Those are really good examples of initiatives and action steps. So you all, as I said, your strategic plan has a lot of these pieces. You have a really strong mission, vision, and set of values. And I put this here because as board members, it's important for you to ground your conversations around goals, around outcomes, around initiatives, around action steps, around what do we really believe and what are we really focused on in the long-term future. And that is that every student empowering every student to achieve their unique potential and fostering an environment of continuous improvement and student success. um and some really great values that I've looked at many strategic plans in my life and I think you have some really good uh unique values here in Battavia that represent the community well. You also have three key priorities. And something uh I just want to say I've seen something really strong tonight is almost every agenda item or maybe every single one has had a tie to a specific priority.
That's that's why I think that that was a good question like do we have what will we com compare it to to know that what we're implementing is going to work otherwise it it could I don't I'm not saying this is going to happen but it could be a case of well we don't know because we don't have all the data yet but yeah no those are great questions and either way we would be in that boat this coming year because star has reormed their assessment so you can't even compare this school year's assessment to prior years. I would imagine we could look at the AR scores too over time, right? So like as we make all these changes, I think if we still watch the I scores because the star and you and not you fly, sorry, I ready will not be reported to the state.
Okay. It could. Yeah. And Okay. And so that that's good to know. Um and I just look at the work that M Rivera's team is doing and looking at you and you know the work with the University of Florida. Um that's an open and I we wouldn't want to impede that progress while waiting board approval, right? That's something that we're going to approve and then we're just going to let you do so. I'm on board with the vendor contract conflict of interest, but I'm not on board with the rest of the language as written in green. I have a quick question. Sorry, excuse my ignorance. How do you publish in order to get contractors to bid? How how would they know? So the the bids we are required to advertise in in the paper and often so the Northwest Herald we have to put a bid uh advertisement in um our uh if our consultant whether it's our architect or uh civil engineer whoever is assisting us with the the bid process will also uh publish that out and send it out to the various contractors that they know that they've uh uh worked with or have worked on similar projects within this the educational field.
So um there's let's go on to the next one. And then there's also um the Mass Clean Energy Center put out a clean energy workforce needs assessment. Let's go to the next one. and um they talk in that report about how to make sure that we're prepared for this clean energy future in our schools. We need to be doing clean energy career awareness. Um we need greater training capacity. We have to make sure that this training is available for everybody. And 65% of the jobs that are becoming available are in 20 occupations that are mostly technical areas. And we want to make sure that we're designing this for our region. And um even fossil fuel workers um there's not going to be a lot of displacement at this point. And we don't really have that in our area, but it's another area that they mentioned in the report.
Um and and beyond that um we're also very appreciative of those who are coming back in about 3 weeks to do summer design studio. Um and some of the effort that will be taking place there in alignment with our student outcomes focused governance work will be work related to the development of our common formative assessments to help um inform instruction um throughout the course of the school year and help us be better at looking at um our data through our data wise process to be more effective in making you know real time what I like to call game time um adjustments on the fly. So that way um we're able to be a little bit more agile as we make um improvements to get the outcomes that our students deserve, our community deserves, and that we really want to achieve. So thank you very much and sorry those are probably the longest comments I've made.
some of the things that we've done um we participate in definitely not us on our own but we have the leader learning series um that we've started this year and we talk about that with the other people that are presenting and sometimes we present as well so that our leaders are getting some specific and sometimes optional for them they get to pick and choose which is always good um types of learning that they might need and or want. We conduct learner leader learning walks. We have gone out to schools over the last few years and we are focusing on specific things to look for on a campus. Maybe it's after a new program like I Ready this year or working on our um instructional focus of clarity, you know. So, we've gone out, we've taken small groups of principles andor other leaders and we talk about what we see and we look for things and then we have ideas on how to take action as well.
And that's something um I said this earlier. I work with so many districts that spend dollars and time and resources building a plan and then it sits on a shelf and it's never reviewed again. And so one thing that you should keep coming back to is how is all of the work we're doing, work that's the same, work that's different, work that's new, work that's old, tied to our priorities. Something I just want to give you all a shout out for structuring your board meetings around your priorities, enhancing teaching and learning strategies, fostering inclusion and behavior and belonging, and then operational excellence and resource strategies. So when you have these priorities, how do you actually implement change? Um and we have an implementation structure we've used with many many districts um that we've seen be really successful and it has different levels of um involvement and support from different folks both internal stakeholders and external stakeholders.
The only thing that's reported to the state is I right and so aren't they reoing I A too? I hope not. But they're reorming. They're reorming it. Okay. Correct. So there you go. Another point I wanted to just bring up when we talk about data if the district I mean since I've been here the past two years if you look we have a huge disparity between our star data and our AR data and that let us know that the STAR assessment is not aligned to the standards or the or the level of mastery that students need to demonstrate. That's why we have such high numbers of our students being able to demonstrate that they're over the 30th percentile. We also lowered the benchmark to 30 rather than 40. But what what we should see and another piece of the I Ready data is we'll be more predictive.
Um, and I I believe uh we've also had uh vendors just reach out directly to the school district for information on those those bid packets. Um, is there any requirement to use union shops for like electricians, plumbers, not technology necessarily, but there are uh we are uh subject to prevailing wage. uh we are not necessarily required uh to use uh union labor although in most cases uh a lot of our our contracts do involve uh union union work uh and often times those are the contracts that uh will win bid approval. Uh there are times where we have uh uh gone with contractors who are not using um union labors but uh prevailing wage uh we have to abide by. Okay. Thank you. Any other questions? Isn't the uh contra conflict of interest also in another section? Isn't there a whole section on conflict of interest?
Yeah. Go ahead. And um what we're looking at is just oh between now and 2030 there's an expectation that um clean energy workers will grow by about 30%. So that's significant. Um let's go to the next slide. And you can see that here in our region what we're looking at is um a growth of 20% between now and 2030 28%. And the jobs that are mostly growing are things like electricians, solar installers, construction workers, um operations managers. Um you can see for yourself a lot of those are the jobs that we train for. The last one there is HVAC installed. So you know looking that's just again the four pillars of of where the state is working in in decarbonizing the economy. Again, just looking at all of those areas are um things that we train in transportation, energy efficiency, clean energy, carbon sequestration. Yeah.
And while I apologize for droning on today, I made up for the two board member comments that we didn't have. So you don't need to apologize in a minute or two. So, since we amended the agenda, we're going to be moving 8A um to now, which is the approval for director of curriculum and instruction and assessment. And I will um hand it over to Dr. Lauren to go over this. Um after we vote, we'll invite potentially someone to come up and talk and then uh we can take a quick break for some pictures. So, go ahead, Dr. Lauren. Thank you, Madam Vice President, members of the board. uh we worked to uh hire a have a good process to hire our director of curriculum instruction and assessment with the vacancy created by the um Dr. Pombo moving up to the assistant superintendent position. So we conducted a comprehensive search for this position.
Um, and then of course we both visit our sites, visit sites frequently. Those that are the newer principles I definitely visit more frequently than others and that's a lot of fun. Um, uh, and we might talk more about that later as well. And then finally, my last part of my um section is on the next slide um enhancing school systems and structures. So, some of the things that we do at the elementary, sorry. Oh, hold on. Slacking. All right. Some of the things that um we've been really doing with our elementary schools over the last couple of years is focusing on we call it MTSS and it stands for multi-tered systems of supports. Having a system of support, whether it's academic or behavior that all students get an extra layer that maybe some students need and even of those students maybe some additional support. So, we've really worked on that the last couple of years.
So you see here on the left of this slide um BPS's roles and implementation. So district leaders, they're the key decision makers. These are the folks that are saying this is the direction we're moving. This is the like final sign off on you know what are we moving forward with in each of these initiatives, strategies and action steps. But that's informed by DCC members who have organized themselves and you all sit on many committees have organized themselves in committees that are focused around these priority areas. So that includes the CAC, the plaque, the rack. I'm learning all of the acronyms. Um it's easy because they rhyme, but um the TCC has worked to um work to look at your strategic plan and say, "We have all these strategies. How are we prioritizing them? What are we measuring ourselves against? And how do we measure progress throughout the year?" And are working with those other committees, plaque, rack, sack, CAC, student services, equity, all of the different ones.
It is not predictive but it was should be in it is more closely aligned to what our students will demonstrate on I AR. And so that was another big piece about the why I felt that there was a need to do the assessment is because we would come before the board and present these huge you know 80% of our students are over the 30th percentile mark and yes that is good for that assessment but when we really look at then the AR data we're in we're below 50% in each of those categories. So I want to I believe the data that is presented at beginning of year, middle of year, end of year should be able to be a good measure along the way of where are we progressing towards and where our students most likely going to be at and be ready for AR.
And then there is a policy about conflict of interest and I off the top of my head don't know if this specifically is addressed in that way. I don't believe it is. Um I believe it's board member conflict of interest or um staff. Again, I'm just bringing this to allow the board to see the language and have this discussion as it appeared to be put in as D26 specific language in the former policy manual. I think your attention to detail is phenomenal. Um, and probably not one that I possess in that quantity, but uh, in in short version, I would I would agree with what Mr. Jantic just said. I would I would vote for an amended one. take out the first three green, leave the conflict of interest. I do think there is something to be said for that. If it turns out that that is the same policy that exists elsewhere, we can certainly bring it back and remove it.
Go ahead. So, I want to tell you about again um my work is a lot of grants and this kind of work is not something that we can do without additional funding. So, I want to tell you about the funding that we brought in and how we're incorporating that into our programs to be able to help our students learn about these careers and prepare. So, we did win a million dollars from um the Mary Mel Renewal Fund, which is administered by the Attorney General's office, and that is again the funding that came from a fine on Colombia gas after the 2018 gas explosions. And so what we're doing with that funding is career awareness on clean energy careers integrated into the career readiness program that um Lauren was talking about as well as um you know we have a lot of curriculum development that needs to be done and and it's not so much that we are going to develop all kinds of new curriculum because all of our trades it's the you still need the basic skills but having an orientation understanding how a clean energy career is also integrated into that technical area.
Um, we advertised our vacancy in our usual places. Arizona Department of Education, Indeed, Facebook, uh, Aspo, which is the Association of School Business Officials, ASPA, which is the Association of School Arizona School Personnel Association Administrators. This is like a test. It's a lot of A's. Yeah. Yeah. All the places. Uh, there were seven viable applicants in the pool for this position. The paper screening resulted in the top five candidates who were selected to participate in the inbasket activity and the interview process. An interview panel made up of administrators, teachers, curriculum team members, students, and parents recommended the top three candidates for a finalist interview. The superintendent, assistant superintendent of teaching and learning, assistant superintendent of business development, executive director of human resources, and the executive director of communications and marketing. uh and the current director of curriculum instruction held the final interviews. The candidate being recommended is Dr.
We went out and with um Mr. Burcher, um uh Dr. Martin and myself, and we visited all of our elementary schools three times this year to see how they run their meetings. And so, that was really interesting. We give feedback. We steal ideas and we share them with other schools. It's been really nice to see and it's been nice for them to reflect and think about the things that they want to do to make their systems um more robust. Um, let's say we're working on our website. We have a website for MTSS and we have um we're going to be revising our handbook this summer, right? So that it's even clearer and there's more clarity. We have another focus of master scheduling going on right now trying to ensure that um all of our students have the best possible schedule to get the services and the the skills and the knowledge that they need.
um to build action plans and collect data and pro moni monitor progress. And we have you all the school board on the right here because you've heard John say this so many times. You'll hear me say this so many times. Your role is setting the conditions so that these teams can be successful. What is setting the conditions mean when it comes to strategic plan implementation? It means allocating resources towards priorities. It means holding the district accountable to results. And it means supporting communication with the broader community.
Right now it's kind of we give star and then we only give really we only have any measure for AR once a year. And so that was another reason why we really felt and I believe why the teachers immediately were like we need to do something other other than STAR because they've seen that disparity year after year as well. I think I think one of the things that we're overlooking with this program too is like as we walk into our classrooms we see a wide variety an increasingly diverse uh set of learners not just in language but just in learners right and this takes it helps a little bit um helps with our teachers to differentiate for those learners right and if we can make our job our teachers jobs just a little bit easier um and get them ready for state assessments and communicate better with parents and engage parents better with with their students uh test scores.