001want to welcome everyone everyone that's here my and all those that are joining us online will you please M PL FL of the United States of America and the for stands Na and indivisible andice for all this is Martin may we have attendance please there are seven directors present tonight Mr Beno and Mr call are absent we do have a a quum this is our second meeting of the month where most official votes are taken many of which are listed on a consent agenda which includes those items which are routine or have been discussed at our work session last week we'll start with board commendations for October congratulations to the boys Gulf team who won the 2023 Lancaster Leon LL League section 2 title in September this marked the program's first first section two title
002in 21 years Mason tarono had a low round of the day of 74 Alex Shiner shot a 77 followed by Tom Ethan brono Thomas calinski Luke Landis and Miles Jackson congratulations to the middle to middle school student Han ha who won second place to safe to say something post the contest and took second place in the seventh grade category and his posters online safe to say is a youth violence prevention program run by the Pennsylvania office of Attorney General the program teaches Youth and adults how to recognize warning signs and signals excuse me especially with within social media individuals who may be a threat to themselves or others and to say something before it's too late I can't say anything two cona Valley District facility dogs and training are Now official facility dogs after graduating
003a special ceremony at United disability services in LOL Coco at facility dog at Jo g husin Middle School is owned by principal Dr Rachel medier elsc a facility dog in Brownstown Elementary is owned by the speech language pathologist Mrs Christine Colony congratulations to Coco and Elsie and to the team who spent countless hours participating in the dogs training facility dogs are specially trained service dogs that work with the trained volunteer professional facility dogs help thousands of distressed individuals and those with special needs C's long-term goal is to have a facility dog in each building congratulations to Maya Harner Bennett Whitaker and Lydia Salmons who earned commended student status by the 2024 National Merit Scholarship program they were recognized for their exceptional academic promise among 50,000 high school applicants across the country and separate congratulations to
004their parents and teachers who guided these students to this achievement I'd like to give special recognition to our district principles and National School principles month and to all of our dedicated and patient Beyond understanding bus drivers during school bus safety weeks superintendent comments Dr har sure before we do that I believe we may have skipped over approval of agenda oh you're right we did well we didn't vote yet so we're back I'm sorry can I have a motion to the agenda Mrs gra we have a couple updates to the agenda if I may should I go home we have Corrections or or additions we have we we have some updates and additions superintendence report um there was a resignation added after public posted public posting it is noted in red consent agenda item J there
005was an additional document added the marketplace pricing schedule item k the attachment was moved from exec content to public content action and discussion Item B and C settlement agreements were not available prior to public posting and they were added to exact content today okay thank you may I have a motion to approve the agenda as amended so moved second all those in favor say I I no now you can speak I can speak now yeah I'll good evening uh would like to introduce a few new faces to to CV this evening that we're we're excited about um the first one is is not completely new she spent some time here uh recently Mary Martin will be serving as a long-term substitute in learning support at Fritz uh Mary student taught here U last year and
006ever since then she's she never left she's been here as a substitute filling in various roles and will be with us for a for a longer term now so we're happy to have ad Mary uh she's a 2023 Millersville graduate in early childhood education I know that feeling coming here and never leaving next we have Kendall hinchi Kendall kendle will be a special education teach uh support teacher uh roaming around the multiple buildings in the district for that role uh she received her bachelor's degree in elementary education and special education from Millersville uh and a master's in curriculum and instruction from Penn State she also is a certified reading specialist so a lot of qualifications she's bringing to us she has 16 years of teaching experience in special education including time working at iu13 St
007Leo the great Catholic school and most recently at Manheim Township welcome and finally we have Teresa McColly who will be our new high school life skills teacher so we've been waiting uh to F fill that position so Teresa is also coming to us for Manheim Township so I have some phone calls to make tomorrow she has 16 years of teaching experience between her time at township and time also at iu13 Tara has her bachelor's degree in elementary and special education along with her ESL Certification from Millersville and her MERS in educational development strategies from wils University so super excited about the wealth of experience all of our new uh new Buck Skins are bringing to us welcome the schools they come from should be a thrilled that we chose because because we only choose the
008best board comments about recent activity we have to work on that folks correspondence we I do have one oh okay I do I to sleep presented with the CV team for first 10 um at their national meeting on Friday so yeah that was Friday yeah so that was a cool thing to be part of um we got to Showcase all that we're doing with first 10 here at CV um and how great of a job we're doing so it was really cool to to represent that is this our first year in that program this is your two our second year anything else well I guess we should say something about about um homecoming I think this is the third year in a row that we've had rain homecoming but it didn't seem to mess with
009the kids Spirits at all um of course I can't go to the dance and all that stuff but having a teenager and knowing many teenagers in District it seemed like it was a a pretty great event for them uh which was awesome and I heard the bonfire and stuff was uh fun as well so kudos for everybody who puts that on for our students only blind fire yeah any others correspondent secretary none okay then let's start off with Mrs Hernandez and the smok town presentation it's based on one of our district Golds should eaten that bread at banana good evening everyone um Katie Hernandez the principal at smok town and I brought with me Kelly Kim um we're here to talk a little bit about pb's implementation at our building and Kelly is here as
010one of our building coaches so we'll share a little bit about where we were where we are and just how we've been implementing here the first couple months of school so there we go are you driving Dr har I will okay all right so PBIS just a little background is connected to our District's comprehensive plan under our instructional model of mtss and Trauma um and then if we go I'm going to talk a little quickly here because I really want to get into what we're doing um within our profile uh last month you heard from Mrs trur about our modern learning and curriculum um and we're kind of setting the stage of our positive climate right so we need to set the stage for for that positive environment so that's that kids can Thrive and
011learn you've probably heard a lot about PBIS from U Mrs schaer and Mrs Cab um we have a variety of levels of leadership here in the district so we have our supporting uh CV facilitators with spec um there are Consultants that are working with the district level team which is outlined below and then each building has a building buing team that has a PBIS building coach and then team members so here at smok toown we have myself we have classroom teachers both at the primary level and intermediate levels we have a music teacher special education we have a variety of team members to have lots of different perspectives on on what does this look like from different lenses um we have team roles we meet monthly we review data and we we try to make
012really good decisions for for kids and and teachers at our building we just started a student group also that's right fifth grader student leaders now are just starting they just met last week last week so where were we and where are we now so last school year our school level teams met with spec and our district level coaches and we really learned about what PBIS was what's the framework what's all the planning that needs to go into um the launch of of this framework so in we did all of that last year and then in June our PBIS team had the day after school left we came back to school and we launched what is PBIS and what does that look like for smoke town and the reason our team decided that we needed to
013set that up in June was we wanted teachers to have the summer to think okay there's going to be a little bit of changes to how we approach things and we wanted them to kind of have the summer to reflect and be ready to go to not have another new thing in front of them in August when they're trying to get their classrooms ready we did a refresher in August where we added in our student code of conduct uh that was voted by the board I think at the end of the school year if I remember correctly um and then in August to September we've launched with the students and what is included that in that is acknowledgement tickets we have schoolwide lessons that you'll see a little bit more about incentives and assemblies and
014then we also made sure that our parents and caregivers also have a little bit of idea of what's going on so so we had an email blast early on we had uh Kelly and and um our counselor at um a back to school night table and just trying to to get the information out to to our families as well here you'll see a picture on the right is our schoolwide Behavior Matrix so this is like has all of our expectations how to be safe respectful and responsible this just set up common language throughout the building so it allowed students to kind of understand the expectations in each area um we even had a bus come in and we had all the students come in on the bus in grade levels to explicitly teach the expectations
015on the bus um so starting day one we had those lessons and we rolled out all this lessons at the bathroom in the cafeteria just so that everyone knew what was expected um and this just again helped with common language and the really nice thing about PBIS and we're going to talk about a lot about about common language and often times you might have one teacher who might say you can talk in the hallway if it's a whisper and then another teacher who says no absolute silence and another teacher who's like I don't care if you talk at all but like you have kids who then also see multiple teachers throughout the day so by having common language common expectations our our children are able to really know what are the expectations and their brain
016is now ready for the learning they don't have to switch what is Mrs K's expectations when I'm with her and when I go to Mrs Hernandez they're different and they look I can do this or not do that so it really sets the stage so that the kids can focus on the learning um and the Brain slots are open up for that so here um cafeteria we give out green tickets in the cafeteria and we have grade level bags and we do weekly Raffles for free ice cream or they get to see the prize card here we have two first graders that earned those prizes we also o started Proctor training and meeting with our sosl cafeteria Proctors monthly um to go over and support them with things that they may need or training that
017they may um May support what they're doing with our cafeteria and the students in there we created a referral form because obviously PBIS we really is heavy on the acknowledgement the positive but we can't forget how how are we going to reinforce those negative behaviors when they do come across and this aligns with our new code of conduct there here are some pictures of our First Assembly um and really the First Assembly just was the kickoff um what are they going to expect throughout the year when are the ticket drawings things like that and here at the assemblies we can also reinforce um some of the problem areas we can retach and we connect them also to our monthly character traits which ironically I saw these in front of you with the monthly traits so
018um um it's nice to reward and honor students showing those traits at these monthly assemblies too so not only are we using that time to retach and reinforce but also have fun and honor so this month on Friday we're going to mummify some of our teachers and the kids get to help wrap them up so um I did get teacher volunteers I'm not forcing anyone into it so all right so you heard a little bit about tickets and acknowledgement and what you see in in front of you is an example of what we're using at smok town every building is using something similar uh but it's really to acknowledge immediately and giving positive praise for what's what's expected so it's really important and we're talking to our teachers and our Paras about acknowledging are you
019safe are you responsible and are you respectful with a specific targeted Behavior so there's some examples so you are being so safe by walking in the hall so it's clearly aligned to what is what is the expectation here are our bins of tickets we broke them up to K to2 and 3 to five and that's what we've collected so far this year so each week they're collected and students drawn from um we pull about two students per home room and they get to pick from the prize cart there on the right and then at our monthly assemblies we pull from those big bins and those students get some larger prizes um not just prize card so we're collecting as the year goes on and these are set up right outside the cafeteria where all students
020can see them you see a lot of like Trinkets and things but there's a there's coupons so some of our hot ticket items are being an office helper um and you'll see a quote here from Mrs Mar our attendance secretary she she gets to celebrate with the kids when they come down and then they do little office tasks other students are um the guest announcer for the day so there's relational side of of reinforcements as well as the little trinkets for for kids who like that uh we're going to close out with a couple quotes from teachers um and then some some students as well um and you really see a really broad spectrum of some positivity of of how people are feeling and it's it's different for some folks uh but you can see
021here our primary emotional support teacher is really seeing some really great things with her students who aren't always uh seen for the positive things that they're doing um second grade seeing some great things you mentioned the spotted so if you see a whole class Meeting those expectations you can spot a whole class and you can earn classwide extra recess and things that that the whole class can enjoy in addition to individual reinforcements and then Milan our fifth grade student here just you can see just reminds her to do the right thing so really great things happening at smok Town we're really excited about PBIS we're in it's infancy right now uh but with our student groups our teacher groups we're excited to see how it grows so thank you for your time any questions comments
022I know it's early but yeah are you seeing a positive effect on Behavior I would say so I think there's an excitement around doing the right thing and and I'll go back to the consistency piece um things were inconsistent with expectations of what we we all agreed upon as being expected um and I keep saying the hallway behavior that was a big thing at smok Town some teachers it was a level level zero a hallway and others it was you could talk so even just having really common expectations is helping kids know what's expected um so that when we do need to reinforce or redirect there's nothing it's very clear so I would say from that stance I'm seeing some improvements um from a schoolwide tier one level even today one of our pair of
023professional support teachers I saw standing in front of the poster in the hallway and just hey hey let's review these expectations and it was just a quick I saw you do this and that's not what's expected here's here's what is expected and it took you know 30 seconds so like part discipline 101 catch them doing something right yes and it is there there are things and consequences and following the code of conduct when things are not done right so um we're trying to support the cafeteria Proctors um with our referral system that's been going fairly well we just started that last week uh but just helping there's positive and negative consequences to all of our actions and trying to balance that out and and how do you have consistency in uh how you handle someone
024that isn't doing what they share so we we go back to the code of conduct and we're working on a behavior flow which is part of PBIS of of classroom managed behaviors major office referrals and then following a process through that which is outlined so it's the same for everybody yes yeah and putting in the supports so that it's not necessarily A punitive but how are we reteaching and and handling each situation as it question as a learning experience you want to add anything back there smiling about it I'm I'm just proud of this team I love hear I think of all the work Sarah and the district team put in to get to this place so it's exciting to see the slides and the pictures and the um all the things that we plan
025for a year actually come to PR and the momentum thank you we appreciate your time thank you have a good school year thank you sorry gentlemen this is the first time during our agenda where we take public comments does anyone have uh an issue they'd like to address with the board from something on our agenda if not yes good evening my name isi I would you would you come up to where we can hear you better please you state your name my name is Tanya Smith and you are a parent I am a parent of a student who is being bullied at the high school it's nice to put a face to your to the name Dr Hartman I'm Jana's mom yes um I'm just curious if anyone here can help me I have been
026working with Administration and I've gotten no resolution I know that Mrs Johnson has been trying but we are at a point where my daughter is being videoed during a study hall by another student and it is affecting her greatly um I'm not sure where to go at this point so this is where I was directed to come can anyone help Dr heart very for this m I think so far from what I know the situation she has gone through the appropriate channels it's um I believe around noon today you emailed the high school administration to look into it and uh Mrs Johnson I think is on it and I don't know where we're at with that investigation or or what's going on with it I disagree I mean she is on it but I disagree
027that we're getting anywhere at this point I feel that um things are getting worse for my daughter well what what would I think needs to happen is everyone involved needs to meet and be one specific and maybe come up with the plan for you I've already done that the board has has no disciplinary Powers until something's brought to us so I could just ask Dr artman to intervene she would be at the top of that chain of command okay we do have her her contact information I'm sure maybe be set up with the Dr har okay thank you and if it doesn't work I'm sure we'll hear back from you I'm sure you will thank you is there anyone else who would like to address something anyone from cvea or another employee group nothing tonight
028they will move on to the consent agenda are there any questions or concerns with anything on the consent agenda if not I will accept a motion to approve items a through K with the changes motion to approve items a through K on the consent agenda With The Changes second roll call please Mr gel hi Mr dman hi Mrs capka hi Mr Hurst hi Dr Martin hi M trobridge hi Mrs SC I our next item on the agenda is a uh the equity audit we have Dr Tony Brean and Eric at we're going to present how far we gotten with this I have this as a PDS not a PowerPoint so just let me know what okay okay so um good evening my name as she said my name is Erica Lee I am one half
029of the chiso Consulting Group my partner uh Dr Tanya breand couldn't be here um this evening but we are um I'm really happy to be here and I really enjoyed working with um the leadership here for this study and I just want to talk a little bit about sort of like where we are in the in the process for for this study so um we can go to the next slide so um three areas I just want to share with you today one is the update for the the study the other is just take a look at I just want to show you the demographics there's one area of the survey participant demographics that we found remarkable um we do this in a few different um districts and one thing about Koga Valley that I'm
030really excited to kind of share with you um that we don't get in other districts um that I'm going to share with you in a second and then finally the data overview sort of what are the what are the larger trends that we've seen in the um particularly the the quantitative piece of of the study um if you think about the study there are three major areas so one is the survey which I'm sure you've all um seen or heard of the other are the the two areas are qualitative data one is the focus groups and the other is the the document analysis um so policy and documents and processes of Koga Valley those are the three major areas that we've been analyzing next slide so as I've said um we're really working through um
031a couple of phases all of the these areas are completed the major phase the major piece of phase one was the distribution and the analysis of of the survey and all of that has been completed we can go to the next slide and then we had um from those the survey we looked at the trends and then we identified focus group questions like what do we want to know more of thinking about sort of some of the answers realizing that the surveys are perception data right so when you get perception data we have to see see like to what extent is this actually happening for um like throughout the district and so we took a look at that identified some questions and we had um some focus groups and we're currently in progress of um
032analyzing the focus group data because we want to make sure that when we have that survey data that we also substitute or not substitute but substantiate some of the perceptions with what we find with the with the focus groups and we've done that and we're in the process of analyzing the focus group data and then also um we're taking a look at we're in the process of looking at different data sources um we're looking at the handbook the employee handbook the student handbook all those um processes that we've um received and we're analyzing that as well so um we can keep going to the next um the next slide so I just wanted to show you the these are the this is the demographics for the participant um data so overall if you look at
033the top left there we have that little table there one of the things that we found remarkable is the parent the number of parent responses we have never seen numbers like this um in terms of like I'm we're working with the district now and we were praying to get to 100 praying it is a full District praying to get to 100 so when we saw like you know these numbers is going up and up and up it's like this is amazing so you um capped out at 548 which is pretty remarkable um that number on the right there that's in terms of like the number of the total numbers of participants so staff um again and that's a pretty robust number as well so staff the staff numbers are 12% of the total number of
034respondents and then you see the the numbers for the parents and and the students as well which when we um administer this to students in school you would expect that to be the larger number um because we we usually get um the full number the full complement um of student responses when we administer it in in school um we also have um the racial and ethnic breakdown um at the bottom left there and then on the side there we have the school breakdown we thought that was important um as well and you would expect the um as you would expect the high school and the middle school numbers are higher just given the great breakdown of the students that took the the um the survey we can go to question sure sure you you you
035you broke it down into how all your responses are broken down what percentage is St uh do you have a number for how the percentage responses um I don't actually have that number does the leadership might but I don't know your total um I don't know your what's your total population number is for your for your staff so um we can get that to you I'm sure yeah I I I had the same question I think would be interesting to see the response rate for each of those categories sure we we had gotten uh very early on when this first went out some uh idea and uh I just wondered if those numbers held up back then it was uh 3/4 of Staff a third of parents and 57% of students but after the high
036school students which I thought was huge I just wondered if that grew or that was adjusted yeah so I so we don't have an um we don't know what your total population is in in either um in either category um but we can I'm certainly find that out um with the with the leadership um I do so yeah I'll just leave it at that we can find that out yeah um so these are these numbers really are trend numbers so in terms of the staff survey so this is a um the top rated on the left and the lowest rated these are those that um identified um selected strongly agree or agree so we use the lyer scale strongly agree down to strongly disagree so the numbers that you have here are those that identified
037or selected strongly agree or agree so um what we found the trend that we found for staff is really around know the notion of um fairness and Justice and creating really safe environments for their students and also like these really engaging learning environments so the staff um responded really positively around their perception of the way that they provided you know really safe and inclusive spaces so you see those numbers are really high um the lower rated items for staff were really around resourcing really around like staff res resourcing so for instance 7% agreed or strongly agreed that there are enough staff to meet the needs of all specialed students so those are those are those numbers are lower and we see that with um that same um sentiment around counseling needs and also bilingual students
038um the other area the other Trend that we saw in terms of the lower rated items are around um really around like these Equity um these Equity principles so one is about being able to distinguish between an asset based belief and a deficit based belief so that is do we see students based on their deficits or do we see them based on the strengths that they bring to the environment in which they're learning um and then finally that last one 24% of the staff respondents believe that District the district uses an equity lens when evaluating policies and so um those are the trends that we saw around the staff numbers the higher the top rated and the lower rated the next slide shows you the parent Trends so what we found with the parent um
039the the one that was the highest rated is really around the access to technology so 89% of parents believe that their kid has access to a laptop or other devices um to complete assignments and that's around like um access and so they believe that there their their child has access the other areas are really around um again the provision of safe spaces so like the teachers the parents agree that the child's teach their child's teachers actually provide safe and inclusive spaces so one is about being valued and included and the other is really about like make providing environments that make their child feel safe and learning experiences that make their child feel safe very highly rated in Kota Valley um and finally that last one is around my child's teachers believe my child will be
040successful so 76% of um parents strongly agreed the lower rated items these all really actually centered around discipline policies so 19% believe that my child can still participate in sports even if they have low grades um if my child gets in trouble they're still permitted to participate in activities 27% agreed or strongly agreed with that and um we found that actually pretty remarkable because there seem to be like 27% says yeah if my child gets in trouble they can they can still participate so that's 27% so that means like 70 something perent say no so then the question is what we would dig deeper in is there inconsistency in implementation is there a lack of understanding around what the policy actually is so all of those um other ones is really around like discipline and
041what happens if a kid is um kind of struggling with behavior or grade um what might be the the consequences um and that one in the middle there um if if rules in my child school or unfair my child is allowed to share their opinions that one's really about student voice to what extent does a kid have um voice um in the space in which they're in which they're learning and then the next slide is the the student um survey results so the trends that we see for the students actually mirror the parents so that first one there again is about access to technology that's almost actually exactly the same percentage number which is really interesting and then the other ones are around you know feeling safe and included and so what we found that
042um in alignment is that staff parents and students all felt like there are really some really safe environments and and they feel kids feel valued and included and that was sort of reverberated among the um the three stakeholder groups um like parents though um kids had lower ratings around discipline so if my grades are low I'm still able to participate in sports or you know if I get into trouble this happens these actually mirror the parents perceptions around discipline um and then um students you know um that that middle one there I believe students are disciplined fairly um that's usually lowest graded when it comes to students um most students don't think they're disciplined barely um but then um that last one there is like I see how my culture is a part of the
043way my my teacher teaches or interacts with me and that's one of the lower rated ones as as well and so that was interesting that kind of popped up as um we usually get all discipline for for kids um but that those discipline um items actually kind of mirrored like I said um the parents but that one about around the culture is sort of one that we would dig deeper around like culture responsive practices and making sure that kids kind of see themselves um represented or reflected in materials or practices or even interactions with with parents I mean with um with teachers and so um I believe that's the last slide oh no there's one more slide and that really is around resources in literature we are constantly looking at what the research says and
044different resources that actually provide really good strategies and and and information around you know providing really great um learning experiences for kids um particularly in spaces that are diverse and so we have two books here that are really considered almost um um standard around Dei um uh teaching and cultur responsive um instruction and then the Pennsylvania Department of Education has a really great um comprehensive compendium compendium of resources around Equitable practices for districts and we wanted to include that as well and so that really concludes my um presentation and my sort of overview of the process thus far and I guess at this time we'll take questions if anybody has any questions is um Dr Hartman and our Administration able to view this data by building based on responses so I'm just curious because since
045we're tracking that they can actually see because it'd be interesting to see and I'm sure they're when they do that deep dive to see which buildings particularly with the negative things is it trending more in one building or two versus another one based on some of that stuff um which would be interesting for sure so I'm glad they can dig down into that do you have any sense with discipline if uh if there's a route there we not everyone agrees on what the discipline should look like can you repeat that question I'm sorry when when you have answers uh there were a lot more questions and you know those low five but do you get any sense that the core problem is or part of the core problem is that a lot of people have
046different ideas as to what the discipline should look like so they may be happy or unhappy with the same uh same rules um I absolutely think so so even looking through and we're not finished with the uh focus group analysis but there does seem to be some um um I'll say just inconsistency around sort of what constitutes good behavior what constitutes disrespect um which is why in a pre that previous um um presentation around PBIS was really great around like let's be consistent around our language and our expectations um because we definitely kind of saw that you notice that in the focus group um from the focus group uh information so yes I do get a sense now what is it specifically I wouldn't be able to say just yet yeah and know the focus
047groups in each of these three categories so is there a staff focus group a parent focus group and a student focus group yes okay yes I when I read through uh the exact questions for some of these uh when it comes to the student survey it seems to me that there was a huge difference between the sixth grader and 11th and 12th grader uh and and some of the questions weren't uh weren't out propose for you know a a middle school student uh do you ever break it down for the students more than that yes so we can actually see that so when we're like looking at um so our analysis is like what's happening in the Middle School what's happening in the high school because we know that there are different environments right and
048so even in the questions the focus group questions we had um slightly different questions that would really address what seemed to be the Middle School concern as opposed to what seem to be the high school student concern so yes yeah I I I sometimes read some of the ansers and wondered what their yard stick is like especially the parents you again it's perceptual yes but uh at some point you want to have something uh more structured you know exactly you know what makes you think that so at some point do we get to that point to where we get some background for why I gave a certain answer so that that really is the whole focus of that really is the whole purpose of the focus group so when we see like those really low
049rated items we go after them or when we see that so for every item on the survey there is not for every but for most items on the survey there was like a a staff question a parent question right and so when we saw large discrepancies so if 80% of the staff said yes I do this but 20% of the teacher of the parents said that's not happening we wanted to know like okay what's happening in this in this Gap um so that's sort of what we went after okay and this will be completed when yes so um our projection is really by the end of the calendar year okay we will have you back yes yes you'll see me again any other questions thank you thank you thank you I have one quick question
050I'm not sure who it to Mark when this is all done Mark when this is all done what do we do with it I think we wait till the end of the recommendations but I think that's where we as a as a board as an admin team will look at there might be some policy recommendations that come out of this there might be some programmatic recommend ations as with anything their recommendations what do we take what what's best for the in interest of the district so I think even when we get the final report there will still be decisions to be made after that I think we'll have to talk about you know if a policy recommendation comes out that might be based on best practice or parent interest is it consistent with W is
051it consistent with what in PA we currently are required to do for for example something like eligibility or something like that but so I think there's still going to be a lot of U heavy lifting to do even when this is done but I think this has given us great Baseline data and then even more in- depth followup data on what our how our community feels how our parents feel how our students feel it that we can look at to make decisions on Dr ker would you not to put you on the spot that you've been more involved in than I have you have anything to add to that right when you think about it from our comprehensive plan lens right that this this audit is just the first step in understanding the landscape and
052then from there we prioritize based on the recommendations and that's really when the actual work starts right now we're collecting the data we're getting the landscape then we'll come back we'll make decisions as far as priority one priority two and put some action uh steps to those priorities and I think the timing if the stars align will be perfect with ending the calendar year because it should align with when we're going to developing our revisions to the comprehensive plan so that's another added added bonus is that some of these recommendations um could become Focus areas of our comprehensive plan for the next threeyear cycle any other questions if not our next item comes from Mr Johnson and good evening good evening this is a step forward right yes actually two steps forward both this one
053and the next one um these are very similar to uh what we presented with J.R Reynolds settlement um a few months ago so I there was a lot of back and forth I mean from the last mediation I think we came at least out of that moving forward with both hor and and matchline so um they've been very responsible in both accounts so if you have any questions we can also Mr Frank CER said he's available if you would have any questions we could bring him in so like approval tonight yes approval tonight will be I'm sorry I said would you like approval tonight yes do we have the final those what oh oh yeah the two final documents the two final documents you have in your and your position yeah any other questions well
054I'm just pleased that at least some of our contractors were willing to sit down and talk yes it's through reasonably and so far we're still staying in budget yes uh I can take one motion for both of these together if you'd like yet you can no I'll I'll make it I I move that we approve both settlements as presented second do we have a roll call this please Mr dilman hi Mrs cap hi Mr tally hi Mr H hi Dr Martin hi M trobridge hi Mr gensel hi Mrs bro hi wonderful the next item I brought [Music] my this is not the most important thing sport does and that's the most important thing we're doing this evening but it's the one that has the most sentimental value to it uh it's a little bit unique
055for us we have um abandoned or demolished or sold or transferred uh property before uh we've closed buildings but we've never had anything quite like this where we're abandoning a building and moving away way and we have to name the new building so at some point we have to come to a an agreement so I will simply open for discussion for anyone who'd like to make a suggestion or a demand whatever but this was a brick from the original snoke town in the original original from 19820 no there was something about that no back then 1937 1937 is that what it says yeah so I'll start yeah I figured you so I I did a little bit of thinking um and I feel like it's almost because we're moving to a new building if we
056give it a new name it's almost like you're rebranding something if you guys saw all the PBIS stuff all the smok town stuff was all over it I don't think it's worth the time energy and investment to make all of those changes just for name's sake I 100% disagree that's okay we talked about this when we first even even thought about the idea of after the Bold issue with with the with with with smokedown had a big Community form with all the people people that were interested in in Smoke Town we were kicking around the idea of it's just not worth keeping up the maintenance aspect building it was going to be a little bit cheaper and um if we sold the property we sold the school we sold whatever and we built a new
057school someplace else that we would not be make naming it it smoke town did anybody have any issues with that the answer was no nobody had any issues with that you know my grandparents met and Mrs Smith's kindergarten class my whole lineage depends upon smok town and I'm going to chain myself to a tree and the answer was no everybody was fine with a new start a fresh start uh it's not in smok town and everybody at the meeting the community at the meeting from that perspective not one person stood up and said keep it uh keep it getting smoked out there's two sides of the is show I agree that I don't think it should be smoked Town cuz it's not in smoked Town anymore everything has to change all the all the stationary
058everything has to change and like the bricks and all the teach teasers that and other um smoke toown stuff people can have that as a memory so you know hey I went to smoke town when to Smoke Town remember when I mean I went through schools that were renamed and moved and all that and you know everything changes kidss kids can adapt and the parents are going to be harder but I don't think Smoke Town keeping at the same name is what we should do I think a new name fresh start new building you R sh name the only thing I would add to that we change the stationary every year anyhow least got have a new address too so yeah that's we did it for the STV Middle School we Chang it to husk
059Middle School changed everything pretty seamlessly we get a new principal we have to change the stationary you a new phone system or something you have to change it I don't I don't know if that's the big issue really anyone else would a weigh in I think um and maybe it's because I tend to be slightly more sentimental but um and I and I I hear what you're saying too Mike with the uh The Forum thing based on our latest forms I wonder what kind of attendance was there because if there's 10 smoked toown people there and they're not putting up an argument based on the way our forms have gone recently it's hard to say that we're getting a great feel from the community when 10 people are there but maybe it was more than
060that's 60 yeah um I think for me it's less about changing things like that I think it's more just um I think it's just the history of the school I think I think it's perfectly fine to we're talking about I know it's not in smoked toown but it's a quarter mile away it's 1.1 miles is it 1.1 that's I looked it up cuz I knew somebody would ask yeah it doesn't feel like that when you drive to Target um so because I'm looking at the speed limit as a suggestion but I shouldn't say that online anyway um but yeah I think I'm a little part of the Cal I know there have been we we did get a little bit write in I think two emails from parents that wanted to keep it the same
061and stuff and I get the sentimental thing and here's the only other piece I have of that is Smoketown is not my family's community and although that doesn't necessarily matter in terms of governance it does influence me a little bit because the families that do care they took the time to write in and say hey we want to keep it smoked down so I would I would think I'm with Diane on this I would I think my preference would be to keep it smoke down plus I think smok toown sounds cooler than the other names that we've tossed around frankly nobody can pronounce husky when they see it spelled but we still took an a luckily there's an acronym for that you don't need to acronym Smoke Town otherwise just I go to S right
062as opposed to ghhms like where do you go I go to S you don't need an acronym for that I'm just going to let that line um anyone else well I as far as as sentiment goes that's the whole thing it's sentimental attachment progress and change is something we should be able to embrace and just because uh the building goes away we weren't going to keep the building just for sentimental reasons but uh that doesn't mean it it disappears in our history originally uh this School in smok toown what what was the school in smok toown is church um and I think sometimes uh you have to move forward and you have to be realistic uh I I I'm for embracing the new not forgetting the old but I'm for embracing the new it's a
063new location a new building uh it's a new uh we Chang our grade our grade mixture and now only goes to fifth grade uh and that's moving forward and I don't think it's disrespectful to drop the other look I've had these bricks at my TV room for let's not talk about how many years uh my kids want to smoke down and my daughter graduated CV I remember once I was out with her and somebody said where did you go to school and she said smoked T and she graduated high school so I I understand that I also know that those those parents right now who don't want to change the name four years from now there won't be anyone that remembers smoke town and cares uh it's a moment in time that causes change and
064I'm ready for the change so I I agree with Mike and I think [Music] Diana I still have a few others of you who haven't weighed in I mean my two senses it I don't it more sense renaming it to the location it is however I also respect the sentimental value and stuff like that of keeping it the same name um and since it really doesn't matter to me too much I would defer to the smok town community and the only thing I've heard from them was so far was keeping it like Dan Mark said so I guess if I had to choose a side I would defer to them and say keep it but is it any surprise the people that are there feel that way no no I'm not surprised by that at
065all um but I just I guess I have a little bit of hesitation being coming in from the outside being I'm not I don't my kids aren't in that school and stuff like that coming in the outside and be like no I'm sorry you really feel strongly about this but too bad I want it this way instead kind of thing so I just since it doesn't really affect anything with me I would defer to that is my view on look at the two of you that haven't SP was Cathy to go first it it doesn't matter to me I naturally thought we would call it smoke town but it's it's neither here nor there for me either but I don't wondered since we had the principal here tonight and she's been in different schools and
066different areas if she's leave quick just my my thoughts it's been a a topic of conversation at PTO meetings at back to school night um and what I share with the the parents is that it's a boor decision but I did I did say that lots of school boards have different processes in which they take when when a renaming occurs uh some communities reach out to the school community and gather a broad opinion from from the community other boards make an opinion based off of kind of it sounds like what you've heard from folks uh but at the end of the day it's a board decision and I encourage you to come to a board meeting agenda um but so I kind of just told them the process in which it occurs but I I
067have heard both I have heard from parents that they would love it to stay and I've heard from parents that they would love for a new building a new name um so that's sort of what I suspected you know we have to be careful of paying attention to squeaky wheel you're left so my opinion is similar yet different than Phils so I have no connection to smokedown so I want to be very respectful and differential to the people that do have connections to that school so from that perspective I don't feel as though my opinion holds much weight having said that though I lean much more towards this is a new school with its own identity might be the same group of students same group of teachers but it will have its own identity and
068therefore I think part of its own identity is its name which is different than the current school which I feel it should be different and and for me I feel uh well if if you've got everything there from kindergarten to fifth grade now the people in fourth and fifth grade have been there several years and their families have so their feeling is going to be strong stronger than the ones who' have only been there a year because you have to remember that all these people that want to keep at smoke Camp are Dynamic they're moving on and in a couple years they won't be in elementary school at all that's that's true I but your daughter is a prime example of even when you're out of that school you still feel very connected to it
069well I gave that example to show that you know I I understand and I spent a lot of time in Smoke Town HS but that was that so um right now we've got three three one way and four the other something like that that's only half a decision folks because once you decide well if you decide to keep it smoked Town that's it if you decide to change it to [Music] what Whit I agree with what it's just we already have the Whitmer Annex on the high school anex that becomes confusing I think yeah W elementary school elementary kids don't know what's going on in the high [Laughter] school like oh it's a wh well my suggestion Denise lamper that's where it is and don't forget everyone that goes say to Brownstown doesn't live in
070Brownstown because it encompasses know some of them live pretty far away too not even the same you know municipality that's true so I guess I figured all the others except for Fritz which was a new building so it got you know the name the bar uh the first superintendent of CV the others are named for where they are brown is it browna Isola I felt this is in the SL pater so of how we divide we think of ourselves as the three municipalities which at one time they all separate back in what the 50s so I'll throw something out in reference to that so there is lamp Peter Elementary in lamp Peter Strasburg so that could get a little I don't I mean it's close and if my kid says yeah I go to they
071forget the east or like whatever L I'm like well you go to LS no you don't go to LS you go to CV so I think that is a little too close a little too similar well but I don't know East have East Peter West E West yeah I don't I don't like naming it a bigger Township I like a smaller Community feel of naming after the town or like you know Koga we can call TV Elementary that's what a lot of it's all on the same campus it gives the board of future board or you know to name after somebody if later on down down the line well changing a name is you know different yeah my vote is if we're changing the name it goes to Whitmer financially Whitmer is a shorter name
072over many years it'll be less ink less science say that again I'm giving her my calculator it's a shorter name yeah so you're saving over 50 period she's right over 50e period you the school probably saved like 10 or 12 bucks that much that much a little bit helps hey the state is not giving us more right saying we got a penny pinch here well I'm willing to take a motion and see if it floats motion to what rename it I'm will to take any motion and see if it floats or you want to Kick the Can some more no I think we need to get we haven't even got creative yet let not like please stop what no the creative we could really go down around there yeah cool okay I'll make a motion
073to put does Ken have something just a clarification Whitmer andex was named after a person not after a town okay oh there you go so just just to clarify well I'm sure like if somebody's like where'd you go to school and you say Whitmer an alumni isn't going to go you went to school at the Whitmer Annex we can always rename the Whitmer I get that I just it's the same name what' you say you rename the wh at next if you want to guess we could all right I'll make a motion to keep to make the new smok Town Elementary School keep named smok Town Elementary second no have a question I just have a question to make sure we're good no we're we're not voting this is not an action item you said
074you wanted a motion for a motion right I'm sorry not have so we can motion to put it on the future agenda but we can still come to an agreement right well I think you had three for keeping it and one two three four five for renaming it so I would say you rename it and then so far with that you have three say Whitmer I haven't heard anything else other and East sleter Whitmer I could go with Whitmer I mean we can take a straw vote youing wrong with that lmer yeah I go no I'm not me neither well but still that's major we will put it on the uh agenda for our next meeting consent or vote for vote for vote for vote so people can have time to I really was not
075so sure we were going to come to an agreement I apologize for asking for the motion I Cor myself there does this still give Ken the time that he needs less letters okay then that is settled uh board reports I'm sorry finance and operations any comments and those reports curriculum instruction reports are there any reports to Federal fund okay then we'll get down to board reports I posted the usual I psba and Academy ones the only thing I would add to psba is U there's still playing games with parts of the budget um one of the things I've heard a lot lately was that they're actually willing to talk about getting rid of uh sunsetting uh or reviewing mandates the idea there is if we save money by not having to meet some of these
076mandates that leads more money in our revenue and so the state can say we have more money and they haven't had a take it out of theirs uh the other thing is uh there are some numbers around I don't know which ones are finalized and which ones aren't uh one of them is more money to ctc's uh not as much as I would I don't think it's nearly what they asked for considering we're talking so much today about career and technology training another is for leveling up uh but even that doesn't touch even half of the leveling up ones but the one that's getting the biggest of the three I'd like to mention uh is getting 150 million and that's an increase in what used to be called the eitc is now called thec right
077uh those are the tax credits for money not going to the public school but going to donations to private schools they're going up $150 million without anyone uh adding to that that they have to uh show data about who whom they're uh they're putting they're accepting um or anything about uh the requirement of achievement yet they're getting quite a chunk so they say you put your money where your heart is and some of us have our hearts in our Public Schools um CTC do you have a report for us just I was actually unable to make the last meeting because of a work emergency but I'm assuming Dr Sav emailed that annual report over that was attached so okay other than that construction team have you met again I needed to nothing new okay are
078there any other reports from many to committees I would have one request I don't know if all of our board members who sit on District committees are actually being notified I don't know if you might check on that check okay is there anyone else who would like to address the board on any issue at all board initiatives and concerns uh our next meeting will be uh at the middle school in Whitmer um we're going to have a very short forum and an open house so we'll get that information out and uh we'll get it in the the buckin bass and such so people have plenty of time to know that it's coming coming up uh and last uh the dates of our board meetings if there are no other issues I will take I will
079take a motion session second all say I that's it very thank you