Saugerties Board of Education Special Meeting 8/26/2025

001the Sorghetti Central School District uh Board of Education. Um we have emergency exits at the back of the room and on each side. Um Miss Gardner, can you do roll call, please? >> Christine Delar Roza here. >> Katie Emerson Hos here. Melia here. >> Robert Tolman here. Kina here is Eric. >> Carol Keer >> here. Michael Meyer >> here. >> Jeffrey Rosy >> here. >> Timothy Bell >> here. Everybody please rise for the pledge of allegiance. >> I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for it stands one indivisible with liberty and justice for all. Let's get Let's uh Miss Gardner, make it official. Let me go back to roll call and call that one name again. >> Sina. >> Yep. >> Okay. Um next list on

002the agenda are mission and vision statements. Um everybody can everybody can read what those are. Um so now is public recognition. So, anything um that is uh either has happened since the last meeting or is on our agenda um please come up. Um do you a couple of things since we've added this table. You can either grab the mic and stand up and talk or sit down at the chair. Either way, um please announce your name um and and your topic that you'd like to talk about. Um, and also please, I know from our clerk's perspective, please make you make sure if you're going to, if you're going to get up and speak that you have signed in over there, okay? Um, the microphone is important. We can hear you. Um, but the people online,

003um, if you're not talking into the mic. So, um, and if you have a long, the agenda says three minutes for every speaker. We've never stopped anybody, but just keep that in mind as you're as you're speaking, especially if there is others who would like to address the board. Okay. Thank you. >> Come on. You can't all be here to listen. Yeah. Right. R E A. >> Thank you, Mr. Ray. Try. >> Okay. Okay. I got a few questions that you know I'd like clarified and uh last time. >> Well, the first one is has a written study done to the traffic pattern which is in place right now. I'm not looking for I mean if you have a yes then please tell me where I can find that information. Okay. But that's the first

004question. The second question, has there been a study on a parking lot and functionality of the parking lot as is? Is there a study to estimate the vehicle traffic that Joseph is going to inherit? Is there a study on a traffic flow pattern on 9W at both the beginning of the school day and the end of school day? And will that include left-hand turns from Joseph Drive on a 9W? Because I know the people in Bishop's Gate do not make left-hand turns coming out. They go around the back way because the danger of getting hit. Are there drawings for proposed road? Is there a study for the groundwater and the runoff? Right now, the groundwater from Joseph's Drive and the two houses, my my house and house dump out into the center. Then it runs

005down towards the school, takes a left behind my shed, and runs all the way to the Hudson River. I'm good with that. Is that going to remain that way? Where is the rain? Where's the money going to go with the new road? Is there consideration privacy of the two houses? Will the road be secured at the end of the day? Will there be a gate? Will it be locked just like you have right here in the high school? Because myself and I don't know who maybe other Kazinski which are represented right back there. what happens at that school uh after hours and so forth, especially in the summertime when the kids are around, right? Uh has there been study on a walkway? I thought of putting a walkway in instead. You put a walkway in

006from Washington Avenue to the school. You put a walkway in from Mills Lane extension to the school, but you don't put a walkway or is there a thought of putting a walkway from Joseph Drive to the school? Lot cheap. And uh the last thing I have is why are so many kids being uh taken to school by a private vehicle and not the bus? Is there a problem actually with the bus? Have we looked into that? Well, those are my questions I have to you as a group, >> right? When I bought the house, I knew that the um the east was there. I understood that. But I haven't heard anything except one individual was um Mr. Reinhardt that came to my house 24 23 and he had absolutely no answers to my questions. You

007know, showing up 5:00 on a Friday afternoon is like that's that's not a good time anyway on Friday afternoons. But um no no answers whatsoever. So I would like answers. >> Okay. Um, so I I I'm not going to get into depth answers here because this is public comment, but um I'll take your last one first. You are right. We we always are looking at why so many people drop their kid off as opposed to taking the bus. So that is a consideration. The one consideration I can tell you is not hasn't been looked at and probably will not be is walkway. And the reason being is it's not so this easement is not so much for um allowing kids to walk from Bishop's Gate into Ricardi. It's about allowing safe vehicles and true access.

008So those are and and you can smile, sir. This is coming from the police, the ambulances. So you can address it with them about having access during key times to the school and having kids be safe if there's an issue. The other thing on your I think general let me let me finish >> real quick to that one. >> Let me finish because I'm I'm almost done. The answer to most of all your other questions is yes. And the reason and we are so early in the process is we got granted the um the property as a gift. Um we had to go through the town. We had to go through a 60-day comment period where there was zero comments from anybody. Um and so now we had to get that on an agenda which

009we did to look at. We have architects, engineers and all that haven't even started to look at. But your your point on traffic studies and water studies and all that, I completely understand the land behind Mr. Bruno's house and what it is as far as a uh I'm going to use the word wetlands. It's probably the wrong term. So yeah, all that would be encompassed in the reviews that are done before a shovel ever enters the ground. Okay. >> Okay. Address your Let me He wants to address my comment on the emergency vehicles entering. I'm the chief of the case fire department. >> Okay. >> All about that. >> Okay. Great. >> Great. Perfect. So then you understand getting a fire truck in there at 3:00 when that when the one road is completely backed

010up with buses, that's the issue. And that was brought to us by our fire chief and our police department. So I'll leave that at that. The other thing to your point of is it going to be locked? Um yes. One of the agreements we made when we accepted and Dr. university. Correct me if I'm wrong, is the the easement will be open during school hours and school events. So, if there's a a chorus concert at night, otherwise there will be a gate and it'll be locked. It is not meant to be a thorough fair for people to take a shortcut. Okay. >> Just and if you don't mind sticking around, I was going to address some of these things during my presentation a little bit. So, if you hang tight, I can answer some. Thank

011you. Appreciate it. [Applause] Hi, my name is Angie Pon. I live at 4219 Route 9W, West Camp, New York. I am the founder and creator of Speckle Frog Play Care. Um, we were advised to apply for the UPK program. We reached out to Lisa Kappler around May when we were suggested to apply. She sent over a few days later a packet of what we needed to complete. Why were we contacted? We were contacted because your current UPK has 140 slots and at that time it only had 30 enrollments. You had massively low enrollments. So Lisa doing her job reached out to us to say hey would you guys have she didn't reach out to us someone reached out to us we reached out to her and we said absolutely we have 44 plus kids that

012can benefit from this program. So why so after we opened up an advertisement we were looking for master certified teachers that were certified in birth to grade two. Do you know how hard it is to find a master certified teacher that's certified in birth to grade two? You know how much salary you have to pay a certified teacher? You do, right? Because today you're voting to to put people in place to pay these salaries. We learned we we s we found the we found the teachers. We turned in the paperwork. We did everything we needed to do in this process. We learned that the district turned it. We learned why the enrollment was so low in the district. We learned that the district turned its back on abuse allegations in the UC. We learned that

013the district was given videos, first accounts. We learned that the chain of command was followed. We learned that the chain of command didn't work. We learned that even with videos, incident reports, emails, verbal complaints, reports into the office, we learned that those things were not handled. We learned what happened was that those complaints were then given to the site director, Tammy Reid. We learned that Tammy Reed forcibly forced out many of your certified teachers. forcibly forced out many of your parents because of what was happening. She made their lives and their jobs a living hell. We learned that she made the conditions not only unbearable but she cut their work schedules, reforced forced them to not have breaks and made anyone who spoke against her um their life their life very difficult. So what she

014was advised by us that she should absolutely file a complaint for discrimination. The staff that came to us interview I'm sorry to be cl to clarify the staff that came to interview was advis advised by us that they should file a complaint against the district for whistleblower retaliation. Either way, we still accepted the invite to apply because our parents pay a lot of money to do what they do and to send us their kids. And even with the option to have free prek here, they're still refusing to send their kids here. That's a problem, right? If you can save $6,000 a year, why wouldn't you do that versus pay $6,000 a year? That's a big that's a big deal. It's because there's a problem in house. So, we hired certified teachers. We had to have

015teachers go back to school to earn to be on five-year plans to earn these degrees. We had to turn away potentially valuable employees because they didn't have the exact degrees even though they had master's degrees. We couldn't we couldn't hire them because we had to meet these specific restrictions. We met every requirement. We met the deadlines. Our only hold up came from this actual district. There wasn't an RFP. We waited for that. There's not a CBO was what we're told Sunday night at 5:30. Lack of knowledge of telling us if we needed a bed's number or not. That took a full month. We had to reach out to a neighboring district to find out that we actually didn't need a beds number because no one knew the answer in this district, the district that's supposed

016to be reaching out to partnership with other with places like us who provide quality education for some of our youngest members of this community. that alone this. So after taking a month balancing around vacations and everything else that was going on and no one being there to answer the questions, everything was in on Friday. Our site director spoke with Lisa Kappler. Nothing was said to us that we weren't going to be receiving this not being on the board agenda tonight. Everything was good to go. The final stuff had to be turned in. Okay, no problem. She knew we were in our final stages of interviews just like you guys are. We are down to the wire to find the right employees. What happens Sunday night? We're working late at the daycare. The phone rings. It's

0175:30 p.m. and receive a phone call from the superintendent telling us that they're not going to be moving ahead with the CBO. Not only have we hired the teachers, we're paying the salaries. Some of them are higher than the salaries you're hiring for tonight. We renovated our entire center. We moved around every single thing we do for our program. We just purchased a building right down the road from here so that we can provide not only spaces for the 44 students we can we can do we can do where we are now but we can take a total of 70 70 UPK students. The money is available. We met the requirements. Our program speaks for itself. The teachers in this district, the kindergarten teachers alone, could tell you how amazing our kids are when they

018come. They're overly prepared. They're respectful. They're kind. They're conscientious. And they know exactly what is to be expected of them. So are their parents. They're going to be some of the best parents these teachers inherit from us. The program in all reality for us is actually a financial loss. Believe it or not, it averages out to be about $25.86 a day that they pay because it's only an 8 to1 approval. So you say, "Well, why would you want to do it then?" Why do you even care? We care because this is what we do. We have some of the youngest people in this community that we serve. Like I already said, this program gives the families that we serve a break of approximately $6,000 for that 10 months. Do you know how much that means

019to some of these families that are shelling out all of this money? That's at least a car payment a week of groceries. You're talking about $570 a month. What would you do with $570 a month? Instead, they'd rather pay it to us to keep their kids fully enrolled versus come here for free. That says a lot, right? When you live and work in a community and you're responsible for the youngest, you have an accountability to the families here because we are part of the fabric of this community. We've been doing this for 20 years and in 20 years, I've seen countless countless kids graduate. They come back. They even come and work for us when they're in school. It's important. It's important to the this community to have a program like a UPK that can

020provide some financial supports to these families. We ask you to reconsider this and maybe not let down the 44 current families that we have enrolled. Either way, they're not going anywhere and we know that. We're not letting go of any of the teachers that we hired and we're going to figure it out and rebudget and pay them the way that they expect to be paid and deserve to be paid and we're going to continue to keep growing. Parents should feel safe to send kids to school even on the lowest level of UPK. They should feel safe and clearly they don't feel safe sending their children here which is why you have such a high open enrollment over there. We have done the right thing for our community and it's time for sovereities to do the

021right thing for some of the youngest members of your community. Thank you. >> Thank you. Anybody else? Hello, my name is Kristen Lane. I am a parent of two daughters, one of which is in junior high and one of which goes to the frog daycare. I'm here to speak on behalf of my four-year-old daughter going to spog and how much not getting this um daycare um preschool is really affecting me. Um, first of all, Railin is currently enrolled in speckled frog. Railin will be turning five on December 24th of 25 and therefore she missed the age cut off. Um, I would have liked to enrolled her in universal prek program, but lack of transportation in the hours of 8 to 1:00 p.m. It made it impossible for me to get my child to and from

022the program. Um, I work in the hospital from the hours of 7:00 a.m. to 3:00 p.m. Monday through Friday and therefore keeping her at speckled frog is my only option. Um, last week they had informed us um at a meeting that they would be they met all the qualifications that allowed them to offer universal pre kindergarten to my four-year-old. I was absolutely elated um that my child would be able to participate in the program and because they offered pre-care and postcare, it would not interfere with my work hours. um cause burden with transportation. This also meant that speech would receive funding from the school district allocated by the state of New York and lessen the financial burden placed upon the parents of the children on the roles. So again talking about um that $570 a

023month is huge. I have a mortgage that I'm paying. I have daycare costs. Losing this program really means a lot to me. Um, I wish you guys could reconsider and know that how much it really does affect me. Um, I worked throughout CO at the hospital. I'm not rolling in money. And, uh, it's I don't know, just really sad to me that, uh, it seems like the daycare did all that needed to be done. And I'm not understanding why at the last second we can't get this. I just need some if anybody has any more information on it, I really appreciate it. >> Okay. >> Thank you for getting out. Thank you. Anyone else? I don't want to I don't want to move on too quick. So, if somebody's thinking about getting up, I just

024want I want to give them time. >> And there is another one at the end. There's another public comment if people want to talk then. Okay. All right. Um moving on the agenda report. [Applause] Thank thank you for everybody for coming out tonight. I gonna give updates on a variety of topics tonight. So, first we'll start with our facilities. So, these are pictures of get the mic so everybody can hear me. >> So, these are pictures of Mars Elementary School. Uh paving work is done. The striping work has been done. Uh our students at Mars actually designed the playground what it would look like. Um, so that is all from them. So that's super cool. Um, that work is wrapping up there. Um, we also have uh some finishing work with AC units here at

025the high school as well as Morris and that will really conclude our $22 million capital project that was voted on several years ago. Uh, other facilities updates. So Ricardi 2425 capital outlay project. This was having for additional ADA compliant egresses um at Ricardi. If you recall, we did go out to bid in the spring. We did not have any any bids submitted for that. So, we weren't able to move forward. Um we are going to repackage and rebid. So, hopefully we can get one doorway done, the doorway off the by the cafeteria so a student can leave the cafeteria, get down to the playground area. Um so, that will be going out relatively shortly. the Ricardi 2526 capital outlay. This is going to be for additional flooring done at Ricardi to to abate the asbestous

026flooring and install new flooring that right now is in the in the design phase. Uh other items we're working on is Ricardi easement. So, uh Ted, our architects and engineers, they are beginning the process to to conduct a traffic study and design what the roadway will look like. Um, so the this is required before we actually take ownership of the property. So we do have to do this submit this back to the property owner and to the town to get final approval by the end of end of the school year. They are doing some ground work remotely right now right based on various maps and information that's out there. They will be on site once students are in the building to see what a typical traffic day looks like. uh because you need to experience

027Ricardi in order to fully understand what is going on. Um as was said earlier, we do intend uh that the the easement would not be a thoroughare, right? It would only be used for buses in the morning and afternoon with a lock gate or if there were special events going on in the school such as open house, concerts and so forth to try to ease congestion ease congestion through there. Uh we will once this design and traffic study is complete, we will obviously share with everybody. Um that uh risk mitigation. At our last facilities meeting, we did have uh individuals from our insurance company. Um Reese be there to talk about different different things that we were going to do in each building or um uh like a walkthrough tool for each building to identify

028areas of of possible risk. So one example would be moisture sensors, right? So placing moisture sensors around hot water tanks so that an alert goes off if there were if there were happen to be a leak. So we're undertaking that process for each of our buildings. And then we also went out for an RFP for construction manager. Um so we did get three uh submissions for construction manager. Mike is working on setting up uh interviews with each of those each of those construction managers uh to move ahead with that use of cell phones and other other electronic devices. As individuals were coming in today, they saw the our yonder pouches as well as ID badges being passed out to our students. Uh I just wanted to recap this. So our process here in Sarres really

029began with the policy committee. Um we started talking about this policy before the budget was passed. So we had several meetings and several iterations of our policy. So, if you were to compare our policy to other individuals, other school districts policy, you will see that ours is not the cookie cutter template that was sent by Erie One or um or the New York State School Board Association. It really was our values, what we wanted uh moving forward. Is it perfect? It might not be perfect, right? But it's a policy, so we're going to evaluate and see if we need to make changes with with that. Uh we did have multiple revisions. We did have a 30-day public comment period. We shared all the comments that we got about the cell phone policy with the policy

030committee and then made updates to that as well. So just over overview why right so yes New York state said that we need to do this they need to be a bell-to-bell uh ban on them but we and already started the conversation before it was required right because because we are seeing the distractions that cell phones cause in the classroom in the building as well right it's also about increasing focus if students are not worried about their phone going off and what's going on in their pocket right the intent is that they will and and we've heard stories about increased focus and engagement. Reduces cyber bullying during the school day. Right? There have been times when students have taken pictures of other students and posted them. Right? By banning cell phones, that is eliminating that

031stuff during the day. Is it going to completely eliminate side rolling? It will not, right? Because the ban is only from when they walk through our doors to to 218. But at least there will be about seven hours of of reprieve. This fights screen addiction. Um I think you know we can all attest when we ask our our children to put their phones away and two seconds later or they pull it out again you have to ask them again right to fight that addiction encourages social interaction this past year at the junior high they had uh their own kind of ban on cell phones and we have seen an increase in communication between students the cafeterias like the caf where kids are interacting with each other. This policy also really simplifies enforcement for us putting

032them with the yonder pouch right. So part of this is also easing for administration and staff in the building, right? If everybody has their phone in a younger pouch, it's simply away. There's no argument about, oh, I have my phone out. I didn't have my phone out. If a phone is seen, it will be taken for the day. If it's multiple infractions, it it may be, you know, have to be left in the office in the morning for maybe a week or so uh for that. But this takes away the argument going forward. All right. And lastly, it really enhances safety protocols. Every safety conference that I've gone to, when it is a major emergency, the directive that everybody should be giving to every student is to be quiet and follow my directions. Right? In

033an emergency, texting, right, is is the students could miss the emergency directions. It could also cause further chaos and confusion within the classroom. So, the guidance from all of my safety uh things has always to been if it's a true emergency, students should be quiet, get out of sight. That's the only thing that that that they need to worry about. So, yonder pouches, as we're using for grade 7 through 12, just to show everybody, um every student is getting a pouch that looks like this. They will put their cell phone, earbuds, uh smartwatch in it. They just close up. They push the button in the back. So they will maintain the pouch for the day. So the school does not store it, right? They will have it in their bag. They will have it in

034their locker and so forth. At the end of the day, they go to one of our unlocking mechanisms, touch it down, push the button, and then they'll have access to to their phone again. Okay? We're going to have to remind them obviously to either turn their phone off or put in airplane mode so it doesn't con constantly ring throughout the day. But they will be in possession of their phone for the entire time. [Applause] if we lose or or damage their yonder pouch, right? So, really as a privilege to bring a phone to school, right? So, if somebody does not have their yonder pouch today, they'll be asked to leave in the office. It'll be maintained in the office to avoid any any uh them taking it out or getting, you know, in trouble for

035it. Um, if they damage their pouch or lose their pouch, right, they can buy a replacement pouch or they can just simply bring it into the office every day and we'll store it every day for the year. Okay. How can I contact my child during a school day? the same way that we contacted our that we contact our students in grades K through six, right? We call the office, we send an email to a teacher, right? So, if you need to get hold of your your child, call the office once again. We'll get a message to them or if they need to call you back, we'll call them down. They can call from the school phone as well. We do have phones in all of our classrooms. We do have phones in the cafeteria. Um,

036if a child needs to use their cell phone, they're going to have to ask to go to the office to the guidance office or counseling center where a either administrator or individual will allow them to unlock their phone should that need arise. Um, but once again, we want to make every effort to avoid leaving during instructional time, right? So, if my son goes in and says, "Oh, I need to say after today first period," right? He doesn't need to leave first period. He can call me during his lunch or a study hall. So kind of choose those times when to reach out. Most staff follow the same cell phone expectations, right? So staff should be modeling these same things during instructional time in the cafeteria and so forth. So we are expecting our staff to

037model it, right? So this is going to be a learning curve for me as well, right? As an adult, I'm addicted to my phone, right? Constantly looking, right? This is going to be work for me as well. Exemptions. Uh so yes, there are exemptions. So for medical if it's medically necessary. So for example we may have students who have diabetes and can use their phone their blood sugar. They will be given a different kind of pouch that does not lock that will just have velcro so that they can access their phone anytime but that's very for for specific cases. Uh translation services right we all can admit translating through a phone is going to be much much quicker and easier at some points. So that would be allowed as well if if a teacher or

038principal or school district for a specific purpose. In the policy committee, we were really talking about uh for instance, if they were going on um going outside to for their ecology class and they needed to take a picture of something, right? Then it may make makes sense to go out with your phone, take a picture, send it to your account and uh and use it later on. Okay. Another question to get is what happens if I'm seen with my electronic device? So that the device will be confiscated for the remainder of the instructional day. Staff will review the policy with the the student, make the phone call home, right? If it happens again and again, then students may be asked to leave their phones for a duration for a week or two weeks leave in

039the office. Okay, good pickup dates. So we have our first pickup date today. Uh it's August 27th. We have for grade seven or seventh grade orientation. Eighth grade is the next two days and then August 28th is going to be for grade nine along with their orientation. Okay. The other part of this policy is that we do we do need to report to New York State uh the number of infractions. We do have to track that data and see how things are going. Okay. Next topic of conversation tonight is going to be a study of student enrollment, grade configuration options and resource optimization. >> Hey Dan. >> Yes. I just want to go back to one thing and you know I'm not a semantics guy but when we say the staff is expected to follow

040I want the staff to know they have to follow not expected to and ah if it happens it happens. This will only work if everybody from the top to the bottom of the employee thing follows it. So whether we have to talk to the union leads and the building leads or whatever I want to remove the word expected and they they will follow it. Okay. >> Yes. I'll make that clear. But it you know so one of the most important things that we can do as adults what we teach is model appropriate behavior. >> Yeah. >> Right. This is what it comes down to is model appropriate behavior. It's going to be a learning curve for everybody. >> Yep. >> Are you going to get your yonder pouch? >> I will. >> That's his words.

041actually a bad idea. >> It's gonna be Velcro though. Sorry. >> But you yell at me in the hallway if you see me with my with with my phone. Um so next topic is going to be the study of enrollment rate configuration options and resource optimization. So for this um Dr. G and I had a couple meetings with Dr. Kevin Bowman. Um he is a former superintendent from from Niski Ununa. uh he has performed similar studies for other districts such as Antiora and I got other ones loaded down here I can pull up later. Um so in speaking with him because I do want to have an enrollment study as well as you know get other ideas because I don't know everything by any means. Um and he is kind of a one-stop shop for

042enrollment study as well as as models. So in speaking with him and on tonight's agenda, there was a proposal from him to perform this uh research study is essentially what it is until January answering these four core questions. So what are future student enrollment projections for the next 5 10 years. So that's looking at birth data, survival cohort survival rate it's called, right? So how many kids remain from fifth grade to sixth grade and so forth. It has to it's going to be talking with our building departments. It's going to be looking at past building projects and seeing how how many actually students came from those projects to to look information forward. Right? So, this will give us the our our trajectory of enrollment moving forward. Core question two is what are the grade level

043configuration options districtwide for grades K through 8 and the implications for each option in instruction operation and district costs? What efficiencies or optimizations may be gained? So, for this part of it, this is really looking at various models, right? So it's looking at our current model. It's looking at last looked at the Princeton model, right? It might be looking at kind of a hybrid of the Princeton model. So it's looking at those models and seeing which would be the most efficient, right? In terms of instruction, operations, you know, perspective for that. Part of this which I which I truly appreciate is also looking at the research and literature as well as similar schools, right? So in New York State, are there other similar schools to us and what are they doing and is it being

044effective? Core question three is how do differences in instructional programming, staffing, educational approach of a junior high and middle school education impact student development, grouping, and student teaming? So this really is a deeper dive into what should be our philosophy around that middle level instruction, right? Because the traditional junior high approach is getting ready for the high school, right? the middle school approach is what kind of behavior we have here is more about teaming uh and additional layers of support kind of built in there. So this is looking at at the at that aspect of it. Uh similar thing looking at research looking at what other districts are doing seeing what's effective elsewhere and making recommendations based on based on that. Core question four is implementing one or more possible grade configuration options. what strategies

045or processes could be used to ensure successful implementation for students, staff, and parents. Right? So, this is the kind of the next step as to okay, here's options. Here's the pros and cons of each option. And then moving forward, how is that going to impact things? Right? So, finalizing uh district transportation could kind of be part of that. Impacts to the master schedule would be part of that. Um how would this roll out? How should it be communicated to the district? What kind of transition activities do we need? So once again, the thing that I appreciate most is their expertise and research as to what has worked elsewhere. Right? So these four core core questions will ultimately um result in a final report. Right? It's not a mandate. It's a final report, a research study.

046And here are the results for a research study. And we as a district will choose what to do with with that to get information. Right? There's going to be a a data collection piece of it, right? So, our enrollments, those factors, um research, as I've mentioned a couple times, on-site meetings with stakeholders, so one-toone meetings, small group meetings, focus group meetings in each of our buildings to make sure that everybody has their concerns shared, their ideas shared so that we can kind of take everything into it. We'll also be be building visits, right? There's one thing for me to say that Kale has, you know, for argument sake 57 classrooms, right? Right. So another thing to be there and see the space to see what what what can fit in those spaces. Um he's going

047to make board of education presentations and then ultimately the final report is that pro pro and con analysis of various configuration models with his expected timeline is in January. But once again that does not mean that we need to act on it in January, right? We're going to receive it, process it, figure out what the best approach is for sovereignty forward. Um I would even propose that right so yes we have in January we have a bigger discussion as to what is right for us and a timeline and so forth if we do move forward with it and then spend the following year really trying to kind of implement it step by step right so this may mean as soon as that the the change does not happen right next school year it might be

048a year or two down right it could even be in phases as well >> just a couple questions sure um can you just give the one minute version of what you're talking about go back you know 50 ft and say potentially moving sixth grade to the school because I didn't know anything about it till I joined the school board. So can you just frame that? >> Yeah no no problem. >> Um so taking a step back right so uh our enrollment in so has decreased roughly by a third over the past like 15 to 20 years. Right? So we as a district are are uh built differently now than we were 15 years ago. So, how are we going to kind of right size oursel? >> And possibilities for that would be looking at where

049our grades are, right? So, it could be bringing sixth grade up to the to grade seven and eight, having a middle school up here. Um, it could be, you know, maintaining three elementary schools that are K5 or it could be, we talked about last time having like a K through3 north campus, a K3 south campus, a 45 building or is it a 456 building? Right? So, it's it's all those kind of things. with the overall idea about being that our resources are finite, right? Both physical resources, staff resources as well as capital resources. So, how can we best maximize our resources? >> The second question, >> yep. >> On the stakeholder meetings, >> do you anticipate those being open to the public in some way? >> Yes. So, he was very open to having to

050having meetings. So we we have to kind of flush out the details, but I I would like an element of staff concerns in a sense or staff focused group, community focused group, parent focus group, right? Whoever is really willing to and able to come out >> for all stakeholders. >> Yeah. I don't have a question comment. Okay. So ju just in the in the of full transparency here, um I'm the one who pulled off the title moving sixth grade up here. Um so it wasn't Dr. Ersig, it was me. Um and the reason being is as he laid out here we were we were and I was as well jumping to a conclusion instead of looking at all the options including like he mentions up here enrollment study the configuration of the buildings everything else

051at the end of the day that may not be the solution we come up with >> the other reason of going with a consultant is we talked about finite resources um I don't know if you're aware we have a few things going on in the district right Now, there's a couple things. Um, that doesn't mean we stop everything else, right? We we you you still have to move forward. And it made more sense instead of trying to pull out teachers and administrators twice a month to have meetings and figure this out on a whiteboard. It made sense to bring in the consultants who've done this teen times, who don't have to figure out, okay, how do we start looking at this? We know how to start looking at it. we know how we should structure

052the on-site meetings and the stakeholder groups. We'll give you the options, right? So, it just made more sense to me to let our teachers and our administrators go run the school and do what they have to do and bring in somebody who's done this a ton of times and let's get it right the first time so that when we do get those those options, let's call them in January, we know they're solid. we know they've evaluated everything because they've done this before. Okay, so that's the thinking behind this >> and then of course there will be the opportunity after we we decided to get all those people together to kind of talk about the actual implementation and what we need to do to it as well. Okay. Um opportunities for engagement. So later this week,

053everybody in the district will be getting a text box sent out with our various committees, our board level committees, board uh policy facility audit committee, as well as our district safety committee and district leadership team. Those are not necessary board committees. Um they'll be actually broken down separately on the forum. If anybody has any interest in participating, uh there will be a link on there where you can just submit your name, contact information, and we'll get you added to to the list. So that will go out later this week. These are the general meeting time frames. Um obviously with calendars how some things change but that's the the the general flow >> but people can just walk in too right? >> Yeah you can just walk in. >> Yep. >> Mhm. >> Um the benefit

054of signing up is you would get the agenda ahead of time >> and if you can't person if you sign up you'll get the link so you can say that louder so the people in the back can hear you. >> We're online >> by signing up for a specific committee. So let's take the policy committee. We log into Zoom every policy committee meeting. If you sign up, if you go on, if you follow the link that you'll be getting and actually sign up, you'll get that Zoom meet. So, if you can't come here to the media center in person that night, but you're home and you can dial in or wherever you are, that's the benefit of signing up. Sure, if you if you want to just pop in, absolutely every there's a few people

055who just pop in. The benefit of signing up is you get those Zoom links so you can join remotely if you want to. >> Google Meet. Is that better? >> Thanks. Perfect. Meet no Zoom. >> And by the way, the other thing is I there might be somebody in the audience who's happy. Um we I spoke today to our technical folks and they are looking at how to add it to the calendars >> meetings. Excellent. >> Super easy. >> Uh lastly for me, opening day, right? So this is what we all work for. Uh and this in graduation um staff returns September 2nd, students return September 3rd, right? This does not happen with all of our 12-month employees. So, our clerical staff works all summer long. Our custodial, our maintenance, our transportation supervisor, our IT

056staff, buildings and grounds. I'm probably forgetting somebody. I apologize for that. But these are the ones that really are the heartbeat of the district in my mind, right? Keep things moving along so that September 3rd when when kids come, all we have to worry about is greeting our kids with with a smile. Uh, I do need to just acknowledge Kristen Wilhelm, our transportation supervisor, who does a phenomenal job with transportation. So, she herself reviews every route, cleans things up, becomes more efficient. She looks back at prior year's usage for for after school runs. She's consolidated some runs because they haven't been used a lot to make sure that we have buses for for athletic events. The magic work that she does cannot be described. So, a big thank you to her as well. >> Take

057the bus, >> please. Um >> um just just so we know too uh September 2nd every all staff in the district will are is will be in attendance in the auditorium. Uh we will recognize the harm that has been caused to the district. We will also make charter course going forward. And as always as always we're going to be focusing on students. That is why we're here. That's what we focus on. So any questions? >> No. Okay, moving on in the agenda. Um, personnel instructional and non-instructional. Um, so the first part is resignations. Um, we have we have three core resignations and then we have somebody resigning as the bowling coach. Um, Andrea Selininovich at the top of there, you'll see pending there's there's another item. Um, she's actually gone from uh that role to

058another role. So, she's just resigning from that current role. So, um, and then we have appointments. Um, and to save Miss Bellarosa the time and turning on our microphone, Dan, can you run down what each of these folks are going to do? >> You got it. Can I have a mic? >> That was a great suggestion last time, so we're going to do it again. >> Thank you. Uh so Evan Jenkins is going to be our new ENL teacher. Uh it will be split between Tahill and the junior junior high school. Just looking at Thank you. Uh Nicole Payone. So she is actually going to be filling our ABC classroom. Um we have posted for our ABC classroom since May. We have gone through several rounds of interviews. Um we are happy uh she'll be

059joining us. Andrew Sinovich was our nurse at the UPK Center at Mount Marian. She is being full-time at who was actually being recalled um from layoffs two years ago. Uh Nicole Cahill is also being recalled and as as well as Rebecca Magnano Campbell. Uh Dimmitra is going to be our new monitor at uh Cahill. So she's actually going to be a monitor early in the morning for our students who arrive there. um who get there well before school starts as well as for lunch. And then lastly is Alina for a monitor position at Morris. That o opening happened because the monitor ended who was there took a full-time TA position on the last agenda. Okay. Go through all the other ones. Um and then there are permanent building substitutes. I just have a question on

060that. Is are these people who were substitutes like our time and then we made them permanent public and is this the only time a year we appoint permanent subs? >> Yeah. So uh several years ago we brought back permanent building subs. So permanent building substitutes are certified subs who are guaranteed work every day. So we have we invite them to our conference days so that they are really part of the of the fabric of our school. Uh but they fill in where needed in the building each day. Okay. >> Does that answer your question? >> Yeah. I'm I'm I'm surprised we only need three. >> Uh we're still waiting for one for Cahill and the um >> one was on last >> and one was on last. Thank you. Pardon the lady with all the

061information. >> All right. And then the other stuff is has a bunch of appointments around extracurricular activity advisors and um [Applause] things like that. So, >> thank you to all those faculty. [Applause] >> Can I have a motion for D1 to one and two? >> One and two. >> So moved. >> Mer second. Second by Mr. Wells. Any questions on any of these? >> No. All those in favor? I >> Okay. [Applause] Okay. E, business office recommendations. So, let me talk to you a little bit about this one. Um, so if you'll see it's pretty big number, 7.8 million. Um, this is our work with the Olster Boseies. So, this is a extremely large bucket of stuff. It's all of our Bosei students. It's a component of um special ed. It is any of the

062software that's used in the building. Um it is all of the inter inner scholastic sports flow through Boseis. Um so that's why this number is um as large as it is. The other thing is this is an a this was in the budget. It's also an aidable number. um we are we receive aid back um anywhere between 40 and 45% based on a myriad of different variables on this. So I didn't want anybody to look at a $7.8 8 million number and go whoa. Um there is a there's a lot of stuff in this bucket that was planned for and like I said if you look at the number of BOSI students we have just from that um and then the components of special ed and things and then I think we're at 400 students

063or 500 students who participate in inter inner school boards. >> Um and so that's everything um from modified to JV to varsity. Um so that all flows through this number. Okay. >> I have a question on that. >> Sure. Can you remind me um I don't know if I need to be on the mic for this, but can you remind me does this include anything for the build out at Tech City? Is that in this year's budget or is that >> Yes. So, we're starting to pay for the lease for Tech City. >> Yeah, >> maybe they want to hear. >> Yeah, >> we are starting to pay for the lease at Tech City this year. >> What What are the details behind that for some that may not know? Um so uh background on

064park is that the CTE program and in the programing campus was had a more students than the capacity of the actual space. Their program has grown over the years. So they had entered an agreement with I park uh to lease forget the amount of square footage over there um to house their their CTE. So any of their their trade programs. So cosmetics is there, automotive, um electrical, I think they're bringing back carpentry too. Um so all those programs are housed there, all on the first floor. Um so we as a component district do pay a portion of that that exact dollar amount. I do not remember. >> So are those our kids in that those programs going to be at park? >> So they will be starting on September 3rd at park. The uh everything

065is done equipment is there. My understanding is that they're going that our students are going to be taking the first two or three weeks to actually set up what the classrooms will will be. So, it's going to be really kind of hands-on getting in setting up what a garage should look like and so forth. >> Cool. >> The actual grand opening is this Thursday, I believe. >> Okay. Great. >> Live park. So, >> now we've learned everybody else needs the mic except for Michelle. >> Um, transportation contract. uh straightforward tax warrant resolution. So um I can have a motion for E1, two and three. >> So moved >> second roa second. >> Second >> by Mr. Meyer. Any questions on any of those? All those in favor? >> I. >> All right. F action items.

066um substitute pay rates relatively straightforward what that is professional development plan [Applause] um C3 Quest LLC agreement um this is actually um work uh this is workbased learning for special ed um so this is you know work transition for all of our IEP and F shouldn't say all but ones that take place in it work transition for our IEP and 504 students um is provided by C3 quest. Um occupational therapist, we do not have an occupational therapist um as part of the district. So this is providing one where we have to provide it um um according to New York State Ed school summit at NYAK agreement um unlimited care. It's registered nurses. Um, and if I'm just so I'm correct, Dan, this is where um, we have an IEP or 504 student who requires it

067as part of it. An actual nurse, we have to provide it. The these guys provide that service. >> Correct. >> Okay. >> Um, Parson's Child Family Vector. Vector is the company who provides all the required online training for everybody in the district. um went over in detail number nine. Um and then we have one policy Dr. Ersig or Dr. Hos you want to just that one polic because it's a second reading. So once we vote on it it's uh it's in. >> Yeah. This is just the one that says that if the kids are going to be taking the charter bus, they need to wear a seat belt. >> And that was the change to the policy. >> Yes. >> Yeah. And so just to remind folks that we do have we are looking at

068the uh student faculty fraternization policy and so that will be coming to our September meeting for a second read. So I invite you all to the policy meeting next Tuesday um if you want to have input in that and sort of have that discussion. Okay. Um, all right. So, I need a motion on board action items F1 through 10. >> So, by Mr. Wells, second by Michelle. Any questions on any of those? >> All those in favor? >> All right. [Applause] Okay, we are because it's not on here. Um, we're just it's not because it's not agenda item. Um, board comments or anything. So, I'm going to start over here. Mr. Meyer, anything? >> Um, just to echo what Dr. and Mike, >> but Dr. Ers said, um, I know it's going to be an

069adjustment this year with the new cell phone policy, um, and the other issues that are going on with the district, but I'm just appreciating the, um, efforts of the board and the faculty and the administration on, uh, keeping the priority on the focus on the kids and just looking forward to a good school year this year. Thanks, Again, I'd like to echo uh things that have been said this evening. I do want to thank all the 12-month employees who have worked behind the scenes all summer to get our schools ready for all the kids coming in on um uh Tuesday of next week. Wednesday of next week. >> Wednesday. Couldn't be sooner. um um anyway I want to thank for the the um members of the community who came out to listen to us tonight

070and hear about what's going on in the school district and those who got up to speak to us and let us know their thoughts of what's going on. I appreciate hearing that. Um and I did want to just echo about the study for the enrollment and grade school configuration. And I think that it's important to really have someone independent with an expertise come in uh and really help us try and understand how we're going to best, you know, can best move forward um with the resources um and the enrollment that we have. So I want to thank everyone. Thank you. >> Nothing. Okay. >> Over here, Mr. Toman. Um, I want to thank all the maintenance and the custodial staff u who worked hard at the getting the buildings in shape. There's no switch there.

071>> Um, and to the faculty who are coming in and and getting ready. I hope it's a good productive year. Uh, and a question. Are we going to do comment before or after exec session? >> Uh, we can do before. >> See, Mr. Wells. Um, first off, thank you all for coming out. It's good to see a lot of people here. Uh, good to see that you guys are engaged and wanting to speak to us and and speak your mind. Uh, it helps us get an understanding of what's going on out there and also kind of gives us some input to kind of work with as opposed to just kind of our own minds. We want to hear what's going on with you guys and and have a better understanding of that. So, thank you

072all for being here. Thank you for those that spoke. Um, it's definitely definitely good to hear that kind of stuff. Looking forward obviously uh next Wednesday um getting all the kids back here. I know my son's pretty anxious to get back here. And my daughter, she found her teacher and her friends are in her school in our class, so she's she's not so anxious anymore. Um, but uh looking forward to getting them back here and uh kind of getting back in the flow of the school year. Um, I thank all of the teachers and the staff and the administration for for doing all that they do throughout the year. Uh, I know the teachers, it's not just a, you know, this summer they're off. They're they're coming in here early. They're getting their stuff ready.

073They're getting their rooms ready. Um, the administration is getting everything ready and obviously the staff is kind of getting everything as far as the building ready to go. So, I appreciate all the effort that's in there and, uh, looking forward to a great beginning to a new school year. >> Thanks, Tim. Um, I will second all of the uh messages of appreciation and thanks to everyone that came out, everyone that's online, everyone that spoke. Um, there's a lot of emotion and a lot of thought put into those comments and it's again very very helpful to us as a board. I just want to speak very briefly but specifically about the student faculty patternization policy. So, as you just heard, that's coming up for a second read at the first or the September meeting, which is

074the second Tuesday at 6:30. >> First, >> the policy meeting the >> policy meeting first committee. >> So, that's coming at to the policy meeting next Tuesday at 5:30. Um, I have heard through the grapevine and obviously nothing's confirmed, but I've heard that there are certain um organizations or groups that are suggesting that folks in the district that this would apply to should not sign it. I do not know um if that is if that's truthful or accurate, but what I would ask is for you to please consider that if you do not want to sign this policy and you don't like something in it, please vocalize that to the board and let us know what specifically. We know there's challenges with this policy. We know that there's a lot of communication that happens between

075coaches, teachers, band, and the students. Um, and it seems like some of the biggest hang-ups in that policy are related to uh requiring students and uh teachers or coaches to communicate via school sponsored electronic devices. Um, if you have concerns, please bring them to us. You can come to the policy meeting or you can get any of our email addresses. Um, I think it's best if you send them probably to uh Mr. Riyazi and Dr. Anderson Hos. Um, >> what did I say? No, you're good. I was green. >> Oh, okay. They could go to any of us and we will get that information over. My personal request and I'm a nudge. Obviously, we know that. >> If you want to say you don't like it, please tell us what you would like to see

076to improve it. Okay? It's it's very hard for us to work with I don't like this if we don't have suggestions and alternatives to consider. So, I would personally ask you to consider doing that. If you say no, also say but please think about this. Okay, let's keep this engagement going. This is fantastic. I'm very excited. I think this is a good start to the school year. >> Miss Keller, >> this working? >> You sure? >> Yeah. Yeah, it's we can hear you. >> All right. So, again, I'm I'm not gonna keep going about Thank you for everybody coming out. We really do appreciate you coming out. >> Um I'd also like to thank uh Mr. Ray for coming out and bringing up those questions. Um, I know that we've been talking about the um,

077egress over at um, Ricardi for quite some time now and um, those are questions that we had and I'm glad that you brought them up here so that we could um, revisit them um, as a as a group here this evening. We're those are all definitely things that we've been talking about and uh we want to make that the you know that traffic flow over there as best as we can still while protecting um the privacy of the people that live on both sides of that egress. I know how important that is as it should be. Um I also want to thank um uh Angie I don't know if I say your name right. Pon Pon I Okay. Um, thank you for coming and and talking to us um about that. I I for one

078would like to learn a little bit more about um all of that that how that took place and how that is happening and what we can do to uh rectify that issue if we can. Um so, thank you for coming out and and um talking about that. Um I want to thank the 12-month employees. As a former 12-month employee, I know how hard they work during the summertime getting our buildings ready, getting our our playgrounds ready, getting our classrooms ready, getting everything ready, getting mailers out to um our families and transportation is always such a big uh ticket item. So, uh thank you all for doing that. Um, and again, you know, next week our our students are going to show up to school and we are going to provide them with a wonderful first

079day and they are going to learn while they're here that that is what it is that we want for our students and they are our number one priority and we're going to see to it that that happens. So, thank you >> Dr. Hawk. Not much other than to echo the thanks. Um I would really like particularly to uh thank the parent who came up and advocating for their child. Um because I know how hard that is. Um and how important it is for us to hear your voices as well as everybody else's. Um, and so I just want to echo again that whether it's happy news or unhappy news or criticism or praise, we welcome public engagement. It's great to have everybody here. Um, and again, even Jeffrey is not a fan of semantics, though

080he is a secret semantic lover. Um, I really want to encourage everybody in the district to think about the chain of response instead of the chain of command. Thank you. Um, okay. Thank you. So, a couple of things. Um, one, the investigation, because I'm sure no one wants to hear about that. Um, uh, just a quick update. It is ongoing. It is, um, it is going faster than anticipated. Um, and that is simply, I think, partly based on the investigator. Um, but is also based on the access that she's been given and also people who are not here typically during the summer, willing to wave their I'm on summer vacation and my day doesn't start till September 2nd and willing to talk when necessary. Um, and things like that. So, um, she's moving forward. Um,

081people ask me when's it going to be done? Like, we have a date. I don't have a date. It's done when it's done. Now, is it going to take a year? No. Is it going to take six months? No. But to say it's going to be complete on September 5th would be a disservice to everybody. Um, and it would be a disservice to our investigator to put her in a time box. Um, I don't think there is um, everyone around this table has had the opportunity to speak with her um, just one on in groups of two or three. Um, and I think everyone around this table can echo that they are happy with how she is progressing and what she is doing. Um, and she is, you know, she is now on campus regularly.

082Um, she won't be tomorrow because she's taking her child back to school, back to college, um, or to college, excuse me, a freshman going to school in Boston. Um, but she will be back on campus early next week continuing what she's doing. Um and there will be some highlevel recommendations of things that we can act on um relatively quickly that don't take a lot of um the more we can do and do quickly um we will. So that's the uh that's the investigation. Um I'm not going to thank everybody because other people did. So I echo all that. I do want to thank the the lady who got up and spoke about her child. And I'm always I'm I'm happy when anybody gets up and speaks, but it means a lot to me when somebody

083who I know is not comfortable in front of a microphone >> or getting or doesn't usually get up in front of a group and speak. So to get up and speak with the emotion that she did in front of basically a group of strangers, I thank you. >> Yeah. >> Um and I wish more people would do that. Um and I know it's not easy. So, um, that's a big thing. Um, just on general, I'm going to close with communications in general. Um, in the past two months, and I don't want to speak for everybody at the board, but the level of communication that we have gotten from the community has been amazing. Um, it is, um, and it's not all on the investigation topic. I I would I would for me personally, I'll only

084speak for me personally. I would say 99% of what I get has nothing to do with the investigation. It's about other things um other things that people are concerned about and want to look into. Um and I know I wasn't getting those emails six months ago or a year ago. Um so that is that's really good. Um the the one thing I will say and this is it's the only nonpositive thing I'm going to say is the one general theme right is I get emails and I respond to everybody. People may not like my response or may not like the answer I give them but I guarantee you I respond to everybody. Um, and if somebody wants to meet face to face, I'll meet face to face or I'll take a phone call. And when

085I look at the you you I always assess the communications I get, right? Because in 35 years of experience in the corporate world, I know I'm able to put a percentage on this person is just disgruntled um and is just airing some stuff they want to air. Um, this person is simply venting and wants to listen. And then these people actually have an issue. The people who actually have an issue are the people I want to focus on right now is there's one general theme that I've gotten out of all their communications whether it's been an email or face to face is I had this issue with my child and the chain of response um whatever um the person they talked to and I wrote it down because I I wanted to get um there's

086nothing we can do. That's unacceptable. I don't get to say it and in this seat >> like I don't I don't if somebody brings something to me like there's and I can guarantee you in all my responses out to the public I've never once said there's nothing I can do. Sorry. I need to find out why that is. And there may be valid reasons. But I but when I hear it 15 or 20 times along the same kind of thing, it makes me want to go investigate it because like I said, the eight other people around this table aren't allowed to say it. Like we we can't just say, "There's nothing we can do. Sorry. Go talk to the next person." And I definitely can't say it. So for anybody in the district who we

087have children in front of definitely shouldn't be saying it. And if there's nothing they can do, they should be escalating it up the chain of response. See how quick I learned? Dr. Hans >> up that chain to somebody who can do something about it because every issue in this district that is brought forward, there's somebody there's somebody that can do something about it. There has to be. If there's not, I can tell you we have the wrong people. And I'm not afraid to say that because in my real world job, shouldn't say that real world, my other world job, this is real world, too. Like that's the answer. the answer is well you guys can't fix the problem then we'll then there's something wrong here. So I just I want to I'm gonna go forward.

088I just want to let everybody know who's reached out with that kind of stuff is and like I said I'm not condemning anybody. I'm not hanging anybody. Like I want to find out why that is the general response to a lot of things. Um and when I get it and we figure it out, I'll give it to you. That's all I can do. Okay. All right. That was longer than I thought. Um, and before we go change the agenda, I'm just going to ask because we have the ability to do this. Is there anybody in the audience who would like to get up and speak? You. Okay. So, I have to we have to make a change now. Okay. I need a motion to add uh an item adding the second public comment. So, move

089>> by Mr. Wells and seconded by Michelle. All those in favor? >> Okay. Sir, thank you for raising your hand. [Applause] >> Apologize for my dress tonight. I um >> I plan on going home and changing. I ran out of time. Um, I wasn't going to speak tonight, but with with everything that's been said, >> could you do me a favor? >> No. Could you could you pick up the mic? Yeah. Just so the people online can hear you. That's all. >> And put it on. Flick it on. >> He's going to do that. He said that, but we're going to get the mic on first. >> My name is Bill Stutz. >> There we go. >> I am the director of Speckled Frog Play Care. >> Um, I've I've been the director for two

090years. Been an employee for a little over three. I was a public school teacher for 20 years. I taught middle school. Um left uh Red Hook Central School after 20 years to become an administrator and uh I'm now at Speckle for there have been a number of things that were said tonight that I'm taking notes and um I'm obviously going to uh write my email to the chain of command uh regarding tonight. The thing that that was repeated five times in the last five minutes is um good luck to the students. It's about the students. No matter what's going on, you have a huge couple of elephants that are that broke out of the room that the district's dealing with. I've seen board of education for 20 years. I know them. I your your jobs

091are thankless. The the work that goes in, but you have real issues that have to be dealt with. just stated um and I apologize I don't even know hardly anybody's names here >> what I said Jeffrey >> Jeffrey yeah um so what you said was was if there's a problem we got to go to the chain of command no one at that at this table should be be saying there's nothing we can do about it and unfortunately Sunday night that's what we were told there's nothing that can be done we don't have an answer as to why the UPK was was uh dissolved per us. Um the the facts are we I was working with Lisa for the last couple months and we had conversation right up to Friday and we now know that that

092she's not in the the prek lead right now. So why are we dropping? Because the perceived issue right now is that that we're spark just got dropped. We don't know why. There's no answers. And the three very short conversation we had at 5:30 Sunday night. The three things that were said were we're waiting on documents from our attorney. We don't even have a signed contract with you. We are not moving forward at this time. That's basically my conversation. >> Okay. We were left dumbfounded. We're I was literally restructuring rooms for the prek that night and could have could have burst into tears as a grown man >> because everything we've been working for dreaming for our parents, not us, to give these people a reprieve and and a break. And um I can't tell you

093the the number of people that I've had to console because their lives were about to be different. 44 families were about to be able to do things. Um, and it feels like a gift has been stripped. So, I I'll I'll close. I just I just want to make sure I cover everything that I was I was writing. Um, >> Jeffrey said, "Just because we have other things going on in the district doesn't mean you stop the other things." I it feels like there's other things and because of them we're just dropped. I don't I don't have any other thing to go on as a why. I know the deadline is Friday the 28th for the district to get the stuff into the state which means yeah we're in the 11th hour >> but we knew

094that when we started a couple months ago um conversations with Dr. and Dr. Kappler, we all three knew that we were on the crunch. We literally waited. I had called the state ed. There were people listed on the state ed website that don't even exist anymore in the state ed that I was calling and they were laughing saying, "Oh, you know that's uh they don't even work. Why are you why is your name on the state ed website?" I tracked down hours to find out we don't even need a beds because we're not affiliated directly with the district. M >> the beds took weeks. The last piece of information we were waiting on took weeks to find out we didn't even need it, >> right? >> I called Dan Boyd in Red Hook who does

095the UPK over there cuz I worked in Red Hook and I just called somebody I knew and they said, "Well, you don't need you don't need pets." >> Okay. So anyway, long story short, uh it was then said for the students by by this gentleman, Mr. Mayor, I said everything we do for the students. We're asking for our parents and for our students, what are we are we going to drop them or can this be done? >> Okay. Um, that was gonna go in an email >> and I I I just wanted to say tonight since it's >> I appreciate you getting up. >> We're in the 11th hour. >> Yep. >> All right. Thank you. >> Thank you very much. >> Anybody else? Since we put it on the agenda. >> Yes. Okay. >>

096Yeah. Just take it right out of the holder. It's easier. Yeah. Alice, can you hear me? I'm just wanted to give you guys an update to go off what Tim was saying earlier about the community and where we're at as far as specific people that I am aware of. There are several families that are not probably more than 50 that have no plan to send their child to school with the current administration at hand. So, I'm not sure what that means for the district as a whole, but if people don't send their kids to school, that's going to cost us a lot of money in the district, right? That's number one. Number two, a lot of a lot of families are increasingly growing frustrated with the fact that no one has been put on administrative

097leave. And I'm not saying anything else. I'm just letting you know that that's still out there and people are very frustrated with the start of school around the bend. That's all. Thank you. >> Thank you. >> There you go. Right there. Lauren Roomberg, nine Darlings Way. I have two children in the district. Um, going into eighth and 10th grade. Uh, just a little background, I was a high school history teacher for uh, 13 years before I moved back to my hometown here. I was on Long Island. I taught AP World History. I taught government economics and I taught Global 9 Advanced, which I wrote the curriculum for and had to get approved by the College Board. Um, I gave up a very comfortable and wonderful job to be a mom because as a teacher, it

098was very clear to me that if I could be home, I would be home. Um, so I took it a step further and moved back to my hometown. I have subbed in the district since 2018. And some things uh that have come to my attention um that I think needs to be addressed and discussed um are the safety of substitutes. substitutes in many districts um on Long Island, Westchester are uh full-time subs who have benefits and paid time off and they're covered by the the teachers union. Here they're not. Here uh there's $150 a day um pay for an instructional certified sub and I believe it's 120 for a non-certified substitute. So, um, we also have here, uh, PDM subs and and building subs. Now, Jeff asked earlier about the building subs and and why

099the need. Um, we have an tremendous amount of special ed needs in our district and every building has um, obviously teachers out where you need a sub, but you also have the building sub filling in for grand rounds. They're filling in for special ed meetings. They're they're also part of the building community. Um the couple of things that are concerning to me uh and many other subs who um I've spoken with is um permanent subs are expected to attend conference dates. They're expected to follow the code of conduct. There is no specific rule, no specific write up on the job role of a permanent building sub. um when I was a permanent building sub just last year. I was perdm up till last year. Um I had asked in the first week of September about

100um what my role was as a sub and um I didn't get that. I'm kind of a rule follower follower. So I went to the code of conduct and the code of conduct uh the thing that was really important to me was the behaviors. Okay, we had a lot of behaviors in the building. Kids are are kids. They're going to do things. They do silly things. Um, however, we're the adults in the building, teachers, faculty, staff, and we're supposed to kind of correct those behaviors and address them. When those behaviors happen with substitute, um, it was told to, uh, myself and other subs that subs are not allowed to write, uh, behavior referrals. they are supposed to report to the classroom teacher when something happens if it's a tier one offense. We have two different

101tiers of offenses which many teachers don't know the difference between um I don't know that how that was communicated prior to my arrival but um it's been very unclear when I've spoken to teachers. The other issue is a lot of teachers when I personally or others have gone to them to discuss a student, many times it was students that they had issues with before. Um, and they also didn't feel comfortable dealing with issues that happened when they weren't in the room. Um, if the person in the room when the teacher's not there is a certified sub, okay, that has classroom experience, class management, you know, has it all down. Myself, for example, never had issues. um when you're told that you cannot address um you can't talk to parents, you can't log behaviors, you're not

102allowed to write them down. Um it gives these kids that many more chances to do silly things and all those little silly things add up to a lot of big things. Um, we've had subs and teachers in the building pushed hit. I personally was hit by a ball. Um, I was pushed by a student. Was I detr was it like horrific and horrible that go? No. But there are there seems to be a an issue with boundaries and um my children have come home to me. Just this last year, I had a a a child, my kid, who the sub didn't show up because the sub fell asleep. I had another student um tell me that the sub they were really uncomfortable because the sub was on FaceTiming on a personal phone call the whole

103time. Um, I had Oh, I've had issues where um I've been cursed at I've been other teachers have been or other subs have been cursed at where as a sub there's no authority. So, on top of that, because I was a teacher and under contract, I took care of myself. I took out an insurance uh on my own to protect myself because as a sub without a contract where we could be held accountable for things. So there's no protection for a sub. So individually on the subs end there's that. But on the flip side, we have people coming into our building mostly perdam on a on a rotating basis who are literally just warm bodies in a room. And it's become so frustrating I know for myself and other subs uh to not be able

104to handle these things when as an adult even just an adult you should be able to have that support. Okay. Um, I do understand that if a perdm sub is not allowed to be, you know, talking to parents and that kind of thing, but if you're having if you're going to have a a permanent building sub, but you're tying their hands, um, it just leaves a lot of problems. Um, when I was perdem, I know for myself, I was I was called from Ricardi, I was called from the junior high, I was called from the senior high. Um, and I was called Morse because of my ability to do my job. Um, I've covered over a thousand classes since 2018, so almost a thousand just last year alone. Um, I built a a great relationship

105with students being there every day. you're part of the community and if the district really does care about the kids and they're learning when a substitute is there even though you know you you think about like old '8s movies or you know when you had subs you're throwing the pen across the room and they're you know playing all kinds of jokes and stuff. Um as long as it wasn't a math class because I don't do math. I taught the class. Okay. Um, if you have a permanent building sub, you're going to have that sub actually carrying out the duties that they're supposed to. They're not just a warm body in the room. And I think that the district needs to think about how they treat these people coming in. Um, we had a few days

106last year we had more than 25 teachers out at a time and they're p trying to pull teachers from classrooms to cover classes. Why are teachers, Jeff said earlier, why do we even give permission to build this up? That's another reason, another thing to ask, why are teachers so exa exhausted? Why aren't they coming in? It's it's, you know, the the beatdown is real. Um, kids are not bad, but they do need boundaries and they need to be held accountable. Um, and lastly, I will say that there were a number of behavioral issues that were turned around on me personally and said that I escalated situations. One of which were a child's hands were put on me. There was a quote unquote investigation and I literally got an email saying, "Thank you for participating in."

107Um, in regards to that issue, I had uh the child's friends come up to me in the hallway and say, "Oh, Mrs. Ruber, we want you to be so and so again because the the child that pushed me, he really wants to see you. So there's there's like taunting that happens to to subs and teachers because things are not being addressed. Um I don't know why. And it's not just here. I will say it's not just here. It is it is everywhere. But no adult or child for that matter deserves to be treated that way. And just to take it a step further, the child who put their hands on me in the beginning of the year um had a number of infractions and then ultimately ended up handing a child and exposing that child's

108genitals to the student body. Now, I really do feel that if the little things prior to that, if they were handled and the kid had was accountable, that that child had their pants pulled down and his genitals shown to everyone. Um that wouldn't have happened. And these things kind of things are happening on on the regular. Okay. Um I will not be a permanent sub this year. Um but since I moved home as an educator, I have been deeply involved in this school district and I've had absolutely no negative feedback from the teachers that I've covered. I've been applauded for my professionalism. I've been thanked. Um, I treat the classroom just as I would have wanted my classes treated when I was not in the classroom. If I came back and somebody had written on

109a desk, I knew who it was. They cleaned it off, we moved on. I didn't tolerate the little nonsense. My kids had great region scores. My kids did amazing on the APs. If you're going to have people in these classrooms in place of your teachers, you need to take care of those people and you need to treat them as professionals and be respectful to them as well. Um, I really hope that the district thinks about these things because not only is opening the substitute for issues, on the flip side, we have such a a turnover on subs. Now, who what do we really know about these people coming into these rooms with our kids? Yes, they're fingerprinted. A lot of times they're right out of college. Some of them are they're not they're not certified

110or they're not um they don't have the experience so they don't know how to handle things and I just see it getting worse and worse as time has gone on and I really think that these things need to be addressed. >> Thank you Lauren. Okay. >> Anyone else? Uh Danielle Holding, I just had a question. Um my daughter is an IEP student. She's had on her IEP for the last two years that she can wear an earbud um music playing uh during testing for distraction. Um, I called her counselor today to find out if she'd be having a magnetic pouch or a Velcro pouch. He had no idea. So then he said I should call um the uh the teacher help her assistant. I don't I don't know what they're called in the classroom. Um

111so I reached out to her. No response. Do you guys know will but they will each teacher have an unlocking device in the classroom? So, you know, if you're an IEP student and you have any learning disability, you have to say that you're we have to sign a paper that says they're classified as special education. It's embarrassing to some students. So, will it be discreet? Will there be an unlocking device in the classroom or will like >> say that say that part again before that? >> When our child she has um dyslexia. So, in order >> Yeah, you don't have to tell me the the signing thing. Oh, we had to sign a paper that said, "We agree that our child is classified as special education." My son has a 504. We had to do

112that. >> You had to sign it. >> Yes. >> I thought you said your child had to sign it. And I >> sign as well. >> She had to sign this. >> Yes. I don't know if it's changed. This was when they were in Kill. She's a junior now. So perhaps that has changed. I don't know. >> Okay. All right. No. Okay. That's okay. >> Um she's just, you know, she's a junior. She's embarrassed. So she was just concerned. Will that unlocking unlock device be in the classroom? Is she gonna have to leave the classroom? You know, she doesn't want it to be obvious. >> Yeah, it's a great question. >> So, uh, we don't usually respond, but I'm responding in this case. We'll have Dr. Kappler reach out to Jamie Churchill to schedule a

113meeting. >> Okay. >> Is it uh >> 504 though? >> She's an IP. >> I Jamie. >> So, it should be listed on IEP. If it's if >> it is listed on the IP. It has been for two years. We just >> There's always issues with IEPs in the beginning of the school year. Half the teachers do not know that their student is an IEP or 504. Every year this happens. So there's usually at least two teachers per my son and my daughter that I have to contact. Last year my daughter was put in the back of the classroom and um she asked the teacher to if she can move to the front because of her IEP. Um he said you we can't switch seats until the first two weeks of class because we have

114to memorize your names. She was in 10th grade. I don't know maybe that's trickle. So she told me. So, I called I emailed the teacher. He he said the same thing. We can't do that. And she's like, "But mom, there's two kids like stabbing each other with pencils in the back of the classroom. They're talking like she can't be distracted." So, that's the point of the IEPs as well. Um, so then I had contacted Miss Costello who was phenomenal and she took care of it immediately. But like the teachers don't always read the IEPs. So, there's always an issue there. Um, so my child doesn't want to be embarrassed in that situation as well. And then with this, I just want to avoid anything I can avoid for this. >> Yes. I >> mean, there

115is the Velcro one, but I understand like she might not want that. Right. >> Right. Well, I mean, and I'm not saying she's entitled to the Velcro one because this is just for testing. So, I don't want her to have a special privilege over another child for that situation. However, I don't want her to be embarrassed or called out as well. >> Right. >> We understand your request. >> Miss Malone is also in the back of the room, so she heard what you said. >> Yeah, we understand your request. Somebody will get back to you. >> Thank you. with not only scheduling meeting but some answers. Thank you >> very much. >> Yeah. >> Thank you. >> All right. There's only two of you that haven't gotten up to the mic. Come on. Come on,

116Jessica. No, Miss McCade. Nothing. Anybody else? And I was only kidding. Anybody else who That's why we're waiting. Anybody else wants to get up and talk? These are great conversations especially >> I just add to the thing my daughter has a 504 player >> she just sticks in her pocket where your she doesn't she doesn't need her phone she just uses white >> okay perfect thank you >> yeah okay all right anybody else okay thank you everybody who got up and spoke and your topics they were great um and some people we have we know answers back to Um actually most people answers back to which we will get. All right. We are we need to res recess into executive session for purpose of discussing a contract um and a um employment decision. Um so

117can I have a motion to recession to executive session? >> So moved >> by Dr. Hos, seconded by Miss Belarosa. Any questions? All those in favor? >> All right. Thank you. Any questions? All those in favor? Motion to adjurnn? >> So moved. Second. >> Oh boy. >> By Mr. Tolman and Mr. Wells. All those in favor? >> I >> guys. Thank you for sticking with it. I appreciate it. >> Good night, everyone. >> Good night. >> Join the school board. Join the school board. Serve your community. That's what they told me. Michelle [Applause] >> No problem. >> Going again. He found another couple. >> They have to be fixed and radiators in the >> uh Christine, if you have a like five minutes tomorrow at some point, I'm free all day. >> Give me a

118call. Let's chat. So like no response.