What are you most excited about this upcoming school year? 

“I’m always excited with the brand new school year because it’s new kids, new opportunities, it’s a blank slate.” 

What’s your favorite spot on campus (high school)?

“Up on the new athletic fields, you don’t hear [route] 55.” Ferreira commented. “Just sitting in the bleachers, that’s kind of a nice spot.”

What is your school’s phone policy?

“They’re supposed to put them in their lockers. They are not supposed to be seen,” Ferreira said “Have we had growing pains with that? Absolutely. Do I know my kids are walking around with hoodies and the cell phones are in their hoodies? Yeah. Have I walked into the cafeteria and they’re playing [on] it? Yes.”

Ferreira said that the new all day no phone policy also had growing pains with parents, and they have now learned to call the office when there is an emergency instead of students' personal cell phones.

“I have seen less of them around because they [students] don’t want their phone to go away for the day,” she said.

What is your favorite school event?

“I love Friday night football,” Ferreira beamed. “I’m in my sneakers. I’m in comfortable clothes and a hoodie,”

What’s your school’s AI policy?

Ferreira said that staff can use Google Gemini, while students are only permitted to use Magic School AI, an AI platform built specifically for school districts. Most importantly, students have to cite when they use AI, according to Ferreira.

“In the 1970s, there was a huge movement to bring calculators into math classrooms, and math teachers were aghast because that would be the end of their jobs, kids were gonna cheat, and they didn’t learn how to do the equations. It was the end of modern civilization,” she said, also likening AI to online thesauruses. 

“We need to create students that are prompt engineers,” she furthered. “Garbage in, garbage out.”

What is the impact of school choice on your district?

“None that we are aware of.” Ferreira said. “Most of the charter schools are in much more urban areas, so we haven’t had that impact.”

What’s something about your school that you don’t get to talk about often?

“We are almost like a private school with public monies,” Ferreira said, citing Eldred’s smaller class sizes. “I know every kid, I know our principals know every kid,” she said. “We know the parents, the family connections, the community connections, and I think that’s very special”

Ferreira added that she was also proud that some of Eldred’s high school graduating class was able to graduate with SUNY Sullivan associates degrees this year, as they’re the only school in the county besides Fallsburg, which is much bigger than Eldred, that was able to do that.

What are some challenges your district is facing this upcoming year?

“Our biggest problem is because this district is considered to be land wealthy, because of second homes, vacation homes, things like that, we do not get a lot of state aid,” Ferreira said. “Port Jervis down the road, they’re at like 87% state aid, which means for every dollar they spend, they get 87 cents back. So that’s how they can offer a lot of stuff for free. We’re at 34%,”

Ferreira further explained that even though Eldred is considered land wealthy, 40% of her students are on free or reduced lunch. Programs like the recently implemented summer meal kit program help to fill in that gap.