001here. Steve Buyers JJ Boy here here. Lo here. Maria Rodriguez. All right. We'll now stand and do the pledge of allegiance. I pledge algiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands. One nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. All right. And now we'll move into public comment. Jackie, do we have any public comment? No. All right. We'll move into board correspondence. Did anyone have any correspondence for the board? All right. Not hearing anything. And I did not receive anything from Maria for student board correspondent. So, we don't have anything for that section. So, we will move on to the consent agenda. Sorry, my thing is loading very slowly today. It is. All right. Well, it is recommended the board of education approve
002consent agenda items 5B through 5, which is the approval of board minutes from the June 3rd meeting. Approval of personal action items, approval of financial reports, approval of accounts payable for June, approval of payroll for May, approval of purchase order requisitions, the activity account request for Mitchell Elementary School, and the acceptance of a donation of a $4,000 check from NIU athletics together with Toyota from Touchdown for Dealb that will be allocated to the Beyond One Barb Transition Center. Do we have any comments or discussion on any agenda items? Just comments. I'm not going to pull anything. And I I emailed staff regarding this. Just one quick question on the statement of expenditures under operations and maintenance. I noticed that column four had a balance that showed a negative of $9.9 million and that that amount
003just kind of stuck out at me. So, I'm just kind of looking to get an explanation of that. Um, it was uh on the statement of expenditures. I'm trying to see what page it's on, but it's the under O and M and I'm kind of curious. That amount is just a little concerning. So, I see a minus $10 million on there. So, that's I don't know if we can get an explanation from staff on that. our mayor can maybe shed some light. [Music] Yeah. So, uh turn it on. So, the statement of uh expenditures, the ON&M funds are constructions facilities. Tam is not in but uh we had a few uh few things happening this year. uh we paid for the uh bond proceeds for the construction of the school out of this fund. Uh
004there was also the uh there was an emergency with um maintenance barn uh that happened. There was a storm uh that um that tore the roof of the uh at the the Huntley. So there was a few emergency items that happened this year. Uh we are still waiting for some uh state revenues to mitigate some of it. I don't think it will be the full 10 million, but uh there is a few uh we're still waiting for some funds coming in for that. So that's the salt shed, the Yes, it's the salt shed and the maintenance bar. Uh the uh the garage where all of the automobile the all of the mobiles are and then the there's a third piece and then the roof from from Humbley. So it was that component that got blew
005off a year and a half ago, two years ago during the storms. Yeah. So this is the this is what it cost us to put everything back together by insurance to mitigate that. So we are getting a reimburse. We are getting some form of reimbursement from that but yeah is that coming out of the capital outlay or the other because I saw that it's about 2.1 million from capital outlay and I wasn't exactly sure what that included and then the other was 4.4 million. So I just wanted to figure out where those expenses were. Sure. The capital outlay from education fund you mean? Or the is asking there's a capital outlay. Oh underm. Yes. So um yeah uh it would come from a capital outlay would be u fixtures uh equipment and then under other
006would come the emergency items. [Music] Other questions about that? Would you want to see an itemized? You can get Tammy to give you that itemized component. Well, I that was like stuff that I didn't need for tonight. So, thank you. All right. So, not hearing anything else. Do I have a motion to approve the consent agenda? Do I have a second? Jackie, roll call. Nick Atwood, yes. Mr. Boy, yes. Mark Shvad, yes. Yes. Yes. All right. Moving on to old business. Kishwalki College Early College Program. MOU. It is recommended the board of education approved thisou for the early college program with Kishwwaukee College. I have a motion. Second. Jackie. The roll call. Uh Chris Boyce. Yes. Shine. Yes. Anti. Yes. Kristen Bailey. Yes. Atwood. Yes. Moving on to the Kagan summer academy conference. It is
007recommended the board of education approve the request for three educators to attend the Kagan summer academy conference from July 17th through the 11th which is paid forward by the teacher vacancy grant. Do I have a motion? Second. All right. All those in favor Jackie. Roll call. Christopher Boyce. Yes. Mark. Yes. Bino. Yes. Kristen Bailey. Yes. The catwood. Yes. All right. Moving on to new business. We have the parent student handbook for the 2526 year will be presented by the director for improvement and innovation. Is it Dr. Parker yet or is it still It's on the way. Okay. It's on the way. And then are any of the PTAC board committee here with you? So, we do have one member of the PTAC board um with with me. Um other people it's summertime. They couldn't make
008it. All right. So, take us through it. Okay. So, we're going to go through uh this presentation. Please feel free to stop me um if you have any questions. This is a presentation um for members that are are new. Um we did have a a person on the board who came as a as a um member of the audience. Um as we transition to the new PTAC uh committee, it is a a board recognized, it is a boardmandated based on schoolboard policy um committee and the schoolboard policy is based on school code. So that committee meets once a year and that committee um receives information from our PSS committee and we'll talk about that more. Okay, let me see how this work. That work. Okay, so our handbook is 147 pages. We paired it down
009from 160 something because we had some things in there that didn't belong. And uh it is a fluid document. What it allows us to be able to do is share information in one central location so that our families, our students, and our parents as well as our staff um understand um how we do things. It is one of the documents that we rely on to do, you know, our business, but it is not the only document. Inside of this document, several of our other documents such as our code of conduct and our transportation handbook are references as as well. So how we get here every year is um as you can imagine laws change and so school code Illinois school code laws change and based on those laws we have to make um modifications. Um
010you all voted on press plus so that's one of the things that goes into our our handbook language. We also use the I uh uh model handbook and this model handbook is u in some school districts they just take it and literally copy paste it. We don't do it in in this district because we have some unique circumstances that we want to address very specifically to our district. We also recruit committee members. Again, there are two committees. So, there's a parent, student, staff council. That committee meets um regularly um every other month. And in that committee, we have parents represented. We have uh we have had schoolboard members in the past. We've also had students come out at different um times and then we also have uh administrators from every level. So we have high
011school administrators, middle school administrators and elementary administrators specifically uh people who are responsible for disciplining as well. We go through multiple drafts. So we look at the handbook throughout the entire year. We bring um the handbook to the committees and we have electronically and we go um in some spaces line by line. We also seek legal counsel. So as you all know um we have a a a law office or firm that works directly with us and so if we have specific coun um questions, we send it out to them. Um sometimes we have um virtual conferences and things of that nature. And then of course we have our in-house parallegal who walks through everything as well. And then we get to this place where we can we come to you. The PTAC committee recommends
012that the version of the uh uh document that was shared with you. I'm sure you read all 147 pages. We are asking you to adopt it because legally it has to be adopted for us to have it in place for next year. So that's another again that's just the direct language from the board policy. So these are some major updates. It was not as many as has been done in the last two years. This year we wanted to make sure that we included language about student IDs because although we are practicing students at the middle school and high school level um carrying IDs, we did not have that in our language. And then we also had to um note that there is a cost associated with replacing them because it cost the district money. So
013we have to make sure that um families know that it cost money, a lot of money. Um and we also needed to note that um previously it was our practice that if uh families did not want their children photographed, they would have to come in and have a meeting with principles. We think that that's an archaic method. Um sometimes families just don't have that amount of time. So, we changed that again to be um better servants to our community. And um we added the word actual smart watches inside of our student use of electronic devices because believe it or not when we get challenged and often times if it's not in writing and we um go to discipline the student for it um their families then say, "Hey, it doesn't say smart watches." So, we
014are being very specific sometimes. And then also we added specific language about chuency plan and procedures and that was because we've been meeting with the regional office of education and they recommended us to do so. We also had to change language about Medicaid and how we get reimbursed and that is because the laws around it change. We used to have to uh basically the student had to be receiving services related to an IEP or 504. That is not the case anymore. So we wanted to change that. And then we also had we we it used to be optional for us to have people trained to be an opioid antagonist. And that basically means someone that knows what to do in case there's an opioid o overdose. That is no longer true. We have to have
015someone. So we need to change that language. And then we also needed to change language. Again, that is legal counsel told us that we had things in there about sex offenders, but not necessarily violent offenses against youth. So we added that language. And then we have been using uh consequences called uh sweeps or tardy blitz particularly at the sixth to 12th grade level. But again it was something that was not noted in our um list of possible consequences. And then prior to this year we did not have a transportation handbook. And so although we had a section about student bus conduct, it wasn't explicit enough. Um Dr. Miner Garcia Sanchez um really asked us to take a closer look at student bus behavior. And so because of that reason, we also reference language from that
016handbook in this handbook and kind of crosswalk the two. So what's next? There are again minor things change. We send out the things that's changed um to be translated into Spanish and Arabic and then um we get it out to the buildings. We get it out to the uh families. We get it updated on our website and then we basically help other people understand what is in what is in it and what has changed. And so when I say other people, the school leaders go to the teachers and the teachers hear about it and the school leaders hear about it and then it becomes um what we do for this for this year and then it will change next year because laws change every year. Are there any questions? So I guess the only question
017I would have is under the I think it was might have been section three there's a portion that talks about how all students you know will obviously have equal access and opportunities to extracurriculars and educational opportunities. Now, with the new Press Plus releases and the changes to Title 9, are we not technically having a disagreement between accepted board policy and what the handbook says then in regards to things like transgender individuals in sports then? So, we we are we haven't had a case very specifically where um we have denied anyone access. So I I we are still speaking um accurately when we say that all of our students that are in our schools are going to get the access because we haven't had a case where that has been challenged. I I guess my concern
018isn't that we are actively you know doing one way or the other. My concern is if something does come up and we have a board policy and a student handbook that I guess have different verbiage and wording because one's following what federal guidance and what came down from ISBY says we should have wording. And then our student handbook kind of adds more to that I guess is my concern. Okay. Well, I can tell you that the state um the state guidance with this Illinois principal association IASA, which is Illinois Association of Superintendent, their guidance and template is telling us to still use that language to say all students basically because you are if you write anything other than that, then you're saying that you're going to discriminate. So, school code, school law takes precedence over
019any policy and our policies have to align to those. That's why when press comes out, we we align to those. Now, Dieter, if we want to be more specific, I I I wouldn't mind you stepping up to to talk about that. Um if you don't mind. So, we do have a lot of entities. Um we have the federal government when it comes to um Title 9. They're the ones who um regulate that language. Then we have ISBY. Then we have state law. Um there is new language in press plus but that language is getting finalized. So for example last year title nine changed in August. So we all went through training. We had to change all of our documents. We changed our process. Then that all got repealed in December. No in uh January or
020February it was repealed. So even at that point what was in the handbook was outdated. So those things unfortunately don't happen timely and because we don't have the final final from the federal government yet, we don't have language to provide. So um that's kind of ongoing and as it changes there's information available on our website because this is a fluid document we we have changed it mid year and we will change it mid year if necessary. Are there any other questions? Right. Thank you. Consensus to bring this back. Yes. Okay. All right. Item D. This one is for information and action elevate learn 2025 professional development conference diligent board docs community. This will be presented by director of human resources Dietra Salis and it will be paid for out of title 2 grant funds. All
021right. So the elevate conference is um for for the uh company Diligent. Diligent is a company that owns and operates our software. Board docs. Board docs the district has used for a number of years. Um I want to say 2012. Um and Jackie and I both um her as a board clerk and me um for compliance purposes have been attending their annual conference which has been in September every year. So last year we learned that there's a new software option called community and they told us but you can stay on board docs. you don't have to go to community. Well, I guess they had a meeting since then and they're saying we have to go to community. So, now that we have to transition from the board docs platform into the community platform, they have
022a hands-on training session that's different than the annual conference we go to. We just learned about it at the very end of May and then we were going back and forth with questions regarding our transition and uh Diligent has now added us to their J July 1st migration cohort. So since we are going to start the phase of transitioning to community, we need to know how to work it. So the hands-on training is happening July 22nd through the 25th in Nashville. and we're asking for permission to travel out of state for the two of us to attend that hands-on training. It is coming to you for info and action because of the short window um for us to get the early bird pricing. Not that it's very early, but they have locked that in for
023us. So, the early bird pricing for the registration fee and then to get air flight airline and hotels booked. Quick question. Do we have do we know any local school districts who are using the community platform that board members could check out? Yes. So for um one that I know for sure is Rockford. They use it. I think Sycamore is already I think they have transition though. I believe so. They switched from I know I was at a board meeting for them. Sorry if I'm joking. No, you're fine. But I was went to one of their board meetings last fall I believe it was. and they had actually just come back from a conference about learning community and it sounds like overall it's a much simpler easier more userfriendly system. I've been complain about Bort
024Talks for years before I was on. So when we were there last year they said you don't have to go to community but if you do you have greater capability to do different things. So Jackie and I kind of took it as a grain of salt and said we'll play around in it and we'll see um if that's the right move for us. Um, I have kind of kept up with some changes with other districts that because I search board reports for different information and there is some different capabilities that would be a plus for us, but we hadn't made the decision that that's what we needed to do until we were told that we were being put into the migration cohort and that it's time you have to go to community. Um, so I've
025actually reached out to the board clerk in Rockford for us to perhaps go sit with her to see how the functions work and that's only because I have a personal connection there. Um, we could check with Sycamore or other districts. Jackie with one of her discussion boards, there were some people saying that their transition was very hard because they did not have the hands-on opportunity. So just by doing it through webinars or um tech support, they have struggled with their transition. So, the opportunity to go to the hands-on training we're hearing is definitely to our benefit. Any other questions? All right. Do I have a motion? Second. Jackie, the roll call. Christopher, yes. Mark Sherbot, yes. Fantam, yes. Kristen Bailey, yes. Nick Atwood, yes. All right, moving on to item C, staffing request differentials for
026Mitchell Elementary. This is also information action and this is presented to us also by DRA. So, as we've um started to approach um different phases of our hiring process for Mitchell, we are now at the point of differentials. Differentials are the stipen payments for extra duties outside of the workday. So each elementary school is allocated um MTSS tier 1 and tier 2 differential allocations and that is determined by um data that's collected by both building what that number at that FTE allocation looks like. Then thirdly, there's a communication le liaison that works on the Facebook posting and um communication aspects and works with Rita um directly. And then there is a coral um liaison or coral director, sorry. The coral director oversees um things related to music and the arts, but specifically the spring sings.
027So every elementary has those four basic um positions although the FTE varies for MTSS tier one and two for schools but we are asking for the addition to that for Mitchell. When we initially um came forward with um allocation requests for Mitchell we said we'd be phasing things in. So we are now at the point of phasing in the differentials. Are these funds budgeted already? They are. Thank you. Yep. We just didn't have um haven't received board approval for the individual positions. What are some of the duties of the MTSS coaches? And could you tell me a little bit about the two tiers, what those involve, please? Lisa, Dr. Becker can do that much better than I can. Good evening. I'm Lisa Becker. the assistant director of student services. And so our MTSS coaches, those
028are MTSSB or behavior coaches. And what they are tasked with is looking at schoolwide behavioral data. They gather that through um multiple data sources. They look at things like office discipline referrals. We do schoolwide social emotional screenings. Um some other teacher feedback data. And based on that data, that's how they decide um what behavioral supports and social emotional support initiatives that school um will be doing. So while we have a kind of district guidance, each building has their own flavor based on their own uh data. Um our tier 2 coaches then look at data that's a little bit more drilled down for students who need more specific support. So students that um might need um groups based on different social emotional needs. They also coordinate um help coordinate our partnership with family service agency. Those
029counselors come into our um uh different buildings, all of our buildings and run groups. Um and then these coaches are uh supervised by the building principal and then also Sarah Bates, our social emotional learning coordinator. And so these are are these additional duties for existing staff members then when they get this differential and which staff members are performing these duties? Yes. So it it's an application process. Um so for example, Maurice will get um some people that will apply and then it'll go through an interview process on on who will be those coaches. Do they have to have any kind of special credentials for that? They don't. And in fact, we really um encourage a wide variety of backgrounds. for example, our tier 2 coaches. Um, it's not unusual for folks like our psychologists, our
030social workers to be those tier 2 coaches because it is a little bit more of a clinical bent, but we really encourage our general education teachers to be tier one coaches since they see the day-to-day in that general ed classroom um, and get a feel of that that whole school. And so, we encourage really anyone to apply. Great. Thank you. Of course, building relationship building and relationship building. Any other questions I can answer for you? Okay. All right. So, these are coming for info and action this evening. Um, because we do need to get the positions posted. Staff members are asking when are they going to be posted because they're ready to apply for them. Um, and it's part of the process of getting ready for the opening of the school. All right. Any other
031questions for Dietra? All right. Hearing no other questions, it is recommended the board of education approve the differentials for Mitchell Elementary School. Do I have a motion? Motion. Second. Second. All right. Jackie, the roll call. Mark Sherat. Yes. Bam. Yes. Kristen Bailey. Yes. Nick Atwood. Yes. Christopher Boyce. Yes. All right. Item D, additional contractual days for Mitchell Elementary School principal. This is also information and action which will be brought to us by Billy Wormmo, the director of teaching and learning through the PK through 5th and director of human resources, Dietra Sales. Thank you. Good evening. Um, so you have in front of you a request to um have Mr. McDavid, our principal, work an additional eight days. So for those of you that don't know, we have elementary principles that work 10 months. They work
032all the way up through the end of the um student attendance, five days after and then there's five floating days. He's already exhausted those five floating days because there's a lot of work that goes into getting a new building like set up, right? So, um we did already allocate, we wanted about 12 days. Um we were thinking we're going to need, but we think we can do with eight days. We're hoping it's five, but we're going to go up to eight. So, we're making that request. Um, and that will come out of local funds. Any questions? So, I guess the first question that I'll start with is what was the official start date of the principal at Mitchell Elementary? Contractual July 1st of 2024. So he the principal started their contract at the same date
033that every other elementary school principal in the district started their contract which means that they've had the same aotted time to do most of the things on this list that we expect all of those other elementary school principles to do from July 1st to June 30th. Uh the planning agenda for summer PD for example was due last week for every principal in the district. Are we giving every other principal in the district more time to do things they're contractually obligated to do? So, as you can see, it's the planning agenda for summer PD. It's not the planning agenda for the building district instituting. I think that's what you're talking about. So, we're already in summer. Correct. Right. So, PD for the summer would need to be planned by now. Correct. And then I will say
034another thing is there's this but on top of it we got the building turned over to us June 1st. So getting all that curriculum and everything to the classrooms that it needs to go to inventory. There's so many other aspects to to that and opening the new building. And I know you're probably looking at it. It sounds like you're looking at it as Mr. McDavid was there along with everybody else and just focusing on Mitchell, but he was great support within all of our buildings throughout the district when administrators were out. Um, as you know, Jefferson Elementary did without a principal. U, Tyler Elementary did without a principal and AP for Jefferson and he was great support during I guess I I I want to clear I have no doubts that Mr. McDavid, you have
035been an invaluable asset to the district the last year. My concern is I just before the board meeting got to sign every administrator's contract in the district. If we paid every single administrator in the district for days that they work out of their contracted salary, every person in this room would be getting extra pay because every single one of you, I know for a fact, works outside of your contract. There's no doubt about that. But we'd go absolutely bankrupt if we paid every one of you for all of your hard effort that you put in day in and day out. And I will say the difference here is he's opening up a new building. It's not that it's an existing building where year after year you have similar things going on. This is a brand
036new building that he's opening up. And I will also add that there is not an assistant principal that's been brought for approval yet. So there is not the additional support that's been there for him that we anticipated to have happened. Um and then secondly, uh I think it was last week landscapers cut the fiber. So the fiber was cut in the building. Um that cut all communication and that caused a delay. So there are things that are outside of our control. Um again, there's not the assistant principal nor the dean have been hired yet. So, it's really Maurice taking on the full load on his own. It's not apples to apples for our um administrators. Um they're not all here obviously, but I'll go out on a limb and say that I think that they
037would agree as well. I will tell you, I have talked with multiple of administrators in the district and every one of them has said to me, "Where are my extra days to hire? Where are my extra days to plan?" So, I don't think that they would agree because that's not what I heard. except him. I'm I'm going to say this. So, the difference between what Maurica is doing and what everybody else is doing is that he's still hiring and preparing to open a brand new building and no one else is doing that. So, the day So, there's not an open spot in the rest of the district right now that those principles are trying to fill. No, I'm not just talking about I'm not just talking about I'm sorry. I'm not just talking about filling
038positions. He actually has to prepare every classroom, every library, organize, do schedules, do bell schedules, do uh all of the schedules for all of the uh individuals that are working there. So, he's not just doing what principles do in just filling uh vacancies, he's also doing all of the other things that everybody else has to do that already that they've already done. So for instance, I've opened a brand new building and an opening new building even from taking books out of boxes, stamping them, organizing them, putting them on the shelf. This is an allin. Everybody has to help. But on top of that, the organization of the building still has to be done and that is his responsibility. He doesn't have time to be able to do that at any other time. That's why we
039need to give in this extra time whereas everybody else has always had already done that. So he's starting from scratch where other people already have a foundation for it. All right, Chris. I' I've heard from several community members regarding this and they're Chris, you kind of stole a lot of my thunder. They're saying, "Well, we hired the principal back in July. He's had an empty school, so he hasn't had to deal with students that are present." Now, that's just the community perception here. And Chris basically pointed out what I was going to point out that everybody else is going to ask for the same thing going forward. I think we're opening up the floodgates here. There's a whole year We're coming up on almost the one-year anniversary. These are things that probably should have been
040done before. So, I'm having a hard time with this and I'm a no vote. So, well, here I'm going to I'm going to push back if you don't mind a little bit. So, we still have a a bunch of punch list items that have to get done. And I'm not talking about the building itself. I'm talking about organization of the school building, getting it ready for students and teachers and staff and everybody else to come in. that is his responsibility in his building. So if it's not ready because he still hadn't had his full staff, he hadn't been able to get into the building to do those things. He didn't have internet connection. We were down for 8 days, 7 days, or whatever that was, uh working days. We're behind because of all of those
041things. So we're just looking to make up that time so we can get that done. We're not asking for a a number of days. We're we believe that we hit about 12 days. We were thinking 8 12 days. We're asking for eight. We're hoping that it'll get down to five, but we need him to be able to finish and tidy things up to get the building ready to accept students. If he doesn't do it, I we don't have anybody else to do that because that is his building. So, my understanding correctly that President McDave is actually having to do the the roles of other people because those positions haven't been filled yet. Is that what these extra days are essentially accounting for? Okay. Because I guess my confusion is some of these designing and implementing
042district signage. What do we have a facilities department for if they're not designing district signage? That's that's what you guys put in the recommendation. Okay. So that that's part of the work that he does. So Tammy Tammy is a facilities person, but it is she doesn't do that by herself, right? She gets she's the one that gets it done, but there has to be a collaboration with other people so that she knows what needs to be done. I mean, Tammy does a lot of things, but unless she is in collaboration with either a center staff or the principles or somebody else, she needs to know what what her parameters are and and a collaboration a thought partner with that. That is again his purview, his building. He needs to do that with her alongside with
043her. I'm I'm going to add to that you're saying we're opening up a can of worms. Uh the last two years we have come to you and we've requested additional days for the chemical administrators because they've expressed it. So I think they're expressing it to the wrong person. I think they need to let us know if there's additional days that they need um because we could have requested those if we felt the need. However, the last two years we had quite a bit of initiatives and professional development that we had to make sure we got in and therefore we supported that. But this year, we felt that because we've been in those initiatives that we didn't have to request that this school year, but they need to let us know. When we opened up Courtland
044back in 2009, did we encounter the same thing? Not that anybody was here back then, but did we offer something like this? Brand new school. I was here then. You were here 100%. We had it then. We had it in 2011 with the new high school as well. The amount of time, energy, and effort that everybody is putting in uh from principal, assistant principal to tech facilities. I mean, there's an enormous amount of time, energy, and effort to make sure that one of the schools opens up on time, especially um a three-section elementary the size of Mitchell. And uh some of it is is very benign stuff like signage and just being able to make sure that things are labeled in the correct places in which, you know, the elementary principal has a better perspective
045than per say a facilities person who's going to maybe put the signage up here when it needs to be down there. Things like that. real basic stuff, but you also talk about things like security cameras, door entry systems, and what the expectation is like. Is it going to chime? Is it going to buzz? We need somebody to give that input. Um, how do we want the smartboards to interact within the classroom? You know, all sorts of things. Did we come Did they come back though for extra extra pay? Did did the board award extra pay back in 2009? Yeah, there was a similar request. I was a teacher at the I was a teacher at Humph Middle School when it was the high school and when we transitioned when I as a teacher I we
046moved to the high school we were compensated for moving because it took extra time simply to move. It was a brand new building and so even as I was the area coordinator at the time as well of the special education department and I was compensated in the summertime to go in and do things like unpack books, set up things because we our custodians will help us like moving the things there thankfully so but they don't know how to organize things because we have to make sure it's organized in the way that our instructional methodology makes sense in that space. So I can tell you that was I think. But aren't these known? You know, we would know this at the beginning of the year. Exactly what you described that these activities would have to be
047done. Why was this not thought about until last minute? I've told I've mentioned before I'm not fan of information action items when it comes from local funds. So it seems kind of rushed. I know the school year is starting and I know there's stuff that has to be done, but I just think this should have been known well before this meeting. We we did know that except that those individuals are either working in their current buildings, closing their building and packing that up, or they're coming from a different district. So, they don't have access to that space. We didn't get access to the building yet. We haven't had full access to it yet. So, there's a lot of other stop gaps that keep us from being able to get in there. So, once the building
048is turned over to us, cleaned, and ready to be prepared, then that's when we have the ability to do that. So we can't get in other people's ways of getting the job done for preparing the building based on the timeline too. We did have one delay in moving in where I think they pushed it back like one or two weeks and then the issue with the fiber would actually timeline wise put us at if those two things had not occurred everything would have been done within the time frame that we expected. So I mean and the hiring of the other administrative staff. So I think so so normally you're right Mark right but the thing is that there's uh things that we can control and we have controlled them very easily but when things are
049outside of our sphere of control this is what happened and thankfully it's not it's only eight you know it could be up to eight days it's not more than that you know it could be it could have been worse it could have been weeks kind of what we were talking about earlier about the roundabout and the bridge something that should have taken three four months ended up taking an additional eight months to too, right? So, thankfully this is not as much as that kind of time and we'll be ready to to have the building ready to receive everyone. I have a question. I'm trying to understand the contracts and how they work. Um, so on those days when you cannot do the work, right, like because you don't have access or whatever, what happens? Cuz
050like you're talking about like floating days to work. I'm assuming that this is just compensation for labor that has to be done. Correct. Correct. And that's the way we think about it is in terms of days in the school district. Is that this is just a new concept? Because we're 24. So an administrator the way that they're pay is per day. We're not hiring people. Okay. And it's not salary. It's I mean it is but it's it's contractually by contractual salary. Yes. Mhm. So what happens on those days when you cannot work and do the things you need to do? You know what I'm saying? Yeah. So it's not the fact that he or others cannot work, but if there was work intended to be done in the building, it could not be done in
051the building. So I I don't know what his schedule was, but if there were interviews that day, they might get moved to another building because of the need that things are scheduled. Um, again, I don't know the exact schedule that he was following the days that the fiber was cut and that there was no communication systems in the building. However, the need of the work doesn't stop because there's other work that you can pivot and do too. Yeah, that's I guess what I'm asking is what what happens then and how do we know the time is yeah used. Well, we know we know what's left for him his call punch list, right? it it's what's left for him to do and based on our experience and our expertise we've determined that that's about how much
052time he will need to be able to do that. So the expectation and we that's I'm I'm assuming we gave him some wiggle room that we would normally do, right? And that might be a half a day or maybe even a full day of wiggle room, which is why I believe Billy started off by saying it probably could be five, six days, but we wanted to give him some time to make sure that it gets done right or if there's another instance where something goes wrong that he has that ability to be able to make it up at a different time. people do cancel, they postpone, they redirect, they do a lot of other things. And so, you know, this is a time people outside of our control take vacation. They're not reachable. And so,
053we have to be able to atone for, you know, line up for some of those things, right? So, we're not looking for, you know, a number of days. And we didn't ask for the 12 that we had anticipated. So, you know, eight seems to be a a good number, but it hopefully it'll be less than that. And he should be done, right, Mr. McDavid? with all your punch list items that have to be con done. Billy is keeps track. So does uh Dietra, so does he. So we know exactly what those expectations are over those few days. Thanks. I think there's something to be said for what you said with your expertise and that there's so many of you evaluating this and and are involved in making this recommendation. Opening a new school and transitioning
054out of a school year into a new school year is really not an applesto apples comparison. Um, we're at the liberty of all other parties that are involved when it comes to the building being turned over. Um, things being shipped, things being assembled, things being put together, things being installed. Like Ben said, it's just so many different contributing stakeholders into that. Thanks. Which of the objectives here are we most behind on that need to be accomplished? We have five things listed or four bullet points here. So hiring is is our top priority. Um I don't know if you saw but um we just lost a first grade teacher who was going to be a first grade teacher at Mitchell and now we have to hire for that first grade teacher. We're still hiring the the
055AP waiting for the the AP to be um approved and then the dean as well. So hiring for sure and assistance are our biggest priority. But aside from that, and this is a whole district initiative, the MTSSA and MTSSB and our PLC's, those are huge um throughout the whole district. And Mitchell being the first year, we don't really have well, we do have somewhat of baseline data because students are moving from different schools. So, we have our data strategist giving us um the students that are coming in to the new building, but setting up a plan and systems and and structures for academics and behaviors at Mitchell Elementary is we want to make sure we hit the ground running. Do you have something you want to add? You want to add something? Yeah, I just
056wanted to just add real quick to to that question. Um, hang tight. That's all. Hold on. Yeah, I just wanted to add to that question. Um, too, really thinking about uh we we've been able to um um schedule some opportunities to to work with staff. So, between right now and September 13th, um there is one contractual, one scheduled day for me to see Mitchell staff and then start. Right. So August 11th is our institute day and that'll be an opportunity to work with staff in Mitchell and then we start school the 13th. So that really is that other big piece is when we talk about MTSA, MTSSB, PLC's is getting teacher voice as a part of this, right? Because I'm just one person. I'm looking for those opportunities to be sure that we're creating that
057inclusive work environment. So, as we do that, that requires me to again just take those times um get folks uh either on the phone, on a Google Meet, or or in the building in my office so we can again be working on some of those different pieces with teacher uh voice, right? So, that way we're sharing those common beliefs um and and they have been a part of creating uh those systems and structures that at the end of the day they're going to be responsible to implement. So, I would really say that that top bullet point, the hiring piece, we definitely will get there. We've got some applicants in already. Um, but that top piece and really getting that teacher voice involved does require just that that additional time. Thank you. Thank you. Do we
058have any other questions from the board? All right. At this time, I'll entertain a motion. So move. Do I have a second? Second. Jackie, do the roll call, please. Vinyl, yes. Kristen Bailey, yes. Nick Atwood, yes. Christopher Boyce, yes. Mark Sherbot, no. Moving on to item E, differential committee request for approval. This is presented by director Salis. Again, it is I. Um so these are recommendations coming before the board from the differential committee separate from what you approved uh just approved for Mitchell. These are um for girls soccer coach area coordinators which are located at the high school and um pretty much changing the model of what we had there because we have had increased FTE and because there are more FTE there are more staff to support in the different areas. And then um
059uh there's one that's for discretionary by building. You do not approve that, but we make you aware of it. Or for the ones that you are approving, I'm sorry, Mr. football coach, assistant football coach, soccer coach, and area coordinators. When it comes to our coaches, we really look at what our numbers look like, how many students are on each team, how many levels we have on the team, and then for any sport that may be co-ed, um, looking to see what our male to female ratio is as required by Title 9. So when we do that, we have to make sure that we have the right um supervision and support and safety in place. So that's why we're coming forward with the request for a 1.5 football coach and a 1.0 soccer girls soccer coach.
060Um then the area coordinators, as I mentioned, we're looking at a different model because per the contract, the DCTA contract, it guides how many staff members an area coordinator will oversee. Well, with added FTE again, those numbers are larger. So, taking that in consideration, we've looked at that and we're bringing forward the request for an additional uh.5 and then there's a table attached that you can look at to see how that distribution works. Questions? Um, the only question I would have in regards to the additional FTEES for area coordinators. Now, I know most of the time PLC days are directed based on at least with the high school, a lot of times they'll go based on like your area of specialty. So, I are we going to have PLC days where it's just driver's ed
061teachers getting together to discuss teaching people to drive and Yeah. So, um currently, uh PE and driver's ed is lumped together. So they sit in a PLC together and either PE is at a disadvantage or driver's ed is at a disadvantage because one of them is going to consume that time. So by breaking those out into their own area coordinators, they can have their individual PLC meetings and really cover the curriculum and the data that supports that individual um area. Okay. It is definitely to the advantage of our staff members to do this. Do we have any further questions? Can you tell me a little bit more just what an area coordinator does? I'm new, so I'm fairly familiar. I got a general idea, but like what are some of the specifics? Billy and Sarah
062might have to jump in um or more so Sarah, but an area coordinator, think of it as the supervisor of that content area. So, like I said, driver's ed and PE. So there's someone who takes a lead in that area of curriculum and they facilitate um everything related to that area whether it's scheduling whether it's curriculum um the PLC meetings um talking about the data everything that um helps us work towards the school improvement plan and everything else that they need to do as related to teaching and learning and it is a DCTA member it is a teacher but it's someone who takes the lead of that particular content area So if there were like new requirements for world geography, that's something they're like, "Hey, you know, the ISB is going to have new requirements
063for this. You know, we have to alter our teaching plans or something like that or just they they would do that at some point, but we also have things like curriculum council um and other um staff meetings that can address that. So we have to look at PLC and then look at the other work that they do, but Sarah can speak to that." Good job, DRA. She handled that very well. I would just add they also work with our um content manager. So we have a steam manager and humanities manager. They also work with them but they are as Dietra explained they're the conduit and the leaders for their group to help look at what are new courses what are the trends that we're seeing in data with which classes our kids are taking. Also
064working with the ed center on expanding those courses like you mentioned curriculum council. They also help with looking at some of the resource renewals. There are a lot of singletons and one-off classes particularly speaking at the high school that they'll look at what are the curriculum needs, what are the resources needs that they need. They'll work um within their building budgets also work within the district budget. Thank you. You're welcome. Question. And this is for information only. We're not asking for action. All right. Do we have any other questions? Do I have consensus to bring this back? Yes. Thank you. All right. Item F, staffing request, increase of 2.0 registered nurses, FTE. This is brought to us by Dr. Becker. Yes. Yes. So, good evening. I'm Dr. Lisa Becker. I'm the assistant director of student
065services. Um, so this increase is for two registered nurses. Um this is for onetoone nursing support for two students, one that moved in and one that um had a recent diagnosis. Um you can see the fiscal impact there for the two registered nurses. This is based on the hourly range. They are paid hourly. Um they are not part of DCTA. Um so depending on where they come in with years of experience, that's why you see the range range there. What questions can I answer for you in general? So, we're we're looking at hiring two additional nurses, right? Yes. Um, with these one nurse per student, is that how correct? Would the nurses be able to assist other students? I'm I'm just curious. Yeah. No, that's a great question. So when the student is there for
066the school day, that nurse has to attend to that child the entire time, lunch, recess, due to the um severe nature of whatever that health um indication is. I can't be specific about it, but in general, these are things like maybe a student is on a vent or has a feeding tube, something like that. If that student is absent, for example, our health services manager manages um different nursing. If a nurse is out in one school, they might be called to, you know, if that students out, they would go sub for another nurse, something like that. So, they would always be able to be deployed, but if the student is there, they are with them the whole time. And the nurse is employed for how long in terms of is it what one year or
067five years or what is so their contract is yearly I believe right as long as that student is with us right that's right and they need that support what other questions can I answer for you all right this is information only I never say Do we have any other questions or comments? Hearing no others, do we have consensus to bring this back? Yes. Yes. And then moving on to the last one which I believe will also be from Dr. Becker is our Sunb Belt Staffing LLC service agreement which is information only. Information only. Yes, that's right. So, this is a staffing agreement and a contract for one uh bilingual speech language pathologist. Um we do uh employ speech language pathologists. We have u many in our district uh that is employed through our DCTA contract.
068However, speech language pathologists are um and have been for several years now a very hard position to fill. Um we've been very lucky this year. We were able to hire two additional speech pathologists for openings that we have had. Um but uh the last several years if we have not been able to fill those openings with uh DCTA employed employees, we use contractual services. So this is a bilingual uh speech language pathologist. We employed her last year through a contract and was very successful. She did a great job and so we're looking to renew that contract for this school year. So the fiscal impact this cost is $178,200. Um that's contractual. So there's that we don't pay into TRS or anything like that. It's just paid straight to that contracting agency. What questions can I
069answer for you all? Do is there any negotiation that happens uh with the I'm not sure how the staffing agency works in terms of Yeah. like with this specific Right. No, that is a a good question. So we actually um have relationships with several staffing agencies. We don't just go to one for many reasons, but one of them is to look at what the going rate is and if if um different agencies have different costs per hour. What I will say is that bilingual folks, particularly bilingual speech language pathologists, tend to be a little bit more expensive because they're rare. Good old supply and demand um sets the market here. So, this is a pretty typical rate for a bilingual speech language pathologist. And does that full amount go to the person or is it
070is it the staffing? It goes to so the staffing agency and then deploy it disperses that money. Yes. And there's no options for going through anyone like you can't go um direct like you have to go through the agency. If we were to go to through direct we would hire them through our typical hiring processes. They'd be um employed through DCTA. So, why someone would choose um a a contracting agency? Um sometimes they look for flexibility of hours. So, it's not unusual that sometimes we're hiring virtual um speech language pathologist, virtual school psychologists. Not ideal, but those are some of the ways that we see that. Um we also see folks who um maybe live in different areas. You know, they they are licensed in Illinois, but they're also but they're living in Florida, so
071they'll come in through virtually. We're seeing more of that truly since the pandemic. People are looking for more of that flexibility. One of the other big things with it is because it's a union position, we're tied on what our pay scale can be for them based on the union contract because I was one of the biggest Well, let's just give them more money and meet them in the middle so we're not paying the contracted service. But because they're in the union, what they get paid is what they get paid. And you can work from home and get paid more money. I mean, who wouldn't take that job? So typically and and I what I can't speak to is how they deploy that money in terms of health benefits, retirement benefits. That's the big advantage of
072course coming work for for the district that we offer all of those um benefits. I can't speak to how that the agency applies that. You know, if their benefits are as good of our as ours, we just pay that hourly rate and then the staffing company um decides what how that's dispersed to their employee. How does the dollar amount compare to previous years? It's 178,000. Um, I would be happy to look what we paid last year. I think it's 130 an hour. Um, this year or this it says 132. Off the top of my head, I believe it was like 130 last year, but I'm happy to get you that exact number. I feel like Sunb Belt was around 169 the last time we had them come around. Okay. So, it's 178 now. All right.
073But it's pretty in line with what we pay for these contracted services. Does anyone else have any questions or comments? Do you have consensus to bring this back? Yes. All right. Thank you, Dr. Becker. Dr. Garcia Sanchez, you're up. The excitement in the room is building. You can tell because it's my turn. Uh, good to have everybody here. It's the summer time. I know it's kind of hot and humid out there. Expecting a storm. We need that that that water to cool us down and make the grass green and all those wonderful things. So, appreciative of that. We have some things I just wanted to share. First and foremost, I want to start off by congratulating Ally Cheney. Ally is a student over at Clinton Rosette who was awarded the 2025 Promising Young Writer uh
074by the National Council of Teachers of English. Uh Ally received a superior rating on her essay on where is home and uh there was over 226 students that were nominated for these awards. Uh and they came from anywhere across 34 states in the US, Puerto Rico, DC, India, Russia, and Taiwan. So, for her to have been selected here in Decal at Clinton Rosette as a winner, uh, kudos Ally. Thank you so much for putting us on the worldwide map. Thank you for that. So, um, and thank you, of course, to Alli's teachers and all the staff that have helped her to get to where she's at. So, thank you so much for that. Um other things that have been happening uh that with no title you know final outcome there's uh two things that I
075guess I I just want to mention is we in the spirit of transparency uh one is that uh recently we met with the city manager and the city engineer and folks from uh from our um from the district uh security uh facilities and um the secondary uh director on the roundabout. out that the city is considering over by Clinton Rosette. U today we met and um board member Shvat joined us with our attorney about what um ins and outs of that would look like in our response to the city on requests that we would make for the safety of our students and for the safety of the community. Um we will be he will our attorney will be drafting that email. um he's been working closely with our mayor and then sharing that with us
076to be able to respond um to city hall around what our considerations would be if a roundabout is to be placed at Clinton Rosett. Yeah, I know I'm looking at the faces. I I get that. But so it's an information, right? and u nothing's been decided for final for finality but uh this is in the works and we wanted to make sure that our community knew that we are a part of those discussions and if there are questions feel free to shoot me an email manurva d428.org or call the office and we'll be more than happy to take questions and then answer them accordingly. Another thing uh that uh board president and I um boys and I met with uh some the board president and the uh superintendent and uh facilities as well as their
077business um director at uh in Sycamore along with uh Tammy myself um around a co-op for early childhood. Uh this is an opportunity that Sycamore has reached out to us about with some space they have um and to be able to build out some of their space to um put our students, you know, our itty bitties in that space. Um I know that there is still a lot of questions we have. Um primarily my questions are going to be around safety and security spacing and then of course a duration of a contract. Uh so you know we don't want to be in a position that eventually um we would have to move out and immediately have to build something. So we want to take and kind of think things through all the way. Uh one
078of the suggestions I made was that perhaps we build our space and they can you know pay tuition to us and come this way right and we would have a building that we would have control of and be able to build to suit for what we need for as far as the early childhood development center. So again, it's another area that we're having conversation on. Um nothing is set in stone. It's just we we're testing the waters to see how we can collaborate. Um I know that with special uh special education, we have they're talking about um doing some um sending some of their children over to us for the uh transition center and other you know other ways of being able to uh collaborate. So, we want to continue to have that good collaboration
079as we normally do, but then um have it as far as communities are concerned as well. Again, questions, comments, concerns, feel free to email me. Again, manurba. Sanchez at CP D428.org. Man, that was fast. D428.org. Slip of the tongue. Sorry about that. Uh anyway, so feel free to do that and um we'll be more than happy to answer questions. And that's it for me. I'm going to turn that over before I make another mistake. So, just give that back to you. So, I guess I'll just kind of add in I thought that it was a good conversation. My personal leanings just in full transparency is that I kind of like the idea of us flagshipping it more just cuz why not continue to have us be the peaking on a shining hill in the county
080for education. And I know kind of the movement also went on, hey, we're talking to Sycamore I think it's a good time just to say, hey, if there's other school districts within the county that want to be open to this conversation, I think that's something we're all open to just to look into, hey, let's just be real here. More people involved, less of our personal local tax dollars also going into it. So, just another way to look at it. Do we have anything else from the board? Real quick, I'll mention Manurva mentioned I was part of the uh uh meeting with uh officials regarding the roundabout and I encourage the community to communicate with the board about your thoughts, especially as it has to do with safety with the school. There are lots of concerns.
081I haven't heard a lot of good things about the roundabout either, but communicate and be in touch with us. Thank you. All right. Hearing nothing else, it is recommended the board of education adjourns. Do I have a motion? So move. Do I have a second? All those in favor say I. I. And the meeting is adjourned. Thank you.