I thought it'd be a good time to go over some of my duties and responsibilities as moderator and those of the finance committee and put them in the form of public service posts on Facebook. Just as our federal government has separation of powers, the same is true of our state and local governments. For local governments, there's an executive branch and a legislative body. In Mson, that would be the same in Ashlin. The executive branch are vested in select board and the legislative powers are vested in town meeting. So he goes on to explain how the finance committee is under the legislative and that should also be independent. He believes that's why it's appointed by the moderator in that town also in our town. And so I think that just reiterates making sure that the finance committee is independent working as the legislative um and and not maybe just simply getting information from one source.
>> Yeah, sure. So, we're kind of a group of about I would say 30 students. And the nice thing about this group is it's not just seniors. There's it's freshman through seniors. And honestly, it's really cool to work with some of the younger grades because I've been really, really impressed with some of our younger student leaders. But our goal is to kind of like Dr. Solen said, getting people to events that aren't football, basketball, lacrosse games. So, our plan is to kind of have a weekly calendar that we roll out on social media each week kind of going through what events are happening and also kind of having like an incentive system to get people to come to these games. So, I think something we discussed in our last meeting was uh a system called RAM points where you come to the game, you take a photo at the beginning of the game and after the game, you send it into our social media page to kind of prove that you were there and then based on what event it is, you'll get a certain amount of RAM points and then like any other reward system, you can redeem those points in for a prize.
Then we went out and did 300,000. That aggregates to 500,000 and it goes to referendum. That's my understanding. Does that make sense what I said? >> Yeah. So it would it be if the town council approved it? Yes. And it was approved under the the threshold and then we went back for more. Yes, you've got that right. >> And it would be it'd be something that would be considered a similar project. So if it was windows at the high school for 200 and this would this was 300,000 for windows at Highland. >> No, >> that would be separate projects and they could both be onto the 500. Okay. >> Yes. So, thank you for that. Um, there's only three that are at the 500, I think, here. >> Yeah, three that are 500. Okay. So, jumping to the 874. >> Yes. >> So, since we had this, since the board looked at this last, I've spoken with somebody who told me he presented himself as an engineer, >> and he said he didn't think that that What am I going to call it?
Um we keep adjusting our parameters. Um you know, uh uh thinking about our different needs, you know, could we compromise a little bit on, you know, uh whether they have to go upstairs, whether the elevator is too far away, whether there's more money that we can spend on these issues. So we we keep sort of adjusting the the you know the sliders on the um the requirements there. Um but we just we have not yet been able to to pin that down. I was really hopeful about that shelter rock space. Um but but the last the last conversation we had was that it's it's it's not likely. So um like I said I have another conversation scheduled in the next few days and um I'll know a little bit more at that time. >> Okay. Okay. And so my second question is um over at Beaverbrook when you're talking about replacing walls, the ceilings, I'm sorry, the floors, the ceilings, there is a big possibility that you're going to run into a bestice.
Um you know I see some districts and you know they're buying food and breakfast for their staff and having all these like monthly things. We don't do any of that. We don't have those types of things in our budget. We have just what we need um to provide an education for our kids. So, we are going to utilize the healthcare adjustment. Um, essentially, like I said, the budget software kind of comes out and says, well, you cap your bud your tax levy increase at 2%, but you can utilize all of these other monies. Um, unfortunately, like I said, there's tax implications. Um, like I had said to you guys, we are currently our school tax rate, we are currently $700 and some dollars lower than the county average. Um, I kind of did a little comparison at some other schools similar in size. So, um, Audabon is a $684 above the county average.
They have a budget and technology. We provide for high quality 21st century tech for our students. That is two cents of every dollar. As indicated before, we pay our club advisors, our coaching stipens. That's one cents of every dollar. And then then when you whittle it all down, less than one cent of every dollar is allocated towards our schools. That's our discretionary spend. And as a matter of fact, it's 50 basis points. So 50% of 1% is how much money our district has allocated towards discretionary expenses. Every other expense you could consider a required expense. So our expenditure pressures, this is kind of difficult to see on this screen. Uh the background's a little bit dark, but I wanted to highlight some of the areas, not all of the areas, but some of the major areas, our largest and most unpredictable areas that put pressure on our budget.
Fewer than 1% of high school seniors nationwide achieve this level of recognition. Tonight, I'd like to read Come on, guys. Uh tonight uh we have two students from Andrew High School who are receiving this outstanding academic achievement. Hunter Bole and Ashton Zaf both who are familiar faces to you with the perfect 36 ACT scores that you recognize in August. Congratulations to both our T- bowls with the national merit finalist status. Congratulations. >> Great job. It's busy busy out there. Uh we had two Sambergians who were unable to attend uh for recognition for uh national merits scholarship qualifying test finalist status. Uh these guys are like on the banquet tour. I see them in the halls. I'm like I got to go to this. I got to go to this. But uh happy to recognize Mahir Pradhan and Neil Patel for also early finalist status. So give them a round of applause.
We're getting course requests in right now from our students. So, we're looking at what program offerings are going to look like, how we can structure those pieces. But the other piece that we're doing is we've been in the ready schools for 3 years now. Two years of really living in the actual plan. And whenever you do something, you can live in it for a while, but sometimes you need to take a step back and re-evaluate where you're at with things. And one of the things that we want to be very strategic about, especially moving forward, is when we're saying yes to things that it's still aligning with what our plan is and coming back to our plan and looking and seeing are are we still going the direction that we said that we wanted to go. And so we have that taking place right now.
Uh we didn't get any questions from any board members. There's not been any changes to the policies and so tonight we're recommending the board uh accept the changes and the revisions to the 14 policies presented. >> Thank you, Dr. Long.
Um, and then also with that with this change would be to access advanced coursework. Um, and then targeting our intervention systems as well. So the targeted intervention system is going to obviously give us ability to increase measurable student growth. >> Question. >> Yes. >> MTSS being used now with teaming. >> Yes. >> More so without team. >> It'll be more structured. Yeah. When we move to this Well, it'll be more structured next year no matter what. We we're working we've been working this this school year to have a framework for the entire school corporation because what we found is some schools do it one way and some then we weren't using common practices or common languages and so um Lynn and Christy have been working on developing with with other people but they've led that the the development of a a common framework for the entire corporation.
>> Yeah. Um I I that line just jumped out at me. Serve the interest of the voters rather than the executive administration, the select board. I really think it's time for the moderator. Um like all the other groups in town, come before the select board and talk about the process, how people are picked. I think that would be really educational. And speaking of educational, I would love to see a citizens academy run by the citizens uh or at least have a part in the citizens academy because it just again we're we've got the the citizens sitting there, you know, but when do they get to stand up front and I mean just regular people. Um so that's something to think about. >> Yeah. I hope the select board next time there's a citizen academy will will at least consider having the a citizen component of that citizen groups think different ways to be involved how it all works.
We haven't really figured out what prize is yet, but we're pretty excited about the initiative. >> It's fantastic. Did you have a question? >> No. Any other board members? >> Yes. Thanks, Connor. Um, always great to hear from you. I just had a question. I also um lies with the Chesure Education Foundation. And in our last meeting, it was noted that we had a nice substantial increase in the amount of applications for at least the scholarships that we administer. And that was great. I was happy to hear that because there's eb and flow, but this was like a market increase. Jason, I was just wondering if you heard more about it this year. I don't know, you know, did you seem to think like there was just kind of more buzz about it or or why there might have been an an uptick and I'd love to see that continue.
It's the patio, the deck, the big cement. Yeah, loading dock. Sorry. >> He said he didn't think the loading dock was urgent. >> Um, you're not an engineer, but you hire people who are, and they've told you this is something that needs to happen. >> Yeah. So, my primary contact is Rich Clevette, the director of facilities, and I I trust his his recommendation on this. I will say I think it was a few years ago that they actually the loading um I'm happy to take a field trip with anyone if you if you want to go see it. Um but it's actually not solid concrete down to the ground. It's a concrete slab that is now um held up by like reinforced scaffolding. >> So you can actually look if you go into the dumpsters and see that it's like held up by this scaffolding which was an interim measure put in place to support it.
>> And so has that been figured in to the 255,000? >> Yeah, to my knowledge, there's there's no uh they've already done the inspection. Um, and I would I'll I'll need Rich to verify this, but uh there's been no mention of remediation at this time. Uh, if it does, we'll we'll address it as it emerges, but there there does not appear to be anything at this time that that uh uh needs to be remediated. And and again, I I will confirm with with Rich and the team on that. Um, if they if they did encounter anything, it would have been built into this estimate. >> Okay. I'm just hoping that that's a guarantee. And so with the $255,000, where are those funds coming from? >> Those are coming out of our maintenance and repair budget. >> So, was that in the financial report at the meeting yesterday?
The Burrow is $356 above the county average. Pineh Hill is $500 below the county average, but they receive um they receive $30 million in state aid. >> We only receive eight. And I know they're a high school, but I can't help but feel a little slightly there. >> We pay a lot of money in tuition there. Send a little our way. >> Um, Magnolia is $80 below the county average. Gibbsboro was $2,000 over the county average. Um, so again, some of these have different demographics and obviously some of these places have the ability to pay more. So they're paying more from their local share. Uh, Laurel Springs was $71 above county average. county from was $97 below. Um, like I said, we're coming in $771 below the county average in our spending. Um, I think that's a testament to how we've tried to be so conservative, but I mean, how do I how do I make up $920,000 in tuitions?
Health benefits being the largest area for us. Health benefits in this budget for the proposed budget accounts for a $4.1 million increase. So in the current budget year, the one we're currently in that will end this June, we experienced a health benefit premium increase of 31%. For our district, that was an unbudgeted cost of $1.6 million. That is our starting place for next year. When I'm budgeting and my staff, our team is budgeting for our health benefit premium increases and our projection over the next 12 months. We start by including that $1.6 million because we know right now that is our current expense in health benefits. Then we have to account for an unknown premium increase in January. We're in the state employees health benefit program. The state doesn't release to us or tell us any budget advice whatsoever. And we don't know what that premium increase is going to be.
ALL RIGHT, coming right back. Dr. Smith, we're on for uh we have some wrestling recognitions that we wanted to um get together. I have with me Coach Elizabeth Short, come on up. Samberg wrestler, come on up with Dr. Smith. We'll bring up the Andrew wrestlers. Come on up, Jade. >> We're doing a lot of combining tonight. It's a wonderful evening to combine together. >> Go ahead, Dr. Smith. >> It's March board meeting, which usually means we got some wrestling recognitions here uh in District 230. So, a long history of great wrestling accomplishments uh at all of our D230 schools, but uh Sam as well. and happy to recognize uh Brady Ritter for finishing in fifth place at 157 pounds in the IHSA uh state competition. Uh Brady's uh went down state last year. Uh grinded it out this year, finished play fifth place all state with a medal and uh he's coming back next year for for a senior season.
Our last teacher workday that we had, we had all of our focus groups meet. And so they were talking about where are they at, what are they working on, what are they coming back to. We're looking at some curriculum alignment. That's one of the big pieces that we're going to be rolling out. And again, coming back to that alignment piece as far as the strategic planning, um especially looking our ELA, how can we provide some additional support? We received a new curriculum for ELA this year. Once you've been in it for a little bit, Brett, you can attest to this. Once you've kind of taught in it for a little bit, then you're kind of ready to start making it your own and see where we can take that. So, we have that coming up that we're going to be doing. And I left these on the board today.
Any questions or discussion? >> Dr. Long, you also didn't get any comments or questions from any community members, correct? >> That's correct. >> Thank you. >> You're good. Okay. Do I need a motion? >> I move that the board approve the revised policies as presented. >> I second. >> All those in favor say I. >> I. >> All those opposed. >> Motion passes three to zero. Thank you. Okay, now we're on to announcements. I want to read something here. On behalf of the Center Grove Community School Corporation Board of School Trustees, we are pleased to announce that Dr. Aaron Stalbomb has been selected as our choice for the next superintendent. This decision follows a comprehensive nationwide search conducted in partnership with the university search team. As part of the process, the board gathered input from staff, parents, and community members through a district-wide survey to identify the priorities for the future of Center Grove Schools.
I don't know if I >> It's a framework. It's not like a thing. So, it's the system that we use to provide targeted instruction reteing support for students in the area of academics, behavior or social emotional. So, it like Dr. Long said, it's looked a little different all buildings, but we're just trying to make sure our processes and our policies and procedures are the same for all students. So, we're trying to middle school. >> Correct. >> It'll be a preschool really that 12, prek to 12 is the plan. for consistency for the students. >> Correct. And I know it was shared last time, but it's in our ESSA plan from the state type of framework for our students for the past several years. It's not new. The word MTSS may be new to some of our staff >> and it's in our our strategic plan as well.