001We're going to call this January 13, 2026, Organizational Regular Governing Board Meeting to order. We will stand for pledge and for monument asylum. I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. Okay, we may sit. We're on our way. First item of business this evening is 3-1, the election of governing board president. Pursuant to ARS 15-321 and governing board policy 1-103 governing board organization, the governing board is required to hold an organizational meeting in January to elect officers. The meeting shall be called to order by the president of the board for the preceding year. The person calling the meeting to order shall preside. until a successor is elected. During the call for nominations,
002any interested board member may submit their name for consideration or be nominated by another board member. Interested members were afforded the opportunity during the regular meeting on December 9, 2025, to express an interest in serving as president. The term of president is one year or until an election of new officers occurs. Following the call for nominations, board members will cast their voice vote. A majority vote of the board members will decide the election unless there are three or more choices where a plurality vote will then be used. Plurality voting is an electoral system in which a candidate or candidates who poll more than others counterparts are elected. The new president of the board shall take office upon election and preside over the remainder of the meeting and throughout the duration of their term. The sitting
003president will entertain nominations for governing board president for the 2026 calendar year. Mr. President. Yes, sir. And I'm a Brenna Poland. Brenna has been moved. Is there any other nominations? All right. Seeing none, we shall close the nominations. And all in favor of Brenna, say aye. Aye. Okay, it passes 5-0. It passes unanimously. Brenna is now the presiding president and will take over the meeting. So I will hand you the... We don't have to move chairs. Yeah, we won't move chairs this much. We'll move, it's because the name tags are where they are, and I'm told that we can't be someone else. Thank you all very much. Since I had to go, I would like to speak a little bit. I think it's appropriate. No, I just wanted to thank Marcos for his years of
004leadership. In the time that you've been on the board, Marcos, I'm not sure how many years it's been president, but it's been several. I think you've provided really great and consistent leadership for the board. So I want to thank you for that. I promise to do my best, but I also know that you and I have different skills. And so my hope for the future is that you will continue your advocacy and leadership role in the legislature. because I have absolutely no interest in that. And you are good at it and you have the contacts and already have a foot in the door. So I really encourage you to continue with that, to keep us informed with what's going on and to advocate for not only Crane, but public education in general. So thank you.
005Thank you for all your hard work. We appreciate that. Okay, we will move on to Agenda Item 3-2. This is the election of the Governing Board Clerk. A clerk may be elected by the members of the Governing Board for 2026, pursuant to ARS 15321 and Governing Board Policy 1-103, Governing Board Organization. The Governing Board is required to hold an organizational meeting in January to elect officers. The term and election of the clerk is on the same schedule as that of the Governing Board President. During the call for nominations, any interested board member may submit their name for consideration or be nominated by another board member. Interested members were afforded the opportunity during the regular meeting on December 9, 2025, to express an interest in serving as clerk. The term of clerk is one year or
006until an election of new officers occurs. Following the call for nominations, board members will then cast a voice vote. A majority vote of the board members will decide the election unless there are three more choices, three or more choices. where plurality vote will then be used. Plurality voting is an electoral system in which a candidate or candidates who poll more than any other counterpart are elected. The newly elected clerk of the board shall take office upon election and acts as the governing board president in the absence of the president. There is, however, no legal requirement for this position. The newly elected president will entertain nominations for the governing board clerk for the 2026 calendar year. Are there any nominations? I nominate Kelly for clerk. Thank you. I'll second that nomination. All in favor? Aye. Opposed?
007That motion carries unanimously. Okay, cool. It's you and me. All right. Okay. Let's see how it goes. Keep it on track, I guess. Okay. Next, we'll go to agenda item 3-3. This is the schedule of 2026 governing board meetings. Governing Board Policy 1-302, Governing Board Meetings and Open Meeting Law Requirements, requires the governing board to hold a regular meeting at least once a month during the regular school year and may hold other meetings, including work sessions and special meetings, as often called. Currently, regular meetings of the governing board occur on the second Tuesday of each month during the regular school year at 5 o'clock p.m. As in previous years, it is recommended that the schedule of the June board meeting remain as the last Tuesday of the month to allow for additional time to prepare
008the budget documents for the coming fiscal year and to accommodate any legislative action that could impact the budget development process. Due to statutory deadlines, the administration recommends maintaining the regular monthly meeting of the governing board of crane schools for the second tuesday of each month at 5 pm except for the june 9th 2026 meeting it will be scheduled for june 23rd 2026 as discussed and schedule work sessions and special meetings as necessary and um the change in schedule dale is because of the budget? Correct, yes. In the recent years, the legislature has not adjourned timely enough for us to be able to put forward an accurate budget package, so the longer that we're able to wait into June before presenting that to the board, the more advantageous this is for us. Okay, thank you. Is
009there a motion? I make a motion that we accept the Governing Board scheduled meetings as presented. One caveat I wanted to mention is, I'm sorry, it says in there the last Tuesday, which happens to fall on June 30th, and then it says June 23rd, so we'd like June 23rd. June 30th pushes it too far. Okay, so we'll strike the last Tuesday, but... Stick with the date of June 23rd. Okay. Is that okay with you, Jim? All right. Is there a second? I second. We have a second by Audrey. Okay. All in favor? Aye. That motion carries. Thank you. Next, we'll move on to agenda item number four, student staff and community presentations recognitions. First of all, we'll have a presentation by Centennial Middle School. Mrs. Laura Hurt, Middle School Principal, will introduce Mrs. Stephanie Littlewood
010Moody, who will present on their 2026 Road Reservice Project. Well, thank you for having us, Madam President, members of the board, and exec team. We have great things happening at Centennial this year, one of which we're going to tell you about. It's our newly developed partnership with Fort Yuma Rotary, and Stephanie Littlewood has been integral in developing that partnership, and so she's going to tell you about that tonight. All right. Hello, I'm Stephanie Lewis Goody, and I am so excited about this project. I have to, like, contain myself. For audience members, if you want to scan the QR code, you can follow along. I am going to skip over some of this. So I talked about this project I've been wanting to do with a few people, and Fort Yuma Rotary said, let's help you
011out. We'd love to help you. So let me go over this with you. This is a three-part project. The first is bike supplies. I have a bike club of 14-ish kids, and eight are dedicated. And we have 10 really nice mountain bikes that were donated by Twisted Spoke. So the idea, the help that we need is to help with supplies and updating some things. The next one would be the bike track. We have a bike track located behind Centennial. And after 2022, when I hurt my shoulder, I stopped taking care of it myself. So it's in shambles and they're going to help me rebuild it. And then the last one, a huge, huge passion project of mine is the garden bed overhaul. We built them together and now we're going to have really nice metal
012ones. So let me go into this because pictures are amazing. The bike club is just a chance for the kids come. They ride bikes. I teach them how to fix their bikes and we replace them. Sometimes they bring in their bikes and we fix those as well. So they're allowed to borrow mine or they're allowed to fix theirs up. So I also have Sean Chapman, who is absolutely amazing. He comes each week on Thursdays and he helps me. He's a bike mechanic and has donated the bikes years ago. He's amazing. So these are my sweet students. They're so excited. They're loving it. And they change out. This is one of my students' bikes. They're changing out the brakes. The whole goal is keep the bike safe so they can keep riding. This year we got
013to ride in the parade, the Veterans Day parade and the light parade. So much fun. So much fun. A lot of us. That's great. There they are. They learn all kinds of different things, not just riding a bike, but different maneuvers. different obstacles and stuff. So you can see here we're putting on new grips, we're putting new brakes, new suspension, like all of it. I teach them how to do them all of it and they love it. I'm going to skip this for time. In August, I met with Leslie McClendon, a Rotarian from Fort Humon, and with Lori and Dale Ponter and Mrs. Hurt. And wow, like just kind of pitching this idea, I was a little nervous about it because I didn't know what to expect. And they were like, let's do it. Let's
014go with it. So this is what we came up with. First up, bike supplies. So we're updating. We're updating our jerseys. We're giving them new supplies, new pumps, all that kind of stuff. A need that we needed was storage. This is in my lab. So when we would go into the lab, so we're like, let's move the bikes over here. Let's move this over there. So we would end up, we needed some kind of storage. And my thought was, let's just get a shed. Well, Rotary thought much bigger and better. And so we have a Connex. So it's like a container. So GCE decided, hey, we're going to donate our time and we're going to help with this. So no cost to you. They came out, they made a spot, they flattened it out. These
015are the guys, they're so great. And then it was delivered the next day over Christmas break. And now our next step is to add bike racks along the sides, which are currently in the classroom waiting. That's great. And then the bike track, the next portion of it is going to be done in end of March, early April over spring break. So the whole point of it is to make it more maintainable instead of the entire backfield, which is here. It's going to be just towards the north end of the school. It's going to make it a lot easier for me to maintain. And yeah, it'll make more sense. And the current project that's happening just right around the corner, January 24th on Saturday, on a Saturday, we're replacing all the garden beds with metal garden
016beds. And Fort Yuma Rotary is going to come out and help us with that. In 2021, we built these garden beds with the help of ABAC. It was absolutely wonderful. Great team. Pilkington came out. My kids were able to use, you know, power tools and stuff, and they loved it. It was great. And they served a great purpose. And now they're splintering and falling apart. So we're like, we need something that's more sustainable. So through these garden beds, we do all kinds of science, life science, earth science through them. My students get to plant them. They learn how to put in the watering lines, the drip line irrigations. They weed. They take out other plants besides that. And they learn how to do companion planting. And, you know, we're not just going to do what's
017in the fields. We're going to learn a little bit more, you know. butterfly gardens and that kind of stuff. So these are some pictures of what we had. We had a little mini pumpkin patch, lots of fun. They also learned about whitefly and that was a lot of fun. So that actually that was a great learning curve for them. And then we have, thanks to Mr. Moore, we had our bell peppers. I don't know if you saw our... That was a lot of fun. They enjoyed that. So these are what the garden beds will look like. They're metal. and they will, they should last for 20 years at least, we shall see. We had eight of them, we had eight wooden garden beds, now we're going to have 16 metal garden beds. And today, my
018students started putting them together, as they were excited and they couldn't wait. So we're going to put a few together, and then the Rotarians are going to come and help finish putting them together, and then filling them. That's the fun part. With some of the old garden beds I was able to piece them together, not all of them, but I was able to get some, piece them together and donated them, delivered them to the Colorado River State Historic Park. They have a little demonstration garden in the back and on the weekends I volunteer there and so now they're going to have like something that's a little nicer. Hopefully the gophers won't get to that. We'll see. And so the side of the container we're going to paint a mural. And I wish my sister was
019here so she could help me with that part. But luckily I kind of know what I'm doing. So I'll be drawing something on there. Then the kids and Rotarians will help paint. And then this is just a list of supplies that we're going to be getting. For the most part, we have about a third of, or no, two thirds of the supplies already bought and shipped. So sitting in my lap. That's all I have. Thank you guys so much. I'm so excited about Centennial. It's going to be great. Thank you guys. Do you have any questions? When do you have time to teach? No, obviously you're teaching every minute of the day. That's so great. And I just, the fact that it's a wide variety of skills and it's so important to our kids. Thank
020you so much. Yes, of course. They just love it. They really do. I'm sure. All right. Well, thank you guys. Thanks for coming. Thank you. Next, we have a presentation by crane middle school. Mrs. Ruby cell Rodriguez crane middle school assistant principal will go over the processes and presentation of effectiveness data over a three year period. With help from Mr. Tyree or support from Mr. Tyree. Well, good afternoon, members of the board, Mrs. President. My name is Ruby Salvatore, the assistant principal, proud assistant principal at Crane Middle School. And today I will be presenting to you different processes that we have in school, but more primarily the effectiveness of these processes over a three-year period. All right, we have a saying at Crean Middle School, and that is making every day the best day ever.
021We have our ups and downs, but as a team, we always try to make it the best day ever. So today, in the next slide, it takes a village to raise a child. And today, really, I am presenting that team to you. The different processes, the different team members within that team that not only include our principal, myself, but our teachers, our instructional aides, cafeteria staff. Custodial staff, office staff, bus drivers, and just staff in general. We're all here for Cougars. And after I went through a whole year of learning of the NME, which is the Neurosequential Model in Education and trauma-based interventions and supports for students, we have really embedded that into not only our lessons, but throughout our day and the different ways that we support. our students. And so something that we
022take away from Dr. Bruce Perry, who is the creator really of this NME approach, is that any second of interaction with students counts. And it can be, he says in a video, microseconds, five seconds of interaction with a student that can really change their lives. And so we take that really serious when it comes to that approach and relationships that we create. foster with students and just ensuring that they do have their best day ever at Crean Middle School. So I'm going to start off with our teachers in the classroom. We have some pictures here of different things that we do to support our students. Our teachers are given a training on the Neurosequential Model in Education by myself and are teacher of the year nominee actually Mrs. Miranda who is also a trainer for
023the neural sequential model in education so we start off our Professional development trainings in the last two years with this information to teachers, but we're all in the loop of what that means and how it looks like in the classroom. We always reiterate that we are a text away, a phone call away, ensuring that our teachers also are regulated because us ourselves, as Dr. Perry says, need to be regulated first in order to regulate a child. So the sooner we can get there and be there to the rescue, we are a text away. We have our zen room for our teachers ourselves. So if they just need to have that moment to deescalate and that's their space, and then we take over while they regulate. But nonetheless, we hold that calming corner for students in
024their classroom. That is one of the pictures that you see there. It is not a requirement that all of our classrooms have that in place. We have a pyramid, which you'll see here. The NME concept, and when I say NME, it's the Neural Sequential Model in Education. I can take a whole week, a month explaining this. But really, it's how our cortex cannot open and be open and receptive to new learning if it's shut down. And so if it's open, it's open and receptive to learning. And so we need to start by how the pyramid goes by regulating, relating with that person, and they'll be able to refund. With that in mind, some of the things that we have in place for students that need that extra regulation, we put students together on success plans.
025Through the NME, there is a database where all the people that work with the student are able to score the students. And then it creates a functional map, which is part of the brain. And so it gives us interventions more geared down to what that trauma and forward interventions are. And so our teachers are on board what that looks like, you know, as a team, who will be supporting, what kinds of supports the students will need. And so that we'll see as part of the bullet for the success plans. Nonetheless, during DEN, which is our whole moon class, we ensure to embed Kagan structures for team building. And I'm sure you have one now. Part of our PBIS or our supports to motivate students is to get all their stamps on the ROAR ticket, which
026is the little ticket that you got there in front of you. Every two weeks, our students are given this ROAR ticket, and this really serves as a motivator to... get them, you know, to roar with pride. And our school rules have shifted from just being safe and being responsible and respectful to really the acronym ROAR, being respectful, being responsible, being organized, and coming in with a positive attitude. So every time any of our staff members, postorial, bus drivers, anyone, any staff member does catch our students roaring with pride, they can get a stamp on that word ticket. And every two weeks, we collect those tickets for giveaways. In the morning during den, while our classroom teachers teach Kagan structures for team building, goal setting and whatnot, we do have a team of five amazing teachers
027that help us to do more of a daily check-in for those students that need it the most. These students may or may not be on the success plan. And on the success plan, like I mentioned, we have the functional map. geared more to the interventions that need to be because of trauma-based interventions and supports, but also just a daily check-in in the morning. Sometimes, depending on the need of the student, we'll do a daily check-in after lunch and or at the end of the day. To ensure, you know, in the beginning that we'll have a wonderful best day ever. And then after lunch, continuing to have that best day ever and then concluding with one. So it really is a collaborative effort. As you know, it takes the village. And so sometimes, you know, a
028chicken in the morning is not enough. So we want to make sure that our teachers are supported and that our students are supported throughout the day. Our counselor, of course, is a great support. As you can see here on this slide, she not only does the daily check-ins with students, but the weekly and monthly supports. We meet at the end of every month so we can kind of see who we're supporting, who needs what approach and what interventions. And some she continues to see, others she may exit, and then maybe one of our teammates take over. or myself, Mr. Terry, or just any other staff member that a student can bond with and have a relationship with. So it's not just really the counselor, but just anyone on site that can build a rapport with
029the students. Our counselor has planned out this school year. to support students after school with the enemy approach. So starting this school year, she has volunteered one time in the month to just check in with students after school, with those students that just want to kick it after school and just have that regulation time with her. During those times that they do meet with Mrs. Magana, there are different, a variety of stations in her room that we have learned to regulate a child's brain. the human brain. So you'll see rhythmic, you'll see music, you'll see coloring, punching bag, a bean bag, breathing balls, and anything that they can use to really regulate any sense of rhythm we've learned through the enemy learning that is something that our brain helps our brain to regulate. So those
030are all the interventions that we have not only in her class, but also in the calming corners in our classrooms. Well, in addition to Mrs. Magana, it's also one of our biggest supports to target our chronic absenteeism. So she is calling parents, coming up with plans and supports of how we can get our students there and on time. In addition to, we do have the supports of, and we have Parkville, where it's an additional support for students with outside counseling. So we're able to refer through her those students that need that extra help. Our PBIS interventionist, Ms. Campos, is new to our school, but she's been a wonderful addition to our team. Not only is she building those relationships, but she helps us with the escalating situation, being the text away for teachers and staff,
031being enlisting in here for teachers, staff, and students, and families, but also getting in that lens of energy support and of knowing those interventions, how they look like, how they sound like, and how they should. to be seen for that support for our students. She does do the check-ins with our students for success plans, and she's just on board with everything. She's phenomenal. Our supporting staff. So you might see our cafeteria staff, our custodial staff, but really, they've jumped in on board since three years ago when we presented the idea of NME. And really, the idea... And so our cafeteria staff, we've had some success plans where the consequence is to get a special lunch. every two weeks for that particular student. We have our custodians with our ODP group at the end of the
032day where they can, you know, walk with them and build those relationships with them after school. So like I said, when we said it takes the village, it really does. And I really love our team, how they've come together to really support our Cougars. And like I said at the beginning, that board ticket gets stamped by everyone, including our custodial and cafeteria staff. Our after school, like I mentioned, our counselor does those NME practices at the end of every month. But she's also come up with different ideas to motivate students by creating a poetry contest. She's done others, which I can't think right now, but she's just wonderful. She's always looking for ways to motivate our students to do something, to just stay in the loop and really... to build a sense of belonging. And
033I think that's very important. Nonetheless, our clubs and activities, we have our ODP, our students, Haleburg Custodians after school. We have the art club, student council, leadership class, and really all those sports and everything that goes on after school. Again, just building that sense of belonging, that you belong there, and that we're there for Cougars. And then, of course, comes the fun. At the end of every two weeks, we give our students the road ticket. We get it stamped. Our road ticket, how it works is that every two weeks, we collect those, and that is the only form of payment that we get in the cafeteria for exchange for snacks. So we collect those throughout the quarter, and at the end of every quarter, we have the Battle of the Teams, which our students are
034really, really looking forward to. This second quarter's assembly is coming up January 23rd. if you want to join us. And so during this time, it really is the battle of the teams. We've grouped all the gems together. So every gem, they represent with a color. So they come in representing their color team. And so we play different games from hungry hippos to rallies to races. And we have a traveling trophy. So they want their team to win. And so we have a scoreboard where we keep track of all the scores. And throughout that pep assembly, let me tell you, it gets loud in there. during that time also to support those that need that extra push we have Cougar Catch-Up and during that time guess what you're going to be doing you're going to catch
035it up on the work that you didn't finish during that quarter or during that time before the pep assembly so make sure you're cut out make sure you're getting the supports that you're needed and that you are just trying your very best every day because we're really trying our best here to make sure that you have your best day ever and so during that time again we have lots and lots of fun and really it's just a motivator. It is hard to motivate middle schoolers, but we don't take no for an answer. So we've been trying for the last three years to really get into the groove of getting our middle schoolers motivated and more than anything engaged. And I think it's working. Nonetheless, we've shifted our PTO meetings from being monthly PTOs to quarter
036PTOs. This year we had a great turnout with 42 families come for our first quarter recognition assembly and we have our second one this Thursday. We are crossing fingers that we are successful in that second quarter assembly as well. But what we shifted to do this year was to not only recognize those students of the month which are quarter now and the A, B and A honor roll but also include those students with perfect attendance which is one of our goals as a school and also a star student which are those students that are improving in some area and so we want to boost that engagement and i thought we thought that um putting in other categories in there would would boost and and i think it's working because getting our cougars really motivated to
037end my presentation here really proud of our data in the course of three years uh three years ago our suspension rate for quarter one and two was 103 suspensions out of school suspensions Last year for quarter one and two, the total number of out-of-school suspensions was 83. And this last semester we closed with 49. And so I think it's a collective effort from all the village that it takes to raise a child. And we're just trying to have the best day and the best year ever. And so with that, I conclude and I'll take any questions that you may have. Good data. I was a crane cougar. I won't tell you what year it was, but it wasn't 72. But I know how to, I have a middle schooler at home as well. So I
038know, I know how difficult middle school can be. So I congratulate you guys, both of you and the whole staff for. those numbers and decrease. That's wonderful. Thank you. Thank you. I was not a crank cougar, but my don't don't start spouting your name, but my children were and they were students there back in the day when. This whole solution was Bob Cleese standing in the hallway glaring at the students. That pretty much didn't care of everything that we needed to deal with. But I really applaud you for taking such a sensitive and personal approach to students because they are all individuals and they all respond to different things. So what a great program. Thank you for sharing with us. Thank you. Thank you. Good job. Nice job, Brian. Okay, we're going to move on
039to agenda item five, superintendent current events summary. Superintendent's current events summary. The superintendent needs to provide members of the governing board and residents of the green schools with a monthly statement of current happenings and pending events, including information about student academic achievement. School board appreciation month. Those of you that were early saw their pictures being taken. So I'm sure Lupe will put something on social media. January is School Board Appreciation Month, which is a great time to focus on the crucial role our elected school board officials play in our communities and our schools. We appreciate your dedication and hard work. You are extraordinary people who voluntarily tackle the enormous job of governing school districts. Your actions and decisions affect the present and future lives of our children. We'd like to formally thank all school board
040members for this commitment and sacrifice. Thank you for your service. Gary Knox News. Gary A. Knox Elementary will be holding their annual farmer's market on Friday, January 16th from 9 a.m. to 1 p.m. Students have been busy tending their crops, harvesting, and preparing for this big event. The Auditor General's Achievement Peer Groups. Our district is laser focused on academic achievement, and I could not be more proud of our students, teachers, and entire staff. Every day you lean into professional learning, reflect on feedback, adapt instruction, and use data intentionally to improve outcomes for students. That commitment is making a real difference. The Arizona Auditor General's Office groups districts into academic achievement peer districts. While we're still awaiting confirmation of our current peer groupings, if the groupings remain the same as in 2024, our district achieved outstanding
041results, ranking first in math, first in ELA, and tied for first in science among our peers. This is based on the 2025 AASA state assessment. These results are something to celebrate. They're the direct result of your focus, collaboration, and dedication to continuous improvement. Thank you for the hard work, professionalism, and heart you bring to our students every day. If peer groupings change, I'll be sure to share an update in the spring. Certification. The CompTIA Cybersecurity Analyst, CISA+, is the premier certification for cyber professionals tasked with incident detection, prevention, and response through continuous security monitoring. It validates a tech professional's expertise in incident response and vulnerability management processes, emphasizing the critical communication skills necessary for effective security analysis and compliance. We want to congratulate Maria Navarro, IT Security and Compliance Analyst, for attaining her recent CompTIA
042CYSA Plus certification. Congratulations, Maria. Yay. Jesus Villarmosa, we invite you to attend a school safety forum featuring nationally recognized school safety expert Jesus Villarmosa, the founder of Crisis Reality Training. This is not a typical presentation. Mr. Villarmosa is widely regarded as one of the most engaging and impactful school safety trainers in the entire country. His approach is real, relevant, and grounded in practical strategies that schools and communities can use immediately. Following his prior training with our staff, educators consistently described it as the best safety training they've ever received. Powerful, eye-opening, and deeply meaningful. During this forum, Mr. Villarmosa will share insights on real-world school safety challenges and how communities can prepare together, the importance of awareness, prevention, and communication, how schools, families, and community members all play a role in keeping students safe. His message
043is delivered with clarity, authenticity, and purpose, and it resonates long after the session ends. School safety is a shared responsibility, and we believe this forum will provide valuable perspective and practical knowledge for parents, guardians, and community members alike. Whether you're deeply involved in our schools or simply care about the well-being of children in our community, it's an opportunity that you will not want to miss. We look forward to welcoming you for an important and impactful conversation about keeping our schools safe. Crane School Safety Forum will be held tomorrow evening, January 14, 2026, at 6 p.m. at the Crane Middle School Gym. The session is designed for adults and child care will be available for attendings. We hope you will attend and please invite others. Martin Luther King Jr. Holiday. All schools and the district office
044will be closed on Monday, January 19, in observance of Martin Luther King Jr.'s birthday. Madam President and members of the board, that's my report for this month. Thank you very much. Any comments? Okay. Next, we have agenda item 5.2, superintendent's update on legislative or other governmental actions. Sometimes issues that could impact Korean schools are considered by various legislative and or administrative bodies in the state or the federal government. Members of the governing board need to be aware of those issues and provide appropriate direction to initiate or respond to them. This agenda item permits the superintendent to provide an update on legislative or other governmental actions and the governing board opportunity to discuss, take positions, or propose legislation and rules and or direct the administration to research such issues. President, members of the board, today is
045day two of the second session of the 57th legislature. The governor provided her state of the state address yesterday. She spoke on areas of water and housing and the economy, border safety, as well as education. I'll highlight some of the education components. driving about reauthorizing the Proposition 123 that was last approved in May 2016, did expire in June, continue to receive those funds, but those funds are now absorbed into the general fund. So the opportunity of maybe having $300 million be spread to school districts and it would be charters as well, but public schools across the state. to be able to address those needs. That's something that's important to her. In addition to that, she did highlight the need for building renewal programs. We do not have a strong building renewal grant system. The needs
046of the state far outweigh the resources that are provided, making the SFD or the School Facilities Division create another layer of criteria beyond what is in regulation through the minimum standards. These types of hardships create challenges for school districts and planning and also being able to meet the needs when we have been able to demonstrate that our systems or the systems that are being reported the SMD are below those standards are therefore deficient and require funds to have those met. The House Committee on Education met today. There was one agenda item. It was about a school safety center. There was a lot of discussion, in fact, that was still going on when I left to come here. And so that committee meeting began at 2 and was still ongoing at about 4.15. So they were
047still on the first agenda item, which was about the... the Safety Care Center that is Representative's request bill that he is wanting to move forward. The Senate is scheduled to meet tomorrow. However, at the request of the, or they requested to the Senate President that they not meet, that request was honored. I'm not sure the circumstances of that, but the Education Committee and the Senate will not meet tomorrow as planned. There are over 300, yes, 328 bills that have been, check that. 509 total bills, 328 only in the House, 509 bills that have already been filed on, that includes those that were pre-filed as well as those to date. And so expect nearly 2,000 bills to drop, but which majority of those end up not being heard or not becoming law. So with that, I'll
048pause for any questions that the board may have. Can you elaborate on what a school safety care center is? Yes, I can. So the school safety care center would be an agency that would be able to provide training to schools, help evaluate their emergency operations plans, ensure that they're compliant. This is really coming on heels of an audit that occurred from the Office of the Auditor General, where they evaluated the school safety parameters. They found that of the 30 districts and charters, so there were 30 of each. Of the 60 entities that were reviewed, they found deficiencies in many of them. And it was either noncompliant with emergency operation plans or the belief of the legislature is we've provided all of this funding and you've not used it to address safety and security. Instead, you
049provide to staff compensation. You've done it for programs. You've invested in early childhood development, those types of things. Instead of investing in safety and security, there's a requirement to invest in safety and security. But their perspective was. These things aren't being done. And so the rest of the bill seeks to provide a resource for schools to be able to get support to address their safety needs. Would it be a state agency? It would, yes. Talk about money, huh? How are charters getting funding for this? Do they have to finance that or do they go through the state? So this agency is going to be for both charters and... Correct, yes. Any other questions? Any ESA stuff that you want to talk about? In the governor's address, she did request greater accountability and more guardrails in
050the program. She didn't seek to dissolve or place any caps on it, but did ask for some accountability to be around the program to ensure that it's responsible use of the taxpayers. She identified previous areas where there was fraud and some waste that had been identified through that program and seeking to try to bring that to corrective action. She also spoke about tax cuts, which was more geared towards middle class as well as senior citizens. And as I understand, does counter these proposals by the Republican legislature for the same type of tax bill. And there's like three or four of them that are going to be problematic, I think. Yes. At least. Yeah. Now, do you, Marcos? I hope that you will continue to chime in. I do have things to share. No, it's just
051there are people who are trying to do good that are not. And it's like the ESAs, people need to realize that the ESAs are here forever, right? They're here for a long time. So what we need to do is we need to figure out ways that we can repair or provide. guardrails because there are some issues you know there are people who are making arguments for the ESAs that I completely understand like I completely understand and I can defend it just as well as they can but they're here for they're here to stay and so we need to but they don't I mean the legislature doesn't even want to touch it they I mean it's like they want to expand it and I did find it encouraging was in meetings where Republican legislators were speaking
052about the need for guardrails, that there needs to be some of those things. So to me, that's encouraging. Where before there was no appetite to hear about those things, I think they recognize that there's some fraud and waste that's happening under the program and do believe that they need to strengthen the parameters of that a little bit more. So to me, that's encouraging. Whether that actually has legs and moves forward, I can't speak to that. But being in those meetings and hear some Republican legislators actually advocating for more transparency, more accountability was encouraging. When we had our meeting with Senator Dunn, he was very proactive and he was very understanding and he wanted to get rid of a bunch of that stuff too. But he's not going to go as far as like getting rid
053of him, but he's definitely someone that we can work with that is level-headed and mindful. There are a couple of bills, if I may say, there's a the, I talked to you about it, the testing, moving the testing back to like the last week of the year or something like that. And so that's going to have some booboos because then like the superintendent evaluations get. I'll screw it up because you're tiny. If you can expand on that, that would be nice. Yeah, so what Mr. Moore is referring to is there's somewhat of a push to move the state testing window towards the last two weeks of the school year instead of near the beginning of the third quarter as it is with, I'm sorry, beginning of the fourth quarter as it is for our school
054district. And so doing that, I think, is problematic for a number of things. Maybe the level of engagement of the students isn't as high during the last two weeks of school as it might be right after spring break. And then getting those results will be significantly delayed in how leadership is evaluated, how the schools are evaluated, and then the funding that may be tied to the successful proficiency of schools or even letter grades that are tied to those things. So all of those things could be delayed. There's also a little bit of a push to. move or allow a paper pencil type of testing rather than being proctored through a device like what we have now, which then further delays those results coming in because then someone has to manually process those in lieu of
055the electronic system scoring all of those in advance. So I think with that would require other changes to legislation, but yes, would delay other areas too. Yeah, and when they're trying to do a lot of accountability and holding people, holding boards, more specifically holding superintendents and school districts feet to the fire, this is just going to make things just a lot slower. It's not going to be... I kind of get what they probably want. They want to see, well, we want to see what it is at the end of the year, not three quarters of the year through. What did they really learn all year? But then it throws everything through a monkey wrench. I think it's because they want more accountability and they think this is... I don't know, hard to think about sometimes.
056Yes. Okay. Thank you guys for keeping us in the loop. Let's move on to governing board business agenda item six one or reports on conferences, workshops, and school visitations. Periodically members of the governing board attend various conferences, seminars, workshops, district schools, and so forth, and have information to share with other members. Is there anyone who has anything they'd like to share tonight? Yes. I did attend the state convention where I got defeated as president of the state ASBA, but it was quite an experience. There were a couple of really good speakers there. I liked the guy that was talking about his neighborhood that had like, what, 10? pro football players and basketball players and his great story was that one of the kids, when they got hit out in the street, when they were playing,
057I'm sure they played with no pads, that they would just help each other up after they got hit, except when one kid hits you, his mother, the kid that got hit, his mother would have to come and take him home. It was pretty, the guy was a good speaker, excellent speaker. There was a couple of good breakout sessions. One I really wanted to listen to, and I didn't get in there in the right time, was... The allowing kids are going to charter schools and private schools to participate in athletics in public schools. And that's a bill, too. What's that? That's going to be a bill, too. Yeah, I know. That's kind of an interesting topic. But and then the light parade. I saw several students from Crane in different parts of that parade. It's always
058neat to go down there for that. And it wasn't even cold, so it wasn't too bad. But the kids, and our kids look darn good, I tell you that. Yeah, makes me proud of them. That's all. Thanks, Jim. Marcus, do you have anything? Yeah, Dale and I. We're at Gowan when state superintendent was here. Now I look like security guard. He looked more like a bodyguard. I look kind of like his assistant. But yeah, so we kind of went around Gowan and showed him around and Gowan got recognized for some of their accomplishments. And that was about it. I also went to the... ASBA conference. I voted for my buddy here. But I mean, it's just some of the stuff that happened, like I didn't understand they were, and it just continues, some of the
059stuff they're doing just continues to like make me think a little bit. Like they wanted to suspend the rules for voting on I can't even remember it was, but they were, they wanted to suspend the rules because they wanted to get more votes. And it was like, it was like two people were, two districts were voting opposing to this thing, but yet like 98 were voting for it. They wanted, they wanted to like extend it. Like we, like, like they don't want that result kind of a thing. And I was like, I mean, I didn't get into that debate, but I was like. It's just, you know, the bylaws are the bylaws. You got this much time to vote. If you don't vote by then, your district, and it's a district, it's a school, it's
060their votes casted by school boards, not like individual delegates. So it's like Crane Elementary School Board or, you know, their district, we submitted our vote. Well, they weren't happy with the number of votes they had, so they wanted to like. They had a quorum. So they had enough votes to technically kill it or pass it, but they wanted to extend it. I was like, whatever. So I voted for Jim and unfortunately he fell short. Can I add something? Sure. Yeah. One of the things that I noticed. and running for this office and doing some stuff with it. And I got to thank Mr. Ponder and Mr. Moore and people that really helped me. And I didn't lose by, I only lost by four votes. It wasn't too bad. But the state ASBA board is made
061up of people from either Tucson or Phoenix. And that... I think that's affecting, and I mentioned this in some of the stuff I wrote up, was that I think that affects the validity overall of ASBA. I don't notice they're doing a lot of things. You know, they have the Black Caucus and they have the Rural Alliance, but it shouldn't be, ASBA should be one body, period. It should be for all of those things. Why do we have to separate this out and that out? I don't know. But just interesting. And who knows if I'm still alive next year, I might try it again. So it's interesting you bring that up because the way I interpreted that whole thing is that everyone on that board votes. Okay. And so they're voting their buddies in kind of
062like thing. It's like, it's hard to get an outsider in. And that's what that organization needs. They need someone like Jim or someone that can go. We're starting to get off a little bit. Okay. So. Anyways, it was interesting. I guess we could talk about that in another part of the kitchen. Okay. Thank you guys for representing the rest of us at the annual conference. I do have a couple of really quick ones myself. I attended the Crane Band and Orchestra holiday concert, and it was great. I especially want to shout out to Mrs. Narviso and Ms. Thompson having two... new musicians in our family. I'm like, yeah. And they do a great job with those kids. It's impressive. I really enjoyed it a lot. It was fun. Also, I was a judge for HLS
063and Spelling Bee. It was great. Thank you for having me. I always enjoy that. Dale was the reader and the more rounds we went, he was like sweating bullets. I mean, to give definitions. Yeah, it was great, but it was really fun. And we always appreciate being invited to do those. So thank you very much. Next, we have, let's see, we're on agenda item 6-2. This is consideration of adoption of hearing officers to conduct student and staff disciplined hearings. The governing board needs to approve the use of a hearing officer to conduct student and staff disciplinary hearings for the district. At the regular governing board meeting on December 13, 2016, the governing board adopted the use of a hearing officer to conduct disciplined hearings with the exception of expulsion hearings. It was directed at the
064time of adoption that this item be brought back before the board for approval each school year. The administration would like to recommend the governing board adopt the full hearing officer list, including those in Yuma County, trained and approved through the Arizona School Risk Retention Trust, Inc., the trust as hearing officers for the district. We have a list attached. I'm sure you've all seen it. Does anyone wish to speak to that? Just very quickly, how often do we actually have hearings? Very rarely. Very rarely, about once or twice a year. Okay. And we pretty much use Neil Johnson. Yeah. All right. Any other questions? Is there a motion? I motion that we adopt the use of the hearing officers as listed. Second. Okay, so we moved in second. Any further discussion? All in favor? Aye. Opposed?
065That motion carries. Thank you very much. Public comments 7.1 call to the public consideration and discussion of comments and concerns from the public. Those wishing to address the governing board on items not on the agenda may do so at this time. Speakers are requested to hold their comments to three minutes. Individuals addressing the governing board may not yield any portion of their allotted time to any other individuals wishing. to address the governing board. In accordance with Arizona Open Meeting Law, board members may respond to criticism made by those who have addressed the board, may ask staff to review a matter, or may ask that the matter be put on a future agenda. However, board members shall not discuss or take legal action on matters raised during an open call to the public unless the matters
066are properly noticed for discussion and legal action. Minnie, do you have any requests? Okay, thank you. We'll move on then. Next, we have the consent agenda. Did I do that right? Public request. Okay. 7.2, acknowledgement of public request to speak. Anyone wishing to address the board on items on tonight's agenda may do so at this time or at the chair's discretion at the time the item appears on the agenda. Comments should be restricted to three minutes, not including board questions and comments and responses by the speaker. Individuals addressing the governing board may not yield any portion of their allotted time to any other individual wishing to address the governing board. In accordance with the open meeting law, board members may respond to criticism made by those who have addressed the board, may ask staff to
067review a matter, or may ask that the matter be put on a future agenda. However, board members shall not discuss or take legal action on matters raised during an open call to the public unless the matters are properly noticed for discussion. Anyone here wish to address the board? There being none, we will move forward. Did you want to, Mr. Todd? No, I'm sorry. I moved my hand at the wrong time. Okay. Next, we have the consent agenda. This is consideration approval of consent agenda items. This consent agenda conserves time by limiting the items to those of a routine nature, which normally do not require deliberations on the part of the governing board. The items will be accepted and approved in one action unless a board member wishes to have an item separated from the consent
068agenda and specifically discussed. The vote or action on any item removed from the consent agenda will be taken separately. Does anyone have any items that they would like to pull from the consent agenda? None. Okay. Is there a motion then? I make a motion that we accept the consent agenda. Second. Okay. Moved and seconded. All in favor? Opposed? That must be serious. Thank you. Next, we have agenda item. Adoption of gifts from the public. Yeah. 9-1. I'm scrolling. I'm scrolling. I'm scrolling. Okay. Agenda item 9-1. Consideration of adoption of gifts from the public. Crane Schools Governing Board Procedure 3-106B. Federal grants and other funds. Acceptance of gifts and donations requires that gifts be made to the district by the individuals or organizations. be reviewed and officially accepted by the Crane Governing Board. We have a
069list of donations for your inspection. Who doesn't love DonorsChoose? I mean, wow, this is impressive and way to go, Gowan. I hope that we are always appreciative because we know that people have discretion about how they spend their funds. And I would like to... Give kudos to the staff because you have to post this stuff in order to get funded. So I hope that all of our other schools will also take advantage of a great opportunity here. Is there a motion to accept the gifts from the public? So moved. Second. Seconded. Any comments? I would agree with your point. I mean, I think the initiative that I take for teachers to, I mean, they have to put a lot of work to get. things on DonorsChoose and they have to provide justification for all the
070expenses and details. I mean, it's not a small project. And so the fact that we've had so many teachers put that work in, take their own initiative and have success is, I think, a testament to both our educators and our community. Yeah. Thank you, Kelly. Okay. We have a motion and a second. All in favor? Aye. Opposed? That motion carries. We'll go on to agenda item 10, management services. Consideration of adoption of the revised 2024-25 Annual Financial Report. Administration seeks Governing Board approval of the revised Annual Financial Report for 2024-25. Subsequent to the Governing Board's adoption of the Annual Financial Report AFR in October, Administration identified limited accounting revisions necessary to ensure the report accurately reflects the district's financial activity in compliance with Did you write this deal? I did. Applicable accounting standards and grant
071requirements. Specifically, certain expenditures were initially charged to a federal grant in which those costs were not allowable and were subsequently reclassified to an appropriate allowable fund. In addition, revenues received on behalf of the District for the Food Service were inadvertently admitted from the original accounting data and have now been properly recorded. These revisions are technical in nature and do not reflect new expenditures or material altercations. materially altered the district's overall financial position. All other financial information previously presented to and approved by the governing board in October remains unchanged. Accordingly, administration is requesting adoption of the revised annual financial report to accurately reflect these corrections. Mrs. Jennifer Bosch, Director of Finance, will provide the governing board with a brief explanation. of these transactions on the annual financial report AFR for fiscal year ended June 30th, 2025.
072Jennifer? All right. Good evening. As Ms. Fallon just stated, so the AFR is being resubmitted for some expenditures that were unapproved in a grant funded that we reviewed during the completion report period in December of 2025. And so since the AFR was approved in October, we have to get I submitted an AFR or I'm sorry, an AFR 915 revision pursuant to ARS 15915. And so we had to submit a letter to ADE requesting for us to be able to resubmit the AFR. They have approved that. And so we're just asking for your approval tonight to resubmit the revised AFR. Okay. Are there, Dale, do you have any comments? Well, you've said everything. It's all in there. That dissertation? Does anyone have any questions for Jennifer? Comments? I don't. Thank you. All right. Thank you very
073much, Jennifer. Appreciate it. Okay, so we need a motion, yes, to approve the, to adopt the revised 2024-25 annual command. So moved by Marco. Second. Second by Audrey. Any more comments? Okay, all in favor? Aye. Opposed? That motion carries as well. Thank you. Okay, we will move on to the Governing Board Conflict of Interest Review and Training. Arizona Revised Statutes 38-502, 38-503, and 38-509 require that the district annually provide governing board members with guidance on what constitutes a substantial interest and that the conflict of interest statutes apply to all district governing board members. Dale Ponder, Chief of Finance and Operations, will provide the governing board with this annual conflict of interest review. and training and ask that all governing board members provide the completed mandatory disclosure to the governing board secretary, Mrs. Minnie Encinas. Thank
074you, Madam President, members of the board. Yes, so this is a relatively new topic that we've done. Previously, we've asked the governing board to submit their disclosures to many for our records. The law does require that the governing board members receive a training in that. And so beginning January of 25, we started as part of the organization meeting, also reviewed a conflict of interest requirements to satisfy that law. And so really the purpose is to avoid any self-healings with public officials or by public officials regarding the use of public dollars to ensure the resources are used strictly for the public's purpose and not for individuals representative of the district and to avoid situations where there could be a conflict. The scope of the conflict of interest law really sets the minimum expectations, so we can
075go beyond these, but what we're going to cover is really what is minimally required. But this is what public officials should consider when facing a decision or contract that might affect them either financially or through ownership, and as well as those for which they are related to. The statute defines who a relative is. We'll go through that. It's quite extensive. The key definitions that we'll hit on are remote and substantial interest. So remote interests are defined as a non-salaried officer of a non-profit corporation, landlord or tenant of a contracting party, attorney of that party, member of a non-profit cooperative marketing association, ownership less than 3% of the shares, public officer and employee for being reimbursed for their actual and necessary expenses incurred in the performance of their official duty. recipient of public services generally provided
076by the city town political subdivision which a school district is a political subdivision of the state of arizona uh the public school board member when the relative involved is not a dependent otherwise defined in section 43-1001 or that spouse another political subdivision and so forth and so on so they define a relative as a spouse a child a child's child a parent a grandparent, a brother, a sister of whole or half blood, and their spouses, and the parent, brother, sister, or child of a spouse. So literally everybody and their mother is considered a relative. So if you are an employee or related to an employee, you should disclose that conflict. If you are involved in any... sale or transaction or you're affiliated with a company or corporation who may benefit from any type of work
077of the school district, you should disclose that. Again, any vendors. We maintain all of these as official records. We do or are required to present them to auditors. They come and ask and they ask for everyone from every board member and then the frequency in which those are provided. And then they also do an analysis to see. are those if a board member has disclosed that they have a conflict are they also abstaining from that vote when that happens and so those are heavily reviewed by our audit firm as well as when a school district goes through a performance audit there are some voting restrictions uh you can vote on most budgetary and personnel related questions obviously those related to any relative need to abstain we just be aware of that You can't vote on
078items containing their own relatives appointment, employment, etc. There are employment restrictions. Some board members or spouses cannot be employed by the district unless permitted by law. Permitted by law really means very small rural school districts where the likelihood of there being any separation is pretty remote because those communities are so small. So you have to be within those certain parameters in order for a board member to also be the spouse of an employee. Former board members can work after two years in selected roles. Basically, those selected roles are certificated teacher, substitute teacher, or in student support services. So not administration. That was intentional by the legislature. That change was made a few years ago. The employment bus involved providing direct services to students. So again, cannot administer. And that's found in ARS 15421, Section F.
079Substantial interest, really you can't participate in transactions where you benefit financially or an organization for which you belong benefit financially. You cannot supply equipment, materials, or services without competitive bidding, even if it's only $1, $5, $10. If it's below the bidding threshold, if the district does business with a governing board member, it does require formal competitive bidding. Purchases from board members are allowed under specific conditions such as competitive bidding if we have done that. Again, we maintain the records. We have contracts. All decisions must also be disclosed if there are any interests in that. This is all really refreshed for many of you. We do maintain the records in a separate file. Those disclosures will ask for you to complete today. They are available for public inspection and also, as I said, required to be
080provided to our auditors at their request. Penalties if the violation is intentional or knowing it's a Class 6 felony. What does that actually mean in Arizona? I actually did that. I was like, what is a Class 6? That's the least severe of all penalties in Arizona. It typically comes with four months to two years of imprisonment. Class 1 misdemeanor, which is an event if it's reckless or negligent, is the most serious of misdemeanors in Arizona. It carries a term of six months and a fine of $2,500. Upon conviction, the public officer will be required to forfeit their... Their position, or in our case, if we also have a conflict, then we would lose our positions as employees of the district. Contracts entered into because of a conflict could be null and void. So recommendation, analyze
081every matter coming before you to determine if you have a conflict. Obviously, things may come to mind right now. And then as an item becomes before you, you might say, oh, I have a conflict here. I need to recuse myself and abstain from that vote. We very much encourage that. Make your determination prior to the meeting and then also disclose that at the meeting prior to the vote. And then obviously follow any statutory mandates disclosing the conflict of interest, such as. the document that is before you today, if you would sign that and get that to many before you leave, that would be greatly appreciated. That really concludes the training. If you want to read more, I can provide you with the statutes. They're all in those documents as well. You can read those at
082your leisure. It's quite a great read. What if we own stock like in Staples? You're not a lawyer. Never mind. I'm not. Thank you. Yes. Thank you. I'm not an attorney. Please consult and return. Do we have one? Any other questions? Thank you very much. I appreciate it. Okay, we're going to move on to our final agenda item. This is agenda item 11.1. The governing board will take action to either select an agency to conduct the search or to proceed with an interviewing deal ponder. The governing board may vote to convene an executive session pursuant to ARS 38-431.03A1. for discussion or consideration of the possible employment of a new superintendent. The governing board may vote to convene an executive session pursuant to ARS 38431.03A3 and or 04 for discussion or consultation for legal advice with
083the board's attorney and or to consider its position and instruct its attorney regarding the superintendent search process. contracts relating to the hiring of a new superintendent and related matters. The attorney may appear personally, virtually, or telephonically. We have our recommended action as possible action to initiate governing board interview with Dale Ponder for our superintendent position. Possible action to initiate process to hire a superintendent search firm. Action to approve the direction given to the board's attorney if any during the executive session identified as agenda item 11 and 1 above. The way I see it, we have three options. We can stay where we are and have a discussion here at the table. We may go into executive session, our group of five, if we want to have that conversation. We also may go into executive session
084to consult with our attorney who is available to us if we would like to do that. So what's your pleasure? May I make a motion? Yep. Is that the chair's question? I would make this motion that we ask Mr. Ponder if he would be available to be interviewed by us on the 27th of January. Okay. Is there a second to that motion? Second. We have a motion and a second that we schedule an interview with Mr. Ponder on January 27th for an interview. I'd like to open that up for discussion. Any comments? What's your pleasure. I was asking you, because you had said last time that you have experience with this process. If you have any additional input from your previous experiences. Yes. From my previous experience, I do. I think what I would say
085is that we did do superintendent searches on all three of the others. It's kind of a wild card. I think that things have changed since we did our last one for sure. I know that the searches have become more expensive. So that's a consideration. I also. I also think that maybe the due diligence is not what it once was in terms of background checks and that sort of thing. Now, all three of the ones that we did were through ASBA, and I think they did a fine job for us. I don't think there was any issue there. But I don't know about you guys. I've had a couple of emails offering their services. So, you know, it's kind of a market out there. So that's what I would say about the process. In terms of
086candidates, I think we know from looking around Yuma right now, it's hard to find leaders that have a stake in our community and intend to stay. And so I probably shouldn't say any more than that. It might be going a little too far. Well, I think. I think the motion is a good one. I had a lot of, I have experience looking for executive people. And I was involved in Lori's hiring on her search committee. I wasn't a board member, but I was on the committee. When we look at what we have right here, usually statistically, if you want, if you have a... a really good organization, the best way to promote is from within. And if you have turmoil or if you don't have a good core, a good group, it's not moving along
087very well, then it's usually statistically better to hire someone from outside. So over the last six years or so, however many years I've been on the board, I worked very, very close with Lori and with Dale. And I just think that it's an easy to me. He's an easy he's a shoo in. That's me. And I'll put it all on the line. I think he he knows the finances better than anyone in the state that I've worked with. What were he made or may not fall short on. I think he surrounds himself with really, really good people. I mean, I think Dr. Hoffman, for one. And so I think he'll be able to put an executive committee together. And I don't I mean, these are questions. There are questions that we can ask in the
088interview. Like, how do you how do you want to put together an executive committee? How do you want your executive committee to execute? And if we don't like the interview, we can at that point decide, okay, well, let's look for something else. But right now, I think it's best for our district, for our principals, for all of the people who have confidence in him to stay in that route. So I support the motion to schedule an interview. Yeah, can we read it? I think we did you have a comment in the motion. We can include the timing of interview the time for field. Okay, is it bad? Let me do a minute. Yes, could you please? Okay, so let's see if I can think of all of them. You know, I'm getting a little older.
089Okay. Added to my motion of having Mr. Ponder schedule an interview with Mr. Ponder on January 27th, we would set the time at 4 o'clock in the afternoon. That would be p.m. Do we need to tentatively set the other one as well? You can do that or after that, if the board votes to go into contract negotiations, they could schedule that date. Do we have a second for that? Is there any further discussion? Okay. All in favor of this motion as amended, say aye. Aye. Opposed? Nay. No. Okay. We're good to go. Thank you. Motion passes. As far as I know, that's all we have. Is there a motion to adjourn? So moved. Second. Okay. Moved and seconded. We are adjourned. Thank you all. Well, there you go. There you go.