for example here are some quotes from people on the mar team Leilani M I liked learning how to animate I liked the help they provided and I liked how fun it was to share my creativity with others Lucy M inspiring to say the least Jane s my favorite thing was who was helping me with animating she was really nice I like learning how to animate it was my first time and I really lik doing the animations on the iPads that was really
035cool dinino L I like the teamwork and effort we had to put into it I like how you had to work with your teammates I like messing around on the iPads and animating it was a 10 out of 10 experience so as you can see many students loved animating and bringing the characters from our big re book One Crazy Summer to actual life how is a great place and the artifact just really made that more clear because here we don't just fly we SAR yeah please continue to give it up for Gabriella Patrick and Kenya thank you very much if we could we have an example of some of the work we did the collaborations between students if you want to go to the next slide go right ahead [Music] he I'm here [Music] thank
036you Bobby so that's just an example of some of the wonderful experiences and collaboration and work that's happening here hav middle school and I really just appreciate those who help put that together but really the work that happens every day in every classroom across all subjects is amazing to see and my my pleasure to share some of that with you guys we start tonight's uh presentation after instruction with uh attendance matters we want our students to attend today to achieve tomorrow and hav has been working really hard on improving our chronic absenteeism rate for those who may not know chronic absenteeism is marked as part of of our the expectation under the Essa regulation which says that students should be in attendance for school and if you missed more than 10% of the school day
037or school year which is really 18 days out of 180 10% you're considered chronic laps you can see our journey coming out of pandemic our our numbers mirrored a national trend of almost 25% or higher of students being chronically absent we continue that work uh we had a four-year commitment with we worked really diligently and purposely on two really clear um commitments one being instructional equity and the other being relational capacity and that school improvement work that we did we're attributing to the relationships that happen in our classrooms with our students with our teachers and making it that that welcoming and Firming environment for our students our school counsil focused on goal work for improving School attendance last year constant vigilance and having really clean data uh adopting this year a wildely important goal and
038it's really we're really proud to note that coming out of last school year we dropped down to 14.5% chronically absent a decrease of 11.1% uh our overall rate as of 122 when this presentation was put together on that day was uh 13.1% chronically absent for this school year and we're going to continue to do that work and I'm going to talk a little bit later about a building goal and some of the strategies that we're utilizing to help stay focused on that this is a little bit of a Learning Journey for those who may not be aware but hav Middle School was designated as a school in needing Improvement a a TSI school if you will in the 20192020 school year and then pandemic hit and we didn't have an opportunity to make improvements over
039that time until we were able to have state level assessments to see our growth and in 2022 we were able to move away from TSI for three subgroups and move into only one it was a new one that we added to the list and we were really excited to learn this past school year that uh this February we had confirmation that we are back to a school in good standing that's the old term it's now labeled as a local support and Improvement school because we're always wanting to improve we're never going to say we're finished and so I just pointed out because that was a long four-year Journey for this building and collaboration that took the effort of everybody who comes to school and comes to work here every day for that to be a
040success we're proud of that here I'll share a a a a snapshot view of ela and math results broken down by grade and uh at the sixth grade level if you look at those columns New York state is in the blue i' go all the way to the right uh and and then our district which is also our building our school our numbers aren't for our ad of District students aren't so large that they're going to change the percentage rates uh but you can see that the state is sitting there at at 44% and our students hit a 41% this is the closest that we've reached to the state average yet and that has a lot to do again with our purposeful efforts of our school improvement work over the last couple years and you'll
041see the same thing happening in seventh grade uh our growth has been quite real and quite um wonderful to experience because it is the hard work paying off and if we could look at eth grade as well you see some of similar growth and these growth if we were to compare year-to year you're going to see five six 7% increases year to year and the next three slides are our math results and we saw tremendous growth here that was uh frankly for us in some areas 12 or 133% growth from year to year but last year our sixth graders were at 47% proficiency with a state average of 51 our seventh grade EST State average was a little bit higher but our kids still grew quite a bit at 48% proficient and then finally in
042eighth grade mathematics 41% for State 37 the slide that doesn't show there is that uh 100% of our students who took the advanced algebra class also achieved Mastery not just proficiency inside the building uh we our BLT through our school improvement work looking at our data last year identifi three goals one of them was uh an attendance goal we continued that work for the previous year and it aligned quite nicely with the districtwide goal the widely important goal of uh decreasing chronic absenteeism or increasing daily attendance rates so inside of that goal go goal number one on the left uh we are supporting those District initiatives at the building level we're developing we have developed a hav Middle School attendance team that was not something we've had put in place since pandemic when we had
043a a chronic absenteeism team in 2020 when we really wanted to work hard at finding out where our students work we we've brought that back in and we're using that system to identify a couple things doing a deep dive in our data but then also looking at the tiered levels of support tier one tier two and tier three inside the mtss or the multi-tiered system of support structure that's available for us to say what what's going to be good for all students but then what are going to be good for our smaller set and an even smaller 3 to 5% at that top of that pyramid and so our next step in that data work is to begin our collaboration with our community schools Council we've already begun that work and then we're going to
044be having our school Liaisons we're super excited becoming a board to be able to help us roll up our sleeves and get out into the community and identify those barriers that prevent students from coming to school and do everything we can to erase them to have them in school every day our second goal is really a goal around always a focus on improving sort of the The Learning Experience the the climate and culture of the building and so we identified four areas around promoting collaboration and teamwork recognizing and celebrating achievements Improvement in communication transparency and fostering a culture of respect and inclusion and that piece is centered on a a staff uh survey that we gave out this past June and then we gave out again in September and our BLT when we meet monthly
045identify areas that we're going to take purposeful steps on on improving the experience here at haville middle school for our students but also for the people who work at our building as well and our third goal is really something that came back from feedback and um our data look which is really looking at utilizing our teacher leaders and our teacher resources to provide um opportunities for teachers to teach teachers in professional learning opportunities after school we actually had peers identify peers that would be great at teaching this or teaching that but we also surveyed surveyed folks on instructional strategies that we've brought in or presentations we've had over the last couple years our school improvement process to say hey who who needs a refresher course in this or the reality that every year we do
046bring on new staff because we have retirements that so people here maybe weren't here three years ago when we did a training on a qft or a training on writing as thinking through strategic inquiry or even the Avid writing strategy so we have a calendar up and and at the ready to uh provide those opportunities and those are the three goals that we're working on all with the focus on identifying ways to keep them sustain sustainable when they're not in our our minds ey have Focus so that's the work we're doing inside our BLT and for hav our C our family community engagement is so key having our family and Community as partners is what will make the success happen we start with a very a really strong PTA we had uh sort of a
047a brand new board come in this year we were left in a really good spot and we've grown since then and our PTA helps make the experience they do a lot of the the extra things that happen that really help grow the climate culture around uh our honor roll breakfast our Fall Fest school pictures we often have ice cream surprises the hot chocolate surprises as give backs to our students uh movie Nights indoors and out there's a lot of things that are happening our PTA brings to the experience for us and we we are really appreciative of them and our meeting attendance for our PTA is absolutely Skyrocket it's the largest attended time that we've had and this is my 12th year in the building so we're we're excited about the energy that comes with
048that experience that they bring and filters into our students uh we are planning our Ninth Annual minus the co time hav Middle School Community night that'll be in March of this year it typically is in the fall for those who have been around a while while but with the renovation of this wonderful Auditorium it really had an impact on our music program and our music program plays a key role in providing experience during our dinner as far as playing and singing so we partner with our music directors to move it to the spring so it has not been forgotten if folks were wondering uh we often get a lot lot of people asking but this is really a partnership with our community we bringing over 40 vendors for like a a booth Fair like atmosphere
049where it's a lot of resources for family that are available in the community at free or very low cost that they may not be aware of and so that that's a wonderful night where we also partner with um our our community in terms of a free meal it is a spaghetti meatball dinner some of our school vendors donate um capol and I park donates the sauce we have a family that's been with us the Babcock for almost 10 years now all students have long gone and graduated still come back and donate the meatballs because of the experience and what they they felt it meant to them when they were here at hav so we're excited about that um our Student Government their annual holiday food drive which fills the shelves of the High Park food
050pantry which is a much needed um thing to happen especially around the holidays and we know that our families participate in accessing that food our High Park resource officers program that is a really big uh commitment for High Park and it is a partnership that we have with our community we have a school resource officer stationed in our building every day there's also another one at the high school but they also support our elementary schools as well as far as partnering for safety uh our Avid experience is another Community engagement partnership that we have that includes guest speakers reading buddies we had been doing historically reading buddies at North Park for several years now we've now expanded to Ralph R Smith our our sister School in our campus and a really unique experience we had
051this year was uh I was contacted by uh a a teacher at Arlington high school and their AP History Class wanted to uh organize to have a historic places roadside marker we already on the historic registry that's on the front of the building but now we have a roadside uh a marker for that was a ceremony we did this fall it was a really exciting experience and um it really get us to really think about the history of this building think about FDR dedicating it 84 years earlier we did it on the day the FDR dedicated the building and that that uh sort of memory of saying that having education last here for another 100 years we're pretty close to that already and we're going to keep that strength going and I thank you very
052much and I'll open up for any questions anybody has I just want to say good job getting us to uh a school in good standing I know it was a tough road but uh congratulations thank you very much I just want to add to that oh sorry go ahead Mr I was I was I was simply going to say I would like to congratulate the entire havin Middle School Community I know this is a Allin effort right and I did have one question on the attendance data that's okay are you at all concerned that as of you know sort of less the halfway mark the absente rate is about the same as the annual rate for two years ago or does it not change much from here on in so I'm looking at the 23
05324 is total of 14% 2425 as of now is 13 so so it becomes a sort of a numbers game there so if you're a student like who missed days let's say let's say you were sick let's say you had covid let's say you were had a surgery whatever the case is you missed four or five days at the point where we pulled those numbers that put you at chronically absent but if you're not a student that historically has absentee issues as the year goes on There's an opportunity for those numbers to to drop because it's based on the percentage of days we had school so when I pulled that we were at 55 school days and so when we're at 180 and that student still at five they're not going to be on that
054list they're going to be in good standing themselves no problem um so I wanted to add to that um I know we're looking at data but first we can't ignore that you had a student come up here and say I learned that I can do do more than I thought I could and that we don't fly we soar those are really important messages from students so for me that's the big win tonight um that you have students first of all SE sixth grade who could get up in a room full of people and speak so eloquently um but but that that was really powerful and so whatever you're doing that students feel they can stand up here and say I learned that I can do more than I thought I could that's what's going to
055take kids further when they're faced with these tough tests they're they're faced with challenges in life right you're we're building that resiliency and those skills that are going to get them through so I want to start with um I just thought that was amazing um I liked in your data collection you had proficiency results for everybody and the state proficiency I would I would love to see over time what our proficiency rates were because I'm getting a sense that we're slowly moving the needle but um our proficiency is still below the state um and so for this year but because each of these are like we don't follow the the same group right so you know if we're looking at um level one two three four for a year it's a different group than the
056year before um but that I I think that state proficiency comp comparison is interesting I I looked at that data before this presentation and I looked at year toe just sixth grade to the new sixth grade but then also sixth graders last year or two years ago to to seventh grade last year and we are probably and the numbers going to be close but when we started our school improvement process we were at in some areas 16 17 percentage points away from the state average oh and now we've closed quite a gap in really it's four years of school improvement work but it's only been the last two years in which they were measured because 2021 and 2122 we didn't have state measurements to go by so we were in this holding pattern of school
057Improvement we couldn't get off the list because there was an assessment that would tie it to allow us to but um we we see in math and in one grade there was a 133% increase wow so that that 13 that that level of growth we've always over time have seen a percentage point two percentage points of growth but the level of growth that we saw in the last two years has been quite amazing and yes that that our data does bear that out if you look at the year-to year and go six to seven or S to eight okay or even fifth to six okay and then the other question that I always ask is in this work is there a need that hasn't been addressed or something that um you think havn needs that
058that we can support there will always be needs that come up so as we are right now focusing in this world of attendance chronic absenteeism better said increasing our daily attendance rate or we're in the world of making sure that our our work environment is the environment we want to be our climate is what we want to be or in a Work World of where teachers want to learn and professionally develop and professionally learn those are the areas right now that are are our strong focus and actually the the board and uh Dr Roman and assistant superintendent Turner have already supported that this year by Pro providing a space for us to have those PDS after school and allow those to happen so I it's already happening uh but there will be other needs that
059do come up as we are going to be going even tomorrow morning in our SPL day I were we had a wonderful turnout out of about 280 families over 700 students over half of our staff who filled out a perceptual survey we're going to be doing that data look tomorrow that's going to give us new implications or new targets to look at going into the future as we build our goals for the following school year any other uh questions I would just Echo what others said congratulations to yourself to your whole schol School community and uh as other said what a gorgeous Auditorium I feel like I'm at the plaza so great job things are looking up for havlin good job thank you very much okay thanks Mr [Applause] sh all right moving on to
0607.4 Humanities update with uh Jen kryer Amy hi uh my name is Jen kryer Amy I am am the district director of humanities for um the audience and those people viewing at home Humanities in High High Park is inclusive of English language arts social studies and World languages in my presentation tonight I'm going to highlight at a very high level some data and hopefully Identify some points of praise and celebration that we should um have as a district I'm also going to update the board on some of the projects and uh challenges that we are facing as a district and work and how we're working together to uh remediate some of those um things that we see in our data so um in terms of our mission empowering our Learners to be successful um reading
061is the foundation for success in every curriculum area so although I am the director of humanities and I am responsible for English language arts which is inclusive of reading what what we do in terms of reading is um key to not only the success of our Scholars here in Hyde Park but of our citizens in the world so when we say we make people we do make people and we want to make people that are um thoughtful and literate so as we um Move Along tonight um I'm going to give highlevel K12 data but when we get to the actual looking at our strengths and challenges I am going to focus on K5 reading that is with intent Board of Ed members of the community if you'd like me to do more in-depth about World
062Language or social studies I'll happily come back but they gave me 10 minutes and I prioritized reading K5 go ahead Bob so I'm going to start with World languages and let everyone know that as of 2023 the state changed the regulatory language uh World languages used to be called languages other than English it is now called World languages this is one year's worth of data on our checkpoint a which is the proficiency that we offer here at havlin Middle School um about 99% of our students uh point of Pride leave with one High School Credit in World Language from havin Middle School uh checkpoint B is our level three it includes students who pass that level three Regents who continue who choose to continue to move on after they receive their one required World Language
063credit checkpoint c um includes both those students who pass level four where students receive four DCC college credits in Spanish and in French and also those students who attempt the AP exam uh French our French students who are in French AP those are singled digigit numbers so when you're seeing that 65 you shouldn't say what happened you should celebrate and say we started a national French Honor Society this year which is amazing and we're going to get those French numbers up but we're talking about very few numbers of students there go this next slide is really my glossing overview of my 912 responsibilities the three Regents exams um I'm comparing FDR and the New York State average over a three-year time period 2022 2023 and 2024 it should be noted that there's no US History
064um US history is only 2022 and 2024 uh 2023 and 2024 because no US History was administ ministered in 2022 um for Global FDR is at a 78% proficiency rate New York state is at a 77 for US History FDR is at a 76% proficiency rate New York state is at a 79 and for ELA this is really a point of Celebration um we're at an 84% proficiency rate we outperform the state who performs at 79 that is in part two to the amazing English Department we have at FDR and the Gob Smacker 11th grade teachers and you've seen them win state Awards and they're not winning those because they're um they're not winning those are awards that are winning they're in challenging um competition and and I want to just call out that for
065my 11th grade um team of teachers in 2024 37% of our students achieved Mastery on the ELA region that is amazing so I'm I and that is because we have amazing teachers delivering rigorous and strong content that is standards aligned and families who support their students and students who show up every day and do their work it is just a beautiful thing um I'm now going to show you the 35 Ela New York State assessment data these are our historical performance levels over the last three years um in 2022 we had a 36.2% proficiency rate in 2023 we had a 33.3% proficiency rate and in 2024 we had a 34% proficiency rate that is the average of grades three four and five in and I'm going on to the next slide even though he hasn't
066punched it because the next slide is really um another slide that highlights what's happened here at havland it is the 68 Ela New York State assessment data um so I'm giving it to you a different way but it is the same data point um in 2022 we had 44.5% proficient in 2023 we had 37.2% proficient and in 2024 we had 42% proficient I have to note in both of the in both the three in all of the 38 exams the 2022 data does not include any writing written response it's just multiple choice because that was the first year we were back from the pandemic and students were not expected to write um extended responses it was just the multiple choice and the reading um oh okay so can we just click through this thank you
067sir I'm glad I had notes I was debating about whether to bring them and I was like I could do it from memory but I brought my notes so it's good I am two slides forward one more one more um so this is our 23 24 3-8 Ela results um our average proficiency rate in 2024 was only 38% I'm going to say that again because that is one of the challenges that as a district we must face and ameliorate we only had a 38% proficiency rate in 2024 now what I want to say is that we are underperforming this state at all grade levels but I highlighted grade four because we've been looking at this trend I'm putting this up there now and for people in the audience are watching on TV we've been looking
068at this trend since we came out of covid and we started some things as part of our district comprehensive Improvement plan about 18 months ago we were ahead of the state and did some things and I want to speak to our grade four in particular because we um go ahead and Advance because we actually pulled a um we actually pulled a fourth grade short Cycle Pro Data project we did not receive our Ela cohort data from 2023 Until the End beginning of December middle of December last year when uh the former deputy superintendent and I looked at it we noticed that our fourth graders from last year our third graders the year before were performing significantly um below State proficiency and basically at about a 25% proficiency rate so we pulled fourth grade teachers three
069days out of the classro we did one day full of uh really deep dive into data and what I mean by that is we looked at subgroup performance we looked at we did a standards analysis we looked at strengths and challenges and frankly I challenged the fourth grade teachers to pick a small cohort of kids that they wanted to make a difference with three to five out of every classroom I challenged myself I identified some third some fourth graders last year who were in co-taught situations and I went and worked with those teachers and I worked with those kids and we implemented some new instructional strategies I was at the elbow of the teachers but I also did the implementing because that's important to me too and as a result of the short cycle data
070project um which was very very intentional teachers chose question answer relationship as an instructional strategy and intentional read allows to build background knowledge and increase vocabulary to Across The District we went from a 27.9 proficiency rate to a 37.4 proficiency rate now you still you're like oh my gosh Jen you're still at a 37% proficiency rate that is unacceptable I agree but what I want you to see that you don't see in the data when you just look at that proficiency rate is we decreased our students students performing at level one by 8.8% so in other words we had 42% of our La our third graders in 2023 performing at level one in 2024 that decreased by 88.8% for fourth grade our proficiency rate increased by about 133% which is great and it is caused
071for some celebration but I also want to talk about really our goal should be 85% at level four and I know it can be done because we do it on the English regions I know it can be done because we do it on the English regions but that is work and that is commitment and that is a lot of investment by Me by the district and by our teachers so I'm going to talk a little bit about the district literacy audit um we started this about 18 months ago in the 2023 school year before we even received our 2023 Ela results um mostly because I was in classrooms and noticing that our in elementary our students were having a really difficult time decoding and teachers were spending a lot of time using a benchmark assessment
072system to identify students reading behaviors but the area of challenge was really can they read the words and um so we brought together a district literacy audit committee made up of teachers and um a teachers and myself and Deputy superintendent and we looked at our data we did a deep dive and we also used some of the Cutting Edge research around science of reading we use um letters to evaluate letters is language Essentials for teachers of reading and spelling to evaluate our current curriculum what we were using in 2023 and teachers made the decision to focus first on assessment and think about what do we have to address those five key pillars in the science of reading we also looked at our units of study for reading which we' been using as our primary curriculum
073tool for years and aligned it to the science of reading rubric and we found that it was lacking and it was lacking really in the area of phonics instruction um so we also looked at PRI the year that we went out for covid we had be began implementation on um a new phonic program but because of the covid interruption there was alignment in phonic instruction that was not there and so the decision was not to dump the phonic program but rather to say listen we've got kids in third fourth and fifth grade who never got what they needed in k12 and now as teachers we're this challenge we're armed and ready to meet it because we know what we have to do we have to teach them to decode so what's new this year we
074changed our literacy assessments at K5 and they are closely aligned to the science of reading where we are looking at those five pillars we are doing deep Dives in terms of analysis of those assessments we are looking at both foundational word reading and language skills and comprehension skills so we are looking at not just the decoding here but we are looking at comprehension vocabulary background knowledge we also brought in a new resource uly is the um Pro is a phonics resource we are using it as both a tier one and a tier 2 um resource for decoding instruction it is multi-sensory and it is also uh very very structured but more importantly it's an educative curriculum what do I mean by an educative curriculum it means that as teachers use it it educates them in
075the principles of how graphemes and phones letters and sounds work together to make meaning in morphemes I won't go any more reading on you but it helps teachers understand why they're doing what they're doing so those are all new changes this year I I will use an anecdote that happened this morning it's not in my notes but I was at Violet Avenue this morning third grade teacher pulled me aside and said oh my gosh Jen I'm using it I now I gave the assessments and there are six who I'm doing other stuff with because they didn't need it but the other 14 that are in my room that need it I have them in three groups and and she explained the whole it was it was a beautiful thing like I I just got chill's
076telling you the story I of course cried this morning when she told me because it means we're making real impact on kids in the moment um what's next so stay dead nysid is giving us some and I'm going to speak to this a little bit later is giving us some directives um we are as a district providing training in the science of reading for all k6 teachers um we are going to reconvene the district literacy leadership team this spring um we are waiting not net is going to give us um perhaps some literacy curriculum evaluation materials um they published new ones in June of 2024 just last June we had already kind of gone through our process but we want to be able to certify to State Ed that we are doing as they say
077so we are going to use their rubric and look at insurance that are the materials we're using are aligned to the science of reading um and then we're also building relationships with our local colleges um because we know that some of this research is pretty Cutting Edge in terms of how we it's the Neuroscience of reading and we want Maris and Vasser and Bard and all of our surrounding Community um Partners really to help partner with us to support our students the other thing we get out of that is um help when we're searching for Teacher Replacements is teachers retire we know those people involved with the universities are what's training our next generation of teachers um so this these are our core components of um literacy instruction aligned to the Five Pillars um I
078just want to say a little bit about youly um which is the structured U multi sensory decoding curriculum that we're just starting this year um really basic phonics is something that should be mastered at grades K2 um we are using uly at um 345 as a as a tier one intervention to help close that gap for kids and our teachers are doing Yan's work with assessments and grouping to get to meet the needs of our students go ahead um so I this is a big thank you to the Board of Ed and to the community i c i can't we can't do I can't do this alone none of us can improve reading scores alone but last year in the budget um two literacy coaches were approved I have Bridget de primo and Jennifer Turner
079who in the first 10 weeks of school have worked with 10 teachers in a coaching cycle have had provided six professional development offerings four of which were on analysis of Assessments and supporting teachers and designing small group work and small group goals um for the students in their class and then they've had 14 additional supplemental meeting with teachers um some of it is just making sure they have the resources they need and I think some of it might also be just talking down um this is a lot of work and just having the conversation that says you're supported we're with you together we can make these proficiency rates um improve so um the plan for implementation is really to equip teachers with high quality professional development and coaching in the science of reading continue to
080use data practices to Monitor and tailor instruction and then create a literacy environment that integrates reading and writing full reading and writing in meaningful and engaging ways across the curriculum the goal is always that students have strong foundational reading skills and develop as confident and proficient readers so I can send them up to the high school and then out to the world of you know out into the world as thoughtful um reflective Learners um the goal though for K5 is really that by the end of grade three our proficiency rates are increased frankly to that 85% um proficiency rate we want to create expertise teachers so that in the moment they can make decisions about how to best support our students family and Community engagement um Regular communication it is part of um just uh
081this year as part of parent conferences for the first time we sent out math growth growth reports in both Ela and math so it showed parents their Cur students current proficiency and it also showed High achievement average achievement low achievement and high growth low growth average growth um which I think is important in terms of a parent resource youly um University of Florida literacy initiative um which is that structured phonics curriculum we've been using has a lot of parent resources which we have been um diligently using on things like family literacy nights and also getting them sent out through your classroom teachers to parents and to families um and again I'm just going to mention that we are partnering with our local institutions of Higher Learning to really keep um the connection to the research
082as strong and dominant as possible so what are our next steps I alluded to the fact that um nid New York State education department has a K3 literacy initiative they did provide us in June of 2024 with a curriculum evaluation rubric we'll be using that um and there in January going to provide us with some recommended instructional practices so we will be attending all of the required niid um trainings but also bringing that back and thinking about how we're going to implement at K3 uh we're going to continue to monitor the impact of literacy coaching and we're doing that through tracking student achievement data Gathering teacher feedback through surveys and observations analyzing classroom practices and then teacher self assessments um science of reading professional development is huge um we are doing that in two ways
083uh we are currently have a partnership happening with the um Sunni Neals science of Reading Center where we are going to offer teachers the opportunity to participate in that asynchronous learning course and then we've started our first cohort of letters trained teachers um and we're hoping to continue that cohort next year and the year after thank you so much for the opportunity to share this information are there any questions from the board I don't have a question but I do like the 85% proficient proficiency goal that you have I'd like to see that any questions for Chen I do um so sorry lots here I'm just looking at um so first you fly that was just to clarify that was a program that was decided on was that the committee that came together and and
084studied all the different programs y so that was that had um stakeholder feedback for choosing that okay good um well and Margaret I'm going to just comment because it was not just stakeholder feedback people on the literacy audit committee implemented in small group some teachers chose to do it whole group and then we we did research so we used the dat data on our kids and we saw was it actually moving the kids or not because before we like so those teachers who used it like I I used it in a third grade co-taught setting with a with a co-teacher I had four kids we had four kids in that group I data tracked those four kids with that teacher first grade teacher who did it she did it with her whole first grade she
085data tracked there was a fourth grade teacher who did it there were a couple special class teachers who implemented so the entire committee reviewed the the program the teachers who selected to use it data tracked and brought that data because we tried to be really intentional around our research yep no and I'm and that was my point is that that we're moving to more research-based programs because we know that the previous programs weren't working and that was something um I'm looking at the then new next screen um your then are the the assess and the units of study in the new you've added a phonic program but units of study is still there no units of study is no longer if you go to the slide with our core components units of study for comprehension
086is not there I have units of study for writing in writing probably one of our decisions or decision points this spring is going to be do we continue with units of study for writing or do we um find something that's a little bit more structured for instruction and writing one of the things that the committee the literacy audit um group The District literacy leadership team recognized early on is that we have a lot of resources we have a plethora of resources some of which are better aligned than others to the five pillars of reading so it's really about slowly methodically identifying what's aligned what's not keep get rid of that's where we're at okay no I'm glad can I cheer over the getting rid of the units of stud you may because I was looking
087for that 12 I know 10 years ago me too I know me too but we have to listen I'm going to just say this we have to hold tight to process and that's why we started as a as the literacy leadership team we started with two places we started with assessments because honestly The Benchmark assessment system is not gone we're still using it as a tier 2 assessment we're not using it as a universal screener but it takes a tremendous amount of time away from instruction and we wanted to get small groups frankly up and running by October 1st so we still use Benchmark assessment to identify reading behaviors but that's not a universal screener that's if we want more information on a student we will do the benchmark Mark assessment what we have now
088are some of the letter screeners the core phonics um some comprehension and some reading fluency screeners that are part of Foundations a toz that teachers are using and then the letter screeners that teachers are using so that they have data and they know like what which of the Five Pillars are my students excelling in and which of the Five Pillars do I need to close a gap so assessment was the first place we started and then um the the second place we started was the second thing we looked at was really um that phonics piece because we aren't where we need to be with phonics we have too many kids who can't decode so I can't I can tell if it's a comprehension problem when I do a read aloud and they can give me
089answers back from a read aloud but when I give them the text and they can't read it means they can't read it not that they can't think it right um so when do you think everybody's going to be trained in the science of reading because that's that's huge so I'm hoping so I think the state might tell us when we have to have everybody trained but we are offering some incentives um the flyer is supposed to go out tomorrow after this particular presentation I'm sending a flyer out to teachers um with a little Merry Christmas gift um we are wanting to it's the science of reading through um Sunni news is asynchronous and they can do it individually um and independently so we are wanting to offer that um to all of our k6 teachers
090um as something they can do individually we'll data track some of that work and then we're going to see if um what's left after we offer it as a choice between now and April then we'll plan for May June or maybe even a summer like uh literacy I don't I want to I don't want to call call it a literacy we probably a literacy Workshop so we're we're hoping I want to see who I want to see who's teacher- wise who's ready willing and able and you know you always have 30 to 50% that are ready willing and able you always have about 20% that might be drawn by that 50% then you have about 30% that that might not be there or might not have not might not be at the place of Readiness
091for it and so then we'll have to find a different plan but we will the goal is 100% trained in s so Jessica and I said by September of 2025 that's pretty that's pretty aggressive but we're hoping that stay dead helps us because ND we're getting some um information from the state level that it's something that they really want us to move towards but that's just good to know because I think that's going to change the the needle for some of our assessments when you equip every you know I said this on second day of opening day there is not one CA there's not one teacher in this District who does not want students to be successful absolutely not one they all want students to be successful it's our job to equip them with the
092tools they need so that we can really get to that level of success we're expecting thank you any other questions any other questions thank you thank [Applause] you moving on to uh 8.1 can I get a motion to enter public participation so moved second add all those in favor I opposed motion carried uh please note as a general rule public participation is limited to 3 minutes per speaker with the first public participation segment limited to 21 minutes the segment of time may be modified by the board as deemed appropriate the board requests that remarks be courteous and respectful of all would anyone like to address the board and if so please uh state your name when you come to the podium hello everybody glad to be here tonight um this is a beautiful Space by
093the way my name is Paul Murray I'm I reside at Slate Hill New York I have three quotes that I would like to read to you we hold these truths to be self-evident that all men are created equal that they are endowed by their creator with certain inalienable rights that among these are life liberty and the pursuit of happiness that is Thomas Jefferson um one of our Founders second quote in what sense Can America be called a Christian Nation not in the sense that Christianity is the established religion or that people are in any manner compelled to support it on the contrary the Constitution specifically provides that Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion or prohibit the free exercise thereof neither is it christian in the sense that all its citizens are
094either in fact or name Christians on the contrary all religions have free scope within our borders nevertheless we constantly speak of this Republic as a Christian Nation in fact as the leading Christian Nation of the world that is a quote from Supreme Court Justice David Brewer and finally I'll conclude with the Hyde Park Native Son Franklin Delona Roosevelt who said in the formative days of the Republic the directing influence the Bible exercised upon the fathers of the nation is conspicuously evident we cannot read the history of our rise and development as a nation without Reckoning with the place the Bible has occupied in shaping the advances of the Republic bored tell you right now I'll challenge you in fact I will buy each of you a stake dinner if we were to get back to
095these values you would see that 37% proficiency rate jumped above 85% faster in your head could spin I wonder if if any of the students in the school understand or are being taught any of what I just read you about who we are as Americans so that's that's that's my piece God bless thank you hello my name is John Aman chukwu and I want to first and foremost give you the definition of porn it's television programs magazines books Etc that are regarded as emphasizing the sensuous or sens Sensational aspects of a nonsexual subject and stimulating a compulsive interest in their audience you all have porn in FD Rosevelt High School in the library a book entitled all boys aren't Blue by George M Johnson page 271 says he asked me to turn over while he
096slipped a condom on himself but this was my ass and I was struggling to imagine someone inside me and he was large I had previously topped someone who clearly enjoyed it but he had been enjoying anal sex before I ever came along he got on top and slowly inserted himself into me he then added more lube and tried again which felt better but not by much he began his stroking motion eventually I felt a mix of pleasure with the pain he didn't last long inside of me thankfully he gave me a kiss before he pulled out I didn't stay long nor did I masturbate after page 266 as we kissed he began unzipping my pants he reached his hand down and pulled out my dick he quickly he quick L went into giving me head
097he then came up and asked me if I wanted to try on him look me in my face and tell me that that's not porn say something is it porn you speak and then we'll respond after yeah it's it's porn and it should be removed from the school system now if this is what kids have to read in the name of diversity equity and inclusion to make all people feel invited and accepted in the name of this you know notion of Pride and progress then it's D it's a dly deed it's corrupt it's evil and it should be removed from the school system but today we live in a time where these things are acceptable simply because we want to appease people and make people feel comfortable in their delusion this should not be why
098should we assault assault the sensibilities of children just to make people feel comfortable there was a time in this country where these things did not happen and I say to you as the Bible tells us it is better for a man to have a millstone tied around his neck and to be thrown into the sea than for anyone to damage a child this is porn and it needs to be removed tonight am hi um I'm Jared Branch I wasn't going to talk but as you guys were going through your your book books um you have the the girls and again I'm very proud to see young people reading but I noticed a trend in every single book every single book that you had that had an African-American uh character was about struggle and pain the
099black experience is not just struggle and pain so it seems like you guys are just showing a victimhood mentality and they're like oh I can feel better because I'm not a victim like that where are your Ben Carson's where are your Benjamin Bakers where are people like that you know we you know being black we have the same things that happen to white people Hispanic people and things like that but every time I see a book in a school and also in your school you guys are talking about the black struggle but you never talk about the Italians or the Irish who are slaves you never talk who are slaves in America who are D service but you focus on the black struggle we don't need to be your your pushing point for your D
100we don't want that we want a strong education we want to have higher reading proficiencies you saw the numbers you saw how low those minorities numbers were but you guys touted those like there was something special they're not every American every student should be able to read every student should feel equal but every student should not be filled to be made a victim just because of their skin color the fact that every single book you had up there was about a black person going through a struggle and I'm going to make it through the struggle this is not a Tyler Perry movie this is real life we don't all go through those struggles and if you're going to do that where are your books about the Jewish people going through struggles when Native Americans going
101through struggles and again the same time you guys talk about these civil rights movements you know these books leave out the white groups the Jewish groups all the groups that fought besides us so what you guys are effectually saying is that black people you are victims white people you are depressors and you have to struggle in order to succeed that's not true you do not have to struggle in order to succeed and this is a lie that's told to black children Across America and you guys were proud to tell them this lie like you were doing something no give them something positive every story doesn't have to be something negative every black story does not have to have struggle if you really want to reach the black community treat them like you treat every single
102body else we're not different we're not different you're not different we're all the same we're all God's people we're all want education we want all our kids to to grow up to be smart we want our country to thrive but we cannot Thrive if we tell one group particularly that they are victims and you tell another group that they are depressors because something that their ancestors did guess what they were black slavers guess what there were black people who slow black people into slavery and I bring this up all the time when there were black slaves there were Irish people coming over here as indention servant that they let die in the swamps because they said they weren't important enough but you guys don't talk about those struggles you only talk about black struggle and
103I'm telling you the black community is tired of school boards that don't look like them constantly telling them what their struggle is about so you guys need to reach into these communities you need to talk to these students and find alternative books that aren't always about something negative because we want positivity [Applause] too hello my name is Drew tooro I was born in Brooklyn New York York uh I went to a high school named FDR um it in um Brooklyn however uh took a bachelor's degree from New York University and I study philosophy at Brown University got a masters from there all right cut to the chase beginning in 2015 uh at age 13 my daughter informed me that she like girls so I told her well she's 13 maybe she could wait another year
104or so to see how she felt and then she came back with uh over a year later I still like girls I don't like boys okay that's that's fine you know I really none of my business and um I felt it was none of my business and not something I was comfortable talking about with her because her mother wouldn't talk about it anyway in high school she got involved with this group a therapist and um unfortunately some school board members who were trying to I think recruit her for cause that she had nothing nothing to do with which is transgenderism because my daughter uh never wanted to be a boy didn't want to talk to them uh didn't think her problem stemmed from that and uh she was certainly not on board with any kind
105of sex change uh um and I wasn't either obviously uh and when I mentioned that as a school board I was kicked out I was literally ushered out and police were wa waiting for me outside because I spoke my mind about it I used I briefly what I said is that um you you probably all know George Foreman let's say let's say at 13 he had decided uh that he he was he was a woman okay let's say that he started taking hormones and everything and let's say he went all the way and got complete surgery now even with those things done to him would you allow a guy like that to compete in a boxing ring with a woman with with with with with a biological woman would you do it I know I
106wouldn't do it I would never of course that would be like sponsoring a massacre as far as I'm concerned and I think the same thing applies to any sport that uh where where upper body strength is going to give the man an advantage and there's absolutely no way uh you could get around you could get around that I thought I was just talking common sense but I was asked to leave because I guess I just didn't fit their agenda and that's all I wanted to [Applause] say good evening my name is William green and I want to read something the good sense of the people will always be founded to be the best army they may be led astray for a moment but will soon correct themselves it is time that this school board this
107school system correct themselves and bring Good Sense back to the educational system it is time that we get the wokness out of the schools Johnny can't read because his proficiency rate is 37% and why can't he read because he has all these erotic thoughts on his mind M I'm a product of the New York City School System my education started at PS1 1554 in Harlem and it ended at Samuel J tillen high school in Brooklyn but what was what was the thing that was taught along with academics moral foundations we as a country need to get back to moral Foundation stop corrupting these kids these kids can't read but they know how to be erotic what does that tell you are you satisfied with that so in the words of Thomas Jefferson it's time to
108bring good sense to education and let me tell you as Thomas Jefferson said we may have gone astray for a while but we will come back to it the people are letting you know we are demanding morals back in our schools we are demanding the days where we can say the Pledge of Allegiance where we can acknowledge God you look at the coincide how it coincides we took God out of schools and now look what you got metal detectors lack of morals lack of values and who is suffering the children you are putting morally decrepit children in the streets who are going to turn into morally decrepit adults it's time we bring God in Good Sense back to the school system any excuse me anyone else like to address the board my name is Pastor
109Rosie and I had no intentions of getting up to speak tonight I came from Newberg actually and I don't have anything prepared but I've been listening to the whole evening and I just would like to make a contribution if that's okay with you I listened and I was so pleased to see the awards that were given to the young children and we have probably one of the youngest people on our city council throughout the whole state of New York which is very beautiful and really for the young people I ran a um at risk youth program for the last 15 years in the city of Newberg most of the kids I can say out of 76 kids in my one of my summer programs only one had a father in the home it's difficult for
110the teachers to be both the parents and and be the the teachers as well we do have a different season that we're working in but listening to the people that were just speaking and then listening to you and looking at both sides of the spectrum I think we do have to go back to the drawing board it really does discourage me to find find out that there would be such literature after this woman was telling us how important it is for us to read I remember taking my grandson and reading with him 56 books over the summer at leptondale school in uh Newberg and we run we won a um reader award so it is extremely important I know even as elderly people for them to read keeps them from um Alzheimer because their brain
111is always active so I want to just I'm hitting at off the cuff here I had nothing prepared had no desire or thought of of of of speaking at all but we do have to do something different we have to really go back to the really go back and and think about how to change things we're using a lot of our intellect which we do in education but I think we had to lose use a lot of our heart too and and think about it in Newberg we have a lot of inner city kids we have all kinds of programs for kids that they have to pay for and I would ride the streets at night looking for the ones that didn't have their shoes on and took me sometimes two months to find a
112mother with a fatherless home just to sign a piece of paper so that I could have them in my kids program we have a different an animal that we're working with now than many of us and she's the youngest I know was admiring her being on the school board it was a beautiful thing I I think we can't do business as usual we need to clean house we got to go back to some of the basics go into our library see see what we're what we're um what kind of books are in there to please people for whatever reason if one of the kids gets a hold of those books what does it do to their lives wrap it up so I want to wrap it up by just praying for you because that's how
113I believe things change and work so I ask Lord Jesus that you come to this school district you give them your heart you said if you we lacked wisdom you would give it to us generally and I ask right now that you pour out wisdom on this school board and you help them shift the atmosphere for our children here in this Hudson Valley and let them even be a model of having great moral Mor moral values and and God I ask for you to help them not to do business as usual in jesus' name we pray amen would anyone else like to address the board okay at this time we'll close public okay well we're you guys just so everyone knows we're at the 21 minute Mark so you'll be the last the last speaker
114my name is Pat ran I have two grandchildren in this school district I was not planning to get up but this is absolutely the best school board meeting I've ever been to and I want to thank all of you that got up and talked and you spoke and I want to thank you boor because you didn't shut us down I was at many school board meetings where they shut us down and they didn't want to hear what we had to say so kudos to you guys and kudos to all of you that got up and stood and I we I'm in a prayer group with my church and every Saturday we meet and we pray for every school child and we've been doing this for four years so we're going to continue and God is
115working he's working and I thank you [Applause] all okay at this time we'll close public participation and thank you everyone for your comments um moving on to 9.1 um board subcommittee reports I I said thank you for your comment comments I don't have any any response to anything that was said other than other than thank you but this this isn't a this isn't a back and forth so I said that I thanked you for your comments I don't have any comments to respond so that's it speak for the enti yes we we this isn't a debate honestly this isn't a debate this this isn't a debate right I okay all right we're we're gonna out of right so we got to cut this off because this isn't this isn't a back and forth dialogue unfortunately
116this is a a board meeting and this is how it operates so I mean so we're on uh 9.1 subcommittee reports did anybody meet the um the EV bus committee met to talk about next steps um Linda probably has more details than I do but I'll give you what what I think I understand and that is that the the EPA has granted us an extension on the on the grant but it's only a 45 day extension which isn't long enough to start a new uh vote so we don't have time to do another vote um but we're working to try to get an even greater extension so that perhaps we could have another vote ideally during the normal voting time there so because we think that that's an important thing to make sure that we
117have plenty of time to have more uh public participation more public commentary and more time to educate people and get a larger turnout hopefully I and know and we were going to have you always forget the name of the leasing company what's the name of do you mind if I please take over yeah so uh after the vote Dr Roman and I met with a representative from Congressman Ryan's office and they're actually uh speaking with the AP EPA to uh request that they honor our request for 180 day extension so that the board would have the option of considering uh putting up the same proposition again um at the may vote uh they the EPA did grant us a 45 day extension um and we could apply for another one at the end of that
118and then potentially another extension but uh like I said we are advocating just to have that option and then uh the committee is also going to meet with Highland fleets um which is the leasing company um just to see what uh service they have um they were working with certainly they were working with New York State recently just to uh determine like how they would be approved to uh work with school districts in our state and we're hoping to get an update from them soon as another option potentially and has this are we going to go back to the state to see if they have or is this going to be through Pat Ryan to see what kind of guidance they're getting because I think we're not alone in that vote was down you know
119shot down I think there was another school district so if they continue with the law what's I mean what options do we have right if if these aren't going to be successful with voters right I mean it's the voter sentiment that's saying no so but yet we have this law that's yeah we have to follow I know um in the Rockefeller study for foundation Aid one of the recommendations was for New York state to fully fund but Bobby can you close close those doors I can't it's hard to hear thank you not you Bobby the other Bobby sorry um I have this for board discussion to talk about and I don't know if this is the appropriate time to bring it up but um we all got an email from nisba about a Lobby day
120in Albany in Capitol conference and I wanted to bring that up as a possibility that that might be a way I in the past I have lobbied in Albany for public education as a teacher um and there is a day in February and I think we might want to consider getting a group together and lobbying in Albany for this and they and nisba has supports they'll support us they'll you know we meet them there what is this lobbying for what for the electric bus for for this anything that's concerning our district it's a day where we can go up to Al and talk to all the lawmakers and I think maybe that's something that we should while we're working on other things um we might want to take it to the next step and say
121we're going to go Lobby and we're going to talk to these people who are making these decisions and let them know our district did everything that we should have done um we did our due diligence we did the research we put up a vote the vote was Was Defeated and now we're we've lost $5 million where do we go from here so I think I think we need to look at ways to pull in Albany and say we've done we've done what we could so I I would like to consider if anybody's interested that we um contact nisba and say that we're interested in lobbying in February um to to just to get our voice heard up there so that's I because because we have to do something I mean is that us physically going
122up there and yeah yeah I I I certainly we can talk about later but I just wanted to throw that out there now we don't have to talk about you know we don't have to get into the details of it but that is a Poss ility and when you talk about where do we go from here what do we do you know 45 days 180 do we put something back up that that's clearly Was Defeated um you know we have a lot of decisions to make but this is another piece of it that I just want to bring from there like superintendence you are you guys doing anything collectively so um so to Linda's point we wrote a letter uh to uh Pat Ryan's office um kind of outlining some of the challenges that we
123Face we really didn't have any kind of Direction uh from n or the state in terms of marketing uh tools or anything like that so um one of the arguments in the letter is uh stating from us that we we actually did everything that we could do in order for us to um get the information out provide informational materials for our community to really understand um what the benefits of of the Grant and um and so uh that was included in the letter uh in addition to that I'm working with with a superintendent down in Westchester who is meeting with uh Shelley mayor um she actually has one of the legislative uh groups and one of the things that we're doing is to use our story to kind of help emphasize the need for the
124state to re-evaluate the way that they're going about um this mandate if this is going to move forward to move away from the the the need for an actual vote if it's a mandate it makes no sense for you know there to be a vote and also the funding the funding it can be an unfunded mandate so um so I'm actually meeting with him tomorrow um our goal is to have a meeting with Shelley mayor and then um go go from there in terms of uh sharing you know the challenges that we face and ways that we we should look at this differently okay good yeah because we need that right so put like putting it up for another vote at this point in in my opinion is almost meaningless right but but until we
125get more guidance from from the state and and and more participation from the state in my opinion no yeah we had talked about talked about that what can't just let it die if we if if it's an option to to have another vote during the normal time and and then we should do that right I agree we need more we need more help we need we we had a a really robust discussion during the EV committee about Lots of different things that that we might do recognizing that it's going to be a very hard Road okay any other committee reports um last month in November I attended a dinner um down in Brewster it was the lower Hudson education Coalition I was asked to uh um introduce Michael rubel who is a strong advocate for
126um changes to the foundation Aid Dr Roman mentioned about the Rockefeller report that came came out subsequently so it was a a dinner that was attended by you know many of the districts um from Westchester but also increasingly from Duchess if you recall in my role as The Duchess County school board's President we The Duchess County School boards have been trying to team up more and more with the Westchester boards and the Rockland boards to be a uniform voice to the legislators and so to your point um Margaret mentioned lobbying day so lobbying day is a day that is held once a year as she mentioned I used to attend it every year for 20 years when I was a teacher vice president you go up to the capital you meet with the legislators in
127their office so that's something you know I would certainly be open to um and so forth what we're also doing um as The Duchess County School boards Association is we're also we've had a different philosophy we've said yes many of us have gone to Lobby days before um you can go you can wait your turn you can go into the office and they say okay it's your turn highed you've got 15 minutes I've got 20 other people lined up outside my office so what we've been doing is we've actually been reaching out and we've been actually meeting with um some local legislators uh we all know Gully Sanford he's on The Duchess County School boards so he's been helping advocate for and schedule some of these meetings um today there was a meeting with um
128legislator Tru it and I believe sus Serino there's also meetings that are coming up with um with others DD barretts and others now you remember at the start of the year I asked and all the districts were asked for the judges County School boards to go back to their districts and say what are your top issues and so I pulled our board and I brought that back with other districts and we came up with our top issues one of them was Foundation Aid one of them was the buses issue so this is something now we're adding it's an interesting and important Point what do we do as a board we are doing everything we can we are not you know quote unquote fighting this legislation we're putting it to the community but at this point
129in time the community is not agreeing so where does that put us as a board so that's something we'll be adding in our meetings with the legislators but I'd be happy to also attend a lobbying day if if anybody wants me to yeah I mean what is it February yeah we have some time to figure out who wants to go all right any other committee reports all right uh the Community Schools met and I was I said that I would just put it out there again that there is an event on Friday and we still need some volunteers so if anyone has a little bit of time tomorrow night wants to join me to serve some hot cocoa to the to our families for a holiday event um we could use a couple more hands
130I'm booked up again um okay no more sub committee reports moving on to 9.2 board discussion including consent agenda items any board discussion I had one thing I think we have to work on getting your information for your review in the tool we we talked about it a while ago and then I don't know what the next step is like we got to Prime the tool and then go from there for the mid the mid year right isn't that around this time something like that we got to look at that I I just I have a not note that we got to follow up on that you know to to do that stuff and I put something yeah and there's no like trigger in the tool with dates to say hey you need to do
131this it just like so I don't know what what our timeline is any other board discussion on um the con uh agenda for 11:19 unfortunately I was not president and I'm listed as president in the consent agenda say say that again so the minutes for 1119 under 10.2 yeah so it was listed that I was present but I was in Florida small detail you were present in spirit that's true I wanted to be president good good catch um on 10. no sorry um the tax corrections I just there's some big numbers there so I was hoping Linda could just explain um High Park Cinemas $ 44,6 52 refund North Cross 87,7 19789 tax refund um big numbers loss of tax revenue just wanted a clarification right so uh these uh amounts are the result of
132tax sories uh where uh the uh property tax owners uh file a claim uh against really the assessors and their assessments are too high um usually when we receive these uh we actually add money to our taxt Reserve every year um we ask the board to approve those at the end of the school year so it's not coming from the current uh funding it's some money that we set aside uh the two that we have on our High we don't normally have uh such high um judgments but they are the result of a court judgment but but also like North Cross has 13 different properties rolled into so it's a group that owns it's an LLC that owns multiple properties and I believe that's the new town home uh uh property on North Crossroad so
133it just I'm assuming that they just didn't agree with the initial assessment um and the other one of was probably on the books for a few years before it got settled for High Park Cinemas yep no I just yeah I think it's good for the public to know that it's not like there was a mistake made it's that right they're questioning their assessments and that's why there are those large sums yes thank you all right any other uh discussion all right we'll move on to uh 10.1 can I get a motion to approve tonight's consent consent agenda so move tibits second Margaret all those in favor I opposed motion carried moving on to 11.1 Capital project change order phase 2A for Violet AV school can I get a motion so move tibits second ad any
134discussion all those in favor I opposed motion carried moving on to 11.2 Capital uh project 2022 Capital project phase one train USA Incorporated can I get a motion so move tibits and a second second Christine any discussion all those in favor I opposed motion carried uh 11.3 Capital project change order phase 2B $ 35.7 million for havin middle school and Ralph R Smith can I get a motion so move tibits I can add any discussion well so I had a like in the title there it says it's a change order for $ 35.7 million that can't be correct that's the total project it's the $ 35.7 million project the change order is 2,000 or uh the change order is 25566 so that's in this table below that's just the latest one 2566 the other ones
135like 261 1,600 and 7,000 those were done before a few years ago the okay I see that yep thank you okay y all right any other discussion all those in favor I opposed motion carried uh 11.4 designation uh banking addition can I get a motion to add Metropol commercial Metropolitan Commercial Bank MCB to the designated official depositories and investment options for all accounts of the district so moved KY second Margaret any discussion all those in favor I opposed motion carried moving on to 12.1 uh can I get a motion to enter our second public participation so some moved in second all those in favor I opposed motion carried please no as a general rule public participation will be limited to 3 minutes total per speaker the second segment will be limited to 12 minutes the
136segment of time may be modified by the board is deemed appropriate the board requests that remarks be courteous and respectful of all would anyone like to address the board oh time's up sorry my name's Robin um I'm actually getting up to um first of all the auditorium looks awesome and I wanted to stress how important it is for the seniors this year to have everything they have in their Auditorium they are they are the class that didn't get to go to um DC because of Co Co to not to start the work on the auditorium in April I think is what they're planning on doing I they're just going to miss out on so many things I think that it should start in July and then if it goes through September October then they just
137have to figure out another plan if graduation happens and it's inside where where is the Overflow going to go they won't have any place to go the elderly who want to go see the see the graduation but can't sit in the Heat or if it's raining or whatever I I think it should just I think they should just wait so that this class can have their day that's it thank you um I wasn't planning on speaking this evening but I just want to reiterate what Miss Peak said um I'm one of the class advisers and I've talked to a lot of the kids about this and um we've even moved our like our Mr President's up to March so that they can hold their last event in their Auditorium so if there is something that
138can be done or to look at the timeline of the projects I mean these projects are still not complete from July um just to let the kids have their ceremony and their um things in their own school would be wonderful thank you thank you would anyone else like to address the board at this time we will close public participation so I don't know Tom did you hear that so um the comments were about starting the project the auditorium project in in April and the kids might lose out on some opportunity to use that and graduation so perhaps you can get with Dr Roman and Linda to look at the schedule to see if there's anything we can do to adjust it even if it means spilling over to September you know time frame so you
139don't have to answer now just you know if you can look into it you know that that would be helpful Elizabeth what you what do you think um I I agree not only did uh I mean I am the grad grading class but um we did miss out on a lot I mean even our our eighth grade year we we were barely even in school so we didn't have much of what you would expect to be normal um I do think I mean I'm part of the student government part of the planning and all that and I think it would just make it very difficult for us to I mean already have to plan an event that's been tradition but not only we would have to just plan it sooner and I feel like it
140would just be I guess kind of more complicated for us and having a more complicated experience in high school rather than just waiting until we graduate and starting the plan so we can finish off normal and not have to go through more obstacles of planning and not being able to have the same experiences as other classes thanks any other and the end of the year is so full of activities I me you've got to play you've got graduation you've got all kind you've got the um award ceremony so and the beginning of the school year isn't as yeah I agree because we do still have a lot of award ceremonies to go through and a bunch of different like activities that kids still have to do and finish and throughout and I think that would
141like just mess up everybody's schedules rather than taking just a couple more months of waiting and finishing off the year normally normally okay thank thanks for the feedback so take a look at that our next meting thanks all right uh 13.1 any other matters deemed necessary by the board I would just say um Margaret already reminded about the big celebration again at 6 o'cl um tomorrow reminding people to be there and uh M Rosario send out at the family center Resource Center at 6 o'cl celebration for Christmas Hanukkah and Quanza so I think you know the entire board for everybody watching at home we want to wish everybody a happy holiday whatever holiday you celebrate whether it's Christmas Hanukkah Quanza or just Ule um you know happy holidays to everybody for whatever you celebrate all
142right thanks Ed and I don't think we have a need for a second executive session right Jesse if you're watching if you want one we um so at this time can I get a motion to adjourn tonight's meeting so moved second all those in favor I opposed motion carried happy holidays everyone for