Hello. I'm so sorry that we don't have, enough chairs. We didn't expect this large of a turnout. This is amazing. This is why Croton is the best. So thank you all. Like, amazing.
• Alright. Now the planned part. No. Hello. Thank you all so much for being here, and thank you so much to mother Jenny, and Saint Augustine for donating their space. By the way, this isn't for volume. This is for the recording. So if if if you're confused as to why I don't sound loud enough. Hopefully, I'm projecting loud enough. I wanna especially thank our five Croton neighbors who have chosen to dedicate their time, energy, and expertise to our community on behalf of all of our children. Thank you.
• My name is Jill Anderson. I'm a mom of two, a proud public school teacher, and the founder of this grass roots group called the Croton Community Collective. For those who may not know, the CCC grew from a group of parents who wanted to work together to bring back a more play based childhood, one that looks a little more like the way many of us grew up. We wanna prevent our children from growing up addicted to smartphones and social media, and we wanna make this work easier for all of us.
• Along with so many others around The United States and around the world, the CCC is part of a growing movement that believes that we can roll back the phone based childhood, and we know we will be much more successful if we all act together. This has become a collective action problem, and the way out is collective action. We believe that we can make Croton a model community for reclaiming healthy childhoods for kids off screens and full of real world play, independence, and fun. Our mission has three basic parts. Keep smartphones and social media out of childhood, advocate for phone free schools and intentional technology use, and foster a community culture that values independence, free play, and responsibility in the real world. We've already begun putting this into action. You may have seen our Enjoy a Goodread book boxes.
• 45,
• in local businesses all around town. Each box was decorated by children in our community and filled with donated books and crayons to give kids easy access to books and activities rather than screens in restaurants, coffee shops, hair salons, and more. In March, we organized a screening and panel discussion of a new documentary, Can't Look Away, The Case Against Social Media, which brought our community together for a vibrant discussion about these issues while raising $800 for the Alexander Neville Foundation, which supports victims of social media. And we're just getting started. Looking ahead to more initiatives including block parties, a landline phone book for our kids, and much more. I may have an idea about maybe a phone booth in town. We'll see. In only nine months, the CCC has grown to over 300 members. Amazing. This is a testament to the extraordinary strength and energy of this incredible community. Tonight, we're focused on the second part of our mission, phone free schools and intentional technology use. We know these are not simple issues. We're committed to thoughtful conversation and respectful collaboration between parents, our incredible teachers, and school administrators, all working together for what's best for our children. Thank you again to everyone who made tonight possible and to our candidates for being here and engaging in this conversation. With that, I turn it over to Danny and Nicole to begin.
Hi. I'm Dani I'm Dani Zelliger. I'm an English teacher and a father to a kindergartner and toddler. Hi. I'm Nicole Curran. I am a third grade teacher and a mom to a sixth grader and a second grader. We wanna take a moment to acknowledge Jill's incredible work. Jill, so many parents in this community felt that the phone based childhood was wrong, and you brought us together and gave us a voice. So thank you. On
behalf of the entire CCC, we want to thank Saint Augustine's for providing us with this beautiful venue and making this event possible.
And by the way, restrooms are just through this door. Thank you to the many CCC members who helped plan and execute this event, including our timekeeper tonight, Tessa Young.
We also thank the community members in attendance tonight and those that will watch at home, not to mention all of the parents who have submitted questions for tonight's form. We received over 100 questions.
And most of all, we want we at the CCC express our sincere gratitude to these five individuals who are willing to volunteer their time and energy to the important task of steering our schools our school district, representing the public, and working to support our community's children. Please join me in thanking the BOE candidates.
• Before we start, we'll quickly explain how this forum will work and why we think it's an important forum to have. Every year, the League of Women Voters holds a forum for the Board of Education candidates that touches on a wide range of topics. It's a wonderful and important event, and we encourage you to attend it on May 12 at 07:30PM in the high school Auditorium. This will be a somewhat different candidates forum, and that we have a much narrower focus, the role of technology in our schools. While much of the CCC's work involves technology in the home and in the community, many Croton parents, and many parents around the world, have growing concerns about how ed tech has transformed schooling into something that looks quite different from what we have experienced. To that end, we found it necessary to give the community a voice with this forum. Many prominent studies have demonstrated that excess technology use has corrosive effects on students that stretch across multiple domains. Attention and self regulation, social skills and relationships, anxiety and depression, motor skills, and eyesight. Further, there are serious questions about edtech's educational efficacy. To quote the senate testimony of the neuroscientist, doctor Jared Kuni Horvath, the available evidence from international assessments, large scale academic studies, and meta analyses shows that increased classroom screen exposure is generally associated with weaker learning outcomes, not stronger ones. In narrow circumstances, digital tools can support surface level skill acquisition, but in most core academic context, screen slow learning, reduce depth of understanding, and weaken retention, end quote. Let me clarify that the CCC is not an anti tech group. Several of us work in the tech industry. We believe that technology should play an important, albeit reduced role in our children's education.
• And we are interested in seeing technology used in a way that is intentional and additive to the student experience, while also preserving the lower tech strategies that we know work. Let me also emphasize that we are in no that we in no way blame excuse me. We in no way place blame at the feet of teachers, least of all our amazing teachers here in Croton. Jill, Nicole, and I are all public school teachers ourselves. So many educators, including Tessa, our timekeeper, have joined the CCC because we see the profound impacts of technology on students. We know that it is not individual teachers, but schools and school districts that make the decisions about the technology platforms our children will encounter, which brings us to our purpose tonight.
We have poured over the 120 questions that were submitted to us and identified six common themes. For each of those themes, we have selected a question or combined several questions to pose to our BOE candidates. We believe that these six questions represent significant concerns for many Croton parents. Each candidate will be allotted two and a half minutes to respond to each question. Tessa will run a clock to make the remaining time visible for the candidates. At the two and a half minute mark, Tessa will wave a hand to indicate that the time is up. There will be no crosstalk opportunities to respond to other candidates' remarks outside the time each candidate is allotted. And before we move on to our six questions, we will give each candidate a minute to introduce themselves. Miss Bhutanagar,
we'll start with you. Great. Thank you. Thank you to the CCC for organizing this forum and St. A's providing a space to have this important and timely conversation about technology in our schools. I'm Anamika Bhatnagar, the parent of an eighth grader and an eleventh grader who have still not managed to crack the screen time password on their devices. Both my children have attended Croton-Harmon School since kindergarten. And before joining the school board three years ago, I was an active PTA member, class parent, and in school volunteer. Now I feel like I'm a full time school board member. In reality, however, I've been working as a children's book editor and publisher for nearly thirty years. My passions are literacy and education. I spent twenty of those years at Scholastic developing award winning children's books, including Captain Underpants and Dog Man. I'm sorry, and also, you're welcome. My current professional focus is K through two literacy aligned with the science of reading and most recently a handwriting series. Thank you to California for leading the way as usual. I'm excited to be here tonight to speak with all of you. Thank you for having me.
Good evening. Thank you again to the Croton Community Collective and to St. Augustine's and to my fellow candidates for being here tonight in what I know will be a thoughtful conversation. I've been privileged to serve on the Croton-Harmon School Board for the last nine years. I live here in Croton with my husband and my son who is a tenth grader. My husband and I moved here twenty years ago in large part because of the quality of our schools. And when we decide when I first decided to run for the Board of Ed in 2017, I was guided at and and still am by a true belief in civic engagement and finding a way to meaningfully contribute to this community that I've decided to make a home with my family. I saw at the time, my son was in first grade, that we have incredible schools and recognize that that doesn't happen by accident. It requires people who are willing to roll up their sleeves and do the work. I know that the parents that that everyone in this community, parents, community members, and our faculty and staff are all working towards the same goal. That is to do the best for our kids and provide them with the best opportunities for themselves and in heading out into the wider world. Thank you.
Thank you, Sarah. Good evening, everyone. My name is Jake Day. I wanna, you know, really thank the CCC for having this conversation tonight. It's why I'm a CCC member to continue these conversations, really take a serious look at technology in the classroom. Obviously, thank you to the moderators, all the other panelists, and to you guys for coming out tonight and hearing us out. I'm running for the board of Ed this year. I have a son who's entering CET in the fall. I have another, son who's two years old. We'll be joining him shortly thereafter that. I'm really looking forward to bringing to this conversation tonight a fresh perspective about screen use, about screen time, what we're seeing with the kids, all the research that's out there. I think I really wanna bring a focus to that. And what I'll bring to the board if I'm, you know, fortunate enough to earn your vote is a really serious look at these issues that we're dealing with from a governance framework, from measuring outcomes, and making sure that whatever we do in the classroom, whether it's technology or analog answers, we're making sure that we're transparent about why we're doing that and what the outcomes of those programs are. And I just wanna say thank you all tonight for having us here.
Thank you. For those who may not know me, I'm Neil Haber. My wife and I have two sons who attended Croton schools, K through 12, had a generally positive experience in our schools, wasn't perfect, but they were able to take the foundation they received in Croton to go on to successful careers in philanthropy and public service. When I joined the board when my kids were in elementary school, I did so because I wanted to serve the community, and that has been my goal. That's been my focus through the entirety of the many years that I've been on the board. I know it's been many years, but I think what I bring to the board is a lot of experience, a lot of knowledge, a lot of dedication. I am looking forward to this discussion because I know that the use of technology, the proper use of technology, and teaching our students, our kids, how to navigate technology when they leave here is very important. And that's what I hope we talk about and we are able to come to some understandings in these and other conversations.
Hi everyone. Thank you so much for being here. Thank you to the CCC and to St. Augustine's. My name is Elizabeth Laird, though most people call me Betsy. I'm a trained psychologist turned data leader focuses on ensuring that programs are the most effective they can be for some of the world's most vulnerable communities. I moved to Croton in 2020 with my family. I have a rising second grader and a rising kindergarten student. Drawn here by the town's natural beauty and what we had heard about the public schools. I'm running for the ward of ed today, not because I ever had any desire to be in public office. Running for politics was something that still scares me to this day, as you can hear from the shaking of my voice. But I'm running because I deeply believe that there is nothing so important, especially in this moment, as raising the next generation of critical thinkers. Our students deserve to be challenged by a wide array of academic opportunities, and our community deserves a board that is truly accountable for the success of its school district and responsive to community concerns.
Thanks, Kathleen. Thank you. And thank you to Kathleen for your help with the mic.
• Our first question tonight, for our first question, we will begin, with Ms. Bottnager. What are your perceptions about the proliferation of ed tech in our schools? What do you see as its benefits and drawbacks?
Thanks for the question. So EdTech has been I think the conversation has has risen to the forefront very, very recently, but I'll speak from my own experience of having had a having had kids starting in the schools as far back as 2014. I was really surprised when my child entered second grade to discover how much of his reading instruction was taking place over a computer program. And I remember remarking on the fact that he was more excited to dress and build the avatar that he was sort of using to identify himself than he was, over the lessons. As someone who has, like, been a reader my entire life and worked in a field of children's books and thought I was doing a wonderful job creating these, like, tactile, beautifully illustrated, engaging materials that were ready to turn reluctant readers into lifelong learners, it was a little bit of a bummer. To to say the least, like, the gamification, the sort of, like, the the that sort of approach really distressed me. Had the CCC been around and anyone else having this conversation back then, I would have been grateful, but it the the country wasn't there yet. We had just sort of, I think, demanded of our teachers and of our educational system to shift into using all these new technologies because people thought that they were a solution in terms of differentiation, in terms of opportunity, in terms of reaching different learners. And I think that the country dove into this without necessarily thinking about the impacts. The impacts now are very, very clear. So I think we're really at a we're at an we're past an inflection point, frankly, in my opinion, because the data has been out there since, like, you know, six or seven years ago.
• From my perspective, the the the situation that we're seeing right now is that we have a lot of technology in our classrooms that isn't additive. It isn't necessarily hitting the mark in terms of what the instructional goals are. And I think, honestly, it's taking us away from some of the foundational experiences that students actually need to participate in to be able to develop strong literacy skills, strong writing skills. Something as simple as actually using a pen and paper versus using technology to do the same thing, tapping versus writing, holding a pencil, developing those small motor skills. These things actually apply all the way through your entire career as a student. We know right now that once kids hit college, they are going to be taking their exams in blue books again because why? Professors don't want people using AI. So this is we're at a point right now in the culture and in the nation where there's an opportunity to shift, and I see that as like the highest one of the highest priorities in our schools right now.
Thank you very much. So in terms of the proliferation of of ed tech in our schools, you know, as I think as Anamika mentioned, something that that's been happening for many years and has we've seen increase. And and oftentimes, it was done in an in a genuine belief that including these things and providing these these technologies would be beneficial to our students. And I think, you know, I think there is a a growing recognition. And and as we as a school district are looking to ensure that we understand that that technology and appropriate use of technology means different things in in different grades at different levels and understanding that our youngest learners, there are important things that they need, in terms of motor skills, in terms of reading books, and having tactile things, and having hands on experiences. And as as our as our children grow and age, we wanna make sure that we are thinking about technology in ways that they have intentional use that is helping them, that's going to help prepare them for the world that they live in. And and unfortunately, it's maybe not the world we wish they all lived in, but we wanna make sure that we are providing them the skills and helping them get to the to the points they need so that they understand the benefits and the the negatives of technology. And and we help show them and model for them the ways that it's important to engage in human connection, that it's important to have to have a make sure that they are they have a fulfilling life outside of technology, outside of a computer screen. I I all I see my son on his screen far too often, and I'm always looking for ways in which we can engage in activities
• and in learning that is outside and away from that. So I think looking to make sure that we are using things in a thoughtful way where they can be helpful to students, and there are instances for that, and and making sure that we are working collaboratively as a community, as our staff and our faculty to understand the ways in which we can help roll some of that back and and do better for our kids.
I'm I'm glad you brought that question up. I think it's a really important one. And I like that you framed it, you know, my perception. Right? So with young children entering CET this fall, we're very careful about screen time and tech use. But once we, you know, send them off into the world, you know, we don't have as much control. So the perception I have after talking with with many Crotonites over the past couple of months during this campaign, many folks in the room, is that we've become very overreliant on ed tech and technology in general. And I think a lot of this is because of the COVID nineteen pandemic. I think we all got so accustomed to Zoom meetings and being at home on on our devices, and teachers were put in an impossible position. Right? Go teach on a iPad. Go try to figure this out. That was COVID. COVID is is, you know, over. It's in the rearview mirror, but the effects of COVID are still today. There's learning gaps, and there's still this overreliance on on EdTech. And I think that what we need to do is take a serious look at the platforms we're using, a serious look at the contracts we have, the companies that are essentially roping us into these long term deals with this software and saying, hey. Is this working or not? And some of these platforms are very good. There's research that says, Alexia Alexia has some very good reviews if implemented properly. Right? All of these things depend on how we implement implement it and making sure that our teachers have the proper guidance, the proper guidelines, the proper rules to make sure that they're using these technologies to the best of their ability. I'm I'm with CCC. It's not a phone ban. It's not a screen ban. It's intentional. It's mindful.
• And we do all we can to measure outcomes and make sure that we know we're in this tech world. We're not gonna get out of it ever, but there are ways to swing the pendulum back and get out under the grip of ed tech. I think the research is pretty clear that these tech companies have a stranglehold on some of our schools, and they've been doing that since the pandemic. And I think we need to take a serious look at that because a lot of the myths that these ed tech companies teach us and and, you know, spread about how great this stuff is, we need to be critical about that. We need to take a serious look at that. And, again, it's not about a screen ban. It's not about getting devices out of the schools tomorrow. It's about making sure that teachers are equipped teachers are equipped to use these tools. And if we are gonna start taking them away or putting restrictions on it, we provide that support that those teachers need to handle that transition.
I don't I I I think that nobody at least has spoken thus far is is in major disagreement about what we are facing. I I look at it a little bit differently because I happen to, for better or worse, have we've raised our children during the time when tech was in the schools to any measurable degree. And so, what we had was the opportunity, the ability for our kids to learn, I guess you might call it analog. And that was very powerful for their growth. And they've now even though they're very conversant tech more than I am, they know how to read a book, analyze a book, talk about a book, read it in various languages, at least my older son, and really just focus on that. But pen and paper is a tool. Tech is a tool, an app. They're all whatever tools we use, protractors, compasses, everything, are things that we can think about or our district should be thinking about in how we get our children, our students to have the foundational skills to understand what they are working on, to understand what it means, to understand what they're getting when inevitably they're going to start using devices, tools that are not, I'll call it analog. And I want, and what I'm looking for is for our administrators, our teachers, our parents to work together to make sure that we know what's being done and why, what's being used and why? I think the end result, well, there will be a lot more use of the analog because teachers for some, it s kind of a crutch. It came out of COVID, as Jake said, that, you know, we can do this. And EdTech is selling that. Even EdTech programs that we have that we use have features that we can either decide to use or not. That's our challenge. That's what we need to talk about.
My oldest son graduated high school in 2004. My younger son graduated in 2008. And so
college four years to say we're not gonna be having any audience questions today. We're gonna move on to miss Laird.
I I wanna say that I, like Anomika, was really surprised by the the fact that my son was learning how to read on a device, on a on an iPad. And like Jake, I think that we, as a board, if I'm so lucky to be elected, should absolutely assess every ed tech tool that the school is employing. I think we should use the evidence for ESSA, which is Every Student Succeeds Act. And what I think is really interesting to build on Jake's point that Lexia Core five has some evidence for it. It is rated as moderately effective when there are 48 other methods ranked strongly effective by the ESSA for reading instruction, only 17 of which are delivered through technology. I So just think that's a really important point is to put that curriculum in context. I think that real learning requires focus, effort, and time, not shortcuts. I think that in order to have intentional tech use, you need to define the values and the goal of a lesson and a curriculum first, then see if technology can enhance those goals. The default should not be a screen, and it should we should be careful to ensure that we're not displacing important activities that children need for healthy development. The analogy I really like to use is a forklift. So if I'm going to the gym, I could bring a forklift. It would lift the weights. But if I'm bringing a forklift to the gym, I am missing the entire point of being at the gym. I am not growing my muscles. And I worry that a lot of ed tech, that a lot of technology use in the classroom creates that shortcut for our kids, and they're not going through the productive struggle that they need to truly, truly learn.
• I will say, because since the question asked whether there are benefits to technology, I think that teachers can and have been using it thoughtfully to remove barriers for students. So my husband is a public school teacher in a nearby district. He teaches seventh grade English language arts, and he has a lot of students who are learning English as a new language. So he uses I believe he uses Notebookal M to help him work through his PowerPoints and translate them into Spanish. He makes podcasts that are conversational for the students in Spanish. So while they're learning, they can get it in their language as well as in the English. It's a bilingual podcast. And he has his co teacher who speaks Spanish review it. So I think there are really good uses. How
For the next question, we're gonna start with miss Carrier. And this is has two parts. Across the k twelve experience, how much of students reading and writing do you believe should be analog versus digital? And does our district's current practice mac match your vision? And if not, what would you do to bring that vision to fruition?
Thank you. Sorry about that. Take down some notes. Okay. Thank you very much for the question. So a k through 12, how much of in my view, how much of our students we learn reading should be analog versus digital is I I mean, personally, I am I am a book lover. So I would prefer our our students to be reading actual books. I would prefer that there it to be much more analog versus digital. That said, I I do expect that there are uses and there are ways in which they it's we are able to deliver texts to students through technology that they can access through their their online classrooms and that they can access through things like Lexia in order to help them with their with their reading and learning. So I think there does still there is still a balance because we can't obviously have all of all of the text that we would want in an analog format. But I think in terms of how we are doing that currently, I do see that there has been a balance in that. I think in some of the younger grades, I've seen that we have classroom libraries, that we also have online uses. And and there is this push and pull between some of the gamification aspects of that that I don't think are helpful for our younger students. And then in our older class in some of the middle school and and high school classrooms, I see that our students are using analog books when they are working on a book and a text through their classes, in their English language arts classes. They generally have that book. They're able to sit with that, spend time with that, and and work with the actual book, which I think is beneficial
• for them. And I think, you know, in some of their other classes, when they have additional texts that they get online, that they're able to get access to things that they wouldn't necessarily have otherwise. So I think that that is helpful as well. I think in terms of us as of of us as a district, as we move forward, it will be important to continually evaluate that, to look at that, look at the ways that we are delivering things to our students and making sure that we are providing equitable access to things, and making sure that we have a rich array of library materials for our students to experience the joy of reading.
Well, Sarah and I already found common ground on being on being book lovers. So I I would say it should be nearly all analog when it comes to reading. The research is really clear that when you read a piece of paper, when you write with a pen, you're comprehending better. You're remembering things better. However, I live in the real world. I have a a Kindle. I love it. You know, I don't need to lug a a 500 page book on the train. But when it comes to kids, especially in that k through two, that's a population, not just because my son is gonna be in kindergarten, but because oh, we all have kids in k through two. That's a population where we really need to be extremely careful about digital devices, especially if it's reading. Again, we have we have books on our iPad for we're not we're on an airplane. We're not, you know, getting there, but, you know, there's nothing like sitting down with a book. There's nothing like thumbing through the pages of a book. There's nothing like discovering a library for the first time. If you're trying to read a book on a on a tablet or a device, and you've got notifications and pop ups and all that kind of stuff, it it doesn't work. So I I the and to the part about is the district getting the balance right, I don't know. I don't know what the district's policy is. I haven't seen it. I can't find it. I don't know if there are rules in place about that. So I couldn't answer that question right now, but what I could answer is if I was on the board, I would make that a priority. I would say, go to the library, guys. Get books.
• But at the same time, being realistic. Right? Kids have smartphones. They're using it for other stuff besides reading. So me, personally, in our household, we try to do as much reading as we can. Books, we encourage going to the library. It really gets back to not just the joy of reading, but also the empirical evidence that shows you just absorb information better when you're reading from a page. You comprehend better when you're writing with a pen. So I would be really in favor of that. I think it's a really important question that I hadn't thought about, but I think it's definitely something that we should all look at.
Before we start, I just if you could restate the question to make sure I get everything that you've asked.
Sure. Okay. Across the K-twelve experience, how much of students' reading and writing do you believe should be analog versus digital? And does our district's current practice match your vision? And if not, what would you do to bring that vision to fruition?
• I am a product my family is a product of reading, as you put it, analog. That is something that we do. My wife works in a public library. We have encouraged that. We do have kids who, you know, utilize their phones because they're adults. But I think it's very important as a foundational thing, and to that extent, you know, Jake hit it very well, to have reading and writing done particularly during the formative years in an analog format as much as possible. I don't know that the district does that as much as I would like. On the other hand, we're not in the classroom every day, so those who are parents of elementary school students will have a better knowledge of that. But that's something that we as a board that can, by our goals, set the policies and direction and by our oversight. Set the expectations and see that those expectations are followed. That's something that we have been working on and we need to work on even more strongly. I'll also say though that we know that knowledge and information is not limited to the analog books that we have available to us. Particularly as students move to the higher grades, they're going to have to learn how to integrate their reading of books, their writing about subjects with the resources that really are going to be accessed through digital sources. And we need to teach them how to do that responsibly. State of New York has adopted an obligation for us to provide computer science and digital fluency training, K through 12. And we have to make sure that we are providing that training and that understanding so that when students leave our schools, they are able to use all the tools to their advantage.
Thanks. I recently heard a quote that I really liked, which is that learning is profoundly and stubbornly social. And that really resonated with me because I don't think my husband went into teaching to sit behind a computer and watch all the screens of the other computers that his students are on. Right? He really enjoys talking with his students, learning with his students, having that feedback and relationship. So my perspective with technology and education is typically that less is more. I also think that we would my experience with the schools was that the technology was way more prolific than I expected. And I was really surprised about the amount my child was talking about YouTube, advertisements, TV shows, and apps. I have also spoken to parents in older grades at CET who have said that they struggle to support their student at home because so much of the homework is delivered through the app without exemplars. So they say, you know, I don't know what they were taught, so I don't know how to help them at home. And I feel like that makes them less good supports at home to the teachers day to day in the classroom. I think that as many of the others have said, reading and writing are so important for comprehension, for memory, not to mention the fact that handwritten notes develop help you develop a deeper understanding of a topic because it slows you down. Again, it's that productive struggle concept. Right? When you have to translate there's actually some interesting research on this. When you are typing, you're often transcribing. When you're writing, you're comprehending the content and translating it into something that you can remember. I found that true of my own, which is why all my stuff is in handwritten notes.
• And I think it's true for our students. And in fact, a lot of the evidence does not bear out that ed tech is actually having any gains for our students, and I think that that's really important. So I think the balance is way too far towards tech, which is understandable given the COVID period. But as we've seen, there are school districts around the nation making a move. I would like to see tablets out of the k through two classes. And then I would like to see
• I would like to see thoughtful technology use throughout the upper grades, but not default. Right? I think that teachers are really creative. Let's give them the creativity to teach.
was hoping Tessa's clock was two hours and thirty minutes. It's only two minutes and thirty seconds because I have a lot to say about this. So, like, the simple the the most simple answer, again, being the parent now of an eleventh grader, is too much digital, not enough analog. When my kids were at CET, the folder would come home and there were pieces of paper in it that gave me a sense of what they were doing during the school day, and there was stuff written on the piece of paper that gave me a sense of what the feedback was. So I had an understanding of what was going on. I could sit next to my child, participate in that learning experience. Now we have an eleventh grader and an eighth grader. Everything takes place digitally. I treasure these folders at the end of every year with all the stuff in it. The folders don't exist. We don't need them because nothing comes home. This is actually like a huge problem in terms of when you get to have your eleventh grader you're starting to work on the college essays and all that sort of stuff, which I'm doing now. Everything takes place on the screen. All of that sort of feedback and conversation takes place in Google Docs, and it's a different experience in terms of that sort of like collaborative, work that you do with your child, helping them develop and supporting the skills that they're learning in school. So I would say the simple answer is too much digital, not enough analog. I'm gonna focus on solutions because I think everyone has articulated what the issues are very, very clearly, and I think we're all in agreement about this. What I will say as the parent of an older child is it's not exclusive to CET. I'm so sorry.
• At at PVC, our kid came home and he was he I asked him the question about the videos and he said, mom, what do you think the teacher's gonna choose to engage kids? A video that shows you what's going on or like a book? And I was like, A book? That's not the answer, unfortunately. So part of it is actually making sure that we have the materials available and that the district is investing in those resources. The bad news is is that educational publishers aren't doing this stuff anymore because the pendulum, as everyone has said, has swung one way post COVID. But I'll remind us all, we are no longer teaching in an emergency. We are no longer learning in an emergency, we have to stop acting like that's where we are. In terms of reading choice, this is like what I spent my entire career working on. We need to make sure that we have reading choice for everyone at every level. Those leveled book boxes, you should not be restricted from going into a box that's above your level. When you go to the library, you should be able to check out any book that you want. In terms of read alouds, the watching on a video, it destroys the entire point of creating a beautifully illustrated picture book. There are clear standards for ELA social studies curriculum that need to be published by every grade so that you know what your child needs to know at the end of every school year and paper that comes home so you can see it happening in real time.
Some school districts across the nation have implemented age based screen limits in the classroom. For example, Los Angeles and Baltimore are removing one to one devices from early elementary grades and strictly limiting screen time for older grades. Some states are also weighing in on screen time with Alabama and Utah establishing screen time restrictions for elementary students, and similar legislation is progressing in several other states. Our question is, do you support the implementation of one to one device limits? And what role, if any, do you think the BOE should play in establishing screen guidelines? It's a great question. I do support
could you say it one more time about the do I support Yep. Do you support the implementation of one to one device limits? And what role, if any, do you think the BOE should play in establishing screen guidelines? Yes. On limits, absolutely. Right? Because the evidence is clear,
the detrimental effects that it has on learning, it can have on mental health, social emotional learning. Not in favor of outright bans. I think limits. I think regulation. I think you know, smart policies are the answer. When it comes to what the board should be doing, I personally think what the board should be doing is looking to the districts that you just spoke to and you just mentioned. Calling other superintendents around the county. Talking to the teachers first and foremost. Say, what are the teachers experiencing? What are they seeing in the classroom? And they should be engaging in forums like this. I'm so glad that they're here tonight. They should be talking to the community. They should be getting feedback and saying, here's what we've heard. You know, Namika just mentioned, we should be publishing this information. We should know what our kids are are doing. Right? That should be up on the website. That should be at board meetings. So the board should be playing a very active and very hands on role. Not micromanaging, not telling teachers what to do. You know, I don't have an education background. I'm not an expert. I'm not running to be an educator. I'm running to be a manager. I'm running to be, you know, a board trustee. Right? And that's a really important responsibility. So to develop that policy for the board, yes, we talk to other school districts. We learn best practices. We talk to our teachers. We talk to our communities. We talk to our kids. What are you guys doing every day? What's it like? We do their homework with them. We see what they're bringing home. But I think the board has to play, you know, a very active, very strategic role in setting those limits and maybe deciding, yes, this isn't working. We have a governance framework in place. We have the goals that we've set forth with these programs. We've measured these outcomes. Right? We've had thoughtful conversations about it. We set limits. Maybe we get rid of it. Maybe we expand it. Maybe we say, hey, this piece of technology,
• a PVC or the high school is working great. Kids are learning. They're engaged. So it's not a one size fits all approach. And I will emphasize though, on the limits of K through 12, I'm highly in favor of that, and I K through two. K through two. Thanks. Thanks. Thanks. Thank you. And I and I'll echo what Betsy said about taking a serious look at that, and thinking about that more because of those formative ages. So I don't think it's a one size fits all approach. I think it has to be thoughtful and age appropriate.
Thank you. Very good question because I know there's pressure that comes from looking at what some districts do, what some schools do, one way or the other. I have read about certain charter schools that say, we're all digital. That's what we are gonna do. We think this is gonna work. K? There are others who reflexively say, you know, almost no digital use of screen time no matter what, where it's going to be anywhere from elementary school or otherwise. It's interesting. I'm a member of the district committee on assessment and feedback. One of the things that we talked about at our last meeting was how do kids like to be assessed in the different schools so that teachers can think about how do we get assessed, or how do we get feedback? In the elementary school, and maybe this is a problem, maybe it's an advantage, the survey showed that kids liked to be assessed on podcasts and Canva product, which was saying to me in one hand, okay, they're using tech. But how are they using tech? If they're using the tech to work together on a group project under the guidance of a teacher, that's an appropriate use. I'm not saying k two. That's not where kids are k two. But, in thinking about all along the continuum, it's a tool. It's a tool that should be used judiciously. It's the role of the board to set the expectations and monitor those expectations and put the feet to the fire of administration to make sure that this is happening and get the feedback from students as much or more than anybody else. I just came from the science research symposium where our high school kids in science research were presenting and looking at how
• they use tech and they use the information that they gain through those sources. They've got very important that they know how to do that, they're able to do it, and able to do it to their benefit. So everything is a continuum.
Mister Haber, I I just wanna give you another moment if you would like to answer the question, do you support the implementation of one to one device limits?
I would support the implementation of one to one device limits in the certainly in the early elementary grades. And, I think, a more targeted or over time approach to how those devices will be used thereafter. I am concerned that there are certain foundational skills in digital literacy that we are expected as a school district to implement as part of the computer science and digital fluency standards. I don't wanna fall behind on that. Thank you for answering.
So I think that one to one device use should be titrated to age. As I've already said, I think that not having them in k through two is a really good start. I was speaking to a friend today who is her son's a rising kindergartner in Red Hook, New York, which is furthers further north. And she was talking about how she was interviewing the low her the superintendent at her school because she's really anxious about this topic. And what she learned was that the way it happens at this school district is that there are no one to one devices in k through two. One to one device uses device use gets introduced in grade three for specific educational purposes, like digital literacy and computer science, and that that it titrates up from there. I think that that's a really appropriate and thoughtful way to look at things. I also think that we need to talk with the teachers about what are the current barriers right now to removing technology from your classroom. What is what is stopping you? Are you lacking printers? Are you lacking resources to move from an app to a to an analog game? I think that is a really important conversation that the board can be a part of as they're the people who approve the budget. So we wanna make sure that the budget has enough in it for resources. I think that it's really important that we recognize that what is merely distracting to adults, it can be neurologically shaping for kids. And so really thinking about the developing brain and like take I am I'm not an education expert, but I do have a background in psychology and spend a lot of time looking at cognitive science. And I think the plasticity of the brain is so important in these younger years, particularly in early elementary,
• and we should be giving kids exposure to as many different experiences as possible. And I don't there's no evidence that ed tech is what does that.
Thanks, Kathleen. So could you just restate the question? Yes. Thank you.
Do you support the implementation of one to one device limits? And what role, if any, do you think the BOE should play in establishing screen guidelines?
Okay. Got it. So I I do support the implementation of one to one device. Limits is a word. Guidelines is a word. I think you can use either. I think that it's fair to say that families, teachers, even district officials, building principals are in agreement that things need to be dialed back. The process of determining that definitely has to be collaborative, and I think that the board of education does have an important role to play. If we look at Los Angeles, obviously, like two days ago, they're the second largest school district in the country. They have mandated for their district to create a screen time policy for each grade and subject. And I think there's something reasonable about sort of helping everyone understand what the expectations are. Clearly there's gonna be a lot of work, I think, to sort of manage again how that gets played out in the classroom, and it's not gonna necessarily be able to happen right away. Other people have pointed to the fact that there are resources that are not necessarily available. There are modes of instruction that would have to change. Teachers would have to reexamine what's effective in the classroom and what's really additive and what's gonna work. So it's part of a, it's, you know, when a policy gets changed, it's not gonna be like that. It is actually gonna be the work over a period of time. But I think the will is actually here in our school district now. And I think what what where it's incumbent on the board is to actually be a little bit more clear about what our values are and what our vision is for the school district. I've heard a lot about the board. We as a board can do this. We as a board can do that. And I have to say, having been on the board for three years, I haven't necessarily seen a lot of that myself.
• I think that there is a shift that is taking place now in terms of having discussions with our school district leaders on what our teachers are doing. We're having an opportunity now to hear more from our teachers about the work that's taking place in the classroom and how they are delivering instruction and how we're seeing all those changes take place. And I want to have more of those conversations and more of those discussions in public so that parents and families understand the actual serious work that is going on in the classroom to reach all the outcomes that we're hoping to see. But that's not happening right now. So not only is it a matter of actually, taking a look at policy, implementing the policy, asking for then evaluation and reporting on those policies in public meetings so that people can actually see the work being done, but also, making sure that the vision that the board is setting reflects the community, and that's what's going forward.
Thank you. So as far as one to one one to one limits, I would support the implementation of one to one limits, and I was heartened to see some of the work out of the technology committee from in our district, discussing shifting away from one to one in our to to classroom carts, next year at CET. And we've we've already, this year, through work and reviewing things, shifted away from sending devices home with our students k through five. So I would support continuing to look at that and continuing to see. So I think if we have we have that technology available in a cart system where it is set away, it's used very intentionally, and it it's not sort of on a on a desk distraction. I think that is definitely a good way to move for our district. So I would fully support that. And then in terms of what role the board the board has in terms of screen guidelines, I think it's definitely part of a collaborative process. I think our technology committee, along with our instructional coaches and our administration and our other faculty, have been looking at digital skills progression, looking to ensure that the global standards are are really meant are really tailored and shifted so that they work for our community. I think in terms of looking at the instructional technology plans for '26 through '29, working with our regional regional schools to review these things, to work with the regional tech center to review that plan, send that forward to SED to ensure that we are balancing the needs and the values that we find important here in this community along with the New York State Digital Fluency Standards that that mister Haber mentioned. I think that is part of a collaborative process. And whether that comes through policy
• or that comes through working and hearing more from our teachers about what's going on in their classrooms and what resources they need to ensure that they're able to to deliver the appropriate instruction to all of our students, I think that's where the board can be really instructive, and we can we can help reach our goals. Thanks.
Legislation legislation banning students from using phones bell to bell is a tremendously popular bipartisan issue and one that has support from both the New York State Union of Teachers and of the New York State governor as evidenced by legislation she passed last year. There are questions as if to as if the statewide ban phone ban is being fully implemented and enforced at CHHS. How will you hold the superintendent, the board, and administrators accountable in terms of implementing the phone policy for our students?
first thing that I will say, I have spent a lot of time in the past year in the high school. I've been in classes. I've been in I've talked with students. I've observed students.
• I've talked with teachers and administrators about this subject. And there are a couple of interesting things that could be noted about the cell phone ban, bell to bell, which is what happened was in April or May or June 2025, the governor signed legislation and said implement immediately. There was no discussion with students. There was no discussion with teachers and no professional development. And from what I understand, when teachers came to the high school for superintendent conference day, and so they were told, okay, this is the rule. They didn't really have any sense of how they were going to deal with that in their classrooms and in the other parts of the school. We worked on a policy, a policy that tried to to balance the
• law and also the expectations that we did not want to be a punitive school. We didn't want students to be kind of watched all the time. We can't, by law, dis suspend students for violating the the ban or the or policy. So the way it seems to have worked out in our schools, particularly with regard to our 17 and 18 year old students, our juniors and seniors, is that the cell phones, at least in the classrooms and in any activities, they are not being utilized, but we need more training for teachers to learn how to do it and how to enforce it and how to do it in a proper manner, not a punitive manner. I think it's difficult at that age, particularly with the resourcefulness of high school students who I've heard can buy burner phones, put them in the thing, and then, you know, they keep the other one in their pocket, they'll you know, that's how they do it. So we have to balance, yep, and and deal with that appropriately.
I was really excited about this law. My husband has seen that the behavior issues in his classroom have gone way down and that student engagement is way up when he started having this policy in his classroom and in his school, which was prior to the law going into effect. So I was like, yes. Great. We're gonna have the same thing in our schools. I'm gonna use an analogy to get into why I'm not satisfied with our policy. So at home, when I know that my kids are gonna have to go brush their teeth and they're not gonna wanna do it, I put on a timer. And when the timer goes off, I get to point at the timer, and I say, oh, the timer went off. Sorry. Nothing I can do. Gotta brush my teeth. What's great about that is it gives me something else to point to that puts their frustration on that and not on me. The law is the perfect analogy for our teachers. They can point to the law and say, sorry. I can't see your phone. It's gotta be away. It is the law. Our policy, I think, instead of using the law to back teachers in saying that, there are too many exemptions that put the teacher in between the students and their phone. That is unfair to the teacher, and I don't know why we would do it to them. Our own policy recognizes that, and I'm quoting here, personal Internet enabled devices have created new challenges in educational environment related to distraction, equity, safety, student engagement, and student mental health. And yet, our enforcement just says, see the code of conduct. There are other school districts in this county that have much clearer enforcement policies that say, if we see it outside of the pouch or the cubby or whatever it is, this is the results.
• If and to your point about how wily teenagers are, if you lie to your teacher about having your phone away, this is the consequence. It has really clearly laid out consequences. The good thing about our policy is it has a re an annual review written into it. So we can review the policy and make a better start for next year.
So I will say that I was on I I've served on the school board's policy committee for the last two years, was part of the team that drafted this policy, I'm not totally happy with it either. This is sort of the work that happens by consensus. You don't always get all the things that you want. I just wanna correct the record to say that the policy that we worked on was actually reviewed by the Croton Teachers Association representatives as well as by the administrative teams, So I don't think it was a surprise to the teachers when they came back on the first day of school, because there was a lot of publicity about the law, we knew sort of where it was headed, just for the record, because I was part of the body that worked on that. So in terms of in terms of the bell to ban specifically, no. I don't think teachers should be enforcing the ban whatsoever. I actually think that that function generally in terms of discipline does fall to the administrators and the building principals, the assistant principals, and I think that we do have a mechanism for making that possible. I am very glad that our policy does include a couple of sort of like, you know, moments to help us sort of revise. Policy I'm gonna nerd out on this for a second, but policy is like a living document. It is supposed to be something that you look at regularly, not like once every fifteen years. And, policy also empowers the board to have an opportunity to say, not only are we gonna check-in on the policy ourselves to make sure that it's still valid, but we can also say we're going to check-in on the district and see how we're doing in terms of compliance. We actually have asked the district, they'll be presenting to the community as well at the next board meeting an overview on what has been going on up to this point. There was an initial check-in in December. There's gonna be another one in two weeks. And that was at the specific request of the board because believe it or not, there are some things that we say that we're gonna do that we do. This is one of them.
• The other thing that I will say is I do think it actually I I think it is I think it's tough. I will say, like, at CET, at PVC, I don't think this has been an issue. I have to also, like, articulate that for our older high school students, they have been living in a world that's very, very different. So this is a big transition for everybody. I think one of the positive things, again, about this policy is we're gonna be able to see what's working, what isn't. And I am gonna actually hope that we hear directly from our teachers this time rather than sort of having that conversation mediated through our building leaders. This is something I've talked to teachers about as well. I think that sometimes we we wanna get that sort of, like, direct information so that we can ensure that the policies that we're making are serving everybody, especially the people who are in the trenches in the classroom. So I think that there's an opportunity to sort of tighten up and make it stronger for all of our students. Thank you.
Thank you. So, yes, as I was not part of the policy committee, but I was obviously part of the board that that approved the the policy that went into place. And I am appreciative and very much looking forward to our meeting on May 7 where we will be hearing some feedback and and learning how this policy has how the implementation has gone, what are the things that we can improve upon, what are things that we can maybe adjust. Because I do think that there's there are still some gaps there. I think and and to to everyone's point, I think those gaps are are, you know, mainly at the high school where there are some additional complications by the fact that we have an open campus and by the fact that, you know, that we also have a bring your own device policy in which students are using device using devices, not their phones, but using laptops in their classes for some of their classwork. So we want to ensure that our the their phones are away. And I from what I've seen and what I've heard anecdotally from my high school students is that the the phones are going go into their cubbies when they go into their classrooms. And I think that that has had an incredibly positive effect on engagement. To Betsy's point, I was really excited when I saw this law coming in as well. I think despite the challenges in implementation and a real shift in thinking for our our particular older students, I think it's incredibly beneficial and gives them an opportunity to set aside some distractions that were that that like a lot of people. And so I think that it will be important to look at the ways that we can tighten up that policy, and we can make some adjustments based on what we've seen from this year and from from how it was implemented and how our students are using it or not using it,
• and and use that to improve it. So thank you.
Okay. That's all. Yeah. I I mean, what is there to say? I mean, I think it's pretty clear that the policy isn't being implemented effectively. It's pretty clear that it's not being enforced. I think there's a lot of credible evidence. I've talked to a lot of people on the campaign knocking on doors and saying, this isn't being implemented. I don't know if it's necessarily a policy failure. I think the policy is is probably pretty good. Right? It's the implementation of it, and that's not the responsibility of the the teachers. That's the responsibility of the administrators. Right? Other school districts can get it right. Why can't we? Hastings has in their policy, they use Yonder pouches. I know my nephew in Albany has a has a pouch he puts it in. He doesn't see it bell to bell, and that's a massive school district with thousands of kids. So if other school districts can do it, so can we. And it's not the school ban, it's not the phone ban itself. It's just the fact that we have this policy in place that's not being implemented, and there's a real breakdown in how that works. And the folks who are telling us that it's fine are the ones who would be held accountable if it wasn't being implemented. So instead of relying on self reports and, yeah, you know, it's fine, and then we wake up the next day and see another report that it's not being implemented at all, we need a strict accountability for this. We need to see not a self report. We need to see data. We need to see what's really going on and how that's being implemented. It's clearly not right now. I think that's very obvious. And again, that's a lack of
• leadership. That's not a lack of of teachers. They should not be responsibly enforcing this. I don't wanna hear that they should be doing that. They should be teaching. Right? It's a law at the end of the day. And and, you know, I do the same thing, Betsy, with the timer. Timer said so, not my problem. Governor Hochul and the legislature made this decision. Right? And I think it's popular, taking away the popularity or or how you feel about it, the law is the law, we have to implement it. And I'd work to see that that happens.
For a breath of fresh air, we'll move on to artificial intelligence. Goody. What are your views on the role of AI in schools, particularly regarding its impact on student learning and academic integrity?
• I don't know if anyone's seen this Westchester Magazine, but I literally read it today because the front cover is AI in education. It's actually really interesting.
• I think it's incredibly urgent that we create an AI policy for this district. I think we're way overdue for one, and I understand that there is one underway, but I think we should be incredibly thoughtful as we develop it. It needs to contain what counts as AI, who the policy applies to, and an overall philosophy that keeps in academic integrity and student safety at the heart of it. We need to make sure that we have a good understanding of what approved tools there are and really think about data privacy. I really worry EdTech writ large how much data mining is going on from our students, and AI is only going to make that worse. I also think that we should be really conservative in how much AI we let into the school. And that is because, I mean, there was a really interesting study and actually a series of randomized experiments that found that AI impairs independent performance and reduces persistence. So basically, scores improve while the student is using the AI, and the minute it's removed, the scores fall sharply. That's a huge problem. The kids are not retaining information. They're leaning on the AI as a crutch. Back to the forklift metaphor. I think we really need to think about the cumulative harm to motivation and to capability that comes from that style of learning. And I also think, you know, one of the things that I've heard frequently is, oh, it's so great because it makes it so much easier for teachers to grade. And believe me, I would love it if my husband could spend every night with me watching TV or hanging out instead of grading his papers. But I think one of the things I really worry about is that grading is a really important part of the teaching process because of the formative assessment that it gives the teacher.
• The teachers learn about where is the student failing to grasp a concept, where is the student still struggling with a grammatical construct, etcetera. So I want the I want to know that the teacher teaching my children is the one grading the assignment. I think that's really important so that they can know what my students' strengths and areas of challenge are. Other local school districts are moving to in class writing and oral presentations and assessments to get around the AI challenge. It's all written in here. Super fascinating. Recommend it.
Like Betsy, I think we 100%, as a school district, do need to take a conservative approach to how we integrate AI into schools and not make some of the same mistakes and learn from the lessons of our, nationwide. This is not just like a Croton thing, our nationwide adoption of ed tech. The, three years ago, when I was first on the school board, I served on the Croton, the the high school's building planning council, which is a collaborative decision making body that includes teachers, administrators, and community members. And we had begun to take a second look at revising the academic integrity policy at the high school. Was really good work that took place. And even at that point three years ago, the biggest topic that was coming up among students was what was AI gonna do. Right? Three years later, I don't know that that process has been completed, and that's a little bit troubling. We are absolutely a 100 behind many other school districts in terms of establishing an AI policy or even establishing clear AI guidelines. And we're left relying our teachers are sort of left relying, I think, in some places on either building recommendations that they've come up with on their own. We have a technology committee that's addressing this, but it's like a long, you know, process. It's taking, I think, longer than perhaps it should be. I feel like we could have approached this a little bit differently by, again, having the board establish a vision and making a value statement about what we as a district, a community, and our community, when I say that it includes actually teachers and administrators as well, wanted to cease that at least we had a framework to start these discussions and to sort of protect the work that's going on in our schools and classrooms right now.
• So we're not there. We are working on it. I feel like that's a good thing. I think we need to kinda work on it faster. In terms of high school, I will say I'm very gratified to know that for my own high school junior, there is there is such attention to the question of how AI is being used, particularly in assignments and assessments. And I wanna say that the teachers that my student has worked with have been very, very careful about setting clear expectations, about ensuring that there's a lot of work that's being done in the classroom, and to also ensure that people have an understanding of sourcing and evaluating information and using those critical thinking still skills to determine whether what they're seeing is real or fake. That, unfortunately, is gonna be a skill that we're all going to need from now until the rest of our lives. And it it can't be it's like it it is literally one of the most important conversations that I think we have to be having. It does go back, though, to the foundational skill of teaching our students critical thinking. So that's something that I hope we'll continue to do as well.
Thank you. So in terms of AI in schools, think I echo what I've already heard here this evening that I think we do need to take a a conservative and a cautious approach to this. I know that my board colleagues are working on an AI policy. I know that that's something that that has been that you've been spending quite a bit of time working on. And I know that our our technology department and our technology committee are also looking and want to ensure that we're taking a thoughtful approach to AI in creating guidelines, in working collaboratively with our faculty and staff to create guidelines that can be used system wide, so that we are ensuring that that academic integrity, that, that we are first and foremost not using it for assessments of our students, that it's not going to be used in ways in which, you know, it that takes away that human connection that is so important between a teacher and a student. Do we want to ensure that we are teaching our our older students who are going to have to come into contact with AI and use AI in their jobs in future lives, what the opportunities are, what the benefits are, but also what what the pitfalls are and what is not right about it, what what goes wrong and where there the limitations are so that they understand and they are able to source. And I will say, like Anamika said, my high schooler, I have seen that there is very clear guidelines and guidance from his teachers as to how AI should be used in in different in, you know, assignment by assignment, whether it can be, whether it cannot be, and ways in which they might be able to help them help their learning,
• might be able to help organize some of their thoughts, but not using it to help them create or finish an assignment. So I'm heartened by that, but I think we have a lot of work to do.
Yeah. I I mean, we needed an AI policy yesterday. Right? I mean, we're way overdue on this. The speed at which AI is developing and and evolving, it's been, I think, three or four years now since ChatGPT first came out, and we all got accustomed to to these chatbots. I can tell you that AI is not going anywhere. It's gonna be in our schools. Where where I work, I manage a down payment assistance program for first time homebuyers, and we have to evaluate their income, and we're looking for AI solutions for that. And that's how it's going to be. I really think that AI is gonna be in everyone's daily workflow, especially this year. The advances that the models have had are just so powerful. So we are long overdue on setting guidelines for how students can use AI in in a lot of ways, also preparing them for an AI world. Right? When they go to college, when they go into their profession, things are gonna look radically different even in the next couple of years, I think. And it's and it's going to be very difficult for us as a community and as a school board to keep up with that. Right? I mean, these are just radical changes that are gonna ripple through our economy, especially education. So we definitely need a policy in place. We definitely need to do grade specific, right, get teachers' input, make sure we're looking at data and privacy concerns, while at the same time facing the fact that, you know, with all the investments that we've had from the technology companies for AI and the data centers, it's just inevitable that it becomes part of everyone's daily workflow, part of our education system. So, you know, I'm not saying we go out and embrace AI and have AI teachers because it only works
• if you know what you're talking about and if you know how to use it. Right? So we have to really be careful and make sure we have strong AI policies. Other districts in the have in the in Westchester have it. Call Chappaqua. How's your policy working out? How did you develop that? We've we know other school districts have it. We're long overdue on it, and it's something we need to take really seriously and be very mindful about.
One of the advantages or disadvantages of being the last to speak on a topic is you could easily just say, I agree with everything everybody said. And I do agree with everything everybody said. I have been, as a member of the board and as a member of the policy committee, pushing to get a policy completed. But I realized that there's complexity to that. Three years ago on the board, we had a presentation from the high school principal about this thing, look what AI can do. And it was so elemental to what we are looking at now and will be what we look at now is so elemental to where things will be a year from now. So, a policy per se has to be something that has the flexibility to be able to deal with those challenges that come along. So, a policy has got to have the guidelines, the kind of the back and forth discussion that we're talking about among faculty, staff, teachers, instructional coaches, and students so that they understand basically how it works, how to weed out false information, how to weed out hallucinations, how to use it in things that are outside the knowledge with things like, you know, deepfakes, how they do not do that, recognize them, deal with them. There's a lot of stuff that's there. We may have to consider, you know, do you look at everything that's out there in the world or do you use a more closed loop content source for the use of AI? Certainly policies on academic integrity are key. And I think our schools, as others have said, have done a really good job with making sure that kids understand the use and what the expectations are. We need to build that into a more robust
• manner in which we deal with the issue and deal with kids.
And with our final question, we wanna give you a chance to touch upon an issue we have not yet discussed or to emphasize one that we have. What is the most important aspect of your vision for the role of technology in our schools, and what concrete steps will you take to implement implement it, including how you will work with school administrators and your fellow board members?
• think it's really hard to narrow. I it's it's we've talked about so much tonight. I think it's hard to sort of narrow it down to one single thing. I think you can see that this is a group that's generally in agreement that, technology needs to be additive and purposeful. The district has stated that as well. I think the thing that I would sort of challenge us as a community to do and to think about, and I guess this is this is what is gonna be the most important thing. Oh, I just figured it out. Is we we do need to have so we do need to sort of put together, like, a collaborative process to do this. I'm seeing people in the audience here that I know are experts in this. This is, like, the work that they do. One of the things that I feel has been challenging for me as a trustee is that when you come you come to the district and you sort of say, it's like, I've got this idea. I think we need to do x or y. There's a little bit of pushback because questioning can be received as criticism. Suggestions can be received as micromanagement and over direction, and that's, like, culturally not healthy in my opinion. I think that everyone understands that with students at the center of the learning experience, everyone from teachers, administrators, parents, and family members are really doing the best that they can for that person. When a person comes in and says, I'm not I'm concerned about this issue with technology. I'm concerned about this outcome that I'm not seeing for my student. I'm concerned about x, y, or z, whatever it is, What are they doing? They are advocating for a human student
• that is in their family. That's the person that they're representing. And I think we have to be really smart about understanding that when we're receiving we're on the receiving end of advocacy, that that advocacy is someone speaking up for a kid. And so what I would like to say is in terms of, like, as we examine these questions, let's be open to not to to admitting, first of all, that we don't know everything because we certainly don't. But we actually do have, as Jake said, plenty of places to get information. We need to be looking at other school districts. It's not something we've been great at, frankly. We need to be talking to people who know the stuff. It's also not something we've been great at, frankly. And we need to not be afraid of doing that because it's all in service to our students. And I think, like, that actually it's like that it would be, like, the most courageous thing that I think our school district could do would be to actually say, this is what we're doing it for. I'm looking at my friend Linda Jones in the audience there. Love her so much. One of the things that she says is, you're only in each grade once. You're only a kindergartner once. You're only a first grader once. You're only a second grader once. You have to make every year matter. So that's what I would say we need to do and challenge ourselves to do going forward when we're looking at technology. Every grade, every year matters. Let's make it matter.
Thank you. In terms of what I think is is the most important aspect of of my vision for tech in schools, I think it's being thoughtful. It's being it's really being deliberative in our choices. It's really looking at the things that we, you know, what are we using it for? What is how is it helping? Is there a is there a pedagogical use for it or not? Is it something that we are using because it was interesting or new? And and there's and there's time for exploration and things like that. But I think we wanna make sure that we are really centering what is the best for all of our kids and thinking and and and that means working with them as well. That means hearing some of that student voice and understanding the ways in which the technology that we do choose to use can help them and helping them learn the ways in which too much reliance on things is a detriment to them. So I think that is important. I also think that, you know, something we haven't touched on quite as much tonight, is is data privacy. And I think continuing to examine though examine what we are currently doing, where we need to be doing it better, where we need to be implementing stricter measures when it comes to data privacy, particularly for our students in making sure that we are protecting our students' data. We are protecting them. I think that it will be that is a continuous thing that we're never going to be able to check the box and say we're done with. And that's something that we need to be always looking at, and that's a a policy that I know needs to be continuously evaluated.
• And we need to be looking to find the holes so that we can plug them.
So I'm gonna I'm gonna jump straight to the second part of that question, was concrete steps, because that's something I've been I've been looking forward to talking about all night. So in my in my day job, I manage a first time home buyer grant program, and it's a it's I work for a a federal agency, and and we have a lot of rules and regulations, but we do have some flexibility about how we run that. We don't put anything into place without a framework. We don't put anything into place without proper governance. We don't put anything into place without board approval. So what I would do is I would push for an EdTech evaluation framework. It's something that the board adopts. Every time we renew or renew or adopt a new policy, we would first evaluate everything through this framework. What does the research say about this platform or this approach or this pedagogy we're we're gonna adopt? What's the cost gonna be, not just in the short term, but in the long term? Are we gonna be on the hook for new software upgrades and hardware upgrades? What does success look like? What does success look like with this technology that we're adopting? Right? And frankly, I would apply this framework to any any decision that we make if I'm if I'm so lucky to be on the board, but we're obviously talking about tech tonight. What does success look like? Is it certain outcomes we're looking for? Is it certain standards or grades? Right? Ask our teachers. Right? What is what are we trying to get out of this? What should we be looking for? And how do we measure that? Again, how do we measure what we wanna see from the outcome of that
• that new thing? And the first thing I would do is run this EdTech evaluation framework through the K through two screen screen issue that we've been talking about. Right? So, again, it's not like I'm saying go in, screen's bad, get rid of screens. Okay? This is our framework. Right? Is this working? What are we trying to accomplish it? How are we measuring it? So that's the concrete step I I would take. The vision, I think I've I've I've laid it out as best I can. I don't have a lot else to say about the vision, but, you know, everything we've discussed tonight is so important, and the number one thing I would do as a concrete step is to make sure we're thoughtful about the policies we put in place. We have metrics. We have transparency. We have accountability. And if something's not working, we admit that. We say, Look, we adopted this, we ran it through our framework, we didn't get the outcomes we want, and we make sure parents understand that. We make sure under parents, parents understand why we're doing something, why we're not doing something. So, that's what I would do.
As I think my colleagues on this panel have said, what we are about here is for the kids, all of our kids. And the way I look at it as a starting point is what skills, knowledge, abilities will our kids have to navigate the world when they leave us? And that includes understanding technology. When you start with that, then things like, and I agree with Jake, finding a framework, finding a mode of analysis is important. We have, unfortunately, kind of done things helter skelter. Part of the work that we have done, the district has done through the district technology committee, and I think the board is pushing on, is to get that framework, to get that idea, to focus on the why, why do we do it, much more than we have in the past. I think that's what we need to do even more strongly. I am also concerned about making sure that our kids understand the bad things that can happen with technology. That we can in our
• health class talk about how you can use how it is possible to use AI in a way that takes you down as a adolescent or an adult, a very bad path. How you can get basically bullied and what you do about bullying if someone is using the tools of AI to engage in that conduct. How we use AI, how we use technology when we leave school district. That's a collaborative discussion. That's and I think I said before, but I will add, you have to have a policy, you have to have frameworks or guidelines, and we have to have everybody working together, students, teachers, parents, administration, to ensure that we're meeting the needs that we know we have and that we're using those tools effectively.
So I said at the beginning that nothing is so important as ensuring that we are developing the next generation of critical thinkers. And I also believe that the skills needed for the future are those that will allow them to be flexible across a myriad of scenarios. Critical thinking, verbal reasoning, the ability to construct and defend an argument under pressure, thinking in real time. I'll give an example since that's all I seem to be doing tonight. In high school, I had this unbelievable AP environmental sciences teacher who taught me how to use PowerPoint. But the important parts of the lesson weren't the mechanics of making a making an image bigger or making animations. The important parts of the lesson were how to tell a story, how to be compelling when you're presenting in front of a group. Those are the skills that I carry with me today, even though most of the time, PowerPoint's in the dust, and I'm mostly using Canva, but the tool doesn't matter. And tomorrow, I'll probably be using Cloud Design. Right? So the tool doesn't matter. It's the skills that I learned that I carry across all of those different scenarios. We do need to teach our kids about technology, but I think that a lot of that is actually best taught offline first. So what's an algorithm? How to recognize mis and disinformation? How to navigate safely the Internet technology? Specific technology skills like typing can and should be taught in dedicated time for, you know, like a computer class, like many of us went to when we were kids. But so many of those skills I just described are taught through books. I learned how to spot mis and disinformation by learning about an unreliable narrator. Right? I think that we don't need technology to teach a lot of these skills.
• Pivoting to what I would do, I'm just gonna steal some answers because I completely agree with what Anamika said in terms of having a collaborative approach. Some of the school districts that I've been talking to about their experiences did massive changes to their policies because they had a passionate group of parents and they had teacher collaboration. And so bringing those three groups together, the teachers, the parents, and the administration, and of course, the board of education, to discuss how to enact policy in a way that wasn't super disruptive to the teachers, but would be really adaptable or really possible for them to adapt to. Right? Additionally, I'd like to echo what I I believe Jake said around transparency. It is possible for us to be really communicative with our parents about how much technology is in use.