 I'm sure you're all here for the Outdoor Ed program, the presentation school, and the ECO program. We, in 2016, Bethel Campus began an Outdoor Ed program called Educating Children Outdoors. We currently have on both campuses seven faculty that are trained by the North Branch Nature Center in a curriculum that is being used in over 20 schools. Each school interprets it a little differently on their own. Our dream is to have a pre-K through 12 program. Tonight, the teachers of the current programs, we have a pre-K, five on each campus, and we have a middle school version here on Bethel Campus. And those folks are really good at introducing themselves, so I'm not going to do that. And we're going to have about a 25-minute presentation and then some questions, okay? And I may interject as we go along, but I also want you to know that this is a pre-K through 12 vision, and it's also part of our Articles of Agreement. So let me turn it over to one of you, and can you all introduce yourselves? I am Alissa Bertie. My ECO name is Ms. Honeyby. I'm Mark Wheeler. My ECO name is Ms. Otter. I'm Mrs. Sugarbar to all the children I work with. Your name is Ms. Owl. My ECO name is Ms. Owl. We're working there. I also teach elementary art on the Royal Town Campus, so I'm going to go with many of our older students. Cross my fingers. So here at the Bethel Campus, all of the students that are taking an ECO have an ECO name, so it's some kind of animal, insect, amphibian, bird, or plant that is a Vermont species, and we are starting that in South Georgia as well. So the kids can choose their own name, and they can keep it from year to year, or pick a new one, whatever they want to do. Okay. So we have a slideshow that's built behind you. Yeah, sorry. I was more at programs. Yes, the exploration and electron investigation encourages a sense of wonder in students and joy, and they're very excited about their accomplishments, the new stuff that they explore and experience afterwards. We go on a lot of exploration talks, and this one on the bottom is a picture on the left. We're pretending that we were millipedes and trying to learn what it would be like to be a millipede crawling over the moss. So in this lesson, we start with a story, and then the kids become the part of the story, and we walk throughout the woods, and they kind of explore it as that creature. This is fostering a connection with all parts of the earth, even the parts that you can't see on a different basis, all the little creatures that we don't think about. So in the top right corner, we always sit in a circle around our fireplace, and this is a circle of power and respect. This is also something that we use in our middle school and our advisories and in different classes. And this is teaching students to have communication skills, listening, one person talks at a time. They all get to share, at some part, in their eco afternoon or morning, and practice speaking. So in a circle of power and respect, one person talks at a time, and they can all see each other. Oh, and the three cares is the foundation of our program, and every kid knows what they are from preschool up until eighth grade, and they are caring for yourself, so it's how you dress, being prepared to go outside, caring for others, helping everybody be safe out there, and carrying sticks in a safe way, working with tools in a safe way, and caring for the earth, making sure we leave everything with that we found it. So in this particular day with preschool, our story was about squirrels, and Karen and I are working on fine and gross motor skills with our preschool students. That's Mrs. Turner, the preschool teacher. She's in that center photo with the book on her lap. She's camouflage, you may not see her. We always start with, we always give questions to the kids. So what do you notice, what do you wonder? So they went through this story walk, they were the squirrels looking for their nut caches, and at the end they were building their trays, their squirrel nests, and then we lay down on the ground, and they were pretending that they were squirrels looking up and let their nest that they were just made, they just made were up in the trees and that they were squirrels climbing up. So imagination is a big part. One of the questions in this lesson was, what do you see? What would it be like to be a squirrel and have their nest at the top of the tree? And then we let them come up with it, come up with their understanding and what they're learning. So our program builds resilience and self-confidence in children. Again on the left they think this was the same, they were millipedes, and then at some point they turned into nut hatches and they were flying through the forest pretending the whole time that they were a nut hatch and trying to experience the forest like they were a bird. Let's see. You jump in at any time. So another big part of our program is learning how to use tools. All the students start with safety protocols. So we teach them how to use a tool, how to be aware, how to have a safety circle, a safety space in which they're using that tool, and be aware of other people that are around them, how to point the tools down. They always start with peelers, really sharp peelers, and then when they graduate from that they're going to show us that they can use all of the safety scales, they move on to blunt tip knives, and then eventually on to saws, making a saw. They're working in small groups, so they're all rotating through different activities so that you don't have a lot of kids working with tools at once. They're all seated, they're all holding their bodies in their positions so they're safety. So we've learned a lot in the end of the last year as well. So one of the main things that we do with this eco program in the preschool through five program is teach them all of these skills, these safety skills, communication skills so that when we get to them, the middle school program, they're ready to go. And they know how to work with bigger tools. And this orange rope on the corner here, if I make a circle on the ground, then every student knows that they don't go through the circle. And that's how we began with gaining some songs and again teaching what a safety circle is. So that's fun and engaging. And that's another good point that I forgot. All of our lessons are fun. We learn through play, we learn through songs, we get into a circle when we beat up, we sing songs to read each other, we sing songs about our lessons, whatever we're learning about science and math, English or singing songs or engaging their learning and their interest. Working with hands is a big part of it. So we, they worked with some earth material to grind them up and mix them with different mediums such as eggs and oil to make their own paint, natural paint. And they made these tools to make paint brushes and pencils and then they made their own art. They also make little tree cookies so they use a saw to learn how to, to use a saw and then they make their own little, I think I brought one, it's for a tree cookie. And they're kind of proud of it because their animal want it, they drill a hole, they learn how to drill, use a hand drill. They make forts. Everything they do is hands-on. We incorporate all of the subjects that you learn in this building outside so science, math, literature, art, music. On the right, this was a kindergarten and I think this was a forces of motion push it, push and pull science lesson and all the kids made their own tracks so that they could try to make that ball, whatever size ball they chose go through the track and it took them a while to try to work problem solved and work through how they can make that work. When we do, when we discuss habitats and ecosystems, they make nests if we're talking about specifically about the words. We connect to literature so on the bottom left is the leafman. I don't know if you guys recognize that story if you have real things to do with your teacher. In this century, some art and math connections lots of math projects too. That's one of our teacher and teachers who have a piece to a math game and then we have some science connections where we're investigating the law and another science unit where we are building insects, bodies of insects. Another piece is journaling at SIT spots. So we're again helping students build self-esteem and a sense of calmness and patience and they choose a special spot in the woods and they look around awareness, observation and they take time to see what's around them and take notes. We're also teaching a science journal Winter is fun too so we are most of our years winter so we just keep going and learning continues. We do a lot of tracking on the bottom left using the tracking card to try to figure out what the tracks are. Making some symmetrical designs in the top right. We do a lot of compass and direction work and math building in the winter. This is a lesson in the big picture in the middle about sugar, maple syrup and the energy in a tree in the roots that goes up to the top. It was a game with a ball where they had to be the liquids that went up the tree. The three kids at the bottom of the roots can visualize this. The trunk is red and blue there and then the other two kids up at the top with this pretty honeybee is the branches and things, etc. So there's a whole science lesson that goes in with understanding what's happened to the tree through the season. And then of course our magnifying glasses are irons that we use to investigate. And then fire. So fire we teach a lot about awareness, safety first. We get to cook on the fire. We learn what sticks and materials are going to be building the fire and lots of science that has to do with fire. I'm just going to go back to school. We're moving into the middle school program. So last fall we started the last winter we started the middle school program and this is our first school year and so we don't have any of the kids of sixth graders because Kiko was the earlier grade so we're still waiting for those kids to grow up and walk right into the middle school program so we're starting to scratch through the middle schoolers. Obviously safety is first. Thanks. And a lot of practicing, a lot of learning outdoor skills. A lot of these middle schoolers have a lot of skills in the outdoors but they all need to be fine too. And there's a lot of missing loops, missing pieces that they should know if they want to live in here. So we're focusing on those things. Alright. They love fire buildings. This year we have themes for each of the mini-mesters. So there's six mini-mesters, three trimesters in the school. We're all part of the same system and fire building and cooking on the open fire is a big piece of it from this session and a little bit of it. We woke in when we were last session and we were doing trail building and we put in an interloop to see the maps on this board here that is a diesel board. And that the kids made. You can pop and look at these at your friends. Yeah. But we always weave in, you know, it's a fire building day. Let's take a break from trail building and make a fire and if you have learning, they don't use matches and they don't use lighters. They use flint and steel. They're practicing with bow drills. We just saw a film about a press. I just lost the name of it. You know, there's a hand drill and then there's one that you go up and down a press drill, basically, and makes the fire better faster and your inspiration, right? The fire comes in a little stick. The other kids this year, this session, you'll see it over here, they're some of the examples of carving with fire and they're using a stick with a ember on the end and holding their own spoon that they're going to be carving and blowing on it. And this is, we discovered the safest way instead of having two sticks together with an ember that you're going to have to take out these kind of things, the little sticks. We're not doing that. So this is an example. You can take a look and we have one student who's already gone back and carving. We use one tip knives. They go through the whole safety thing first, of course, and they're doing a great job. They're really terrible with it. This is some of our cooking for hot chocolate and tea. One day we couldn't get up the hill and it was too icy and so we made a fire down in the snow bank. All right, so let's keep on doing this. Make a lot of fun in the morning. There's some art that's happened. The acorns will be double-tracked on the actual food as well. We used to start with the acorn as a nut and the collected acorns can be chucked then and made them into flour and made our dough boys a little bit harder with chucked acorn flour mixed with it. And it's a very rich food. It's a Native American food source. We're trying to teach how to live more closely to the land and how they can eat off of it as well. We don't go around to mushrooms. You can tell them about them but they're not touching them. We do a lot with ropes and knots with each group. There's one lashing over here. There's a little bowl in the picture bell there if you want to experiment with it, make your own. They're learning the knots and they're pretty important around here. Okay, leadership skills. I'm not going to read this whole thing. So qualities of a leader, what you need to know to be a leader and what does a good leader really need to do. Some of this... A lot of this comes from my history and the things that I did in the rest of my life and a lot of this is coming from the main guide curriculum as well that Lily Brainard has so kindly introduced to us with a very... Actually, Lily, you can talk about it a little bit. We are basing our curriculum for middle school and hopefully towards the high school on their work, 80 years of their work of working with... To be a guide in May, you need to be certified. That process, people learn on their own pretty much. To be a guide in May, you could take a high school certification program and learn so much from all of it. They've offered us to adapt it to the month. They invited me at Lily Brainard's suggestion. Thank you very much for coming in and learning with the first-hand when they do a testing camp for the high schoolers that are at camps in the summer and they go up there for a week and have tests for a week. Both hands-on tests and some learning stuff. Mrs. Brainard, could you explain it in a little nutshell? Sure. I'm Mrs. Brainard, Lily Brainard. I teach shop in the middle school and I've worked with this program, so I did the program as a teenager and I've worked with the program for 15 years training students and now I'm a tester with the whole organizational unit that runs the program. Basically, it's a pretty extensive curriculum. That book that Owen was holding up a moment ago is the curriculum and the students, they train for five full weeks in the summer and they learn everything from... It's billed as a wilderness leadership program, so the idea is at the end of it they're able to guide and lead trips so it's not just what are the survival skills and the wilderness skills that they need but how to be a good leader, how to know what to do in certain scenarios and when things go wrong what's appropriate or inappropriate to do. As Vanna said, it's 21 tests total and it's a mixture of practical physical skills and written tests, everything from leadership and fire building, they're running their own campsites with no adults in them. They feed three meals a day to adults who just show up at designated times and they have to serve a meal and be presentable and then in between all of that they're taking their written tests and so it's a pretty extensive program but it's well established it's in, I want to say, maybe 87th year so it's a very well established program and it's centered around Maine and the director of the program has agreed to allow us to adapt it to Vermont and so the things that traditionally would be sort of Maine knowledge and the map of Maine obviously we would shift to Vermont knowledge and we're still doing this right now What's that? We're the only school in Vermont doing this As far as I know, there are a handful of high schools in Maine that have adapted the curriculum to a high school program This is our vision about the high school and we need to work with the high school faculty administration is to build that pre-K5 then the middle and come into the high school with kids that have all of this knowledge base and all of this interest and eventually bring them back into a mentoring program with little kids on both campuses or middle kids I'm going to try to get us to head towards wrapping up knowing the time issue but I want to get Gay Lynn in here Yep This is the second year of EECO on the Royalton campus We started last year at the Red Branch Nature Center that teaches the EECO level 1 and level 2 through Poussington as well and we were able to be in EECO level 2 at Red Branch last year I've invited elementary teachers at the Royalton campus who have the interest and the commitment to come and to their classes to be in the outdoors for learning experiences and in the second year we've got the grades 2 through 5 and our schedule is intermittent we meet alternating weeks and we're trying to integrate with tech for the librarian with the classroom teachers bringing in science where FMP reading is giving a lot of focus on literacy but we have the literacy as well our environment that we go out into is river bank and riparian zone so we're learning how our environment is different and I think it would be exciting for our kids to be able to explore each others EECO site because they are radically different although we are 7 miles distant the river is on the other side of the road here whereas when I go out with the children the river is just over the bank I think the deep impression from last April after snowmelt and April vacation and the waters came through when the third graders came out they could see the ripples of the silt along the trail that they knew were impressions that the river makes on its riverbed and they could say this was underwater with a sense of awe in their voice and that really strikes home when they get to experience and see that the librarian and I alternate EECO and TECH I had not participated in TECH with our 4 or 5 students the librarian participated in EECO we've devised in our alternating week a journal project on their Chromebooks there's a book reader I'll just pass these around there's just a couple journal entries in there on EECO days the students have access to cameras they have some question prompts they're getting their observations while they are outdoors and we are in the library and they have their Chromebooks out they have our ask to recall with some prompts what was the weather who was with you what were the activities and then there's a photo pilot they can access on drive and plug in so the end of November but it feels very much in the early weeks of school these 4 students have 3 journal entries our first adventure outdoors we're actually doing the Royalton Royalton had its 250th historical anniversary and there was a historical quest created by high school students working with the town historian so that's the first project that the kids and the librarian and the classroom teachers and I did we were able to follow the press path document it on cameras and the cemetery is right beside our school so one student there Mackenzie further questions and explorations she was curious about the veteran Elijah Ken whose farm was on the property that is now the cemetery and her question asks you know did he provide food to the soldiers you know they brought them back to that sense of place and that's what's really important for the time we have access with these children is helping them get to know where they are from and develop sort of their roots and sense of place because this will carry with them and all the students who are here now as you consider what your futures are and what horizons you may visit ego is an opportunity to really know where you're from and who you are from your experiences being outdoors many years ago I want to couple things what do you think is the commentary or the question and we also the art teacher goes out the Spanish teacher is gone out of the shutters I think people do that in other parts of the earth so we're trying to integrate lots of things in different ways questions and comments for these or accolades or leaves a lot of things as they put into the presentation providing really leadership and support for the program I like the fledgling just little things we appreciate being able to share the knowledge and the time and I see some of them especially the image sense of being it's already showing up and I think it's too we need to have a connection and to learn the art side of the classroom itself the art side of the classroom is where you should it fosters stewardship resilience imagination leadership so I remember in the merger process at one point we were talking about having a complete place in Rochester to do similar work and then we left us and we were still there but in the articles of agreement I think it's article 4D it says we will have an outdoor education program and I'm proud to say that we do have a program and what we see is a growing program we know that around the state this is happening other schools are doing this it's not a lot of middle and high schools they're doing this so again we're pioneers in this and we're leading and Tarrant Institute for Innovation and Education who we're in partnership with recently wrote their blog with UVM about our program and that's linked in the agenda and we can post that again to the Facebook and social media sites and it's a really nice little article from the state thank you all welcome to look at this ad thank you thank you you're welcome to stay with us we probably have problems oh and can I ask a question of course, don't go with it I was just wondering down the road if there are going to be any food enforced modules within the eco program food and forest just agricultural endeavors as another piece to the puzzle I think I can address that a little bit Lisa McCurry she's a board member from Bethel and we have talked about having a sugar house here on this campus and there's some talk about that one of the things we want to do with the Taren Institute and with community members and partners is to call together a group of us and to do a bigger, more concrete vision for the pre-K-12 vision and that does include things like a sugar house we've talked about having other food here as well last week I was given some goose what are they, goose tenders one of our students got a goose and he made them into chicken tenders he made goose tenders and he brought them in and they were delicious last week we had five students I think get their youth dear we would love to have some version of that and we know families are going to do what they want with that and we've also talked to the game warden locally and he was talking to us about bringing game here and teaching students how they test those biologically like they take a tooth they take a sample out of a hoof they take a disease and it moves and that he's more than willing to do some of that work with us as well so nothing is concrete but we want to call together I thought you might want to be in that group where we'd get together and bringing community members, educators and community partners thanks and there's a great last one right here that's the end of the process he's getting to do praise for the kids thank you the board meeting hasn't even started yet we do have a dangling what they call little maker up in the woods if anybody knows how to use a chainsaw we would love to know if you sell logs or if you know any loggers we need some help with that you I see her room chainsaw alright should we call the meeting to order thank you so much for your presentation thank you all I'd like to call this meeting to order at 6.38 are there any adjustments to the agenda I have one the music proposal should say schedule proposal just so we could make that shift because it's a broader request and Lisa I had mentioned a student executive session yes anything else that needs to be adjusted on the agenda alright thank you I think for tonight we'll skip over the assigned times paper piece if that's okay and we'll just try to we'll just try to be concise anyway alright so that brings us to public comment anyone general public comment okay consent agenda in this packet are minutes from our meeting on October 15th in Royalson everyone had a chance to review them we'll approve the minutes Tuesday October 15th I second I'll second okay right everyone in favor of approving the minutes is written please say aye aye okay any opposed right the minutes are so approved not a board comment but I wonder if you've got two resignations a board member and also a custodian here Wendell Wills maybe we already did that I don't know but he's no longer with us right he was last meeting we accepted with regret that resignation for retirement maybe that wasn't yeah I hope we accepted it so that right and we have the resignation of Shannon Morrill Cornelius she moved to Bethel so if you haven't seen our ad in the paper if there's anyone who would like to submit their name to be considered for that position I've heard that we have not received any letters yet correct that's what I was told yesterday so we do have that vacant spot for a Royalton resident for a Royalton resident yes please and it's two and a half well almost a little more than two years remaining of that spot that seat is that correct I guess less than that we would probably have to only tell me I know we all staggered as board members so I could remember where she stood with us when we had the right term resignation that would be and then that would be for one year until the election in March so that brings the schedule presentation welcome get the conversation started just for folks who there is a letter that I gave to I hope they want to pass that out to the board members because I don't think they've seen it oh the letter wasn't in the board packet it is it came with me tonight and I just gave it to Lisa and it's turned into the board members I want to give them a minute to read it well maybe just for context for the audience to maybe I can just lay out what the letter proposes so just for a little bit of background a couple of us parents came to the board last spring to realize some scheduling issues that were preventing students that are involved in music from fulfilling their graduation requirements so the board had a conversation about that at the time the schedule itself at the high school hasn't changed for this year but there was a PE class added during learning block that took some pressure off that scheduling issue but didn't entirely resolve it so since then recently a larger group of parents came together just to talk about our own children's experiences with getting the courses that they're interested in taking and what we discovered is that everyone at the meeting all of our children either currently would like to be taking something that is not available to them that they can't access or in the case of freshmen down the line will have a hard time fulfilling their graduation requirements so just from the folks who sat at that table we heard things like a student who is interested in design unable to take art classes freshmen who take band and chorus never having an opportunity to fulfill their health requirements so a variety of concerns and as the parent group talked we agreed that we got the sense that our children are not the only kids at the high school who are having a hard time accessing opportunities and so we didn't create a proposal or come tonight so that you all can get our own you know personal children into French one or something we're not looking for a specific fix for our own kids or kind of a band-aid on the schedule as P.E. and learning block is serving as for this year but keeping with the promise of the merger to provide additional opportunities for students and in following up on the action items in the strategic plan that talk about students having increased opportunity through different courses and also parents and students being involved in decision making our letter proposes the creation of two committees one being a scheduling committee that would involve administration teachers and also students and parents with a specific mandate not just to argue about schedules but to really dig into possibilities for creating a high school schedule that will maximize students ability to access opportunities and take the courses they want to take and our hope is that we'll be given a mandate to propose a solution to the scheduling troubles. We know it will never be a perfect solution because scheduling is hard at every high school but we feel that it could be improved upon the second committee that we're proposing knowing that fulfilling P.E. requirements is an acute challenge for many students is a committee also comprised of administration teachers students and parents that would specifically look at flexible pathways for P.E. So the parent group that came together to discuss our concerns has actually done a lot of research about what's going on at other schools we've researched different schedule models and we've also looked at how different high schools handle P.E. And it turns out there's some really creative approaches at different high schools from Vermont to flexible pathways where students maybe are involved in dance and that counts toward part of a P.E. requirement or even we heard a really creative idea that students could do physical forms of community service such as cutting in stacking wood for senior citizens in the community or raking leaves for senior citizens and that that might be something that could help students be part of their P.E. requirement. So we are proposing a second committee that could specifically look into that issue and the possibility of adding some flexible pathways to the P.E. program at the high school. Any other questions or anything that someone would like to add? Is everybody here concerned with the scheduling? Does that work? I mean I can go all the time anyway I can. So the schedule right now is a modified block for the learning block every day. Okay. So the same schedule that the school had before the merger? Okay. Or approved before the merger? I'm not really sure. Any other concerns about the schedule prior to the merger too? Yeah. What's that? The year we had a committee for half the year talking about possibilities and then you say his name and Dean came in and just said this is what we're doing because this is what Bethel does and then we merged and that's what we did. That's correct. So I just want to speak also. I signed the letter with Lori rather than having her be also by herself and my husband Brian also signed it. So our daughter Grace gave up chorus this year. But I think what's important to know first is we have a fantastic array of classes and opportunities at our high school and so as someone who came from Bethel whose first child went to Basque there just wasn't anything. There were exactly zero AP classes to my second child who's in her sixth. So there's a lot of opportunity. So I think we're just at that next place where okay so we have all these wonderful courses now what do we need to do to make sure that kids can take advantage of all of them. So I have a son as well kind of coming out through who loves music who spent tonight in our living room practicing for Manuski if he gets to be a senior and he wants to take an AP course he may have to give that up or he will have to give that up as far as we understand. So we're just asking for the opportunity to help solve the issue be creative and I believe we can do it. I believe that there are solutions out there and that we're just at that place now we're figuring things out and we've arrived here and I'm optimistic that the issue will be solved. How would you frame the issue? What is the issue that we're looking for a solution to? A schedule that allows students to access an array of opportunities. There was vocalization that today is delayed schedule. The modified schedule because of the start of the day was different but they saw more of their teachers more consistently and that was a positive feeling compared to an usual I'm Tim Fitzgerald I'm an English teacher at the high school I would just speak for myself as a member of the staff I don't speak for the entire staff I see a lot of discontinuity in our schedule and just as an example with our current schedule I have students in one of my classes that I will see for 50 minutes this week because 50 because for the whole week because of an interruption of a music festival and shortened classes today if we were in a more a daily model I would have 130 minutes of contact time so I think talking about not necessarily jumping on it but talking about the idea of classes that need more frequently would perhaps negate some of these interruptions that we face all winter long we ask a lot of our high-flying students they go to music festivals they leave early for basketball games and we don't see them enough to teach them well a lot of the time that's my concern so as you may be aware Disney Plus now has a show called High School Musical and one of the conflicts in the original High School Musical which I've never actually seen but I haven't had to because my children are of the generation my niece, my nephew one of the conflicts is that one of the young men feels like he has to choose between his life as an athlete and wanting to be in the musical and some young thing probably 22 on Facebook the other day was like people don't even have to choose that stuff anymore and I went I didn't have to choose that in 1993 in a high school situation that was not ideal in many many ways and I don't understand how in 2009 when we should have learned more about this stuff we're making our children make more sacrifices between physics and chorus which is literally the choice that Alexis had to make this year and fortunately for her physics is in two separate semesters this year so she could do one semester of physics and one semester of chorus only after begging the music teacher to do it and literally having to prove that in colleges require physics so that was fun but this is the narrow little chute that a lot of students because it's your daughter it's my daughter every teacher in here could name two or three kids who have had to deal with this and to a certain degree we are a small school there are only so many options there are only so many slots in the day there are only so many teachers but I can't help but look and think about our job of balancing this and if we have something like the committee I don't even remember if I told you I knew but my name on the letter or not but one of the things that came up was how other schools are dealing with this scheduling and I remember looking at it and going well we don't want to say this is how it should be because we want to make sure in that letter and we all agreed or at least nobody told me I was wrong that we want to do what's right for us but there are other schools that can do this so we know it is possible and so I would like to see a school with a really vibrant participation in a variety of courses to not just be on the oh you're the high flying track that means you take these classes and maybe you could fit a band or a course in a couple of times in the next four years I don't think that's ideal or you know if you go to a vocational the Hartford Tech kids are here for half a day and they're away for half a day and so if Band or Chorus falls in that half a day and I feel like we need to do something to support those kids because they have a voice they should be in Band or Chorus or whatever the issues in and we may not be able to give them the ideal music experience just as the example that keeps coming mind but it's not just music, it's studio art it's English it's whatever it is but I feel like we should be able to work in flexibility that we're not just you know these kids by the end I was just going to say that we sort of wrapped up at the end this isn't just an issue for kids that are high flying I think it's a good thing particularly the troublesome for kids whose parents can't be here to talk for them or aren't even aware that it's an issue for them so I mean I know we're so little it doesn't matter how big you are there's only so much time in the day so you have to make choices but I think the choices that some of these kids are having to make have really limited opportunities for their future and not just for now I think it's a long term issue Hi that's so I'm Katie Collins and I signed the letter as well as I am concerned about the schedule and Reid you had asked a little bit about what the issue was my concern would be so my daughter's a freshman and coming in this year she wanted to take a French one and she was told she could not because the end was at that time just starting out as a freshman you know that's a little bit discouraging just knowing that already she's not able to take you know a certain course that she wants to and then even for next year she's already said to her mom I'm not sure if I'll take chorus but she loves to sing and I'm like well why don't you do that she said well I really want to make sure I get my physical education health requirements in I need to make sure so you know for them to have to think about this and have to stress over that already you know that's definitely concerning and I think we can be creative we did call around and some research we can do this for these students and allow them to have those opportunities that we said that we would have with the merger we talked about up in May maybe previous board meeting and we talked about having being able to fulfill health therapy requirements during the learning block and providing other opportunities for more independent study or something has anything happened on that front? yes we created a learning block PE class which meets three times a week so then students who want to take band and chorus have the opportunity to do that it's only twice a week and we also were asked by some students about a flexible PE option and there are two students that we have allowed to meet graduation requirements through a flexible option so when we've been asked we try to work with them if I could just address them hi, I'm a student at the school with the learning block PE I would also like to underline there's a lot of students concerned about learning block and just sort of ditch unwest because it's a massive how long is it? 40 minutes? yeah 40 minutes of our day every day and so PE for example only meets two of those days and that's the only class that's allowed to be taken during learning block and while I understand the value of having the time for the students to be teachers and especially for AP teachers to grab us and be like hey there's some supplementary stuff I also am concerned that we prioritize it over actual productive class time we can lengthen the last period block we can add a class that isn't PE and there's a lot that we do I don't speak for the whole student body I'm just speaking for those of us that have talked about it but it's definitely an issue to follow up on the PE in learning block I just wanted to point out it's a great example of the difference between a bandaid and a lasting solution yes technically the students who are taking that PE during that learning block are now my son who's a junior can fulfill his graduation requirements so that's great at the same time my three sons are all in that PE class and while it's incredibly fun apparently they are regularly scolded for not being in other places they're called to the office for not being where they're supposed to be and they're regularly double booked by a teacher that wants to do some science during that time and they're like I can't I'm supposed to be in PE and so while they are technically fulfilling their requirement and they're having fun doing it it's certainly not a solution that the freshmen want to continue for the next two years because it actually creates a lot of other conflicts during the learning block time that are fairly stressful for the kids thank you Claire and I was just going to say it's actually we teachers have had to because we have such limited time because every other day is schedule that each of the AP teachers have chosen the learning block to teach an additional class which essentially freezes other kids out from getting help from us during that period but it does provide an extra time for the students who again are the high fliers it's not really sustaining or helping kids who need additional help so even that it's like a bandage but patches over one problem it creates another so it's not it's a very temporary solution I think to this problem actually I'm part of what I was going to say that Claire just said I mentioned so it is in some way like a bandage to schedule people don't see our kids so we as a curriculum would like we try to make do with this time learning block time but I think it wouldn't be as necessary if we had as different schedule was a little bit more conducive overall and the second piece what I was going to say is hopefully with maybe this conversation this committee we can also maybe look at returning to having multiple pathways at our high school I've been there for 14 years or so and we used to do a lot of the things we're asking for now pre-merger we offered everything and we also had means to achieve so we have AP courses that are accessible once you get to be like an upperclassman but we currently since the merger we've done away with all the pathways to get kids prepared for that like appropriately prepared and we're saying that oh we'll just I would like to as a parent I guess I'm going to say that on the radar here as a parent for my kid I would like her to have the opportunity to not just only offer AP but to actually have a pathway that takes her there in an appropriate way so she can also be successful in those courses as well as I think for all kids with a struggling kid I'd like them to have a pathway and I'd like the middle kids to have options I just want options for our kids the way that we used to have them at our school so can you say more about what those pathways are like sure just how do I say it I've been scolded a few times with this so leveled courses but not tracking leveled as in options for students interests as well as ability so again no one's forced to take anything but if they're interested and they want the challenge and they want a little bit more of a focus for any of our AP courses for science, for math or there's an actual track that they can take to get them there so there's not a prerequisite which creates the tracking no, there never has been in my experience and again in my 14 years at school we never have but again but again you could be lost in calculus if you didn't have skills the prerec would be the parent and the guidance counselor and the teacher if there was a concern but we always wrapped around all of our students in the situation with the family and it wasn't just no one was making decisions without that kind of we made sure that people didn't also just get wrapped thank you I remember a lot of students would sometimes come in and be like oh someone's in academic English now because they weren't and that obviously didn't happen three quarters of the way into the school year but it definitely was and it's how it still happens to a certain extent if somebody says you're a better fit in this class because I saw but again and it didn't at least feel to me as a parent like oh you are in the dumb track and you're going to be in the dumb track it didn't feel like that at all I feel like there was a smart track and a dumb track it felt like there were the challenging courses and the courses that were maybe the pre-college maybe the pre-AP and the courses that were still challenging but less challenging again it's hard to articulate this right you were still expected to hit the marks but maybe you needed extra support or maybe you weren't headed for an AP class so you didn't want to or headed to college so you didn't want to take that AP class in English but maybe you wanted to do an apprenticeship so you were taking more challenging classes in math and it didn't feel like kids were stratified into one area or another at least again as a parent and you know I have one kid I don't have a broad perspective but that was certainly the way I always felt to me so this sort of adding onto what Mrs. Lee and my mother said the honors and academic options for classes were also I know in math at least differently paced and I think that was also really helpful because some people wanted faster pace in a class like that and some people needed it slowed down going more depth and it didn't mean like oh you're better at math like them kids were better than me at math who were in the slow class and that was what made me do that I think that was really helpful and I think when we decided to get rid of that it we lost a loss yes so hi I'm Molly Brian I'm a teacher at the high school as well so just to cycle back in to the scheduling specifics of that I think that what I'm hearing is that the concern is about the level of options that we have and trying to find ways to even that out and spread more options across the day so that kids have more opportunities am I understanding correctly so realistically we would have to look really closely at the amount of classes that are available to be taught just in a realistic situation we have the class we have the day we have we can't just add hours so we need to be really realistic and think really logically about where those hours are going to be organized that makes sense and I think that's absolutely true but I will note that before the merger we had fewer teachers and fewer students so we could do that I disagree you're very good at synthesis it's like you're an English teacher so one of the things that I would just I guess say maybe as a word of caution the parents that have discussed this have reached out to a number of other schools and we provided the board and the administration with actually bell schedules from a variety of other schools in the hopes that the conversation could be not simply about things like done in the past but they can broaden also when there's value in that conversation like why does the schedule seem so acutely challenging right now and what are ways that it worked better but also broadening beyond that every high school struggles with scheduling whether they're big or small and other high schools are using a variety of different models and so I would just caution against being totally insular in kind of the walls of the current high school but hopefully having a broader-based conversation about what are some other options that are out there that maybe haven't been explored in our district before because we can totally reinvent the wheel we can take some of what has worked well historically in Railton and in Bethel but also what's working now at other Vermont high schools I think one of the things that we continually talk about is how we can get more community engagement and have parent committee and voice and student voice and so I wonder if at this point in time supports the idea of creating these two committees or what our thoughts are about that Andrew? If they're willing to work with these committees, if they're interested in working with it I know like before the merger we did have the scheduling committee that a lot of work into coming up with different options but then because we were so time crunched and actually putting together a schedule it was kind of one was chosen and so I don't know that all the work was used so it would be good I think to go through and deliver the process to really come up with what makes sense and what works but I like to hear what you're talking about Sure Well I would you know adding a 8th class could impact teacher assignments could have budgetary impacts and I'm not we haven't seen the first draft of what we've proposed so far and how that's going to impact the tax rate but one of the things we're really looking to do this year is to keep any tax increases to a minimum when we talk about adding usually that sometimes comes at a cost so I'd be worried to look at that and how that may play out there are also some contractual issues I know we're going into union negotiations so we would have to know what's on the table there with the union as far as what may come out next year's contract so there's some sensitivity around deliberations with public with some of these issues and well presumably if you laid out what the constraints were as far as like the teachers can only teach for this amount of hours and you regardless of whether it's through this committee or some other way like you have to arrange a schedule around that you know I think given how busy we are and we've been doing a number of things moving staff around to try to free up our workload I'm a little bit worried having seen the union in our last meeting with the administration in South Florida of fatigue I'm a little bit hesitant to start a deliberative process that we would have to deal with by February because we didn't know what our numbers are going to be to generate schedules for next year so we'd be talking about undergoing a big process we planned all along to have a scheduling work done at the faculty last year we started and I believe we looked over November we had three faculty meetings and then we voted after some deliberation in the fourth meeting that'll be the plan for this year I'm happy to have one or two opportunities for members of the public and students to come in and provide input to that I'm concerned about we're three and a half weeks away from Christmas break and we'd like to have some idea where we're going and not on the long schedule process yes, sorry I'm Sam Griffin I'm from High School and I just want to speak to the idea I think the initiative fatigue is a separate issue that we really don't want to get into in this form right now but the gist of that is people feeling like their work is going to see the work that they do so like last year maybe we don't need to get into too much detail we had the scheduling the time that staff spent looking at different schedules we did have three meetings but many staff volunteered hours of their own time discussing options alternatives etc and we left with a conclusion that not all I can't speak for all the staff but that many of the staff felt predetermined in a sense so that's where the initiative fatigue comes from and I think like I said that's a separate issue from this conversation about trying to find ways to give our students more choices to take what they would like and what they need and also as I see a related issue to meet students at the levels where they're at so they can best get served because I'm going to speak for myself but in the current system that is we're not doing as good a job of that as we could and I also just to address possible issues with the association I mean it is a negotiations year that's coming up but we don't know what any of those possible issues might be yet and no matter what sort of schedule that we do decide what we want to figure out those issues directly so we're across that bridge when we get there but I wouldn't say that worries about those issues should preclude us from starting these conversations and having these committees we can work through that the way that we have in the past and the way that we will continue to do to best meet our students needs so thank you did you have your hand up I'm Carol I am a high school Spanish teacher and just going back to being a possible teacher assignment I'm understanding correctly and I think last year during our scheduling meetings we looked at a couple of different possible schedules where each teacher if I remember correctly could have an additional class for example next year I'll be adding Spanish 5 so a lot of my Spanish 4 students are juniors and hopefully we'll want to continue on to Spanish 5 next year and that will mean that all of my classes will be filled and I won't have room for a double schedule which means a lot of students coming in who might want to take Spanish 1 they just won't be another period of the day because I need to be able to do that but if we switch to a schedule where kids could take 8 periods and I could teach an additional class like we had previously then that would open up more flexibility in the schedule and I know that my first year here and I've been here 6 years that we did have an 8 period day and we had so I taught more classes than I do now but when we chose to continue with this schedule I lost a class so a lot of teachers who for example our department of 1 couldn't have as much flexibility but if we just chose a different schedule that had more periods in the day then that would be possible without adding anybody else pretty much what I was going to also say I know that the concern with taxes inside of a tax fair as well I don't think it has to be it's not a money issue at all we used to do it more effectively and I was one of one and a half English teachers and I have three and there's so many ways around that we don't want that fear of like we don't have to add anything we can absolutely do this with the resources we already have we can do much much better for our students for just humanity we just have a little attitude I know as a student my parents would gladly be paying more if we had to in taxes knowing that I'm getting a better education that will help me go in the college or foundation for college or foundation for whatever I go into versus having this classroom where my C teacher one day a week and they're trying to cram as much as they can so I end up spending more time after school with them trying to learn knowing other students are in the same boat but they don't have the time after school maybe they have something else going on we need to find a way we can get everything we need in the week in the school day versus me going to teachers after then you help with this because I went home and I'm not understanding it they're great at helping me but I need to know that in my school day if I have something else going on outside I can get what I need thank you yes I just wanted to kind of as I like zooming back a bigger picture comment I definitely appreciate time and money considerations they're huge and I know that it's a really stressful time of year at the same time how will we ever fulfill the promises of the merger if we don't get into these conversations not in a token way where one or two kids gets to say this bothers me or one or two parents gets to share their kids story but in a really thoughtful conversation about values and the schedule that genuinely gives all of the students at the high school the most access to opportunity if we always need with you know we will never fulfill the strategic plan and we will never fulfill the commitment of the merger personally as someone who believed in the merger and continues to and worked really hard for it I feel like we owe an obligation to all of the children in our communities to fulfill the commitment that we made which was first and foremost to provide them with more opportunity people are willing to do the work on it I think it's really really important that we not reflexively say no but that we take the time and make a genuine effort to have a really thoughtful reflective and open conversation about it really Lori said a lot of what I wanted to say which is you know budgets are not just about the bottom line they are I would be happy to never to pay another dollar or more in taxes again that would be cool but the other aspect of votes failing is when people don't feel like they've been heard when they don't feel like their voice matters especially when two communities voted for a model and a promise that parent voice would be respected and listened to and implemented that student voice would be respected and listened to and implemented and I don't remember if teacher voice was doing the articles of the merger or not because it was a couple of years ago but it's absurd to have a two school four schools if you count the elementary schools experts who work with scheduling every day and not to use their voice and not to integrate their voice like we are resources parents and educators and students are resources and we were made a promise and we voted on the promise well those of us who voted but we voted for that promise and maybe it's not logistically feasible to do something in the next three months for the next school year great why can't we do it for the next 18 months for the next five years like I feel like we've gotten into this cycle where oh there's no time and then no one wants to put the investment into playing ahead for the next year and so once again oh there's no time we just have to go with something somebody thought it was a good idea we don't even know who with this plan there's a whole stack of research and information over here but we don't have time and I don't want that to be the cycle for the next 10 years because we will start losing we will start seeing budgets fail even if the budgets go down if people are angry and frustrated and don't feel like they're listening being listened to we will see budgets fail we will see negotiations be harder because educators deserve to be listened to and so I think we look at this as an investment and maybe not a time crunch for the next six months but as an investment we make for the next two to four years or five years or ten years of this school I think I've been misunderstood I fully intend we have intended since the April meeting actually since last February we started to work on this schedule it was clear that there were some things they would like to fine tune with it there were a couple proposals that came to the table last February at the 11th hour that it didn't seem fair to introduce into the process at that time once people had already committed to a vote and we stuck with that schedule I fully expect to go through a process like has been done in the years past where teachers voted on this schedule you know we went with a vote and over two thirds the teachers on staff voted to keep the schedule the same students were surveyed that we could beforehand the schedule that we have is the schedule that most of the students didn't have their biggest concern in that survey that we did with students was that students like Alexis who have been at the school for four years now have had a different schedule every year they had been at the school and if we had changed it this would have been the fourth year that they had a schedule change what? yeah, the one who's left longer but I also think students just assumed that they would be able to have all of the opportunities that were laid out in front of them with the schedule you know we just they kind of assumed that that would happen it was brought up to me that my daughter might not be able to you know take electives just because she needed to get in the PEN health requirements and then if she wanted her four core classes every year and a language and band and chorus that's her day like I just don't think that's there I don't think we are helping our students in any way by restricting a schedule for them I think it's great that the community wants to come together and talk about it and figure something out I mean that would help with your time as well you know I know you guys are busy and I appreciate all that but I really appreciate all the work that went in I mean I didn't know this was coming it would have been great to know that there was a group of folks in the community who was working on this she sent it out earlier than now for sure well I guess I'd be able to look up parents and students and teachers here that are in agreement that I think the schedule can be reworked that we should look into it I would be willing to be on the committee your daughter's headed right in that direction well she's still being helpful so I'd like to make sure she gets enough credit to write a book there and enjoy and enjoy it's about a personalized learning I see a lot of things like learning along the way let's take a look at it I don't know what we can do but we have to look at it for us to move on I just was going to say Lori had said it's time and money but I also think the other constraint is scale and I don't think that we've really considered that we'll keep changing our schedule our school is too small for the current schedule that we have I think it's been a seven block since we've tried to do this particular version of the schedule and I would also say just from a historic perspective years ago we had a block schedule and it was parents who came together and rallied to get rid of that because it was the same issues that were happening so I think in a bigger school it doesn't even have to be that much bigger than our school there's more flexibility because there's more staff and more room but in our scale I think that that really is something that has to be looked at seriously this time around so just looking at this from the outside because my kids are too young to be dealing with this yet but it sounds like there's some history where this was done before and then we're in the current format around the country these sort of go back and forth a lot and so maybe one thing that the committee should look at is what are the pros and cons of each because as you said it sounds like there were cons eight block type of schedule too and so I think it sounds like there's a lot of pro stuff four and eight block schedule but I think we need to also look back and remember what was the issues back then are they the same issues now and then what are the pros and cons with the current one and is the solution something in the middle too it's not necessarily one or the other but it sounds like there's some sort of a solution out there but I think sometimes when we make decisions we forget to look back at what was there before and what were the issues when we had it before and we sort of look back on things with maybe some nostalgia and forget about some of the drawbacks so I know that there are people with institutional history I'm not one of them on this issue but it would probably be good to pull and talk to people that have some of that historical background and try to remember the right and what went wrong before yeah hi I'm Sandy Kudelman and I was a freshman at the high school and just to echo what Bridget and Lori said if not now when quite honestly and second of all as evidenced by the research, the polling and talking with some of these other schools that was done we're not the only one there are other schools in similar size some a little bit bigger they've been down this path they have solutions they've remedied it yeah is it perfect well maybe not and they're still kind of working through some of it but at least at least some of these schools that were to talk to at least they've worked through it and they've developed these committees and they've worked through and they have solutions and it's working and so I urge you to consider creating these committees so that we can take a look at it and like I said if not now when yes Andrew I would encourage the administration to utilize the parent parents energies and engagement and stuff to set up some kind of one thing I did want to say though it seemed like kind of the catalyst for this was changing music and chorus from the ones who were in class periods because that made a sudden schedule and that came with some benefits and that for longer like the kids who were in music and chorus can now get the rain block kind of bits and whatnot but it does seem like it may be quite more problems than which may be worse so perhaps one solution would be rather than over on the whole schedule just trying to go back on that one specific thing you know I do think switching into the regular class period increase the amount of time that you have for being in chorus some of these in band chorus is getting more band chorus than you work for but what that makes so they can't do other things so I don't know but this is the sort of thing that having quite the feedback and all that's going to be important Tim Yeah I just think that if it's the way the wind is blowing to make this these committees I think it would be really important to define how the decision making is going to happen because I've been on committees where I've done work and my colleagues have done work and it's sort of come to not I'd like that to be kind of clarified out front how the decision making around these issues will happen I think one of the things that's standing out to me most is not necessarily a time bound process is what's being requested but a deliberative process with all stakeholders included and I have been consistently um really inspired by the level of creativity that these communities come up with when people are given a charge and the ability to do some research and really be thoughtful about how to proceed um so I think I feel like we're out of place where an exploration really needs to happen is what I'm hearing and also I think we keep talking about the teachers and the parents in the room and taxpayers and these stakeholders but I think we need a substantive student voice included as well I don't think that can be discounted most dramatically impacted by this Yes, and students at all levels incoming eighth graders the freshmen and the outgoing students once they're all the senior we'll talk to the seniors they're great, I love seniors, I have a senior but again to look through because at different grades there are different challenges there are different concerns and a senior will see something different than a freshman especially since three years of Alexis's high school it was a different schedule every year Right, it's a different course and so you know some who comes in as a freshman is going to have a completely different and very different No, if this is an item that we act on and vote on Is it fair enough to say that the administration will develop a process for making a decision that incorporates student, teacher and parent voice in the process of looking at schedules and considering a new schedule for next year I'm not hearing that it has to be a new schedule for next year necessarily, right? We need a new schedule for next year because of some problems with existing schedule and the contract Alright So can we expect Can we expect to at least know the process by our December meeting Okay Can I just clarify? That doesn't sound like specifically what we asked for like that could be that a survey goes out to all parents how's the schedule working for your kids and you send it back on Google Form I think the request is that from that we proposed to you this evening is that both students and parents are a more substantial substantial part of the conversations How about we go as far as saying that parents will be invited into the school to discuss with staff and students their desire to have more opportunities through a different schedule to have that conversation and deliberate with staff so they can understand your concern So my question would be I have my son who's junior and we've been very fortunate with this schedule but I have a daughter coming in next year and I have no idea what that schedule is going to look like so I don't know how I'm going to have that conversation Yeah, I mean that's I'm scared, I don't worry The teachers who are in the building have talked about this at length for the last four or five years so they understand each time there's a change they understand the strengths and weaknesses of any given schedule So like one of the things we talked about when we considered an eight period schedule last year is that the length of classes could drop to 42 minutes a class which would mean a loss of I don't know, 30 minutes per week in every English class We go from 50 minutes period to 40 minutes It's a night game It's a significant night game By adding an eighth period Yeah I mean you're taking seven periods and you're adding an eighth class you have to reduce them unless they can teach your contractual day lengthens the only way to increase the number of minutes into eight classes is reduce the number of minutes in any given class I believe that's incorrect I believe that it's in that game I think we're having a committee I think the process is a little I mean in my mind for a deliberative process I guess we're asking for non-token representation So that's the difference It's not let's sit down once for an hour and everyone complains but let's do this process with a group that comprise of different stakeholders that are all part of the process I certainly understand as a parent that I have no right whatsoever in decision making but I think we're asking for a non-token representation of our voices and Lily would like to weigh in I just want to say that with an eight period schedule having those periods every day it would be really helpful with languages you get that every single day math every single day it would be really helpful English I would say if anybody is looking for non-token representation you can just put your name in for this right I just want to clarify there's a difference between eight classes one day and eight classes over two days is a block I think the solution that I perceive would add flexibility over two days you do sacrifice some time from the existing classes to provide the flexibility because you wouldn't necessarily take that eighth class and just add it to your existing classes you're talking about open up space to allow flexibility so there would be some class time lost in the existing classes to create the room for statistical education and help us thank you do we have any authority around next steps or thoughts on what how we'd like things to pursue we're just going to come back with a proposal for next month then hopefully it will be something that will be satisfactory yeah I think the things I'm hearing that we're valuing is that it represents stakeholders and involves meaningful deliberation for the group and ideally we commit to having that meaningful deliberation have an impact rather than sit on the metaphor of the show okay I'm just a little concerned about the timeline kids have a four-year high school career I just don't think pushing it forward last year I don't think our kids were extendable until the first week of school because we were deliberating this for so long I just, I feel like with committed people that this can be done and I think it should be ready for roll out next year not squandering more time for these students who have such a little time in high school to be in like thank you how about we try to meet with some representatives from the folks who signed this letter before Thanksgiving and discuss your concerns with them and try to figure something out what's the drop-in time when this has to be August 28th 2020 that's the drop-in time when is the drop-in time for when kids have to sign up and know if there's going to be an offer we would like to have we would like to be able to start working on a schedule early March so that we can have student schedules to them by spring break that's what we did last year and that's the ideal we could go into the summer with kids having a schedule but that's not what we want we want teachers to know when being able to make their plans so the goal of the meeting with the parent representation would be to determine committee structure, meeting schedule those sorts of things to try to figure out some form that satisfies their desire to be an integral part of the process in voicing their concerns while acknowledging that ultimately it's the educators decision what's going to work best and fits with the budget fits with the contracts and etc any any other comments anybody else want to weigh in so we'll expect to hear at the December meeting the outcome of that and hopefully we'll have parent and student representation here again to weigh in as well maybe feeling a little bit should be a part of that too would you do that? right thank you for your time thank you okay um so our next item is reports to the board for the audit reports to the board okay do you feel like you can answer our questions we are we've been really going on anything if I want to okay um yeah sure we can move budget and audit after the agenda um I'm going to propose since we've been in here for an hour and 40 minutes already that we take like a three minute bathroom right alright alright do I start getting him on the phone I think so please don't let me let me let me let me let me read it in a meaningful way okay sorry for that interruption um so just before we took our brief break we discussed the need to move item number 11.1 into the place of the superintendent report because I'd like to hear from the auditor um during the budget and audit discussion okay so we've got the auditor on speakerphone hopefully his name is Ron Smith he was at our last executive board meeting alright um okay we're having trouble hearing you okay okay so Ron is here to talk about the follow-up in the executive board meeting the very rough draft audit financials um I just left for you tonight that information is still not accurate because of this morning we finally got the spread reconciliation from the agency of education which has not allowed the auditor's time to complete the cleanup of SPED and the reallocation of that expense to each of the individual districts as long as well as the SU so Ron is on to talk about any questions, concerns, thoughts that you have additional to what we initially talked about Willie I did share with Ron your email that you shared with me for them to address your questions and concerns on the food service side of things so if there's specific questions that you want to ask him for your side of it he also is available to speak to that I did not release these reports previously when I got them last Tuesday because I wanted to give you accurate information I didn't want to give you stuff that I knew was going to change but as of today this is what I have and I know you wanted something tonight in writing so that's what I have for you we can talk about the points where you're over or under if you would like to do so you've got some notes as far as that is concerned where your big differences were in budget versus actuals so Ron does that cover the intro that we discussed? also the special ed money was something owed to us from last year and the agency we just got it this morning it's Bruce give us a background on spend the fact that we just got that this morning and it was really the last piece of the puzzle knowing exactly how much money that was going to be given to us from the agency of education so you got that Ron? these numbers don't reflect that no these numbers don't show anything as far as what was released to us today on spend yeah an idea of that so Ron do you want to start in any specific place or do you want me to just kind of go over what we talked about I can start I can certainly answer any questions that you all may have go for it so that's a special ed being certainly one of the biggest topics here given the fact that we just got information as soon as today and when we were sitting in that room a few weeks back you know as far as the conversations go specifically we're talking about the White River Unified District one of the comments that was made is that the spend in the supervisory union was known basically the special ed budget piece was going to be over spent around $250,000 we actually think that that's going to be about $230,000 based upon this reimbursement that the state just sent today and any loose ends that they're cleaning up as we still speak and I guess I understand there's still a few and Derek can correct me if I'm wrong as we speak for June 30, 19 the revenue projections are going to come in probably about $220,000 for sure so what does that mean for spend it's going to be about $450,000 on the supervisory union level of which about for 41% was the math for Black River Unified District so that means that that deficit just will put a ballpark finger for you all so it will go up by about $200,000 based upon what we've got for information right now as far as food service goes you know the the supervisor I don't think is concerned about the $100,000 deficit in this fiscal year I have not had a chance of a few food service directives who have distributed some information and I just don't know what he was giving for information but here's what I'm sure that there's about $80,000 sitting in the supervisor union that was not distributed to the separate city it's on December June 30, 2019 and of which I understand and is Jane in the room, Tara? No, she didn't come and Tara wasn't about $38,000 or $20,000 was the Unified District share of that $38,000 is what needs to be distributed to Rudd's food service and even with that $38,000 you all the district for June 30, 2019 for the fiscal year it's good as the revenues you know over expenses is going to be in the whole about $100,000 of food service that we see based on the information that we're looking at and I think that those are the two big talking pieces there was some Tara wanted some substance you know as far as you know is there for the Unified District and then Tara did you distribute that information to them? I didn't give those emails out because it didn't print right so I have rough numbers that you gave me that we can share but they didn't print right so Operations and maintenance as I recall was basically overspent by about $300,000 and that was largely in part 2 if my memory serves me it was contracts and services as I recall Tara was a big piece of it you know I think that there was some other budget and expenses and I really think that the big story is here is based upon the budget that you all passed you know last year for 2019 when your prior management tried to set that budget up for the new Charity of Accounts they just didn't talk to each other for sure and what they tried to do is provide Tara with that bridge on what you guys all thought that you passed for a budget and basically you know what your management posted to its board you know as far as for operations maintenance you can clearly see in 2019 there's some big problems you know with that This is Deb Matthews Special Ed Director on that same topic of the issues with the budget here can you explain about the flow through we get a federal grant called IDOB which is about $500,000 and as I understand it the revenue was put into the budget the expenses were not therefore all the assessments were off because it's supposed to flow through and whoever put that budget together or helped out put that budget together to kind of make it flow through in that in the Charity of Accounts it was a huge struggle for us to do to try to piece that together Deb and let me just say as Tara is there right now you definitely don't want to continue that budget process for sure going forward and one of the things that we actually I think got it broken down I think that there are actually five struggle areas in the revenue piece Deb that never materialized for Special Ed and Tara that's part of that email if it's not please give Deb if he doesn't have it already my email address and I can send you that but we didn't think that the revenue piece was going to be that big but certainly based upon the state payment today everything else that we think we've captured since July 1st yeah it's going to be about $220,000 short based upon how those budgets were projected Deb and I think that because the when the budgeting was done it was done incorrectly the assessments that were originally sent out were incorrect and then previously we have reassessed at least every quarter the first year that we all came together we did it more often and there was no reassessment there was no looking at all as to whether it was matching up or not and to also to expand on that too that when you're talking about reassessment you know one of the questions that was raised I think it was by Lisa on the Unified District Board you know was the carryover balance and what was used to put the 2019 budget together remember in 2019 that whole debacle was special ed in the re-assessment you know which is why it was very important for us to give you guys information and get it timely there was probably oh my god at least I can't remember what the number that was but you have it but that was actually you know arithmetic to 2019 we actually have taken that out of 2019 and went back and restated 2018 because it actually went on to moms in 2018 and just as the state has paid you you know almost five months late you know with your special ed we're trying to clean it up so you know on June 30, 2019 what you carry over balance or you carry over deficit you know wasn't special ed so that we can make sure that we just got it in the right year so that when you guys go to a budget you guys know what you have for numbers and I think that this is the first year you know in two years you know that we can finally sit and say that we've got everything in the right period but there was some real struggles with that special ed budget for sure as well as maintenance as you'd see in the e-mails that we said to Tara and I just want to mention as well that each year I do a service plan and for whatever reason the numbers that were on the service plan especially for salaries and benefits were seriously under budgeted on the benefit portion of the budget that was another area that was underfunded because definitely for sure you could get that one right on the head that would be proud of that but maybe she could sell it on the budget so thank you Ron this is William Walker I'm the food service director how you doing I noticed I went through the food service report that was passed along to me and I don't see certain revenues that should be in that report and there's a dinner program that we run and there's no reimbursement this year on this for $41,000 that's $38,000 it's $41,000 I think that's the $38,000 I think that's not an $80,000 it sits over the supervisor union that actually hasn't been distributed yet as I recall that okay so even when it's going to be close to $100,000 you know you're an old well in addition there's also some catering revenue of $13,000 I did that's not representing anywhere in this number it appears that's in Eddie and Tara's share would be your email and William probably could just best if you and I and Carol went over it I don't think it's reflected in any of the district's financials will lead that whether or not the money coming into you I don't think there's any money coming out that's going to make some general fund deficits bigger as well on the other hand is that money is distributed to food service but it's making me look like I'm an idiot with a $100,000 deficit somewhere between 90 and 100,000 this food transfer has been in the building for another $1,700 the fresh fruit and vegetable programs underfunded by $2,100 but commodities aren't represented correctly with $13,000 difference I have labor dollars of $4,000 that don't go along in the in my labor report and I know you're just giving the numbers but there seems to be a lot of differences from what I have for receipts from the state and federal governments that aren't represented correctly you and Tara for sure before this is all finalized I wish we would have anyway willing to just make sure that we're all on the same page with the numbers so that's an issue especially that some of us weren't bought it was just during that 2019 was just a disaster this year for many reasons and Willie I think of food service I think just actually better ways of best practices a bunch of food services this doesn't happen and I would have hoped that these questions would have come up during the year as opposed to five months after the year I guess is where I'm going so I would have loved to address those questions with someone too yeah I'm just a little frustrated with the situation I don't think that's an accurate picture especially that assessments it just makes everything problem we just want to make sure when you guys put your 2021 budget that you're giving information timely and accurate so that you can make some good business decisions food service included too well that's my concern at this point in time is how do we trust the numbers that we have budgeting moving forward because I feel like we've been asking good questions all along and we've been provided with reports and when the reports look favorable and you're consistently asking where we're at with the budget and the reports that come to you again look favorable it makes it very difficult to trust and or verify because the information we're getting comes from the supervisory union and they're giving us the numbers that they have which we're now learning are pretty substandard you know concerning to us and we actually started out what was provided to us with special ed with a deficit of over a million dollars and Tara couldn't believe it but because of all the adjustments that got made and waiting to see what the state of mom was going to owe us and that just finally came in today that's why we're able to have these conversations and hoping that we've captured all of that there's been a lot of work given to try to make sure that you guys are all going to read that we're going to sign on June 30, 2019 is not only accurate but obviously trustworthy because the reports we were given indicated that those areas were in the black so I think it's also challenging for business level or for building level administrators to rely on the numbers they've been given as well through this transition consolidation there was really no follow up to that there was really no looking at the budget to make sure that that aligned with what you guys were thinking when you put it together and if Tara if you share those emails with them the biggest one you can look at is operation and maintenance so you can see what we're talking about because that's really the story for almost every department at the districts someone worse than I would say the unified district was just very you can just see the struggles that they had for sure can we talk a little bit about operations and maintenance, why that is such a huge number so we had a question about why operations and maintenance was such a large number I was $100,000 that was actually due to as I remember where that was placed for moving kids around for extracurriculars and some other matters insurance, I believe the superintendent's office or director's insurance was a big part of it and Tara you just have to look at those emails and provide them but I just don't have that I have them here we can I can go over them after we're done Ron I want to make sure they get what they need from you Tara specifically you action on at that budget and you will see exactly what we're talking about information was when the books were put together when the budget was put together through the consolidation you will see exactly what we're talking about as far as nobody went back and crossed we did it was clear that nobody else in here did it didn't print that way so that's why I didn't hand them out because it's very confusing how it printed but I do have it you can see the struggles as this information was put together and as these books were consolidated and budget entries happened or didn't happen I mean your budget my memory serves me for the unified district I think Tara was out of bounds by about 300,000 miles Yes Okay do we have other questions for the auditor when we let him on the phone just I just want good information I think our goal is that you're kicking off budget season is to give you something here like December 1st dish and I'd be more than happy to sit with you all there at the unified district to answer some of these questions but there's still support to be done here especially with special ed and going into reallocating all of this stuff Jeff I'd be more than happy to sit with you but we're just not going to be prepared to do that until December 1st dish just to make sure that we've got everything and that we can have more conversations and sit in a room with you all and selectively as a board but we're certainly more than willing to do that Alright, thank you Any other questions for them Okay, thank you Ron Listen Tara, just reach out to me and Willie, you know before you need us to sit with over the next weekish we're more than happy to do that Perfect, thank you Thanks Thank you Perfect So that's what I gave you I will email you all the stuff that he sent to me but as far as operation and maintenance were concerned contracted services ended up being 101,000, 146, 22 and it was budgeted for 36,000 repairs and maintenance was 128,197,96 and it was budgeted for 80,000 So those are the two line items specifically referring to that were the big to get items on the operations and maintenance side of expenditures Quick question So it looks like on the stage of seeing the kind of little project funds it looks like they're the same as what they were last year So there's some things that should have come out of the budget Prior to me becoming your business manager, did you as a board take any action to approve spending your capillary loan funds? Because the only thing that's happened since I came on here was the ROOF project and that's on the current fiscal year not last year Can I offer something for context Last year we had multiple business managers and we asked for expenditure reports throughout the year like we usually got and along the way we received expenditure reports that had no indication of these overages I want that to be really clear nobody was misspending with mallets I think we can all agree on that and we are all sitting here with our hat in hand and trying to figure this out I think we could probably do some sort of forensic autopsy if we wanted to but I think one of the other pieces is to really understand that we can't and shouldn't overspend like that we can't have that bad information We had bad information all along the way for zero information Can I just want to explain that in terms of under budgeting probably the same thing happened for white or green five district the health insurance for the special ed staff was under budgeted by $209,000 the excess cost budget was and this was under budgeted from the numbers I gave the business office by $100,000 to have in a year on a $7 million budget to have variance of $200,000 is not unusual given that the special ed is an estimate when kids move in you always think kids will move in kids will move up when kids move in you need to provide programs and it doesn't matter whether it was budgeted or not we did have looking at the email when we do the service plan the state looks at everything and says well this part of the budget is up by so much can you please explain at the end of 2008 in 2019 five new kids moved in already in out of district placements when kids move in the majority of our special ed kids now are trending the 7 through 12 years which tend to be more expensive and so when kids come in in a placement a new district just can't take a lot of the placement and say well we're going to put you here it's a process that takes time so I mean I feel the same as Willie and Owen you know when information was asked for what we got was totally inaccurate and I apologize I feel foolish that this has happened but it's happened and I feel that right now having a parent in the business office and having a new team of people there that we are getting honest information and I think Ron is giving us kind of a forensic look of what happened over not just one year but a couple of years yeah I mean I appreciate getting I feel like this this mess would not have been surfaced without the work that Tara has been doing without the work that's been happening recently and I just feel like if we hadn't had an opportunity to speak deeper it could be much worse even as terrible as this feels right now so I am wondering about the hiring of accountants because applicants are not looking very promising so I do have a backup plan if I can't find a suitable person in the position yeah I'm deeply concerned that those are vacant so I want all of you to know that this has been a really difficult year, year and a half we have probably five people in our business office that are no longer there and I think the teachers and the members of the association know that it was a struggle last year they were deeply affected by this we were all affected I think we're eight months into a reconstruction of the business office starting when Tara came in in early March we've spent an awful lot of money getting her by somebody who's got a 30-year track record, Marilyn Frederick Marilyn also helped us get through the budget year last year or this year and I don't know what I would have done because she was really the only reliable person that we could go to during budget season last year business managers are really really hard to find and you can either steal one from someone and we probably don't have enough money to do that but we can try to build one and that's the plan we have done in trying to invest a lot of resources in helping Tara you know work on all of this and she's been great and I also have my heart goes out to all the people in the business office now that have done double duty really these people have been around for a while and we are a small unit we do need accounting help and we've got ads out looking for a person and a half hoping to find somebody we're not going to just take anybody and the back up plan that Tara outlined is having the auditor relinquish one of their audit people to work with us until we can find somebody permanently for ourselves and we're pretty confident through this process of digging down and trying to figure out what's going on has been good in a couple different ways in that it's helped a lot of obstacles we had to get over that we've learned about and are reassessing and changing and we've also had a very good connection with our auditing firm there are people that have reached out and are willing to come over if we don't get our own accountants right away so this has been a struggle and what you're hearing about is the outcome of last year and we're going to do everything we can to overcome this without having to affect taxpayers and that is putting a slowdown on the budgets trying to do whatever we can in order to be able to make it happen and those are already in effect and have been for month to month and a half to slow down the budget try to end in good stead this year and maybe be able to apply something whatever that is to some of what we're behind in so that the taxpayers don't suffer with that so we're just trying to be more efficient and more effective in being able to clean that up this will be brought within the business market to really tightened up processes and procedures that we started to establish criteria that we're here with so I think that's been a really good experience for the reference to have within the business office have that overview from the top down and understanding how each function that they do feeds up to the top and the top feeds down and I think that my understanding historically is that's not always the way it's been in the business office it's been very cellular and to break those walls down and to really make sure that everybody understands their pivotal part that if you make this change on your end you are now impacting four other things and to have that understanding they may not necessarily have an understanding before so I think that's a huge difference if you process one invoice that's not coded appropriately what impact that has you process one payroll and that employee doesn't have the right code what impact does that have and that's really been something that necessarily may not have always been brought to light in the past and that's where a lot of our when I came on I started seeing reports and realizing as I shared with you all so many times that things are just not where they're supposed to be and to get those things fixed and to make sure that the accurate moving forward is really pivotal to making sure that you're getting the accurate information on your projects so for the backup plan it might have not having qualified applicants for the accounting positions I'm just wondering to what degree having someone from the auditor's office because my understanding is that they might be pricey hinders our efforts to then put someone full time and permanent in that position the goal with the auditors is that they would be working with me they would be showing me the ins and the outs that my accountant would come in and do on my behalf so that would be a very short term solution as we're continuing to try to find the right candidate hiring someone that doesn't have experience is not going to be a help to what we have right now we're giving you someone who's qualified and who understands accounting because accounting is very different than regular accounting and it works very differently is that FUN? yes um this could not be a popular response but like hurt for you guys because I know Ron real well and when I was in your seat spent a lot of time on the phone and it's like deja vu for me and I know that the business office piece is really difficult it's very difficult to recruit and I know what I heard Bruce say about kind of stealing people and budgets but I really believe that that's a place where you need to put the funds in and you need to defend putting the funds in because look at the return on your investment when you're able to do that and look at the losses when you don't and it's hard for people to swallow it's hard for taxpayers to see administrative costs go up but I would so strongly advocate for that because this has gone on at least from a battle perspective for years and the turnover and I love to see that you're here and you know they're supporting you well and I hope that you find the qualified accountants um but I really would and that's and it is hard to defend that but it really is a place that's incredibly important part of the problem I mean when Donna was here Donna was great and she was a good accountant as well as a business manager it was pretty easy to see that that wasn't the same after she left and me the people that came in afterwards didn't stay very long and you know because it was difficult for them and you know we had those hard conversations and that doesn't help to clean up last year we've got to face it and it's got to be what it is and I'm sure that these are going to be tough conversations as we get into town meetings in March about all of this but you can't hide it it has to be out on the table we have to try to do better from it I take full responsibility I do I mean and I live through it with all these people and like I say many of them are going now but you know I think we're in a good place and building better but we've still got to hire some good people one of the things that will happen is Marilyn Frederick who's been working with Tara all along will go away she's and the automated health will come in about the same time that happens so it's not going to be a budget they don't believe and Tara has created some strong ties with a couple of the auditors and they've been willing to come over here and work with her on the ground and a lot of that has to do with coding making sure things are in the right places and then you know it didn't help at all that the state required us to go to a new computing software at the same time and now we understand we're going to have to jump again to another one so that's part of the problem is a whole new software so why is coming every time you get jumped to a new software it screws things up and now we're trying to rectify things and now they're making you jump again to agree with it again add one more layer when the mergers happened we went to a different chart of accounts that chart of accounts wasn't established I looked at the third cycle and for the software system to be an issue set up so that was all done post transfer we then have to transfer to another chart of accounts effective July 1st this year which is the state's universal chart of accounts and it continues to be they never had one before and the purpose behind that is the future goal is that by having every school district in the state have the same chart of accounts it makes the reporting to the state more efficient and more streamlined and the point of the financed software transition is the same thing that every school district is using the state mandated software and as a result of that they can generate the same report cycles they can get the same information that they need to get to make it more efficient and more efficient and more consistent the SLDS system where is how you report up all of our students and grades and all of that information that was also put into place last year so it changed the way you reported your student account to the agency of education so the end goal of all of these changes is to make it a more streamlined more efficient consistent process all the way across the state these lag times that we're having with getting information up to the state and getting information back to them goes all the way ultimately that's the goal but the downfall is I'm sure like every other company whenever you go to a new software you always have bugs and to fix that we are blessed to be the very last grouping of schools that has to go to that software so all of the other schools in the state of Vermont will go into forests so all the bugs have been worked out and by the time it gets to us it will be so easy that's my optimistic view on the software but that is ultimately the reason why this is trying to remind all of these processes and unfortunately when we as a supervisor move to infinite visions on the recommendation of the prior business manager infinite visions was one of the runner up for the state software are asked to move to infinite visions before the state make their decision and unfortunately it's the other one that we didn't go to so that's also part of the downfall but it has to happen we have to do it there's many business managers and several auditors who feel like it's still going to go away I don't share that same understanding with the state's investors I'll connect so I guess slowing down the budget now is good what I'm curious about is given what we know about this ending from last year we had an idea of whether the budget for this year was correct basically saying that we didn't budget enough didn't the budget last time and we were basing the current year budget on that previous budget are you going to see the same time over this year or is this kind of a one time thing I do have absolutely so in terms of special aid because that the top million dollars of flow through incorrectly last year we have revised everything for this year so that we can see as soon as Ron comes and talks to us then we can see if we need to do an extra assessment part of the problem is if you true up the books once a month at least and reassess then you kind of have an even in this sort of year because new kids do come in when you wait till the end of the year then it just hits you really hard so the idea is I'm not even really thinking about special aid right now that's not even included in the budget right now well but it's all in the tax but the same process I think is going to happen Ron is going to sit with us and we're going to basically redo the budget and then be able to know how far off we are we're up on tuition kids that's a good sign and as far as current year expenditure reports your principals have been awesome they have been monitoring their expenditure reports every month when I send them out and I get pages of questions and corrections that need to be done and we get through them and we do them so I think as we pay more attention to what potentially could event a rollover of account coding errors from the prior year we're definitely recognizing them and fixing them they went through a huge process of making sure all of the faculty and staff had the appropriate codes so Anne went through and we coded all the payroll and then we have to do a bunch of general entries to clean up what have been paid prior to when the fix was done so we're definitely working very closely to try and make sure that things are where they need to be so that we do have a true understanding of where you are now and where you are each month moving forward and I'm working with other business managers to really try and get more especially for the ones who have already rolled to e-finance to get some consistency in the reports that we can generate out of infinite visions prior to moving to that transfer so I know one of the things that you had all said when I first came on is that just the view of the reports alone changed all the time so that you never really knew what you were looking at so I'm trying to find there's so many report options in the system I'm trying to find the ones that work the best and my understanding historically is there's really been a focus in the supervisor union on expenditures and not necessarily so much on the revenue side of things so to really make sure that when we're looking at reports we're looking at both sides of the picture not just the expenditures but also if we see all of a sudden that we have a shortfall in revenue that we know that upfront not I guess like in February when Marilyn came to you all and said we have a revenue issue that's too late to know that so to really make sure that information is out to you in a more timely manner which then comes back to the business office and really solidifying the practices and the procedures and the way that we're doing things in the business office to make sure that that stuff is happening more timely so that the reports to you are more accurate yeah that's definitely a good new issue that's how it needs to happen so when we have this when we now have the when we have this unassigned undefeated measures that we're going to have to incorporate that plus whatever we're looking at in the next year's budget I think you have three years you can take three years but it's probably best to do it in the next few days you can so we don't have to do it all next week now it's going to start to advance your final on that when we come next month and that was one of the things that Ron had pointed out in the executive board is that's the downfall of the statute is when you're looking you're basically looking at numbers that are two years old when you're building a budget and through the audit process they then have to go back through and reconcile prior year accounts receivable and accounts payable which then has a direct impact on that surplus or deficit that we potentially use in the next year's budget so it really it really does cause however much we can do to figure out encumbrances and figure out if we are going to have some sort of work we're going to be able to do it especially less than this year and that's what we're working really hard for I'm really concerned about basically like when we did the budget in 2018 or last year it was starting we're just adding like the number that we started with was just the two districts separately added together so him saying that there wasn't like we didn't account for things in the budget like it started but the two separate budgets that were good so I don't see how we wound up and then we added the $500,000 on top of that that was because of the tax and merger tax cuts so I don't see how we wound up going $400,000 over that when you know so we clearly have a lot of work to do to figure out about the budget so if I can just explain you heard him say that initially he thought that spent was a million dollars off and the reason that they thought that is what had happened is assessments had been entered in this system like they had been sent out and collected but they were never sent out and never collected so it's that whole revenue and expenditure so that they were like well a million dollars had been collected where is it so that's those were the issues I think that happened because nobody who ever was putting it in was like what we had now we had to have according to this we had a net deficit net change in fund analysis of $46,000 and that's we had this already having had it a bunch of actors fending into our budget we increased the taxes by a bunch more than we would otherwise so we need to figure out what happens and and not do it again but what happens then so that you understand what happens next because I had to get my head around what happens next the auditors do their thing on their side and then they send it back to us from our side to match what the audit is so once my understanding once that process has happened once that process happens I should then be able to generate the detailed revenue and expenditure reports that will give you that backup documentation other than the summary numbers that are shown in the audit itself so that is my understanding of what can happen so once that process is done that will be what we will do is we will print those reports and we can look at the detail behind that to see where things were up or down after it's all said this is December 1st deadline when we get together in December which I am going to heads up now we're going to need more than one meeting in December to go over this stuff and to get your budgets and to look at that because you're the town court they want their reports by December 17th through the book so I think that will happen most likely January there will be a lot of conversations that we're going to need to have around the budget cycle because it's my first time doing the budget on the side of the table so I'm learning a ton about that and how that works and then we're going to try to meet in January December along with our third Tuesday of the month because you're planning to have extra meetings okay so we can maybe add that to our discussion of future meetings at the end of the meeting yeah one more meeting okay also at our executive board meeting Ron mentioned that he has been doing in Chittenden County trainings for board members related to how what to really look for and I just think that would be incredibly useful so I don't know if we can collaborate with other school districts or have other boards attend a similar training from outside just even the SU or if he's running one someplace else I mean I would travel to attend that I just think it's really important that we know what we're looking for absolutely so I have emailed all of you the four emails that you referenced so you should have them all in your inbox yeah please okay any other questions really just a comment I think it's important if we don't get the information back from the audit and time for our town report still put some kind of notation in the town report so that folks describe the extent of what happened here from an accounting perspective so that folks like Willie and the food service and maybe folks in charge of their property and grounds don't take the fall right make sure that that's clearly split out in the board thank you thank you for that so that brings us to the superintendent's report we are I've put together a list of dates possible for Federal Open on the calendar for negotiations I've sent that to Don Shaw most of you have seen that in my odds and ends and I'm hoping that we're going to be able to get together for a beginning session to figure out which of those dates we might use I think I pulled them out till January and of course the longer we wait in order to be able to schedule those more those are going to be filled up so I know the union has written us and is anxious to start to get some meetings together I haven't seen the proposal on the state health care yet I hear it's it was supposed to be out I think on the 15th of November I haven't seen them the two positions from the union side and the management side the state side and the auditorator was supposed to select one of those and it was supposed to be ready by December 1st so we don't know where that process is I certainly haven't seen anything usually I will get it and I'll send it up all of a new you may get it at the same time I do so we've been having some conversations here in the building with Owen and Andrew about space and especially I've become aware that there are some kids that may need advertisements and we're trying to avoid that so we really need to perhaps look at finding some space to expand the middle school restorative program so that we can avoid some of that as I told you before the restorative program has a track record now about returning about 41% of the kids they work with back in the classrooms in their own schools that's huge it's really a high number and I credit Deb and Dr. Ketterer and the staff in being able to make that happen a lot of these kids have been in the program for a year or two three years but they are headed back into the classrooms where they came from with their peers in other buildings around the SU if somebody is sent out to a program like Academy and they're not special it kids because not all the kids in the restorative program are special it kids that cost $35,000 to the school district in order to do that we'd like to avoid that if we have a program here in house that's really exceptional and it's got the track record like the restorative program that has developed and I just don't know whether people know that we've been able to you know send a lot of those kids back into the classrooms if they should be that they came from in the schools they came from the idea that we've been floating around is the possibility of combining two small preschool programs into one with two teachers and using the space where one of the preschools is trying to gym in the old I don't know what that was was that a industrial arts area where that preschool is and maybe combining it so we'd like to do that now we'd like to do that in a planned way and I know Owen and Andrew have been talking about it we don't think it'll be high impact on the kids that would mean a class of there are two classes of nine kids right now class of 18 which is doable we don't know if kids will move out or if kids will try to move in but that's what it is right now and I wanted to be upfront and honest with you about that I think it's a good move and it would help us to have those kids that we're having to have go out maybe stay here and be worked with by a program that's very effective I don't know if you have any thoughts I wanted to be upfront and honest with you I think it's possible that we may get a new preschool kid in now it's also possible some may move out but we don't I think that's a good review Senate will also open up a space where the program is now to be repurposed for other folks here in the building so I'd like to move on this and we talked about putting a plan together that will allow the kids to adjust to it over time so I don't know if you have any thoughts we don't usually ask you about the room changes for me one thought I do have is that if you're a negative negatively impacting our programs through a committee I do feel it's appropriate if you're still in a classroom to provide some financial support in our district part, you know, it does save a ton of money and I don't think it's unreasonable for us to get a little better that's probably a discussion that you need to have to do more because the problem with rent is that we would pay 490% of the cost for rent we would receive almost 60% 100% and I expect that if you guys are looking to expand in other buildings too and if Chelsea or Tumberge opens up their buildings we'll be going to pay them for them and I think it's something to be using that we pay heed to the reserve classroom and the expenses that come out of our budget and right now we're talking about taking a classroom that's currently in use and repurposing to a different use and so this is not of no cost to our district I'm just saying that I really support the reserve classroom program I do see that it saves a lot of money for our district for a program but I don't feel this way we should get all the money out of the cost I think that's something that I think about too and definitely when other board members have entertained the notion of having restorative classrooms in their schools I've been asked by other board members what the rent is or what the return is on having it in our building and I just think that having some sort of mechanism for that and being able to share with them what that is for people who are really focused on the bottom line I think that makes it feel more equitable for them I mean we currently house all the restorative classrooms for the entire SU and that's because we have a board that really believes in the program and we've been willing to be good partners in terms of this work but I think that as the program needs to expand we need to look more carefully at guarding our resources and also ensuring that there's some return beyond the fact that we all live in central Vermont and these students are people who are going to be in our communities too I just also want to point out when you say you know they're one of the returns and maybe David or one of the principals can talk about it you have some writing resources in your buildings when there's some issues and some I mean that's one of the positives of housing it but I think we have to be careful because it's not a collaborative especially law has their rules so it's not a collaborative program it's not an independent school program so my concern is it will tuition be next because if we start doing tuition then it's going to be a problem with the state and what we call right now it's an alternative classroom which they've accepted without having to go through a few more groups on the different kinds of special and placements you can have but they say we have to accept the question of the academy building we have to pay rent for that and presumably it will come in the SD budget and then it gets refunded by the state too so it's not just that the other districts will be paying for that and then these expenses get specially funded and so that gives you the percentage of payback for that but there's no mechanism that I'm aware of and I could you know they might change the rules on special ed to start stretching the tuition just so you know the other little nuance here is that we've got a lot of people knocking on the doors from other districts that she was kind of wanting to bring kids here because they know from somewhere else we can charge the tuition but in terms of charging the tuition and frankly we have one kid right now who's being tuition debt that wasn't a program and so I don't know we're trying to figure out we're compromising anything but in terms of you all charging tuition to each other then that turns into something else I don't think we're talking about that we're just if you had to put this in the sort of in the county building or you know if you didn't have room you had to do something about it if you paid money in part of the budget so we're just saying do the same thing for the rest of the county moving to classrooms to accommodate the historic classroom I want to make sure we have plenty of room for our preschool list too I don't want to cut that to show up we were trying to expand that two months ago now we're trying to downsize it the kids didn't show up but we're going to have room for them once we have 18 kids in a class we can measure it out in one room there's two teachers I'll make the room it's a regular site last week that could work for this year but if you get the numbers it gets next year then you're just going to have this issue I trust the administration our principal is to figure out the appropriate what's needed for the preschool program if they're comfortable with the changes Chris? that was just my question how many of these preschoolers are continuing into kindergarten next year and how many are staying in preschool I know we don't have really any sort of estimate because we haven't done the preschool screening for next year so we don't know how many incoming three-year-olds we have but I mean I guess one question is how many four-year-olds are moving up to kindergarten and how many of the three-year-olds we know that not a lot of four-year-olds so it's half and half right now and half are going to go and some unknown numbers are going to come in I just want you to reframe the problem we're going to end up sending some kids out of district and you're going to pay full price for them to go and that's not going to be special ed funds for some of them it's anywhere from 35,000 up we're sitting here worrying about a special ed problem we have and we've got to deal with some of these things and we have a program that we can expand to try to gamble those kids without having to avoid those costs and that's what I'm talking about doing with not a whole lot of inconvenience to the preschool that we have right now so it's called unified district kids that we're talking about or the SU kids there are kids right in this building that I'm talking about I could name you the number but I don't really want to do that I talked about negotiations I'm pretty good I had a question about negotiations Shannon was our representative from this board to negotiations and she is no longer with us so based on I don't know comments I've made in the past about the potential for conflict of interest for me because I work in a neighboring district Rodney's wife teaches here at the school so that means there's only really three people on our board there's two negotiations there's support staff and professional staff you don't want to have one person doing both of those I think Shannon did last time but so I'm just wondering if we have a volunteer willing to take on that role representing our board or even deliberate and let me know talk it over with your significant others a lot of fun we have a good time I feel like I'm missing something missing great food no I'm not too included thank you for that so that brings us to the principal's report right are you guys receiving that now did you get included awesome thank you so thank you is there anything you want to highlight or share we have an incredible fundraiser on Friday night 2400 that's amazing and we also sent off Wendell Wills North Carolina it was one way ticket it was very nice assembly with all the school nice work were said Mr. Laps came over and said some nice things that's uh we're reading actual books every day in middle school still no I'm so glad to hear that still no phones that's not enough though right okay I just got a comment that I appreciate the newsletters that have come out the last time thank you any news on Wendell's replacement no applicant I could tell you that our team has received a grant for a middle school pre-tech program and they have reached out to Bethel to have a STEM class here on campus they sent a teacher and all the resources and we just need to provide space and they can serve 10 to 12 kids for half a school year and they'll commit to us for this year and next we're going to be meeting with our faculty soon when there was a play last weekend the director author no director you one of the stars is teeter writes and Alexis is one of the other leads in the play something they didn't make it in the principal's report that you asked for information about as a driver's ed and I talked to Tammy I don't know if I said that right who's in charge of driver's ed and the guidance she provided to me is that our obligation is to provide driver's ed instruction to all residents of our communities that we collect taxes from so that's any homeschool kids that's any schools who pay tuition to go to other places outside of our towns we are also obligated because we take state money to provide driver's ed to any students who tuition into our school she was clear to me over the phone that we don't have an obligation to pay for students in the SU who choose to go to another high school I'm working on getting that in writing to make sure I asked that three get that in writing because that's not exactly the version that I got that we need to have it in a lot of sense same person same person well that's why I'm saying it needs to be in writing because it's a little bit changed given this understanding you know if Sharon Academy wants to provide us with some funding for the program correct we can accept funding from another school to provide driver's ed instruction for students however we cannot accept tuition dollars directly from families or students themselves to enroll in our program because we're collecting state money but we're under no obligation to provide it for free and certainly not to provide spots at the expense of students who do go to our school okay thank you alright so the the Visvid seems like there were some things in there that some spaces just need to get reorganized and stuff needs to get moved out of the way to the electrical panels and things like that and it sounds like you are working on it I think the first priority would probably be like some of the electrical stuff would it point out to you yeah so when you approved the new electrical outlet to move the deli slacer in the South Royalton kitchen it's not budgeted but it's a pretty serious safety concern carbon monoxide detector in the kitchen that seems like a no brainer but one of the recommendations was to provide to create a new space for the hot part of our wood shop so we've got a machine shop that we teach instead of welders and torches and that sort of thing you know the report was clear you shouldn't have wood products and sawdust in the same space as welding and wood hot so if we want to continue to have a wood shop and a tech program like we do now we need to be looking at another space I don't know if that's building an extension off the back of the building well some of the GFIs too if it gets to be a bunch of outlets if they're all in the same circuit you can get like a GFI circuit breaker and the individual GFI outlets too but I mean the electrician is going to consult with you all and give you those customers and stuff any other action that you know I know that our maintenance director is doing is simple things like if people weren't supposed to have incandescent lights they're taken out if things are supposed to move certain distance from doorways they would move yeah a lot of it seems like there's something missing anything else yes I did just want to say I noticed in the principle of both what I've been looking at on my phone it does talk about involving middle schoolers in musical and well it's a great idea really I firmly believe that there should be access to everyone, I do worry about the logistics of that the fact that middle schoolers deserve to have their own theatrical experience that they get to sort of leave themselves involved in I've done it for years and middle schoolers definitely really important and really helpful when it was divided up so I do just want to put that out there like take that into consideration don't just vote in a manner for the sake of not doing something here we have a long drama here thank you for that, Alexis so were the hiring updates addressed the hiring updates that I requested be on the agenda were the accountants so I feel like we've addressed that yes, okay okay we have some policies to review I don't know if we want to count this packet as a first reading and move them to the next agenda since it seems like it would be hard to focus deeply on them I think you have to warn that you're approving policy yes, so so I think the idea is we could read them and come forward either ready to approve or with revisions but I think December 3rd is the next policy committee so if you have suggestions for the revision December 12th you can get that to me before that okay does the one policy need to be in the packet since it's just for the sharing they're using that as the policy he passed a different version and they corrected by adding the principal in their written superintendent and the policy committee decided that they should accept that one rather than the one you had accepted so it really is it's as she said but when it's finished it'll say I think we've been trying to work toward a role of greater continuity and so no one objected to the language that Sharon proposed and so that's what we decided to move forward but since they felt very strongly there are settings that I broke in the policy committee that aren't ready yet to bring to you guys they needed more language work and some reference work I brought the ones that I thought were really no-brainers and had passed so we also have physical policy we'll be coming forward to you and if we're going to have multiple meetings in the center we can try to approve these at the earliest meeting I just want people to have time to go and like space to really thoughtfully read them okay we have one more public comment okay alright well thank you all for coming out today it's wonderful to have public at our meetings