001Good evening everyone and welcome to the regular meeting of the south district board of trustees like to call tonight's meeting to order. A recording and or broadcast of this meeting is being made at the direction of the board which may capture images and films of those attending the meeting. I'll now take role. Brian present. Vladimir present. Kim present. Stella present and I shall present as well. Let's all stand for the pledge of allegiance. I pledge algiance 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. Thank you everyone. All right. Would any board members like to provide comment on tonight's agenda? Okay, then may I please have a motion to approve the agenda as presented? So moved.
002Thank you, Vladimir. I have a second. I'll second. Thank you, Stella. Motion to approve tonight's agenda as presented was made by Vladimir, seconded by Stella. All in favor, please say I. Any opposed? Any absentions? Thank you. The motion passes unanimously. Close session report. Uh direction was given to staff in close session. No votes were taken. Oh, this is this is the best part and also the most bittersweet part. Yes. Recognition of retiring employees at the conclusion of the 20242 school year. So we have some excellent guests here tonight to celebrate. And Shalley, I believe you're going to I'm going to say a little bit and you're going to give out some gifts and what have you, but when we think about the 11 and I don't believe all 11 are here, folks um retiring from
003the district, we have hundreds of years of service combined. Wow. It's a huge impact to our school district. Um so if you hear your name, come on up. We're gonna start with Mitra. supported students uh in our special education programs both at Springer and more recently at Block with gentle guidance guidance and endless patience. Her calm presence and steady encouragement made every single child feel seen and valued. RA, we will miss you and we're so happy for you to to retire, but really sad for our organization. Thank you so much. And I don't believe Scott is here from Springer. No, we have um one of our great uh campus supervisor crossing guard has worked in the district for 19 years and is retiring Scottman. Um then let's go to Oh, how about the Kathy Day
004Bob? Kathy Debb is often a teacher we bring other teachers and administrators to go um watch teach. Uh she has been with us for 25 years as a teacher serving students across the district for some time and then as a classroom teacher at both uh Sanorita and more recently at Homeland. Uh, without a doubt, my line here is her vibrant energy made learning unforgettable for students and Kathy, your classroom was really a special place to be. Thank you for everything. Is not here tonight. No. Kim Farwell, 20 years at Springer, retiring teacher. Uh J not here tonight. Yeah. Years of teaching physical education and LD. Incredible. Thank you. 41 total. 41 total in public education. Yeah. Pretty incredible. Pretty incredible. Next up, we have Julia who's here hiding in the back there. We have the
005science area at over at Egan. I will often snake through. So sometimes I think I surprise them because they're doing their stuff and then they like see me because I'll come out of the workroom. Julia has been a phenomenal science teacher for 22 years at Egan, teaching mostly seventh grade or only seventh grade science, almost entirely seventh grade science. uh her classroom is full of curiosity, a place of wonder, laughter, and lifelong learning. And I think you wanted to share a little something about Mrs. McFarland. So my daughter is a third year in college right now. Wait, she was searching for her weight. She um she's majoring in biology genetics research over the summer with her professor. And all of that is because of her experience in your classroom and that you had recommended her
006to do the two week internship. Tech trip. Yes. And you really built up her confidence in science. Excellent. And so when I think back to like where was that point in time where she was set on her path and she so much Andrea not here. Andrea Powers, 28 years at Oak as a special education resource teacher. Debit, you are up. And 10 years at Oak and at Gardner Bolis as a sixth grade teacher, I would often hear piano coming out of his classroom. um and such a creative inspiration for students. Debec is a musician, is a published author, um and really has been an exceptional sixth grade teacher, uh so thoughtful in his craft and working with his colleagues and students. So, thank you, De. We're really appreci. All right. Where to begin with Dina?
007Dina has been in the district uh starting as one of our elementary PE teachers. Yes. Starting in sixth grade. Oh, sorry. Sixth grade. That's where I started. Elementary PE and then moving to Egan, which is had she's had such an incredible career. Uh Dina brings passion, leadership, and an amazing dedication to students and staff over at Egan. Um you have truly inspired generations to move, to lead, and to believe in themselves, Dana. And your loss over at Egan is going to be tremendous. We're going to miss you. Yes, please. These last are really hard for me because um my for those of you who know my child, she's not the precarious outgoing, you know, like she's very reticent, very shy. she kind of folds back. And I remember um when we were visiting Eden and
008we kind of wandered into the locker room just to check it out and we saw her and you kind of I don't say you clocked her but you saw what she what kind of kid she was and then you kept smiling her for the next two years and we knew her by name and that made a real difference because it was um she had a hard time. She's one of the youngest in her class. She's always been one of the youngest, one of the smallest and um I think that she would not have felt love and acceptance wasn't for you if it wasn't for more. I'm crying now because I can't believe you're thank you so much for your service and congratulations from Wu. Also, last up we have Connie. We're not going to cry
009this time. Connie Connie has been at Egan for 25 years, starting in math, moving to teacher in charge, and for the last three years has been an outstanding principal at Egan Junior High School. Only because of Sandra. Mhm. Uh Connie has shaped young mathematical minds, always leading with her heart and vision. And something we will all remember, Connie, is your be here, be you belong motto. As a principal, you walk and talk that every single day. And that legacy will live on forever, I believe, over at Egan. And I can't thank you enough for all the work you've done for us. say anything. I think I had all of them except Stella's kids. So, I know I tried to get you to stay for my second. Sorry, Stella. Steve, too, just for the kicks. Thank
010you. Uh if I'm being recorded, I always love to talk. You know, there's not a better on this planet. So, um thank you for all that all of you do to support kids and make this a place where kids can be who they are. So thankful for each of you. Truly, truly, truly. Thank you for all the time and dedication you've given to students for so many years in our district. Thank you. Yeah, let's do a picture. You want to go home and do homework? Can we do a picture? Can we have you come up and come behind the trustees there? Where's our photographer? Yeah. Come out right behind [Music] Do you want us to spread out? Do you want us to? Yeah. Where do you want us to be? The sign there. Oh, there
011we go. I did bring a check for you today. Down one. That way we have equal amounts on both sides. Okay, there we go. All right, we go. There we go. A little bit more. You're super tall. Okay, ready? One, two, three. Awesome. Thank you. [Music] Thank you. Several Thank you all for your service to our district. Nice to meet you. one of the hardest. I'm so happy for for showering, but I'm I feel the loss. I know we hire new people. We do hire phenomenal people. Right. So, while I saw a lump in my throat, the superintendent just a short one today because somehow it's the end of the school year. Uh, Wednesday is our last day of school. Carrie might be a little excited. I love it. Updates. Okay. Uh, just a couple
012of reminders for these next couple of days. If you do have time tomorrow to attend preschool graduation, there's one at 9:30, there's one at 1:15. It is incredible. Miss Lisa and the team have been working with the little ones and it's a really fun event. It's over here in the play area. Um come if you can 9:30 or 1:15. Yeah, it's it's really something to be seen. I love it. And then of course on Wednesday we have um Egan graduation at 11. Arrive early. you'll have a little parking cone and then we'll move over to block at 1:00 or for the 1:00 graduation. And um just wanted we haven't really spoken about it um at all this year, but just a reminder we are offering our extended school year program and it starts right away
013June 9th and it runs through July 3rd over at Covington. If you would like to come for a visit, I know a couple of you came last year, but if you would like to come, it runs in the morning until lunchtime. just let me know and we'll arrange a time. It's um great to walk through and see what programs we're offering. Great. That's it. Thank you. Let's move on to the consent calendar. Uh would any board members like to provide comment on tonight? Yeah, I have two questions. No changes. Um number four there is that effective, this is for Sandra. Is that effectively a sharing agreement between the two of us? It's just written as us loaning. Okay. I believe it is our FTE and so they are paying a portion of that FTE salary
014and the high school it's their FTE and we're paying a portion for those specialized services bearing and the second one was the hearing. I think that's the high school one. Okay. Um yeah the second question again for yes uh Senator um do we have have we requested w so this is has to do with BP 1431 waiverss. Okay. Have we requested waiverss in the past that you know of? We have not. This was the one to be able to do a waiver to the CDE around certain compliance issues. We've never needed to ask for a waiver. I had I don't recall ever just curious about that. Okay, thanks. That's all. But it gives us the ability and should we ever need to. Any further comments? Okay, then may I please have a motion to approve
015the consent calendar as presented? So move. Thank you, Vladimir. Have a second. I'll second. Thank you, Stella. Motion to approve tonight's consent calendar as presented was made by Vladimir and seconded by Stella. All in favor say I. Any opposed? Any abstensions? Thank you. Motion passes unanimously. Moving on to employee request to address the board teachers association. Um I will not be back until August. So I will see you then. Um I always have to write down what I'm going to say because I feel like words are just so incredibly important. What you say is really important. I live and breathe by that in my classroom with all my students every single day. So, do the same here. So, um here we go. Okay. Um I'm definitely excited to be here tonight for uh my final
016board meeting of the school year. Uh I'd like to close out the year with a moment of reflection. Our association, which is the educators of Los Altos, has done amazing things this year. We're the people who bring learning to life for our kids. We support them through their struggles. We celebrate their wins, no matter how big or how small. Our union, our mission goes beyond defending the contract and working to refine it so that the best educators choose to work and stay here. We also look forward. We think critically about what the educator and student experience could be in Los Altos. As a newly elected president, I never assumed I knew how the membership felt. I never relied solely on what I heard from site reps. Instead, I made it a priority to visit or
017three school sites every week to ask our educators what they cared about and what allows them to be their best and do their best work for kids. The executive board also developed surveys and analyze data because we believe that listening to our constituents is central to our work. We've worked hard this year to be transparent and build trust not just with our members but also with district management. A strong partnership formed as I work closely with members of the management team and together we developed a shared vocabulary and a clear protocol for solving issues. I learned that when we interact regularly, decisions are made with greater educator buyin and those decisions prove to be more effective for students. Next year, we hope to build a similar relationship with this board. As your constituents, we value
018your time, your expertise, your willingness to get to know the educators of Los Altos, and we look forward to all continuing a meaningful partnership with every stakeholder because we all share one common goal, which is giving the children of Los Altos the very best educational experience. Thank you guys. Thank you. Thank you, Alex. California School Employees Association. to provide public comment on an agenda item. Speaker cards are to be submitted to the superintendent. Speaker cards will not be accepted once public comment begins. Your name will be announced when it is your turn to speak. For community comments now, this time is reserved for members of the public and employees to address the board on items that are not on the agenda. The board is not permitted to discuss or take action on non-aggenda items except
019to instruct the superintendent to review the matter further, report back to the board at a subsequent meeting or place the matter on a future agenda. The board may make a brief comment or ask clarifying questions. We don't have anyone for not agenda. I'll close public comments. Moving on to action and discussion items. Um, if anyone wants to provide public comment on this item, please turn in your speaker cards. Got one right back to Boston. Um, yes. I'd like to invite our director of communication, Lynette White, up to present our all district parent survey results. Hello, Lynette. Hi. So, good evening board president, board members, superintendent, staff, members of the community, whoever's tuning in on YouTube, right? Um, this was a really cool survey to do and I'm not just saying that because your results were
020incredible. Um, it's really rare to have a district that has such positive results. Um, so the results that we're going to go over will include respondents who agreed and also those who were neutral to allow the voices um of those people to be heard as well. Um, as you'll be able to see, like I'm saying, the results were overwhelmingly positive. It was super cool to see. So we had a data collection period of 21 days. Um we were happy to see 587 responses during that time. It's super important feedback from the community that will help shape the LD priorities for the future. Uh the survey was a collaborative effort between the district school sites and LA. And so with our next slide, I wanted to kind of show the overall experience. So, I like to
021start high, right? So, we're all the way on on question 31 here where 90% of the respondents said that overall their district experience was excellent, um, very good or good. I think this is a really strong affirmation of the work LD is doing and it highlights the positive impact um that you all are having in the community. It's important to recognize that this feedback not only reflects the satisfaction levels, but we uh superintendent and Carrie and I have really dug deep in the comments to also set as a benchmark for goals going forward so that we can really use some of that feedback that we received to frame what goes on next right in the district. So respondents by school site, I think this is an awesome visual representation of how many people responded to
022the survey. You can see it was pretty great participation across the school sites. Um, I do want to thank everyone who helped to get the word out about the survey and I think this shows that they really did a great job getting the word out and just thank you to the community for participating and and giving their input. And so as we dive in a little deeper to the specifics of the survey results, you see the question up there says, "Which best describes your impression of communication from uh the Los Alto School District?" You'll see 94% of respondents felt well-informed, adequately informed, or neutral. Um even if we don't I do want to point out like even if we don't have the neutral people up there, you're still looking at like an 80s something% um
023positive remark. So, it's it's just really good numbers. It's a positive indicator of the communication efforts going on throughout the district. And so, moving on to question three, which best describes your impression of communication from your child or your children's teacher? Again, 94% of respondents felt really well informed, adequately informed, or neutral. Um this is really powerful for the teachers, for the principles, for district level to see um how engaged the community is in getting that information directly from their child's teacher. I always say the communication from the district is we think it's really important, but really what they want is the communication from the teacher. So that's most important of all, and we can see they're really responding to that. And then question four, which best describes your impression of communication from your child
024or your children's principal? You'll see 95% of the respondents felt well informed, adequately informed, or neutral. Um, it indicates our efforts in sight level communication that are making a big difference. 95%. I mean, these numbers are crazy, you guys. I don't know if you realize that, but these numbers are incredible. You should be really proud. So, how often do you feel you receive communication from the Los Alto School District? Uh, you'll see 86% of the respondents felt they received just the right amount of communication from the school district. This metric is particularly important to me as I guide uh the site level staff on not only their frequency, but like the content that they're pushing out. So, this is a really good metric for me to look at to see, are we doing too much,
025too little? It seems like they're right in the right spot. So that's great to see. And then question six, how often do you feel you receive communication from your child or your children's school? Again, super high numbers across the board in terms of communications received from site level with 88% of respondents feeling they receive just the right amount of communication from their child's school. It's great to see that. I know myself being a parent of three students who would at times receive you know three teleparents three emails three text messages like all within the span of two minutes right too much too much information so to see 88% feel just right that's pretty cool to see and then what's the best thing about communications in the Los Alto school district it's really cool to see
026the weekly newsletters mentioned there which I subscribe to all the school weekly newsletters they have really great powerful information in there. And um most importantly to me was consistency. I wanted to see when I first started working with the district, I wanted to see are we doing too much? Is it too many weekly newsletters? But it seems like that's that's one of their top five things that they're really happy with. And again, teacher communication really important to the community and just seems to be a top communication theme. And then you'll see the key attributes. It's very well distributed between consistency, clarity, timeliness, completeness, um, and frequency. Again, frequency being really important to me. And then what's the best thing about communications in the Los Alto School District? Again, the newsletters are winning, which is really
027great. The consistent schedule, which is something that school communicators like to push a lot with uh with our site level folks, but you guys have it really dialed in here. and then the right amount of um of information and also really great visual content. And then I won't read the the what parents are saying, but you can see it's just really positive positive feedback. And then to what extent do you agree with the following statement? The school shows respect for the cultural diversity of the students served. 96% of the respondents feel their school shows respect for cultural diversity. I think that is a really good um a really good bar that has been set in terms of equity and inclusivity in the district. I think you see a lot of people really really value that
028and they're they're grateful that it exists here. To what extent do you agree with the following statement, the school meets the needs of the students? Again, 91% of respondents strongly agree or agree with the following statement. The school meets the social needs of the students. Um so just really great. Uh another question was how uh do you agree with the following statement? The school sets high expectations for student achievement. 90% of respondents strongly agree agree or neutral with that statement. Um and again taking out the neutral we were still at about an 80 maybe high 70 range. Um to what extent do you agree with the following statement? Overall, my child's school performs well academically. I mean, you all get all the data. You know that these schools perform really, really well academically and the
029parents agree. 95% of respondents strongly agree, agree, or neutral on the performance. To what extent do you agree with the following statement? Staff members at my school respond to parents questions or concerns. This is such a really important question. You want everyone to feel welcomed at their school sites. and 94% um feel just that way. And then to what extent do you agree with the following statement? The staff at my child's school create a welcoming environment for parents. 98% of respondents strongly agree, agree, or are neutral. Um again, you can see by the graph, even removing the neutral, we're still super duper high. To what extent do you agree with the following statement? I feel partnership with my school and my child's education. 93% agree with that statement. And then to what extent do you
030agree with the following statement? The school effectively communicates with me regarding my child's behavior. 93% agree, strongly agree, agree, or are neutral with that statement. To what extent do you agree with the following statement, the school's report card, which you know being parents and board members, report cards are always touchy, right? So, for this to be 91% of people agreeing that the school's report card is providing val a valuable summary of their child's learning and progress, that's great to see. How comfortable do you feel approaching teachers or staff with questions or concerns? 85% of respondents feel very comfortable. And of course, for a question such as this, we're aiming for a hundred. And so I know that superintendent really is diving deep into um what's causing those somewhat comfortable or not comfortable to see how
031we can do better for next year. And then how often do you participate in school events or activities? 85% of respondents frequently or sometimes participate. That's super high. I will say for the most part when I ask this question in surveys, you're lucky if you get like a 40% response. there's just not the engagement that I'm seeing in the community here, which is great to see. And then types of parent focused offerings our community would like to see LED provide in the future. I mean, number one, overall screen time and technology management. And that's across the board. You know, I love social media. It's what I do a lot a lot of my day for my living. Um, but it's a concern for parents. You definitely want to limit the screen time for your students.
032So this is definitely going to guide the executive cabinet on how they can offer some great parent workshops for that that kind of stuff in the future. And then you see our emerging needs additional SEAL support was mentioned 21 times. You'll see parent teacher conferences was mentioned 18 times. So that's something that we want to dig deeper in to see how we can serve uh those people that see that as more of a need still. And then to what extent do you agree with the following statement? the school has a good public image made me so happy. 98% of respondents strongly agree, agree or neutral with the following statement. And then we asked people to please share aspects of your experience with the uh Los Alto school district that influenced your rating. And you can
033see the top rating is our teachers. you know, just as you said today with the staff members that are retiring, it's really hard to see them go when they're amazing, but you know that you've got some amazing ones coming up, too. So, our dedicated and caring teacher, definitely the strong community involvement, like I mentioned, um having such community involvement is key to a student's success. Um, excellent sped services, IEP services, great mental health resources. uh again with the safe and inclusive learning environment. You saw that in the metrics as well as as well as strong parent school communication channels. And then of course there's going to be areas of improvement which is where we really dive in because we want to see how we can get better. You want to be 100% in all the
034categories if you can. And so definitely enhance support for advanced gifted learners. Again, these were all taken directly from comments that the parents put in. So these were the top comments. Um, improve school meal quality and nutrition. Definitely not a knock on anybody's nutrition services department because this comes up in every single survey. It doesn't matter where your district is, the kids are never happy with the food, but there's always room for improvement, right? and better district-wide communication strategies, which I know superintendent and cabinet are working on, stronger classroom behavior management, more consist consistent teacher or teaching quality across schools, enhanced math curriculum and tracking transparency, and then expanded extracurricular enrichment programs. So, I think overall the survey was a great success. I'm glad to see so many people that participated, but also I'm really
035excited for the areas of improvement because I know that the team is really looking deep into those areas to make the improvements for the students. So that concludes the uh the survey for this year and thank you all for letting me present that to you. Do you have any questions? Thank you. Comments start clarifying questions from the board before we move to public comments. Well, I have some questions or comments, but I don't know when they're Well, let's do public comment. Uh, my only clarifying question is whether the survey respondents were broken down by race, ethnicity, socioeconomic status, English. No. And so, I know you do have an additional survey um that is just getting digested. Um, but no, the these this survey was not broken down like that. Okay. I'll save my comments really.
036But we do have one um uh part for public comment. Pat Rok three minutes, please. Thanks, Lynette. You're welcome. Yeah. So, it is really great to see that the vast majority of the parents are very happy with their children's education and communication with the school. Can you just hold on one second? I think we're trying to get the go up. Technology is always tough. Did you use the phone? Yeah. When in doubt. Okay. Thanks. I I hope that this overall success will allow us to focus on helping a parent group that's less satisfied, has trouble communicating with teachers, and is asking for help. And really follow up to your question, Shelley, our Latino families, and particularly the socioeconomically disadvantaged Latino families struggle in achieving a positive connection within our school communities. I know this because
037over the last four and a half years, I've spent a major portion of my time helping these families, these students, and last fall, I held a listening session with a small group of parents, and their comments were really disheartening. While the Latino families comprise around 10% of the district overall, if you look at all Santaita, even think they're closer to 20%. And I've heard staff members at these schools express the need for a communication platform that will help them connect. We have very few Spanish speakers on our staff and I was really glad to hear from Dr. Bosco that there was a plan to roll out such a platform. This is especially important to our Latino families. Um they differ from the parents of other EL students in important ways. Many of them don't speak
038English and their educational backgrounds are frequently very dissimilar from other EL parents. And we need far more than a communication platform to help these students succeed and help the families be connected with the schools have the information they need from teachers and from staff. And I know that the respective school principles and the district staff are working to define and implement solutions So yes, let's celebrate our successes. They're awesome. And let's take the time to focus as as you mentioned um on the areas where we can improve and where we do have shortcomings. Thank you. Thank you. All right. U let's move on to board discussion. Who would like to kick us off with comments? Um just a quick comment, all the schools that I know at least have a very strong sense of of
039community and so that's really good. Um I noticed that on a couple of the slides, maybe one, two, three, four, maybe five slides, um which were different from the other slides in the sense that the strongly agrees were not didn't exceed the agrees. And so those are obvious areas that we could uh look at for improvement there. I also was very pleased to see question 19 about uh report cards. Uh we had a lot of back and forth a couple years ago about standardsbased reporting and there's difference and it's good to see that it's been finally understood accepted uh and valued. Um, as far as teachers are concerned, I was really glad to see number one. Um, and it reminds me of a a comment that some CEO made that uh if you take care
040of the employees, they will automatically take care of the uh their customers and teachers, parents and and children of their customers. Um, so I'm glad to see that that's that's happening there. Um, screen time Some schools, I don't know whether elementary schools have done this, but I know that definitely some high schools have simply banned uh screens uh a cell phone in in schools. You have to put your cell phone in a in a little pocket or something like that. And um from what I've heard that has increased participation, grades, happiness, and I will note that um both of our uh junior highs go to yuse and they're not allowed to have screens there and kids get over it and have a great time and report that they feel better after the the the absence
041of screening. So, thank you for your for your questions and your presentation. Thank you. Were there any other question? Okay. I just had a couple things. one I've already expressed to Sandra, so I'm sure in your conversations, but I don't like including neutral in a lot of those answers because I don't think it is an accurate picture of satisfaction. Um, so um that's my comment on that. um you had mentioned that you were kind of happy with the response rate and so I personally was not. So, I'm just wondering in your experience and working at other districts, like is this actually a good I I know we've done other surveys and we've had like similar or lower response rates. So, maybe this was a little higher, but like by school site, Egan's the only school
042that got to 20% of a response rate. And to me, I would like to see more responses. And I don't know how I don't know how we do that. I think that's always been an issue. But I also did not see any um I'm not saying there wasn't I did not see on social media any promotion of this. So I don't know if that would have helped or not helped or if it next year. Yeah. Yeah. I'm not running the social media yet. But that's my next year task. I'm not on there yet. Um but um but but like for other school districts like this this response rate like I because you mentioned like you were happy with it. So I'm just wondering Yeah. So um two things. So the response rate I think is
043great for the 21 days that we had it. Okay. During the time that we had it because it was testing. It's almost the end of the year. It's the crazy time right now where you're just asking someone to do yet another thing. Um, and so maybe that's something that we discussed with cabinet is the timing of the survey. I think the timing could have a lot to do with your response rate. So I think for the time of year that we chose, I think for the 21 days that we allowed it, uh, I think that was a great response rate considering the size of your district. So, and I do agree social media promotion would have been incredible and so ne next year you'll see a difference in social media. But yeah, does that answer
044your question? Okay. Yeah. And then the only other question that I have is in the areas for improvement like something that kept mentioned and I presume those all came from com like open fields but better district-wide communication strategies and I'm just wondering like how do we figure out what is better because reportedly 80% or around 80% of those people are feel adequate or wellinformed. So I'm sensing a disconnect there and I'm definitely and I think that the disconnect could be the platforms that we're currently using. So I think the platforms that the team is transitioning to I think that's going to make a a whole huge difference for the next school year. So I think that could be the disconnect is uh the platforms that they have now versus the platforms that we'll have in
045the future. Great. Um I'm hoping that that would change that a little bit. Okay. Yeah. Awesome. Thank you for your questions though. I appreciate them. Question. Um, no, not on the slides. Um I just I'll echo Jim's comment that I think for some of these questions including neutral in sort of the good number is a little bit of a stretch um in the sense of like for example the and it's an interesting contrast with the sort of um support for high achieving students being sort of the number one the concern and then sort of question number 11 sort of asks you know do you agree the student the school sets high expectations for student achievement and you know sort just sort of eyeballing it. Strongly agree was 25, agree was 45, and then neutral was
04620. And I think the text in the slide sort of counts that neutral with the agree, which I think I think is a little bit not exactly misleading, but like a little bit over maybe. Yeah. So I think we'll we'll reconsider that question or having that neutral part, I think. Yeah. Yeah. So, I think just depending or maybe just not lumping it in with the sort of like with the good with the clearly good answer because I think the neutral is a little bit more sometimes I don't know rather than than I'm okay with what's going on. Um and then I was looking at that one specifically because um I just wanted this is more a comment for my colleagues than for you. Um, but the concern about adequate support for high achieving students is
047something that I've heard from a lot of constituents over the years about every school in our community, not just our schools. And you know, obviously our teachers do a tremendous job and do everything they can to sort of provide differential learning. But so, but I think it's an area where we could probably do more work and more thinking about, you know, to what extent can we leverage technology to do these things? to what extent is it just sort of communication or capstone opportunities for students who are doing really well like I think but I think that's a a definite area of potential improvement. Do you have a comment? I just wanted to add on I think maybe we just need to change the neutral answer option to something else that's more descriptive because we don't
048even know what people really mean when they select that box. And that's the conversation that we had was we probably don't want to offer neutral and just you have to choose something. Is that what a liker scale does is it forces you to choose something or is it or is it something else? Is that what a liykan scale does? Scale. Yeah, that is well it makes you choose something. Yeah, but it could have neutral as a liker scale have to that's the thing is good to I think your previous surveys have had neutral, right? But I think it might be a good idea to do away with that. That way we get a clearer picture of yes, no maybe, not maybe, yes, no, and no maybe. Yeah. So, or no opinion. But see, no opinion
049also falls in the neutral category. So, we kind of have to just have the buckets of yes and no. So, I have a few questions for you. So, thank you for doing this, by the way. And um it is really nice to see the high numbers of approval that we have. What I'm really interested in is the the poor, the fair, the no, the nevers, right? Um question 31, their experience in LD. Like Sandra knows how much I love like and care the Last experience, the LS student experience, all that stuff. And yet 10% of our folks are not happy with their experience in LD. And so I'm just wondering like how do we dig deeper or follow I'm sure these are all anonymous and randomized. You don't know who's answered that way, but I
050would really like to know like where are we not serving our families and our students and what can we do uh to to improve that? And I was just going to say I like the areas for improvement and I'd love to see like can you find out this information we can add that to the areas for improvement. I think that would be a really great place to have a strategic discussion like do that. Um the well-informed and the not well-informed the breakdown. The reason I asked about the breakdown by SCES and uh language ability is this. Yes, Pat and I have had several conversations about how do we reach all of our families and how do we make sure that all of our students have the amazing experience that we want them to have, right?
051Uh it's an equity issue, right? And so that's why I'm curious like the the where we're falling short on the survey, how how do we dig deeper and find out like you know and how do we find out what are the best ways to reach all of our families? And it might just be asking in the families themselves or having a several focus groups and asking them how would you like to be communicated with because I don't right just but um but but it really hurts my heart because we are a small school district right and so when we have 10% of our kids or our families saying that they're not enjoying their experience here that's still a large number. Yeah. You know. Yeah. For sure. And we're we're a school district that I am
052so proud of us that we know every kid by name right. We know to follow up with every kid. So, I think that um the followup to this uh to dig a little deeper shouldn't be I don't think it should too hard because we know our kids. That's just my thing and the the digging deeper into um the question about lack of respect for cultural diversity. Uh that one is probably the one that shocked me the most. Um even if one person said that, that again hurts my heart. And so another thing that I want to dig Oh yeah. Well, I was thinking maybe we could consider offering an option for people to request to be followed up and to provide their contact information if they would like a followup. Yeah. Or or can you
053or or andor can you and I don't know what the survey tool is, but I know there's survey tools where if you say no, then we ask you more questions to try to get into what you want or what your issue is. I don't. But yeah, I I for me, I already know all the good stuff. I want to understand how to fix the not so good stuff. Yeah. Yeah. I do appreciate you, Janice. Thank you so much. Are there any other questions for you almost? I had to write down Jim on my Thank you. Thanks so much. I appreciate it. But I won't be back. You're gonna mess it up. Okay, we're moving on to Citizen Advisory Committee for Finance Annual Report. Eric is not here. Yes. So, we want to welcome John Michaelelsson
054who's been the chair of the CACF committee for the last year and or two years, I'm sorry, John. Um, but the committee's been working on their annual report and uh are going to present tonight. Thank you. Yeah, absolutely. Good to see everybody. It's been a lovely day outside. Hope you've got to enjoy a little bit. Okay. We we've tried to focus our report this year on a couple of things that uh will hopefully work. exciting report. All right, we'll just do it. We'll do it there. Okay, so uh the agenda very quickly uh we focused in this report on on two main areas hopefully forward looking uh to be as helpful team folks as we can. One is enrollment and and the second is is balancing the budget. Let's let's go right to enrollment. Two
055slides ahead. Uh you have probably seen some of this and thought about some of this, but it's a pretty stark picture. Uh the bars only go up through last year, don't have this year. My understanding is this year the numbers about level. Uh but um the prediction is as best one can tell um the size of the district in terms of student count is going to go down. If it goes down 10% you're we're at a 3,000 student level. If it goes down 20% we're at 2800 2700 student level. It's materially different uh than where we are now. It certainly is materially different than where we've been in the past. Um, is it the economy? No. Is it immigration policy? No. Is it tariffs? No. Uh, it's birth rate and it's purely a reflection of
056birth rate declining. Uh, not here. throughout California, throughout most of the US. Uh, and the chances are because it's demographics, it it's even if the birth rate levels off, turns around, the impact of that will not be felt very quickly. And if in our appendix, if you look, we we compare kindergarten and and first grade cohorts, the size of those classes in our schools with where we the size of our seventh and eighth grade uh cohorts. And it's close to a 200 student difference. So that's whatever the level of the decline is that says unless something very surprising happens we're going to be a smaller district in terms of student. So, you know, we talked about some of the things and let's look at the next slide. Uh that that could mean uh the one
057that I know you're already well along the way of thinking about is if you want to offer the sorts of of educational experience in junior high that we ought to be offering, you're going to need more students because we're not going to have enough students in seventh and eighth grade to fill two junior highs. So for that reason and for other reasons I know as well the the notion that uh we're going to limit junior high to seventh and eighth grade is probably by the wayside. Overhead costs, we have fixed costs, we have fixed facility costs, we have fixed insurance costs. uh those things as the number of students goes down will increase on a per student basis and it's going to be more and more difficult to maintain our schools the number of schools
058we have below junior high um because our population is shrinking and there is some point I'm not an educator but but you will be well advised there is a point where it is simply the size of a school is simply too small to have it make educational sense. It will also be too small to make financial sense. So that's coming and we need to be thinking about that. Let's let's look at at the next slide which sort of summarizes just what I said. Um the the educational quality is obviously the key and one way to to think about uh where we are um we live in a house that was designed and built 75 years ago. We do. And it was designed and built for a student population of up to 6,000. Okay. our sites,
059our facilities, where they are relative to where our students are. That's 75 years ago, and some adjustments are going to need to be made. We don't have enough uh people to fill that large house that was built 75 years ago. Uh as we think about how to update, how to modernize that house, uh some decisions are going to have to be made. you know, we need 20 bedrooms. Um, you probably don't. Uh, and those are serious, uh, considerations for the community as a whole, but that's, uh, from an enrollment standpoint. Some of the things we looked at and talked about this year. And the, you know, the last one is particularly important. How do we maintain quality as we go through this process because there are going to be some serious adjustments over the next
0605 to 10 years. Okay, second subject, balancing the budget. Um, our favorite topic. Yeah. Um, it it's we've been through an interesting couple of years. CO uh increased funding because of CO that funding is disappearing. The district has been hit by some mandatory requirements from the state lunch traditional kindergarten and you know there's been a right-sized process going on but you know it looks like at least for the for the next year or two there will be a budget deficit. So how how do we how do we best tackle that? Um, and in the process, we've got to think about property tax growth. You know, that I don't know to need to tell you, property tax growth is the main driver of increased revenue for the district. Well, you know, that may not be as
061positive a thing uh for the next few years uh as as it's been in some past years. And then reserve levels. Uh let's go to the next slide. Uh we looked at four scenarios for dealing with the budget deficit and you know there there there's a lesson here that goes back to reserves we've got and we're fortunate to have some flexibility in terms of how we deal with the in the deficit that we're looking at today. And the reason we have that flexibility is because we have reserves. If we didn't have flexibility based on those reserves, we'd be talking about having to take some drastic action, not thought out right sizing, but I don't want to use this image too much for the chainsaw approach. Uh reserves mean that we don't have to do that.
062So we looked at ways in which we could take advantage of of our uh reserve positions and deal with what has to be done in terms of balancing the budget. Uh the the results of that uh are are there if we don't reduce expenses uh we u we have an impact of about 20 28 million over four years. And as much as we have reserves, uh, that's not going to cover it. So reductions need to be made. Um, do we make them all $7 million worth of it? Uh, all of a sudden next year, uh, we can do it. Uh, it has some, you know, some negative impact. Uh, and I'm not sure we could practically reduce expenses by $7 million in a single year. We could do it over two years. Um and uh
063it it has an impact on reserves as indicated over four years and we could delay it uh for several years and that probably uh is not a good good approach because it it has the the greatest negative impact on reserves. So very clearly the notion is that we think is is best uh in this in these circumstances is to use our reserves balance the budget not next year but by the year after and uh that would be also before the next discussion of contract. Let's go to the next slide. Um again we come back to uh what's most important in terms of delivery of services to the to the students. Um how do we stay competitive uh in terms of faculty and staff who deliver those those services. So we we assume that scenario where
064we balance the budget over the next two years. Uh but then you know what happens with property tax growth and here are a couple scenarios. Uh we looked at um if uh property tax growth after next year which is more or less locked in um is just that 3% um we we never get to a balanced budget. So, we don't expect that property tax growth is going to go down that far. Uh, that would be a real real estate recession. Uh, we've had those in the past, but it doesn't look like we're we're headed for one now. Uh, but if that were to start to look like it's happening, uh, that's a big flashing red light in terms of how we feel from a financial standpoint. Um on the other hand uh if there's uh
065a continuation of basically what appears to be the growth for next year at about 4 and a.5% um it's it's a little bit nicer scenario. Uh we can afford annual increases across the board in salary and still have a balanced budget. uh which again is pretty important and while reserves drop they would still be at a relative health of 16%. Which is not bad. And then a third scenario we looked at we have an immediate recession uh but we recover quickly from that uh we again because of the reserve we can survive that sort of thing financially. So the message here, if we can look at at at at the at the next slide, um is we can balance the budget in a reasonable amount of time. Uh if property tax stabilizes, we'll be in
066pretty good shape. And one of the things that that we would recommend in those circumstance is you look again at your reserve policy. We're seeing right now how important reserves are. I don't know about you, I can't predict the future. Something bad might happen. Uh but maintaining healthy reserves is going to give some cushion uh for the future. So if we see over the next couple years property tax credit stabilizing um give that some serious thought and uh that will help further down the line. Um quick summary and without repeating um these are again all things that we're concerned in terms of maintaining quality. Thank you. What questions do you Thank you John. Are there any clarifying questions before we go to public comment any request for public comment? Okay. Um then are there any
067questions for John? Well, thank you John so much for coming to present and I thought that your suggestion about um looking at the reserve levels and thinking about a 15% target was really interesting and I would like to request that be added to a future for agenda. And just you know on like as I I was thinking about it like 15% is actually about it's a little less than I think two months worth of expenses and it does seem like certainly in my personal life I would like to at least be able to cover two months worth of my expenses you know if something should go wrong. We're not going to talk about your personal but uh you know our reserve policy is has been good. it's been a lower uh level than some other
068districts have had. Um so it's I I to me the numbers suggest an opportunity to strengthen where we are financially. Thank you for your suggestion about adding that to a future agenda item and I'd like to do a little bit of a deeper dive in um our budgets and our reserve policy. We're raising our hands. Oh, you're raising. Um I I agree with S. I think the suggestion of raising our our reserve rate um deserves a hard look. Our our reserve levels for basic aid districts are are outliers. A lot of districts that are basic a have reserve levels of 25 30%. Um I think the 8 to10 target was set. I think a couple things have changed since the 8 to 10 target was set. I think um the cost of special education have
069continued to rise as Eric would say if he were here and so our sort of um unexpected expenses level is a lot higher there. We get students who move in and cost six figures for six years um that are very difficult to budget for. Um, and then the other thing that that we've shifted to since Eric has been here is if our reserves levels are a little higher, it allows us to not have to do short-term borrowing to make up for the chunky property taxes. So, we get property tax revenue a couple of times a year. When I first started on the board, we would do revenue anticipation notes every year, which cost us money. Now, with higher reserve levels, we can just shift cash around, which saves us money in the long run. So,
070I definitely agree we should look at that. I just wanted to offer a couple other thoughts on the um the enrollment forecasts. I got a little bit into the weeds of the county's site and I think there are reasons to think that the 22% drop is um not what's going to happen to our particular districts because of COVID. That 5-year projection goes all the way back to 2018, which is a time when the charter school was still growing its enrollment. So we were losing kids there in a way that I think gets uh built into that projection in a way that's no longer true. Um and then I as as I understood the details of how they generated those projections, they were also doing hindered first grade cohort estimates based on countywide data which again
071I think like the the enrollment drops countywide have been more severe than we've seen in our particular area. So I think to me that's kind of why you know if you look at our the last few years for which have kind of been flat. I think we're kind of flat again. I think we probably will be down a little bit, but I I think it'll be closer to flat than 22% down over the projection period. 22% may be high. Yeah. But it's going to go down. Sure. And the the our data are in our the appendix and again the comparisons have already and that's very well taken that our graduating works are larger than our area for sure. But the other thing I wanted to sort of talk about is when I've been thinking about
072this, because we don't get um extra revenue for extra kids, right? So, if we weren't down by a thousand kids, we would arguably be in a tremendous amount of trouble right now, right? We would probably not have been able to offer the raises that we've been able to offer because we would have 50 more teachers that we'd have to spread that money across. So, I'm actually kind of more inclined not to try to optimize our structure for the number of kids that we have because when the trends turn around and we start growing again, we need to be able to absorb more kids without necessarily having to come up with that extra money right away, right? Like as as we lose kids, if we maintain our schools, maintain our boards, our class sizes get smaller,
073which I think everybody enjoys, frankly. But then that also gives us the buffer for if things turn around, we start getting more kids, then we won't have to hire more teachers for a certain delayed period. So that's kind of the way I local dynamics theoretically as a we're at a huge advantage as a basic district because we don't get revenue based on headcount. And if you haven't noticed, uh, Los Altos is a pretty nice place to live, which generates some pretty good property taxes. So theoretically, we have a very solid property tax base. It may not grow as quickly as in the past, but it's still. And if we only have to educate a smaller number of children, there should be a way not just to maintain quality, but maybe even improve the quality. Right.
074So to me, maybe there's an opportunity here with with a lower student population. Sure. The the notion of a overly large 75 year old house is because we've got facilities built out for 6,000 students. That was done in the 60s. Okay. We don't have 6,000 students. We're not even if it increases, we're not going to have 6,000. So teacher hiring is one thing, but there's a facility. Sure. Sure. Got it. And I mean, we did we did sell off four of those bedrooms back in 90s, but I take I take your point. I don't need to um Yeah, I think that's the So, there's some interesting dynamics and again, I think there's some opportunity to take advantage of some um I'd like to go back to your recommendation slide of uh the enrollment. And so
075the first recommendation is um evaluate the transition from junior high to address the impacts of the primary enrollment. It's the enrollment doesn't change because we're taking the kids from the uh elementary school and moving them to the middle school. Yeah. So it's a it's it's not it's not that's not going to affect enrollment. No. And so I I don't think that that is a reasonable I don't think looking at that um as a way of addressing defining enrollment is accurate. it may be a uh a curriculum uh issue and that you know that's a definite possibility but I don't think it's a it's uh has anything to do with well I may maybe we haven't defined the you know staying the point as early as we should if you just stick with the number of
076seventh and eighth graders who are coming down the line there are not enough of those to justify uh the teaching resources that you're going to need to offer them the same kind of electives and experience everything that Okay. So the um um the other thing that is those those kids that are moving sixth grade kids that are moving into the junior high are going to depopulate the uh elementary schools and some of our elementary schools are in great danger of falling below an undefined limit so far. We don't know what that limit is of reasonable uh attendance to to the school. Um that's yes. Okay. Um if you look at uh if you go to balancing budget, can we stay competitive in compensation and you talk to me about uh possible changes that coming down
077the road? What one thing that I would really like the CACF to do is to articulate some triggers. If this happens, we need to address this. um and maybe it's if enrollment drops below 2500 we have a problem we need to address it so a couple of these triggers uh I would really like to to to understand we we we've done that in the past we we had this cute little red green yellow light system but yes um lastly I have a whole list of things that you could do Well, I'm basically they all have to do uh with with um scenarios that affect our budget and I can go over them with you or I can talk to Curtis or whatever. We we um that's our usual closing which is please if there are
078things you would like us to do please tell us about those. Uh I my the general concern I have is that changes in federal revenue or changes in income state revenue are going to trickle down in some phase because this there'll be budget maneuvers to move money around next year. We're already looking at deferrals. No, we're not looking at deferrals but um other districts are looking at deferrals. Uh so they just won't be enough cash to go around. Um so those kind of trickle down effects is sort of like your background mind is a concern. Um the last thing I wanted to comment on was um Eric's presentation if I can find it past uh comment in there that um if we became a LCF district uh our revenue would drop from 61 million down
079to 38 million. It's a big hit. It's a big hit. Yeah. And I would also like to comment that our 68 what I said $61 million versus the 38 is a huge inequity in the system that would benefit. Well, there there as I'm sure you've heard from whether it's Eric or Sandra, I mean a number of districts locally have gone basic to basic basic basic. Yeah, that's all. Okay. Any other questions for John? John, thank you so much. Good sh so much. Going to move on to our public hearing, our 202526 local control and accountability plan. Um, anyone would like to provide public comment on this item, please submit a speaking card. The public hearing is now open. Yes. Thank you. Good evening. Um, it's really my pleasure to bring forward the district's local control
080accountability plan. I was before you on March 3rd with our midyear update to the plan. So much of this you've seen before, but this evening is a a brief update. Um, we love to start with the LSD student experience. You've been seeing this in our school presentations and it really centers the work that we're doing for those 34 3,500 students in our classrooms every day. Um, and we know that our academic growth is deeply connected to our social emotional well-being for our students. And so we talk about push and care. So that we're pushing and caring for our students, but also our staff members that are are serving our students so well. Next slide, please. And so as part of our academic um program, we also have skills, habits, and mindsets that we want all
081of our students to develop. And so what's been really fun for me is the last three years we've this has been like a northstar for us, the LED student experience, the portrait of a learner. Um so seeing this through with you all makes me feel so very proud. And as we think about our actions in our strategic plan, um it's all gauged around these four strategic priorities of thriving students, empowered educators, a strong infrastructure, um and engaged families. So all of the actions that are are in our plan uh reflects those critical parts of of the system for supporting our students. Um so with that you have a document at your table of 25 26 strategic actions aligned with those different priorities. Um and just hearing the survey results tonight and some of the comments
082and some of the areas of continuous improvement that you all identified. Um, I feel really good about the work that we're doing to support those advanced learners, to support our students who are struggling, whether it's through our deeper learning initiative with the wheel or integrated systems of support, the shared leadership systems that we've been building uh in the district um as well as the work we're doing to engage our families. So this evening in addition to the LCAP update that 89page document that you have attached that has required metrics, required goals, required activities, um we've brought forward a draft 2526 strategic action document as well if you move forward. Um just an update for each of those goal areas. And then finally this evening we also have oh thank you um an update on our
083local indicators. So those are um how the district is doing in terms of qualified educators, the percent of fully credentialed educators, the professional learning that that we are providing as well as materials, curricular instruction materials and resources, our facilities, and then parent engagement um and our facilities. So in my time in the district, we've passed a parcel tax, a bond measure um all with the great support of our community. And we've also raised additional funds with LEF and PTA. Um, so I just feel really proud of of the work that we're doing in in these areas to support all four of our strategic priorities. Um, as we think about our LCAP and and the goals and things around strategic communication Lynette was talking about tonight, yes, the results were were positive, but just like you,
084we're very interested in where we can grow and where we can improve. So, we are looking for um a different platform for communications. Mountain V lotos is using parent square. So that's a a platform that we've um are investing in as well as updating and refreshing our website. So that would be the area for strategic communication, family involvement. Um yes, our families are participating on our school campuses. They're volunteering. Um but what type of education and opportunities can we provide for them? Training that they might need AI is a a topic um that we know families have lots of interest in. how are we um supporting students safely and that how are we using those technologies to advance learning? So, with the local ind report, I'm happy to tell you we're we're meeting standards as
085you could probably guess in in each of these areas. Um 89% of our teachers have clear credentials. Some are missing our authorization, so we're working to support them with that process. All of our students have instructional materials that are aligned to state standards and according to our fit reports um that were conducted at the sites, all of our facilities are in good repair. Now, we know we need to modernize and update our sites um good repair for our students. Also, we uh are meeting standards with that parent family engagement. There's opportunities for students to participate, whether it's in surveys or on-site in volunteer opportunities, but we know we can do better with streamlining communication as well as supporting our families around improving our chronic absenteeism of of specific students missing schools. So, next steps um
086here are that we'd like to develop parent education series. We'd like to implement a new communication platform. Uh we'd like to support our teachers with translation um between home and school. That will be via our new platform next school year. Uh the parent square app actually has translation services for um all of our top languages. So teachers can communicate and parents can communicate in real time um using translated services. And then we've just administered a survey, a multilingual survey in our top five languages for our families of multilingual learners. And we're analyzing those results right now. I can tell you just at first blush, they're equally as positive to the general results you saw tonight, but do have some specific comments about how we can improve connections, home to school connections um with those parents.
087Our local climate survey from our students um is something that we're really really um proud about. So we have our students participate in a survey a few times through year actually because we want to ask them um about their student their experience as students. And so some of the questions are this teacher believes I can learn. I have a good friend in the class. I feel safe in this class. And so these results show us that students are not just attending school but they're experiencing that connection, that care, that push and belief. And that's really the foundation for everything else we hope to build for our students. So as we look ahead to 25 26 out of five, right? Out of five. Yeah. Out of five. Yeah. Thank you. Yeah. Not out of 10. That's
088a little different survey result. Not out of 10. You know, we want to continue to improve the experience that all of our students have um and that our families have. So our commitment to deeper learning to the wheel um to well-being and strong relationships with families, educators, and the community will remain at the center of our work. Um so we thank you for your time. Happy to take any questions on the actions that you might have or the documents there are quite a few. I have one. So um for family involvement, you talk about the parent, we'll do clarifying questions and then go to public comment and then do a discussion. This is a clarified question. So for the parent education opportunities, is that the same or different from what I've seen about like the
089parent university? Yep. Same. Same. Okay. Y Thank you. Any clarifying questions? Um just really quickly, Carrie, when do we when will we see the results of the survey that you're talking about with our uh parents who our Yale parents? Uh we're sharing at DAC tomorrow morning. Oh, so we can certainly share with the board as well. Um is there any public comment? Well, there are no requests for public comment. The public hearing is now closed discussion any further. So, um, just today, uh, one of the things I I do for no particular reason is I go to GitHub to get source code and there's always a readme file in there. When I went to this one particular thing, it was all in German. And it turns out that on my browser, I can click on
090the that page and say translate this page and boom, the entire page was translated. Now, I don't know if it was translated accurately, but it was complete sentences that made sense. So, translation really should not be a a barrier to us getting stuff out there. I mean, it was I was impressed. We actually used um a tool to translate those surveys into the top five languages. Yeah. Um and then we had parents read them for accuracy. also one try to translate to that that language and then translate back into English and see how well it it makes sense. Okay. Oh well to follow up on my clarifying question I also wanted to comment about the parent education opportunities. I mean, based on the draft that I've seen, I think it's really great. And I was
091wondering if we could get a presentation for the board um sometime next year because it also kind of addresses some of those concerns that we heard earlier from Pat Bodkkey. Yeah. Um our plan is over summer. So, we have um I don't remember several hundred families who qualify for ELA. um which are really the families we're targeting much of our parent education around and some broad topics for all people. But we're going to have um one of our bilingual staff members actually reach out to every single family over summer um to ask what topics may be of interest to you. Make sure that they understand how to enroll in ELOP and what's available at their school. Uh we had a series of questions. Am I missing anything else? I can't remember. But, uh, they're going
092to get a little personal touch over summer, which will be great. So, yes, once that's refined, we'll bring it back in the early fall, midfall for you. Thank you. Since um parents were something very different that we're doing, what is the plan for like educating the parents like like walking them through it like just you can't just tell them we've got this new app now download it? Yes, we're planning a what we're calling a slow roll so we can be really intentional and thoughtful about the roll out plan. We actually have been meeting with IT department at Mount Vtos to learn how did it go for them? What did they learn from their roll out? What went well? What didn't go well? Um but it's it the website the app itself is so user friendly
093and it's in so many districts that their support and training is really really good. But we're working through all of that right now. We're anticipating rolling to parents probably in January. Okay. Can we have a a board presentation on for parent square? Sure. Yeah. It's also it's it's it is important for us to know, but it's more important that here if there's a parent who's listening online, the one or the two, but it's just another way of getting that information out to our community. Just one other comment. I don't know that there's anything we need to do about it, but I'm bothered by the fact that we have so little public comment. No. And nobody online. Well, yeah, that too. Yes. I I just have a comment that I don't want to spit it out.
094Just say it. I I I am very happy about this this survey results. I mean, I think that it's a more detailed survey uh that the students participate in, but it's been on my mind all year just because over last summer, some information was released about another school where students did not feel this way. And so, I've been very concerned about our students feeling this way. And I'm very happy to see that that is the case. That a school in our district or a different district? It's a school in our community. No, it is it is verif you said school or district school. All right. Any other questions? Well, I it is technically both. It is what it is. Any other questions for uh Thank you very much. Thank you very much. Also, I want
095to just thank um we had over 200 individuals participate in input sessions with us around LCAP and we wrote it last year in the strategic plan. This year we had as you saw many people participate in survey. Um but then we had staff meetings at all nine schools and met with staff too and got their input. So we appreciate our teachers and classified staff who provide input in addition to our parents and community. But thank you. Thank you. This whole 360 degree review. Thank you. Thank you. Okay. So we have another public hearing. 202526 district budget pursuant to ED code 42103 42137 and 52062 and ending balances in excess of the minimum recommended reserves. Uh if anyone would like to provide public comment on this item, please submit a speaker card. The public hearing is
096now open. I got this. I'm ready. Can you guys hear me? Mic check. Hi, Eric. Hi. I It's hard to hear, but I'm going to get going here. Um, good evening tonight, Board of Trustees. We're excited to present uh at our public hearing, and it's a two-step process. We'll be coming back uh next Monday night, the 9th, to ask for um to have the budget adopted. I'll go to the next slide. Um, and there's this two-step process. Marcy able to advance to the next slide. There we go. Uh, we have to adopt our budget by June 30th. And we've kind of talked about this a little bit before. Uh, we also have to hold the public hearing that, um, our budget will support all the goals of the LCAP, which it does. Uh, next slide.
097And uh just want to kind of give the board a very brief update on the May revise. Uh not a lot of changes that really anticipated that really are going to affect Los Altos. Uh obviously the stock market volatility uh in response to the federal policy changes can uh impact our state revenue. Um California was recently claimed that we are now the fourth largest, we were the fifth, I think we're now the fourth largest economy of GDP. Uh we're also noticing that property and liability insuranceances are going to be increasing in the future with a lot of the wildfires that are happening all over the state. Um there's also going to be some pressure for the state to potentially backfill uh any loss of federal dollars. And so we're going to be mindful of those
098items. And then COLA uh was reduced uh just a slight hair down to 2.30. And we do not get a lot of state funding, but we do get a little bit of cost of living adjustments for mandated block grant. uh special education and uh child nutrition. Next slide. We and I wanted to highlight uh all the different federal funds and categories that we received because there has been a lot of talk about some of the changes uh in Washington if there's going to be this dramatic shift and cut in federal programs. The the biggest chunk of change that you can see is the special education IDA entitlement. And we know which I'll come into a later slide, but it's it's a very small fraction of the federal of the funding that we need to make
099special education whole. Um, so just a little over 900,000. And then we get all the different title funds that we direct for targeted instruction. And these title funds, we use our LCFF funds, our property taxes, but then we also use these title funds to support all the EL strategies for our second language learners, immigrants, lowinccome. Uh, and we do that through many of the items that Krie mentioned earlier in the in the LCAP. Uh, next item, general fund revenue assumptions. You heard John Michaelelsson do a nice job talking about property tax growth. It is a number one driver of our district's revenue. Um, we will not know the final property tax numbers until August when the ROS are closed. So, we feel very confident that our property taxes will be a little bit above 4.75,
100but at adoption for the based on information we know right now, we're going to adopt our budget with 4.75% growth. The parcel tax gets a cola at 4% just on the measure A funds. We're going to be uh $10.3 million and we highlighted LA this year of 2.7 because um they are very confident they can meet an extra $200,000 to help fund some of the programs, which is really great. We really appreciate LAFE and all they do for our kids and all these other categories that you've seen many times in our budget. Uh the other state funding we get is the education protection account. We'll be bringing a resolution to the next meeting to talk about that on the 9th. That ends in 2030 and that's about $655,000. It's $200 per ADA. So if that
101goes away, um many districts will be clamoring trying to find to replace some of those funds. Uh we have our ELOP revenue and in the Sachs forms this year is the first year actually there's a line item in the Sachs forms that says ELOP and and Prop 28. It's in the restricted side of revenue, other state revenue. Uh the last few years that was all rolled up in one category called other state revenue and we tried to provide you um with a pretty detailed description of all the revenues that we're receiving in your uh narrative and assumptions handout that was part of your board packet. And then due to the charter school is $10.6 million. The charter school is the LCFF funded students and they get a they get that COLA. So as their um
102the number of students is about a little bit over 11,000 per student. And then our special education entitlement which I mentioned earlier that's this bottom number here is actually the excess property taxes called RAF and that's restricted LCFF revenue that we get and that use is used all for special ed funding. Uh next slide. The charter school. Uh our budget is going to assume the b the charter school enrollment will remain relatively flat and only 10% of the students are coming from out of the district. We also assume that our uh property tax monies will be revised in the May revise which is so from this year to next year it's an extra 462,000 of our transfer. Uh so the total inlue transfer at budget adoption will be 10.6. BCS also is projected to receive
103625,000 of the parcel tax revenue and that's their share of the measure A that was approved in 2023. And the portable rentals for BCS for this current year is about 865,000 but as uh just like with inflation the leases in these will be going up. So we'll be adjusting our budget accordingly uh to account for the extra lease revenue from mobile modular or at least some of these portables are leased from. Next slide. This is a pie chart we really like to show. And every year it changes a little bit. Some years uh depending on how much state funds we get, the parcel tax might be 12 or 13%. But we try to break it down. But the biggest sources of revenue and you can see property taxes is the number one driver of our
104revenue for the district. The foundation is 3% and the parcel tax. If you add all these locals up, it's over 90% um which is 93% local in nature. So, we really are uh and and I know Vladimir uh made a comment earlier, but if we did lose our LCFF status, it would be a loss of over $21 million. Uh so, being in that a basic a status is definitely beneficial to our district. Next slide. This is a uh just a three-year summary of our property taxes. And you can see in 23 24 the prior year growth was 854. Last year, we're going to probably end the year at 5.66 866 for this estimated actuals and then we're going to be adopting at 4.75. Uh and so we are seeing uh we are seeing growth but
105not like the seven and eights that we saw earlier in uh 22 and 23. Next slide. Our general fund assumptions uh we have step and column and the 8 and a half% salary increase for the LATA csea and confidential group and then a step and column and a 7% uh for management which is mostly the certificated managers. Uh next year we're adding two additional uh TK classes and then we'll have to have the TK aids which are six hours a day. So it's a 1.5 positions. Um increased health and welfare benefits is about 10% per year. So, we're going to be budgeting for 344,000. We do not know what the healthc care rates will be because we don't get Kalper's rates until mid July. So, we're going to do 10% and then we'll bring this
106uh number back to the board uh at first interum and adjust accordingly. OPED is one we want something to point out which I point out the narrative assumptions. It's about $1.2 million a year for our retiree benefits and this is called oemployment benefits and that's for our retirees. So, as our health care benefits go up, our oped obligations go up as well. And so, to for the retirees, that's that's money uh that we have to budget for every year for the healthc care increases for retirees. And then we break down the statutory benefits. The top two ones is just uh just for the pensions for CalPERS and Calsters. And then on the bottom is all the statutories which includes workers compensation uh and so on. Uh next slide. cafeteria fund. We like to highlight cafeteria
107fund. Uh we did hear a little that some of the parents aren't happy with the meals. I was over at Almond and the parents are actually very happy and very understanding that uh the district is trying our best to do um we have had some good success with the program this last year and I want to acknowledge Jason Elizabetha um for helping help us manage the food services program. Uh we're we're anticipating next year that our contribution from the general fund is going to go down a little bit of uh from 1 million down to 848,000. So it's a decrease of our general fund contribution. Most of the increases or salaries is because of the raises for CSEA. Next slide. Special education is is a a very large part of our budget. It's about 20%
108of our budget in total. Uh and we we have to fund it from 70%. So, we're really only funded about about 30% from federal local sources and state. Um, you can see the jump in salaries. It's a pretty significant increase. Some of that though is because we're going to be using less contractors and hiring more speech teachers. So, we're going to see an increase in in salaries than a decrease in the all other which is contracted services. So, instead of hiring outside contractors for speech services, we're hoping to be able to capture uh some increased services for our students. Uh but you can see the total expenses from special ed going from 17.3 to 17.6 and then the general fund contribution uh has gone up a little bit too and then once we close the
109books in August September we can bring you some final numbers. Next slide. Our utilities is something we're always watching. Uh this year estimated actuals is $2.7 million in utilities. This year at adoption we're going to adopt three million. That's a that's about a quart of a million dollar increase in utility cost. And obviously P Gen is our biggest one. Uh and we're very fortunate. We still are under the net metering for PG Gene. So we do get a significant benefit for having those um photovoltaic parking shade structures out in our parking lots. Uh if we did not have those, the uh the energy our energy bills would probably be at least 2.5 to 3 million for PG. So we're very fortunate to have that power purchasing agreement uh that we approved several years ago. Uh
110next slide. So, not only do we have to talk about the current year, but we also have to look at the multi-year budget. And the multi-year outy years, we're going to be adopting 4.75 for this current year and the next two out years, four and three. Our parcel tax, you'll see a slight increase, and that's due to cola. Uh, LA is uh feels confident they can reach a fundraising goal of a 2.7. And then you can see all the other state funding that we get. Uh and then as COLA goes up that inloo transfer to the charter school will also be increasing in the outy years. Next slide and column in the multi-year expenditures. Um and this was talked about a little bit earlier in the meeting, but you can see uh when we adopt
111the budget in June and then we when we adopt to the following year, you can see a pretty significant increase from 22 23 and we have been doing the work. Um I know John Michaelelsson mentioned about, you know, we kind of have to we have been doing that right staffing to really match our our lowering enrollment. And then uh yes, as a basic age school district um you do not want to be overstaffed because that comes the cost of salaries. So been so we've been able to afford some really significant raises in our compensation for our labor groups which they they very much deserve. But to do that we've been able to reduce staffing to help afford these raises and still maintain uh good reserves. Um and then health and welfare all groups uh increase
112about 10% annually. And then most of our books and supplies, contracted services that are in our budget, we we budget conservatively about 3 to 5% per year on those items. Next slide. Calsters rates. I wanted to point this out. Um uh if you look in our budget book which you'll get on next Monday night's meetings um there's we do there's analysis about CalPERS and Calsters rates and you can see over the years it is a significant part of our budget. So this is the employer contribution the employees when they get their paychecks they pay their portion but the employer we pay a huge portion. So you can see 26 cents of every dollar the district is contributing for CalPERS and then it's going to be going up in the next years. The calsters rate for
113teachers has been relatively flat for the last several years. But if you look at our budget, $13.2 million of our of our budget, almost 15% of our budget is just for retirement pension contributions. So that's a significant amount. Um and so uh when you start having if you're overstaffed, not only paying for the salaries, but you're also paying for the retirement and pension plans as well. So it's it's so we um we'd be much higher than this if we weren't doing that that right size effort staff that everybody's been working very hard on. Um, next slide. And then our multi-year expenditures, you can see it is our expenditures are going up. And the expenditures are going up on step and column and our health and welfare increases, supplies, and other um, and then the other
114financing uses. That's the transfer out to the cafeteria fund. And you can see it's about a 10% increase for supplies, food, and and salaries as well in the out years. And then the next slide is the four um multi-year projections. uh our beginning balance is starting at 19.2 and that's the what we were talking about earlier and Brian mentioned about cash. It is important to have those reserves that we don't have to borrow and do a tax revenue anticipation note. We've been able to not we didn't do it last year. Uh we're feeling we can have a a positive fund balance and borrow enter fund borrowing and not have to go borrow out in the open market. So this year uh for 2526 we're projecting a $2.2 2 million deficit and then 3.3 and then
1153.7 in the out years. Fund 17 is our special basic aid reserve and that we that money has grown over the last several years because of interest and you can see our reserves that we're projecting out in the next couple years. We do have some time to make some more reductions and then build some room uh for you know to be looking at our budget. But um good news uh we're able to adopt our budget. I it's hard to say yes. How can you adopt your budget and be positive with the with the negative fund balances and deficit? But but we do we do have the reserves to meet our minimum requirement. And I want to thank Carrie Bosow, my LCAP partner. Um and also want to acknowledge Elizabeth Bay uh who's our fiscal director.
116She's on the call tonight. Uh uh she works tremendous amount of hours uh making sure we're accurate and thorough. And I really want to acknowledge her and all of her hard work. and really the whole team. We do we do have a great team, the business department, but we work well uh with all the departments because we're all in this together. And I really want to thank everyone for all their help getting our budget ready and we'll be excited to bring you back um and be asking for adoption at the next meeting. And then the next slide um talks about some future concerns. Obviously, property tax is growing, but not at the rate it was several years ago. We are worried about stock market volatility and how that might impact stirs and pers because they
117do they do invest in the stock market and mutual funds and then when those things aren't going so great you have to be mindful of that. We are worried about future TK staffing impact because not only um just for the teachers and staff but also for facilities and equipment and supplies. Uh we are worried about immigration and tariffs and it impact on measure E. um the cost of steel could go up and uh all these other um you know construction materials uh rising utility costs, healthc care and then as I mentioned earlier we do have a lot of old portables that are at classrooms uh this summer we'll be removing two of them uh from Almond and so we're going to continue doing that work uh as part of our measure projects and then the
118next slide is really just a quick summary of the key deadlines we'll be bringing this back to you um for to adopt the budget next Monday night. And then the last slide is really just uh thanking everyone again uh and we'll be ask here to answer any questions for you. Great. Thank you so much, Eric. All right. Do we have any uh are there any clarifying questions, Eric, before we take public comment? Are there any requests for public comment? Great. Since we have no public comment, public hearing is now closed. Any further board discussion questions for Eric? Okay, I don't have any questions either. Thank you very much, Eric. Thank you. Very thorough. No questions. The narrative was really helpful, too, at answering any questions we might have had. Good. Good job. Thank you. Great.
119Thank you, Eric. I'm wondering if you um want to stay for number five. Yes. And um I wasn't sure if um uh if anybody from Waldorf was able to attend tonight. Yes. Yeah. Folks who've been patiently waiting in the corner for I gave them a warning that it was late on the agenda. So I thank them for their patience. Yes. So tonight we're asking the board to approve uh it's an action item. It's a resolution uh 2425-17. Uh the district has been a partner with um uh Waldorf school since 1995 and we started leasing uh part of the old Eastbrook school site which is out off of Mora Drive which is up behind the Los Altos Country Club in the Lyola Lyola area and uh they've been great partners. They've been paying us lease revenue
120uh over the years. They've been in charge of maintaining the property themselves. Um, and so tonight, uh, part of that agreement, that long-term agreement was that they can exercise their option if they want to, uh, take ownership of that property. And, uh, they they let us know last year. And so, we've been working over time of actually when to do that, that the deed and transfer is, uh, and I apologize, it's a lot of documents to transfer a property. So, I apologize for the number of items, but we want to be thorough. Uh, we had legal counsel advise us on this to make sure we're doing it properly. So, there'll be a resolution tonight. We'll be asking you to approve um and uh going to be approving resolution 242517 um to authorize the conveyance of
121the former Eastbrook school site to the Waldorf school. Thank you very much, Eric. Um are there anyone want to see a speaker card for public comment? All right. Um are there any questions from the board? Are there any other requests for public comment? I do. Would any board members like to provide further comment on this agenda item? For $1, we're selling the entire site. 30 years. Any other? All right. In that case, may I please have a motion to approve resolution number 24/25-17, Balder School? Thank you. Thank you very much. Thank you, Vladimir. Uh, may I have a second? I'll second. Thank you, Stellar. All right. Any further board discussion? Motion to approve resolution number 24/25-17 Waldorf School of the Peninsula transfer of deed was made by Vladimir and seconded by Stella. As this is
122a resolution, we'll take a roll call vote. Jim, did you vote your name? Hi, Stella. Yes. Vladimir, I. Brian, yes. I too vote yes. Motion passes unanimously. Thank you. Thank you for being here. Hanging hanging in there with us. All right. on to board and administration comments. Dr. Terry, would you like to kick us off just on comment? Um, Eric here with me, thanking him for all this work on the not just the district but the LCAP. We are in each other's office every day about this on the phone every night just trying to work it through and he's always so positive about it. It's kind of helpful when I get sad through the template through that raised. I just wanted to thank him and his team for all their hard work and the partnership.
123It's really fun. Yeah, thank thanks again, Carrie. I agree. It's nice having an LCAT partner. Uh we can comorate on on the lovely forms from DTS that we like to deal with. But I do I do want to acknowledge Elizabeth again uh and really thank her for all of her help. She's been a great asset to our team uh team business and and just want to thank everybody for working so collaboratively. So, thanks again. Eric, are there any other comments you want to make? Eric's no sorry look at me. Sorry. I'll just add I would love to thank both Eric and Carrie. Uh we're finishing up our third year together as a team and I'm just so grateful and really appreciate the strengths that each of you bring to us. Thank you. It's a great
124team and it really shows. Thank you Stella. Uh yes, I attended the Oak open house on the 22nd. I can't remember how many weeks ago. Um I also held the second school ambassadors meeting which was very productive and I attended an AAPI heroes celebration that was hosted by Margaret Abbea. I was not recognized that I just attended. Sorry to clarify. I sit here. I uh just Viking showcase last week which I always tell people that they should go and do just because it's interesting and it's a good insight into junior high. Um and I don't always do it, but I did it this year and it was every bit as good as I thought it would be. I was very encouraged by what the students shared and how they shared it and um it's just
125good to see our students doing so well. Thank you. Uh I don't so uh I don't have anything to report except uh that we will not be able to attend the uh budget presentation. Yeah. That occurs right before graduation. Yeah. So, I was sort of like disappointed about that, but there's nothing we can do about it. There's some virtual ones like I went to a virtual one. I think there's another tomorrow. Yeah. Okay. I'll work it up. Saw that in my um I volunteered with Science Olympia Santa. Um and then also got to do the Viking showcase which was great. probably my most impressive kids in the 10 years I've been doing. So, it's nice to see. And then, um, I also attended the LATACSA end of your picking. Thank you. This time of year
126is so busy that I was out last week and you missed so much. Yeah. So, thank you to all of you for like getting out there and doing all this stuff. It's like a marathon at this time of the year. And with that, I would like to adjourn tonight's theme.