Finance discussion led by Paul and Nicole.  They want to take advantage of three more years of federal aid to increase the pay scale, modeling the new one on Schenectady’s.  They propose reducing the amount of merit pay available at each school to help with the new pay scale. Pay scale addresses teacher retention.  Paul emphasized that the schools’ budgets are lean and efficient.  After the federal funding stops, each school will need to find an additional $400K per year.  Martha proposed that a small committee of the board look at external factors (e.g., declining numbers of elementary students in NYS) and determine the right size and scale for the schools.  

Martha reported out from governance, reiterating the need for a subcommittee to examine the intersection between governance and finance.

The board voted to go into executive session, inviting Kristina, Karen, and Luke to remain to discuss current disciplinary challenges. 

Kristina and Karen briefly highlighted statistics from the reports on enrollment that they had distributed to the board.  Karen emphasized that the increase in SPED scholars meant the need for a SPED teacher at every level except K.  (This is outsourced to Spotted Zebra.)

Nilsa reported on the 20th anniversary celebration.  They are targeting an event for 250 people and are looking at dates/venues and will be reporting on both in May.  

Luke presented the calendar for 2022-2023.  It has 190 days, which builds in 5 days for snow days. Start day is 9/1, before Labor Day, ends 6/27.  If the snow days are not used, school will end on 6/23.  Calendar includes day off for Good Friday, 5/26 and 5/30.  K camp will be held 8/29 and 8/30.  The afterschool program starts two weeks into the year.  Boys’ school wants to outsource this, perhaps to the Y.