001It is 5:00 p.m. I'm going to call the September 8th meeting to order. Can I get a motion to approve the agenda? Yeah, I'd like to make a motion to approve the agenda. >> Can I get a second? >> And Miss Snipes, I'd like to um move to amend the agenda >> to move items um items 18 and 19 from exhibit A um executive session to move those to open discussion and open vote on the action agenda immediately after item 12. >> Second. Um, I move to amend the agenda to move line items 18 and 19 from exhibit A, which is on in executive session, to move those two line items to a new action agenda item under item 12, so that we can have discussion and vote in public. I heard Mr. Bum second.
002I'm not looking at my packet and I'm not sure if others are. Can you please tell us what you're referencing and maybe why >> um and I have something I'd like to put in the minutes. Um so those two line items are not about specific people. They're about stipens. And I raised this issue in a in a previous meeting, but the foyer law in South Carolina gives an exemption for executive session that's based on discussion of employment, appointment, compensation, promotion, demotion, discipline, or release of an employee, a student, a person regulated by a public body or the appointment of a person. And my understanding is that the law is geared to protect the person's privacy. Since this isn't about a person, I don't think it belongs in executive session. and it should be discussed and
003voted on in public and not in executive session. >> Dr. Ros, are those positions um new? Can you do you want to respond or >> I mean we can we can talk about them in We can discuss these in open session. I have no objection. They are stipens. So they're >> okay. Um, I guess what we would need is just clarification moving forward with any uh positions that we talk about. We typically do ask for approval for positions. No action happens in executive session. >> All of it would have to happen in open session, but if we just wanted to handle those two in open session, we have no objection. >> Okay, that's fine. All right, we have a motion. Um, Mr. Satfield, >> I had a question. I don't have my packet in front
004of me either. I wish I did. that I could flip to it right now. Um um I'm trying to ask the question before without >> there. Yeah, there's stipens for a um a booster club wants to help pay a stipen and then the other one is stipens for tutoring. >> I just it it would be really helpful to get some of these prior to the we get in here so we have some idea to do a little research because I obviously didn't know what you're talking about at all. >> No, I agree. I apologize. I had a very long weekend and I did not even notice this until like 2:00 this afternoon and I did text um Miss Knight to let her know. >> So, we have a motion on the floor and it's been
005properly second. All in favor of Miss um Huddle's a motion to remove two of the line items to the discussion agenda. Um um I ask that you please vote. All right. And the motion um carries six to zero. Now back to the original motion on the floor um uh to the approve of the agenda. All those in favor? All oppose. Great. And the motion carries. Um six to zero. Can I get a motion to enter into executive session, please? >> I'll move that we enter executive session to consider the following. Selected employment items. Exhibit A, action. Selected employment items, exhibit B, information only. Contractual matter regarding the purchase of property, exhibit C. Contractual matter regarding A and E services for Harvest and West Elementary and Nursery Road Elementary classroom walls. Exhibit D. Contractual matter regarding
006A&E services for the fine arts center auditorium at Chapen High School. Exhibit E. Contractual matter regarding A&E services for administrative and professional development building district office. Exhibit F. legal advice related to a data security incident and discussion of the development of security personnel or devices. >> Second. All in favor? And the motion carries six to zero. We'll now adjourn to executive session. test. Test. Testing. 1 2 3 4. Testing. 1 2 3 4. Testing. One, two, three, 4. One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine. Testing. I'm not sure where the echo is happening. Testing. Testing. Testing. I haven't heard. I thought I saw him, but then I guess I didn't. Sounds better now. Test, test, test. One, two, three, four, five, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10. Test. 1 2 3 4 5 6
0077 8 9 10. No. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10. Testing testing. Test. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10. That sounds better. Okay. Good evening. It is 6:10. I'm um going to call the regular scheduled September 8th board meeting to order. Um, can I get a motion to come out of executive session? >> I move that we exit um, executive session and enter the regular session. >> I need a second. Second. >> All in favor? And the motion carries um 6 to zero. Good evening and thank you all for being with us today. I recognize we all recognize that there are some challenges before us. Um, but I continue to see this as an opportunity to strengthen our schools and rebuild trust by working together. And so
008I'm looking forward to open dialogue, share commitment, and steady leadership as we begin this meeting tonight. Uh, Mr. Scully is not with us and also it just registered to me that he was supposed to do the invocation and he is not here. So, I guess I am will put my own self on the spot and not call on anybody else. So, if you would join me in prayer. Um, Father God, we just thank you for this opportunity to gather here um tonight to continue the work for the students, faculty, and staff in this district. We thank you for the opportunity to recognize students in the community who've accomplished um great things and we look forward to making decisions here tonight that will help continue to move this district forward. We ask that you be with
009us in this place. In Jesus name we pray. Amen. You stand for the pledge of allegiance, please stand. Board members, if you could come down front for the schoolboard spotlight. or Dr. Ross. Good evening. Uh we are excited to um have some special guests join us tonight. If special guest, if y'all would stand up for me while I tell everybody all about you. I think everybody recognizes you from ESPN, but um we are in fact happy to welcome tonight the Irma Little League Majors All-Star team. Fresh off of their trip to the Little League World Series in Williamsport, Pennsylvania. These young men and their coaches had great success at the World Series. They played some amazing baseball, won a lot of games. Um however, what they also did was demonstrate teamwork, dedication, perseverance, and never
010gave up. They also represented their team, their families, their schools, and the Irma Chapen community with good sportsmanship. Made us all very proud. So, um, congratulations to you all. Come on up and be recognized. Great job, guys. At this time, I'm going to turn it over to Dr. Ross for the superintendent report. >> Thank you, Madam Chair, members of the board in our community. It is such an honor to have such amazing celebrities in our house and our mid. So, we're very proud of uh not only them representing uh our district uh but our state and and our region. So, uh that's just a sign of uh the great we have here. Uh as always, we're a system asking three critical questions. Why do we do this work? Our vision, how do we accomplish the
011vision, our mission, and then what are our outcomes? And that's u here always to get feedback to ensure that our our what matches our why. Our why is that we love and grow our students. Our how is that we're focused on academic, social, emotional growth and development. And then our strategic plan is set forth with two objectives that every student feels loved in our schools and every student has demonstrated academic growth in our schools. There's 24 strategies chasing full performance goals to that end. Uh as a result, we in the process as we prepare for our new strategic plan, our new five-year plan that will take us out to 2032. We see that our state has a strategic plan that by 2030 75% of our students will be at or above grade level. So with
012that in mind as we plan to end next year ending our fiveyear strategic plan and beginning our new we want to keep that goal in mind. So with that I think we should look at the data that we have uh as our baseline this year. And so I want to ask to come to the lectern our chief of student services and planning Dr. Harris to bring forth our 2024 2025 test data uh as presented for SE ready in the course in South Carolina career readiness. Dr. Okay. Thank you. Um, madam chair, members of the board, superintendent, uh, Ross and community, we're here to talk in reference to our 2024 and 2025 test data, uh, to give you results and highlights of that information that was recently uh, shared with us by a press conference on
013last week. We have our director of accountability and planning, Miss Audrey Black, who's here, who will give us those highlights and we'll be able to respond any question you might have. >> So, good evening, Madame Chair, members of the board, Dr. Ross, and members of the community. The last time I was before you, we talked about Victoria Burnernhard's four measures of data that help us to form a picture of a school, or in this case tonight, a picture district. One of those measures of is of student learning um which can be measured by our standardized summitive assessments. These assessments help provide a snapshot of what students have learned at the end of a course or the year. They allow us to measure achievement, report progress, and evaluate the effectiveness of our instruction. In addition, the
014state's code of laws in chapter 43 section 262 requires districts to administer state summitive assessments which serve as a common measure across schools and districts to ensure accountability and equity in reporting student outcomes. Tonight, I would like to share with you the results of three of the assessments. Please note that summary data for advanced placement test, the ACT, and the SAT, remain under embargo and are not available for release at this time. The South Carolina College and Career Ready Assessments, also called SE Ready, measures student achievement in English language arts and mathematics for students in grade levels three through eight across the state. This first chart shows the combined district and state performance in ELA across all grade levels. Rich Lexington Richland 5 increased 5.8 percentage points from 2024 to 2025 and outperformed the state
015by more than six percentage points in 2025. When we aggregate test scores by grade level, every grade level from third through 8th show consistent growth of students meeting or exceeding expectations in ELA from 2024 to 25. Our strongest gains are in the lower grades with third grade standing out with an increase of eight percentage points. The middle grades also show steady progress, but the real showstopper is the eighth grade who grew by a total of 9.2 percentage points in map. The district also shows positive growth from 2024 to 2025. The percentage of students meeting or exceeding expectations increased by 1.2 percentage points. Additionally, district 5 students are outperforming the state by nearly 5 percentage points. When we look at math by grade level, we see trends consistent with national data from NATE and with statewide
016SC ready results. Math proficiency tends to decline as grade levels increase. Unlike the steady gains in ELA, the math results show mixed trends across the grades with some grades levels improving, others slightly decreasing, and some holding steady. Some standout performances are fifth grade increasing three percentage points from 2024 to 25 and once again eighth grade standing out with its notable gain of four percentage points over the two years. Because South Carolina conducted field testing in 2024, no science scores were reported for that year. So in 2025, results show that in both fourth and sixth grades, Lexington Richland 5 students outperformed a state by 3.7 percentage points in fourth grade and 12.4 percentage points in sixth grade. The EOC is a statewide assessment program of end of course tests for algebra 1, biology 1, English 2,
017and United States history in the constitution. These assessments encourage strong instruction and specific standards, measure student mastery, and count for 20% of a student's final grade. Here are the results for the students scoring a C or higher on the EOCC's over the last two years. District 5 is represented on the bar graph and the state scores are presented in the table below. Lexington Richland 5 students consistently score higher percentages in all four subjects compared to state aggregates including strong overall academic achievement. Performance in algebra 1 remains steady with a slight increase from 64.1% to 64.2% significantly outperforming the state percentages. Even though we saw a 3.2 2 percentage point decrease in biology 1. Our students are still scoring over 16 percentage points higher than the state. The district continues to shine in English 2. Even
018with a slight decline from 2024, over 80% of students are scoring a C or higher on the test, which is well above the state percentage at 70%. US history is another subject the district is continuing to see growth. From 2024 to 2025, the district grew 1.7 percentage points, now outpacing the state by 16.7 percentage points. The final test we'll discuss tonight is the career readiness assessment. All 11th graders are required to take this test, which measures four areas. one soft skill assessment and three employability skills subtest in math, reading and data. These assessments measure the most common transferable skills that employers nationwide define as fundamental for career readiness. The assessments provide students an opportunity to apply job skills, not just simply demonstrate concept knowledge. Here are the two-year trends for each of the four subtests.
019The graphs display the two-year trend of the percentage of students scoring a three, four, or five on the data, math, and reading assessments and the percentages of students passing the soft skills assessment. Like the state, district 5 experienced a decline across all areas from 2024 to 2025. However, even with these dips, our students continue to outperform well above the state aggregate in every category. Overall, the results show strong overall performance. Our students score well above average in their ability to understand, interpret, and apply workforce data skills. About 80% of students reach a level three or higher in data in 2024. Even with a slight dip to 76.7% in 2025, our students are still well ahead of the state's percentage at 65%. This indicates our students have strong competencies in communicating effectively, conveying professionalism, promoting teamwork
020and collaboration, thinking critically, and solving problems. Our students also show consistent leadership in math. Though there is a slight decline, over 64% of Lexington Richland 5 students scored level three or higher in math in 2025, maintaining a clear lead over the state's 51.6%, 6% showing solid foundational math skills and understanding of and ability to apply foundational mathematical reasoning skills to solve real life workplace problems. Reading scores are particularly strong with nearly 82% of students scoring a level three or higher in 2024 and still maintaining a high 79.5% in 2025, which is well above the state 68.1%. Our students demonstrate their mastery at the ability to read, understand, and interpret written workplace text, applying new knowledge to the job and follow instructions in complex business process documentation and organizational governance. The results showcase our students excellent
021achievement in soft skills. Soft school scores are consistently high and stable around 80.7% in 2024 and 80.5% in 2025 which is significantly above the state average of 69.1%. This reflects strong student readiness in communication, teamwork, and other essential career skills. These highlights show that Lexington Richland 5 is preparing students well for career success, especially in critical areas like reading and soft skills. This student success led to 62.1% of those 11th grade students taking the test that took the test to receive a level three or higher career ready credential. This means those students display the foundational skills to pursue onet job zone level three career paths and higher. And with that I'll stand for any questions. >> Do we have any questions huddle? >> I don't have a question but I do have a compliment. I
022am just so happy and blown away by the increase particularly in our reading scores and just want to compliment everyone at the district office all the teachers all the staff everyone the parents everyone so I mean I thought that 75% by 2020 2030 was not achievable and Dr. Ross might throw something at me, but I think you know it is and um and we did make remarkable progress and just compliments to everybody. >> Mr. Satderfield. >> Uh yeah, and I just sort of want to echo what Miss Huddle was just saying and I hope that we're giving feedback to those teachers telling them how much we appreciate what they're doing because sometimes we just take that data and we stick it in a notebook or put it on a chart and nobody really sees it.
023But You know, it's kind of like the mo baseball team. When we get a chance to brag on these folks, we need to be bragging on them for sure. So, >> right. Thank you so much. >> Thank you so much, Black, for great presentation. Way to break down the the data set. Um, as we total in our our strategic plan and beyond, it's really doing a great job in our MTSS model. And I just want to thank our team, our academics team for really focusing in on uh tier one. We're going to be really driving in that. And then we are working on ways to strengthen our care too to really look at for those students who are not hitting the mark, what can we do to continue to intervene. So we're excited from where
024we are, but to to get to those next levels is really strengthening our MTSS. Um, but we all can help as parents or guardians working with our children. The academics team has taken every expectation of what we're supposed to learn in every classroom. But uh and you can go online under our department's academics page, office of academics and academic programs and see what your child is supposed to be learning right now this quarter, first quarter, second quarter, third quarter. You can see those expectations. We call them success criteria or I can statements. And if we have all of our parents and our guardians, our tutors, parents of your engagement tutors or our tutors and they want to see what are we learning, what is the expectation of math and science and social studies and arts,
025all of that's laid out in our academic program success criteria. I've gone through it and I've welcome those conversations about how if a child is having struggles with any of these I can statements, we can be a of that that tier one and tier two intervention. So that our operation transformation is turning all those students who say I can't do those those statements to I can and that begins with the heart. What we believe we believe all children uh with the right types of intervention can be transformed into I can students. Uh so with that we'll um offer back to the lecture for a school safety update our chief of student services and planning. >> Thank you again um Dr. Ross members of the board and the community. We uh just a board meeting ago
026um you were kind enough to review and to approve on third reading a tobacco policy specific to student use. And within that particular policy was language that related to or referred to vaping. And uh certainly we heard your questions, we heard your calls for concern and we certainly gave us a call. So take a clearer look and a stronger approach in terms of what we do uh and how we do uh in terms of addressing that particular item or that particular issue related to vaping. It caused us to meet several times with our secondary principles in particular uh to hear from them as to where they are, what they're seeing, how they are addressing it, and aligning those things with our code of conduct to make certain that we are addressing it appropriately. Uh to
027even consideration of recommendations for expulsion and not to exclude even if there were a need uh for law enforcement should there be any uh violation that that that are inclusive of um THC or any other kind of drug related use. What I uh what we've done is that we have uh as we met with our administrators, we have kind of fallen on the point that we feel very comfortable and very confident in what is currently listed in our code of conduct. I had a chance to meet with legal as well and there's strength there is great strength in what we're doing currently to address uh the vaping issue. However, what I wanted to do was I've invited a couple of people. They said they were going to be my bodyguards. I don't know. Um but
028anyway, I have Mr. Polock who is here who's a student services officer who hands-on with a number of the issues related to quite frankly the majority of our issues related to student discipline. They've been happens to be one of them. I've asked them to come tonight and just kind of share with you and certainly the public those who are in virtual world to hear what we do, what's currently in place as it relates to student discipline found in our code of conduct as well as uh the program that you've heard me mention and reference before a vape educate to give us some idea a little bit more about what that is and what that includes. So at this time we'll turn to Mr. Polo. >> Thank you Dr. Harris. Madam Chair, uh board members, Dr.
029Harris, I mean Dr. Ross. Um yeah, I do not look like a bodyguard at all as you can see. Um but uh thank you for this opportunity to discuss u vaping and uh how we address that in our discipline. Uh we met with office of student services, met with our uh middle level principles and our high school principles last year to kind of come up with some consistent measures of how we address uh vaping. um and and how we practice that, put it in our procedures. So, uh for the first offense of of of vaping or tobacco use in uh in our schools at the middle level, the first offense is a three-day out of school suspension uh with the ability to reduce that to two days with the incorporation of Vape Educate. Vape Educate
030is our um is an online tool to educate and bring awareness uh on the dangers the health risk of of vaping. Um on the second offense uh then that will lead to a recommendation for expulsion. Um for the high school level after speaking with administrators, speaking with the principles, uh we concluded that on the first offense of vaping, it will be a 4-day out of school suspension. um and with the opportunity to reduce it to three days with the incorporation of vapor educate. But on the second offense um it would be a recommendation for expulsion and those are on category two levels and category 2 levels of discipline or uh tobacco tobacco use uh or drug drug paraphernalia. Uh anytime as Dr. Harris mentioned if it's THC or an illegal substance, that's an automatic level
031three. That's not going to be allowed whatsoever within our buildings. Right. Any questions? >> Um before I um see if anybody else has questions for the vape and education um that you referenced, you said it's online. So, they do that at school and somebody's overseeing that. How do we know that they did the >> It's a 4 hour It's a 4hour uh modules that they will have to complete and at the end of the completion of the modules uh once it's completed then they can do they they'll have three days of suspension so they will have time away from home that they are able to complete those modules. >> Okay, I have an unusual question. Do you think that I mean the penalty for the first offense is really harsh. Do you think that that
032may I just wonder if administrators really want to follow the policy. It just seems like we may be too tough on the first offense. And don't look at me crazy, but I'm just, you know what I'm saying? I mean, it's it's like, you know, like the dress code. If if I see a a girl with her short her skirt that's a little too short, I don't think three days of out of school suspension, I wouldn't do anything because I'd be like, "Wow, that's overkill." I mean, do we have Do you think that might be an issue? >> Oh, I think uh the the goal of serving as a deterrent from the behavior um is is what the purpose of those three days. And also, we don't know at times what's in these vapes. So, the
033health risk and all of those things involved uh we hope to deter students from even getting involved with it whatsoever. >> Well, maybe a follow-up question is um how often like do we have a report? Do we know like so far this school year how many kids have gotten out of school suspension for vaping? >> I don't have those. I have numbers from last year of the number >> How about last year? >> Number of expulsions that we had from last year. Um have that data right in front of me. I figured that would come, so I wanted to make sure I had it. Um, we had a total of 24 uh recommendations for expulsion for possession of tobacco or tobacco use, which includes vapes. Um, and uh 10 recommendations for expulsion for drug paraphernalia,
034which it's also can include vapes, but also other drug paraphernalia as well. Um, so that's a total of 34 recommendations for expulsions. >> Yeah. I don't know. I'm just really I I really want to get the kids help and and not so much something that goes on their permanent record the first time they do something. And and I guess that's kind of where I'm coming from. He's the vaping guy over here. But I mean I take it really really seriously. It's really I have a lung problem and if you there's lots of parts of your body you can replace your and technically your lungs are but no nobody gets that and these things are so dangerous. Yes. for kids lungs that I just worry that maybe we're hitting something so hard that maybe we would
035get at more kids and get them help if it wasn't such a such a rough first offense. >> I know that we uh in this this is kind of reactive. So, like you're saying, we want to be more proactive in our approach and I know Dr. Harris is going to speak to that with our awareness, but we we want to see where this is stemming from and how can we how are we getting to the point of this is the outlet that they're utilizing. Um, so with connection with our community, with our with our parents, how do we kind of eradicate that? But that's going to be a proactive approach that we we're looking to take. >> If I may, a follow-up question because somebody asked me and um there's a fake shop like right
036across the street from Irmo High School, but there's nothing we could do to stop that, right? >> So, and Dr. Harris, we can we have kind of spoken to that sits within the Not in the town of Corre. >> That's correct. >> And I think our rule those have to be,000 ft from the front door and that is just over the just over the foot. We've been asked to do that. Um, one of the things I just think as a as a standpoint might not go anywhere, but maybe a resolution from this body as we look inclusively internally what we can do resolution to this body, the county council about those things. You remember two years ago we had this matter with Ch High School advertising on the chamber property for I don't want to
037misspe but it was THC was one of those products there, >> right? The jewels. That's correct. Thank you. Um and and we were able through the advocacy to to get that advertisement away from the students, but I think it's a allaround approach. So talk Harris about some of the prevention pieces that they're doing in our district. And so again, thank you for >> Dr. Harris, I'm sorry. >> Oh, sure. >> Before you Mr. Veum had his hand up and then Mr. Siderfield, if you don't mind. So, and maybe we can do like a a joint thing between like the town and um the school district, but you know, similar to have we how we have the attendance initiative, you know, we had like the DARE program in the past and all if we focused on
038instead of gearing towards negative consequences, trying to figure out a way to, you know, highlight the the health risk, you know, the over 30 plus chemicals and vapes. And, you know, the more the kids, these kids are smart. like, hey, listen, you know, do you want to have a family? Do you want to have a future? This is going to really damage that, you know, prospect. So, I don't know, focusing on positive, you know, outcomes. And there's some members on the Irmotown Council and I know Lexington County Council that are really focused on our school districts and we could, you know, partner with them to kind of do joint almost like a task force to focus on this for the community. Just an idea. and uh I had the great fortune of being an elementary
039school principal and I think early intervention and early awareness is key and so I saw that we don't see those numbers at elementary they don't also have the access as as secondary does but continuing with the early intervention to help serve as prevention as well. >> Yeah. First thing I want to say is I had the great fortune of working with Mr. Pock for several years at Dutch Fork High School. So I'm glad he's doing what he's doing. Um I had I had a couple questions for you, Miss Bolock. One is uh um do we still review the discipline code handbook every year? Like committeewise look I know that when Miss Huddle asked about the three-day suspension, if my memory serves, it's been pretty close to that for smoking for quite some time. Um but
040um again, uh this is just old folks speaking. If you don't, the kids know, they know when they don't go to school, they know how many makeup days are left. They calculate that. They figure that out. The more opportunities you give them, the ones that want to take advantage, they will. So that the consequences really have to be enough of a deterrent to stop it. Um, and as far as permanent records, these things don't go on kids permanent records. if they get suspended or detention that doesn't go on any every year all kids start with a clean slate. >> Okay. I was told that out of school suspension did. Is that wrong? >> The only permanent records there are that I remember unless something changes are their academic records. Now, if there is a situation
041maybe where they're expelled, there's probably a letter put right Mr. Pock in their file. So if you decide to go to another high school that might follow them, but just for being a knucklehead and, you know, cutting class or something like that, um, it's really not fair to those things should follow kids around. So you mentioned the vape education program. Do we do that before students have been caught for this? I mean, seems like maybe if we're really interested in prevention, are they getting that program even, you know, in in middle school, in elementary school? >> So, we have a limited amount of seats available to for that program. Um, so we don't have enough seats. It's a costly program. Uh, so we don't have enough seats for every student to have that. There would
042be a great preventative measure measure if we had that those funds, but I don't that's not me. That's someone else. Um so uh but but so as a part of the education component of it we utilize that in the suspension process. >> When you say we don't have the money for it, do you mean because it's a 4hour module the do online? >> It's a cost per seat. Uh so we utilize it that as >> are there other ways to provide this education? I'm thinking about like when we did the DARE program in school, you know what I mean? Like is there some other um way like I get that module piece and so maybe that's the >> after you've gotten in trouble piece, but what is is there a simplified way a more human
043interactive way to do a broader um educational piece that maybe involves somebody coming in? Do schools still do assemblies? I don't know. But you know, something like that is what I'm thinking. I I'll say Mr. Snap all of that has has is under uh has been discussed and what we've attempted to do or currently doing is looking at a plethora of different ways to address this. So while much of what we've discussed so far has been about on the receiving end if you will the discipline approach what the code of conduct says uh that sort of thing we're also looking at one of the recommendations I think very strong in addition to uh your support with uh uh the local um municipalities and and and and town councils. Uh in addition to that came uh
044discussions about more intervention as you as I'm hearing uh that we're going to begin exploring with organizations in our area that can help us in terms of additional counseling uh beforehand in advance and certainly even after the fact should that be the case. Uh individual as well as family kinds of counseling scenarios that we can partner with these organizations so that we can get additional support and additional intervention. uh for all for our students. Uh we're also going to take advantage and and take this year to highlight during our um shatter the myth shatter the myth uh program that we have each year. I think it's two or three times a year, but the the one for the start is going to be October 28th. We'll talk a little bit more about that later time,
045but I mention it now. It's going to focus on vaping and it's going to focus on the whole issue and concept and ideology related to vaping and all that's involved with that. Uh the the dangers as Mr. Ber I've heard you talk about and the the contents thereof uh and and what parents can do. So that's going to be our focus for this year throughout the course of the year and we'll continue that. So we're looking at a number of different ways to address the issue and not just one single way. Miss Huttle, >> I just had a question about the consequences. If a student gets out of school suspension this year, does the clock start over next year? In other words, if they get a second offense next year, do they go back to
046out of school suspension or does it now go to expulsion? >> If it's next school year, going back to what Mr. Satfield described, that students each year that student starts over each year they start over. So there will be whatever occurs during the current school year what is this 20 25 26 whatever happens that's what happened in 2526 but 26 27 each student by law starts over with their student discipline no further question related to that I want to move to our second item very quickly and that is in reference to another item uh that we have uh taken note of and we have been uh addressing addressing for some time now and it does include our safety office and uh it's in reference to crossing guards. Uh we know that there are some areas
047what I often refer to as some hot spots if you will in our district where crossing guards are certainly uh could be of benefit and certainly of use. Uh I have asked officer Wise who is our lead safety officer to come and share with you our current status, our current state of crossing guards here in the district. and then I'll come back with another idea of this information that I will share with you based on the information I received from you as well. Offic Dr. Harris, good evening board. Can I give you a brief overview of where we're at with crossing guards? It mirrors kind of where our SRO's are at. We split two counties and I'm going to talk about Lexon County first and then I'll go back to Richland County. Lexton County runs
048trains if they're out fills in for all the crossing guards for the Lexon County side. So that's run by the Lexon County Sheriff's Department. So and we have currently nine on the Lexon County side that range all the way from Harson West to the Irmo clusters and one up in Chapen L. So it does go the whole county distance. A couple years ago, Richland County used to do the same thing, but they got out of the business of crossing guards. So we incorporated that into the safety office. Right now we have two crossing guards that are run trained. We fill in if they're out to the safety office and both of those are located at Dutch Fork. One's located at Dutch Fork Middle School, Dutch Fork High, which is on Lakes Ridge 5 property. So
049it does not cross an actual roadway and the other one's located at H Corley and it does touch the campus and goes across a two-lane road right there. So there is a little bit of difference, a lot more resources on the Lexon County side because they're backed by Lexon County Sheriff's Department. We are running the Richland County site at this point. And like Dr. Harris says, we try to keep up with what are potential hotspots, areas of concern. We definitely listen to the community, try to get input with that as well. We do have a couple of those in mind. I believe Dr. Harris is going to talk about that. But uh I'm open up for any questions for the crossing guards. >> Miss Huttle, >> is that I just remember more crossing guards than
050that. Is were there more and we just have decreased them because maybe there more car riders or like for example I could have sworn there used to be one at Seven Oaks. >> There is one at Seven Oaks. There is one at that's Lexon County at 7 Oaks. Okay. >> I believe you used to see a lot more on the Richland County. >> You said Harvest West. So I was just thinking that that >> well it is that's the the most unique one we have in the district because there's three jurisdictions that make up Harvest West. So actually the roadway is in Lexon County but it has a Richland County SRO. >> Okay. >> So luckily they did incorporate that. So they do have a Lexon County crossing guard there. Seven Oaks is also within
051Lexon County. So that is a Lexon County. >> Okay. I was just I I because I also know where those neighborhoods are. So I was like how do the kids get there if there's no >> And most of them are neighborhood schools. So they're crossing two-lane roads now. Crossroads. Yeah, Nursery Road, good example. But Crossroads Intermediate, four-lane highway right there that there that's we have two s uh two crossing guards that assist with that. >> So, a follow-up question. Um I got some calls from uh people who said that people are parking in the um Portrait Hills um neighborhood that don't live there so that their kids can cross the road and it's causing problems. And I mean, I told them I don't think that the school district can necessarily get involved in whoever's parking
052at their um office or whatever that is over there and they probably need to get private sec. Is that an accurate answer to because we cannot patrol a neighborhoods? >> There's a lot of homes in that neighborhood. So, there's a lot of kids, you know, that you'd have to figure out who's going car right. It's it'd be difficult. Very difficult. Yes. >> Thanks. >> Yeah. Um, one of my concerns I think is um, Chapen Middle School. It's like five points out there. They're pulling out of the neighborhood. They turn right, left, they're trying to get to work. There's I mean, it's so congested. The car line goes not only from the school around the circle and down the road and interferes with bus u leaving. Um, but the kids have to cross the car line
053first and then they cross they go to a little island that they stand on while cars are coming behind them and in front of them and the little island is probably six square feet maybe. I'm not I'm not good at that. But uh and then they have to cross the road and you got these you know a lot of folks especially the pool end of the car line they're on their cell phones. They're not looking up at all. I've had very a couple of calls recently where close calls where they hit me, almost hit me because they were on their cell phones. I just tapped my horn. But I watch those middle and probably you were is the big neighborhood across the road there and maybe they're dropping them off. But nonetheless, a lot of
054kids cross there and I dropped my granddaughter off this morning and um I was watching all those kids coming and then the parents coming from the other side from the car line and it's it's a bit scary. It makes you a bit nervous. I know that administrators don't want to go out there because I'm remember when I used to go out in direct traffic at Chapen and the Lexon County said they're not going to be responsible for that. Um and I almost went well I went in the ditch a couple of times but uh my wife ended up buying me a orange vest I guess so they could find my body after I got hit. But that is an area I don't know if you've been out there to watch especially dismissal it just when
055I come up there I get a little nervous I'll be honest with you. So Mr. Stephanie, you're you're absolutely right. As we started there, we mentioned that there are several couple hot spots we're aware of and uh I can tell you that we the safety office, the uh just a number of different persons for quite frankly a couple years now at least have been monitoring and paying attention and and discuss discussions and conversations even about the Parkinson area that you raised. We've been talking about a lot of that for quite a bit of time where we currently are because we do not have uh crossing guards in the Richen County side of the house. We are have a petition to take a look at how we can fill that void, how we can fill that
056absence or that that gap. And so we've taken a liberty to uh look into um the bid through our procurement process and uh looking at that for companies that can assist us uh and that they can partner with Richen County in their own way so that we don't have to employ staff or we don't have to employ persons of of uh uh lay people if you will to be in the road and trying to direct traffic. We don't want to have that kind of liability. So, we have um petitioned for a bid that closes on tomorrow and we'll see what comes of that and and with fingers crossed, if you will, we hopefully will have something in the very near future that will be able to address the issues that we're talking about in the
057eras in which we're talking about. >> Well, it's almost like it would be neat if you had a place where they had a access over top of the traffic. If there was a walkway that, you know, they walk up a few stairs and cross the road and then get down. I'm telling you, go up there and sit and watch the kids cross up there. Uh, >> and they have signs that said, "Please look out for the kids." >> Absolutely. >> Was there two brief questions? When you said that you have folks on the Richland and Lexington County side, do you mean there are Richland and Lexon County officers at all of these locations? >> No, sir. They're they're crossing guards, but they're employed. on the Lexon County side. They are civilians employed by Lexon County
058Sheriff's Department to be a crossing guard. They are not a sworn deputy. >> Got it. >> So that's the they are just crossing. >> And what are the qualifications? How are they different for someone say that is going to be a crossing guard across St. Andrews Road versus across um Crossbow that is right in front of Harpson West. >> They receive the same amount of training is the same amount of training. The thing with the reason I brought up crossroads right there is it being a fourlane road, there's there's actually two for that one crossing walk, whereas normally if it's a two-lane road, there's just one crossing guard, >> right? And I almost witnessed one this morning have an accident. I could barely see the crossing guard over the cars that were in front of
059me. That's why I was asking like qualifications. I'm not like what kind of training are they getting? So if you feel like they're being trained properly >> and we could get that information for you if you want to their training, but it's it's the standardized Lexon County Cross. >> So what it sounded like is we might possibly have a company that the district will pay for some of these um high need areas. >> If all continues to go well, uh Mr. Bannon, we certainly look forward to that that level of support here in our district. Yes. >> Okay. Because I did a little bit of like research when I called Richland County and found out, you know, that they discontinued that due to the administrative burden. But worst case scenario, you've got officers that will
060do it, but it's like I think 55 an hour and they do a two-hour minimum. So that's always an option to actually do traffic control. So for like the um the Chapen area, if it's just a complete snarl area, it might be an option. and also PTO groups have reached out that they're open to volunteering, but we would want to make sure that they're trained through Richland County, understand traffic laws, background check, stuff like that. So, there's a couple options if that doesn't pan out. >> Yeah, we and we've explored that and I appreciate that. Uh certainly, and considering the the need and the safety matters, nothing's off the table, I don't think, but I would tell you that uh and officer Wise can certainly correct me where I'm wrong, having been an officer prior
061to being a um uh safety officer in the district. It It's really a hit and miss with officers in terms of uh that $55 minimum three hour. It's really a hit and miss scenario there. You won't have the same officer. You may not have the same may not have your person every day. It just kind of contingent upon who's available and uh so we've looked at that a couple different times, but it doesn't give us the level of consistency that we need to support the concerns that we have. >> Miss Barhart, >> my question was answered. Thank you. I'm sorry. Anybody else? >> All right. Thank you all so much. >> Thank you so much. >> Thank you, Dr. Harris, Mr. Pock, Mr. Wise, for that report. At this time, we'll move forward to our
062financials. We'll do two months. So, coming to the lect turn is our chief financial officer, Miss Heather Tucker, uh, to present our June and July financial report. >> Good evening, Madam Chair, members of the board. Ross. Uh, tonight we have our monthly financial reports for June and July. I apologize that these are a bit delayed. We had some delayed tax returns from the county coming in. So, I wanted to make sure we had complete financial reports before we presented to the board. Um, for the month end of June, this is our fiscal year end. Now, I do want to make you aware that we are still in the process of closing out our year end. So, this will not directly tie to our audited financial statements because we are still closing out our books and
063working on our audited financial statements for the auditor. But this is as where we are as of June 30th. Um we ended the year with revenue higher than projected. I do think that this our revenue will be better in line now that we have um increased our collection percent for our budget that we're for the year that we are currently in. So our revenue from our um local sources should be better in line with our actual budget as we move into 2526. Um you will see that our state source of revenue was under projection. our state aid to classroom did come in um at 96% as opposed to the 100% where we thought we would where we thought we were going to end the year last year. That is um related to essentially the adjustments
064that were made based on the 10th day from our charter schools um from the loss of students last year. So those adjustments were made um throughout the year last year. We started seeing that decline in November and we saw our monthly um state aid to classroom decrease over the year last year. So the increased local support did help out with our overall revenue for the year. Um our month end for June for our expenditures. We were over budget last year. A lot of this was due to salaries. Um just looking throughout the um the different expenditure lines. Um we were over in elementary programs, high school programs over in homebound. And that's one of those things that we base off of expenditures from the previous year. But there's a lot of things that we don't
065know moving into um the budget season. And so some of those have to be adjustments through the year. Um but we were over in those lines. Um as well as um just essentially over in salaries across the board. Um for our July financials, again, this is just the first year, first month of our fiscal year. And remember, we were not 100% operational in July. We had just come off the cyber breach and we did not have our financial systems fully functional at this time. So while it does look like our revenue um our revenue is down um we were also delayed in collecting taxes and our expenditures again we just were not fully functional during July. So our expenditures were also below where we were this time last year because we were still getting ourselves
066back up and running after June. So I will stand for any questions. >> Do you have any questions for Mer and then Mr. B? >> Um if you wouldn't mind go back to the June um revenue. Okay, so we ended up with 16,460,000 more revenue than projected. Did I read that right? >> Um 9 million. So we ended at 249 million versus 240. So the total revenue through 630 2025 that last the next to the last line. >> Oh, okay. So there's Okay. So you're calculating in your head. It's not on here, right? >> It is. It's the um the very bottom um the very bottom line is through 2024. So that's where we ended last year. The 232 to 240. Let's see if I can get the >> I guess I was trying to
067compare the 24. Okay. So it was 9 million. 240 was our budget and we collected >> 249 167. So it was almost exactly 9 million. Okay. So and then if you go to the next slide. >> Okay. So on the expense side, we budgeted 24,100 and we spent >> 2482. So we spent 8.2 more. >> So our net budget surplus was about 800,000. Correct. >> Okay. Thank you. Anybody else? >> Right. Thank you so much for At this time, coming to the lecture to deliver our quarterly operations report is our chief of operations, Gerald Gary. >> Thank you, Dr. Ross, madam chair, members of the board. As Mr. Knox comes forward to do our construction um update, I want to give a update on our indoor air quality that's work that's currently being done at
068district office. On August 26, we had Crossroads Environmental come out and perform air quality testing on two office areas by taking samples of what appeared to be some type of microbial growth that have been observed by employees. Um these samples were sent by sent to Hayes Microbial Consulting in Virginia, which is a lab that conducts testing for them. On September 2nd, after completing the testing, they confirmed they were slightly elevated areas of growth in these two offices. On an abundance of caution, um the executive staff made the decision to have the entire district office and the portables clean and conduct testing again before allowing employees to return to those areas. On 93, um podium restoration was deployed at 12:00 noon and worked Thursday, Friday, Saturday, and Sunday from 8 to 8 um to to have
069this building cleaned. Um this morning um Crossroads Environmental came back at 9:30 to collect samples again of those same offices and other space at the district office and they have been sent back to Hayes Microbial again for additional testing. We anticipate having those results back this Wednesday along with their recommendations as to how to proceed. Good evening, Madame Chair, members of the board, and Dr. Ross. I'm pleased to uh bring to you all our overall construction update within the district. First, I want to touch on the HVAC report. This was first um I think presented a couple years ago uh for us to really track to see how we are we as the district how we are doing when it comes to our overall HVAC program um versus us looking at every count of of
070every piece of equipment that we have. We um looked at overall life expectancy and the life of the actual equipment at each um each school. So here in 2023, we can see that we have I think it's about 12 schools, 12 sites that are over the 15-year age limit, the average age limit for equipment. And in 2024, as we received the data, we were able to um you know improve the overall numbers to where I think it's nine um nine schools that their average life expectancy is over 15 years. So, as we move into 2025, we'll see uh schools like Chapen Intermediate, they will be um pretty far in the green at that point in time because we um were able to replace a chunk of equipment over over the summer break. So, we hope
071to have that information the first quarter of 26. Our last PM for the year uh I believe is in um it's around November Thanksgiving time frame for that um PM. Um to date we have uh approximately 53 portable HVAC units um across the district. That could be the one ton units or it could be the larger five ton units depending on the on the overall space. Um typically if we have someone say hey they put in a request we have a piece of equipment that's down uh we know we have to get parts we deploy a spot cooler in that classroom. Now whether or not it gets used you know that's up to um you know the school itself but we deploy spot coolers in in those classrooms. Um so with this number you know
072taken into account with our overall HVC units that we have across the district we're at 1.2 2%. Um, then since spring break, we replaced 45 rooftop units. >> Um, can I ask a question? >> Yes, sir. >> Uh, while we're on HVAC, when you say portable units, you're not talking about like the portable unit we had in our meeting room for executive session. >> Yes, sir. So, we will >> very loud. So, those are in classrooms. So if we have a unit that's out, we may not and and let's say if if it takes several days to get parts, we need to have some some sort of conditioning and that the unit could be ran you throughout the evening. Um it can also be ran when there's no students in the classroom. So there there
073is flexibility for um the teacher to shut that unit off if they need to. >> And I mean they so they have local control of that. The reason I ask and I I know it I don't know that it matters age group uh in any way, shape or form, but I remember how loud those things were and we could not hardly hear one another in there. I couldn't imagine having a bunch of third graders and you're trying to teach them something. Are are there smaller, quieter ones or are they all is there just a standard portable unit that >> that's a typical standard one? I think it's a ton ton and a half. Now, they do have larger ones that are quieter, but they you have to put them outside. You have to replace you
074pull out a window, replace duct work, and then have a generator to operate it. Um, so we we've actually had to um utilize units like that. I think one of them was over at Armad Elementary School. >> Yeah, I know 53 is a is a good many classrooms. Um, and then the previous slide that you showed, it said 15-year, and probably Miss Barnhard can answer this question, 15-year life expectancy of these units. Um, and while there were several in the red, um, there's a lot in the orange and the yellow and all that. Um, is this one of the issues that keeps us very busy with, um, with schools and >> Yeah. Yes sir. It it does. So we have everything from um circuit boards, control boards that may no longer be uh readily available.
075There may be uh coils for the refrigerant that they no longer manufacture for really old pieces of equipment. And then um we go through these cycles of changing out refrigerants to to you know a newer newer type of refrigerant. So, at a lot of our schools, we still have R22 units, and we're in the process of phasing those out to, you know, to bring bring in and install newer units. >> With these older models that we've had for quite some time, our parts are to get. >> They are hard to get. >> Okay. Thank you. >> Um, I have a couple questions. One is um each school has many units, right? So like for example just Valentine Elementary is that the age of the oldest unit or the average? >> These are the a is
076an average. >> Okay. So so do you have any idea districtwide like how many total units we have that are over 15 years old regardless of where they are. >> We can slice the data and find out. >> Okay. I I was just curious. And then the other question I had is kind of what's the process? So, if a teacher um at Valentine says, "My h my my my classroom's way too hot." Where does it go from there? >> So, if it's if a teacher says, "Hey, I'm it's too hot in here." Um typically what happens is they will notify the um facility supervisor, the head custodian at each school. Then they take that information and then they process a work order. We we have asked them to take um to take the actual temperature
077of the air coming out of the unit because what may be hot for somebody it may not be hot for you know another person. So we just want to measure to make sure hey are we getting you know 50s some 40 some degree air coming out of that unit and that kind of helps us determine what's going on from there. Um, so that that's typically the process, you know, >> and does that like from there does it go straight to the vendor or does it go to the internal HVAC team? >> It goes to the internal HVAC team. So then we have another component. We go and we um we have to double check our control system that controls all the equipment. We check that and then and then at the same time then we'll
078deploy somebody out to a site to check the unit to make sure that it is operational because it could be um well our district standard is 74 degrees and it may be the temperature at 75 so it's still stuck in a dead band so it's got to get a little warmer before the air cuts on so it could be something along those lines. >> Um and I just that triggered one so the there's no ability of a teacher to set the thermostat in the classroom. >> Correct. >> Okay, that's what I thought. >> Uh, a couple questions. >> Yes, sir. >> The portable units, how are we acquiring those? >> Is through a rental? >> A rental. Uh, generally speaking, how much are those? I mean, to rent and for the duration that we would
079use them. >> I would have to get that information. I don't have it read readily available. Um, and then the 45 units that you said have been replaced since spring break, who is uh putting those in? >> So, it's uh it's a mix of um we have a uh contract with Newberry County. Um so, um we've utilized train, we've utilized Dyken, and then our own internal group. Um they've done some some replacements. >> So, there's not a company that we're working with to install them. We we're doing them house or >> well it it depends on the situation. So we do work with other companies like train we'll have train actually come install them at the rooftop rooftop units because we'll have to get a crane and there's a lot of moving pieces and parts
080with that if it's a smaller unit um um one that controls maybe let's say an IDF closet that has all your data switches and everything else that might be something we would do internally. Y'all might have discussed this when y'all were prepping for the bond referendum last year and obviously it's changed now. Is there kind of like a rough estimate running if we had to fix everything tomorrow HVAC related what the cost would be or is it just as it comes up? Just wondering if we could if you had all the money we needed to fix it, would we just contract out like what you're doing to get them all taken care of or is it worst case scenario on down the line? >> So, if I'm understanding this correctly, I'm it would be something
081we'd have to do in phases. I mean, there's no single company that could handle all the work across the entire district. Um, you know, just from getting items and pieces of equipment manufactured, um, you know, they run in in in lots. So, it would be hard for us to say, "Hey, we want to do everything in the district all at once." Um, there was a number we looked at at one point in time for us to get everything below that 15-year marker, we'd have to replace, I want to say it's two 200 plus units a year. If you look at that and then you add the the price for these these units, um, it's it's in the millions of dollars. Now through our capital process every year we're allocating more and more money and these
082things are not going down in price they're going up in price. So you know we're we're trying to stay ahead of the curve by you know doing a chunk of these um every year. >> You mentioned that there's a sort of a mix match of units and um I guess v not vendors but the actual brand of the units. Are our folks all trained to work on all of them? >> So, we can our our internal folks can work on some of them, but when we get to the schools like Hermo Elementary, they have VRF systems. It's a variable refrigerant system. So, you could heat um uh heat and cool a space off of one condenser. Think of it like your house. If you if you're in one room and you want it cooler and
083your wife's in another room and she wants it warmer, you can actually do that with with these types of systems, uh they're very complex and we do not have the capability to work on those systems. >> Okay. And going forward looking some of the new facilities we're looking at, are we going to try to install units that would be serviceable by our own people? >> Yes, sir. >> Is that something to consider? >> Yes, sir. That that is the goal was to move to something that we can actually and maintain. Okay. Uh roof updates. So, uh every week um we are um we send out a roofing update to all the um affected schools. So, if we have 10 different schools, 10 different schools administrators, they get tagged in on this on this report. Currently,
084we have 14 sites that have reported leak issues. Um, five of those are under warranty. Um, seven of them have been issued uh, purchase orders and then there are two sites that were still waiting quotes back from our vendors. Now, this changes week to week, so we're trying to turn these as fast as we possibly can. Um, sometimes the warranty issues take a little while and we are actively working with our partners, the the manufacturers of these roofing systems to get these items resolved. So, here now we're just going to go over a couple um visuals from um some of the work that's taken place throughout the district. Here to the uh left we have Chapen Intermediate. Um they replaced I want to say it was maybe 12 rooftop units there over the summer. Um
085and then to the right we have um a through wall vent unit that um is over at Ballentine. So we're in the process of of changing all those units out of Ballentine. the these are like the the older systems I remember growing up with and um they're a little dated and we can no longer get parts for these units. So, we're trying to do a mass push to replace every one of them. To the left we have a um backflow pre that was replaced at Chapen High School. And to the right this is a water heater at H Corley. I don't know where the other picture went to. Um we have a lot of we did a good bit of cosmetic work over the summer. Um this is one of the bathrooms here. Uh but
086for some reason the picture didn't show up. Oh, it's the Oh, I'm sorry. I'm sorry. So, you can tell there's a big difference. Um, if you've been in any of the bathrooms and the boys restroom, um, and you talk with the administrator at those schools, they will tell you this is making a huge difference. Um, stuff gets on the floor sometimes, you know, when you have an older school where the tile may look, you know, from afar may look okay. Um, there there's definitely some um some issues with the grout and stuff like that. Just, you know, it needs to be refreshed. should need to be recealed. So, uh we've done a lot of work throughout the district this summer, you know, from a cosmetic um um you know, sign. Here we have Dutch Middle
087School. You can um you look at it, you kind of see the uh VCT tile. It's a vinyl composite tile. Um it's got the green going down the sides. Um the school needed was, you know, in need of an update and a refresh. Here we have the after product we put in it. It's a product called Texas granite. It's really it's not really granite. It looks like terazzo. Um it is our base flooring that we do have in the district. It's a no wax low sheen product. Um and it'll withstand the test of time. So uh we're trying to reduce a lot of those manh hours of somebody, you know, on a buffing machine or trying to strip and wax floors to have a to have a floor they can go through and and do
088a with a floor cleaning machine and and have it looking really good. And then we did a lot of painting throughout the school. Here's our latest aerial view of Irmo High School. As you can see, we have the front parking area has been paved and all I think all the windows are in the school now. So, it's definitely making a lot of progress since the last time everyone's made a visit to the school. Inside we have the media center. It's really starting to take shape now. It is u it is something to see. Uh and then to the right we have the social stair and you can see um the folks from Edcon are placing the steel and they're prepping for the concrete pore. Here are change orders. We had um a total of four
089with one of them being a credit back to the project. This is an aerial view that we've seen before for the uh new Dutch Elementary site. So, we are estimating closing on the property in um the latter part of September. Uh we hope to have a um a bid time frame, you know, sometime late fall, early winter um so we can get pricing on that. And this is just additional um images of of what the school could look like. And this is the classroom. And then the hallways on to Chapen Elementary. You can see we've relocated uh the portables. They should be able to occupy them very soon. And there was one thing that our inspector is requiring us to have and is some kind of um battery operated exterior lighting. Um that is the
090last key thing that that we found that we have to get before they can be occupied. Outside of that, everything else um is is ready to go with with portables. Um, as you can see here, and I don't know if y'all remember, but if you kind of look to the left, you'll see all the um the um construction barrier there. That's where we were during the groundbreaking ceremony. But all the portables and all the asphalt has been removed over at Chapen Elementary. And um they should be I think digging important footers here in the next week or so. So, they're you know, they're moving along. Lake Murray. Here you can see that the portables have been removed and they're in the process of pulling up the asphalt at that location and I stand for any
091questions. >> Miss then Mr. Bain, what's the um current deadline for the new east wing for Irma? the new the new east wings. Um I want to say it is going to be um late spring summertime next year. So it'll be everything will be ready for us to transition to the reszoning. >> Okay. And the I cannot remember was the demolition included the old east wing. Was that demolition included with this plan or is that separate? >> That was separate. Okay, >> two things real quick. One thing, we've got a lot of correspondence in reference to various schools and I don't know if it ties into these temp units or not with the the HVAC with the the mold issues at the various schools. You know, you have high fluctuations with it super cold and
092then it can get humid. I don't know if there's any correlations. So, I'm sure y'all are we forwarded the, you know, emails that we get from parents and stuff. And then the other one tied into the um I believe there's bond funds for it. Some of the high schools maybe not and middle schools with the boys bathrooms. I noticed some of the updates here with the divider walls. If that's something that we can look into to see what bathrooms don't have those and what it would cost to add something because that'll speed up traffic, get them in and out so there's less chances of standing around getting into trouble vaping if we've got more areas for them to use restroom. >> Gotcha. And what one thing I know we did do to help speed up,
093you know, getting kids in and out of the restroom was we took out some of the um the mirrors at the high schools because they would sit there and just stand and look at the mirror all day long. And um the some of the administrators have they requested to remove mirrors um especially out of the boys. I I don't think we've moved many out of the female restrooms, but um they said the students must kind of stare in the mirror all day. Just a follow up for Mr. Bam's question. Um the Crossroads Environmental that we brought into the district office. I've heard the concerns about the mold in some of the schools as well. Is that something that we could send out to the schools that are having these concerned in the same way that
094we did at the DO to just test and see? >> So if somebody requests to have have it tested and it gets brought to our attention through a work order, um then we do have it tested. So, that would just be something that would need to be done from from the school level to bring to y'all's attention um to get them out there to to look at it. >> I'm sorry. I I can >> That would just need to be something that would need to be brought to y'all's attention from the school level in order to get you out there and maybe get this same uh testing done. >> Yes, ma'am. So, um they just have to request that through us and uh we do want the school to take a look at it too,
095you know, to say, "Hey, um yeah, this, you know, this needs to be tested." But, um we We do a lot of business um with those folks and they test just like any other facility. We just have that standard process. >> Anybody else? >> All right. Thank you. >> Y >> that concludes the superintendence report and I stand for any questions. >> Any additional questions? All right. Thank you. That moves us to the approval of the minutes from the August 25th board meeting. Can I get a motion, please? >> I move that we approve the minutes of the August 25th, 2025 board meeting. Second, >> all in favor. The motion carries um 6 to0. It's my understanding we don't have anyone signed up for public participation tonight. So, that moves us to our action agenda
096um on actions that's necessary. on matters discussed in executive session. Do we have any motions? >> I move that we approve selected items for employment per exhibit A except ones 18 and 19. >> And we're excluding those because we're going to have a separate vote on those. >> Yes. Um all in favor and the motion carries six to zero. Okay. Um, I gotta go through this. Okay. I make a motion that the board approve and execute the contract for sale of property located at 1709 Hauling shed Road, Hermo, TMS R052000-15-15- I'm sorry, 01-15 for 50 thou for $50,000 as part of the new Dutch Fork Elementary project. Final approval of the board for purchase of this property pursuant to board policy FE site acquisition will be contingent on reports from administration regarding phase one environmental
097study and other required due diligence efforts which are currently underway. >> One point did you say for sale or purchase? >> He wrote for sale. I'm reading what I was going to but you're right. I'm going to correct that to say and execute the contract. It does say contract of sale. So, I'm going to say a contract of sale for the purchase of property. And um I will write that into the the motion. >> Can I get a second? >> Second. >> All in favor? And the motion carries six to zero. Um moving on. I move that we approve the contract for architectural and engineering services to be awarded to Mosley Incorporated for um walls for um Harvest and West Elementary and Nursery Road Elementary. >> Second favor and the motion carries six to zero.
098>> All right. I move that we approve contract architectural and engineering services to be awarded to Craig Golden and Davis for the fine arts auditorium at Chapen High School. >> All the motion carries six to zero. >> I move that we approve contract for architectural and engineering services to be awarded to McMillan Pasden and Smith for the administrative and personal devel professional development building district office. Second. >> All in favor? And the motion carries six to zero. >> Thank you. Um we have a 12 A since we um made an amendment um to the agenda. >> All right. >> Um Dr. Turner, if you can speak to items I believe 18 and 19. uh their purpose and uh the recommendation for approval. >> Absolutely. Anything that goes above and beyond what is already approved in
099the general budget by the board whenever um requests are made to exceed the standard. We bring the positions to the board first for the purpose of ensuring that the board has approved the purpose and function of the position and then pending approval of the board, we move forward with posting those positions um to get someone hired. Um and so the presentation of 18 exceeds the standard number of um in this case the position listed it exceeds the standard number. Um and funds for these positions are um these positions are funded through alternative sources by the schools in need. So that can be through booster programs um or fundraisers to get those funds. The amount still aligns with the um extracurricular schedule, but because those amounts weren't included originally whenever we pass the budget after they
100raise funds, we come to you all to say this particular um campus has raised funds to support this additional need and we seek your approval on those. So that's the relevancy of 18. I've um 19. Um Miss McCascal, can you provide some insight to 19? >> Yes, ma'am. Sure. So um section 19 is going to be about the read to succeed tutoring. And I'll read to you from act 114, section 7 C2. The parent or guardian of a retained student must be offered supplemental tutoring for the retained student and scientifically based services outside of the instructional day. And so that that that is being requested of you because it is law that we have to um offer that to those students who are retained. >> Um and I just want to make a clarifying point.
101I have no disagreement with this. I just wanted it to be discussed in public. I would like um to make two separate motions. Um so I'm going to go ahead and um start with the 19. Um I move that we approve um line item line 19 of exhibit A. >> Second. >> All in favor? >> Can we have discussion before we vote for it? Um, I am certainly for compensating teachers for this and I've brought this up in the past. Um, and uh, I'll try to be brief and not get on my pedestal here, but I really think that, um, while this might be a first step in this direction, um, I really believe that we should look at supplements for teachers at each school. I mean, we put a lot of emphasis on athletics
102and we pay our coaches pretty well, but if we're about academics first, then I think that we should look at supplements for teachers uh at our high schools, our middle schools, and it maybe it would work out separately with the per hour at the elementary school, but um um teachers years ago, we had uh something called enrichment where teachers stayed after school for a period of time and helped and kids from different classes, same subject matter, but different classes could come to that enrichment class and they would get the extra help they might need. Um um I know we I don't know of any school that does enrichment anymore. Um uh but I really think that um when we had our presentation with all our test scoring and um and again I applaud those teachers
103that are working hard to do their best. Um we all want those scores to improve even more. We just do. And um I think that maybe this is the first step in that direction. But I really hope that we will continue to um and maybe Dr. Ross and Dr. Turner and and Miss McCascal and their staff can get together and maybe come up with some sort of idea or something. But um why not have a math uh coach at each of these schools, the high school and middle schools especially, and pay them what you pay a coach to coach a team. Um the the um I think that the impact would be immeasurable. Dr. Ross will remember this. Um when we first arrived there, our SAT scores were not what we wanted them. So we
104put in our own SAT program, our own SAT coaches and everything. And in the first year, we raised 35% by 35 points our S average SAT scores. So, it was just by going that little extra mile. And again, I don't want to get on my soap box here, but the point being is I think we really should look at uh in the face of academics and the things that we're trying to do um putting into place a a bonafide stipen for folks that can work at each of these schools and work with the with the kids. And um you again, Miss McKascal, you you I know you would be for that, but the idea is that I talking to the teachers and the principles and having some sort of an idea of the best way
105to implement that. But uh and I don't mean $100 for staying after. I mean a genuine year round stipen as if you're coaching two sports, right, Dr. Ross? if you're a coach at a winter sport and a or maybe a threeear sport or a three winter fall winter and spring. But um >> Dr. Ross wanted to say something. >> Yeah, I appreciate it. You gave me too much credit for the SAT. That was you and Miss Pillow. But I I would like to say that M. McCow and I are going to be working on a presentation, a budget amendment. It's about tier two uh just for that fact. Um it's a heavy sitement for uh those enrichment opportunities after school and we think um providing that tutoring that enrichment across the continuum. We have students
106who struggle in AP classes that could very well use that type of tutoring. So um that and I think Madam Chair we talked about tier 2 also can have counseling um in that. So Mr. is working with her team on building that out and we plan to bring that to you uh a budget amendment when we look at those funds for implementation at the first of the year in January. >> All right, we have a motion on the floor and it's been properly second. All those in favor and the motion carries six to zero. Um I move that we approve line item 18 uh for exhibit A. Do I have a second? I need a second first. >> Thank you. Thank you, Miss Barnhard. Um, uh, in my experience, one of I have a a
107couple of concerns. The first one is is, um, every school has an athletic director and an assistant athletic director. And, um, we're configured differently. At Dutch Fork and Hermo, the football coach is also the athletic director. At Chapen, we have a football coach and a separate athletic director. And um uh the looking at the job description for um scheduling um you know getting officials um you know getting buses and all those kind of things that go along with athletics. I'm not sure if eligibility is part of that um description as well, but um everybody's I want to share with you I won't say everybody should know I want to share with you that every school of those three high schools they have different setups for their booster clubs. Chapens is the Eagle Club for every
108sport. It's all under one umbrella. Dutch work is they have a separate football, a separate baseball, a separate golf, and some sports can raise a lot more money than others. Um, when I was at when I was at Chapen, the you would go to the Eagle Club and you would ask for something that said that you were the baseball coach and so we wanted to get some new bats and they would take all their requests under consideration. And the reason I say this is because Um, again, we have two athletic directors. We have an athletic director and assistant to do those very tasks and I know how things work um or things have worked in the past and that is that if Chapen has plenty of money and I again I applaud them for every
109athletic supported group I applaud them for what they did. We could not operate without them I think. But um I know if they have a it's kind of like getting a new scoreboard. If Chapen has it, you better believe word gets out with Dutch Fork and Hermo would want to have the same thing. So those are my concerns. And I'm not saying this is a bad thing. If this was a um a parent volunteer, you know, like we have in band or what would we do without ban volunteers? Um, but, uh, a paid position of, you know, up to $3,500 or so, I'm just concerned about the fairness to the other schools and how that would come out. And the last thing I want to say is that if you're an athletic director, that means
110you have this air of responsibility. People see you as if you're an assistant athletic director. So, they're not a school employee. So, how will they handle and what can they say and what if they make decisions and and somebody complains and you you see what I'm saying? It sort of opens up Pandora's box. That's just my opinion. If somebody's got another uh a better perspective than but those when I read that those were my concerns. So, anybody else want to share feel free. So, just to confirm, so the booster club's going to pay. Um, what responsibility do we have as the district? Are we just like screening the employee, doing all the training and background check? We still follow the same process for employment. The difference is in terms of funding. in order to get
111the funding approved before we even bring it to you all, the boosters have to work through um finance to do certain background things that will allow them to collect funds and allow the district to um use the funds that they collected. So before we put this on board, there's a process where and Miss Tucker, you may be able to speak a little more to the financial aspect, but yeah, they have to get the finance cleared. we get the position approved and they have to follow the normal hiring process in order to get someone employed and onboarded. >> But this will always be even if like you know his concerns about other schools it would have to be funded through their booster clubs. >> We do all the lead work but >> they're funding it. >>
112Anything above and beyond that standard of one has to be um the funds have to be raised independently. And I just want a a point of clarification to make sure we're all speaking the the same language and have the same understanding. Athletic director, it's an administrative position. So, every school has an administrator called the athletic director. Um, assistant athletic directors, those are extracurricular duties. So, if you look on the district's um admin salary scale and it lists principal, high school, principal, middle school, assistant principal, you're going to see the position of athletic director. That's a position. You're going to find assistant athletic director on the extracurricular duty scale. Um, and so I do want to make clear that regardless of the the perception of what it entails, I just want to be we're looking at
113it correctly. One is a duty, an extracurricular duty, and one is an actual admin position. And I didn't know if you needed to hear from Miss Tucker on the clearance for the booster component of collection of funding or no, >> just as long as if we're going forward with this and it's approved that we've got funding that they understand is going to be funded through the clubs. Um, I had a question that probably is a Miss Tucker question. Um, do we have any other um, positions or stipens that are funded by athletic booster clubs in our district? >> There is, to my knowledge, at least one other um, request in the pipeline. We are working on the finances for that position at this time. Um, but we are requiring the booster clubs to make sure
114that they are registered with us. They not only provide the funding for the position, but also the friends benefits as well. And so that's what we're making sure that the general fund is not picking up any part of this. This is completely funded by the booster clubs. Okay. >> There's one other that is in the pipeline but not yet financially approved yet. >> Okay. Um, I guess I just want to share I made the motion just to get it out there, but I'm with you, Mr. Sfield. I think this is a very slippery slope. Um what happens if the funding dries up? Then we're faced with either now we're going to pick it up or we're going to have to let the person go. I also have equity concerns um that you know the a
115wealthier schools boosters are going to get extra positions than another school. I I just have really grave concerns. >> Well, let me just I'll just share this personal story was I dealt when I was at another school. I won't say where, but I dealt with that inequity issue because of the separate booster clubs. So, one sport was able to raise a lot of money and the others not so much. And uh so I had end up taking over some of the responsibilities of what was going on. So there would be we would have equity. The other thing too to think about and this again I'm just asking the questions just for clarification is that according to the job description they're going to be doing the job that we're already paying people to do. In other
116words, they can the person I mean those things those tasks of the assistant athletic director that's a job description that they're responsible for. And so if the booster club's going to pay somebody else to come do part of my job, then I don't know that that's right or even fair to the other schools because they can't afford it because you see what I'm saying. So th those are just some concerns. When I saw that, those were my concerns. >> Like you were going to say something after Miss Huddle's last statement. >> I was I wanted to just address Miss Huddle's concern about the financials for the position. So of things that we made sure of is that when the booster clubs bring these forward that they are cut they are writing a check to the
117district for the entire amount for the year. So they are providing the the supplement plus the fringe and we are putting that in a separate account so that if that they wouldn't promise that to us and then spend it on something else. So they are writing that check to the district and we are holding it to pay that out of for the year. So once the position was awarded through the HR process that we would be able to cover it for this year. it would not be guaranteed next year be pending funds. >> I understand that. I I was concerned that what happens in the following year because I mean I was here when we use money for S or positions and we say when the money's gone the positions are gone and in reality
118that's a really hard thing to do. And so what usually happens is when the money's gone the district will suck it up. We just have to be realistic about what can happen. We have a motion on the floor and has been properly second. All those in favor item is >> I didn't hear them all. >> Nobody raised their hand. >> I saw your hand kind of raised my hand but I was alone a vote. So, um I assume that they'll bring this back to us maybe in some other format um pending some of the concerns that were brought forth. So, that moves us forth um forward to number um 13 on the action um agenda. >> Um I move that we approve second and final reading of proposed revision to board policy GCB, professional staff
119contracts and compensation per exhibit I. Do I have a second? >> Second. >> Do we have any discussion? All those in favor? And the motion carries six to zero. I move that we approve second and final reading of proposed revisions to board policy um GCI, professional staff development for exhibit J. Have a second. >> Second. >> Do we have any discussion, questions? All those in favor? And the motion carries. to zero. >> I move that we approve second and final reading of proposed revisions to board policy GCK, professional staff assignments and transfers. We have a second. Do we have any questions or discussion? All in favor? The motion carries six to zero. I move that we approve first reading of proposed revisions to board policy IC school year per exhibit L. >> Do you have
120any discussion? All in favor? And the motion carries six to zero. >> Did I skip one? >> No, ma'am. >> Okay. Um, so we're going to discuss this one then it is first reading. >> Yes. >> I guess I was wondering if you could go over the changes. Which one are you talking about? >> What the school year? >> It's late. Um, the first reading. Usually we have a little discussion on first reading. >> I did ask. >> Yeah, you did ask. I apologize. wondered for um for the per for people who are listening since it is first reading kind of what the main changes were for the um the school year. >> Yes, ma'am. This was for school year. Um the main changes in this one were we added a parentheses s for calendar.
121So that allows us the opportunity to bring more than one year's worth of academic calendar at the same time. And then we also cleaned up just a little bit the process for if we are going to ask the board to forgive days miss due to weather or other hazardous conditions. Thank you. All right. Um I move that we approve first reading of proposed revisions to board policy be school board meetings per exhibit M. >> Do I have a second? Do we have any discussion? All those in favor? And the motion carries. 6. I move that we approve first reading of new board policy BA live streaming of board meetings for exhibit N. >> Have a second. >> Second. >> Do we have any questions or discussion? >> Um, I did and I apologize. It's just
122I had problems getting on my computer, but could we go over the main changes for that? >> Yes, ma'am. This um policy is a new policy. So, we based it on the guidance given us by the schoolboard association and the department of ed. And um it really is exactly the guidance given by the schoolboard association with two changes. Um the first is instead of listing specific options or specific online products such as YouTube or Facebook live as options for streaming the board meetings. We just um kept it sort of general as an appropriate streaming platform. Um that way that allows us some flexibility as technology changes and other products become available. The second thing was that we left out the section on access to broadband which says that we will work to achieve streaming um
123capabilities and um if necessary ask the state board for an extension to be able to provide streaming because we're already streaming and um we have a suitable product available. So those were the only two changes. >> I guess I had a question. Um so we did follow it. Um the is the officer's meeting considered because we talked about that before. That's considered a committee meeting or what's that under this? >> I I believe it's going to be the board's position that it is a committee meeting. >> I just wonder if we should add officer meetings to the Here's why. We actually have a separate policy on committees. And so um and we don't use committees. So I'm just wondering from a standpoint of being crystal clear if we should just add the word officer's meetings
124or officer agenda meet setting meetings or something like that. >> Just a suggest happy to do that if that's what the board would like. Sure. >> This is just a question. Um for those might be out there wondering. We normally all have big packets of papers, but we don't have them tonight, so we're kind of on our phones or laptops. Um, but there's the part right under that the section access to broadband, and it's the accommodations for the Americans with Disabilities at the ADA. Um, and I obviously we don't see as as live streamed, but is there access to like subtitles and stuff as we're live streaming our meetings because I know there's a lot of people that I've heard comments and concerns about, you know, just the microphone the the sound that's going through
125the live stream. It is not as it's happening in real time. However, when it's posted later on YouTube, close caption is available there. >> Thank you. >> Anything else? All right, we have a motion on the floor and it's been properly second. All those in favor and the motion carries 16 to zero. Thank you so much, Miss Sailor. That moves us to the discussion agenda starting with unencumbered time. Dr. Turner. >> Good evening, Madam Chair, members of the board. Dr. Ross, this is the second opportunity for us to discuss revisions to the district's uh GCLE unencumbered time policy. Uh during our last discussion, we previewed the various versions of um options for how that how those edits could be made. During this discussion, we've proposed some revisions. Um and so this is an opportunity to
126ensure the board is supportive of the revisions that administration has suggested that incorporate nurses into the existing policy of unencumbered time. Are there questions? >> Have you guys figured out what you're going to do yet? How we're going to cover it? >> Yes. I'm sorry. >> I remember there the prior discussion there was an issue with um figuring out how we were going to cover the all the time for the nurses. While we're working on that, yes, looking at this uh policy, uh we believe that the best way to do that is um just as we would do with the teachers and anytime there was an interruption of their unencumbered time that that we would make that up within the week and that way uh they have their 30 minutes. uh that structure, but if
127there's a cold blue or an allergic reaction that they would respond, but it would be at to that site to log those hours or those minutes uh so that they would be made up within is it the week or the >> it's it's within the work week. Um and so when you look at our current nursing staff, they are um non-exempt employees. So at the middle school and high school, they are eighthour a day employees, but they're scheduled for eight and a half. So we already have built in the 0.5 in the schedule to allow for that 30 minutes. And for intermediate and elementary schools, they're seven or seven and a half hours a day, and we've built them in for eight hours. And so the plan would be to handle it the way that
128we already have um to ensure that their schedule allows for that 30 minute buildin time. Um so that's something that we've already incorporated >> and you're able to ensure that there aren't meds that have to be delivered by a nurse to the student. There's a half hour clear every day. is that, you know, sometimes we can't predict when those students are going to have to need those on a year-to-year basis. >> To the fullest extent that we are aware that is being done to the fullest extent um practicable um when it's not um like all of our other hourly employees, we should be um maintaining records of that to ensure appropriate compensation um in compliance with those fair label standards acts for our nurses. Are we going to just give them a sign that they
129can flip on their door that says the nurse >> I'm going to ask uh Dr. Harris uh he works more closely with nurse Stannic um for advice on on approaching that. >> I'm not sure it's going to be a sign of Mr. Satderfield, but uh it it it is uh appropriately appropriately and properly communicated throughout the various schools when the nurse is station or the health room is uh under the unencumbered time. And and and and so far to date uh we've all been compliant. And again to um uh um we in emergency scenarios those those are being addressed. So no student who has a health concern or is being overlooked at any point in time. So uh the times that uh they have for unencumbered are really for documentation counting medications uh IHP kind
130of documentation things of that nature which which is very significant. Uh but they make certain that all students continue to be served throughout the process. You know, I know they carry a radio with them, >> which is common sense, but um if they're in a noisy place like the cafeteria or the gymnasium or something like that, um again, this is going to be, you know, of all the things we're trying to do with this unencumbered time, the nurse is going to be a a real critical one for sure. Anyway, >> good luck with that, Dr. Harris. So, I don't know if we have something similar. Um, my mom actually works for Aken County Schools and she's a UAP unlicensed um assisted personnel. So, basically, she can do the medication, she can do basic first aid
131and stuff like that. So, there's no issues with lunches and and so forth. So, I don't know if we have a program or, you know, some sort of they do safe school training so they're fully aware. So, that would take care of medications and I don't know if that would help bridge that gap. We do have a few nursing support assistants. We just don't have them um at every school, but a part of the role of the nursing support assistant employees that we have sounds like it it mirrors the capacity that you're speaking of. Um so we do have that just not right now at every school and location, but that's that's very helpful for us. >> Anybody else? >> Thank you so much. >> You're welcome. All right. Yes, ma'am. Madam Chair, members of
132the board in our community, I wanted to bring a discussion. We've discussed this a little bit with the DLE, but I wanted to bring this up uh in terms of middle school, co-curricular, extracurricular facilities. Um I did not want to make this seem like this was singular. Uh but this is an issue that is multiaceted that I think we have an opportunity to take care of for our students. Uh I want to open up with an email that I received on August 12th, 2025. Um it was during lunch. It says, "Good morning, Mr. Ross. Me and my friend know about the great things you have done for this school like paint the cafeteria walls and cafeteria. Me and my friend met you at lunch today. me and many other students want better recess equipment or
133more things to do at recess and a new gaga pit. Thank you for your time and have a wonderful day. And I just thought, you know, for a student requesting things, this was just such a beautifully written letter that she did. She started out with appreciation. I didn't do the cafeteria walls north. Uh so Alan KN and your team and Dr. Gary for doing that. This young lady says, "Thank you." I wrote back to her says, "Thank you so much for your email. I appreciate your advocacy for your school and classmates. I did meet with Mr. Brent, that's Mr. Brent Davis about providing you a better resource area. Uh after walking that area with him, uh I think that we have an opportunity to provide this young lady and her friends and her classmates uh
134something better than what they have. Uh she replied August 13th at 11:33. I hope this is during lunch here, but thank you so much I cannot wait uh to tell my friend uh we've been trying to make it work since around the end of last year. Me and student do whatever is needed for this school and our classmates and we knew after hearing what you did for the school cafeteria. Again, shout out to operations for that. Uh that you would be a great help. Again, thank you so much and have an amazing day. Um and I want you to see what she's talking about. She's a fifth grader at uh Chapen Intermediate. Uh it will transition into Chapen Middle School. That means she will be there to her eighth grade year. Uh but this is
135the area in which she references. And um as I walked up with Brent Davis, I realized that in that area that's where the dirt is and the the grass, there's also some other uh things that we got to navigate. some pipes that are there and what you speak. So, uh that's the area that they have they have their recess. So, we started to look at um not only uh this young lady's school and for her classmates, but um what what other middle schools would would be faced with. But we felt like uh going back these are again conceptuals of uh spaces that we can do to improve uh that area for them. We looked at Chapen Middle School, uh, but this is the yard of for for middle school play at at Chapen Middle School.
136It's really, uh, this area and then the kind of the the walkway that they have. And, um, again, we have an opportunity to provide them uh, with better spaces to to play and do um, than we currently have, upgrading what we currently have. intermediate. Uh you can see this is the the play area that they have. Um this is what happens at lunch. You can see the you know where they are basically in a lot of our our schools use kind of the driveways or the parent pickup loops or bus loops for their their recess. We are working on every elementary school playground fall surfaces equipment uh but middle school. It's a it's a year it's a tough year of transition and those kids need a place to kind of cut loose at lunch. Um
137and so Gaga pits are are huge. You see in the picture right at Irma Middle. Uh I would say that Irma Middle is probably in the best position of site but and what they have, but we we feel like we can do better in terms of revamping the play spaces for our middle school students. They will now be there for three years, sixth, seventh, and eighth for for all of our our campuses, our five middle schools. And we just wanted to look at uh ways that we could conceptualize some better spaces for them. Uh going back to um Spring Hill Middle or Chapen Middle, we feel like with Spring Hill site next door, this would be a unique opportunity to uh put an inclusive play space uh for uh programs like the scream screaming eagles.
138I know we've talked a lot about that uh so that uh we can address the inclusivity issues. I talked to Allan Allen feels that um you know we would like to price out one at both ends of the district uh inclusivity uh in um in Chapen at Spring Hill but also in Irmo as well. So, um I think the toughest one is Dutch Fork. Um this is is that the bus loop and um but it's one of my favorite videos because you see a little kid in the right just rolling down the hill. That's what that's what they do. I know his mom is excited about laundry, but um we we feel like we can uh take that that uh that area and and really improve it. um for those students. So um again what
139you're looking at conceptuals these are not priced out these are just conceptuals um what we did with a with a program uh it is the intent of the administration to bring to this body uh a permission to uh do A&E services uh for the we call co-curricular so that's recess that's um you know, PE classes that is anything that we're doing during the day uh um or athletics or and extracurricular activities as well after school uh opportunities for our middle schoolers uh so that we can address these sites. Uh A&E would not commit us to building or actually doing the renovations, but it would give us a cost. It is our goal to have that uh in place before the capital um campaign starts. U we will look at options in our current uh capital.
140Uh but I do want to kind of go back to Miss Huddle's point of looking at that five-year capital plan because as you saw in Allen's presentation, being able to have a preventative maintenance uh plan is a is a good thing to look at assignments in our capital plan so that when it comes time to replace 45 units so that we're not behind, that we can get ahead of the game. So um again our ask um at the next meeting would be that we pursue Annie looking at what this would be looking at the cost um and then from there looking at finance options again does not require that we pursue it but does give us some options to to meet not only this young lady and her friend's request but I think those of
141all the middle school students in in school district Barnhart. >> Oh, love that email. And if you had asked me what a gaga pit was before this morning when me, myself and Mr. Bum and uh Miss Huddle went to Irma, I would not have known. But um I I love the idea of getting them outside. And I'm curious, how long do they do middle schoolers generally get to go outside? Because I'm assuming it's not as long as >> It's not as long as elementary school. Um Ch look to you school day or or Miss Tucker who just finished middle school. How long is >> I can give a little input on that since I worked at middle schools. But go ahead. >> Recess is sort of built into the to the lunch time of middle
142schoolers. It's not on paper they probably have about 20 minutes, but they really probably don't have 20 minutes. Um, first of all, I mean, I I I think that the kids do need um some more things. Um, the Gaga pit at um Irma Middle was was cool and obviously these really like that. Um the only concern I have is that some of these things are a lot more expensive to maintain than others. Um like I would think a football field would be a whole lot more expensive to maintain than a gaga pit. And I worry that capital and I'm not saying it's like we have tons of it but we we have capital funds and we can do a lot of things with capital funds but certain capital funds turn into maintenance funds and then
143when it becomes maintenance it's literally a choice between either it comes out of the classroom like the tutoring and things or we have to do a tax increase. And so I would just hope that maybe we walk before we run and maybe some projects like the Gaga pits, um other things that maybe kids can do in a 20 minute period that aren't aren't going to be a big drain on the on the maintenance side of it um going forward. So, that's just my two cents. >> I appreciate that. I think one of the things we're we're looking at is all the spaces that you see are currently within the footprint to be maintained and they're past their um they're past their opportunity to be maintained. I think that's kind of the issues that we dealt
144with when Allan first came on. I'm bragging a little bit. He introduced us to a concept called run to fail. And I think that's been the strategy for our district for a long time. We just buy it and we run until it runs out. You see that with the 15 years. Uh that's not one person's issue. It's just kind of we put it in and and we don't have a a maintenance plan. I think that's what the young lady is talking about is that we have we try to do things and and we can't sustain it. I'm just talking about kind of a very robust way of looking at it. I think field maintenance is tough. Turf maintenance is is is kind of that one thing that we can put in assign capital for 10
145years and then slowly put in at it. I told the team I'm I'm I got to put a roof on the house. We've been working on that for the last five years, putting money away so you can handle that big expenditure. So I agree. I think you know in 20 minutes we need to address those pieces like the new gaga pits, basketball courts, four square, those things. Uh but we have current spaces that uh those kids need maintained and I think we we could look a capital expenditure that would be um something that improve the current grounds that we have. And the last thing I'll say is we never want to confuse the capital with the operation sides. So tutoring, the things that we're going to do tier two, tier interventions, those will never be
146on the on the capital side. >> Yeah. Um just a couple of things. Um, you know, one of the things being an old PE teacher, when I visit schools, I look at their playground. I look at their outside facilities. At Chapen Elementary School years ago, they had the school park agreement and this Crooked Creek built all the fields out there for nothing and as long as they could use them. And I don't know if that is an option to look at um to maybe help uh you know with the cost. Um but um you know when I look at some of those um playgrounds and things if the kids have 10 minutes or they have 30 minutes they ought to have a basketball court that doesn't have holes in the in the courts. Some of
147them are just so old and cracked and they just and then some of them are so confined because of the way the aotment that they have for the kids. If you go I ride my bike sometimes and I go through the again I'll go to the CS CIS school through there and it looks like they've got everybody in the whole school crowded in this one little fenced in area. It is tight as a drum. Um but uh I think that um you know upgrading those playground opportunities for the kids. Um the other thing I wanted to mention was and I brought this up before is the thing with the the screaming eagles and I I'm maybe I I really think there needs to be a partnership with the the folks that are involved with that
148right now and they can help uh lead us. Um, if you're a physical education teacher, there's something called adaptive adaptive PE and that's for those students who have some sort of disability and it's a special curriculum. But when looking at um again, Spring Hill might be the perfect place for such a thing or at least for the beginning phase of this. Um uh but I think there really should be good time spent before we spend any money on that. But get the parents involved and get their input because some of those the screaming eagles have been going on for several years now. And u um but and the last thing I wanted to say was um I really like the idea of and I'm not saying building stadiums at middle schools but even having a
149field where the kids it's their it's their school. it's it's it is their school while they're there and they take ownership in that and then they there take more pride in their school and their behavior is better. um everything that that shows that we're supporting them um you know impacts a lot of what they do and how they behave. And I don't like I say we could just throw in some if we had a field and we'd throw in some metal bleachers and parents could bring chairs their own lawn chairs and sit along those sidelines or whatever. But um u but I do like the discussion. I just I guess that's what I want to say. Um, I like the discussion and as I said for the children that have disabilities, they should not be
150they should not be traveling to another county to for their for their activities. We should have um paid coaches. We should have paid individuals that support that program for those kids for those children because we, you know, again, that's something that's I think we're we're lacking. But I'm I'm glad that we're having this discussion. >> Scott, >> same thing. And I just want to say that it's been a long time since any of us were in middle school. And one thing adults are not always good at is predicting what the kids want or need. And so I would encourage you, please ask them because Dr. Ross, I know one 10-year-old little girl who would tell you, and she did tell you this is not what she would want. There are other things that I think
151we need to think about that these kids need to sensory rooms. places where they where they can be quiet and not be inundated with activity and sensory overload. So, if we're going to do this, let's let's try make sure we do it for all the kids, too. >> Yeah, I agree. I think like a school survey, you know, ask the kids with, you know, we have limited funds as a district, what's your top three? What do you want? Do you want tether ball courts? Because like with Dutch Fork Middle, our daughters there and other ones that we've been a part of, the PTO groups are super involved and they're looking for ways to, you know, give these kids, you know, ways to blow off steam. So, how can we support the PTO's? You know, they
152can't necessarily do anything with that large bus loop because you got to kind of grade it to do anything with that. So, that's kind of out of a PTO realm, but you know, they raise money for like tether balls. We just got to figure out is that going to be something that we're ready for, but um I think there's definitely a lot of cool opportunities for them. >> I I think we can start off with that survey uh of knowing those things that they would like. Uh I think to your point, what you see at um middle school lunch is a crowd and uh you see everyone from those who race after the basketballs to those who sit in the corner. And I think having a space in place for everyone uh is is really
153what we're looking for. >> I was just going to say to your point, Dr. Herring, I want to say that at least the middle school I came from, I know had that accommodations for those students that didn't want to be outside in the chaos. Um they had opened up to the stage and had some fluffy chairs. So those that wanted to read or crochet could spend their 10 minutes inside in the quiet. And so I will say that our schools are doing are doing that. Anybody else? I move that we adjourn. Second. All in favor? Motion carries six to zero. Y'all have a good night.