For instance, our painting project and weatherization at my school was starting Monday of spring break. I know what I said. Um and and that's all important and and we do spend a lot of time focusing on that. Um and we have a lot of positives academically to talk about as well. We have we have 91% growth. I just done a few things here. 91% growth in math. We have 90% growth in reading. 352 of our 477 kids met their AR goal. I'll tell you when to switch. Um, we have the lowest suspension numbers that we've we've had in the last five years. Our EL audit did well. Those are all fantastic curricular things that we need to talk about. But we also need to pause for a second um, and recognize that nobody is going to get to our age or adulthood and go, "Yeah, remember that time I really knocked that state test out of the park when I was in fourth grade?" That's just not a thing.
I recognize the complexity of the situation and the limitations of the different boards and governing bodies. However, everybody has the ability to do something. So please, we urge you to take action. Enforce strict safeguards and staff trainings that are tailored to the unique dangers that ICE and DHS pose. Establish new policies and new protocols. Revise your crisis response plan. Expand student and family support services to help students who experience the detainment of loved ones by ICE, students that encounter these agents in the community, and students, family, and staff experiencing a mental health decline as a result of everything happening in our country and in our own backyard. This has already created so much fear and uncertainty. Please do everything in your power to help and tell us how we as community members can help as well. Thank you. That's all.
So, we're just that close. And a third one was Robert Hubka. Ended with a 30 and3 overall record. Ended up as a state finalist as well. So, we had two people in the state finals. Uh, state So, we're losing two eighth graders. We got one fifth grader still join us. >> Uh, so Robert and Grayson were both second and Becca was one match away from placing. So, it's the first time we've had two players here in a while. >> That's it. >> All right. You're more than welcome to spend the rest of the evening with us at this wonderful board meeting, but feel free to leave if you choose. >> It's okay. >> The board member code of conduct review. >> Okay. I will encourage and respect the free expression of opinion by my fellow board members and will participate in board discussions in an open, honest, and respectful manner, honoring differences of opinion or perspective.
Great job, athletes. Congratulations on all of your achievements. Thank you. I'm going to give them 1 second. You want to give them a second? Sure. Thank you, guys. Thank you for coming. >> [laughter] >> A lot of good celebrations tonight. Hard and well-fought season. They did. Erica, you were at the Yeah. many many many of the games. Soccer regionals is Monday. Oh. Wait, what'd you say? Soccer regionals. Soccer regionals. Okay, where? It's in um Minooka South. Like straight down 71. That's my old That's my old stomping ground. >> If it was If it was like closer, I have like a couple hours free. Sorry. I'll be there. I tried making it. I don't know. Maybe I have to go. They canceled the game. Oh, it's the It was supposed to be a little bouncy, yeah. Okay. Mhm. >> It's really upside down. Are we We're ready.
Great. Awesome. So, they're all here because they have worked so hard on our iLearn checkpoint process. Um, this is something that's been new. We're in year two. We piloted this last year, but our kids worked extremely hard and our teachers worked unbelievably hard. So, our vision at Cedar is that together we cause learning. And so I wanted to start with kind of what the process looks like with how hard our teachers have worked on their PLC teams as a collaborative team to really break down these these kids data uh by question um by standard and then they group them and what I need now time which is just an extra block of time during our school day um to really really support them so we could see the academic growth um and proficiency for some of them that we know we're so proud of. Next, in addition to that, um we utilized a goal setting system.
Eventually, the show became known as the Grand Old Duly. >> Boys and girls, thank you so much for representing our school. So, well, we also appreciate the historical society doing this because it encourages the kids to dig a little deeper into their community and learn a little bit more about the leaders that help shape it. Um, we also have their full essay. Do you want to pick someone to give it to? Each of you go pick one of these board members. >> I want this guy. >> Thank you for this opportunity for us to celebrate them. chance. >> All right, that brings us to our next segment, which is our stellar employee of the month award. This month's stellar employees, graciously sponsored by Overpass Pizza. >> It is my honor to nominate Miss Chelsea Market for this month's stellar employee award in recognition of her outstanding dedication to the students of CMS.
Any questions? And now I need a motion to approve that. I move to approve Mr. Gavin's recommendation. I'll make that motion. I have a motion. Do I have a second? I second. All those in favor say "Aye." Aye. Opposed? Carries. Thank you, gentlemen. Appreciate all your support and everything and you guys coming out. So, uh Next up this evening, we have a quote for $46,500 to replace um locker room doors on our boys' locker rooms. Um if you remember correctly, you um approved a quote for our school safety security grant last month and that quote actually came in less um than we expected and we received 92,500 in that grant. And so, um I contacted um Stefano Rue as well as the uh company Thomas Commercial Glass um to get another quote on these two doors to to spend the remainder of the uh school security grant and then also the some of the remainder will come out the operations fund.
This was a very good opportunity to actually learn without having the risk and without having the don't you know, not really having much knowledge on it. So, uh myself and one of the other fire training officers, uh Tracy Reynolds, we've done one bus extrication and it was in uh like 2006 and it was with another training core um class we were in. So, I just wanted to say thank you for that that that that donation really meant the world um to us and hopefully we never have to use it. Um but it engaged a lot of conversation, so thank you so much. Thank you. I'll point out two things. You as a school board declared the buses junk because it doesn't run. That's true. But it was perfect for for your training. Rhonda Yates showed us pictures today and we appreciate that. And then the salvage yard paid us for the scrap metal.
So, you know, come on up. Jamie and Haley, coach and assistant coach, right? >> [laughter] >> Yep. Yeah. >> [laughter] >> Just to make sure my eyes are up cuz I'm really bad. You're a good girl. >> Thank you. Congratulations. Wait, wait, wait. Sorry. Mom wants one. I think I'll never be sorry. >> [laughter] >> THANK YOU. >> [applause] >> OKAY. ANOTHER SUCCESSFUL PROGRAM, THE state speech competition, our speech team. So, we're going to recognize these? Huh? Is that Is that FFA or speech? Speech. Oh. I'm supposed to wait FFA till the end. Oh, are we? Yeah. Jennifer's not here yet. Jennifer's not here yet. Speech. I was just going in order on the list. Oh, sorry. My bad. We did that to confuse you, Pete. >> Speech. Speech. Madison DeHaven. Okay. Is there a line? Are we supposed to be in an order? >> [laughter] >> Caesar, just listen to me.
But once again, a position is being lost through attrition. Even though it may feel less immediate, the long-term impact is the same. We are gradually reducing staffing levels and support for students. The proposal to cut an additional kindergarten position at Quinn is especially concerning. Cuts at Quinn are complicated because of how classes are structured across grade levels. Some grades have four sections, some have five, some have six, which already requires annual shifting to balance things out and maintain equity in terms of student support. We're also thinking about what's ahead. With new housing um developments in progress, it's likely that enrollment could increase in the coming years. If we continue reducing classroom teaching positions while class sizes grow, we risk creating a gap that will be very difficult to recover from. Rebuilding that capacity in staff and student support will not be easy once it's lost.
And when, you know, so something that I've started doing is going back historically and looking at our honor rolls compared to how are we performing level two and three on our state assessments um that we're going to look at there. And then also this week, Wednesday, we have a BLT meeting that we're going to be looking at some ways of how we can get creative to provide some interventions more interventions for kids. Um, so we're going to be looking at that this Wednesday. Um, that was something that we talked about and shared at our site council council linkage specifically, so um got a couple ideas there. We're going to look at it as a staff as our BLT and then take it to the staff from there.
So, those were some items I wanted to make you aware of. Any other questions? Not, I would entertain a motion to approve the invoices as presented. So moved. Motion by Allison. Second. Second by Josh. All those in favor say aye. Aye.
Do you have any questions regarding 2020? If I may address the approval of the revised 2020 the support needs of the calendar and the extension. Yes, Mr. President, members of the board. We have We had the vice board meeting and uh I did the calendar. If you notice, the key points are The all day teacher and the all day teacher professional development day have been changed from 19th to 22nd. Fall break has moved down from 10 to 12 to 10 to 16, 2026. The one week coordinator days have been moved up to uh 10 5 and 10 7, 2026 right before the following week, which would be the fall break. Okay.
We need to recognize that education is the practice of practical skills in the midst of virtuous action with a little bit of fun. >> Amen. Um and teaching is a walk in the park. Jurassic Park. Wrangle and enjoy the adventure. That is what cementss learning. So we need to in in our kind of daily practice and here goes the image on the bottom. We need to focus a little bit more as we're walking into the schoolhouse gates every day um being Tigger and not being Eeyore. And I've said this to many many students on our campuses and um I practice it every day and Matt can attest to this with one T as we um walk in like this one sticks with me. This is from last year. Matt can [clears throat] attest to this. We try to find something positive every day. Um and and the one that sticks with me and then we'll kind of start walking through some things is um was this last year the the sheep in the bathroom >> right last >> might have been early this year.
Next item on the agenda, section C, item one, superintendent update. Thank you, Mr. President. Just a few updates today. Um, we have Dysart Heroes on the 22nd, we have our Dysart Education Foundation scholarships for our kids on the 23rd, our DSB Live Awards coming up on the 23rd. Um, we had a Purple Star celebration for Dysart with some share you'll hear from a few board members today. And, um, last but not least on the updates, all our certified contracts are in. Um, and we are proud to report that we have a 94% retention rate, um, on all our contracts. So, great job to HR. Thank you to all our certified staff. Um, and that's all I have on my update. Thank you. Thank you, Dr. Crothers. Next item is governing board updates. We'll start with board member Dastrup. Good evening. Today I was able to attend the Dysart High School, um, Purple Star ceremony.
Motion >> second. >> Enters. Yes. Johnson. >> Yes. >> Sesca. >> Yes. >> Peter. >> Yes. >> Lions. >> Yes. >> Patterson. >> Yes. >> Bennett. >> Yes. >> All right. Item A is the county school facility tax and uh I'm going to do a little bit of uh so we're great. Thank you. You have the exhibit in your uh exhibit 11 in your packet. If you if you want um you can look at the screen up here or so I'm going to scroll through it and kind of and explain a few things. All right. I have ver I've verbally given you this information a few months ago. I just kind of talked through it, but I I want to put it uh this is a presentation that we uh the Lake County Superintendent Group had a few months ago and I thought it was very well put together.
Okay. Um 5.1 we're going to action items. Um 5.1 is approval of district administrator contracts. Can I have a motion, please, for the approval of district administrator contracts? I make a motion to approve the district administrator contracts as discussed and presented. Second.
And I think that this is what I'm so proud of for for these kids is how hard that they worked. Um it is I learn is extremely hard. Um and so after each checkpoint, we took uh we set goals on where they were. We aligned those to our Cedar values. So if I go back to our next slide, you can see on Monday, we focus on challenging ourselves, encouraging all is Tuesday, do your personal best Wednesday, achieve goals is Thursday, and then remember success is possible. And we love that that's Friday because after a long week it may sometimes it's kind of hard to remember that success is possible. But these kids um really embodied all of those different values and working their tails off not just showing proficiency but also showing a lot of growth. Um and so we are so proud of them for all the work that they they showed.
Her commitment to excellence combined with the genuine care she shows for every student makes her truly deserving of this type of recognition. Miss Margaret's passion for teaching shines through in an engage engaging lessons she creates, making learning both exciting and meaningful for her students. During a classroom observation in December, I had the opportunity to see this firsthand. Students were presented with a challenge of designing and building a sleigh and a ramp with one goal in mind. Their sleigh had to travel the greatest distance while carrying two presents. With limited materials but unlimited creativity, students tested ideas, solved problems, collaborated with one another, and refined their designs. The result of this classroom was a classroom filled with ingenious ways, clever engineering, and authentic learning and action. Simply put, her students truly slayed this challenge. Secondly, Mrs. Market consistently goes above and beyond for her students, often dedicating extra time to support those who need additional encouragement or guidance.
Um so, you have that quote. Um I need a motion to approve um the replacement of the locker room boys' locker room doors for the cost of $46,500. Do I have a motion? I'll make the motion. Okay, I've got a motion. Do I have a second? >> I'll second. I've got a motion second. Any further discussion? All in favor signify by saying "Aye." Aye. Opposed the same. Okay, it got five to zero. Next up this evening, uh uh Mrs. Lee um brought um got three quotes for the replacement of another oven um in the kitchen. Um she would recommend um purchasing the same oven that we got last time at the cost of $5,999. Um and once again, she's I she's had very good success with this oven and um she feels like it'd be easier just to have all the same ovens Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait.