001our first school board meeting for Monday April 24 2023 to order our uh first meeting for tonight is um our um appointment process for a new board member uh Mike Wade one of our board members uh resigned the board in February and so the board uh made the decision um to hold this appointment tonight just prior to our organization meeting so that the newly appointed board member will be able to be part of that full process of reorganization be able to provide input on what committees they're interested in potentially officers positions Etc so um we have received three applications um we also sent out the questions that are going to be asked of the applicants out to them this past week as we have done and um so what we will do be doing is
002the applicants will be coming up front board members will be asked to be seated back in the gallery um so that the attention of the public the community can be on our applicants Corey uh our superintendent will be asking the questions from the podium this will be run if people are familiar with the League of Women Voters forums it will be run in the pretty much in the same way they're each applicant will be able to give a two-minute opening and closing statement and then we will have a series of questions there's been a random draw um ahead of time um with the superintendent um and she will let people know about that so that we make sure that not the same person as answering the same question first second or third so there'll be
003a rotation once that process is fully completed the applicants will be asked to go out into the gallery board members will be asked to come back up and we will conduct the voting process I'll mention this when we get to that point and that um that the first top vote getters will advance unless on the first round of voting an applicant receives a majority of the votes tonight we have eight members here that would be five votes um so if any board members have questions or applicants have questions um please feel free to ask about those as we move through the process so I'm going to note we've got our regular public access to meetings people are able to be here this evening in person they are also able to be here we are live
004streaming on the web I am going to ask Amber to call the roll miss erler here Mr Robbie here miss portson here Ms Bushman here Ms Reno here Mr hope here Kowalski here Mr Summers here we have a quorum great I think did you call me yep oh I'm here okay so we will not whoa so we will now um if I can ask board members to head out and we will ask the application up front thank you for the audience I don't dare turn it off [Music] hey you didn't mention Ed yeah two top advances foreign [Music] okay so first of all I'd like to take just a couple minutes to thank the three of you for your interest in being interviewed tonight for our current open position so um it always warms by
005heart when we've got people in the community that are interested in serving on our board so thank you very much for that um as Meg erler had indicated we have six questions we've got time for an opening statement a closing statement those two we will allow for two minutes and then we will allow for one and a half minutes for each of the questions Chris nyman is going to be our time keeper he will put up a yellow sign with 30 minutes to go and then the red sign win time is up 30 seconds you mean thank you 30 seconds what did I say I mean we could do 30 minutes 30 seconds 30 seconds thank you um we did do a random draw and this is the order um Chris Scott we'll start with
006the opening of course and then Catherine will have go next and Miguel will go after that then when we get to question one Catherine will start Miguel will go next and then Chris and then starting with question two Miguel will go first Chris and then Catherine any questions okay with that we're going to go ahead and start with Chris you get to start with the opening statement okay well thank you for having this um this feels a little bit like taking a test for your driver's license when you've been driving for 50 years you've done all of this but thank you very much so first of all I'd like to say when this opening came up I I didn't think or know if I would even put my name in but you know I thought
007about is it would this be a good thing would I be a good candidate and then something happened that I truly did not expect I started to hear from people all over the community phone calls emails running into people and they asked will you put your name in you're going to put your name in what do you think and I said well I don't know let me think about it let me look at the possibility of my doing that and if it would benefit in any way the board or the district so I guess having been elected by the community seven times without putting out a sign or a Facebook page or a website anything like that I thought most of the people in this community know me from the school district because I love
008supporting students and doing the work and I've done it for a long time and for me it was a joyful thing to do and so that's really important to me and I also know the fourth person who had put their uh the name in who I'd never met um he told the district that he wanted a viable candidate in and when he saw my name on the list he pulled his name off he said now I feel comfortable so those are the things those people saying to me please continue please do this you've been such a valuable asset to our students to our parents to our community we want you to continue if you'll consider it so I did tell a couple of them give them my word that I would at least put my
009application in so that's why I'm here thank you Chris next Catherine hi everyone my name is Kate gotwald thank you for your time this evening considering me for the seat I think I am a new name to most of you so I'd like to just share some quick background info I'm originally from Park Falls I graduated from uwsp and moved back to Stevens Point about 10 years ago my husband and I have two young children our son is in 4k and our daughter is in second grade at Madison as a family we love board games reading gardening spending time in schmickly on the green circle Trail and at the library and local parks I've worked in Talent acquisition for 10 years and in several higher education roles before that going all the way back to
010a work-study job at the uwsp admissions office I currently work remotely from home for the standard an insurance company based in Portland on their talent acquisition team I wanted to share just one little piece of trivia about me as well back in high school I was a member of the Parliamentary procedure team in FBLA the future Business Leaders of America and competed in that category at the national leadership conference and also passed the exam to join the National Association of parliamentarians at that time I admit I was not convinced that that experience would ever be relevant in the real world sure I have my old copy of Robert's Rules around somewhere if I need to dust It Off thank you thank you next Miguel well I'm Miguel Campos um thank you all thank you to
011the board in the district for hosting this and for everybody watching online some of you may know me I I've run for the board seat for the past for the past two terms I haven't made it yet but I don't plan on quitting anytime soon and I heard this possession came up and after licking my wounds for a little while and sucking up my pride I also had a similar experience to Chris I had a lot of people reaching out in support to tell me that encouraged me uh to throw my hat in here once again this is this is about the kids it's not about winning or losing election it's about keeping moving forward for the district I have to remember why I got into this for the first place as a father of
012two kids in the district that will be here for 10 years I think I'm well suited um to to move forward to move this District forward I have a vested interest for the next 10 years so I'm asking you all to consider me for this position thank you thank you question number one the question is what unique value will you bring as a member of the school board first of all being a parent isn't unique but I think it's important for our community to continue to have strong representation on the board from families with children currently enrolled in our district schools I've been on the board of directors for Community child care center since 2016 and have served with other local non-profits including the Portage County breastfeeding Coalition La Leche League of Stevens Point and
013most recently as Treasurer and social media chair for our local Wild Ones chapter working remotely from home for the past 10 years the teams I've worked with have included people from across the country and the world I'm comfortable listening to different ideas and appreciating the perspective and background that everyone brings to the table right I will repeat the question and this is Miguel's turn what unique value will you bring as a member of the school board this this was a unique question as well there's a lot of people in the room today and you all have a lot of different values that you bring to the board which is why why you got elected to the position for myself over the past two years of running I ran on the idea of balance and for
014me I believe my commitment to creating balance and everything I do is is a unique value which I think will help serve this board well right now we live in a society where politics and social media and personal opinions have a Stranglehold over many over many communities ability to engage in productive and respectful debate and opposition I think someone like myself who is willing to respect another's point of view and actively engage in constructive a dialogue albeit sometimes in disagreement and opposition is increasingly rare and I believe it is both a unique value and a necessary one to move our society and this board forward Chris what unique value will you bring to the board as a member of the school board is that the the environment one or it's question number one oh but
015unique value sorry you bring as a member of the book okay I'm sorry um so I think my service over the years the decisions and the great things that I've been able to be a part of really make a difference I would be right now with where the board is to relatively new board members to brand new board members the possibility of change in leadership and the upcoming referendum and also the budget review I've had a lot of experience in ref in working on referendums that have passed and work around referendums that have failed and it's a really scary thing when that happens but having the knowledge the history and the experience I just believe that I believe that I can bring what we've had and then as a board that is stable a board
016that will work together and also able to help and Mentor some of the board members who are new and even the two newer ones um Dennis and John even though you've been you're very accomplished and that there are so many things on as being a board member that you're not aware of last year um I don't think either of you realize that when you vote for officers that's public information and I think you were surprised well there's hundreds of other things being on a board member versus being an employee or someone who's accomplished that I can help with thank you Chris next question we'll start with Miguel how has your background and experience prepared you to be effective in an environment that holds diversity equity and inclusion as core to our mission and values well
017for those of you that don't know me I actually come from a pretty diverse background myself I am both a Hispanic American a father who still speaks fluent Spanish I'm also a member of the Sault Ste Marie Michigan tribe of Chippewa Indians on my mom's side my parents once from Texas one's from Michigan met in the military I was actually born in Odessa Texas but moved to the wasaire in the 80s and being so foreign to that area I can fully appreciate the value placed on respecting the many variations of new Learners that are coming into our district and into our community having been one of those Learners myself I understand that value on a more personal level I've also been I've also spent the past three years in my career as a local Ambassador
018for Dei related work as part of our company's Global diversity efforts and on a local level I currently serve on the counties diversity Affairs and inclusivity committee seeking to ensure that our county is recognizing the demographic and cultural additions in our community or to our community I believe my person on professional experiences provide a balanced experience perspective Chris how experience prepared you to be effective in an environment that holds diversity equity and inclusion as core to our mission and values first of all I I should mention that our mission prepare each student to be successful I was part of a board that talked about that mission and what it was going to include and there were a lot of discussions about how do you define success and over the years this was a long time
019ago how that has changed is it just tremendous our student enrollment has such an increase of minorities of marginalized students poverty in our community families are struggling with that even though our looking at that learning Gap our teachers our staff has been have been given tools to deal with a lot of these things but when you go into a school and you don't know anything about someone's Heritage or identity um you can't or culture it's really difficult to say we're here's our here are rules for you to success those rules need to be changed and looked at so one of the things I want to say is I've worked in Denver with hearing impaired students that student was completely different and we modified her schedule in the the classroom to make sure not that she
020had everything that everyone else had being equal but the equity portion of it modifying her her work I also grew up with a lot of kids in school who came from all different countries I actually helped a student who came from Greece because my mom was Greek to work with that so I understand how much those differences make a difference Catherine how has your background and experience prepared you to be effective in an environment that holds diversity equity and inclusion as core to its Mission and values diversity equity and inclusion are core to my personal values and I believe everyone in our district deserves to be supported and safe being their authentic selves I write to my legislators on issues that are important to me including those related to Dei I donate to organizations whose
021missions include advocacy for Dei initiatives and the empowerment and protection of marginalized people I participate in several employee resource groups with a focus on Dei my current role I've worked on projects to elevate Dei including allowing candidates to provide their pronouns on our job application adding gender options in addition to male and female on our job application and increasing the visibility of our process to request accommodations I believe the culture policies and actions of the school board and its members should help to ensure that all students and staff are embraced and valued for who they are and are able to fully participate and grow within our schools thank you Catherine the next question we will be starting with Chris please list the top two issues you feel the district is facing so our structural deficit
022having not received additional per pupil funding in the last two years an increase has really been difficult um it's going to force us eventually to go to referendum over 60 percent of our budget is salaries and benefits if that if that referendum should not pass and I've been involved in one that didn't here's what you're looking at it could mean cuts and programs it could mean increase class sizes it could mean um Cuts in positions I just feel that it's really important that we look at that and and realize what could happen the next one would be our social emotional impact on students and families and staff because it has taken over such a large part of our district it's caused added even more changes because of society social media and it's just given so
023much dress especially after covid so I think it's really important that those two things are dealt with um in my own personal life which makes it really personal to me um I had family my mom had a mental illness um bipolar and my sister who has had her PhD um was working on helping students and a year later had such a severe depression that she committed suicide so that social emotional to me is huge thank you Chris Catherine lists the top two issues you feel the district is facing first the need to provide competitive wages that fairly compensate our teachers and staff the positive influence and impact of good teachers and staff is vital to our community we must support our teachers financially so they will happily choose to pursue their profession by joining and
024remaining in our district second is the upcoming budget shortfall a need to pass referendum with unreliable funding from the state our community will need to approve a referendum in 2024 to ensure the continued successful operation of the district it will be imperative for the board to be United in this effort and the explanation to voters of budget projections and the need for the referendum to be approved to Catherine Miguel please list the top two issues you feel the district is facing sure um teacher retention and Financial stress I think are the two top issues demographic shifts are leading to just less teachers going into college so we're just going to have less teachers coming out pretty soon here low pay increasingly political environments that are deterring teachers from entering the field altogether or leaving the
025field altogether better financial gain and alternative jobs is pulling teachers out of districts everywhere that's not just here it's it's everywhere and it's not just this field it's a lot of lower paying Fields people are leaving for higher pay jobs increasing competition among districts both public and private are also affecting teacher retention again not just here but Along on districts all over the nation um High inflation loss of students covid costs increased programming and their Associated costs and certain political decisions have all exacerbated the financial burden on many districts the next five to ten years are going to be difficult Financial Times if and we need to ensure we have many viewpoints on how to best weather of this storm together thank you Miguel moving on to question number four we will start with Catherine
026Catherine please share an experience where you strongly disagreed with a decision made by a group you are a member of and how did you handle that moving forward all right so several years ago some new technologies began emerging in the talent acquisition world where instead of candidates completing a phone screen with a recruiter they could complete a one-way interview by accessing an online platform where they would see the screening questions and record their answers a member of the recruiting team would then listen to their answers and determine if they would move forward or not my initial reaction to this process was that it sounded awful it felt incredibly impersonal to me and it didn't give candidates the chance to ask questions as would happen in a typical phone screen so moving forward for any client
027team that I was on that had this platform in place I pushed to make it optional we could give candidates the choice to use it but we needed to provide them the opportunity to opportunity to schedule a normal phone screen with a recruiter if that's what they prefer preferred to do this felt like a fair compromise because it removed my own negative opinions about the technology from the picture if someone wanted to use it they were welcome to but it was important to me that it needed to be a choice and not the only option to continue moving forward in the application process thank you Catherine Miguel please share an experience where you strongly disagreed with a decision made by a group we were a member of and how did you handle it moving forward
028sure to think about this one for a while but then it hit me right away having getting called back to the office after two and a half years so during covet my employer required everyone to work from home for the better part of two years we're one of the first companies to start so we had like an extra month home from from work over a lot of companies because we were Global and as it turned out this new Arrangement was very well received but once kova died down the executive team called on everybody to return to the office four days a week after having been at home for two and a half years and this did not go over well with myself or any of my colleagues there was a very small amount so I
029ended up being part of several meetings with local leadership and eventually our Global Leadership to better understand their thought process and to share on air out our Grievances and logic as to why we should be allowed to work from home for more than once a week we had a lot of good conversation a lot of good debates we did end up having to adhere to the four days in the office but I appreciated the respect given to those who spoke out against the return of the office and I was half happy to have been able to respectfully disagree with the leadership team while still being able to accept the outcome that I did not like but we were able to move forward again Chris please share an experience where you strongly disagreed with a decision
030made by a group you were a member of and how did you handle it moving forward so this one just kind of jumped out at me as something I remembered I've worked with a number of boards and other board presidents and a number of superintendents and over the years there were things that would happen and decisions that would be made and there wasn't a record so there wasn't that rest of the story that people want to have so one of the things we had was recording closed session meetings and the majority of the board members decided we should not be recording those meetings and I disagreed because as you change superintendents and as everything changes you've got these major decisions that were made and all you would have is this was the vote but no
031rest of the story and these were really important decisions that were made in closed session so I totally disagreed I understood the concern of having that but I thought the concern of not having the information that led to these decisions was really important but when I realized that I was in a minority I understood that's democracy and that's what happens and so it was like that and I was fine with that once that once that decision is made by the majority of the board you move on and I did thank you Chris moving on to question number five we will start with Miguel Miguel is there a particular issue that motivates you to serve on the board well I can't say there was a single issue that motivated me to to serve but if I
032have to choose one it's definitely teacher retention and here's why I chose teacher retention because so many of the district's outcomes are contingent on the successes of great teachers everything from student outcomes and their appreciative parents to more financially supportive taxpayers to student retention and even legislative policy moreover the monetary incentives and fringe benefits needed to attract and retain top teaching Talent require the board's decisions to be laser focused on excellent fiscal responsibility open communication and Community again engagement to achieve this goal I see teacher retention efforts as the fulcrum for many of the future decisions that this board will make thank you Miguel Chris is there a particular issue that motivates you to serve on the board you know I've always served with the student in mind and in today's world it's so important
033for students to have every opportunity that the district and the community can support we're in a global Community now they're World citizens I think everywhere I visited all over the country and out of the country I'm immediately talking to parents with kids and asking them how are they doing I think one of the things that was really important is when I served here on the human health and growth committee I never realized how much of an education our students are getting life skills they are getting that I never got my son graduated from here I'm not sure that he got it that's the world we live in and I think it's really important that we provide students with every opportunity raise the level of their education so that then when they leave here they've got
034the tools they need not only to move forward right away but in and then to build on those and that's the one thing in the world that no one can take away from these students is their education and something that they can always build on and in today's world they really need it when I graduated I didn't have any of those skills I have to go to back to school now and watching our teachers in that health and human growth committee listening to them how they were teaching those students I literally had goosebumps and said that's what these kids need and that motivated me thank you Chris Catherine is there a particular issue that motivates you to serve on the board no there wasn't one particular issue that motivated me to want to serve on
035the board selfishly the main reason I motivated to serve is that my kids will be students in this district for the next 13 years I want them and their classmates to be in schools that are safe and welcoming to have qualified teachers who love their jobs and are properly compensated for the value they bring to our community to be challenged by appropriate curriculum and to continue to grow every day into intelligent empathetic and caring members of society none of that is possible without a school board that values the role of public education and values the people responsible for bringing it to life thank you Catherine and on to the last question and we are going to start with Chris if you are appointed to the school board is it your intention to run for your
036seat in the April 2024 election would be in my intent to do so if I'm able but that would make me research if the community wanted me to do that if they wanted me to continue you know the people that contacted me were people from our district from the University from the business Community all of those people that were asking me to please continue the stability working together in the last I don't know how many years because that had such an effect on students and staff and teachers and the taxpayers if you have a stable board so I would absolutely consider it if I'm St if I'm still around and healthy and able to and people want me to do it good thank you Chris Catherine if you are appointed to the school board is
037it your intention to run for your seat in the April 2024 election the 2022 election felt mean-spirited and hostile toward candidates running for school board and honestly it turned me and probably many others off from seeking elected positions well this year's election cooled off I'm not confident in knowing either way whether that was an exception or the start of a trend at this point I can't say for sure that I'd plan to run for this seat in 2024 but if I pointed to the board I'd like to give myself the chance to be in the role for a minute before being confident in making that decision either way good thank you Catherine Miguel if you are appointed to the school board is it your intention to run for your seat in the 2024 election yes
038I am absolutely going to be running next time that's all I've got thank you Miguel now on to the closing statement you have two minutes and Chris will again give us a 30 second warning and with the closing statement we are going to start with Catherine all right thank you to the board for your time tonight and for considering me for this role well I understand that the board and District citizens may be much more familiar with Miguel and Chris than me I hope that you feel my recent willingness to apply for this role conveys the genuine interest I have to serve my community in this capacity thank you on to Miguel um thank you again to the board in the community um it's it's been a great learning experience over the past two years
039running running for the board proper and this is yet another experience for me and I keep learning along the way and I I really want nothing more than to serve my community I've been serving my community both in Wasa before I moved here and now for the past since 2004 and all kinds of different roles with the Salvation Army the Community Foundation the Lions Club through my work efforts bootstrap all kinds of organizations and I I'd like to do that because I like to set an example for my kids and for my kids friends and stuff like that I mean I had my parents when me moved to Wausau we didn't know anybody so my parents were extremely active in absolutely everything and that's how they got to meet everybody and that's that has definitely
040been a part of my life and I want I think this is a good thing for my kids to see and I have a vested interest in what my kids are doing for the next 10 years in school and if I want to be a part of the solution or be a part of making this an increasingly great District I want to be directly part of it just like when I was telling you earlier about the the covet situation I just went right to the people that make those decisions it's it's easier to do that sometimes sometimes you have to get you get bumped back and you got to work your way back up there but I intend to fully serve the community as best I can and again as I've stated many times both
041here and at the League of Women Voters Forum I'm open to to discussions with people that I that I oppose I have opposing views with and that's going to happen and I don't have a problem with that so I thank you again for all your time thank you Miguel Chris so thank you everyone I think you have three good candidates here I think it's great um you know over the years when I was um on the school board I can't say my son was the happiest person in the world um he is now teaching an English teacher in Whitefish Bay and he understands how important this role is to everyone to students to staff to community I think when you get to a certain age you you understand that having a purpose and having that
042purpose brings joy to your life this district has been like a family to me I I have done nothing but be joyful in so many different ways not everyone can do this but being part of things like pods the 4K with our Community Partners the life skills center uh being part of online learning being part of the pay plan all the things that led us to where we are today and there are there are a lot of things coming and I would really like to continue for this next year to be a positive influence on the board and the community to continue that for all the things that will be coming so thank you very much thank you Chris and once again thanks to all three of you if not appointed tonight I hope that
043you will consider running again in the future because as Chris said I think we've got three quality candidates so thank you very much for your time at this time I'm going to ask for the candidates to go back to the audience section and our board members to come back to their seats [Music] yeah exactly what I thought foreign [Applause] so I will note the the obvious um we have three wonderful candidates um um on behalf of the board and board members are free to speak up um very grateful for your interests very grateful for your answers um I um for sure it's a lot easier this time around I think the last appointment we had we had 17 applicants and I think it was online three and a half hours too so it was um
044I'm just saying it was a sunblock it was a somewhat rigorous process that being said we will be utilizing the same process that we have used um or voting and I want to lay that out board members will be receiving paper ballots um for each round of voting you are asked to put on the ballot who you intend to vote for as well as your initials um once the vote has been taken um these ballots become a member of public record and they are subject um the the public has the ability to be able to take a look um anyone has the ability to take a look at who voted for who but it's important for all of us to understand that up front and um to also for the community to understand that that
045information will be available for them after this evening we will be looking for uh we're going to need a majority vote and there are eight of us here tonight Dennis you're still there right I'm still here all right perfect um so Dennis is on phone if for members um or for members of the public um but is in attendance we will be looking for a vote of five um the top two vote Getters will advance so for example if we had a four four vote um those top two would Advance um if we had a four two two vote all three will advance um and then we will again depending on that um we will then have to start again um g go ahead how does Dennis vote Dennis will be voting by phone with
046Amber so Amber and Corey will be handing the voting so once we all vote just uh fold your piece of paper Cory is going to be walking around grabbing all of those she will be bringing them over to Amber um who thank you very much is standing out and helping us tonight because Carlin is on a much deserved vacation um and then uh Corey I think will be coming up to the the polling announce the vote um does anybody have any questions at all once we have a majority candidate um then our work today will be done um I do want the public to be aware that we will then be uh formally that that individual will be taking the formal oath of office between this meeting and our next meeting and will be being
047then seated for our next meeting so I would ask everyone to cast their vote we do not have a majority but we have two individuals that are the top two vote getters Miguel and Chris and could you state what the vote count was Miguel for Chris three and Catherine one okay all right thank you so we will then have a second round of voting there should be pickles olives in there oh sorry we have a majority Miguel five Chris Scott three thank you I would ask all candidates if you're able to stay around after tonight so the board members can chat with you for a little bit that would be wonderful um so we have received a majority vote um Miguel Campos will be seated as our uh new duly appointed board member and I
048do board members have anything they'd like to say well thank you all for your time welcome really talented group yes so I'll be looking for a motion to adjourn so moved second okay motion by Barb second by Jen any discussion or questions on the motion all in favor with i i any opposed with nay merge earned also the next one starts at seven