001waiting for us to go live. >> You are live. You may begin. >> Thank you so much, Mrs. Fish. Good evening, my friends. Welcome to the April 14th rendition of our ECI committee meeting. Uh we'll call the meeting to order and we'll stand right away for the pledge of allegiance, please. 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. Thank you as always, Mrs. Fish, for getting the flag up there for us. Appreciate it as always. So, our first item this evening is the approval of minutes. May I please have a motion to approve the minutes for March 10th, 2026 at our previous ECI committee meeting. >> So, move. >> All
002right. >> Moved by Dr. Tio, seconded by Mrs. Coin. All in favor, please say I. Raise your hand. >> All right. Motion passes. Thank you so much. We have some wonderful topics for us this evening here. Uh and Dr. Waters, I think we're starting with curriculum adoptions if we're all set to go. >> Yes, we are. Good evening, everyone. Yeah, I'm really excited um to introduce to you our new director of curriculum. She's no stranger to ECI, uh Mrs. Rachel Early, and she will introduce Yes, we'll clap for her. Uh we will in she'll introduce uh her wonderful curriculum team. And this is that time of the year. They come every April to talk about curriculum adoptions and summer programs. And so I'm just going to turn it over to Rachel to get us started
003um for this annual uh informational session that needs some action. How's that? >> Thank you so much. Good evening everyone. I'm pleased to talk about our um 2627 curriculum adoptions. I am joined by Miss Donna Dome who's our STEM one of our STEM supervisors and also Dr. Fenster who's going to be talking a little bit about secondary reading and I will be reviewing all of our new adoptions on the humanities side of the house tonight. All right, so we can do we have our slides full while they're there we go. Um, so here's our team for tonight and we're ready to go to our little opening slide. Just a little bit um that I wanted to highlight for um the team tonight is just our curriculum review process. So of course we're looking for high
004quality instructional materials. We want to make sure that we're engaging our students, that we're providing access, and that we're having common experiences through all of our elementary, middle elementary schools, middle schools, and high school. Um, one of the things that I definitely wanted to highlight is that for each one of these adoptions, curriculum review committees were formulated. They are made up of diverse stakeholders and they've had multiple meetings to evaluate multiple resources and so that process has taken place for each one of them. All right, so over to the humanities side of the house. All right. So, I'm going to start by talking a little bit about elementary English language development. Um, so in elementary, our English language learners, our multil- language learners are included in core instruction for English language arts as much as
005possible. However, we do understand that particularly our upper elementary multilingual learners do require um specific supports in order to be able to access our core curriculum. So, we are proposing new resources for our English language learners in those upper grades, particularly our newcomers and beginners. Um, and we have selected a product from Vista, which is a publishing company that's known for their language support. And it's called Get Ready Soar, and it highlights specific vocabulary and all of the domains, um, reading, listening, speaking, writing, and of course, grammar. Um, so it's specifically for multilingual learners, which I find to be so amazing that in today's day and age, we have products specifically targeted for this group of students that are age appropriate. Um, and it's also visually um, engaging for this particular group. And one of
006the highlights of this particular resource is that it includes teacher and student resources um which include licenses but mostly primarily is made up of books including reader kits which are critical as students progress in their language acquisition and um the online access for this particular resource is included for six years. Okay. So we can move um on to social studies. So we have a few title usually every year we have a few titles for social studies um that just kind of highlights our large group of courses that we offer at North Penn High School. Um and so I have a few from social studies um before I move on to world language. So, I'm going to start off with AP European history, um, which is one of our many AP courses at North Penn. Um,
007and our, um, this is a primarily 11th grade course. Um, and it is a title from Sengage, um, Western Civilization since or 1950, excuse me. And um this text is um we're excited about how it's updated and really focuses on cultural, economic, political, and social development from Europe in that post450 time period. Um and one of the things that um the curriculum review committee really highlighted about this is just how it definitely had a more inclusive version of history, which is a theme that we will be talking about with our additional social studies text tonight. All right, over to American History 3. Um, American History 3 is our core social studies course for most of our 10th grade students at North Penn High School. So, a wide variety of our students take this course. And
008we decided to um look at two different texts for this specific course to meet the needs of all of our students. So um for our uh core course we have selected um United States history America through the lens which is from National Geographic um which uh obviously a great component of this resource is that it includes all of the National Geographic images in addition to compelling stories, primary sources. It's also aligned to um the C3 framework which is um from the National Council for Social Studies. Um and one of the best um elements of this resource that the committee really liked is just the accessibility for this resource. It includes um readability online which a lot of our students may need or actually prefer at this point in time. Um and we are proposing a
009blended approach with books for students as well as licenses um teacher resources as well for eight years. and then over to our other American history 3 texts. So, with the American History 3 course being American history, there are so many different resources, which is great. Um, because there's a lot to choose from, unlike some of our more niche titles that I'll be talking about tonight. Um but the committee decided to go with approach of selecting a Norton text for our honors course with the lens of really providing that bridge um to you know Norton tends to create texts that are for many AP courses and just having that bridge and creating more accessibility for students who may take honors American history 3 and then decide hey there's a lot of AP course offerings in the
010social science department at North Penn you know this could really help be a bridge and kind of encourage more students to take that chance and take some of those courses. So that's how we landed on the Norton resource America the essential learning and again really amazing primary source secondary sources um for students and it um also includes document based questions um and historical inquiry topics and similarly to the many of the other titles tonight we had the access of eight years which from a financial perspective makes definitely the most sense and then we're going to move away from social studies into a completely different area and talk a little bit about Japanese um Japanese 1 and 2. So, it's been quite some time since we've revisited our Japanese resources at North Penn High School and
011we are excited to um adopt Tobyra 1 and two beginning Japanese from Curioso Publishers. Um and for this particular curriculum, we really wanted to just have teacher and student texts. um and as that is the most um helpful modality for students who are learning beginning Japanese and focus on connecting their language learning acquisition and then also that cultural connection with global topics. All right, so I'm going to turn it over to my colleague Miss Stone to talk a little bit about the STEM side of the house. Thank you Rachel. Uh next slide. So for pre-calculus um as we have worked to update our pre-calculus uh curriculum after updating algebra 2 last year um this resource met the differentiated needs of our students, teachers and the curriculum topics that are in both our 50 and 60
012levels. Um, additionally, I wanted to also share tonight, um, I'm very excited to share that three of our pre-calculus honors teachers have all been approved by the University of Pittsburgh to offer our 60 level course as a dual enrollment course through the University of Pittsburgh. So, our honors pre-calculus course meets the requirements of University of Pitts math 200 prep for scientific calculus. So we will have the opportunity, our students will have the opportunity to earn three college credits from the University of Pittsburgh if they choose to do that. So we're very excited to offer that next year. Next slide. And as we continue to implement the steel standards, our 9th grade physical science course chose Inspire Physical Science from McGraw Hill Publishing. Uh what stood out to our ninth grade department was its accessibility to
013our diverse learners. Uh the ability to differentiate uh the integration with Canvas and above all the focus on phenomenonbased learning. Um they've also provided updates specific to Pennsylvania and directly related to the steels standards. I'm going to pass it on to Dr. Ftomaker for her reading course. Maybe don't. Hi, good evening. We are uh proposing tonight to adopt a new reading curriculum for the seventh grade reading class called um well the course numbers are 4075 and 4075R. And the uh program or resource that we are selecting is into literature. It's a Hin Mifflin hardcourt resource. Um the copyright is from 2001, but the version we're getting the updated version which is version two. Um this is a seventh grade reading course which um in North Penn all students take both an English class and a
014reading class. So the majority of our seventh graders u will engage in this reading class. We will have uh the resource for a three-year contract. It aligns with the PA core standards for reading, writing, speaking, and listening and our primary tenants for instruction. Uh building knowledge, having uh you know great exposure to a variety of text genres. Students will be engaging in close reading exercises, uh constructive responses. The uh resource does offer a variety of differentiation materials so that they can address the individual learning needs of our students. They'll be strengthening students vocabulary, building executive functioning skills and stamina uh for life lifelong reading. Um in this contract we'll be uh providing students with physical text as well as digital resources and that is it. Thank you very much ladies. I love these presentations about
015our curriculum updates and changes and resources because we get a nice little glimpse into what's going on in our schools and uh the types of really fun interactive materials uh that our students are able to to access here. Uh, and I'll open it up to our committee, my fellow committee members for uh for questions quick here unless um Dr. Tio has any comments or questions. I I have um so thank you. Thank you um for the presentation. I think that's helpful to me to understand um especially being new to the board and new to this committee. um appreciated um some a little bit background to the decision making for my understanding things like um C3 um the PA core standards like I know there's a lot of regulatory mandatory needs to in you know to
016make sure that the curriculum meets those standards is there anything that is nonregulatory just simply best practice that's something that's well accepted in in education is something to adhere to as opposed to something completely regulatory by Pennsylvania. >> Sure, I can answer that. I mean, there's definitely things that are mandated or recommended, right? Like following our Pennsylvania standards and then our organizations that are national. And then in terms of like best practice for curriculum review and evaluating resources, having committees of diverse stakeholders and utilizing an instructional materials evaluation tool to make sure an entire group is objective and has data with their decision- making. Um like evaluating like the images and texts, the actual texts themselves. Um also another best practice and a part of the curriculum. I know tonight we're talking specifically about adopting
017the materials, but a big part of the committee work then is once that's approved is writing the curriculum aligned to the standards as the resource is like a vehicle for the curriculum, but it's not the curriculum. So hopefully that answers what you were asking about best practice a little bit. um if you want. >> It does and I think like I'm beginning to understand too, you know, when you mentioned the committee work, you know, those stakeholders that are involved with either creating the curriculum or choosing this material, right? Like so if you're revamping the Japanese language material, I'm assuming part of those committees are the teachers that teach them, maybe students. Is there anything else that I'm missing? >> No, definitely teachers. Uh oh, Dr. B wants to chime in. students. Sometimes we've had um
018parents, community members, you know, a wide variety. We definitely always want to make sure that we have representation from other departments like English language development, special education. >> Yeah, I was just going to add kind of on um now that we've gone further and further down the dual enrollment path, sometimes we let the college courses guide a bit of what goes into our courses as well. Um, and of course all of your AP courses are very very regulated, um, if you will, because you know, College Board says we have to teach these things. And as Mr. McBain knows, as a AP teacher, there are X number of topics and X minus 30 days of uh, the year before you take that AP exam. So, it's I mean, it is really lock step the whole way
019through until you get to the AP test. So, but those are just some other influences outside of the department of ed and PA department of ed. >> Dr. Bower, I was watching you say those things and watching Malachi's face at the same time. I think you were g making him like, "Oh, AP." >> Yeah, I got two coming up and um AP psych and AP world and >> I'm just just praying. >> You got this. Can I teach world? It's an easy one. AP World's an easy one. You got it for sure. >> I'm gonna come email you if I have any questions then. >> All right, I'll check. >> Sounds good. Any other questions for our our team here, my friends? >> No, I appreciated the point uh that Mley mentioned around the diverse
020stakeholder engagement and having students involved in the process. uh given that they are the primary consumer of these materials. It's great to have great to hear that students are providing input and feedback. Um I noticed that in all of the adoptions there's both a uh analog version of of materials if you will as well as digital access. And and I'm wondering, and this is by no means an endorsement or a nudge in any direction, but are you seeing any inclusion of AI tools in some of those digital resources at all as you're exploring the various providers? Just a curiosity, but I'm curious to see if AI has ma made its way into some of the digital resources that y'all are adopting. >> I can start and then others feel free to chime in. Um, so
021not for like tech like resources like textbooks online access as much, but there have been other tech resources such as like turn it in, which is a program that we utilize um for plagiarism where they have that option. We turn it, you can choose if you want to turn it on or off. So, a lot of more so on the tech application side of the house, we've seen that as add-ons that companies are providing and then give you that choice if that makes sense. >> It is. And I'm curious and I' I'd welcome a conversation maybe offline or at a future date around the use of uh how some of the vendors are including uh tools for formative assessment purposes as uh as supplemental uh supports for for the teachers and what uh strides they
022have made in in creating more personalized learning opportunities through uh some of those digital resources as it seems to be been the promise of some of these uh artificial intelligence uh supports. So would welcome a conversation about this at a future date. I'm just curious to see um how some of the providers are doing that with some of the tools that you're selecting. So thank you. >> Yeah, and I'll just add that I'd be happy to have a conversation with you about the AI tools that are included in the in literature resource. Um there's a specific supplemental add-on called Waggle that I can give you more information about. Okay, thank you very much. Yeah, the the the way in which we uh are receiving these resources has certainly changed recently and I myself am getting
023spam mailed from Sengage and other organizations that are starting to include AI uh as tools for teachers and it's almost happening so fast that it's not part of the uh you know they roll out this edition of the textbook it happens between editions now because everyone's trying to to keep up at the same time. So excellent question Dr. Dr. Tio, appreciate it. Um just a quick shout out to our team who has once again worked very hard to include a lot of awful lovely resources, awfully lovely resources uh for our kids uh ranging from things that are sort of tried and trueue best practices uh and and into the new uh you mentioned the textbook by Spiel Vogle, the old Penn State history teacher. This still kind of the goat uh one of his textbooks
024that has been through Sengage uh you know developed and modernized in so many different ways. That's really great to see. Um and and thank you for once again another dual enrollment program starting up here in North Penn for these kids. What a great thing for them to have the opportunity for. Um the 3C standard was mentioned and I did want to use it as an example of how um standards are growing not just just to include what to talk about but also the practices the historical concepts and the um uh the using of resources and historical skills. Uh those are also now in standards and so the three C's actually stand for college uh career and civic life. So, we're we're looking not just at the content, but also the practice and also the implementation
025in the real world. And I think education um is moving very quickly along those lines. I'm just happy that to, you know, see our team adopt those programs and and help our students get that cutting edge uh information and resources at their fingertips. our teachers are are uh really lucky to have these these resources and we want to just continue to support them with um very nimble and modern um looks at what's available. So, thank you my friends. That's really helpful uh to understand what's happening in our schools. Great presentation. All right. May I please have a motion to move these curriculum adoptions as listed to the board action meeting this evening? >> So moved seconded. Thank you. >> Thank you my friends. Any other comments or questions before we vote? >> Only only that
026I I I think my the point of my question between like what is required in regulatory versus what is best practice. I think I just wanted to point out that I can appreciate that the district not only we're we're not just doing bare minimum there's there's other right like there there's other things other than what is mandatory and what is needed and what is actually what's best for for the students. >> Absolutely Mrs. Coin. We know that our educators in our buildings are taking these resources and really inspiring students not just through the resources but also what they do in the classroom. That's an excellent point. We have a motion in a second. All in favor, please say I. Raise your hand. >> I All right. I believe the motion passes and we are looking
027ahead to summer programs. Yes. So, for summer programs, I'm going to throw it back to curriculum, but this time, one of our wonderful assistant principles, uh, Mrs. Christine Capriyotti is going to join because she will be speaking to uh summer school at the middle and high school level. So, um if we could put that presentation up and Rachel, are you starting or >> um actually Nina is going to start. >> All right. The doctor Nina Fencaker. >> All right. You can advance to the next slide. I'll talk about our first elementary summer program. We have been offering this program since 2020. It is our elementary virtual enrichment program. It's provided to all students in elementary grades K through six. It's a fully asynchronous online program for students to stay academically engaged over the summer. So,
028we uh designed four weeks of uh practice activities that will reinforce grade level standards from the previous year to uh encourage students to stay academically engaged and accelerate their learning um over the summer with both hands-on and techdriven activities. Um and everything is in Canvas. And um through that learning management system, students access all of the um activities. While it's four weeks of content, we do provide six weeks of the camp for them to be able to access those uh resources and activities and complete things at their own pace. Um last year through a grant through the educational foundation um and other community partners, we were able to provide incentive rewards to 65 students who participated in this program. Um and we're also working with community partnerships again this summer uh to incentivize students to
029stay engaged and participate in this program. So very exciting um things happening. You can go to the next slide. We are also offering our spark program which is the acronym for summer program for academic readiness for nights. This is also a summer program provided to students who completed grades K through six, but it is a more targeted and focused program. Uh students are invited to this program um based on um performance and data that we collect throughout the school year so that we can really focus our instruction to the foundational skills that students need to be successful in the upcoming year. Uh we retach grade level standards. We um engage in a lot of small groupoup personalized instruction with students and we include a variety of techniques to improve their reading, writing, speaking and listening
030skills. Um and there is also a math component in the program um as well. It's going to be held at NAP Elementary School and it is just for four weeks Monday through Thursday. The last program that I'll share with you tonight is our kindergarten readiness camp. This is also a program that is uh for select students that are invited to engage in a school readiness camp for students that may not have had any previous school experience uh prior to coming to North Penn, prior to joining um our night team uh as they embark on their kindergarten journey. So we focus on school readiness skills, routines. Uh teachers align their lessons to the prek standard. So, we really just want to ensure that students are mastering those prek standards as all the kindergarten standards will be
031introduced as they enter kindergarten. Um, this is really a readiness camp. Uh, we practice a lot of school routines like lunch and recess and getting on a bus and getting in a line and moving throughout the building, working with their friends, um, moving about a classroom. And it really is a play-based learning environment. And we have a lot of fun over the summer. We do regionize the camp. So, we host at just three schools, Hatfield, Oak Park, and North Wales. Um, while we're only hosting at those three schools, all 13 of our buildings are included in this program. We just invite students from the other schools to attend at either Hatfield, Oak Park, or North Wales, depending on what school um, and location they are living in in the district. Um, I'm noticing a typo
032on this slide, so I apologize because I was the creator of this slide. Um, it is not going to be July 6th through the 30th. That is an error. It is going to be August 3rd uh to August 13th. So, it's just for two weeks in August, Monday through Thursday, and we can go to the next program, which I'll kick it back to Rachel early. Thank you so much, Nina. I am pleased to discuss our elementary English language development program. Um, this is a program that we've held for many years. Um, specifically targeting our English language learners or multil- language learners that are of the newcomer or beginner status. Um, and this program, we are fortunate enough to have it housed at the same school as Spark. Um, and we love having both programs there.
033It's like running a mini school in the summertime, so it is the same times and the same dates. Um however, our staff are instructing um our English learner students particularly to help their oral listening, speaking and writing skills and also introduce them to non-fiction literature and focusing all instruction on the ELD standards from PTE. Um and we also are able to pay for this program utilizing our title three funds. Um so it's just one of our student outreach components of that particular grant. Okay, I am going to turn it over to Miss Capriotti. >> Hi everyone. So, the final program that we are presenting this evening is the secondary summer school remediation program. Our course remediation program is designed to support students at both the middle and high school level. Uh so we are supporting
034uh students in grades 7 through 12. Um it is important to note that there are different eligibility criteria for students at each level. So, as you can see here, students in grades 9 through 12 will be eligible to remediate credit bearing courses if they earn an E in the course, which means um if they earned a score of anywhere between 50 um and 64% in a core area class, health or PE, they would then be eligible to remediate the credit bearing course. Whereas students in grades seven through eight are eligible to remediate nonreditbearing courses if they did not pass a core area class health or PE. Um so our learning platform is egenuity. All students will be enrolled in in their courses uh online. This year we are proposing to reinstate um the cost due
035to no longer uh due to funds no longer being available through ESSER. Um and so we wanted to take in cons into consideration uh the cost that was previously charged back in 29 2019. Um and what we learned was that um they previously charged $310 per credit. So in order to cover our current program expenditures this year, we are proposing um the following costs. So it would be $300 $320 uh for one credit, $160 uh for.5 and those would include our semesterbased uh science and social studies courses and then $105 uh for.3 of a credit. Um, another thing that I wanted to ensure that we were noting was that we are going to offer a reduced rate of 50% off for any student eligible for for free and reduced lunch. We wanted to ensure that
036we were taking into consideration any family who may be ex experiencing a financial need. Another thing that we are considering, I know we already talked a little bit about this tonight. um AI is here and it is here to stay and since the program that we are offering is primarily offered online we wanted to ensure that we had guidelines in place uh for academic integrity. So what we did was we took a look at the guidelines currently in place for um North Pen Virtual Academy and we adjusted those guidelines to fit our program. So, as you can see here, it states that if there is a concern regarding academic integrity, the teacher will first notify the parent, student, and program administrator and then they will pause the course. Um, they will then work with the
037program administrator to investigate the concern and if the concern is founded, uh, the program administrator will then reach out to the parent or guardian to discuss resetting the course to permit resubmission. Um it's also important to note that we will only reset um one time for each student. Reset the course one time for each student. Uh so if we could advance to the next slide. Uh the program does run for five weeks. It's Monday through Thursday from 8 to 11. It starts on June 29th and ends on the uh 30th of July for the students and the 31st for the teachers. We always want to make sure that we're giving the teachers that extra day so that they have time to close out their courses and submit their final grades. Uh we will require all
038staff staff to be uh on site in person the week of 629 to help um with the administration of the prescriptive test. Uh and in order for the students to start their coursework, they are also required to complete the prescriptive assessment. We have found this assessment uh to be very helpful as it is used to determine what the students know versus what they need to know. So for example, if a student scores a 50% on the assessment, this means that they've mastered 50% of the coursework and will only be responsible for remediating the remaining 50% of the course over the summer. So it really does allow for more of that targeted uh support. Speaking of support, um our program offers high accessibility and high support. So all students have access to either in-person or online
039support. If the student does prefer to work with their teacher in person, they are more than welcome to come to the high school Monday through Thursday from 8 to 11. Um and if they prefer to work online, um then they will work with their teacher to schedule a Google Meet so that teacher can provide more of that one-on-one support. We did have a number of students who took advantage of coming in on site last year. We even had some students who were here every single day and they they had stated that they they really preferred that option. Uh we also require our our teachers to track and monitor progress on a daily basis and they will uh send weekly progress updates to both the program administrators and um to the families. uh they will work
040with the families and the students to ensure that the students are on track and meeting their goals. So for example, if a student is scoring below a 60%, they will be required to either attend in person or um online support until their grade is above a 60. So we found a lot of success with this program. And just running some quick numbers from last year, summer of 2025, we had 364 students enrolled. Out of those 364 students, 315 students um ended up passing at least one course. So the pass rate ended up being around 86%. Okay, so I was just taking a couple extra notes there. Thank you very much for all that information. Uh opening the floor to my fellow committee members. Thank you. Um thanks for all of the work that leads to
041really strong summer programming uh for our students. I was curious um for some of these programs. Can you give a sense of the scope of how many uh students are participating and um what you're noticing from year to year in terms of number of kids who are are are joining some of these programs like on the kindergarten readiness programming. Are you finding how how large is the program and are you finding that enough members of our community are part are taking advantage of these opportunities? And then on like the remediation, um what are the sizes of the groups who are participating in this? And are we noticing that this is going up or going down or staying about the same year-over-year? I can start for the remediation program. Um, this is only my second year
042helping to run the program. I did run the numbers from last year. And I would say at the high school level, grades 9 through 12, we we averaged anywhere from 56 students participating in 9th grade all the way up to 119 students participating in 11th grade. Um, of course, at the middle school level, our numbers are lower. um we're not seeing as many students uh failing uh their courses at that level. So, for example, at the seventh grade level, we had 24 students enrolled and at the eighth grade level, there were 31. Um, from what I'm learning and in having conversations with some of the other district administrators who have done this uh previously, the numbers are pretty consistent. Um they may fluctuate here and there, but uh for the most part, they're pretty consistent.
043>> Thank you, Miss Capri. staying on the remediation piece for a moment. Um, are you satisfied to what degree are you satisfied that this the students who are needing these uh this program are actually taking advantage of it? >> So, that's a great question. We last year um because the program was free, we ended up enrolling any student who was eligible um in the to to remediate either at the high school or at the middle school level. And out of all of the students who were enrolled, we had around 20 25 students who ended up not participating. So for the most part, the students are taking advantage of uh what is being offered over the summer. We definitely emphasize that uh through this program, students have the opportunity to remediate versus repeat. Um, so it
044again it gives it gives the students more of an opportunity to really hone in on some of those skills or those gaps that they may have been missing throughout the school year. >> Dr. Tio, I was just going to comment um, you know, so many horrible things happened during the pandemic and one of the good things of course was the online uh, accessibility um, that we have perhaps as a society have overdone in education. Uh, but I will say that pre- pandemic and as a former high school principal, every year you had many, many kids who couldn't participate because they had summer jobs or they traveled and they're like, well, I'm going to miss these two weeks of the five. And it's like, well, then you can't participate in summer school. But now that it's
045online, um, students who are away for the summer can participate. Students who have jobs can do it asynchronously. Um, so it is definitely more accessible. And this is one of the good things. Not that we ever want students to need the remediation program, but if they do, uh we are glad that it's more accessible and the participation rate has increased dramatically because of that. >> Thank you. That's really helpful. >> Any other questions for the team? >> Well, I was also curious about Oh, sorry. Go ahead. >> No, I can add >> the only thing I can add for you is for the kindergarten readiness camp uh we have about 100 students attending um give or take in a given year. Um trying to find um a analysis that we have recorded the number of
046students that we're inviting versus the number of students who are accepting the invite. Um and I I want to say it's roughly um 60% of our students are accepting the invite. most like most of the time our parents are declining because of transportation. Uh so that seems to be the biggest barrier. We do provide transportation for our spark program which is our students who have already attended uh or North Penn schools have completed kindergarten through sixth grade. Um and we do see better um enrollment because we're able to provide that transportation option. um that program is really restricted by the budget, not necessarily so you won't don't see um necessarily enrollment trends changing. Um we have a budget and we're able to in you know invite a certain number of students and so that number
047stays consistent. >> Thank you Dr. Fermaker. This is what that's really helpful. Um Miss Coin, did you want to jump in there because I have just one more question. No. Okay, I'm gonna go then. Um I'm wondering how s how uh how do you all feel about the level of coordination with the various municipalities and townships and burrows uh covered with North Penn in terms of uh summer summer program offerings and coordination of their summer camps, the various burrows, etc. Is that is that a um a pain point or is that a success story from what your experiences have been? >> So I can try to tackle um that and I would have to say Ms. Liberals who runs our community education program and overseas extended school care is probably Am I lagging? Sorry, I
048saw my camera jump there. Um she's probably the best person to answer this. I'll say that um the partnership that we lean on the most in the summer is the YMCA and their camps. We try to coordinate. Sometimes they use some of our facilities. Um but I I there is not significant competition which is a good thing. Like we just want students to be busy and involved in positive activities over the summer. So from our sports camps, uh there are certainly many sports camps in the community that aren't North Penn sports camps. um we haven't seen a negative impact on our enrollments in those camps. So, it looks uh to me like there's a seat at the table for everyone for these summer programs. Um and it's really just a service we try to offer
049to our community and if if kids are pulled away to do other fun things and other offerings, we're okay with that. But, uh Dr. Tio, I think that our strongest partnership is the YMCA and we try to coordinate some things with them. >> Thanks, Dr. Barrow. That's really helpful. I just want to add one thing because I think it is a positive. Uh we do work handinhand with all of our students who are attending daycarees or camps throughout the summer to also attend Spark. Our transportation department is very accommodating um to pick students up from the daycare that they are assigned to, drop them back off midday. Um we even work you know if we know that um that camp in particular is going on a field trip on a Tuesday or they're going to
050the pool on a Thursday um we accommodate those. We make sure that the students are not missing really big events at their summer camp as well. So uh there is collaboration and it's something that we are proud of. >> Thank you very much. Just a quick shout out to our team for such a great job. And I I also wanted to celebrate the not even the invitation but the mandatory communication that has to take place in remediation with families at home. So often educators that are trying to reach students um that are having trouble um uh are able to communicate with families and and we get to be as educators allies with families in student education which is really um uh the alliance that our students need. Uh, and so communicating between school and home,
051even in the summer, uh, especially if a student's having some difficulties and looking for some academic help. That's that's a really key communication. I'm glad that we've made that mandatory in this in this process here. Um, okay. Thank you. >> I did I did have a question. I'm sorry. Hi, >> yeah, sorry, Mr. McCain. Um, I appreciate the transportation being called out. I really really appreciate that being worked into the cost um for transportation. I think especially with like half day camps that is such um a pain point I think for families and parents to accommodate. Um and I appreciate the effort to work with wherever that child is, whether it be a daycare or another home or etc. just to make sure it works. Is there thought with the kindergarten prep program? This is
052also a very again a maybe a selfish question. Is there a thought to work somehow especially since it's only 60% say yes most likely due to transportation issues for the kindergarten prep summer course. Is there a thought to include transportation for that eventually? um or and and if that if that does happen, would you then expect increased acceptance and then have to accommodate those children? >> Yeah, we have conversations about this, you know, at the end of every summer program. We really debrief and discuss what our um biggest, you know, celebrations are and where we can grow. Um this program did evolve out of um ESSER funding. So when ESSER funding did um go away a couple years ago, the district did commit to continuing the program. Um transportation was actually not included even with
053the ESSER funding. Um but we did maintain the program itself within the district budget. Um, in terms of growth opportunities, I think transportation is certainly an area that we'll be discussing next to see if it is something that could be also um, brought into the district budget, but it is a conversation that we have to have every year really based on the fiscal um, opportunities that we have lying ahead. >> Yeah. And and challenges there be many. So I I I understand. I I could see that as being helpful, especially for the incoming kindergarten classes to get just an extra effort to get some of those children who have not had the privilege to have a standard preschool experience um up to a little bit more closer to standard and and hopefully improve the education
054experience for the rest of the classroom as well. Um, and talking about the SR funding, I know that we've had um I've had some questions offline about um kind of my concern over the the the summer school tuition for um remediation. Um and and just thinking out there again, um so for the remediation one for the secondary school, transportation is provided or is not provided? >> It is not provided. >> Okay. So that's what I thought. That's what I thought. So, I'm thinking about this as a parent and and just this is just food for thought. This isn't like a demand. This is just thinking and I'm sure everyone's probably thinking the same things. It's just a matter of what we're able to do. Um, I worry about families who, okay, if you have a
055child that needs remediation, most likely there's other challenges going on that are affecting that because everyone, nobody wants to have to take summer school and nobody wants to have to um, repeat a grade. Um, so obviously there's things that are going on that are more than just the learning ability of that student, right? I'm envisioning myself. I'm envisioning myself, you know, if my child in secondary school needed a remediation course in the summer and how hectic and challenging that would be to even get them there if I was in some kind of socioeconomic situation where I'm I have I I qualify for reduced or free lunches. I appreciate the 50% tuition cut for them. I I'm almost thinking if someone qualifies for free lunches, I'm not sure that's helpful to the entire situation, even the
05650%. You know, it's one more thing. I think the students are like or families, both of them, I guess, are kind of being punished, but like I know that's not the intent. I know that's just the situation that we have and we have to work within the budget, but I I'm I'm asking to is there opportunity to partner with North Penn Foundation? Is there opportunity to look for other sources for maybe those who qualify for 100% free lunches if if not the partial, right? Is there some kind of and and I'm sure these thoughts and have already been thought and probably talked about before being brought to us. Um, but I'm just asking and requesting like is there a way to accommodate that in already very hard situation? >> Yeah, I'll be happy to take
057that one. uh because I feel like I'm turning into Mr. Gilmer as a North Pen historian here, but um you are correct. Uh first of all, it's a great question and thank you for the question. It's um you know, you run for school board and you work on a school board because you want to serve the community and the kids and the families, right? So, you're seeing a hardship here and what can we do? Want to help? Um so, first the travel part, most students don't come in. It's virtual. So getting them to the remediation, there are opportunities for them to come in to get additional support if they need it or sometimes their parents force them. Um but in general, most students don't need to come in. Um that said, scholarships from the Ed
058Foundation is something that has been pursued in the past for things like course advancement over the summer. Um so absolutely a conversation we can have. Maybe they could sponsor a number of scholarships. I will say it has never um prevented a student from taking summer school ever. Um we have gone as far as taking $5 down and a payment plan that lasts for months. Um so we definitely work with families and we have had families in the past like I can only afford $10 right now and we've gone with that. Um so know that we would never ever deny a student summer school because they can't afford it. There are also the parents who are like, "No, no, no. My kid is paying for this themselves." Um, because they got themselves into this situation and
059they're going to work this summer and pay that tab. And it also allows them, pardon the phrase, but it puts some skin in the game, right? They're making up the credits. It forces them to work. And um, so there's a balance in there of all those things, but certainly Dr. Tio is a trustee. Um, and I'm also on the board of the Ed Foundation. So something we could bring forward and have have a look at. I appreciate that background, especially like the payment plan in the district working with the students. Not that I would expect anything less, but it is uh reassuring to hear. So, thank you. >> All right. Thank you, my friends. I apologize. I think I cut off both of my colleagues at some point who were just trying to ask questions.
060So, I apologize. That's my fault there, folks. Um, so I believe we have the item on the agenda uh for summer programs moving forward. Could I please have a motion in second? >> Move. >> And second. >> Thank you very much. If there's no more questions, I'll ask for a vote. All in favor, please say I. Raise your hand. >> I. >> Excellent. Motion passes. Thank you very much, my friends, for coming to uh teach us more about our curriculum adoptions uh and our summer programs today. It really is appreciated, especially on a nice day like this. I hope that each of you has some time outside left uh tonight or in the coming days. Uh so it's very appreciated. Thank you all very much. All right, we now move on to student travel. Dr.
061Waters, where are they going this time? >> They're always going somewhere good. All right, so I have three this month that I'm recommending. The first one is um recommending a ratification. Um this is for a North Penn High School academic dathlon student and a chaperone. Um, they will be going to the Nationals in Garden Grove, California. I know, right? April 22nd through the 26th. And the cost is $200. We also are recommending 15 Science Olympiad students and three North Penn uh staff members to participate in the Pennsylvania State Science Olympiad Invitational. They're going to Altuna, PA, April 24th through the 25th. And then um this one is just really exciting because our secondary students get to go to a lot of really cool places, but we have 12 elementary students from York Avenue and Bridal
062Path. Um Odyssey of the Mind students, their teams will be accompanied by their families to participate in the world finals at Iowa State University May 27th through May 30th. And the registration for that is $7,500. But as you know, with everything in student travel, there's always opportunities for anyone who has a hardship. So that is all I have for you this evening on student travel. >> That is tremendous. California, >> Iowa, >> Aluna, >> my goodness gracious, look at look what these kids can do. >> It's amazing. So many wonderful opportunities. I love it. Uh, let's put um may I ask please for some motions? Then we can ask any questions we might have about it real quick. So, could I please have a a motion and a second? >> So, moved. >> Seconded. >>
063Thank you both. All in favor, please say I raise your hand. >> I >> Oh, I forgot the questions. Loento Senori. Uh any questions or comments now that it's passed that we still want to make sure we get by uh just in case we had any? >> I had 33 questions, but according to Robert's rules of order, I think you've cut me off, Mr. McBain, so I >> tell you what, >> I will not have the right to ask those questions. >> Give me a call after the meeting. I'll answer all of them to the best of my ability. Thank you for your patience, my friends. I'm a teacher and it's springtime and boy does summer feel close in the evening. So, uh, okay. So, we have passed our agenda items and it is, uh,
064time to check in with our students. And I see Malachi is here. Sir, did you have anything to update us about or any questions about any of our items tonight? He's getting checked in on by the by the family at just the right time. That happens these days. No problems there. We'll give Malachi a hot second and we will Sorry about that. >> There we go. >> All set. Anything for us tonight, sir. >> Um, nothing for me. Um, high school's running pretty smooth. We're all just getting ready for at least all of my circles are getting ready for AP's exams and wrapping up our AP uh coursework and stuff like that. Trying to wrap up the year, starting fourth market period strong. >> Other than that, no real updates. Any questions? Not. Can you
065I can make one. >> I I I like to check in when we can to make sure the the the daily life of the student isn't being too interrupted by our uh construction efforts and and everybody's still getting through the building properly as we go through different phases. >> Honestly, I think with the second floor K-pod being finished and having the um the walkway done, it's at least for me cuz I've classed third floor K-pod, it's made it so much easier to get to class. um not having to go all the way down and having to all the way go back up. I've noticed that people traffic's a little less. We love it. Loved having the second floor K-pop. We love the chairs. Hopefully, Mrs. Capriotti, we can start sitting up there soon. Just saying.
066We love the chairs. They're very comfortable. Um but second floor and third floor K-pop are great. A little hot. Very hot actually. It's like swingy, but other than that, we love it. All right. I see Dr. Bower smiling over there. I know we're on top of that temperature issue, right? >> Yeah. I actually I met with Mr. Slaughter yesterday and obviously this is a topic for FNO, but um I just said to him, "All those chillers up and running because obviously we knew what was coming these couple days here, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday." And he said it was 28 degrees on Thursday night, so we had the heat on and now we need the air conditioning. And a a school HVAC system is not like a home. You don't just turn off the heat and turn
067on the air, right? you shut down the boiler, got to boot up the chiller, which takes quite some time. Often you boot up the chiller and you have issues with said chiller. So I was told that as of today, all 18 schools or okay, let's say 15 schools uh will be locked and loaded and ready uh with their air conditioning. So um I believe that doesn't mean second and third floor Kod will be working perfectly because they're brand new. Um, we'll have to iron out those kinks, but chillers should be up and running as of today. >> Can't wait to experience the fresh AC. >> Good stuff. And you deserve it. You and your friends. Uh, I know that the teams are working very hard to get things done at uh, properly, but also efficiently
068for you guys. So, thank you very much, Malachi. We we wish you and your teams uh, in school the best of luck on their AP exams. uh and everybody taking exams as we get here into the the last few months of school. We know it's it's tough to run fast through the tape to use a track term, but uh it's important to get the job done all the way, and we know you guys are trying hard. So, thanks for that, buddy. >> Thank you. Thank you. We're going to need all the all the wish and help we can get. >> You'll be great. Thanks again. We appreciate it. All right. We have uh just to make sure I'm in the right order. Very good. Does anybody have any other business this evening? All right. Hearing
069none, we move on to public comment. Mrs. Fagish, do we have anybody? We do not have anybody, I don't think, in attendance asking questions. We have none. Okay. >> In that case, >> oh, I'm sorry. Go ahead. We do not have anyone in attendance so we are good. >> Thank you Mrs. Fagish. Appreciate it. All right. So in summary, our items recommended for work session uh or action meeting coming up are those items under number three 3A curriculum adoptions 3B some programs. I believe 3C student travel. I think that's all we had tonight, right? Okay. There we go. Our next meeting dates for the ECI committee will be on Tuesday, May 12th, 2026 at 5:30m here in a virtual format. Be there, be square. Thank you so much, my friends, for a lovely evening. I
070hope you all get out and enjoy the weather. Uh once again, we are reminded through our programs all the wonderful things that are happening for North Penn students, and it feels really good this time of year to be reminded of those things. So, Malachi and the rest of you, keep on working hard. It's going to be a great finish to the year. May I please have a motion to adjurnn. >> So moved. >> Seconded. Thank you, Chair McBain. >> Oh, thank you all. I'm just lucky to be here with you guys. Thanks so much, my friends. Have a great night. >> Thank you everyone. Great job everyone who presented. Good luck, Malachi. >> Thank you, Mrs. Spish.