In fact, I met with some parents last week who were who had a list of things they were hoping for for this district. And I talked about the number of years this district did not levy compared to Yorkville, Planefield, Neighborville 204, which we get many messages from families whose who live here but work in 204. Many of those families say, "Why can't we do X? Why can't we do that? Why can't we do this? And I look at the damage of not levying to the max all those years has done. It's the equivalent and I explain to these families that when you don't levy, it's the equivalent or there's a parallel metaphor I use is that you go to Starbucks every day and you get a venty cup of coffee and then one day you decide, you know what, I'm going to get a grande.
And now when you go back to Starbucks the next day, you can only now buy a grande. You could get a tall, you could levy, and you could choose to not levy again, which would not put you at a tall. So essentially, for the years that this community chose not to levy to the max, we are now only able to levy to the size of a tall.
And that means that the impact of those those not living to the max whatever the reasons were whether it was political expediency uh financial choices whatever those reasons I can't judge the community back then but what I can say is that the compounding effect of not living to the max if anybody has any questions about that I would be honored to sit down with those individuals not in a in a browbeating or upset way, but just to really help educate because Yorkville, which has traditionally been a very conservative community, has never not levied. And as a result of that, today that community, Planefield, we were borrowing money from Planefield just so we could do payday. You see all those folks who came here tonight and we celebrated, we were borrowing for 20 years. We did a payday loan for 20 years. And so I would say that, you know, Jared, you opened the door and I want to just take that opportunity to say that I think um I pray this community has uh reflected and um if anybody has any misgivings about levying, I would just be honored to sit down and help them know that the most precious and important folks in our district are our students.
And when we don't levy, we basically say that they're not as important as that that that that investment. So Dr. If I may add to uh back in October, I did a presentation at the last Uni District Association in Neighborville in conjunction with my counterpart at Yorkville. And if you look at the profile of our district and Yorkville 115, our profile is very different. But the different or similar profile, are they similar or different? Similar. Okay, you said different. Very similar. As far as the sources of revenue, they're tier one. We're tier one. as far as the the makeup of the the the revenues that it get property taxes, state uh mandated categorical fund. But the difference is when we looked at our finances, which we talked about the presentation is the fact that they always led to to CPI and as a result of that today, they have a higher fund balance than we do.
50. They're thinking about building a school and being able to pay for from their fund balance. They having the same challenges that we having as it relates to transportation, but the difference is they have enough money in their fund balance that they can able to absorb the uh the deficit that is brought on by transportation where we're not in the position to do that. So those are the repercussions of decisions that were made years ago that actually have real life today impact. So put a dollar amount on that for us. So if I I know we did an analysis a few months ago about what that amount is. It varies between 55 million to 75 million that we could have right now in our fund balance that we don't have. Additionally, in later on this month, I'm doing a presentation with our counterparts again with Planefield, my counterpart at Planefield and also Yorkville at the Illinois Association of School Business Official.
That's some of the things that we are talking about at the presentations because I asked them to join me so that people can know that what has happened here. Uh we were wondered in part by decisions that were made about the revenue that we needed to be able to run a school district well and we lost that and will we never catch up. But we're trying to be prudent and efficient in the way we manage our resources. Now I don't don't think people realize but and I know we're kind of going off on a tangent here so I apologize. I'll try to wrap it up. But um there was a time where not this board but a previous board, right? Like they literally gave a presentation at IASB um and they were like proud that they were a district that was quote unquote figuring out a way to I see that look over there from they're trying to figure out a way to uh do better with less and they were not levying, right?
And then the problem was about four years ago that all came to a head and I'll never forget those bright lights. And to your point, one of the things I said is we're going to feel pain from this for years and years. So um I asked the question only because I respect um anyone who's in the community who approaches me with those um even if even if they're even if they are followed by disparaging words aimed at me. Um so that's the point of of asking those questions. So I appreciate it kind of what you said. I've kind of figured but so thank you. I mean just the fact of the matter is 80% of our of our expenditures come from uh from salaries of our educators. 80%. Yeah. So right off the bat 80% of the revenue that we get pays for our teachers and building administrators.
We have a question. One more question. What's the uh what's the lifespan of a bus? the average life. Okay. So, in theory, five years leasing, buyout, we could have it for another, I don't know, say 10 years. Yeah. Awesome. And saved um in this case, it would be a savings of $12 million. Okay. Real money. Uh, thank you again. And you have with you some special guests as well. Came out to support. Just want to say thank you all for coming out. Okay. I just want to make a quick comment um to basically the work that you guys have done. very very important. As someone who was in a sport and cheer, it was really hard to get from game to game because we didn't have buses. Like it would be right after school. So we'd have to wait for football to go and then that football bus would have to come back to our school.
We would go on that bus and then they would take varsity. Like it was such like a ripple effect. So I'm glad that you see the problem and you fix the problem because not a lot of like sports get that opportunity to just have a bus. It takes a process. I remember sitting down. We would have to wait hours. Like the game was starting at 4. We were not getting there till 4:45. Like we're not having a bus till 4:45. It was absolutely insane. So to see the work that you guys are putting to solve a problem really means a lot. All right. Thank you. Thank you. I'm so appreciative because I feel like not enough people talk about it and by you coming here and explaining this to us, it's like a huge like eye opening. I remember when I used to play volleyball, it was a very hard bus situation to where like two events the bus didn't even come to the school to pick us up to where the varsity girls had to drive us to different occasions.
So, I'm so I'm so happy you guys are talking about this. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you again this evening. Thank you, Mr. Buff Fei. Uh next, I want to uh welcome we've got uh Mr. Artson and Tony Mard for our update on uh uh flag football and uh thank you all for your leadership. I know Dan, you work a lot with transportation as well. So I feel like this is perfect segue. Thank you for your leadership and Dr. Conincaid as well if you have comments. Yes, thank you Dr. Kgatti. Uh good evening board and yes uh Leon and her team uh we've met a lot lately to discuss some things too and we are making some positive headway for a lot of things too. So I do appreciate all the work that she's doing as well. Absolutely. So uh we are here tonight. Uh my name is Dan Artson, the executive director of athletics and asiggo high school athletic director.
I'm here with Tony Miller, the uh Asiggo East athletic director. We are here tonight to discuss the process for adding a new sport just like we did last year. This time in particular for girls flag football. This slide here represents um kind of the why behind we look to add new sports. Uh and we discussed this slide actually last year as well because really anytime we're offering new sports and new opportunities for kids, that's what it is. It's opportunities for students to be involved with our our school community. And not every student of ours fits into kind of the traditional path for athletics. If you're talking baseball, softball, girls basketball, boys basketball, we have a lot of students that have a lot of success uh in other sports and other athletics. Uh in fact, today I was meeting with um some some teachers and one of those teachers happens to be a a community member that her her son is playing boys lacrosse for the first time this year.
Um in previous years they were ice hockey only and it was no interest in the traditional sports that we offer. Um but we offered lacrosse this year and for the first time her her student is actually participating in a school related sport. So she was very thankful of that. Um and I will give some updates on lacrosse too. I know uh Mrs. Johnson here was applauding lacrosse and how well they're doing here to start this year too. So I'll give some updates as we go. But yeah, it's it's to give opportunities to kids. Uh the last couple of bullet points here with the links really it's an article talking about the benefits of athletics um and really how they improve social emotional obviously physical wellness but really the second link talks about the role of athletics and kind of the world we're living in today.
uh we live in a world that people disagree on a lot of things, but for whatever reason uh when you put a a ball in front of them, they can all kind of see on the same page, right? And it really breaks down a lot of barriers and that article kind of defines that and the importance of that. This slide here represents emerging sports and activities which um you can click through that there's a hyperlink there too that lists all the emerging sports here in the state of Illinois. And essentially um emerging sport is it's not yet reached kind of a 10% threshold mark that to bring it to a larger picture for a state tournament. Uh some schools offer it. Um for example, in the past uh boys gymnastics was a state sport. It has been since taken off that because fewer and fewer schools offer that.
So it's still kind of on the emerging list. Um, but for us here in SD308, that state series length, uh, we offer every sport that's approved, uh, all I should say, all of our sports are approved on the IHSA state series. The only two that are not are boys and girls water polo, uh, which was offered starting 2001 2002, and then girls flag football, which the state series is, uh, started this past fall. as we go through our process to define and really kind of determine whether we should be moving forward or have enough interest uh to move forward with any sort of a sport. The first thing is an assessment of interest and um you know as this kind of came to be last year around this time and we and girls flag football became more and more of something that a lot of people were interested in.
This was a process we had kind of laid out for boys and girls lacrosse and girls wrestling last year. Um, and if you recall in those conversations, one of the things we have with this, uh, number 10 up there is the pilot of the club program. Uh, we had yet to have a club program for girls flag football. So, we thought it was appropriate to continue this path is making sure to establish this process and and adhere to this process as we go on for girls flag football. Uh, we'll talk about the success we've had with girls flag football as a club team. But, um, this is the process that we've laid out and followed each one of these as well. and you have some of this information in your packets and I can speak to this later if need be. um 1 through 15 of course 15 being the board approval 1 through 14 uh we've created a rubric uh ranging from one to five one being essentially we shouldn't do it or don't have that ability to do it and five is absolutely yes and we've scored um uh girls flag football and we've scored um boys water polo and girls water polo as well I will give you kind of a a news breaker here we're not looking forward uh we're not asking to move forward with girls or water polo, but since it was something that's on the state series and we don't offer it, it's always something we should be evaluating as far as making sure that our rubric ensures that we should not be moving forward with it.
Right now, it tells us we don't have the resources to do it. We don't have the need and desire to do it. It's something we should reevaluate every couple of years to determine where we're at with that. That's not something we're recommending at this time. I'm sorry. Can I ask a quick question about that slide? Sure. I don't see it on there, but can I am am I correct in making the following assumption that we currently have schools in our conference that are doing girls flag football, but we do but we do we are lacking schools in our conference that have water polo. Is is is that a correct statement? That's correct. Yes. Okay. Thank you. Yes. So, uh, on the last side, it talked about the assessment of interest. And so, uh, just like we did last year with all of the sports going forward last year, we conducted a survey of all, uh, 8th, 9th, 10th, and 11th graders currently in our buildings.
Um, and that was conducted over December through January. Uh we gathered their name, their school, their grade level, and then we just simply asked them if offered an SD308, I would be interested in trying out for girls um girls flag football, boys water polo, girls water polo, or none. Um and so on the next few slides, we'll see the uh go through some of the results that we found. Uh overall, we had just over 1,200 respondents to uh the survey that we sent out. And you can see the breakdown by school. Um the two high schools with the largest also the largest number of uh you know 9th, 10th and 11th graders. So there was more students who got the survey than the um than the middle schools or junior highs. Um and then on the next one, you do see though that our eighth graders were overly um ambitious with their responses.
So over 50% of the total responses came from our eighth graders, which I think is a really good sign because those are the ones that are going to be in our buildings for the next four years. And they're the ones that are going to be participating in the next four years where as our juniors are probably already set in the activities that they are participating in and so uh adding something to their schedule is probably not something that many of them are looking to do at this time. So uh so anyway, so that's a breakdown. um there. And then by gender, you will see uh again uh we did have more females uh respond to uh the survey, which also is good since we were kind of specifically looking at here today uh girls flag football. As for the results, um you can see the green is none.
So it was good to see the number of students who actually responded none because they weren't just responding to say yes I want to try out to this because they just were responding to it. They really were thoughtful in the fact that no I'm not interested in any of these three so I am going to select none. So you do see uh the total number there is about just over 800 just under 900 of the 12 um 1,200 that selected none. And then you see girls flag football uh just under 250 respondents said they would be interested in that. Uh girls water water polo just under 70 and boys water polo uh just under 90. So looking at next year the IHSA girls flag um football proposal. Uh a couple of things it's been mentioned a couple of times tonight. We're looking at, I believe the IHSA is anticipating over 250 schools having uh girls flag football team register for the state series next year, which is up from about60 I think that we had this past fall.
So about 100 more schools looking to add girls flag football for next year. Every school in the SPC is anticipated to have flag football. Our conference is expected to have flag football as well next year. Sorry, I guess I could have skipped ahead and told you all this, but um uh so again, it continues to grow. As you heard from some of the uh speakers earlier today, uh the clubs that we both had uh at Asiggo uh they had about 50 girls registered for their club. We were right around 80. When we first did our interest at Asiggo East, it was over a hundred. But then when we actually made them start showing up to practices and stuff, that number slowly dipped down, but we stayed around 80 for most of the fall. Um, again, we had 242 girls in uh 8th through 11th grade that showed interest.