[8/4/25] D65 - Committee of the Whole

001Okay, I'll start the meeting. It is 5:01 p.m. Today is August 4th, 2025. This is the committee of the whole meeting. Um, I'll take roll call. Wymer >> Anderson. >> Salem >> here. >> Wilin >> here. here. >> Oak here. Hernandez out. Okay. >> And I'll just note that Dr. Turner will be participating remotely. >> Okay. >> I the approve today's meeting agenda as presented. Do we have a second? >> Second. >> Wymer, >> yes. >> Anderson, >> yes. >> Salem, >> yes. >> Wilkins, >> yes. >> Pinker, >> yes. >> The land. >> I'm going to read the land acknowledgement. We take time to acknowledge that the land we meet on is the traditional homelands of the councils of the three fires, the Padawatami, Ojiway, and Ottawa. This land also served as an important

002meeting place for Miami, Hochunk, the Monamin, Inoka, Sack, Fox, Poria, Arapjo, Cheyenne, and other tribal nations. This land has long been a center for indigenous people to gather, trade, and maintain kinship ties. Located at the intersection of several great waterways, the region has become the site of travel and prosperity. We acknowledge that Evston and John Evans are tied to the massacre of the Arapjo and Cheyenne for railroads and westward expansion upon which John Evans developed his wealth and founded Evston. This land was violently taken under settler colonialism through genocide and open warfare. And the region that is now Illinois and Chicago land is still home to thousands of native people who are actively struggling for sovereignty, self-determination, and justice. The genocidal acts of settler colonialism extended to peoples of Africa and their enslaved descendants. Despite

003Illinois eventually prohibiting slavery, slavery was an accepted practice before and after statethood. The vestigages of slavery remain throughout the United States and directly affect the descendants of enslaved peoples, rich and heterogeneous communities who help define the African diaspora. The genocidal patterns of violence against peoples of African descent and indigenous people have been replicated to exclude and harm people from many intersecting marginalized identities in the United States. Religious, minoritized, disabled, and LGBTQ identified peoples, bipo, and people of color at large. These patterns demonstrate that the pursuit to end state sanctioned violence against bipok is a daily struggle for liberation and continued social, political, and economic anti-black racism and oppression. Today we acknowledge that we are living, breathing, loving, grieving, laughing, and sharing space on unseated territory. May we learn to honor the historical and contemporary presence

004and power of the people and their belief that we must be caretakers of the lands and waters for the livelihood of future generations. We encourage everyone to continue to expand their knowledge and reduce their harm through awareness of local mutual aid models for survival and through engagement with online and local resources such as the Chicago American Indian Community Collaborative and the Shorefront Legacy Center. >> Members of the public are welcome and invited to address the board during open public meetings. Speakers are discouraged from using the public comment period to heir specific concerns about staff members being mindful that the public comment period is not is not a suitable form for factf finding or resolution of disputes. Rather, we encourage members of the public who have concerns about specific district employees to follow district communication guidelines

005found in the student handbook. Please remember to state your name and that you have three minutes to address the board. Also note that it is not customary for the board to respond to public comments. The best way to correspond with members of the board is by emailing schoolboard district 65.net. >> We have one person signed up for public comment, William Jackson. >> Thank you. >> Good evening. And first of all, uh, thank you guys for your service to the parents and students of district 65. My comment today is regarding the school consolidation. As you may know, the uh the Evson is building an affordable high-rise uh building on South Boulevard. And like other new affordable h housing and other new highrises in Evston, it is built with the assumption that not not all families need

006or will have a car. Uh now the problem or the situation is that while students can be bus to schools I would like to make sure that it is kept in mind that parents and guardians will not be busted to school and that is something that the committee that is uh handling and deciding on the consolidations should keep in mind because what we don't want to do is make it harder for the parents and guardians of students to participate fully in the education of their students. Thank you. >> That concludes the public comments for today. >> Okay. So with that, we'll begin the curriculum and policy committee portion of this meeting. And the first thing on the agenda today is the transportation policy. >> So for transportation today there is no particular presentation because the

007presentation was provided in June. So we put the memo and the slides in the board packet and it's it's for conversation amongst the board. Um so I I think we've been um the presentation that was provided um gave us six questions in essence that they wanted uh the board uh to think about in terms of how we think about uh policy. And so for me one of the in thinking about those answers it was important to sort of think about well what is the vision for transportation? Um is our vision um all kids walk as much as they can? we think that's healthy, sustainable, or is our vision, you know, our goal is to put as many kids on the bus as possible. In reality, of course, the cost uh mediates what's possible, but I

008still think regardless of cost, how do we, you know, as a board understand what our what our desire is um such that as we're um coming up with a policy in line with what's going to happen in in clo in terms of uh school consolidation, we're understanding the, you know, ramifications of how all of that stuff happens. And so um for me um I just think the I think of walk so our our laws allow the policies the state policies are 1.5 miles right so if you live within 1.5 miles and if you're not in hazards um then the expectation is that you can we're not required to provide transportation um but that is really the question you know I it's like is that are is that our desire? Um, do we want a kindergartenner

009walking 1.5 miles? Is there something different between what a K3 does, what a 35 does, or a 68? There's a law that says 1.5 miles, but what is it, what have we done, and what is it that we seek to do as we understand how we have to uh understand the finances to make things possible? >> Can I just um Can I just ask like a update question? Since we're revisiting the June 2nd presentation, at the end of the June 2nd presentation, there were eight next steps that were outlined. Which of those next steps have been taken up until this point? Or are we simply revisiting the presentation without additional progress really being made on those next steps? So Chris Gutavis has been working with Lou Gada on transportation and Lou is listening in today

010but it was not able to join us in person and so Chris and Tamara will work on answering some of the transportation questions. >> Yeah. So as far as next steps, uh this really is the initial first next step for the board to discuss and kind of make decisions regarding policy changes and the implementation timeline for that. And then it'll be kind of a domino effect after that of what we'll do regarding communication, getting that information out to families and everything else. Outside of that, uh Lou and I, we have reviewed uh hazards uh and potential hazards that would fall under the ID do criteria. So, we do have that as well in preparation for SDRP. >> And I'm just mindful that with what uh Dr. Pinker raised around like the 1.5 miles that that

011it would be nice to have some sense of what our community um thinks about these and if we haven't yet engaged the community around this, it feels like we're still kind of stuck a little bit. So, that's where I'm I'm a little bit a loss here. Has there been a survey sent to the community to ask their opinion? >> No community has been sent to the survey as of yet. We have surveyed uh building principles and administrators so far. >> Okay. >> Do we um we could do an analysis or we probably have done analysis of of how far kids are walking. Um >> yes, that's correct. >> And do you is there do we have kids walking 1.5 miles? >> Yes. Correct. Yeah. under uh school code. Yes. >> Okay, we do have Okay.

012>> Do we have do are there actual children that are doing that today that are in the K through five? >> Yes. Now, do I know if they're walking or being dropped off? No, they are just not being provided transportation. That's what I can tell you today. >> Okay. >> And Chris, she did say specifically K5. Is it K5 and 68 students beyond 1.5 >> according to school code? Yes, it would be K12 according to school code. So that would include 68 for us. Currently we are not providing transportation to 68 with the exception of Bessie roads and King Arts for a fee. >> Aren't we Aren't we providing the busing though to to shoot? >> Oh yes, that's correct. I am sorry. Yes, shoot is included in the busing. Yes. >> Okay. And Chris

013did a quick analysis or an analysis on the number of students that are in middle school 68 that are beyond that 1.5 that are not receiving transportation. And if I'm correct, Chris, that total number is 197 currently. >> Yeah, that's correct. That is for this upcoming school year. So, the numbers are still in flux a little bit as we're cleaning things up and and preparing and, you know, figuring out enrollment, but yes, that that's a rough estimate for for this upcoming school year. So that's about just under it's just over 10% of the middle school population approximately. >> Approximately. Yes. >> I just want to clarify one thing uh just to make sure. I I believe we did do a sensitivity analysis on attendance rates for children that were receiving busing or not receiving busing.

014And can you just rem remind me what the results of that were? >> Yeah. So, uh, there was no statistical significance when you look at the the p value specifically, uh, between students that receive transportation and do not receive transportation as far as if they're coming to school on time. And we did do uh, propensity score matching for that. So, we like students to like students. So, we looked at race, ethnicity, race, ethnicity, IEP status, free and reduced lunch status, and a couple other categories that I can't recall off my head, so I don't want to name them explicitly, but we we did look at several different uh categories for students to match appropriately. I definitely think this is something where getting more community is going to be really important because I think you know

015like every family situation is different and I think we really need to understand what the impact of any changes would be. Um and you know like this is I feel like this is an area where the budget is obviously important but obviously the safety of students is more important. So, I think we need to take like a really hard look at what any implications would be on student safety. Like especially when we're thinking about like the lower grade levels. I know um some of the hazardous areas even for middle schoolers. It can be sort of questionable sometimes if they're mature enough to be able to get there on their own. So, I think you know it warrants further exploration. >> I have two questions. uh one is in regards to the um assessment of the

016crossing guards and how that may be adjusted to bring down the cost of that. So that's also a component of the study. And then the next question is because of the budget implications, is there any thought for cost sharing with families? And when we talk to the public, I think that should be something that should be mentioned because that could be helpful in terms of balancing the budget. >> Yeah, I'll answer the the first question first. So, for the crossing guards, we do have an intergovernmental agreement with the city of Evston. Uh, I have it pulled up here that expires on June 30th, 2027. So, after that date, we will be responsible for the full cost. Uh, in FY2627, the estimated cost is $700,000 and it's estimated to increase about 5% each year. So the

017the the district's responsibility after 26 27 will be the full cost if we want to keep all crossing guards as they are. >> So as a part of that agreement is the number of crossing guards negotiable or do we have to? >> It is yes we do not need to keep all the crossing guards that we have currently. We can change them at any time. >> Okay. So um as I think about our past policies around transportation, they're also connected with the fifth ward and the reality of busing, even transportation to uh Bethy Rose and to uh King Arts because if you looked at what their boundaries were, they intentionally gave permissive transfer. So how do we think about you know foster opens up then so many kids are there but also think about the

018eighth ward kids who go so many uh different places in transportation so how to how to have that in our thinking there's what has been but in reality we're moving to a a different different space and so even I live on one side of um live in the fifth ward but on one side of uh um golf Emerson um and I assume um my nephew would the bust to Foster, but you know, we would walk across the street to go to the park if we're going to play there. So, how do we think about those types of hazards in terms of how can we do a better job of trying to make them crossable in ways um because the bus costs um gets ex gets expensive. Um but I do know because we do have

019to do some diff transportation will be different given once Foster is open. Correct. >> Yeah. So I I don't have a direct answer to that question, but I can tell you um just like we mentioned uh at the last transportation discussion that crossing guards and hazards are interconnected. And generally what Lou and I Lou and I found uh during our hazard study recently was that if there's a crossing guard at an intersection, most likely it would not be considered a hazard. And McCormack is a good example of that. Um the ID dot threshold is 12 points and it's just a a simple calculation. You just uh tally the points based on traffic volume uh the speed, the width of the road, the students age and the the crossing. So whether it's traffic controlled, stop sign,

020crossing guard and it's strictly just a point system. And generally uh if there's a crossing guard there, it would not be considered a hazard. So, we can definitely play around with different scenarios with placing crossing guards in different locations to make them more uh accessible and safer for for students to cross rather than bus if that is an option the board would like us to pursue. >> Uh, one other comment I have is about the busing for afterchool programs. Um, and when we do our community outreach, I think those partners should be brought in in terms of looking at some cost sharing or some other community partners that can help support that that fee because that's something that's also contributing to the transportation cost. Um quick question and and um I don't know if you

021have an answer to this or this has been completed but I was I was noticing in the presentations and also had asked Lou um if there had been any analysis done on the potential transportation savings if we changed the school time start times. So, the implication was that if we had uh transposed middle school to be at 9:00 a.m. and elementary school to be at 8 a.m. that we could leverage double routes um which are more costefficient. Um has that analysis been done in the current setting? >> I have not done anything specifically uh that would be a better question for for Lou to answer. >> Okay. One thing we didn't start by saying, I just want to acknowledge the the work that was done in decreasing the transportation cost and the savings that happened

022uh this year and oftentimes we talk about the cost overruns and we don't giving up credit and I just want to call you know uh Tamara and Chris and Lou and everyone in the team for making sure >> I can't take credit for that. I don't want to that that was strictly >> the team the collective team. I just want to make sure that we uh that we recognize that. Yeah, there's been some really heroic efforts, I think, in trying to streamline transportation. So, I'm excited about being able to continue that work. Now, >> my question is about timing and and how we're thinking about timing of any potential changes because obviously if we make decisions around um how many schools we have that would impact cost as well. So like has there been any

023thought given to that like either timing of implementation but then also timing of even making decisions given that like we probably won't have budget estimates for any changes until we know what our school footprint will look like. >> As far as timing, we're going to defer to the board on that and how they would like to implement this. Um yes. So, so I can say that um um one of the questions is how are the models in terms of can account for different forms of transportation. I know the work Stacy that you have done understand blocks and you know what's you know is a block needs transportation not depending on where it goes to school. There is the which has to come first. Um I know there's a desire for us to have the policy

024such that the they can build around and our desire to sort of say we need to understand the cost. So um I think the more we can get to modeling u in the scenarios that can allow us to understand uh the choices. One thing one I do want to put on the table there's some costs we just have to do. It's just we don't have a cost. That's what they are. We are hopefully going to try to figure out how to do some savings and things like that more savings. But then there's there's, you know, if we had $15 million in transportation, we would bus everyone. But if we only have four million left off of off of uh off of what we're required, how do we prioritize that? We still have prek. So I

025think part of for us is how do we how do we order what you know the priority of of transportation might be given a budget or do we have a budget that's just we're going to we're going to figure out the money regardless of what it costs or could you say here's our transportation budget. We're going to stick within this budget. We'll do what we have to do for required, but then we have to prioritize um you know other if we are trying to stay within the budget because if it keeps going up and up, how do you not get back into a similar situation? >> I think it's really important to remember that we have certain obligations, right? And so then there are certain things that are discretionary and the things that we're talking

026about that you've enumerated in the policy are the discretionary pieces that we've decided um as a board to or in previous boards have allowed via the policy. Um um separate from the policy itself though, Chris, like do you feel that the that our ability to kind of enforce that policy and make sure that we have the right kids that are being busted and for the right reasons is uh well managed and maintained. Do you need any other assistance there in your department to maintain that? No, Lou has done a fantastic job of that so far. And there are not really any kids that are on routes that should not be um if there are kids that there are special exceptions that administrators will assign sees to get them to school if there are attendance issues

027and stuff like that. But other than that, Lou does a a very good job of ensuring that students that are supposed to be on the bus are on the bus and students that are not are not. >> That's great. Thank you. So, one thing, I'm sorry. Can I add one thing, Maria, to um the conversation that we had a few weeks ago talking about utilization of routes? Um so, one thing that we will definitely do as we progress into the school year is check those utilization numbers. So, we know the students that we have routed. So when we look in our system, we can say we have x number of students routed, but we want to confirm those students routed with the utilization uh on buses to ensure that those numbers match. >> I think

028um just to further elaborate on what Tamara is referring to, um I know that many children who are who say that they're going to ride the bus, but then they get a ride or they don't really use the bus very often. And so we're allocating routes to kids that really aren't on the bus. and we want to just understand what what that actually looks like. So, we'll look at that over the course of the first um several months of the year. But one of the things I just wanted to point out for the community that's listening is we are not making any changes to the transportation policy and the ability for kids to get to school on the bus between now and the start of school, which is in two weeks. >> So, this is

029for next year. And I think, you know, I don't want anyone to be worried that we're going to stop the bus routes to shoot, for example, or send emails concerned that their child is not going to have the transportation that they did last year because they will. >> I'm just uh aware just like we need to save money. I mean, just where we're at, we need to be finding ways to save as much as possible. and just um how directly this relates to the safety of our kids and um it's very sobering like to be looking for for savings in an area particularly around crossing guards where even on routes that are not designated as I do hazards they are hazardous um on a two-lane street right I've seen crossing guards almost get hit um

030right so one child getting hit is just That's one too many. And so it's just very sobering particularly around crossing guards for me. Um how even the ID do hazards doesn't quite get at the risk of even for instance like Ridge is a 25 mile per hour. No one goes 25 mile per hour. Sorry, you know, I mean it's four lanes. It's narrow. It's it's scary. So that's just really sobering to me in all of this. Um and I don't know if there's a question in there as much as just naming that. I think that's important to name and I agree with that completely. I think you know we probably need to develop some principles that sort of guide any kind of changes that we make and I think like student safety would be number

031one on that list and you know hopefully we can come up with some creative solutions but I think student safety is one I know I'm not willing to give on because it's just too important. I'm old enough to remember when crossing guards um weren't paid. And I'm not saying we shouldn't pay crossing guards, but it is a a question, a conversation. Uh can community members, are there ways that we, you know, all crossing guards have to be paid? Are there ways in which community members in their blocks can help kids get uh to certain places? I mean, so the challenge is safety. let's make sure everyone's safe, but then you know transportation is one of the bigger cost increases. Um so what's that balance and creatively what can we do? What are the what are

032what's possible? But you know keeping safety in the in first position. >> I also want to point out that you know children are crossing streets in our community throughout the entire year without crossing guards. And it was it struck me in this conversation as we were we were talking about it and the the intersection of Ridge and Lake Ca comes up, right? That's a very busy intersection. It's a confusing light pattern. And I saw two girls that were probably around 9 and they were so safely crossing that street yesterday evening, like right in the prime time. And so I think while we think about safety, I also want us to think practically about how our community functions and not make, you know, not not overindex on um, you know, crossing guards, for example, when there's,

033you know, lighted stop signs and other other technologies that we could use to we could employ alongside the city to ensure that every time of the day, every day of the year, we can have safe crossings at hazardous intersections. So, I think we need to um have more conversations and and get to can Stacy and Tamara who you know what's the what's the reality of the of the timeline of when y'all need um policy >> for this transportation policy. I think to Maria's point, we're not making any changes that are going to impact this school year immediately. Um, I think these the policy will tie in with the work that the subcommittees are doing, Stacy's subcommittee in particular, with their criteria and how that plays into it. So, I'll let Stacy chime in a bit

034on that as well, but that's my take on it. >> Yeah, sure. I think that's a good point. The other one is that we open up for registration for students for the 2627 school year in December. >> Okay. And so it's helpful for families to be able to know what transportation guidance is in making decisions about whether they would apply to a magnet or things along those lines. >> So can I amplify something you said, Nicole? Um I think that would be helpful is just to start visualizing the impacts of this. I think you use the word of modeling. >> Um I don't know if it creates too heavy of an undue staff burden. um but to begin modeling some basic options for us so that we can see financial implications impact on number of

035students um really the details of this. I wonder if that would like you mentioned Nicole help us go the next take the next step >> and then share those models with community. So in there is a conversation we as board members you know the uh STP making sure that transportation is added in here as we understand the ramifications of the changes um we're going to make. >> Can can I ask a question? Yes. Um so just bringing it back to the earlier conversation I heard several board members express the desire for engagement of parents and caregivers in the community in this conversation. I think it'd be helpful for the district team to have a little bit of sense of understanding from the board about what type of information that you would need or you would

036like to have from the community in order to feel that you can make an informed decision. Um, we talked as a team a while back in June prior to this presentation going forward. Um, and at the time we decided to hold off on issuing a survey because the board hadn't even publicly discussed it yet and it didn't feel like the timing was right. Um but in addition, we also realize that just the conversation at hand can be fairly complex and interconnected, right? It's one thing to ask about, you know, a family the impact of having transportation or not, but then realizing the um you know, cost implications and such. So we had talked about is it helpful to give the community and more specifically families of children who actually ride the school bus something to

037react to versus like very openended broad questions where most families are probably going to say if push comes a shove I do need transportation and how valuable is that in the long run. So, I think as we're thinking about next steps, it might be helpful if anybody has any suggestions around >> it'd be really helpful for me to know this or to have this information so that as a team as we're formulating this, we can make sure we're headed in the right direction. >> That's a really good I was just going to say that's a really good question and I know for me like I don't know if it's a survey or if it's a conversation because I really want to know what things we should be considering, right? like things like what what factors

038families think we should be considering as we make this decision, comfort levels with their children walking in different places, like what they're doing now, because every child is different, right? Like even with my own children, just because I might let one walk at 10 a certain place doesn't mean that I let the other one walk at 10 a certain place. So just really getting that information for me to understand what considerations we should even be thinking about um from a parent and guardian perspective. >> Yeah, I would say um geeking out a little bit, Chris, taking the block data um once as you model schools, you it'll be clear what's walkable, you know, if this happens, you know, what in this boundary is walkable and what's not. I think those things have to be visualized

039for families to and for all of us to understand the ramification of these because again as closings coupled with a cost of transportation it's you know in some sense it's still a dollar amount we have to understand how both of those play together. So to your point, I think it is waiting where we can do some of the modeling, which I know y'all are doing, to then say what is the implication of if we just say, hey, we're going to do 1.5. It is what it is, 1.5. And then there's um um um hazards, well, what does that look like? So if you then want to get away from that and say, well, maybe let's not do that, then you do have to begin to understand those to me are optional uh costs. But I

040think the visualizing it, seeing it makes it real for what it means for different and it's going to impact different pieces of the city again as someone who lives in the fifth ward only seeing busing like what does it all of a sudden mean that you don't have busing there what does it mean for everything else. So seeing that visualizing that I think will help us you know understand the m the cost and the and the not just financial cost but the um uh physical cost of implementing something like this. I think one thing that I do want to be clear about that your comment made me think of as we if you as you may recall in the categories and criteria we're specifically paying attention to transportation cost and then students living beyond 1.5.

041>> It would be based on the volume of kind of work that we need to do on the modeling. It will be very difficult to model transportation costs in multiple different ways on top of bringing that for multiple different scenarios. So we will need I don't what that makes me think about is like it's difficult to intersect multiple decisions at the same time. We will need to land on one formula for modeling transportation costs and then it may be thinking about transportation a little bit separately because there's the math of the scorecards and the scenarios and then there is the decision making on transportation policy. If we try to put both of those together, that could get I think confusing >> and to be a lot. So, >> so can we spend some time thinking

042>> that would make I think it would make the scenario part of it cloudier. Can we can we engage in a conversation to figure out what we can do in ways that can be you know what can be useful in the standpoint you know so let's not promise some not modeling that just isn't plausible but let's think about what we can do to be able to say what that is so that we can talk to Melissa to say what is what can we think about being able to communicate um to families to help them help us understand these decisions go ahead >> I I just think it's impossible to even ask people before we know what school they're going to and we're going to ask them that question. You know, we're going to tell them

043what that is in December. And then we're going to have a whole slew of communications and conversations that need to happen after that. And people's opinions might change, right? So, let's say, for example, that block that's that's um that's zoned for Foster between Church and Emerson, right? between Dodge and and Ridge, right? They have to cross Emerson. Well, right now there's nowhere for them to cross. That's an ID dot hazard. And so, what are we going to build? Right? So, if I say to the if we say to those families, you want your kid to take a bus? Well, they're going to say yes today. And then we're going to say, well, there's going to be a crossing guard or a this or that. And then they're say, oh, that's okay. We'd rather walk. And

044so it seems like asking families about this now might just give us a false outcome. I mean, I think it's helpful to to just think about our discussion around the six points that are enumerated here. >> I think we talked about the crossing guards. We've talked a little bit about the trans the hazardous routes. There's, and I'm going in reverse order from our conversations, but the magnet and pro magnet programs, are we 100% clear that we that magnet programs are considered public schools and we would have to bus from more than 1.5 miles? Uh based on our legal counsel uh and the what they said is based on the plain language of the statute, it could be argued that if they live on or along a regular route that we would have to provide them

045transportation, but it's not explicitly in any school code. >> Okay. And I mean if they are along any road we they could just get on the bus. That's fine probably. Um Okay. And then transportation to afterchool programs. Just to clarify, we currently bust students to out of school programs like the Y. Um, and that's kind of up for discussion. >> Yeah. I would also say part of that I know part of that happened in the fifth war because you were having to bring kids, you know. So I think it's really interesting to look at the data now to see what we're doing this year or what you know what we would be doing next year if foster because some of that is the ramification of needing to do that because we were busing kids >>

046all over the city. >> Yeah. I think from a community perspective, like it probably is too early to ask like if you want a bus or not, but I think some of the considerations are definitely things that we could get, you know, some open-ended input about. So things like, you know, how cars factor into it, like do you want to be walkable? Like how does weather play into things? Um how do you feel about, you know, your student taking the bus? How long, you know, are you comfortable with them on a bus during it? like I think there are some there's some things that we can take into account as we're sort of having the discussion and I'd rather get that sort of input before we get too far down the path of making any

047decisions um than to get it later after we've sort of committed to things. >> I think to be able to kind of wrap this portion up, what are we what does the group see as next steps out of this particular topic for our team and for yourselves? >> Ask a question Stacy first. Uh would it be beneficial to the like SDRP committees or whatever to to have guidance on this for school closures and consolidations? >> The so for the facilities categories and criteria we made a decision and defined our criteria in a manner that we can move forward. >> Perfect. I think when we if we if the board votes for school closure, I do think it's important to have finalized transportation policy. So when families do find out potentially about a new school, they

048would also know whether transportation was provided. And isn't it I mean so maybe I'm the cost of transportation could mean whether you close or I mean is there is there a relationship between keeping the school open or you know reducing our transportation budget or is are those not uh conversations that need to happen? And so that's in my head I'm like, okay, well, we're saying we have to reduce our budget by X amount and there's ways to do that. School, there's all kinds of ways to do it. And so if we have a transportation, this is the transportation budget that we're going to work with versus we're going to pay for whatever the transportation is. How does, you know, to me there might be some overlap in those two. So to the point of looking

049at any school closures, you have to understand the transportation costs related uh to that. Um >> we will model using >> a set of assumptions >> transportation cost to impact in any scenario. >> Right. Okay. So is it then possible for us to have to say here's some north stars of where we want to go but then finalize that once we have more clarity around the scarc buildings and understanding the implications which is in September or something like >> the the plan for STRP theory right now is that we would bring a set of scenarios for you to review on September 29th >> and then we will go out to the community for feedback. back and we expect that to be an iterating process into November. >> Okay. >> And so, you know, I think

050it's important to understand that that will be a process and refine >> and then the transport. So can we so this is I guess I'm look both for you and can we say we're going to finalize we're going to finalize our transportation policy for moving forward in that period after seping and understanding hazards and everything we need to do so we come to those next conversations with more clarity of what options are but we will look at those together in terms of once we have understanding the cost of transportation So that potentially is the goal. Are there any particular next steps that need to be spoken here for us to understand before we move on to I think it's the next item >> who's whose work is it to understand the h so I think

051the trying to understand the a bus route is what 80,000 but then a crossing guard is 15. Um, so beginning to understand some of these cost. Um, and are we do we tell do we give families a route? So like look, we this is the route we need you to take because this is the safe passage route, right? We do that >> and I understand that there's been a lot of analysis on the routes >> recently >> and there are safe routes to school posted on the district website and the city has been doing quite a bit of work on the sidewalks around safe routes to school as well. >> Right. Right. So I think we have to do our work to understand what all the what are all the possibilities for each school in

052terms of you know um one keeping say making sure kids can get there safe but also trying to understand how to reduce uh the cost of that so we can you know hopefully >> and I and I think to guide I think to guide that work we should at least come to some consensus on the six questions that were answered as a foundation for the policy because we've had a chance to visit and revisit that and I think if we start there and say uh should we expand uh transportation well according to school code we we must so let's so I think if we get through get through that as a basis we can use that as a foundation to move forward >> to come up with a guideation here's our framing of how we

053want to do this going into that conversation. Okay. >> So, I think what I hear there's a couple ideas on the table. It sounds like we also just make sure you're locked down on the specific dollars for transportation and I think at a point we'll discuss there was some back and forth about whether to do the survey or not. So, we'll need some clarity on that in time. Um and I heard speaking to hey if school code around middle school we could probably start by understanding the financial impact of serving the students that are not yet covered based on that particular >> can we add to that just can we do the analysis on changing start times. >> So then there's a request about analyzing that if we flipped middle school and elementary start times

054whether there would be any cost savings. >> There's a couple reasons why. I mean, I've heard from many community members that, you know, around the school closure discussion that middle schoolers will pick up um elementary school kids. Well, it's that would that would be problematic if the middle school students are are getting out later. However, they would be able to drop them off at school in the morning and then continue on to school. And so, what what does what are those trade-offs? Not just from a cost perspective, but from, you know, are there any considerations we need to make with, you know, staffing and and that kind of thing. Are there obstacles that we need to consider if that's a viable option? >> So, the team will take a look at that. Tamara was nodding,

055so it seems like that's something that's feasible for us to do. >> Okay, Chris, thank you very much. >> Thank you. Appreciate it. Okay, moving on to the teaching and learning part of the agenda. Starting with the school work plans. I know that we got the memo. I don't know if there's any sort of presentation or if we should just jump into discussion and questions. jumping questions. >> Great. Okay. I have a general question before we begin, just this being my first time reading and understanding this process. um what kind of communication or what kind of engagement do does do each of the schools or does the administration have with the families of those uh with their families around what their goals are for for the school year? >> So part of the process is

056Dr. also asked this question. Part of the process too is that once these are all completed so this process started last night. >> Thank you. And to add to that, um, we really push our leaders to also engage street data. >> Use the mic. >> Oh, um, Dr. Turner, >> I think that was a delay. >> Oh, can we use the mic? >> I was >> You're okay. You are on the mic, Dr. McCoy. >> We really engage our leaders um to use street data. And so a part of that street data component is engaging their school communities as they are getting ready to revamp their school work plans. So they go back, they talk to their stakeholder groups, see what their thoughts and ideas were around the last school work plan they had so

057that they can also see what are some things they need to shift or continue working towards in the new school year. >> All right. I have Oh, go ahead. I have a few questions about the plan specifically and I just think this is so important because this is where it all happens and so um I think that that it's it's really good for us to hear about these and to understand the things that are going on at individual schools. Um so I will start with shoot uh so one of the things that you had Hello. >> Evening. >> Hello. >> All right. So, uh this is particularly exciting for me because you'll have my son this year, but uh >> sharpen your pencil. >> Yeah. Yeah. So, one of the things that you mentioned in

058your schoolwork plan that um I know that as a district that that we're trying to do more of is to um the integration of the high engagement instructional strategies. Uh and I I'd love to just hear some examples of like how we're engaging students or how we just work that in more because I think it is really important. >> Okay. Um hi, I'm Anna Schneider, the new principal at Shoot. Hi, I'm Ebony Dixon, assistant principal. >> So, we have um been working with AVID for the last three years. We're moving into our fourth year. So, that's been kind of the foundation of all of our work. Um if you're not familiar with AVID, AVID stands for advancement through via individual determination. and they have a whole system of strategies that they have us incorporate not

059only in our um elective classes but we've been on the journey over the last two years to try and incorporate them schoolwide. It's their wicker strategy. So writing, inquiry, reading, um collaboration and organization. And so last year we took um a step and said, "Okay, we're going to go to a binder system schoolwide." And so we launched that and had some really good success with that with kids. We've been working on focused notetaking. Um some additional things that we've done through wicker think pair shares. Um so Socratic seminars really to get kids into that inquiry um kind of learning. Claim evidence reasoning is a strong um thing across many of our classrooms. sentence stems to help kids kind of get get their thinking started to help support the way that they're writing. Um just analyzing

060text in different ways, getting into well what's the author's thoughts, beliefs, and ideas that they're trying to convey um reader response. And then what we're going to try and do this year is build on that with um one text for our whole staff. And so we're going to be um trying to add to their toolbox um through it's called 50 cognitive or 50 cognitive strategies to boost engagement and creative thinking in the classroom and it kind of parallels some of the work that some of our teachers did last year with building thinking classrooms. >> That's great. >> I noticed you also had the five essentials and a goal is to move up by 16 points. Can you speak a little bit about how you think about the five essentials and how you use it, the

061data from that to help you think about where you might go? >> Sure. So, last spring, um, kind of the stakeholder group that we chose to really engage with was our kids. Um, because our teachers have reported, hey, student agency is just a thing we're struggling with, really getting kids to try and buy into learning and doing school kind of in that postcoavid era. And so, um, we had kids take surveys about each of their classes and give us some some data about, you know, do you feel like you're being challenged in class? What's good about class? What are some things that if you could, you could change? So, the SIT team really dug into that this summer. And that's kind of what the the the basis of our schoolwork plan is. And then when

062the five E came out, that kind of solidified it. Um because the academic press has been historically neutral and we think the two things really tie together that if we can get kids to to buy in more to what learning is and the the different parts of learning that hey there is there's going to be some struggle in this and it's not quit and wait for somebody to give me the answer. It's how can I persevere and push through. >> Anything else for >> Thank you. Thank you. >> Thank you. >> Okay. Um, so my next question was for Orington, but if anyone else has questions, jump in. >> I have a question for Haven. >> Oh, okay. Good evening. >> Hello. Um so my question is in relation to the restorative practice goal >>

063um where you the goal is to reduce the number of incidents in branching mind. So do you have a breakout of where what what the trend is in terms of where there are more incidents and at what level and how is that going to inform your your goal? >> Majority of our incidents for the last couple years have been levels one, two or three. Um and so we're looking to reduce that number. Um, so that way we can have students engaged in the classroom and learning more frequently than not when they're, you know, out of the classroom dealing with someone from the front office or anything like that. So that's the focus for um the metric. >> And at the at the current what what you want to reduce the number of incidents by 5%.

064So do you think that's is that your acceptable goal or is that your stretch goal? >> That's a pretty ambitious goal. Okay. >> Yeah. >> All right. >> How does the number of incidents relate to other middle schools? I don't have any idea. >> That would be a good question. I don't work in the space of other schools, so that might be something that someone could have to follow back up on. >> So, can you go ahead? >> Okay. Um can you speak a little bit about the um the star student growth and the relationship between uh professional development uh for teachers particularly you know given teachers making some changes and how you're thinking about the professional development in line with um your goals around growth student growth. >> Yeah. So we have some strategies

065that are specific to that goal. You will notice that like we don't have a target yet because we're going to be using Star 360 and we wanted to wait till we get a baseline. the strategies that we're going to be using are pretty just best practices. We're going to make sure that we have win time that's embedded uh for math and reading uh as a means to kind of continue to support students who are in tier 2 and tier three in ways that we haven't been able to do before. So, um the wind time piece is a is a piece of I think Haven that we really want to focus on this year to make sure that we have better practices moving forward. I was um intrigued by the peacekeeper team creation for the se

066the peacekeeper. Yeah. And the seventh and eighth graders. I just wanted to learn a little bit more about what that was. >> Yeah. So the peacekeeper program is a is one that is a studentled program. So that's under the umbrella of our restorative practices. So um you know we've done a lot of work with the adults on the restorative practices side. And so this is our student component to that. So, um we'll be able to sort of deputize students uh to be peacekeepers and it's a program that we are um developing through uh some of the PD that we've done over the years with the AP. >> Thank you. >> All right. Um, so my question is for Orington. Um, and I noticed Oh, wait. Hello. >> Hi. >> All right. Um, so my question

067was about um the disproportionality and behavior incidents. Um, and I'm glad that that's something that you're like really focusing on and a goal to improve this year. Um, so I noticed that there was professional development and it seemed like a lot of the incidents was were happening like more in the cafeteria and outside of class time. >> Um, I was wondering for that is there also going to be more monitoring or involvement of like other building leaders or will it mostly be like professional development for staff? >> I'm glad you asked that question because the highle summary doesn't allow us to get into the nuance. Um, but we do have have a system in place for that. So branching minds as I'm sure you've read in the different reports people have is a level one

068through five based on our district behavior continuum. There's also a level zero. So we have been using the level zero to track intentionally um a number of students that already have behavior intervention plans but um you know kids grow and change all the time and they're they outgrow their plans and they need you know so the level zero isn't reported to the states um but it is included in your aggregate data. So while we had about 236 overall incidents K through five, about 52 of them were level zero. And that's our intentional monitoring that we take to our MTSS meetings, which is multi- um tiers systems of support for all of our students to make sure that we are able to see if there are any patterns in their behavior that need additional support. Are

069there certain things that are triggering them? Um are we setting them up to fail? like what barriers are um in the way that maybe we need need to remove where we can support them better. So that is that is a piece of it that is embedded in our process. >> That's great. Okay. >> Yeah. I think that's something important for us to watch and learn from. Ethan >> question >> I just I thought that it was um I liked your the core phonics benchmark the goal number three. Where are you starting from? >> I'm sorry. The goal was by spring of 2026 that 80% of students in K through2 would meet the core phonics end of year benchmark. >> So this year we had about 83% of our students met it. I think our focus

070for us really going into this school year is early intervention K2. It's really really key that we are monitoring closely um in all spaces but specifically in that space because any gaps that we see early we want to make sure we close or don't exacerbate over time. So, you know, when you're looking at MTSS, you want 80% of your students to, you know, engage highly in the tier one curriculum. And we just want to make sure that we we keep that benchmark where it is because we don't want to lose sight of the fact or we don't want to take for granted that 83% of our students um were able to reach oral proficiency. We really want to keep that as as a high bar um and a north star for us. So, that's why

071we we uh continue to use that goal this year. >> Thank you. >> All right. Thank you. Nicholls. >> Questions for Nicholls. >> Okay. >> Good evening. >> I'm Miss Fishman. I'm the principal. This is Miss Brunson, my assistant principal. How are you? Thank you. Um one uh thank you for um very thorough um and can you speak a little bit? So I have two questions. One around just better understanding for me building thinking classrooms and how the strategy you're using with that you know to focus on increasing your I AR uh scores. >> Sure. So with building thinking classrooms it's um a instructional framework and it's essentially mapped out throughout the year with professional development. So, for example, the first nine weeks um is lowhanging fruit. So, it's something called, for example, vertical alignment

072where students have space around around the classroom and they're doing instruction that's vertically um appropriate to them. Um it's flexible grouping where the groups change randomly each day. Now, this is also just for clarification, this is during their core time because we do something different during the win time. So during the core time they're doing their random grouping um instead of for example a teacher answering the question directly they would probe further they would say that's a great question can you tell me more about what your question is can you tell me more about what you're asking about can you ask a classmate so versus just directly answering the question to give students agency and ownership over answering the question developing that capacity um in addition to uh doing those sorts of things eventually it

073leads up to scaffolding within the questions which is very important for math. As you can see, math is our one of our goals. So, the ability to flexible and scaffold their answers and their responses is going to be critical for them to learn that skill. So, those are the some of the parts to building thinking classrooms. And it's also um it's a it's an ideology of way of thinking about instruction. Um, and it's really about getting the students to think deeper rather than handing over the answer because learning is about being able to figure out the process to get to the solution versus being given the solution. And I think for for a lot of kids in this generation, it's a microwave generation, right? They we give them the answer, we we give them exact,

074you know, everything is quick, fast, and so they're losing that skill set. So this is something that's really critical within the building thinking classrooms framework and so that's why we're using it with math particularly and then our goal I'm sorry and then our goal is to ultimately lend that um framework across all content areas because math does not exist in isolation every content area supports and uplifts math. And so with our math teachers being a pilot group for this instructional framework ultimately we'll be able to carry that with the rest of our teachers across content areas. And are we only doing it in Nickels or is building other places? I should >> build thinking classrooms and Katie you want to speak to it. Go ahead. >> Building classrooms and teaching and learning stuff they can

075talk about. We also presented last year it is being rolled out across the district and I also are leading these efforts and I think if you want to really go deep into those questions we can we can do that in your presentation. The last thing I um in the deconstructing math instruction for racial equity really want to highlight and and hear you speak a little bit about the intentionality of the lunch groups and the black sunrise um and those types of uh relationships you're bringing in to try to sort of do wraparound and making math matter. Um well, first I would like to give credit to Miss Brunson because she did um find the framework. Um when we looked at how our performance was happening across the board, we noticed that obviously there was an

076issue with our African-American students. So I'm want to credit Miss Brunson for doing that. So I'll speak a little bit about it and then I'm also going to allow Miss Brunson to speak on it as well. Um I think the important thing is is to recognize why students aren't performing. Um, and so with this particular area, um, with our African-American students, for example, there's four reasons typically. Um, teacher expectation, are we expecting our students to be able to learn? Um, pedagogical knowledge, um, as far as how to reach students um, within their community, how to reach students within the basis of their identity and their framework, and then looking at the stereotype thread. So, I don't want to seem smart. I don't want to seem like I know the answers particularly for girls. This is

077an area of concern in math. And then finally the opportunity gap. So are we reaching the opportunities to get students interested in math so that they see that it relates to them so that it see that that they see that it relates to their interests. So when we look at all four of those areas we targeted our SWP goals to reach each one of those areas. So, for example, with the pedagogical knowledge, we've done work with our teachers on how to identify bias within instruction and we'll continue to do that. Um, as far as the stereotype threat in math, we are working with our math teachers to be intentional about grouping during win time and about using algebra excite to address some of the students that are in this group that we know we need

078to reach. Um and then as far as the opportunity gap um this aligns completely with our SEAL um goals as you can see with um academic press and academic personalism um building student capacity um building student capacity to have advancement within the course themselves and then also developing that relationship with their teachers because without that relationship there's no learning and that that's just a fact. Um and I'm also going to have Miss Brunson to share because again I want to give her credit because she was the one who found this framework for us. Miss Bronson, >> good evening. Um the framework that I found is equitable from equitablemath.org and it's really um the way that I have it broken down to um give to our staff this year is through our PLC's. um really looking

079at different um components each month like first who are my students and really reflecting on do we really know who they are and what they bring to the classroom and not just their scores but their story and then how am I teaching them like how did I learn math versus how am I teaching math how am I dismantling the power structure within my classroom making sure that our students have ownership and our students are able to access the curriculum that we're teaching them just really looking every month um at different areas to make sure that we are bridging ing the gap. Um I'm a former middle school math teacher and I know our students come with a lot of gaps um when they come into middle school. So making sure that we're bridging the gap,

080getting to know our students so that we're targeting um giving them the instruction that they need at their level and also rising them up to the expectations. >> Is that for sixth, seventh, and eighth graders? >> Yes, ma'am. >> Are there any other questions? Thank you. >> Thank you. >> Um I had a question for Willard as well about building thinking classrooms. I don't know if you want to sort of add to um what they're doing and and just sort of how you're implementing it at Willard specifically. That would be great. Hey y'all. I'm Chloe Battle. I'm the principal at Willard. State your involve assistance. >> All right. Um so in thinking about um our school work plan this year, one of the things that we really wanted to focus on was really grounding ourselves

081and our team in some instructional priorities. One of those instructional priorities has been building thinking classrooms. Um, so with the help of Sonia last school year, we were really in an exploration year of BTC. So we had some teachers that were part of the building thinking classrooms book club. Um, and then we had some of our team members sort of sprinkled across the building really trying the performance task that are from building thinking classrooms. Um, and thinking about our professional learning plan for the year and thinking about our priority goals. Um, one of the things that we're really implementing this year with BTC is just really doing it with fidelity and doing it really well. Um, and so as we're thinking about kind of aligning it to what what it looks like in middle school,

082it's really an opportunity for our students to have autonomy um, in their learning. It defronts the classroom. So traditionally we see our teachers at the front being the ones that are just delivering instruction, but the shift to building thinking classrooms practices and mindsets um really is that our teachers are facilitating the learning and that our students are doing the heavy lifting and really ensuring you know rigorous instruction. So >> that's great. Thank you. Yeah. Any other questions? I just think this is so important and I I know I'm asking a lot of questions about this topic, but I think that it's so important for us to understand and you know just this is this is the direction we need to be moving in given the skill sets that our students will need to be successful

083in the future. So very happy to see um sort of work taking place >> trying to build critical thinkers like you know it's a really dope thing to see. So I really welcome y'all to our buildings. You know, I can speak for Willer. I welcome y'all to my building to come and see it in action. It's really cool. So, >> yeah. >> Thank you guys. >> All right. So, I know Bessie Rose isn't here. So, ah, King Arts, I guess going along this theme of uh student focus. Hello. >> All right. So, one of the things you talked about in your work plan were um just elevating student voice opportunities. And I'd love to hear more about ways that you were going to do that. >> Yeah. Um absolutely. So, a few of the ways

084that we want to do that are um first we want to amplify student voice by taking more uh surveys. So, our culture and climate team is um planning to implement student surveys three times throughout the school year. So, once per trimester to get some of that feedback. Um, additionally, we are going to be doing some more student council partnership with admin. Um, so more routine meetings and check-ins as part of like a monthly schedule and cycle. Um, we're also planning for our student council um representatives to be leading some of our pep rallies that we do um throughout the trimester. So getting student feedback about how they want to participate in that, how they want to be celebrated, recognized, um all of those pieces. And then um we're really focusing on goal setting and reflection

085both with staff and modeling that with staff and having that roll into classrooms as well. So uh with the goal of students leading conferences in the spring, so student led conferences um being one of our targets for spring parent teacher conferences. Is that new? Will that be new? >> Yeah, that'll be new. We've never done that. Um, but we would like students to have more voice and ownership and really be able to speak to the goals that they set for themselves and how they are achieving that. >> Can you talk a little bit about the peer-to-peer support for academics? >> Yeah, I think that's been an area that uh we saw a dip in this year. And so it's interesting because we saw student teacher trust increase but then their interactions with one another not

086necessarily go up right like that that went down. So um we want to build some of that is um some of that we want to target through the goal setting and the reflection like how am I showing up to this space? How am I contributing to the classroom? And how are we building that collective responsibility in the classroom? So those are definitely things we want to target this year. So that relates more to how students work together within the class. >> Correct. Yeah. It's about So some of the questions within that and where our survey will be parallel is like my my classmates think it's important to do well in class. So like we've kind of picked apart what those survey items are on the five essentials that reflect that data and created a parallel

087survey that students will be taking throughout the year. So we can kind of get a real live um feedback from the kids. >> Being a certified U magnet school, what implications or impact does it have on what your work plan might be or professional development? >> I think leading up to this school year, um programming coherence was a big piece of what we were trying to do in terms of our school work priorities. um moving forward and for the next five years anyway until we have to reertify a lot of what our goal will be with will be around like how are we integrating the arts into everything the students are doing. And so one thing that we've done uh for the upcoming school year is adjust scheduling so that our fine arts teachers are

088able to be on a rotation um and pushing into classrooms more often. Um, we also have kind of modified the way we're doing our sixth grade advisory to incorporate a fine arts um, social justice component so that students are working that into um, like a project that will be concluded throughout that um, that section of their advisory. >> Yeah. >> Thank you. Okay. So, my final questions were for JH, our babies. >> The babies. >> Good evening everyone. I'm Nisha Parm, the director of early childhood programs. And >> I'm Jesse Black, the assistant director of operations. Great to see you. Okay. Um so in your uh school work plan you mentioned the elevated social emotional needs which we know is is something that you know we're really dealing with right now. Um and just wanted

089to understand like how have you been ma managing those needs? How do you sort of see that going forward especially given like the elevated um requirements and needs the students are having when they come to you? >> Okay, great question. Um overall we've noticed you know the uptick in our needs for social emotional. However, what we've decided to do is we're going to zone in specifically on those um areas through our teaching strategies. So through a wonderful grant through tier um no through title two funds we were able to take a team of nine of us to a conscious discipline training where we are able to go and build capacity and learn more strategies that we plan to implement within the classroom this school year and through by that we plan to be intentional and

090making sure that we have visuals consistent through all of our classrooms. A lot of times you see that mostly in our self-contained classrooms. We're going to be intentional in having those visuals throughout all of the classrooms because we do notice and we see that being a benefit for the students in all classrooms as well as making sure that we have like calm down tools for all of the students um throughout all of the spaces. We want to continue to build the capacity um through our professional development through my school instructional team. So, when we're having our building meetings um this year, we will make sure that we are um the team that I took with me, we are actually teaching one another and going into each other's spaces and making sure that we're doing that

091trauma-informed care, positive behavior supports, as well as inclusive practices for all of the students. And we are going to continue collaborating with all of our staff throughout the building to ensure we have those individualized tools, not specifically just for all of the students, but for those students specifically that need that support, we'll have individualized tools for them like visual aids specifically for them and to support their needs. As well as um calm down kits specifically made for each of those children. And Miss Block's been working as well. >> Yeah. And another um big ongoing project we're working on is tightening up our MTSS pro process particularly how it relates to SEAL goals. It's a little bit more cleancut when it comes to other academics. But when we're looking at responding to the needs and how

092we can make sure that we are making database decisions and what data we're looking at to make those MTSS decisions and then what we're doing with that. That's a process that we're really working to to clean up and tighten up and make sure that all teachers are equipped to respond to tier 2 students and the tier 2 needs in their own classroom and not making that um necessarily a special education effort. >> Okay, that's great. On here you talk about family engagement. Um can you say a little more about your strategy and practices around family engagement particularly around the social emotional? Yes, actually the team um my school improvement team um were leading um some training specifically for those parents to help with emotional regulation as well as with the big focus on screen time

093um and the development of screen time. So, we're really going to focus in on that and, you know, encourage families to actually engage with the children, not with screen, but taking them outdoors and having um those opportunities to build um friendships and things of that nature with other students and other just children their age at different parks. So definitely >> I I applaud the return to conscious discipline because I know what a difference that makes as everybody will be on the same page. >> Yes. >> Um there's a mention in here about staff collaboration a 30 minute protected block per trimester. It seems kind of um seems like it be could be more robust. So can you talk to how how you're going to manage that and and bring it into fruition? >> Yes. So

094that was a goal that came up in our five essentials report um where it was 49% of our staff that's our uh paraprofessional team. They I really feel as though it came from their voice and not really having that collaborative time with teachers um with their educators. So, we want to really be intentional this year and making sure we block off that time where they can be with their educators and we can all learn and partner together and be in a collaborative setting because they are a big part of our team. They help make JH run. Without them, we wouldn't be able to do the work that we do. >> Do they have have time on a daily basis to do that or because I I'm familiar with the classroom. So why was this time

095specifically set aside? What? >> Sure. >> So that time specifically, I know um with our half day classrooms, it's much easier to ensure team collaboration because they do have time in between the morning and the afternoon session. Our full day classrooms are much harder because in order to get the whole team, so all of the paras and the special ed teacher and the lead teacher, um there has to always be somebody obviously with the students. So finding that time is that that area that we want to target with making sure that we are being very intentional about letting those getting those full day classrooms an opportunity to make sure that we're meeting all together with them. >> I just wanted to ETA negotiations is directly connected to the timing that's laid out in their contract.

096This is a conversation. We're extending our session because we're very involved. I met with Jesse last week just to really hear our voice of the team. So I could bring that to the table in terms of how we can find that time. So the 30 minutes is probably directly connected to what that contract time is right now and us. >> Thank you. Okay. >> Okay. >> I think if Yeah, that is it for questions around. Do you have one more? >> Well, I have more of like a systemwide cover now that we've heard some wonderful things from our schools and look forward to hearing from the other schools. Um, I'm a new board member, so I'm going to lean on that real hard right now. Um, and just say I' I've struggled with it. How

097do we relate to these as a board? Uh because our job is the system. Um so we've heard these, you know, fantastic visions, but very particular to each of our sites. Um and um right, there's a beauty. I love, right, the visioning in these, right? We're we're we're we're stepping out. We're casting a vision and we've got direct means of accountability to see if we achieve those. Um, but then what the piece that I'm kind of missing is um how does that fit into a district-wide plan? What's where's our districtwide work plan? Um, that we can then kind of all this connects straight down from our vision. So that that's I'm I'm trying to figure my way here and I it feels like there's some missing pieces that we have room to kind of flesh

098out some more. I don't know if that raises reactions. Um, and the other question I do, real question is, do we share these out? This seems like this would be a really good thing to put up on the website. Um, you know, we're casting our vision. We're saying we're going to here's how we're going to be accountable to this. >> These are shared out through like through family participation, back to school nights, um, the conversations. Also, all of these goals roll up to the academic department goals. So, if there's an goal, we have an academics departmental goal. So each of the eight directors I have and those will be presented in next week's presentations. All these roll up into our smarty goals. So and also evaluations for both my team and even for the school

099leaders are based in school work plans. Yeah. >> So it's it there's there's a continuing you know it starts here and rolls down but it starts here and rolls up and it's this ongoing conversation around this. >> Yeah. look forward to seeing those and I I it's just an area I'm conscious of as we lean into, you know, further growing into effective strategic planning and then also sharing that out with the public. >> Um I'll just look forward to seeing those. >> So in that sense, um any work any SWP plan that's been presented here has gone through a process with you and and your team. We did outline that in your board questions, but so really like we start in April and um the school teams meet with their their sit teams. Um they

100have conversations with their sit teams and also it's not like they don't create this in a vacuum. It's taking a look at here's what if you notice in the the plans now it's like okay we're going to reflect backwards and how are we going to move forward but it's also in conjunction with both schools management teaching and learning multilingual our IEES team like whatever their goals are we are not do nothing's going to be in a vacuum because it's all connected >> yeah and I think I mean it was great to have our uh school leaders here today because you know so much of so much of what happens in this district is because of you so appreciate you h having you here and walking through your plans. And I'll say, you know, each one

101of our schools is different. And so that's why it's sort of it's so important to have like an individual school plan because our leaders are looking at that and and able to see what their school needs to get to the goals that we've set. And so it was really encouraging hearing tonight how that all fits together and the work that you're doing at your individual. >> So I'm going, you know, be like Andrew and ask a newbie question. The assumption is all of these also the the deck the teachers in the building have um or they helped to create this as well. Right. >> Right. It would be be you know I think beneficial to sort of see a teacher up here also with a uh with the school leaders when these are presented because

102it is in essence a a relationship between the administration and the teachers to move this uh move this work forward. Um, and oftentimes I don't think we get to see teachers as much in that and be interesting to see if that's possible. >> I think one thing to note, teachers do commit extra time to work on these teams, but we are still out and so they are on the summer and so as we hear about some of this work as the school year goes on, we might hear from some teachers. >> This is also part of ongoing staff meetings, things like that. I mean, this these are transparent and and we have very very good school leaders who ensure the transparency in these goals. And I think what we want to do is say thank

103you to our school and tell them. >> Yeah, that was not a just to say that wasn't a it's just like you know just seeing I like to see the whole community together in that sense but phenomenal work. Thank you. >> Thank you leaders. Feel free to leaders. You can >> we worked really hard and last week was revitalization week and we put in extremely long days of work. So I want to >> thank you happy hour. Thank you. >> Okay. So, our next item is the teaching and learning presentation. >> Good evening. Um, my name is Regina Colquit. I started in the district in 1994. I'm saying that clearly. Um, as a seventh grade ELA teacher over the time at shoot, I was an ELA teacher, department chair for social studies and literacy, as

104well as an iPad instructional coach. Um, and then I held several roles districtwide. I've been a new teacher mentor as well as the um humanities content facilitator, literacy content facilitator and then um last year the director of social sciences. >> Hi everyone, I'm Sonia Radak Krishnan, the director of steam and I started in education in 2001 as a seventh grade math teacher in the city and then I've been in curriculum writing and work with University of Chicago and have been a math specialist in the city. I started here in Evston in 2010 um as a title one math coach in our title one schools and then became um a STEM content facilitator and then now I'm the director of steam here. So I've been here 14 years now in the district. So today, Sonia and

105I are going to talk to you all about the instru introduce you to our instructional framework for district district 65 and we're going to give you our update for SBG learning. So last year our teaching and learning team completed an instructional leadership reality check and we noted a couple of things. We noticed that we had adopted um high quality instructional materials or curriculum um for science, math and ELA. And each one of them came with their own specific content driven practices. So we acknowledged with these materials, it was time for us to take a granular view on what we would lift up as in instructional practices across the content areas. And so we had to come up with like why do we want an instructional framework from this? Um we've lifted up eight points of

106reasons why we would want an instructional framework. Um one being that we needed a very clear definition of what we meant by standards aligned highquality instruction that would anchor us across our entire system. We also wanted to combat the whiplash of initiatives on educators. Um so we understood that a framework when um properly rolled out and implemented and supported it would be something we would live with for multiple years in excess. It could we broke down five years initially but we could see ourselves living in it longer than that. And then finally um it supports guiding a district in building professional learning um where we can specifically see where sit teams and SWP plans and um the work that we do as teaching and learning how it can help anchors all in one straight view

107like you all were just discussing like where does this all connect? So over our time, oh I'm sorry. So one example we the reason why we really leaned is one of the things we saw from Nichols and I believe it's Orienton that lifted up um building thinking classrooms and we saw the impact of one content area leaning into one instructional framework. And so we valued the view of looking at collaborative groupings and how they were fostering student autonomy. We saw evidence of it across our system and so we started thinking about how that could also impact us if we centered ourselves across all the contents in a particular framework. So we did tons of reading podcasts. We dug in some into a lot of pieces and we ended up leaning into this teaching for equity

108workbook. This quote came from it. No one teacher can do this work alone. To transfer beliefs, practices, and outcomes, teachers need resources for personally and systematically. Working together, these strands foster excellence and equitable learning experiences and outcomes for every student. And so we acknowledge that in order for you could hear for us to hear these schoolwork plans that are rooted in some strong instructional practices in order for educators to have professional learning at their building sites as well as at the district office that we would need something to help support and anchor us all. And so there are three there are three areas of work that our framework lifts up. The three are curriculum standards, relationships and community building and then finally instructional practices. We have eight um content agnostic high impact practices that we've

109lifted up and each one of those practices has a series of three or five look fors and look fors meaning actionable practices that if you walked in the room you would be able to see and identify easily. Um so as you see our slides you'll see one of the um practices highlighted in yellow and those identif those are identified as three of the practices that we as a teaching and learning team um will be focused on this year. Noting that again not causing um impact of whiplash or overwhelming educators and in shifting practice that we would be very focused and look at these p three pieces. We selected these three because they support something we're already lifting up which is standardsbased grading and learning. Sorry. So this first area on curriculum standards focuses on um

110how um gives makes ensures that students all learners have access to grade level instruction but they are also given the scaffolds a possible on-ramp if I am a diverse learner. And so we lifting up that as a major practice. The second practice deals with looking at relationships and building community and say that in when an educator um communicates strong belief in student success saying that you too can do hard things then students are they change their productive mindsets and they are more apt to be successful in being academic minded students. Our third area focuses on instructional practices. And so when we're looking at uh practice number 11, we're talking about how students have on or take on that cognitive lift. And I believe the Nicholls team spoke to this directly when you talk about building

111thinking classrooms. This sits directly inside of this particular uh practice. So when students are are doing the load and the teacher is standing back and allowing them to construct their own understanding and to grapple with the question and or leaning on another student then we could see the lift um um we could see them their cognitive load and them centering it themselves. >> Just to clarify because building thinking classrooms came up earlier and you all had a lot of questions and we can start speaking to the mic. >> Sorry. Um since building thinking classrooms came up before and you had some questions. I just want to give you a high level some context with that. We can always talk about the details later. Um it is a framework from professor um Peter Liladal and it

112has 14 practices in all. Now we are focusing on five. Um we've been doing this work for a year and a half now and I've seen all these years that I've been doing professional learning and working with teachers and coaching. This is something that is catching on like fire with both students and with teachers and they're seeing immediate impact like the next day. So this has got a lot of potential in getting our kids engaged. It came from the space of where teachers were honest with coaches and people like myself to say the kids are they could be more engaged. I don't know what else to do. I'm doing the work and they're doing the work. How do I get them to take more more ownership? And we've trying we're trying to coach teachers into

113who's doing the talking is the one who's learning. So how do we shift that practice? And this gives them something very concrete beyond the vision and the philosophy and that you know that idea. How do you actually put it into practice? So to give you a the context of five out of the 14 that we're focusing on three go together. You cannot do them in isolation. They have to happen together. One is random group. So literally they're randomizing software. So you give them a card when they come in. Whoever is in your group of three, that's your group that day for the task. It changes every day. So, you get to work with different people different times. No one's excused from doing the thinking and the work. Cuz what happens is, and I did this

114too as a teacher, I had groups of four. One always slacks off. That's what the research says now. Um, and then you get very comfortable with your group and you know who's doing what and Sonia's always going to answer the question, so I'm not going to do the work. So, you don't know who's in your group for a while and you get the different variety of people. So everybody is on the hook for thinking. So that's your random group. And then the non permanent vertical surfaces. So we are fitting a lot of our classrooms with either white charts or those white boards. So when you stand up and work, there is medical research around this. Your blood is flowing. We know that they're more engaged than sitting. So this gives them chance to get up

115and do the task with their group and talk. And there are these rules about the marker. If I have the marker, I can't talk. So on and so forth. So everybody gets a turn. And there are moves teachers can make to move the marker around to so if I'm the person who talks all the time, my teacher will give me the marker. So I need to let my colleagues talk. So it's very subtle and it's very beautifully done and it's very practical. Um so that was number two and tasks that are worth about thinking about. So we start with non-curricular tasks and I'm happy to do one with you all later. It'll be a lot of fun. And then we took our um tasks that are in the curriculum and modified it for teachers. And

116how do you consolidate? There's a specific way to consolidate the lesson. The teachers do it with the kids. And then what questions you answer, you heard other principles say that. If it is a thinking question, let them think about it. Put it back on them. If it's a clarifying question, you can answer. So don't jump in to help them. So that's what that is about. And that really hits what we're trying to do with our instructional practices in the framework. >> Okay. So then now we've clarified what what we're doing and um and possibly uh the thinking behind why we're doing it. Um now I want to talk to you about our process. And so we have again identified those three to five looks and basically we've created a tool for example high impact practice

117number four. You see these look fors provides guided student practice. Introduces organi organizing tools purposely assigns collaborative groups and scaffolded tasks. So those are actionable things that you can see when you walk in for a walkth through. We are organizing ourselves into we have already organized ourselves into principal PLC's and our academics team and we will be going into classrooms um a few times a month looking at it across our system. This data will help us to better support or clearly support our professional learning at the site level but also at the district level. We're going to switch gears and talk about standard space grading updates for you. So there are three things we want to do today. one is uh talk about the successes and challenges what we learned from that this last year

118and what changes we're making uh based on that and then share some next steps how we're going to roll this out. Okay. So what did we learn? We learned a few things when we moved from a 100% you know point scale um that we used in the past to report to actually using standards and rubrics and reporting. it was more accurate um picture of where the kid is in their learning and and the feedback was better for them to make some improvements on that. We also saw that among teachers who are using rubrics and talking to colleagues if I gave an exceeds someone else also gave the same thing. If I gave you also gave the same thing because you used a rubric and it wasn't all over the place. So it was more interrator

119reliability was there and the best part was when we pulled an alignment with our I results unlike in the past where there was grade inflation and we did not quite match when we were giving A's and B's they were not meeting or exceeding now as you see from the chart it is much tighter with what we are doing we did this past year to how they did in AR which none of our educators nor us none of us expected to see that and right there even with the bumps and the challenges our educators did a phenomenal job and came through and it's right there. The proof is right there. So that was very encouraging for us. Now what we also noticed you Oh, thank you Virginia. What we also noticed were some challenges. Parents had

120a hard time understanding interpreting what a PR for progressing meant or me. For me it's like what does that mean? I don't know what that is. I've never seen this before. Our progressing category if you notice here compared to IR is a little too broad. So we had a lot of kids while they were all progressing it was not more specific to say where you are in that progressing band. So that was a real challenge. Um and also insufficient evidence we had that category which is like a zero and that was interpreted very differently between different educators and buildings and grades. They were not sure what to do with that. Power school is a bit of a challenge. It's not set up for standardsbased grading reporting. So that there was some challenges for parents with

121actually reading the report cards in there. All right. So based on what we learned, what are we keeping and what's changing, right? So we are keeping the grading practices we have. We are keeping our rubrics. We want to separate the learning habits and academic measures because it's not fair to say because you're per behaving a certain way, your grade should be less than what you're actually showing me what to do, right? So we're going to keep them separate and we're going to continue to report by domains. I'll talk in a minute what I mean by that with an example. We are going to use summitative assessments like we always have for 85% of our grades and then whatever class work collaboration practice the teachers are giving. So so kids take that seriously and complete that

122and do the work and show that they're working in class for 15% of their grade. So we don't lose that domains. When we talk about domains and literacy, it's reading lit, reading info, writing, speaking and listening, language, math. This is a sixth grade example, ratio, proportions, number system, expressions, equations, etc. So, they want in the past we had math, you got an A or a B. How helpful is it to me to know where I'm doing well or not? Right? But if you say the number system, you're meeting standards, but when it comes to geometry, you're progressing. So, I know that I have to work on geometry, but my number system is pretty solid. I know that. So that's specific. So we're keeping that. That's what we mean by reporting by domain. So this is

123a comparison of what we did this past year. You see the ex MEPR that was throwing people off. They were not able to read it for parents. So the new will have the A B C D that they're familiar with and they see it. But our teachers will use a four-point scale because we don't want to slip back to the 100 point system and that old mindset. But they will see the A. parents will see the ABCD with the 43210. Um K5, just as an FYI, they'll see the 43210. There is no letter grades. It wasn't an issue for them. They're not asking for it. Um so we're leaving it as it be. So this is for the academic indicators alone. Now for um learning habits, which I said we're separating, we're going to keep

124it separate. The three domains prepares to learn, engages, and takes initiative to learn remain. they were fine the way we had it this year. Homework became a big issue with with our middle schoolers especially. Um so we're calling that out separately as a learning habit. Uh not to like impact their grade. We don't want to do that but we still want to say hey are you making an effort? Are you doing this? Um how are you performing? >> Keep going. Keep going. Okay. Um and the other change we're doing is the descriptors were the same as academics like meeting exceeding. It doesn't make sense if you think about it. These are behaviors. So you want to report the frequency. So how consistently you're doing this sometimes rarely and it's easy for parents to know what

125that is and kids know what that is because they were confused what meeting in a learning habit meant. So those are the changes that are coming up which we hope will help our parents and our students as well as our educators. Our timeline and roll out our next steps. Update our website add FAQ sections for parents to understand the changes. use our fast five, provide guidance to schools for the back to school nights and parent teacher conference times, provide specific feedback. Again, that's another time to hit parents and help them understand and also continually throughout the year work with school leaders and our educators during our half days, during our institute days to help them understand and navigate this as questions come their way and we find our way through the system. Questions? >> I

126have one. Um, one of the pieces of feedback that we've heard about um, standardsbased grading and I is is around sort of, you know, kids want to know where they are. So, I think you've done a nice job of of communicating words into numbers. What was your Can you put up for example just like the crosswalk >> right there? Yeah. Um what what was your thinking around making an a meeting versus extending? >> So so now there is no way to you know >> that's a really good question extending >> which is some people call it exceeds um >> from the experts as well as from our teachers. Uh we heard a lot of challenges with the exceeds and extending because really what does that mean exceeding what like grade level standards is what we

127want everyone to go up to and also giving them something extra to do or challenge like we need to have a robust system to do that. Um so it didn't seem fair at this time to continue to have that because it was being done very inconsistently across the district. So that was irrational but that's a really good question. >> Yeah. >> So the dog ate my homework. um how does a teacher effectively assess effort to complete homework the or the the strong effort to complete homework. I'm just curious how you even assess that. >> Part of the issue we had and we heard this a lot from educators. We heard this quite a bit from parents is that because they were listed as practice and it wasn't actually quote graded that kids were not doing

128it and they saw no value in it. So we understand they're middle school students. You have to put some skin in the game. So there's 15. It is um the the 15%. So the 85 and the 15% that's homework, but it's also a learning habit. It's a behavior. Are you actually completing like your practice? Are you participating in CL? And it's not participation, but it's more like am I engaged in my classroom? That's a learning habit. So that's and and if you look at I can't see on the the deck up there, but if you look, it's like consistently sometimes, and rarely. So if if we have a student who's just not doing anything, the learning habit for them is going to be I'm rarely making an effort. >> Okay. So it's more it's less

129the effort though and more you can actually see what's submitted. >> So it's it's a little bit of both. Yes. >> Okay. Okay. Okay. >> Want to say I I really appreciate the presentation and how you're you made visible your thinking around this. Any move to standardsbased grading, no one's going to get it right the first version, multiple years. and you could tell that you're how you're thinking about it is you're tuning what's going on and and able to explain it. I'm um really curious about the uh Melissa the communication of this to families and how we can you know do that in a way if you go back one slide um like definitely the learning habits but the yeah I think this is to your point the language is like okay this is everyday

130language I would even say go to the churches ways in which we can um you know get people to you know say this is year two let's you know let's keep going with this but I really commend y'all to to the whole team in in terms of you know I can like oh I can have a conversation around this. I will I am I will say to the piece of the extending the standards I and the meeting are you saying that so we so what do we do if students are meeting they come in meeting >> are we saying we're not we we're not extending >> we we do offer um enrichment tasks and opportunities for them in class during win time >> to work on that to go deeper and I think in common

131you can note that. But in terms of grading, I think it's really challenging when we say in like novel and complex situations. It's not clear what that is. So, >> no, the comment section. That's good. >> And and real quick, one of the things we also recognize is the value of a school-based community organization. So, we will also work with school leaders and and with educators to ensure that both parents and students have a clear understanding of this because we want kids to be able to own this. And I think that's a real key to all of this is if I'm a sixth to eighth grade student, I can explain this to my parents. >> And the other one, the last one is I'm a coach, right? And so I have girls on my team,

132FAM coach. And I think even communicating this in a way to many of the organizations that are working metia working with kids when we get to progress, understanding what is it might mean for progress reports when you can have those conversations with them. I've been amazed when I sometimes like now let's think about sports compared to schools. we can get them to have those conversations. So I do think getting this to stick thinking about some of those organizations that they're engaging understanding this. >> Yeah. Thank you. >> One one thing just in a from a framing that really helped me understand standardsbased grading and why it was important for for us to move in this direction is that you know you can accumulate a bunch of points and still get the grade. I think you

133said this a little bit, but it but you may not grasp all of the concepts. >> And so this breaks down and takes away that point-based uh grading and really assesses whether the the skill has been learned. >> Yeah. >> And that that framing for me is, you know, a perennial overachiever was really helpful. >> Thank you. >> In addition, a four-point scale, you can come back from a zero >> pretty easily. you can hand it in. In a 100 point scale, 0 to 60 is failing, >> right? >> And you're set up for failure. So that's why I think this really empowers students, right? >> Yeah. I think the communication piece is really important because, you know, all parents want their kids to get A's, all kids, all parents want their kids to get

134fours. And so, you know, understanding why in some cases, you know, kids aren't shouldn't be penalized for getting a two and partially meeting in a specific area is going to be a really critical conversation between the educator and the parent, I think. >> Yeah. So, it doesn't become another system that you're trying to gain to get the points. Yeah. >> Yeah. >> Dynamic duo. >> Any additional questions? Thank you very much. >> Thank you. >> So, we have a just a request as to whether we could possibly shift the order of the agenda to move 5D and 5e forward. Uh because we have a speaker waiting. >> Adila, is that possible? >> Yep. So if no one objects, we'll move 5D and E, which are the pre- audit actual performance of FY25 and the tenative

135uh FY26 budget to now and then push the SAP 3 SDRP and foster school agenda items to the end. Okay, Tamara. >> All right, >> your show. >> Thank you. Um Dr. Gy, if you would like to come up to the podium. Um, and thank you all for switching that agenda around so we can uh get Dr. Grossy presenting for us and then have him go on about his way. So, um, we tonight we have the presentation of the preliminary FY25 results as well as the tenative budget for both D65 and parks. So, I will let Dr. Gy go ahead and get started. >> Thank you. Good evening everybody. So, um, for those who are are new to the board, I've been working with the school district, uh, for a few years now. I pretty

136much came in a couple months after Dr. Turner started. Um, and, um, pretty much since I since I started, we've been focused on um, right sizing the budget, as Sergio always said, and, uh, trying to stabilize the district as much as possible um, as we continue on this process. So, what I'm going to do tonight is is briefly go through an unodudit a summary of the unodudited results for the fiscal year that just ended and then I'm going to shift it over to Tamara and she's going to talk about the uh tenative budget as it stands right now for FY26. So, this is um this is a chart of the 2024 actual, 2025 budget and 2025 actual. So, as we put together the 25 uh budget, we knew of the reductions that were going to

137be in place, but we also knew that during the fiscal year, we were going to take efforts to try to continue to reduce the budget beyond what the board even adopted by looking at efficiencies primarily in special education and transportation. And um and I'm pleased to report well what this is this is the revenue side. So I I'll wait till the next slide to talk about that. But um well if you go back I'm sorry just for one second. So on on the revenue side um in aggregate we came in um amazingly close in terms of what we expected to receive versus what we actually received. We actually received about $400,000 in aggregate more than we anticipated receiving. Now, revenues are very difficult to project in Illinois because it's not only a it's not only

138a function of how much aggregate dollars you're going to get, but it's a timing of when money's received. So, for example, this district has historically received 96 approximately 96% of its revenues, real estate taxes by a by a certain point in time. And this year, they came in a little bit slower. Doesn't mean that collections are down. It's just a matter of the timing of when things are distrib distributed. That's the same thing with state and federal grants as well. But you you do the best case scen you you do the most realistic case scenario on all these revenue types and some are going to be a little higher, some are going to be a little lower, but you you're hoping to come in and and we came in very good this year. Now on

139the expenditure side, as I had mentioned, uh I'm I'm pleased to report that we came in under budget in virtually every item major category. So So uh salaries um we came in about uh $2.5 million under budget in in employee benefits. We ended up overbudget, but that's that's a timing issue as well. That related to was it IMRF or TRS? It was the TRS annual report. Part of it was that TRS annual report that when that report was filed, it was discovered that um there was an error in the prior year. So part of it is that and then the other part was the increase in employee benefits. Um but the net salaries and employee benefits is under budget by about $880,000 when you combine the two. >> Um the next item very pleased how

140the performance was in purchase services. That was something that was really was put out we put a laser focus on. Purchase services have gone up significantly over the past few years. And uh although while we spent 80 28.8 million in 24, we decreased that by over uh $6 million and actually we were $ 8.3 million under budget. That was a a really strong effort by I know the administration worked very hard um before we adopted the budget and during the fiscal year to get to that point and and I I think Tamara will talk about that a little we'll talk about that a little bit later. >> That's a just a clarifying question on the salaries for this the 25 is taking into consideration not the 90 changes. These are like so how do we

141Yeah. How do we get to 2 million in salary changes for 25? >> So, there were some salary reductions put into place in phase one of SDRP >> and then uh it's phase 1.5. We have so many iterations of it. As part of phase 1.5, there were hiring a hiring freeze was put in place and then there were positions where if the position was vacated and it could remain vacated, we didn't fill it. So, the necessary positions were filled. other positions were left open. So that's where that came from. Thank you. >> And then one other point I want to point out is that uh two out of district tuitions primarily special education tuition that was other another major focus of the administration and while the district spent a little over 8.3 million in 24

142we decreased that number to a little over 6.9 million in 25. Um so in summary we ended up 6.3% under budget in terms of expenditures. It was a phenomenal performance. Every month your district receives monthly financial reports and and Tamara and I review those closely and we were optimistic in how we were trending but we weren't you're never sure until the fiscal year ends but we were very pleased with the ending performance. Next slide please. Uh preliminary fiscal results. This so this is just a summary breakdown by fund of the things we just talked about on the prior two slides. So, I'm not going to emphasize anything on that slide. Uh, this slide. So, this compares excluding fund 64, which is your capital projects fund. So, obviously, a lot goes on there. We had the

143lease certificates going in there from the fifth ward uh building. That's what it was called back then. And um we have the expenditures going out. So, taking out the ins and outs that create a fluctuation that's addressed by bond proceeds. Uh you could see that um pretty much uh when we started, you know, this was right at the 23 fiscal year, the district had a $15 million structural deficit. that deficit was again over uh over five, you know, over$10 million and um and the district really since 2023 because 24 we did what we could given the short time that we had. But we really done a the district has really done a good job of kind of bending the curve on that and and kind of and lowering a trend that was you know that

144that that put that put the district on a very precarious spot back a couple years ago. So in 2024 the deficit was 13.7 million. Structural deficit we dropped that all the way to $710,000. Part of that is due to the timing of some payments, but but much of it is due to structurally changing and right sizing as much as possible because this is pre these major reductions that are going into this year. Um but but the but I know the administration has worked tirelessly to get to that point. >> How much of it is due to the timing of payments? Just so we have a sense this is great. I want to celebrate it and even with the timing of payments, it' still probably be great, but I'm just curious to know where it would

145have ended up if for instance those capital expenses had fallen in this year as opposed to the next year. >> So I think what Rob's point as far as timing of payments he's talking about FY24, am I correct? >> Oh, FY. No, I'm I'm talking I'm talking about like the capital projects that aren't going to happen till Got it. I was thinking back to FY24 and how there was that issue with timing. So yes, so capital projects about $1.2 million I believe as a dollar amount that did not hit the FY25 budget because the projects weren't started weren't invoiced. So that will carry forward to FY26. >> But does that is that included here because this is X capital funds, right? >> No, this is outside of the uh fifth ward project. These are maintenance

146projects, >> correct? So that would be in fund 20 and operations and maintenance fund. The only thing that we have flowing through fund 64 are expenditures related to foster. Okay. >> Everything else is in fund 20. >> And does this include the um back payment for salaries for teachers when we sign the contract? >> Retro. >> Yeah. So that's in there. Okay. >> So Andrew and there's a couple other things. So it's about $2 million is is the is is due to the timing. The rest is due to >> uh other other events. >> Thanks. And um and I do want to point out because because Tamara brought up another point, not not only did the deficit get closed, but we accelerated expenditures that get caught up, which which is, you know, so prior prior

147results that were reported in audits. There still were bills that were outstanding that weren't paid. We're all caught up now. So, so the district in the last two years, I mean, this is the good part of the story. There's there's not as good a part at the end, but the good part of the story is that the district has done a tremendous job of stabilizing its financial condition and giving yourself giving the district time to methodically stabilize the district without having to impact student learning to the magnitude of other districts I work with where all of a sudden they're out of money and they have to make drastic cuts to programs and staffing to a point that they know impacts student learning, but they have no choice. So, this is giving this isn't solving the

148problem, but it's giving you time to have the conversations like you had earlier tonight and and the ones I've been involved with over the last couple years. Next slide, please. So, uh primary reasons for the budget, the actual uh special education, uh Tam, why don't you take this slide? >> Sure. So, um special education purchase services. So when I first came on board last year that was one of the areas that was um highlighted like Dr. Grossy said it was special education purchase services as well as transportation. So one of the things that the previous assistant superintendent uh along with the IEES team did was look at scheduling. Uh so taking the related services educators looking at their schedules and their case loads and finding room within those schedules to be able to provide the

149services to students versus bringing in a temporary agency. So those internal scheduling efficiencies resulted in that $2.5 million underbudget savings. So when we set that budget at the beginning of the year, um none of that had been looked at. Dr. Herrera was new, I was new, Dr. Grossy was uh coming into second year with the district. And so as we move through the year, that was one of those areas where we were able to focus and see some savings and then bring come in $2.5 million under budget there. As far as transportation, transportation came in $2.2 million under budget. Largely two reasons there. preschool routing changes. So, in the past, the district was routing general education and special education preschool students on separate buses. Um, that really was not the most cost-effective way to do

150things. So, we combined those routes. That saved about a million dollars. Um, and then also some special education routing efficiencies as well as McKenna Vento routing efficiencies as well brought those expenditures in line uh to come in about $2.2 2 million under budget. I mentioned salaries and benefits earlier. Combined, $882,000 under budget because of those hiring freezes. Um, and closing positions that could be closed and we could still maintain uh our processes and delivering services, capital, and equipment. That was the $1.04 million under budget. Again, that's being pushed into FY26 because those projects are in process right now. Um, so it's just a matter of getting the projects closed out and the invoices paid. And then purchase services and supplies. Supplies, both of those in particular, there was intentional expenditure monitoring to reduce spending. Um,

151as that saying goes, what gets monitored gets or what gets watched gets >> measure gets done. that that um but really we were keeping an eye on uh supplies expenditures, keeping an eye on purchase services, keeping an eye on temporary agency services, all of the things. And that really did uh play into that. And then there's approximately $700,000 worth of budgeted expenses in those categories across purchase services and supplies that weren't needed in FY25, but they will be needed in FY26. So that's reflected in the FY26 budget as well. Can I ask you a question about the internal scheduling efficiencies? >> So I know I know what that means. >> So what kind of feedback did you get from >> staff in terms of the service to the students got the services they needed and

152they were at the quality that it needed to be at. That's what I'm concerned about. when you compress schedules, group kids, what kind of feedback have you gotten from from that effort? >> That's a fantastic question. I personally didn't hear any feedback. I don't know if my colleagues Dr. Spat or Dr. Beardsley or even Tiffany heard any feedback as well, but I did not hear anything. >> I mean, I have not heard major complaints. I heard that there is there additional efficiencies but also this was not under my purview. Um I did hear that we were really working towards um empowering school leaders also to have um related service providers as part of their teams too and that was in on terms of the school's management part that was well met. So they felt like

153they had um a better understanding of what services students were getting in their um schools. But with this new reorganization, all of these directors are in the same room on a weekly basis. So this is very productive conversations. Every, you know, IEES schools management, they're all in the same room having these conversations. So thus far, it's been very productive on how we can continue to support students and teachers. And I think the other thing to note too is that there's a new individual in this position and your team is move your department is moving forward with the special education audit and there'll be some opportunity to gather feedback at that point. >> Yep. >> Next slide please. >> All right. So this slide this is a really important slide. So um the orange line represents

154the district's fund balance policy which is a minimum of 90 days worth of reserves. The green line represents 180 days worth of fund balance reserves, which is what ISBY would wants to see to get the highest rating from their financial rubric profile. Um, so you could see that the district prior to referendum was below its 90-day and that's I'm sure I wasn't around, but I'm sure that's what prompted uh the the call for a referendum. referendum passes, the district um fund balances grew. Part of that is a product of just the environment of the state of Illinois. A lot of things aligned for all school districts in Illinois. COVID, which was a terrible thing, was good financially for schools. Schools received a lot of extra money. And when during the period that they that uh

155learning was virtual, it cost less to educate students. So financially school schools over that period tended to do well. So the district got a lot of money in from the referendum and it was good times um and and you peaked at about 165 days worth of reserves. Um because of the deficit the fund balances declined uh to about 96 days in 2024. That was brought up to about 104 days worth of reserves in 25. But the district is, you know, hovering right at the the point of its minimum target uh per your board policy. >> And then one thing before we move, well, two things before we move on, Rob, one thing I want to point out about this slide is uh the days cash on hand reflected here is covering all funds except for

156the capital projects fund. So with the state of Illinois, what ISBY is looking at as far as days cash on hand are the operating funds. So they're just looking at educational operations and maintenance, working cash and transportation. This uh day's cash on hand is looking at everything except capital projects. And then the other thing uh Pat Dr. Turner um said that she has some information from Dr. Herrera as far as feedback is concerned uh that came in from the related services provider. So she can follow up with you on that information. >> So I'm turn over Tamara for the temp tenative budget. All right. So, uh, this is just a quick timeline of the budget timetable. So, we're talking about the tenative budget tonight. The tenative budget will go on display here at JE. Um,

157and then a notice of public hearing will be placed in the newspaper on August 25th. And the reason for that timing is we have to have a minimum of 30 days between the posting of the notice uh and the public hearing date which the public hearing will be at the regular board meeting on September 29th. And at that time that's when we will present the final budget with all of the various um updates and changes that we'll make to it. Have the public hearing and then uh the board will be able to discuss and vote on that budget at that time. So breakdown of our revenues by source. Um as usual the majority of our revenues are coming from real estate taxes. So right at 79% um we have about 6% of our revenues coming

158from federal sources. That restricted uh 4% for the state is really um grant funding that is restricted in nature. So our early childhood grant would be included in that. Evidence-based funding is about 4% of the budget. And then that 7% is other local. Other local would include interest, revenue, corporate personal property, replacement taxes, school fees, things of that nature. Variables impacting the projected revenue. So, as Dr. Grossy mentioned earlier, real estate taxes, um, it's all about timing really with real estate taxes, the state and the federal grants. Our real estate taxes are projected to increase about $4.7 million. That's from the tax levy that was approved in December of 2024. As a reminder, that tax levy was based on a 3.4% uh CPI increase. Interest earnings and corporate personal property replacement taxes are anticipated to

159be relatively flat. That those uh interest earnings could be impacted as well by property tax receipts. The later the property tax receipts come in, then that's less opportunity that the district has to earn re or earn interest revenue on those uh receipts. State grant reimbursements are expected to decline as reimburseable expenses incurred last fiscal year are paid in this fiscal year. For instance, transportation. We spent less money on transportation in FY25 than we did in FY24. So, that reimbursement is going to go down. uh federal grant revenues are projected to decrease slightly based on some current uncertainty that we have happening in Washington DC. Um and just in general those levels are expected to come down slightly and then evidence-based funding revenues will be flat. As a tier 4 district for evidence-based funding, the district

160gets about $6,000 of new money every year. So, the total that we get is about close to $8 million uh for evidence-based funding, but it's only about $6,000 new money every year. Oops. And why are we not moving? There we go. So, this table is our budgeted revenues uh across all funds. So, you see the greatest increase in revenues there is real estate taxes. And of all of those lines, as you look there right at the top with real estate taxes, that's really the one that moves the most because that's where the majority of our income, our revenue comes from. It moves along with CPI. Those other local revenues relatively flat when you look across those fiscal years. Um, evidence-based funding of course flat across those fiscal years because the district is a tier 4

161district. The same uh with state grants is relatively flat there. Federal grants peaked there in FY22 and 23 based on that ESSER funding and you see our federal grants are coming back down to normal levels. So we're projecting right at at this point almost $10.7 million. >> Question um particularly federal cuz you know every week we're hearing something uh different. So how much of the federal these are all our title two fours all of those right? So it's conceivable >> Mhm. that a large portion of that could be withheld. >> So, at this point, it most of our federal money is Head Start money. Okay. >> Um, at this point, what came out last week, I believe, is that the money is being released. We just don't have our allocation yet from the state. So,

162the federal government said, "Okay, we'll release the money." Um, but Isby needs to let us know how much those allocations are. And as soon as we have that then we can update all of those numbers in the tenative budget. Right now the numbers are really um based on FY25 numbers but decreased some to be for conservative budgeting and then breakdown of budgeted budgeted expenses by object. Our salaries and benefits make up the largest portion of our expenditures. Um and then purchase services again is our next largest portion there. purchase services of course includes our transportation which is probably our largest purchase service um the largest of the purchase services in the category um and then all of the other um expenditures fall in line there after salaries and benefits and then purchase services major variables

163impacting our projected expenditures. So the salary increases tied to collective bargaining agreements um offset the reductions in FTE. So we reduced our operational budget for FY26 by 93 FTE. Um but then when you add the average salary increases of all of our collective bargaining union groups, which we have five of them, and then our nonrepresented groups as well, it's really offset. those increases or the reductions are offset by the increases. Employee benefit costs will decrease due to a reduction in FTE, but those rates are moving up as well. So, in the budget, we have the employee benefits cost projected to go up a little over 5%. Uh, purchase services expenses will increase due to contractual increases. So, our transportation contract increases at 5% per year. Um we have built into the budget for purchase services

1643% increases for those which that's um about average for CPI. Some of those may be higher than that but we have 3% built in there. Expenses tied to um oh also utility costs. So one of the challenges that districts across the state are having right now is utility cost increases. So it's not just district 65, it's across the state. electricity rates. Uh we received notice from our cooperative that we should expect 30 to 36% increases due to capacity charge changes. So for conservative budgeting we built in a 38% increase. For electricity and for natural gas 15% increase was projected from the cooperative. So for conservative budgeting purposes we built in a 17% increase. So, just those two uh increases in utilities costs are about $370,000 projected increases year-over-year. Um expenditures tied to building maintenance projects.

165Uh again, that goes back to those capital expenditures that did not get covered in FY25 that we're pushing forward to FY26. And then we have our usual uh operations and maintenance budget, the little over a million dollars per year that we budget that we'll be spending as well. And then out of district tuition costs are expected to increase due to an anticipated 3% rate adjustment. And then we're allocating the full amount uh for district 65's park school reimbursement. So when we look historically, the reimbursement for Park School would usually be done um as a a journal entry after the annual financial audit was done. It's more appropriate to go ahead and allocate that during the school year. There might be an adjustment at audit time, but what we don't want is a large adjustment at

166audit time that would be four, five, $600,000. So we're allocating that um with this budget in the tenative budget. >> Can I ask a clarifying question on the first one? The um so last year when we were thinking about we needed we had 13 million we were trying to cut, right? And we did that. Um but then we added back whatever because of the 4% on the raises when we're talking about the 10 you know this year 10 to 15% what we were already including the the raises in in our projection. >> Yes. >> Okay. >> For the fourth one building maintenance. Uh, so I think one of the challenges I see for us post SDRP3 is making sure we have built into our budget significant allocations so we're not deferring maintenance. Um, I got

167excited because I thought maybe that's what we were working toward here. But will this still situate us for the next budget because we will have already expanded. It looks like we'll have a 4 million set aside for building maintenance. Will that situate us for the future when we need to even expand that further? So part of the what my goal would be would be to allocate more to our budget as we move forward and that will be part of the work of SDRP3 and beyond as well as we look at various financing options whether that's any type of debt financing or closing that expenditure gap a bit to be able to put more money towards our facilities on an annual basis because the approximately $1 million is obviously not sufficient to properly maintain the buildings.

168>> Any other questions with on this slide before we move on? >> And then this is just budgeted expenditures all fund um a chart that just lists everything going back to FY22 and then forward to the budget for FY26. Um so again the for me the thing that stands out the most is that where we budgeted for FY24 and then obviously uh our unodudited numbers for FY25 um and then our excuse me projected budget there for FY26. Is there any way in like so there's purchase services we got to pay for utilities some things we just got to pay they go up we don't have a choice but to deal with those uh but then there's other purchase services that we you know we can choose to do or figure out how to not do

169them. Is there a way to understand that difference? Cuz here you you go like, "Wow, we just cut and now our purchase services are, you know, 3 million." But the reality, as you just explained that some of that is just, you know, it's just the reality of the world. And being able to more clearly see what are the fixed costs from separate from we have contracts because we're choosing to do some things which are choices um and not um >> We have a slide. Yeah, we have we have a uh one of the next slides talks about that. But but that's that that's the exa exactly the issue. I mean look at expenses all all the staff that's been reduced. I mean we are expecting salaries to go down $63,000 and if you didn't make

170the cuts I'm just guessing but salaries would be closer to 113 million something like that. Um so that's it's it's >> that's the frustrating part of this process. >> Yeah. Just trying to educate, you know, so people can see things were made, you know, changes were made. >> Feels like we took, you know, two steps forward and one step back. >> Exactly what it is. >> Maybe it's two, maybe it's three and two. >> It was helpful for me in reading this though to go back and look at the projected FY25 budget. So, we are coming in 8 million for the FY26 over actual, but we're coming in 4 million under the projected FY25 budget originally. Correct. >> Yeah. >> Um and then um maybe this isn't the best place to ask, but so that

171was SDRP1 with the 6.2 or 3 million that we reaped the benefits from in FY25. >> Yes. and then a lot of work by admin to go find extra savings and we probably shouldn't expect that again >> it for FY26 because we're getting closer to the bone kind of I mean you know what you all done is amazing >> right right >> but can we expect anything close to extra savings that you all found in FY26 >> maybe not to that extent >> um there may maybe some more um cutting that would be able to happen, but the more we cut, then the closer we get to having to impact programs and impact our students. And what we've been able to do so far has not really directly um impacted our students just yet where

172we're seeing that. Um one thing I do want to note too, as far as the budget right now, this is still in very tentative form. So the salaries and benefits projections really all of it is tentative but the salaries and benefits projections in particular are based on um average increases. So once between the financial services department and the human res or human relations department once we have all of our things settled then we'll have exact numbers of what we can project the salary and benefits lines to be. Um, I don't expect much movement, but it could be lower than that the projected numbers up there. But I just wanted to call that out. >> Might the uh special education audit provide more insight into managing the budget a little more proactively? >> That's the part

173of the purpose of the audit. Yes. For them to look at our our staffing numbers and all that. Yes. So go back one more. So this changes still 8 million. Okay. >> Is the is the increase is the increase in tuition and other is that an anticipation of additional um students being outplaced and paying that tuition or is that the 3% increase because it's a little more than 3%. No, >> it's 3% plus that adjustment that we're making for park. >> Oh, got it. Okay. Yeah, that's the the what the extra is there. >> Okay. >> And and and one high level way of looking at these numbers is that despite the fact that salary increases were 4% plus in aggregate >> operating expenses are are projected to increase 2.3% if you take away the

174capital >> which is a timing issue. So I mean it's a two it's it's still a 2.3% increase but it's it would have been significantly higher but for the action that >> I think it we need to take some time to communicate that you know because people are going to see this and go whoa wait a second what's going on here salaries just went down so how to communicate you know that simple those some of those simple things to make sure people are coming along with us as we're doing this >> y >> and this is fiscal year 2026 So the plan is, you know, 2026 will probably be difficult again and, you know, we're seeing that costs are going up and the budget is going up across the board, but SDRP is addressing this

175long term. So once we get to 2027, hopefully that's where we start to see things come together a little bit more. >> Correct. Robbie, you want to talk? >> Sure. Then, so this is just again like the earlier slide, this is just a uh by fund summary of um what we just what we just displayed. So really nothing more to comment than that. But this is right now as Tamber mentioned, it's a work in progress. And I'm and probably as I'm reflecting it, we should have probably did the budget first and then the prior last like so it could be like a happy ending like a movie. But it's it's the other way around. But um so and then this this is a this is a um again these this is a trend with the

176numbers of the deficit. So the deficit is expected to increase to a little over 5 to right around 5.7 million and again completely different ballpark from where you were in 2324. Um and part of it was pushing expenses into into 20 into 26. But the board could take solace in know in recognizing that we're we're not coming here say giving a balanced budget knowing that it's not going to be a balanced budget. What you're what you're seeing tonight is what we honestly believe this thing how your district's going to end fully paying bills for e even taking it one step further this year by fully paying park and being as transparent as possible with where where we think we're going to stand. And then in terms of fund balance reserves, um because of the deficit,

177we are right at or slightly below this this three-month period. So the vulnerability of being at 3 months, especially in Cook County, is that you're susceptible to cash flow issues, uh as it relates to Cook County being late in their taxes. So if they are late to a level that they're talking about, there'll be other things that we'll have to be talking about down the road. So, so this is um kind of to to the points that were brought up. So, this is the challenges to to this current year and future budgets. So, these are just natural things that happen every year that despite whatever we do, we're living through. So, first of all, the revenue challenges. So, so lower inflation is going to impact your revenue growth. So, your total real estate taxes are

178around, excuse me, What are we project total real estate taxes are aroundund the part the bond issues was $130 million let's say so every 1% is $1.3 million in 22 and 23 the board was able to increase it by 5%. So that got that rest that gave you a lot of money to pay offset lot of natural growth in revenues to offset the natural growth in expenditures. Well, now last year when the board approved the levy, it was 3.4%. In December, this year it's going to be down to 2.9%. And now inflation is trending back towards historical levels of 2.4%. So your natural growth is probably going to be half of what it was. So 2% of 13 is $2.6 6 million. So you one one thing I'm very confident with with the exception of

179COVID and all schools getting extra money, you're really not going to get more money from the state and federal government. That's just not going to happen in this school district. So you're totally dependent on real estate taxes. So if you're if if CPI is between two and 3%, you're going to get, you know, two and a half to $3 million new money every year. So unless you could keep expenditures at an increase of 2 and a half to three million, things are going to get worse. Um on the expenditure side, um there's still over 180 or at least there was I don't know where it's at right now, but $189 million in building improvements that have to be addressed. So you're you're obviously addressing them at a slower pace than um which is helping the

180annual finances, but down the road something has to happen. Uh every 1% increase in salary is about $1 million. So again, if your re if your real estate taxes if you're getting $3 million in real estate taxes and your salaries grow by more than 3%, that in and of itself takes away the new revenues. um on the on the um uh special education uh th those costs are continuing to rise. They they were they grew very significantly in D65, but nearly every school district I work with, especially postco, have seen significant increases in special ed costs that are going to continue to have an impact on the budget. Uh health insurance premiums are expected to continue to rise. that makes up a major portion of your budget that are just going to happen automatically. Uh

181utility costs, as Tamara mentioned, are continuing to grow and both service agreements go up at the rate of inflation or more. Almost every service agreement that school districts enter into. So the those are headwinds that you have to deal with and and and you have to make cuts just sometimes just to whatever five steps forward, four steps back, whatever the ratio is. But those are the challenges long term that even though we got really close to getting to balance in 25 it it continues to grow. So so there's you know when we do financial projections after the audit's complete it's going to bear out more but but but the district's challenges we deferred the challenges but we have not eliminated the challenges. Next slide please. All right. And so the park budget, so park has

182the same tenative budget process as district 65 does. Um the way the park budget works really is it's the the total revenues match the total expenditures. So if you look at the annual financial report for park, there won't be any fund balance reserves or anything for park. Um it's the the revenues in match the expenditures for that joint agreement. the uh district 202 pays 40% of the cost of park and then district 65 picks up 60% of the cost of park. So you see there down at the bottom we have the total revenues and total expenditures matching. Um the again that 60% is us, 40% is district 202. Um and you have the breakdown there of the reimbursements there from district 65 almost 2.1 million. um the district 202 contribution there's a little over 1.9

183million and then other revenues those other local revenues are um districts being built tuition the evidence-based funding contribution that is district 65 evidence-based funding that is allocated to Park School and then federal sources um park gets a very small amount of federal revenue at $11,000 there uh salaries and benefits of first the majority of the expenditures there for park followed by purchase services and then the remaining expenditures make up that total expenditure budget of about 7.5 million and that is all we have. >> So >> can I just pause? >> Sure. >> Thank you for coming. Um and I just want to say really well done on all of the cuts that have been made so far. are I think it's been obviously a focal point of the district and something that has really rallied

184a lot of the community around this and I think I'm hoping that Bill's going to write a nice article about how well we've done here um so that everybody knows um I think what I'm seeing in this budget is that we have a lot more work to do >> um and I think you know while we can take a lap and high five for a quick second we got to get back to work so I think the the next phase in this process is really important but I don't think that school closures is going to do it alone. So I think some innovative and creative thinking around transportation, around special ed delivery, around how we can reimagine the delivery of services is required for us to get out in front of the structural deficit that

185we see because we're going to be chasing that CPI down. Um, you know, I don't remember what cycle it was, but about eight years ago it went sub two. we were at one point >> sub one >> and so those are things that we have to be very careful of as we're projecting forward because all of our all of our collective bargaining agreements predict an increase of at least 3% salary increase. So that's sort of the challenge that we face. Um you know we have one pie to work with and we don't get more than that. So thank you very much for coming for all the good work that you've done for our district. I think we're on really firm footing. I really appreciate all the work you've done, Tamara. You can ask a question

186now. >> Can I just think it um even like if we think about the transportation conversation like at some point there's caps that we have to have uh on costs because the costs you know we are limited in what it is we have. Um I just yeah to echo the thankfulness um just the team here know that um I'm just still stuck on the 6.3 cuts but then you all went and found all the rest of that 12.7 million um and I just don't think we can be enthusiastic enough about that just Dr. Turner is not here. I know she's listening. And just also to tip uh at her way um for that. Um the looming question I have is SDRP3. We were 10 to 15 million. When will we know the spot on here's

187what we need for SDRP3? Do you have any clarity about that yet? >> I do. It's coming in the next presentation. >> Wait. >> Next slide. D. >> Okay. Thanks. >> Drum roll, please. snacks. She wants the snacks. >> We're cutting the snacks. >> It's a It's a BYU snack. >> Any other budget questions or FY25 questions while we have Dr. Grossy here with us this evening? >> No, I'll just um reiterate what Maria said. I think she said it very well. This has been a journey. Definitely appreciate all of the work you've done. All the work you've done, Dr. Turner, I know she's listening. I mean, you know, it hasn't it was not easy to get to where we are and to be able to stabilize and give ourselves a little breathing room. I

188know we're not out of the woods, but you know, this is a process and given what we've been able to do so far, I'm confident that we'll get there, but it's not it's just not easy. I'd like to second that. Um, and going back to what you said about getting out of the woods, I think, um, my gratitude goes to finding out what the woods are >> and putting in place systems and strategies to bring us into a a format where we have accurate information. So, thank you. Mhm. >> And just to this may be like very obvious but I think just to name right the goal of SDRP3 is that we would have an FY27 budget that is not that's a balanced budget right >> that's what the goal is we're aiming towards financial

189sustainability. Um so that's the goal. >> I also want to thank Dr. Turner. I know you're listening. if you want to come on and say anything. I don't know if you're able to do that, but um thank you very much for all your hard work. I know it's been uh blood, sweat, and tears and and blood from stones and all the other phrases that we use for those those things. Um and I know that we you know we're going to keep going and we'll do it again. >> I think there's probably a 15 second delay, so if she chimes in it'll be a little bit delayed, so we'll just wait. for those. >> There she is. >> Thanks for that, Maria. Just gratitude to the team. >> She She said gratitude to the team. >>

190There she is. just for that Maria just gratitude for the pain. >> That's our YouTube. >> All right, Dr. Grossy, thank you so much. >> Thank you everybody. >> Thank you. Okay. So now are we up to the SAP 3 update >> and there is no update? >> Yeah, there's no update for SAP 3 today. Moving on back in our next fastest agenda item on the list. All right. SDRP3 and beyond update Tamara. >> Yes. So, this is where that slide is with that number that Andrew was asking about. So, uh this update tonight is just very brief. Uh it shouldn't take me very long to get through it. So, just a quick overview of what we'll be covering tonight. Um a review of the background on SDRP phase three as well as the overall

191timeline for phase three. a review of the oversight and engagement guidelines for the work and then we will cover um both the subcommittee work timeline as well as the board timeline. And just as a reminder for what is driving the need for SDRP phase 3, we have our three pillars there. Uh finance on the left, facilities in the middle and then our students on the right side. So we are uh seeking to ensure long-term financial stability. We need to find a funding source to address the uh many facilities needs that we have. And then we have that declining student enrollment that uh has our buildings that is projected to continue to decline for the next 10 years. And our buildings are uh underutilized in about 65% because of that. And so three pillars here again.

192Um, Andrew, the number you're looking for is there on the left. We're looking at an additional 8 to10 million in estimated reductions necessary for FY27. Um, nothing new on this slide really. We know that we have um that $188 million worth of recommended facilities repairs. We know that those are $201. So when you factor inflation in there, then we would be sitting at well over $200 million. Um and that number includes Bessie roads as well as we we know the building is closing but we have not uh made any decisions as far as the use of the building disposition etc. Then as I mentioned a 65% occupancy rate for our buildings um average occupancy rate for the buildings. Looking at this timeline, we are right in part two right now. So number four there on

193that timeline is for July and August. Um and so as I move through the slide deck, we'll talk about what September through December are going to look like. Um and then I won't cover what January and beyond will look like. Um but the most of the discussion will be really what the next couple of months will look like um between se September, October and November. And this slide here really pulls everything together for SDRP. So we know that the board uh will approve the final STRP phase 3 plan whatever that uh plan may be. Um the internal steering committee which is made up of the superintendent as well as cabinet members. So myself, Dr. Beersley, uh Dr. Beth, Melissa, Tiffany, um all of our cabinet members make up that internal steering committee. And then our

194community steering committee is comprised of those three subcommittees. So the facilities subcommittee, finance subcommittee as well as the program subcommittee and all three of those subcommittees have their own charge which is noted there on the slide. Um, one very important note that I want to point out at the bottom of this slide is that our superintendent parents advisory superintendent parent caregiver advisory council that has been dissolved for this school year and members of the spack have been invited to join SDRP phase 3 subcommittees. The application period is open until this Wednesday, August 6th. So far we have received nine uh responses that members are interested in continuing on with the SDR3 SDRP3 work. Um but again we have um the application period is open until Wednesday. So we will be looking to integrate those nine

195members at least into the subcommittees. And so here is what our subcommittee meeting dates are. scheduled to be at this point. Um, and I will really uh focus on that that first meeting there August 13th. That's going to be our kickoff meeting. So, that's going to be bringing those uh the SPACK members on board, integrating them into the subcommittee that they select and really bringing them up to speed as far as uh the work. and they've been informed throughout the process, but it will just be them now sitting in on the actual subcommittee meetings and participating that way. Um, on August 13th, we'll also be reviewing the work that was done this past spring as well as talking about any deliverables uh or materials that we uh promised to deliver to the subcommittees in the

196fall. Um so just thinking about some of the things that I know the finance subcommittee was promised as well as facilities that will be really what that um first meeting is all about. The meetings that are there in gray those are going to be optional meetings. So each subcommittee will determine at that first kickoff meeting whether or not those optional meetings are needed. Uh and it really will be based on the needs and the work of each subcommittee. So whereas perhaps just using this as an example, not saying it's true, maybe the facility subcommittee needs to meet all six of those meetings, but programs uh only needs to meet the meeting dates that are there in white so they can take those optional meetings off. It will all depend on uh the work of the

197committees. The meetings that we have set for all subcommittees to come together as a community steering committee are the 13th, August 27th, September 10th, and then September 24th. >> Question. Um the 924 is really um that's really the presentation where the facilities is in like if you think in it's in first position, right? the facilities >> um not the programming or with the fiscal the fiscal would also be here too right I'm trying you know as we talked about the who's who's leading this is where y'all coming back and saying here's the score card against all of these buildings >> so the 929 meeting board is when we will do that and our intention is that the scenario the process of developing scenarios will include the finance committee so they'll be able to essentially attach

198financial implications with the scenario. >> Financial implications with respect to the school buildings but not necessarily any are they looking at financial implications with respect to um professional services. This is much much more financial implications with respect to the buildings. the we will further develop that. But currently the items that I think are in our radar for including were essentially we have a set of costs that we had rolled up into that $2 million estimate that we had provided and then the second would be an estimate of impact on transportation costs. >> But keep in mind what we have hazarded before is we will bring draft boundaries with the scenarios. They will change as things get tuned or as the board makes decisions. >> Okay. >> So, we'll receive the scorecards and the scenarios on

199929. >> That is correct. >> Just to clarify one other thing. The um the consulting work about the um options for the buildings that are proposed to be closed. I'm sorry I'm saying that terribly. I think it's the assessment. Is that right? >> Property assessment. Thank you very much. The property assessments, those will be incorporated into the scorecards. You'll get that work. >> Yes. In time, that work will be come in in early September and will be incorporated in the scorecards that you will see on the 29th of September. >> Okay. >> And so now I'll move on to some board meeting dates with deliverables. So, um, obviously we're here tonight for the committee of the whole meeting and, uh, we just reviewed the SDRP phase three timeline, phase three part three timeline. Um, moving

200down to again focusing on the gray areas there. September 29th, as we were just discussing, that will be the board meeting where, uh, we'll review initial scenarios. So that will include looking at potential school closings as well as the financial projections and deficit reduction associated with that. Um again just initial review there. So for October 20th, we will be looking at updated scenarios. Uh and the board will have the opportunity to either vote on those updated scenarios or provide additional feedback and input for the internal steering committee and for student centered services to address. Um that final grade out box there, November 17th. Um, we've identified that as being the date for the board to vote on a final scenario because that would allow us time to hold any public hearings prior to the winter

201holiday season. Um, so there is going back up to October 20th. There's an opportunity to possibly vote there. Um, but if not, we would be looking at having that board vote on November 17th, giving us uh time in December to have those public hearings before we go on break for the winter holidays. >> Thank you. >> Can I just ask a question just for general community? So it is theoretically possible say the scenarios come back very clear the board has consensus that um the vote could occur on October 20th about because it says vote on updated scenarios on 10:20. >> Mhm. >> So it's possible that the decision could be made earlier than November 17th. Right. So just to flag for community engagement this is really important that there's there's possible variation there. >> Yes.

202Right. Yes. >> My question was going to be around um you had mentioned Dr. Beardsley that after the scenarios have been presented to the board on 929, there'll be some community listening sessions. Um, I I would like for us to add community listening sessions that are outside of our school buildings and potentially think about adding and and board members. You know, I think we should talk about having specific listening sessions um you know, in synagogues and churches and, you know, PTA councils and areas outside of where our exact school, >> you know, our schools are because this is a communitywide issue. um potentially the Levy Center, some other places where um people can connect, we can access community members because I think this this conversation goes well beyond just uh the individuals that participate directly

203in district 65. >> Yeah, we can certainly consider some different locations. >> Yeah, and we have plans as we're um preparing our calendar for the upcoming school year that are also more informal engagement opportunities. Last year, Dr. Dr. Turner hosted a number of cafes. We call them community cafes that were across the community. Um if board members are also interested in hosting those in pairs, we can certainly develop a cadence for that. So there's opportunities, you know, as early as, you know, later this month in September so that we have some information leading up to um any decisions. >> A great idea. I think that would be essential because people are going to want to talk about it. Um, and knowing that we have uh opportunities to talk with the administration, but also to talk

204with us as board members, I think would be uh essential. >> And the sooner we can share those out, >> absolutely. >> Better. >> Thank you. >> But is it likely I mean, so I know we could the 1020 would we have had? I don't imagine we would have had enough conversations in the community like you would 929 we're saying scenarios to you know then 1020 that would feel probably very rushed. Um, so I know it's possible, but interest. >> Yeah. My concern is we don't catch any group in the community by surprise. >> Yep. >> At any point here. And just knowing that we've put it on the schedule that a possible outcome is a vote. Just to be as transparent about that as possible. >> Yeah. >> Even if it's unlikely. >> Okay.

205All right. And then lastly, all of the work that we've done so far and the work that we have ahead of us is all about creating a bright future for our current and future generations of district 65 learners. And then that is the end of this presentation. >> Thank you. >> Next we have the foster school construction update. >> Yes. So Kirby's not here this evening. Um, but there was I'll do my best to relay the message. Um, there was a memo in the board packet from Cordigan Clark requesting that the board approve a change order for $120,000 um, which is the painting contract. Um, essentially uh, if you driven past that building, it's very different um, in terms of the look, which are really excited about. Um, but compared to some of our other

206buildings that have brick and masonry work, um, it was brought up by our owner's rep as well as several district representatives that the ongoing maintenance of that pre-cast exterior could be really difficult to maintain over time and eventually be more costly. Um, I think it's referred to in the memo as anti-graffiti spray, but like a coating, but it's not necessarily just for that purpose. It's really just for like that upkeep and maintenance and it's probably something that should have initially been included in the original scope of the project. >> Yeah. So, um I'm I'm glad it isn't just anti-graffiti because I'm like wait a second. It seemed like it was, you know, describing the community like, well, we got to make sure they're not doing graffiti there. uh as we talk about it, I hope

207it is more about just, you know, extra spray you put on the building that keeps it uh as as opposed to anti-graffiti, >> which it is that as well, but that's not the >> I think that it's probably the trade, you know, terms or contract, but it's really just for that building upkeep and dirt and dust and all of that that would get soaked into that exterior. And I know we've built in surplus into the budget. Where does this impact that surplus? >> We would still be well within um well under budget. Um so essentially it would be 120 $20,000 that we would be pulling out of our contingency fund. >> But do we know where that is exactly? It'll >> um >> I know I'm putting you on the spot. >> Yeah. Yeah. I

208don't want to quote any numbers. Um, Tamara, I'm not sure if you know, but >> I don't recall off the top of my head, >> but we can, >> but there's still ample. This does not put us in a bind for >> We can send we'll send an email to Dr. Turner and I'm sure she can get that from Kirby. >> I'm curious now that we have a principal. Um, I know we have foster school construction update. Um, is the Well, I guess the SAP 3 is the SAP 3 is really the foster update. was is there a way to change does it it stays SAP 3 as opposed because now the principal is should be doing updates about where she is in terms of bringing not necessarily here but it's a different voice in

209the space now because she's >> hired and she has a timeline and it would be great to to understand that timeline and how have standing have some standing updates with that the same way we have updates with the timeline for building the making sure we're on point for the updates that was created in the timeline for decisions being made for the school. And right now, I don't think it's because this wouldn't be SAP three because SAP 3 intentionally doesn't deal with the curriculum and things like that. Correct. >> So, what I think what you're raising is an interest in having potential updates from more than the construction side of the house related to foster school. >> That's something that we can talk to Dr. Turner about and follow up with the board. Do we have

210to move and second the >> Yeah, sorry. I was just taking a note. My bad. >> Um, I move that the board of education approve the foster school K&J change order, which will increase the K&J painting contract to a new value of $621,020. >> Second. >> Wymer, >> yes. >> Anderson, >> yes. Salem, >> Yes. Yes. >> Yes. >> Okay, we're back to six. Um, the acceptance of the gift, the district-wide air purifiers. Andrew, I know you had a question about that. >> Yeah, first of all, it's a great gift. It's fantastic and know that air quality inside is very important and all of the impacts on marginalized communities are are aggravated. Um you know data shows this is really crucial. My one concern is this is a year do we have and can we

211afford on the district level not putting it on individual schools to make sure that we keep this going. >> So the buildings and grounds team has engaged and been involved with the group who's donating the air purifiers. They also provided us with unit cost for replacements and we have looked at budget and we and buildings and grounds knows that they can build that into their budget going forward to ensure that there'd be fresh filters for the air purifiers. So we we will incorporate that into future budgets and it's an amount that is feasible using the buildings and grounds funds. >> Any other questions? I move the board of education approve the gift of 577 air purifiers for the district buildings from the joy fund. >> Second >> yes. Uh with no further business. Oh wait

212>> no we did that one already. Sorry. Um, >> look at the time. >> Financial updates. I know. Are we on mountain time zone? >> Um, all right. Well, I guess it's 7:59. Uh, with no further business, I join this meeting.