001Yeah, knock it. >> Oh, you got to do it. >> Good evening. I'd like to call the Monday, January 20th, Springford Area School District work session to order. Please rise for the pledge. >> Please rise for the pledge of allegiance. I aliance 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. The Springford Board of School Directors believes the community has the right to bring before the board issues and concerns they may have about items on the agenda or about items in general which affect the district or their children. Because of this belief and philosophy, the board will schedule a time at the beginning and conclusion of every meeting to have an opportunity for community members to
002share their concerns with the board. At the start of the meeting, members from the public may comment on agenda items only. The school board will move through the meeting agenda. Then at the end, when prompted, there will be a time for public comment. This meeting is being filmed to be broadcast on community cable channels and online. Individuals intending to make public comments should be aware that they are being filmed. Speakers will be asked to state their name in the area in which you reside before your comment. >> Good evening everyone. Thank you for being with us today. Mrs. Schmidt, could I please have a roll call? Today in attendance we have doc Dr. Chararma, Mr. Lackey, Mrs. Deerdorf, Mrs. Yut, Mrs. Wearten, Mrs. Westwood, Dr. Wright, Mrs. Goldmith. Not present is Mrs. Herman's. >> Thank
003you. I have one announcement tonight. Uh, the board met this evening in executive session to discuss a personnel matter, a student matter, and a legal matter. Dr. Scanland, do you have any announcements? >> Sure. I have uh just a couple of things. First of all, welcome everybody. It's been a while since we got we've been together as a as a school board. So, uh welcome. I hope everybody had a good long weekend. We had a very busy weekend. I just want to uh extend a thank you to to some of our staff members for several events that have taken place over the past few days. Uh last week, we received notice on Wednesday at about 6:30 in the morning uh that we had a break that was affecting several school districts for our our fiber
004network. uh and they affected some districts in Montgomery and upper upper Chester County. Uh when we switched to our backup internet, about half our schools remained out. About half came back on. Uh and that was because our backup provider was also using some of the some of the lines by the by the primary provider. We scrambled to use cell phones that day uh to contact people when needed. Uh we used hotspots on the district phones to access the internet. Uh Verizon also that day to make things even worse reported a nationwide outage. So any of the Verizon phones that that people were using those accounts did not work. Our district phones however on AT&T network. So we did have uh we did have access with with our district district phones. They were not affected. Our
005staff had to adjust. Um and for some students an old-fashioned internetfree day of instruction took place. Uh children got to run uh the paper attendant sheets down to the office like they did 30 years ago. And there was some old school teaching with paper and pencil. It's kind of neat to see some of our veteran teachers teaching some of our newer teachers how to use paper and pencil out there with uh with some teaching. Uh schools with internet connections opened their conference rooms for some of our staff to relocate. Our building principles made adjustments during the day to ensure that we had communication with staff and parents. Uh and that was all in place. Uh these are just a few examples of the hundreds of people who jumped up to make the best of a
006very frustrating day. Uh we learned some lessons from this experience and like any new emergency, we used it as a learning experience. Had this outage lasted longer than one day, we were prepared to have phone numbers dedicated for each school building to be received by other schools uh where they had internet connections and phone services. Uh we were deploying secretaries to various conference rooms around the district to answer phones. Uh Aaron Crew, our communications director, and Jason Hilt, our technology director, were instrumental in preparing that plan for us. Uh one minute before we were going to launch that plan, the fiber came back. So it was uh it was really really good. But moving forward, we have documented this for this kind of an emergency. We now have that in our arsenal and a plan.
007We we met the following day as an administrative team uh just to kind of tighten tighten the tighten the loop on that. Now, after all that fun ended, uh we had an electrical panel burnout at the high school early on Saturday morning. Uh Mike Zen uh Zendic, our operations supervisor, Dan Pellegrren, our operations director, uh Colin Beard, our electrician, Matt Stem, James Butler, and other members of our facilities team spent the weekend making the necessary repairs. and we didn't miss a beat this week by getting those electrical panels back up at the high school. Aaron Crew was also over there and she stopped in for some support uh as they were doing those repairs and she got some great photos of of of all the work that was going on. Uh while all that was
008going on, we also had two small snow uh snowstorms this weekend that kept our custodial and our maintenance staff busy. They were cleaning sidewalks and parking lots so we could start school on time today. Springford truly has a dedicated staff working around the clock to ensure that we have the best learning environment for students. So, please thank the custodian and maintenance staff person the next time you see someone. Uh they do an excellent job and if the future weekend forecast holds out, they may be called upon again to clear some snow this weekend. So, thanks to everybody and kudos to our team. It was a lot of work, but uh we had a lot of people behind the scenes really keeping things going for uh for our staff and students. So, um, Dan, thanks to
009your your your crew and Aaron and Jason, tech crew, uh, and everybody else that was that was supporting our staff and students the past couple days. >> Thank you, Dr. Scanland. I share your sentiment. I had the pleasure of being at the Ram Rumble cheerleading competition on Saturday morning, and I was very surprised that all the lights were on. Well, not surprised, but impressed and kind of not unsure going into it, but you would never have known um a that there was an unexpected crazy snowstorm currently happening um or that there was an electrical fire. The building was warm, lit, beautiful um and safe. And I also got to witness, I think as I was leaving, I saw Raven sprinkling salt out there. Um, and then yesterday my kids went to play on the playground
010in the snow and the immense work that it took to get that Brook Elementary parking lot ready. Uh, so of course, thank you. Thank you. So, next up is public to be heard. This is on agenda items only. If you wish to speak, please approach the podium with your name, township of residence, and the agenda item number. You will have three minutes. Okay, seeing none coming up to the microphone, we will move on to section three, presentations. Uh, we don't have any presentations tonight, so we'll move on to section four, action items. Tonight, we have two finance related action items on the agenda that were discussed at length at our November voting meeting and our January finance meeting. these action items that the district must address by certain dates as outlined by the state and
011act one timeline. My recommendation is that we take these action items together, but if anyone feels differently, please let me know and I will separate them out. Does anyone have an opinion either way or can we do 4 A and 4B together? >> Together sounds good. >> Okay, great. section 4 A and 4B. Do I have an em a motion? >> Yes, we are. >> Do I have a motion? >> So moved. >> Do I have a second? >> Second questions and discussion. >> I did want to discuss something about this. So, I've been following school board, you know, um budgets for many, many years and been a part of them and um in different capacities and I um I totally understand both of the reasons that we do this that these are our really
012our obligations, our responsibilities that we vote on these at this time. I do want to to point out that um last year we did go into referendum exception. We did go above for our budget and if you have been following it, you know, at all, you are um fully aware that I did did not approve of us going to that. So for um to for that I did not vote for the budget last year. There was no secret about that. I um I'm voting in in favor of this tonight. um not because uh not um we're going I I'm I'm sincerely hope that we don't go above this referendum again. I had never known our district to do that or any district in which I was involved with to go to that. I understand that
013our our board our finance committee and our board felt that this was necessary to do it last year. I support our district um and the and the board in which we do this. However, my voting for this personally, me as one board member does um is not a statement that I approve that we would go to this. My feeling still stands that the only reason we vote for this ren render referendum exception. Thank you. Is that if there were extraordinary measures, I did not feel last year merited it. Others did. I support that. But I wanted to make sure that that was clear. I'm not voting for it. I'm voting in support of our board so we can move this forward. >> Uh, sure. Yeah. And Dr. Wright is correct. This uh by there are
014two two resolutions here. Uh, they are both under the school code uh going back to act one of 2006. Um, applying for uh referendum exceptions. There are really only two I think that we qualify for is one would be the anything over the pension but I don't believe the piecers numbers are going to budget if we're taking an exception that timeline starts tonight uh by approving a preliminary budget and there are certain timelines in January where that has to be done in order to meet the school code and we do have uh Mrs. Herman is has joined us online so uh Mrs. Herman is welcome. >> Thank you very much everyone. Can you hear me? I'm going to take it that you can hear me. Okay. Unless you interrupt me and tell me otherwise. Um
015so I just wanted to uh reiterate that yes I think for the nine board members here and Dr. Scannon like we live and breathe this every day. So uh I do want to make it clear Dr. Wright I know you did state this but we are only applying for exceptions by doing this. It is not meaning that we are taking exceptions. what is in the past is in the past. And as we all agreed back in September when this board unanimously passed our board norms and we approved our uh PSBA resolution, right, uh the will of one person on the board does not reflect the will of the board and we all agree regardless of our own individual stances, whether we agree or disagree, we support the will of the board moving forward and we
016don't bring up how we vote previously. Um I will say that I have a different opinion. I do believe there are very good reasons why we took exceptions last year, but again that's in the past. So moving forward, this application does not mean that we're necessarily taking them this year and I want to reinforce that for the community. Thank you. >> Thank you, Miss Hermans. Is there any other questions or discussion? Okay, >> Miss Herman, I will call on you for your vote after the table vote. All those in favor say I. >> I. >> Mrs. Herman >> I >> all those any opposed? >> Okay, that motion carries 90. Thank you. >> Okay, so we're going to move on to section five board and committee reports. We will start with Mr. Drover and Miss
017Gupta for our student rep report. >> All right, good evening everyone. This is our January student rep report. I hope everyone um on the board and in the community has had a wonderful and relaxing winter break. Um and we're excited to get the year started. So, moving into our past events, um on December 1st, the school board had a reorganization meeting. Um congratulations to Miss Yut for being um inaugurated into the school board. We're really excited to see you here. Um and then we had Keystone testing being administered from December 3rd to the 11th. And then the there was a winter orchestra concert for grades 7 to 12 on December 9th. And there was a winter coral concert on December 12th, which I heard there was beatboxing in there, so that must have been really
018fun. Um, and then there was ACT testing administered on December 13th. There was a winter band concert for grades 7 to 12 on December 16th. And then students had their winter break from December 24th to January 4th. And then the class of 2027, class of 2027 parent FBC presentation was on January 14th and the district was closed this past Monday on January 19th in honor of MLK Junior Day. And then finally, we have midterm exams finally over tomorrow. Um, and they've been administered from January 15th to the 21st. And so now I'm going to pass it over to Jason for our future events. >> Thank you. Um, for our future events, the end of the quarter is tomorrow on January 21st. Uh, with report cards being posted by uh 4M on February 4th. Uh, the
019indoor winter guard show uh is sorry uh will be on January 31st with the uh VEX Robotics on February 7th. Uh the Capital Plan community forum update will be on February 11th. Uh there's an inservice day for President's Day on February 16th. and the class of 2028 FPC parent presentation is on February 18th. Thank you. >> Uh thank you, Jason. And just a few reminders for the community, please continue to read weekly update for districtwide news. And for students, please keep up with your weekly assignments and let's finish the marking period strong. So get all those assignments in. Thank you. >> Thank you both so much. Next on the agenda is community relations, which was not held this month uh as we had superintendent second interviews. So we will move on to policy with Mrs.
020Goldsmith. >> Hello. On January 12th, 2026, the policy committee met. Um, one of the first points of discussion we had talked about was some of the uh language that we've been utilizing our policy. There was a switch a couple years ago to utilizing uh persons and parental relations versus parent and guardian. And the issue came up in terms of some special education policies where that could have some broader implications legally than what we were intending. And as a result, the committee has decided to in the moving forward that we'll be using parents and guardians. We're not going to go back to all the times that uh that term was used. But as we go through the policy, we'll be updating the policies moving forward to use the term parent and guardian. In addition, we had
021uh reviewed again policies 718, 178, 718.1 uh as well as 822 and those policies are being recommended for first read. Uh new policies were also discussed policies 218.1, 141, 105.2, 606, 626, 626.1, and 634. Um that was a mix of some new policies that you will see coming up forward uh that have are going to be new to our board uh specifically in terms of um the tax uh in addition to some of the old policies which we're getting some more information on. The next policy meeting will be February 9th, 2026. >> Thank you, Mrs. Goldmith. Any questions or comments regarding policy? Okay. On to curriculum and technology with Dr. All right. >> Thank you very much. The curriculum and technology committee uh met on January 12th. Um the you will see one thing on
022the agenda regarding technology. Dr. Hilt provided information regarding the migration from Skyward to cumulative. Uh this will be an ongoing project as a result of our current Skyward product suns setting. So you will see that on the agenda um to vote on next week with curriculum. Dr. Bowers and Mr. Bowers and Dr. Edwards provided course selection guide updates for the 2627 school year. So we can look forward to that course catalog coming out in the not tooistant future for our students to select courses for next year. Dr. Gardy led a discussion about world languages in the district. the board would like an additional additional information regarding programming and information will be brought back at a subsequent meeting. So we had a really good discussion. This was a very long meeting. So we covered a lot.
023So it was a really good meeting. Dr. Murray provided information about our AP exams which included enrolled students and the registered test takers. Dr. Murray and Mrs. Angeluchcci provided information regarding a full-day kindergarten playbased learning model. So it was really a discussion about what the day would look like for full day kindergarten, how the instruction would look in the day. Uh Dr. Gardy provided information regarding the work that has been done to explore a middle school model at spring forward. So again, this was just information sharing what it would look like if we were to change to a middle school um setting. Dr. Guardi also presented 2425 state assessment data which included math and English language arts results for grades 3 through 8 and algebra 1 biology and um lit keystone exams. So normally this
024information regarding these um our data are presented at a bo the board table here at a meeting but the decision was made to do it at the curriculum meeting uh committee meeting that information that meeting was recorded. So, if anybody wanted to see that information besides it being available, I think the date is available on our website, you could also view the meeting. Uh, our next meeting is scheduled for Monday, February 9th at 700 p.m. in the district office conference room. Thank you. >> Thank you. Does the board have any questions or comments for Dr. Wright? >> I will say it was awesome to see the presentation um about the playbased learning. My kids have had a great opportunity to enjoy that all three of them um as I have a first graders my youngest
025now and they love those programs and it's very exciting to be able to to to highlight that and show the great work of our kindergarten at Brook. So as well as all the other things are there's great information provided at that meeting. Thank you. So next we'll move to finance with Mrs. Westwood. >> Good evening. The finance committee met on Tuesday, January 13th at 6 PM. Um, items to be discussed, we started with ongoing business. Um, executive monthly reports. These numbers are all through December 31st, 2025. We have 139 million cash on hand. Last month, prior year, it was 140 149 million. For revenue, our local revenues are behind due to real estate assessment appeals, which we've discussed previously. And our state revenues are flowing again at expected levels now that we started to get
026money in from the state budget from this past year. For expenditures, they're expected to um continue to go according to plan. Assessments, we've had a $1 million increase since our prior meeting in um November. Transfer taxes were 65% of the goal for the year, and we estimate at year end we'll be around three to 3.2 million. For earned income tax, we're almost $400,000 ahead of the prior year to date, uh, with 48% of the goal achieved for the year. Uh, we are pacing approximately 15.2 to 15.5 million for the year. Self-funded health insurance um, a little bit of a better story at least um, recently. So, quarter 2 expenses were large, but at the halfway point of the year, we're at 49% of budget. Um, we've had one high claim so far this year, but
027we're still under our stop loss amount compared to the six last year. Um, compared to six last year with two hitting the stop loss and we're currently pacing from break even to 250k under budget for the year. So, that last bullet was uh very good to hear considering we've had some larger expenses from a healthcare perspective the last couple of years if you've been following this. Uh, for food service year to date, we've served approximately 358,000 reimburseable meals. We have 360,000 in alocart sales which is 7k better than last year. Um we already approved our our preliminary budget this today. So we had that um no significant changes to date from our meeting in November to the the budget for um next school year. Um budget books are out and in the buildings and are
028due back the beginning of February. So should we have more information there soon? Um during the finance committee meeting we had a capital plan update from Dr. Scanland where he reviewed enrollment number projections for the district buildings. The board also got a detailed view of the um demographic study updated in your board packet this week um as a note as well if you wanted to go deeper there. [snorts] Um new other business food ser food service employee hour adjustments will be um later in the agenda for us to take a look at that. We need to switch a quarter of an hour plus or minus on two positions for board approval. um interest impact income. I'm sorry, too many too many words here. Interest income impact um of PA budget delay. So, if you recall,
029our budget was um significantly delayed being approved this past year. There was approximately $50,000 in interest lost to the state budget due to that. U Mr. Frink did send the state an invoice and copied our local representatives to make a statement. Um just a note because I know some of you follow this, our 2425 audit is complete. Um, we had an unqualified opinion, which is a good thing. Um, we will summarize the district's financial results and related audit opinion at our February committee meeting. Um, items for the next board meeting for today. The work session, we already adopted the preliminary budget and the referendum exceptions. We have policy 634, um, which will be up, I believe, next week, and then food service adjustment hours. Our next meeting will be February 10th in the district office.
030>> Thank you, Mrs. Westwood. Does anybody have any questions? No. Okay. Next, we'll have property with Mr. Lackey. >> Thank you. Uh before I get started, I just want to take a minute to uh thank Chief Boyer and Mr. Pelgrren for their time and support as I step into the role of property committee chair following Mr. Jackson's tenure. Uh their work has really helped me make the handoff seamless and maintain the strong foundation standard set by Mr. Jackson. So, thank you to both of you. uh on my report. Uh the property committee met on Tuesday, January 13th, and continues to focus on long-term facilities planning, day-to-day operations, and maintaining safe, functional buildings across the district. On long-term planning, work on the facility master plan is moving forward with weekly meetings. We're on track for a
031community update on February 11th, and final building assessments related to potential renovations and additions are expected in March. Operationally, the director of facilities reviewed recent maintenance activity, including emergency power bears, winter weather response, and mandated safety inspections across all district sites. On capital projects, a district-wide access control project is approximately 85% complete. Remaining work at Brook Elementary and High School are expected to be completed by midFebruary. From a safety and security standpoint, the district continues active uh active monitoring, training, and prevention efforts. To date, 395 safety tips and 295 incident reports have been processed. Um, a security assessment at Springstate Elementary was completed and the all hazards plan review is ongoing. Staff continue to participate in threat assessment, targeted violence, and emergency response training. Um, in addition, radio signal boosters are being installed at the
032high school in Flex to eliminate communication dead zones for first responders. Um, some good news on the grant front. The district was also awarded $23,232 through an MCI BGA grant to support purchasing of communication equipment. Um, let's see. Uh turning to new business administration is recommending 24 a 24-month district-wide natural gas contract with UGI energy services which provide the lowest cost option among multiple suppliers. The committee also began reviewing future custodial service options as a current agreement approaches expiration and received an initial overview of proposed capital projects for the 2627 budget year. The next property committee meeting is scheduled for February 10th. And that concludes my report. >> Thank you, Mr. Lackey. Any questions or comments? >> Okay. Next, our assistant superintendent report. Uh, Dr. G. >> Montgomery County Intermediate Unit. >> I apologize. >>
033No, no worries. It's very brief. >> Yep. I stepped right over it. >> So, backing up. We'll give you a little extra time to prepare, Dr. G and Dr. Murray. Uh so next Dr. Wright with the MCIU update. >> So thank you very much. So uh our meeting um for we did not have a meeting in December. Our meeting for January will be uh next Wednesday, a week from tomorrow. But I did want to remind the board that um there is a new board member finance workshop that's being run by Pasbo um Wednesday tomorrow from 6:30 to 8:30 virtually. Um you do not need to be a new board member. Any board member can participate in this and have the finances explained by the um executive director of HASSPO. So it can be very informative.
034Um if you are interested in the link or any information, you can um speak to Mrs. Schmidt or you know um >> I think Mrs. Schmidt did send the email. She sent the link today. So >> yeah, great. So I I just wanted to make sure that uh everybody was aware of that who would want to attend. So thank you. That's it. Thank you, Dr. Wright. Okay, on to assistant superintendent report with Dr. G. >> Thank you. Good evening. I'd like to highlight an upcoming event for our students that will be participating in called the Polar Plunge. It's held at the Citizen Citizens Bank Park and it's um which is the Special Olympics Pennsylvania's largest annual fundraiser. Funds raised support free year-round sports training and competition opportunities for more than 15,000 athletes with intellectual disabilities
035across the state. We're proud of our Springford students for participating in this annual event and thank you to Mr. Chad Strickler for leading this activity. Next, the early intervention transition season is way well underway. Our elementary school psychologists are reviewing and evaluating preschool students currently receiving special education to ensure appropriate supports are in place as they move here to Springford in kindergarten next year. This work is being completed in addition to their regular case loads. As of January 20th, there were 81 early intervention students. To date, 67 transition meetings have been completed in just three days with 14 meetings still to be held. So, I'd like to give recognition to our team for their hard work and collaboration. Our school psychologists involved, Miss Ms. Christine Bradley, Karina Clark, and Andrea Weber. Our speech and language
036pathologists Carrie Klinsky, Elise Writer, Angela Fitzgerald, and Jennifer Smith. And finally, to our administrative assistant, Laura Pinland, and our special education supervisor, Amy Hiller, who leads this process every year. Finally, at the secondary level, two psychologists are piloting a dialecticalbased therapy mentorship program at the eighth grade center after completing an MCIU refresher course. 12 students meet weekly to develop interpersonal and distress tolerance skills and visit Royersford Elementary monthly to to mentor younger students. The goal of this program is to improve attendance for all participants. I'd like to recognize Jenna Deamiani for leading this initiative as well as Dr. Teresa Carboy, principal of Royersford Elementary for their collaboration working together on this initiative. And that's the end of my report. >> Dr. G, what was the date for the Polar Plunge? >> February February 20th. >>
037February 20th. Um, and I just wanted to thank you for your leadership and collaboration and your teams to allow them um, and support them through getting through so many meetings and and doing that very important work right now. >> Good evening. I'd like to take a minute to wish our students luck as they navigate midterm exams. As Jason mentioned, the second marking period ends tomorrow and we'll move right into the second half of the year. All electronic report cards will be available by 400 pm on um on Skyward on Wednesday, February 4th. And as we approach the midpoint of the year, our students in grades K to 8 are also completing benchmark assessments. These are important assessments that students complete to help determine if students are on track with regards to math and reading. But
038administering the assessments is only one part of the puzzle. After completing the assessments, building principles, MTSS coordinators, and building level teams are meeting to conduct data team meetings within the building to evaluate needs, make adjustments to instruction and intervention plans as needed. I'd like to acknowledge and thank our building level teams, administrators, teachers, MTSS coordinators, school counselors for all of their support and hard work during this time to support our learners. And that's my report. >> Thank you both very much. Does anybody have any questions or comments for our assistant superintendent? Okay. Finally, our solicitors report with Mr. Fitzgerald. >> Uh good evening everybody. Uh just a brief update. You know, when the state provides us an on-time budget, that means they provide us an ontime school code with on-time changes. But when you give
039us a budget in November, you give us changes to the school code in November right before the holidays. So, it was frankly hilarious. watching school districts as we were getting ready for for uh Christmas break recognizing, oh my gosh, we have all these changes to the school code that have to be implemented effectively January 6, 2026. Um, so Springford and many districts have been sifting through changes to cyber charter language and and what that means for us to assure that students who live in Springford um are attending cyber charter schools and not claiming to live in Springford but are living in Durham, North Carolina. Uh, so we've seen changes there. Um, we've seen changes with regard to reporting weapons on campus, Act 44, and what that means and and what it means to be an
040incident on campus that must be reported. So, districts are working through that. And of course, there's other language that districts are scratching their heads about about defining employees and and what rights they have to a full year's worth of employment, which um again, we're working through and and potentially contacting our state legislators indicating that they've probably um drafted the school code incorrectly and now has some language that needs to be cleaned up. So, uh a lot to sift through over the last 60 days or so since uh the changes and uh and probably more to come soon. Thank you. Next, we will move on to what will be the voting portion of our meeting for next week. As the community may or may not be aware, these action items have been brought up and discussed
041in their respective committee meetings earlier this month. So, as we go through them, if the board has any additional questions, feel free to raise them now. So, we'll start with section six minutes. Any questions or comments? Section seven, personnel. Any discussion? >> Yeah. >> Yes. Maybe um Dr. Scambling could explain for to the community for a moment just why there are so many resignations there >> or Mrs. Lee. >> Yeah, I'll I'll defer to Miss Lee. >> Um in our collective bargaining agreement, there is language stating um there's an early retirement or early notice of retirement incentive. So, if our teachers let us know on or before January 15th of the current school year of their intent to retire at the end of the school year, they can be paid um $100 per year of
042service up to 30 years or $3,000. Um so, we do have a lot of individuals who notify at us at this time. >> Thank you. And I know that that one of the reasons that we do this is because it does help us to therefore be able to find um highly qualified replacements for those those um teachers that are choosing to retire. Thank you for that clarification. >> Any other discussion about personnel? Okay, moving on to section 8, finance. Any questions or comments? Okay, moving to section nine, programming and curriculum. Section 10, conferences and workshops. Any discussion? Section 11, property. I think the hot item lays in section 12, other business. Any questions or discussion? >> Uh yeah, let's uh if we have questions about A through D, we can save the calendar. I know
043the calendar is always a a fun topic uh as we get ready to to approve that for next year. But um A through E, I guess anybody have questions? We'll start with those first. >> Did you say A through E or A through D? I'm sorry. >> A through Oh, I'm sorry. A through D. I'm sorry. A through D. So I have questions but >> wait your question. >> I'm sorry. I thought you said no. You have questions on A through D. >> I have no questions through A through >> Okay. So moving to the calendar. >> Sure. Uh I'm happy to start the conversation. I know I've talked with a couple of board members. we we sent a uh to draft of a calendar and as we look at next year's calendar uh we've
044introduced a new concept uh of a some delayed openings uh for some professional development and and we're looking at a couple of things with this calendar one we have with the capital and realignment plan we have we figure we have a lot of needs with some of the new mandates from the state uh in terms of of uh getting all the the the trainings in we we have some additional needs. We're we're trying to get some more uh frequent monthly opportunities to meet with our staff. Um we talked about some uh early dismissals, which a lot of districts do. Uh I don't think there's any districts currently doing a delayed opening for a two-hour delay, much like we would do on a on a dreary snow day. Um, but it's an opportunity to bring all
045of our staff in first, do our PD, and then um move on with our with our day. Uh, like I said, most districts are are doing uh dismissals. Some districts have tried the delayed openings. Uh, it creates some concerns for parents uh in terms of finding uh daycare opportunities for for those those months where we would do that. Um, but it does give us an opportunity to meet all of our staff at one time. We also uh we're using act 80. Act 80 is a uh an opportunity where you can schedule 180 days for students. The school code does allow us to do hours and or and or days. It doesn't have to be both anymore. It used to have to be 900 hours for elementary, 990 for secondary, and 180 days. Uh under uh
046previous law, you could apply for some of those days for professional development time or conference time if you needed conference time. and we have been using three of those days. This calendar would only use one of those days. So students would actually uh report to school 179 days versus the 177 that they they currently do. But we would take some of that time uh and and a delayed opening for some some professional development. We wanted to talk to the board about that concept before we went out to uh with with formerly with our staff and our and our parents. Um, but again, the goal is to try to find time each month. Um, whether it's a delayed opening or maybe with an early dismissal, there's some other things that that we might be able to
047do with that. So, with that, I open up for questions. >> Mrs. Cold Smith, do you want to go first? >> Um, so a couple questions and then some comments. When we are talking about a two-hour delay, are we doing the delay schedule or are we doing a just opening two hours later? I mean, how would that work? some is it following the the standard snow 2-hour delay schedule. So both AM and PM kindergartens would then have abbreviated schedules. It >> it would it would be similar to our 2hour delay which is we have that in our arsenal. Uh so it would be two hour teachers would report on time but students would come at the at two hours late. Yes. >> Okay. And then in terms of the benefit to the families um because
048I was a little confused about that. So right now under the calendar they there's they are in school 177 days or 179 days >> this year 177. >> Okay. And under this calendar they would be in school 79. >> 179. Correct. >> Okay. So theoretically the the the benefit to the families would be the fact that there would be two additional full days in school that if they need child care. Um so thank you. And I think that was some linger. I had asked a bunch of questions I know already. But uh I guess and I'll just kind of is it okay to give my thoughts? Okay. So I love creative stuff I think and I do know that other districts are doing some sort of abbreviated schedules and that's kind of a new thing
049for progress monitoring, professional development, a lot of variety of different things especially now that a a lot of districts are moving to the MTSS model. You know there's a lot more data collection. And honestly, it's not just the collection, it's the reflection and processing the data and planning to what to do with that data. So, it's it's not just simply taking data. Um, I'm a little concerned right now with the fact that we have half day kindergarten abbreviating the schedules. Um, I think it's a little bit different if we had full day kindergarten. I think in addition to it in terms of the involvement in the community, you know, as someone who was a working parent, um a two-hour delay every month can cause almost more difficulty than finding two additional full days of child
050care. Um and I think right now I think this is something where this is a concept that we work towards maybe not this calendar year but next calendar year where we get some more community involvement in that kind of planning as well as child care and other resources. The other thing too is you know sometimes and this is a difficulty that I personally faced is you know you have kids who are developmentally at different stages at different times and a lot of the daycare centers here cap out at a certain age. Well, you may have a sixth grader or a seventh grader who maybe you're not completely comfortable, you know, getting themselves off to necessarily school on a two-hour delay. And just again giving families that opportunity to figure out that child care where maybe
051a child care center uh is is not an option. And also too to give the district, you know, I've talked about in a previous finance committee that other districts offer child care at some sort of financial benefit to the district of whether or not that might be an option going to a 2-hour delay. You know, do we open something like that up? I I don't think this is an end discussion of like a for me personally as this one board member a no. It's a I want to gather more and be more thoughtful about this process than maybe doing it for this calendar year. >> Thank you. Anybody else? >> So, I have some I have a couple things as well. I have a a similar sentiment as Mrs. Goldmith. So, it's not it's not
052a no for me. It's just one I would be curious about the community's perspective on some of this which I know we'll get to. And two, like I agree with more of a phase approach. I agree like working parent like two of us both work full-time. Like I think it is just speaking for one person less disruptive like you have a full day to try to find someone because they have camps and things like that for example like I have middle school kids versus like two hours every month but I'm only one person but I think it would be good to consider maybe a phased approach if we do that. Um the second thing and I did email Dr. Scanland about this, but um in talking to to some teachers that I know and I've
053heard this from parents considering a slightly shorter Thanksgiving break and adding a day to spring break. We have had members of the community even come to the podium and ask about spring break and I think um probably that have emailed us as well, but that's been an ongoing I think piece of bush. Um and lastly, the only thing I'd say is um a teacher survey. I know that teachers I've talked to have asked for a teacher survey for their input potentially. So we if we have not explored that just something to consider. >> Yeah, we we have not done as far as I know formal uh teacher or parent surveys. I mean I have been involved with them in the past. A lot of times with calendars it it centers around when do you start?
054Before or after Labor Day? Do you get a full week for spring break? And everybody wants to end right after Memorial Day. it's almost impossible to do all of those things. Uh and then all the I guess the last 10 years though it's been a lot of the requirements coming out of the Department of Education uh with trying to find all the professional development time. It's that's kind of banging on these calendars. Uh and then contractual language with uh with our our teachers contract to get the 189 days in. I know had a conversation uh with a parent over email today. um had a proposed a great calendar but forgot to plug in the nine additional days for the for the teachers and that's I said that you know there's there's some other contractual requirements
055that that we need to make sure we plan and that extends the the school year. So so there's there's a lot to it. I do think it is it's beneficial and I understand this this as a new concept. Uh it's a hard pill to swallow. Um and maybe we need some more time with that. Um, but I think we should we should look at if we can some of the months where we don't have any PD time, maybe perhaps introduce either one of these days or the early dismissal day where we can build start building some of that in and and maybe you know to a couple points that I've heard to uh, you know, to work toward a more uh, comprehensive calendar. So >> I know >> go ahead. >> I know Mrs. Herman's
056is on Zoom and would like to speak, but could you I know one thing that when we spoke about this too was accounting for you know moving towards if approved in March a middle school model or some of these transitions all the work that our staff will need to be doing to prepare that. And so I know that looking at a calendar and seeing all these two-hour delays monthly um but also the importance of giving our staff that time to do to do that work. >> Yeah. If the board does approve that uh realignment plan in March and and all the things the moving parts of capital plan, there's a lot of a lot of training I think we'll be doing for the next couple years. Uh, and it's and it's it's beneficial if we
057can have shorter, more frequent times each month. I know Dr. Murray has has been involved with some of this. Dr. GM Batista uh has been involved with some of this and and they can share some of the some of the needs that we have. Uh, Dr. Gardy with some of the professional development that that she's overseeing as well. >> Um, Mrs. Herman's, >> thank you. Um, I had a first a question follow-up question. So, I know I heard Mrs. Westwood and Mrs. Goldmith talk about the need to um have a staff survey. I was curious, Dr. Scanland, do does any of that in qualitative feedback bubble up through the union? I'm assuming that you've talked to the union leadership about this or at least put it in front of them. Is that a fair assessment?
058>> Uh we we do meet uh monthly uh with the association. Um Beth Lee and I do that uh try to head things off. We have talked about the concept of potentially doing either a delayed opening or uh or early dismissal to try to find some of that time. So the concept we have we have talked to them about it. Yes. But but that's just with the leadership team. >> Just with the leadership team. Okay. That's what I was asking. Um thank you. And then the second thing is um just since we're sharing opinions here um I do I hear what um the reservations that have been stated and I don't necessarily disagree with them. I just for me I think it's very hard to you know it's like balancing the personal needs of our
059parents and families right albeit maybe not all of them but a subsegment of them and then balancing the educational needs of our staff and frankly our students getting two more full days in the classroom and we know how important that is. So, it's, you know, and I'm not saying that one is more important than the other, but it's um, you know, I think change is hard in general, especially when you've been doing things a certain way in a district for as long as, uh, you know, districts do. And, um, I don't I I I would be in favor of exploring this. I would be in favor of maybe a phased approach. Like I don't think it needs to be all or nothing. I mean if this is the administration recommendation and you know there are
060good reasons for it especially given the impending changes that I think this board not speaking for all of you wants to see. Um, I'm not necessarily opposed to it, but you know, open if the administration thinks there's maybe a middle ground here between, you know, some of the statements that have been made and approving it as is. >> Uh, yeah, sure. We yeah, we we actually started looking at um some other options. Again, I think there are there are a couple of months in this calendar. Um, you know, August, we have some days with our teachers. September, we want to probably just keep everybody in the classroom, get things up and running. Um, in October, we have a day. Uh, November, uh, we have a day designated. December, we don't have a day designated, but
061December is a pretty busy month with all kinds of activities, and we maybe just want to make keep everybody in their in their, uh, schools as much as we can. Uh, January, we don't have a day. That might be a day we want to look at a a delayed opening or maybe an early dismissal. Uh which a lot of districts do. Uh that might be easier for for uh parents to make some arrangements. Uh we don't we haven't done that. That might be a possibility. February we we have a day designated for professional development. We talked about maybe sneaking a day tied to uh uh that Friday. You have f you have uh the 15th I believe that uh Monday which is President's Day is a is a professional development day for us. Our staff
062are in that day. Uh and maybe tying on a half a day on that Friday to to get a couple more hours and make a long weekend trying to make it a little easier. Something like that. Uh we got into April. We don't have a day. That might be a day where we wanna we want to plug in one of these one of these days. >> Is the seventh? Uh 7th is has has a a delayed opening. >> You mean a scheduled >> as >> you're referring when you're saying we don't have a day, you're you're speaking of a scheduled PD day. >> Currently, we do not. Correct. Yes. So that would be a day where we might want to put a you know a delayed opening or an early dismissal perhaps if that is
063again a little bit easier to to begin to to begin to introduce into our calendar. May we're we have a day set aside in May. Uh and then June we're out that first week. So, there's a couple of opportunities I think in there where we might be able to do two or three of these to kind of get it started and build them around times that that might um be more beneficial to parents uh and and be helpful to our our our professional development teams uh to get some time each month where we can actually work with our staff particularly with um the things that that may be coming down the road over the next couple years. >> Uh Mrs. wine garden. >> Thank you. I really appreciate the creativity in this and I'm a
064big fan of the early dismissal uh days. I think back to the uh uh we used to do them when I was in high school to build on um the exact same the exact same concept making sure our teachers had time in their classrooms, had time for training. Um, I do like that we're considering this, especially rolling up to the possibility of uh the middle school model. So, I think it's smart. I appreciate what um Mrs. Westwood said about spring break. I know that's been a point that our community brings up often um having that full spring break versus the um the three days at Thanksgiving. However, I know those three days are very uh useful in terms of parents uh parent teacher conferences and and training. So, I do I I really appreciate that
065the creative thinking that's going into this because it's lining us up for um a really good long-term planning. >> Yeah, we did look at those uh those other days the mon the two Monday Tuesday before uh Thanksgiving. They have typically been time for parent conferences. We talked to some of our principles about that and to to shorten those uh it just does not give us enough time to meet with our ele and we think it's important to meet with our elementary parents. >> Absolutely. And I I really app um think it will be impactful to have the teacher feedback on on the suggestions. question uh what will be the impact on the transportation if we have a dedicated day in in a week in a month or ad hoc days that we are planning um
066what will be the impact uh early dismissal or the other way around >> uh if we I think if we strategically place these um we we we did talk with our transportation office about doing these we can do it um you know there there is um we haven't done it in the past I uh because there is fear that some u private schools may want some kind of similar transportation but I think if we keep it limited to to some you know small number of pieces we'd have to work that out with transportation. >> I remember you called out we transport our students to 66 schools if I'm not mistaken. So six, so we'll have to think through that plan because I think we got to a state where we have a good plan that
067was executed this year. So no delays in school buildings through the through transportation. So we need to keep that in mind that we can't really mess up the transportation if we do choose to pick one or the other option. >> Uh correct. I would want to make sure we coordinate all that with transportation before we put a final final calendar out there. Yes. >> Does anybody else have any feedback? >> Yeah. >> Um, yeah, I just want to echo, you know, some of the sentiments from other board members as far as like balancing the needs of the staff, students, and parents. Um, I would be interested in getting feedback before we make a decision. Um, I think a phased approach also gives us another opportunity to get some of the feedback as we move towards
068this or away from it. um not just in terms of like dislike but also what worked and and what didn't how can we improve the execution so I think a phased approach makes a lot of sense uh you know barring what kind of feedback we get back from uh uh all the stakeholders >> thanks anybody else >> I just have a a quick comment June 3rd seems I mean I know we typically get out that week but that seems really early is if we needed wiggle room. I mean, I hate to say that out loud, but if it had to go into that next week, it's still really early June, >> right? >> Yeah. >> And it's not hot out yet. >> No. Well, [laughter] it could get hot in May. I I can't wait
069for it to be hot out. By the way, >> uh June 3rd, I think we were about June 3rd uh last year. So, it was it was about the same time. We tried to build the calendar around the same uh start and end time as as we had currently this year. >> But I feel I correct me if I'm wrong. We've gone >> to like the 9th before a couple years ago and this is when I think this is when my first do my daughter started. We used to start after if I'm remembering correctly after Labor Day. You mentioned that. No, I thought we did. >> For some reason I thought or maybe I thought we ended later and maybe it's because we had snow days or like something else. But I I do know
070the last couple years. Yeah, we've ended really early. The point I'd made to Mrs. Weine Garden, too, just related to to child care things, there are very few, if any, summer camps I've ever found that are actually open the week of June 7th. So, that is a child care thing anyway that many of us maybe juggle now, but I agree. I'm I'm sure it's not popular like and people want to end school, but you you could consider like if you had to maybe going like the Monday, the Tuesday, like not the whole week, but a day or two overflow if it was necessary. >> Sacrificing those couple days for your full spring break. That's all. >> Well, yeah, we can we can we can do anything we want as long as we meet the uh
071the contractual obligations and school code obligations. the summers I will say and again if we're starting before Labor Day there is an awful lot of work and I want to think about the the the capital renovations and things an extra week in summer makes a big difference to have schools if we got some renovation pieces going on ready to go before uh before the start in late August too >> if I could also add to that too one of the factors is trying [clears throat] to get more of the educational time on the front end of the calendar um so we have immovable dates such as um keystone testing or AP exams. Um while it it's not designed around that, it's designed with that in mind. So if you get more dates up front of
072the calendar, that helps in that regard. >> And that's exactly why we need the all the input that you give. I appreciate that. Great point. >> So what are the next steps that you need? Like what do you need from us to move forward? >> Well, what what I'm hearing is uh you'd like us to get some feedback particularly from our our teaching staff. Um, how about we we'll circle back and I'm hearing uh reduce the number of days, but but I would like to work on two versions of a calendar that uh give us at least some time each month with the exception of December and September and that might be two or three partial days and look at different ways we can we can do that and then get some feedback on those
073two calendars and bring that back to the board and we could look for probably a February approval date. Does that work? >> And and I will just say I did like your idea of maybe having some you know not just all the early opening but early dismissals picking it back on a weekend that maybe cuz so for example I mean just again as a working parent like sometimes up to some holiday weekends you might get you know work closes a little early so it just makes the impact on the families a little bit less to piggy back. Has that have you already reached out to the Y care to see if they would be able to stay those two hours or is that something we can >> that's something we'd have to look into? Yes.
074>> Okay, great. Thank you. I think this is a very great start to a good conversation to adopt a calendar that that works for our spring for community uh students and staff and families. So, thank you for your all of your work with that. Um in section did anybody else have anything else they wanted to say about the calendar? >> Okay >> discussion. >> It was very good. Uh so moving to section 13formational items. We have two information items for your review around tenure and IRA mileage rate. And after that we will go to board comment. Is there any board comment? Finally, we have an opportunity for public comment. I typically would read through the rules of public comment, but I don't think we need to do that because I know that our public that's
075here are well aware and he doesn't seem like he has anything to say tonight. So, thank you for coming, sir. Um, thank you all for your attendance and participation tonight. Do I have a motion to adjurnn?