001All right, we're now recording the meeting. All right, so all that we need to do over um um I would add to it. We have a special guest to recognize. See if you want to come up to the table there and I will introduce you. Uh tonight we want to recognize someone our students know simply as Mr. JT at Pleasant Acres. JT is the head custodian. On any given day you'll find him making sure the building is clean, safe, and ready for learning. He fixes things, moves things, cleans things, and quite frankly keeps the whole place running. But earlier this year, he did something that goes far beyond his job description. During lunch, a student began choking. >> While others heard a student say she might throw up, JT heard something else. He recognized that
002this wasn't nausea or an upset stomach. It was choking. He acted immediately and performed the Kimlick maneuver. Within seconds, the obstruction was cleared and the student was safe. Two nerd clusters were the culprits. In all seriousness, choking incidents can escalate quickly. There is no time to hesitate. No time to second guessess. It takes awareness, training, and the willingness to step in without thinking about whose job it is. JT didn't wait. He didn't look around for someone else. He simply acted. Because of him, a family went home that day with their child safe. We often talk about how every adult in our schools plays a role in keeping our students safe. JT is a perfect example of that. He reminds us that heroes in our schools sometimes carry radios and keys. Mr. JT, his full name
003is John Thomas, but I've never heard anyone call you that. Okay, Mr. JT, on behalf of the board of education, the staff at Pleasant Acres, and the entire Randol City Schools community, thank you for your quick thinking, your calm under pressure, and your commitment to our students. We are proud to recognize you tonight. You make a difference. Thank you. >> Thank you. >> And this might be more work. It's special limited edition Lego. trophy trophy. >> You got a lot of people that came and >> I guess now you got to stand over here. >> Stand right there and I'll stand right over here. >> Greetings everybody. How you guys doing? Um, first of all, um, want to thank my Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, uh, for putting me in a position to do so.
004I think things, one of my wife's favorite saying, things happen for a reason. >> And so, I think I was there because of the vomit. If you all know, uh, I have EMT and I'm a current CPR instructor for the American Heart. And uh usually something happened to make you go to the hospital to actually find the issue that's wrong. Right. So the situation was them vomiting which led me to be there for the young lady. So um I'm grateful grateful for her and her parents um her family. I'm grateful um for Pleasant Acres under Levette and Sammy's uh administration. Wonderful leaders. Um, I thank my family, thank my u my wife, call her Cupcake, she's here. She allows me to do what I need to do to um have the skills and go teach.
005I'm a current CPR instructor for American Heart and um she never tells me no. She supports me and she allows me to learn the skills I need to learn to do what I got to do to save my community. Um because the thing is for a person to have a big harvest, you got to sew a good seed, right? And so I'm looking that saving that little girl, hopefully if my daughter or my grandchildren or my wife or my mother's in that situation because I plant a good seed, >> the I'll reap the harvest, somebody will save them. >> Um so I believe that giving back. Um I thank um Jana and Les. They are the educators of OSF with my training center who I report to for helping get the skills a ambulance for
006hiring me years ago medical I mean the EMT Christy clinic medical assistant. Um all haters that you know doubted me and everything to you. Um 137 uh Tom and U Bryant and everybody, Pleasant Acres and all the staff, thanks for hiring me. Thanks for making me feel welcome, like I'm a part of the family. Um day one, I told Tom in the interview, if you hire me, expect me to uh produce ownership of not just the building and the cleanliness, but everybody that's in that building. That's my ship, >> and I nickname myself the captain or short cap, and I make sure that everybody is taken care of. And I do that um not to be better than anybody but be a better me every day. Um last but not least, I think I got
007everybody. Yes. Last but not least, um my mom had a stroke three years ago and she's living. My father may rest in pieces in heaven. Um I asked God to spare her life and he did. If you looked at her today, you wouldn't think she had a stroke three years ago. The reason why I say that is being elementary school, teachers told me that I wasn't going to be nothing. They told me that in my face. I had a stuttering problem. I learned differently. Um, I got the same answer but did it differently but they tried to put me in special class to say that I wasn't normal in front of my parents, in front of my peers. And every night my mom would uh not going to get emotional. My mom would kiss me
008on the forehead and rub my head and said, "You're my little man and you're going to be somebody." I asked God to spare her life because I want to equal every kiss on the forehead she gave. I have a band. We did something very successful. I donated. I um u gave her all the allegiance and say that hey mom, this is for you. So, even though I can't kiss your forehead, hopefully I can kiss your heart because if it wasn't for you, >> I wouldn't get this. So, God bless everybody. >> And everyone who came from that part of the meeting, don't feel like you need to stay. This would be the time to politely leave. Thank you everybody. >> Um, okay. Up next, we are going to move into public comments. Um, thank you
009again, Mr. JT. We really appreciate you. Uh, Rita Ray, you're up first. As we get ready, uh, members of the public are welcome to speak during the public comments section of the meeting only. Comments are limited to five minutes per speaker. Board members will not respond to comments or questions during this time, but they may follow up with speakers following the meeting. If speakers are asked to please conduct themselves with respect and civility towards others. And we do have a microphone if you want to turn it on. It should be a green light. Yep. >> Okay. Last month, Mr. Scott stated that before the meeting board meetingings were for business items. Mr. Scott, you are not on the school board. You work for the school board. The school board has signed an oath they and
010this is a 280 board member oath and conduct. Each school school board member before taking his or her seat on the board shall take the following oath of office. I their name do solemnly swear or affirm that I will faithfully discharge the duties of the office of member of school board of the board of education as the um of Ranchville City Schools in accordance with the constitution of the United States the constitution of the state of Illinois in the laws of the state of Illinois to the best of my ability I further swear or affirm that I shall respect the taxpayers's interest by serving as a faith protector of the school district's assets I shall will encourage and respect the free expression of opinion by my fellow board members and others who seek a hearing
011before the board while respecting the privacy of students and employees. I shall recognize that the board member has no legal authority as an individual and that decision can be made only by a majority vote of a public board meeting. I'm going to skip some parts. As a part of the board of education, I shall accept the responsibility for my role in a equitable and quality of education of every student in the school district. I shall foster with the board extension participation of the community, formulate goals, define outcomes, and set the course for rental city schools. I shall assist in establishing a structure in an in an environment designed to ensure all students have the opportunity to attain the maximum potential through a sound organizational framework. I shall strive to ensure a continuous assessment of student
012achievement that isn't being done of all conditions affecting the education of our children and compliance with state law. I shall serve as educators education's key advocate on behalf of students of our community school to advance the vision of Ranchol State Schools and I shall strive to work together with the district superintendent to lead the school district toward fulfilling the vision that the board has created fostering excellence for every student in the areas of academic skills, knowledge, citizenship, and personal development. I think that the school board is giving your power that is not yours to have. I am requesting that the school board set aside time to meet with the superintendent who's supposedly wanting to address my concerns, but I want it to be done in front of the school board so they can hear what
013he has to say and I would like it to be recorded for the public to be able to hear it. I want to hear the responses from the school board and if they need to get in the information from the superintendent then so be it or have him answer in front of them. I have been asking and addressing concerns since I think August 2025. I have not heard anything from the school board. Why is that? Again, if you are not 100% for the children, then you really need to get off the board. The superintendent is the chief executive that is responsible for implementing the policies achieving the goals set by the school board for the district. This would include safety from any bullying from other students. And so far the >> whatever last last week
014I mean last month a seventh grader it's and it's it's he's telling that it's not being done. He's afraid he's afraid and no one's doing nothing. I don't understand it. I am for the whole I don't care what nationality they are. I don't care what grade they are. I want something to be done. I keep hearing students suffer um struggling to read. I've asked questions. I haven't got any answer. This is all that I have to say this time. But I also want to say that I am a veteran and the flag that's being flown in front of this building is a disgrace and I think it should be updated with a a new flag. Thank you. Next divine. >> I'm so sorry. I was murdered. >> It's different. Sorry. How you guys doing? >>
015How are you doing? Good. >> My name is Deos. I'm currently employed as a TA/P professional with the care program. I've currently been employed through RCS for about seven years now. I've worked at East War now Rise Academy witness here at the care program. At first, I was a little skeptical of working at the care program because as a TA, who likes being who likes being moved around or going to a program that I know nothing about, but working for the care program, my outlook on everything from walk from working with kids who have trauma troubles and mental illnesses, even just needing a mental reset. I feel like working at care, I impacted a lot of kids lives because of the short amount of time we spend with kids. In care, we work on social
016emotional learning, which I feel like goes a long way in kids life. All kids are perfect. So I feel like we need an alternative program instead of suspending kids all kids on purpose. I So I feel like it would be critical to send our kids to alternative program instead of being at home in a nonproductive environment for some kindergarters for some kindergarters may not be suspended. So sending them to care is the only option that gives them to have a mental reset and also have teachers have a mental reset for the week. I really appreciate the time, effort, and the board for listening to my program and listening to what I have to say. Thank you. Thank you. Up next is All right. Uh, you'll forgive me. I've been a little ill, so I don't
017sound my normal self, but my name is Laura Fondia. I've worked here in Ranchel City Schools for all 14 years of my education career. and I've been a TA, a fourth and fifth grade teacher, taught ESL, and I've been the sole teacher for the care program since its inception in 2018. In fact, I think I've taught almost all of you board members kids in some capacity. So, that's a point of pride for myself. Um, I'm here before you guys today to give you an update on the care program and also to advocate for your continued investment in it as you guys consider budget adjustments in the near future. Uh, many people know me or our program by name but don't fully know what we do. Um, CARE was created as a response to the behavior
018concerns that we see in our schools here in Rainul. Um, our goal is to give students who are struggling um to meet their classroom expectations the time and the space to be understood and to understand themselves, to name and validate their feelings, and to teach them an alternative, more appropriate way to express themselves. While half of our day in the care program is devoted to academics so students don't fall behind, the other half focuses solely on teaching those social emotional strategies that a lot of people find lacking instead of punishing students who lack them. Uh some of the strategies we teach are broad and we use them daily like using a safe place to calm down or practicing breathing in the language of problem solving and others are customized to meet that specific student. So
019we most commonly address alternatives to physical aggression, recognizing and regulating emotions and teaching the importance internalization and implementation of empathy and respect. The goals of our interventions in care are to help the students become more successful when they re-enter their classrooms and these opportunities are not afforded to the students when they're suspended to their home. In our seventh year as a program, only four of those years have been full. Some of them have been interrupted like by COVID. Um we have served over 365 different students and prevented over 750 suspensions which is over 100 suspensions a year. We have also taught 29 kids long term many of which would have otherwise been expelled. Care has been a support to classroom teachers and building administrators who have exhausted their resources. It has helped increase retention of
020teachers by providing additional disciplinary options for them when they're on the verge of burnout. We have been a crucial component in all three tiers of the MTSS process. We teach self-regulation and problem solving in GenEd classrooms for tier 1. We provide specific skills pushin for small groups and during their visits to care for tier 2. and we intervene in the district's most severe cases by serving tier three students long term, creating a safer environment for students in the gened population. These supports are necessary specifically from care because principles are often not able to take the time to teach replacement behaviors and logical consequence options are limited. Social workers are often overloaded or responding to a crisis. So many students cannot receive interventions unless they are prescribed them by an IEP. And teachers are already cramming
021their schedules full with academics and basic tier one. This year, there have been many conversations at these board meetings and in our schools about discipline and taking away a disciplinary intervention will only further deter us from our goal as a district of educating students to their greatest capacity. Here is also a key in addressing bullying as it is one of the only ways that we have where we can remove a student from their environment, help them gain skills and hands-on experience with learning empathy while also protecting the other students involved. In addition, with talks of new laws preventing kindergarten suspensions, care would be the only alternative for discipline outside of the school we would have. Recently, I've had the opportunity to work in one of our elementary schools since our program has been moved to
022Northview. And this uplose experience has given me ideas about how our program can continue to best address the needs that we are seeing across the district, especially after this year's reorganization. Moving forward, I'm hoping to begin next year by pushing in for tier one instruction on the current conscious discipline strategies to promote consistency across the district. Then, as we begin to see student assignments to our care classroom, we would still make room in our daily schedules to try to add two tier 2 SEAL intervention groups per week at every elementary school. Of course, we would continue to accept our long-term students and push in to schools with TA support if we had low numbers in our care classroom. At just the cost of one teacher and one TA salary, we can continue to provide short-term
023alternative to suspension and preventative interventions, long-term instruction, and add in that desperately needed tier 2 education. As you all consider future programming for our district, it is my hope that you will continue to invest in a restorative response to the behavioral, social, and emotional needs of our most vulnerable students. If you have any questions at all about our program or our ideas about addressing district needs, I'm always available. Thank you. >> Thank you. >> Um, up next is Candace Johnson. >> Good evening. My name is Candace Johnson and I have worked for the district for the past 15 years. The last five have been in the care program. I am very passionate about the care program and have seen firsthand how it has made a p positive impact on our students. We spend a majority
024of our day doing social emotional learning with the students. The the care program is one reason I decided to go back to school and pursue a social work degree. The district has paid for me to receive my master's degree and I have done my internship here this year and see a need to continue to add social workers to our district. I know that there will be upcoming budget cuts that may result in there not being a social work position for me here. I am hoping that the board will consider keeping the program for care and also allow me to be a social worker in the district that I love and have dedicated my career to. Thank you. Thank you. >> And up next is Shay Bennett. >> I have her go cuz I know there's
025so many. >> Yeah, >> Sabrina. >> Good evening. As you may know, my name is Sabrina Rivera. I'm a part of the Rantel Family Advocacy Coalition. My pronouns are they, she. We are compelled to speak at each board meeting pleading for specific, measurable, achievable, relevant, and time bound change. We're asking that you develop smart goals that you take with utmost seriousness. I worry our school community and leadership have developed an apathy that is contagious. If leadership does not take an issue seriously, they are modeling to everyone under them, they do not have to treat these issues seriously either. This then cues to families to feel that there is no point in speaking out, getting involved or caring because leadership is showing them that even if they do, it will not be taken seriously enough to
026initiate change. We can't treat smart goals as just another box to check. They have to be taken seriously by everyone involved with them. We will continue to show up and tell the professionals and leaders of RCS that accountability, accessibility, equal representation, and fidelity is important when that should be a given. We will continue to point out the broken parts of the school system because we care and because we take it serious. It's a shame, too, because there are so many amazing educators who work for this district and they are doing the hard mental, emotional, and even physical labor in your buildings day in and day out, opting for a fraction of a livable salary. We can see the caretaker burnout that is happening. We can see the apathy that is developed. Educators need your support.
027They need to know that they you have their back when they swiftly shut down a student's use of slurs and hate speech or when they step in front of a bully to protect another child or just as important if they're willing to speak up when another staff member is not working with integrity with our students as we've witnessed and heard from many families in the district. I would like to take you or invite you all to take your oversight position seriously. Start spending more time in your school buildings. Observe to the best of your ability how student conflict and bullying forms are handled. Ask why our students are not permitted to write them out themselves. Why are they feeling like they do not have a voice in these issues? Ask yourselves, does this represent how
028the student feels about the situation? Or is it possible that our children are being led through these conflict and bullying reports in order to frame these issues as much less serious than they are? If this is the case, why would our administrators do so? And while we're asking these questions, would you also ask why an admin felt comfortable asking my student during one of these interviews if they were going to talk to me about what was said? Because attempting to influence children to not communicate concerns to their parents feels downright predatory. We teach our children that if an adult alludes to them that they want something cut secret, then that is a bright red flag. And it seems we continue to have to confront these red flags with our district. We're asking that you take
029time to truly see and continue to address these issues with us. Thank you. >> Thank you. Thank you. >> Thank you, Shay Bennett. that pronoun she her. Um again I want to read our mission to remember was my colleague Sabrina. We are the Rantul family advocacy coalition. Our goal is to ensure every child in Ranchol feels safe, supported, and valued at school to strengthen the relationship between family, school, community leaders through open communication and advocacy. Our vision is to unite Ranch community where families and schools can work together to protect every child, promote accountability, and create a culture of respect, inclusion, and understanding. Our mission for the Rantel Family Advocacy Advocacy Coalition is to empower parents, families to take an active role in student safety, well-being, and education. We are working together to advocate for
030safer school environment, and stronger anti-bullying measures, encourage transparency, accountability within the school system, build bridges between parents, educators, and community leaders. Educate families about policy, resources, and their rights. This promotes unity, respect, collaboration across our community. We are not here to fight against the school. We're here to work with them. Our goal is not to blame, but to rather to inform the current policy to be more effective. We want to be part of the solution, helping to create safer schools, stronger relationship, and a more unified community. And recently, we've met with the school and Scott. We are understanding that you're hearing our concerns. Um we're asking before a next big meeting comes uh Scott um and Jamie, we would like to meet with you and our group. We have some solutions. Uh again, we want
031to encourage any of the board members who want to hear because you guys are the ones who make the final decision. We have some pretty big ideas and with the support of the school board and the community, we know it can work. So, we're asking to schedule a meeting with us. We have some real solutions for some pretty big problems that are going on. And again, we're here to unite. You know, we have heard Rita come up consistently explaining and not feeling like she's being heard. I want to make sure her voices heard. It's clear that she has concerns that's that are not being addressed. I want to I know our group supports her and we need to help her. She's here advocating every month. So, there's a problem. I hear about the cares. Hear
032about the social workers. I really think we should hear them and really hear them. Not no more meetings. We need action and follow through. My colleague came up here and I was heartening after a wonderful meeting we had to hear how she felt and how her child felt coming home. You guys should be outraged and upset. You had a wonderful meeting, Scott, right, Jamie? and to hear that we backslid. We thought we all were on the same page. There's a still a big disconnect. So, I'm really calling that you guys really take action. My group is committed. We are all hands in. So, some clear solutions we have. So, I'll be looking forward to your guys's email, scheduling a date and time, and we'll be there ready. Thank you. Next. Um, up next we are
033moving on to board superintendent comments. So for anybody who wants to make comments. >> Yes, I'd like to make comment. Um there's actually a few. Uh first of all, I'd like to thank everybody that came in. Um um especially the concerns. I was going to speak as a parent, but I decided I I'm not going to speak as a parent, but what I have to say, I want everybody to understand. >> Um >> use mic. >> As a board member, I >> can everybody hear me now? >> Yes. >> Yeah. I was going to speak as a uh parent, but I decided that I'm going to go ahead and speak as a board member. Um there's a few issues that I actually have in the comment um that I want to make. First of all,
034is uh and I'm not sure if Dr. Woods can answer this or not. And I don't know how many of you other board members had issues with your with your uh child if you have a child um in the school district to where a uh staff member instead of um putting it on parent square my my email or some other means text whatever to give me my son's uh disciplinary they put it on my school report email. I don't understand that and why that happened. That was one of my concerns and I didn't understand why a teacher would sit there and no telling who's all can see it cuz I know many people can see the see my emails on my workbook even though they're not going to tell you tell me that. That's one
035concern. Now the other concern which is a little bit more important in my opinion and actually is more for the public is I'm a parent that was here when I came to the school to visit my son on um itap >> I was in a classroom um to be totally honest I was shocked in both classes but I was more shocked in the second class. The students were terrible. Terrible. I know plenty times we come to these board me meetings and we talked with other board members and the first thing come out of their mouth, oh no, they were angels. They were great. I didn't have a problem. Well, I I've seen it firsthand. These teachers are getting kicked in the teeth. to sit there and see the disrespect of a substitute teacher that probably
036stood this tall get talk talked to talked about things thrown at her. That was just crazy. Blank crazy. There was no help there. She definitely didn't know I was part of the board. She just was looking at me like I'm thinking, you know, I what am I supposed to do? There was a young lady that um told this lady to get out of her face. Get out of her space is what she said. And the teacher goes, "What'd you say?" She said, "I told you to get out of my space. I'm not going to tell you again." And the teacher goes, "I'm not in your space." And she jerked at the teacher. And that's when I got up. Students had their feet turned in their desk completely backwards. They're taking a test. They're taking a
037handwritten test. And I kept asking teacher, I said, "You sure they're taking a test?" "Yeah, they're taking a test." I said, "So they can just look Chromebooks, whatever. Wide open. Phones wide open. I can hear somebody's uh board book or not board book. Uh Chromebook." I mean, it's so loud. I'm thinking another classroom could hear this. Kids just getting up and down, up and down, up and down, getting food, throwing the paper on the floor. Same teacher substitute tells me it's worse at broad metal. I said, "What?" She goes, "Yeah, it's worth that broad metal." She reported it, but she's the one that got disciplined for it. these teachers, these TAs, these substitutes, they're afraid to say anything because they're afraid to lose their job. They're afraid to lose their position. That's what we have
038going on in our schools. I'm not saying in every single school and I'm not saying in every single class, but I was embarrassed. I was embarrassed as a parent. I was embarrassed as a board member and I was embarrassed as a a community person and living in Ran Tulle to see our kids act that way. And I'm only telling you just a small portion of what I seen and what was going on in that way. That's embarrassing. Thank you. They stole all my limelight by telling the whole story. Anyway, I wanted to talk about I had spoken to Moto and Miss Tori this week um because they well it was actually Tori and another parent. I hope you don't mind me. Okay, thanks. Do it now. Huh? Um um talking to me at a band
039concert about things that had happened at Napit. They were like, "Miss Nikki, what was your experience?" And I actually did say the kids in my classroom were angels because they were. Um but then she was telling me how that was not her experience or another parents experience or Mo's experience. So then when I talked to them and heard all these things about how uh kids were, can I just talk loud? Probably not. Um how kids were going up to teachers and saying these things. In our discussion, Moto and I were like, well, I had said that I don't understand what the problem is because is it that we're not vetting teachers correctly? Because first of all, I love Rachel. I always have. I love our teachers. I love the kids. I love my community. But
040I don't know if we aren't vetting teachers correctly for because we do have a special subset of kids. It's not what's in Rantul isn't like how it is in most places from what I hear. Um, and so I I wonder if the teachers that we hire can handle the kids that we have because as you have pointed out, Dr. Woods, um, we have a different set of kids with all the different special needs and different issues that we have. And so I'm just wondering, is that part of the issue? is the issue. Um what I mean by that Miss Rita you look confused when I said that. Um the reason I am saying that is because we do have a bigger special education community from what I hear or uh our poverty level or the
041uh help me with words not depression but uh trauma. Thank you. That type of thing. We do have more in this community than in other communities. And that's what I'm speaking of. And if we don't have the correct people to handle those kids, then that we are doing a disservice to our kids. And I think that it takes all of us to come up with solutions and problems. And I I asked Tori like, "Do you think this is what the Rand Tool Coalition group um wants us to talk about out loud?" Because these are the types of things that I want to talk about during our board meetings because we all do care about all this stuff because it has happened to most of us as parents. Um, I know that I have said this
042many times that I don't have an easy time when I go to say something to gosh. Um, I don't have an easy time when I go to say something to a principal or an admin at another school either and it takes me I'm a blunt talker and I don't stop till I get what I want. And so I'm no no listen listen and then I go back and I go back and I go back and they probably get sick of me. But until I get an answer that I want, I'm not going to stop. And and if they I feel like it's sometimes if they brush me off or um don't take what I'm saying seriously, then I will say, "Okay, well then since this parent's doing this, this is what I'm going to do.
043So be ready for it." And then that's when I start to see stuff happen. Now, I don't think that it should take that, which is why I'm saying there's got to be and we I've I've spoken about this before. There's got to be some something more than us just saying, "Okay, we'll get to it." Like, we have to start and I don't know what that is. I don't know if it's um laying out strict policies because I understand that um all the principles there's general rules and then all the classrooms have is the word autonomy to do is that the right word um to do what to run their class however they want I understand that but there I think that there needs to be some type of set rules so that when things happen
044what the second time it's being documented. It's so that we can start getting results because it's not fair when we have kids cussing out teachers or just being completely disrespectful like that. Like, you know, Miss Rita always comes every month and talks about the reading. Well, but can you blame kids? Do you are you blaming the kids for not knowing how to read? Are you blaming the teachers? But if the teachers are trying to You know what I mean? if they're trying to teach, but there's all these disruptions, what do you do about that? And so, there's got to be some way that we all work together, whether it be the school board demanding that we have these rules or that or if there are these rules in place that the teacher that the principles
045adhere to the teachers following these rules. I don't I don't know what it might be, but I feel like something needs to be done in order for these things to stop happening. And I also think that um I forget who said it, maybe it was Shay. Um that because of the bullying, I mean, all these things also contribute to the bullying in the classroom as well. And it like they said, they keep on coming back every month and saying stating these things. So, there has to be something that we can do in order to combat this problem, which leads me to the care program. Um, and it's funny because I talk to you all the time about stuff, but we didn't talk about this. Um, I don't know that that would be the best thing
046for us to eliminate, especially with all the issues that we have. And I feel like that's just one more time when the black and brown and disadvantaged people are being like, "Uh, it's okay. We're going to get rid of you." When that's what we need. I mean, we we we the board said that we needed it so much that we created a whole school for the middle school through for the middle school, not the high school, for the middle school. So then why are we eliminating it for our younger kids when our younger kids are needing it just as much? It sounds like I don't I don't know that if sometimes we think about things all the way through. >> Thank you. >> Hang on one more time. Sorry. I just wanted um anybody that
047might have thought that I was I was targeting them or or point fingers at them. Believe me, I wasn't. I um and I agree. Um Miss Pettit said it before I did, but um and I'm sure that's what the care program is saying. You know, you need to be there. Um you need more support. You need more help. Um, and that's what these teachers are saying, too. And these TAs, they need something. They need us to back them. They need the administrators to back them. They need the the superintendent to back them. And that's what we're here for. And I'm sure that that's what we're going to be trying to do. But we need your help. We need your support. We need your input so that way we can try to correct things that that
048you guys are living every day. I'm just saying that that one one day, one 60 minutes that I was probably in there was was shocking to me. Um because I know when I was in school, that ain't what school was about. And I know u Miss Rita and I'm I'm going to bring you up. That is true. Our job is educate these kids and give them proper education. And every single one of the kids deserve it. And that's why I'm the school board is because I want what's best for the kids, the district, and our community. Thank you. >> One more thing. I'm sorry. I wanted to leave on a positive note. Um, I just wanted to do my own little shout out. Um, but I don't know her name because I left my post-it
049note with my notes at home. But is there anyone from Pleasant Acres still? No, there is. But that's not the one that it was on. That's all right. >> Um I don't know. Miss Miss Amber's she has >> cyber. Yes, that one. Um she helped a student learn how to write cursive. I don't know if you guys saw that on the rant community page. I thought that was awesome because I always hear kids aren't learning cursive and we don't do the pledge. Well, they are learning cursive. So, I thought that was great and I wanted to give her a great shout out for that. Thank you for doing that. And also my own experience with Mr. Neil Parthon, he emails parents every week so that we know what's going on. He will reach out personally
050when you are missing assignments and that takes a lot of work to do. And I just want to give a acknowledge him and say it publicly how great I think that he's doing because it really it helps this ADHD mama out a lot when he does that. Um and also Mr. Brandon Miller um he's a social worker over at Ader. Yes. Um he also emails us every week if he has a student that he's working with um to let us know of any homework assignments that are missing and things like that. And it helps out a lot. And so I just want to say thank you because as much as I'm complaining about things that need to be done, again, I think that our students are great. I think our teachers are great. I think
051my community is great. And so I think that we are greater together. Thank you. Can you guys hear me? So, um I think two weeks ago, Dr. Woods and I um had the pleasure of being at some of your schools for your lunch um time and we got I got to meet a lot of teachers and I did also go out to the to the hallways and I spoke with some kids and um and I got to one of the schools and acres I went into the cafeteria cuz I wanted to see some of the kids what they were doing and I got to see firsthand kindergarteners ers hitting themsel hitting each other, blapping each other. And I stood there um and this little girl, she was just angry. She was upset. She was mad.
052And I tried to calm her down as best as I could. Um it brought me from when I worked at the schools that I would go into the cafio room and try to like calm these kids and I told her, you know, do you need a hug? And she just looked at me and she yelled at me. She didn't know who I was. And I saw firsthand what teachers go through. It's not easy, you know. And they sit there and they try to talk to these kids. They try to calm them down, but then they turn around and another kid is fighting. The other one went under the table, tried to hit the other kid, and another kid is throwing food. And there's a couple of adults in there, but they're trying to turn fires
053away like everywhere, you know, and I, you know, and it's I can I cannot imagine and I and and I, you know, we all see it. I mean, I saw it the care that they put into these kids, how much they try to calm them down and everything they're doing. So, what you said, Miss Rita, you Absolutely. You know, we should spend time in the schools. We should see firsthand what's going on. So, when we hear it, we know what people are talking about and it just shows also that we care and that we um are acknowledging everything is going on in the schools. So, you know, it I try to visit all the schools as best as I can. And I'm not going to say here that I do, but I do see what
054the teacher are doing. And they are trying very hard to try to calm these kids and give them the best of love that they can. And you know, and most of the times teachers responses were how's it going? It's behavior issues. You hear it across the board. And so what do we do? How do we do it? You know, the organization you guys have. I do want to say that I want to start going to your meetings, you know, um I want to be involved in that not only because it's that is something important that our community needs and people that do what you guys do advocate for your community is a lot and be proud of yourself for doing something like that. And lastly, care program. I was there when it started in the
055school district. I know the heart and soul that Laura, Candace, and that you know you what you guys put I've seen it firsthand. You know, you guys pour your whole heart into it and you guys work hard each day with those kids. I've seen it and and it is something that we need because I see that you guys give one-on-one love to these kids and one-on-one attention and um you you and you guys are the best to do it. You know, you guys are a great team and thank you for everything you do for these kids. Um and you know, the numbers that you mentioned, wow, you should applaud yourselves in the back. Thank you. And um like Nikki and Moto said, you know, it takes a village. We can't do it by ourselves. You
056know, it's I've always said it's a hand inhand partnership. We can do it. Teachers can do it, but we also need the parents to do it. And together it can happen, but it's just not just one person pulling it cuz it's not going to happen. and I'm willing to do whatever you know and I'm sure everybody here we do what we can because we want what's best for our community and our kids and that's why we sit here. Thank you. >> Just say one brief thing. I also want to say that I applaud our teachers like 100% because I was a substitute teacher and I know what you guys are dealing with. Um I also agree that it does take a village. Um, we all need to be um 100% invested um from the school
057board to our to our administrators to our teachers and to our parents. We need to have some parent responsibility for kids that are out of control. And um on the other side of this, I do want to state though that um it may seem like we are not trying or not doing things, but there's also some things we need to consider like we work within the constraints of the state law. There's only so many things that we can do. So, if you're stepping in between a bully, yes, it's important to protect the child. Um there's just it's we had this recently happened and it's hard for um I don't know where I'm going with this. It's hard for um teachers to know what is appropriate when there's the constraints of the law saying that they
058can't do something to protect a child. Um, and I also just kind of want to reiterate that we are working within constraints of our budget as well. Um, do I think that we need to have, you know, more TAs in every classroom and um, more social emotional um, coaches on staff and all. Yes, I would love to have all of that. Um, but finding the money for it is an issue as well. Um, I'm like Libby Downer. I'm sorry. Um, anyways, I just want to say thank you to our teachers and to our parents for coming out here and consistently advocating for our students. Um, it's important. We recognize you. We know that you're here. And Miss Rita, I we do know we we we hear you. Um, we're listening. So, Yes, >> board members.
059Sir, I'll do my comments. >> All right. Um before I get into my prepared comments, the uh I would say that um I know that I had some conversations with some of you about the substitute situation um because we've had a couple of issues recently with substitute teachers. So, um I think what I remember there was a book I read in elementary school called How to Sink a Sub and it was all about naughty things kids could do when there was a substitute because they could get away with it. Now, that seems very innocent. That was probably 1983. Okay. But um substitute is a very difficult situation for the adult who's in the room and there do tend to be more significant behaviors when there's a sub. Um I'm not excusing it. I will say
060that u for a lot of our subs that are our regular folks that Hannah knows quite well, we don't have those types of problems. um when there are problems with a day-to-day sub, it is very easy for us to uh identify that and remove that person if that's what needs to happen. Um I'm not I don't know the details specifically of what happened in the case you were talking about, Mr. Johnson, but I just want to clarify that um the sub situation is difficult. And Hannah, I'm going to put you on the spot. How many teachers were out today? 2 26 >> 26 and you had all of the teachers were covered today, but we still had like five or so TAs that were not covered. >> So, we had 26 teachers out. They were
061covered, >> right? >> Um but covering also sometimes means that we're pulling internally teachers or taking extra kids into their classrooms. >> Um and this isn't a just a randol issue. Um, it is a challenge everywhere and it's flu season. So, um, okay, my comments. Here we go. Move along screens. All right. Um, on February 9th, all of our schools invited families into the schools for National African-American Parent Involvement Day. Thank you to our families who are able to attend. Uh last week our Black History Month planning committee at our meeting uh we debriefed the different events from this year and we will provide feedback to the schools uh and the buildings to help improve their events for the next year. Um our district-wide Black History Month event will be next Friday, February 27th from
0626:00 to 8 at the junior high. The event will include food, fun, and fellowship. Those are my favorites. student artwork and displays, arts and craft activities for students, opportunities to support and learn about local blackowning businesses, uh a complimentary book for the first 100 students in attendance, although we have a lot more books than that. So, we're just trying to get people there early. Um, and the event is open to the public. We are still in need of volunteers to help before, during, and after. A signup sheet was distri a sheet a sign up was distributed to families and staff today uh on parent square and there's also a link to it on the website. So really anybody could volunteer. Um we did also mail home a letter to all the RCS families with details
063about the event um encouraging them to attend. So hopefully we'll see uh increased attendance this year. Uh the next item is on the evening of March 12th, schools will host our spring family teacher conferences. All families are encouraged to attend family teacher conferences. If a family is unable to schedule a time on March 12th, please remember to contact the school office and we can find an alternate date time for that. Um looking at the agenda for this evening, um there are a couple of items I want to highlight in advance. First in the consent agenda is the annual approval of the school calendar. This year we are planning to have a full week fall break in October. This is something becoming more common in schools. Uh because this year Memorial Day is on May 31st,
064so the very last day of the month. Uh the calendar provided us an opportunity to try a fall break this year and still finish the school year before Memorial Day, which is typically when we finished here at RCS. Uh additionally, unfortunately, depending on your take, uh I learned today that legislation was introduced in Springfield to make election day 2026 a holiday. So, um it may it will likely pass. I would assume the last several election days have been holidays. Uh if the legislation passes, we'll have to come back to the board and ask for an amended calendar. Uh we would likely uh the election day would become a holiday and then the last day of school would get bumped back one day um to be Friday, May 28th instead of Thursday, May 27th. So that
065won't be a huge impact, but it's just terrible timing that I learned it today. Um second, we're going to have two presentations tonight. Um the first presentation is to provide information to the board about our overall efforts to improve student reading performance which will highlight some of our promising mid-year data. The second presentation will provide an administrative recommendation for possible spending reductions for next year in anticipation of lower revenues. Uh last I want to highlight in theformational items there is one contract in there that I want to highlight with a group called leading simply consulting. This spring leading simply will host needs assessment focus groups for families and community and one for our staff to gather information about uh programming ongoing programming programming interests uh for Ranchole City Schools. This ties directly to the district
066improvement plan priority area five and we will have close session this evening and there will be no action after close session. So that's all I had for my comments. Okay, we're going to move on to the consent agenda. Does anybody have anything in the consent agenda they would like to discuss? Can I get a motion to approve the consent agenda? Personnel report is submitted with the stipulation that each individual is required to comply with all requirements for new hires as indicated in Illinois statutes and our CS board policy and procedures including ratification of bills prepaid by the finance manager and the board policy for >> I second it >> I Mendoza photo Johnson Hi >> John. >> Hi >> Robin Bon. >> Hi >> Deborah Sweat. >> Hi >> John. >> Hi. >> I'm kind
067of liking this microphone. I feel like really loud. Um, next option, approval of contracts greater than 50,000. We have two contracts on the agenda tonight. The first is for um the purchase of books at Ader and the second is a Skyward student three-year contract. I get a motion to approve the um contracts greater than 50,000 or does anybody have any questions? >> Anybody want to make a motion? >> Second. Second it Johnson. >> Hi >> Robin Bond. Hi >> Vicky Pettit. Hi John Brotherton. >> Hi >> Ky Johnston. Hi >> Deborah Swat. Hi Diana Mendes. Hi. >> Okay number eight presenting or presentation discussion update on the implementation of the literacy framework. You guys want to come on up? Up next is Jamie Roundtree, director of curriculum and instruction and Diana Kisler Remy, instructional programming
068court and they will be providing an update on implementation of the literacy framework. So why are they presenting this? It's the big question. Uh the district is investing significantly in shifting how we teach reading. This is not just an investment in time, tools, and training, but is also an investment in developing leadership across RCS so that we will have sustained results. This presentation is intended to clarify for you what we are doing and how it is building toward reading improvement for all of our students. So, I'm going to Oh, I'll be your clicker. >> Oh, perfect. >> Right. I don't know how else we're going to do this. >> Excuse me. Remote. No remote. It's all good. >> Okay. Um, I trust you. >> Well, >> am I supposed to do How would I give
069you my laptop? >> Oh, okay. >> I just I don't even know how to expand the screen. Good evening. Thank you for the opportunity. Good evening, community. How's everybody doing? Um, today I'm going to talk to you a little bit about alignment of our systems. Uh, because our goal as always is to improve how we positively impact student growth, right? And this year we made some major major uh system shifts. But systems can only shift strong leadership because leadership is about bringing change. Leadership is not about a position. It's not about a title and it's not about some sense of authority. Sustainable change requires strong strategic leadership, not just management. All of the work that we have done required leadership from the boardroom to the classroom. Uh for initiatives to last, leadership must be grown,
070not soon. Leadership is shared. It's not limited to just the school board, district office administrators, or building administrators. Leadership is about identifying the strengths of others and growing more leaders. It's about organizing and mobilizing people toward a common purpose. finding a pathway to commitment beyond compliance. Uh student success is happening because in each of these pillars um it there has been or is being established sense of leadership in RCS. Right now when systems are aligned students grow but systems do not sustain themselves. People do it's about the technical versus the adaptive one. Right? A technical problem is when you know the solution. You just need the right tool for the right process. An adaptive problem is when the real challenge is in people's beliefs, habits, fears, or mindsets and there's not a tool that's going
071to fix that. For example, let's say that our student scores are low, right? District buys a new curriculum. That's a technical fix. But if our teachers and staff don't believe in the approach, don't understand the science behind it, and they aren't deeply properly trained, or if the school culture avoids hard conversations about instructional practice, curriculum is not going to fix that. Because real issue is not the program. It's whether we're willing to change how we lead and how we teach. It's about our collective efficacy. believing that we can do it and more importantly believing that our students can do it. Leadership is about creating conditions where growth is possible. Conditions that allow our people to feel safe to try, adjust, and try again. That's where you'll find the adaptive work. All right. So the K5
072restructuring required courageous collaborative leadership and adaptive work from the boardroom to the classroom. Just amongst yourselves, it required you to learn with, from and about each other. Went out, you listened to families, staff, students, and the community. And during that, you faced some very challenging perspectives. And then you took the time to find common threads amongst those various perspectives that you were presented with. And in the end, you made the best decision even though that may not have initially been thought. All right. This leadership impact led to a strengthening of our cross school alignment, development instructional leadership teams that included teacher assistants, teachers, admin at every school and it led to stronger collaborative opportunities for our teachers with more grade level partners. Now, the implementation of our literacy framework required instructional shifts challenged some of
073our very deeply held on to beliefs. We shifted to a new instructional framework that was aligned to the science of reading. This required reframing beliefs about how our students learn to read and how we teach those skills. This required collaborative leadership amongst and between central office and then with our building leaders, principal and assistant principles and their instructional leadership teams began developing their own targeted learning focus to help understand and reframe purpose of all these shifts that we made. Then these instructional learn leadership teams work to help the rest of the staff understand the why and the purpose we made these shifts. This process is what's shifting our district to commitment beyond compliance. Of course, there are challenges that come with change, right? Such as resistance. And that required us to model how we lead
074and how we always bring it back to the purpose and the goals, which is always about improving educational experiences of all our students. Leadership does not work when we only impose top-down directives. This leadership impact led to the district developed a targeted learning focus and our building's instructional leadership teams each developed their own that aligned to the district targeted learning focus. It led our instructional leadership teams to be trained in how to collect and look at our data and it led us to scheduling our school improvement days where we blocked out dedicated time for our teachers and teams to analyze data to improve their instructional practices. Now these leadership teams that are helping how we look at data now these sorry now these leadership teams are helping how we look at data and turn it
075into opportunities for growth not outcomes we should be fearful of or afraid of. Um the technical aspect of that right we created data systems to provide clarity and consistency. Um and we rebuilt our assessment systems. We established data monitoring pro protocols and as mentioned we scheduled some very designated data data days for our teachers to work. Now the adaptive work we're still in is still ongoing is in the dew weaponizing of these data systems because leadership is what helps build safety so that our staff can reflect honestly. Leadership is what's going to drive culture shift so that data informs action rather than places blame on our students, our teachers, on our administrators, or our families. Okay, first we have to look at our systems. Okay, this leadership impact led to our instructional leadership teams collaboratively
076analyzing student trends. It led to the district instructional leadership team analyzing patterns and trends across schools. And it led to structured protocols to help us take action. Okay. Leadership is really about growing decision makers, not creating followers. It's about solidifying a continuous improvement cycle. A cycle where we identify a focus, set a goal, implement a plan, monitor progress, reflect on outcomes, and then we wash, rinse, repeat. Right? And every single pillar uh that we showed earlier required that site. We can see this with because now we have individual individuals both veterans and novice uh staff stepping into leadership and facilitation roles starting to see colleagues challenge their own instructional practices and even those of their and even those of their fellow teachers during data meetings. We're seeing this through our principles leading and modeling databased
077decision making. What we're building is leadership capacity, not dependency. This leadership impact led to instruction leadership teams leading staff conversations, staff data conversations, principles connecting professional development to collaboratively identify priorities. It led to more meaningful connections between professional development and the learning that is happening in the classrooms both by our teachers and by our students. Initiatives don't sustain themselves. Leadership sustains them. You can have the right curriculum, you can have the right resources, you can have the right plan, right number of people, you can even have consensus. But without leadership capacity, initiatives are not sustainable. RCS is becoming a district where leadership where leaders are and learners are grown in tension. Leadership is expected and developed at every level from the boardroom to the classroom because leadership is what made it this possible and leadership
078is what will sustain it. Right? So now Diana's going to share with you just how this process has impacted the most important why which is why we're all here. Right? that's improving our students learning experiences and outcome. So going to look at some data together. >> And I'm going to say clicking because I like to be trust >> just not with the clicking >> without the adaptive work. Yes. >> Okay. So one of the ways in which we can measure student outcomes and student growth is by looking at our I Ready benchmark assessment. So that is given to our students beginning of the year, middle of the year and end of the year. It is a norm referenced and a criteria reference test. So that really those are just fancy words for saying the test
079can compare one student's performance to all students nationwide who take this test as well as grade level like standards. Okay. So I want to start by showing you where we were last year before all of these big shifts were made. So last winter, 57% of the students in first through fifth grade were showing that they had made at least half a year's progress towards their annual growth goal. Okay, that the test sets a growth goal for each student depending on where they take the test in the beginning of the year. This 50 57% of our students had made at least half of that growth last winter. Okay? Okay. And I give you this as a reference because after we have made these shifts, 63% of our first through fifth grade students have made half a
080year's progress. That's a 6% increase from where we were this time last year. 6% might not sound like a lot to you. So, let me put that in perspective of systems change. system change in such a grand scale if you are seeing anywhere from 5 to 10% that's considered pretty excellent growth. So halfway through the year which actually we started a whole lot of this did not get implemented all the way until end of September. So September to December we were able to see a 6% increase from where we were last year. One of the areas that is traditionally, historically difficult to see accelerated progress is with our upper elementary students. There's a few reasons for that. Probably the biggest one is that those grades the text level becomes increasingly difficult. They shift from learning
081how to read to reading to learn. And so the foundational skills kind of drop off in the upper elementary schools. With all the shifts that we have made this year, we have seen an 8% increase for our third through fifth grade students. 68% of them are showing half a year's worth of growth. Third grade in particular is a very challenging year because those foundational skills pretty much drop off. We the teachers in primary grade spend a whole lot of time teaching kids how to read and in third grade it is expected that they already know that and so the instruction shifts more to making meaning from what we're reading. Our third grade teachers are incredible. Actually scratch that. All of our teachers are incredible. Our third grade teachers are showing up challenging each other's thoughts,
082being very intentional with their planning, being very responsive to the data that they are collecting in between these big chunks of time. Um, our teachers progress monitor very frequently to make sure that our students are continuing the growth that they expect of them. And our third grade team in particular at both Eastlon and Broad Meadow are seeing an 18% increase from where they were at this time last year because they have fully dived into this new outlook, this new framework, and they are challenging what it looks like to be a third grade teacher. When you make systems change, you want to make sure that you're looking at all of the demographics, all of the programs that you have for your students. One of the biggest programs we have in Randol is our bilingual instructional programming.
083We have what 29% of our students in bilingual programming. Okay. And those educators, I cannot tell you how insanely impressed I am with them on a daily basis. Teaching bilingual students requires high level of complexity cognitively, linguistically, and they are still trying to meet grade level rigor and balance all of the needs of their students with a huge range of abilities. our bilingual students are making 1% higher growth than where they were um or than the the overall district, sorry. So the their scores last year, 57% of them were making half a year's worth of growth. Now they're at 64, which is 1% higher than the district average. So when we look at equity, when we consider is this framework and our new practices equitable, we're really looking at yeah, it's actually making a pretty
084big difference for one of our most targeted groups that we want to see making some big improvements. And I want to specifically shout out our fifth grade bilingual team because they are reaching levels at pretty much the ideal. They are seeing 83% of their students making half a year's worth of progress. And if you have not had the opportunity to go meet Mr. and Miss Moya at Elon, I want you to make that a priority. They are a father and daughter who are working side by side changing lives and they are the most delightful humans and they prioritize their students beyond everything. They work insanely hard. They make all the changes based on data and they they have really made this new framework something that works for them and their students. That is not done
085alone. that is on the backs of all of the other teachers, fourth, third, second, first, and kindergarten who came before them who laid a really strong foundation. Our bilingual teachers are truly incredible. So, I want to leave you with where we're going. We're at 63% of our students making half years worth of growth right now. We think it would be an attainable reasonable goal that by spring we would see 70% of our students making half or making a full year's worth of progress. So when we look at these numbers again in the spring we'll be looking at students who have made 100% progress of their annual goals growth. >> That's where I will leave you. >> Yes question. >> I have a question. answer. Well, you can take a minute to think. I also want
086to make sure that when I'm talking about leadership, I'm not talking about positions. Talking about leadership amongst our everybody, our staff, our students, everyone. So, I don't want you to think I'm advocating for leadership from a positional space, but about going leadership amongst and within Is this just based off of our I Ready? Okay. Um when the bilingual kids are taking their test, are they doing it in English? >> That's a really great question. >> Are they doing it in >> This is the first year that we are taking the I Ready test in Spanish. >> Are they really learning? >> I mean, they're learning. >> Our bilingual students have superpowers. Listen to the way you're talking. and it seems like they're getting a little more education than than the regular kids. >> So, there
087is a lot of um research that shows how being bilingual enhances your cognitive abilities. And so, a lot of our bilingual students are outperforming our monolingual students currently because of those superpowers in addition to the very strong teachers that exist in our bilingual program. That's not to say our monolingual teachers are not strong. they are also very strong. But the way that the bilingual program has been structured, the reason we th those numbers that I put up there are the English scores. Those are the the bilingual students who take they take both tests. So they take everything that our bilingual students and our bilingual teachers do is double. They take the test in Spanish and they take the test in English. >> So the numbers are higher in Spanish. Um, so because this is our
088first year taking the test in Spanish, it's actually the first year that it's been available nationwide in Spanish. There are no norms and no percentiles and no like it is this is they are still collecting >> I'm just wonder so the numbers were the English test. >> I'm trying to say okay well maybe we need to put more effort somewhere else then. Um another thing you had said the bilingual group uh third through fifth grade 57 to 64% which is only 1% less than the other group% >> higher >> that's fifth grade through first through fifth grade why what's the difference why do you unless I misread it >> no you're right currently the way that our program is structured the K2 bilingual program is strictly in Spanish and So they are not they have
089not adopted the same literacy framework that our third through fifth grade bilingual teachers have adopted. So our K our first through fifth grade monolingual have made these big instructional shifts for the literacy framework and our third through fifth bilingual have also made those shifts. But our K2 bilingual has remained practicing the same way that they were previously. >> Okay. I just I just noticed the >> Yeah, >> the uh grades were different and I'm thinking, okay, how do you go? >> Yeah. >> Thank you. >> You know, upand and this if you don't, that's fine. So, the spring goal is 70%. Do you know what it was in 2425? Like how many students hit that full year of growth? >> I do. I just ran the numbers yesterday. My brain currently is like a running
090spreadsheet. Um, so at the end of last school year, only 50% of our first through fifth grade students had made a full year's worth of progress, which is 7% less than what was indicated at the middle of the year portion. Um, why that is, we could make a whole lot of hypotheses and figure that out. I kind of don't care. I really just care where we're going from here. >> One thing I'd like to point out is part of why we're looking at growth is for a lot of the students in our district, we're below proficient, right? They're not if they take the IR test, the test isn't going to be proficient. But one of the other variables that we do look the state looks at also is growth. Um, we're not going to catch
091kids up if they're behind unless they're they have if they make if they don't make a year's worth of growth, they're going to fall further behind, right? So, we have to get kids to that full year of growth and then some. Um, so it's important. Um, I we do look at proficiency. Um, but where we are right now is we've got to really accelerate the growth uh for really most all of our students. >> I do have a question. If we're um if our goal is 70% for this year, um what are our anticipated projections for the upcoming years once we've fully implemented the program? pretty much. >> Yeah, I think our goal is to get to 80%. Next year. I mean, that's just a goal because I think that's that's what a typical multi-tiered
092system of support is set up as for 80% of your students are getting what they need from just the general education. You're always going to have 15 to 20% that still need more intensive supports. Um so our goal is to get that and then we can start to think about how do we now approach addressing the sort of um achievement uh gap that's happening. >> Okay. One more question. I'm sorry. Um on this growth that that the numbers that you guys are coming up with um is that on the level of the child not the level of the state right? I mean, you know, like the state might say this where this child should be. All the growth that you're data that you're getting is only based on that individual child. So, we we could
093still be this far behind the state, >> right? >> But yet, we're saying this is what kind of growth they have had. >> Okay. >> That's a difference between proficiency. >> Yeah. I just wanted to I just wanted to make sure in my head. So realistically, if we continue to see growth like this within five years, we could say kids are are making up the gap in the grade levels that they were falling behind previously. >> Yeah. And it takes three to five years for any right structure shifts that you've made to really show an impact. But fact that I'm impressed first off with our staff. I mean, the way the staff has embraced all of these changes has been unbelievable. And I really invite you all um to go in and watch some of
094the word reptile and what you are seeing in those spaces because the the level of engagement with the students is unbelievable unbelievable. Um so it's a testament to our to to the to the teachers in the building and the administrators in the building for taking all of this change on and really implementing um with I mean with with optimism and and and and open mind to learning. But I, you know, I I think that what we've done here in this district is incredible. I've been in other districts. I've worked in other districts at the district level, building level. And I can tell you it's been I can't think of a time when I was able to see this districtwide. And I don't think we appreciate it. It is not because of anything we've done, because
095of the work that they talk about that collective efficacy. they are now believing is possible and seeing the impact that they're having in these students. So, I would love to walk through some classrooms with any of you at any time just to help you see it and also highlight um the work that's being taking that's taking place in our classrooms. Um I want to highlight one thing that I can't believe we didn't catch this earlier. Um so the the leadership development is that Jamie is talk was talking about a lot of that is a very formal process that we're going through with our schools. Um we have a consulting group that we're working with called focus school focused schools or focused schools >> focused schools. Um and they for instance last Friday at the inservice
096day we had about 50 people in this room. There's a Jamie referenced the instructional leadership team. So each school has a basically a data team. Um and so we're working with this outside group to help get everybody on the same page, everybody um uh at least speaking in the same way and looking at things similarly. So then those same consultants are going into the buildings and working with the instructional leadership teams and the principal in the building. Um, so that's a that's a piece that I don't think anyone the board really knew we were doing that and I should have brought it up. We should have because it's been a significant effort this year um and uh for for the district and we have at least several people in here staff who are on their
097buildings instructional leadership teams. Thank you, Jamie. Your part was only eight and a half minutes. Well done. All right. >> We appreciate you coming. It's not easy first time thinking. So, thank you very much. >> Thank you for having me. >> Yes, it was. >> Thank you. >> So, thank you Diana and Jamie. Next, I will be sharing with the board information about budgeting for 2627 school year. As I have shared with you uh previously, we the financial situation for next year is um uncertain is the word I would use and it's important to take steps now to maintain strong fiscal health uh moving into next year. And so Chris, you are here. Hello Chris. So you look so excited. Um so first um I'll talk about revenues. So that's the money that comes into
098RCS. Ultimately I would say there are too many unknowns heading into next year. And I'm going to explain each of our three main sources of revenue and they're shown here on the pie chart. Okay. So um first I'm going to talk about our federal revenues. Um, our primary consistent revenue funds that come from the federal level are for title programming. That's title one, two, three, and four. And I've kind of listed out what those are. That's about 5.2% of our overall budget. Other federal funds are going to be uh school lunch program, special education funding, those kinds of things. Um, typically we have annual increases in those title revenues, but that is very uncertain moving forward. I would say, um, I don't want to get political, but it seems uncertain how funding is going to
099play out at the federal level right now. Um, there's also been serious discussion that title three, which is bilingual education funding, would be cut um, completely. So when we're projecting for next year, we are not assuming increases uh and we could actually see cuts in the federal funding. Um at the state level, which is our single largest revenue source, uh the evidence-based funding model has provided significantly more revenue to RCS over the last six years, but the increases in revenue have declined every year. There is no guarantee that there will be any increase in funding. Whether we see a flat EBF, that's what it's called, EBF, for next year or a slight increase. We also won't know that until after the start of the budget year. Um, we do know that the governor did not
100recommend funding categoricals in his uh budget address yesterday. So, categoricals are transportation and special education. So there he he he did not recommend funding them at their current levels which is already a reduced level. Um and the state board requested 150 million new dollars for categoricals that would have kept the percentage funding the same and the governor recommended 50 million. So we know that's that's a cut. Um and those are affect mostly things like transportation and special education. Um our local is our most reliable source of revenue and that's our uh the single most reliable source is our local property taxes. This accounts for about 20% of our funding. Uh, and we know this is the one revenue source that we know what the increase should be assuming everyone pays their property taxes and that
101would be a 4.9% increase in this source of revenue. Uh, so this is our only revenue stream that we can realistically predict right now. Uh, I do want to note that our 1% tail sales tax revenue has also been increasing. We've actually had doubledigit increases over the last two years in sales tax revenue. Uh all of that money has to be used on facilities. So we can't use that money to save positions. Um and also most of it already is earmarked to go towards outstanding bonds that we have which is normal and that it's structured that way. Um so then I need to look at expenditures. When I say I, there's several of us that look at this. Um Chris is here. Um we know for instance, oh rewind. Um we are able to more
102accurately predict what we will spend. All right. This year in our budget, 71% of our budget is salary and benefits. And I would say direct benefits. So that is health insurance, dental insurance, things like that. Um there are other costs that go into having employees that are not being counted in this number. Uh based on contractual agreements, salary will increase next year by 4% or 4.5% based on employee group. And so that's based on negotiated contracts. What we cannot predict is employee benefit costs. Health benefits alone typically are seeing a double-digit increase in recent years. Last year, we had a 17.5% increase in just our health benefits. Uh unfortunately, what the pie chart here shows is that for us to reduce expenditures, that reduction will most likely need to come from the cost of salary
103and benefits. Um, this slide is showing different ways we could look at forecasting for next year given the unpredictability of our revenue. The current budget is a deficit of $185,000. And Chris wants me to clarify this. What that means is, uh, this year we are using our savings, our cash reserves. We're not going into debt. Uh, that's why we have cash reserves. For some perspective, in a $35 million budget, we are projected to overspend by 1/ half of 1%. Okay, so that it's pretty close to the target. Um, in this table though, I put together four scenarios for consideration, A, B, C, and D. I'll walk you through A um and what that means. So a is let's assume that we have a 4% increase in revenue next year and we would have a 4%
104increase in expenditure next year. If that is the case and we make no changes, we will next go into next year having a $192,000 deficit. However, what is more likely is what I'm projecting in C or D, a revenue increase of less than 2%. And an expenditure increase between four and 5%. Likely resulting in at least a $1 million deficit. So, how did I arrive at this 1.8 85% number? Um, when you're budgeting, you have to make some assumptions. So, I sat down with Chris and said, "Let's make some assumptions." Um, for example, we could assume that for local property taxes, we would have a 4.9% increase. Um, we could assume at least receiving our current level of evidence-based funding. So, in law, we have to get at least what we got this year. This
105results, when you do those kinds of guesstimates, results in a conservative estimate of only a 1.85% 5% increase in revenue. Um again these projections are based on spending the same way right now same way next year as we are right now. So the administrative recommendation is to reduce expenditures for next year by at least $1 million. And I ask myself this but what if we are wrong? What if I we've estimated wrong? That that's a possibility. I will not have estimated on the dot for sure. So, but our best case scenario is if we are able to reduce spending by over a million dollars is that we operate in the black and we do not draw down fund balances potentially increasing our fund balances. So, you that's the position we would want to be in.
106Worst case scenario is we operate in the red and draw down fund balances by no more than about $400,000 which we can tolerate based on our current fund balances. And again fund balances means the money we have in the bank. All right. Uh we typically how many months Chris is are we recommended to keep in >> Six months. Okay. Oh my. How much are in the fund balances now? You're the correct answer is six months, but >> we're at six months. Um we I think we've got 11 million in the ED fund right now. >> That's the largest fund. >> That's the largest one. That's where our most salaries. >> Uh digression. An interesting source of revenue we've had over the last year and a half, two years is we've been able to uh more
107aggressively invest the fund balances in uh interestbearing accounts um which has been generating some additional revenue for us. That is slowing down. Interest rates are starting to come back to normal. Um all right, so here are the cuts. I'm going to hand out a handout now. This is for the board once you get around. All right. The rest are for the audience. So, uh, so the chart that I've got up here shows the proposed um cuts, budgetary cuts by category. Most of these cost reductions could happen, and this is I want to clarify this. Most of the reductions that I'm talking about tonight could happen without explicit board approval because they're cuts that would just happen naturally. Um, but for the sake of transparency, we want to make sure the board is aware of what
108we're discussing and considering. Um, and we want the public to have this information. There are some reductions that I will recommend that would require specific board action. Whether the board whether board action is required or not, um, my team would like guidance from the board related to how to proceed with these possible reductions. And so the handouts are the more detailed version of what I have up here. Um, and I did provide that to the board in advance. um if you had an opportunity to look at that. So, first group is our TAS, teaching assistants. Uh by reducing five TA positions, we could save about $170,000. This reduction would happen through not filling vacancies. Some of these vacancies are current. Uh yes, you as you can see here and it was already brought up in
109public comment. I am recommending that the district cut the care program. The program costs the care program as budgeted for next year uh would cost about $200,000 in salary and benefits. Um, this recommended cut is not a negative reflection of the people in the care program and the work that they do, but a result of looking at overall programming needs for the district. >> Excellent question. >> Your guess, >> but um the care program there's no way to restructure it. that has to be open. >> How about I go through the rest of the proposed cuts and table? Can we table that thought? Okay. Postpone be the way to say it. Thank you. Um the other area would be other non-certified positions would also be eliminated or reduced. Uh we anticipate one clerical retirement and
110not filling that position. The proposal also includes a reduction in days and hours worked of our parent family liaison. Currently we have one unfilled nurse position and even without filling that position we will still have one nurse at each campus um with the exception of Rise. We added the two school crossing guard positions this year due to the change to companion schools and these positions are were they are not necessary. Um so this would be another potential $156,000 in reductions. Overall I am recommending a reduction of five teaching positions. These are a uh the positions are a one-year position that was added for prek for just this year, a one-year position that was added at Pleasant Acres, again just for this year, the care teaching position, um and two positions that uh will no longer
111be needed due to lower class sizes, which is also a result of the shift to companion schools. Um board action. So board action on certified staff is known as a reduction in force and that will be needed for the one-year positions at prek pleasant acres and the position at care. Reduction in force does not mean that the teacher in that position will lose her job. The district will go through a process of identifying where the teachers in those positions currently would move. And if there is no open position for them to move to, we would then go through a process defined by state statute and contractual agreement with the teachers union. Um that will not be determined uh much sooner than the March board meeting if that would need to happen. Um it is possible
112that this reduction in for force would not result in uh other teachers losing positions because we will have existing vacancies, resignations and possible non-renewals of other staff. Um but the reduction in force needs to happen because we're eliminating the position type. I think I'm saying it correct. All right. Then there are recommendations for and and that was $350,000. We estimate the co the average cost of a teacher. That does not mean we pay all of our teachers $70,000. Most of our teachers would love that. Um that cost is salary benefits. What that number is um on average. So administrative cuts um the cost savings will come through retirements and consolidation of responsibilities. In food services we will consolidate two positions into one. In both positions shown here, the prek uh administrator and the food services
113administrator. Um those positions will be refilled. Uh and they're vacant. They will they're not vacant. People are doing the jobs right now, but they are result of retirement. Um, so I have a little asterisk at the bottom here. So, one question I anticipate is about cutting um 300 I can see the headline now. We're cutting $350,000 in teachers and only $136,000 in administrators. Okay. And that is a very fair criticism. Um, however, the administrative budget is being reduced at nearly double the rate of the certified staff budget. Uh so the way to think about that is is $350,000 is a much smaller piece of um the total cost of our certified staff. Um so the certified staff is the single largest budget group in our district. All right. Um then there are other staff positions.
114So, um, we're recommending reducing the number of full-time permanent substitute teachers and I'm recommending discontinuing the school resource officer position. Um, I want to clarify, officer Craft has been a wonderful resource officer for RCS. Um, but the expenditure to for a school resource officer, as you can see on that line item, is significant. And so this recommendation is not a reflection of his work or Ranchual Police Department. Um I'm on my last slide almost. Next to last of the total recommended cuts about 12% will come from discretionary spending. Uh we have been reviewing all spending and focusing on identifying underutilized or redundant systems. Um and I do anticipate we will be adding to this list. This is just our first list. Um, and I did list those out for you so you had an idea.
115And most of those things won't make sense to non-teers on there. Um, so now I'm going to stop talking and I know I think board member Pettit might have the first question. So we'd like to hear from the board >> regarding the care program. Is there a way to restructure it? my question instead of I understand that the teachers and TAs aren't being eliminated that but when I said when I spoke earlier my concern is that we have these issues in our schools and we don't have a place to send the students that um benefit from this program. That's my concern. And and I'm also concerned because it seems as if it is um our marginalized group. I don't know if that's like it's our black and brown students or students that have these difficulties.
116>> Okay. And I I would the answer is yes. It could it be restructured? Um, I think based on the board comments earlier tonight and um, I think that would need to be part of a much bigger discussion about what the board wants the outcome to be because I would say what I heard in some of the board comments is not what the role of care is right now. Um, but I'm again I'm not Yes. Could it be restructured? Could it be reorganized? How many students do we have here right now? >> So today you had two three. All right. Um and the number is lower right now. Uh probably because we're a little different since we moved over to North View. Um I don't have the average number that we have in there, but
117I would say three to five would be the average. Some days there's none, some days there's more. Right. Uh the allocation is for three, excuse me, three TAs and one teacher. That's not what we have in there right now. Right now we have one teacher uh one and a half TAs is what's in there right now. Now with some of the um shifting of the teachers or staff I should say um is that going to affect their salary in any way? Meaning for example um you have some of these teachers slashtas that go out and let's say get a master's degree and then they get shifted out of a position that's being eliminated. then they get pushed into a diff are put into a different position. Um, is that going to affect their salary? Meaning,
118is it going to go down because of what they're going to be doing or are they going to stay um probably because of the teachers union anyways? Do we got to keep them at that salary cap anyways? >> So, generally, no. there would not be a change in compensation. In order for the in order for the district to reduce an employes's compensation if they're in the same role has to go through the riff process. Um I think I do want to I are you talking about Miss Johnson? >> Well any teacher? >> Okay. Um and I will say on that comment from earlier we are not reducing the number of social workers. I think there's a concern that um uh you know we've when we work with our teachers to or our TAs to get
119education it's always our intent to employ them and I think the concern is is where's where am I going to end up right now um but right we're not at this point recommending reducing social workers it's matter of finding spot on that um no so a TA currently in chair if they were moved to be a TA at North View. Um it's the same uh on paper it's the same job. Um and it's the same rate of pay for that. >> A big question I have is if we get rid of the CARE program, what are we going to do? Do we have a plan in place for when we have students that are being disruptive and disrupting the class when they're kicking and hitting and doing all that? What are we going to do?
120We have a plan in place for that. >> So, I would say I'm not I would I would going to have to connect with Miss Fund later and check those numbers because I'm I'm not I don't know that I'm going to come to the same numbers as that. Um to answer your question specifically, most kids that are placed in care receive an out of school suspension, then they're placed at care is is the function that happens. So if I am suspended or if I my behavior happens in the morning, we don't typically move kids directly to care that same day. They're going to be suspended home and so there is a suspension. So most of a good number of our care placements um in the discipline data they're double counted. It counts as an out
121of school suspension and a placement at care. Um I did say in the more detailed the the negative of removing care is I do think we will have um longer out of school suspensions than we currently do. I don't know that it's going to lead to more out of school suspensions, but the length of the suspension would be longer most likely. Um, so instead of me going home for half a day as an out of school suspension and then I go to care for 3 or 5 days, um, I might be suspended out of school for 3 days. I will say we there is um I think I I will take Laura's word on the number of long-term placements because I I you would be the person that would ask for that number. Um and
122so I think a challenge would be what would we do in the cases where we have had long-term placements? Long-term would be what's the minimum we do? 8 to 10 weeks, right? >> 12. Um so those are uh unique situations. Yeah. Diana, Miss board member Mendoza, >> the only question I had was so the current the way we operate for chair is they get whatever happens behavior issue in the morning like you mentioned they don't get sent to care right away. They get sent home and then you but then they come back the next day to feel their out of school suspension. >> And I'm I am simplifying it. There's a lot more scenarios like we do have some students um one option principles have when care is running normally is um that they can
123place a student at care as a preventative as as an intervention. Um and that's usually a cred that is with consent of the parent, >> right? >> Okay. So um and that is not as an alternative to suspension. It's how it's used. >> And that would be the majority of our think. >> Say you want to say that louder. >> That would be the majority of our placements are preventative, not alternative. >> But they're in a school setting instead of being home. >> Correct. And if a kid is placed on a long term, you know, in a worst case scenario, what's the longest that a kid has been placed out of school suspension for, you know, a minor behavior issue? >> Well, 10 days is the maximum a student can be suspended. And if with
124the care program taken away, they would spend these 10 days at home. >> Technically, yes. It's very unusual to have a 10-day out of school suspension at elementary level. Those 10day out of school suspensions are usually the students going to be expelled is the next step. Can I ask a clarif clarifying question? You had mentioned Robin about the number of um teachers and TAs um and then Dr. Woods had explained how many students were in care. But I am wondering if the reason there are the number of teachers NTA's in that program compared to the number of students because of the behavior problems is that the need for the >> that's why the ratio is higher. >> Okay, that's what I thought. Thanks. >> So, um I have two questions. One is kind of for
125the board in general um and one is for Dr. Woods. If we um kept the care program, is there alternative cuts that we could consider? Um and um second for the rest of our board members. Um, if we were to keep the care program, um, I believe it was 120 was the number correct for the care that we were expected to cut, would we, um, be comfortable going into our reserve funds um to eat that cost basically if we kept the program and we didn't make cuts elsewhere? I had another question and that's I don't know this is a complicated question before the care program and now that we have the care program do we have data that shows like because I how much significant this program has made in these kids' lives that have
126utilized it. You know what I mean? >> Yeah. And I believe it has. So like because I'm in the believing that when a kid in a structured environment in a in a sc, you know, you have a somebody pushing you to, you know, do A, B, and C, and During the course of the day versus being at home and you're free to do the work as you please. They're better because they're like in the care program, they're scheduled. they're in a structured environment and when a kid is home, you know, maybe the parent has to go work and they're going to stay with the babysitter so they're not going to have that care that these teachers are giving them. That's my only concern. I don't know if you're understanding what I'm saying. Yeah, >> I
127am. And piggybacking off of that, not only um would there be a structured environment, but and correct me if I'm wrong, if I'm not understanding the care program, but when they go back to care, they stay at care for a little bit and then they get introduced back into the classroom. Am I correct about that? >> We have short we have we have short-term and long-term stays. Short term, they go directly back into the classroom, but the long-term stays, we transition them back. So, a staff member goes in the classroom with them and transitioning back to their school. >> Okay. So, then are we thinking about um if we don't have that program, how that's going to affect our teachers who we've already said are burdened with all of this difficulty of teaching anyway. >>
128Have we thought about that? >> The impact that it can make. >> Yes. and teacher because we keep on talking about how there's bullying and how the classrooms aren't managed the best and all these other difficulties that teachers have without kids going to care or rise and then coming back. So if that program isn't there, have we thought about the effects of that without having that program? Can I um ask one brief question? Um with care, when a student is placed in care, are they reassessed before they're moved on? So if if we haven't had a significant intervention and they're not making any progress, do they get reassessed before we send them back to the classroom? like if they're if they're there for a short-term placement and you're not seeing any kind of significant progress
129or something like that, the behavior is continuing, do we reassess and determine if they need to be there long more long term? >> Um, so there's a process. There's multiple you can do multiple short-term stays. So if a student gets alternative suspension or PPR, they could get up to three days. We don't allow more than that because if we start to remove kids for longer periods of time from that, they're missing too much of their general education instruction. So, for the short-term stays, it's three days and that we kind of make some um uh some allowances for like really special cases, but most of them are only three days. So, it's got to be three days because it has to be enough time for Laura and the team to be able to do the intervention
130and do it with fidelity. So once they've gone one time, if they do something again, they can get sent a second time. Then after the second time, they're eligible for long-term care. And then that's when myself or the administrator in charge will talk to the building principal about that particular student and do some of that data collection that you're talking about. You know, what are the concerns? What interventions have been tried at the school level? Um have they been successful? And if they are successful, if they haven't been successful, if they haven't tried interventions, we might say to the administrator, you need to continue to work on uh interventions at your home school. But if they've tried all of their interventions that they've had um at their disposal, then we then accept that kid for
131long term. So that's kind of how we assess them. We give the intervention time to work by sending them back to the classroom um because sometimes that change in environment helps. And then I bet Laura could pull the numbers on how often kids return to care after that first care stay. Um it's that kind of tells you if that intervention has been successful for that kid. There have been a lot of questions and I haven't answered them that out there. Um, I'm hearing perhaps I'm hearing incorrectly that there are a lot of questions about care and that I'm not certain that the majority of the board is comfortable moving forward with that right now, but I don't know that for sure. Which gets to I think what board member Ron was suggesting. If we don't
132cut this $190,000, then what else is there? Or does the board say we we eat it for a year? That's the kind of the decision. So >> I do have another another question. Where is one 190? because I thought it was >> teacher. >> It's a estimated 120,000 related TAS and 70 teacher. >> Oh, plus the 70. Okay. Um if if positions aren't being eliminated. >> Mhm. >> Then they're just going to go to somewhere else. Then how why is the care program costing? Do you understand? the line the budget line item is that amount. So if I'll use Miss Fondia specifically. So Miss Fondia if she were not the care teacher next year she might get reassigned through the process I talked about to be a fourth grade teacher. >> Thank you. >> Um
133she's filling a vacancy, right? So, she's filling a vacancy that is there and then that care position that was whatever her salary is is no longer being paid out. >> But isn't she making the same salary as a >> because she is just going to move >> or you're using different plots of money. >> You're not. >> And then that's the same you're going to do with the TAs. They're going to put them in other positions to have become vacant. >> Chris wants to say something. >> Am I live? Can you hear me? Yeah. >> Since I've been here, we have made cuts, not with staff. So, we've been running on a very limited budget everywhere else. So, we've we've lessened that. Now, we're at a point where this is the biggest piece of the
134pie. So, I'm not we're not wanting to cut staff and get rid of staff to to save money. The goal is not to put money in our reserves. We have a six month figure. Our goal is and even is the state board of education will say your goal is to whatever revenue you bring in is what you're going to spend. You want to break even, right? So, that's kind of where we're at right now. Can we get into our reserves? Yes. But if we do that continuously, we're not going to have the six fun. And given the climate right now with our findings with limited revenue, just for example, our evidence-based funding, just our tier money alone since I've been here in three years has been over $900,000. That's the million dollar that we're talking
135about. This year, our tier money, I don't know the exact amount, but it was about $400,000. So that's $600,000 less just in that one piece of revenue. So I've eliminated and and lessened our budget, but now we're asking you to help with this piece. >> What's um is there a penalty if we get below that six month revenue? >> There's not a penalty. >> Really? >> There's not a penalty. Um our auditor will say we need to save some more money which then more cut and we build our reserves but if we have too much money in reserves the state will say you need to then so it's a fine tier right so we don't want too much money but right now we're dipping into >> we are not in the ballpark too much >>
136no we're not that was reiterated My goal was telling you the goal is not to heal that reserve up too much. So we're not eliminating a million dollars so we can put million dollars in the bank. That's not the idea, right? We're eliminating things that maybe we can do without so we can keep that reserve at a healthy balance. So in case administration federal funding completely stops, we can sustain this school district for 6 months until we can figure out what else to do. That clarify >> would it be an audit finding if we didn't ask? >> It won't be a finding. >> Um it'll be mentioned. Yeah. What more information would the word want? >> You're not listening to the people. >> Yeah, >> I have a program, >> but we just sat here
137and told you how everything is struggling. You guys are concerned that it was struggling. >> We don't had a program. >> We We understand. Um, thank you. Um, we kind of have to stick to the to the agenda public comments at the beginning. >> Rans here, Ransel Family Coalition is to speak up for the community. >> And we appreciate you being here. Um, >> yeah, we appreciate you being here. >> Is this going to be decided before next month? Because I have I have a suggestion. You guys aren't going to like it, but I have a suggestion. So, what information does the board need uh from me to help make your decisions at this point? >> I like to know what the I would kind of like to know strong if we can do that
138of who wants to keep the program at this time. And I was kind of like to know um how what your thoughts are on if we're going to move forward with keeping it um I just comfortable with going >> with going into research. Yes. Thank >> I know I'm not really allowed to talk but I did want to say that moving forward we feel comfortable with just one teacher and one >> I'm g I'll stop you. We need to we can't have comment back and forth with the the audience. >> We've been having comment back and forth. >> I just wanted to clarify that amount of positions, >> but we've been asking Mr. Henderson stuff the whole time that we and I've been asking clarifying questions to the audience behind. So, either we're going to
139do it or we're not. But when it's something like this, I would like that input. >> Amen. I agree. Let's take a straw poll. Who wants to keep? Please raise your hand. All right. Um if we want to if we are keeping the t are we comfortable um looking into reserves for the 190 or are we considering that's elsewhere? I would like to have Miss Volia speak because I think that she was getting ready to say something that had to do with the budget and the numbers. Can you please say what you're getting ready to say? >> We currently um are pretty much operational with just me and Mr. Thompson. So, two of those TA positions are okay to be cut um in that. >> Right. So, Laura, for the last five years, why have
140we needed three TAs? And whenever there's not three TAs in the room, you won't take more kids. I've >> I mean, let's keep it real, Laura. >> No, I it it's very dependent on um the students that we have, like the specific students that we have. Um and I >> Right. You will refuse to take students unless you have four staff. >> That's not true. Um it is >> it it depends on how many kids we have. But right, I feel like in the past year and a half, especially working with Mr. Henderson, having the director of alternative programming, we've really streamlined our approach and the way that we can um really intervene and help the kids and yeah, I mean, ideally we would have more, right? But to be able to maintain the core
141of what our program is doing, I think it's possible to move forward and to at least keep it and save it as a resource with just the teacher and one TA position. We already lost Miss Johnson to social work. That's what she was telling you guys earlier. She's already going to be a social worker anyway. Um, and then the other aid that is allocated in there is already not working in care at the moment anyway. So that would save us $50,000. I think 80 cuz that's two. There's three TAs listed on here and it's 40,000 per TA. So it would be Oh yeah, sorry. >> Yeah, >> I guess the the only question up for debate right now is are we going to make additional cuts to make up the difference from that from the
142care program or are we going to just um eat the cost and go into our reserves for that additional? So it be what 110,000 instead of 190 because you say two TAS would be about a 40 and 40 to say 80,000. I would say look to see where additional cuts can be made before touch reserves because I think we might be able to streamline some more things for the additional >> monies. your thoughts >> or come up with a solution, >> an alternative. >> I Yeah, that's like I don't necessarily want I'm uncomfortable saying outright get rid of the program, but we don't have an alternative solution in mind. So I I think just tonight to say you know after hearing what everyone has said yeah let's cut it does not sell but if we
143have a different solution proposed like I was thinking and this is my very limited understanding like what if we have like an coordinator to go across all I don't know but like just someone who could like pop in and I don't know again like it's just trying to like think about this but not comfortable cutting it out right I'm comfortable hearing alternative ideas >> no and that's fine I think That's earlier when I suggested that would be part of a larger conversation in how you're envisioning the use of an alternative program for elementary schools because I I said I don't think what we're talking about entirely is what care was designed to do. So again, I do not apologize, Miss Fundy. I was not coming in on purpose. I did though. I I acknowledge that.
144Um, but I it it's fine if the I don't need this to go away. That's it's but we need to determine then and I appreciate what you said, Miss Sweat. Then do does the board want me to come back with a different type of cut. Okay. I just want to add that my concern, biggest concern is we heard at the last board meeting how they and we heard from the kindergarten staff and administrators how they came to the rescue when they were in a situation that was harsh in their classrooms of many teachers and how they held and like Nikki mentioned like do we have plan B in case you know this program is taken how are we going to take how are we going to help we've already heard there's behavior issues, there's bullying
145and these kids are taken out of these classrooms because if they continue to stay there, there's going to disrupt the classroom. Teacher learning is not going to happen. These other kids that want to learn are not going to be able to learn because of the consistent behavior issues. So that's my biggest concern. >> Yeah, we just need service. >> We need a solution. Yeah, if that's what we have to do, that's what we have to do. But there needs to be a solution. >> Can we put in a new business as well? But this is just throwing it out there. How about next month we put a section on agenda and we'll spend some time actually program options. We can come up with ideas on the agenda. We talked about it. Um, it might require
146a special board meeting. There are timelines. If the requirements result in more registered certified staff members, there are timelines that we have to meet. Um, >> I think we've established we're keeping the care program. >> Sure. >> We're just talking about how u we want a better understanding of how the care program operates and how it's operating with. But uh my concern is if we if the proposals we come back with require additional huts in other spaces that may require actual additional rifts >> allow for that to occur. We we have maintain the timeline. >> And so my only thing is it may require a special board meeting. >> What is the timeline? >> We have to notify individuals by April 15th. >> April 15th. Um, so I'm a little hesitant to wait till a
147March board meeting because that really kind of puts us up against that timeline very closely because >> Okay. Okay. I'm willing to have a special board meeting for this. >> It's important to me. >> Yes. >> So I think what we've gathered is we're we're keeping the CAR program. Um, we need the administration to establish if there's additional cuts that they can make to make up that funding difference. If there are no additional cuts that we can agree on, then we need to decide whether we want to go into reserve cuts to make up a difference. >> And could all that information be gathered by the time of that special board meeting and all presented together with the care program overview? Dr. Woods, we should be able to >> depends on when the special needs.
148>> Well, is that up to us to figure that out? Yeah. >> Yeah. >> Um >> I was going to say do we need to start beginning of March 12. Can everybody do the >> caller bring up? >> Yes, absolutely. >> Um, and I'm just I don't have an opinion. I just just something I hold up it and I agree about this character. I raise my hand if you do agree with everything else that is on there so far. Is there anything else that you want to discuss? I had a little bit of a concern myself with the with the police officer, but I don't know how that registered with anybody else. I thought that I thought that was a bene beneficial thing. But again um so I guess what I'm trying to say is
149maybe we can if we can say okay suggest everything just everything else is fine that he suggested except here I'm I'm but like I just said I am talking with the police so trying to maybe expedite things and make things a little easier for us if we if we we discuss it then we can move on more things to meet >> Mr. Brotherton brings up a good point. Um, is let's just say a little is everybody comfortable with the remaining cuts? Are you comfortable with eliminating the SRL position? We'll do the first one first. Are you comfortable with the remaining cuts? >> You are. Yes. Raise your hand. Are you comfortable with care right now? Everything else is okay. I can live I like the old >> I I like the SRO too. I just
150um I feel like um it's a it's a big but >> Yes. No, they're going to respond anyways if we have this issue. >> That's my first. >> Okay. So, we're all good with the the remaining cuts as they are. Correct. Does anybody have a problem? Okay. So, um, realistically, a week, two weeks. How long do you need to come up with >> recommendations? Next two weeks. >> Two weeks. >> Can we do it on a different day? Like on a Tuesday? >> Yeah. No, I have a village >> on a Monday the second >> Monday >> or Monday the 9th mean Monday the 9th. We're getting close to the following board. >> Anybody with a second four times, same time. >> Can you do it remotely? >> If it's this time, I'll I'll just
151Is everybody okay with the second? >> Yeah. I mean, I'll probably set it. Excuse me. That's six, right? Okay, you're moving on from the budget of that explorers. Um, >> commissioners. >> Yeah, commissioner. >> All right. Um, this month we responded to four Voyer requests which are in the board packet. Uh, the packet includes three contracts that were under $50,000. The fiscal year 2026 tenative revised budget was posted for review today. There will be a hearing at the start of the March board meeting and the board will be asked to approve the revised budget. We'll provide more details about the changes uh at the meeting uh the regular March meeting. Um there is a report related to explores program included in the packet. I want to share again that we have applied for grant funding
152to be able to offer a limited after-school program for some students next year, but we will not have explores next year. Uh we have not yet been notified if we will receive this uh new grant. And that's it for information items. >> You just need to read the short motion. to close session regarding the appointment compensation discipline as well of specific importance. Second Pet Johnston. >> I Diana Mendoza. >> Hi. >> Roman Bottom. >> Hi. >> Deborah Sweat. >> I Johnson. >> Hi. >> Brother. >> Hi. >> There will be no action after the close. I'm going to stop eating and networking.