001president of your school board. Welcome everybody to our voting meeting on March 19th after some delay earlier this week. We're glad to be here. Um we're going to start by uh saying the pledge of allegiance. I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands. One nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. All right. Um, the board did meet an executive session. Um, also as I always remind folks, we do record these meetings. They're live. So, you can tune in now or you can watch them later on our website. And we are going to hear, it looks like, from a couple of schools tonight. I'm very excited. Um, who is up first? Alphabet. Yeah, we'll go alphab al alphabetical. Charles Town, come
002on down. We're so glad you're here. Good evening, members of the school board and administrators and guests. Thank you for giving us a chance to share what student council has been doing at Charleston Elementary. In November, our school community worked together for our annual food drive. Because of the generosity of our students and families, we collected nine full boxes of food that were donated to the Chester County Food Bank. We would also like to give a special thank you to Dr. Davis, our art teacher, for letting us use her very large vehicle to help transport all the dinners. In December, we held our tis the season gift drive to help families in our community. This year, we helped 28 families to pro provide gifts for their children, which is a new record for our school.
003The Charletown community came together and donated over 300 items. We wanted to say a huge thank you to everybody who make this a special event for so many families. We also started something new this year. Student council has been making small things to share with different groups around Charles Town so everyone knows they are seen and appreciated. And since so many students wanted to be involved, our fourth grade student council representatives were also allowed to bring another fourth grade friend to help. In February, we made Valentine's cards for every adult in the building. And in March, we are making suncatchers to give anyone we think may need a smile. And we have something special planned for teacher appreciation in May. March has been a very busy month at Charles Town. Our Discovery Fair, which was
004the first book fair at Charles Town in many years, included lots of steam items that students could explore and purchase in audition to the books. Thank you to Mrs. Harvey and the PTO for bringing this exciting event to our school. We loved it. We also celebrated ReadAcross America week from March 2nd through March 5th. Mrs. Burgard organized a fun book bracket to help us decide Charles Town's favorite readaloud. Mrs. Harvey ran a guest the book in a jar activity where students tried to figure out the book from small snipets of pages. Dr. Davis and Mrs. Demitzus created a Dr. Seuss inspired photo background drop where students could take pictures and students council held reading inspires spirit days. We also are getting ready for the upcoming music concerts and we want to give a big shout
005out to Miss Seatan and Miss Rel for all the hard work they do to make these performances possible. Also, another highlight was our staff of student floor hockey game organized by Mr. Steve and Mrs. Tutani. It was amaz It was an amazing event for our school. The teachers did win this year, but Miss Seaman, we appreciate you helping the students by scoring two goals for our team. March also included the Chester County Science Fair where five projects, two teams, and three individual projects from Charles Town were represented. These of the three of those projects earned awards. Vihan and Arjun earned second place with high honors in the team category for their project called Signal Smashers, The Hunt for Wi-Fi Kryptonite. Sam also earned second place with high honors in the engineering category for the project.
006Does the speed of a magnetic field moving through a coil of wires affect the amount of electricity produced? And Vrage received first place with the distinguished honors for his computer science project called can AI model recognize the human posture accurately. We are very proud of all the students who represented Charles Town so well. Looking ahead, May will also be a busy month at Charles Town. On May 1st, we will have our spring fair and student council worked with Miss Cobalt from the PTO to help share theme ideas for the event. On May 8th, we will have field day. And from May 11th through May 15th, student council will be collecting donations for for two love a canine, a local rescue organization in Malvin that we partnered with last year. Thank you for letting us share
007what student council has been working on this year. We are proud to be a part of the school community that works together, helps others, and spreads kindness. Enjoy the rest of your school year. Thanks guys. That was awesome. Thank you to Mr. De Midas for leading the charge there. We appreciate your work. All right, General Wayne, come on down. Good evening. My name is Dina Shri and I I am the president of the GWES student council. With me tonight is our vice president Logan Ludy Treas Treasurer Lily Ree and Secretary Roy. Thank you for inviting us to share some of the wonderful things happening at GWes. The GWes community continues to be more than generous. We have been very busy over the last several months. In early December, we say yay to PJs to raise
008money for the children's fund at CHOP. Everyone who wanted to wear their PJs brought in or made a donation online. Do you want to guess how much we raised? No. Well, it was three digits, $84. Throughout the month of January, we focused on collecting items to love K9. We collected gently used towels and blankets, dog and cat toys, food and leashions, and more. We also held a PJ day where friends could bring in $1 for their to wear their PJs. We collected almost $175. In February, we held a spirit week focusing on kindness. We call it Valentine week. Monday was brighten someone's day. Do something nice for them and yourself. Tuesday was kindness makes the heart grow fonder. We reached out to a family member or a friend and checked in on them. Wednesday was
009we are powered by kindness. We spent time with a pet or family member. Thursday was dream of kindness. We created a Valentine or kind note for a friend. Friday was team kindness. We were helpful doing chores without asking. We have begun March's reading madness events across the school. Teachers and their students have chosen a favorite book. Each class book will compete against other class books to see which ones make it to the next bracket. We are super excited to read. We have launched our spring has sprung leaders campaign. We are holding a spirit week to practice leadership skills. Monday, leaders practice mindfulness. Wear your PJs. Tuesday, what kind of leader do I want to be when I grow up? Just like that leader. Wednesday, our role our leader role model. Pick a role model you
010aspire to be like. Thursday, quote, pick a quote that aligns with you as a leader. Friday, GWES day. We will all come together to show our unity as leaders. Just like you, as board members, we strive to be role models to each other by showing kindness to new friends, asking them to play, helping someone, showing integrity by picking up trash even if it's not ours. holding doors, showing respect, responsibility, and being safe. Our three Bs, which are a part of our GWES community. Lastly, we are getting ready to celebrate April is Autism Awareness Month. We're going to tattoo our teachers. We get to buy tattoos and tattoo our teachers. of course with their permission. The money raised will go to the Eagles Autism Awareness Foundation. We will also hold a spirit week focusing on team
011up Monday. Wear Eagle/screen and or gear sensory friendly Tuesday. People with autism have a variety of sensory needs. Dress up today in your comfy clothes, sweatpants, or school appropriate PJs. What's your passion? Wednesday. One characteristic of a person with autism could be that they're very focused and passionate about a certain topic. Wear something you feel passionate about today. Dress to dress to sew something you love. Neurodeiversity Thursday to celebrate the diverse spectrum of the human mind. Wear tie-dye or rainbow. Friday. Color wars. Each grade wears a color to show unity. Lastly, we'd like to ask each of you as our school board members and administrators, can you please visit our classrooms? Thank you for inviting us to share our general way pride this evening. We are honored. Have a fabulous week. Thank you guys. Well
012done. Thank you to Mrs. Salvatico as well for leading this. I love your merch and I will be reaching out to your principal to schedule a time to come visit. I would love to come to General Wayne. So, thank you for the invite. Well done, everybody. Um, I think up next is our high school report. Justin, come on down. Hi everyone. I hope you've had a great week so far. I know it's been a little bit of a hassle with the rescheduling, but now that we're all together, I can share what we've been working on over at the high school in the past two weeks, which as usual has been a lot. First, on the academic side of things, I know I talked a couple of weeks ago about the course selection process. Now, that
013is complete and students have submitted the classes they'd like for the next year and they'll hear about their core classes before the end of the year and schedules with all the classes will come out in the summer. And then another thing, it's hard to believe it's been eight months since I was up here introducing myself, but already it's March, so we have to start thinking about AP exams and students are studying for those with the hopes of getting college credit as I talked about previously. And then also on Saturday, the high school hosted an SAT, which was great for those of us taking it because we didn't have to go as far this time and it was very convenient. On the athletic side of things, the Citizens Bank Cool School's Polar Plunge was participated in
014by members of the cheerleading team, girls basketball team, and Best Buddies Club. And that raised money for unified sports, which is where they combined students with and without intellectual disabilities to foster inclusivity and build friendships. And with that, they raised over $4,000 for that cause, which is really sign significant, and it's the most they've raised in a while. And uh as you can see with the image at the bottom there, they went to Citizens Bank Park and they took a polar plunge. It was a very cold rainy day, but they were happy to do it for the cause. And for other sports, the lacrosse opened with a win 13-2 against Perkyan Valley. The boys tennis started their season 2 to1, two games one with wins against Bishop Shanahan and Heritton. And then six Great Valley
015wrestlers recently competed in regionals combining for seven collective wins. So I wanted to talk a little about the allied health program. So it's a great program. I was I was able to talk with a few of the students who participated in it and learn more about it. But some general overview before I get to what they said. It's a healthcare internship that counts for credit hours. So students at the high school can take this class in place of their classes and still get credit for it. And there's three pathways with this. EMT, hospital, and sports medicine. So they differ in what they learn and also with how they do their clinical hours, which is hands-on work. So with the EMT pathway, the students who take that go on actual calls with EMTs and learn about
016in learn about performing first aid in a fast-paced environment. And then they learn in the classroom about what it takes to be a first responder and how to effectively answer calls. With the hospital pathway, they work clinical, they work their clinical hours in a hospital, obviously. And they learn about working in a sterile environment, how to keep that clean, how to work with patients, and then on the sports medicine side, they do their clinical hours at various um physical rehab centers, regional and local. And then all three have a focus on learning about communication and how to perform under pressure which is a huge aspect of healthcare. And this is an especially important program because healthc care has been the amount of workers in this profession has been on decline recently. So anything that can
017be done to build more people in the community of workers in healthcare is always positive. And then this is designed for people who students who want to work in healthcare in the future. And I know I said I talked to two students who do this program and they wanted to share that it was a really great opportunity that they wouldn't have otherwise and it's really rare to get these clinical hours in high school and it gives them an advantage when it comes to applying to competitive schools that are for healthcare and also for applying for a job in the healthcare industry later on. Next, similar to the healthcare theme, I wanted to talk about the HOSA club, which uh it stands for health occupation students of America. And as opposed to the um previous slide,
018this is a club, not a class. And it's a international studentled organization. So, it's similar to FBLA or DECA. I know I presented on them earlier where they have competitive events and they compete at state and local, state, and national leadership conferences. and it promotes career opportunities in healthcare as well as allied health. And GVHS recently went to the state leadership conference. They brought around 45 students and 15 of them had top finishes and they will head to Indianapolis this summer for the international event. And also it's a cool thing that one of the Great Valley students was actually appointed secretary of the Pennsylvania chapter of hostess. That's a really big accomplishment for them. Finally, I wanted to highlight one more class, popular culture studies, which is a fullear half credit class, meaning students take
019it for the entire year, every other day. And through this, they examine modern art, culture, and entertainment. And the content of the class shifts every year, which is really cool. They don't study the same thing. They'll whatever the students want to study, they can study. I know in years past they've done the Grammys and they've also studied the Super Bowl and the cultural effects of that and many other aspects of modern society. And through the class students get to redefine literature to include many things like art and entertainment. And it's good for students who want to take communications majors in college and pursue a career in that as well. Lastly, some upcoming events. the Denmark exchange, the long- awaited part two. I was here a few months ago sharing what the first part of that
020was when they came to the Denmark students came to Great Valley. But recently, a few days ago, the Great Valley students left for Denmark. And when they get back, I'll be able to share some photos and tell you how that went. Next, the prom closet is an opportunity for students to borrow um shirts, pants, dresses, and shoes for prom. And that's something that the student council puts on that they're setting up for and will be happening in the next week. And then finally, I know Anna talked about this, the Lightning Thief spring musical at the high school is coming up and the date for that is April 17th through the 19th. And you're obviously welcome to attend that if you would like. So, as always, thank you for allowing me to come up here and
021present to you. And I had a lot of fun learning about allied health, as I hope you did. So, thank you for that, and have a great weekend. Yeah, please. Oh, could we turn that mic back on? Oh, sorry. I did not put this in our speech, but we have a first place winner. Dina, our president, was one of the science fair first place. I wanted her to explain her project if that was okay. Hi. Um, my project was called the greenhouse effect. It was talking about how if we added more carbon carbon dioxide to plants, would the plants grow bigger and stronger? So my partnership and I worked on a project about we would have a controlled experiment growing the plant regularly and another experiment while we would to combine baking soda and vinegar
022to create the reaction of carbon dioxide and add that to the plants and trap it in its atmosphere to see if that will help the plant's growth or make it bigger and stronger and toward I the help I gained was from my family and my partnership. Overall, the project was really fun. Yeah. Thank I got to have a question though. So your your project, what did it yield? So did the carbon dioxide add to the growth? Just I'm I'm curious to know the outcome. The carbon dioxide did help the outcome of that plant, but we also after further research, we figured out it's not very healthy for the plants to receive increased levels of carbon dioxide. It actually contributes into global warming. And so our end question was, do you want your plants to be
023bigger and stronger or do do you want it to compromise the Earth's climate? So very impressive. Well done. Thank you. Thank you so much. Thanks everybody. We're going to move on to the rest of our uh board meeting. So we can take a couple of minutes so folks can move on with their evenings if you would like. Thank you to all our students for being here and their families. Happy birthday, Lucas Dan. Thank you. All right, moving on. Uh, the we're in section five. The board did meet in executive session to discuss legal and personnel matters. 502. Is there any secretar's correspondence? There's no correspondence this evening. Um, IU report. 503. I do have an IU report. uh we met last night. Um so one of the fun things they reported on was that they
024have three students they highlighted three students who are technical high school graduates who have now come back to help teach classes in both um electrical HVAC and autoc collision. So they did a really cool video asking students like how does it make you feel knowing someone who sat in this program now had a successful career and came back. Um and they're still young kids. It was they maybe been out about five years. So, that was really cool to see that and see all the cool things that they're doing. Um, we heard a lot about the marketplace budget. We've talked about it a lot. Um, there will be a slight increase in the marketplace budget and that's just where we do all of our kind of allocart things, special ed, preschool, head start, DEVO, those types
025of things. Um they talked briefly about um some state mandates that that changed this year and they referenced a handy dandy 26page checklist of changes to state mandates this year. So there's a lot of stuff for our administrators to go through. So thank you for that. Um, another interesting thing was that if you remember during the uh budget impass, a lot of schools including the IU took out loans just to cover expenses and now they are billing the state for the cost that of those loans. So the IU is has build the state for the $300,000 it cost them to just take out the loan even though they didn't end up having to use it. Um, so that is something that's happening there. And then just a reminder, which we talked about, they are having
026their legislative breakfast on April 17th at the Boot Road location. Great. Legislative report. That's Trisha, who's not here, right? Okay. Um, any other board committee reports that I missed? Um, all right. Finance committee, we meet next week on Monday. Okay, it's a committee of the whole uh comm's committee is not set to meet till April 9th, facil uh learning and innovation April 13th, facilities April 23rd and policy April 28th. So April's a big month. Uh superintendent update. Thank you everybody. Happy to share some some good news from across the district. We'll start off with our middle school and you'll see on tonight's agenda we we have some qualifiers but our middle school math counts team uh is doing well and you can see the team are in fourth place and we have two of the
027students in the top 10 out of 136 students. So uh congratulations and you can see Mr. Bernbomb our one of our middle school math teachers in the picture and uh want to thank him and the students for their support of math counts and it's nice to see uh we'll have some qualifiers moving on to compete at the the next level. sticking with our mu musical or our middle school theme. We had our our musical that the the production um went really well of of Legally Blonde. So, uh Justin mentioned our high school musical, The Lightning Thief, is on the horizon and we have our our our young theater students refining their skills here at the middle level. Nice productions all the way around. Hopefully, you were able to get out and see it, but uh
028congratulations. So we see the arts, we see math, um music, uh carrying that forward, our elementary music concerts, many of them have been going on um some today, some previously. So we have had some structure uh where we now do them during the day and really it was twofold. One is when they were at night, a lot of students couldn't get back in the nighttime and so that was hard to leave students out of these whole school concerts. So, uh, one of the recommendations that our principles and music teachers wanted to make was like bring it during the day. Uh, and they had some live streams available for parents. So, it's a newer change. We'll see what kind of feedback we get, but it really was uh a decision made with our our students in
029mind. Also, when you do all those evening concerts, it is a lot of nights out for your elementary music when you're doing first grade one night and second another and third and and so on. So, uh, we're going to see how this went. We'll gather some feedback and see if this is the the structure we want to continue. But I want to thank our students and our music teachers and the principles who um made it all happen and showcase our our elementary musicians. Both the middle school and high school conducted cultural and heritage festivals and amazing. I had a chance to go to both. Uh the pictures are are just a sample. Um you can see the dates. I I'll just tell you from um just a community member perspective, forget even being a superintendent,
030to walk through and watch the students display their heritage with pride to watch them engage other students in conversations about their culture, their traditions. They shared food, music, dance to just it was to we created the space and the kids made it happen at both the middle school and the high school. uh real proud moments and uh I know you know Mr. Khan I think you came by and you had a chance to take it in as well. Uh just thank you to everybody who was a a player in making these happen. Uh just really impressive and we're going to continue that and every year they get a little little bigger and a little better. So the high school one filled up both gyms, the main gym and then the smaller auxiliary gym and it
031was just packed and just to watch the students um again I can go on and on. I'm really proud of this uh both both events and I want to thank our facilities team. I know Mrs. McGibney uh oversees our facilities department, but Mr. Zapone, you've seen our supervisor, this has been a rough winter and a lot of snow. Uh how we I know we're not out of it yet, but how we managed to get with just two cancellations so far is uh somewhat of a a pleasant surprise, but where do you put it all? and uh when everyone else is home and I make the call that we're going to stay home. Um not for the facilities team, they're coming in, they're clearing it, and um our unsung heroes to make sure our buildings look
032so good and they're safe and ready to enter. So, Mrs. Mcib and I both wanted to give them a shout out and extend our our gratitude to their their continuous efforts. And as always, each month I come to you with our four heart award winners. And here you'll see uh Miss Crabtree, Miss Morelli at the middle school, Miss Demillion, one of our kindergarten teachers at General Wayne, and then uh Julie Wagner, our learning support teacher at Katie Markley. So, they were selected. Again, we continue to get a great number of nominees from students, parents, and staff. Uh I want to thank Miss Marsen for launching this project and getting everybody involved. It's a lot of different voices and I know we have a tough time picking uh the the award winners each year, but you
033can read some of the writeups. They're very touching and it just a small token of thanks, but everyone up here and our whole the way they shape lives and they help families and develop students. It's so impressive and this is just a way for us to showcase some of that excellence with you each and every month. So, congratulations to all four. they'll be getting their awards uh um in in the near future, at least for those that maybe haven't gotten them up to this point. So, congratulations again to those award winners. All right, with that, I thank you. Just happy to share some good news from across the district. That concludes my report. Wonderful. Um I can report back on the concert. I attended the KDM concert, but my son's grandparents and aunts and uncles
034in California also tuned in. So that live stream was a real gamecher for our family and I'm so grateful for it. I think it's awesome. Um and I'm so glad that it's during the day so that all the kids can have a chance to participate. Um and I'm again always for a live stream. So it was great. Appreciate that. Thank you. All right, moving on. Um our first round of public comment on any voting items. We will have a second round of public comment for anything else at the end toward the end of the meeting. Three minutes. There's a timer. Correct. Okay. Um, moving on to consent agenda items. Is there a motion to approve 801 through 812? Anyone? I make a motion to approve those items. 801 through 812. And is there a second?
035Second. All right. Um, Mrs. McGimny, any updates or changes? And then any questions from the board after that? No updates or changes. Okay. Questions from the board. I just have one question. The, um, uh, keyboarding, typewriting without learning without tears, keyboarding. Um, how will that be worked into the curriculum? I know it said that it would kind of be mandatory, but do we know yet where it will fall? if it will be, you know, how we're going to use it to ensure that it's being used every day or however it needs to be often needs to be. I know it's in grades three through five. Uh so it's definitely in more elementary a little bit with fifth grade. Um but specific your specific question is is it when I know in the past we've had
036a bunch of typewriting um things that we could use, but they never had a place. they never had a real place in in our curriculum, in our day, in in anything. So, I'm curious if this has a real place or if it's just a resource for teachers to use. I mean, are we teaching them to type or are we teaching cursive? Like, it's big debate. Yeah, I think there's going to be a law at some point. Um if I I I don't have a direct answer but um my because I haven't had a chance to talk with the team but my thought would be we would look for ways within the writing curriculum and when students are using their iPads for any um composition of their papers to also include time for them to conduct
037typing. So, language arts would be the time whether or not we then have call outs as we have done with our elementary schedule already where we have certain times where we have word study or we have uh portions where we dedicate that time. We haven't made that decision yet, but we may do that within the schedule so that all teachers um not only are using that time for that, but also other support specialists know that if typing is happening during that time, they're not coming in and providing literacy support if typing is to be going on. In addition, we also have the core extension in grades three, four, and five where students can then also well three and four and then also five and six have core extension for ELA. But uh if we were
038to expand this that core extension, it's another opportunity for students to continue to practice if there are specific skills um for typing. Thank you. Any other questions about 801 to 812? All right. All in favor of 801 approving 801 to 812. All right. Motion passes 6 to nothing. We have three absent board members tonight. Uh 9:01. Any financial approvals? I don't see any, Mrs. McGibney. All right. And then 100 personnel items. Is there a motion to approve 10.01? Motion to approve 101. Is there a second? Second. All right. Any questions? All right. All in favor? All right. Motion passes. Six. Nothing. Get back to my agenda here. If if I could with the personnel agenda. Um just looking forward two two retirements on there. I just want to signal and call those out. Uh one
039is nurse Allison. Allison Morse at our high school has her retirement up for approval. and thank you and also Mr. Nolan, one of our reading specialists. So, I do want to thank those. We'll I'll be sure to see those two staff members, but uh just want to thank them for their service and draw their retirement to your attention specifically. So, thank you. Wonderful. Thank you. And thank you to those folks for their incredible service to our district. Please enjoy your retirement. Um all right. Uh I don't think we have any policy approvals this evening. 11:01. Correct. Okay. Moving on to 1201, middle school overnight trip. Is there a motion to approve 1201? Motion to approve 1201. Um, is there a second? Awesome. All right. Anything to add here from our administration? Seems exciting. Yeah, it
040is. And this one is is more of a later addition. Sometimes our students win accolades and qualify for the next round of competition. It's not only conducive. So, this is one we did have to get before you relatively quickly. Uh, we do have uh students or robotics teams that have qualified, but they have to have your permission now because registration's due by the end of March. And so, Mr. Ruckle House, who's our middle school adviser, they will be traveling out. As you know, we went over this previously with overnight trips. We cover the advisor, the EDR holder. Students and families are covered for the other cost. So, families will be transporting their own children. Mr. Ruckle House will be driving out himself to keep cost down and families will be transporting their their four children.
041So, we did have to kind of move quickly based on when we found out so that they can make the proper registration requirements by the end of the month. If we would have waited till the April meeting, that window would have closed for them. That's the only highlight. But, um, this is not the first time that they've qualified. So, we we have a really strong thriving program. And I'll probably be talking to you at the in a few months about actually creating two teams and having a second edr because the support and interest is that that large. So it seems like success is uh contagious. So uh more to come on that but thank you. Great. Um all right. All in favor of approving 1201. All right. Motion passes six to nothing. All right. Nothing
042under facilities, transportation, food service. All right. Um, and back to this is a quick one. Um, public comment again. Open to anything, not just voting items this evening. 3 minutes. There will be a buzzer at 30 seconds. Keep going if you choose. Um, and just state your name and your residency for the record, please. Name's Nick Rock, 461 Konosa Road, Melvin, PA. Um, just a friendly reminder, as you all know, uh, something that's near and dear to my heart in this community is the quality and the capacity of our facilities. As I've been saying for years, construction is inevitable. And that is represented in no other way than uh, the fact that we've got, I believe, three new playgrounds slated for consideration by the board and delivery by the school district. Uh, that's my understanding
043that that's in the works. Now, I also want to remind the board, and this board in particular, that during that redistricting process of two years ago, every member of this board, with the exception of the two newest members, voted to remove a group of low-income and predominantly Hispanic students from KDM with a brand new playground on the order of millions of dollars of work and redistrict these students to Charleston Elementary. Now, don't get me wrong, Charleston Elementary is wonderful. The staff are wonderful. The building is a bit old. The building probably needs a bit of a retrofit. But what I want to talk about is the fact that the facilities, the playground facilities that these students, including my children, started to use after having Katie Markley are substandard. And I think that Dr. Graffo, you've
044recognized this and the board and the administration has recognized this and that's one of the reasons why we're considering these three new um playgrounds. I think that it's important to point out that in the case of Charle Town, one of the facilities was so old and decrepit that the district actually had to tear it down because it was unsafe. I think that two years is too long. I think that these new playgrounds probably should have been on the docket a year ago if not sooner or rather later uh because of the fact that you're creating a condition and this is an alldemocratic board where the equity provided to the members of this community is not equitable across the board. The issue that we run into in this instance is where you had Katie Markley with
045a brand new facility, an inclusive facility, and you then take in particular a disproportionate number of low-income students, and send them to a school where they have now a lower quality of um recess time is unfortunately unfair. I think that this board needs to recognize that. But I think that this board needs to focus upon the importance of upgrading those playgrounds and not drag their feet any longer on any of these upgrades that this this facility Charles Town needs. Thank you. Uh and again u I'm I'm also going to call to mind and call to this group's mind bring it front of mind that we need to be very cautious and very pro uh proactive with the way that we approach our facilities when it comes to the preparedness of the high school for all
046of the growth that we need to be anticipating in this community particularly in East Whitland Township. East Whitland Township is, I'd say, one of the greatest defenders of allowing too much development to occur without having Thank you. Should I use the step stool? Showing my height. Oh. Oh. Oh. Sherry Lawrence, uh, Charles Township. Um, I am here, uh, to talk about the parking situation once again and the traffic situation at the high school. Um, it is our, um, understanding that as of the Monday that we come back from spring break, students are supposed to be able to park on Moors Road. We have not heard anything from the administration regarding registrations, uh, payments, uh, the plan, anything like that. It's my understanding that as of today, they are still having safety meetings and that maybe
047we might hear something by end by the end of next week, but by the end of next week, people are going out on spring break. And we're afraid that as parents, things are going to fall through the cracks. We're not going to be able to see our children who now have their driver's licenses uh to be able to park on on Morris Road in the time frame that we're looking at. This past week has been um probably one of the worst weeks in trying to pull into the high school. Monday, it was 11 minutes for me to turn from um for me to go from the middle school in order to turn onto the high school property. My daughter walked into the high school at uh 7:39, but she was dinged with a tardy because
048their clock said 7:40, but the bell hadn't rung yet. There was a traffic incident where uh when you pull in front of the main main office at the high school, if you're in the right-hand lane, you're supposed to take a right out of out of there, and if you're in the lefthand lane, you're supposed to take a left. There was a car that was in the right-hand lane, cut off the cars in the left lane, went into the opposite lane of traffic, bypassing the middle school traffic, the buses, all that stuff, and nearly had a head-on collision from somebody turning from the middle school to make that left out of the middle school area in order to get up the ramp. Um because this is now happening with consistency to get up the ramp from
049Phoenixville Pike up to the high school. We now have parents who are pulling into the middle school and going into the student parking lot in the lower lot and dropping kids off, blocking access for the high school students to be able to turn into their lot. are not left for the upper lot or for the lower lot going up the hill to let the students turn into the lot. So, that's causing the backup. Typically, it would only be the the students walking from the buses, but it's all that um um additional cars causing that traffic. It's my hope that when Moors Road opens, that type of drop off won't be as bad. But now we're going to have all the middle school parents and the families coming off of 401 um causing issues uh getting
050car getting the students to cross the parking lot. Um there there there needs to be somebody with a lollipop holder. Thank you. All right. Any other board comments for the evening? I'll share something. Yes. And we did this I think you might have started this a couple meetings ago of time that we're spending, you know, at an event. Um, and I'm going to talk about baseball a little bit because I like the intersection of talent and this is not about the game itself, but congratulations to you. You had a good game today. The team won. You should have mentioned it. So, Justin, you guys are highlighting yourself in your own sports. We want to I'll take care of it. Yeah. But, um, I, you know, it's pretty cool. On the team, we have kids that
051are bringing in friends to do certain, um, I'll say work or like game day hype. and we met one of the kids at the tech high school last week in our program. So, we have a and I'm not going to name names, but we have a tech student who is within the digital media program who comes to the baseball home games and he sets up a live stream. And this isn't any old live stream. He has like five cameras mounted all over the place, professional equipment. He then sets up what I'm gonna call like ESPN Sports Zone. Um he right now is setting up because it's so windy. He's up in like the press box, but he will he will like toggle between cameras and film kids at the plate. He'll watch the play on
052the field and it's amazing. I am blown away by the talent. I I get blown away by the talent that we see every year at TCHS over at Pickering and this was just really amazing to see it in action. You can watch it on the YouTube channel, Great Valley has it. And so again, it's great for families that can't be there and they see not just, you know, um, you know, a score that's being presented on the screen, but they actually see live action. And the other thing that we had a parent do which I loved is we had um Katie with the music program had give had on loan to us this amazing young woman that plays the mima with mallets four mallets she's holding and she did the star spangle banner. Amazing. Amazing.
053So I just I thought it was like a very special thing. We try to bring the choir in to do the song. Um, and this is all either students or other, you know, parents on the team that kind of bring the talent together. So, it was very cool. Yeah, that's it is. And we we have a lot of talented children. And even the one that you mentioned with the live streaming and setting up the five cameras, he's a sophomore. I mean, I mean, these are things like you think like it's just really impressive. So, I'm glad you highlighted that. Oh, yeah. And he comes like dressed, too. Like he had a jacket, a hoodie. I'm like, "This is a great game day fit." I I'm blown away. Um I wanted to highlight, so the good
054news is spreading because now I'm getting I'm getting tips and um I'm loving this from our community. So I was told that Great Valley Swim Team had their very first ever Paris swimmer at high school states this year. Um which I thought was really incredible. Um and a really big deal. I know um we had a couple of swimmers um at states this year, but I wanted to give particular shout out to them as well as this young person. So, well done. Um we see you all. We want keep giving us the tips. We'll we'll shout them out as best we can, but we love to see what our students are doing out in the community. So, thanks to everybody. All right. Is there um a motion to adjurnn? Yeah, go ahead. Motion to adjurnn.
055And is there a second? All right. All in favor? So, let's go. Thanks everybody. Have a good evening.