in three 2 3 two one action good evening everyone I would like to welcome everyone to the October 24 2024 work session the Union School District Board of Education item 1.2 approval of the agenda hello recommended action beol at the Board of Education hereby throughs the agenda as presented move second question all in favor I opposed abstain motion carries we will now move into our four session item 2.1 subject what school can be the people Personnel Services Department oh turn it over to you thank you Anna good evening everyone thank you to everyone who's here in person thank you to everyone all of our Tigers who are watching from home thank you particularly to the phenomenal members of The Faculty who are here this evening to share some of their amazing work with us I think one of the things that makes the vision map incredibly special is the idea that when we say it impacts all students we genuinely mean that and I think that's going to be one of the ties That Bind tonight one of the common threads is the idea that through the amazing work of Faculty like those Tigers who are here tonight we get a chance to impact every school age child in this community and to make sure that our schools are places that cherish every student that Embrace every student that make every student feel loved accepted and challenged to be their best selves in our schools and I'm incredibly proud to be part of a leadership team with our outstanding assistant superintendent for people Personnel Services Rachel and happy to turn it over to her thank you so good evening everybody I'm so excited about tonight the panel that we have here is such a great representation of the adults that we have working with our students and families in this community and I'm extremely proud and thankful for them being here tonight okay Steve you did such a beautiful job introducing the vision map I'm sure everyone here is familiar with said Vision map L I love the vision map I talk about it all day so I'm going to be focusing on how the pupil Personnel Services Department aligns with the foundation of the vision map essentially so I'm going to be focusing on the culture of Wellness so the PPS Department that's how we will refer to it it's just a lot easier our priorities include setting the foundation for our students and families by connecting them and supporting them through a sense of community and through our programs and supports tonight the PPS staff will proudly share with you some of the exciting work being done in our district these examples represent the alignment and interconnectedness of the PPS Department's focus and how the vision map has laid the foundation for this work so I'd like to just start the conversation by sharing with the board and the community that we are currently in the midst of the administration of our full School climate survey so the administration window was October 15th unit day and we will conclude administration of the survey on October 31st so we are administering that survey for grades four at C grades 5 through eight at PBC and grades 9 through 12 at the high school we have a pretty good response rate right now our students are being administered the survey either through advisory chap or in C obviously in the classroom they've been administering the electronic version a pardon me a paper version I believe of the survey so as you can see from the Tim timeline during the month of September the administrative team worked together collaboratively across building and with the district to develop a set of questions that were representative of the two domains in folky which is a sense of belonging and a sense of emotional safety in our schools so we had a very robust conversations at each building and then additionally at our administrative councel in how can we ensure that there's an alignment with the spring survey that was administered because we want to use that as our Baseline data and then trying to elaborate on some of the questions that we felt we could have took a deeper dive into the students response and the student experience so I truly believe that between that conversation discussion review and essentially we dug down into each question to project you know what type of data are we going to gain through this Administration and then how would we use that to inform our next steps so we all left an administrative council meeting extremely confident that the question sets for each of the three buildings will represent exactly what we want to know at this time we chose to elaborate and drill down on a few of the questions not all of them because we didn't want to make it too too long and we hope that it'll give us a clearer I guess shine a light into some of the original responses that we received with the agreed somewhat agree so we dug down a little bit deeper on some of the questions so our plan is that after the administration window has closed they will there will be meetings to discuss the data at the building level building and District level and then across all three buildings this is just a little snapshot of the survey as the students would see it so last year in the spring Administration some people had voiced concerns that the students were not 100% honest in their responses because they were concerned that there was some they believe didn't believe there was anonymity in their responses so we reassured them at all the building leaders communicated to the teachers that we need to be very clear to our students that this is an anonymous survey we are not linking any email addresses we offered QR codes for students as well because we do have some grades at the middle school that are using iPads so we thought that would be a good option for them the QR code and then the other the other grades were administered this through a Google form so I would just like to make note that on the C survey now these fourth graders it's the first time they're being administered a survey so we worked really hard to ensure that we provided them with developmentally appropriate definitions of some of the words that they may not be used to using such as race and culture and so that they can understand the difference between the two and the teachers the classroom teachers administering the survey also did some teaching into the survey as well we also added a developmentally appropriate version of race and culture for the middle school too because we felt like maybe the fifth and sixth grader may need just a clear understanding of the terms prior to Administration so as I had mentioned we are continuing to focus on emotional safety and a sense of belonging and what you'll see in the orange diagram is the definition of emotional safety and sense of belonging and that is included in the actual survey for the students when it breaks into the tional safety questions there's a clear definition for the students before they start to look and respond to said questions and similarly to the sense of belonging we wanted to ensure that everyone had a clear understanding so that they could do their best to align their responses to what we've provided them so this diagram depicts the school Community as a unit and its success in fostering a sense of identity agency and belonging while promoting academic achievement and supporting the emotional well-being of all of our Tigers so the Aspire experience so Miss Nicole damasio is a firste special education teacher at PBC and she is the lead teacher in our Aspire program so Aspire stands for active student participation inspires real engagement we come up with catchy SP catchy acronyms keeps you excited all right Mr Mia hi I'm n Deasia I'm the special education teacher at PVC at Aspire room the Aspire class allows students to Foster develop and strengthen their social emotional and daily living skills that they will utilize in various settings in the morning I have seven students in my class and we focus on math and Ela we adjust the instruction based on their unique strengths and needs and we like moving around the building moving around the clro so we do scav around the building for math we do little games we keep them up and moving not just sitting down and taking notes so there's a Time built into the schedule between math and Ela for movement breaks the kids go outside and run they either play tag or run the track do it too we don't need a movement break and it really helps them get focused for ELA and just get a little refresh is there a video in there yeah there is you think I could you that if I make you an editor would that work yes you share the video file that I do to share that I'm not the owner of that I can do yeah I'm sorry that was a good time for a superintendent Jo what is the leading cause of dry skin towels thank foring just want to say that was off the cut ready to go he's got rolling right off it worked no okay we will unblock that and share it with you at a really good time so these photos look wonderful I mean I'm not just saying that the photos look amazing the they we done I mean our students really happy he issues the permission for the videos not the you want me to go next class spend a lot of time with dutches service St this helps the students relax release energy and feel more focused and calm as they continue their day we spend time on her in the mornings and during our movement breaks the kids will play fet with her they'll run around with her and it really helps them feel calm and focus in them Beyond academics a significant part of teaching is focus on life skills with my three Aspire students we integrate daily activities that promote communication self-care and Community awareness each month we focus on a LIF skill topic integrating it into daily lessons and reinforcing it throughout the year we focus on getting the community safety walking the community being able to locate different places in croin so we took the students and we practiced how to safely cross the road we talk about money management how to identify points and dollars how to pay a cashier we went to Apple Farm and we practice paying we also talk about making healthy life choices in food and fitness so we create grocery list we show them how to navigate the grocery store how to find these healthy food choices and we also walk the draft in the afternoon every single day so they get a lot of movement in the students follow a morning routine and we incorporate these skills into every subject we teach we like to focus on selfcare and hygiene so being able to recognize personal hygiene needs and the importance of cleanliness and being able to locate these items in the store as well F to CVS and we located these items another one that we focus on is domestic skills so being able to understand the concept of different household chores and responsibilities the students have class jobs that they apply for they have job application and they take each job very seriously they also use plastic plates and bowls so they'll just transfer their breakfast or lunch on to practice washing so they'll wash the dishes they'll wash their utensils and we also started working in the cafeteria so we started doing this so they can gain a hands-on experience with tests such as preparing food cleaning organizing and interacting with others in a real world setting our teaching philosophy is based on active student focused learning prioritizing Hands-On activities instead of traditional note taking by understanding each student's strengths and means we cultivate a welcoming and dynamic classroom atmosphere in conclusion we work to create a flexible movement oriented environment that integrates life skills with academic lessons addressing my students diverse needs and fostering their overall development great job great and this is a chck place of of this my oh yeah my no my morning routine yes sorry about that so those a checklist you have to brush your teeth use your mouth W that's where chapstick is put it the other way creas the and put the on the Shelf yeah so and this is a toothpaste is on the toothbrush a toothpaste right now what I holding right now so you have to brush your teeth always what are you using di this is mou this is this is toothpaste this is toothbrush this is ChapStick this is deodorant and this is e e to our program to see if their students are appropriate for our po so we do have some visit before coming in as a tuition based student but yes this is keeping our students here and these students prior to this would have been going to other districts it is very likely that they would have yes that's amazing it's a great program they're doing a phenomenal job there and it's supporting the students because our speech pathologist our occupational therapist and our Behavior Specialists accompany this group there's a lot of frontloading of skills and appropriate behaviors that needs to be modeled and taught prior to them going out so they do a few days of like prep work and then the outside going out into thetion that are had when they when they return beautiful thank you well good so our next presentation is by Leandra Ramirez who's a school psychologist at the high school and Miss Cassandra Lea she is a special education this is her first year as a special education teacher here in Croton and she works in the flexible support program at PBC and Leandra is a full-time school psychologist at the program here so we've have such a cute title how flexible is the flexible Support Program see the capitals so I'm Cassandra again and that was a good question how flexible is it it's pretty flexible so it's for students from fifth 12th grade they all have access to it and this is a spot for them to reset so we're having a bad day having a bad period maybe we're having a bad chunk of time and we need a spot to come in and reset and this spot is IND individualized towards them so it has flexible seating it has a quiet location for them to get their work done and because sometimes their emotions might be affecting their ability to complete their work and that's our goal is to keep kids learning this is a really good spot for them to come and get some individual venting if they need there so there's two ways Flex is open to all students so anybody at any point in their day if they feel they need a few minutes whatever they may need a space a person an emotional support human we're there so there's also students who are scheduled into the program so these are students who've been identified as having that their the social emotional concerns are impacting their academics so for them what this looks like is there's individual and group counseling which we use a lot of DBT that I'll touch on in a little bit even drive-thru counseling that is not uncommon that sometimes people the big step is that they made it to the front of the building or they drove here with their parents and at least were able to connect with them so and a part of being scheduled into the program is you meet with us on a regular basis I should say that us includes myself Mr Xavier he's a special education teacher in the flex program and our teacher Aid is there so there's three adults and there's usually someone in there at all times to keep that place open for our students and we also do home visits as needed and connect families to outside resources to just help maintain that wraparound approach so who can be a flexer so as landra was saying there's certain kids who have it in their schedule their IP declares that they get to be there but it's also open to all students in the building so it's open to students who are having the dist regulated emotions that are stopping them from completing their work from students who are in a crisis situation students who might need emergency counseling like we said earlier and then it's also targeting students who maybe have treny issues or have some historical emotional dis disregulation that this would be a good spot for them and then students who are transitioning from a therapeutic placement or a hospital setting it's a great way for us to BR that that yes so that's actually why one of the reasons why Flex was started I think almost 10 years a go now was so that we have a place in croin for these students who are in hospital programs they can step down in cin we feel the best place to educate our students is here so to help them transition back they can spend this where it gets very flexible again as much time as as they need adjusting back to school for some students it can range some students are ready to come back hit the ground running and want to get right back into school and then there's kids who need full days in class for a week or maybe we gradually do one class at a time but what it allows is a place for them to gradually get caught up on work and not feel that stress of my God I need to get this all done now and build connections I think something that's great about Flex is that these students are now meeting other students who are going through the same thing and these are not things that are some students don't openly talk about it right but if you see someone else in Flex you get an understanding that we we're connected on some level it's really nice to so as I mentioned DBT dialecto behavior therapy is a big part of flex this is what drives our group counseling and it's dilc it's being able to see multiple perspectives that way when you get stuck you can have a different way of looking at the problem what we touch on is mindfulness breathing being able to focus emotional regulation learning how to regulate distress tolerance skills sitting through that discomfort knowing that it's okay to feel a little nervous it's okay to feel a little worried that sometimes these emotions are what pushes us to do things think about when you have a test and you get nervous before a test so just kind of reminding students that these emotions are valid we don't need to run from them we just need to learn how to sit through them and and let them exist and also the last part is just interpersonal Effectiveness so relationships navigating friendships learning how to say no advocating for yourself which is huge in the high school and what I love about DBT is that uses this emotional thermometer which gives it almost a kid feel it brings it back to elementary school a bit and some of the language we can use is oh you look like you're in the red or we are feeling hot right now and I'll use some of that same language with my high schoolers and it they respond well to it I think it just clicks that oh Red Wings on hot and up here I need to P down and that way they know that's our goal let's get you to a cmer place so you are able to function problem solve and get back get get to go sharing a little tip from gbt is so when you're in the red they Big Friend of acronyms is DBT and if you follow the the code there it will give you even more acon that have more coping skills but I love this one because these are easy and quick to do don't require much thinking what you want to do is change the temperature of your body make it really cold so maybe go take a walk outside or thankfully in our cafeteria we have an ice machine we also intense exercise walks we go for a ton of walks Pace breathing and muscle relaxation I will say the first two are some of the ones that kids students are going right going for that walk just being able to separate themselves from the stressor in front of them is really help I could have used some of those strategies during some Giant games well soon we're gonna do mindful fantastic and show that mindful is more than just breathing and I I like well look get it but I do like it because soon to tell someone just breath just bre through it and they're in crisis they don't want to hear that I said so I'll show you a different way of mindfulness but the last things I did want to say is so fle 10th year now and what's great I'll bring it back to the students they recruit each other so our program has expanded not only with our program being more known amongst teachers and just us being more out there but also students bringing their friends we know a place where you can go so we actually have bulletin boards right outside of the flex room where we've just put some of the language that is common in our room out there growth mindset learning to react instead of respond and the mindfulness that comes with little tabs that they can take out little breathing activities that they can just take with them but the idea is that they see this and know F exists we are here Okay so we do have a mindfulness activity it's still okay it does require everyone we could just stand up here we are and this one is called a participating mindfulness mindfulness activity because it requires you not be bully in the moment that's mindfulness it's not just shutting the mind off it's just being in the moment right now so we're going to do is something called sound B and what you have to do is I'm going to I'm going to give you an example I'm going to throw a sound to Cassie she's going to catch it by repeating the sound and then throw another sound back to me so we can see how this goes but then I'll throw it around to everyone else you catch the sound and then throw another one to someone else it lands on you this means it's thr to you it's gonna be good promise thinking boom boom boom aha Ribbit rib it Bo smush [Music] smush yes B e for