Board of Education Meeting - October 7, 2025

001All right. Good evening and thank you for joining us for the October 7th board of education meeting. If you could join me in a pledge to the flag, please. I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. >> And we will begin this evening with the report of the superintendent, Dr. Murray. Thank you. Next week, October 13th through the 17th, is NISBA's school board recognition week. I'd like to take a moment this evening to thank our board of education trustees for their service and dedication. Their work is absolutely essential to the success of our district. They devote countless hours to providing thoughtful guidance, feedback, and support to ensure the very best for our

002students and staff. Al although our trustees are elected officials, they serve as volunteers giving generously of their time, energy, and expertise. I hope the entire Ry community will join me in expressing appreci appreciation for their commitment to our schools. Sarah Dur has a small token of our gratitude to present to each of you this evening. >> Thank you, Mrs. Dur. >> Earlier tonight, the board toured Osborne School and had the opportunity to see the exciting progress on the new wing. Construction there and at Midland School is moving along well. The remediation, plumbing, and electrical work are nearly complete, and preparations are underway for the installation of the roof. This fall, we have already hosted four superintendent coffees with three more scheduled in the coming weeks. The upcoming sessions will be held in October 17th at

0039:30 a.m. at Osborne, October 21st at 7:00 p.m. in the Middle School High School Library Media Center, and October 23rd at 9:30 a.m. in the middle school. These coffees provide a wonderful opportunity for informal conversation with parents about what's working well in the district and where we can continue to grow. I'm often joined by members of members of our administrative team and we look forward to connecting with many of you there. And that concludes my report for this evening. Love you. >> Uh yeah, I would say I have attended some of those coffees and they are wonderful events. So please members of our community, please come out and have a chance to have some coffee with Dr. Murray. It's a great way to spend some time. We will now move on to presentation and discussion

004number one and we will start with the external audit. >> Ah, it's on, right? >> Okay. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'll start over. I'll start over. It's good. Uh so my name is Justin Wood. I am from Nutinhouser PC. Uh we are the external auditors of the school district. Uh we are based out of Orange County, New York. Uh so this is our fourth year doing the audit of a 5-year bid. Um, so before I get started, I do just want to thank Gabby Peruio and Kathy Vigano who, you know, with all their hard work and all of their staff's hard work have given us the opportunity to complete the audit in a timely manner and very efficiently and without any, you know, material findings to report. Um, so just to give you a quick

005timeline of how the audit works, we do work together all year. Uh, we met in June. I'll come for what we call the preliminary audit work to discuss the internal controls of the district and do some walkthroughs and uh some other testing. And then we come back in the middle of August and we do what we call the fieldwork for about a week, work closely with the staff and Gabby and Kathy. And then throughout September, we complete the audit, write up the report, provide draft reports, and then just last Tuesday, we met with the audit committee. We went over the financial statements in detail with them, which I will spare everybody here this evening. Um, but I do just want to pick on some of the highlights. So, these financial statements consist of three reports.

006uh most importantly the report on the general financial statements um which we've given an unmodified opinion uh that is the highest level of assurance we can give. It's otherwise known of as a clean opinion. So basically the best grade that we can give we've given for the the audit of the school district. Also included in this report is the internal control report and the extra classroom activity report. Both of them also unmodified uh clean opinions. You know, one thing to note is that due to the delay in the compliance supplement being issued by the federal government, uh, and currently being caused by the government shutdown, um, we were not able to issue the single audit report for this year yet. Uh this is the same situation for all New York State school districts or all

007all audits throughout the country that have a single audit. Um so New York State Education Department has recommended that we issue the audit of the financial statements, the internal control and the extra classroom and then follow up with the single audit at a later date which we will do once the compliance supplement becomes available. were able to review it and then give an opinion on that as well, which at that point in time, you know, I'll let um the school business official uh share that with the board. If there's any questions, I'm happy to follow up. Um overall, just as far as the financial condition goes, the district is in very strong financial condition. They have well-funded reserves. Increase the capital reserve by $1.167 million this year and increase the teacher retirement reserve by $600,000

008this year. Both areas are great places to increase the reserves in. The capital reserve will ultimately save the district residents um interest down the road when that's used for a capital project. and the district did adhere to the 4% unassigned fund balance law set by New York State. Um, and if there's not any further questions, that's concludes my presentation. So, thank you and have a great evening and I'll see everybody next year and I'll I'll be in communication with Gabby and Kathy throughout the year. Thank you. Take care. >> Great. Jeeoff, thank you so much. It's always wonderful to get uh a report that is unmodified in a clean opinion once again and that is a great reflection of the hard work and diligent um financial and fiduciary responsibility that our team provides to the

009district. So, thank you so much for your work on that. It's great. Um and we did have the pleasure of hearing the update from Mr. Shibonoff LA our last meeting. So none of this news is new to us but officially it is now being accepted. So thank you. >> Thank you to my team happy to shout out. Thank you. >> Yes. Great. Uh okay we will now move on to sorry our uh presentation for AI. Dr. Murray. >> Sure. Thank you. I'm actually going to pass things over to Lauren Santa Barbara our assistant superintendent for curriculum instruction and assessment. and she's joined by uh Dr. Caitlyn Sasson, our director of technology. Um Carolyn Bombbase and Kim Kimberly Prasad, who are instructional tech coaches. And they also we also have two of our teachers and two

010students here tonight. Um and this presentation really builds on the presentation that we uh gave last spring. I believe it was last April. Um as well, so you can see where we are with our work with AI. Okay. >> Good evening. Thank you for this opportunity to speak uh with you tonight about the use of artificial intelligence in our K through2 schools. Before we begin and Dr. Murray already shared, I would like to welcome um Dr. Caitlyn Cone, our instructional coaches uh Miss Carolyn Bombbass and Miss Kim Persad. We have two of our teachers tonight. Miss Francesca Miller. She is our department coordinator and teaches 8th grade social studies. And we have Mrs. Anna Dagmar Johnson who teaches at Osborne Elementary as a teacher of music. And a special welcome to our two students, Taylor

011Dary and Brooke Ericson, who will also be presenting this evening. As technology evolves and becomes increasingly embedded in our daily lives, we believe we have a responsibility to not only keep pace, but to lead with integrity, thoughtfulness, and purpose when it comes to the use of AI within our classrooms. In Ry, our instructional approach and innovation is grounded in something deeper than the tools themselves. It is grounded in our Ry commitment. We have stayed consistent in our philosophy as to how we view the use of AI. Over the past two years, we have worked collaboratively across departments, grade levels, and with community partners to develop an instructional framework which aligns to our educational values as well as our strategic plan. Please allow me to share briefly how this work is unfolding this year and how

012it connects to our ride commitment. First, critical thinking. We are preparing students to meet the demands of a rapidly changing world with both technical skill and deep intellectual curiosity. Through guid guided use of AI tools, students are learning how to think critically, ask meaningful questions, and problem solve in ways that are rigorous and relevant. They are not just consuming information. They are evaluating, creating and engaging with it on a higher level. Second, inclusivity and differentiation. AI is helping us deepen student engagement by personalizing their learning and expanding access to resources K through 12. Whether it's being used as a thought partner for students who are preparing for a writing assignment or an exercise or a high school student who's exploring texts created in a different Lexile level for better comprehension and understanding. We are seeing

013how thoughtful integration can increase student achievement. But just as importantly, students are engaging in thoughtful conversations about what these tools mean, how they work, who they benefit, and where caution is needed. And you're going to see a little bit of that later as our students present. Third, social responsibility and ethics. We are teaching our students not only how to use AI, but to how to do so ethically. our classrooms across the district. Students are examining questions of bias and algorithms, the importance of original thought, and the responsibilities that come with digital media. They are learning that the choices they make with technology reflect who they are, and the impact on social media presence as well as the impact on other students and peers. In this age of rapid change, our focus on student well-being has

014never been more important. Our AI guidelines, which were created last year, are designed with balance in mind, ensuring that human connection, empathy, and kindness remain at the heart of every single thing we do. It is about using AI not to shortcut learning, but to deepen it. And it is about ensuring that our students grow not just as capable thinkers but as ethical compassionate citizens. Through professional learning which has been provided for the last two years specifically around AI, collaborative planning and shared leadership. We are building a system that supports innovation without losing sight of what matters most. the development of students who are prepared not just for the next grade or the next job but for a lifetime of learning integrity and positive contribution. And now I would like to invite Dr. Cissone to the

015podium to speak with you about our AI guidelines. [Music] >> Good evening. Um so over the last year the district has spent a lot of time writing these guidelines and it's been such a pleasure to h work with this team on this task. This goes back to as Lauren said part of the right commitment something new entered education and instead of shying away from it I think as a district we really thought about our values and beliefs and said what's at the core of our learning and that's to always push students in a critical way and our teachers in that way. And so we spent two years with our technology committee writing guidelines, revising them, revising them again, trying them a little bit in the classroom, getting feedback um from other teachers, from other students,

016from the community, and now having a standardized format of what we feel we can use in the classroom with students. The AI guidelines were designed to upload ethical, responsible, and equitable access for our students. And that's something that these five sections, if you look at our guidelines really appeal to what you're going to hear tonight as to what we're doing in the classroom, the guidelines talk about what is our belief and our vision for the Ry City School District around AI. How are we going to teach our students and our teachers to use it in a responsible safe manner? How are we going to provide professional learning, which you'll hear about our plan and what the work we've been doing over the last two years. and how do we also meet the approved policies that

017we already have set forth in the Ry City School District around access and approved sites. So, taking that all into consideration, it was wonderful to now come up with this framework of a stance of how we can actually use this new piece of technology to foster crit critical thinking and ownership within our classroom. over the summer because we always providing professional learning for the district. Um we have institutes every year and one of the great things about our institutes is a bunch of teachers and educators get to come together at the end of the year and study for multiple days on a topic that they're passionate about. This year our focus was AI. We got to spend two full days learning from wonderful keynotes. We had a keynote each day. Um and then we offered

018with our own uh professional development team in the district 12 different series of workshops um each of the days that teachers had choice on it that they could pick. We looked at AI strategies that enhanced productivity. We talked about student learning and engagement and we focused on instructional project um strategies and ways that AI could be used in the classroom. This was a tremendous opportunity. We had about 53 teachers join our institute and then as we'll talk about a little today how we showcase how we continue that learning but it was a real eye openener for our teachers to say this is not going away it's something that we're going to be presented with it how do we integrate this in an impactful way to support ourselves and also our students and I'm going to

019have Kim and Caroline come up and talk a little bit about what the institute looked like on each of the days >> good evening thank you for having us. So the first day of the institute was teacher focused and it was really grounding the teachers in a common foundation um and a collective vision of the work that we did through the AI guidelines and we really wanted to enhance teaching and learning across the district. Um, we wanted them to have like a foundational understanding of what AI was, how to use it, um, and to really promote ethical use because if they had a strong foundation themselves, they then can turn key it to students. So day two prim primarily focused on student use. So the first day teachers were learning how to use it, how

020to use it to enhance their instruction just as a tool, whether they were using it for differentiation etc. The second day we started to look uh look deeply at what this could look like in the hands of students. Um and we looked specifically at tools that students have access to and did some explicit professional learning around that. Then we also looked at tools that students have access to that have that they've had access to for quite some time that now have some AI embedded and integrated inside of them. And we did that across K12. So we looked at what this would look like at an appropriate level for elementary students, whether that was through teacher modeling and what this would look like when students are a little bit more independent with it at the secondary

021level as well. do this. >> So, with all the wonderful work that we've been doing within the Ry City School District over the last two years, we thought um what a great way to showcase this was coming up with our strategic plan around AI. Um and we've been talking a lot about strategic plans and way that we can document all the meaningful learning and growth that we've had over time within the district. Um during the last school year, if I can jump back into last year, what we really thought about was how do we train teachers um into understanding what AI is and how do we start to pilot some tools and find great entry points for teachers to integrate this into their classroom in a way that felt comfortable and safe for them. And

022so during the last school year, we spent a lot of time just building teacher capacity, right? That's where we needed to start. We needed to have set guidelines so we knew clearly what the expectations and the vision were for integration. We had to make sure that teachers had a foundation of what AI could be and what it looks like. Um, and let them have time to just process and think about ways that it it could work in the classroom. It's a little nerve-wracking in the beginning. Um, so we needed to just sit with that and really help and support teachers in way that it was felt digestible and comfortable in a classroom. We spent time piloting different applications with teachers to think about, as Kim will talk about in a little bit, a tool called

023DIFET. And that's a way that teachers could help support differentiation and lesson design within their classroom. So more on the teacher and not the student. We really had to think about when we say curriculum development and where does this fit, talking to teachers about what is the natural entry point because anything with technology, it's not technology all the time. It's where it makes sense. And so what are those natural entry points to help grow and to push our students into critical thinkers and have them really engaged in what they're learning about? We had to start parent discussions because that's just important, right? Our teachers and our students, we all do a wonderful job in these walls of the school district, but how do we get parents on board? How are we talking the same language?

024How do we have a commonality in what we believe around um hey, how AI could be beneficial and supportive? And then what are the things to look out for, right? We also had to think about how do we start to expose students to this technology tool but again in a way that is safe and supportive to their growth and learning within the classroom. So we had a lot of time to do a lot of professional development last year which you'll hear um in the next couple of slides around superintendent conference days running our own sessions with teachers during department meetings or faculty meetings. Um so we really spent a lot of time digging into the teacher end of what this could look like. And then we also then built off of that feedback throughout last

025school year. That's what helped us to design the AI institute and what teachers needed to move forward. And that's why the two days were creative. Again, focusing on teacher use, but then also starting to have those thoughtful conversations about how do we turn key this with students. This year, what we're really excited is we're looking to scale and start deepening the integration of the AI. And so in um this year and in the next couple of sides you'll really hear about the roll out of a lot of the tools that we have access to. Diffet Magic School Chat GBT Gemini Notebook LM. These are all wonderful tools but they're being integrated in a purposeful way. We're looking at alignment with standards and curriculum across the board which you're going to hear about tonight. We talked

026about teacher growth and where they feel confident confident and um comfortable and where do they also need some support and how do we help them get through that. We talked about the expansion of AI literacy. So looking in our elementary library classes where this is a natural entry point. All of our elementary students take um library media. And so we're already teaching digital literacy in those classes. And so now just adding to the conversation of what AI looks like is that um for us has been a great entry point for that and we're working on continuing to build out those lessons. You're going to hear about middle school integration tonight with our passion projects um library crosswalk. We've also done that work in fifth grade during the capstone uh project that we launched last year

027which was a really nice pilot for us and doing some deeper work this year with those projects as well. And then we're excited for our three-part series that's coming up for our parent engagement um all around AI. So you'll hear about that a little bit more tonight about what that role for parents and the opportunities that they'll have to participate in learning around AI. And then we're going to continue with our conference days and just districtwide professional learning in general around this topic. So when we talk about the creation of the professional um learning plan, we really want to be purposeful in that and really elicit feedback from our teachers about what they need um and what they need additional support in in order to give our children the proper access to those tools. So

028what we do is we offer surveys throughout the year um and we gain that feedback. We have um a lot of our teachers speak with our coaches in terms of what they need in real time um while they're in their in their cycles. And then we also have a lot of feedback from our administrators. Um so keeping a pulse on the departments because every single department, especially in the 6 through 12 range, need something different. So we've been intentional about building our staff capacity. Since fall of 2023, you can see a lot of the professional learning sessions that have occurred um last year. And this year, I'd like to highlight um that we have included cohort-based book studies, advanced workshops, and inschool coaching. These sessions give educators hands-on experience and practical strategies that they can

029implement in their classrooms right away. Some things that we're looking forward to, um we had this fall the amplify student thinking with AI. We also have our coordinator meetings. Um secondary is focusing on AI goals. These came from our department coordinator saying that they're hearing a lot of the teachers in their department say that we need these tools and we want to start using these in our pedagogical approaches for student learning. So every month we're offering an AI mini session um some a new tool every single month and how to use it. We have AI technology integration um that Dr. Son uh spoke about. And then superintendent's conference day um we have coming up November 25th and we actually have a keynote speaker coming in um to talk about you know really what AI looks

030like in schools for to think about projected for tomorrow and then he's offering two sessions um to our teachers that they can elect into and we're also offering our in-house courses um based on teacher um requests. So uh we have a lot of professional learning around um AI and it's going to be continuing because as you know since AI is always changing so do we um and that's something that we are very conscientious to to keep up with >> and now Miss Prashad. Mr. >> So we just wanted to highlight some of the general work that you'll see elementary teachers utilizing and how they are utilizing AI in the classroom. So specifically the two primary tools as a teacher that you would see teachers using are diffit and magic school diffit is more of a

031teacherfacing tool. So it's a tool that teachers have access to and the primary purpose of it is for them to really target differentiation. So, for example, if I was a teacher and I wanted to maybe level um text for the different, you know, skill areas of my students in my class, I could simply get a different text leveled based on what I've entered. If I wanted to get modified test questions or assessment questions, that's a tool I would be able to use. Also, what's also nice about this is that it will also generate studentf facing resources. So it's not studentf facing in the sense that students are going onto it and interacting with the tool but a teacher could very easily modify materials using diffit and generate that so that they can target the specific

032students in their class. This is incredibly helpful for saving time just because every classroom is made up of so many different learners. So that's a tool that's heavily utilized by teachers in order in order to target the needs of students in their classrooms. The other tool that we're going to see a lot of people using um at the K12 level is Magic School. And Magic School is both teacherfacing and studentf facing. So as Carol was sharing on that day one of our AI institute that was primarily teacher focused, we were looking for example at ways that teachers could utilize a tool like Magic School to amplify their instruction. That might be to um insert more engaging opportunities in a lesson. That could be to help uh generate higher order thinking questions in a lesson. It

033might be to help take something and chunk it down into smaller parts to support a student. But what's nice about Magic School is that it has a ton of generators. And it's a little bit more targeted for teachers rather than a tool that's a little bit more open like let's say a chat GPT which um relies a lot more primarily on a teacher completely inputting or the user rather inputting exactly what it wants. Um, Magic School is specifically made for educators and it has a bunch of different types of generators to help teachers tailor what it is that they're creating. On the studentf facing part of Magic School, it is solely dependent on how a teacher wants to use it. So, it's not a tool that a student can just kind of go on and

034it be a free-for-all as they explore. It's very targeted and it has a purpose. So, the same way that a teacher would have an explicit assignment, let's say on Google Classroom, they would push out Magic School and pre-select which tools they want students to use. So, at the time, there's probably there's like 60 different tools on Magic School that students can use, but by no means when they click on it, can they access all of that? They would only be able to access the specific tools that a teacher assigns. On a management standpoint, it's also really nice because since this is a K12 tool, you could imagine a student using AI at a kindergarten level or first and second grade level is probably very different than secondary students. So, what's nice about this is not

035only is it dependent on what teachers are assigning out, but it allows teachers to kind of prime what they want uh students to use it for. So they're selecting grade level. They're putting additional parameters like what is the focus of the assignment to what capacity are students studying XYZ or interacting with whatever topic it is. Um and then teachers also get analytic data. So every single interaction whether they're asking a question, if they're asking for feedback, students are able to see those optics. I'm sorry, teachers are able to see those optics of what students are doing just to kind of go back to the conversation that students are using it appropriately. Um, and it just gives you the ability to manage that and make sure that when you are using AI, it's appropriate regardless of

036the age level that you're using it. >> AI, >> I'm going to invite Anna Dagmar Johnson to kind of talk about a specific project she's doing with um, AI in her classroom. >> Should I speak from here? >> Sure. Okay. >> Um, great. So, my name is Anna Dagmar. I teach at the Osborne School and I teach elementary music and I also work with my partner uh Matthew Strang who uh you teaches the similar classes that I do. And last year we did a project um working with the instrument the recorder. We've come a long way since Hot Cross Buns um and we added to it a composing element. So students would learn a series of notes and they work with these notes to create their own melodies. And so we did this project last

037year and we had them also explore different genres. So different styles of music and they had to read about that in an encyclopedia online type of thing and just do some research and put together what the styles would sound like. Um but this year we're trying it in a new way to incorporate AI. And so one of the first steps that students will do is to get to interview an historical composer. So for example, it's much more exciting to ask Beethoven a question than to just read about music that was written 200 years ago. So they might say to Beethoven, what instruments do you do you compose for? Um what is the sound of, you know, classical music and learning what what country do you live in and things in this way. So it's more

038dynamic experience when they're doing that initial research. Um so carrying on from that, we want students to then listen to these different genres of music and be able to describe in their own words. So they're not just taking off the page, but be able to talk about reggae music. For example, I had a student last year say, "Regga music tends to be very bouncy. It puts me in a happy mood. So, what instruments do you hear?" And they have to explore that and be able to articulate that themselves. Um, and after they've worked in small groups, they use these accompaniment tracks um that actually have that type of background in the music, but they're making up their own melody. Um, and then they feel like, hey, I'm actually playing reggae on the recorder. I'm actually

039playing jazz on the recorder, um, to really bring it to life. Um, so then when they go into the part that has to do with really pinning down their research, really putting it into words, they have to write that just as we would write a mini essay, and they have to come up with their own way of paraphrasing it and their own terminology um, to explain it. But then they can then use AI to help just to refine and edit their writing to make it a little bit better. But the AI material is not writing it for them. So the idea is that the the the children are doing the big lifting of the learning and thinking and then they're using AI as kind of a partner uh or a secondary step in their learning.

040So, what you see here is a visual of what it would look like if a teacher was setting up what we call a room in Magic School. So, this is an example of a character chatbot that Anna was talking about of how you can kind of have students engage with a musician. Um, and what you'll see is a dual view. So when a teacher is setting up a room in Magic School, they have a teacher view which is where they're priming the very specific details for how students are going to interact with whatever it tool that they selected. So here you could see that Anna is inputting information like what the project is about, what musicians she might want to include when the students are engaging, um what specific genres so that it's not just

041completely open. And then of course you can also see that it's tailored specifically to third grade. So the types of information and that iteration and that conversation that's going to be happening, it is going to be appropriate at a third grade level and it's very targeted so that it's not just like an open-ended putting a third grader on some type of an AI tool where they're expected to kind of do all of that lifting. So you'll see teachers always have that dual view so that they can understand the student experience. And what makes it nice is when we're introducing this to students, we can very directly and explicitly model what that appropriate interaction should look like prior to just putting them on a tool. Here you can see an example of a writing feedback tool.

042Same thing where you see the two the teacher view as well as the student experience where students would be uploading writing that they've already done to get some feedback. And that feedback can look differently and I'm sure Anna can speak a little bit more to that. But the purpose of that is so that it can be very individualized to what students need in real time. And again, it's just kind of stimulating their thinking and adding to what it is that they're creating. They're not doing the idea generation directly on this tool. >> All right, I'm going to hand it over to middle school. All right. So, um we wanted to talk a little bit about what the plan was for middle school this year. Uh we were really thoughtful in what we did across sixth,

043seventh, and eighth grade so that every middle school student has an experience with AI. Um, all the lessons have been integrated into core curriculum. So, they're not add-ons, but they're tools that enhance research. They enhance lit literacy, inquiry, and critical thinking skills. So, for sixth grade, um, they go through a quarter class, which is passion project. In that class, sixth graders explore something that they're passionate about. they do research and they're using um through uh magic school AI tools to help support brainstorming in the research process. Um in seventh and eighth grade we took a different approach and I'd like Franchesca Miller to uh come up with me and go through some of that. Um in seventh and eighth grade we looked at the library media crosswalk. So that's areas of the curriculum where we're

044able to embed library media media skills into social studies and ELA. And over the summer, Francesca and I met and we worked on six different lessons that the seventh and eighth grade would have targeted explicit AI instruction embedded into their curriculum that they would have been able to dive into all different topics. So um our first three lessons that we created were really focusing on shifting away from um prohibition of using AI to the ethical use of AI in academics. And so the first lesson was really about for um having conversations around AI use. Um and we used um a tool that we had learned about at the AI institute over the summer and we paired that tool down um for seventh and eighth graders. Um it's called the grayscale and we'll get into that

045um in a little while. Um and then the second lesson the second two lessons are on um helping students to recognize deep fakes in AI, hallucinations um that AI produces and then bias in AI. Um and so once the students are sufficiently skeptical of AI, then we introduce them to lateral reading across the internet. And so that we teach them using critical thinking skills how to um assess AI and determine whether or not the information that they're gathering is um is verified um or if it's made up. um our our second three set of lessons um four, five and six are um building on their academic skills and are using magic school um as a a source for them to enhance their study skills, their writing skills, and their research skills. So, every single seventh

046and eighth grade student through their social studies teacher um will be setting up three different rooms within AI within the magic school AI. Um each room is specifically tailored for uh writing um study skills and research skills. And the teachers are picking the tools that they want the students to have in each one of those rooms. Um each tool can be paired down to what the teacher wants the tool to look like. And so you can put on bumpers um so that the kids can't ask the AI tool to rewrite their paper for them, but it will give them feedback, um areas of strength, um areas of growth. Um and so each room has something different in the study skills room. Uh one of our favorite tools in the social studies department is a tool

047called chat with docs. So the kids can upload a primary source and can have a conversation with AI about that primary source um and it can help them to study and prepare for an assessment. Um the in the writing room there's the writing feedback tool um which like I said provides them with um their strengths, areas of growth and then mechanical errors. Um and then in the research room, um there's a research question generator which can help them to tailor research questions. So for when they go off and do their own research in our library media center and can help them to focus their research for an assignment. On the teacher end, uh Magic School is wonderful. Uh there's a dashboard where we can look at the output of every single one of our students

048and see how they're interacting with the tool. Um, and it gives us their full history. We see their conversations. We see the prompts that they put in. Um, it gives us a detailed summary of how they interacted with the tool. Um, their behavior while they were interacting with the tool. It can flag them if they were having an inappropriate conversation. Um, areas of strength and then areas that they need for improvement with the tool. So, those three lessons focus on those three areas for using Magic School. And to date, um, our seventh grade has already started doing investigation for research with indigenous tribes and eighth grade is going to start using the research tools towards the end of the month when they start their veterans project. Um, and they've already started with some fun warm-up

049activities. There's one that we're going to see in a minute. Um, and as a research assistant. So, one of the examples that you see up there is the gray area activity, and that was an activity that we did at the AI institute with staff. And what we did during this was a really, it was a values-based activity. Um, and staff thought about their own personal use. Francesca and I thought that it would be more appropriate and we have scenario cards if you want to take a look and see what we did with the kids to create several scenarios that would take students through that values-based work, but instead of tying it to their own practice, which may or may not be something that they use, we gave them scenarios that they could talk about, have

050discussions, and be able to make some ethical decisions based on that. And this was a nice unplugged way to get kids thinking and to encourage conversation about the ethical use of AI. From there, we built in um some warm-up activities that had to do with deep fakes. And then Francesca um put, as she had said, three rooms, a writing room, a research room, and a study skills room. And we have students here to talk about how they've engaged with that. And I think that their experiences are something that you're going to find really interesting. Um, one thing as noted by Miss Prasad, you cannot just go on to magic school as a student. So if the um tools are not assigned to you, you don't have access to it. So what's great is by social

051studies pushing these tools out to kids, they can not only use it in their classes, but they have the opportunity to use it for other study skills for other classes. um they've had, you know, a lot of use through the study skills tool. Um we've seen through the dashboard that they're not just using it for social studies, they're using it to help study in other classes as well. Um so I'll just highlight so um up on the screen in the the lefthand corner you can see the output for the gray um the gray area activity and this was really an excellent way to start conversations about AI and the use of AI in um education and the kids were moving away from thinking about it as right or wrong and really critically thinking about you

052know the decision-making process of when it is appropriate for them to use AI. So, the scenario cards you see being passed around, those were the scenarios we came up with that would kind of mimic what kids would be thinking about. Um, one of the scenarios was the essay writer and and using AI to write your essays. And they had to determine if that was appropriate, if it was in the gray area or if it was an inappropriate use of AI. Some of the other ones was an idea starter. Is it okay to use AI to help you start your ideas? Or a grammar checker. And this really the conversations were very fluid. It was excellent. The kids were talking about it engaging in an engaging way. And what I really like to hear in the

053classroom was they were a lot of our students thought it was a little icky. That was the word they used to use AI um in academics. And what we were figuring out is through the use of magic school that they can use AI in an appropriate way um to help enhance their education. Uh so I'm going to let Taylor and um and Brooke um talk about the gray the gray area activity um the deep fake warm-up and then their use of magic school. making this. I think >> Hi everyone, I'm Taylor and this is Brooke. And um in our eighth grade social studies class, we've been doing a lot of studying and exposure to AI tools and how they can either benefit or negatively affect our education and our academics. And one specific exercise that

054we did was I'm going to start with the gray area was it really helped to like enhance students ability to really think about if their use of AI was appropriate and whether or not the way that other student peers might be using AI was appropriate or not. And the gray area in the middle was sort of we don't really know if it's okay. We don't really know if it's not okay. It's just sort of like the way students are using it. And there were three scales, 1 2 3 or four. And throughout our tables, we would read the individual prompts and say whether we thought they were 1 2 3 or four or five. Five being the highest and like the worst. And some of like the ones were using AI to give you like

055a word like synonym for happy or synonym for sad. But some of the fives were having AI write your essay if you were preoccupied with sports and you got home at 9:00 p.m. and you asked AI to write your entire essay for you about reconstruction. And um the gray area in the middle was kind of Miss Miller gave us a really good example of like if you have too much writing asking AI to do to like shrink it down for you because then you're kind of missing out on some critical thinking skills. However, our exposure to Magic School has really helped us realize that using AI doesn't have to feel icky. Like she said, it can feel beneficial towards us and we can feel really comfortable using this resource. And something that I wrote on

056my little paper here was that it really specifically targets students who may not feel comfortable asking questions in the public classroom. So it kind of makes them feel more comfortable asking questions either to Raina or to ask them to help them start writing prompts. And a lot of my friends and peers have expressed their positive outlooks on using Magic School because they don't feel necessarily guilty for using it. They actually really enjoy it because it was given to us by our teachers. just so we know that we're allowed to use it and we're not allowed to cheat since we can't ask them to write the essay for us or write anything for us. So, we know that we're using AI in a beneficial way for us and we know that it's working really well for

057us. So, >> hi, I'm Brooke and um another one I would like to talk about is the deep fakes with AI. So half of the photos are generated by AI and the other one was a re um a real photo from the time period during the Civil War. So it was really interesting to be able to talk to my peers about how AI has changed the image or you can see how different the images are cuz some of them that are created by AI they're very still. But since me and my peers know that during the Civil War the cameras were blurry and you had to stay still for more than 5 seconds for the camera to take an actual shot. The second photo of Abraham Lincoln, it had to be fake because the people

058are moving in the background. So using our critical thinking skills, we could know that that was AI because you had to stand still for a photo during that time period as technology wasn't as advanced as it as it is now. But on the photo on the far right, you can see how the photo the photo is in the front. It's very clear and the people had to stay still, but in the back it's a little blurry in the tents blurry. And on on the far left you can see Abraham shaking hands with Robert E. Lee who was part of the South. So you can tell that that's not real because Abraham Lincoln was part of the North during the Civil War. So he wouldn't be taking shaking hands with Robert Eye. Um, sorry. Also to

059add on to what Brooke said for the deep fakes, seeing the photos and being exposed to having to actually think about photographic history and critical thinking really helped us to understand like AI can be very scary at some points and can be very like blending in. But we all had a really good time trying to like decipher the difference between the AI and the real photo. And one of the girls in my class actually noticed that in the old photographic times when Abraham Lincoln was actually alive, they had to stamp the ink onto the photo and she could see the ink stains in the corner which made her know that it wasn't a kids enjoyed this so much. They've asked me to do these repeatedly. So, we have more of them coming up. I told

060I told Brooke um and and Taylor that there's another one coming on Friday that they're going to have three photos and they're going to have to figure out which ones are AI and which ones are real. We're very excited actually. >> Um, >> girls, do you want to talk about uh your documents? So, how you've used it for writing and studying? >> Yeah. So, so far in 8th grade, we have been introduced to Magic School AI. And one of the helpful tools that I used was the writing feedback, which when we wrote our essay about reconstruction at the end of the unit, we could paste our writing in and ask it for helpful um growth, strength, and punctuation errors. So, it'd read over our writing, but it wouldn't give us exact examples. It wouldn't give

061us it wouldn't cheat, and it wouldn't give us the exact writing of what we should change. It would give us sentence starters or it would give us punctuation errors and it would tell us different ways that we could evaluate and elaborate on our work. And when I got stuck, it helped me, it thought of other ways that I could write something or make it sound more professional. Um, one way that I used Magic School was study habits. And for me personally, as a student, I have an issue with procrastination in studying areas. And I asked Rea to give me a study schedule almost because I was going to be missing one of the days of school. And I asked Rea to give me a study schedule to study Abraham Lincoln and reconstruction. And she gave

062me a very indepth like what I should study dayby day. And I printed it out. I took it in the car and I studied it all the way. And I did really well on the test. So it was really helpful. And um I also asked Raina to give me like a daybyday like Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, what I should specifically study, quotes, people I should know, and she gave me a really great output to put on a Google Doc. >> Another thing I found helpful about Magic School is when I pasted my writing in, it wouldn't change it for me. It would help me figure out what to change. So, it would give me my growth and tell me what I did really well. And it would give me my strengths, which it gave

063me my growth, which I should have evaluated on or change up. And then it gave me my strengths, which is how I understood the topic or wrote well. And then it gave me my punctuation errors and helped me change up words that I spelled wrong or add commas or periods when I should have. >> Thank you very much. >> Thank you. That was fantastic. Um, so as you can see, there's been a lot of work that's been going into the learning around AI, the integration into our classrooms with AI, but we know the work is not done yet and there's a lot of next steps um that we have to do. And so, as we talked about in the beginning, constantly just looking at our guidelines to making sure that we are um where they

064need to be, that things don't need to be modified, there's not different tools out there, that it's meeting the needs for our students and for our teachers. Um so that's something this year at the technology committee one of the focuses again will be to reooking at the work that we did last year and just seeing what feedback and what adoptions need to be made um if any but it's always going to be a document that gets revised um and you know republished and shared with our faculty and staff. In addition to that as we talked about throughout the night um K12 alignment is really important to us. So, you heard a lot tonight about um upper elementary, you've heard about middle school um but we're still looking at the works from a K12 perspective. And

065so, working with our department coordinators this year and our elementary grade level leaders, really thinking about the AI in the curriculum and where it fits best is one of our um major goals for the year. Continuing to look at our AI literacy lessons across library media. Um, so really looking at like fourth and fifth grade where we are adapting some of our lessons right now to make sure that that conversation gets integrated. Um, in fifth grade capstone, while we launched Capstone last year and found a lot of success with it, we always know that there's room for improvement and growth. And so as we heard tonight from Miss Pursade, the different ways that we can now integrate and use Magic School on the student end um will be something that we put into play when

066we're launching our capstone projects with our students this year in um sixth, seventh, and eighth grade. Um Francesca and Caroline and the team have done an amazing job on our social studies lessons. And so now our next step is we are working with our English department to write those lessons for seventh and eighth grade, which we're really excited about. And then the continuation that this year is just getting feedback from our teachers when they do integrate AI into a lesson. Just getting feedback from them. What worked really well? What do we need more professional learning on? What do we need to adapt or modify? So, it's going to be a year of just growth and iteration for all of us throughout all of these lessons. Um, in 9th grade, we're really looking into our nth

067grade composition course. So, we're working with Mr. car, our high school principal, um, to really look at the discussions around how that can unfold and be adapted and modified as a as a course to bring in AI literacy, ethical use with writing application. Um, and then I'll turn it over to Lauren to talk a little bit about our parent university. >> So, this year we are offering our parent university focused specifically on AI for our families. It's going to be a three-part series. The first one is on November 17th. That's going to provide an overview for everybody K through 12 and then the sessions are going to build on each other. So, the next one's going to be January 7th and then February 23rd. The plan for January 7th and February 23rd is to really

068break each session into two groups, a K through six and a seven through 12, and really let parents know what students have access to, not only here at school, but really what they have access to at home because we have structures in within our classrooms, but when they get home, there's really no structure. So, what does that look like for parents? What do students have access to? And then how does that pair in the building here? and how are we supporting them? Um, so communications going out um about our parent universities and we look forward to having everybody attend. Um, at this time are there questions, comments and please feel free to ask any questions of our students, our teachers, coaches. I will just start by saying that was a um very comprehensive presentation with

069a lot of thoughtful reflection and our student presenters are always the highlight of our presentation. So, thank you both. >> Thank you. Thank you. >> You both did a very nice job and it's clear that um you feel that your education is being enhanced by the opportunities that you've had and I'm sure that it's not just because of the AI aspect of it. It's probably more so your teachers than the tools that you're using. And so we think that I certainly have some things, but I'll turn it over to others to start. >> You're the other. >> That's one. >> Okay. Um, so I I um I often find when we have these kinds of presentations, there's so much information that I'm taking in that it takes me a bit. because and even though I

070looked at it beforehand, um hearing your perspectives, teachers, students, um and the uh instructional uh coaches, it really brings a different level of understanding to what it is that you're doing when you're um learning about AI, when you're helping the rest of our faculty learn about it, when you're implementing it, when you're using it day-to-day. Um, I I mean there's a lot of exciting things in here and what I really appreciate is that we are grounded in the guidelines that were developed because I think that is um that's going to be a key element to ensuring that we are monitoring and watching that this does continue to be something that enhances and builds and doesn't like dip into the, you know, a student isn't getting the learning out of it that we want them to

071have. Um, and I know that that's something that we all are on the same page about and and certainly want, you know, at our core. It's it's the kids learning for their lives, not just so that they can go from uh fifth grade to middle school or from uh middle school to high school, but what are they what are they able to bring with them that they're going to be able to use forever? And um I really enjoyed the the um the gray sk gray area uh exercise. I thought that was and reading the um examples that you sent around. I thought that was a very helpful I mean I didn't get a chance to really dive into them, but you could see where there'd be some where you'd be like, "Oh, I don't know.

072Is that is that the wrong way to use AI? I'm not sure." And I think we're all kind of learning a lot of that together. Um uh one question that that Lauren actually already answered was um the building the parent universities how we're going to build on those. So I'll be it'll be interesting to see how we take the foundational piece and then can uh kind of separate it out. Do you see both sessions being separated out or do you would you see one is case K5 and the other sorry K6 and then the other 712? the plan. The first one is an overview for everybody. So, everyone will be in the same room and it'll be an overview of really what AI is and how we're using it in the buildings. The idea for

073the second two, everyone will still attend, but we will do two separate rooms, K through 6, 7 through 12, because that looks different for an elementary age parent, school each parent, and then a secondary. >> Um, and and really the part is what AI can do, right? when when the child isn't in having bumpers here at school, >> right? >> You know, when they're home and that access is, you know, is really vast, what does AI look like when there are no bumpers and really how can a parent identify that and support that and really just parallel what we're doing here, which is increasing the scale comprehension, right? >> Um, and and really it's it's a partnership at that point. So, you know, we're hoping to get a lot of our parents to come in

074and say, you know, this is what AI looks like. You may think it's not, but really this is what it can do and it's very capable. Um, and a lot of it is the conversation that AI is able to have. Um, you may have heard our our students talk about Raina, you know, and these are bots and then they feel like very real people and that's something that we want to educate our parents about too because there could be conversations that maybe not are always educational, right? Um, so that's something that we really just want to partner with our parents and make sure that, you know, they're aware. >> And at this point, so based on that, Magic School, I'm um guessing can only be used in the building with the parameters that exist within

075it or they if it's on a the teacher has to set it up is my understanding to have >> to have it go home on the um Chromebook. >> Yes, it can it can be accessed on their schoolisssued device um from home. Okay. but with the parameters that the teacher said and only the tools that the teacher has pushed out to the students through Google Classroom. >> All right. Okay. So, well, that's that's helpful that you can still have that access at home. Yes. At um >> and we can always monitor their on the dashboard how they're interacting with with the tools. >> Right. Okay. >> There's just one one qu question about you know the magic school. There are some really great examples and you know again I think it does a great job

076to have those those guard rails and you know the teacher can can very clearly identify you know what a student can have access and cannot but you know I saw you know chat GPT and Gemini being mentioned you know you you raised the right point you know about the parent side where you come home and maybe they have access to it but I guess what what are we currently allowing students to to access around you know those larger you know no guard rail LLM >> um so currently right now our approved list for Gemini or Chapp chachi is for the teacher facing end of it so we don't allow it for students um not saying we never will or won't be but right now we want to really do some education around having a platform

077that's support both the teacher and student engaging in those conversations together um before we just do an open-ended there's a lot of rules around Ed Law 2D and data privacy too with chat um GBT and Gemini. So we have to be mindful of student age um and who has access to it. At the moment right now if you're a rise student and you try to access it with your Google account like a chat GBT you would not be allowed to. That's not to say at home with a personal email it can't be accessed. And so that's why we feel like it's really important with our parent universities to have those conversations. So to say if it's a is a family decision and it's something that is allowed at home, what you can do to help

078support your child navigating a platform that's very open-ended like that. >> Great. I guess just a follow-up question. I don't have kids in, you know, uh, middle or high, but is that part of the conversation? You know, at the beginning of the year explicitly, you know, uh, magic school is your preferred avenue. Please do not use these other >> Yeah. So I'll definitely say from the education from the teacher end our coaches do an amazing job with every year publishing our um approved web tools and it's literally a guide with resources and materials of what we pay for subscription rise within Rice City. So all the things they have access to um and then our teachers do a phenomenal job in terms of turnkeying that in the classroom with students to say that our preferred

079tools are X Y and Z and that's what you are allowed to use within Ry City. Um so I think we do a lot of communication around it. um constantly having conversations about why and why not for certain applications. Um we even work with our consultants to say when they come in and do professional learning here like what tools are we allowed to engage with? And so it's something that we're constantly talking about. Um and it's not a model that is always going to stay, right? Every year they adapt, they modify, and they change, but it is something that we push out very early on for teachers to say this is what you have access to. So planning and and designing can be done. Um but it's not open-ended by any means. And I'll I'll

080also add as the students become more familiar with the tools that we push out to them in the classroom, the hope is is that they will become so comfortable with those tools that they will stay with Magic School into high school. Um because these are tools that are education tools and and they're there to help them specifically with study habits or with research skills as opposed to a a larger LLM that's just kind of out there. um there are specific ones targeted for research questions and for study habits and so the more comfortable they become with those tools hopefully they will use them into high school as well and that takes me to like so many questions but I'll try to I'll try to stay focused as best as I can um because I do

081think and it was one of the points that I wrote down where Taylor was talking about using Raina and I want to you know it's great to set up these study guides and so it is teacher directed, but then the opportunity will exist perhaps in high school for other teachers to have a more open access for students in those classes. Like I guess I'm trying to understand what's the rolling forward to allow somebody like Taylor who's found a successful tool to give her that access to it to create to continue that success moving forward. speak to the system. >> I mean, I think I'll jump on. Sorry. That's right. No, I I mean, I think that that goes back to the professional learning. I mean, I would say like we are really still at like

082the initial steps, you know, of this work. you know, we've done a very thorough job of setting it up in terms of our guidelines and and but like the amount of professional learning. I think that we need to continue engaging teachers in is is probably the answer to that question. We have some early adopters um like the two educators you have here who are, you know, kind of passionate about this and taking it on and that's going to happen with anything that you um implement. But I, you know, it's going to go back to like where what opportunities are we offering teachers? What are their entry points into this work? Where do they see it making sense for them um and for their students? >> And and Dr. Murray, I'll also add that the social

083studies department um 6 through 12, our goal this year is centered around AI. And um Carol also came to our first department meeting and 6 through 12 teachers set up rooms in Magic School for their students. So the high school students in social studies will also be um accessing magic school um tools as well. >> And so then is the expectation that all teachers at some point will either use it as a teacherfacing tool and or a studentf facing tool there. We haven't been that clear and say we expect this but I would say that's going to happen with the amount of professional learning that we are giving and the ways in which we're doing it. I think we're relying heavily at the secondary level on our department coordinators as Franchesca said that they can

084go in with their they can create goals around this for their departments and engage their colleagues in those ways. >> Okay. I I think it might just be helpful um to just highlight for those who maybe haven't um had a chance to really read thoroughly through our guidelines, but to talk about what are the student consequences for students who are accessing or using these AI tools in a way that certainly sits outside of the gray area or maybe inside of the gray area that we as a system don't support. So the tail end of the lesson on the gray area was that we came up with class guidelines um for ethical use of AI in our classroom and we did that collaboratively as a class um and those were posted in in my classroom and

085in other social studies classrooms um about what should happen, what should be the consequences of misuse of AI. Um and and the students generated those themselves. Um you know, having a conversation with the teacher, um being able to go back and redo the assignment, um having lessons and and conversations about what happened and why things went wrong. Um so those were some of the the things that we came up with as a class together. >> I'm sorry. I have a quick comment about Raina that I forgot to get to. I I just realized a couple of minutes ago that I forgot to mention that in my study habits, Rea also gave me some studying mistakes to avoid to that other peers may have fallen into very badly. And she told me just to avoid just

086reading over my notes if it's not out loud and to avoid making flashcards cuz apparently that's a big study mistake. and she gave me a lot of helpful resources and ways that I can study instead based on my personal like learning experience. >> Sorry. >> That's great. Thank you. >> Your honesty. So there clearly is a lot of um thought being given into kind of the different entry points across the curriculum and across the K to2 curriculum. And typically what happens right is you pick areas and there are certain ones where you know you're getting it and then there are kind of these little valleys where we're not. And so are we how are we ensuring that a kid who maybe is in a grade sounds like could be a ninth grade where it's in

087development but before they know it it's developed but the year's over and now they're in 10th. How are we making sure that every kid starting now at some point is going to make sure that they have an opportunity to work with these tools both ethically and to have those conversations around them the use and misuse of them. >> So that would um that again that would go back more at the at the high school level to the work that they're engaging within their departments. So the teachers are learning about ways to use it specific to their content and so they would that all students would be engaging in it that way. Um however to your to your point you know we said we are going to be revising you know a nth grade course to

088put more AI literacy skills in embedded in that and if you are in 10th grade or currently nth you know or on up currently nth graders you would have missed that. Therefore um we need to be creative about ways to bring that content to students. Um if you um recall last year we did um a symposium an AI symposium for our 12th graders who were leaving because we said okay we said to ourselves these kids are going off to college um and this is some AI is is dramatically impacting the college experience right now. We wanted them to at least engage in a discussion together with panelists of experts around it. Um it was a very successful event. Um but we have to find more ways like that to to um have discussions with students

089who aren't, you know, engaging in the sixth grade passion project or the fifth grade capstone or the seventh and eighth grade crosswalks. So I I think that those are discussions that we have to be having so we can so we can fill in those gaps for kids. One of the pieces yesterday that I had the privilege of sitting in was an all day professional learning with Mary Emwsworth and she was great working with our English department 612. And so while as Trisha said like we don't have exactly in every course teachers are engaging in those conversations and looking at what they're teaching and their units of study and finding the entry points right now um eventually we'll get it mapped out to that capacity but just continuing the conversations in all avenue has been something

090that's been really strong and having it part of our department goal 612 having conversations at our coordinators meetings talking to students um we definitely have a long way to go but you constantly now see the conversations happening it's not an afterthought or a second thought. It's as we're doing the learning together. And so we had a great session yesterday just talking about reading and writing across all eras um and ways that AI can help support us in that work. So it's just another example of how we're integrating it across all areas. Um does it seem like the um social studies and English departments are are finding more um opportunity than maybe math and science or maybe it's just that we haven't heard that yet because I'm hearing a lot of English and social studies and

091I can see why given the amount of writing and and um uh research that you would do in those in in those um subject areas but for math and science where what kinds of applications are we seeing there? >> Yeah, I would say at the math math and science they're using more of the teacher facing tools um you know in terms of coming up with um real life math problems that enhanced critical thinking kind of using using tools to for in terms of lesson planning. I think they've had some success with that. >> Um and and also with our science teachers who are still, you know, rolling out these new um learning standards uh and really thinking about the assessment work that has become very complex to match with up with those units. Uh they

092they've been I would say experimenting with it >> and having success in some ways and not in others. >> Okay. But but yes, I think you're correct that that the much of our the work the student facing work is happening mostly in the humanities right now. And just to kind of circle back um to um when we were talking about the the lessons of um what happens if if a student ends up using AI incorrectly or it's it's used in a way that is does not fit what our our guidelines um talk about. Um, and for uh what was great to hear was that the class came up with the the um what lessons they wanted and and the conversations they wanted to have for the for the class to be able to have a

093set of standards. Is there is there um has there been conversation around how do we make that more consistent across across classes or across subject areas >> in terms of creating sort of class norms around it? >> Yeah. Um we probably will need to engage in more conversations around that. Um the area that we did cover first that was last year we had conversations with department coordinators about um I guess consequences if you were to use it in a way that is is not ethical. Um and so based on those conversations I know the middle school and high school both updated their handbooks to reflect that. >> Okay. >> Right. because I just I I think it's important to be very clear and explicit with families and with I know the students know having my

094own two students at home but there are certainly expectations and norms across the district that writing you are producing is your own unless it is accurately sourced that it is not yours and that there is an expectation that students will be creating their own work products and that it is not acceptable nor expected to pass off work that is not your own. And I just I think we need to because there's there are concerns there are rightful concerns from from community members, from parents about kids who are home and just, you know, I do have a late night of sports and so I'm going to pop this in and it's going to punk it out. And also, I've got this chapter that I'm supposed to read and I don't want to sit down and read

09540 pages. So, uh, AI summarize it for me, give it to me in two paragraphs, and now I've done my reading for the night. And I think I I I just I think it would be very helpful to somebody to other somebody with real authority to tell everybody that we mean what we say. And there are in fact consequences and I've heard about consequences of students through conversations. But >> yes, there there are consequences and we do always want to make sure that obviously that our student work is is their work. Um, and I I would actually say that was probably the topic we ha we tackled first with teachers because that that is that's what comes up naturally as we you know and it reminds me of when AI first came out and I

096remember I saw some teachers in the high school and they're like shut it down and that was our response. We shut it down. Um, but although you know to Lauren's point and what she started out with saying you know a AI is here it is here to stay and we have to figure out a way to engage with it in a way that is that is good for students is good for their learning and I think we've put a lot of thought um into that and and I think that as you know we are again in a very the very initial stages but but handling the you know the plagiarism piece or the you know um it has to be tackled before you can do Anything else? >> And just to add to that, over

097the summer when they when we had the AI institute, there was a lot of conversation and a really nice emphasis on teaching teachers how to it's not really flipping the classroom, but making the writing process in classroom and creating a rubric that was assessing the process for the child developing the writing piece. So they would use AI in terms of a thought partner for that writing piece. And that would actually be like a metatext or the assessment, not just the actual final product. So if our teachers are putting a a big emphasis on the process that the child's learning and the skill development in their interaction with AI, that's really teaching the skills of how a student should be using AI appropriately. So the idea of giving almost two assessments, the one that the rubric

098has a built-in reflection piece and a conversational piece with AI and then the actual product that's the end product. So really just thinking about how we teach is part of the professional learning that Dr. Murray is really talking about that we're going to be offering. Yeah. And I think it's I I just don't think you can say it enough that that really all of this work is grounded in that ride commitment. And so it is about using educational tools to further our students in those skills and dispositions that are rooted in the right commitment. And it's not to displace them or take them away. It's really about enhancing them and giving our teachers the opportunity to be as effective in their instruction with our students as possible and then enriching the students experiences as much

099as possible to give them these highlevel skills that they can take with them. >> Sweet. other comments, questions. >> I just have one other um comment or question. Um as you roll out um all these AI processes and clearly as the district rolls out any new initiative, right, it's it's done in a thoughtful way. Uh and it's usually for teachers, it's an elect you elect to take the a class to learn about certain things. At what point do you see um going from teachers electing to take classes or learning more about AI to teachers being required to do so so that you know we get to a point where each every student no matter what class they're in is learning about AI in the same way. You know, it's been difficult because it really depends

100on content at the secondary level. So, it's it's so we usually a model when we want all all teachers have to have to learn this one thing. A faculty meeting is a great place to do that, right? And we we use that model. That's how we developed um our authentic learning projects last year. Um it's how we'll be doing a lot of our work. I think it's it's more difficult because AI is just depend on content. It's it's we've had success um learning about that within a department structure. Um and so that's why I said that you know using our department coordinators has been very very helpful because we can tailor what are the needs of that department and and how can we adjust what we're doing in terms of AI and make it work

101best for them. So um that's how we want to make sure that we provide the professional learning for everyone. So everyone within that department um because they do work on shared goals every year would be putting those goals into play. >> And then just one other question. Do you have any types of data assessment tools that you are currently using to kind of assess that students or and or teachers are um using AI properly like across the district? Um and if if so or if not, what programs do we want to get rid of? What programs do we feel value in keeping? like right as as of now there seems to be about a handful of different tools and how do we narrow that down or widen that? Um that actually is the work of

102the tech committee every year to look at the tools and look at how teachers are using them and look at our use and you know are we getting the most out of it that we can? Are there other tools that teachers are using for specific reasons and teachers sit on that committee and they provide the feedback. They can tell us why some tools get more use than others. But you know something that Dr. has own um analyzes every year throughout the year. >> Thank you. >> Thanks Pete. >> This was been fantastic. Thank you all. It's very thoughtful conversation and it's one that will as um Dr. Cessone said it's an ever evolving and everchanging and some days moves faster than I can move and thankfully maybe it'll be a little slower than I move

103some days too. So maybe we'll get all balanced out. So thank you all so much. This has been really a great opportunity for all of us to have a conversation. Thank you. >> Thank you. We just wanted to thank our student virtual technology. >> It's got swag. That's awesome. >> Now everybody's going to want to come. This is how we're going to get more kids. You get a swag bag on your way out. Excellent. And we got swag bags. Look at us. Everybody. >> All right. Thank you ladies. Have a good night. >> All right, we will now move on to the hearing of the public. Sorry. >> Got all a excited. Okay, here I am. All right, we are now moving on to the hearing of the public on non-aggenda items. We welcome and

104encourage our community members to address the board at this time. Please come to the podium, state your name, address, and if you are representing an organization. To ensure everyone has the opportunity to speak, please limit your remarks to three minutes. The board is here to listen. The public comment period is not designed to be a discussion. So, please understand that we may not respond to your comments or questions at this time. We take your comments seriously and may need more time to process and research an issue. We will ensure questions will be addressed by the appropriate staff member or possibly answered at a future board meeting. We will not entertain comments regarding individual students or district personnel as these are protected under state and federal privacy laws. Please know we take personnel concerns very seriously

105on these matters. We would ask you to follow the appropriate administrative channels. As a reminder, the community may submit written comments at any time to the board by sending those comments to RC RCSD board at ryeschools.org. Anyone from the public wish to come forward? Seeing nobody coming forward at this time, we'll move on to the consent agenda. Can I please have a motion to approve this evening's consent agenda? Matt Shimonghov, seconded by Jen Bole. on this evening's consent agenda. Consent agenda general consent agenda fiscal consent agenda professional appointments consent agenda. Classified appointments consent agenda pupil personnel services and special education. and consent agenda curriculum instruction and assessment. Seeing no questions, can I have a mot vote to approve this evening's consent agenda? All those in favor? That is six to nothing with one absence. On

106this evening's consent agenda, we have the acceptance of our external audit minus one piece. So, we thank our finance department for great work on that. We also thank our um audit committee and the members of that committee who are both public members as well as our board members. We thank you for your participation in helping with that. We also have an approval of a gift from the Milton PTO in the amount of $5,800 to support cultural arts programs at Milton. We also have the approval of Dr. Washington as our instructional coach for secondary. This is another wonderful example of where we are growing our own and it really speaks um volumes to the level of professional learning and supports that we're providing to our staff as we just heard about that great two-day um AI

107workshop that we're giving to our teachers that our teachers are able to come up through the ranks and to lead other teachers. We also have a an approval of agreement with STAR interpreting and translation for translation services for the 2526 school year which is a great way to highlight our partnership with our families and to ensure that we are limiting access or limiting barriers to access for homeschool connections and so we're great grateful to be able to have that with us. Uh so now we will move on to presentation and discussion number two. Mrs. spoil lots of policies. >> Yes, policy discussion ex extensioned uh from last week. So, these uh are the same policies that we reviewed um for uh information last uh meeting. Um as I said before, they're sort of separated out

108into a couple of groupings. The first um grouping are policies that um actually we reviewed and um added some clarifying information to from questions that actually came up about those policies. So, one is student admissions. Um, and that clarifies uh we added a a clarifying uh statement to a section on um what happens when a a family chooses to leave the district um in the middle of the year or at the beginning of the year. Um and then um eligibility. Our policy on eligibility clarifies um that an excused absence, which is detailed out in our attendance policy, which is is policy 5100, um allows a student to participate in those activities if they have an excused absence um for a reason that they were out for part of the day. Um we also have a

109third policy in that first grouping that is for non-represented employees and this um uh we did an update to to ensure that there was parody with another similar employee contract and took the opportunity to update the listing of positions to reflect what we um have at the moment uh as part of that. So were there any other questions about those three before I move on to the second grouping? No. Okay. Um so the next group of policies and um some regulation regulations um were from a NISBA update that came in July. Um these were all uh related to student data privacy. So we heard a little bit about student data privacy in our discussion around AI. Um they are related to policies that include foil um furpa and PP which are all um related in

110some way to protecting student information or uh and teacher information um which is called P uh PII personal identifiable information in information. Um so going down the list um we have first uh school district records and regulations. Um this basically clarifies the rules around um sharing personal identifiable information of students and teachers. Um and uh this is a regulation that typically most regulations we do not need to adopt as board but this regulation we do. So that is why this will continue forward as we move through the process to be formally adopted. Um policy 5500 is um student records. Um this uh the changes here um are allowing parents to opt out of directory information at any time during the year where there used to be a 14-day time period for that to happen. Um

111and it also um added uh language to explain the restrictions on releasing uh personal identifiable information. Policy 5550 which is student privacy. Um the title changed actually to include the protection of people rights amendment as part of it. Um and it also uh clarifies um the uh process for how um parents can opt out of surveys uh if they uh decide that they do not want their student to take those. >> Um and then finally we have policy 8635 which is data privacy and security. This includes um elements related to the parents bill of rights which it did not before. So that has been um uh kind of housed uh centrally into this policy and it also adds guidance on um how third party vendors must include what they must include in their contracts uh

112related to this in with the the contract that they have with the district. The regulation also has an update. It added a a definition around what a contract is. um and it uh added another um a process for submitting privacy complaints to the state education department. This regulation we've included here for everyone's information. It is not something that we as a board need to adopt. So, um if there are no questions related to that, then that will not be part of the policies that move forward for adoption at our next meeting. [Music] questions, comments. Okay, seeing none, then we'll move these forward to be adopted at our next meeting at the end of the month. Great. Excellent. Uh, okay. We move on to communications to and from the board. Does not I do not believe

113we've had any meetings over the last week, not even policy. Uh, so coming up next week, the policy meeting, the policy committee will meet and curriculum council will also meet. So, we look forward to updates from them at our next meeting, which will be on October 28th, which will be another highlight uh presentation, assessment data. Dr. Murray, do you think your crown and your sash may make an appearance? >> Well, I thought you were going to tell me I had to give it to pass it on to Lauren. I hope that's >> We're going to have to We're going to have to see what Lauren presents. And she may get her own. >> See if she's crowning. >> She may get her own. >> I have a feeling she will. I've got high I got

114I got big beliefs. I think it's going to happen. We're going to have to all Everybody's going to have to tune back in and see. That's making it must see TV always. >> The the wellness committee is also going to be meeting on the 22nd. So, we will have an update at the next meeting for that. >> Excellent. >> This >> perfect. >> All right. So, we will make sure to add those. >> Okay. >> Great. >> The nth. >> The ninth. >> Okay. So, the ninth and I'm sorry, Valerie, give me that date again for >> Well, 22nd. Great. Oh, we're going to have a robust communications to and from the board section after a great data discussion. It's going to be a great meeting, everybody. So, that's why we've got a few weeks

115then to get you all excited and prepped and rested up so you're ready to go. Actually, it's because we don't have school for a few days on Monday. So, that being the case, can I have a motion to adjourn this evening's meeting? Valerie Lapen, seconded by Sean Cloffer. All those in favor, that is six to nothing. Have a good evening. Thank you.