SSCSD BOE Meeting 4/18/2023

001the executive session um we've already had our roll call recalling the meeting back to order if you would all please join me in saying the Pledge well good evening and well it's loud good evening and welcome everybody my name is Mike Patton the superintendent of schools I hope everybody had a wonderful spring break uh and had some time to get away and and enjoy the beautiful weather we had in Upstate New York last week so I want to um introduce we have a special performance tonight over the last few board meetings we've had a number of our student performing groups from all of our grade levels elementary middle school and high school and so tonight we have a very special performance by our high school core leaders who are combining with our fifth grade choral

002group from Dorothy Nolan Elementary School under the direction of Miss Carrie trimmings and miss Karen Houlihan so this is I think of the largest performance we've ever had at a board meeting so we're very excited uh to hear from all you tonight so I will turn it over to miss trimmings and Miss Houlihan hello everyone I'm Maddie cook I'm the president of coral ears um we're here today with the fifth grade chorus from Dorothy Nolan we've been sending pen pal letters back and forth with them and we're so excited to sing with them today um the coraliers are headed to Virginia on Friday for a competition we're so excited um and we can't wait to sing for you fifth grade parents can meet their kids in the hallway after we're done with the song Thank

003you so much thank you [Music] foreign [Music] foreign [Music] foreign [Music] foreign I just want to congratulate all of our students thank you so much what a wonderful collaborative effort between the two schools thank you to all of our parents all the teachers and for your great support of all of our musical experiences thank you parents for coming tonight foreign sure yeah oh I think there's closed door I think Carrie and Karen are just outside the door but I again want to thank both our choral directors uh for making that collaboration possible it's always an awesome experience for our high school in elementary school kids to have the opportunity to uh to interact like that and perform together so I want to thank Carrie and Karen for making that performance possible thank you all right

004everything else will pale in comparison to that we now come to the exciting part of the agenda where we I need a motion to approve six rounds of minutes that were in your packets could I get a motion to approve those Natalya second by Dean any discussion on oh all in favor that looks unanimous Tim I now need a motion to accept today's agenda as presented John Ellis second Natalya any discussion all in favor of accepting today's agenda as presented that's unanimous too all right we're now at public comment uh on behalf of the board I would like to thank all community members in attendance tonight for your engagement we truly value input from the community and are grateful that you're here please note that the Board of Education meetings in New York state are

005not public meetings with real-time dialogue between officials and Spectators they are board meetings held in public where we conduct the business of the district with one another but do so visibly so that maximal transparency and information sharing with the public can be achieved there is no conversation between the board and the public during our meetings however we do provide two public comment periods during which speakers May address the board to share information and opinions that may inform our work we are eager to hear your voices and opinions if your statement or question requires follow-up the appropriate District official will be in touch outside the confines of the meeting to enable an efficient environment in which the board can complete the meeting's planned agenda the first public comment period is limited to 30 minutes total the

006first three slots are newly reserved for current students if any wish to to address the board while the second comment period has no official time limit the ground rules for public comments including asking speakers and the audience to conduct themselves in a civil and constructive manner we are invested in hearing your voices and ask that you model the same respectfulness we expect from the students of our district we do not allow comments about specific individual employees students or trustees and ask that you be succinct and try not to repeat previous speakers in order to allow more people the opportunity to address us we now open the first public comment period each speaker is allotted a maximum of three minutes and the period is limited to 30 minutes total before you address the board please clearly

007state your name and address I don't see any students signed up in the first three going going gone on that one so our first signed up speaker is Megan Cook hi I'm Megan Cook I am a parent of Madeleine cook the president of the choraliers and uh you heard from her tonight and you heard from all the students and and when their energy came in the room I wanted to um talk a little bit tonight about music education I'm not an expert in music education but living with Maddie cook I've had to become one um so I just want to talk a little bit about where her interest in this was sparked it was Lake Avenue Elementary School it was the drama club there it was the music teachers there I have a picture of

008her playing the xylophone I wanted to bring it in but I figured that might be going too far um from there it went to musicals so we had musicals in the Middle School people who were taking their time to do this work and I remember one of these meetings early on when Maddie was little and I went out and learned as much as I could about music education and now standing on the other side of it when she is a senior now I'm reflecting on those things that number one it helps with cognition brain cognition spatial intelligence math language pattern recognition all things you know now I'm seeing it on this side of what it's done for her the standardized testing it helps students become better learners and I've really been able to see that

009not just in Maddie but in all of her friend group and then finally with joy you saw the joy you're sitting in meetings all day I'm sitting in meetings all day and don't you wish you could stop and listen to music some of us do or maybe sing or clap so when you think about the focus and discipline that they've had throughout their years I come back to thinking about it when she was young and now on the other side of it music education is so important to me it is the secret ingredient the thing that gets excited when you look at all those kids who are here they're they're just so different and they're all excited to be up there so I know you have hard decisions to make these budget decisions are not

010easy ones but I wanted you to know how much music has made a difference in our family's life and and so many students in the school district um that's really just wanted to share our story about how happy we are how blessed we are to be in the school district um with this with these teachers and that's the last thing I wanted to say Mr Hall said Miss trimmings Miss Houlihan have been like family to us we've been able you've seen the good side and bad side of the families and we we couldn't imagine all these years without you so thank you [Applause] next up is Steve mittler I have more to add in a different way but um what the Cook family didn't point out is Maddie the honor that you got yesterday a

011call back to Proctors Theater uh for next week to be able to perform for uh is it actress of best actress in the entire Capital Region so [Applause] and if she wins that she goes to New York City to uh to perform and practice for a week with passively talented folks I'll also add as I say that that um uh Spencer Boyce last year won in Albany and went on to New York City so that's a pretty fascinating opportunity for these kids to be able to do and I know many of you up here personally and I know that you guys really support what we're looking for in enhancing some of the the programs and really and I likewise I just looked over here I gotta thank these guys um what they do and I

012don't know where Jeff went but what they do for our kids is just over the top and every teacher here I'm sure does the same uh likewise our house is loud not thankfully not as loud as a band student or a screeching Orchestra but it's it's loud when the kids get together and one of the teachers here back in middle school they saw that my kids were still in Balton theater and he said I love theater kids they're just awesome when they come through respectful funny um but uh that's who they are they're just awesome kids one of the things I want to point out we hear a lot about the Arts versus Sports when we talk about school and funding and I don't want to be in any of your shoes when people are

013looking at that but when you think about funding for the Arts and funding for music specifically in an environment with band and Orchestra they have banned once a week and then they have their individual music rehearsal once a week with their band teacher or their Orchestra teacher of course of course you show up you sing and you have no opportunity to really have enough an outside opportunity with your teacher so for many of us because our kids are so excited about it we pay personally we do out of uh we get out of our pocket to be able to give that opportunity to develop their voices uh and their voices are their instrument so those are the things that I just want to at least in within the music part be able to think about

014what we can do from what you just heard and I had no idea what the song was going to be but I'll close with can you hear me that was the end of the song I had no idea so thank you all very much appreciate it thank you and please get them a contract thank you thank you [Applause] and that closes the first public comment period thank you um brings us to board committee reports are there any board committee reports Angie finance and that yesterday and went over the two items that we used Angie would you just turn it up a little thanks is that better oh yeah I'm the opposite of the two loud now it's too soft um we finance committee met yesterday we went over the two items that we discussed already

015in executive session and then also had a preview of the tax property tax report card which we will hear a lot more about from our presentation today so I won't steal any of that Thunder and I'll leave it to the experts so we'll hear about that tonight some more and I do have one other item um I did want to just mention that Tony and I and Mike went up to the BOCES annual meeting on April 5th it was absolutely lovely um we had excellent food done by our BOCES students flower arrangements which we got to take home that were stunning and we got to sit with students at our table while we had dinner it was really fascinating and got to really talk in depth with some of the students and watched them get

016some awards and round out their careers in BOCES sat with a fascinating young man who was in the forestry program what I didn't even know we had a forestry environmental forestry program who's going to join his family business now and he graduates just an outstanding showing of what our BOCES offers so it was a great night thanks any other board committee reports um seeing none I'll just report quickly on a meeting that we were invited to by Skidmore College the community leaders breakfast happened last Thursday um they uh invited trustees and and Dr Patton if you haven't been to this I I couldn't recommend it more it is at an awkward time it's at 7 30 in the morning on a on a Thursday but they the program runs quickly last year admits in a

017finger paint and business for good came and uh and spoken it was a wonderful program this year the directors of the YMCA and the senior center talked about their collaboration uh putting the new Senior Center expanded Senior Center on the back of the of the Saratoga YMCA both presentations were great um it's a it's a really inspiring um uh Arena that that Skidmore puts on and invites community leaders too so just wanted to report out on that Mike and Natalya and Angie and John and I uh were at that and I couldn't recommend it more that look like looks like it's the end of board committee reports that brings us to student representative reports Kate you're you're doing the whole thing all right so at geyser Road Elementary the third to fifth grade students have

018Ela State Testing starting tomorrow and guys road is taking over the High School auditorium stage on Friday night with the return of air band at 6 pm and then on April 28th they will be joining the Department of Public Works and planting a tree in Geyser Park at Lake Ave all the kids enjoyed Ben and Jerry's free cone day before spring break some classes took a walk to Ben and Jerry's and others had their ice cream delivered to enjoy in the classroom Miss Ellsworth hosted the high school science research club for stumbration at Lake Ave the club ran four stations related to science technology engineering art and math kids learned about stability the Fibonacci sequence electrical currents and chemical interactions while creating building and challenging one another it was a great event and then also

019at Lake Ave students in grades three to five will be participating in New York State Testing and Ela this week and next week Dorothy Nolan same story students in grades three to five will be participating in New York State Testing and Ela this week and next week the high school research Club also came to Dorothy Nolan and they had a wonderful stem event the students did the same stations and had a great experience and their HSA is partnering with BTA Community programs to offer before and after school enrichment classes these will be in things like stop-motion animation stem Snack Attack Jazz it up arts and crafts and knitting and then at Division Street grades three to five will be participating in the New York State Ela assessment starting Wednesday April 19th over at the middle

020school again New York State Ela assessments April 20th and April 19th and the no place for hate pledge week is scheduled for May 1st to May 5th and the no place for hate student Planning Group are working hard in creating future no place for eighth grade level activities for May and June at the high school tomorrow there will be a no place for hate event organized for all students in the introduction of the Ally program on April 26th at 6 PM the high school hosts the student voices event this will include a panel of current students who will share their experiences and their commitment to inclusion free ice cream will be served the academic team will be hosting toga trivia takedown on April 20th teams of students will compete against their peers to raise funds

021for the student and faculty of the high school and then finally several groups were able to travel abroad for April break there were successful trips to Greece and Costa Rica with over a hundred student and staff Travelers that's it thanks Keith that that brings it to Mike for administrative reports and presentations all right thank you uh so just a few updates uh Andy Angie touched on uh that before the break uh Tony and Jenai attended the BOCES uh annual budget presentation uh so the budget vote and the board election is scheduled for next Tuesday uh that is April 25th so all 31 component school districts uh in our BOCES regions will be meeting next Tuesday uh to vote on the BOCES budget uh and then the board candidates so our meeting is going to be

022held in the administrative building at 8 A.M next Tuesday so if you can just give me a just a final uh raise your hand we just got to make sure that we have at least five people there in person for a physical Quorum so one two three four five perfect okay um so again after that voting election takes place uh Tim will submit um the our votes into the BOCES and again the BOCES truly appreciates the support portable 31 component school districts in our region Kate had mentioned that we've got a number of events going on at the high school tomorrow and no place for a hate event that's a student run event and then our district Dei committee is sponsoring a student voices event next Wednesday April 26th at six o'clock in the High

023School auditorium so we're really excited for the work of the Dei committee and some of the goals for that student event next week which to open up to the community is really to celebrate the work that our students do to make our school Community both welcoming and inclusive to all students but also to engage our families and and community in the work that the DI committee has been providing and the opportunity to interact with students from all of our buildings so we're going to have all of our elementary schools our Middle School and High School participating next Monday Wednesday night and again the opportunity engaged parents and community using some of the no place for hate this is a new initiative just starting this year with our partnership through the Anti-Defamation League uh that all

024schools are engaged in so you'll see again more promotion coming out in the next few days we've got a number of students that are going to be speaking at the event and then again opportunity for parents of the community to interact with each of the eight schools in the school district and the work that they're doing throughout the school year and then finally just an update for Board of Education candidate seats the candidate for the three seats that are up each year candidate petitions are due on April 26th for City school districts across New York state so each year we partner with illegal Women Voters to host a meet the candidates night this year that's going to be hosted on Wednesday May 3rd at seven o'clock right here in the High School teaching Auditorium so

025for those who can to submit their petitions on the 26th they'll coordinate with the League of Women Voters for an opportunity to meet the candidates and again that would be an event that will be live streamed on our District page but um obviously that is being coached co-sponsored by the illegal women voter so we appreciate again the support that they provide each year to the school district in promoting our our Board elections that's it for updates for tonight we do have three presentations tonight so again each one of them again we'll cover a variety of topics so as all of you know for the last several years we've been preparing for our Legacy project so with us tonight is Bill mcmordie from Saratoga project management and John otterdunk from Mosaic Architects and they're going to

026provide the board and Community just an update of kind of where we are right now in the Legacy project there's obviously there's been work that's been done over the last year there was work that was done over April break in anticipation of some of the significant work that's going to start in June so for staff and community members at the high school at Greenfield Elementary in Dorothy Nolan Elementary School this is when really the project kicks into kind of full gear uh the last day of school when students and staff roll out out you're going to see a lot of construction begin this summer so we just want to provide an opportunity for Bill and John to update the board thank you Dr Patton uh Dr Patton said my name is Bill mcmordy we're going

027to take you through phases one through six tonight won't be that long um there's eight phases in the entire project so we actually have six of the eight phases in different parts of development in the program so we're going to take you through those tonight so phase one really was what we have been through most of last summer coming into this school year it really dealt with two large topics that there's really security it's a building improvements as far as efficiencies and boilers air conditioning over at Lake Ave on the third floor we actually just turned that on over April break so in the classrooms up there it's not fully under control yet we're still working those bugs out but we had a big delay in the delivery of the units they were actually supposed

028to be installed last summer but they didn't show up until the fall so we have completed those if it's a master clock work and big network cabling technology things that you don't see but you use every day uh Dave lahama news Department worked very hard over the past eight nine months to get that up and running and that was actually pretty successful we are doing security cameras right now we had a huge delay on security cameras again they were supposed to be done last summer we didn't get most of them delivered until probably November um so we've been installing those right now we've got them in all the new security cameras and all new build all buildings except for division and Lake Division and Lake are about 80 percent done the rest of the buildings

029are 100 done with security cameras updates the other thing we're going to do for your security vestibules we're putting in new uh card readers and new visual uh card reader so when you come up you'll be able to see the person there we tested it at geyser it went okay it didn't go great but I think we've got our bugs worked out and we're going to wait on those Wireless buttons that go with these they're back ordered so they're supposed to be here mid-may once we finish those we'll be circling through all the schools and best views we'll be getting new entrance procedures into your buildings so hopefully that will close out really the first phase of the project phase two again that's three uh three parts of phase two Dorothy Nolan Greenfield and transportation

030building we awarded contracts back in December there's roughly nine contracts that Encompass these buildings to add alternates as you can see up there and we're going to start this summer we've already done a little bit of work started at Dorothy Nolan uh we've done a little bit of work Greenfield we did some column replacement over April break we've also cut some trees down at Greenfield in order for Preparation to expand the parking lot and at transportation we are carrying the bus wash apart as we speak and we're digging a new hole in the bus garage to put a new bus lift in which we've been through that a few years ago and it's it's always a challenge but it seems to be going okay right now so John's going to take you through some of

031the design scope in free in these three buildings and then we'll move on to phase three thanks Bill I think most of you have seen this scope before so we'll try and move through that relatively quickly we have this broken out by schools Dorothy Nolan we have the main entrance renovation which also extends into the main office we have select classroom Renovations six of those will be renovated completely then the cafeteria and kitchen Edition servery Renovations where we'll be completely gutting the kitchen the cafeteria completely renovating each of those and expanding the kitchen and relocating where the server is stage lighting upgrades in the auditorium select bathroom renovations these are the bathrooms more public access the larger ones I believe near the cafeteria select Roofing replacement and building improvements in energy efficiencies the mechanical electrical

032Plumbing upgrades to each of the schools just a quick reminder of what the Dorothy Nolan Cafe 2 will look like when that's all completed the diagram we've shown a few times now for the secure vestibule this is uh not Dorothy Nolan but represents the new separated entrance for all the visitors uh to enter the school without compromising the envelope or the outside of the building the 21st century classroom with the Smart Board the writable marker boards the idea wall the Cubbies added storage and bookcases all new surfaces lighting ceilings paint and flooring and furniture will be included at Greenfield a lot of the same things the main office Renovations with secure vestibule the traffic improvements here the expanded parking lot and the rerouting of the Bus drop off really segregating the parent drop off from

033the buses six of the classrooms will be renovated select kitchen renovations stage lighting in the auditorium select bathroom and Roofing Replacements and again the energy efficiencies and building improvements and then at the bus garage we have the bus wash system being replaced the last of the bus lifts is being replaced and then all the lighting within there is being replaced with LED lighting hope we do want to add something in there you ready so one other thing that we've been working on which isn't in any of the slides is obviously moving stuff around before to prepare for construction so we've actually been working with uh Dorothy Nolan Greenfield and the high school to go over our move management plans yeah Dorothy Nolan we actually have to create a contemporary cafeteria in the small gym because

034we're taking out their cafeteria to renovate so that's been fun trying to figure that out again at the high school we've got kind of the same condition you know we're moving the cafeteria to the white gym while we renovate the current cafeteria so there's a lot of logistics that go with that so we're really now that it's April everybody's really starting to pay attention and uncomplicated that may be so we've we've been meeting with the buildings and uh getting the move plans organized to uh to start we're actually starting moving on in the high school on the 23rd graduation day so on cafeteria we're going to move starting at eight o'clock in the morning and then we're going to move over to the d-wing and we'll be moving those classrooms out in the afternoon Dorothy

035Nolan and Greenfield will be done on Saturday the 24th and cut directors will be in on Monday the 26th so a lot of prep work in order to just get started so high school we awarded back in October we awarded our contracts we've already started actually some demolition work I don't know if anybody's noticed but in the cafeteria there's a few things missing in the high school cafeteria we've taken down the petition wall the old folding wall that used to be there that's gone and taking down the ceiling panels we've done actually some asbestos abatement in the auxiliary gym and we've done some abatement in the corridors in the C and D wings of the building so we did that over April break so that all seemed to go okay a couple that alternates as

036you can see up there that we awarded for a high school and then we'll get started this summer and hopefully finish from Fall 24 with this space okay so we start with the the big two for the high school the renovation of the cafeteria and the auxiliary gym creating a new Fitness and Wellness Center and the well well the wellness Suite where the existing weight room is traffic improvements this is the turn lane off of onto West Ave which we've been working in the city diligently to make that happen um Auditorium stage lighting and rigging are happening again the select bathrooms it says select Roofing but I think we're doing a lot of roofing here so um a lot of selection there and then the building improvements in energy efficiencies throughout the building just a

037quick reminder of what we're expecting it to look like after we're all done here um this is the dining hall concept and we're working through Furniture selection at this point and it's going to look very similar to what we see here this is the auxiliary gym or what it will be is the fitness center with the new uh curtain wall going in allowing a lot of natural light to come in and giving everyone a great opportunity to exercise yeah so this is phase four so this these are projects now that are currently in design so really phase four for Carolina division we haven't awarded any contracts to these uh these projects yet we have submitted SED for approval we've actually gotten through the architectural and Engineering approval now we have to get through the fiscal

038approval and the money part of it which sometimes takes as long as the other part but we're not bidding this total fall so that'll be our next round of projects the bid and we'll start this in June of 24. so as you can read I'm not going to go through all the project scope it's similar for each of the buildings that we're going to talk about in phases uh four and six but similar to other schools you know traffic improvements classrooms vestibule upgrades security vestibule upgrades uh we're working through the CD estimate which is actually called the construction document estimate which is the final estimate we do before we go to bid and we'll probably be developing some alternates to make sure we can award-based bid uh in the fall phase five this is really

039the first part of the middle school it's not uh really major interior construction this is more related to site work we propose bidding this in the fall of 24. we're in the schematic design phase which is really just the first design phase right now traffic improvements really is a drop-off Loop in improving the traffic flow around the front of the building that'll be one of the first big things we do tennis court replacement emergency generator we'll be putting more things on the emergency generator Auditorium stage replacement we'll be replacing really the working part of the stage or not really the apron part but the part behind that gets abused and stuff screwed down to all the time and then we'll be moving forward in the design development here soon phase six is geyser and Lake

040similar to how we bid Greenfield and Dorothy Nolan and we're going to bid Carolina division we did this is one project two separate schools this will bid in Fall of 24 basically on the same path as phase five and we'll bid these at really at the same time involve 24. and again similar to scope to what we have that Carolina division would uh classrooms your vestibules roofs those types of things there's the scope at Lake very similar something different at Lake we're going to do Courtyard replacement of the windows the interior Courtyard those windows need to be replaced so we're replacing those and that's what we got for tonight any questions from anything that we went over thanks very much so just to just to add as we've been going out and meeting with the

041staffs of each of the buildings that have been impacted Bill mentioned move management he makes it sound very easy but obviously uh there's a lot of moving parts so we truly appreciate just the cooperation and support uh again when you're going through a significant project like this there's disruption that's going on throughout the building there's movement of programs this summer Maple Avenue is going to be very busy between middle school and high school summer school programming as well as our partnership with the Greenfield Rec program Greenfield Rec is usually held at Greenfield Elementary School but they're going to be at Maple lab this summer so again a lot of movement Parts a lot of folks that were coordinating with so our plan in the next few weeks is to have some pretty good sized poster

042boards uh out in front of the lobbies of each of the schools that are impacted so Dorothy Nolan Greenfield High School just starting to give our students a heads up a reminder to parents it's you know High School this summer with the construction that's going to be going on outside there's going to be limited access on and off the the campus and so again just appreciate again our 12-month staff who's gonna have to relocate out of their offices and buildings again to other spaces as we kind of work through this and we know this is obviously it's going to be a long project between now and 2028 when we finally finally wrap things up so the more that we can continue to get information out to folks well in advance where they can kind of

043plan and prepare because I know that this year last day of school I believe it's what Friday June 28th what's the date fourth third we'll be leaving and construction Crews will be moving right in so as much as we can get that information out to folks so folks can plan and prepare the better so I appreciate all the support that we get from Bill and John and Dave's team has been working extremely hard on the technology side then John's folks in facilities and operations uh you know they you know the work that they do over the summer months just cleaning our facilities but then cleaning in the middle of a capital project and getting our buildings ready for September is always a huge challenge so John and his crew again are up the task and

044have been really doing a great job coordinating the effort so so just thank the board for your support and I will continue to keep updated as we as we work through the Legacy project all right so our next presentation tonight is from our district professional learning uh committee and so tonight Lisa Danielle Michelle and Karen cangera are here with us uh to provide an overview of the professional learning and some of the work the committee has accomplished for this school year so start with Lisa hello okay good all right um good evening everyone uh we are excited to talk to you about our professional learning uh plan and the activities that have been going on um this is the multi-year plan just as a reminder that the board adopts annually um we have it rolling

045in three-year increments so that we're constantly tweaking it so it's not a a big huge overhaul every three years one of the things that need to know is that the committee is working now to actually plan for next year's work already and so um it seems like it's far off but that's some of the work that's actually being done already this is a list of the current committee members and you will see that it's a representation across all of the bargaining units teachers administrators and CSEA because we look to provide that support and ongoing learning for all of the adults here in the district um and across all content levels as well with monster zones okay there we go okay so um just making a connection um to our district vision and core beliefs um

046under each of the core beliefs uh we have the priorities that we've been working on and what you're going to hear from the lady shortly are some more details of the professional learning opportunities that have been offered and some created by our own teachers to support all of the work in these areas I know under the equity of opportunity one of the questions that had come up I think in a previous meeting was asking about our implementing culturally responsive instructional practices and so just to um to talk a little bit about that for a moment we have partnered with generation ready and Anna Munoz has come in and focused that work on a a book called cultural responsive teaching in the brain so looking at the the makeup of the brain and how we learn

047and then moving into instructional practices really which the classroom is where it is at when we're doing this professional learning so we've had her come in and work with all levels of our teachers throughout the district and after each of those sessions there is a feedback mechanism where folks are asked questions about the content of the PD and additional questions they may have or suggestions for the future so we'll be continuing to use that we've used that every time and the ladies will also talk about how we get feedback from not just that particular one but since it was asked about I thought I would mention that but also all of the other PD that we offer um so when you go across all of the uh beliefs there's a lot of pieces in there

048regarding our academics and our support um for our teachers in the classroom and our student learning and um Mr hamadu will hand out a sheet shortly that talks about some of those specific things but again it's a lot if you if you look at what the priorities are up there there's academics there's SEL there's technology there's safety and that's what this committee works hard on is trying to make sure we're addressing that and working with some of the other committees in District as well so at this point I will turn it over to Danielle to continue talking about the requirements evening so as outlined by our professional learning plan we have the mission of the committee to Foster multiple avenues for staff members to experience a personal connection to learning that will serve them and

049our students for a lifetime so this mission is formed around New York State's seven domains of professional learning New York state provides these standards to guide high quality professional learning for all Educators to improve outcomes for all students so these standards provide a framework for educators to engage in ongoing learning and reflection as part of that lifelong professional development so just briefly to touch on and Summarize each of those standards just to give you an idea professional growth and collaboration there speaks to how professional learning should be ongoing and characterized by collaboration we all know that we learn best not in a vacuum expanding professional capacity that addresses the building and deepening of individual and Collective expertise of course with the aim of improving outcomes for all students the domain of leadership involves developing and

050fostering the Knowledge and Skills existing in the district and among stakeholders to build capacity and to have those support systems for all instructional staff professional learning approaches that talks about utilizing what we know is effective with adult learning so from research on Adult Learning we know that it is most effective when it's ongoing focused on content that has immediate relevance and can be applied when it's differentiated to meet teachers learning needs and experience levels and when there is input in choice utilizing data professional learning should incorporate a variety of data to monitor student progress to inform plan assess and evaluate learning and to sustain that professional growth the professional Improvement cultural responsiveness so that standard is not just for specific professional development offerings but really Talks To That All Professional learning should be mindful and

051inclusive of the needs of diverse student populations and diverse learners engagement amongst diverse communities that speaks to building professional development capacity by reaching out to resources within the community to encourage information and resource sharing to support our students and staff so those domains along with the our district vision and Pathways guide the professional learning in our district so at this point I will turn it over to Michelle Whitley thank you very much all right so as Dr cutting mentioned we have a professional learning plan in the district and that's reviewed and updated by the professional learning committee which has compromised with all the folks you saw on the first slide I'm honored to work with this group of professionals we've been coming up with a lot of great ideas this year and having really solid

052conversations about the needs of all Educators within the district and some of the goals that we align our conversations with that help guide us is looking at what folks are asking for so it says needs assessment and that's really what types of professional learning is Staff looking for we always want to make sure that we're staying updated with research and best practices and a lot of our conversations are a workshop model where we're talking about those practices and and seeking input of others the professional learning that we do put together is tailored under one of our core beliefs is really tailored for what specific opportunities teachers are looking for uh you'll see that the catalog that we offer of professional development changes yearly based on our goals a lot of our work is ongoing and

053it builds as we continue to grow and learn and be responsive to our students and one of the priorities for our professional learning team is to conduct analysis of feedback from all of our stakeholders to plan for future opportunities it shows some feedback mechanisms that we use whether they be surveys conversations um the feedback from our faculty and staff is really important for example our recent superintendents say that we had at the beginning of the school year was responsive to classroom needs social emotional needs and Trauma and it also spoke to curriculum needs across the district with department and PLT time and we received some feedback because we asked for that after every professional development that we put together and the committee comes together and reviews that feedback and identifies the strengths and weaknesses of

054what was put together this year's committee looked at all of the feedback and prioritized Choice as something that is a primary goal for the district that our educators are telling us that we need choices to personalize our learning so we decided as a committee that in January we were going to start planning next November's um superintendent's day and we have some really awesome ideas that have been brainstormed by our professional learning committee asking colleagues in all of the buildings coming back with ideas looking for facilitators and we're in the process of you know shaping the vision of what we're looking for as we move into the next school year and that's been just really exciting to think about and respond to the needs of our Educators and students and for example our CSEA members that

055are on the professional learning committee are talking with all of their colleagues to say what would be best for you what's time worthy for you that you would like to see offered and we're looking to personalize those opportunities so the feedback is really key because we want everything to be critically important and engaging to everyone the professional development opportunities and options that our faculty and Educators have throughout the year all staff has the opportunity for superintendents conference days which are scheduled during the year we also have professional development course offerings throughout the year so my office puts that out four times a year and honestly I think anyone that you could talk to we have a tremendous amount of expertise here in Saratoga just having the opportunity to share with one another as colleagues and

056teachers and to teach one another so we consistently look for those options as well the professional development is targeted based on needs and we also offer that through faculty meetings department meetings articulation and any opportunity that we have to have committees together we have embedded professional development for new curriculum which I'll talk a little bit more about in the next slide and really the work that we do is to help us be responsive to all students needs and to enhance our own skill set so this gives you a professional development year at a glance of some of the work that we are doing this year so far we've had 50 offerings and 192 hours and 466 attendees to give a to put a number to that to give me an idea and the professional development

057has primarily been focused on targeted professional development with strategies for classroom use to support students in de-escalating classroom management there's new science requirements and we've had Hands-On training for our grade level teachers in three four and five so they could experience those lab investigations as students would those are going to be required starting next year we've also had ongoing support and professional development for our curricular programs American reading company K through 5 is our literacy program we utilize iready and NWA as assessments to drive instruction we have lab age training of the science six teachers and summer curriculum writing and all of this work is comprehensive and thoughtful and intentional for example as we are planning for summer curriculum work there's multiple layers of conversations as educators are making suggestions in terms of what would

058support the curriculum and what our needs are to further enhance programs for our students and then those decisions are made we also have the professional development that is based on the district goals our opening day was with Dr Jody Carrington and it was called kids these days and it was really talking about and focusing on the how the needs of students have changed what's also made us change as Educators to be able to be responsive to support them things like social emotional needs trauma diversity equity and inclusion in addition to the multi-tiered system of supports those are things that aren't isolated those are things that are ongoing conversations that happen across the district in all settings and they're really integrated um in our conversations as we talk about students and talk about instruction we also

059had during our superintendent's conference days many trainings and department meetings I think our faculty and staff would really tell you that time together is critically important to be able to share experience share resources and be able to talk about the craft of teaching and being able to support one another the instructional staff for technology is really important to support all of our work in curriculum and instruction and we have multi-layers of people working on digital fluency whether that be our techs or our classrooms or our Librarians we have committees we have technology leaders and educational technologists and those groups of folks are meeting to support curriculum and instruction across the district um we also have um a lot of support with our school tool professional development and support by Abby Adams who provides specific trainings

060to groups of folks within the district so whether that is our clerical staff administrators is my time off I hear about ringing I'm sorry um AIS data and now I lost track um so Abby I'm sorry she provides a lot of personalized support to help folks with the tools that we use to manage our systems and programs and to monitor our assessment of students and then of course we have opportunities for our parent University and for example Dr Jennifer bishan did a series of professional development workshops and just conversations with parents some examples would be social media overload ways to advocate for your child how to help your child manage their emotions so again we look to what our community is looking for to be able to offer that support in-house Kendra has offered a

061lot of opportunities for digital wellness and we're always looking at opportunities for training with canvas and communication we are really lucky to have Karen kenjura with us tonight she's a long-standing member of the professional learning committee and she's an enl teacher here at Saratoga and she's going to share some of her experience with you next I'm going to talk about some of the professional learning opportunities that we have as teachers and administrators to provide to um to other teachers and administrators in our own District so teachers and administrators have the opportunity to design and develop learning opportunities and deliver to our colleagues um that professional development should be designed to improve pedagogical pedagogical um in leadership skills and also targeted towards improving student performance um these are the areas in which somebody can provide professional

062learning to their colleagues and they are these areas or these categories were developed based on the feedback that the professional learning committee gets from needs assessment and surveys that are sent out to staff so the areas of cultural proficiency social emotional learning supports for language acquisition instructional practices use of technology to enhance enhance instruction and data-driven instructions are all areas that we provide PD opportunities to our colleagues I mean I think it was mentioned before when someone is interested in providing a professional development opportunity they develop a Course and there are different times there's quarter quarterly calls for teachers to submit proposals and um they would submit a proposal under one of these categories and um they're approved based on the alignments of the district's goals and vision and the um as long as they

063address the needs that that um staff is learning one of these um topics just some other opportunities for professional development in our district professional Partners is our new teacher mentoring program um and that's a that program is awesome for new teachers to the district as well as for beginning teachers teachers and mentors and their mentees meet throughout the year several times sometimes together sometimes separately it's just a great opportunity for new teachers to become a part of the district learn about our district learn different classroom techniques we have different PD offerings throughout the year the last couple years have been very interesting because teachers coming out of school and new teachers have not really had a traditional teacher education program with covid so the professional partner committee has really been good in putting in some

064really good PDS for teachers really help with classroom management and things that they may have missed in a traditional program other opportunities for PT for professional development throughout the year professional learning teams meet throughout the year at all levels at high school middle school and elementary schools articulate articulation days at the elementary level or when grade levels throughout the building can get together to discuss curriculum and they believe that most recently in the elementary level the new reading program has been the focus of the articulation days and then there are also multiple opportunities for for staff to sign up for professional development outside of our district through Frontline we have access to many different catalogs for different providers that provide PD this year alone I've gone through two PD opportunities from outside agencies that have

065been really good and it's great to have the opportunity to be able to look other places for professional development all right so where would anything be without State requirements um so the state requires that um all professionally certified teachers administrators and level three teaching assistants get what's called ctle or continuing teacher and leader education credits a hundred of of them every five years so our it's our responsibility through our professional learning plan and as a district to make sure we have those opportunities for them and as a school district we are an improved ctle sponsor and just like the professionally certified teachers and administrators have to re-register and re-certify every five years as a ctle sponsor we have to renew that and reapply every five years as well and what that allows us to do

066is offer activities that can be counted as ctle for that and we use as you heard the front line professional learning program that helps do some of that management of keeping the records and keeping track of that paperwork but ctle activities are aligned to the New York State professional development standards they also have to be designed to improve the teacher or leaders pedagogical and our leadership skills and are are targeted at improving student performance and should be aligned to District goals for student performance which all of that makes sense with professional development and of course it's important to reflect it's important to reflect as a practitioner it's important to reflect as a committee and on the plan we have a variety of feedback loops which you heard about built in and is important for the

067district and the committee to gather information and reflect on the strengths and the areas of improvement each year to work to best meet the needs of Staff across the district so from feedback from committee Reflections and from what we know about adult learning here are the main Reflections that have helped to shape our professional development this year and moving forward so we continue to have embedded professional development structures we have done that with our new Ela program English language arts program and we've adjusted that structure along the way based on teacher and principle feedback we've been able to be more systematic and thoughtful with curriculum support through the use of our curriculum renewal cycle coming out of covid teachers are not just putting technology for the need of using technology to reach students but really

068focusing on those best practices now where is it best to incorporate technology what's most impactful so you'll see that reflected in some of the professional development offerings that teachers have asked for and offered listening to feedback throughout the year and planning responsive professional development offerings through that you heard about the quarterly call for proposals and those classroom management strategies and de-escalation strategy offerings are some examples of that that had popped up as needs throughout the year um and then one of the ways we've worked to respond to teacher and staff needs is to work working with a professional learning committee and reaching out and Gathering more input and feedback um as you heard like planning this upcoming November 2024 superintendent's conference day really bouncing back from covid we have the ability to start that planning

069earlier um and start to gather those resources and that input so just as professional learning should be ongoing and reflective for each person the professional learning plan process and the plan itself strives to be reflective and responsive to staff needs and we'll bring it to questions anybody have any questions honey thank you for that presentation I just had a question about basically the last point and the feedback mechanism if feedback from faculty and staff is reflecting that something needs to change whether the quality of the PD was you know not up to par or whatnot like what what is that mechanism for making changes so for example I know in our embedded structures of the arc training they gathered feedback about what was working and what wasn't working so one of the things was having

070more communication amongst the six buildings and so that structure was changed most recently or the last set of embedded professional development to get a representative for me to the buildings together for training the next unit and having those teacher leaders those grade level leaders then go back to their buildings so that the messaging was a little more consistent so with something like that I was able to be responsive in the moment throughout the year and make those changes for things like professional development offerings that were not well received on a superintendent's conference day we might not have that speaker back or we would go to look for a different resource provider so responding with what the issue might have been in making the changes from there so Danielle gave the examples of the coaches and

071how they're working with our buildings and the outcome of that is District plts to represent all the buildings to increase communication like Danielle said but in addition to that the product that we're making is a cohesive and consistent literacy instruction and delivery and having that opportunity to have those conversations across buildings not only within the buildings so we're working on our pacing guides we're working on looking at resources aligning things vertical alignment and I think the feedback that we've received from the staff as that's been really a positive opportunity and staff feels heard in terms of what their needs are so based on the feedback we were hearing we implemented those changes and we're continuing to get that feedback to see what the next steps will be because we're going into the third year of

072implementation so it's a progressive model and I I think that answers what you're asking for how we take feedback and utilize it I have a related question um what if every single bit of professional development that was it was done um was thought of as being extremely effective and high quality but there was just too much of it do you have any mechanism that can ever capture that I think people are pretty on I um this was great but what about more time to process it or to work together and so that we do consider that well the the thing I have in mind is just um how often it feels like people are pulled out of their classrooms or buildings a lot and that that can be uh taxi I mean I know there's

073so many important things people need to learn about so I don't I wouldn't I'm not questioning any specific programs so that's the top of our mind and it was prior to the pandemic that was something that was we were trying to cut back on with pulling people out of their classrooms and I think as we've returned we've the pendulum has swung trying to figure out okay wait people do need to get together not only within their buildings but across as a grade level to to work together on these certain things so I think we're trying to figure that out based on some of the things that people are sharing back that no we need you know I think of some of the arc training and the responses for we you know no we don't need

074another coach to come in we need time to work together on this and so that adjustment was made and again I appreciate the um the honest feedback that comes through so that we don't nobody wants to waste anybody's time so we try and take that and use it in the most constructive way possible Amanda um excuse me related I think to John's question um based on some of the feedback we've heard from from teachers and not just classroom teachers but the AIS teachers having to fill in and the strain on substitutes and how difficult it is to find substitutes on average how many hours were our K-5 teachers spending on PD which require them to be out of their classroom this past year and based on what you said moving forward looking at 20 23

0752024 school year I think you were suggesting what you just said that it would be less how much less will that be so I just want to make sure I understand clearly what you're asking so you're asking me what the number of hours are that a person is out of their classroom to receive training on something they need to use within their classroom correct I don't have to get back to you on that exact number okay um and then to answer the second part of that question a I'll have to get back to you as well but I think one of the things I've mentioned before when we talk about new programs in general is that there's a heavy lift at the start of them always and there's also the need to figure out okay

076say here's the program here's our district our classrooms our kids and then all right what are the pieces of it how does this work for us and so being this in our second year of the American reading company first year for grades three through five we're definitely going to see a different kind of PD in the future and the best kind is when teachers can stay in their classrooms or you know be able to see their neighbor teaching too that kind of really organic thing and not have to rely on folks outside so whether it's with American reading company or with the cultural responsive teaching we definitely see that as a paring down those are just two examples I thought about the top of my head but um it's an absolutely legitimate question yeah and

077I know I kind of sprung it on you and that's a very my question was like very specific and I understand could you maybe even just give roughly was it 14 days 20 days five days that a K-5 teacher ended up being out of their classroom do you think I think it depends on if you're talking about coaching or if you're talking about articulation days as well and they're both different kinds of PD and I'm going to have Michelle talk a little bit more about that so um the answer to your question I can put in a chart and Lisa and I can share that with you but what we are looking at is different groups of people some are some things are optional some things are representative so we wouldn't be able to say

078to you that fourth grade teachers were out of their classroom for 12 hours over the course of the year because it's dependent on the professional development that the teacher participates in or that they seek out and it's also an opportunity for representatives to be able to share with one another so sometimes we have a full grade level together depending on the content and sometimes we have a person from each grade level so it's a variety because we're trying to avoid um because there's that fine line between providing resources and support because folks are feeling overwhelmed when you implement something new or just the changes in education and then there's also the side-by-side coaching that we do so we have our coaches in the buildings working with teachers and teachers have the option to sign up

079for those things based on what their needs are so it looks different across both buildings but across all buildings in content areas but we're very cognizant of all the things that you're asking about it's just hard to Define by hours and I mean I wasn't looking pretty sort of delineation because I I understand I have children been in K5 and one teacher is doing one thing I want to I fully understand that that's I just I'm just sort of looking for an average because we are looking at the budget and these things have a budgetary impact when we have to bring in more substitutes or we're hearing from teachers about reduced ability to serve students that need AIS support because as teachers are being put into the classrooms to cover when teachers have to be

080out for pdu or other reasons so I was just sort of looking for a rough number is it 14 is it 25 not specific hours maybe just a day I mean I have a general idea being a parent but I don't want to make any guess um so you know I think it's something that the Board needs to hear about moving forward and hear how it's changing and even maybe hearing you know if we're looking at capping it based on your conversations with with the staff sure is there like sort of a Breaking Point here where the balance needs to be and I know we're in a transitionary period post covet and all these initiatives that are being introduced but again just hearing all these things from all different people it's I think we just

081need to understand it more absolutely we'll get back to you with more information any other questions well thanks very much for that presentation folks again I also want to thank the professional learning committee you could see so many people are involved teachers support staff uh district and building administrators again working really hard uh throughout the course of school year so you see the tremendous amount of work that's that's accomplished throughout the year so really appreciate everybody's collaborative efforts there um so our last presentation um is our budget update for the 2023-24 uh school year uh so again I want to kick it off by thanking Tim and Joe uh for the leadership that they've provided uh over the last school year uh it seems uh it's a year-round cycle that is as soon as the

082the board adopts a budget and we present that budget to the community for a vote uh we're already you know looking ahead to the upcoming school year so uh Tim and Joe and and the feedback that we receive from all faculty and staff and the conversations we have here at the board table and feedback from the community really helps inform uh you know the important decisions that we have to make each year uh so tonight's the last update unfortunately we do not have a state budget in place so Tim and Joe will touch on that um about you know again the complexities of developing a budget when you don't have a state budget and squeed runs included with that but Tim and Joe will provide an update as to where things stand right now and

083then later in the consent agenda all school districts in New York state have to approve their budgets by tonight because again we're late in the process with the the schedule as it is anyways but again this is a critically important part of the process that the board will be adopting the budget tonight for next school years I'll turn over to Tim and Joe good evening so like Mike said we're going to go through the budget as it was presented and discussed at the last meeting there really have not been any changes from our our last discussion so um the only really new information that you're going to get tonight is to the extent that there were any loose ends that we talked about needing to tie up that those have been tied up and and

084to Mike's point we uh this is the week that we legally have to adopt a budget and so on tonight's agenda you've got a resolution to both adopt the budget and approve the corresponding property tax report card which was discussed yesterday in finance committee so again as Mike said there's not a state budget in place and so we have to move forward with all that we know and this is all that we know this is what the state aid runs projected for our district as a result of the governor's budget proposal so two numbers I really want to draw your attention to are on the bottom right of the the top portion there and that's the 799 thousand dollars which is the net of all changes to state aid so um if we were to

085aggregate all things we would be expecting about eight hundred thousand dollars more in state aid across all the categories um we've talked uh briefly and we're still working with our financial planner to really get you the the long-term projection on the with respect to Capital planning and the building aid but we did talk at the beginning of the process about that negative 444 000 that you see right above that number and that represents a decrease that's projected currently for next year in building aid but we've sort of disregarded that for purpose of purposes of our estimates just because we expect that in a year's time and certainly if not shortly thereafter that because of the projects that we have ongoing right now that that building Aid would be restored and so we're not recommending making

086permanent changes to the budget as a result of a temporary problem if you will what I do want to sort of foreshadow is that at this time next year if the state aid runs come out and you see an increase of 444 000 or something like it I would not I would caution you not to get too excited because that will be not realizing an increase to a decrease that we also didn't realize right so um but the net affected that also net of about 235 thousand dollars in Prior year state aid adjustments results in when we get to the overall summary you'll see it's closer to a million dollars so that's the 800 with the 444 added back uh minus the 235 from prior year adjustments so it looks a little bit more like

087a million dollars when we get to the overall budget summary so uh within the statutory limit of the tax cap we are capped this year and I'll show you this there's a graph that I think does a nice job of representing this coming up in a couple slides but I also did want to mention in the materials that you've got with your board packets and board Docs there is a copy of the property tax report card that was mentioned in the finance committee update as you read through that you'll see on the top it shows the year-to-year budget change below that you'll see several elements of the property tax cap calculation and then below that you'll see some reporting that's required by New York State on both what last year's various fund balances were there's

088restricted there's unrestricted and there's appropriated and it asks us to show last year compared with what we're projecting for the end of this year and then below that it also asks us to report out on all of our restricted reserves and what's in those accounts and what our plan uses are of those and so I would direct your attention and I'm happy to answer questions but um if you want to kind of further understand that if you go back to the fund balance and reserves plan that was adopted I believe at the February meeting those numbers you'll notice correspond directly to what's on the property tax report card and so it also reflects Our intention to go out with a proposed 2.75 increase to the property tax levy and then you can see on the

089bottom there the amount that's within the tax cap that's not being levied which we always leave a little bit of room there for uh adjustments that happen throughout the year and as we close out the year so um this chart I to me um and maybe it's just because I'm a numbers guy but this is uh somewhat a source of Pride for me because if you recall about six and a half years ago when we first started talking about Capital planning and and there was essentially a a cliff of the local share that was going to take place which on its own could be problematic but it also has massive implications on the the tax cap formula and so looking back at where we were um how how Dynamic the changes were to our property

090tax cap calculation and kind of looking now at not only the stability that that we've been able to achieve with that through Capital planning but also the congruency of the two lines where you see the the top line is the tax cap and the bottom line being that the um what we've proposed to Levy and in years past have levied um but I I this is um the ideal scenario that you you would hope to see um both with your property tax cap calculation and with the local share for purposes of capital planning so the result of that proposed increase would be and again this I use the word estimate as frequently as possible when I'm talking about these things is that using current valuations and current Equalization rates which will be finalized and will

091change between now and August but the best data we have to go on is current your data and so when we do that we look at what would that increase mean to the average taxpayer across the district and again that varies by municipality so it's not a perfect estimate but it's the best we have and so you can see the the 44 44 cents per thousand assessed and what that breaks out to uh on a monthly basis is 3.66 per 100 000. um and then another comparison this is data put out by the Albany Business Review but um we always tend to fall lowest on this list when when compared to some of our peer districts and largely that's due not necessarily to fiscal Conservancy it certainly I think that plays a part but I

092think it has a lot more to do with the strong and dynamic tax base that we have here in Saratoga and so um we do really well comparatively to some of our peers but again just to kind of give you a sense of where we Stack Up um and then on the topic of fund balance and reserves you can see here the increase to from last year to this year the projected increase the use of fund balance and reserves um and and that's we've talked a lot about that that's not an accident um that was a part of the planning process what I as I was looking at this what I wanted to point out to you is back in 2018-19 when we had that big jump in the increase to the appropriate fund balance

093is that the following year in 2019-20 is the only year in the history that you see here where we had an unplanned operating loss and it was about six hundred thousand dollars which uh I think corresponds fairly well to the ensuing decrease that we made which again was intentional it was strategic I bring that up because I just want to caution that as a long-term strategy to continue to rely on appropriate and fund balance and reserves and I've shown you various iterations of what that looks like when you run that out but rather than that continuing to be a strategy I think the focus really ought to be on managing and in all probability reducing the Reliance on those fund balancing users over time so then we get to the overall snapshot on the revenue

094side of the budget and as I said on the top there that that state aid number represents the eight hundred thousand dollars plus the four hundred forty four thousand minus the approximately 230 000. right so uh factoring all things state aid we see about a million dollar increase there total federal sources these are your Medicaid Medicare reimbursements uh fund balance designations you see there the increase of 755 that uh you know we when we built the fund balance and reserves plan that was adopted we had already planned for uh about 475 of that and then through budget development process and considering all things we increase that appropriation which we'll we'll see that when we get to the end again but those put together make up that 755 thousand dollars miscellaneous other receipts the the biggest

095increase here is to interest and earnings and that's just a factor of interest rates going up and that's a good good news for us that um you know between the money that we have in fund balance and reserves money that we hold temporarily from tax Collections and then any other unrestricted cash that we might have we're able to invest that in a Cooperative investment pool and maximize our earnings on that and you can just see what a big difference that makes in terms of the earnings and then property tax levy you see there the 2.5 million represents the the 2.75 percent increase that we've recommended and the pilot is uh that's related to the pilot that we've discussed many times in the executive session but uh bringing that into the fold so when we get

096to the bottom line there and you'll see this again I'm going to turn it over to Joe to talk about the expenditure side but we see a budget to budget increase of 4.07 percent which is to see in a minute higher than it has been but for all the reasons that we've talked about so I will let go take thanks Tim I'm actually going to stand over here so I look taller on the camera so for the expenditure side it's uh it's mere image of what you saw Tim just present for the revenue you know broken down for our general supports instruction and then some of our other miscellaneous pieces in there so the bottom line total expenditures last year we were at 137 million this year we're proposing a budget of 142.7 million so

097that's a 5.5 million dollar increase or as Tim had pointed out of 4.07 percent increase which is not very typical and some of those big drivers we had talked about these over the last couple of months health insurance for starters was a huge driver putting us in that four percent range so when you look at our comparison of budget to budget increases over the last few years typically we have kind of hung out in this one to two percent range and then this is kind of an abnormality where we're jumping up to that 4.07 so to kind of bring us back to where we had started when we had some early conversations back on February 28th when we first talked about this we had a budget Gap that we presented to you of uh literal

098over 420 000 dollars so we worked over those next couple of uh weeks and months to start to reduce those expenditures because there was no additional Revenue coming in so as we started to pull some of those expenditures off we were able to get to the point of a balanced budget but then we continue to work more and more to remove more expenditures kind of tighten that belt so on March 30th when we last spoke about this we were at actually a budget surplus of 275 thousand dollars now the reason why we got ourselves to that Surplus was we remember we had some additional things that we wanted to try to capture in this budget so we looked at additional programs and Staffing and some of those key things we had talked about was the

099school counselor position we talked about that ell position which was the 0.6 position and then one of the biggest drivers in there was the tech Hardware replacement that was at the elementary level to kind of put ourselves more in line uh similar to what uh with our busing where we would replace our buses on that kind of 10-year cycle we wanted to build in the same type of replacement cycle for our elementary to maintain that that one-to-one initiative so when we did that though um yeah that swung us all the way over to the other side so kind of put us back at a deficit of actual 301 thousand dollars I put in there increased the state aid question mark because remember on March 30th we thought well the next day that's the deadline we

100should know what we're getting from the state um and as Mike had told you right in the beginning we're still waiting so the only way to kind of solve this by ourselves is to bring in fund balance so we had talked about this and we had agreed that in order to balance this budget we would take the remaining deficit amount and use our fund balance that's available to us to give us a balanced budget of 142 million seven eighteen five thirty so that's where we are as of today so another way of kind of graphically representing this we started out with that budget surplus of 275 000 back in the end of February adding in the school counselor adding in that ell teacher adding in the tech Hardware replacement that kind of swung Us in

101the opposite direction gave us that deficit of 301 thousand still waiting on the state aid but at this point we're looking to plug the remaining balance of that 301 000 by appropriating more fund balance so that's where we are at this point when you're going out and having conversations in the public though it is critically important that we're talking about what are we actually getting with this budget and we are getting quite a bit um remember those two additional sros that were brought in this year that wasn't part of the original budget so now it is uh in perpetuity into our budget so those two additional school resource officers 40 additional Career and Technical education slots for our students at BOCES the additional Elementary position that was needed for us the additional school council we

102had talked about that ell teacher and then finally that Tech Hardware replacement so those are some significant gains that we're getting uh when people vote for this budget if I could just add real quick to the last couple of slides um the one previous and it you'll see underscored the word budget and that's because those are the things that had an actual budgetary impact um I would refer you back to the last presentation where we had the Venn diagram that talked about a whole lot more that's going on within this budget and a lot of those that have impacts on programs but just not a direct impact on the budget and so that's why that reads the way that reads the other one is on the slide prior where we had a zero number in

103there for state aid and and when we left off the last discussion had been if we get more state aid we'll reduce our Reliance on fund balance and that that is in in effect still is the plan however the the budget that we're adopting has a fixed amount now or will if approved tonight of um the state aid figures and the um appropriated fund balance that's also incorporated into the property tax report card that if approved uh will sort of set that in stone for now um and so we wouldn't go back necessarily and and modify the budget as adopted or approved or the property tax report card because that has to get submitted by tomorrow if approved tonight but the long-term effect of that just so you know is that if we do get

104more state aid that all other things being equal we would use less of the fund balance that was appropriate um and then I just wanted to bring us back to this because we generally start off here and it seemed appropriate to finish here the levying of like stuff I think we've done a fantastic job of not only managing the tax levy limit itself but also working within that and maximizing that to the extent possible in terms of managing program and Staffing um you know we've we've been more reliant on that as the means to adopt or to balance rather the budget and so part of what I think we're seeing now is just that we've become a lot more efficient with the resources that we have but that doesn't mean that we need to stop

105looking at that I think the next budget is probably going to be have a similar feel to it but with less in the way of state aid less probably in the way of Reliance on fund balance and so we're probably going to have to really get down back down to that and then the use of fund balance and reserves again just to kind of show you the where we started versus where we ended up graphically but I think we're we're in a good spot or we would not have made the recommendations that we've made so I did want to uh this hasn't changed functionally but um I added uh in parentheses there on the one uh that last bus there that we hadn't previously shown that with the wheelchair lift and so just for the

106sake of thoroughness and uh knowing what's in the budget that we're adopting and in the propositions that will be voted on I just wanted to draw your attention to that also relative to board governance I think we mentioned earlier on that uh for the three vacancies that there are that the petitions are due April 26th um you all know just as well as anybody that these are volunteer positions and these three terms will begin July 1st we do have some information here we've got a link here to the nisba website they really are the authority on this matter in terms of providing resources and information we are more of a we when I say we the business office central office we're more of a pass-through for the information on this so I would direct you

107to the nisbo website for more thorough information on that and then you know looking at adopting the budget and then working on budget newsletters and handouts that are required disclosures but also documents that we will have on the website and hand out at the buildings we don't know yet what the future holds for a state budget but I think for our purposes we've we've waited as long as we possibly can so we'll we'll adjust accordingly when that comes in and then we have meet the candidates tonight on May 3rd I think Mike mentioned that earlier and then we have uh one week before the budget vote we'll have the budget hearing which will that's a a required meeting hopefully quicker than tonight's presentation but really probably a lot of the same information so with that

108happy to answer any questions that you might have before we move on John Bergman I apologize in advance my speech it takes the village to build a budget and two smart guys named Tim and Joe apparently I plan to vote to approve this budget but I'm doing so more reluctantly than usual I have three concerns which I hope will motivate us to do better next year first I think we learned more this year about how imperfect our our process is for Gathering budgetary input from employees on the ground I'm thinking of teachers in particular we need robust input from those most closely identified with our core Mission the questionnaire that was distributed was a good start but it turned out to be a problematic instrument that led to questions about the validity and reliability of

109the findings second if we're going to have an inclusive and transparent budgetary process we cannot add things to the budget in the middle of the year that have not been through the normal process that's what happened with the addition of two new school resource officers whatever one thinks about the benefits of having more sros than any other District in the region a majority of this board clearly think it's a good idea I strongly encourage the administration and my fellow trustees to not make this procedural mistake again except for the rarest of circumstances additions to the budget should go down I'm sorry can do you have a question for these guys first I have a comment could you could you make it in board member comments yeah I think it's probably start over sorry about that

110I think this should be this time should be reserved for questions for these guys does anyone have any thanks very much Joe and Tim sorry John I'll come back to you thank you okie doke that moves us to the consent agenda um the 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 items associated with the everyday running of the schools and their inclusion in the agenda is the result of a great deal of Prior work and Care by the Professionals of the district there are from time to time business items that by law cannot be included in a consent agenda that will happen tonight and when

111this happens we pull those out and vote on them separately consent agenda items are known to trustees in the public several days ahead of the business meeting on which they are considered so that board members may have the chance to ask questions of Discovery and do any advanced fact-finding that is part of their due diligence process so that said Natalia are there any modifications tonight we have there are two field trips added for our approval and the second is that there is a a resolution that's recommended for or that's we are required to do the roll call vote for so um let's do that first that's for Cooperative betting of custodial products resolution president cracker yes vice president yes trustee Borman yes trustee Bruggeman yes [Music] yes trustee elethorpe yes Jesse Culligan yeah trustee watovich

112yes I make a motion to approve the consent agenda items GH and I in their entirety along with any items listed under f um which would be the modifications the consent agenda the two field trips do I have a second Angie any discussion all in favor signify by raising your hand seven all opposed signify by raising your hand and all abstained signify by raising your hand so I think we have seven yeses and two abstentions trustee Borman and Ella Thorpe so the consensual gender carries we just have one acknowledgment recognition so in the consent agenda Mark Newman who's a French teacher at surgical Springs High School announced his resignation for the purpose of retirement so we've had several faculty staff members over the course of the Year announced their retirement so I want to thank

113Mark for his dedication and commitment to serving our children here in Saratoga Springs so congratulations on his upcoming retirement that brings us to the second public comment period rules are the same as the first public comment period uh although there is no official time limit does anyone wish to address the board in the second public comment period all right seeing none that brings us to agenda planning keyboard members have agenda planning items okay seeing none that brings us to board member comments and we will start with Mr Bruggeman how's that okay I'll start on the second point that I was making I argued for a more inclusive uh process and then second if we're going to have a more inclusive and transparent budgetary process we cannot add things to the budget in the middle of

114the year that have not been to the normal process that is what happened with the addition of two new school resource officers whatever one thinks about the benefits of having more sros than any other District in the region a majority of this board clearly think it's a good idea I strongly encourage the administration my fellow trustees to not make this procedural mistake again except for the rarest of circumstances additions to the budget should go through our normal process that way everyone has a chance to see what the trade-offs are and weigh in before the budget is developed my third concern relates to music in particular I think I think putting full putting forward a budget without restoring one of the ftes in music is not what is best for our students and therefore a mistake

115the reason I am voting to approve this budget in relation to this issue is that we have committed ourselves to look carefully at the needs of Music next year that's my three cents do any other board members I see Natalya I'll Echo what John said I also wanted to make everyone aware that the Saratoga Springs Public Library which serves everybody who lives in our district is having their budget and trustee vote on Thursday so you can vote at the library from 9am to 9pm I see Angie thank you I want to extend my gratitude and amazement at the um the grease trip that my student and several other students went on that was a phenomenal undertaking and extremely exciting Endeavor for my student anyway I saw lots of videos of cats Greece has a lot

116of cats um however I'm just astounded at all of the volunteers and the teachers who spent their spring break with our kids even more and shepherding them through a foreign country and doing all that it's amazing you couldn't pay me to do that so I'm just so in awe of everybody's time and just thank you for putting together such a great experience for our students anybody else I have a couple quick things uh first uh I do want to re-acknowledge the coral ears the the fifth grade singers from Dorothy Nolan and the music teachers who who put that together for us that was a special uh beginning to to our board meeting um I also want to uh wish Dr Patton a happy birthday apparently it's his 39th birthday again [Music] and now that I've

117embarrassed Mike I do want to acknowledge the uh accomplishment that a few of you alluded to earlier of um of adopting this budget to to place before voters um thanks to everyone at this table and throughout the district who worked and um planned and put it together it's a necessary budget that includes important additions uh to our program and also includes careful economizing with the Public's money um this body takes our responsibility around this task very seriously and we put this budget forward hopefully for approval knowing that the funds will be spent in pursuit of in one of the most critical uh Community um benefits and and Boons and in the form of uh public education so thanks for all the work that everybody basically everybody in this room had a part in that's all

118I have okay so we are now to the end of the meeting um and I basically have all I need is a motion to adjourn could I have a motion to address I see Connie second John Ellis any discussion all in favor that's unanimous thank you everybody