001It is 5:00 p.m. and I'd like to call the February 23rd meeting to order. Can I get a motion to approve the agenda? >> You make a motion to approve the agenda. Uh, Miss Knox, I'd like to um move that we agenda amend the agenda to add clarification to item 3F um legal advice regarding contractual matter and change it to legal advice regarding IT services contractual matter. >> Second. >> All right. >> And the reason is just to make it clear because it it's all the other ones kind of have more information about them. There's no vote going to be taken on this that I'm aware of, but just so the public has more information on this item. >> Yes, ma'am. All those in favor >> are all the same. >> All right. And the
002motion carries five to one with one extension. It takes to the original motion. Can I get a mo um all those in favor of approving the agenda? And the motion carries 70 to zero. Can I get a motion to enter executive session? >> I make a motion to enter executive session to consider the following. Uh item A, selected employment items, exhibit A for action. Item B, selected employment items, exhibit B for information only. Item C, legal advice regarding board policy GB, staff conduct, as seen in exhibit C. Contractual matter regarding supplement study as seen in exhibit D. contractual matter regarding the development of security personnel or devices as seen in exhibit E and uh F legal advice regarding an IT contractual matter. Can I get a second? >> Second. All those in favor and the
003motion carries seven to zero. We'll adjourn to enter into executive session. Good evening um everyone and thank you for joining us tonight. As we begin tonight's meeting, I just want to express my appreciation for all who are here, whether in person or following along from home. Our work as a school board is strengthened by the engagement and partnership of our community. As we continue our agenda, I'd like to take a moment to reaffirm two values that guide everything we do. Civility and service. Our district strives thrives when we treat one another with respect even in moments of disagreement. Maintaining a tone of constructive dialogue allows us to focus on what matters most, supporting our students, our staff, and our families. Several of you had concerns regarding portions of our last meeting, and I want to
004apologize again for behavior that was not always for coming of those who you have elected to lead. We are here to serve the entire community. And that means listening thoughtfully, considering diverse perspectives and making decisions that reflect our shared commitment to highquality education for every student. I am grateful for the collaboration and goodwill that help makes this possible. Again, thank you for being with us this evening. Let us take a moment to pause and center ourselves as we begin this meeting. We gather with gratitude for the privilege of self-government and for the trust placed in us to serve our community. May this time remind us of the seriousness of our responsibilities and the importance of approaching our work with wisdom, fairness, and respect. As we deliberate tonight, let us listen with open minds, speak with
005civility, and seek common ground. May we value the diverse perspectives represented here and work together in a spirit that unites rather than divides. May our decisions contribute to the well-being of every student, every family, and every member of our school community. Amen. Please stand for the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for it stands under. >> If my board members would please join me up front for the schoolboard spotlight. All right, Madame Chair, members of the board, Dr. Ross, good evening. I'm so grateful to be here with you tonight to share some great news from around the district. And tonight, we are so happy to have with us the Irma Middle School C team football program. This year they completed an undefeated 70 season, marking the first perfect season for
006the program since 2022. Coaches credited the players commitment, sportsmanship, and resilience as key factors in this team's success. So, we are happy to recognize them tonight along with their coach Johnny Johnson. And principal Mansa Joseph is here, too. So, players, coaches, y'all come on up. All right, take two on three. One, two, three. One more. Congratulations. As you're settling back in, I'll share with you just a couple more exciting things from around the district. We have um an additional 18 school district 5 teachers have earned their national board certification this year and 12 teachers renewed their national certification. That gives school district 5 a total of 250 educators with this designation, putting us among the top districts in the state. National Board as you are probably aware is a voluntary advanced teaching credential. Uh the
007educators pursuing this certification go through a rigorous process that includes applications, sample work, videos. In some cases, they have to take an a subject matter assessment to um to show to the judges that they are truly the best at what they do. So, we are indeed honored to have 250 of the very best educators in our district and we celebrate them for taking on um this additional certification. And then I also want to share with you that National Beta Club members from Dutch Fork High School recently participated in the South Carolina Senior Beta State Convention. They earned first place in 17 competitions and placed in 27 events, which is remarkable. The Dutch Fork Beta Club is one of the largest and most active chapters in the state with 310 student members. Throughout the year, the
008members participate in a wide range of service initiatives, including the Buddy Walk, um an African-American history community project, adopt a family, and March of Dimes fundraising. So, um, in addition, they regularly partner with elementary schools across the district for reading and and other outreach activities. So, we are so happy to celebrate these students and their hard work at the Beta Club Convention. So, Thank you so much, Miss Taylor. Y'all's name tags are in the wrong spot. >> All right, at this time I'll turn it over to Dr. Ross for the superintendent report. >> Thank you, Madam Chair, members of the board and our community. It's a honor to recognize that for I'm sorry, I middle school. I'm thinking about that for how big that club is. Over 300 members. Very good for that for beta
009club. but Middle School's um football team and Coach Johnson, I just want everyone to know Coach Johnson is an expectation coach and just to have someone that works in our schools during the day, in the hallways, but also as coaching in the evenings just uh really is a as a very powerful position we have to make those relationships with those students. Uh also, we talk about weather. Um, we know there's a big snowstorm in the Northeast. Uh, and so we are also dealing with weather issues. I just want to make everyone aware that we're going to use April 23rd, 2026 as our early release date. Um, that was in place of the January 29th early release. So, mark your calendar for that. That date was cancelled so that we can maximize that face-to-face learning time
010during that during that snow event or that winter event. Uh just want to celebrate uh all of those that were from uh academics and communications uh all those that are involved in our virtual lunch and learn pathways to hot jobs. Um our we had amazing um expertise coming from MEBA and Lexington County Economic Development Board uh to assist families in the community who are preparing for the hot jobs of the future. uh want to make sure that everybody's aware of not just what we provide here at the center for advanced technical studies but also the amazing programs that we offer within our schools. Why is this important? This is important as ppbs.org reported the unemployment rate for our young recent college grads at is at very highs. um we haven't seen these uh levels in
011in quite a long time and uh as a result college grads are coming out of of college and they're looking for jobs and it's it's kind of tough to find placement. Uh the study went on to say that uh that there's an 8% increase in the number of applications they must submit in order to get a full-time job. As a result, uh we wanted to make sure that our students are in position to take care and take advantage of those um those hot jobs, those jobs that are in demand. Uh when the Lexon County Economic Economic Development Commission presented, they talked about what those hot jobs were, what are those trending industries uh within Lexon County. And you can see from material movers and laborers to medical and legal administrative assistance, nursing, operations management, and
012home health care. So these are the areas um that we're seeing a trend in jobs in in Lexon. Uh is also in in in the Midlands. Um we had um a representative from MIA to come forth to speak about things that we're seeing in the Midlands. And so we want to announce all of our families the high school to hire event. Uh this is being put on by MEBA, the uh Midlands Education and Business Alliance. Uh so crossing the stage to earning a wage. This is going to be May 1st, 2026 at Sacred Park. Uh so if our families can attend, we want you to be informed of that. This is important that we do because we are a system guided by three critical questions. Why do we do this work? How do we accomplish
013that why? And what are our outcomes? Our why is that we love and grow students? Our mission is that we're focused on academic, social, emotional growth and development. And then our strategic plan governs what we are producing and we're tracking uh each week the progress that we make towards the strategic plan. We're the closest that I've been to crossing that orange line. And that takes a lot of work from a lot of our staff. Uh working uh tremendously hard not only to identify the numbers, but what are the names behind the numbers and the stories behind the names. That's so important as we prepare for our spring assessment of our measures of academic progress. Uh we can see the work that our our schools have been able to do from fall to winter. Uh while
014we're making growth, we're looking for ways to really shrink that gra that gap between students who are not on level and students who are off level. How do we do this? Well, this is our playbook, our four PLC questions. What do we want students to know and be able to do? And we provide resources. Uh the the district framework that teachers are have a heavy hand in developing our curriculum guides, the summer planning workshops. Um we just um the highlights of the the conferences that we put on um through our academics office and the I can success criteria. This is available online. Any parent can go to our classes and I think um almost 90% of them are mapped where you can go in and see the success criteria for your children. Uh so that
015we there's no secret about what we want students to know and be be able to do. That's available for all of our community, our parents, our students, tutors, families, and our teachers. How we know if they've learned it? We utilize our CFAs u and our progress learning and parasess. That's a a cool tool for teachers to map those success criterias to student performance. And then what do we do if students do not learn it and how will we extend the learning for students who are already proficient? And we focus very heavily on our tier 2 programs or tier three interventions using magic school AI to help us differentiate in the scaffold. Uh but the best thing is our PLC process where teachers share great ideas with other teachers and through uh our four-step process uh
016through our PLC process we're able to meet the needs of our students for growth. That's our operation transformation where we're committed to turning the I can't to I can't. I'd like to also um just give an update on our redistricting and magnet and choice update. We have been working really hard to inform our community about this process. Um none of these things are easy, especially re redistricting or or reszoning. And um it takes a tough district to do tough things, but we do that. Uh we have been directing people to our website to get uh information on the resoning, the magnet, and the choice forms to have that. Uh but a recent article came out that talked about the uh confusion and concerns regarding resoning. And uh we'll be very honest and anything that I
017say I take full responsibility for. and I do apologize for any confusing comments that I made regarding students finishing to the highest year. We have directed through our print media and our website um multiple information to help families navigate to where where they're they're going. Uh but uh this sent a almost a 300% increase to a Q&A um versus what we have asked our community to to look at. So uh I want to make sure that we understand that I'm going to continue to do lunch and learns. I won't ask people to submit their questions in advance. Uh but um that could lead to uh confusion in my responses and live. But I think it's important to have these live opportunities where people can ask ask questions. Uh but this does give me an opportunity
018to clarify and I think I should start from the beginning. This goes back to March 27th, 2023. Uh when the board of trustees approved the revisions to board policy IE where we talked about changing our organization of instruction to standardize elementary, middle, and high schools. elementary pre uh prek to five, middle school 6 to 8 and high schools 9 to 12. We are almost three years from implementing uh this this this policy and u going to from a system that we currently are to what we have in policy uh does take uh redistricting. And so regardless of what the referendum was going to do uh the referendum passed, we were reszoning. If the referendum failed, we were reszoning. U redistricting is the correct word to say for that, but we were redistricting regardless of what
019was happening. How we redistrict was based on the referendum. Uh the board of uh approved how we would move on July 21st, 2025. Uh but we tried to make it very clear that regardless. And so we showed two different maps uh on June 24th, 2024. Uh these were adopted. And so none of these maps are current maps. All of these are different maps that shows regardless of the outcome of the referendum from 2024, uh the we were changing our attendance lines. Uh once it was clear the direction uh we moved from our current elementary map uh to our new elementary zones uh showing how this would work to ensure that there was clarity um on the process. We sent out mailers um as was not only on our lunch and learns and our print media
020and our website but we actually sent out mailers to our our um our students and families uh to let them know how this would affect them. home locator, um the website to learn about choice and preferred choice options, and then the due dates for the applications. As a result, we put out a timeline that talked about how the process would go, uh, when the applications would be due, um, when the lottery uh, and selection process would be uh, presented, and then the acceptance or declining date uh, for those accepted during the lottery. Uh so if you look at um basically that process, we adopted the new educational structures. We adopted the attendance lines for the new educational structures. We published the school locators to inform families about resoning uh on elementary, middle, and high school
021placement. We provided applications for choice, preferred choice, preferred pathways, and magnet options. Uh number five is what I want to clarify. uh zone and previously uh previously approved choice and magnet school students remain at their school through the highest grade. So if you're uh zone for that school, your choice for that school or your magnet, you remain at the highest grade. And then for six, we ran um step six is we ran the choice and magnet application pool. Um, and that went through a random lottery selection process. And I think it's important to understand what do we mean by a lottery. Um, a lottery does not have preferences. We have a $9.6 million federal grant for magnet schools. As a part of that application, we have a random lottery selection process. Um, and so what
022does a random lottery do? It's just going to run the applicant pool and randomly select applicants. It won't look at siblings. It won't look at employee choice. It won't look at those matters. It will just generate the random lottery. Now, families can accept or decline that placement. And then after we have the acceptance rate, the administration went back uh and uh asked the board for three FTEEs for special education. We assessed uh our seats in the applicant pool and now we will start placing preferences, siblings, uh self-contained classes, employee choice and uh we're going through the process of assigning staff uh um sorry step eight assigning those preferences of siblings, self-contained classes and employee choice. Except nine, we uh assign staff and contracts based on the student locations. Now, this is typically when we do
023the employee choice because that's not part of the lottery. Can a employee get a part of the lottery? Yes. But according to that application of that federal grant, it won't be a preference in the lottery. So, if you're in the lottery is random. If you're outside the lottery and the preference, then you're you're hand selected at step eight and nine. And then once we receive contracts and field available choice uh through mid July. So uh how does that look? You can continue to go to our website choice and see the FAQs. Um we should have those uh preferences placed and available seats placed by February 26, 2026 uh of that applicant pool. Now again it is ongoing. uh we continue to have that ongoing uh through mid July but as as movement happens there is
024not one day where the attendance is the same um in our schools. So this will be an ongoing process as we as we place uh from the applicant pool but again our website ww.lecturists5.org/choice has a lot of information about uh the process. We believe that because we're still through the process, we'd like to present at our March uh 9th meeting a kind of followup of of where we are after the February 26 uh placement. Uh as our staff is constantly running through the applicant pool uh looking at placement, I want to talk about why and at the end we we did this, but what do we get? And um um I know it's hard uh to change, but I think the product that we have after that is a school with true feeder systems where
025um we don't have 10 elementary schools going to one intermediate school that there's parody in terms of how we prepare all of our elementary schools, support all our middle schools, and that the high schools are able to vertically articulate um there. I think also um and you'll hear tonight as we talk about a special education program that all schools now and I I applaud uh can handle self-contained within their community. Um we have seen in in some cases where certain schools had almost five sections of self-contained where other schools had not. And to we saw the success of that when nursery road um shared with Leapart two self-contained classes. We can see that placement um yes it's about location but it's more about the quality of services and having schools that take all of the
026districts self-contained uh classes. It's not fair not only to the students in the program but to the school hosting to be able to have all of our schools um meet their self-contained population. I think it's important and effective and so we also gain positionality by and efficiency uh by similar start times of our elementary, middle, high uh schools. So, I'm excited about the system that we're going to uh I look forward to the efficiencies that we can we get and I know change is hard, but I think because we're able to expand uh Lake Mary and Chapen Elementary through the referendum, we're off we're we're able to offer more choice uh back to to those schools. So again, by February 26, we should have another round of acceptances going out from the applicant pool as
027we transition to our new structure. >> Dr. Ross, I'm going to pause um for questions before we move to the next section of the superintendent's um report. Go ahead, Mr. Bum. >> We may have mentioned it before. What is the um the supervision time? For instance, like if I have one at Crossroads and I have one at Dutch Fork, is it 15 minutes? So, is it like 7:45 that we drop off at the middle schools? Will that still be accurate? >> Is the microphone It wasn't. It's usually 20 to 30 minutes before the actual start time. I don't have that specifically in front of me, but it's usually 20 to 30 minutes before the start time. >> Okay. Miss Huddle. >> Um Dr. Ross, could you go back to the slide that had like the
028dates and the process? Yeah. So um so when the lottery was conducted how did we determine how many slots were available at any given school? So the here she want the initial um prior to the lottery that was with principal support and we were able to collaborate with principal to look at um available seats as well as look at historical data as well as to what might be available uh in terms of open vacancies or seats within a school and a grade. I guess I'm trying to understand like what I'm hearing is that there were there are more seats now than there were at that time. Is that right? We're currently looking at and assessing all of the seat the available seats that remain so that we can again start that back filling process. Uh
029we've already started I might add to to part of what Dr. Ross shared. We've already started meeting uh the date of February 26 by addressing our employees and placing those students those requests as well as uh the students who uh had IEPs. We've already place that. So we are ahead of the game uh interestingly enough of that February 26 date that we've talked about. So we've already started that process and with whatever is remaining after that we'll begin backfilling others siblings and things of that nature. >> Okay. I guess I'm not I'm not asking my question clearly enough. I'm trying to understand like um when y'all did the lottery, someone figured out, let's just use an example that at Dutch Fork High School, ninth grade, there were 10 spots. Am I on to something here?
030Is this kind of the process? And then you you randomly pick and 10 people get and let's just and I know some of those people might have declined but how did we end up with more than 10 so that we can we filled them. How did we end up with more spots now? And I'm maybe there aren't in that. I'm just trying to understand because I I feel like a lot of people got really upset that maybe they didn't need to. So I'm trying to understand why we why we have more spots now than we had when we did the lottery. >> One of the things you can say is that you know there is an acceptance and decline period as well. So not everybody accepts a placement. Some people persons prefer other options than
031what they actually selected. So again that's an opportunity for us to back field that way also. Uh that makes a seat available. And so we'll begin that process again looking all of uh all of those who didn't get their first choice that perhaps would uh align them with their second choice. >> Okay. And a follow-up question if I may. Um so let's use my example again. Um there were 10 slots at Dutch Fork 9th grade. Two didn't accept. We have two spots open. Okay. And we have 10 people vying for that spot. One is a already attend Dutch Fork and got reszoned. One is a um sister of a older Dutch Fork student which is and another one is a teacher's child and then the other ones are not any of the above. What's the
032preference? That's a hypothetical, >> but it's a very real question and I mean I'm people are are asking and and I think that we need to be transparent and let them know. >> I think in full transparency and correct me if I'm wrong Dr. there's um you know we've always placed employees choice and I don't want to from take a hypothetical and everyone looks at that and then says um we make any comment off of a hypothetical they take it as actual. Uh so the the the reality is all of those are preferences. Um I don't know if we've had a situation where it's just that that perfectly wrong in there, but all of them are preferences. So I don't think we've ever declined an employee. Um is that correct? >> That's correct. We we
033do place an emphasis on and placing as many employee uh children as we possibly can and run the lottery thereafter. >> And I mean I might just make a note to um Miss Snipes that maybe once this is over we actually look at it and codify it into policy. There are other districts that do that. So, it's very clear what the preferences or the guarantees are. Um, just to help prevent people from getting upset that they know what the the deal is going on. Um, I also had a question if nobody else does, but I I'll I'll wait about the special ed. >> Dr. Harry has one and then we'll come back to you. >> So, Dr. Ross, item number five in your um list. Yes. Wow, that was quick. Um so if my child
034is currently zoned for Irmo Elementary, they're in the second grade and the lines are redrawn so that that attendance area now would go to Nursery Road. Will my child still go to Irma Elementary that they have been going to Irma Elementary the entire time? Not unless they applied for the the the lottery for school of choice. So if they were attending Irl Elementary School, the lines were redrawn and now the new school location is nursery road, then nursery road becomes the home school for the 26 27th school year. unless that family and that student applies for school of choice uh and or magnet because nursery is one of our magnet schools and they are accepted. So I I think part of the issue with the misunderstanding here is the language in number five. It should
035say newly zoned. So the way it reads to me is if you were already zoned for a school prior and now your zoning has been changed and you say they can stay in that school to the highest grade. There's the assumption by the public that whatever school they were zoned for previously they can stay in. That's honestly was one of my confusions as well. Now I understand this, but I wish that number five said newly zoned and previously approved choice and magnet programs. So that you have to go to your school that you were newly zoned for. You don't necessarily have the right to continue going to the school you were zoned for before unless you go through the choice process. that I think is a little bit confusing in that language. >> Yeah, I'll
036take that um recommendation. We'll add that. >> Um I had a a second question about um special education. So, am I right in understanding the IDA says that a change in placement of a special education student cannot occur without an IEP meeting? Is that correct? Placement is correct, but location is not placement. >> I'm getting there. And so it also says that location does not constitute a change in placement. >> Correct? >> So while you may not want to do this without an IEP meeting, an IEP meeting is not necessary to move a special ed student to another school provided the services that they are entitled to is are available at that school. Legally, probably. Yes. But there will be conversation for sure. >> Of course. I just want to make sure that we're we're
037going by the letter of the law here. >> Yes. >> Thank you, Miss Nuts. I I also want to remind folks that the previous model that we saw that the structure that we're in right now, I mean, students are going all over the place. This will give us more structure. I know that we're trying to work our way through this to make it as easy and as accommodating for all parents, but imagine the previous structure we had how many elementary schools feeding crossroad 10 elementary schools coming from all over going to cross roads and then going out to other schools. So uh and the other thing is is um we want need to remind ourselves too that school enrollment is fluid. Um we had how many different? 600 students different from the previous year to
038this year. What was the change Dr. Ross? Somewhere around 600 students came and went. So we have a lot of transition. So we're I mean the I'm sure that the staff is doing their best to give their you know stay on top of this and accommodate everybody but we'll have folks that'll move out from here and then all during the summer people will come and go. So this is a very fluid operation as well. So um it's it's very difficult challenge and uh to look at singledigit numbers can be a pretty difficult thing. Miss Huttle, did you still have a question? >> Yeah, I just had a question um about the the special education. So, I I wanted to kind of understand more why that decision was made and um because we had some parents
039at the last meeting that that were um not obviously not happy with it. So, could you talk more about like why that decision was made and um any parental andor um teacher involvement in making that change? >> See decisions won't be clear >> the change what I understand is we had um in the elementary school level, special education, children did not always go to their zone school before, right? Um, and the change was made to um expand special education back to all zone schools. And I'm asking like why did that decision what can you give us some more background on on the rationale behind it and what kind of communications occurred with special ed parents and teachers as part of that decision-making process? I want to I'll start out and then I'm gonna turn it
040over to Miss McCascal. Kind of what I saw. I think the the biggest piece and no one likes to change location, but I want to talk about effectiveness for a while. Um we're really not talking about all special education. What you're talking about is intensive services. Intensive services or self-contained classes where we need uh more supervision, more adults in there. Um, we were getting the criticisms at first that students could not get those services of self-contained in their home school and that we had to move them across the district to receive those services. And I understand that they get comfortable, but that new family doesn't understand why you're moving them in, and the old family doesn't understand why you're putting them back in the in the in the home piece. We're explaining to both families
041all the time, one family why they can't go to their neighborhood school and another family why we're moving them back to their neighborhood school. Uh so we don't want win on both of those those fronts. But uh I did see that as we have since October I think 200 more identified special education students um responding to effectiveness of the programs. One of our schools had five self-contained classes um just for one staff at an elementary school. Um the needs of that those teachers, the administration um it's it was a lot in terms of operational um and last year when we did this did the same thing last year. ago. Uh we moved two of those five self-contained from um nursery road to Leapart and um had those conversations. If you look even Leapart may want
042to grow into their self-contained classes. So it's working very well. Uh we did the same thing this year uh because of the pressure at Old Point. And uh if you've been in Oak Point, you've seen I think we have five self that entire hall. Um students need to be served in their in their neighborhood schools. And I I think for the new families, they'll understand. Thank you. You can serve my child in the neighborhood we move to. For the families that love the schools that we go to, you know, it is tough to say that we're going to we're going to return you back to your neighborhood school. Um, but in terms of the the internal process, that's at a 30,000 ft foot view of why this structure is going to work for us. But
043kind of in the in the in the details, Miss McCascal, you want to share uh how that implicate implementation works? >> I can share this now, but the presentation also has that in it. You want to wait for the presentation or if you want me to go ahead. It's it's >> wait to the presentation that you prepared. Thank you. I'm sorry. Go ahead, Miss Abum. I'll save most of the questions regarding that after the presentation, but maybe I don't know if this is a lot of work or maybe it's something that we can do simply, but as a special education parent, my daughter, would it be possible maybe for each school with their the families they currently have now to do before the end of the school year? It can even be informal and up
044to each principal just kind of informational session almost like an open house for special education families to say hey because you know there may be some grandparents that don't follow all this some parents even single parents I just want to make sure that they're fully aware >> and we will start messaging this on our calendar it's on the big calendar but it's hard to see that that turn alluded to that to make sure I chunk it. Um every school will have their openhouse uh welcoming sessions uh as we go through the placement. So that will include those families as well so that you can for every child meet the teacher, meet the the principal, walk the the building, learn about car pickup rhymes. Uh we want to do the uh orientations for the faculty first
045and then once we get those uh acclimated, we'll do the the staff there. Do we have any other questions or Dr. Ross? >> All right. So, now our academics report. Uh, Miss Tina McCass. >> I'm sorry, Dr. um Ross. I didn't see that. Mr. Scully had his hand up. >> Oh, I'm sorry. >> Yeah, Dr. Ross. I just wanted to say that relating back to the the choice question and preference I think it's okay to say we have a waterfall because it in terms of preference because every industry is going to have a finance has a waterfall how you spend your money follows this path. Um, and I think it's perfectly acceptable to say and acknowledge that teacher choice children have have the the first priority if that's the case or whatever it may be.
046And I know people have brought up having um siblings being split up. I mean, that kind of cuts both ways. I had four kids in the district at the same time. One of them got into Spring Hill. if because they're siblings. Should I have knocked out three other families just so all four of my kids could go to Spring Hill because one of them wanted to? And so I, you know, I I don't think that would have been fair either. So I think uh it's okay even if siblings get separated and sent to different schools if that's their choice. Um they always have the choice to go to for the whole family to go to their zone school. So it's not like we're intentionally splitting people up. and I didn't want my one child that
047went to Spring Hill to get denied because the three others didn't get in or get selected. So, I um I'm I'm supportive of that. I I think it's perfectly okay for for us to say we have a waterfall. I don't think we need to codify it uh because then that does limit flexibility and the the the district's ability to kind of move with the fluidity as our needs change. But it's certainly uh okay to if you want to communicate that. I mean it's okay to acknowledge that. So that's just my opinion. >> Thank you, Miss McCascal. >> Good evening, Madam Chair, Dr. Ross, board. I am so excited tonight to be able to um introduce the academic report because you're fixing to be in for a treat. So, I'm going to turn it over to
048some really amazing students and let them um tell you all about the wonderful things that they're doing with businesses. Hi. Hi. We are here to represent Dutch High School studentled business call of the Foxes profession. I am Luke. I am Gabriel. Hi, we are here to represent Irma High School Kids in the kitchen. I'm Claudia Manu. >> Please enjoy the video. We continue to talk about our business. Hey Nicholas, what is a studentled business? >> A studentled business is an opportunity to help us learn real skills and connections like marketing marketing, sales and operations and financial literacy. Hey Aiden, what are the benefits of a studentled business? >> We are learning skills in communication, independence, ted time management, networking, budgeting, and public service skills to help us grow into active citizens in our community. >>
049Hey guys, what is our goal? Our goal is to have the opportunity to obtain skills and knowledge that will help us after high school. We want a job for you success outside of school. >> Herson, what do you like most about our studentled business at Dudge Fork? >> I like learning new skills and showing everyone what we can do and being more independent. I also like learning how to get and keep a job and learning how to work with my peers. >> Mine, how have you been able to give back to the community that donated resources to you for the studentled red business? And thanks to our sponsors, we were able to put on the talent show for our community, created thank you baskets, sent Christmas cards to generations of Irmo in taping and also
050gift our products to others in our community. and we are in the process of getting ideas of what to do for Easter. Let's What are you making? I need my >> quit. No. >> Do you want to continue to grow your studentled business? >> Maggie, do you want to continue to lead your grow your studentled business? Thanks, >> Jordan. Do you want to continue to grow your studentled business? >> I do. >> All right. Thank you. >> Hey, Myra, what are the steps to creating a studentled business? to leave the losers make a mission statement and make a lot of jobs. >> What do you like most about our student le business at Armo? >> Student kit in the kitchen. it. And we both we have different jobs that we have to do to make
051sure to make the product. And then we have to we all collaborate to help put together the product that we're making. >> Quinnel, what challenges have you faced when working on the business? Waiting. I'm waiting. Hey, Victoria. What advice would you give to others who want to start a business? >> Okay. Reading. >> Reading. >> Victoria is correct. It is important to do your reading and research on your studentled business because you want to understand the fundamentals, have the proper resources, and be prepared for anything. This would improve your succession in your studentled businesses. Does anybody else have any questions? >> Just a second. >> Can we um get a list or can we get buy stuff from your organization? Can we can somebody contact us so we can buy some of your products? >>
052We'd love to. >> Great job. So pretty. Okay. What time do we need? Smile. One, two, three. And you notice the teachers stood back because and they were like, "No, no, I don't need to get up there because they want the students to be front and center and it's on them to do these jobs and so they do not." But I just want to make sure that we give the teachers a round of applause because the work that they do is amazing as well. So you cannot not have a warm heart after that, right? Like there's just absolutely no way. Great stuff happening. So now we're going to talk about this um programming. So Miss Huddle, this is back to your question. Um this slide will kind of help us a little bit about the
053why. This has been discussed for about three years now in terms of where the programming is and how we're serving students and just the whole idea of students having to be moved out of their neighborhood and into another neighborhood and then back to their neighborhood and not being around the students that they might see every day at their homes. And so we've talked a lot about that. Whenever the resoning was taking place, we decided, well, why don't we do it all at one time? Not so sure if I looked back on it that maybe that was the best timing, but you know what? It is the timing. So it is what's best for students. So the timing of it doesn't really play into this a whole lot. Um, when we think about being community and
054being within an area of what we know, this will put students in areas that they know. They won't be bus, they won't have to be on a bus for long periods of time. They'll be able to be um, again, like I said, with students and with adults that they see in their neighborhoods. the collaboration piece of parents getting to know their community and staying within their pathway. And so from an elementary to a middle to a high school, the communication that can happen from one school to the next and that fluidity of practices. We've talked about like even our CKH being able to, you know, have an entire pathway of how we implement um character traits, way we do our different expectations, things like that. Just trying to be as consistent within those areas as
055we possibly can. Um the equity is there. We can provide FAPE and in every school and in a few minutes you'll see where some of the programs and how every school will have certain programs. there only our most comprehensive students that won't necessarily be in their zone school, but they will all be in their pathway. Um, so that's important. So then we look at the three different types of services and we've even changed the names of these a little bit and I'll try to correlate the names of what you're used to hearing versus what the new name is so that maybe that makes sense to you a little bit. But but strategic instruction is what we have always called resource students. So those are your lowest level of need of of support. Um so they
056go into general education classes but they may need to be pulled out for like an hour a day or very small amounts of the day that they may need some additional assistance. your intensive instruction are self-contained students, but these are self-contained students that that may be mainstreamed as well into um some general ed classrooms, but they do have some self-contained needs that they they need to be in a a little more closed, smaller setting for their for their needs. And then you have your comprehensive instruction. Those are students who typically are they're going to be on an alt assessment. they're they're taking off-grade level assessments. They're not taking grade level assessments. Those are students who are your those are your smaller numbers of students and those are the students that may not be in their
057zone school in all cases. A lot of cases they will be but I'll give one instance. Um there's three elementary schools that have total of seven students that would fit into a comprehensive class. It doesn't make sense to put two students in a classroom with a teacher and an assistant in one school and two with a teacher and assistant in another school and three and a teacher and assistant another school for seven students. So those seven students would be in the same pathway but they would be at one elementary school. So So that's that's the intensive services. Again, like I just said, strategic and intensive would be at every school and then the comprehensive programs would always be within the pathway of for that student. The other really cool thing about having every school having
058both the strategic and the intensive is that the needs of the child can be met within whatever setting that needs to happen. So, a comprehensive child may not need to be in a self-contained classroom all day long. They might can get some of their needs met in the resource classroom, the strategic classroom. They might can get some of their needs by going into the general ed classroom. Maybe an assistant might follow them in just to help make sure that they can get the material that they need while other students might need to be in the classroom 100% of the time. So, so really this gives every school that opportunity to be fluid with those services and ensure that we have the specialized instruction that takes place to meet the needs of all of those students
059in whatever area they might need it in. Um, again, that's what I was just talking about was just being able to be fluid, placed on needs, flexible with the instruction, really matching the student to what support they need instead of you have to be a resource student or you have to be a self-contained student or you have to be with the intent with the comprehensive which is extreme with some medical needs and things like that. It just allows a little more fluidity in a in a respectful manner for all students. Not only to say the diverse culture that every school will be able to experience. That in and of itself speaks volumes. I know at parent advisory recently a parent spoke up to to just show appreciation for just that to be able to ensure
060that all students had what was needed to ex to be accepting of all students and to see what that does to a culture within a building because that to be able to have a buddy um schools that have you know unified PE where where you've got you've got buddies you've got general ed population with the special ed population and they're helping each other. There is something there for empathy and for compassion that just doesn't come any other way. And this is going to be a way for us to do that in all schools and to be able to create that for all students. So, I'm very excited about that. You also ask about um special ed funding. This is the 2425 year. So, this is not the current year. This way we could actually give
061you expenditures versus the budget. Um so this is last year's information. So this is the grant revenue that we um took in for special ed. Underneath you'll see it's broken down a little more as to exactly what it's what it's you know what it's paying for. That's just the grants. And just so you know, we were cut about $85,000 for the 2526 year and anticipating more cuts coming from the federal from IDEIDA. Um for 2425, again, this is total expenditures. So what this means is that the general fund added into the grants, this is the total expenditures for special ed. Um and I and I want to caution you a little bit about this because this is all inclusive of everything. So I special ed falls under me. Part of my salary is in that.
062So anyone who is a part of special ed in any way is inclusive in this. Okay. So I just want to make sure that that you understand that about this as well. And then what I thought was very interesting, Heather and I looked into this um that the total population of students was 15.2% were special ed population and 16.4% of the total expenditures were special ed funded. So when you look at that, it really kind of goes hand in hand. It it it is very very balanced there. So, I'm going to stop there and I want to recognize the person standing beside me very quietly. Sarah Weber is our um coordinator for special services. Miss Friend has had a family emergency and can't be with us tonight, but their department, their work has been phenomenal.
063And I want to make sure that I say that. She has been on speed dial um through lots and lots of things. And we have to understand that there are people who have to they have to we have to have people that keep us on the legal side of things. This is this person. She she keeps us on the legal side of things. She doesn't always give us the answers that we want because there are times when I call her and I say Sarah and she'll tell me and I'll say no Sarah try again. I need a different answer. She said Tina that's the legal answer. There is no other answer. And so we have to have those people. and I appreciate that about about her. So, I just want to make sure that I
064recognize her and and tell her how much I do appreciate her. So, I'm gonna stop there because that's all the special ed slides and um see if there are any questions. >> Mr. Bean. >> Well, first of all, thank y'all. This is an excellent presentation, very good information, and possibly I don't know if it's way to maybe clip the presentation that you're doing or do it in a scale down format to email out to all sped families or some sort of handout because as a parent, I mean, this is great. It breaks it down, explains it so we can understand it. And I think that's that's the big key is like y'all said is communication. So, but I just want to say thank you for the work on this. Thank you for helping with the
065reorganization and getting this right because it's incumbent on us to take care of these students because they need us for sure. Um, with the cuts in the budget specifically, do we need to look at realigning some of our budget aspects to because specifically in the high school classes, my daughter's class, we can't lose an assistant. You know, they need she's compliant, but there may be some that need additional help. So, is that something that we need to look at? >> Jenny, Heather, and I have already we've been meeting like two or three times already this year. We're already looking at that and what that needs to look like. So, that's already in the process. >> Good. That's all for right now. Um, Miss Mr. Satderfield and then Miss Barhard, do you have something? Oh, you
066might. >> So, um, one question I had is on the strategic instruction. um the students that fit in that category. Um if a student needs help with something like a learning disability like dyslexia, is that included in there? That would be an example. Okay. >> Yeah. So that would be strategic. Well, it could be in different categories, but if it's a minor, it would probably be strategic. >> Okay. And I was curious and um I'm putting Miss Tucker on the on the hook here, but is that is are these categories the same? I know that the state does weighted pupil units and there's a weighted pupil units for children with disabilities, right? Is it the same? Is there their criteria the same and it's a one for one or is there a difference there? >>
067Okay. >> It is done by their primary primary area of disability. It's not done by the amount of service they receive. >> Okay. So on an IEP, we look at a student's primary area of disability and then if they have secondary and the state's funding goes by the area of disability, not how much service they receive. >> Okay? So if a student maybe that's another way of asking it. If a student has an IEP, when we get the money from the state for the operating budget, I'm not talking about the idea, do they're counted as a disabled student if they have IEP. How about a 504? >> They are counted, but the funding is not the same. >> Okay. So, a 504 is a weighted pupil unit different than a than the disability. >> Yes.
068>> Okay. >> I don't think we get extra money. >> I don't think there's any extra money for 504s. That's just general ed. So, 504s are not extra extra funding. There's not an extra like a 1.0. But to go back to your point on the like the IEP, there are children with IEP that for for dyslexia that can um need extra help but can function in in a regular classroom versus there are children who are medically complex needs and they're in the comprehensive which is very resource intent. I'm not saying dyslexia is not but comparatively much more resource intensive and the state treats those the same as far as funding. Thank you, Mr. Satderfield. >> Um, I was going just going to say that I appreciate you talking about the impact on the regular uh
069student body. It's powerful. It really is. It really adds to the school climate and the morale and just across the board. It's it's it's great for the regular ed students, too. So, just I want to say thank you for mentioning that, >> Mr. Bum. We may have this and I'm just not aware when we're recruiting like our special education teachers and assistants. Is there or could there be some sort of incentive because obviously they there's stuff they face that not everybody realizes and it's tough, you know, psychologically. Is that something that we offer now or we could? >> They're looking at me for that one. Um, you know, I think as we go through the budget process, we'll have another opportunity to talk about, you know, what we can do. Um, we do offer for
070firsttime teachers the Ner program, which um, I think is a great incentive across the board and I just think, you know, the the best hearing your words mean a lot. I think one we we financial incentives are huge, don't get me wrong, but climate and culture is the best way to recruit. and uh for folks that come to a district that's supportive uh that will wrap around resources around them I think is the best incentive we can get. But I think um we're certainly open to during the budget process looking at other things that we can do. >> I will say the special ed assistants are at a level class level nine whereas um general teaching assistants are a level eight. So special ed assistants are at a little higher pay grade. >> Thank you.
071Anybody else? All right. >> Okay. Now, I'm going to celebrate some more. Try to celebrate as much as I can tonight. So, your tutoring that you passed for us, we want to appreciate that greatly, and I want to give you an update. This is week one. Um, we had 792 students that participated in week one. We had 167 teachers participate in week one and seven of the schools had counseling services in week one. When I came to you with this dream, um I was very concerned. I was not sure we would be able to have enough teachers that could give extra time after school because you give a lot during the day. I didn't know. Our teachers have just been phenomenal. They have said our kids need it. They've stepped up and they are doing
072such just intentional and strategic instruction. And they're not, it's not just homework help. They are identifying specific needs. They're identifying the success criteria that the child is missing. And they are really targeting those areas. And so I'm very excited about what this can have, what this can bring for us. So I want to say thank you. And I just wanted to give you a little bit of data. I can't give you much more than that, but um a little bit of data um to let you know what what your what your commitment is doing for our students. So thank you. And then finally, I will celebrate um the teaching and learning conference. Uh the academics department works diligently to try to provide professional development so that our teachers can continue to grow. And just to
073see on on this slide what one of the teachers said, when we take time to share our ideas, resources, and support, everyone, especially our students win. So the more our teachers can collaborate and learn from each other, the more our students win. And that's what's so great about this conference. We had so many of our own teachers that are presenting. It's and now we have um businesses that are reaching out vendors. They want to be sponsors. They they all we had a vendor that sponsored these cooler bags for all the presenters. They they're they went to Costco, bought all the snacks for us. I mean, they want to be a part of what we're doing with our teachers and really want to provide the atmosphere of a true professional conference right here within the district.
074And so, um, just kudos to the staff that they created this and thank you to the teachers that participated and just continue to learn from each other. I just really want to to say how how much I appreciate that from them. So, thank you very much, >> Mascal. Um, one question. I know you've answered this before, but I forgot the answer. What were the um kind of the the criteria, the milestones that were used to se to target the or select students for the tutoring? >> So, for elementary um we looked at students who were between the 20th and 30th percentile in ELA and or math. Um, and then in the middle school, it was still the same 20th to 30th percentile and failing a subject. Um, and again, the target was ELA or math.
075When you get into the high school, it's um looking at your four core subjects and students who had a 65 or below. Um, many of our high schools are targeting math specifically um because that's an area that we're finding with the new math standards that we're we're seeing a little more of a struggle with our students. And so, they're really targeting that area. And I had a a follow-up question. Um, and this might be Mr. Satderfield part answer, but um, when my daughters went to Chapen High School, they actually had some studentled tutoring and and so I was curious if if there's any thought to to doing that because I think it was pretty successful. >> Dr. Ross, you had lots of conversation about that. >> We we did use students for after school tutoring.
076I think um we were using that as a as you heard Mr. council said we're wondering if we're going to get enough teachers will we come in with the student le but 167 teachers signed up and so we're going to we're going to begin with the teachers if there is a situation where we were going to overload then we use I think we use AP students or something like that >> right and we would just we would have to really dig into how that would look and what the supervision of that and things like that would be >> castle what was the first week of the tutoring two weeks ago. Uh what was that? February 9th, I believe, was the first day. >> And how often are they meeting? Is it different depending on the
077levels or >> Right. So elementary is three days a week. Middle and high school is two days a week. So elementary is Monday, Wednesday, Thursday. Middle schools are and high schools are Mondays and Wednesdays. Uh, Miss McKascal, I know that you said whenever you started this, you were kind of wondering how it would go and then the numbers, 792 students and 167 teachers. That's amazing. Do you see that rising now that people are knowing that this is going on and and seeing those numbers get larger just based off of um the participation that you already have? >> I haven't heard of I've there's been like onesie twoosies here or there added. Um, so I haven't heard of a lot of additions, but honestly, whenever I had schools reach out to parents, they had to commit.
078So, this isn't a drop in. Um, because for long-term sustained change, it's going to take a commitment. And so, I I really I'm not looking for that to happen. Um, now at the end of the quarter, middle and high school may have some changes and and that's that's going to be expected. Elementary will be more consistent. And then of course with middle with high school, we have EOC and AP sessions coming up. So six weeks prior to the test, which is coming up in the next couple of weeks, we'll be starting that. So then you will see some increase in numbers because of those sessions that are those study sessions for the testing. >> Well, like I said, I mean looks like um it's working. So congratulations. >> Thank you. >> Anybody? Oh, >> one
079last question. If parents have questions about their students that may be involved in the 18 to 21 program, what who who best to reach out because I know it's a little bit different setup. We're trying to transition it to Spring Hill. Just as far as I've had some reach out, they just weren't sure on communication and I want to get them to the right people. >> Sure. And they can talk with their placement chairs at their school and if that's if they still have questions after that, >> um, Miss Friend, Miss Weber or myself, we're happy to to speak to them about that. We've got about 30 to 32 students for that program for next year. Um, so we have not we've had one student say that they're not planning to return, but other than
080that we've we've got about 32 students. >> And just because I wasn't sure, how do we do transportation? Is it on on the parents that need to transport them or do we offer phone? >> Right. Anytime they're not going to their zone to school, transportation can be provided. Um, if >> from their home school even right, >> thank you. >> Any other questions? Right. Thank you, M. >> That concludes the superintendent's report. >> Thank you, Dr. Ross. Do we have any additional questions? Perfect. All right, that takes us to the approval of the minutes of the February 6 board planning workshop. Do I have a motion? Make a motion to approve the minutes of the February 6th, 2026 board planning workshop meeting. >> Second. >> All in favor. And the motion carries. 70. Can I
081get a motion to approve the minutes of the February 9th board meeting? >> Make a motion to approve the minutes of the February 9th, 2026 board meeting. >> All in favor? And the motion carries 7 to zero. That moves us to public participation. The board welcomes and encourages public participation. We respectfully ask that you adhere to the procedures provided in board policy BEDH public participation at meetings. Your comments should be limited to three minutes and must remain on either the topic noted on your signin form or a listed agenda item. Questions asked during public participation will be handled in accordance with board policy BEDH. >> Thank you, Madam Chair. We have one speaker tonight. Beth Le Prey is here to speak about the additional band supplement for Irma High School. Good evening. My name is
082Beth Lestrey. I am president of the Irma band booster club and I'm also a parent of three band students at Irmo High School and Middle School that are involved in the arts and Escalore's magnets. It has been brought to our attention that the funds for approved budget for the additional band supplements in the amount of $30,000 was never deposited into the high school band account. Historically, we received those funds July 1st, but we were aware that the cyber attack would possibly deploy those deposits. With the end of the year fast approaching, we have yet uh to get any updates as to where that money went after several inquiries. The band depends on uh those funds for logistics during both marching band and winter guard competition seasons as well as region and all state band. Without
083them, we as parents have started taking money out of our own pockets to cover such things such as prop transportation to competitions, uniform mending and repair and cleaning and also uh a few other things to do with the students and that is outside of the many fundraisers we have already done and are doing and the fees that we already pay. I stand before you today asking for clarification and transparency as to whether or not we will see those funds this year and to ask if we won't if they will be added to the funds that we should be expecting for the 2026 2027 school year. I'm not sure if that you are aware that we have been bumped from class 3A to class 4A. That means that we will be on a larger stage competing
084with much bigger bands. Without those funds, we will not be successful in in the p like we have been in the past and we will not be able to maintain the things that we've been doing. We want to bring Irmo back to the main stage and we want to bring the bands of Irmo back to what we know they can be. I speak on behalf of all the band boosters when I say that we look forward to any information you can provide and the decisions that you will be making regarding ruling over this year's funds in addition to next year's. Thank you for your time and your consideration in this matter. >> Thank you. That moves us to our action agenda. Starting with actions as necessary on matters discussed in executive session. Do I have
085any motions? >> Make a motion to approve selected employment items as seen in exhibit A. >> All in favor? And the motion carries seven to zero. >> Uh make a motion to approve the contractual matter regarding supplemental study as shown in exhibit D. All in favor and the motion carries seven to zero. That moves us um to the approval of renewal of park school agreement between Irma Chap and Rack and school district 5. Do I have a motion? >> Make a motion to approve the renewal of park school agreement between Irma Chapen Recreation Commission and School District 5 of Lexington and Richland counties as seen in exhibit F. Any questions? All those in favor? And the motion carries. Seven zero. That moves us to the approval of third and final reading of proposed revisions to
086board policy GBE staff conduct. >> Make a motion to approve the third and final reading of proposed revisions to board policy GBE staff conduct as seen in exhibit G. >> We have any Additional questions? All those in favor? And the motion carries. Seven to zero. And that moves us to approval of the 2627 board meeting schedule. >> I make a motion to approve the proposed 2026 2027 board meeting schedule as seen in exhibit H. >> Second. >> All in favor? And the motion carries seven to zero. That moves us to the discussion agenda with the discussion of the 2627 budget calendar. Thank you, Madam Chair, me trustees, members of the community. Uh today is really an opportunity to see if there's any discussion on the proposed budget calendar. Uh just kind of going through as
087we looked at our priorities. uh we talked about for school five is addressing the challenges of cost of living for uh LR5 mainly uh for our staff uh as we talk about the amount of South Carolinians struggling to afford those basic needs. Uh so for parents uh we're looking at ways to help with college reducing the cost of college. Uh so our priority is to approve the associates degree pathway uh at Harvest and campus and Mentless Tech. Uh we looked at our advisory report from uh last year regarding the uh this current operational budget. Uh, and we asked about the future um, uh, board priorities uh, for the future budget. And we talked about teacher pay raise, lower class size, uh, substitute pay, additional sped personnel, additional safety and security personnel, staff pays raised, and
088additional instructional support personnel. Uh, just wanted to share some of the progress we're making on the teacher pay raise side. Um currently of the 72 school districts uh you can see where we are in terms of the average teacher pay. Um we are following the legislature as they talk about um the additional funds that are providing through state aid to classroom. Um as we look at our class sizes you can see that lex 5 um has more teachers than uh funded by the state. So, it's about 70 teachers where we take uh there's no supplement. We take 100% of the cost on locally. Uh I think there's about six districts in the state of South Carolina that have more teachers or more funded instructional positions uh more actual funded positions than the funded positions. Uh
089so this year we really like to focus on the staff pay raise. um has been shared how important it is in a lot of our programs to have our support staff um in in good position. And right now, if you look at our lowest class, our um student nutrition operator, class six, uh that starting year is below the federal poverty level. And so it is our goal to look at our current support staff schedule um look at that first level and delete it and move all levels uh up one level. Um, by doing that, by moving advancing those pay sales up one level, uh, that would essentially keep the salary class system the same would be an opportunity to, um, get those positions above the federal poverty level. And so, uh, as a result, we're
090operating on these three budget priorities, addressing the cost of living, the academic interventions that, um, you heard Miss will talk about and the increased supervision uh through expectation coaches and cyber security monitoring. Uh so in order to meet this uh again I published this but it's very hard to read. So, just as um for the board's sake, um as we go through March 23rd, um we we're looking at the reappoints and the strategic plan amendments, giving us an idea of kind of where we are as an administration on uh personnel and strategic plan. On April the 20th, uh that's when we'll present our budget book and have a discussion. And so right now between uh we're working on getting feedback from all the advisories. We'll bring that back to you. You'll see all of their
091priorities from the student advisories, the teachers, uh the staff, um the administ the principles, directors. We're gathering all those priorities um to bring back to you for that budget discussion on April 20th, uh May 4th. we would like to hold first reading of the budget and be uh for our second and final reading of the budget with our public hearing on June the 8th. Uh so just wanted to pause any questions, thoughts about this budget calendar. Um we would like to hear that now as this would uh help us better prepare uh to be successful for this budget season. Miss Huttle. >> Um just a suggestion that um when we had the the lady from Spartanberg that did the the workshop, uh she suggested that the board agree on their operating priorities, which Dr. Ross,
092you did have a slide on that, but I don't know that we've actually like agreed on it. Um and then also the same thing on the capital. Um and I believe there were some priorities that came out of the budget workshop. So, I might just suggest as an agenda item earlier than later that we revisit um both of those priorities um at maybe like the next meeting or the March 23rd meeting before we start getting into the details of the budget. >> And I I would just just say one thing as we collect the feedback from the advisories if we can do it after that so that way they know that their input is being considered. That's Mr. Satderfield. >> Yeah. Uh, one thing I'd like to just sort of mention at this time, I
093know that we when we've talked about budgeted items over the past year, I think all of us have said teacher pay. That's the reason if we look at the the priorities, the board's priorities, teacher pay and lower class size. We've said it all said it several times. When I say teachers pay, I mean everybody. I'm talking about support staff, too. I'm hoping that we're not going to just jot it bump them up just over the poverty limit. I'm hoping that we'll be more aggressive. I know that uh down in the Charleston area, they're like 10 grand more a year, correct? Somewhere in the neighborhood of that. Um and and maybe to as a result of several various extenuating circumstances. I'm I don't know. But I would just like for us to be a little more
094aggressive when it comes to sour. We all know that people are struggling. They're struggling to pay their bills and uh we're hearing all the great things that teachers doing. I mean, heck, who wouldn't stand and applaud all the the fine things they're doing? And uh I I uh I had mentioned before that it used to be people we would have lines at during job fairs. They'd be 20 people long in each line, at each table. Um, a lot had some of that had to do with the atmosphere, obviously, all the services, but a lot had to do with the salaries, too. So, um, I I would just hope that maybe we could have some look at a couple of different options and ideas when it came to salaries. Um, I think that our ladies in
095the cafeteria, we have a I know we're short a lot. We have turnover and uh I think that we should be paying them more. So, again, I know we've all said it, we've all brought it up, we've all made it a priority and talked about that as a priority. Um, I just hope we as a board will be a little more aggressive, if for a lack of a better term, when it comes to that. So, >> thank you, Mr. Satderfell. I have the same concerns as far as the support um positions go. Um, did you have your hand up, Mr. Bum? And then back to you, M. It was to are the cafeteria staff paid out of our budget or is that through their own funding? >> Uh we set the amount but they're paid
096out of their own funding. >> Okay. And then lost my train of thought. Going to >> um I just wanted to I guess ask maybe um at our next meeting or when it's appropriate. I know that the um the state legislature is looking at um and gotten pretty far along with eliminating um the difference differential on boat taxes um and also the increasing the homestead exemption. And I could be wrong, but I don't think that they're making that money up. So, I think it would be good to um sooner than later. I I did um ask the auditor for some information, which I'll share with all the board members. probably already have it because I was just curious how much money it was and being on the lake. It's a lot of money. Um but
097anyway, just to update maybe at at our next meeting or after that what we think the impact is going to be to us um from that and um how much of it we might be able to make up um for you know because either the reassessment was more than we thought or because collections are higher. But um do we have the ability to make any of that up? We have about three things that we're tracking. The homestead, the uh boats and trailer u motor I'm sorry, boats and the motor uh piece and also um healthc care going through the formula. So >> musical mics. Um and also the governor's proposed for the um all students to have a free breakfast, but then there's also the changes in the big beautiful bill that reduce SNAP and
098TANF benefits. So there's an an offset there, too. So there's quite a few things that we're looking at from a legislative perspective. what it's going to impact her budget. >> Can I ask one more question? Is it there not a proposed proviso also to change the formula for funding for schools for students? That's correct. That's what's going through now. It's a proviso 1.3. Uh there are those nine recommendations that are on there from the RFA. We're following that. We're going to have a legislative breakfast, I think March the 4th, uh to basically advocate and explain to our legislators the positionality this puts in. You heard during Miss Mcowllo's piece that we're also seeing reduced funding federally from um uh our our title series and so we're seeing contractions on all all ends. Um but the
099the power bill is the same or going up. So, we we will um we wanted to agree on this calendar so that uh when M Tucker's team starts to put this together with our staff, I mean with the with the rest of the staff's input that we can get around April 20th with more realistic view uh as we track what's going on in the legislature. >> Okay. So, it was tied into what Miss Huddle and Mr. Satico kind of asked. So, with those five items that could potentially bring back or take away funding, um, with increasing teacher pay, which is a board priority, the only way to do that is increasing revenue, >> right? >> Increase revenue or you cut expenditures. That's only way to make that. >> So, just go ahead and get that
100out there. I just want because we talked about it at the budget workshop and so we can go ahead and get that out there. I'm going to follow up with just a plea to anyone that's watching and the board members is talk to your legislators. I mean, the the state says they have a lot of money. Well, if they want to cut, it's kind of ironic. They want to cut boat taxes. Well, we're the ones that are going to lose. And the same thing um with the homestead exemption. I'm not saying they're bad ideas, but if the state thinks they're so great, maybe they can help make up the money. Um because otherwise what's going to happen is the counties and the school districts are just going to raise their millage rate. And so now
101the people without boats are going to get to pay for the boat taxes, right? So just, you know, and um I've the articles that I've seen in the media don't even talk about this. They make it sound like, oh, your taxes are going to go down. Well, counties still got to pave roads and they still got to pick up trash and we still have to educate children. So, you know, they're going to raise your taxes. It's It's not it it's it's one sum of money and if one group is paying less, everyone else is going to pay more. Thank you. Anybody else? All right. Thank you, Dr. Ross. >> I make a motion to adjurnn. >> Second. >> All in favor? Thank you y'all. Have a good night. We're journ.