Verona Area School District Board of Education Meeting December 15, 2025

001Good evening everyone. Good to see you all. Thanks for your attendance this evening for our December 15th uh Verona area school district board meeting. I'm going to call the meeting to order and let's establish please that we have a quorum beginning with a roll call vote. Joe >> here. >> Corby >> here. >> John here. >> Meredith >> here. >> Juan Carlos >> here. >> I am here as well. We do have a quorum. Corby, has this meeting been properly noticed? >> Yes, it has. >> Thank you. To help ensure that we're centering our board work around our shared values and serving our students, we begin each of our board meetings by reading our district's equity framework and the Ho Chunk land acknowledgement, which can be found at the top of the agenda. Meredith, would

002you please read those aloud for us this evening? >> In the Verona Area School District, our mission is that each student will acquire the knowledge and skills necessary to achieve their personal goals, thrive in a diverse, global society, and lead a healthy, self-fulfilling life. To meet this mission, the Verona Area School District will ensure that every individual has access to the educational, social, and emotional support they need to feel valued and affirmed in their unique identities and experiences. We acknowledge that inequities and power dynamics exist in our system such that some individuals on the basis of their identities face barriers to accessing the opportunities they need to experience success. In acknowledgement of such, the Veron Area School District is committed to disrupting these systems of inequity. And the Ho Chunk land acknowledgement reads, "There are

003currently 12 tribal nations who call Wisconsin home, with the Ho Chunk Nation being the primary group living around Madison. No matter where you are in the state, you are on the ancestral land of a tribal nation. As we begin our meeting, we honor the land upon which we stand." >> Thank you. Uh board members, calling your attention to the remainder of tonight's agenda. There are any questions, any amendments? Otherwise, I'd take a motion to approve the agenda as printed. >> Thank you, Meredith. Is there a second? >> Second. >> Thank you, Juan. Carlos, all those in favor of approving tonight's agenda signify with I. >> I. Any opposed? >> Okay, moving on as we shift and are welcoming a couple of recognitions this evening. Uh, Dr. Clarity, I'll kind of let you choose. We have

004a staff and student recognition today. Always a great way to start our meetings. >> Start with our students. >> Okay. Hey, welcome. So good to have you all here. Good evening everyone. This is the accidentals the high school vocal jazz group. My name is Heather the director of these wonderful young people here. Um we're gonna sing an oldie but a good um you all recognize it as we get started. You guys remember? >> Yeah. Okay. Three. D. Do you d D. We have one one short one sing. What are we going to dance with? What are we going to >> dance with La is the season to be et Laaz you us the deck to reach Now I get a per Thank you all for Thank you, Miss Thorp. Uh, anything else that you want

005to add about just We are so appreciative. This is such a great thing that we look forward to every year. Thank you all so much. My face hurts from smiling and I pled myself back from dancing along. We're going to give you uh Well, thank you all. As you can imagine, this is hours and hours of rehearsal and practice from all these students starting from kindergarten on. >> So, as we are moving forward in in in our journey, just remember that everything that these students are showing now as sophomores, juniors, and seniors, these are things that they learn at four years old, five years old in their music classes. I'm giving you all a sticker of from our vocal jazz groups. This is our accidental. This is an audition group, but really singing and music

006is for everybody in the Ron Area School District. And we just like we we display it with pride um how important music is in all of and to all of our students. I think you would talk you would see these students here and you can see how much joy the music brings, but also the fact that they are doing this without a director. They're collaborating. They're working together. I'm there as a guide that they're working together and always with joy and laughter and sometimes tears and hard work and hard work is just not always fun. Um but there's tons of learning that happens there. So, thank you for inviting us. Um display these stickers, share them with a friend. I'll leave these back here with all of you folks, too. Um, I have a few

007more growing up, but these stickers designed by one of our students by Izzy Texor. Um, who is just an all-around artist in music and art and all of these students just wonderful human beings, well-rounded learners. They are in AP, they are in sports, they are in everything. Um, it's just important to remember that we have make sure to have a place for all of our students to succeed. So, thank you. >> Thank you. YAY. WONDERFUL. Thank you so much. >> Thank you. Have a great winter break. >> Oh my god, that was so >> I know. >> That was so pretty. >> What was the name of it again? I always call John. >> I know that's Peanut song. Yeah, we needed Heather Thorp to be just doing like the Yeah. >> All right. And

008we get another celebration, which is great. We have a staff recognition this evening as well. >> Absolutely. So, it's my honor uh to graduate. Let's graduate. Don't I want I want pizza with the kids. >> Yeah. Right. >> Let's Let's try this again. I want to say congratulations. uh to Hannah Andrich, Cornell Charter School instructional coach. Uh actually we just got to meet with uh Hannah and the team right before we came here and joined their schoolbased leadership team as they continue to dig in and do the great work on behalf of students. Thanks for welcoming us into your space and kudos to your full SBG. They're definitely making a change on behalf of the core college students. But we're here to recognize you for the uh winner of the Wisconsin Education Association Member Benefits

009Outstanding Educator Award. Outstanding Educator Awards recognize Wisconsin public school employees who demonstrate exceptional service to their students and their communities. Only 10 of these awards are bestowed annually. The University of Wisconsin athletics will recognize Hannah for her contributions to education at a UW athletic event. And we recognize her here tonight on behalf of the Broner School District and the board of education. Congratulations to you, Hannah. >> Congratulations. Thank you, Hannah. Anything that you want to add while you're here, not to put you on the spot, but we certainly want to give you an opportunity if you want to share anything. >> Yeah, I've uh I've this is my second district that I've been in, and I have really loved Verona. I feel like Verona has like reinvigorated my love for education just with all of

010the amazing work that we're doing here as educators. and I've gotten to work at Badger Ridge Middle School and then now I'm at Cornow and it's just amazing to see all the amazing educators that are in our district. So, thank you. >> Thank you. >> CONGRATULATIONS. >> All right, we'll shift into our superintendence report. So, Hannah in particular, welcome to stay, but we also recognize the service you're doing every day to our learners and families. So, yes, thank you so much for being here so we can celebrate you and we'll continue with our superintendence report. >> All right, for the next part of the superintendent report, I'm going to turn it over to uh Chad Weezy and Coach Steiner uh to talk about aics and some information on a project that we would like the

011board to hear provide some valueful I can't speak today. >> That's okay. I'm just smiling my face. It's cold weather and frozen cheeks and a smiley happy choir. So, turn it over to Chad. >> You know what? I've seen your uh inability to speak maybe that you're on the doorstep of another birthday. >> Wanted to be the first to >> pretending happy birthday. He got me at the last board meeting. He's also an undercover birthday guy. So, we won't have another board meeting until he flips the calendar again. See you. Happy birthday. I will fast. >> Well played, Chad. Well played. Happy birthday. >> Take a second to appreciate how young is >> there all my it is good to see everyone tonight. Typically I follow it seems like a student performance or student artwork

012with a $3 million budget deficit or a problem I'm bringing to the school board. That's not the case tonight. We've got two, I think, really exciting agenda items we wanted to review with you. I've got Adam Steiner here who we're going to kind of tag team a proposal. We want some feedback with the board. We've got a couple of folks from Dacttronics here. I don't know if you guys want to just introduce yourself if you would. >> Yeah, my name is Chris Okowski with Dacttronics. Uh I've worked at Dak for almost 23 years. Live outside of Madison. Kids go to elementary. Thanks for >> My name is George Bench. um from Green Bay, Wisconsin. Chris is more on the sponsorship side of things. I'm more on the equipment side. So, any equipment questions you might

013have about that trends under >> Thank you. >> Thanks. >> So, we've been working with Chris and George, I think well over a year to bring this proposal to the the school board tonight. Uh in a nutshell, I'm sure most of our board members um are familiar with uh what you see at I think many area uh high school now high schools now or their main outdoor competition field um and in some cases indoor court spaces have advertising uh sponsorships that essentially endorse and pay for um a state-of-the-art video board uh that we want to kind of go through with you tonight. Um, I think this is, and Dr. C can kind of talk to this as well. Uh, this would really be our district's first step into a more um, strategic and major partnership

014uh, to help better the facilities uh, and experience of our school district. I think as you walk your way around our high school and our facilities, you haven't seen a ton of outside branding. Uh so I wanted to at least get that in the space that this would be uh new I think new and exciting for all of us. Uh but certainly would be something that we this district hasn't necessarily looked to in the past but we wanted to go through this proposal for you and know that Dr. Clarity, myself and Adam have thought through this before we ended up bringing this your way. So tonight we're going to do and we did we did share the full project proposal uh with all of you in PDF form and it is tied to Borox and

015we essentially have a summary for you this evening. So we're going to go through the background of the proposal. Uh we're going to talk through what partnership opportunities might might look like. At that point I'm going to turn it over to Adam. I think he's got some ideas on how sports media um and connecting this to be a learning experience uh for our students could be a really good thing. Uh and then we're going to finish up for with a little bit of uh back and forth. I'm interested in the board's feedback in terms of if if we're in favor of continuing to explore this option and what it might look like to fund it. So again, and these are screenshots for the most part out of the the full proposal we shared with the

016board and uh connected to board docs tonight. We do believe uh that this partnership would give us an opportunity to uh highlight academics and uh connect students uh through kind of a the press box version of what's going on on the field. Um and I think there are a ton of applications uh that that could actually happen if we can end up with a video board um at our main main competition field. Uh we do believe there are connections to band and cheer potentially even choir uh student government and everything uh in between. Uh we are excited about the fact similar to my second uh agenda item tonight, the the Miracle League. Uh we believe in the end uh this could be a free endeavor and potentially even a revenue maker uh for our school

017district and uh you know we're l very lucky to have the two folks from Dtronics here. We will not be the first in fact we would be one of the last uh in our conference to do this. Uh so it it's not like we're the first to go like is this really going to work? Dacttronics has proven that this this is a model that would work uh for our school district if we're in favor of it. Um and lastly, this would be super for our athletes uh if we could pull this off. We do believe this would be a value added to our school district. Uh so in general, this would not have a a taxpayer impact whatsoever. None of this uh if we end up doing this would be funded uh in the end

018by taxpayers. This would be funded by um outside sponsors that are interested in what we're doing here uh in the Veron Area School District. Once the scoreboard is paid for, this is the big idea. uh if we can land some uh some bigger sponsors uh that would end up with some branding around a scoreboard, end up on commercials during the game, uh end up having I think a number of other things. Adam would help facilitate uh through Dtronics to kind of show that they're uh in favor of what what's got going what we're doing on the field and certainly in the classroom. Uh in the end, once the scoreboard is paid for through landing these sponsorships, once that's done, then it's a revenue maker. Um and uh and athletics in general. Uh we try to

019keep fees down uh to make sure that there is access for all of our students. Uh we aren't making money on athletics. Uh and there aren't there aren't probably there isn't a high school in the in the nation that is. Uh but we believe it's a really important piece of engaging our students. Um, and you heard from Adam the large number of students that participate uh in athletics around our district and the related GPA uh that kicks out the other end. Uh, and so Adam's short money every year. Um, and there um we meet on basically a weekly basis and continue to do budget updates. Um, and his work the cost has not gone down when it comes to equipment, when it comes to transportation, what we have to pay officials. uh and I would

020look forward to the fact that this has the possibility of kind of filling some of the gaps in his budget uh to support our student athletes. Um it would certainly be a modern and engaging experience. Um it does give our chance uh you know Dr. Clarity and certainly our school board uh has really prioritized making sure that uh we're in the community and that uh our community businesses are aware of the great work going on in our school district. And quite frankly, we don't have many opportunities uh minus an occasional fundraiser for a business partner to step up in a recognizable way to say we're in to support Veron area school district um and uh an independent student athletes and this will get give us a forum to do that and we believe there are

021people that would uh step up if the school boards in favor of this opportunity. Uh it's it's simple and sustainable once we pay the score the scoreboard off and we would be kind of debt free on it. Again, it would be a revenue maker for us. Um once we line up our our sponsors, there is a little art on that we've been working with Chris and George on and what it possibly might look like. Uh you can you can see that they we've left kind of spots in there. Uh what we would call anchor and an anchor and a platinum partner. Uh so um the model we have right now and there's a couple different ways to spin this uh but at least on this one you'd have essentially seven major uh sponsors that would

022step out. That platinum partner would be kind of our keystone or major sponsor and then six other sponsors that would be um nearly on the on the same tier. Uh so that could have the name of an area of business uh that has agreed basically on you know a five-year contract uh that if your name is on the scoreboard, here's what you're essentially donating or sponsoring uh to the school district every year to do that. Um and there will be different tiers in terms of advertisements and commercials that might happen during uh any of our contests that will go along with um that sponsorship. So that's uh that's essentially what it would look like if it all comes together. Um this is at least our latest best thinking on what we've kind of seen uh

023success with area school districts in terms of what this might look like. Um again there's a few different ways to spin this. Um but um a platinum sponsor would be up for a $15,000 um a year um you know donation or um would be would be in for the district for 15 $15,000 a year. Um then then we've got different level sponsorships that would be put into a package um all the way down to $3,000 a year uh that would come up with digital exposure and some rotating logos. Uh we took a screenshot out of the project proposal we wanted to share with the school board. Um and this is just general math. Uh but uh in essence uh you know we're about $300,000 in for the scoreboard about another $130,000 uh for installation. We'd

024have to do a little more exploration on what would be needed for wiring. The estimated uh total project uh cost would be in the neighborhood of $400,000. uh we have worked with uh with Dronics. They are part of several purchasing cooperatives and the board eventually would have to be comfortable uh with the fact that um their um their involvement in purchasing co-ops uh is uh they have done the leg work already to say that this would be their competitively bid prices. Um and essentially we're bringing you a Dacttronics proposal this evening. um that that's kind of the uh southern Wisconsin I think Wisconsin standard uh for a project like this. The board can certainly push on this and say we wouldn't be ready to approve this until you said you sent this out to bid

025um or you did a little more homework with Dacttronics to make sure that they've sharpened their pencil in terms of pricing. Uh but the proposal we're bringing you tonight would be with Dacttronics essentially because they are the southern Wisconsin leader in this um and have proven that they can put a project a complex project like this uh together for the school district. Did want to have Adam talk a little bit. I think there's sale opportunities. I think student leadership opportunities uh for what this might look like. >> Yeah. When I when I first brought this to Chad, Dr. Clarity, you know, first question they asked, well, who's going to run it and how are we going to make it? You know, obviously I have a great team around me, but we don't need to add

026work, but this is a great opportunity to tie that athletics in with that coursework that our students are already doing on their um day-to-day studies. So, um I went through the course perspectus. I looked at a lot of classes and what could help and make this operate at a high level and also help us work ahead and give students opportunity to see their work out there in front of the community. Um when I was doing some digging, I mean, we get upwards of five, six thousand people at any given football game. So they now get to say, "Hey, mom, dad, and uncle, like, I made that graphic." And and that's something that, you know, sometimes our students that favor the graphic design don't get to say that in the same way that a player out

027of the football field do. So within the art department, um, the big thing, video production. Um, you see a lot of cool intro videos. We have a lot of great alumni that are in this. I'm sure if you've ever been to a football game, you see our sideline. Sometimes there's more cameras than people, it seems like. Um, but use that to make those cool intro videos, the highlight videos. Um, Chad mentioned like, you know, favoring our cheer team, our dance team, like making cool videos with them and giving those students different opportunities to highlight each other. Um, photography, uh, computer art design one, two, and advanced. So, obviously, you can tier what we're asking them to do, and it's going to be a lot of working ahead. Hey, can you make some templates for us

028for next year? Try to be advanced. And it could be a cool way for students to connect with, you know, outside extracurricular. And then from the business side of things is our DECA program is growing exponentially thanks to Ashley Autton and the great work she's doing with DECA and they have continued to expand those offerings. But you see the direct high with things like the the sports and entertainment marketing class we already offer and then digital marketing about how this works and this is an opportunity for them to potentially support us and be like what kind of plan would you put out there? What do you want to offer? And especially as we go, you know, in five years, if we choose to go forward with this, we're going to go out and do it

029again. So, this could be a student's capstone project is to create the pitch for us, right? Work directly with those students that are looking to really get into this to have that real world experience. It ties in and and finally, there there's a new course opportunity um that uh experience. It's called that classroom. So it it helps create a lot of these opportunities for kids and gives you that curriculum to say hey you want to see some of these jobs that you can get out and do. Here's an opportunity to learn about them. Here's some of the curriculum. So we're not asking teachers to go out and learn. I'm not asking you to become a video production expert. I'm asking you to help our students learn this uh information and so then they can create

030that show like you create that experience that is a Wildcat sporting event. Um you know we're fortunate now we're getting into our second year posting track sectionals. We get about seven 8 thousand people here for that. That's not a high intense football game, but there's a lot of downtime. There's a lot of time for students to express their learning and make, you know, quick 5-second highlight for the 100 meter dash finals. So, we have we pair up with that classroom that allows us to say, "Hey, you know, I could go to our teacher and say, "Hey, I have sectional track. Can you have class start making stuff for me now?" And that's not till May. And then they let those students see their work come to fruition. So that that's a big thing obviously is

031you know athletics is one portion but that community school is also just as important making sure that they can see themselves using this video board. >> I wanted to thank Adam for his willingness to bring this kind of to Dr. C and myself. Uh this this will not end up in like less work for our athletic director. Uh, as you can imagine, it's gonna if if and when uh we actually pull this off, uh, it's going to be Adam coordinating with potential classroom teachers, student leaders, offseason athletes who aren't into this stuff. Uh, but, um, there's going to you're going to have to put together a script uh, kind of like your mini Fox football or soccer uh, for the evening in terms of when you roll the commercials, when music comes, when you roll

032back highlights. Uh, and it will not be less work for Mr. Steiner. uh if we end up pulling this off, but I do think um it it it has the possibility of providing an amazing game experience uh for folks in the stands and also a really cool experience for our student athletes. So, we're we're excited to be here tonight and talk through talk this through. I have one final piece and then we're here to answer any questions you might have. Um the um the what will eventually require a board vote uh is we are not asking for um the sponsorship money upfront from the potential donors or sponsors. Uh they will sign a sponsorship agreement that will likely be a five-year handshake in writing with the school board that I'm in for $10,000 for the

033next five years. There would be signed paperwork that would go along with that, but we wouldn't want to wait five years to build the scoreboard either with the sponsors. They'll be excited to see their name up as quickly as we can pull this off. So, one of two things has to happen. One, uh we could potentially pay for the scoreboard in cash um and not finance it and we'd need board approval to do that. Uh that would send us into a budget transfer. Uh Pete's not super excited about that that possibility. Uh but uh but uh there would be the possibility of us paying for it up front and then we don't incur interest charges. Uh two uh Dtactronics will work with us. Right now it's about five and a half to six% on the

034money we would lease to them. We would build in uh essentially into those sponsorship uh payments that we would have enough to cover the lease on an annual basis. So essentially, we'd be working through a third party that Electronics would hook us up with that the annual sponsorship revenues would cover the lease costs and interest uh until we paid it off after five years. Then we can abandon the lease because we'd have the thing paid off for a $1 buyout and all the revenues after that would be ours. Um three, which may be intriguing and I'm I'm interested in the board's feedback on it. Um, I think Pete and I could likely go to a few of our local banks, let them know that we're interested in heading in this direction. Um, I think there's

035the possibility if we ended up uh with a local bank that actually wanted to be one of our sponsors that potentially part of their sponsorship agreement with us would be a very lowcost lease um that we might not end up having to um front the cash and maybe they can get us something that would be um well below subprime um and we could negotiate something with them. So, I think that's in play as well, but we were waiting tonight to get more feedback if there's even any appetite for this project. We left time for questions, comments, concerns, uh, anything else that may have popped up this evening regarding this project. Chad, could you quickly two weeks ago we did a pretty dire straits operations side just make sure that our listening audience and anyone understand

036between a capital project and the operations and how those budget lines are distinctly different. >> Sure. Uh in in this case, this would this would technically be a capital project because we're building an asset uh for the school district. That's one. uh to the proposal we're bringing you tonight uh is actually a revenue maker. Uh so um if if we decided to head in this direction uh that in the end uh we would be providing a funding source that would give Adam a funding stream that would likely we could use for some deferred maintenance uh down the road. Uh when and I think if we can pull this off I think there's indoor possibilities. I think there's competition, soccer field, uh, and lacrosse field possibilities. Uh, but down the road, all of the very nice

037assets this community bought through the referendum will start to wear out. We're going to need tennis courts. We're going to need a new turf. We're going to need the track to be resurfaced. Um, all things that are essentially in Adam's world to support our student athletes. Um, and I think having something like this in our pocket that has the possibility of gen generating us some revenue, we would have the possibility of banking away some of that and saying, "Mr. Steiner, you're s you're saving up $80,000 for resurface of the tennis courts. That's due in four years. Build it into your budget. We need you to sock away $20,000 a year." So, it's not we're not dropping a problem on the school board's lap um when um one of those bigger items comes through. So, I

038think it gives us some more flexibility and if anything, Dr. C, I think in the end it saves our taxpayers money and it's part of the reason we're excited about it. >> Thank you. >> Can you speak to and I think I know the answer to this because I think we've talked about it, but uh standards for advertising partners like making sure it aligns with our district's values. We're not going to see Coors live commercials playing on the on the you know the timeouts of football games. >> I agree. I think part of the part of what this will eventually the board says we're in on this. I know Dr. C has taken a look at that administrative rule uh over the last year. Uh but I Joe, I do think that that will surface

039that administrative rule for us to make sure that we're comfortable with where we end up with sponsorships. But that is a piece of it. um it uh all sponsors would have to meet certain criteria outlined in um our administrative rule and we would have the ability to better our way through that >> maybe a question for Dronics typically how long does installation take >> yeah it really depends on a project like this I would guess something like a week you know it's installing beams and foundation you know making sure everything's right with the power so I would say anywhere from a week to a couple days for a project like this. >> And George, from the time we have a signed agreement, uh, what's the typical timeline for putting together the plan, you getting materials,

040and lining up vendors? >> Sure. I mean, Chris, you probably have a little more experience in that world. >> Yeah. Typically, um, once the purchase is made, um, we have about an 8 to 10 week lead time. Everything's made back in Brookings, South Dakota, where Dacttronics is headquartered at. Um that takes again typically 8 to 10 weeks before it's shipped and then as George said typically once it's on site takes anywhere from a week to make just over making sure everything's set and ready to go. Typically the beams the concrete can all be done weeks months ahead of time. Hanging it takes literally a couple days and then any final kinks connection issues dactronics tech would come out to site do all the final termination. Um so I'd say that the figure slope will be

041good for that. Thank you. >> Anything else? >> So, I know you kind of alluded to do and you're here in the room, but I'm going to still kind of speak pretty candidly of kind of being a strong partner around the area. Um, so in terms of consulting with other districts and how far along they are in this process, is it coming to fruition as we talk about because I'm kind of curious, we're playing this game of not getting sponsors yet because we don't have it, but also relying on the fact that we're going to have at least seven people say I'm all in because that's where the revenue comes from of, you know, how does this go in other places? Is it really likely that we're going to have these strong partnerships of Yes.

042and we're going to be able to follow this kind of trend of payback and revenue generation because we know there'll be people willing to take this partnership. >> I can speak to that a little bit. So like if you just think in our conference alone, right, middle built the brand new video board two years ago now and and they were able to find all that funding relatively, you know, a year span from when they announced they were going to do it to getting it. Uh the MMSD just upgraded both of their fields. So, and they did that throughout >> what Chad mentioned with they keep reselling those ads. You build up the money. Now, you don't have to do at least the second time around. So, that that's kind of like what Chad alluded to

043like we have all these great athletic facilities and I want all of our student athletes the same. So, some part of that plan for me would be how can we, you know, fund an indoor how can we fund one over at our other turf field to make sure that our student athletes all have the same opportunity. Um, and then Sun Prairie with their new stadium, they got a new video board over there. So, you you see it a lot. Um, Mount Warm, for example, right down the road here, they just um bought, I believe, a used one, right? they had a generous donor that purchased that um with the intention of still going out and selling sponsorships after the fact, but that was also interested. >> So, we're in the area that and I mean,

044we're fortunate that we even have like the Bron Ice Arena right down the road that did their big campaign not too long ago now. And we have a great partnership with Joel Marshall and Ice Arena. And there's a lot of those those sponsors that are eager to find ways to be represented in this area, especially the way we're growing. So, um, we're seeing great success with it all around the conference and bank county >> and it's a a little bit of a chicken or the egg exercise, but and the board would have to be comfortable with how we end up with the contract with that chronics. It's certainly uh one approach would be we're in Chad figure out a way to fund it or we'll pay cash for it now go get the sponsors. Another

045version of that would be we sign a contract with Dtactronics. They partner with us on the marketing campaign and we tell them we're not actually going to have you make this purchase until we're halfway home or we're all the way home uh with sponsorship agreements uh to move ahead with the project. But we wanted to come to you tonight just to get your feedback on if we need to continue the conversation with Dtactronics to bring back a formal proposal that you would vote on. add one more question is I know every community is different but is there an average time or lead time to fill out those sponsors sponsorships typically >> yeah there's a couple ways to do it um but I could I would say it could take three days it could take three

046months um depending on the strategy so there's been schools where we have um done our best to put out the word to the community whether it's through the local chamber of commerce or invites bring them into the performing arts center and do one big presentation or we've done it where again Chad's got his list of of people that he knows and people he wants to approach and we individually go and meet with each of those businesses. Again, just the timing of when we're setting those meetings and how long they take to make those decisions. Um, but typically what we've seen it is we're asking for the blessing to go out and pursue and get those agreements. only until we have those agreements in place would we ask for you all to move forward. So that's

047typically um the approach. Although we have seen it where we get really close, we're getting up to that end of uh spring where we need to place that order to have it up for the first football game and then the board makes the decision to pony up the extra 10,000 bucks to make the project. So completely up to you, but typically it's contingent on the sponsorships. could take three days to three months. >> Got it. Thank you. Good. >> So like while our current scoreboard the lightbrite basically is the you know envy of the conference I am >> are you speaking with sarcasm? >> Yes. >> Just putting that out there. >> Feel like it's been a while since I've been out for those features on a regular basis but this will be very welcome

048for anybody who comes to our stadium. This is really fantastic and coach, I think this is great. I think this is like really capitalizing on um the community support that we have. I think we have an amazing community that really shows up for our students in all areas. But this helps I think spread this to some different areas like you said that don't necessarily get the um the recognition or the visibility and really gives some great opportunities for some behind thes scenes work. So >> I love this. I'm thrilled. I don't like our old scoreboard anyway, but I love what you um have put together and how it really plugs into a lot of the values that we have for our kids and uh I think it's fantastic. So, thank you. >> And I I

049think it gives us opportunities, Meredith, that whether Millers is a sponsor or not, they are so good to our student athletes, >> broad sales, you name it. We don't we don't have a billed venue right now to for Adam to throw on a 10-second spot at a football game. Um, thanking people are helping his work and that would that would give us a possibility that >> I I do want to so I'm very supportive of this too. If the if the only thing it did was solve the you can't hear anything at a football game, uh, it would be a win in my opinion. >> But, uh, Chad, you had alluded to a question about competitive. >> Yep. And I do think that's something we need to talk about and consider because, you know, we

050have our policies that say we need to do this. Um, and I I don't feel great about making exceptions to pol policies for purchases we're excited about kind of thing. >> So, I mean, I I don't know what it would look like. I don't know that it needs to formally go out to like a full bid, but some kind of price comparison or more information from DTronics internal competitive bidding so we can kind of look at them more as a you know general contractor type of rule. Just something that gives us some satisfaction. We're in compliance with our own policies around competitive bidding and large purchases. Joe, I would agree, but I would also say I think it's um a value that this is something that we can see in action in our neighboring districts

051so we also know how it works in practice. I don't disagree with what you're saying, but I think that's also a a uh a value ad that um may not show up in the >> Yeah, I think at a minimum I I think we uh to Joe's point, I think we can ask the Dronics team to I I think you can uh prove some competitive pricing and markup internally. uh in terms of the pricing you're get getting for installation of materials. Um I also think you can ask them to produce documents in terms of the value related to purchasing cooperatives they belong to. Um and if that didn't meet the threshold for the board regarding OE6, which we're presenting on tonight, um you could say, "Chad, put out a full RFP." Um and we would

052put out an RFP with likely local experience. We'd ask them to prove that they've done this before and could pull this off and we'd probably put some specs in in terms of what the scoreboard would actually look like. There's a chance that Chronics might be the only respondent to that. Um, a little bit of a risky run. Uh, but I think it would be the board's decision to decide what runs on. >> Thanks for that, Joe. I'm going to stay a little pragmatic still as well. Even though I'm I'm super thrilled about the student connection piece that you were talking about about course connections, I'm also sort of curious. Have you had like off-the-cuff conversations with any of the instructors already with those classes to just gauge interest? Because again, right, that's a partnership that

053we're sort of making assumptions about. So, I'm a little curious about that. >> Yeah, I I I talk with Ashley Autton every now and then just because I'm club I mean activities director as well, not just athletics. So, she's eager and she wants that real world experience. Nothing this practical just because I think mainly from the fact that we're so early in the stage. just like we wanted to do a lot of the like work before, but I also don't need people going out and, you know, telling their students, "Hey, we're going to start this too early." Um, and I think one of the things that I I pride myself on is like I try to build relationships with the staff. I try to be out in the halls. I try to go talk to

054them so they don't see me as someone that's asking them for favors all the time. Like I try to help them as well. Um, so when I come to them with things like this, it's not a hey, I need you to do this. It's a hey, what can I do to help make this happen? Um, and the light of some of those relationships I built during my years in the district. I mean, I know it's not forever. It's seven years, but you know, some of these teachers, you know, went to school with, it feels like. Um, so use those relationships to help. And it's also just like what I hear from other side schools like, you know, I think of Madison West who has a student that runs and, you know, not an athlete, but

055literally lives and dies for this. He is at every single athletic event running their video board because that's what he prides himself in. So, it's finding that one student that's looking for that that experience that, you know, we talk about all the time. You know, we have a lot of things that hit the majority. What are we going to do to hit those little minority students that are just looking for something to do? >> I love that part of it. Um, I have one last finance question. So, on slide 16, the piece that's missing is like ongoing maintenance, repairs. Right? We've just kind of made this assumption five years and we make all the money, but like what is the longevity of a of something like this just from an ongoing keep it going >>

056perspective? >> Yeah. Um our products uh and our parts are guaranteed for 10 years. Um, we typically see a system like this ask anywhere from 10 to 15 years before. The one thing after five years that more than likely we'll need to look at updating or upgrading is the actual like computer piece like your laptop, you know, that's something that typically after five years does need to be updated. Um, but outside of that, uh, warranty is included. We have a 5year parts warranty. Um you can do extended warranties if you wanted but um again from Wani to Madison schools to Florida um we'd love to give you those references to see any questions like that too. >> Great. Yeah, I think that'd be helpful as we get to a point of kind of final proposals

057and crunching all the numbers to just have a sense of truly the longevity piece financially. >> Perfect. Yeah, I think it sounds like we're all fairly thumbs up on continue doing the doing with the prompts. I think Joe, appreciate what you elevated. >> Awesome. So, I've got I think in in general takeaways. We'll we'll get back with Dak and start to um kind of glean this proposal I think a little bit more after the feedback. We've heard certainly heard from our board treasure and saw some nods. uh we're addressing the board getting an update on basically how we can prove that we're receiving competitive pricing either working with DAC um or through an RFP. I think the next time you may see us would be those tidbits of information followed up with a a potential

058board vote if we're feeling like we're comfortable the direction it's heading. Dr. Jed, and I know we've gone over this in some of our meetings with this, but for the board's sake as as as well, can we accuracy map as if we were trying to have this board ready to go fall of of next year, like whatever the first event, whether it's whatever the first audit is on that bill package method from that date, what would our timeline look like in terms of decision- making things? >> Yeah. So it sounds like 10 weeks after we have after we've got the the sponsorships lined up. So let's say that's three months. I think that puts us at June wanting to have the the the sponsorships done. So I would say conservatively to have this and you

059guys can correct me to have this ready in the fall. I would say by early spring we need the the board to have voted on a proposal that they're comfortable with. That gives us two or three months uh to either hold an open house or start to shake hands on sponsorship agreements. Once those are lined up, we would come back, give the board an update. Good news, we've found the you know, whatever it is, 10 or 11 folks uh to sign on, sign the full contract with that, and then give them I think safely three months it sounds like once you guys have the the PO in hand. that that May time frame will be yeah once we get into June July um it starts to get pretty pretty crunch time that first event in

060August. So >> I think you should hear from us in the next six weeks to two months uh with a refined proposal that you pull out >> and that would include the possible funding pathways potentially with greater detail. >> It will. >> Okay. Thank you. Thanks to the Dextronics team. Super appreciative to have you here. Thanks, Adam. >> Glad to be back. >> So, quickly, >> can't wait for Chad to call me on >> for a little bit. It's good to see you. >> We're just gonna keep Chad at that seat though, I think, as we move on through our agenda. >> So, if we have a video board at the football field, can we put birthdays on it? >> I think mandatory >> or certain >> only December, you know, late November. So, Perfect.

061>> All right. >> Thank you. >> I'm gonna bring up Nate, Kevin, and Bill for our presentation regarding another exciting proposal. All right, you guys. Uh the uh the school board, this is not the first time you've heard the term Miracle League. Uh I wanted to remind us the last time uh we talked about the possibility of a Miracle League field somewhere on school district property. We were exploring the possibility of potentially selling a piece of land behind one of our schools uh to have the city of Verona potentially partner with these fine gentlemen uh to build a miracle field. Uh for a variety of reasons I'm not going to dive into tonight because I'm guessing I actually don't understand the entire story. the city has decided that the timing was not perfect uh for

062this partnership and in turn I have made a few new friends uh who I brought uh brought with me tonight. So I'm excited to give you a new version um of the miracle leave proposal um this evening and I brought um some guests that are going to talk through this. Um so we're going to tag team this just a little bit. Um, I'm gonna uh first kind of give us the agenda, introduce our guests. Um, and then we're going to kind of walk through a project proposal and see if the board's got questions or feedback. Uh, so we're going to do a little bit of background in terms of the Miracle League of Dne County. Uh, we're going to introduce our community partners. We're going to talk through a site viability study. We do have

063a few other guests with us this evening. John, do you want to take the honors to let us know who else is with us tonight? John Gerald, member of the Madison West Middleton Rotary and a big supporter of this ex baseball player, >> Greg Sweeney, who is the construction manager for Miracle League County and will be involved. >> North guy. >> Okay. and and you were very involved in the category engineer with Snider who is been involved with uh quite a few Miracle League construction projects. Jack Ferrari, a member of our Rotary Club, current secretary for the last 10 years, I think, finally retiring. Mary Beth Brown back here is the president of our boardroom club and Bill Molry is the incoming president. So >> it's wonderful to have him here. It's wonderful that they're

064very interested in what we're going to go through with you this evening. But I I can tell you that from the get-go, all the people that are are here tonight, every interaction I've had with them is pro kid, pro community. We're excited to have something like this on the west side of Dane County. And how lucky are we to have them here tonight to kind of go through this uh through this possibility. So, I'm first going to turn things over to Bill. Bill, you got the floor. Um I we worked up a little bio here. You certainly don't have to read it word for word, but I think we're interested in hearing your story and kind of uh hearing your involvement with D County Miracle League, what it means to you and why Verona. I

065sent Chad a picture of me two 20 years ago, but we're in the same square. Well, the American League is very personal to me in that uh growing up as a child with multiple disabilities and a love for baseball. Um I was not allowed to play ball back then. And when I heard about the miracle league concept six or seven well seven or eight years ago, uh my wife saw me start tearing up on the couch saying, "Wow, that is exactly what I would have liked and it's exactly what we I need to get involved in." So um the Miracle League has turned out to be not just a baseball league. Um it's it's a it's a program. It's a baseball program, but what it really is is it's a it's a program that allows

066kids to feel accepted and included, to feel normal, uh to grow themselves and their confidence, uh uh to grow their social skills, to have fun, to enjoy themselves, uh build self-esteem. And one of the things that we we record is that it it that never let it allows them to never let a boundary define them. And we started in 2021 with 90 kids. Well above what we expected. And five years ago, five years later, we're at 320 kids. These are children ages four to 19 four to 20. We have 18 and 19 year olds that kept asking me, can I keep playing? So we we raised the age. Um and these are kids that are about 40% women girls or 60% boys. Surprisingly field is in college. It's a special field that allows kids with

067wheelchairs and walkers and any mobility issues to be able to maneuver with the help of what we call buddies. These are these are volunteers that are beside them the moment they step on the field. And one of the beauties of the Miracle League is that these volunteers are high school kids for the most part. These are kids from the community that their eyes are opened by what these kids can do and that has an impact on them as well. Uh the other other volunteers that we're seeing are the special ed teachers and the teachers of these kids that decide to come out and be their be their child's buddy. Uh it it's turned into an incredible community. Um, yes, it's a baseball program, play baseball. Uh, but I think as the Rotarians would tell you

068when they came out, they expected to see a baseball program, but I think they saw something more. I think they saw a celebration. Um, when these kids come up to bat, whether it's hitting off the tea or being pushed to, at the very beginning of the season, they are in shell. They have little confidence. by the fourth or fifth, they see some of the older kids being pitched to and they say, "No, I don't want the batting thing anymore. I want to be pitched to." And they might swing and miss 10 times, but that 11th time when they hit it, you won't believe the impact it has on those kids. Um, and I also look at the stance of the parents and that's a celebration itself. These parents are not allowed to volunteer. We want

069them to stay in the stamps, enjoy their child, and that has developed into quite a community because um of the 90 kids that started with us, 70 are still playing. And so they've developed a community along with more parents. I hear them talking about strategies with their kids, fun things with their kids, and it's just a a buildup for them as well. Their self-esteem is is developed as well. When you talk to the And you watch the the high school kids out there and at first they kind of stood there and watched the child kind of stumble and all of a sudden they started to fall and these kids go wow you can see in their face. Um so it's it's a yes it's an athletic program but it it's it's more than that. And

070so we have grown out of space in Cottage Grove and it's also become a little bit of a difficulty for people on the west side to get there. And my vision a couple years ago was we need to build field on the west side. Along comes the Rotary Club who came out to see some games and one of the leaders came to me and said what what uh how can we help? I said, "Well, my vision is to kind of build a field on the west side because we're growing." And I think they caught the vision by just watching what was in front of them. Um, we have kids that um parents send me notes about, well, our our child now wears this um uniform top to bed. It's pajama time. They they take it

071to they they wear it to school. We get a major league baseball touch. Um, few kids have their uniform up on a wall in their bedroom. Um, I I get teared up every night watching these kids. Uh, they are they they're just enjoying themselves so much. There there's no there's no uh negative to this whatsoever. Uh we've had um we've had two kids drop out because of it was too much for them in the five years and three of them dropped out and they came back. So, I could I could sell you more and more on this, but it's a it it becomes a comm it is a community program because when you come to a ball game at night, you've got the kids, you've got the parents, you've got the volunteers, you've got the

072community, we get close to three or 400 people coming a night to see a ball game. And most of them are just from the communities who heard about the miracle come out and I get a tap on the shoulder from somebody said thank you for doing this and da da and this is this is unbelievable and what what a blessing it is to me but and to all of us who are involved. So with the Rotary Club coming and saying we want to help build that program on the west side, uh that certainly was music to my ears and we want to do this together. This is a collaborative effort on the part of the Miracle Indiana Rotary Club and we want to make this just a a tremendous community program for all. Thank you.

073Bill will be around to answer questions when we get through our presentation. Always good to hear from him. Uh thank you, Bill. Next, we got we have Kevin. This is a true, I think, kind of triangular partnership here. School district, Miracle League. Uh and there are Miracle League fields all over the nation. This is Miracle League of D County. Uh but the third leg of the triangle, uh if we can really pull this off, is actually Kevin and his group from Madison West Middleton Rotary Club. So, we're excited to have you here, kind of going to talk about your work with Rotary. >> So, let me just also uh make certain you understand with our officers here, uh th this speaks to their credibility and their personal interest in making sure the school board understands

074we're about the partnership with the Rotary Club and Miracle. And so, we're just delighted to begin this conversation with you. I also, Superintendent want personally thank you for the team you've provided us. We have had an exceptional experience working with Chad and figuring out how to get this in front of you tonight. So, thanks again for the commitment that school board has made to us in the school district. >> Let's let's keep going. Um, in terms of the vision of what we want to do, uh, and Bill spoke to what happened a couple summers ago. We took roughly three dozen Rotarians and families out to, you know, club activity. Let's go see some baseball kids. We had never been to the Miracle League field. Um, some of us knew about it. Um, and Bill's already

075talked about this, but I want to make this point very clear. When we went to watch baseball, we thought we're just going to watch baseball, maybe have a beer, whatever. It was an unbelievable, almost cathartic experience for our members to say, "My gosh, we could we could do this. We could help with this." And tonight we don't want to get into the details of how we can do it, but we want to assure you that you'll allow us to go forward with some business details and and uh contractual arrangements with uh Verona that we can make this happen. And candidly, it's possible in 24 months from this coming summer, we could be um playing baseball in Verona with the Miracle League. The Miracle League has the facility in Cottage Grove that you may also have

076read there's one being built in the Sun Prairie area. And so to be candid, you step back and look at just geography of of Dayne County. A third location in Morona is perfect because not all disabled boys and girls live in Morona. They live in Mount Hord. They live south of us. And so what we're trying to do is to give you a sense that by maybe just luck, the city of Verona site is perfect for the growth that the Miracle League needs and frankly um can facilitate. >> Well, thank you, Kevin. All right. Uh, and this was just uh essentially our um our vision for what this might look like where um West Madison West Middleton Rotary and the Miracle League of Van County, they're interested in pulling this off. Uh, and we believe

077the school district would benefit from it. Um, what I'm going to go through next starts to tie into uh why we've got Mr. Bruner here. Uh, so Todd and I Todd, I didn't I don't want to put you on the spot. I am interested uh in your left suit pocket. Uh you you shared with me what landed in there today out of just happen stance. First of all, I'm a principal. I'm used to being put on the spot. I do want to say I met the gentleman here tonight with PowerPoint. Talk to Chad. I am completely in support of this should it be something new as the school board move forward with. I was sharing with the gentleman. So, we have a student council and they have surveyed kids what's going well at Sugar Creek,

078what's not. And just last week, I was reviewing some of the uh feedback from kids in our school. Some of the things they want are please give us playgrounds with ramps. We need more options for children with disabilities. I think we should put rubber on the ground on the playground. Please fix the circle swing. Okay, I'll we should add more things to play with at recess for all kids. We should add a ramp to the stairs for kids in wheelchairs. So, what they're proposing are things that kids themselves see that we need in our school and our school district. And from my understanding, during the daytime, this field may very well be open to children in our district. As you know, about five of our nine schools are within walking distance of where this field

079will be. New Century, BIS, Sugar Creek, Cornell, and Badger Ridge. This is an incredible opportunity for Cathy kids in this district. >> Thank you. >> It's great. Thank you for being here. I know you had a busy day. You did certainly did. Todd offered to be here and it's great to have him. Um we shared uh in similar way to the DAC products proposal a full site assessment that I actually encourage uh Miracle Lee John and Kevin uh to go through and I did some screenshots out of that this evening and that's that's why Andy's here. So the reason uh our worlds kind of came together uh we had Andy review our school district in terms of available land in the city of Verona um and asked him to essentially do a pit study on

080the site that that his firm and you guys built the firm uh in in Cottage Grove felt would be the most ideal when it came to a certain set of criteria. Uh, and we thought that actually having a third party, not Chad, not John and Kevin, come to the school board to say, "Here's why we actually think this site uh is the most viable was very important instead of trying to shoehorn it in in another place." And that's where we ended up. So, the the full site assessment we're not going to go through tonight. It's a very very well done document. We we commended uh Andy on the work he did to kind of prove uh to us where the best spot on school district property was. And we essentially explored uh the the site

081we talked about before u behind Country View. Uh if you can kind of picture the bus turnaround at New Century, we've got the empty practice field there. It turns out it's in a lowlying area uh and not ideal when it came to storm water. Um, and then we we explored the third what ended up being site number two on the uh the the site analysis and that was the the spot up and we're going to go through some maps uh this evening in terms of where we ended up. So that that was Andy's work. Um Andy had to explore um where we could we could fit either a 125 or 100 150 foot field. Uh this will be a fully enclosed field that we would end up having keys to uh to potentially use during

082the day. um and then kind of work through what a Miracle League site would look like on school district property. We shared the picture of how it ended up in Cottage Grove. And it's it's gorgeous. This would be an amazing asset if we can put this together. Uh the next slide, site one, site one, two, and three. Uh one of the the three places we had Andy's team explore in terms of viability for a miracle field uh on school district property. Um, in a nutshell, uh, we, um, we ran into, um, primarily parking and enough land, uh, behind Country View, and we do believe there's the possibility of pulling that off there. Uh, but it was not the ideal site in our mind. Uh, knowing now that we were in a spot that the city

083of Verona purchasing a property was no longer in the mix. And as a reminder, we had explored selling those softball fields. That was really the only reason we were trying to kind of wedge in a miracle league field behind Country View, but we were transparent about the fact that we knew we'd bump into parking. Uh so Andy's work and he's certainly here and available to answer questions. uh in the end determined uh that uh and I heard Todd say this uh this is really underutilized acreage uh um to the west of Sugar Creek Elementary right now and would would be a really great fit. Um and if you guys can kind of picture it, there's a open field that I think used to have there's still a former little back stop there for a throws

084area uh for track practice. Um, I think the varsity soccer field, uh, practice field used to be to the north of that. You can still see, uh, Andy sketched that out. So, it really the field would be north of Central office, Morona, uh, and west of Sugar Creek Elementary. Um, and Andy kind of proved with a fit study on where that might go. The other thing that came to the surface in terms of why this is the most viable site, uh, not only was it really just the layout and the topography of where it landed, but, uh, Andy had storm water concerns on low the lower line area by New Century. And it turns out existing utilities, water and sanitary actually run right through that area. Uh, so down the road if we and phase

085one, we likely would not do this. Uh but down the road, a concession stand and restrooms may be kind of the next level work. Um if Miracle Week takes off and uh we continue to have partners like like the Rotary Club. Uh and that was going to be much more expensive uh if we had to run um essentially sewer and water uh to the site by New Century. Uh so that is where we ended up with our project proposal in terms of where we put it. Um, and we detailed that in the end, just a summary document uh that ended up kind of we pulled out of Andy's work with the site assessment. Um, we have Nate here. So, this is this is slightly complicated stuff. I'm excited for us to have the possibility of

086doing it. Uh but uh in the end uh we would be doing likely a $1 land lease uh and some type of unique agreement with uh the the funders, the Rotary Club, the Miracle League of Dane County having for sure after hours access to do their programming. That would include uh folks from our community being able to participate and watch it. Uh but in the end a shared use agreement that would also mean uh all of the schools on the core campus in Verona would have the possibility of using that field during school day and when Miracle League of D County would be using it for some of their league games and it gets a little complicated. So we pulled Nate in Nate's had a chance to meet these fine folks a couple of times.

087Uh and we're going to turn this portion over to Mr. Nate to kind of talk us through what this might look like. >> Yeah. So, like Chad said that this this proposal will require some legal work. Um, but in working with the American League and their council, they've been like really transparent in terms of how these agreements have been set up with um the village of Cottage Grove and either even other school districts. And in providing like some of those draft agreements or sorry, some of those executed agreements to me, I've been able to kind of pick out some unique circumstances and clauses that I'd like to discuss with the board in close session at a future date. Um, for example, the lease agreement with the village of Cottage Grove, they have it set up

088as a 10-year long lease. Um, but if something happens and the lease has to end, the village actually has the option to decide whether they want to keep all of those hundreds of thousands of dollars or even north of that, all of those improvements, or if they want to have the Miracle League essentially return it to the the status that it was before. So, that's just like one example of like some of these kind of unique decision points that I think we're going to run into. in this this land use agreement which would promptly be a long-term lease. Um and more clauses like that I think especially because we haven't actually started negotiating with the American League yet are why I think we should talk about this close session and the board should give me

089and Chad some negotiating parameters to actually start negotiating this agreement uh more specifically. Um, so, and I guess one more thing while I'm up here, it's kind of like a parliamentary thing. Um, there is something on their agenda today that ask you guys to to vote on this proposal. Don't worry, I'm not asking you all to vote on an agreement you haven't read and hasn't been written yet. That wouldn't make any sense. Um, but what I would actually ask the board to do is to decide whether you want to um move forward with some sort of vote that would actually express some sort of confidence in this agreement forward. even if it's directing district administration to um bring a draft contract and bring some of these key decision points to a close session in the

090future. I think having that vote on the minutes could um be really important for our community and maybe potentially some of the donors and some of our partners here to show that um we're serious and moving forward with this. >> And and Nate, I've certainly heard from from John and Kevin that uh um a a board vote of confidence essentially direction. You you guys get to work on contract. We're excited about this um and would be ready to go once we can come up with terms of the contract would be a key piece for these fine folks to start to shake some hands with folks who would be interested in writing a check to support this work. And prior to that close session, I wouldn't just walk in with the the draft contract itself. I

091would also pass on to the board a corresponding memo kind of outlining some of the key decision points so we can use that time efficiently. Um, so it's up to the board today was whether they want to actually vote to direct administration to set some sort of timeline for this or if they decide not if the board decides not to vote today, we'll kind of default to our typical procedures in which um board leadership will decide, but we actually take action on this. So, let me just also um and full disclosure and sort of lay out where we're at as the Rotary Club. Um, and that's why it was important for our officers to be here. Um, Rotary is I don't want to go into the marketing of Rotary for you, but Rotary is um

092a, as you well know, a internationally recognized um, service club that has done just incredible work around the world and certainly here in Dayne County, certainly here in Berlin. Um, the Rotary Club, our interest is very simple. What we want to do is that we have the relationships. Um we believe we have the capital capacity um through fundraising to um generate we're saying three million is the internal number. By instinct it'll be four million by the time we finish up all of our work. We want to bring to your community and frankly Sugar Creek uh what we will think will be the third best miracle league field in Dayne County. We have one in obviously in Cottage Grove. We're going to have one in S Prairie. We want this to be third. We think based

093on the calendar that we're looking at today, uh, 24 months from now, two summers from now is doable. Uh, we also, um, happy to tell you that I received a notice today from someone in Verona, you might know, uh, she sent a check, personal check for $10,000 to get this going. We don't even have a structure yet for for this. We're deeply confident that we can exceed three million. We're 100% confident that you will find our Rotary Club, Miracle League, and um our two organizations um the best partners you got in municipal government. We're we're very uh seasoned in terms of understanding politics of what you're dealing with. We also want to simply get that field built as quickly so children in Verona were disabled, their families are can experience joint. That is our simple

094goal. the price tag of three million may go to four million, may go to three and a half, who knows? But the quicker we have commitments from the school district, we're moving forward with the expectation we can be partners. And so, um, sizing this and then just the work that Greg and the leaders do to do the actual building. That takes a little bit of time. We need a runway to be able to do that. But we're confident three summers from now, Miracle League baseball can be being played at Sugar Creek. And we also have we think the um community support not only in Madison there's um up roughly the north of a dozen Rotary clubs in Dayne County. We have many of them that are stepping up saying we want to help. Can can

095we help in the concession stand? We haven't even gotten to this yet. Part of what speaks though to Bill and his credibility. I mean in the miracle you organization you look at it and you go they're based in Atlanta. What do we know about them? That's that's the miracle >> and what goes on in Cox Grove as when the snow gets out of here and you get a chance next summer to see this. It's it's just it it it changes how you think about the world. >> With that, we're just deeply thankful for the opportunity to uh enter into negotiations with you. We can get this done um in a reasonable period of time. Chad has been superb to work with on the details. We know we have the technical talent in the room. Um

096what we're uh shorted right now is cash flow for the fundraising and as soon as we have a project, we will begin that. Frankly, we've already begun, but it's a it's a big deal and it'll be done in a manner consistent with what the school district would want us to be as a business partner. >> It's a project I'm excited about to go out and fund. >> Questions or feedback from our school board? I'm thrilled that I got to read the equity statement tonight because I think this captures um everything that we as a district say we stand for and now you've given us the gift of an opportunity to prove um our commitment to all of our students in our community. Um I think looking at board service over 10 years, there's some things

097that you can point to and say, "I I changed the trajectory." This feels like a um an opportunity to change the trajectory of our community. I I really feel like this you're giving us the gift of an opportunity. >> That's really well said. I find myself trying to think of it again of like what ought I to be doing as a board member, putting that hat on of asking really serious questions. And I just feel like exactly like you said, it feels like a gift has landed on us. I mean, with the strong partnership, all of you being here, I think even speaks to the commitment. I'm so appreciative that just your presence here really shows us that yes, we'll knock out details of a contract to just ensure tees are crossed, eyes are dotted.

098Thank you, Nate. Um, it just sounds so exciting to just see where the next steps can go with this. >> I've got I'm very excited about I think this could end up being a really great thing for the community, for the district. As a board member, I got to be honest, I'm a little confused what it is I'm being asked to vote on. I don't know how I can express confidence in a project without any of the details that kind of matter to us as like fiscal fiscally responsible board members. I mean, I'm supportive of the concept, but like without knowing it like is this going to have any financial implication for the district? Who's going to handle maintenance? Will we have any ongoing capital maintenance cost? like the those details affect whether or not

099I feel like and and that's ultimately what'll come out in an agreement. And so I'm I'm totally fine voting on an agreement when it comes. I'm just unclear what it is I'd be voting on today. >> Yeah. To be clear, yeah, not asking answer agreement today. Um but we do have something on the agenda in which the board could put forward a motion. And if I were to recommend a motion, it would be for the board to direct administration to um bring a draft agreement back to them as well as some of the key decision points. So then we would have something on the minutes and something on the record of this process kind of moving along. But again, like that that vote was totally up to the board, optional, and not asking people to

100enter into an agreement before it's drafted. So we just had an agenda item before this that's essentially the same thing. It's a it's a project that we're interested in, but we didn't have a vote like that project. Why are we on this one? I I think that's where my discount is. >> Um, honestly, have having it on the record and having on the minutes I think would be helpful to our partners in terms of okay, showing people that um that the board is uh progressing this along, even if it's not necessarily like an assurance that's for sure going to happen, but that there is. So a vote saying like we're supportive of more or less advancing this to the next step is useful in you know whatever capital campaigns happening. >> Correct. >> Very much

101so. >> My my understanding is that we are as a board also saying that we approve of this land being utilized for this purpose. It's school property and are we comfortable allowing this property to be transformed in a way that fits the needs of Miracle League. And I think um that would be something that I I would be obviously very much in favor of. I think that's a perfect location. It's been underutilized, especially since the high school and all the practice fields have been built. That kind of is an area that um historically hasn't seen the use that it could for the location that it's at. Is that >> No, sorry. That's not what the administration's asking for just yet. Yes. >> And and I I think like in terms of like how like the

102land that would actually be used, I think um that's something that should be hashed out the agreement. And >> specifically that the um the goal today would just be to um direct us and bring this back to you with more details, the actual contract so we can actually get into the weeds. It was like, okay, where are we going to cut off the land use here and what will it look like during the day? and um >> right what are the financial obligations >> after school and maybe there's not a numerical leave event um what kind of discretion do we have to use that land and what type of training do we put in place for staff so they don't damage the hundreds of thousands of dollars of equipment that's going to be used there

103um so today we're not asking you to vote on any of that just yet really just push this along to the very next >> yeah did you have something else too >> yeah but it's on completely question. >> No, I think I just want to speak to that as well. It's having having been on that side, having been a Rotarian at one point trying to get projects through. Um, I can entirely appreciate the desire for something this large to have asurances that, you know, we're also wanting to move forward even if it's just like a police vote that like we're doing that particularly given the increasingly fickle nature of politics. Um, but uh, you know, I just want to also voice my support for this. I think this is wonderful. Also, having been a baseball

104player at one point, um, and I I think that this, you know, particularly this site having been thought out and proposed the way it is is something that I can definitely get behind. I think there are obvious questions about land use and then fiscal responsibility and risk and insurance and whatever, but I'm comfortable directing admin to like proceed um with this sort of project. I think that um this could be a really cool thing and I would hope that the uh city of Verona would reconsider. We certainly need an accessible playground somewhere around here. >> Uh my question is I agree with everything I said about that that the land we're talking about is very very underutilized and this would be a good use for it. It is utilized some. So, have we already started

105talking with the community groups that do use that space about what maybe some alternative space that could? >> Yeah. So, at a minimum, I um I've run this by Janine, who you've had a chance to meet, award-winning Janine, uh who takes care of our facility rentals, kind of ran through uh what we see after hours at at Sugar Creek. Uh and really, it would be finding new empty green space around the district. We have an underutilized baseball field to the north and to the east on Mr. Bruner's lot. Uh we have a whole bunch of clean space here that there are times that it's underutilized. So we feel like that is a hurdle that we could get past. Um and I think it would be a layer of something we have to work through as

106we start kind of starting to draft the agreement here. >> Yeah. I just know I know from my experience that the youth football group that space quite a bit but there's lots of other you can play football in any patch of grass >> and and that that is not that isn't necessarily one of the fields that is always lying and used for their typical practice is kind of spillover space has been what I've seen >> I think uh we've got a model out of cottage world too where you can look at maintenance costs and other think of how we have operated out there. And the beauty of the cage grow lights is that the maintenance cost negative mean uh you've got a a maintenancefree field. Yes, you got to pick up they pick up trash

107and that sort of thing, but that that's it. And so it would be our goal to have volunteers to be doing that. So, uh, the maintenance really has become not a problem. Other thoughts and questions? I I can't tell what Meredith said. I'm total agreement. Um I I used to play sports a long time ago. No longer play sports, but um you know, I think the benefit of sports and um I just like the idea of expanding that to all of our students populations and um and folks that that could benefit from that. So I think it's it's a win-win all around. So thanks for your great work and thanks for that. I also want to just in terms of disclosure, we we are at the beginning of how we're going to do this in

108terms of planning. We know also in Verona there are other very civic-minded organizations and businesses that may have stepped up. Hey, I'm interested. >> Uh ladies and gentlemen, we haven't gone to any of this sort of sourcing things where we were really working with Chad on the land. Um you may say, oh three million, that's a big number. It's going to be 33 by the time you finish. Yeah, it's a huge number. We believe uh the brand of Rotary, partnering with the brand of Miracle League, partnering with rational community members and say, "I want to support this. We think this is part of the Pawn A home run." >> And we we we've talked the club level because, you know, we're just a bunch of retired men and women and some workers, you know, but

109we're we're really dedicated to service in the community and we think this would be a very fun activity to partner with city. >> Love it. Great. >> I feel I was much younger when I was a Rotarian and I was like the youngest person by far in my group and they kept saying things like that and I was like I'm sitting right here. >> We need to get you back to >> Well, I did take notes just based on what you were sharing, Nate, because of the kind of confusion about what we're really voting on. So, um with board kind of permission, I'm just going to say back what I think a motion might be. Um, so looking for a motion to direct administration to bring the board draft contract and key decision points at

110a future close session. Does that sound like a reasonable motion? >> Is there a motion to do that? Great, Christopher. Is there a second? >> I'll second. >> Thank you, John. All those in favor of approving a direction to administration to bring back draft contract language and key decision points at a future close session regarding Miracle League signify with I. >> I. Any opposed? Okay. So, we do have that in the minutes with the certainty and appreciation of all of you here. Thank you again for your time and commitment to this. It's so exciting to think about. >> Thank you. to all of our Rotarians, if you'd like to stick around and listen to the financial monitoring report, you are welcome. But >> similar to others, a lot of times folks don't know, so you

111guys >> Thank you again. >> Thank you, Mr. Bruner. >> Um, as we are shifting, >> um, you make our website available. I'll show how it >> Thank you. As we're shifting, I did kind of leap us into taking that vote, which is technically under item seven, board action. So, I just want to acknowledge which I think is certain that we do not have any public comment this evening. I did technically move past that agenda item, but I'm looking for Lori who's outside. Um, just wanted to make sure that we did move through the agenda that we do not have any public comment. Lori, is that correct? comments. No address. >> Yep. Okay. Thank you. So, now we'll move ahead to board action part B, which is our OE6 monitoring report. Um, appreciation advance to

112Meredith who will be capturing notes for us um to just yeah summarize the dialogue and the conversation on OE6. This is a heavy dose. >> I apologize. >> It's a rotating partnership at least. >> It may all >> Oh, yeah. You've been listening all day, right? Okay. >> So, we're going to try to make this brief. Uh, as a reminder to the board, OA6 is our anchor document for fiscal management of our school district. Uh, you've outlined the fact that the district better do an audit every year and report to the school board and the community regarding the results of that audit. You've outlined what Joel referenced tonight. You better adhere to some purchasing standards, some competitive pricing, and provide evidence that you're doing that. The board has also said if people owe you money,

113figure out a way to at least make several attempts to get. All of that is outlined in OE6 and we and to the tune of 28 indicators. Um I did a brief little video last week. I said thank you for that to outline what is in O6. We provided a mountain of evidence uh that we believe proves the fact that we are in compliance with this board policy. Um and the main thing we really wanted to talk to you tonight about uh is really the results of the audit. Um, so I'm gonna have because I've done too much talking, I'm gonna talk have Pete kind of highlight the work that happened with our finance team and the the evidence he had to provide uh for us to get through um the the audit. Really two

114audits uh this last year. Oh, we really cleared >> talking budget and finance beat up here. So anyh who, I'm happy to say that audit season is officially over and in the Verona school district for the 2425 school year that ended several month months ago. Um I would like to uh just do a quick little review on uh what what we're doing and why we're doing it. Uh so what is an audit and that is just an examination of our books of our financial records and our procedures uh done by an independent firm. Uh the firm we use is Clifton Marson Allen so called CLA for for short and we've been using them since uh Chad and I have have been with the district. Although we did go out to RFP not last year but

115the year before and uh they came back with the best um the best price the most attractive uh contract for us. So we still have another year I believe on on their contract with a optional two-year extension on there. Um so what else is a audit? It also verifies the accuracy of our books and um the reliability of our financial information and just make sure that we're following all of our regulations whether it's a federal regulation, a state regulation or um some of our OE6 compliance that uh we're going to be talking about tonight. Um it's a real good idea to have an audit and it's also the law so we have to have one every year. So the uh next slide um there are a few types of of audits. So we have the

116annual financial audit and that's one that we refer to most of the times when we say the audit. That's what OE6 is referring to is the financial audit. We're going to go through all of our all of our books. There's one that's a little bit more uh targeted at our federal funds because we do receive a large amount of federal funds. They call it single audit. Uh that was also completed at the same time as our annual financial audit. And uh finally the membership audit where once every about four years at least once every four years where they go through and verify our third count, our third Friday count and our second Friday count and they look at our software and look at everything when we reported and they just double check and make sure

117that we have all of our data in there correctly. Uh we haven't had one, we didn't have one last year, we didn't have one the year before. I'm a little worried about this year. If we didn't get it this year, we'll definitely get one the year after that, but I'm a little bit worried we may end up having a a membership audit this year. Um, not only did the auditors give us their information, they also work with DPI and they have to send their data to DPI. Their due date is today and I looked out on uh the website and saw that yes, they did submit it and uh DPI has actually accepted our audit as of December 11th. So everything is good to go on that. Um for the results on it, I I'm

118also happy to say that we had a very good audit. It was a clean audit. It came back uh with uh basically an unmodified or a clean uh audit opinion. There were no findings that they had. They didn't have any recommendations for any of our changes. They didn't note any compliance matters or any internal control matters that we had. So it was it was a it was a good audit. So that financial audit was good. The single audit was also good. There were no uh compliance issues on that particular audit either. So um all in all it was a it was a pretty good financial year for us. to uh to Pete's credit and our small but mighty finance team uh there as the board knows two three years ago uh there were some recommendations

119and some findings in terms of internal controls uh and one related to the way we did some federal spending uh and being endorsed by uh what's the name of the that crazy website the federal gov.gov open.gov that you and Michael just went through. Yeah, the uh SAM.gov SAM.gov.gov. >> Yeah, we had to be in complant and we are sam.gov now. Uh but this is a small team. I can tell you feel free to pull up an org chart in any district of our size and you will find more members uh than the the four people that exist here to manage a $110 million budget. Um and to their credit, they work their tails off. they are dedicated and they know their craft um and excited for the fact that our audit came back again for

120the second year in a row clean and in line with Oasis. So just kudos to Pete and his team for the work they do uh in our finance department. Um I'm also going to point out to uh yeah not only the finance department and Teresa Phillips is our accountant and Adrien Kaiser is our AP and the person who handles all of our money. Also want to point out Michelle Hades team too because uh the HR staff also has to provide a lot of employee information and contracts and such too. So thank you to Michelle's team for getting all of all of that information out there too because we need that and uh and Michael helps us compile all this and kind of gets the pile of evidence together. Uh we did include a a few

121comments from our folks uh uh that that we actually required our audits a little different. We kind of put this board policy in front of our auditors uh and we asked them to take an extra look at a few of the things that are called out in OE6 when they are going through our books and they did reference the fact that things were in line with OE6 uh when it came through with the audit. So all all of that is good news. We are here to answer questions if you've got any around or over 46, but we are certainly uh proud of the fact that we believe we've provided evidence uh in line with all 28 indicators that says we're doing this work. >> So, I'm sorry, I've got a bit of a curveball here.

122>> It's also a bit of like a kind of just basic I'm reading the news too many headlines sort of thing. Um, I went through all of our stuff with Don and all of our indicators. It looks great. It's wonderful. My question isn't really about that. It's just in this world that you live in, you occasionally come across the headline where like, you know, school has misplaced a large sum of money and it's like a total surprise. And in my mind, I'm trying to get that fact to jive with the fact that like schools are legally required to do these audits. So I don't want to just like ask you like how does that happen but I kind of want to understand how is our product auditing process kind of controlling for that sort of

123a surprise you know that we just because you don't know what you don't know until you know it right >> um I I think there there's one thing in particular that our school district does because of the governance work that we do that requires that we get in front of the school board on an annual basis and go through this policy that has uh all of the fabric of the audit in it. Um there are certainly school boards uh their school districts that do an annual audit that potentially have findings that are still submitted to DPI but do not formally present this to the school board um on an annual basis and have board members review it. That is doable. the finance department can go through an audit and there is not a need to

124get up in front of the school school board and go through it. Pete, I don't know if you have other ideas in terms of a big stubbing the toe incidents uh that are not caught in the audit land from well from our perspective to talk about like if a pilot cash had gone missing. it it's pretty unlikely in our case because um we're doing our own internal audit every day, every business day because one thing I have Teresa do is log into the bank website say okay how did our cash flow amount change from yesterday so what what's all come in and what's all come out so then by the time the month end is in here and we're trying to do all of our journal entries on there we're going to have a daily

125record of of every transaction that's there. So that necessarily answers your question. That's the first thing I was thinking of. >> No, it does. And I think that's a great example because what I wanted to get at is like there are some practices I feel that you all engage in like that one that like an auditor wouldn't not see that practice and suggest you do it. Like that's above and beyond what would be considered even best practice from an auditing firm in my experience. Um, so I think to kind of have that out there that like we do things kind of above and beyond in certain ways >> is worth noting. >> Yeah. The the other piece that we have actually tightened up since OE6 came online and we got feedback from the auditor. An

126example even is uh what Pete mentioned on journal entries, which is essentially moving uh money from uh one budget line to another after we've uh made a determination we need to change an account number. Uh previously uh we didn't necessarily have two sets of eyes on that happening. Now one person enters it and says this is the right accounting move and another person approves it and that came through the audit process and made Pete and his team uh rework some of the internal controls that exist uh when when we're moving money around. >> It's nice because I haven't had a journal entry in a couple years now. I also along the lines of John's question when one of these high-profile school districts like blew through a bunch of money and somehow their board didn't know

127about it. It happened. I had talked with Chad and Pete about some ideas that I had about because I was worried about okay what if hypothetically we were just exceeding one of our budget line items by a massive amount under our current system. There's no way to know that in real time. it'll eventually be discovered. But one of the things that they've put together then is this budget dashboard that kind of in real time shows our budget categories on a day-to-day basis more or less that then we can we all have access to it. I think uh uh that we can kind of track on an ongoing basis to make sure all of our spending not just isn't you know crazy but aligns with the budget that we approved. I think that's really useful >>

128and and we've shared a the high level one with you, but Chad and I have one that goes into detail where I built a dashboard for every principal and every department and superintendent and athletics and all of those out there. So there's 40 dashboards that I have all rolled up on one dashboard so we can see all right is Todd over spent on his budget and he's not here anymore. But uh we we could see with just one one little look and as uh Joe was saying that is updated every night at 3:00 am is an automated report that Skyward sends directly to these Google Sheets for us. So we're able to to monitor our budgets that way. Yeah. >> The the main spot at this point that I think most districts are are exposed

129would be you don't have checks and balances for local budgets that spending's out of control. local building budget. I would mean a principal or a director spending running a buck outside of a budget. We have put in systems to make sure that doesn't happen after the last four or five years. The other spot would be um undercalculating or underestimating what payroll and benefits are going to cost you on an annual basis. Pete, Michelle, and I meet every week. Uh, and they are reviewing kind of where they're at with cash flow, where we're at with payroll, where we're at with open positions, uh, to ensure that that doesn't happen. And that's part of the reason on an annual basis, we're usually presenting to you, 1 to 2% excess funds available at the end of the year

130that go in the fund balance because we believe we've appropriately budgeted and put checks and balances in to get to the end of the fiscal year. really appreciate Joe's comments about just how do we know and I appreciate your answer is just so reassuring too. I think um when I'm looking at this OE and all of the evidence, it's a lot of information and that level of transparency, you know, there's reciprocal trust then. Um and it's that just continues, you know, to grow. It just I feel just so confident in where we're headed. But if anyone in the district is concerned, here's the transparency to be able to see exactly where things are. I think that just speaks so highly to the value of not only the trust of the board but the trust of

131our community. Um it's it is very very very appreciated because I think we've all kind of seen some of those stories that have come out and are very here. So, thank you >> and and thank you for holding us accountable. And I think your uh your policy has pushed this team uh to to to do different work to build systems to make sure uh we can adhere to the evidence that we provided for you tonight. That's a whole other just a general question and just looking for education here because maybe I don't understand it but um do we have a process where there might not be individual payments that cross a threshold from a service provider but if we aggregate all those payments through an entire year that total number crosses the threshold A B

132if that does happen would it make any sense and introduce any possible cost savings to introduce bidding process or some kind of comparative analysis for those providers that we consistently use that might not cross the threshold of any one payment. However, in aggregate through an entire year might cross that threshold. >> Yeah. Uh some of that's already happening. So an example would be us buying paper towels uh that on an annual basis we will go through more than $10,000 a year of paper towels. uh and John Bremer is doing competitive pricing on that behind the scenes. There are other examples like that, Juan Carlos, that aren't feasible. Uh we spend more than $10,000 a year on Amazon. Uh but we we can't send Amazon out there to bid for all of the oneoff purchases that

133happen there. >> Um I I can tell you that um the the $10,000 threshold is followed to the letter of the the law. uh and that um areas where we have um department leads that know on an annual basis they're going to get over that $10,000 mark uh we continue to have conversations with them. Uh John has gone through uh and so has Robin on an example of paper products um and has done competitive pricing behind the scenes uh to ensure that that happens. But it becomes it becomes uh really difficult when you have onesie twoosy little things happening at 10 different sites through an individual vendor to then ask them to provide competitive pricing on items that um may not even line up and being the same thing. >> For sure. >> Amazon is

134the example. >> Well, I appreciate that because that's a testament is how much you guys are really trying to squeeze the efficiency from >> Oh, yeah. That's shop. >> Oh, yeah. Yeah. We need some that's lost in the community. >> So, I love bringing these things up because We are looking at at things at that granular level for sure to make sure that any cost opportunity savings available are being looked at trying to be maximized. So I appreciate that one of the benefits of Pete building those dashboards for all of our budget owners are the and and and you know we're living it every day. He literally has built a a speedometer in terms of where you're at with your budget. Um, and now our budget owners know, and this was not previously the case,

135but um, you're going to end up in my office, maybe in Dr. C's office, uh, if you run your budget over, and there isn't a reason, and you haven't given us a heads up. Um, and we we're finding all of our department heads um, are doing everything they can to stretch that dollar most uh, in line with board policy. The opposite happens if no one's held accountable to maintain a budget. uh there is no incentive for them to go out and actually squeeze the extra uh nickel out of a a contractor to get competitive pricing. >> Thank you. >> May may sound frivolous, but there's something about even the way that that thing is colorcoded when you see it going to the yellow to red. You think you think twice about it and all of

136us are individual personal finance. Exactly. That'd be great if we had a home budget. >> It would. >> Yeah. >> Yes. We should all have a >> I just had one final, it's sort of a question comment because I'm I'm realizing what you said a bit ago with the question of like how do things get missed that it's possible for an audit to not land in the scope of the board? So, is it because of our governance policy? I get a reach out from our Clifton Larson Allen as a board member for them to basically cross reference. Hey, as a board leader, we just finished your audit. What thoughts do you have? Is that typical or is that also built into the fact that we have our governance structure the way that we do? Is

137that just the way that that third party works? >> I >> because I'm appreciative of that. >> I I don't know. I can't speak. >> I didn't know that was happening. >> You didn't know that was happening? Well, I'm glad. Yeah. Am I supposed to tell you that? >> But I get But I get reached out to Yeah. And I get to talk to the auditors. >> It's happened in years past though, too. >> Yeah. So I've done it for the second year row of being president if that's why it's >> the president might I don't know if that happens in you know the Middletons or Madison of the of the world but I I believe I remember hearing them say that a year ago that they were going to >> be reaching out to

138you. >> Yeah. I think it's just an added piece that that's an intentional part of the audit team that we're using that there's at least that check and involvement of the board. >> Nice. uh board members, any additional questions for the team? Okay. Then it is our charge of course to determine um if we feel this report is meeting expectations or not meeting expectations. So feel free to offer any other um comments or thoughts or feel free to propose a motion. >> I'll make a motion that it meets expectations. >> Thank you, Joe. >> So move. >> Is there a second? >> Oh, second. I'm sorry. >> Great. Second by Juan Carlos. Any further discussion? All those in favor of approving OEE6 as uh meeting expectations signify with I. >> I. Any opposed? Okay, 6

139is approved as meeting expectations. Thank you team. Thank you Pete and the rest of your team. Please extend our gratitude to the three other individuals that do this work. Thank you Chad for the full presentation show this evening. >> Yes, that was a lot, but we made it. Thank you guys. >> Excellent. >> Feel good. You got the feel good like presentation. >> Yeah, there was a lot of good stuff. >> I was looking forward to this night. This is a busy day, but lots of great stuff to talk about. So, >> yeah, usually after following the students, that's a tough road. >> But we kept the mojo going today. >> Yes, we did. We did. >> So, moving on to board updates. Um, anything related to OEA communications? >> Um, we should update. We

140went to Slate. >> Yep. >> Was part of the admin team, the state >> uh technology and education conference. >> So, I want to speak for everybody. I'll just speak for myself. Was focused on um AI in education this year. And it was uh I thought really really good and insightful. Um the sessions I went to followed kind of more of a classroom track um and were mostly facilitated by people out of CISA 4 um that seem to be kind of focusing on this sort of work um and it raised some really interesting questions for me about AI and um um I would encourage us all to think about it. this the presumption in a lot of uh the sessions that I was in was that um AI is going to be very similar to

141word processing and that it's a skill that students will need to acquire, not something that should be avoided or punished. um which I think for people that don't have a lot of interactions with AI or that only have certain interactions with AI might come as something of surprise but um it certainly did feel like that might be the way to think about it. Um, and I I got a number of good questions out of a number of eye opening experiences about how teachers might use it or how I might use it or but really like what sorts of skills students are going to need. Um, you know, my experience with AI is that you ask it some goofy question and it answers it in a more thorough way than you can possibly imagine. Um, but

142when they really get into the the specifics and techniques around prompting AI properly, like there is some next level stuff that you can do and it is really a skill to learn how to prompt properly. And um, and when people are using AI, this is the thing I think that I struggled with when it first started coming along. It's like I could just say, "Hey, write me a paper." and then you get kind of a crappy paper and you turn pass it off your own plagiarism blah blah blah. That's not what this is about. When somebody does a thorough job, it's like two or three pages of prompting to get that one little bit of like a juicy nugget of right product that you need. Um so it's actually more work to do it right

143than you might do on your own. Um and in that way it really is a tool that is worth incorporating into our education system and it's you know inevitable as I say but it was really really really good. There was also a lot of stuff that I saw that I didn't agree with just personally. So it was one of those good conference that way too. I won't bore you all with what I did because >> not sure. >> Yeah. I got I really appreciated focus on me. which plays into how to properly drums and how the magic happens after the fourth or fifth iteration. Um, but also I agree with John like it was really really impactful to just have that consensus on this is going to be this is going to be a game

144changer and a necessary skill to be present in pretty much every job or industry that our students are going to face in the future. Um, and what that final update thing is going to look like, I don't know, but definitely something that they have to prepare for. And also appreciate the fact that we need to do it to Dr. Clarity. So, I know you're this is what you're thinking about. Do it the right way in a way that everybody has access to it in a way that everybody's opportunity to make the most of it and a way to protect, you know, family, students, and and staff. >> So, Yeah, go ahead. >> First, a couple things. I want to begin by thanking um our board members that were able to go to the slate. Uh

145uh John, Jen, and and one colonels, thank you for being there. I know you took time out of your schedules. It was a really kind of a cool moment. U we were in the space and I saw some leaders from other area. We were talking comparing notes and networking. We talked about our board and they just probably said, "Your your board's here." like yeah, you know, we we we learned together and I just thought it was like the greatest thing since sliced bread, but it just really speaks to the full commitment of the seven of you and they're just willing to go in and engage and be right there at the front. So, a long way of saying thank you. at the end of the week email on this this past Friday. Um I I

146did place a and I use it like definitely rough draft philosophy statement, but I I I feel to Carl's point, we have to have a bit of like what is our mindset about AI and then get into tools and things like that, but what is our mindset? And you think about any space that we're in where we're getting feedback from uh staff, you know, we're able to talk about a lot of things, but the one thing that I feel like I just never have had a good response for because there's just no way to duplicate it is the gift of getting time back. And and that's where I really looked at AI the most is as how do you use it as a way to make things more efficient to give those quality things. I

147want our our staff and educators just to go home and be family people. leave leave the papers at home, turn the emails uh off. And I thought also to this point that you know uh some of the fears that go along with that. I felt like this quote from the Harvard Business Review really stood out to me. It says AI does not replace educators. It replaces tasks. The capacity of educators becomes more essential and not less there. And I really think that really grounded our our our framework and really grounded that philosophy statement that I put in there. So my my ask or wondering from the board um well it's it's a philosophy not a not a policy as it is is not my position to create create policy but if as you're reading that

148philosophy if there are pieces that um you you want me to think about differently I'm going to present it to the principles on Wednesday still in draft form just just as as a starting point but I would love to hear some deeper perspective if there's any if it's great the way it is I'll I'll continue to push push it that way as well But again just want to extend appreciation for this journey that is on. There is no sidest stepping or going around AI. It it is it is here and is coming that we approach it from that as from that aspect. Uh but also ground it in true alignment with our our strategic framework and our and our and our uh equity statement that we use it as a means to remove barriers not

149create them. >> Yeah. Thank you for sharing that in our weekly email. Just great to see that in draft form and know that the team that was up at Slate was just doing this kind of rich work of really being intentional about how we think about this as a partner system. >> I just want to reiterate something that you said that I think hit home for me as well too that required me like I really had to think about it deeply is that AI replaces tasks. Mhm. >> Um, and you know, having worked with teachers for a long time, like it's amazing to me like how much we prohibit teachers from teaching by overloading them with tasks. Mhm. >> And the demonstration that I saw there that really like blew my mind that spoke exactly

150to that was where they went through one of these really highly technical prompts couple pages long to create um a series of lessons plans lesson plans around like a project according to a particular teaching philosophy to cover some particular learning targets that met some particular Wisconsin standards and fit you know into that classroom's pedigogy. So that was a very long technical prompt. What was interesting to me was that it not only spit out what I considered to be a fairly decent class plan is that once you had that prompt, um you you change a few of the parameters and you can keep redoing that >> in ways that take so many tasks, so many planning tasks off your table and allow you to be human and in the room and all those things that we

151know we need to allow teachers to do to facilitate the social emotional learning to facilitate you know the classroom connections they need to facilitate there's the potential for time to be there to do that now um while still meeting these like really really burdensome standards um and that for me was just like >> so it's not just >> you know it's not >> no and so for My first thought when I heard that statement that it eliminates tasks not like whatever was that my first thought was if your job only constitutes tasks you might be in trouble. >> If your job like a teacher encapsulates some human elements, this is a profound tool for you to be able to emphasize that humanity >> if you know how to leverage it. And it took me a

152while to get there, >> right? Um because like all you know aging people I was like this is too easy. It's crap. It can't be good. Makes life too easy. You know the old pyramid in me is like if it's too easy it can't be good. So anyway >> that's super impactful. I hope that this just this little last piece I think encapsulates a lot about how we're going to think about this moving forward. Um other updates, just a reminder to board members, we have the next um Greater Jane County Consortium gathering on January 14th in Belleville. That's listed here on the agenda, but we want to get um RSVPs through Lori. The RSVPs are due by January 5th, which is the day we're back from break. So, if you could maybe look at that

153yet this week, and just confirm if you're able to attend in Belleville, our consortium gathering. Um and then just regular board meetings moving ahead. >> Jen, I have a question. Yeah, >> if we're doing planning. Um, and actually there's probably a question for Dr. I love the idea of gowns for our administrators, but I have a couple questions about caps and gowns for graduation for board members because our interesting circumstances where we could have new board members coming on in April or and as I was looking through like the order form, I mean, are we purchasing these for board members or renting these for board members? I mean, I'm a little nervous about I'm a little nervous about it for board members in general for a couple reasons, but I'm also like, you know, I've

154only got like another year on my term. Like, this is like is this what is this? >> Yeah. So, the we're doing them in in size ranges just like the the student ones as well. So, we just keep them all hung up. So, we try to >> almost like a tuxedo rental place where we try to keep the sizes. So there'll be a range of sizes of them that we just always keep. >> Okay. >> Uh that that that are there. Uh we're also looking at um uh universal board of education stos. So everyone >> looks doesn't the degree doesn't mean it's just a board of education stole. Okay. >> That everyone wears looks looks the same and uniform in that in that piece. So um it wouldn't be it's not going to be a

155waste of >> uh because we are turning the gallons back back in. It's just part of the collection or range of sizes that we'll always have that are board of education. >> I really like that. >> I really like the board of education uniformity regardless of degree because there's no degree requirement to be on the board and you know I would just hate for somebody to feel like >> I mean that that is a a thing. >> Correct. >> Um but I love the idea of the board of education. So just you answer my questions. Those are my concerns. Like I don't know what to do with this and I >> Absolutely. >> Yeah. And so we were they're probably going to have to design it the first time which because I don't think anyone

156in there but like will sign it then and and make make it make it make a board of education style one. So yeah. >> So it can be if somebody comes on the board, you know, an April election, they're not going to be precluded from being part of it. Perfect. You answered my questions and >> you raised my concerns. >> No, I think just similar to the graduation ones, we, you know, we we just do a full range of size of sizes and of of gowns that we take. Again, if a and if a student wants to >> keep it, then they just purchase as they would have purchased there. >> I did not want to see mine graduated. So then I was like, oh no. I know they're they're pricey when you're first getting

157them. But the if if it is utilized over a extended course of time, it makes far more sense than renting. And I do think there's a >> you knowity to it. But I really appreciate the eliminating the different degrees for the board members. I think that is very appropriate and accomplishes what we >> Thank you. >> Absolutely. >> What if you're larger than all the students? I'm asking for a friend. So what is it? We have a graduation set and we have a we have a board board set. So we have adult we have adult we have adult because they are they are large extra large >> they are they look and they look a little slightly different. >> So like faculty gowns look different than student >> so I think the link those two

158it's like height weight all of that like which where did you graduate from like none of that really matters then so much as like >> yeah I think the the thought process about the stolen self didn't come till we had already sent that out. I think that's like let's let's look at it from this perspective. >> I really appreciate that. I'm really glad that's thoughtful in the inclusivity of it and you know um I know that it would have mattered very specifically to certain people that in a way that was you know doesn't need to be and this I feel like is >> looks like so yeah universal boards. >> Glad I asked. Thank you. >> No problem. Can you just rest? >> Thank you. >> Yeah. Thanks. Any other general updates from any other

159board members? >> I just want to call out the the staff who worked to put together the winter concert last week. >> That is always it blows me away at the production value. It seems like you're seeing a professionally show in addition to the quality of the musical performances which is also ridiculous. But just the production value of of what it takes to put a show like that together. It's very impressive. >> It's really popular in the community and it shows for good reason. >> Yeah, we got to see some of it today. >> All right, then moving on to superintendent's consent consent agenda. Please make sure you've looked that over. Are there any questions? Hearing none, superintendent's consent agenda is approved as presented. Similarly, making sure you've looked over the board consent agenda. Are

160there any questions? Hearing none, the board's consent agenda is approved. We did basically go through future agenda items, but just making sure that you've got notes on your personal calendar and we'll circle back about the um Greater Dane County Consortium meeting and then we will be adjourning to close session under Wisconsin statute 19.85 85 sub1 subc to consider employment, promotion, compensation or performance evaluation data of any public employee over which the governmental body has jurisdiction or exercises responsibility specifically considering the employment contract of the superintendent. Uh we'll take a roll call vote to move into close session. Right. >> No. Yes. Uh Joe. >> Hi. >> Corby. >> Hi. >> John. Um, yes. I believe motion and second before we take the vote, but yes, I I >> Thank you. I know. I That's why

161I was reading my own note. Second, >> I'll do the motion. >> Okay. Thank you. Is there a second? >> Second. >> Thank you, Corby. So, we have an I from Joe, I from Corby. John, >> I >> Christopher. >> Hi. >> Carlos, >> I am I as well. We are journ to close session. Um, we'll take a quick pause board members as we shift to close session to get a picture with Marcy. Um and then we'll yeah prepare our space for