001everything you say can now be heard are there any more public comment forums we need those before we start we got two so Fara and [Music] Welcome to our February board meeting if you rise please pledge United States of America Johnson here Katie Johnson here Diana mza d p here Tyler Wilson here Rob Bond here John Brothers here hey we go to the agenda I'll make a motion to approve the agenda removing and correcting items as presented I get a second okay Johnson hi Kati Johnson hi mza hi n p hi Ty Wilson hi hi John brother I and M on the public comment we'll have five minutes we have just two people speaking and Grant you're first I'll just do the timer on my phone since it's 3 minutes up there I'll do it
002on I'll give you a one minute okay than I just said it in line down a little bit because I saw three on the sorry so I'm kind of L of words um so that's why I actually came prepared with written notes tonight uh at last month's board me meeting it became apparent that the grade level change was going to happen the only variable was when since then I've had discussions with my wife trying to wrap our heads around it and find some Silver Linings POS possibilities that might provide positive outcomes I was prepared to come and ask if all fifth graders were in one building could we include them in in AER Junior High Athletics currently AER athletes are year behind lot of the other local schools um with the exception of champagne because
003their fifth graders can participate um last year when my son was in sixth grade they come go to school play the fifth grade team come back out on the floor and for good chunk of the season they only had six players they were playing two games T night um it it was right but could we include those kicks with the two schools with the comanding schools I'm not sure if that comes an option now uh as a side note um during that uh Zoom discussion last month I was the one to ask the qu the anonymous question if all schools will be the Bulldogs or families to be asked to buy a new merch uh with different mascots each year I partly asked the question to give a lighter question to break up some of
004the tough ones being asked but I also wanted to see how many of the finer details have been thought of for me any change needs to have as many of those finer details figured out as possible the change for a 25 26 school year only allows for a small window and the bigger broader issues to be addressed when the finer details aren't discussed because there's not enough time it can feel rushed there's a lot more to figure out than just the trans a we recently received the email a little over a week ago before this meeting uh that the recommendation has changed to companion schools has there been a review of the board minutes uh from years ago when this was abandoned I tried to look up the board minutes but they're no longer available
005and I'm pretty sure most of you weren't even on the board at that time was operating our own transportation the only problem with this pre previously personally I'm not a fan of banking on a vendor to fix everything um especially when there's not a competition in the area and they control the market what prevents them from raising the rates drastically after the current contract expires I'm also not sure how this addresses the mobility issue has been previously reported students can still be in a situation where if they move within the district they'll have to change school's mid year I appreciate that the parents and staff were given the opportunity to complete an additional survey but with the recommendation to take effect in August it feels like this is another attempt to rush this through even
006quicker than before there's been no opportunity to review them information and ask questions about this particular plan as it is previously presented as an option that was ruled out another side note that I just came across this morning was during the State of the State address Governor pritsker has proposed a balanced budget including an increase for Education that seems to be a far cry from the Gloom of Doom that we've been presented with as far as State's financial crisis I know the decision has more than likely already been made made as the news article this morning recently stated this is a compromise I hope this works honestly I'm not sure that I have much faith in the decisions being made at this point Thank you thank you sir there you go okay good evening my
007name is Nilda Smith and I um have loved serving for the past three years as a multilingual literacy specialist for RCS I adore My RCS family our students and staff had become a second home to meet Dr Woods and board members for slowing the restructuring decision down to allow time for parents and staff to share their thoughts the surveys were clear concise and unbiased and were available to parents in Spanish gracias pedit for being the squeaky wheel when it came to parent and staff input mission accomplished gracias Miss mendosa for helping us to remember that our multilingual Learners are immigrants and that our experience in the United States is a unique and precarious one gracias Mr Johnson for being a voice of reason and practicality during this process especially about busing and grade level centers
008gracias Mr Brotherton for being you Dr Woods thank you for communicating with the multilingual team regarding how the restructuring options would affect the students staff and families what I am especially grateful for is that the district is willing to hire multilingual staff needed to make sure that our students get what they need this will mean an increase in multilingual Staffing lastly I am grateful for the new administrative recommendation I implore the board not to choose grade level centers given the current immigration crisis disclaimer none of my advocacy efforts are associated with any political views only for what is based only for what is best for the precious innocent little Souls that are now caught up in the middle fear of deportation has caused some of our multilingual families to not send their children to school
009possibly even not going to work themselves no doubt the situation has caused many parents to rethink their living arrangements possibly even return to their home countries we love and represent our home countries however we also know that conditions there are not safe many of those governments are corrupt and it is dangerous for us to go back to our home countries I invite all in attendance to look up the conditions of the ice facilities and to ask yourself if any human deserves to experience those conditions our school climates and cultures at Pleasant Acres and Easton are culturally sensitive inclusive and celebratory we know we are safe and loved at isan and Pleasant Acres as multilingual people if we go to grade level centers not so sure anymore who will love and protect us at our new
010schools if we go to grade level centers who will reinsure multilingual families in Spanish at these schools that RCS is a safe haven for them not all schools are created equal and implicit and explicit bias is a real thing we are all imperfect humans however not all humans are alike and they may not use their power in privilege to love and protect others fortunately we have RCS our school board our administrative team and Dr Woods to help even the odds thank you for your time thank you you I include public comment move on to four consent agend items all right uh as we're that microphone's on that one turned on thank you all right um so there's a 10 items on the consent agenda so I'll run through those quickly but while I'm doing that
011why doesn't uh Miss wigle come up to the table I'm going to put you on the spot here in a minute okay um I want to highlight a few things uh item 4 or4 is approval of donations and grants um Miss estto who is a teacher at eastlon um received a $1,000 Grant through the Illinois Education Association uh for a service project that she's doing with her class for uh work towards Carl uh a donation they're making to Carl hospital um board policy updates are listed in there there were no significant updates it was just is uh updating of footnotes and those types of things um the calendar the school calendar is in there and I just want to make sure the board knows that we do have a process for determining the calendar um
012for the last two years we have that I I remember it maybe longer the uh all rths and all the feeder districts uh two rghs we do share our calendars information um that doesn't mean that they all end up being the same that's probably a far cry from happening um but this year one of the big discussions among our staff was whether they wanted to do a fall break which um I believe champagne and Arana both those districts are now doing that and our staff chose not to do that and keep the traditional schedule um we do have a contract to provide Occupational Therapy Services with uh Ford County Special Education Co-op our longtime occupational therapy has left um to work in the private sector uh also a second month in a row we've had
013a an intergovernmental agreement with rths regarding student transportation um where we cooperatively uh transport some kids to private placements um and then the annual discipline Improvement plan uh does have to be approved uh by the board but Personnel items hi Melissa you've been waiting patiently I'm going to introduce someone who is no stranger to RCS Melissa in her 20 oh Melissa is going I'm recommending that she is the new principal at Eon um and uh the current principal Jamie bager who's they they've been a team together there for three years and uh Jamie is going to be I can say this out loud right I think I can I'm about to is the assistant super attendant of the regional Office of Education starting March 1st March 3rd um and so miss Ry who is also
014here I introduced her at the start of the school year um and she will be the assistant principal that's in the personal report Melissa will move from assistant principal to principal so I'm going to introduce you now Melissa in her 24th year in education and is in her 24th year in education and has been part of the East Lawn Elementary Community for the past three years with an extensive background in early Elementary education she is passionate about early literacy student engagement and incorporating movement and activity into learning as she transitions from assistant principal to principal Melissa looks forward to continuing to foster a dynamic and supportive environment for all students committed to creating a welcoming and inclusive community Melissa has been actively involved in supporting responsive classroom practices establishing schoolwide houses to strengthen social emotional
015learning and maintaining consistent systems and procedures that promote a positive School culture she is also dedicated to supporting teachers by introducing engaging instructional activities and providing ongoing support for professional development thank you for being here Melissa assuming they vote Yes um you'll be the new principal but do you have anything you want to say I told you you get to do this yeah you did um I will just say that I appreciate um the central office administration and the board for providing us the opportunity to transition into this and allow me the opportunity to be able to take over um while Jamie is moving out and have Rebecca coming in that's an opportunity that I think wouldn't be afforded to me in other places and I really appreciate that you thought that was important enough
016to let us do that so thank you thank you thank you much you can go sit down all right Mr Brotherton to number six we got to vote vot that's right sorry not trying to get us going I'll make the motion to approve in sent sent agenda items including Personnel reports as submitted with the stipulation that each individual is required to comply with all requirements for new hires as indicated in Illinois statutes and RCS board policies and procedures and including ratification of bills prepaid by the finance manager under board policy 450 second thank you second Moto Johnson hi Katie Johnston hi Diana mosa hi Vicki pet hi Tyler Wilson hi Robin BAU hi John Brothers hi now we can number six I believe it's memorandum standing with rcca okay um we're doing anou for a
017contract that hasn't started yet so um we have one employee with a doctorate um who's in the certified staff group of the rcsa uh during negotiations we mutually agreed to eliminate the language related to placement of certified staff members with doctorates so this mou clarifies where the one employee will be placed on the salary schedule um and where she will be moving forward so we don't have to actually do this every year okay comments from the board he I'll make the motion to approve the item that's presented can I get a second I'll second it second thank you motto Johnson hi P Johnston hi Diana Mendoza hi Ricky ped hi Tyler Wilson hi roben Bon hi John BR hi number seven action Health Life Safety PL okay every 10 years we have to submit a
018health Life Safety plan to the state um and I will say that our last Health Life Safety plan was substantial and we have done a lot of the work um to do that so these are things that are critical things that have us in compliance with uh code um so we now on this one have about $155,000 worth of work which is a great number to see because that's not much um ceiling repairs some doors have to be Hardware on the doors not doors themselves um minor electrical mechanical updates and minor fire safety and emergency eress updates um so uh technically the board doesn't have to approve it the the board president just has to sign it but I thought it would make sense to approve it and we have have 10 years to do
019this work for $155,000 but we will probably knock it out soon a motion this make the motion to approve the health light safety plans second I'll second okay Johnson hi ktie Johnston hi Diana Mendoza pedit hi Tyler Wilson hi Robin vau hi John Brotherton okay um so um we're on the next it yes okay so I feel like I need to explain this one a little bit to the board and I'm um again this is one of those things that you would normally approve this in the bills but I wanted to make sure you knew this is um an agreement I was planning on us entering it so RSP which is the company that assisted us with the demographic study that was presented in September um another service that they do is um needs assessment
020work with school districts so in the district Improvement plan um which is an agenda item later to talk about um area five um is about improving or increasing curricular and extracurricular opportunities for students that was an area that you all as a board last April identified um so the Target in the district Improvement plan for year one uh is to do A needs assessment and looking forward into resource allocation which would be in year two so what the plan is is to do A needs assessment of students staff and the community by conducting surveys and feedback from students teachers parents and community members and then the other layer of that is actually looking at existing programs um that we have determining Effectiveness um and uh informing our decisions on those things so I realize that
021I think this is some an area that um would be better coming from a third party in terms of getting feedback and they have I would say better skills on surveying um the and the methods that they're able to use so I am uh recommending that we work with this Consulting Group on this portion of the district Improvement plan um so what this involves primarily is uh doing the survey work um where you know the work's on them to get it out to Community to get it out to will facilitate staff and students obviously um but um and then also assisting in analyzing the data and then making recommendations they we think we can get this work done by June 1st so any questions on that yes I guess I have one question um in
022The Proposal is there a like a um a requirement that they have to be on a certain per percentage of response rate from the community in order to I mean accurately gauge theate itself I can ask that I'm supposed to meet again with them um next week so there's not actually an agreement to sign today this is um looking at their costs that which was in what I shared in the board packet um me getting the go-ahead to spend up to this amount is what I'm looking at but I think that's a a good question for me to ask is what is there a minimum response rate that we would consider what they did effective right noted what else yeah someone like to make a motion I make a motion to approve the item as
023presented I'll second that Johnson hi K Johnston hi Diana Mendoza hi B P hi Ty Wilson B John Brothers I number nine K5 organization so what everyone's here for all right we are ready um so I do have Hannah this handout can you get me a copy of it I realize I don't have a cop that's we're going to get to that eventually all right so um action K5 School Organization so um I want to go oh thank you quick um there a reminder of the work that has already been going on this school year um in September we reviewed a demographic study the October and November board meetings we discussed different options uh December I made the the administrative recommendation to the board regarding grade level schools no action was taken um in January
024at the meeting we had additional discussion no action was taken um we did follow that up with a survey to families and staff um at that January meeting we talked about four uh possible models um even my recommendation was one of those models but those other models were presented um and so tonight February the uh and I actually I shared this publicly last Monday um was that the administrative recommendation based on feedback um which we had a lot of feedback from families and staff was to uh my recommendation to the board is to go to what I'm calling companion schools um so before we get to that I want to make sure we uh have the opportunity for the board to REM reminder of the different options we have been considering and this is what
025was presented at the January board meeting I'm not going to read through all of it but I just as a refresh our minds uh one was to maintain the current system um there would likely be some changes that we would still have with that um two would be um splitting Pleasant Acres in East Lawn only for all students um along the k235 model um and third was um what is now being called the companion schools that was option three that was shared at the board meeting in January and option four which we spent the most time talking about was grade level schools um so following um getting all that data following the January meeting um I revised the recommendation to be companion schools so I do want to go through uh briefly some of this
026inform whenever someone says briefly it these are going to talk a lot um so what are companion schools instead of four separate K5 elementary schools uh the district would partner the existing K5 schools resulting in two companion School groups those pairings would be Pleasant Acres with Eon and North View with Broadmeadow uh Pleasant Acres and North View would be the K2 campuses and East and Broad Meadow would be the 35 campuses in any of the models and recommendations prek is going to be at Pleasant Acres and in any of the enrollment numbers that would that are have been shared we're not counting the prek kids there's a whole separate Wing that they will be occupying and um uh so just so everyone's aware prek is going to be at Pleasant um know the main question
027there were two primary questions we were getting um and concerns from families and staff those were Transportation um and then there's hopefully my there we go this is the slide I want to do next uh why companion schools so this was partly the um response to family and staff feedback um this plan has fewer transitions so that was I would say the number one concern from all parties and uh simpler Transportation Solutions when you compare it to grade level schools um so again those were the two biggest issues that were being brought forward um another reason is balance class sizes and use of space it does allow us to U have a similar number of students in each building this is actually different than grade level schools um so depending on how we would ultimately
028draw the boundaries um I'm estimating between 262 to 268 kids at each school with no school needing more than 15 classrooms for general education just so you're aware right now uh Pleasant Acres is using 18 rooms for general education and Easton is using 17 um so that does um create uh classroom spaces in those two buildings where it's needed um it does uh it is more efficient with Staffing in case there is a point in the future where we have to reduce Staffing uh we would not need as many general education classroom teachers as we do now um it does like the grade level Center model um allow for more teacher collaboration um and the way that means is that you know it it you know I would say at North VI there's going to
029be I think it's five kindergarten teachers in one building so the ability of those that kindergarten team in that building to collaborate um is much improved over those same teachers being spread out across two or three buildings um every grade level will continue to have a teacher partner um so there there's not a case in which um a grade level teacher is alone and has no one to work with and plan with uh this program this change also has no negative impact on special programs um specifically there is zero change to the multilingual uh bilingual program um and then there would be some self-contained special education students rephrase that students who are in special self-contained special education programming uh they we may have a a few kids that move based on but that would be
030no different than their general education peers they move to a different school um I also want to clarify that it it like grade level schools it opens the door for new programs uh which is this is actually something that will be a key part of that survey that I just talked about on the last agenda item which would be um dual language and we're going to explore that with that survey uh so if the our data shows that the community wants to do that and supports that we would be able to move forward with a dual language program um with the companion schools model um big question from everyone is how will I get my students to school it will be the same as it is right now um so bus service will be provided
031for students who live more than 1.5 miles from their school one thing um I've mentioned I think we were probably going to do this no matter what plan happened is um expanding the drop off time uh for our families as a convenience and that will also assist our daycares um so that um we should parents daycares if they choose to drop off at two schools should be able to do that very comfortably um in that time window um so that is a change for us will current School boundaries change I'm only asking the question so I can say Yes um the modeling that I'm doing right now um is really looking at um um some neighborhoods that are um there already adjacent to other areas that are attending at North viw and Broad Meadow and
032expanding that area so that more students are pulled into the north VI broad Meadow area um it looks like it's 50 to 100 students would be affected But ultimately that's going to be determined by um how boundaries are redrawn so I'm not anticipating the reason I say 100 um if we look at it and decide oh we need to take this Chunk from North View and they should actually be going to Easton um that would end up impacting more kids I don't anticipate that's the way we would go um we would mostly be looking at the current Pleasant Acres East Lawn assignment boundaries and shifting off parts that are already adjacent to uh other neighborhoods that go go to Northview and bro didn't we already try companion schools so one of my favorite questions so
033I want to make sure everyone knows that right now 22% of our K5 students are already in this model okay um this model has been in place this year for our bilingual program our multilingual program um however the other 78% of the kids are in the traditional K5 model um and I've said this at multiple meetings now yes um in starting in the 2006 2007 school year RCS shifted to grade level centers um Pleasant Acres and East Lawn were K two schools North un broad Meadow were three five schools um at that time that was done uh I would imagine the the driving force really was the Federal legislation at the time it was called No Child Left Behind um that's not what it's called anymore and there were accountability measures that would required schools
034to restructure um it that model ended in 2014 and um the I also want to so unlike 2006 to 2015 um when we were operating under that model the district is no longer operating their own own transportation department um where that is a significant benefit to us is they uh first student or whatever company we have and we discussed at a previous meeting that there is going to be a bid process uh for transportation services so we may be changing vendors and we're putting out a competitive bid on that um is that we would um we have much greater flexibility so when if we need to add a route which we did at the beginning of this year within a couple weeks first student was able to get a bus get drivers get monitors for
035that bus route um had we been operating it ourself our big problem would be how do we get a bus um we don't have $100,000 to just go out and buy a bus it takes a long time what first student does is they borrow them from other school districts that they work with so they actually within their Fleet will have unused buses and they're able to do that um I also want to say that uh in response that part of why it happened and federal legislation accountability measures I have seen repeated comments made and I have been asked directly um is this reorganization having to do with um Federal accountability measures getting additional funding the answer is absolutely not th those things are not in place anymore there is no one from the state of
036Illinois coming into school districts saying you need to restructure and reorganize that is not true um and uh that is no longer part of the law uh which it would have been uh in 2006 2007 so whether we keep it at K5 or we go to a different model that has zero effect on the school district's funding from any level of government um so the recommendation itself is ah this is where I'm going to transition to the handout so for the folks in the room it is over there and uh on the table and it is the memo to the board from February 18th for those of you watching at home um there's quite a few people on here right now um it is in the board packet and you can access it from the
037the board web page um so instead of reading it all to you I just want to point out if we want to jump to the next to last page of the handout oh no did it go in order there's an extra blank page at the end so three pages from the end at the top in the middle it says evaluation framework okay being a good teacher I'm waiting making sure everybody put your pencil on the word evaluation framework that's something teacher do she didn't know that Tyler's already refusing to do it I can see you need to go to miss whittle's office all right you there all right so um I actually did this in December it was different organizational models but I think what is helpful um and I shared this with the board
038last week so you had some more time to look at this is um it does give you a side by side comparison of each of the different uh models that would be shared everything from what would class sizes look like how many teachers would be needed um how many classrooms would there be at each school um it I mean it's all listed out in there um and so there are uh 14 categories on there but I want to go across the top real quick and say uh number one is that's your comparison column that's what we're doing right now so that shows you that right now the districtwide class size average for our English only classrooms is 16.6 students for our bilingual classrooms and there are 12 of those the average is um 19 students
039so that's what you're seeing there so one option is to do number two on this list which is don't do anything and make no boundary changes and so that shows you what things would look like next year and what you'll see is it doesn't really look that different from this year although I see someone's face so something must be different um don't say it all right so it does show you um for instance that we'll still have a large enrollment range um we'll we would actually be able to go down one classroom teacher um but that would have happened no matter what that's just based on enrollment at a specific grade level item three would be maintain what we have right now keep keep schools as K5 schools but do some boundary changes so that
040we shift enrollment from East Lawn Pleasant Acres to North View Broad Meadow and that shows you um the how what that would look like uh for next year um so again we're it's almost like incremental changes as you go left to right on those first three um number four is grade level schools which is the model that was first recommended in December so the some of the big differ differences on those um are it's a significantly lower Staffing size so you would actually need 11 uh fewer classroom teachers on that model um so when you go to companion schools you what what I was um happy to see when we started modeling this one out is there are still a lot of the same types of efficiencies as we would get with the grade level
041schools um and a lot of those would still carry through and it would uh be responsive to the concerns about too many Transitions and uh I would say chaotic Transportation which was the perception um that would wiow was in there um so yeah and and so if hopefully had a chance to look through that so for instance uh line 12 talks about Transportation um as I shared at the last meeting grade level schools would add six to seven buses uh companion schools would add two to three buses um even if we kept K5 schools and just shifted boundaries we would likely be increasing our busing by uh I it could be zero but it would likely be two buses also um it would all depend on which neighborhoods you we would choose to do um
042to change boundaries on okay so I don't want to belabor it um but I think that um I just want to clarify the recommendation before you all discuss so the recommendation and this is what's on the screen is that the students currently assigned by boundary or program to Easton and Pleasant Acres will be grouped into companion schools with all students in grades K2 attending at Pleasant Acres and all students at 35 attending Easton that language is that says or by program is that is specifically about our bilingual program and acknowledging that those students in that program will continue in those buildings um the second bullet point is students currently assigned by boundary to R Meadow and North viiew will be grouped into companion schools with all students in grades K2 attending at North viw and
043all students in grades 35 attending at Broad Meadow um I'm planning to have uh the third bullet point um I'm planning to have in front of you the recommendation for um the boundary changes that would shift families um from the broad North View area to um excuse me Easton Pleasant Acres broad broad Broad View I just renamed it Broadview North Meadow my gosh I'm done all right um and also clarifying that the plan is as a minimum we will do the one and a half miles or further uh Transportation which is what we're uh required to do um one point on Transportation it's um there was a an email exchange at least with one parent and I think all the board was copied on my response to that we we have not abandoned the idea
044of doing shuttles um between uh BR so it's actually a much simpler shuttle system if we do it it's just I've gota um if we can do it feasibly we're going to do it I guess that's what I would say it's not going to be a significant cost essentially what it would be is the last bus that would drop off at North View could pick up take any kids that live nearby North View to Broad if that makes sense okay um that should work um but we've got to know the transportation is going to need to know the boundaries um and model that we also don't have any way of knowing how many families would take advantage of that uh but the example that this parent raised is they currently live uh I would call
045it spitting distance from North View okay so they can see North View from their house it their child walks to North View on paper they are 1.4 miles from broad Meadow okay so we do not have to provide transportation for that family but I want to make sure folks know that we're trying to find a solution for that family um which would expand Transportation uh my guess is in that case that family would choose to um have their child walk over across the street go to North viw get on the bus to Broad Meadow so we are hoping to make that work um I'm also kind of betting on that kids that aren't you know the kids that are a mile from North you probably aren't going to take advantage of that um and that's
046um but we won't know that um yet we won't really know that until uh we ask parents closer to the start of the school year and that was proved to be complicated with our bilingual families this year to actually get a headcount on how many we're going to use the shuttle um and but we've been through it once and uh we've learned I think on that one so I just talked for a long time and my voice is a little horar and I would be putting myself the sleep if I had to listen to myself you say I would be oh thank you take a sleep all right I'll turn it over to Mr Brotherton he board and comments questions uh with line in the evaluation framework line three says allows decrease or that we
047are not letting go firing however you want to put it set correct yeah that that is correct and actually I'm glad you asked this I didn't ask you to ask this but it's a good question for me because um if the board approves this there's a document that's going to go out to our uh all of our staff tomorrow um I've got it ready I've talked with the Union about it um Tara might have to fix it again but um explaining the process we will go through for um reassigning staff unlike grade level schools on this model every if if every first grade teacher wants to teach first grade next year this model allows for that to happen next year where on grade level schools we were going to have a pool of there's a
048voice coming from the back of the room um on the grade level schools model we we were going to end up with kind of a pool of unassigned teachers waiting on assignment and so on this one we're just gonna so the simple answer your question is everyone will we're not cutting any positions um with our current staff and um um as I said it should work out that if as I said every first grade teacher wants to teach first grade that should be able to happen don't that's where it's gonna get Miss pett said unless they don't want to move schools right so the process that will be spelled out for the teachers which I shared it basically before so it's not going to be brand new to them um we'll have a kind of
049a decision making hierarchy of um what that's priority um so um I'm going to look at a first grade teacher who I I can barely see people with my glasses off but I can tell that's a first grade teacher out there um most likely the first grade teacher who currently works at Northview would stay at North viiew in first grade because one priority will go to first grade teachers they want to stay in first grade that's priority one priority two is if they want to stay in their building so it's just unlikely that that first grade teacher would be moved because she's already at North View in first grade where it will get complicated is if the first grade teacher at Broad Meadow doesn't want to move schools right then it will become more complicated
050but our staff will have uh an option the ability to express their interest and in uh what grade level they want to be at what school they want to go to this also does not shift any special teachers which grade level schools was going to do that um was that your next question yes so um the music teacher at Broadmeadow for example will stay a full-time music teacher at Broad Meadow for next year unless she randomly puts her name in and says she wants to teach first grade at northv right then we'll have but I'm not going to play that out but um so yeah there is a plan for staff and non-certified staff so our uh custodians secretaries nurses there's no plan to move any of those people that was never really a consideration
051but we are going to go through a similar process for our teaching assistants U and I'm spelling that out but it's actually they do it every year with uh most of them uh Allison Didier special ed has most of the Tas under her umbrella so she does that process every year would anyone else like to ask a question and I'll spend by answer so basically what this is is basically still grade Cent it's just now three grades going instead of two going to each school I mean you didn't change nothing in my opinion other than you did make it easier for the transportation part of it but still there's going to be kids that's going to still have a transportation problem and parents are still going to have that problem um teachers are going to
052have to move even though they don't want to move um I think we have two schools in our district that the schools are are pretty much half unsatisfied with the way their their programs are running so that we disrupt that automatically right um so that's to me is a problem the biggest safety problem that I have with it is like you said this 1.4 miles or even one mile for we have kids that are only in third and fourth or fifth grade and they're walking to Broad medal and they live let's say on sheno street across all these highways and I think you had mentioned to us as a board that there that you were going to get with the village and and try to um see if we can't get crossing guards and stuff
053I live in ranol I don't know how many people live in ranol teachers wise Administration wise um and I drive around a lot in my opinion the cars do not slow down I don't know I see people making comments and saying oh yeah the it's safe it's not it's not it's not safe these kids are these kids at their age are not going to be able to make it in my opinion walking that far I know that you did your very best and everybody's done their very best to make it where you got east side and West Side basically is what you got here now got Pleasant Acres and Easton on the east side and you got North you and Broad meow where North is more Central broad meal's more West Side that's a huge
054difference I can see if broad metal was closer to North to you sort of like and really if you look um even Pleasant Acres and Easton um and I don't know if everybody knows what I mean because some of these people don't live in R tool they just work in their school so they know where their school's at and I'm sure pretty much the teachers know where the where the other schools are because they work for the district and they probably went and did training in one way or another in those areas I'm not trying to make this a harder decision for for anybody and I think some of you already made your decision um I'm just giving you my opinion um I think um and I think it was mentioned with the first speaker
055that um the bulk and the big part of it is being corrected we're doing our best to correct the big part of it but we're not looking at the smaller parts of it and um what I mean by that those are some of the smaller parts where the the of a child walking um the way Society is now the way things are now had a child can you talk the microphone it oh I'm sorry sorry sorry sorry no problem my I'm sorry and if you didn't hear me I apologize um and one of the other things um that I'm that I bu um on the safety part of it is you have these kids that may be walking and you um have parents they're they're going to be waiting for their kids for more more
056than 15 20 minutes and what about the weather look at the weather I mean we've now had um in the past week in my opinion freezing weather and I watch these kids walk I don't know how they do it I get out of my vehicle and I'm thinking gez and some of those kids are not dressed as well as I'm dressed those fingers freezes really quick those ankles those little legs I mean those are things I think some of the some of the parents and some of the teachers are are trying to say we're not looking at we're not looking at the whole picture and I know sometimes it's hard for us to look at the whole picture but those are things I think we need to look at before we make a final decision
057and and my opinion is next starting next next fall is too early I think we should wait one year and try to work out some of the Kinks that's just my opinion thank you thank you any else okay um yes just waiting for everyone um I think I have a lot of the same concerns that model has um we received that email about the student in round nine and um having to walk and I don't know the detail I don't remember the details of it but I know that the concern was that it was a long walk for such a young child and that we for sure did have students in that section I don't I did not follow up with you to see how true that email was but is that really the case
058so then there would be a student having to walk it made it seem like when she said R night is the country I think she meant 45 okay um so is she's saying that she they would have to walk across 45 to get to north or something like if they're on oh okay um so again those are some of my concerns the the little kids walking I mean my kids when they were younger walked different places but we showed them how not that parents aren't going to show them um that's just one of my concerns the little kids walking alone because what if their parents have to work and you know what what do we is there anything that we can do to help those types of students like is there are we thinking about
059that in the background and trying to fix these problems or are we sticking to the 1.5 oh but it has to be 1.5 because of the kind it do okay you don't have to would address that okay yeah I mean uh I think the concerns that you're both of you are expressing about students getting to school we I would say we already have those problems right now um there are already a lot of kids um who are walking 1.4 miles and Crossing busy roads um to their to their buildings so um I don't think this what we're proposing here makes that worse it makes it different for some families so some families some families that may not have had to to deal with that like the one we're referencing um is going to have to
060to do that what I did say as as a crossing guards just this has come up before so the village provides crossing guards but my understanding is that uh during the covid times uh they stopped doing that um people I also get the let's have a crossing guard we have um the one place where we would obviously want a crossing guard is 136 uh at Broad Meadow right um we have no students that walk that route right now and when we've put a crossing guard there it doesn't mean kids start walking um so that's where I think the village has made decisions that they're not going to staff these crossing guard locations if there are no children actually using them um and uh so yeah that's that's as I said I that's something we need
061to bring up with the village again um I think that's something we need to do regardless I also though acknowledge that from The Village's point of view they're not going to put crossing guards at places and that don't don't actually have work um to do um but yeah I ultimately it's a it's a bored question on whether or not uh you keep it at 1.5 miles or you take it to one mile um and it becomes a difficult question to say how far is it reasonable for a child to walk um right now the vast majority of our kids in our district are considered walk ERS uh that would continue even under uh the recommended model um most parents drive their kids is what we see um and that's why we have very long drop
062off lines at all of the schools um but that's a choice um I agree though it is too cold right now right and I and I think that's why we um there's a point at which we will cancel school or we do a late start if it's too cold uh because we know our we do no matter we always have some kids walk you know um so yeah I don't I mean I I'm I agree with what you're saying I don't know what the solution is it's it currently it's a problem too and I agree I think that's going to be a problem like you said no matter what we kind of deal with that right now one thing I do want to ask um you said that it's going to be the responsibility of
063the uh Village ran to and or Police Department to have crossing guards okay if that's the case as long as kids are walking okay now we make this decision we got 30 kids now walking the broad metal and they have to cross 45 and or any other Highway 136 depending on where they live are they going to commit before we make this decision are we just going to assume that they're going to do this meaning the police department yeah and I have no idea what theill I mean we're going off you know we're saying hey let's make this vote let's do this let's do this and then all of a sudden they said look we never committed to anything we're not going to do nothing you guys better hire your own uh cross are we
064willing to do that and pay someone to do that and make sure these kids are safe because I tell you right now I personally as a board member do not want that on my conscience to say look and have of these parents and or somebody come up and say my kid just got hit on 45 and ran over because we got people that are late to work trying to get out to work at um Eagle wings or whatever it's called now these factories out there I mean that's what I see on my street alone which is a 20 mph Zone people are going 50 60 70 M an hour I can't even back out sometimes and when I do they look at me like I did something wrong well why don't you slow down these
065are kids these are babies these are somebody's child that is is is going to be hit or hurt um that's just one thing another thing and Miss D you might be able to help me out on this one and I don't know if this was brought to your attention but it was brought to mine um one of the parents that um had expressed their opinion and feeling is they have three kids all three kids now will be going to different schools okay we knew that that may happen if we do any change um one of them has a IEP and the other two kids helps this kid Sister sibling I don't want to say kid and um in school at whatever school it is they help their sibling go to the restroom they help their
066sibling um get the class that'll be gone then and um I told the person that they needed to get a hold of you and or somebody that's in in the spit department and find out um if this person can get you know help basically so that may be coming at you sometime soon I didn't know if that was going to be a problem or if how many people may have that type of problem that that um we had siblings helping other siblings because of that reasoning well I don't know specifically what you're talking about I would say it is never appropriate for the school to rely on a sibling to provide instructional support and that would not be part of a child's plan so if that's happening they need to reach out to their administrator
067thank you thank you because that's exactly what I was think you know wondering you know being in the situation I'm in I'm thinking wait a minut what how's that happening um so I just thought I'd bring it to your attention just in case um that person didn't want to reach out but if we do make a change I'm sure they're going to have to one way or another anyways thank you I just want to um conclude what I was trying to say about uh the transportation as long as we are trying to because I did talk to the principles and they help me understand why waiting another year would not be advantageous not so sure that I agree because I'm thinking about the kids and not how difficult it would be on the teachers or
068the principles but as long as we have things in place for transportation and getting kids safely to school I think those are the types of things that um I know that you said the little things I know and I know that you don't think that getting kids to school is a little thing but we're saying these all these extra details like we want I would like to think of and I know you can't cover every single scenario but I would like to think of as many little small things as possible so that um it can go as smoothly as possible which is why I was in favor of waiting for re and talking um things out to try to make sure that we have all these things smoothed out so that we could hit the
069ground running and it would be as smooth as possible that's it thank you anybody else okay I'll make motion to prove the companion School model is presented with implementation to begin at the start of the 205 26 school year in a second I'll second thank you hold on before you call the vote you might want to just procedurally ask if there's any further discussions anybody else no this is this is the way it is supposed to go you're have a motion a second then have discussion I thought we had discussion but if you want we're fine if you come hey is your chance ready lto Johnson n Adie Johnston hi Diana Mendoza he there trying to tell you it's they hi nck pit hi iy Wilson hi Robin Bond hi John Brotherton hi motion passes
070did you ask did Katie vote you didk you're making me nervous I didn't skip anyone did I okay moving on to to number 10 which is discussion audum discuss District Improvement plan updates okay okay um what I want to say to the whole board well first of all thank you for your thoughtful consideration on that last item it's been quite a process to get to that point um so what I thought I would be doing most of this school year is talking about the district Improvement plan um so um for sake of time I just want to go over a few things with you so this is the large document I did not print this for everyone in the audience because it's 42 Pages uh but it it is in the packet online um so
071I had the um and this is not an action item this is just discussion um there was a group of us here at district office including Heather Jacobs principal ader and Kelly Mahoney principal at Northview that had a a meeting with isby yesterday and I just want to give some kudos to our team um the folks from isby uh I'm not exaggerating said this is the best District Improvement plan they've ever looked at um and uh I said well who's have you looked at but um it was um I think and they actually asked if we could share this uh as a model they could share this as a model for other districts so the nice part of what we've developed here is we went through a process where the board identified priorities now I
072heard another priority tonight in our discussion that we may want to revisit which would fall under priority area three you look at the cover page that's school safety so one of the items that's not listed out in here anywhere is addressing uh student Transportation safety right so that's something we could add in as a priority within school safety right um so I won what this document has done for me um this year has given me a reference point to continue to go back to to say where are we on progress with this um and so I just want to make sure the board knows that that's your job is if things are not included in here and you don't see them being addressed are we going to put it in there are we going to
073add it in somewhere at some point because that's what gets priority it doesn't mean we won't work on other things it just means that's the priority so I'm looking over at Mr rry he has had so many meetings this year there was one this morning um about uh what we're doing on literacy um instruction in our district that's our priority for uh priority area one student achievement curriculum and instruction we are what's the target for this year is year one focus on literacy that's really General but there are within this document then multiple action steps that uh and it's not just Jamie but he's kind of the lead on several of these things is actually getting that work done and these are for the most part very large tasks that we're doing so one thing
074you can do is if you let's just jump ahead and look at uh I want to find one that's not complete so if you go to page 11 okay um page 11 is one of the literacy steps so you can see in that kind of grade out area that we have tasks and we've paced those out chronologically um we've had to adjust these so I don't want you to think that every date deadline has been met we have changed dates on this um as life happens right um but I know because of this document that we haven't developed a classroom walkthrough tool for building administrators and instructional coaches to provide feedback on literacy instruction this is a very important thing because we're and you've asked about this we're implementing a new reading I wouldn't say
075curriculum it's a new reading what do we call that tool called magnetic reading so we've got to get our administrators and then the other group would be the instructional coaches in the Elementary classrooms and looking for specific things and that's one of the ways we monitor is a teacher actually implementing them right not as a punitive thing because my I I like to assume positive intentions so if a teacher's not implementing it I'm G to assume she doesn't know how so we're going to have to help her or maybe she's in trouble okay and so it does work that way but unless we're actively in classrooms looking for specific instructional practices um we don't we don't no okay so I just want to make sure you're all seeing there is there's a lot of detail
076in here there's a lot of work that is completed there's a lot of work that's undone right um but we are on Pace or all the things listed in here I I appreciate that what ISB uh there one criticism of this document um really it was not even criticism I just took it that way was um making sure you continue to implement the things that you're putting in place right so if we put something in place in year one what's the mechanism to make sure we aren't just checking it off and never revisiting it all right um so I'm actually really excited about this and the what I was going to update you on tonight were actually priority areas four and five so if you want to go to page 33 um 33 yep okay
077um priority area four community and District relations um so just giving you an update on where we are with this so I areas four and five are different areas where one two and three are things that I think school districts are very good at you know it's instruction it's social emotional learning it's school safety those are the first three priority areas these are community relations right that's how do we improve community relations so if you go to um 35 page 35 4 a we outlined at the beginning of the year that we needed to update and maintain website content and there is nothing checked on there right okay well I'm happy to share that the new website is launching soon I wish I had an actual date but um Nikia I what isn't shown on
078here is all the background work that Nikia and actually Hannah has been helping him and some other folks uh making sure that um actually I think probably every building principal has had a say in it uh launching a new website is very complicated and also what's going to happen when we launch it is we're going to find all kinds of stuff wrong with it so we're putting things in place like the third checkbox down is Hannah's new job among her many hats uh you know she's going to have a regular schedule where she's checking the content on all of our web pages right so these are things that I'm looking right at you Nikki because you you've always said this like the website's got to be up to date um so things like that but
079it the first step is once that new website launches we're going to be able to check a lot of these boxes but we have to continue to do is and this is a lot of it's going to come up down to that new task we're going to put in place that Hannah's going to help with is that has to happen monthly right that literally someone has to click on all the links apparently big organizations do this all right we have a oneperson tech department I always have to remind people that so we don't have a web master um the Web Master is also the guy who fixes the Wi-Fi so um but I'm you know it's exciting that these things are coming 4B um this one has been great um launching parents Square we've had
080minor hi hiccups but by and large parent square has really enabled us to get communication out to parents I see some folks in the audience nodding uh the interaction that our teachers are getting with parents has been a lot smoother uh which I think that's what we were aiming at with two-way communication um I'm doing a uh almost Weekly Newsletter until I forget for six weeks with but generally it's a Weekly Newsletter the target was a monthly newsletter um most of our buildings are putting out newsletters because parent square has made that much simpler for us to put that content together and it looks professional um when our families get it um one thing we put on here that nik's got it all set up is we're going to have like a suggestion box feedback
081form on the new website so that will checked off uh once the website launches I'm as cool as that sounds I really think it's just an email but it's a place to encourage families or community members if you have something you want to share you can click this button and it sends an email to a whole bunch of different people so that someone would respond to that um I'm really happy that on 4C Tanya Carter has really taken the lead on this um we want we've had a lot of success in the past few years with our bilingual parent advisory committee so we wanted to get a family advisory committee going um so Tanya has started that she's been having regular meetings kind of the uh where I can monitor is you know I've got
082the link in here for the notes from her meeting so if I want to go check or another uh person in the district wants to check we can see when they met what they talked about uh and kind of keep tabs on that uh in all fairness it's a struggle to get parents to show up um for these things because most I'm I'm feel the same way as a parent not dissing any parents I don't really want to always go into my kids school and talk about hard stuff right I just want to go watch the band concert um and so it is I respect that parents don't necessarily want to show up for having conversations about curriculum okay um um but that's what we're aiming at and so Tanya's been trying to do topics
083that would be of interest to parents and she's really reaching out to try and build that group up we are doing regular office hours you don't you may not know you're doing it but that was a check box on here we started at 5:30 we had one person tonight that came in early excuse me how many were there more than Oh I thought you met board members no board was here yeah we had several board members here but doing that um we May explore doing I I'm sure other schools do it but I know that levette and Sammy do this regularly at Pleasant Acres they do a event during the school day that's open to parents uh what do they call it coffee and something principal cofy with the principal not a very creative name
084but that's what they do so we may uh we'd like to do something like that for central office but I I just don't know we got to try it and see who shows up may not get anybody um so those are things that we are working on in terms of increasing um you know the overall goal for that area is community relations right and the website how do we that's one how do we communicate two ways with parents so are they able to communicate back to us or is it just us pushing out and we we're putting those things in place increasing opportunities for in-person communication so we are working on those things the family advisor committee the um office hours don't forget also every year a couple times a year I give you that
085giant list of events that happen in our district um so there's all that already happening where most families are going into their their child's school for those specific so that was the big one on um community relations the fifth priority area um starts on 38 is programs and services I'm very happy that tonight you've um authorized me to help get help on that because I think um I I wanted to bring in someone from the outside to assist with this partly because of um the critical feedback I will call it when I tried to be creative and different with a survey earlier this year we got a lot of feedback about the bias in the survey the you know the the questions were leading like that so I think bringing in somebody else who has
086a lot more experience in doing this because what I would ask in my survey is do you want a dual language program yes or no right and so uh what should happen with what you approved tonight is it's going to be a much more complicated an question and answer but also done in a way that someone can answer it right so we need a lot more information in order to make a decision not just would a parent be interested in it would you actually send your kid to it so if you're a broad meet parent would you actually send your kid to Pleasant Acres in Easton for six years um were are you okay with the district spending more money on it you know those are all things I think that you as a board
087would want to know uh before we just add a program right I expect we're going to get all kinds of feedback on sports right we need fifth grade Sports Mr Kelly brought it up tonight okay so we need to ask more qu we need to drill into that and how we're serving our families to find out what that means um and it are our families and Community willing to support those things financially and so you do have to word your questions that way um I've mentioned it to most of you and this is as good a time as any is you know we're GNA have a big question ahead of us uh next school year our biggest most popular extracurricular program is explorers right and we have no more funding for that after next school
088year so part of what I hope the survey will do is help us identify what are those best parts about explorers um because as a district we cannot afford $600,000 a year for explorers which is uh about what it's costing us for three schools right so the grant is 450,000 a year but then we are spending additional money on top of that to to maintain the program as it is so we would want to go to four schools right so that we have it at all four um realistically we can't afford that but we I think the value is in asking the families and Community what are the best parts right um what are the because I I think it's going to be a difficult thing to do if we have to say we can't
089provide anything right um so that's what we're aiming at with this uh District Improvement tonight um I also appreciate I maybe Jamie did this this morning just because I was in the room but he actually when he started his meeting today on priority area one which they were specifically looking at which group was it it was mtss academic so they were looking at um literacy instruction and interventions that are being uh done in the district for students who struggle to read but he started the meeting with the district Improvement plan this is what we're trying to accomplish this is where we are in the plan and so that I think it's helpful for people who are paying attention at least to see that it is part of a bigger picture we're not just having a
090committee uh and that we're trying to accomplish something I just talked for too long and my wife texted me so can I make a correction uh oh Miss Harmon let me know that I was incorrect it is called coffee and conversations okay so that was my boring interpretation I apiz she had a much cuter name copy and conversation so she texted you in the meeting so I am in trouble all right okay I I don't know that you'll have a lot of questions on the district Improvement plan but I'm I'm happy Happ to sit down with any of you um and talk through where we are on on these items if you'd like to in the future or we can talk about it now let thank you this is that I feel is very important
091that we do have Outreach that we do communicate because if parents staff don't feel that we're listening I think it has a det effect on every so I appreciate the I'm very encouraged so anybody else yeah I'd like to Echo that as well because I know that I hit hard with the people aren listening blah blah blah blah blah blah um so I'm happy to see this and happy to hear that it's the best that they've ever seen and I would like I know I did invite the guy from is to come to the board meeting tonight and say it to you for me he said he was busy said he was busy I bet he I bet you did anybody else um I just want to say thank you for um putting this together
092it's really impressive and um I thank you and the um Administration team for um taking us seriously when we asked for goal setting and incorporating that into District Improvement plan um I think you've done a really good job um I'd like to thank all the kids that gave me these cards u from broad medal that was very very very gave us the cards Oh I thought it was to me no no Moto no no no she said me I thought it was for something totally different I better read them now but um I did want to mention um um I think you're going to be the new eastan principal I need to get it uh come to the school and talk with one of your teachers about a student that um sent actually I think
093she sent she or he I don't even know um a card remember thanking oh yeah um I have a booklet made up for the person and I want to make sure that I get it to the right person and I think the teacher is still there from what I was told so if by chance I stopped by Eon that's more than likely the reason I'm going to be stopped by thank you okay how about number 11 information oh the heading on this the heading on this slide should say information items um we had one foyer request it was a rare denial um uh but that's in the board packet it was I believe it's referred to as cumbersome um so it was asking for a lot of information um so there is a point at
094which I've now learned that you can say no to the person and that they have to uh refine their Foy and I never heard back I did reach out first and say can you narrow the scope of it and they never responded so um we had four newspaper wcia stories that I caught I just want to highlight one and that is as everyone's leaving is that Miss Lloyd Dolores Lloyd she was here she left oh it's too bad she was recently teacher of the week uh she's a third grade teacher at B Acres um which is always exciting when they get recognized um I need to inform the board that the tenative revised budget is um posted and will be listed as an action item for the um March meeting which means we have to
095start with the hearing that meeting uh the summer school calendar is in there uh in your packet um and just for your information of all the summer programs that we are anticipating right now um so that was it on the information items for me new business Bo okay 13 board and superintendent comments we're not have you saying more you're done well I have things on the screen I don't care all right one of them is from Hannah so I gotta talk any board comments first certainly we're gonna we're gonna talk first um I just say I just wanted to say um I know that this last few months has been a really challenging time with us trying to come to some kind of consensus and I wanted to thank each and every one of you
096for giving your honest opinions even though sometimes it might have gotten a little spicy between us um but I really value each and every one of you and your your opinions and it really um it makes me happy that we can um all seem to come together and work professionally and um come to some you know commonality amongst ourselves that is important amen definitely thank you everyone including the leadership team for like answering all of our questions making sure that we were as informed as we could be um it's you know it hasn't been a decision that any us of tap and lightly there's been a lot of discussion and a lot of a lot of thought us going into this so thank you everyone for sharing your opinions thank you board for meing at
097class eight yes I'll that go both ladies it's uh not something that we take lightly we have discussed this I've been on the board almost four years and it's been brought up all four years so it's taken us a while glad a decision has been made um on a lighter note uh 8th grade boys basketball and seventh grade boys basketball did a good had a good season they both unfortunately lost regionals I had to ask Robin about the eighth grade because I only know a seventh grader on there and only paid attention to that uh but good job I'm sure the women's sports did well as well and uh unfortunately Canada is beating us in hockey right now one nothing Canada just happened not happy Come not happy we'll come back can can I compare
098with um Tyler on that with the eighth grade and seventh grade and all of their um sport activities because my son would be very upset if I didn't mention that I was proud of it what sport were you talking about Tyler no the hocke they got Fight n seconds in in round one because somebody and that's how hockey play GNA something I was um oh I was going to ask if there's a way because I'm assuming that the uh admin from the elementary schools pushes out the um information about the sports at their schools and I was wondering if there's a way that we could get it some if we don't have yeah we can sign you up for the parent Square lists for the other buildings I think you might not want at all
099just ation it's a lot of content but yes we can do that it's probably my responsibility to ask them what it is I can go I want to go but oh you just mean the sports schedule well I mean yeah because there was volleyball and basketball I was missing yeah I was missing and I would have love to go them and see them play and parent square is really great back it up more but no I mean I I've never felt more connected I guess like but in a good way not like I am so glad that I can see when practices are and games and all the stuff no it's great and I was like why how can I don't know about this are you supported am I I'm just messing because the kids
100would love it I know I I I really think that the kids would I would see see board members not only board members you know but some times parents can't make it because working and stuff so be nice to building and Tyler's right I think the boys basketball team had had a successful season um and I think the girls had a successful season each season she get better and I know from uh watching last year boys track well actually girls and boys track I think they're going to have a a decent season with u with a couple of the it's this year I have one more thing I'm sorry but um just um eastand did a third grade wax museum um in relation to the um nap big celebration that came up um also like
101there were really great events in all the classrooms so and I know that was not I don't think that was just at Easton so that was really great or not Easton what am I say North View one class Dian how about you quiet she quiet yes what Robin said you know it's been rough couple of months but we made it and I feel like we've also like with some of you like strong relationships for years to come that's amazing friendships thank you guys the admin Scott for always answering my obnoxious [Laughter] questions but and I read everything that comes through even though I don't reply I read everything I see everything and teachers are doing an amazing job and students and um I'm going to be more in the schools because now I'll be working
102hybrid because I took a new job kind of oh something exciting for me but anyways um yep looking forward for that and just seeing you guys more thank you D my comment would be that yes we have done our homework tried to make the best decision for all con but now that we've made the decision it falls now to the teachers and um they're the ones going to to implement and I you know I would like to think we're all going to do them our best support and encouragement because um as you all know teaching is a very very important part of life and we want the very best and I think we have some of the very best Administration on down and um I I have the greatest confidence that things are going to
103improve and U I'm I'm I'm just very happy that we have the staff and faculty that we have in administrators so thank you thank you thank you permission to speak not yes yes we okay um so I do have three calendar events up here first two are you know open to the board but I don't know why anyone would come to the third one except for uh School Employees but uh hopefully in it's next week is that 28th yeah next Friday 5 to 7 at AER hopefully you all come by there's lots of food and fun for the African-American Heritage night uh for that event the next board meeting is the 13th which Nikki already said but it's not the third Thursday of the month it's because of spring race oh okay so our spring
104break is March 20th um and then uh Hannah is going to be reaching out to board members about statements of economic interest um the the SEI this year is not available um digitally online on their website and they can't tell us when it's going to be available digitally I was supposed to print them out and put them in front of your little space today but I blanked on that so I will probably email it to you if you can't print it then I'll print it out for you we can do it that way so well we still be able to upload it or do we need to valid nope you'll have to you actually if you just give it to me then I will take it down there so they sign out that they received
105it and there's no question on that just um for those of you who are running again for the board you probably had to do an SEI when you did that application to run that was 2024 so you still have to do the 2025 one so even though you probably just did one couple months ago you still have to do it for this one we didn't have to do it because it was already on file okay all is it is it due by May again it is yeah I tell everybody the end of March but it really is to that's one if that change too you know recorded one item on here that I do need I want to make sure I run it by the board um it's part of our prek construction project uh
106so we do have a builtin contingency uh in the project but one of the things we've been considering is uh extending I really now I'm wishing I had a picture up here so when you pull into Pleasant Acres and you go to the right where the new construction is at the end of that parking lot we want to do a road extension that will connect that end of that parking lot to the back of Pleasant Acres so that a vehicle can drive all the way around the building why would we want to do that we want to do that for traffic flow for families and then the buses would be the other part so it's going to as you know that building is our one building where it's it's let's just call it tight there's
107only one way in one way out and they don't have a lot of options so uh the estimate or not the I shouldn't say estimate the quote from the contractor came in at about $150,000 which was a lot smaller than we thought it was going to be um so that is within the contingency it's a it's a two-lane road that would go that and connect it that way um so we can approve it by we I mean the admin can approve it within the contingency but I don't want to do large uh expenditure like that um so most of our contingency things are if you want hord rubber playground or rubber mulch which we should never do and it costs $15,000 more and that's normally what we're looking at in contingencies um so I just
108wanted to see if there were any it is a large expenditure it's already budgeted for in the Bri project it will just and Tom I'm ready for you to tell me I'm wrong um it will result in us spending down the contingency um to the end but it won't exceed what was originally budgeted is my understanding um other things may still come up that will push us over but I I don't think there's anything significant for out there the the worst is over right um I mean they're almost done when you're out there at this point there's flooring going in there's um they're putting in some of the finer touches but I just want to see if there are any strong objections to it I don't know okay and yeah it is something we were
109considering doing all along um just so you know but it was kind of like if we did grade level schools we would have only had 150 kindergarteners at Pleasant Acres so we wouldn't have needed to worry about traffic flow around the building so this actually comes together in a nice timeline because now we know what the enrollment will be more or less um and also I so thank you the other part I didn't say is there is a slight overlap in prek drop off and pickup and pleas an Acres drop off and pickup so this will also help with that um there are times when they overlap we really try to um the next item Mr Brotherton is close session but only if the board wants to go to close session if the board's comfortable
110uh approving the separation agreement we can just go to a vote it's up to you Bo pleasure satisfied that we can go without a closed session okay I had a few questions but it doesn't have to be add we can talk about it okay so we can move on then to that is that okay then to move on to just the action item okay so um 15 action destination and separation someone needs to know the employees name make motion to approve the resignation and separation agreement regarding Shannon Clark a second Johnson hi Johnston hi Diana Mendoza hi P hi Ty John I make the motion to adjourn second all in favor CH second I