001welcome to the regular board of education meeting of the hartford union high school school district we'll start by calling meeting to order with the roll call ross curly ross here craig westfall here james come sure tina pridemore here tracy westfall is expert i'm sorry tracy is excused please rise for the pledge of the united states of america to the republic for which it stands one nation under god indivisible with liberty justice for all i'd like to make a adoption of the agenda as written back who moved here second motion by ross second by tina we'll start the meeting with the recognition student recognition mr helm we have one one student recognition tonight um it's a uh an athlete a junior who competed at the state track meet this june came back as a state champ
002ran the 800 in a minute 53 seconds an unbelievable feat and a school record so we'd like to introduce kale showman our state champ from this track season even though kale won his award as a junior he is now considered a senior so we're gonna have him answer these three questions sounds good one of my post high school plans um as of right now i plan to run in college i don't know where um i i still have to make the decision of kind of what kind of competition do i want and how hard do i want to have to train to be competitive um what advice would i give to incoming students just be i think to be confident that it's all gonna work out um especially over the past half year um i've
003had to have faith and the people around me and myself and i would all work out i'm even in tough tests and tough homework it would all it would all finish my favorite memory so far uh has so far been the state meet i think i don't know there have been a few good ones but i think that takes first thank you thanks jail actually kale was so excited to be recognized he was up here last night about eight o'clock looking for the board meeting uh snooping in all our new construction uh spots so it was actually exciting to see him last night excited for some of our new spaces or excited for the board meeting not remembering it wasn't on a sunday night are we gonna take a picture quick yeah congratulations to kale
004again we're going to go into a closed session contemplated closed session pursuant to wisconsin statute 19.851 e deliberate or negotiate the purchase of public properties the investment of district funds or the conduct of other board business whenever competitive or bargain reasons require a closed session 19.851 e specifically consideration of public acquisition either roll call to owen bye oh the caller okay tina ryden yes jim gom aye ross early yes i myself oh thanks everyone for waiting um we are now back into open session at uh officially 6 11. i understand we do have one person that would like to speak so i will read this per board policy this meeting is a meeting of the hartford union high school district board of education public for the purpose of conducting school districts business and is not
005a public meeting the public is welcome to address the board public comment for this meeting is limited to items that are posted on the agenda specifically the old business new business section each person wishing to make public comments will have time to make them as determined by the presiding officer the board or administration may respond to your comments at a later date you may also provide your comments with copies to each board member and the superintendent no public comment will be heard that the presiding officer be critical for an individual or group either by name or by reference also per board policy the presiding officer may interrupt or terminate a speaker's statement when the statement is too lengthy personally directed use of obscene or irrelevant please direct any such comments to the principal or the
006superintendent for administrative action comments on other agenda items or non-agenda items that are in writing was copies each board member and so this clark may step forward and then i i'll allow you you can move that as you it you pull it down so i guess thank you um this is relatively new to me too so yeah um i'll allow you five minutes you certainly don't have to use all five minutes um and then just confirmation you you are a resident of the high school i am i most certainly am perfect yes and i don't think i'll need five minutes okay well go ahead thank you very much my name is beth clark i am a resident um that feeds into the school district um i have a question about curriculum and giving parents more
007time to be involved in developing the curriculum um authorizing the curriculum um you know there's i think parents are really concerned these days there are some theories and studies that are going around that um parents would like to have a say in so it's important to me um as a member of this community um and it's important to parents with kids in this school that they have a good amount of time to understand the curriculum read through the curriculum um have input into the curriculum and that that's totally above board so i understand you're going to be talking about that i don't know if it's going to be briefly or in depth but as much light that you could shed on that topic tonight as possible would be um a really good start to a
008conversation okay that's all yeah and we appreciate your time um and just know that in this public comments section or not state where they would respond to you they would certainly there's something from a chair and we would invite you to stay and listen for mr mcintyre's conversation around curriculum i would certainly appreciate you being selfish oh for some opportunity great thanks for your time excellent thank you thank you see ms clark was the only person to sign in we will move on to the phoenix uh don't have any board reps do we do not at this point okay they're still taking their summer off so but we will move on to the communications starting with the donation and so again a number of donations which we very much appreciate from our local partners in
009our district so both culvers of hartford and culver's of sussex donated support our ffa program the 498 dollars and 40 cents for revolvers of hartford and 683 over sausage cover some of the offenses at the end of our ffa program uh carol moldguard um 260 to assist students with bill purchases certainly appreciate her uh contribution donation then an anonymous donor of three thousand dollars support expenses from our hohs girls softball program so thank you anonymous donor and all of our donors who continue to support the work of our student campus okay then we'll move on to creative reports and board dialogue i'll turn that back over to you two areas to focus on this evening facility planning update regards to our outdoor facilities we had two scheduled meetings one in june and july a dozen
010or 15 people probably have been in attendance along with myself and mr helms and some of our other staff members mr helms and i also presented at our local rotary we had an audience of about 20 individuals shared out some of what we're thinking in regards to our outdoor facilities plan we have begun working with jp cullen who is a a contractor that does a number of projects across across the state a neat thing about working with them two of the three individuals that we've met with our hohs graduates so there's very much invested um pride can do its attitude with those individuals with jp collin they will specifically be working on um ideas and thoughts and help support some of our marketing fundraising efforts that'll occur between now and august 20th which again signals
011uh our first annual aussie fest and for those of you who have gone to an aussie fest before it is not our aussie fest um so we're excited for that and that will be a kickoff again for a campaign raise funds for our facilities i think i'll stop there and take any questions and thoughts about the facility planning update um i have a question from a couple of parents that were concerned about why does it need elaborate what they didn't well it's a good question i'll bring it up yeah that is a good question i appreciate that um as a reminder for everybody listening um the first um proposal was over 14 million dollars just by taking a look at it and eliminating some of those things that maybe we thought were elaborate reduced it
012down to 12 million dollar range over a million dollars were already cut off um and i don't think we're done with that conversation i think that's where jp colin now that they're gonna take a first shot at it and figure out how pieces fit the square feet that we have outside maybe can find some other efficiencies and maybe we can see um some reductions off that number um but we're cognitive of that again i remind everybody that a couple months ago i don't recall specifically it was march or april our financial consultants baird came in and talked about the impact of what any funding options would be for our district and there were certainly different outcomes regards as the price got higher impact who our taxpayers are into prices or at the end we i
013i think we know our threshold and that's why i think the fundraising campaign will create a good story for us to decide if there's a number that we or is it by or any of our so we'll be using advertisement to pay for some of this at all or people's name businesses we've invested no dollars to anyone at this point okay um well we have what are we looking for say that one more time are we looking into that though correct so that's the agreement with jp cullen is at a dollar amount it is not more than the dollar amount that's required for board approval it's a small amount of dollars that are going to be invested for them to partner with us no guarantee of if something successfully happens and then we'd go out
014to a process ultimately would okay thoughts or questions about the facility planning update and again the other thing i'd like to make sure people understand in the audience and listening from home i'm sure that's a large number on a beautiful night um is uh august 20th also will be a night that will be in a day that we give scores of our inferior work where again our district has invested more than five million dollars of renovations improve our students experience on campus doors are really excited about some of the products that are happening and hopefully we'll be close by august that'll be an opportunity for our community to see how best dollars are ready we're designated for capital um next item on my report area is 2020 21 22 planning our leadership team had an
015opportunity to kick off our three-day leadership retreat uh today and they still all came tonight so thank you for that we tackled a couple of key issues that i thought was important that i share with you prior to my arrival at hartford high school there was a focus around a strategic plan that kind of provided the direction district and as i've advertised previously in some of the work that you've done this year we've now gone through some movement model work we've landed on four areas of focus student learning and achievement safe and orderly school financial and operational management engagement at the august board meeting you will see those four areas individuals working on those areas bring that a foundational level where you guys will see what that looks like we'll roll it out to our
016staff all to kind of guide our next steps here and direction for our district the other part that we talked about is operational procedures again those are the words that we've used to guide our response to the pandemic that started in march of 2020 um so we've looked at our previous operational procedures where we've been where we are now and where we want to go in the fall i think there's some key areas to again focus on with those procedures and i think those fall into face coverings contain tracing and quarantine virtual instruction social distancing um our current approved procedures that were last updated this past may again may 3rd we moved our face covering from required to mask in motion and on may 18 we moved our base covering expectation from required to recommend
017it so those are still our operational procedures and therefore at this point in time we have more conversations to have around social distancing virtual instruction quarantine and close contact as well as the face coverings but as i've said all along our data right now is in the low category as a county when we were in the height of the pandemic we were at a moving category target of high and very high and mostly high and critically high we're at a fraction a fraction of aces in our local area so as i've advertised all along our mitigation strategies will align to data through the cases okay if we've already shifted our operational procedures away from base coverage be required i don't see any reason why we would alter that specifically when our data is a fraction
018of what it was actually anyway okay so please um tell your friends please spread the news that we will bring more information back around those other areas and some of the conversations we had are about are we going to quarantine kids okay we had no evidence of anyone who was identified as a close contact that we quarantined that transmission causing them to have cover right so if that's a data point i think you can probably read between the lines of the recommendation in august going to align to that data was no transmission with contact tracing closed contacts okay it doesn't seem appropriate for us to consider their contact race or quarantine students and though that is what our current health department is right social distancing is a third of the four pillar areas that we
019identified again if we use this space here there's an opportunity to stay respect people's face or there's a choice to be made to sit at a table with somebody else i think we'll still be cognizant of maintaining learning environments for learning right and maximizing the space that we have now that may sound simple but in some cases learning environments have turned into learning and maybe storage or excess furniture or things like that okay we will focus our learning spaces on learning try to maintain any distancing because it's the right thing to do and this may be just and then lastly the virtual instruction piece is was a convenience for many kids and our response to the pandemic last year was we gave parents choice and again over a thousand kids chose to be here every
020day and about 300 chose to be virtual and many kids chose to be virtual that probably shouldn't right while it was convenient we saw kids fail because they chose virtually right and so we'll continue to have conversations about the way in which technology plays a role with how we deliver instructions um remember or maybe new for our board members but we adopted schoology as a tool long time ago right at the onset of the pandemic or even before that and that's a digital tool that doesn't have to drive virtual instruction it can drive on campus and it's a platform that allows us to deliver resources and things to students through a digital tool and we'll have schoology right the question will become is if we are a district that adopts any level of a virtual
021option or if we are going to return to normal or as normal as possible come to fall again based upon our district and also based upon the current um levels of the pandemic that we are hopefully navigating all right so as i close i would just say our goal is september 1 to be as normal as possible okay the numbers tell us that we should at this point in time in july but it would be irresponsible of me make that decision make a recommendation tonight when we have six weeks before the start of this and we will make that decision when it's appropriate i'll bring that recommendation for any adjustments to our operation here's at the board meeting with that i'll take any questions or comments about that part of my okay not hearing anything
022i'll turn it over to our leadership team uh first mike mcintyre is here for a curriculum follow-up from previous conversations we've had around some curricular updates hello everyone um as i promised at the last board meeting we would do a follow-up with curriculum for this for this board meeting and two of the agenda items tonight for approval are the um it's a revision of our curriculum handbook and our grading handbook and i've actually combined them into a single handbook so what you see in the packet is an update of all the changes to grading an assessment and then changes to curriculum and instruction and then a completed handbook itself i wanted to go over our policy for controversial issues in the classroom and then share a little bit about our overall education goals so i'm
023going to start with grading last month i did talk about our curriculum process there are some specific highlights that i wanted to focus and emphasize one of the big shifts that we're making is with our transition to a blocked schedule we are not having our final exam grade count as 15 of the overall semester overall credit half credit term um a part of that is because learning is a continuous process and we already have an 88-minute period that to extend to an exam period doesn't make a whole lot of sense but with that we have put it into our proficiency category and in other terminology we talk about formative scores and summative scores our categories here are feedback for formative and proficiency for summative so the bulk of the student's grade obviously is coming from
024where they're demonstrating their learning on a proficiency scale a different shift is the return of graded work and the the whole concept here is with a block schedule we tend to move more quickly in in the term by term so instead of having a 45-minute period for the duration of the semester we have an 88-minute period that runs for nine weeks that requires us to return school or return work much more quickly and promptly and our previous handbook did not have very specific guidelines on what that should be feedback for our feedback scores we put a range of one to two school days but we also know that feedback formative feedback can happen instantaneously we need to get away from the idea that the only way we provide feedback is writing on a document and
025handing it back or typing comments into a google sheet or google doc and handing it back instead feedback can occur instantaneously but we are working toward understanding that our feedback needs to drive our instruction our proficiency feedback we put a window of four to six school days with the idea that these would be larger projects um essays research projects things that that span a lot of time and giving quality feedback does take time that four to six school days also considers everyday courses courses that run monday tuesday wednesday thursday and every other day courses that run for the duration of the year so giving time for the teachers to provide quality and feedback and giving time for students to learn from where they can grow the next issue is with reassessment lake work and academic
026dishonesty and our prior handbook had some conflicting issues associated with it something that i along with our building leadership talked about the fact that in our prior handbook a student who cheated could earn full credit on the work once they resubmitted it and actually had more chance at success than those who turned in work as a reassessment so to find a balance between that because we want our achievement scores to demonstrate just that achievement we don't want it necessarily to demonstrate behavior but the way that we talked about it is that academic dishonesty is actually an academic behavior that students have done something to be deceptive um a lot of times it's a result of poor time management of um maybe an inability of thinking about how to ask the right questions to understand what
027it is they're supposed to do but ultimately we feel that these adjustments really do align more closely with demonstrating what it is that we want our grades to do which is to show their achievement scores so this is an adjustment essentially it's holding students accountable for their decisions and then also making sure that we we show students that working hard focusing on the learning and driving what it is that we what they're trying to to demonstrate what they're learning is going to be reflected in their overall score last board meeting i talked about this curriculum review process it is focused greatly on standards um the standards themselves are what we're held accountable to and that's going to be the are the driver of our instructional decisions the revision in the actual handbook took a a
028different approach on how we're going to demonstrate what we do in at the course level and this is going to be the work that's it began like i said last board meeting it began pre-covered covet interrupted a little bit but we did plug along last year with a lot of this work of identifying priority standards and learning targets each department is at a little bit different place and a little bit of what the what jeff alluded to with our planning for 2021 22 is going to involve a continuation of this these documents will become our where we house what what occurs in each of our classes and then i also wanted to talk about controversial issues in the classroom um this is a obviously a very challenging time um in education and in our culture
029um when we have a lot of things that shouldn't be controversial become quite controversial and i think it's important for our board to know that this policy is something that i reviewed with our our social studies and our english team including our um librarian and our instructional coaches back in january we reviewed the policy because it's really important for us to know and to be aware of our understanding of how we're going to talk about controversial issues in the classroom and as was alluded to with our public comment like critical race theory right now is is a release powerful topic creates a lot of emotions in in all sorts of dimensions whether citizen educator student it it's just all over our society right now but as educators it really is our job to make sure
030that we are preparing students in the best way possible and it's not as simple as saying critical race theory is not something that we teach in the classroom because it is ultimately up to interpretation on how people view critical race theory i can say however that it's not something that we do in our classes we don't talk about dividing people in terms of the oppressed and the oppressors we don't talk about or instruct on race-based privilege these things do not occur in our classes when it comes to the classroom itself and this is direct language from our policy our board understands that the consideration of such issues can help students learn to identify important issues explore fully and fairly all sides of an issue weigh carefully the values and factors involved and develop techniques for
031formulating and evaluating positions so when i talk with teachers our our focus is most often on inquiry the idea that we need to understand multiple sides of an issue really focus in on how others can believe in certain issues and how to defend your side how to understand another person's side but ultimately to how to have a engaging conversation and and really focus on the tenets of argumentation these were some of the issues that i highlighted with our team back in january controversial issues provided that they're used in the instructional program i bolded the words that i thought were most significant it would be related to the instructional goals of the course of study and the level of maturity of the students its right and our policy does not tend to indoctrinate or persuade students
032to a particular point of view and encourages open-mindedness and is conducted in the spirit of scholarly inquiry so these these are the the tenets that we follow whenever we're introducing something that's controversial in the classroom and i think this is where it can become somewhat complicated because a lot of times controversial issues are brought to the table by students themselves what i've put in quotations is is directly from our policy as well i did emphasize with our staff in this reminder of our policy that a teacher may not express a personal opinion and then ultimately i think this is one of the most important things is when we discuss any type of controversial issue we need to make sure that any view is not held derogatory malicious or abusive toward another student or views of
033a toward a particular group so when we review this policy we walked away with a i felt as though a really strong feeling that we've been following this very closely we do not share our own opinions as educators um that's not something that we're going to do in our classes and our focus needs to be on our educational goals overall so i put our mission on the left but the way that i see how that is put into action in terms of our instructional practices is meeting the needs of all of our students fostering our opportunities for all students i think that's one of our main celebrations as a district is our students have so many opportunities that they can pursue build skills and capacity to ensure hard work within and beyond school i think
034at the core of so much of what we do in our classes is about working hard working with curiosity thinking about how you can grow yourself and what is your purpose and then probably the most challenging thing for any educator is our job is to prepare our students for a world that's constantly changing what careers look like 10 years from now many of them don't even exist so our job as educators to really focus on growing students and their skills focusing on inquiry focusing on academic practices but then also life ready practices to to be prepared for what comes next so with that i will take any questions from the board yeah i have a question um so i know i talked to you earlier and i would like to see some kind of curriculum
035or something for parents and grandparents and taxpayers concerned about what's being taught in the school system you know because this is big controversy right now and um also that let's just say like a teacher is um imposing their views and ideas is there a disciplinary act that happens teacher or professor or whatever so that would be a personnel issue and we would bring that to our building principal and the evaluator and depending on what comes of that hr would be involved as well okay thanks that's spelled out in terms of if you break a policy yeah it had a general statement break a policy exactly i i don't know the policy directly but any violation of a policy that our district has any reason uh could lead to possibilities of determination depending on the level
036of severity of that policy that's what policies are right because employees have to stand behind them but i do like to have written clear yeah this isn't mine um i i know i can also create our back and forth i would share the request for a little bit more transparency when it comes to the actual curriculum itself uh i do consider such an expert here tonight and from what i'm hearing you say based on your position correct me if i'm wrong that you feel confident that critical race theory the way that it's described publicly is not being taught here it is yeah i do feel confident in that okay all right i appreciate that um i just go a step further with that drum so if you look at some of the words the legislation
037either whether it's the recommended legislation states or in our country the three key elements of that include teaching that one starts a race superior i can tell you that doesn't happen right that a person is inherently racist by virtue of his or her race or sex i can tell you that and that anyone bears responsibility for past acts committed by other people of the same race or sex i can tell you that that's what leads into the previous question about if that is happening those conversations had all right our job as educators is to facilitate learning not just first okay we have a unique opportunity as a high school district facilitate learning in and out of what we would normally define as academic area right this provides a great opportunity to prepare our store well
038knowledgeable uh ready for a global sit right ready for whatever they leave after and that's why i think it's important to know that we have that um young adult in our classroom and we will not run away from contributing okay but we will not violate a policy bill not first knowledge that would go against any of those words i just shared in person i appreciate that walters and mcintyre the reason that i'm asking questions it's not to be sorry but i think the people that we represent want us to ask questions or that we talk about it out loud i don't i don't ask you these things from a perspective of being accusatory that they're happening or so inquisitive uh and wanting not only to learn for myself with some assurances based on care that
039it's not happening mr walters said you're committed just one more i apologize one more point that i wanted to make was we have required classes and we have elected the class that we have in our building that is most likely going to engage in conversations possible controversial issues more often than not they're minorities and projects right that's a class that a prior board has approved class that runs multiple sections of it and you're going to get into an adult conversation it died of the teacher i've had thoughts for my 24 years of high school education about the role of a government teacher right that's probably a bit more difficult be that guide or facilitator make sure that we stay away from that more so than ever and i think those unique high school courses are
040more challenging any regards to making sure that our teacher plays that role that they're expected and i think to add to that that specific course um it's taught from the lens of looking at um statistics looking at population looking at demographics looking at socioeconomic um factors and so on and within the course itself that's where inquiries really driven so it's presented as let's look at our what does the data say for the united states for the state of wisconsin for washington county look at socioeconomic factors etc and students then work with that data it's it's not the other way around it's not it's not presenting a position it's presenting data and really getting the nitty-gritty of having students do the inquiry process i would just argue that sometimes you held based on how the data
041is presented you're providing absolutely and that's that's one of the ways that the when i when i spoke with the teacher himself he said data can be presented in any way that you want and that he goes through ways that it can be skewed it's etc another thing and this is part of the the controversial issues is there's a talking points on how to look at bias within a source to recognize why someone might might present data um in a skewed way and looking that that's an essential skill for our students to understand where there can be bias in in what it is that they're reading and understand how different perspectives have different purposes and we need our students to be savvy consumers of information and that's that's a key part of the the class
042itself true i would just close real quickly by just reiterating that uh while i agree we're all well intentioned here and i do believe everything that's being stated um there is no doubt that it has snuck in concepts that that we spoke about here tonight have stuck into some classrooms uh across the state and across the country and i think that the reiteration of the a little bit more transparency with the actual curriculum itself or the parents point that spoke earlier would provide i think a greater level of comfort for the people that have some skepticism regarding it so again i just want a voice of support to have a little bit uh have the curriculum more broadly school board members we should know what's being taught students you know that's why we were voted
043in so you can't just go blindly and just you know state that yeah everything's a-okay but i think that assurance knowing oh right and my emphasis has always been on its its skills its standards that that drive what what we teach and it's through those skills that students are able to learn and demonstrate their learning that's been my lens with it so this classic what what level next year we've got two sections of it running it's primarily juniors and seniors i think with our new block schedule there might be some sophomores that are enrolled in it because as a prerequisite they need to have world cultures and civics and then they can get into their elective courses but i think it's primarily juniors and seniors okay no it was 20 years ago that was a
044great class back when pete often bought that class it it was a i mean hit the nail on the head it was controversial there was but back 20 plus years ago no there wasn't much yeah everything else pretty much shoved on you wrote the way the way it's going um kids have to be able to think on their own and not excuse by teachers parents for the meeting they got to be able to prevent the information and let the let the student kill them i want to thank you whoever everybody that's been involved spreadsheet i came tonight and all right everything you news everything you read your transparency open my eyes tonight and um as long as there is transparency open dialogue with critical race dear or any other policy coming up i'm i i
045echo what kim said i'm i'm comfortable pointless problem thank you mcintyre thank you i appreciate it mr helms with a spring athletic report finally get to talk about the end of the spring sports season was pushed back a little bit into late june and so that's why we're getting so late in july here um but you can see in your report that we did uh fairly well throughout the conference season we also recognized 20 of our student athletes as north shore scholar athletes and as we got into the state qualifiers our boys and girls track team qualified in 10 different events which was pretty impressive we were also able to host some major events at the end of the school year we actually hosted a regional track meet for living word kind of helped out
046a neighbor there we held baseball games uh sectional track meet as well as a sectional final for our softball you can see their participation numbers um fairly healthy um the two areas that we saw uh decline in our numbers were in the boys and girls track programs but still the numbers are are fairly high and when you get into the different activities i'm pleased to report that many of our activities in the spring somewhat got back to normal um started traveling a little bit and were able to do a lot of their activities uh we're hoping that will continue into the fall um so that's it for the spring i can i can say i'm very proud of our coaches and our athletes throughout the entire school year for following all the different protocols that
047were in place by the wia we were able to go through all three seasons and provide opportunities for our kids here at school without any any setbacks so i'm very proud of that thanks that's uh problems i do have a question for you yeah okay well first off congratulations to you and all of your staff and other kids who are involved in all the great things that they've accomplished over for the various i'm just wondering do you know what the current wia policy for restrictions iran spectators or participants for fall will be no the wia board of directors is going through some transitions right now stephanie hauser just took over uh we did get an email this morning that we may see something later this week because we're all waiting for it football is only
048uh two weeks away thanks sorry nothing yet and again just um in my role i convinced scott our athletes our coaches and also our families um because you're like no other not have to sacrifice effort so an appreciation for all thanks thank you scott all the reports we have tonight mr westfall yeah so seeing no old business we'll move on to new business proposal two two two seven nine one uh sixty six point zero three zero one t e motioned by tina i'll second and then we'll move to discussion that's the third year that we're we're having a teacher at joint one and we have a teacher yes yes um any other discussion oh that is that is why we held off bringing the proposal or that agreement because of our less than full confidence
049to be able to fill the position uh therefore once identified candidate by the proposal any other discussion hearing none this will be a roll call vote aye ross aye aye aye ocean pass ocean 22-2792 the 2122 primary budget approval will have a motion to approve the preliminary budget motion by ross we have a second second second fight yeah any discussion anything to add mr paul um just a little brief uh go over my my memo and address any questions but um budget process essentially starts in december and january and as we move through the year we update it uh with information that we get from the state this being the first year the biennium we're always kind of held hostage by the governor and our legislature on what um we're going to get for for
050funding uh going forward and as you know other people have mentioned this past year has been um you know a little off uh to say the least with covet and how the budget has been affected by that going forward um it's probably going to be another year of transition and not knowing um the governor did sign the budget um he did add a 100 million dollars to it from what the legislature or the joint finance committee um approved how that's going to flow to us don't know yet and we also have the second round second two second round and third round of esser money which is the the covid relief from the federal government so those are going to play in it uh and factors into the budget as well so this is what i
051have come up with and prepared so far and as information becomes more available we'll up continue to update this is a preliminary approval we'll bring it back in september for another approval that will be presented at the annual meeting and then a final approval at the end of october so this information is presented as based on the governor's budget as we know it now we have a significant increase in general aid there is no increase in the revenue limit we're assuming no pupil increase per pupil aid is 742 per student which is the same as last year at this point and we are anticipating our first run of esther money which is 154 000 at this point we are in the process of providing um the state with information based on how we had our
052in-house in school and virtual instruction last year and so we'll get funding based on that once all the numbers play out in all the districts report so hopefully we'll have a little more of a allocation that the legislation legislation hit legislature has been talking about so that will probably hopefully be updated in the final budget but if not we'll bring it back for approval at some point but all the other revenues are based on um kind of prior two years with some assumptions because of the covid hopefully we'll get back to normal and we can have a normal budget projection in september and october along with that the school national school lunch program is again going to feed all students so we'll have a lot more revenue from the federal side than we do from
053low from the students buying their meals at this point so that's another year of kind of skewing our revenues going forward with the food service program on the expenditure side the salaries are based on a settlement with the teachers union and a 1.5 increase for all other staff it reflects our staff that is hired at this point we still have a couple of positions that need to be filled english art guidance counselors a couple of custodians if we go that route and a food service position benefits are based on a 7.5 increase in health insurance and no increase in dental all the expenditures are based on grants department allocations that haven't changed the last couple years and information based on prior year expenditures the balance the budget is currently balanced as i said before we
054did receive a significant increase in the general state aid going forward for this year and on the last page that's a landscape you can see the history of our of our tax levy and based on no increase in the equalized value at this point because we don't have it we're showing it that the taxes are going to go down eight percent from the prior year um so based on that um a taxpayer with a three hundred thousand dollar home last year would have paid everything being equal 857 dollars and this year they would pay 800 788 so it's at this point it's a significant increase hopefully that will stay relatively stable for us once all the final numbers uh get rolled through the budget and the governor decides what he wants to do with the
055100 million dollars so like i said we'll be bringing back another um update in september and would address any questions anybody has at this point thank you any further discussion hearing none obviously is the roll call vote we'll start with ross hi you know hi jim hi hi from passive ocean two two two seven nine three updated policy five two four zero point zero one do i have a motion and by jim do i have a second a second second by ross any discussion point out a couple of adjustments schedule austin credits per year for us only chain another discussion hearing none all in favor say aye aye opposed eyes have it moving on to proposal two two two seven nine four the student parent handbook do i have a motion to approve the 2021-2022
056student parent handbook some action by tina second by craig any discussion kelly anything to add i just wanted to call her out on her [Laughter] mine too i appreciate it welcome thank you almost the changes in the handbook just kind of represent our change into block scheduling so we can notice like the changes are all there the new board is updated we wanted to have some consistency and verbiage as well so you'll see some changes as principal or high school leadership team superintendent we got rid of resource times so that's a big piece that is out i added in the oriole time we put in new changes for academic dishonesty and just some verbage that we wanted to clean up throughout that no longer is here so and then the times so there wasn't that
057much but just type it was only to represent the big changes that you guys approved last school year to the school year okay thank you any questions at one i was reading that oriole i don't know if you're gonna what's the difference between oriole time and source or whatever from what i read kind of like what what changed sorry so i have a bias against the use of the word resource or homeroom as an example because or real time an advisory or something like that is research-based there's to support kids so conceptually oriole time again is most certified staff in our building service oriole coaches on tuesdays and students will have choice one day thursdays and fridays to go directly for the support or the choice of session that they need or want that day
058so it'll be much more intentional much more focused much more targeted and that we're referring to as the otmc the oriole time mentor coach will be one more member of that kid's team and i hope that all parents and should know that person and support individual on our campus all four years once you get that quote or once you that is the plan at this time so all of our incoming ninth graders at this point could expect to spend all four of their that same mentor coach otmc okay thank you any other question question okay are you none thank you all in favor of proposal two two two seven nine four say aye aye aye opposed proposal two two two seven nine five the approval of their curriculum grading and assessment book do i have
059a motion wishing by tina do i have a second i'd like to make a second any discussion yeah i'd like to propose tabling this until mr mcintyre can provide a more thorough outlay of the social studies in a curriculum to include the syllabus of each class along with the reading list of it last we address it august after that give the board and parents some currents that it's looked at we tabled it until august not saying it's approved for mcintyre if we tabled it until august that gonna somehow affect your uh ability forward or prepare for your so you would want a syllabus of every social studies class in every english class to be in the curriculum handbook for us to review before we approve the curriculum handbook um i could see some challenges with
060timing in terms of contracted time for teachers knowing when they would do that that work to provide that in terms of their syllabuses aren't readily available each each class has a syllabus and that's something that i did want to share prior is we are going to be having parent access to schoology in next year and part of the schoology class pages is going to be to have a syllabus in it in terms of reading lists i think the last time we did a comprehensive look at each of the courses was 2017-2018 school year so that would i would need to meet with teachers to collect all of that information in terms of the priority standards and learning targets for each of our courses i would have that available part of our responsibility is the board
061you're asking approve curriculum that i don't know what's in it i'm asking help me understand what's in it before i approve it sure and as i said before we've focused and this has been my lens both as a teacher and now as an administrator as the we're held accountable to the standards that we're teaching and the skills that we're teaching um in terms of collecting a reading list and publishing that within a handbook one of my concerns would be when that reading list changes and when it when it's adjusted based on needs of students um i'm not asking put it in the handbook asking to see oh see that so no it's sure yeah i think that's something that we would be able to do um because of the our publication of that in our
062schoology classes um i'd have to talk with the instructional leadership team about formatting and things like that for how we would share with the board and under what context that shouldn't be so hard if you have it in the schoolology right um typically it's shared in terms of units of study and it can be adjusted um [Music] it's not something that i currently can just jump on and look at right now what's read in every single class but it's something that we certainly can get i just want to be clear mr mcintyre want to hear what i said before not being accused right i i believe you in what you said and what mr walter said in terms of your standards and your ideologies and all of that i i believe that but my responsibility
063is to take a vote on the curriculum that's being taught at the school and i don't know what it is so how can i vote on something that i don't know it would be irresponsible vote on it but i don't know what's being taught sure we're responsible that's so in policy that we're responsible right and i i guess my struggle a little bit is we teach the standards and the standards is what drives what happens in the classroom the standards of what that's that's my standards of what it thought i i heard all so all the standards i'm in agreement with them but it's the standard of what what is it that so a standard within um [Music] a specific course would be a standard around inquiry or a standard to run research or a
064standard around textual analysis those would be what drives it and that's how we've we've done our work to this point i hope you can see that none of that is specific that's all very general oh i'm trying to get more granular in terms of the effects of what's been taught if i'm not supported by the rest of the board i'm not supported but sure i'm voted in as an independent elected official and i think what i believe and i think the way that i viewed the the handbook is our processes for instructing on those skills and that's been the the driver of what the handbook does we do have another item on here the approval of academic standards which goes through what standards we use in our classrooms again that's standard but what we're voting
065on right now in proposal 2795 says curriculum and that's that's my sticking point i'm specifically taking a vote on the curriculum and i don't know what the curriculum is so the courses that i'm concerned about are the english and social studies i'd like to see the syllabus of those courses and the reading lists for those courses that way i can honestly tell parents that i answer too on both sides true that i've reviewed it and that i have a level of confidence in it for the people that either agree with me or don't and i jim i'd also like to say i do not feel like you're being accusatory whatsoever so that's that's mutual i understand your your stance on this so but isn't it i mean i worked with uh homeschooling and there's always
066a pacific curriculum that you have for the whole year isn't there a name of your curriculum for each level of grade or you guys just so we would have a [Music] different units that we have within our required courses and we would have in for example our english two curriculum focuses on the american experience is kind of like the overarching concept and within that class you're going to work on skills associated with writing about speaking about reading about different different skills associated with each of those concepts so when we're working with reading for example we're going to look at key ideas and details we're going to look at structure we're going to look at author purpose we're going to look at all of those components that are driven by standards well i'm asking that question
067because if there's a name of for each curriculum it's really easy to give that to us and we can just check that curriculum but don't you want for granularity i mean i think you're talking pretty generic that i feel like you already covered well that's how i bought my children's curriculum by looking at what they you know each curriculum so you so you're comparing this school district in a home school environment i'm just going to make a curriculum name do you have a curriculum like a becca was a curriculum name whatever they wanted private school mr mcintyre what i was getting at with my initial emotion or my initial suggestion i understand that syllabus itself each teacher can get away from that and then the discussion classroom they've gotten many different forms that's where what
068mr walters spoke to and you spoke to earlier regarding your policy regarding controversial topics that come into play and i have every trust that you would hold adherence to that so i understand that by providing you a reading list and providing syllabus it's not going to account for every discussion that's had in every classroom and there's no way for you to project that i don't expect what it does is it provides me an opportunity to be able to review the material that i'm taking the vote i'm representing the people that elected and i need to have some not some form of knowledge on what i'm voting uh in addition to the confidence that i have in you and all of the staff that you'll hold your staff accountable to the policies but what i won't
069do is take a vote blindly something that i have no idea i think what tino has referenced or is it previously adapted over lustre that's the name of our curriculum that i think right right is not that type of curriculum all content no synonym for illusion illustrative math and fight things like that what did they do of those areas unless we were out okay i guess i just had you requested or because i guess could this have been avoided if we would have asked hey question yeah i i respect your position but i i think this is the appropriate place to do it we're we're here in public forum we're answering people people have an opportunity to speak to us and appropriate reform to voice concern regarding issues that are in the agenda no i
070was just specifically asking for the information that oh before i've had communications with mcintyre regarding asking questions what's included okay and obviously get a status back well i wouldn't put it as not satisfactory i thought it was a because that has a negative connotation to it i thought it was a valuable discussion um but there's prior to actually voting the curriculum for myself i'd like to have more than i'd like to see it then from those from that conversation i don't recall you asking for these reading lists for a specific syllabus with english and social studies yeah great agreed up my my request tonight i i pared it down from the pretty long list i sent you of concerns um so i i for ease of accomplishment because i get it i mean school year
071is coming i want to do it you've already given us information that our concerns you know are not warranted that what i think we've raised concerns about are not happening so i felt like this request and i'm open to suggestions but i felt like the request for syllabus and reading of the two topics that would have the most controversial discussion attached to it would be the easiest for you to obtain prior to working okay so the motion that's been presented second um so so how do you excuse me how do you go about janet what do you so you've got the first and second to table it you should do a roll call vote on the tabling and if that passes then if we don't do anything that's what's done if we if we if
072it's approved that's what happened right if it doesn't then we do have a motion in a second on the original proposal that would then go into we have the motion in the second on the original one also then we would do i would say a roll call vote on the original one if this does not pass the table okay any other discussion i just i just want to point out handbook not deliver the curriculum [Music] say that again the handbook provides guidance direction regards to curriculum grading and assessment does and i viewed it as focusing on the process it's it's the guidelines we use to discuss standards to focus on assessment to provide guidelines for our grading practices then i would i would just point out that then there's nowhere in here for us to
073actually approve curriculum because the guidelines so my only my only option then board member to have leverage over there is to is to not vote for this because nowhere in the rest of the proposal does it allow me an opportunity to review the circuit if all i'm voting on tonight is just the guy the guidelines uh there's no actual need in terms of what's being taught i don't have the opportunity to play in them and i think that might be a little bit more kind of semantics because i i do feel like the curriculum is the skill that the students are learning it's the skills it's the standards that drive what they're learning um not the actual material the materials of vehicle to help drive that but what they're being assessed on and what they're
074learning is those skills and those standards well i just would respectfully say that that there are some people that agree with that some parents actually want to know what material is is appearing certainly i understand and when instruction is driven by a textbook right when it's not driven by it makes it the other place that the board has an effort proof curriculum adoption go back to that court had an opportunity that curriculum i would agree with that i think we always could raise our uh opinion all regarding structure and that's hurting now so we need to take a vote well we have to finish discussion okay it's a valuable discussion i i appreciate the perspectives i understand where you guys are coming from and you've not only to you but to the teachers as well
075don't mean for it at all to come across like that but i have a responsibility i look myself in the mirror lay my head on beyond this would it make more sense have some specific versus you know you've got all these other things right back in the restructuring rating success if if this is what the type of transparency that we like as would it make more sense in the future to have that as its own i mean i'm just trying to understand because there's people have questions right and and and i think you might get more of a peanut butter spread over how how to overcome the hurdle of what are you teaching child right and i think let me just jump in sorry mike um going on three years i don't know if i've
076had one individual conversation about curriculum and what's being taught i've had more conversations about resources as vehicles deliver that so i'll use a there's a novel in english not necessarily the standards of inquiry or whatever the literacy standards are that are being addressed which is the curriculum it's the tool or the novel that helps us and so either i've not been part of those and i'm not aware of those um but i think we need to be careful when you for curriculum versus resources because resources are evolving every day right in a digital world that we live in with more and more coursework not being driven by one tool in a textbook doesn't change the curriculum it changes the journey along the path staff right go together or ride together so harvard we going to
077not be tied with that but to to if we he gives us a list next month and like to your point of evolving how do we not hide directly i'll just reiterate that's why in a class like sports marketing could have a conversation about targets and standards about that course i think that we're going to have a pulse and our hands on the resources that are classed like that youth is well and i understand that and that's why i indicated that i have trusted mr mcintyre knew that it would come to your attention that policy was violated in terms of how those resources were being used to discuss learning objective classroom you'd hold it accountable that's your responsibility as superintendent and your responsibility as a curriculum director and i have trust that you would do
078that what we're talking about here tonight is my responsibility that's to ensure that to some level some some level that i i have some knowledge of what is what is being taught with the understanding of course for walters that like i said before it can spider web and grow and i i accept that that's why we have professionals such as yourselves to oversee the school but for my position i'd like more than the blind approval of what's happening so i can tell constituents to talk to me that and frankly what i'd like to be what i'd like to be able to say and i think we're darn close is it's not happening hartford it's a dead issue me too it's not it's not happening here so let's move on the more important issues is what
079i'd like to be able to say but for me to be able to do that honestly i i have to at least be able to see something and that's what i'm asking so i guess what i'm trying to do is not duck below the bar expression and if we trust the process like saying and trust the leadership team that we have and we have the transparency of what students are being provided through schoology which is new this year right but that that wasn't as transparent parent access is going to be introduced this year yes so so aren't we kind of already doing that nope okay nope i'll quote someone that i really respect trust but verify my responsibilities ronald reagan right back in terror what do you believe to deliver word by the audit on
080the slideshow i presented there was a revised approach to how we're documenting priority standards learning targets and so on and there is a section for resources and i think that might be something that we could build out i think my um concern about is is just timing i i feel like i would be able to gather that information um or at least verify that information against some of the like i have a spreadsheet from 2017 and look at see what text we continue to have and so on i think that's something i could do um by the next board meeting in our at the very least are required social studies and english classes just for me do you think you could get the syllabus for those i would think so so i just for for
081clearing your part jim we're just moving this x and you'll do the same thing again the data that you're asking because you're not you're not asking for what he's giving us to be part of the policy not the way mr uh walters the way it's great right i just just for so you're you're essentially we're just moving this this proposal to next month what we are asking of you mike is to provide us the data that jim's asking to us and just for clarity's sake this is not being added to the handbook it's just we won't vote on the handbook until we have required course syllabi for english and social studies that yeah i mean that's my interpretation so the proposal says curriculum and that's what i have the issue that's what i have the
082issue with that even though an explanation it's not more of a guide post to the curriculum i guess is what it is but it says i'm voting on curriculum mcintyre is a former english teacher maybe it's a bad use of a comma it's not written the approval of great deal overlove curriculum i'm a great assessment and i mean it's a curriculum drainage handbook that provides a guide direction but it's not the guts of what but we ever find that out but that's what first get what you're getting at for west fall and maybe a compromise would be and i'm not trying to create more just for you here janet um just as we go through discussion um if you're if you're saying that because i have no interest in holding anything hostage here if you're
083saying you can get that information for me by next board meeting so we can review it before the school year starts and that what we're supposed to be voting on here tonight and it's clearly on the record that i'm not voting on the curriculum voting on the guidebook that that drives the ideologies you know i i can withdraw my motion if you're telling me that you'll be able to provide that information by the next by the next board as of this moment i think i'll be able to do that and i'll let you know if i if i can't based on communication with a staff member or something like that how about you'll make the best of your ability to give the information your government's request that's always what i'm trying to do so so
084okay that being said we're going to vote on your motion and if it fail go back to the proposal follow robert so no i if i'm hearing mr mcintyre say that he's going to give his best effort and obviously we'll have a discussion if it doesn't happen all right so i have every trust and confidence that he's going to do that um so i'll withdraw trend with the understanding that we've talked about what mr walters has said what we're what we're voting on here tonight is not the meat and potatoes of the curriculum it's the guidebook by which your teachers utilize the standards within the classroom it's not the actual curriculum itself of which you're going to most likely provide to us at the next board meeting you're going to do your best to get
085me the syllabus and the reading list of the english and social studies courses so don't but don't we have to vote on it because second okay she should withdraw too but i don't want to withdraw because i think i want to make sure we have specifics now we should vote on it there's something up in me then then we should vote on it right so we'll do a roll call vote starting with me i'm a no ross i gather this correctly if it fails we're going back to the original one yes and then mr mcintyre will give us our information that's what he exclamated that we can go through and i'm gonna vote now i thought the purpose of this discussion was to learn about what we're talking about more which occurred here and so
086you guys educated and we listened uh and i understand what you're saying which is why i was willing to try either way i mean i think what i wanted to happen is is happening it was my emotion and i vote yes i'm for it but i thought the purpose of discussion was to understand it better which which you did i appreciate it oh i'm a yes then we have a tie so i looked up robert's rules of order in a tie it reads robert's rules of order allows a president to vote to make a tie vote or break a tie vote so in this case craig would be able to vote to break the tie so my votes no so we go back to the origin so then we go back to the original so
087there is a motion and a second on proposal two two two seven nine five the approval of curriculum grading and assessment handbook for any further discussion just making sure tina still has the motion on that one correct she still has the motion okay just making sure so now do a roll call vote for the original proposal okay based on the original proposal i'll start with tina no ross yes jim no and craig yes and now there's a tie so craig you get to break the title so i guess that's what we really some of this is okay moving on to proposal two two two seven nine six approval of the 2021 2022 supervision and evaluation handbook might give you or i had i need a motion and a second i'll make the motion prove it
088i need a second second second by jim any discussion like anything to add yeah i just wanted to highlight um the primary shift now we we looked at this handbook again i want to say it was we approved it back in july and i think we did it again in september where we kind of revised the experiences of evaluation for teachers and what that looked like um the primary change from that adjustment to the present is in who is in a summary year a summary here is when you need to demonstrate evidence in the different areas over your three-year span we our adjustment is for new teachers both new to the district and new to the field the prior handbook had new to the district was every it was the first year and the third
089year of their experience at hartford we have adjusted that to focus on the first and second year and part of that was looking at just the relationships that we have between evaluator and teacher and how we're continuing to grow our staff having that process for two consecutive years will help us continue to to have teachers deliver instruction the way that we expect the that's for new teachers to the district new teachers to the field so fresh out of school we'll have the summer year for the first three years so those are the primary changes to the the handbook itself and the evaluation cycles a discussion hearing none all in favor say aye aye aye all opposed also two two seven proposal 222797 the approval of the mentor handbook do i have a motion motion by
090tina second by ross mike anything to add to this yeah the primary shift here is um the mentor handbook and the the process itself is very similar with the exception that we have our instructional coaches particularly those that are full-time or almost full-time instructional coaches are going to be doing the coordinating responsibilities for the mentor program so that involves assigning mentors to mentees that's our new staff members and i think this adjustment makes a lot of sense because our instructional coaches are going to be doing a lot of professional development with our new staff but also our veteran staff and that gives a really cohesive connection for our new teachers and instructional coaches is a natural landing place for that mentor program so that was the adjustment that we made there any questions or discussion
091proposal two two two seven nine eight and you'll notice of academic standards you'll have a motion motion by jim second by myself any discussion mr walters um a feedback of the prior conversation of the transparency could be found board of documents um so if you look at what was shared with the board those notices referenced standards glad at least provides some general framework doesn't get resources and uh reading lists and things like that it certainly is a starting point for all uh community members um to take a look at regards to standard curriculum resources on our website any discussion would just like to add mr mcintyre i am cognizant and aware of this responsibility compliance statute specifically regarding different educational things included in structure not fair of that i don't intend for analysis to in
092any way eat that district has obviously fire fly with state law in that regard i want to make sure wherever anything else hearing none voice vote so all in favor say aye aye opposed proposal two two two seven nine eight united proposal two two two seven nine nine annual notice of educational option motion all motion the move of a second got a second i don't i do not have a second as a second yeah for walters so just for our new board members and a reminder for others uh a couple of the options um advertised through here our start college now and early college credit program so you will see some requests for that either in october or march where students are interested in taking courses at a post-secondary institution the start college now gosh
093i just had a brain freeze is the technical college and the early college credit program is four years or two or four-year colleges so as an example if they have interest in auto body we don't offer an auto body class could see a request one of those programs take classes like that at off site any any just any further discussion or comment carrying none all in favor say aye aye opposed proposal two two two seven nine proposal two two two eight zero zero approval of the updated 2021-2022 co-curricular code of conduct handbook uh mr helm or do i have a motion motion by ross second by rounds you have anything to add okay discussion questions comments hearing none all in favor say aye aye aye opposed proposal two two two eight zero zero proposal two
094two two eight zero one interim services agreement with c6 do i have a motion portion by tina do i have a second elsa second by ross they see anything to add okay any questions or discussion hearing none do a roll call vote involves money start with me i jim for zero motion passing now i'll propose the approval of the unanimous consent agenda do i have a motion i'll move motion by jim do i have a second elsa second by ross all in favor say aye aye aye i'll oppose um we'll move to the announcement and meetings and events um starting this starting today the marching band camp started i saw them oh tomorrow sorry um marching band starts tomorrow so be prepared for some excitement there because i know the marching band missed out last
095year and then registration is august 2nd to the 4th and then there is the huhs athletic department golf voting on august 16th and then our next board meeting august 16th uh at 5 45 in this year just to clarify the girl voting is august 13th what did i search nice and just a reminder for the board as well more information to come on august 20th or the first annual aussie fest okay happy august friday august 20th which coincides with the first football game of the season yeah we're going to work on that i can't hear over there and don't seem to hear me well we have our tech people coming in wednesday to kind of address that maybe we need a speaker on stage or something solve this solve that issue so we will not
096be eating the closed session so i need a motion to adjourn be it thank you thanks everybody