By Kate Hill

Staff Writer

On July 13, the Cazenovia Central School District (CCSD) Board of Education held its annual organizational meeting.

At the beginning of the meeting, Dave Mehlbaum was elected board president and JoAnne Race was selected as vice president.

The oath of office was administered to Mehlbaum, Race, new board member Meghan Kelly, and returning board member Dr. Jan Woodworth. The oath was administered to Superintendent Matthew Reilly earlier that day.

During his report, Reilly shared the latest information regarding the school reopening guidelines from the New York State Education Department (NYSED).

He presented two documents, the first of which provided an overview of the topics covered in the reopening guidelines.

According to Reilly, the document was presented to the Board of Regents that morning,

“I thought this showed at least the skeleton of what districts’ expectations are going to be in different areas,” Reilly said. “It left some ambiguity in terms of what was actually expected . . . More specific requirements were issued later in the day.”

As he scrolled through the presentation, the superintendent highlighted several different topics, including facilities, transportation, school schedules and special education.

Reilly informed the board that he and Assistant Superintendent Thomas Finnerty have been searching the community for “alternate external facilities” to expand the district’s physical footprint in order to accommodate students.

“There are going to be some challenges in terms of what we can do with the current facilities we have . . .” he said. “We are going to need extra space in order to socially distance our students and teachers.”

Reilly said he already contacted GHD, the Hampton Inn & Suites, and Cazenovia College about potential spaces, and that he plans to reach out to local churches and the Cazenovia Public Library.

According to the document, all plans for additional learning spaces must be submitted to NYSED’s Office of Facilities Planning for expedited fire/building code review.

Reilly next explained that the district will be responsible for developing its own transportation plan, noting that Transportation Supervisor Karen Cowherd has been proactively working on bus routes and trying to understand the options available for ensuring social distancing.

“We also anticipate doing a survey that allows us to gauge whether parents will be willing or more interested in self-transporting their children,” he said. “I wouldn’t be at all surprised if we saw some reluctance of parents to put their children on buses during this time.”

The NYSED presentation says that schools must create a comprehensive plan for a schedule that includes in-person instruction, remote instruction, and hybrid instruction.

“The requirement document essentially says ‘Set your priorities,’” Reilly said. “’Are your priorities K-8 for in-person or are they [special ed. or English Language Learners]?’ Then you look at your space and look at your staffing and look at what some of your options are . . . This is a puzzle that we know we have to solve and will. I think if any district can, we can, but it’s not easy.”

Reilly also informed the board that the district has been doing in-person special education summer school.

“We have a jumpstart on this . . .” he said. “We are essentially running a pilot program for our special education. It is going remarkably well.”

The state disseminated its formal reopening guidance just hours before the school board meeting.

According to the superintendent, the document provides an in-depth overview of the state’s expectations for schools.

“It is dense; it is daunting . . .” he said. “It won’t look the same in every district. That’s actually a concern because we will see people comparing . . . At least now we know how high the bar is, and knowing beats not knowing. We have something to aim for.”

The district will submit its plans to the state via the “School Reopening Plan Portal” by Friday, July 31.

According to Reilly, Governor Andrew M. Cuomo said he expects to provide schools with some indication of whether or not they can open in the fall by the first full week of August.

“[It’s based on] transmission rate . . .” Reilly said. “Currently, I think all regions in New York State qualify for opening, but as we have seen in other areas of the country, that can change rapidly, dramatically, and in a bad way . . . If people behave responsibly and avoid out-of-state trips to states that have high incidents of COVID-19, if they social distance, if they wear masks, if they do all the things that have proven to work in New York State up to this point, our chances improve dramatically of being able to conduct that in-person learning that we know is best for kids.”

The district’s reopening plan will be reviewed at the next school board meeting, scheduled for July 27.

The NYSED reopening guidance is available on the district website at cazenoviacsd.com.

In other news

Board member Jen Parmalee asked the group to weigh in on a recent letter to the editor of the Cazenovia Republican calling for anti-racist training for CCSD teachers, student instruction on racism, and guest speakers of color.

“I really want us as a board to start thinking — from a systemic perspective — about what policies, practices or procedures we may have in place that unintentionally, disproportionately, negatively impact children of color,” Parmalee said. “I appreciated the letter because I think it pushes us to have a conversation that most of us are not comfortable with or haven’t been having for some time.”

Reilly said he met with two of the authors of the letter to discuss the district’s path forward. He also noted that the district is in the process of organizing an anti-racism summit facilitated by a person-of-color from a local college or university.

“I understand their desire for change,” Reilly said. “I’m of the mind that we should begin by listening . . . I very much want to hear what our current students say and respectfully go about addressing issues of racism and inequality in ways that respect their experiences and their thoughts.”

Several members of the board offered suggestions for ways to continue the conversation around issues of equity within the district.

School board meetings are generally held on the third Monday of each month in the board meeting room located in the district office in the middle school. Meeting dates are listed on the district website and the school calendar.

For more information, visit cazenoviacsd.com/board-of-education.