By Kate Hill

Staff Writer

On Sept. 16, the Cazenovia Central School District (CSD) Board of Education discussed the issue of cybersecurity — a growing concern for districts across the country.

Superintendent Matthew Reilly updated the board on a national data breach, believed to have occurred in November 2018, which compromised Cazenovia CSD student information.

The breach involved the unauthorized access of data from the AIMSweb 1.0 system — an assessment tool used by the district to monitor the academic growth of students in kindergarten through second grade.

AIMSweb is provided to the district by education software developer Pearson.

The breach, which was discovered by the FBI, impacted more than 13,000 schools and colleges nationwide.

The district was not alerted that its students and staff were subjects of the breach until the end of August 2019.

According to Pearson, the following directory information was disclosed during the breach: first name, last name, date of birth, school district name, and AIMSweb ID number.

Reilly reported to the board that there is no evidence that the data has been misused, but that the district plans to notify the parents/guardians of affected students electronically and by letter once they have been identified.

According to Reilly, the cost of the labor and postage required for such action will be billed back to Pearson.

“Every hour that I spend on this, I am going to bill back to them,” he said.

Pearson is offering all affected individuals one year of complimentary credit monitoring from Experian IdentityWorks. To learn more, call Pearson at 866-883-3309 or email [email protected].

According to an Aug. 30 letter from the superintendent to parents/guardians, the district is working with the Central New York Regional Information Center to protect its data network and to ensure the security of its students’ information. The district is also evaluating its ongoing use of Pearson assessments.

During the meeting, Reilly also reported that he received warning of another potential data breach just that morning from the Onondaga-Cortland-Madison Board of Cooperative Educational Services (OCM BOCES)

The superintendent said the organization sent a follow up email later that day informing the district that no data appeared to have been compromised.

“The pipeline to our district comes through BOCES,” Reilly said. “I just wanted to reassure people that BOCES is trying to be as vigilant as possible about not just setting up firewalls, but about sending notifications to keep us as up to date as possible about any [potential] breaches. Apparently, [all districts] are under siege . . . by people trying to infiltrate our networks . . . [I think it’s] absolutely necessary to talk about [this] and necessary to really be as open as possible about what’s happening here.”

Reserve funds

During his report, Assistant Superintendent Thomas Finnerty recommended that the board consider setting aside funds in a reserve for employer contributions to the Teachers’ Retirement System (TRS).

“This past state budget season, it was negotiated that we could have a sub-reserve of the ERS (Employees’ Retirement System) reserve that is earmarked for teachers’ retirement system expenses,” Finnerty said. “This type of reserve would be used . . . if we have fluctuation in the employer’s share of retirement contribution. This would be a reserve that we are able to take funds from to help smooth out any big spikes in the employer’s share. I recommend that we put this into place.”

Annually, the district would be permitted to set aside up to two percent of its total TRS payroll. The fund balance may not exceed 10 percent of the total compensation paid to TRS members in the district during the prior fiscal year.

To establish such a fund, the board must pass a resolution.

Discussion on the topic will continue at the October board meeting.

After the TRS reserve conversation, the board established a balance limit for each of the district’s existing reserve funds including insurance reserve, tax certiorari reserve and the reserve for capital projects, based on Finnerty’s recommendations.

According to the resolution background, the recommended limit increases were made “based upon new information and current economic conditions or estimated calculations of the potential future liabilities in several different reserve categories.”

Finnerty, the finance committee, and the board as a whole will work to determine how best to allocate the funds.

In other news

Reilly announced that the district named Mathematics Department Leader Kim Schug “Teacher of the Year” and Rick Bosworth “Staff Person of the Year.”

The district received proposals from three energy service companies/contractors for an Energy Performance Contract (EPC) to complete a $1.5 to $2 million energy efficiency project.

According to Reilly, the comprehensive proposals received from Siemens, the John W. Danforth Company, and Day Automation focus primarily on lighting and building envelope improvements. All three also include some small solar component and some educational component.

An EPC would enable the district to complete the improvements without tapping into capital budget funds, as the project would be paid for with the savings generated from the improvements.

The facilities committee will read through the proposals and set up times to interview the interested parties.

The policy committee reported on its work on three district policies: Student Data Breach, Immunization of Students, and Meal Charging and Prohibition Against Meal Shaming.

Finnerty announced the one-year probationary appointment of Geoffrey Brown as the district’s new director of facilities. Brown has nearly four years of experience in the position in the Marcellus Central School District. He plans to begin Oct. 21.

School tax collection is currently underway. At the time of the meeting, the district had collected approximately $2.5 million.

Online tax payment will be available next year.

Finnerty reported that the district submitted its $15 million 2020 Capital Project to the New York State Education Department for approval.

To speed up the approval process, the district has agreed to have a third party group review the architectural and engineering aspects of the project. The review is estimated to take 47 calendar days versus 57 workdays.

“That will give us a leg up as far as timing with regards to getting our project out to bid hopefully before other school districts do,” Finnerty said. “[We] could reap great rewards as far as expenses go and the quality of contractors still available at that point.”

Monthly school board meetings begin at 6:30 p.m. in the Board Meeting Room in the District Office in the Middle School. For more information, visit cazenoviacsd.com or call Superintendent Reilly at 315-655-1317.