001welcome I'd like to call to order the regular meeting of the Board of Education of the saratogo Springs City school district for Wednesday May 22nd 2024 um and we need to get a roll call Bobby could you do that uh truste crackler here trustee lakia here trustee Braxton truste bugman here trustee Ellis truste elor truste AA here trustee Colligan trustee waic here student representative mamera student representative pek thank you uh now if you'd all please join me in reciting the Pledge of Allegiance I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands na under God indivisible withy Justice for All uh could I get a motion to accept tonight's agenda as present as presented uh Connie second uh Angie any discussion all right all in
002favor raise your hand that's 80 motion carries um brings us to oh I didn't uh I didn't see if if any yeah would you uh was did anyone sign the public comment sheet in the front even if they didn't does anyone wish to um make a public comment all right I won't nothing on that Mike okay then I won't read the uh the public comment um rules but uh we do have another one at the end of the meeting should anyone change their mind brings us to board committee reports are there any board committee reports John the policy committee met but I don't see uh policies in the consent agenda doing next time okay any other uh Dean yeah thanks Tony the property committee met uh on Monday as well and we just had one
003item that we discussed um an area over behind uh Geer Road Elementary School with um the potential to utilize some grant funding for an outdoor classroom type uh area and so uh Cody is working with a representative to obtain some more information before they provide a formal formal proposal to the board thank you any questions for Dean any other board committee reports brings us to Eleanor and student representative reports hello T um the high school had a successful Junior Prom this past Saturday at the Saratoga City Center and is looking forward to the senior prom on June 1st at the Canfield Casino the hdes museum annual jured Student Art Show is known to be one of the most competitive Student jured Art shows in the region from over 580 artworks submitted the show is narrowed
004down to 100 pieces and of the 100 pieces 23 are from Saratoga students um thank you to Amy Moore and Michaela vanderson for organizing the annual e8th grade trip to Washington DC they took more than 375 students seven hours away and overall the students were amazing and over 40 faculty staff bus captains and parents and Guardians who attended the trip were very helpful at Caroline Street students raised $45,000 with their annual wathon and last week the drama club presented susal Jr it was an amazing show with over 70 students participating as well as former Caroline alums helping with sound lights and dance routines they also had sever several parents help with producing the show costumes and program Lake a just enjoyed bike to school day last Friday they had a great turnout and wonderful weather
00563 students participated in in in the lake AB science fair last week and students investigated all sorts of thing like non nuian fluids mold and projectiles at Division Street students enjoyed having their special person attend the publishing event this the students had the opportunity to read books and showcase their beautiful writing pieces also a thank you to everyone who helped have a wonderful art show and family book fair night first graders put on the wonderful Play Pajama Party for families in the entire school at Dorothy no Nolan students and family took advantage of the hot weather to enjoy outside time at their HSA Spring Carnival they're looking forward to meeting the newest set of kindergarteners and their families at their screening on June 3D also a thank you and congratulations to members of their staff
006that are retiring this year kathle ala Michelle Knight and Lil Hamill thanks Elanor does anyone have any questions all right moving right along to administrative reports Mike good evening and welcome everyone uh I want to start off by thanking our entire School Community uh for their continued support uh in passing our school budget uh as well as the bus Bond uh proposition I want to thank the board uh for their outstanding leadership uh throughout the budget development process uh and to all of our district stakeholders for their input and feedback uh throughout the budget development process uh the budget passed by over an 80% U margin uh as well as our boss Bond proposition and also congratulations to Deb Amry Matt Copans and Connie White toich for being elected to the Board of Education uh
007and they all be serving uh three-year terms starting on July 1st so both Matt and obviously Connie are with us tonight so uh congratulations to all three of our new candidates uh right before uh tonight's board meeting we had the wonderful opportunity uh to recognize uh congratulate and thank uh 35 our of our dedicated District employees who are completing their service to the district uh and will be retiring uh at the end of the school year so uh each year from tonight's uh retirement reception all the way until uh next year we've had uh several of our staff members retired during the school year uh and we recognize their retirement uh at each of our board meetings uh but again for uh just want to thank all of our retirees for just the incredible job
008and everything they've done uh throughout their careers uh to to support our students uh and their families so uh so congratulations to retirees and we wish all of you uh a happy and healthy retirement um we've got our senior give back Day that's coming up on June 4 4th I did you say that one already all right I caught you I got toide you on that one um so but that's just a wonderful tradition here in Coga Springs that's been going on for many many years uh it gives our senior class the opportunity to get out into the community uh to provide Community Service uh and just obviously thank uh the community for their support uh throughout our students uh academic career so so look for our our seniors spread out across the community uh
009on on June J June 4th um and that's all I have can I go right into our introducing our presentation go right to it so tonight we uh have two formal presentations uh and it's my honor um to introduce our district Equity inclusion and diversity uh committee uh who will be presenting their annual update to the Board of Education tonight our uh District Dei committee uh is made up of over 40 stakeholders it's students our teachers support staff administrators uh parents and community members uh who continued the dedicated work of helping to create a safe and welcoming School environment for all of our students uh in all of our schools K through 12 uh here in the district uh so we have uh many representatives um of our district di committee here with us tonight
010uh and you're going to have the opportunity to hear uh from several of our subcommittee members uh who've been working uh very hard throughout the year on on some Project based work uh and again the star of any of our presentations as always are students uh so we're very excited uh to have both students uh staff members parents and community members here tonight uh to share the wonderful work of our district Dei committee so I'm going to be turning over to Rebecca Lynch uh who serves on our steering committee uh and she's going to be uh our Master of Ceremonies as we um Anissa as well um the uh a tag team for uh introducing each of the subcommittee so I'll turn it over to orisa hi everyone my name is Arisa galani and I'm
011currently a sophomore at Saratoga Springs High School and this year I served on the culture and climate subcommittee so I'm gonna turn it over to Mr to to introduce our four principles e okay so um our Dei committee we use I'm good okay so we use the four principles of culturally responsive sustaining education as kind of our found um per the New York State education department the definition of a culturally responsive sustaining education is um one that is grounded in a cultural view of learning and human development in which multiple expressions of diversity are recognized and regarded as assets for teaching and learning and it's composed of four major principles which we see here um welcoming and affirming environment which is a space where people can find themselves represented and reflected and it ensures that
012cultural identities are affirmed valued and used as vehicles for teaching and learning um high expectations and rigorous instruction um where the instruction is academically rigorous and intellectually challenging while also considering the different ways that students learn inclusive curriculum and assessment uh so this elevates historically marginalized voices it includes opportunities to learn about power and privilege in the context of various communities and to learn about other pers perspectives it also empowers Learners to be agents of positive social change as it works towards dismantling systems of biases and inequities and then the fourth principle is ongoing professional learning and support which is the belief that teaching and learning is an Adaptive process needing constant reexamination and allows Learners to develop and sharpen a critically conscious lens and then why do we do this so this is our
013why um per our Equity regulation um we affirm that each and every student family teacher staff and Community member regardless of their race color weight national origin ethnic group religion or religious practice any type of disability sex sexual orientation gender gender identity and expression socioeconomic status immigration status housing status caregiver status and primary language mouthful um feels that their humanity is valued they feel respected safe and treated with dignity and feel hopeful and like we are working toward a future of justice and peace and how do we do this so this year for this school year we reorganized our subcommittee structure to focus on actionable projects um it enabled us to focus our efforts uh more tailored to what we wanted to get done and to be able to acheve goals within the school year
014the projects were organized under some of the subcommittee umbrellas from the prior years uh welcoming and affirming environment policy and progress monitoring and family and Community engagement uh we also uh phased out some subcommittees as that work is now embedded in the normal course of business for the district for example our curriculum and assessment subcommittee and the hiring and retention subcommittee so under the welcoming and affirming envir we had a subcommittee working on the project of preventing racist and discriminatory language another one working on the culture and climate survey uh under policy and progress monitoring we had a subcommittee working on the Dasa review and under family and Community engagement we had subcommittees working on the parent welcoming project and the student voices event and those are all of the uh subcommittees you will hear
015from their representatives of shortly thank you Miss lunch so our next subcommittee we're going to be hearing for Miss Bennett who is presenting the preventing racist and discriminatory language subcomittee good evening my name is Aaron Bennett and I am an assistant principal of the high school I'm a Community member and I'm also a parent of a 12th grader here at the high school this committee's work arose from an alarming concern that incidents of racism and discrimination are occurring daily in our schools but are under reported or sometimes not reported at all while we have resources to facilitate reporting including the safe schools helpline and the dignity for all students act reporting form most students don't know what these resources are or how they can be used to get help students also feel uncomfortable sharing their
016experiences and fear the social rep cions of reporting to help create a culture of awareness and support our subcommittee has collaborated on the creation of a poster similar to our Ally program poster that will provide a single Source Point of access to all supports with the simple question do you need help students can scan a QR code and connect with information about the Ally program and the Allies in their schools the safe schools helpl line and the dignity for all students act we f that creation of this poster was an immediate actionable step towards tackling a complex and harmful set of behaviors that impact our kids every day our hope is that this poster will encourage faster and more direct reporting of incidents of racism and discrimination and help our students better understand the supports
017available to them thank you Miss Bennett so now I will be reporting on the subcommittee of the culture and climate survey so last time our survey was administered was back in Spring of 2022 because there was so much data to review and our subcommittee this year focused on the culture and climate survey revision Administration and data analysis in support of creating a welcoming and affirming environment this survey was developed um as a way to measure School climate uh perceptions within our school because what better way to gauge student input than to hear from the students themselves and this is the second Administration of this survey as the questions are based on the US Department of Education School climate survey it is anonymous for student perspectives so the results of this survey will guide the district
018and future action plans to improve culture and climate in our buildings we revised this survey to include a question about home languages and overall we saw Trends in grades three through 12 feeling positively about being supported by their teachers and having a trusted adult to talk to in school so there were also Trends in grades three through 12 indicating peer conflict this was found in our qualitative and our quantitative data that was analyzed for grades 3 through five and we are still analyzing the quantitative data for grades 6 through 12 because there's a lot of it so some of our work could be done in grades three through five sharing backgrounds customs and beliefs as our data revealed that only a small percentage felt that others knew about this and once remaining data is analyzed
019in the summer it will be re referenced by Administration and used to impact our goal towards creating a safer and more welcoming School environment for all next I want to introduce Mrs Deandrea to um report on our Dasa review good evening I'm Mandy DeAndre I'm a parent member on the Dei committee uh my daughter attends the cares program at the high school the daa review subcommittee um reviewed um um Dasa what is daa daa is a dignity for all students act it was signed into law back in 20 I mean it yes it was in um sorry it was signed into law in 2010 but it wasn't implemented into schools until July 1st of 2012 since that time there have been several amendments to the daa law and updates daa seeks to provide all students
020with a safe and supportive environment free from discrimination harassment and bullying on school property a school bus or at a school function the goal of our subcommittee was to increase awareness of daa with all district stakeholders to review and update School District procedures and policies to review daa complaints how they're reort reported how they're investigated how they're verified and followup with all parties and then to take action sh steps for prevention and education to create and maintain a sa safe and positive School culture and climate for all students our committee's action steps included training all district and building dignity dignity act coordinators participate in trainings throughout the school year through bosis we conducted a review of The District daa complaint process including accessibility of forms review of dat at incident reporting and investigation process incident
021verification and parent guard Guardian notification process and targeted action plans including teaching and learning to prevent reoccurrence of behaviors and ensure the safety of all students also communication this is a piece that's continuous and ongoing it includes ensuring all Dasa forms are continuously updated continuing to update and educate all staff and students about daa laws processes and procedures further education for parents community members about daa and student engagement to help create and maintain a safe School environment where everyone feels welcome and safe thank you our next subcommittee will be hearing from Mrs Carol on the parent welcoming project and Miss Manny hi I'm Mora Manny director of communications for the school district um our discussions began this year by having that ongoing conversation of how do we make our families feel welcome in our schools
022and also connected to our schools so our first part was of the parent welcoming project was to create a document that would be given to all of our families as they join the school district um at right after they register so I'm going to pass around a copy for you to glance at so the packet aims to make people feel invited to our school district and more connected it includes a welcome letter valuable information from various departments uh Det on District Communications and platforms um and tips on how to get involved in our schools and be connected and supported within our schools Additionally the family welcome packet features our new family Mentor program which uh principal Carol will discuss next um the welcome packet can be easily exported into multiple languages as needed by our
023families you can see here um it's displayed in Spanish and Chinese but the design program was created and can be easily exported into any language that we need um which will be done um as needed basis um this will be provided um very soon through our kindergarten screening process um in early June and then on an ongoing basis by our district register as a new family joins our school district um so Prov by providing this resource that we hope our families have a great start to schools by feeling informed um and connected and understand ways that they can get involved and be engaged within our schools I'm Liz Carol I'm the principal at Lake Avenue Elementary School so I'm going to talk about the second second goal of our subcommittee and you might remember our
024second goal from uh last year's presentation our team was really looking to scale an existing uh idea that we used at Lake Avenue that pairs new families with Mentor families to help our newest additions to our district um so with our new plan this will be for all uh new families joining Saratoga Springs our Mentor family will serve as another resource to our families to connect with regarding any questions they have and help to navigate through our systems and our schools a survey is going to go out to our current existing families so we're able to create a bank of Mentor families at each of our buildings when a new family registers they will be asked if they would like to be paired with a mentor to help them navigate the transition new parents will
025be matched with a mentor from their building mentors will be responsible to reach out to our families to make initial contact and at least three additional times throughout the year and we provided some guidance on Good Times to reach out based on if they are an elementary student or a secondary student and we also provided mentors with a suggestion list of discussion topics so they could best support their mentees Mentor families additionally will use this family welcome packet that's being passed around as a resource to support new families um and we'll also be able to share building specific information as the packet is really used to cover the district as a whole we are very hopeful um that this will be one way to help increase connectedness in our community and help new families feel
026welcome and we're excited to actually pilot this um this next school year thanks Miss Carol our next is we will be hearing from our student and voices event from Mrs Alman and our students themselves let's give him a hand Applause thank you everyone um I'm Jesse Elman I'm a teacher at Maple AB middle school and tonight you get the pleasure of hearing from some of our very own students um this group here has been instrumental in helping create spaces for student voices to be heard to be respected and to be valued um they are really amazing student leaders and um very happy that they they came out tonight I'm going to let them introduce themselves as they speak so I'm going to turn it over to our first speaker um hello hello my name is
027Lyla mcnavish I am a sixth grader and I went to Lake gab Elementary I'm going to share some goals of student voices the goal of student voices was to bring students from kindergarten kindergarten through 12th grade together to share work being done surrounding diversity equity and inclusion in their buildings we have some new goals for next year's event we are hoping to rotate schools and have a new school host the event Division Street did a fantastic job hosting the event this year and it would be neat to see student voices at another school too we want to continue to extend the invitation to the community and bring more students on board for the planet hello my name is Alexander so dinosaurus and I a sixth grade and I went to Division Street Elementary School I'm
028araria vessie I am in eth grade and I went to Division Street Elementary as well Alec and I are going to tell you about what goes on at the student of voice spent oh SU Elementary buildings the middle school and the high school had something to share there were booths from every school displaying projects they completed that year from identified icebergs to project celebrating inclusion there was a lot to see and a lot to learn about there were also students on greatest performance but put on by the V Street and Caroline Street students they were amazing uh this year we also had some new community organizations join us uh Pitney Meadows Saratoga usafe space Camp stomping ground Saratoga pride and the public library were all there we like seeing familiar organizations and learning about new
029ones we had a student panel of middle school and high school students Alec and I were both on the panel we got to answer our audience questions and we talked about our own experiences relating to diversity equity and inclusion hello my name is Ella hair um I am a sixth grader and I went to dorol in elementary I'm going to talk about why having an event like this is important for us we want to have an event like this for many reasons it is great to see new clubs see what other schools are working on and share ideas student voices is an opportunity to come together as a community in support of us young people at Saratoga Springs schools but most importantly we want events like this because it makes us feel proud to be
030student at Saratoga thank you for listening and supporting our work in diversity equity and inclusion at school do you have any questions thanks guys all right I would now like to open the floor to any questions you may have and I will direct them accordingly any board member questions or comments I see Natalya and did you have your you go first Natalia then Angie um first of all phenomenal job to the students that was fantastic it's so great to hear from you directly um I actually don't have a question I do have something to add which is that um I got to serve on the preventing racist and discriminatory language subcommittee and I just wanted to add another piece of information for the board which is that the poster that we are prosing which is
031still under um design is going to be created by one of our eighth graders so this is a student created um poster it's the same student Luke who created um the phenomenal Ally program poster and so it's really um I know that when I walk through the schools that poster really jumps out at me and I think that sometimes when you're walking through there's kind of a blur of posters but that one really sticks out so um it was really great to be able to invite Luke and to have Luke accept um to come and uh work on that with us and we're excited to finish that this summer that's great thanks Angie thank you and thank you for all the work this committee did this year um it's wonderful present then thank you to
032the presenters um this question is well I guess I just have a comment about the the poster in the that um subcommittee and kind of um hoping maybe we can add some kind of um a lens to that message that it's not just if you need help it's if you see something or hear something that it's placed for you to reach out as well so the burden is not on those who are hearing it directed at them it's for anybody to so it's just emphasized that it's it's for all of us too and I wasn't privy to the subcommittee so I just wanted to um just say that oh yeah yep that's definitely something that we discussed and we are still finalizing the language I also want to note that one thing that we talked
033about was how we can begin this work at younger levels because a lot of times what's happening is we're waiting until kids are in like fourth or fifth or sixth grade and saying like hey if you heard something that's hateful let us know um and I say we as if I work in the schools I'm not I don't um but you know having kids of that age but instead if we're focusing on prevention and talking about these issues at the students level that work really begins in kindergarten and so I just want to acknowledge that that's something that Mrs Bennett talked about a lot was how and is working on is how we can really focus on prevention and focus on education from a young age because our schools aren't here to punish kids our
034schools are here to educate and if we start that work in kindergarten that will make our the work much easier later on but yes that is absolutely something that we discussed thank you I had a feeling can I say one more one more comment um I would I I would love to see two in our welcome packet just some kind of direct statement about our District's dedication to inclusivity and welcoming of the diverse population of students we serve I think that could be um would be very well received by those who are often um those who don't always feel welcome so this is wonderful though I this is amazing so thank you Beth um thank you students for sharing your experiences with us um it's always wonderful to hear your voices and so we really
035appreciate you being here tonight and sharing that with us and um I have a question about the poster as well the QR code does it link to a source that provides information that is um developmentally appropriate or or does it is there a way to kind of report um something that has been seen or experienced and is there a response or what is the process with that so the process is still under development but what we envision is that you can scan the QR code which would then link you to a an area on our website where you can access information about all of the different types of supports that are available what we were finding is that you know we have we have like posters all over the school for the safe schools helpline
036we say daa all the time our kids don't know what these things are or how they can help them uh we also have our Ally program which we are hoping to relaunch in the fall uh we have our incoming freshmen next year who will maybe not know about this program or any students who are new to our district so it's really just a way of funneling all student concerns into one place so they have access to different types of information at a minimum we want students to connect with an ally because if they experience something that is harmful or if they see something that is harmful they can go to a trusted adult who can point them in the right direction for getting those supports so that is all under development but this is what
037we envision for the students sounds wonderful thank you you might as well stay there Aon for my question um and and you may something you said you you may have implicitly answered it but I just want to ask more explicitly so the the the poster that your group talked about and the Dasa report that Mandy talked about is there a is there a Nexus there on your poster is there not only a way to um have kids learn how to uh report discriminatory or racist language but also reported in a in a daa way if that applies like do they connect again that's what we envision um I think one of the biggest concerns right now is that that our students generally don't know what daa is um we know what it is and oftentimes
038when we're getting reports submitted they're reports that are submitted by adults not reports that are submitted by the students who are experiencing this directly so there is an educational need as well so we're hoping we can combine the work of these two subcommittees so that we can achieve a few different goals one of those being education of the students and the other is honestly more reporting faster reporting um so that we can take action immediately thanks oh yeah go ahead sorry this is obviously um the committee that I served on but another thing was that we did have one student member who talked to us about the need for adults in the schools to affirm directly with students like why you should report that it's okay to report um what happens when you report Etc
039so we talked about that in terms of the educational piece and also in line with that relaunch of the Ally program and so the need to really communicate with students like this isn't like you're not telling on somebody like you are reporting and here's why you're reporting and here's what happens when you report thank you Connie um I had two questions but first thank you for a very a great presentation everyone um I had a question about the family Mentor program um it seems like it will be very useful um and I was just wondering and I'm not sure if you can answer this yet as you're still like developing it it sounds like but like how do the matches work like how would someone be matched with a family and do we have resources
040for our elll families so because we're going to match we're going to have a bank right any family existing family can actually sign up to be a mentor those lists are going to go back to the buildings and I think I have a good process only because we are currently doing it at Lake Avenue when a new family is registered the question is asked and we match them so very similarly this will be done um actually with the help of Mora Manny um she'll actually be doing the matches and people who are split level will clearly get an option to say you know would you like to be match with a family at your level or um sorry at the secondary level or the elementary level or both um but getting the folks signed up
041is step one and that survey can just go out having the building lists in each of the buildings so every building knows who their Mentor families are is kind of step two the information going out we already created to kind of say hey mentors this is what you're signing up for um and then it's just the connection at registration that Mora is going to be doing this next year to pair our families okay and then the elll component the elll component we're going to have to figure out with our schools to see when we are getting folks signed up maybe we can add and that's a good suggestion maybe we can add that to the form um for folks that are signing up um for their home language that's a good suggestion thank you I
042remember way back in the day when I was at Division Street um the PTA membership of person at the time her name is Jen and I can't remember her last name right now but she had a wonderful suggestion we did have a night for our enl families to kind of do a like a welcome night for them but um I just it it made me think that it would be a really good resource for those families yeah absolutely um and then my second question which I don't think would be your question okay I would love to pass the back I'm ready my second question is about in the the discussion about reporting and daa what is the role of our mental health professionals in this process and are there any on this committee informing this
043work because I believe that they play a big role in this as well and they are trusted adults okay um I'm not sure about the committee in general but um offshoots of the committee and Aaron is involved in this with the school with the training and the work that we're doing um does involve uh mental health providers in terms of additional support plans Etc where we do provide um have mental health providers um who would be working with students um as a result of daa complaints whether they're founded or whether they are not founded that's something that in our training that we've gone through this year we have found to be a best practice um to better support our students so um that's something that we've been doing throughout this year but in trying to
044align all the the different pockets of the work will be continuing when um this work um of the committee happens that that's a piece that as the administrators go through it and you have the work of the investigations Etc that is a piece that has been added and are the students also being told like that they are people they can go to like with a concern or if some if they overhear something yes okay yeah I'll just make one final comment thank you very much uh to the committee uh and all presenters but I I was on this committee for two years and and went off uh this year and I just want to uh commend you from the you know from from the outside the structure changes that you made seem I I don't
045know what you feel about it but they seem to be uh a positive step uh decreasing the number of subcommittees and focusing on actionable goals um that uh I liked seeing that so thank you y and we actually have one more piece to the presentation oh a late addition so I'll explain hello hi hi I'm Leanne donalan and the adviser for no place for hate Club here at the high school and these are our no place for hate students so we are in addition because we are not technically part of the Dei committee but I think our work falls under Dei initiatives and it's very much aligned with what the Dei committee is all about so we wanted to present to you just about a no place for hate initiative that we started this year
046called bridge the gap and it's been pretty successful and we're really excited about what's going on so we just wanted to tell you guys about this so our students are here here to share hi I'm Kayla so um what is bridge the gap it's a no place for initiative and it's used to create and maintain like an open line of communication between Administration staff and students um we thought it would be like helpful and it's really important to um make sure students are comfortable speaking to their administrators as well as their teachers but we find that there is a gap between the administration and the students specifically so we have all of the administrators there usually and Dr patent and we have uh group discussions monthly uh we use the same uh format as restorative
047circles I don't know if you guys know about those but uh they've been really successful for us we just find that you know it works better than something like a Socratic seminar because we don't want the loudest voices in the room to dominate the conversation so uh we've been using that and it's um primarily like a solution oriented discussion that we're working on we're trying not to do too much brainstorming and a little bit more coming up with solutions for problems um and then it's open to to all students and staff in our building and we are trying to get as many students as we can to come we were struggling for a couple months with um participation but we got some more people the past time I was there um so what have we
048discussed so far in the meetings our main three topics are bathroom slurs and Communications for bathrooms we want to create a safe um for bathrooms we want to create a safer environment we want to lessen the the amount of vaping and drug use and make the bathrooms more clean for slurs we uh were finding like a common language on how to address the use of slurs because depending on like the situation PE teachers might not feel comfortable um addressing slurs so we want to have a common leanage of not in school or not here the communications um bridge the gap between the admin and students is like a main part of it also finding more direct means of communication just to add something we picked these topics based on um our first meeting that we
049had where we had everyone kind of talk about issues they were seeing in the school and these were the three most prominent ones that students in the high school were concerned about because that's kind of our uh main group so our impact so far and the progress we've made the lower G bathrooms were recently renovated and thank you to everyone who helped with that the main lobby bathroom is closed during lunch for the slurs is issue we're taking a proactive approach to addressing slurs working with our working with educating younger students on the use of slurs and the connotations around them and how they started and why they're not okay to say and our next steps are finding some resources for staff to help them better address the issue and help them to stop it
050um and for our Communications we're working on utilizing in students square and we have our monthly Bridge of the Gap meetings where we all get to talk in person which I think is really great cuz I definitely like in-person communication better than over technology stuff myself we used this presentation for when we presented at the um faculty meeting uh so these not these are not all the students that behind here um well it's actually most of us except for one person yeah um yeah this is hi my name is siia oette and I've been a part of bridge the gap for a couple months now and I have had my fair share of circles and I feel that what I've really taken out of it was that I connected with teachers that I would nor
051not normally talk to and I connected with Administration that I wouldn't normally talk to and a new uh issue that we brought up was spirit in the school we feel that the school doesn't have as much Spirit as it might have had previously and one thing that we really talked about was quotes in the yearbook but I think that we've really gotten down to seeing what issues we have in the school and since we're getting started this year I think that we're really looking at that and next year we'll really look at solving the issues does anyone have any questions I don't see any thank you very very much so I just want to take the opportunity to thank all of the members of the Dei committee for their hard work uh throughout the the
052course of the school year and I think to the board's point I think the reorganization the focus of the committee uh making them Project based you know people felt like you know there was work to be accomplished and and uh it was awesome at the end of the year to kind of celebrate the accomplishments um obviously the student voices event has been a tremendous opportunity to hear from our students uh who continue to impress all of us uh and I want to thank the bridge the gap students at the high school I really look forward to those monthly conversations you know discussing discussing the issues uh you know that we face in our schools but really you know coming at as a collaborative approach uh so I want to thank Miss donlin Chris Conley and
053Christine vardo are three of our teachers at the high school who really helped kind of spearhead the effort and uh and the wonderful leadership from our from our students so uh so great things are happening across the district we we continue to move forward uh know that there's obviously challenges that we continue to face uh but it's it's awesome to have so many stakeholders uh involved in the process thank you everybody for who's here for Dei you're welcome to stick around or you could use this as an opportunity to um get home and do your homework students thanks folks I think um as some people leave I think we can set up for the athletic review thank you everyone for coming thank you parents all right just for um a brief uh introduction to our
054next uh presentation uh throughout the course of the school year um the district always likes to take proactive approaches uh in conducting self-evaluation uh in a variety of our programs so over the course of last several years uh We've we've asked for some independent eyes um uh in conducting program reviews program evaluations uh and then this year uh we wanted to be proactive uh in uh Mr Goodson being our brand new director of Health PE and Athletics uh as well as responding uh to a very public um uh report uh that was shared uh with State officials in the fall uh that we wanted the opportunity to gather feedback from uh our student athletes here at the high school from our coaches uh as well as parents and community members uh using this as an
055opportunity to evaluate the current status of our program uh and also looking ahead to continuously looking for ways that we can uh improve uh both the programs as well as the opportunities uh for our student athletes uh so after some uh research uh over the winter months uh we were really fortunate uh to get in touch uh with the state officials uh in Connecticut from the Connecticut inter Scholastic Athletic Conference uh and with us tonight is Dr Glenn uh larini um I called Glenn back in December uh and I said hey based on our research uh a program review like this does not exist uh in the state of New York uh and would Connecticut uh be willing to to come into New York and and help uh support our athletic Pro uh program review
056process uh and Glenn and his team uh have been a pleasure to work with and again I want to give kudos to John where's John he's behind the pole over there uh to John uh Goodson uh for his leadership uh and his first year uh we threw a lot at him uh but again uh his uh coordin a of effort uh in working with our student athletes and our coaches and our parents and partnering with Glenn uh to provide this opportunity for us to get the feedback uh that obviously is essential and critical for our further Improvement efforts um so uh great opportunity here to uh introduce Glenn uh larini uh and Glenn's the executive director of the Connecticut inter Scholastic uh Athletic Conference thank you superintendent Paton I I appreciate that and uh thank
057you to the distinguished members of the board for allowing us to come into your school uh work with your staff and report to you tonight uh it's never easy following kids is it they're so impressive and uh this was the first opportunity even though we're just a two and a half hour drive away this was actually my first opportunity to visit uh Saratoga Springs and each time I come back I'm more impressed with the the school the facilities the community and uh what you're offering here uh it truly is uh remarkable and and evidenced by just articulate students tonight that that did an incredible job um as uh superintendent Patton had mentioned um I'll go into a little bit of our uh program review for you um as of right now I believe we are
058still the only uh standards based review that exists uh in the country uh we are working on expanding that out right now we primarily do New England uh States in in this area it's kind of limited right now to section one of the national Federation of high schools which also includes New York New Jersey along with the uh New England State so our team that came out here um as uh superintendent Pat Patton had mentioned just to give you a little bit of a background of our team and and who we are um my uh resume coming into uh the position where I am now not only do I serve as the state uh inter classic athletic executive director I also serve as our state principes Association executive director as well so we very much
059look at uh everything that we do in inter Scholastic Athletics as an ex extension of the school day we truly see all extracurriculars as the last classroom of the day this is where we're taking all of those skills and the things that we're teaching kids and giving them a practical environment uh to apply those skills in a meaningful way with something they have a passion for whether that is uh Sports it's music it's theater it's debate it's the clubs that you're working in uh so that's why we felt it was important to come up with some standard-based uh measurements to ensure we were given the best experiences that we could uh to our kids uh as I uh went through my career I served as a teacher at Elementary High School uh and Middle School
060levels uh I served as an athletic director a health and phys department chair an English department chair an assistant principal and a principal uh before moving into uh the role that I have now uh also served as a uh coach at the uh middle school high school SCH and Collegiate level uh served eight years as an assistant baseball coach at Yale University Dr Bob waldwin is my counterpart in uh Massachusetts serving as the executive director there uh who along with me served at multiple levels as a teacher coach athletic director and spent n the last 19 years of his career prior to his position now as a superintendent uh in Massachusetts Dr Jamie Beckham is a uh principal in Connecticut uh likewise had served as a uh teacher athletic director assistant principal now principal um
061High School coach and college coach as well so when we put our teams together to come out we really try to look at this through the lens of not just the school but um how does extend beyond that we have expertise of District levels and also looking at experiences of kids going on uh Beyond high school as well and what those expectations have have means um you know the culture of sports has changed significantly in the in the past decade and so being able to to understand that and and where things are going at the next level as well we we feel is important uh in Connecticut we did uh establish in uh 1921 so we've been uh over A Century of uh of working in the uh space of governing inter Scholastic Athletics uh
062in our state we developed this assessment program more than 34 years ago so we've been doing this for quite some time uh with conducting standard-based reviews across uh across New England we are actually working right now uh with nas it's neasc it's the um New England Association of schools and colleges so that is the accrediting body uh for uh schools and colleges in our New England states uh they have adopted our program and we're working with them on some uh protocols with that and doing uh a few um pilot programs with them so this program will soon be uh in a credited program that Nas is offering for accreditation reviews uh as well we have been contacted by the Nia which is the major the national athletic um administrators Association as well as the nfhs
063to bring these programs uh more nationally so um you know this while we've tried to keep it short we've got a lot more requests to do things like this and we can't do it all so we're bringing these out to uh to our partners to be able to do that what we look at in the athletic program review we have five standards the first uh standard is really looking at your mission statements your core values beliefs um how you have come to develop those and how those are being implemented uh throughout your program uh standard two looking at program curriculum again we very much view this and look at this as the last classroom of the day so how are we communicating expectations uh to kids what are we doing in terms of professional development
064and opportunities for our coaches um how are we staying up to- dat on best practices and for a lot of students um this is one of the places that kids will tell you is the primary resource for um stress for for them being active and really addressing uh what has become a mental health uh crisis and pandemic in our country uh our third standard looking at program resources and Equity so uh you know this we're looking at things like um budget opportunities for kids looking at the um the the student athlete um comparison how many female students male students do we have competing what do the facilities look like for uh male students vers uh versus female students budgeting uh so just looking at really everything through pretty much a title 9 lens uh for
065equity and and equity and resources program Administration uh we're looking at the availability of what the program has to actually run uh the programs that are in place what are the responsibilities um how are Communications um going with uh outside entities within the school uh how are the expectation formalized for so everybody is on the same page and understands when they participate in these programs really not too different from what you uh just heard in the presentation of creating these um uh packets to onboarding uh parents as well so the more we can do in uh communication the better that we're going to be and the uh program and player evaluation uh again wanting to keep this as a learning experience for kids so how are our coaches and our athletic department fostering that communication
066so kids know uh as they enter into a team what their role and responsibility is coming in what are the strengths and weaknesses where our coaches looking to help kids improve individually as well as working into those team Concepts uh and goals and making sure that everybody is on the same page and then that there are uh the resources in place for uh parents and students to understand how to contact coaches and access coaches uh if they have questions or or things that they need to meet our Athletic program de viw process included a self-study uh by the school so this was something that uh was sent out a few months uh in advance the school had opportunities to work on this self-study and uh do an evaluation of where they see themselves uh in
067relation to those five standards in addition to that there were surveys conducted of students of coaches and of parents uh those surveys all the information from those surveys were gathered and collected uh they were analyzed to find uh strengths and weaknesses from those stakeholder groups of how they saw things uh from their perspective uh we then came on site to conduct focus groups so uh taking the information that we had from the self- study and those surveys we then had areas that we wanted to dig a little deeper into to have a better understanding of what some of the concerns were but also what are some of the uh things that are um really prideful uh here in uh Saratoga Springs as well uh we also conducted a tour of the uh school and the
068facilities looking at um what you've done in capital uh Improvement plans got some good understandings of what things may be coming down the road as well and all that information got um uh compiled into a final report and within those Port again we're not looking to come out to say here's what you're doing right and here's what you're doing wrong that's not our place to do that we look at the standards and we measure that based on the standards so we come out at the end and we share with you here are things that we see that are Exemplar you are doing very well this is what we commend you for and these are things that we recommend that you take a look at to address potential areas of concern as they were identified uh
069by these groups it's very similar to what you have when you go through accreditation process just the the process itself uh again um organizing that feedback that you see and again we're going to share the full report um publicly on the on the district website but just getting all that stakeholder feedback um John and and his team just work so hard uh to make sure that we were hearing from our students um so the data that was collected from the student end as well as uh uh surveys for all of our coaches uh and then the Outreach to all of our parents um you know we asked Glenn you know how did we do kind of compared to similar size schools and and actually our response rate was was outstanding so it was it was
070great to have so many stakeholders within the community you know providing the feedback on the surveys and then uh Glenn and his team came and spent an entire day uh meeting in the focus group so geez we must have had close to 40 coaches we had a whole room full of students uh we had our administrative team uh had the opportunity to meet with Glenn and then the evening uh Board of Education as well as a parent group so I just thought that that process of gathering that much individualized feedback from each of those stakeholder groups um was was very helpful and again there's all that data that we collected is available and we'll make sure that we could share that out with the public absolutely thank you Mike and uh all the all the
071surveys and everything that that we provided uh to to John and to superintendent Pat and again um those are available to the school so through this process um we allow you to keep those you can modify them you can reuse them you can uh those are those are your yours to work with uh our only disclaimer on it is that it's like you know going to a baseball game you can't reproduce it without the express written consent of the CIA but the uh but you within your district with any of your middle schools your high schools if you wanted to uh do another study your yourself you know three years from now five years from now see where you are those are years uh to to use at your discretion within your District uh so
072just to share with you a couple of the key takeaways that we had from from the work that that we did with you here what Rings loud and clear and even you know coming up today I I got some time to uh to head out to the lacrosse game I don't know if you got an update Mike was it it it was 1-1 when we uh when we left the game T all right so there there you go that that pride is continuing sounds like you had a great game last night too with a a game-winning goal uh right at the end there so uh again just a you know to the the students coming in and speaking about their program and the pride that they have they very much feel like when they put
073on a Saratoga Springs uniform uh that is something special they feel like they are the team to beat they're the school that everybody wants to beat no matter where they go and and that doesn't just happen over theight that speaks to a long-standing culture of Excellence that you have within your program uh same thing exists with the with the coaches um you know I think your coaches are very much by and large viewed um as very dedicated uh to the sports that they're coaching sure no problem uh very dedicated to the sports that they're coaching um they uh they know the uh know the sports they have you know their their records uh speak for themselves but just the relationships that uh the kids spoke to and the coaches spoke to reciprocally that they have
074with the kids and and that's really at the end what it what it's about you know I think when we think of education-based athletic in schools the wins and losses and the Championships are nice but our success really comes from how many meaningful relationships did we develop along the way and what have you contributed when we leave that makes it a better program from when it was when when we first arrived to that program and your coaches and your athletes are certainly dedicated to that uh on a daily basis um looking at uh as well the the facilities that you have are are really outstanding uh as I said just coming in from the turf facility that you have outside um the uh the the weight room that you have and the fitness room that
075you have here uh absolutely Rivals what we had at Yale no doubt about it so it is a incredible uh facility that that you have uh available to uh to kids to be able to condition to uh to work out to um you know when you're coming out it's easy to see why there's such pride in the programs uh that that you have here it's not just in the coaches and the kids and what you're doing there but you're showing that in the facilities as well as well um and the dedication of your uh athletic Administration um you know I think that uh again it's um you'll see in in one of the next slides you know some things we talk about with help but um the the job description that John has uh is
076extensive and you know the dedication that he has uh from early in the morning to the work that that he's doing uh in curriculum to the work that he's doing in athletics uh as we uh kind of walked around campus and drove around campus a little bit uh this evening there wasn't a a player that walked by him that didn't stop and say hello uh fans that were coming to the game kids as well so you know that they know uh they know who he is that he's getting out that the kids have a connection with them uh really speaks volumes to uh to that work uh to summarize some of the the key recommendations that were uh that were in the report so just continuing on we're just looking at the UH responsibilities uh
077that that John has uh on those things and you know it's not uncommon uh that we see this in a lot of places where the ad has multiple roles we often times see where uh ads uh may even be um stien in positions that come on to teaching responsibilities it may be um with uh DEA student responsibilities assistant principal responsibilities curriculum uh director responsibilities observations things like that that so you know to see the the the job description and responsibilities as it exists isn't surprising um but it also in every place that we've gone and we've looked at the thing that has rung rung true is with all those responsibilities you can't expect anyone to be done full-time you're you're just resigning yourself to the to the idea that each of those is going to
078be done to the best of their ability part-time um but if you really um you know are looking to have uh just thinking to I think uh John you do the health and fed uh curriculum as well so there's new National Health and fed standards uh that just came out a couple months ago that will require uh looking at and most of those are really designed away from uh sport activities and towards he uh healthy balanced living curriculums uh so that's going to take extensive work for uh again for schools across the country to uh to address those things so you know if we're doing that at the same time that we're trying to you know create schedules manage buses make sure officials are scheduled meet the needs of our coaches of our programs uh
079create professional development do the observations um it's a it's a tall order so I just want to recognize that uh and what John has there and if there was an ability to provide support to that uh that would be important uh creating systems and structures to include stakeholder input in decision making so uh this is something that uh again I think you have a lot of great things going on here but um one of the things we heard from the kids as well in the uh work that they're doing with um with those meetings that they're having with Mike in the in the circles is uh making sure that the student voice the coach voice is is heard and is valued and is put into uh process so um you know things we heard this
080year is uh from some coaches that this was the first opportunity that they were really having to have input into uh the budget planning for for the department so you know John has done a good job of of bringing that into play and having some discussions there of of what is being uh proposed but finding those opportunities to bring kids in because again that that's why we're here right so anytime part of our job is representing principles and assistant principles in uh legislation uh in Connecticut and DC and anytime people ask well you know what's the purpose behind that our answer is always because kids and you know and that's we do this because of our kids so we need to continue to hear their voices what they need and make sure that we are
081having those conversations student athlete to coach to athletic director and keeping those things visible uh same thing with parents uh it's important to keep parents informed uh so the better structures and systems that we have to increase that communication increase the uh the awareness of the programs and and what's happening uh just the better the programs are going to be uh formalizing rules procedures expectations through student athlete and coaching handbooks you guys do have you know a fairly robust website you have good information there most of that there seems to link back to uh the state standards of the New York uh governing body of expectations of behavior things like that so again these are opportunities where you have such a great Community um you know I think you should probably look at how do
082we formalize that student hand uh that athletic handbook a little bit more so all the kids know coming in these are the expectations same thing with coaches handbooks right what is expected of you uh what are the expectations how are we going to communicate uh what should you be doing in preseason meetings what you should you be doing and communicating with kids throughout the year uh so everybody is on the same page of roles responsibilities and communication if those things are formalized a little bit more again it just creates better Pathways of communication uh and lessens any uh miscommunications or misperceptions that may uh come out into uh communities um I don't know if you guys have social media here we do and uh it's always interesting what we uh what we read on social
083media and how far that may be from the truth um reviewing Capital Improvement plans to ensure program Equity again you guys have done such a great job and I know that you still have uh plans in place it's just keeping an eye on those and making sure that now you have Equitable access access to those so again with such an incredible uh Fitness room and facility that you have just making sure their schedules in place so the room isn't dominated by one sport or another that there's equal access uh for sports that there's rotations in there that there's ways for uh uh the female sports uh to be there as well as the male Sports and and find that way to make it comfortable for those kids uh to all have access to those things
084um little things like um you said uh again the baseball facility that you have I was a baseball coach for eight years at Yale wow you know it's that's what to play there in high school what a privilege in and honor that is um so just thinking to like okay um but at softball we still have a uh temporary fence right so like those are little things that you just want to you want to make sure that we could address as we move forward to to ensure that we're creating Equity uh in those plans um this isn't going to come to a surprise everybody talked about buses so um you know so again just thinking about uh it sounds like that uh earlier tonight you had something on that already so um you know and
085and that may be a piece too where that system and structures so if we don't have if there aren't enough buses if there are going to be some other routes is there a way that that can be communicated out early so you know people can plan car pools that can be done well in advance so uh so people know who that is and again with only one one year to to look at that you know that'll be something that uh John can look at moving uh moving f forward um and then the last piece is uh this is where we see um if we see hiccups and we see things where um Title Nine concerns come in it's usually where uh booster club and District money um there's not a clear understanding of what gets
086used for what uh and you know oftentimes where we hear concerns with this is um you know can a program that maybe only has um you know a dozen kids in it um I'm thinking of like maybe a golf program that might have 12 or 15 kids in it vers a a football program or you know a lacrosse program that might have 80 kids in it and you know so one can certainly raise significantly more than the other uh and if that is providing additional opportunities that the others don't have um again that's something that that we have to be cautious of and uh so looking at what do you have in place of uh whether it's its policies or just kind of regulations around uh what booster funds are used for versus what district
087funds were used for will help you uh from falling into that sort of uh Pitfall down down the road okay um so again that that gives you a a pretty good summary of what our work was I'm happy to take any uh questions that you have and again we really want to thank you for the privilege uh that we had in coming out to work here in Saratoga Springs and I greatly look back to to coming back and visiting again thank you thanks Glenn any board member questions or comments I see John bugman let's get a little queue going I see Connie we'll start with John and Connie go ahead John uh thank you for being here and thank you for doing this good work and uh I really appreciate the fact that the district
088took this on and uh John and all his people especially John but all your people uh it's really hard work and it's hard both in the sense that you've got to exert a lot of labor but also you're you're under scrutiny and um that's I I just think it's really commendable I'm glad we've done this I'm glad that we've got a neighboring state who's out there leading the charge I hope you'll come I hope you'll spread the word um I I find this very validating because um we've been talking about stakeholder input for a few years we've been talking about guidance for coaches and the handbook has come up um and it has occurred uh before John got here that the ads to us that the ad's job was monstress um and of course then
089we go ask him to save money too um so uh I just want to say thank you for all that but one thing I you know just want to raise is that I believe we have more Sports than any other District in the area and um you know we we we obvious like everybody we we want to figure out how to balance our budget and I just wonder if that's an area where where we can do fewer things better uh without without doing too much harm to the choices and the quality of our program yeah I mean uh the two things that hurt programs the most is um eliminating options for kids and adding payto playay uh restrictions on that uh those are the two biggest limiting factors uh that that we've seen in in
090Nationwide that impact people coming out um especially when you look at the way that kids use um High School sports my guess would be that you have more kids participating in inter Scholastic Athletics than any other uh club or activity that that you have in your school right so this is the outlet that kids have where again it IT addresses uh mental health needs it helps put those uh practical applications of what you're learning in in school into place and is really helping kids form uh deep and meaningful relationships with their peers as well as their coaches so what we've always seen is the limiting factor is when you're adding Sports and adding those Sports means taken away from uh sports that you currently have so um I'll give you an example in uh Connecticut
091we had a team that uh last year uh played in the state finals of uh basketball lost in a close five-point game girls basketball team uh and this year they didn't have enough kids to to to run a team this year so if you're running so many teams that it's starting to draw away um you know that's where you're getting to be too much but again thinking of that student voice right why are we doing it we're doing it because of the kids so if the kids are asking us to run these programs and those programs are um are being maintained because you have enough numbers to do it then I would say if you have the the ability to do it do it because that's what the kids are are asking for and that's
092what they need Connie okay I'm going to start with an apology because I have I have five notes Here uh the first one is that I am not sure if this got back to you but as a board we do get some feedback from the community like via email sometimes all the time uh but there was one that came in that I just thought you should know about the survey itself like the structure of it um and one it was just that um this particular person found the survey difficult to answer because they had a student in multiple Sports so the question was how can like if they had a great experience with one sport and not another some of the questions were so General that they couldn't Express that so I just wanted to
093to let you know that um and then I appreciate what you said about John needing help and some of the um options that you gave like administrative restructuring perhaps and changing assignments or changing duties um I'd love to know more about anything you can suggest best practice-wise about Transportation um like is it changing the schedule or start end times like how could we fix that based on some in you know experience you have with other districts and then I was wondering if we do currently have a policy on booster club and District fund we do okay do we need to change it I think it has to be annually reviewed okay okay so those are my thoughts and then one more the recent title n changes do you find that it affects any of this
094or our program is no good and in compliance and all that you're yes from a Title Nine perspective we had no concerns about what you're doing right now um as I said Ju Just keep an eye on uh things like the capital plans just making sure that you know some of that low hanging fruit like you know baseball versus softball fi you know things like that are are addressed um Equitable access to to the weight room and and those sort of things as long as you stay on top of those there was nothing that that stood out um from the from the new title 9 regulations that that would not uh be in compliance um with the survey it's um you know we could probably you know tweak something or that to answer multiple sports
095but we do have an open-ended question uh at the end so there there are opportunities for people to put in whatever uh comments or or open-ended uh questions that they may have there um busing uh you know uh I'll try to find your drivers it sounds like uh sounds like you have enough buses but and and it sounds like it's not really just an Athletics you know issue as well that it's it's an academic uh issue um you know for for you guys as well so um we're not a bus bus company you know so that's where I would say you know that it would value probably value to to look at um a study of of buses and and what you have to to see that I couldn't tell you if changing your start
096times of different schools would alleviate it because if you don't have enough drivers anyway it may not um you know so that that would have to be I think something that you look into from a bus study thank you [Music] Dean thanks again thanks for all your hard work it was a pleasure to uh have the opportunity to meet with you as a member of of one of the Committees that uh that you folks took the time to meet with um just a couple of comments and then a question just for clarification one um I appreciate your response on the athletic programs and the opportunities for kids right we do have more programs than anybody else in Suburban Council um but I think there's great opportunities for equity and the ability for all kids to
097be able to enjoy that right because the alternative to that ultimately is and I think we talked about this in our committee meeting is there are opportunities for pay to playay right with clubs and organizations like that which kids still take the opportunities to do but as you explained to us and enlightened us with the fact that your relation to this is it's the last classroom of the day and so giving those kids an outlet right where especially some children might have folks who are working and and can't get out of work to be able to be home with the kids when they get home at 2:30 or 3:30 but are at 5:00 when this when when practice is over or something like that I think there's a great opportunity for that so I appreciate
098that the second is a uh an observation that I made last evening relating to the buses um and although we often times resort to the fact that we don't have enough drivers which is an accurate statement I think what gets missed is it was not our students it was the opposing team who shall remain nameless from the girls the cross game last night and I was leaving at the same time they were 20 minutes down the road there was not one student on their bus and so I think oftentimes it's lost in the fact that it seems like it's a district problem right whereas we don't want to take away from parents who are coming to observe their children compete in athletic events and of course they get in the car and go home with
099Mom and Dad or they're stopping for dinner on the way home or whatever it might be but I think that adds to the problem a little bit right so when the bus leaves and it's still got to pay for the gas to get back down there and the driver's time and so on and so forth and and there's no students on the bus so it's a bigger problem I think than just not having the the person capable of driving um so I think although you are not a bus company uh I think it will present challenges nonetheless no matter who we engage with that might help us with that direction down the road then my my question is uh in reviewing the the information that you provided to us um on the on the first
100page under standard one which is program guiding principles and and it it refers to our self-study and I guess it used the term Committee in general are we were we referring to the various committees that ultimately ended up meeting with you or what is the committee that's referenced in committee so in the schools in the observations that they made committee selection there's a split view on the openness of the committee selection process and I just wasn't sure who the committee was or or yes where that came from yes thank you de that so that relates directly to the development of the athletic Mission uh their values and belief so uh there were stakeholder responses that uh that were aware of that that said yes that was developed uh with input from stakeholders uh there were
101uh other responses that came in uh that said said that uh they were aware of it but it was uh developed singularly there was not a committee uh that that was involved in it so you know again that that's where it comes back to that General if we have systems and structures in place that says uh here is our athletic Mission this is how we're tying to it and we're going to review this on a three-year cycle a five-year cycle you know if we set out that system and we have that structure in place and know that we're going to have coaches we're going to have parents we're going to have students who are part of this uh invoice and what this mission is to ensure that it continues to represent the core values and
102beliefs of our schools community and program then you're going to when you redo that survey you should have you know a much uh much stronger response with everybody on the same page of uh the stakeholder input that went into the committee that's developing that statement and again when you look at the comprehensive nature of the port and the number of recommendations and find ings within each of the five standards um you know when John and I and Lisa met the other day just when we got our hands on it for the first time it can be overwhelming you know uh and so we said hey we have to take some time now over these next several months and establish both short term here are the things that we want to that you talked about low
103hanging fruit things to to dress right away and then maybe what are some of those long-term next two to three years you know that John and when you talk about a committee that would be assembling a group of student athletes coaches and parents that would help us because I think our mission and vision of our Athletics program it's a work in progress and so I think the idea of establishing a committee is bringing the same stakeholders we just gathered all this feedback from you know together um evaluating you the survey results and then planning out what what are some of the next stages and you know we'll continue to keep the board informed as the progress that we're making um but there's a lot there you know there's a lot to tackle um so again
104I know everybody's excited about it you know to have this opportunity to kind of reflect on things are doing well but obviously we identified there's there's definitely things that we can Contin uh continuously improve upon ju just keep in mind that the accreditation process this is based off of is a 10year cycle so you know you're not expected to get this done year yeah yeah yeah guess I have one uh one observation comment uh that's just a my personal opinion of how I absorbed and processed all this information and Glenn if I I say anything that you disagree with it's not necessarily a question but if if I say something that that improperly summarizes uh you know any part of the report feel free to jump in uh but I just wanted to make the
105comment that I think you know there are there are multiple takeaways you know there were seven or eight key takeaways but a lot of them I think can be covered and um examined under really the the Under the Umbrella of two and and the first and most important it it seems to me that there's a sense that um we need to produce where they don't exist and utilize um where they do exist produce and utilize formalize structures and and documents more within our athletic uh Department um you know that would include things like uh you know Vision training feedback articulation of goals um Planning by coaches guidelines for coaches students parents booster clubs um you know and then follow up on things like Improvement plans and that I guess just a a general greater attention
106to um to these these formal structures that kind of guide from the top down our our program and then in order to have John and his folks be able to do that over the next X number of years uh we need some capacity and whether that's how we how we increase that capacity is is um is a big question uh but with 80 plus teams in a health and wellness curriculum you know doing that formalized uh production and utilization of structures is not going to happen without um without some real thought into that so that that's what I took away from it and and almost everything else in the key takeaways can all can almost you know uh be a a direct result of improving those those structures and guidelines and that that was my
107sense um spot on Tony and that's um you know just to give you an example when the kids talked about um understanding roles responsibilities so you know football was a great example yes we have a depth chart we know exactly where we are our coach has talked to us about individually what we need to do to move up um and it ranged to some who said we had a conversation at the beginning of the year or we had a conversation at the end of the year to other teams that didn't that that never had that conversation um you know having um seasonal meetings for uh for student athletes so that they know the expectations of you know just understanding knowing the signup process and what tryouts are going to be like and uh you know
108how to get in contact with coaches and stuff so those were the things that we saw that vared so your spot on if if you formalize those a little bit more uh it's really going to tighten all those things up thanks anyone else well thank you Glenn thank you it's a pleasure thank you very much I think you know I think and hope that this can be the beginning of a Perpetual conversation around that um around this topic um so this brings us to the consent agenda um for those in attendance or watching um a consent agenda is a commonly used vehicle provided for by our adopted rules of parliamentary procedure Robert's rules that allows a board to vote on a large number of items in a single motion typically there are business it these
109are business items associated with the everyday running of the district and their inclusion in the agenda is the result of a great deal of Prior work and Care by the professionals there are from time to Time Business items that by law cannot be included in a consent agenda and when this happens we pull those out and vote on them separately consent agenda items are known to the trustees and the public several days ahead of the business meeting on which they are considered so that board members have the chance to ask questions of Discovery and do any advanced fact finding that is part of their due diligence process uh Natalia are there any modifications to tonight's agenda there are not so I make a motion to approve the consent agenda in its entirety do I have
110a second Beth any discussion all right all in favor that's eight nothing motion carries consent agenda carries I just have a a few welcomes uh so you'll see on the agenda uh tonight there were several uh of new uh District employees uh that were recommended to the board uh for appointment tonight uh so we are right in the heart of our busy hiring season uh so there are several appointments on the board agenda tonight uh and I also just want to thank all of our uh building and District level uh hiring uh committees uh again there's a tremendous amount of time and detail uh and engagement uh in our hiring process uh we've had some outstanding candidates um uh come through uh each of our committees uh so again want to thank everybody who's involved
111in the process so you'll see there's a number of folks uh that have been appointed uh to probationary uh positions across the district tonight in the next meeting you'll continue to see the next round of folks um but with us tonight is uh Melissa daviero so welcome uh and Melissa will be uh over at Division Street so uh welcome to Saratoga [Applause] Springs thanks Mike uh that brings us to the second public comment period is there anyone uh here who wishes to address the board all right we'll move on um that brings us to agenda planning board members uh any items for agenda planning Natalia go ahead John you oh John I see okay John and Natalia go ahead John I would like to uh reiterate um the request I made at the last meeting
112that the board collectively request the administration to look into the topic of cell phone uses in um schools in general and um I propose what I'm asking for is the board support in this proposal I propose that the administration bring a report to us um sometime during the next school year uh between now like within a year from now and that they um bring some relevant research um and share with us um the possibilities of being of a more restrictive policy and I think I I won't um presume to know what my my colleagues think or what the ad Administration thinks until we have a look but I will say to you that just to give you a heads up my view is that we should make a move and that we should be more
113restrictive and um I will I can be talked out of that if given some data and logic but that's where my head is right now and I'm hoping my colleagues will support me in this request anybody have any questions or comments for John or in general yeah Connie uh question for John do you expect in this research that they're solely looking at our district or are you looking for them to also research what other districts are doing it's it's a good question I I I definitely think we want to learn about the biggest picture possible we want to find out um what other districts are doing including our peers in in you know in our region but also what we're learning from around the country what the best practices seem to be um this is
114sort of new terrain for for public education because screen use has proliferated and the idea of sort of reigning it back in is very new um so you know I don't think I don't think there's a a giant pile research on this but I I hope the administration will look broadly to see what's possible what can work what's uh affordable um so definitely the possibilities within our district but also gathering information from other settings too and and I you know I'm not asking for them to to generate the comprehensive report on this but but to see if there's some viable scenarios for us I wonder if also looking at within our district because I know that there was a recent decision or practice where cell phones were more more restricted or that the idea was
115there um I wonder if there are some teachers that are having more success than others and then I wonder why my impression is that we used to have sort of no policy on this and more recently we've had a policy saying let's not use phones in classes and so you know what what it sorry right right uh so what's in my mind is thinking about what it was like when we when we didn't have much of a policy what it's been like since we've had this new policy and then what's it like in other schools districts where they are more restrictive and you know all the tradeoffs uh the and and we will have to collectively think the administration on the board if we decide to make a make a big change um how to
116how to think about stakeholder input and so forth okay thanks I just want to make sure we're they're doing and we're all thinking the same way and I I will say I mean I hope my colleagues will support this idea but I'm I also uh I would like to ask Mike if if this seems like a reasonable request yeah these are ongoing conversations I think ever since the cell phone was introduced uh it's been a challenge in the educational setting um so I think to your point engaging our students engaging our faculty and staff our Administration getting feedback from our parents uh to make sure that whatever the outcome is is their Buy in from all stakeholder groups um because I know it's a national conversation and there's progress that's being made um but with
117progress comes challenge but I I think there's definitely consensus for support to continue the conversation and what it looks like Elementary Middle School High School progress that's been made and then yet still obstacles we still have to overcome I I guess I'd like to just throw my support behind this and and say that um I I actually do love the changes that I've seen uh from my kids my I have uh two kids in the high School uh this year with the adoption of stricter uh in-classroom um uh policies I I definitely get fewer texts from the high school during the school day um but I I do think to John's bigger point I think it's time to look at and anecdotally the I I don't have I don't have you know numerical research to
118to back this up but anecdotally a lot of what you read about the the districts that think this has been a success story for them this type of of of stricter um restriction uh they will often point to the fact that more even than the classroom where sometimes a cell phone can be useful um but more even than the classroom the gains they see um come in the hallways and at lunchtime and so times when when we used to socialize more and um uh so i' I'd really like to uh explore possibilities for you know I I'd support a uh at this point without hearing research coming back from our our our folks i' I'd support a much stronger um guideline John um I would also support it John I think know you see a
119lot of times you know we just talk about bullying and everything and it's used so much to bully kids now especially in school you know if somebody's having a bad day somebody's filming them and then posting it and so that I think that would cut a lot of that down and I think it would be positives all the way around Beth yeah I completely agree with this as well um you know as you said anecdotally things that I have read about schools that have implemented more restrictive policy is that not only is there um you know more social engagement and students are communicating more and they're they're better able to focus but also it it allows the teachers to have relationships with the kids that are not focused on the management of you know the
120phones in the classrooms they don't have to say put your phones away or take your earbuds out or whatever it might be um and so I think having something that is more restrictive and clear um will also be a tremendous support to the teachers in addition to having a benefit for our students just socially and emotionally and and academically and also I um I offer this and and and uh want to get Mike's opinion on it and John since he proposed it but I sort of I kind of feel like a year is too long for for what John's asking for um the sort of a report back to this group to the board because after the board gets a report then let's say you know something happens policy-wise or the or the the group
121coming back recommends something very um very specific there's there's a to Mike's earlier Point there's a um a process that has to start whereby stakeholder groups have to be engaged and and allowed for feedback and if we you know how many let let's say we do this at some point you know how many years are we going to lose uh school years before this happens so I I guess I in a perfect world I'd like to see the the report sometime in the fall you know and and but that's if Mike you know I I I put a lot of a lot of that would um a lot of that timing I think uh is dependent on whether Mike thinks that's realistic for the uh for his crew again to start initiative in June will
122be a challenge um I think in September when our students are back in school and we have the opportunity to engage our parents and engage uh our staff in the conversation I think a few months into the fall with maybe a midyear report and then that would give us the second half of the year to talk about an implementation plan um but just you need access to students who we need access to our parents to think things are going get done over the summer in July and August is just not realistic Angie yeah I just I Echo that because we do need time for policy to committee to look at if that we need policy shift the student code of conduct comes out every year is that going to reflect anything in there so that
123kind of I could see it being a closed loop within a year from Fall well uh we don't have to take a formal vote but by nods of the head or or are we behind this kind of process getting going and and with a with a um end of the first semester kind of or end of the year end of the school end of the uh calendar year um report back as as as something coming back to the board I I see more than five of us yes okay John thanks uh Natalya um I have a potential agenda planning item but it actually uh first I have a question for Mike um so Mike I know that our next meeting which is on June 6th will have the counseling and student Support Services presentation so
124I'm wondering if this will focus only on the secondary level which is where we have our school counselors or if it will also include an update from the social workers and school psychologist at the elementary level Lisa that's for you hello we typically do include a piece on that I mean the the January um PPS uh report out typically has more information on it but we do um have an update about that usually includes things about U bhsn mental health that sort of thing um so we we'll typically include that again for this year yeah so um I definitely think it's important for us to hear from people in those roles um especially as our board has talked so much about prevention in addition to response and so I think um in my experience on
125the board that presentation is extraordinarily valuable I think it gives us such a picture into what uh I guess is happening in the lives of our students at school um and so I know that there are some changes um or potential changes to our mental health supports due to the ending of the covid funds and so um definitely one that I want to hear more about um just as we are moving forward I think it's something that we as a board have talked a lot about and so I guess depending on the content of that presentation which I know is still a couple weeks away um I would want to have an agenda planning item for the next meeting where we're asking for a presentation that does specifically focus on the prevention aspect of um
126the work that our social workers and school psychologists are doing at the elementary level so I'm not proposing anything for tonight this is I'm saying what I would like to propose next time just I'm Sor sorry I would make that I would make this an agenda planning item for June 6 just following our our process not the presentation would no no no I'm not asking for a presentation next time I'm saying that I guess I would like to I would like to make an agenda planning item and as part of our board agreement to have no surprises I wanted to I guess share that with the board that I would have this um I I'd be planning on having this for June 6th during agenda planning to make this a motion and so like John
127just uh send me an email and we'll formalize that and then uh move on thank you Connie uh I feel like based on Natalia what she just said it's probably a good maybe a good time to remind about a previous agenda planning item that I had already brought up and we have discussed at the table for that June 6th meeting and that was related to the elementary level specifically and the relationship between the SRO and the mental health professionals and how that's working out so I don't know if that helps if that was already going to happen but that was something previously brought up um and that we all knotted our heads on previously so just a reminder and is that a reminder for a specific meeting or or it was for the counseling June
1286 meeting yes okay any other uh do you want to say something leis or I think that was a um a few meetings back when there was an announcement about from the county that came out about a partnership in um I I can spoiler alert here um there hasn't been any more information shared so yes but the other part of that was can we hear more about that relationship between the SRO and the mental health professionals and how that's working out so sure okay thanks thank you anybody else all right that moves us on to board member comments board members comence commenting Angie I have a couple um first I want to congratulate the retirees we celebrated before our meeting today that it's always nice to uh celebrate those who have served our students in
129our district and community so well so congratulations to them um I also want to thank Bobby and and congratulate his team on a successful budget season um it's been a first year wild ride and I'm getting through it because day one of the next year starts tomorrow no rest for the weary so again thank you so much for our very robust process um and to the board for all their engagement and that brought us to a successful budget passing and then I wanted to address Eleanor um and um congratulate her we got to go to um the adirondac area School Board Association student Community Service Awards last week and sit with her and her parents and celebrate her community service and she had the most lovely comments to say about sitting on the board um
130it was wonderful to celebrate you and um and meet your mom and dad and um just congratulations on your award it's really been nice having you here this year thanks Angie anyone else well I'll oh go ahead Connie um I would also like to thank the voters for supporting our budget um I am looking forward to working with everybody again um and our discussions our debates our collaborations I'd like to congratulate Deb and Matt for also being eled to the board and um continuing to work for our students so uh thank you everyone Natalia um I know it was just added on at the end but I wanted to note that I found the bridge the gap um presentation to be so valuable um and I love to see um constantly how our students are
131leading the way and I just really wanted to acknowledge that those were four really amazing students and a great Club advisor and I I'm grateful that we got to hear about that thank you um I think I'd like to just take this uh opportunity to tell you a little bit about what I was doing the the night that uh Angie and others were um at the uh event celebrating Eleanor uh and just say that for for year for three years now three or maybe four um I have been interested in going to the scientific research Symposium that uh they put on uh every year and in the high school and it's usually during a board meeting night and so we have haven't been able to go but I was able to go this uh this
132past Thursday and uh was blown away by the um the diversity breath level of research level of uh engagement and excitement that these students who uh uh who apply in 9th grade and then participate from 10th through 12th uh with with cl collaboration from community members including one board member um you know in The Sciences social sciences and and uh hard Sciences sorry John um the uh it was it was a great night and um really the the the teachers and students who put it onor to be commended and I I recommend it to anyone um who uh has a chance to go to it next year um I wanted to also um thank the public but Connie you you said it perfectly so I'm not going to repeat uh for um their vote last
133night and then also just uh welcome um Connie back but but um Matt and Deb uh Matt Copans and and Deb amyy uh you will uh be hearing from Natalia myself and Mike uh in the next um Coming months uh as you prepare for for July 1st um there are nisba um trainings that are possible you'll you'll meet with uh with us for an orientation program that has the benefit of a newly uh constructed uh onboarding packet which was a a big uh accomplishment of of our board this year in my opinion so welcome and um stay tuned all right that brings us to the end of the meeting um at this time we will move into executive session um and anticipate adjourning directly after and will not be taking any action in public session
134so may I please get a motion to enter executive session to discuss issues pertaining to employment history um matters leading to appointment employment promotion demotion discipline Etc um and also discuss issues pertaining to negotiations with the handbook employees of our district John second Dean any discussion all in favor we're now entering executive session thanks it was 80 Bobby