Please click on the link below to see my video message for October. Thank you for your hard work and dedication to BOCES. We really are building the future of BOCES together and I am so proud of our work.

As we embark upon School Board Recognition Week from October 16 - 20, it is my pleasure to express heartfelt gratitude and appreciation toward our esteemed Board of Education Members for their unwavering dedication and substantial contributions to BOCES.

As I often say, "It takes strong schools to build a strong community." Our board members embody this principle, devoting countless hours to ensuring we are able to facilitate every child’s learning at an elevated level. They shoulder the responsibility of making tough decisions and investing numerous hours in understanding educational issues and regulations to provide the accountability our community stakeholders expect.

Our school board members demonstrate a year-round commitment that transcends the special appreciation we show them during this recognition week.

A special acknowledgment to our dedicated members:

President Sandra Ruffo, serving since 1995

Vice President David Hawley, serving since 2012

John Crosby, serving since 2006

Nicholas Matyas, serving since 2020

Peter Nowack, serving since 2006

William Powell, serving since 2019

Michon Stuart, serving since 2020

Please join me in expressing our appreciation for their selfless service, commitment, and the impactful contributions they have made in building a better future for BOCES.

Warm regards,

Dr. Rebecca Stone

We hit a major milestone with our board adopting the resolutions needed to move forward with a public vote on Nov. 29. This would not have been possible without everyone’s ideas, expertise, commitment, advice and so on. Thank you!

There will be a series of virtual town hall meetings open to all BOCES employees in November. These town halls will take place on varying dates and times to provide flexibility for our employees. The format will include a presentation and opportunities to ask questions. See dates and times below:

Nov. 3 – Noon – Join Zoom Meeting - Meeting ID 955 4892 1921

Nov. 8 – 3 p.m. – Join Zoom Meeting - Meeting ID 968 3764 1411

Nov. 16 – 7 p.m.– Join Zoom Meeting - Meeting ID 971 1716 5033

As we continue to pursue our “Go Digital!” initiative, we are pleased to announce that we have taken another step to allow you to access and control your own information in our system. No more hunting for a form or figuring out who to contact to simply change your phone, address, email, or other important demographic information.

The instructions are attached on how to update your demographic information, only if you need to make any changes. This information can also be found on the BOCES website staff page under “Employee Self Service (ESS)”, along with other important information for employees.

Thank you all again for your efforts for our BOCES!

Team,

As noted in the previous O&M update, on Oct. 9 2023 we will start replacing two HVAC units over the 500 wing. We will also be installing a new dust collector for the carpentry shop. The dust collector was identified by our architects and engineers as needing replacement and is part of our larger goal to improve our facilities. I also would like to remind staff we are still working on two additional larger projects. One is to improve our electrical infrastructure and the other is the very large HVAC project over the 100 and 200 wing.

As we enter the month of October, we are getting back into the swing of the school year. Our instructional buildings have begun meeting for their monthly health and safety meetings as well as beginning to conduct their annual emergency response drills. It is an SED regulation that New York State Public and Non-public schools conduct four lockdown drills, and eight evacuation drills each school year (Sept. 1 – June 30) with at least eight of the required drills being conducted by Dec. 31 of each school year. Two drills must be conducted during the summer months if summer school is provided. I have added a quick reference guide in the Health and Safety Shared drive under the SED Requirements folder for your convenience.

All our non-instructional buildings are required to conduct these drills once annually. I will be working with our building contacts soon to ensure these annual drills happen as it is important to ensure all staff know what to do in case of an emergency.

We will begin planning our first districtwide health and safety meeting to be held sometime in late October or early November. Zach Pugh Combative Inc. has completed their security assessment on all our buildings and will be providing us with a written report of their suggestions and recommendations on how we can improve our buildings safety and security by the end of the month. Hopefully we will have this information to discuss at our first districtwide safety meeting.

Other than that, our office is always here with open doors willing to assist you with your health and safety needs and concerns. Thank you all for your help in keeping our school safe and healthy!

This month the team kicked off the first HR/Payroll collaboration meeting. The goal of this team is to evaluate current processes/practices and work on improving the employee experience. Special thanks to Robin Eccelston and the CPR team for this team's logo.

Congratulations to the BBO and BT BOCES for receiving an external audit report with no findings for the 10th year in a row!

Megan Kaminsky, our fabulous social worker in the Susquehanna Valley Crossroads program for Broome-Tioga BOCES, is building great relationships with the students. Sometimes she relies on prehistoric friends to help.

Did you know that the display outside Roberson Museum during its annual Home for the Holidays event is designed and built by our Broome-Tioga BOCES students? It is!

Recently, students from our P-Tech 11 Engineering Academy presented their ideas to visitors from Roberson and Raymond Corporation. Our guests voted for their favorite components of the prototypes and let the students know what pieces they would like to see built, full-size.

Now, the creating/building has begun, with an eye on a November installation.

We’ll keep everyone updated on the progress (and final product) on our social media, likely here, and maybe even a media story or two.

On Oct. 10, Matt Sheehan, director of CTE programs for Broome-Tioga BOCES, was part of a presentation of books in our library. The handoff was made by Joe Russin, government and community relations program manager at NYSEG, to Heath Georgia, superintendent for Harpursville schools.

Congratulations to so many of our staff and students for great success at the recent Southern Tier Construction-Technology Career Day.

We're very proud of our team, beginning with the Career Development Center for their organizational role. And we are so fortunate to have had several of our trades instructors and students performing demonstrations, including our HERO, Masonry and Carpentry disciplines. Our Criminal Justice and Hospitality Careers students and instructors also played a vital role in traffic control, as well as preparing and serving lunch to attendees.

We received two stories from our friends in the media, with links included here, and you'll find many photos from the event on our Facebook page. Well done, everyone!

A few weeks ago, a group of seniors in our Broome-Tioga BOCES Culinary Arts program learned that they’d won the coveted People’s Choice Award for their entry in the annual Fresh Food Faceoff, hosted by Cornell Cooperative Extension. On October 12, the students received their hardware, making things official. Well done to our students, and our teaching chefs, Rachel Patinka and Jestina Dawson.

During the last week of September, students and staff in our new Broome-Tioga BOCES ACE (Academic Center for Excellence, Middle School) program welcomed Broome County Executive Jason Garnar to the program site, the Boys & Girls Club of Binghamton, as our students asked him questions about his job and involvement throughout the community.

Laura Karlson, East Learning Center assistant principal and the lead administrator for ACE, was interviewed, as was one of our students, Aundrea Bryant, a Binghamton seventh grader.

We are excited about this new opportunity for middle school students in our region. We have a dedicated group of staff working at the Boys & Girls Club providing a caring and engaging environment for learning. A big thank you goes out to them.

October is National Farm to School Month and the Rock on Café NY Thursdays are well underway in all 15 of the Broome-Tioga BOCES school districts. “NY Thursdays” is a program that brings local, farm-fresh, nutritious foods directly to students. While schools boost the nutrients on their lunch trays, our school nutrition programs are giving local agriculture a boost too! A delicious and nutritious win-win. Our farm to school program is a collaboration with the Food and Health Network of the Rural Health Network of South Central New York and Cornell Cooperative Extension of Broome County. The Food and Health Network supports the program by coordinating taste tests, local food procurement, and promotional materials. Cornell Cooperative Extension of Broome County provides education through Ag in the Classroom and school gardening programs, as well as educational materials and resources. For this current school year, we have 24 NY Thursdays planned with many other local NY foods sprinkled throughout the menus. We also have over 15 taste tests scheduled for students to try local food and recipes. This aids in exposing students to new foods and gives them a voice when they provide feedback on possible future menu options.

The South Central RIC now has an app available for download in the Android Play Store and iOS App Store! Get everything you need all in one spot - download the app today! October is Cybersecurity Month! We invite you to learn more about how you can enhance your security posture all year long!

The South Central RIC is now on Facebook! Find us by searching South Central Regional Information Center - SCRIC

This month our Communications and Public Relations Team has been busy! The school year is in full swing and our public information officers are managing websites, social media, newsletters and important communications for our school districts. Our video team has also been busy creating sportsmanship videos and other videos that highlight the great things going on in districts. You can check out one of our amazing videos below that Allen Lown created for CF with the help of Alex Ladstatter. Many of these sportsmanship videos will be shown before sporting events on the big screen to remind students and families about the importance of being a good sport.

We have also been hard at work creating graphics and branded materials for the BOCES capital project. We also welcomed Mikala Chadwick to our team! She will be working closely with Newark Valley CSD and Harpursville CSD to provide public relations assistance.

Document Services has been busy working on monthly newsletters for the school districts. We have experienced a surge in lamination work and had an extreme increase in Wide Format printing. The department is also busy processing all the usual teacher requests that are needed daily within their classrooms.

A few of the Document Services staff will be attending the Printing United Expo in Atlanta, GA from Oct.18 through Oct. 20 to learn what is new and exciting in the world of print.

We wish to welcome the Maine Endwell School District and thank them for allowing us to print their District Calendars, Capital Project and Budget notices. In addition, we wish to welcome the Susquehanna Valley School District and thank them for allowing us to print their District Calendars, Budget newsletters, and Budget notices.

Document Services wishes the best to Gordie Woolbaugh as he makes his journey into a happy retirement. We thank him for his just over 10 years of service to the BOCES school community. He will not be a total loss to the organization however, as he transitions to a part-time role helping out both Document Services and the Business Office for the next eight months or so.

The PLIC team has been updating their goals and priorities over the last couple of months. Guided by the organizational priorities of improving the employee experience, strengthening communications, and going digital, and from feedback from the field, the team has established four priority areas with specific goals and action steps. The goals are:

1- Identify, communicate, and connect evidence-based, evidence-informed, and research-based practices/ resources to the focus areas of their work. For example, for a service focused on supporting community schools strategy, the team will clarify and share the evidence and resources that guide their work.

2- Enhance the support for leaders throughout all PLIC services to be able to have a greater impact in their local systems by…

• Providing additional professional learning opportunities focused on leaders’ needs and district goals

• Providing networking opportunities and regular communications

3- Internal Relationships: Foster trusting relationships among all members of our team by:

• Clarifying and supporting the needs each individual of the team, and

• Creating stronger connections across the team

4- External Relationships:

• Create/refine the PLIC’s external communications plan

• Cultivate and strengthen relationships with districts

September 18-22 was Community Schools Appreciation Week. Thank you to the Community Schools team for all you do to support the students and families in our school districts!