001e e e um I'll call the public hearing to order and note for the board and public that this hearing per state regulation is to give an opportunity to the public and board members to present any written or oral testimony and or comments on the subject to modify school code 105 ICS 5-4-2 d325 holidays that Kashmir palaski and Veterans Day be granted commemorative holiday status in allowing student attendance on those days for the 2526 school year and that Kashmir palaski indigenous peoples that's Columbus Day and Veterans Day be granted commemorative holiday status in allowing student attendance on those dates for the 26 27 school year Miss Bradford have we received any written comments no we have not do we have anyone in the audience uh wishing to make comments on this item tonight does any
002of do any board members have comments on this tonight okay I think we can close the hearing let me get my having an opportunity for public participation in oil and written testimony I declare this public hearing closed the time is 6:31 p.m. okay we'll move on to our Open Session agenda after the public hearing tonight board of education has been en closed executive session to conduct employee discipline hearings discuss the appointment employment compensation discipline performance or dismissal of specific employees of the public body and Collective negotiating matters between the board and representatives of its employees no action was taken during closed executive session I would now ask everyone to join me in the pledge Al flag United States ofice we have a recommendation for tonight's agenda yes we do I recommend the board approve tonight's
003March 18th 2025 Open Session board meeting agenda as presented can I have a motion second any discussion all in favor signify by saying I I I those opposed motion's carried we'll now move on to our district highlights Maria good evening president Clevenger members of the board Dr Gray Melissa um our first highlight tonight is a state senator student intern as District administrators and advocates for our school district we often talk about creating opportunities and career exploration so students can have Pathways in a world in which we know they can and will do amazing things tonight I am honored to share an impact from an Eisenhower student that he has made not only for himself but for all students particularly for students in the state of Illinois jamaran Marshall last year as a junior participated in
004the inspired internship program powered by our Innovative programs Department his internship was with Senator Doris Turner's Office later jamaran was placed in the Jerry Dawson Civic leader leadership Institute during the summer leading into his senior year during this time with the senator he wrote and presented a bill to Senator turn in July which was last year and with Senator Turner support and guidance Senate Bill 1331 was developed and passed the first phase of becoming official now I'm unsure of jamaran plans to go into politics but before we hear from him I would like to share a video every year Senator Turner does a um intern program and she partners with DPS and she partners with Innovative programming with Ashley gret and Leslie risby and so last year Leslie and I um had interviews because they
005went through an interview process in order to become an intern for Senator Turner we had interviews at Eisenhower and we also had interviews at MacArthur and so jamaran was one of the ones that was selected and and I think that it's also important these are not students that are kind of handpicked because they are the number one in their class or they're the most popular popular in their school uh we send out uh to like I said to decada public schools and school district 186 in Springfield this is an opportunity the kids have an opportunity to U make application and say why they want to do it why it's important then we have an interview process and uh and each year we do three to four kids so it's not just a one off it's
006three to four kids that have the opportunity to um to take advantage of it's not just just busy work you know we're not just finding things for them to do it's not just showing up answering phones or filing or just you know uh cleaning out closets this is really substantive work that these students are able to do and they really become part of District office staff his task was to make sure that he pulled together a document that listed all of the requirements and the elected positions in make County that was his first task his second task was to figure out and start to work on a bill and so less than a year later here we are in the Senator's office in a meeting with Senator Doris Turner jamarian Marshall and uh Illinois Student
007Assistance Commission because it passed it's the first phase of however the bills work so we're here it was an interesting process really it's like I had to learn how to actually make one the components like there was this thing online it's called the Illinois compiled statutes and a certain amount of time I had to read and comprehend and learn how to format an actual bill I don't know if that was necessary but I did it anyway the bill is about scholarships making a database or a website online to make it easier to come across them them all compiled instead of just searching around for them and further than that it's to educate parents and students when there's some students who don't even know what the how a scholarship works that's what the bill also addresses
008and all that get the parents informed as well that's the intention of the bill instead of just it isn't all just scholarships but that's like the main thing those two components scholarships and educating parent and child on importance of further education and how it can be accessible because there's a way and college Deb is a huge deal it's a big concern right now and so the more our students are aware of um dollars by companies by institutions by individuals I think the better our students will be positioned uh to attend a post-secondary institution limiting and eliminating the debt and so jamaran done the work it's shown me a lot about how getting legislation Works how you work with different people with different opinions and all that why it matters to care about other people which
009is why we're here to make laws that don't just say follow this rule but are made to also benefit people's lives yeah it's really really in a good spot I'd say it was passed by the Illinois higher education committee if I'm correct and right now being considered it has a pretty good chance I believe of passing I'm I'm so proud I'm proud of of him I'm proud of um our our partners and I'm proud of the work that comes out of innovative programming for identifying our students I'm proud that we have the ability to create opportunity and access for our students to shift and change the trajectory of their lives and now as well as others think your taxes are simple so proud and so excited for jamaran and at this time I'm going to
010ask him to come to the podium and share um what his plans are for after graduation and talk to us a little bit about his [Applause] experience all right hello boy lord it's nice to be with everyone here this afternoon and before I really just start rambling I'd like to thank um inspired Ed Innovative programs DLI the senator Doris Turner's office as well of course dps61 itself for the opportunities it's gifted me amongst other things and really just all the teachers I've had my experience with the district has been mostly great it's been in my experience that the people working here whether it be the administrators the board the teachers and all else they really have a great care for helping out students and helping improve education indicator really just a genuine care to help
011out students and that's what I admire about District 61 of the cater and that is what I'd say inspired me really to do with the internship and it's like that question um mariad had asked would I be interested with politics it's not necessarily politics that are that's my interest as it is doing real public service that's been an interest of mine for a while now and that's partly part of the philosophy that went into making the bill I did it was really not to just make a database like I said it's really to make higher education more appealing because I said before the people here in District 61 they've put a lot of effort and helping educate students in elsewhere but really after after that there would need to be more of an appeal to
012higher education I believe and I believe the first way to do that would be to make money more accessible main way to do that would be through scholarships and then of course getting really students involved in education as well from early on it's part of that I had put into the bill that's really the philosophy that went there now for any plans I have after High School I really just plan to go back down that path of course see where it leads hopefully it leads somewhere where I can do similar public service to that of Senator Doris Turner she's done a lot in education specifically to help out students in all of Illinois and that's mostly where my plans lie find a good way to help people that's the philosophy really that guides my actions
013and once again I'd like to thank the board for um acknowledging and um award awarding I can't really think of the word right now giving my work its recognition that's really what I'd like to do now if I may I'll go ahead take my seat [Applause] you mind do a photo jamaran said he'll do a photo with you that's nice I do have a quick I do have a quick question yeah I so you you talked about the bill but um I'm sorry I I know how it is to be in front of a microphone and uncomfortable so I I know how you feel but I did want to acknowledge your work right so um you talked about the bill but didn't did you put together the the the card that has the list I
014think it was touched on the video uh list of the um elected officials and what they're what they do in Mak county is was that part of what you did yes and in fact I had another there was another great intern as well someone similar I'd say MH in philosophy he had helped alongside in making that he was another intern with the senator his name is Mason Richards he's a great friend of mine he's a great very talented student I'd say he'd be deserving of recognition as well and he helped put that together together as well and that's part of our project really okay well that was really good goodlooking I I I appreciate that um um a friend of mine showed it to me and and I just wanted recognize that it wasn't just
015the bill I mean that was uh like an educational Aid that you could claim um as part of your work that can be used in the schools and then I think it's being used in the uh I'm going to get the acronym wrong the Jerry Dawson Leadership Institute I think it's being used in that too if I'm not wrong so cool good work thank you you that's all I had so all right thank you all going to take one too right [Applause] all right on to our next highlight we will have Miss Maria Wiggins who is the principal at muffley elementary to share some of the great things happening at muffley good evening everyone and um to Dr Clark in her absence to Dr gray Miss Bradford and especially to miss Maria Robertson for helping
016me out through all of this um just some of the things that are going on at muffle I want to thank you all for this second opportunity last time I didn't get to make it things happen emergencies come up and those are just things we got to do and I than want to thank Dr uh flesh for being with me up here she's kind of helping with my nerves right now so all right so muffly Elementary some amazing things that are going on um for this school year so our vision is we educate and Empower our students with strategies to adapt to Everyday challenges leading them to be become successful citizens in a diverse Society our mission statement as a collaborative team muffle Elementary School promotes respectful and responsible Learners by creating a positive learning
017environment with high expectations all right let's go muffle so one of the first things that we all enjoy and we we love to talk about is our unplugged days these are our halfday events there's a list of them there if you um will'll have some pictures on the next slide but we unplug from all forms of technology that's the adults and the children um we learn about different individuals we do things with our hands so for example um on indigenous peoples for day for October we learned about four different tribes on Veterans Day we had breakfast we did trim the tree all the students the building made in ornament um women's history we even had our mayor there miss Julie Moore wolf she came in and presented to all of our students we also had
018um the MacArthur girls coach and a couple of her girls there so it was an awesome day um all those days are super exciting in our building here's just a couple of pictures of um those unplugged days all right we also had a sneaker ball in February it's kind kind of like a little twist on the daddy daughter dance well our students dressed up they had on their sneakers Jordans Air Force Ones or whatever ten shoes they wore um and we just had a ball we danc we had snacks and we just danced the night away it was super fun um we had a group small group of our students that attended the Illinois music musical Education Association with Mr Krauss he's very inspirational and he loves what he does and it shows in his
019students one of those super super cold days where we thought we were going to be cancelled we did not but we had um um Mrs Mitchell she thought about why not let's give our kids some hot chocolate so at the spur of the moment she went out got hot chocolate we got hot water and we had marshmallows and those kids who were coming in from the buses and coming in we gave all those students some hot chocolate that morning just to warm up their physical bodies but it also warmed our little hearts because we were able to do something fun and just out of the box for them um we are working on this I Isa class challenge students are practicing test questions taking home reading and math work every night so if they earn
020a star when they return it so the class with the most stars at the end of I believe this week will have this plaque outside of their door for the rest of the year and for the next year we just want to inspire them to do their best on the those tests and it's always good to practice um we did have a teacher who earned ANL Spotlight for being a an high one of the highest users in our district Mrs me our second graders put on a play earlier in the year and they did a phenomenal job that teacher took those students and read over that book gave them parts and they did a phenomenal job putting on a play A Bad Case of Stripes um we had a trun or treat day in October
021um this year we actually had 26 vehicles that were lined up in our back Circle that was the most Vehicles we've had the kids loved it so much um I think it was more enjoyable for all the adults though um the kids just got the candy but the adults enjoyed most of it okay a couple more things that I did not have on there we are partnered with Rocky Wilkerson and the workforce Network they are working with our fifth and sixth graders so they have brought in like Richland Community College healthc Care Military construction workers the trades program just to plant seeds in our fifth graders and sixth graders um mind so that as they continue to grow they'll begin to think about their careers um last but not least we did increase 5% in
022our um fastbridge uh math so in the fall we were at 28.2% and we increased to 33.8% not only are we supportive of our students but we also support other students and when that incident happened with Charlie and the other kids we wore red for him on that day just to honor him and let those other schools know that we supported them okay thank you all for listening any questions okay thank you thank you thank you thank [Applause] you thank you Miss Wiggins and Miss flesh next up we have the running Reds here to present is principal Curtis Lindsay for Steven decator Middle School I need a walk up song or something y'all come on now how's everybody doing this evening howdy to everybody back there it is steaming back there I just want to
023let y'all know the heat is on um hello to the board hello Dr Gray Miss Bradford um in Dr Clark's absence as well I am Curtis Lindsay the principal at Steven deor Middle School the best school in the state of Illinois coming into this year you got you had to be a little crazy right and so part of my mission is to think outside the box and um in order to do that I had to get my staff to buy into that so the first part of what we wanted to incorporate was a mantra for our school and mainly that was to boost our kids up to show our kids that with a little bit of success comes from discipline from having the right mentality and also believing in yourself and so those things we
024try to implement that every day with our kids when they're in the hallways just trying to encourage them and tell them and let them know that even in your hard times even in your darkest moments success is still on the rise and so therefore having that self-esteem and that mindfulness helps that a little bit I guess I got the clicker all right so I'm Kurt Lindsay the principal um this is Matt Gman my assistant principal right now it's just the two of us we need another assistant principal um we just received one and um we're excited about him becoming part of uh Steven decer running Red's family um home of the Running Red Nation um but again to be part of my staff you got to be crazy and you got to be willing to
025get out of your comfort zone you have to be willing to have those tough conversations with parents you have to be willing to get cussed out by parents um you have to be willing to um pull kids to the carpet when they're doing things wrong you have you have to hold them accountable for their actions as well as our staff as well because it goes both ways so our vision is to be the number one Middle School in Illinois um again when I told my staff that they gave me this crazy look but again that's that's my idea that's that's my belief and I believe that for our city as well um so in order to do that for our city to get back on track to be the best that it was when I
026first got here in 1994 is that is having our kids believe in this vision and this Mission and we're going to do that with positive character development and applicate positive character um sorry um character development and academic application now that means that um giving our kids those those things that they need in order to be successful in school um having yourself a um time management being organized um being able to think outside the box um being able to bring on people that you usually would not talk to and have different conversations because you got to have different ideologies and different things of that nature so just trying to get our kids to believe that that vision and um and just going in that that Avenue that aspect same thing for our teachers we want to
027promote positive atmosphere um we don't always want to tell our kids that they're doing wrong we want to explain to them why they are wrong because that matters um so my mission is create a safe learning environment where all our students can be successful through discipline mindfulness and self-esteem team um so one of my other missions when I came to Steven decar was to get our families back involved and so some of the things we started doing was having family student events um the first thing we did was have a back to school dance with the families came in um we provided Refreshments um so every event that we have it's a family event and so we want to make sure we bring the parents in so when you call Mom on the phone because
028Johnny was cussing you out then Mom will be more successible to listen to you as opposed to you're picking on my kid what are you doing to my kid and so therefore again we wanted to create some some events and avenues for our students to do things again we had a back to school dance we dressed up for Halloween um my eighth grade girls had an opportunity to go to U ofi for a basketball game and they played at halftime of that game as well so a great opportunity several of our girls came back from that wanting to play division one basketball and and so that was great for me because now they know what now they know what their motiv at to do and so now it is my job to keep them motivated
029um so therefore so these are a lot of the things that we do at our school um we had a Christmas party we recently had a family robotics night in January that was amazing um we had a karaoke night this past Friday um because of the weather we didn't have a lot of parents there um but we still had a good time we came out I serenad I sang some Michael Jackson Beat It I did the moonwalk um my ankles are hurting from it um but more importantly again just being able to create things for our parents and for our students to see us in a different light um for our students to know that we don't just go in a closet and then we come out in the morning um you know so when
030they see us at Walmart they know we're normal they see us at the mall they know we're normal um so these are the things that we have done and we're trying to create and and build a different Mantra and a different attitude and aspect of Steven theater because before when you said Stephen theater people would cringe now when you say Stephen theator people smile so I want to continue to do that I want to continue to make sure our school is shown in a positive light um not always the negative we have some amazing kids we have some amazing staff and we do have some amazing families as well so again we always want to showcase that and highlight that and let let our students know how amazing they are as well um and I
031do have a video I think Maria did I turn it off what happened okay they're going to pull up my video for [Music] me when I came here in 1994 there was some history here at stepen Deer I remember Steven theer called the deep and um we made it a priority to come watch the basketball team play cuz that was like one of the highlights here and so when I got the opport to come over to Stephen theer um then I just jump at the chance to do that so if I have 24 divided by six we are inner city school and our Middle School is about 400 students 420 students seventh grade and eighth grade students ultimately my vision is to be the best middle school in the state of Illinois um you know
032so that that means that I our kids have to believe that as well and that means that everybody here in this building has to believe that and that means when they step off the bus we have to have that mentality of we're going to be the best and in order to be the best we want to try to teach our kids what success looks like and so we're we are determined that every kid here can be successful with in implementing some discipline for them um letting them know to be successful to have some mindfulness about themselves and to build their self-esteem and then that will help them project them to the next next level of their lives what I try and teach my students in self-reliance right so I'm I kind of feel pretty self-reliant
033a lot of the time they try to make you a leader so you don't follow people's footsteps to make the wrong choices they help you make good choices and and prepare you for the future so I think self-reliance is modeled for our students as well which is something that they need to be advocates for themselves taking care of what they can take care of and what they can control so that's kind of what we do here at stevenor stenor gives you like a lot of good opportunities that some schools might not give you like culture and communities sign language and learn how to cook and foods and just like a lot of good opportunities um I've been in stepen deor now for I think this is seven years I've been teaching in the district almost
03420 um but I would say here is St indicator um probably the best thing and I know people are going to think this is crazy it is the kids I love middle school kids they have great personalities they come here to share their thoughts and ideas they're old enough that they can um form their own opinions and we can have disc sessions obviously in social studies we're doing a lot of that and they know more than we think they do and um just the best thing about Stephen deor right now is the change that we're making we have um some new leadership which is awesome um and we see a bright future with that leadership um our staff is also great we're very supportive we support each other we do things outside of school um
035having us having a good team is essential and we're really building that team and we're always welcome for more so we're looking forward to building people up and getting new teachers in here our kids are amazing they're smart um they're caring they they show empathy for one another our kids understand each other and they know that we're all in this together they're attentive they do what we need them to do um but I'm a tough love type of guy so if if you mess up I'm going to call them to the carpet um and of course talk them through it because they need to learn this and then as we do that then we help them become better young men and young women [Music] all right that concludes the video um any [Applause] questions thank
036you all right thank you I believe that I believe that concludes our district highlights for the evening uh we appreciate we at every meeting we appreciate appreciate those highlights it sure accentuates what we're doing as a district on a day-to-day basis uh we'll now move on to public participation Board of Education would like to note the following during public participation identifi identify oneself and be brief comment should be limited to three minutes any public comments submitted to the board secretary will be included in the record please note that during any Board of Education meeting and public participation board members do not respond and or comment to public comments All comments are referred to Administration furthermore the board refrains from referring to specific students or staff members by name and request that public commenters refrain from
037doing so as well the request that you emit names is made to protect you from allegations of liable or slander or from violations of the Illinois school student records act it is not intended to Shield an employee from criticism Miss br for do we have anyone wishing to address the board yes but I would like to acknowledge that I received two public comments one from Stephanie Martin and one from Jessica Cameron will that will be added to the record I would like to call up Holly PE peckard to the podium please hello my name is Holly pecker and I'm a graduate of DPS and have been teaching and coaching within the district since 2001 I am proud to say my children attend Johns Hill and I'm a teacher at Johns Hill I've been teaching at
038John Hill for almost 19 years which is a long time for someone to stay in one building in fact in our district it's pretty rare for someone to for someone to stay as long as I have your building needs to have things you love and I love coming to work every day because of these things one thing I love is the culture at Johns Hill for 19 years I can say that our building definitely has a unique culture we are oneof a kind not only are we an Arts integration school but we house the K through 8 ESL or English as a second language program in our district which by the way is 33% of our population there are currently 13 languages spoken at John's Hill I love how my own children have such a
039diverse experience at John's Hill my children are friends with many children that have different Customs or ways of life for example it is radon and because my son's friend who he's had since kindergarten is celebrating Ramadan their class decided to say their snack for home because their friend couldn't eat with them how amazing and kind that this class decided to do that for one child I also love how that we are a K8 building many of the intermediate and middle school students have been my former students and when they see me in the hall they say hi because they know me I love how our school teams with the older grades to have reading buddies or other activities for example we planned a Black History Month Arts integration day where the Middle School came down
040to teach lessons to our younger kids I love how when my first graders see their buddies or even their older siblings they immediately ask me to give them a hug johnil is pretty unique and special but the district wants to do away with our program I have been around long enough to see changes to Great programs and then those programs don't succeed like they once did for example Dennis was thriving until the district decided to change their program milikan withdrew their involvement and they moved to two buildings creating a divide within one school many teachers and families left the district or trans trans for schools Now dentist students and staff are struggling to cope with the results of these changes in addition to having inadequate facilities many of the people on this roadmap committee and
041board members have never even stepped foot into John's Hill to see or learn about our ESL program and to witness such a diverse environment many of these PE people don't understand that many teachers have been at John Hill for over 10 years once again another rare thing in our district so I just don't understand why the district want to separate a family because that's what we consider oursel so do things need to change yes but is taking away programs that work the true answer the district keeps talking about equ equ sorry I'm a little upset um about Equity across the district but Equity doesn't mean taking away from the programs that are successful it means supporting all the buildings so they can be successful candes claudo good evening everyone good evening board member so I
042am here today Familia not to talk to you about how the program of ESL has helped me with my family family but to show you when we got here Raa as a student was very timid and did not like to speak English because she was afraid but now you can see that she is more comfortable and she is more fluid and ESL has helped her with that so I don't think I need three minutes to show you or talk to you about how ESL has helped us maybe like a minute or a little bit more than that has showed you how it has helped us and impacted USL gracias Hill sohow thank you to the program of ESL and to John Hill and now Eisenhower thank you good night Christine Boomer decer public school board
043members my name is Chris Boomer I am a parent of a student at Eisenhower High School and teacher at Johns Hill Magnet School currently I work with sixth through eth grade students in the transitional bilingual education program and the traditional program of instruction these two programs make up the English as a second language program at Johns Hill I am here this evening to urge you to keep the kindergarten to 8th grade English as a second language program together at John's Hill Magnet School 198 students 13 languages five dedicated ESL teachers four of whom are bilingual endorsed four dedicated ESL teaching assistants two of whom are bilingual and the other two are multi-lingual five general education classroom teachers with ESL endorsements utilizing their skills service to service and work with English language Learners in the general
044classroom a bilingual social worker working with students and families in the building a bilingual parent liaison to assist with the needs of our families a bilingual special education administrator using her knowledge and confidence in teachers of English language Learners to best guide teams of teachers working with Ells having learning disabilities certified IEP interpreters available in the building these are the many of the supports we have been able to develop to work with a very speci special population of Learners the ESL program works with our students in the four areas of language development listening speaking reading and writing upon exiting the ESL program our English language Learners are often some of the top students in each grade level the program works as is if we are divided services will not be rendered with the level of
045current success this week alone I am scheduled to interpret five different IEP meetings how in four different buildings one of these buildings is a county school when I am asked to assist at another building this takes Services away from my case load of students if we continue with the proposed plan from March the March 11th meeting of the roadmap 20 30 committee families needing interpretive services will be housed in many different buildings in the district students are in danger of losing even more instructional service time for a certified interpreter to provide this necessary service in conclusion I feel it is imperative these Services remain intact at the John Hill Magnet School location English language Learners count as much as any other student towards the success of our school district please keep them together please keep
046together the supports designed to lift this marginalized population of students to help them achieve great success thank you thank you Kevin hail uh good evening Mr President and esteemed members of the school board my name is Kevin hail I'm here to formerly ask the district to recognize one of its fallen heroes I'm here to request we give back to a man who gave Limitless amounts of his time love and efforts to put a spotlight on DPS 61's children and their athletes I'm asking today that the Press Box at decar Eisenhower be formerly designated the Scott busboom Memorial Press Box Mr Scott busboom was a decer legend who broadcast games at Cromwell radio and gave a voice to the cator's coaches athletes and students Mr busboom passed away the other day and we lost someone who
047championed deer's children with his incredible talents and Gifts Scott filled the Airways with his uncanny unwilling or uncanny willingness to put DPS 61's children and coaches in the best possible light as His Radio partner I got to see him do interviews with coaches and student athletes and then they would stumble on the microphone from nerves or the inability to put thoughts together he would remake the take and then help the student and the coach rephrase their thoughts and make them look like a billion dollars he helped purchase laptops for athletes that were going to college that could not afford them I saw him walk on a practice field and notice students without spikes and he said Kevin we're buying spikes for those kids and we did he would talk to Broken coaches and players after
048tough losses and he gave them hope when he left to cater all the stations in this town dropped regularly weekly coverage of our teams he fought to keep decer athletic stories on the air now no one tells their stories he was unwavering in making sure he made decer teams sound like gold on the radio he told me constantly to always broadcast only the positive and there were times that was very hard he even broadcast spring Sports to give those athletes coverage they never received in this town I can still see him on a frigid Illinois baseball spring broadcasting from the Steven decer Dugout with a pair of baseball pants wrapped around his face in the intense cold I was the coach of that team he was broadcasting for and I told him to go home
049as we played in the snow and the wind he stayed to call the last out and then gave words of encouragement to my pitcher after the game I would like to see the district honor Mr buz Boom by name naming the Press Box the decer Eisenhower Scott busam Memorial Press Box and naming it after him it would be an incredible honor for his beautiful wife Paula his daughter that he adored Abby and his grandson who he worshiped Payton to come to a decer Eisenhower football game on a beautiful fall evening and sit in the Press Box that bears Scott's name I have already followed the chain of command once and was denied I am now asking you to please and if you want me to I will get on my knees and beg you to
050please honor my dear brother and friend thank you for this time and thank you for your consideration blessings on you and the families and the children of this community thank you Samantha [Applause] car good evening Board of Education president CL Dr Gray Miss Bradford for those of you who don't know me I'm Samantha kch I'm a secretary at South Shores Elementary I am a member of Desa I am their region 10 chair I am a member of our bargaining committee I'm also their volleyball coach at South Shores but my favorite titles are a wife to a DPS security officer and a mom to three amazing DPS students tomorrow is our first meeting at the table as we begin to bargain our contract which expires June 30th my intention of speaking here tonight are to communicate
051with you all as we have spent truly a extended period of time taking everything and I truly truly truly mean everything into consideration with our requests we have reviewed surveys from our members for their needs we've seek to understand what we can do to help with our current members and as well as with recruiting all of that as well as taking the district's concerns needs expectations and and financials into consideration this was truly a tedious process but we want to make sure ensuring success for both our despa members and DPS I could stand here and tell you all the details of what a building secretary does every day but I Would by far surpass our three minutes so instead I would invite any of you to come sit with me for a Day My Hope
052for this ratification process is to pave a new way for DPS showing support and appreciation to each other as we strive for success for our students and our staff I do have some despa members if they will stand for just a quick moment I am looking forward to this process as I am new to the bargaining committee but I'm looking forward to it as being able to show everyone a new way as we all do this in good faith showing our True Values morals and respect for one another thank you Amber Bala I thought my wife was coming up with obviously I'm not Amber I'm Michael I'll say hi Amber yeah she chickened out I guess uh I'm up here to talk to you guys I want to tell a little story about my son
053Jayce Balo his senior year was the year after everybody went home because of covid we all know Co took out Sports it took out school it did a lot on this community well his senior year by the spring they finally let Sports come on and my son had decided he wasn't going to go to college he was going to go into the trades so he started letting his grades drop and I started getting calls from the school and I reminded him I'm like son if you let your grades drop where you can't play baseball your senior year you're going to let down the one guy who has always had your back for four years at ice and I know my son he loves I'm just going to say coach Hill I know we're not supposed
054to mention names but Jace did not want to let down coach Hill I bring this up because I had another stepson who played four years at Eisenhower baseball as well Eisenhower baseball has meant a lot to this city it's meant a lot to my family um I've got another son who's going to be a freshman next year that's going to Eisenhower well we found out this week that Eisenhower baseball is not going to have a program this year because they did not have enough kids and the ad at Eisenhower I'm not saying names but he knew that they weren't going to have enough kids but he kept telling everybody we can't combine with MacArthur because we're going to have enough kids we're going to have enough kids he was told on Friday that they had
055enough kids to play well today they had to cancel their game with decater St Teresa two hours before the game because they don't have enough kids to play five seniors don't get to have their senior season because nobody did anything to look ahead seeing that baseball was dropping at Eisenhower whereas mathur I think has like 20 kids and I can tell you the coach from MacArthur has been pushing for Eisenhower and MacArthur to join baseball programs which I know other sports indicator has done that for high school because the enrollment is going down and kids are leaving eyes hour to go to MacArthur just to play baseball for this guy uh he's taken over the junior high program and combined all the junior high schools and they had one of their best seasons in years
056because they had all decater baseball together I want to talk to you board to see what we can do about combining for my son who's going to be a freshman next year and so I don't have to move move so he can play baseball next year what can we do to combine the two programs into one Josh Lea has been pushing it and pushing it we've we've reached out to the Kyle Building my wife got a nasty phone call from the ad at Eisenhower saying who's telling you all this who's telling you all this I mean we're concerned citizens we pay tax dollars I feel like we should know my son's going to have a sports uh future if he does go to Eisenhower and how do we find out two weeks before the season
057that hey you're not going to have a season what can we do to prevent this in the future so I I'm sorry I'm passionate Sports has been a part of my life and it's been a part of Decor life and I just want to present you guys with my uh argument so thank you for listening thank you Adam [Music] GLA good evening school board members my name is Adam glouse and I am a fifth grade I am a fifth grader here at Dennis lab school I want to talk to you today about something that's really important to me and many of my classmates starting a flag football league for our district not all of us can play tackle football because it is either too expensive or like me our parents are worried about the risk
058of injuries like concussions I know a lot of kids who love to play football but don't have a chance some of my friends go to S for life and they have flag football others play for Holy families and they have a team called the dog but at our school there's nowhere to play flag football I think we could solve this problem easily if every school in the district could just get seven kids to join that's enough for a fifth and sixth grade league and a seventh and eighth grade League grade League just like the leagues we already have for basketball and volleyball it doesn't seem fair that we don't get a chance to play football too flag football is cheaper than tackle football Flags don't cost much and footballs are affordable two plus our school
059district has at least two fields that are unused on Saturday mornings this means we could use them to play games this could benefit mccarthur and Eisenhower by providing kids with more talent in football as they enter their freshman year on the team the only challenge I think of is finding coaches but I know my dad would be willing to volunteer and I'm sure we could find other others who love football and want to help out too I believe that starting a flag football league would give us a chance to be active learn teamwork and most of all have fun I hope you will consider making flag football an option for us us at school thank you for your time Sam [Applause] Mills well that that's hard to follow my name is Sam Ms I'm the
060EA president and a longtime employee of Decor public schools and a product of decator public schools I grew up in decator and spent my whole life in decator um I'm here to talk about the road map 2030 process I was not allowed to be a part of the road map 2030 process from the beginning uh even so as a leader of my organization I felt the need to let the process play out we're near the end of that process now and as I speak with members of my union I keep hearing similar fears and worries rise up across the district your staff fears the unknown and the unstable in the past few decades there have been far too many disruptions in DPS from building closures mergers bold plans and bold poor decision-making all of these
061factors have made it hard for teachers to trust the process anymore what we have seen coming out of the roadmap meeting seems to be creating Solutions without particular problems in mind uh do we have problems yeah you you ask anybody in the district they'll tell you that right we need to find solutions to the problems our main issue with education indicator right now is clear should be clear to everyone and I have spoken on it before and that is the lack of quality certified teachers staying in DPS or applying for our jobs you've recently heard for parents that are upset and I think you're about to again that their students are being split up into other classrooms our long-term sub should be covering those situations but they are out filling the roles of certified staff
062members we hover around about a hundred at any given time so they're unavailable for those jobs so kids are split shuffling buildings with no trust no real reasons given and no compensation will make more staff leave and our vacancy problem right now will look like nothing compared to what you have coming so how does a road map address this problem I met with some Central administrators uh to voice our concerns at the end of February I made it clear that our staff feels unheard and unvalued and are beginning to get worried I urge them to get into the buildings and listen to staff one-on-one I ask that they use half day time to hear directly from their staff and hear the concerns at a minimum I ask them to survey staff to my knowledge none
063of that's been done we are the Professionals in the room every single day with the students we are trained for this we are the ones you need you need us and you cannot function with us listen to us hear us slow down you don't have to get this done before the next board is seated show the connections between your roadmap process and the problems we have as a district and how your plans seek to solve the problems and if you are not having those Solutions come to you as a board you need to ask Administration why are we not addressing that Abby Steel good evening I spoke the last two board meetings and have now sent two emails to all of you who sit in front of me as well as building and most District
064administration and the union president I have to say I'm disapp appointed and truthly surprised to not heard from single person with the exception of our building Administration um confirming receipt of my email so due to your lack of response my daughter and her 18 classmates have started their fourth quarter now this school year with no teacher thus no consistency minimal instruction and very low expectations I have asked for the 19 children in this class to be split amongst the other E2 classrooms for the remainder of the Year there are other teachers who are prepared to incorporate these students into their daily routines and instructions that are already taking place rather you are all choosing to provide these children with at most two days of instruction from their retired teacher when she can sub the majority
065of their week is spent semi-supervised by a substitute or sitting in another classroom on their iPads please know I have been a consistent cheerleader for decer public schools probably since I became a student here in the middle of fourth grade I was also an employee for 17 years I've seen what's behind the curtain so to speak and I've continued to see and focus on the good and have tried to spread it but your silence on this issue is beginning to speak for me your silence on this issue is beginning to change my narrative I've been patient and I've given Grace when change didn't happen but now I'm taking your lack of action the board the union the building and District administration personal it became personal when I had to console my daughter because her friend
066and classmate was changing schools due to a lack of action on this matter it became personal when we checked the search history of my daughter's school device trying to be good parents and saw she had searched I quote is it illegal for teachers to leave kids in the class without adult supervision when asked she said that is what happened that day the sub had left their classroom multiple times during the day for extended periods of time it became personal when it was brought to my attention teachers some potentially my own former colleagues really were just wanting classrooms to be split for the extra money it became personal when I realized my family was not the only ones to of concerns when I reached out and tried to connect and well before us other parents had
067seen the problem Brewing or asking for something to be done finally it became personal and after all of this a solution for this class for these 16 students to finally get semblance of a school year had been presented and not a single person has moved to do something not the solution I presented not a solution presented by someone else nothing that is what is changing my narrative for this school district I can no longer defend an organization that chooses to let a group of students flounder in a shell of a classroom or line the pockets of individuals who are solely required to supervise them for the day rather than giving them the opportunity to have consistency instruction and Expectations by placing them in another classroom of their grade level Chloe Halm [Applause] good evening board
068members my name is Khloe Helm and I am here as a concerned parent resident and active member of this community I have homeschooled all of my children before and during the pandemic but when my sons asked to give school another shot I supported their choice now I homeschool my daughter while also navigating the public school system with my sons that's why I'm standing here this evening because whether a child is homeschooled or in the public school system their education and environment matters our education system is failing not just because of the buildings but because of the conditions inside them merging two high schools will not erase the Deep rooted issues we Face gang violence is already high as we all know staff Staffing shortages are at a crisis levels students are struggling struggling academically and
069emotionally so tell me how how does cramming more students into one space or in two campuses solve any of this beyond the scho beyond the schools let's look at the bigger picture Our Town lacks opportunity safety and investment vacant buildings sit as reminders of what was was fires are destroying homes at an alarming rate college students at milikin barely have food options let alone reasons to stay and build a future here where is the vision where is the leadership that says live here you will Thrive here in contrast my family and I experien something entirely different in Amarello Texas where the school and the community were truly invested in the well-being and success of their students my boys attended tascosa high school and Austin Middle School from 20 21 to the end of 20233 and
070we saw firsthand how a family oriented approach can make a real difference the staff at both schools were not only highly involved but actively collaborated with the parents creating an environment where every student felt supported and engaged it's that level of community involvement and care that I believe we could be bringing to our own schools here an environment where students parents and staff work together toward a common goal the success of every child if you truly care about education and the future of this community you will listen to the voices of parents teachers and students not just make decisions from a disconnected position we deserve transparency real solutions and an approach that actually prioritizes students success and Community growth this is just not about schools it's about the fure future of our town we demand
071better we deserve better and tonight I challenge you to step up and prove that you're just not filling seats but actually leading thank you Liz [Applause] Harding hi hi sorry probably couldn't hear that first High um I would love this to be my own words but unfortunately I'm not as good of a writer as is this one and I'm going to read this from she already submitted it but it needs to be heard and this is from our my co-teacher and friend Jessica Cameron who is a kindergarten teacher at John Hill myself I am a second grade teacher at John Hill I've been there for over 10 years and the only building I've worked in and probably the only building I will work in so dear sir Madam I says my name is Jessica but
072I just told you it's Liz sorry my name is Jessica Cameron and I teach kindergarten at John's Hill Magnet School I've taught DPS since 2015 and the 2030 plan is incredibly detrimental to our district school is community and this plan decimates our school communities I am an English as a second language teacher I am too and that program is housed inside Johns Hill taking those students out of a unified building and program and sequestering them in their home schools is nothing short of isolationist it is the F Furthest Thing from Equitable how will the schools be staffed when we need more ESL teachers right now in our building well what will happen to our special needs population for whom change is disruptive and relationships challenging to forge when they have to move schools every two
073years how will we find special education teachers to come to our district when they cannot have adequate time to build a trusting relationship with some of the most vulnerable of our children how will we encourage the Arts and Athletics in high school when they must leave behind the coaches and staff that help them develop their talent our district needs changes to be sure the first change that needs to happen is that the board and Kyle Administration need to learn to listen to their staff we here to serve our students and we want what is best for them which is why we know that this plan is not it trust your teachers we are supposed to work together we elected you because we thought your vision for our students was the one that would help them
074and by extension your staff grow in a positive direction go back to the drawing board on this 2030 plan it is not ready at the very least table this until our new superintendent and Border are in place DPS is a good district and it really does have the potential to be a great district and one that teachers want to come to and retire from and if we can work together if we can work together I wanted to retire here I want to stay here destroying communities that have Generations behind them is not the way I H and she and I am with her and I think we all are we humbly invite you to come to John C magnet to see what amazing work we do every day she teaches kindergarten in room 159 I'm
075in 174 and we all have students who speak Spanish French Haitian Hindi Arabic and igu kindergarten is in the back of our building on the first floor and under the banner that says better together thank you Ben I can't reach your the last name it says Ben I think is the first name okay hello my name is Ben Steele and I have one child in sixth grade at monor for Academy for peace and two children in MacArthur I've been pleased with my children's education to this point but I'm here tonight to talk about my frustrations with the district's management of children when they do not have a teacher this is unfortunately becoming more of a norm as the teacher and substitute shortage seems to be compounding year after year splitting students when a teacher is
076not available was always meant to be an emergency procedure it is clear to see years ago though that this procedure is in nobody's best interest not the students that are normally in the classroom now have a teacher whose attention is sprad even thinner than usual not the children who are being placed in that classroom sometimes kindergarteners with eighth graders sometimes uh self-contained classes into a PE classroom as that day becomes a day of merely being babysat it's not great for teachers who lose their plan time and are given more work in the effort of being a team player in emergency situations though teachers wanted to step up to help it became more and more of a problem however when I would be called each day as a teacher indicator to be asked to take a
077new group on rather than it being used just for emergency use it was not difficult to see that it would become more of a problem if it was not handled properly and of course covid and the teacher shortage and substitute shortage have only Amplified that problem my daughter this year has not been in a classroom with a teacher her teacher retired last year this seems to be an ideal solution for the problem except for the glaring exceptions that that teacher is in a situation that will prevent her from being present regularly and that that retired teachers days are capped knowing this would be a problem makes you think that there would be a ready-made solution to this problem in advance unfortunately it seems as though this is not a priority for the school district a
078solution has been brought that would enable some semblance of continuity for this class but the ball has most certainly been dropped and nobody seems intent on picking it up I taught in this District when rigor and relevance were a mantra when teachers scheduled instructional minutes were counted to make sure that a student's time at school was being effectively used I ask you where has that mentality gone it seems if you win the lottery and get a great teacher that it is the only way to get a quality education otherwise we seem to be more intent on merely getting students through the day rather than making that day productive what message are we sending the students in our community I'm very disappointed in our community represented by this board that we have not stepped up to
079solve the problem for the children here that nobody has Revisited the system of splitting kids up among other teachers when that teacher needs a sick day and a substitute cannot be found in the past this was a rarity but a large percentage of children in our district experien this on a regular basis and when Administration was approached about this problem we were told that it is just the way it is I implore the members of this school board to work toward creating a better solution to this problem one of is faed teachers but that has at its core the best interest of the children in our community Summer Boy [Applause] that's fine all right sorry guys and this isn't my name again I'm Liz Harding and this is Lesley Johnson all right my name is
080Lesley Johnson I a Community member and a teacher indicator Public Schools it is disappointing that scenarios of buildings have been made without first surveying and asking for input from building staff students and parents I feel that the school district has done with this with no regard for anyone's feelings and with a lack of expertise from those that spend every day in the classrooms and those that have built relationships with students I have many concerns when it comes to the scenarios especially the scenario presented on March 11th my concerns are that none of these scenarios have considered that only a handful of teachers in the district are by bilingual certified yes we do have others in the district who are ESL certified that's like me that are not currently teaching our U ESL students however to
081teach some of the ESL courses you must be bilingual certified and ESL certified do you know how many people in the district have both of those certifications there are six one at MacArthur and the other five are at John's Hill is it possible for six teachers to travel all over the district and to ensure that ESL students in the bilingual classes that to ensure that ESL students in the bilingual classes get what they need plus teach their non-bilingual ESL classes these bilingual teachers go above and beyond to translate for conferences IEPs and more than often do not get paid or thanked for doing this they do this because they love the students ESL students account for 33% of our student population at John Hill some of these students not only e need ESL services but
082also have IEP Services due to learning disabilities these are the students that will be the most affected by the loss of John C ESL students currently show growth in I and and are not a targeted group but if they are dispersed and become an afterthought all the hard work work will be for nothing how many teachers will leave how many teachers will leave with some of the new building changes don't we already have a teacher shortage we just heard a ton of it we'll shifting teachers and buildings around solve this problem I'm willing to bet the answer is no in the current elementary buildings older students get opportunities to work with younger students for example I take one of my reading groups to kindergarten once a week and they learn the kindergarten reading centers and
083how to teach them these opportunities teach our students shoot teach our students to be leaders and to be role models and to also learn their curriculum to a higher degree are these opportunities what we want to take away from our students have you thought about parents who have children in multiple schools you are asking them to spread themselves thin by having them attend conferences open houses and activities Sports in multiple buildings often is the older siblings that make sure the younger siblings are safe at bus stops and getting on buses how will you ensure this this can still happen do you have building administrators that are willing to be at prek through two buildings 3 through five buildings at 6 through eight buildings have you thought about now having an administrator at a building are
084not comfortable with with will affect the whole staff will administrators walk away from the school district too I understand that we as a district need to improve but there are other ways to ensure that buildings are successful take a deep look at the district curriculum that is lacking the behaviors that have become accept acceptable in classrooms due to the lack of consequences oh crap and the professional development that's repetitive from year to year in all I just urge you to vote against the restructuring of the buildings in road map 2030 thank you than [Applause] okay on behalf of the board we we thank each and everyone for their input and comments tonight and now we'll move on to our Junior board members uh and I don't believe we have any J Junior board members with
085us I think we're reaching that point in time in the year when we have a busy busy busy high school kids uh at this point in time we we'll move on to board discussion and Dr Curry all right following all the passion that we've heard here in the last hour with math seems kind of flat but this is where uh my presentation Falls at the juncture of the agenda so here we go so this is your Finance update um once a month we do this um so I started with the treasurers report comparison we've been talking about for a while so February of 24 that's the column on the uh left um where you see 48 million in the Ed fund and in February of 25 you see 43 million so what I wanted to
086note was the difference is mostly based on the fact that we had to bolster two other um struggling um funds with some evidence-based funding that would normally have gone into the Ed fund so you'll see fund 20 and fund 40 are bolded because they've shown some growth mostly from ebf um that was not put into the education fund you can put evidence-based funding in multiple funds you would like to put it all in the Ed fund if you can but our other two funds were struggling uh and were not be able to be brought up with just tax money so and then I wanted to note that um oh part of the reason that that there's a little bit of difference is we're waiting for a couple really big payments on Dansby we're about done
087with Dansby uh we're 99.9% there we're at the punch list but reimbursements take time so we're waiting on some reimbursements uh if you look at 50 and 51 those two funds are healthier especially 50 is a lot healthier than it was Prior uh and that's because we have been robbing Peter to pay Paul when it comes to those three funds of tort imrf and trans or and Social Security and this year it was um tor's turn to uh not be fully funded and ship those dollars to fund 50 and 51 uh we are showing a 14 $43,000 and change difference uh in the capital projects but we're spending reserves out of those projects on purpose that's kind of a savings account for projects uh most recently um the uh excuse me the football facility at
088and track facility at MacArthur um working cash looks okay and Tor again notice that it's 2.5 million down but the revenue that came in this year was um a lot less than it has been the last two years so that's the current treasurers report comparison we're down about $834,000 this year to uh last year but there are some funds in there that have seen significant gains couple times to the detriment of other funds uh and then I had a constituant um asked me about the days cash on hand and I thought this would be a good time to explain D's cash on hand so I ran a five-year history on days cash on hand to share with the board and the constituent so in 2020 our Revenue was 32 million our expenses um per day
089so that's our expenses divided by 360 were 281,000 days cash on hand in 2020 was 113 in change in 2021 we saw a little less Revenue 27,600 hand at that point in time U might have looked Bleak um at 84 84 days in 2022 we started getting meaningful Sr 2 and sr3 revenue we also then got meaningful bloated cppt money which I've talked about at nauseum probably that it's going away uh in 2020 it was 3 point something million in 2021 it was in the fives then it jumped to 11.2 and then if you look at 2023 12 uh million and currently it's sitting or last year was at 8.2 million and it's coming back we budgeted five and we're currently just at four so what a status quo would have looked like um approximately
090$30 million worth the tax revenue we end up with 46 million so that's why our revenues look a little bloated um that on top of the Esser money but our expenses are bloated as well or at least increased because we have to spend to get when it comes to Esser dollar um so uh in 2022 with the extra Revenue on top of the extra expenses we still made it to days cash on hand of 124 124 days um in 2023 um we had a really inflated Revenue um plus the extra cppt and we were at 155 days so in 2024 this is what somebody asked me about they're like wow we dropped from 155 to to 101 um but I had to explain that timing is everything we've talked about this as a group before
091our final reimbursement for our grants came three days late to be counted on last year's dollar amounts so that 415 was actually more like 49 488 and instead of 101 we' would have been at 121 um days of cash on hand if we had ontime Revenue uh and so as we think about what's going to be happening in the near future I believe FY 26 um will be our first real Baseline because we'll be out of all of our s revenue and all of our Esser expenses we're we're making our last payments here over the next couple months and we'll receive our last reimbursements so that's all I have short and sweet any questions said we have a couple payments left on us sir we that we've made we've made the payments we waiting for
092the reimbursement roughly how much uh left on Dansby probably in the not Danby funds that's all that's left is Danby and the playgrounds uh the porn play for three playgrounds uh and a little bit of furniture for Dansby uh that's all that is left on the waiver that we were able to procure to be able to continue to draw against our Sesser money I'm not saying how much money are we still expecting from us about three million total thanks anything else okay any other questions thank you Dr Curry I believe now uh we have an update on road map 2030 Dr Marino Ashley bringing the team tonight right good evening Board of Education thank you for having us on this lovely March 18th evening as we continue to um go through the process um the
093Strategic plan process on road map 2030 we just want to remind everyone that um we have been very transparent in our community all information um is available right on our website um at roadmap 2030 um information is processed and uploaded within 24 to 48 hours after each meeting so even if someone wanted to go back all the way to October and look at meeting EV vals or the agenda presentations for every meeting whether it was in person or virtual um it is available our first Community form was January 30th um at MacArthur High School here's some data um on those that signed into the event and the breakdown of what that looked like our second Community form was February 20th at John's Hill um mag um yeah at Johns Hill Magnet School um as you
094can see we had an increase in participants that attended the event and there's the breakdown as well all right so the road map 2030 uh really kicked off in October 2024 and as you can see here the grade out areas um is our progression through our timeline So currently we have two meetings left in April April 10th and April 15th and um our Focus area for those meet for those two meetings are really looking at um plan refinement and um bringing forth recommendations deliverable um and the time frame so I want to uh note 2425 school year um as you can see from the previous um timeline we are moving ahead with um the first two deliverables to be on track um to present to the board The Five-Year strategic plan would which is com
095comprised of the vision mission values and goals and we are also working on finishing up the balance scorec card the master facilities plan um May have um some delay in that time frame um for the board to make a recommendation 2526 the school year um will uh consist of planning within implementation um with things moving forward in the 26 27 school year so you've heard us talk before about lots of moving parts and we thought this might be appropriate um just to put together what are all the moving pieces so Ashley and I are serving as your facilitators um our role is really to communicate involve uh seek input feedback facilitate meetings and ensure content experts um are able to share from their perspective when I say content experts we're talking about teaching and learning
096we're talking about facilities um we're talking really about our executive cabinet um Human Resources each of us play role within the organization we want to make sure as we do that that our content experts have uh buyin ownership and the ability to actually carry through with the recommendations so the other moving part one of the next moving Parts is our committee this is our steering committee uh represented by stakeholders um from all walks of the district and we engage in this schedule that Ashley just shared with you prior um other opportunities for input as you know uh We've had two Community forums uh we did launch a SWAT analysis and open that up to all teachers all staff uh the public uh we encouraged our roadmap 2030 committee members to um get their colleagues to
097also share that input and that's strengths weaknesses opportunities and threats so we could hear the voice from all of those um who chose to participate with us that way on the output side we've created an online uh Q&A uh it's on our website when we get questions we have a 48h hour turnaround where if a question is asked we go to the content expert and we work to provide um those responses so if you've not been to that site lately I believe it's up to about 17 pages of questions that have come in um the other two uh roles in this process I mentioned our content experts as this process starts to dial in specifically um what we're recommending to do you're going to hear more and more from our executive cabinet members um and
098their staff you're going to hear more from Dr Gray Dr Curry Monica wils um and the rest of our administrative team within our specific areas so that the information is provided to you from the person actually responsible um for those moving Parts um decision makers that's the board you've empowered uh the district to engage in all of these other pieces the road map committee uh the community forums the opportunity to seek input um as you know there's a lot of a lot of passion around all of these areas um and that's normal and natural in anything that involves change you know the the saying we use is change is great you go first um and it's that notion that there's a lot of unknowns and and every speaker tonight was was correct in there are
099unknowns and there have been no decisions made at this point the only real decisions that are going to be made are going to come to you in the form of recommendations and that's why the board serves as decision makers for this process so I just wanted to put in front what each of our uh place is in this entire process um the committee heard me say often that this is a very messy process and if we have members of the team they're probably nodding their head if you've heard Jay say this this really is messy I think we're really in the thick of it now as we start um getting very personal to people's schools people's programs um and and change is is frightening and it does cause anxiety so we are aware of that
100um we also know that this is true if we always do what we've always done we're going to get what we've always got and and this is what we've got at the moment and I don't know about you but when I look at our results I know that we can be better I know there are reasons and challenges um hurdles that we all cross every day when we come into work but the reality is the results that um our taxpayers have empowered us to provide are not delivering the kind of results that I think we all expect that is not a ding on any person or group um we're all part of the process which means we're also accountable for the results what that means is if we do what we've always done we will
101likely see these kind of data sets um report after report so at some point in time there's going to have to be some recommendations on what could we do differently based on the best feedback that we can get and the process that we've laid out it is not perfect there are going to be lots of people who will Lobby for their particular area their school their program or some aspect of the district that they really don't want to see change and they're probably right and if you've asked a 100 people what they thought you'll get 120 different opinions on what we should or shouldn't do the bottom line is the board has a responsibility to educate all students so when you look at the results and you look at the system you have to decide
102if what comes comes before you is worthy of trying a different path to get different results or if we will maintain status quo because the alternate change is scary I want to talk about vision mission values goals the one piece that we are on track for and we're going to talk about uh the final pieces of the deliverables Ashley all right so as I mentioned and um you were able to view with the timeline um we started really Gathering feedback um back in February um whether it was from our committee or the different opportunities um from the community so to support the um M to support road map uh 2030 moving forward we started um with Gathering that feedback putting together what we felt like we were hearing um our mission our vision those values
103that really speak to us as a district so myself and a um small writing team from the committee um we started going back and forth um and then last week at the committee meeting um we put uh white sheets around the room and then the committee could go through and do a gallery walk and kind of give us some feedback so what you see here is version two of um our deliverable one that we feel strongly about um and being able to meet that um timeline deadline uh for next month so we will continue to um keep working on those those things and um this is deliverable one however um deliverable two is the balance scorecard in which Dr Marino will speak about momentarily Mary Brady okay and so part of this we teaching and
104learning has worked with the committee as well as with Dr Marino and um Ashley in order to identify some highlevel strategies that we want to see come out of this so that includes professional learning communities which would be job embedded so that was within that teacher work time increasing our um CTE so our Career Technical education Pathways having a real focus in grades 6 through 12 on Steam so that includes not just that science technology arts and math but also that art integration as well as establishing some gradekeeper grades and some strategies that go along with this which helps us talk about what are we doing in terms of the multi-tier systems of support what those interventions are what options do we have regarding summer learning and how are we utilizing professional learning communities as
105part of a professional development plan for our teachers and then also looking at expanding and improving our alternative education and personalized learning options for our students having an implementation of structured Literacy for our kindergarten through fifth grade structured literacy another term for that you'll hear is science of reading but we're using structured literacy um because that's the overall focus and then having uh a focus on early literacy with an um with prek through grades 2 being integrated together so one of our content Experts of course from teaching and learning um Mary this is uh a first draft actually second draft of our balance scorecard and I just there's a lot of text here here this is all posted on our website if you want to take a deep dive but we took the five goal
106areas which include goal one improving student achievement goal two effective learning environments goal three promote a positive workplace experience goal four increase family and Community engagement and goal five ensuring fiscal stewardship what you're seeing are a collection of key indicators key performance indicators um that we're going to use uh to set out to set up what's called a balance scorecard in the in the lower right you'll see an example and we just wanted to give the board a visual you're going to see all of this in the deliverable as a balance scorecard in that format that looks like what we did with just one metric um we used um grades three through eight student math proficiency is measured by I and what makes it smart is we start looking at historical Trends current data and
107then projections so I just wanted you to look at that for a minute that's actual data on our current uh percent of students who are considered Pro proficient according to I in grades 3 through eight as it's aggregated um that stop light on the right hand side which says status this is going to be a visual tool that organizations use where it will have a red yellow or green which will look at the Historical Trend and it will look at current data and it will give you a visual to say are we moving toward the goal that would be green are we relatively flat or kind of up and down that would be yellow if we're going in the wrong direction it would be red so your eye can be drawn to the right side
108all the way down through all these metrics and you get a really good visual of how are we doing according to these measures so this is what we're calling the balance scorecard you're just seeing one line of what will be about 25 lines we're going to try and take about um four or five of the core measures in each of those goal areas and then um develop out the actual scorecard but that's the feedback thus far that we've gotten from our team so that is deliverable to and we are on target as Ashley said to meet the first two deliverables the Mission Vision Values goals what we call our plan on a page and then the balance scorecard which is the board's way of saying are we making a difference are things getting better are
109they flat are they worse and you identify these measures before you set course On A New Path so that you know where you've been to compare that to where you're heading and what results look like along this journey so let's talk facilities for a minute um this is deliverable three and this is likely going to be delayed um the board will need to provide guidance as to do you want the first two deliverables independent of the third um if you did we would be in a position after the April 15th meeting when we will have those pieces finalized if the board chooses to have all three deliverables at the same time then we'll just need guidance on when we can give you some thoughts on when we may have it uh but we'll wait for
110further instructions but we wanted the board to know we're on target for one and two on the deliverables and this is uh part of work with the master facility plan I don't expect you to read the slide but rather take in all of the opportunities that we have used to do it deep dive we did this with our facilitators green and associates who are also Architects um we've we've we know that uh we've got enough square footage so I wanted to put these facts and assumptions out we are in declining enrollment we are losing between 100 and 120 kids per year on average some years more more some years less if you extrapolate that out to 12 grades it's about 10 kids per grade level if the math ever worked out perfect which it won't
111but that gives you a sense of at what point in time does our current situation become unsustainable the current recommendation includes two high schools as is so if you look on the website you'll see the current recommendation that we're looking at and Mary's going to talk about this in a minute um does include two high schools as they are however you're going to see phase two and in the future Dr Curry will speak more about the facility impact and phase two is when that enrollment continues to drop and gets to a certain point you will have elementary and middle schools larger than your high schools and so there will be a point in time where the board will have to make that difficult decision to absorb into one high school that is not going to
112be part at this point of our recommendation um we know this we have inequities in square footage we've we've been in all of the buildings there's a vast difference between some of our newest construction like John's Hill or Dansby and some of our oldest buildings um it's evident there inac inequities in the learning environments because of that as we look at this whole process we know that we have adequate square footage we know that there's more more square footage at the secondary level our high schools are now overbuilt for the population that's there so at some point in time and in this process we've talked about do you you know what does that look like to fully utilize that that process um we also know as Mary mentioned we have limited time for teachers to
113come together and talk about what's working with kids in their classroom we want to take that ambiguity out of when that time happens and you're going to see some recommendations that talk about doing it within the work day not after school when teachers are tired um and then how would we reuse that time to actually work with kids who are not meeting those gatekeeper benchmarks so there's some real academic strategies that are going to be tied to this but I wanted the board to see the facts and assumptions okay everything is on the table with this committee you can't say think big and have a vision but say don't touch this piece don't touch that and certainly don't mess with that so although this is causing some anxiety and and a lot of inquiry about
114what's really going on all things have to be on the table in order for us to arrive at where where we feel is a comfortable place that will move our district forward it does not mean if something was suggested that it's a done deal okay these scenarios have evolved all over the place as we continue to revise evaluate and look at all those structures so please keep in mind these were the facts and assumptions how do we use the square footage we're not talking about constructing anything how do we get greater equity in that square footage so all students have an opportunity to benefit from some of the um finer buildings that we've constructed as of late so all of those things are being considered and everything is on the table I'm going to let
115Mary talk about the current scenario this has not been decided but it's the one that has the feedback that we feel best matches what we've heard from the feedback from the forums from the committee this is not perfect there are problems with this but we've got to be able to say is there a direction we want to move in to change the results that we're currently getting so I'm going to let Mary talk about this for just a minute then we'll bring some closure and answer any questions so in the current scenario that we're looking at running proof of concept so we can determine if it really does work we know square footage wise it does but there's a lot of other factors that go into this it is to have prek-2 buildings buildings true
116middle schools with 68s the 68s would give us Pathways of choice so there would be the idea is to have like a stem Middle School a steam Middle School to kind of have that arts and then like a CTE focused middle school so everybody would have that opportunity as early as sixth grade to start to have some of those Pathways to have some choices you would also as Dr Marino discussed have the two high schools it maintains the current configuration as is it would also maintain monory as a prek-8 magnet school across the district so again this is a scenario we as we've worked through them we have a kind of a second option and probably a third option but we are running proof of concept with our content experts that means uh Dr Gray
117Dr Curry uh Miss wils in in HR we're looking at what's a staffing impact if we were to do that what buildings would we select um for those particular schools what does educational adequacy look like um how do we get to the place where we can come in with um uh understanding the proof of concept meaning let's run a scenario see what it looks like do all the math and all the Staffing and everything to it and see how far off we are on actually being able to pull that off again we're starting with a vision we're not saying well we're already short staffed so let's not have a vision or let's not do anything different because we can't staff our current program the question is what is it that we think we could do
118run proof of concept on it and then let the board determine um if that's a recommendation that that you can support and again the timing of that is going to be a board discussion so there's there's a lot here there's a lot of moving Parts there's a lot of different people um serving in a lot of different capacities here please know the intent we're all here because we care about kids we're all here because we care about results we care about the system or we wouldn't come in day after day and subject ourselves to some of this work but it's worth it if it takes the district in a different trajectory and we turn the corner on what we're seeing in results um getting greater Equity among our learning spaces to get rid of the
119halves and the have not pieces that we currently have in the district and these are tough things to say and they're probably tough things to hear but we're all part of this process so the question is it's some point in time we have to walk up to it and make a decision and say are we okay with status quo and if we aren't then let's entertain some scenarios and some options that we think will put us on a better path based on what our content experts are telling us so that as these presentations roll forward we feel like we've got a Fighting Chance of actually changing uh the trajectory of those results so with that um it's been a lot you've been sitting a a long time uh we are here if there are questions
120we may ask content experts to respond to those or there may be a question you ask and we say we're going to come back to you um with a response so um I I I'd be remiss to not uh let will or Jason who are the representatives that are serving um on the committee uh have been at uh most meetings and have the opportunity to share anything they would like because they are the people at the table right now at least providing that that Global board perspective so I have a question um so in full transparency I've had a few absences because my life has fallen apart the last couple of months so I'm trying to get caught up with all of this but my question is I've been looking through it and I don't
121see a list of who's on the committee but so my which leads me to my question how many teachers in the district are on this committee we've got a uh full list of members there are 57 members they are on the district website I believe I I I would want to go verify I think it's around 10 of student uh we've got a couple of students and I think eight teachers I can verify that but I believe that's okay and we have community members on this community as well we do we have business partners community members government um Milik in the hospitals where's the disconnect because we're getting so much feedback on social media and here and everywhere else I'm getting emails I'm replying to emails is this isn't going well the community doesn't like
122this the teachers don't like this I'll be honest I don't like this um I don't think this is the time to be doing this so if they don't feel like they're being listened to and you have teachers on the committee and you have community members on the committee then why are they not being listened to why why do we have so much feedback right now to the contrary of what you're presenting because you're talking about change and anytime you suggest doing something different you're going to cause a reaction that's what we're experiencing right now and depending on what the issue is or or who's paying real close attention next time it'll be a different group wanting to lobby for their specific building or program or something else this is going to continue to happen until
123such time that the board either takes action or does not take action and it's okay for the board not to take action the question is where will that leave us and what where do we go from there and so Dr Collins I don't know if I can answer it in a satisfactory way but we're we're kicking a lot of hornets nest the minute you start talking about all these different things so we're going you're going to hear from I understand that and I understand you know change is rough on everyone variety is the spice of life I get that but that's not the Fe feedback we're getting the feedback we're getting is you are not listening the teachers are overworked already and then like what some of these community members are saying you know they're
124going to have kids in four or five different schools at one time which M then the parents are running thin I mean I really think we need to take more time and listen to some of this feedback and maybe you know come up with some kind of uh an algorithm or whatever based on what we're getting back and then address it that way and then maybe factor that into some of this because I mean and I will say also we have a superintendent retiring I know we have a new board that's going to be elected in two weeks we still have schools that need to be repaired and we still have a massive teacher shortage a dep of shortage and we it's it's just going to get worse but yet now we want to do
125all this but ignore all the other problems but when we're doing this we're ignoring the teachers and the community members who have concerns so there I said what I said so I what I'd like to comment on is um the idea that the data you show obviously and we've talked about this we know for years there's a lot of things that need to be changed in the district that doesn't mean you need to change everything and to me um the least of our problems is facility usage um the the teacher vacancies the teach the lack of teacher retention which leads to shortages and working with the students um there's so much to do and there's there's no one solution I don't have any great solutions for everything there's so much to do within the curriculum
126within how teachers are working together and and not criticizing that it's just so much to do in the improved delivery of education and facility usage to me is just definitely the least of our issues and also we just built 2K8 buildings in the last three or four years seems awfully odd to just suddenly say well we're not going to use them for that purpose The Architects designed Danby totally for the basis of a Ka building um just facility usage I don't think is our priorities we can make some modifications and um but that is not the biggest thing we need to work on and I I think that's what a lot of people are saying in the community and and I just wish we would not be pushing that so much I'd like to hear
127just more about where are the priorities what is roadmap coming up with what we're going to do for the academic issues that the staff issues that's that's to me the high priorities that might be a good board discussion to say we want to see deliverables one and two and we want to pause on the facility piece when we started this journey it was directive um from the board to include a strategic plan and master facility plan therefore those are the marching orders that we took on if the environment has changed or the priorities have changed we can adapt with that but understand we set a course we put that course out in front of the board we told you what we were going to do how we were going to do it the process we
128were going to use to do so and that's where we are at the moment so um everyone's opinion is is valid and we're not opposed if the board wanted to say we want you to put this on pause or we want you to do everything but the facilities part I'm not comfortable making that call as an administrator reporting to a board I'd rather have the board say you're not in a position yet to feel like you can make the best decision or there's more process you want or something else so we're interested in your discussion and uh we're perfectly fine with Keeping On Target for the first two deliverables and holding on the third or waiting until the board decides there's something that you want to do I just want to caution us you're not
129going to find stability in a better time you've already engaged people in a process um you have every group who says our voices aren't being heard teachers will say our voices aren't being heard even though there's a committee there's a process there's forms parents will tell you you're not listening to to us your community members will tell you you're not listening to us our tax dollars are buying us what so every constituent group you're going to have the same issue change the scenario and you're going to change the people showing up uh at the podium wanting to tell you why it's not a good idea in the end uh the board is responsible for all Learners so you have to decide what do you think that you were elected to do is in the best
130interest of all Learners and sometimes most of the time it means making tough decisions that some people aren't going to be happy with and I'm not suggesting there aren't some tweaks or things we can do where you're more comfortable but the notion of we're going to find a plan and everyone comes to the podium and and applauses is probably not going to happen the reality is we've got a system you got great people doing the best they can with what they've got but we're not moving the needle and are we okay with that and that's ultimately what the board is going to have to have to determine so we're open to guidance Direction anything that you suggest and you don't need a response to it now but just know we're willing to uh pause especially
131if we're not comfortable with the facilities master plan please piece provided the board says we want you to take that off the table for now then I feel like we're at least doing our diligence in responding to uh what the charge was give will a chance I you tried to talk a couple of times yeah um just a few things the first is I've been first I'd like to apologize for missing the last board meeting and uh the road map 2020 uh 2030 meeting um I was sent out of state for work with uh about three days notice and then in getting back I haven't responded to about the 995 emails is uh how to prepare for my grandmother's celebration of life this past weekend so I am working through these emails and trying to
132get responded to everyone and I told everybody in the world to reach out to me and you have and I've heard a lot of wonderful things from this community um one of the things that I haven't heard though and and this is this is one of those things that's kind of wearing me down uh about this entire process is no one has come to me and said hey we should do this has always been in the constraint of don't do that and or I'll leave or don't do that or I'll take my kids out and I understand the frustration I'm a parent in this District too I grew up in this District I've seen the absolute Mayhem that previous boards have wrought and you know this process has been moving in such a way and
133and really has made me think about accountability if we pass this at after an election in a lame deck period where we could flip up to four board members this offers the community no accountability there's no one except Bill Mark and myself that they could hold accountable to this um Jason is reelected then they could hold Jason but we have three board members who would make a decision that would have long range effects on this district and there would be zero accountability not that I'm not saying Al or Kevin that you're not accountable people and you don't you're not out in the community but at the end of the day the only way that this community can hold us accountable is either voting for us or voting against us so I would urge that as
134we look forward that we postpone this after until after uh this next election now to the next piece is we can't let we can't hire a superintendent to come in and tell us what to do we've been relying on that as this community for 30 years and this is where we are poor decision- making done by small groups of people who want to carve up this district and really don't care about every child that walks through this uh through our door and we have to make decisions that are based and not to say what Dr Marino said but what works for every child and we have hit a point in this District that we are in freef fall and things have to change and we have to actually work together to make it happen and
135we have to to provide Solutions and we actually have to do this thing right because this will be the first time in a very long time that this body will actually do that this is one of the most transparent processes I've ever seen having been a person that has sent probably upwards of a 100 foas to the school district in the past I just think that that what we can't do is sit here and bring all these people together and do exactly what the city of Decor did five years ago which was filled the room with all these people that want to make things better and then ignored them because Administration change it has to be up to this board and this future board to work with our community and do our jobs and to
136reach out and reach out and build something that's what we have to do and I don't think that this timeline provides us the opportunity to do that I know that this committee has been wonderful and they've had a lot of great Insight but to put us in there where in this lame duck period is just not going to work so that's my piece other thoughts so I guess I would offer to the process I know both of you all have been so actively engaged and we sure appreciate your time and energy on this process I think it's more important that we get it right than we rush to justice so what does it take to get it right um I do think that this this process has been really transparent I I know just personally
137I've been involved in a lot of planning processes over a 45 year span and this has been one of the most transparent processes that I've been part of it's out there if you want to take the time to go look at it read it digest it and how does it work and let's all step back for a minute and say how can I be part of this solution and offer solutions to all these issues that we have are we happy if you want to put that that chart back up there again Dr Marino are we happy with 3% I ask you as a community I ask you as the people in this room are we happy with 3% balance scorecard and there's there's all kinds of reasons why I get that I think everybody needs
138to be accountable all through the organization it's not one group that has total accountability we all have to get in the boat and we all have to start rowing in the same direction uh rather than constantly pointing the finger at somebody else it's somebody else's it's not it's a decator problem and if we're happy with 3% then we need to really be getting in front of that mirror and taking a look at oursel because that's a long-term disservice to our kids and I'll leave it at that anybody else have anything so yeah and I think it we're looking for the the one with the stop light I think there you go there so that's what you're talking about the historic Trend 22 23 24 the 3% 3% 3.4% um the projections I mean you know
139of course we want better than 3% right um but I I think that I think that I agree with the more time piece right um one thing that I pushed was we we needed to come up with a plan for buildings right because dentist they're in modulars not cool um so how do we combine whatever changes needs to happen with that with the strategic planning process so I I really pushed for that to to have kind of a symbiotic um relationship between the two as we move forward and I I I think that that's what we need to do spend more time on uh showing what that relationship is um you know one thing that we talked about recently is the calendar and half days and we had somebody talk to us about um how
140they're not able to do the um their um you the trainings that they do um with other Educators at the same grade level so they they mismatch and and that kind of stuff um so how would reconfiguration of the district support that right uh we talked about plcs at the pre at the last meeting um you know how great would it be to have you know six or eight Educators that are in the same you know grade level as you work together instead of the two or three that are in your building right um I think that we need more time to explore that and explain that I think U so I think that I agree we maybe we take that opportunity to move forward with the Strategic plan because we need to get that
141in place um and then the U more I guess um the the changes that are are more pronounced uh you know take time to to explore that and and get it right you know instead of right now let's get it right instead of right now would you go to the next to the last slide that you have one of the things one more one more right there right there one of the one of the things that I've heard from people talking to me is they're worried about our magnet schools how how does this affect magnet schools so one of the things that we wanted to be aware of is currently currently um data shows that 21% of our student population are fortunate enough to attend a magnet school um our our thought and thought from
142the committee was uh we had a lot of support for a true Middle School um versus a four 48 a K8 um there was a lot of support for that so we said how do we still take the concept of magnet what if we had two it's likely going to be three middle schools in this scenario and as uh Mary Brady said Each one would have its own theme um we're suggesting that the buildings uh in order to create that Equity you would use buildings like a John's Hill which is one of our Flagship schools like a Dansby regardless of how it was constructed what it was for it doesn't negate the fact that as our environment changes and things evolve that we want to be able to put it on the table so uh
143Mr Reynolds to your question um the concept here is three middle schools 68 middle schools we would use John's hill we would use Dansby and we would use one other newer building we're still doing concept proofing to see what that would look like each one with its own pathway so that then what we would do is say every student is going to go into a newer building not just the 21% who are fortunate enough to be in a magnet program but a 100% of kids in their sixth seventh and eighth grade years would be defaulted to one of the three middle schools with a magnet option if they had an interest in something like Fine Arts integration likely John's Hill would be the Fine Arts integration Middle School um Dansby might be the stem middle
144school and the third Middle School might be the Career Technical education and all of these three middle schools you would have a magnet option to say I know I live in this boundary but you get the magnet option to cross boundaries and select the program that most closely align to your career interest and we want to start that in middle school and then pick up at high school with these uh three different paths so that's the rationale it's not that magnets are going away it's not that magnets are going to only serve 21% of our current population but 100% of our students and families would have the option of benefiting from our brand new schools and a choice magnet option and that's why this scenario is in front of us for consideration because it actually
145gives 100% of the kids access gives that square footage equity and quality of learning space everyone in a newer school and then a magnet Choice depending on what your interests were so that's the rationale behind this so when we say magnets are going away the real response is magnets are being expanded to 100% of the families not just just the current 21% but you're you're you're talking about 6 through 8 though yes what about K through five yeah and that's where we're we're suggesting right now these this Attendance Center concept um the other thing we have to deal with is we've got some schools that are not um that people just don't want to go to and one of the ways to work through this and get a fresh clean start is to um get
146rid of the notion of well that's all always bend that school and it's always going to be the same and say if we're going to do this what if we could get a greater Equity using the buildings we have um ensure a guaranteed and viable instructional program at these levels you would get two to three times the number of teachers at the same grade level which also allows us to do some different things with staff shortages it's not ideal but we've got a better opportunity to distribute kids if we're going to be dealing with the staff shortage and we can't seem to get the teachers it's much easier to distribute among eight classrooms than it is two or three so that's just one sample of ways in which the reconfiguration may help us with professional
147development um these gatekeeper grades we would put a gatekeeper grade at grade two at grade five at grade eight and there would be benchmarks along the way teacher job embedded time for plc's every week to be focusing on those kids so that we get a better shot at trying to get these kids at the grade level that they need to so it's probably more than you wanted but the notion here is this is new buildings for 100% of our kids and 100% of our kids with a magnet Choice option and that's why this option is in front of us and is currently being considered thank you one thing Jason started talking about was some methods that were going to be used to try to increase those percentages that we're all concerned about of achievement in
148the academic area and that's what I'm not hearing discussed um how you know I understand what you're saying about equities I think that's wonderful um but like I said the highest priorities are what specific things are we going to do in the academic area and the staff retention area and the staff hiring area and there's not easy answers but those are the things to me that have to be addressed as soon as possible um the other thing too I want to mention that isn't mentioned up there what you had up there is the solution to the dentist problem the Southwest part of decar is on hold basically um we have a three-year purchase rental I mean I'm sorry of the mobile classrooms I don't know if that was being planned to continue or not um
149no matter what happens that should be decided within the next couple months so that the plans can be made for a year from now how that would be handled uh I'm not proposing any particular solution but that's a separate issue um because that's been hanging around for two years and I'm not very pleased with the fact that that's just keep being put off and saying oh we'll make that part of the whole Master's facility plan well you're not that's not addressed at all um it's part of the whole neighborhood School concept for young children um which affects a lot of the other schools but it's just not being addressed at all we're ignoring it putting our head and saying oh it'll take care of itself um so where is the specific recommendation of how we're
150going to solve the dentist problem we got to stop ignoring that we also have to stop ignoring that we need some academic staff retention staff I mean all those things we did push made a big push one one small step was getting as many teacher assistants in the Elementary classrooms as possible things like that are examples no one thing is going to solve all these problems but we got to throw as many things out there as we can and see what we want to push I just think the district's priorities are being misled by a focus on facilities instead of of the things I've just been talking about and in terms of facilities the one issue that still has not been identified and how we're going to solve it it is the dentist situation I'd
151love to hear how that's going be discussed and you talk about deliverables so where are the deliverables for the other things that are not you know has that never been planned to have it brought to us before I thought that was the original plan that we were going to have a vote on everything at the end of April I've given up on that I know that's not going to happen but I still want to have input and I'm sorry will whether I'm accountable or not I've had four years on the board I've had 45 years in education I think I have a little bit to offer um and I'm just very upset that we keep putting these things off somebody maybe has an agenda that's how it's going to be solved well if you do
152let's hear it and let's do something about it um and I think also one thing Kevin was talking about and he was asking about 10 teachers on a committee of 55 is very sad and this is an educational organization and those people are the ones that are in there every day dealing with what we are talking about and there should be and I'm very happy that we've had surveys now starting to be used but this is the one thing that we really should had a survey from every staff member in this District on what their feelings are about the road map um that to me is just inconceivable that we haven't done that how can we how can we really possibly move move forward um without knowing what our staff has thoughts on and I'm
153not sure I'm not saying they all have the same thoughts but we need to at least get an idea additional thoughts okay if not Dr Marina thank you thanks to your group Ashley Mary thank you thank you thank you any other thoughts before we leave this topic for the evening well is the board going to give the roadmap group a different direction I have suggested that we de prioritize facility use except for just Dennis and focus on the other issues related I'm not using all the words academic staff retention and staff hiring to me those those are the crucial things um I would definitely want to see us um change our priorities I I am at a loss about trying trying to cover the staff shortages I I'm at a loss well I'm not I'm
154not saying I have any solutions but we've got hundreds of people out there we've got people that can suggest things let's hear that we're not hearing it this is the first time I saw anything um and it was about facilities where's the ideas about what we're going to do in the other areas which I would like to see us you know not just sit back and go oh we'll talk about in a couple weeks well let's talk about it right now do we want to change direction on our [Music] priorities well I I see the facilities usage as not just not just using buildings correctly but he he talks about Equity footage per student which I think you know if if if you're talking about tiny things that could add up to helping us with
155raising numbers raising math those small things like that make a difference which in my heart is all about trying to get our students reading at grade level and doing math at grade level so everything that they do that Focus Us in that direction I'm I'm four yeah and I I agree and I I talked one or two meetings ago about yes I definitely want to see the magnet school stay that we have but we also need to address the inequity between the buildings um with whatever resources we can do again I don't have specific ideas but I think this also relates to something I've been talking about for a year last June we talked about what are the goals for this board what are our goals and individually what is the administration goals I have
156yet to see anything in writing I know my goals I've stated them very clearly the teacher retention the teacher hiring the academic Improvement as whatever you can do to do that especially in the lower grades but all through the curriculum those are my highest goals and I would love to hear other people say what their goals are and I don't see that the road map committee is stating goals what are the goals of the district once you have the goals then you can say how are we going to go about working on those things where is all that in the presentation it's in the first page of the presentation and then there's also the balance scorecard that talks about specific strategies why haven't we've been given a copy of that because it's online for everyone
157I'm sorry I can't go to hundreds of pages of why I have a job why can't you just give us if that's the first page of the presentation just give us a copy of it and then discuss that okay is the committee deciding what our goals are for the district why can't we get copies of this you talk about transparency don't just say it's on a website let's get it to us here right here transparency doesn't mean spoonfed it is on the website there's a a document for each meeting and there screenshots and videos and pictures and I mean list but I've never heard the goals mentioned that that's there already um there's I mean yeah yeah um it will be a lot to to to print in hand to everybody and I think that
158it would probably go how many pages of the goals well I mean each artifact produced from each meeting I mean I no I'm just talking about the goals goals should just be a few things the district is really pushing okay do we have that or not we do just one moment let me go out if we're not making a decision tonight I just say we just move on and we can discuss this later but I do agree with Al on a lot of this stuff um I for one have been having it issues for the past four years that have yet to be fixed um and my term is up in two weeks so um so to be asking for a handout is not asking to be spoonfed he's just asking it's on DPS 61.org
159you don't have to have a district device to get to it sorry I just wanted to offer that okay well I mean it's but I didn't know that was even there no one told us no one told us on March 11th that you had made a recommendation this is a mark be kind of nice like I was saying I found out tonight that my password was supposed to have been changed two weeks ago and that's why I haven't received any emails for a while um these little things just go on and on but I think we're missing the main point which is what is our main direction for this district and I agree we I don't think we need to be worried about the facilities portion of this yet we need to be be working
160on the academic portion and I think if we can get data to show that we've made improvements in another year or two then we could discuss the facility part but if we're not making any decision on this tonight um yeah okay but I would if we are making a decision yes I would agre through I think we should just you know kind of change the direction so what I'm hearing is decouple the building configurations from the rest of the process right not necessarily decouple it but look at where the priorities are at least that part right now but I think we need to get more um how what I want to look for we have too much feedback still where there's there are still too many unanswered questions or too many concerns that I don't
161feel comfortable moving forward with any of this um we need to listen to The Experts which are our classroom teachers and our parents and we need to figure out a way to get these um scores up right but yet you know but like kind of what I was saying we did that whole thing with the whole um with when we reassess all the buildings in the district to find out which buildings needed repairs and I have yet to hear any of that um followup but now we're talking about you know making a a prek to2 school and a 3 to five school but yet we still have buildings that are need repair you know so and like we just built Dansby and now we want to make it into maybe like a pre- to two
162school I mean it's it's it's like we have all these things in the fire and we never think about long-term we have all these little short-term goals and it's just it just makes us look unorganized and that's why everyone's so scared and Jason what you were talking about deconne no I'm not I've said all along this needs to be connected the previous 5-year plan had five subcommittees the only one that really became operational was the building usage right because they didn't interrelate those things so I would love to see it interrelated but there's also a matter of priorities of what we're focusing on right now so I guess delay the building piece I mean is it is it fair yeah okay I'm definitely in FA that except for the dentist decision that has to be
163made I mean got stop putting it off I apologize if the spoonfed thing I mean I you know trying to think quickly you know have you ever heard this saying that when you want to say something stop take a second and think about it before you say okay I that would be my advice for you Jason because you did this a lot um I guess what I mean for that is you know it's a lot to try to take every artifact from each one of those meetings there's a lot that goes on in and provide that in a meaningful way right so that's why we put it on the website but I would also sorry to interrupt you I do apologize that I would also like to just iterate there are a lot of community
164members in this District who don't have any access to a computer or Wi-Fi or anything and here we're all like well it's on the it's on the website well you know what I have neighbors who don't even know how to use a computer and I live in a pretty good neighborhood so I mean and I I really get annoyed with that like for example when I call you know the disc for example and I didn't get something in via email about something so I miss a deadline and that's that's always their response well we emailed it to you well guess what I didn't get it you know not everyone has access to everything on Facebook or whatever and so to say that it's on our website I think we are doing a a miscarriage of
165Justice to a huge huge portion of our community because we are a very low socioeconomic Community I yes I I hear that and yeah we need to figure that out yes so there's got to be another way to get that information out what strategies are other board members using to connect with that Community I don't know okay I it's an open question to the board so what can we as a board do to make sure that we connect with those communities well we did publicize the meetings pretty good didn't we I mean those two meetings we've had and there's one more coming up at the Main Street Church on April April April 2nd I mean there is they really in in my opinion not much of an excuse to say you haven't had an opportunity
166to have input into what we're trying to do and that's that's not what I said they have access to input but they don't have access to the information well if they go to the meeting won't they have access to the no they only have access to the presentation that night but if they want to go back they get input right they get to if you'd let me finish Mark I'll answer your question if if I for example I don't have any computer access at home I'm just saying this as an example and I go to one of the Town Hall meetings yeah I get access to the information that night but I can't go back and review the previous stuff because I don't have any access that's what I'm saying and a large portion of
167the community has no access to the website so so the question then is what will is saying you know how do we how do we connect with that group that's the question you have a recommendation I I I already answered that I said I don't know I have a recommendation do a survey of our staff that's how you connect with the community I went to the one of the community input and I heard a lot there too um and I don't see that the community input that was there that night is being used when a lot of the input was just put into it's kind of like brainstorming if you have 100 things it's very difficult to piece out what it is it's one of the hardest things is to decide what are the most
168important things that we got just from all of this it's difficult I understand that well I think a Time's maybe come to put a pause on this one for the night Ag and um Dr Marino maybe you all can come back to the next meeting and we'll continue this kind particularly with timing I think we do need to have a conversation about timing because what I'm hearing from people people here tonight my fellow board members is there's a sense of urgency to do it right rather than try to force feed a date that we have to have this completed by now and I'm not saying We Kick the Can down the road by because I'm not a big one to Kick the Can down the road but I think it's important that we get it
169right I also think it's important that we acknowledge Will and Jason and the work they've put in on it and the commit that's put together so far what we've seen and try to bring some Synergy to all this information that's flown that's flowed forward and give give them a sense of accomplishment for what they've done so far because we're not finished and not going to be finished for a while so anyway we'll move on tonight everybody give some thought I guess I would like to get some consensus on the timing of the process and bringing the process to fruition well it's not going to be this board that makes the decisions on this on this 2030 roadmap right I think what I heard will what I heard you say was it's probably going to be
170in the best interest of the process to move out a bit that would be my opinion yes and we're going to need a good process to bring the new board up to speed as quickly as possible because we don't want this to stretch out we we need action like right like Al has said we need to move and part of that new board orientation should probably be the road map issue as well as you go through an orientation process well and will is putting together some stuff as an Orient for new board members which I I think is going to look pretty pretty good and and that's the one thing I wanted to ask is if you had things when you came onto the board that you wanted to know that you didn't learn until
171later please e email them to Melissa and then we can bring them all together and then use that information as building part of this orientation there's also an orientation guide that the Illinois Association of school boards puts out I only have one copy if somebody would like to look at it uh we can get you a copy um just as a good policy to get board members up to speed so they can effectively do their jobs okay let's move forward then um move on to our consent items I do have a couple other things I want to talk about board discussion separately the last time we had the results of the survey on the calendar which I was very pleased that their survey was done there was a statement made and I wanted to check
172it more thoroughly about the results of the survey the largest number of people um when talking about if they were concerned with the half day school said they had no concern but that largest number was 32% um the other people who were concerned were divided into five groups why they were concerned um structure the professional development content of professional development um student learning being compromis on half days student attendance being especially low on half days and sometimes even staff attendance you put those five together that's 68% so I think it's very important that um we are aware that more than two more than a 2:1 ratio of people do have concerns about those half days the other thing I do want to mention there was um nice article in the paper about um why there
173are shortages for teachers and a whole lot of different ideas and the one I really wanted to focus on was just really quick something I think the Board needs to do in the future um the whole idea of mentoring is very important for new teachers there is a mentor program in the district I think it needs to be reviewed it doesn't necessarily need to be used for everyone if you have a teacher coming in with five years experience teaching they probably don't need a mentor as much as the that first year teacher and who does the mentoring is also very important um it's also it it's just I think personally in my experience best if you have someone in the same department and the other third thing about that is I saw the pay for
174mentors last year and I was shocked um it's extremely low if you going to ask a teacher to be someone's Mentor it's worth more than $1,500 a year um I think that's what it was I might have misread it but I think that's something we definitely have the money we can definitely put more into mentoring and that's one little small as ECT that might help teacher retention thank you okay moving on to our consent items uh anyone have any of these items that they'd like to have pulled tonight Dr Gray uh yes I recommend the board approve the consent items as presented as presented which includes a minutes open meeting February 25th 2025 and open to close uh minutes uh meeting March 4th 2025 B bills c financial conditions report and the treasurers report got
175a motion so moved second discussion M Bradford Mr Reynolds hi Dr Collins hi Mr Wetzel hi Mr cleer I Mr Dion hi and Mr shider six I 6 I Zer nay one absent motion carried thank you now we'll move on to our roll call Action items do we have a recommendation for a non-renewal of a buildings and grounds administrative support employee yes I recommend the Board of Education approve the non-renewal of a building and grounds administrative support employee Mitchell Johnson effective at the end of the business day Monday June 30th 2025 as presented Dr motion so moved discussion M Bradford Mr shider um I believe that the employees definitely needed some kind of discipline and wasn't doing a good job I don't agree with the process that's being used to call for a non-renewal so
176no Mr Reynolds I Mr Wetzel I Mr Dion I Dr Collins no and Mr clevage I I have four I two nay one absent motion carried thank you um for the next item uh roll call Item action B possible discipline and or termination of a decator educational support Personnel Association despa employee was pulled from the March 18th 2025 board meeting agenda moving on do we have a recommendation for the Personnel action items yes I recommend the Board of Education approve the Personnel action items listed and the memo from Monica wils Director of Human Resources and the human resource department as presented I have a motion so moved second discussion M Bradford Dr Collins hi Mr shider hi Mr Reynolds hi Mr Wetzel hi Mr cler hi and Mr Dion 6 I Zer nay one absent
177motion carried do we have a recommendation for the employment of an assistant principal at Steven decater Middle School yes I recommend the board of education approve the employment of Eric Newan as an assistant principal at Steven Decor middle school as presented do I have a motion so moved second any discussion M Bradford Mr cleer hi Mr Dion hi Mr Reynolds hi Dr Collins hi Mr Wetzel hi and Mr shider hi 6 i z nay one absent motion Carri Mr Newan can you come to the podium please hello I'm not going to take up too much of your time I just want to thank the board and Dr Clark and the Kyle Building Administration for this opportunity uh although I'm going to miss hope I've been there for six years now I'm going to miss that
178staff especially the special education staff who got a part of my heart U so I hope to continue that with Stephen deer as well well and Mr Lindsay and his staff thank you [Applause] congratulations we have a recommendation for the internal substitution memorandum of understanding between decator Education Association and decator Public School District 61 yes I recommend the Board of Education improve the internal substitution memorandum of understanding between the decator Education Association and the cater public school district 6 61 as presented do I have a motion so moved second discussion M Bradford Mr Dion hi Mr shider hi Mr Reynolds hi Mr Wetzel hi Mr clevinger I and Dr Collins I 6 i z n one absent motion carried okay do we have a recommendation for the power purchase agreementcontract between the decater public school
179district 61 and straightup Sol yes I recommend the Board of Education approve the power purchase agreement contract between Decor Public Schools district 61 and straight up solar as presented do I have a motion so moved second discussion um Dr Curry there's five or six it says here what why is it not just six because we haven't fully completed the purchase of the park property adjacent to sby okay has not been it has not been fully executed okay but it will then it'll be six when it is it will be six okay I have I have ninia and um straight up solar here if you have any questions for them as well let's do it be Al I'm expecting question I want to vote let's go I've been waiting for two and a half years might
180bur his moment I was just thinking they're going to be dis wanted to wait until 9:00 p.m. and not have any questions well let's at least let them stand up come on down at least let them stand up come on up here real quick all right I have a question so if the solar panels need replaced who's responsible they are you are at whose cost theirs okay let them speak you know they're here I wanted to give them a talk right yeah Mike let them speak yeah during the I'm Shannon Folton straightup solar um during the term of the power purchase agreement the operations and maintenance any servicing any replacement all of that is the responsibility of the asset owner which is um hakao um the third party provider financing provider so long long way
181of saying it's not decer Public School responsibility that's all we need to know right um I'm I'm with Al I'm excited to have you know to to finalize this especially with the uh you know the price that uh we're getting so thank you um who installs them your company or is it local it's a mix of um we're we are working with a local sub electrical subcontractor um as soon as hopefully we get an agreement signed we'll then um walk all of the sites with them firm up all of the details and work with a local uh contractor it would also include very likely uh folks from our from straightup solar um and um local electrical contractor and there will be other subcontractors doing things like driving piles and Grading you know um doing um
182site layout like civil civil contractors so it'll be a mix of different contractors um probably all to most of which are very much Central Illinois based I'm guessing we'll have another proposal once Dan be's the land fully executed or purchases executed right cover it's EXs we don't need board action modify it got as written it includes Dansby at the point at which that final transaction is complete okay and the timeline for this to be totally completed right we'll start um the smaller projects first so we'll try to get as many energized as as quickly as possible um but I wouldn't expect the very last project to come to completion until probably uh mid year next year mid mid to maybe third quarter cool other discussion M Bradford Mr Wetzel hi Dr Collins hi Mr shider
183hi Mr clevinger hi Mr Dion hi and Mr Reynolds hi 6 i z n one absent motion carry thank you Melissa you the we have a recommendation for high school iPad refresh yes I recommend the Board of Education approve the Prep Academy MacBook purchase as present wait a minute hold hold on we missed one I missed one my fault I don't have a GMI you got it you got it right C no problem yes I recommend the Board of Education approve the high school iPad refresh as presented do have a motion so moved second discussion Miss Bradford Mr Reynolds hi Dr Collins hi Mr Wetzel hi Mr shider hi Mr clevinger hi and Mr Dion hi 6 i z n one absent motion carried do we have a recommendation for the Prep Academy MacBook purchase
184we're catching up with you now yes I recommend the Board of Education approv the Prep Academy MacBook purchased as presented show moved second discussion Miss Bradford Mr shider hi Mr Dion hi Mr Wetzel hi Mr cleer hi Mr Reynolds and Dr Collins I 6 i z a one absent motion carried thank you do we have a recommendation for the two 2025 26 decator Public School District 61 calendar and the 2026-27 decator Public School District calendar yes I recommend the Board of Education approve the 226 the cater Public School District 61 calendar in the 2027 the cater Public School District 61 calendar is presented do I have a motion so moved second discussion I will be voting no against this I want to make it clear that I do appreciate the tremendous work that our administrative
185staff and the in the schools and teachers do to make do with some wonderful things during those half days but I look at this basically as we only have 168 instructional days you can call a half day and instructural day if you want and if isby supports that I guess that's their choice but I hardly think that's really eight instructional days when only half are coming and then onethird to two-thirds of the students aren't here um I'm very concerned with this and I feel we have not looked into Alternatives of what could be done in terms of changing the amount of professional development how professional development's done work days whatever I'm not saying anything particular but I just don't think we've been looking into alternatives to address that problem of only 168 educ instructional M
186Bradford Mr Wetzel I Dr Collins hi Mr Dion hi Mr shider no Mr clevinger hi and Mr Reynolds I five I one nay one absent motion carried you have a recommendation for the Lakes Shore Learning purchase for DEC Dennis lab school yes I recommend the Board of Education approve the lake shore learn and purchase for Dennis lab school as presented got a motion so moved second discussion could you explain what these grants are so the grant is our school Improvement Grant so we re received a set amount of money in Ju I'm going to call it July is for school Improvement and then at the end of January we received I believe it was at least $124,000 most schools received 150,000 or more additional dollars that need to be spent prior to August 30th 31st
187um this year for school Improvement efforts and so that's what the next few items are coming from we worked with the building principles to identify what they wanted to do as purchasing using those School Improvement funds so that's what all of that is thanks thank you okay M Bradford Mr Dion hi Mr shider hi Mr cleer hi Dr Collins hi Mr Reynolds and Mr Wetzel hi 6 i z n one absent motion carried do we have a recommendation for the Lakeshore Learning purchase for Franklin Grove Elementary School yes I recommend the Board of Education approve the Lakeshore Learning purchase for Franklin Grove Elementary School as presented do have a motion so moved second discussion uh this is this is for flash cards I mean how and like how many of our schools use flashcards so
188it depends on the school and this is manipul the idea with this is to actually send the flash cards home with each student so they have them at home so they can work on their math uh effects at home and so every child gets that full entire set of flashcards addition subtraction multiplication and division they can go home so they're working on those skills they've got those take home over the summer we're trying to get resources into the hands of our students at home so they can be continuing to work on those skills and you'll see some more of these purchases coming through and I know you've had some conversations about maybe sending some books home some of them didn't hit the threshold for for me to say like this is what we're doing but
189that is some of the work that they're doing with that this is awesome flashcards just take me back to my education and I know how to do one in one now you know so that's the that's the hope with this is that students are able to have these at home to work on those skills it's great just great M Mr Wetzel hi Dr Collins hi Mr shider Mr Dion Mr Reynolds and Mr cler 6 i0 n one absent motion carried do we have a recommendation for the blue star education purchase for Hope Academy yes I recommend the Board of Education approve the blue star educational purchase for Hope Academy is presented motion so moved second discussion M Bradford Dr Collins hi Mr shider hi Mr Dion Mr Wetzel hi Mr Clevenger and Mr Reynolds hi
1906 i0 nay one absent motion carried do have a recommendation for hmh Center for model schools contract for bomb Elementary School yes I recommend the Board of Education approve the hmh center for model schools contract for bomb elementary school as presented motion so moved second discussion is this brand new or is this something that's they've had before this is a continuation of contractual Services they did a little bit of work they've been doing it all year so this allows each of the schools I think it's five days for each of the following schools to bring them in to bring the consultants in to also do some work over the summer as well and to work with some Retreats for um providing professional development for staff so do we track this do we have any I
191mean it's good M yeah we're tracking and I can bring back I can provide you with a specific data about what they're doing and what that what those outcomes are okay M Bradford Mr shider hi Mr Wetzel I Mr Reynolds hi Dr Collins hi Mr Dion hi and Mr Clevenger hi 6 I Zer nay one absent motion carried I just have a quick question as we move through these with the same company just for different schools could these not all be Consolidated into one motion different no I I understand that but could we put them in one motion so we're not we'll look into that okay we have a recommendation for hmh Center for model schools contract for Franklin Grove Elementary School yes I recommend the Board of Education approve the hmh center for model
192schools contract for Franklin Grove Elementary School as presented got a motion so moved second discussion Miss Bradford Mr shider hi Mr Reynolds hi Mr wetel hi Mr Deion Dr Collins hi and Mr Clevenger hi six i0 n one absent motion carried do we have a recommendation for the hmh center for model schools contract for muffley elementary school yes I recommend the Board of Education approve the hmh center for model schools contract for muffley elementary school as presented motion so moved second discussion M Bradford Mr Wetzel hi Dr Collins hi Mr shider Mr cleer hi Mr Dion hi and Mr Reynolds hi 6 i0 one absent motion carried do have a recommend ation for the hmh center for model schools contract for Steven decater Middle School yes I recommend the Board of Education approve the hmh
193center for model schools contract for Steven decer middle school as presented do I have a motion so moved second discussion Miss Bradford Dr Collins Mr shider Mr Reynolds Mr Wetzel Mr cleer hi and Mr Dion 6 i z nay one absent motion carried do we have a recommendation for the elevate your classroom contract for Parson Elementary School yes I recommend the Board of Education approve the elevate your classroom contract for Parson elementary school as presented do I have motion so moved second discussion M Bradford Mr Wetzel I Dr Collins I Mr shider Mr clevinger I Mr Deon and Mr Reynolds 6 i z nay one absent motion carried do have a recommendation for the 95% group purchase for Parson Elementary School yes I recommend the Board of Education approve the 95% group purchase for Parson's
194elementary school as presented do have motion so moved second any discussion they they had one of these last year didn't they is this so this is just a continuation of their phonic M Bradford Mr Reynolds hi Dr Collins hi Mr Wetzel hi Mr Clevenger hi Mr Dion and Mr shider hi 6 I zero nay one absent motion carried thank you uh like to also send condolences Johnny Travis Senior passed away Monday February 17 2025 Mr Travis with the father of Janet lore librarian assistant at South Shores Elementary School and first vice president of the decor Federation of teaching assistance our condolences to her family Scott bus boom who passed away on Wednesday February 26 2025 Scott was a dedicated sports broadcaster and was inducted into the 2021 decator Public Schools Athletic Hall of Fame for
195his special contributions to District 61 Athletics Mr bus booon was a h was the husband of Paula busboom retired teaching assistant and president of Decor Federation of teaching assistance local 4324 our condolences to the bus boom family Scott meant a lot to the athletic community and our kids as they matriculated through our education system as well as our athletic programs Michael Willis Frederick who passed away Thursday March 13 2025 Mr Frederick was the father of Travis Friedrich assistant director of making Patt special education District our condolences to all those families once again and some important dates to remember March 21st parent teacher conferences no school no school for students the 24th to the 27th is spring break no school district offices are open uh and the 28th is cashmir palaski holiday observed no school district
196offices are closed April 3rd Community en rich summer sign up event for students and Family Resource event that's at MacArthur 4:30 to 6:30 uh April 18th is a good Friday holiday and one more time Dr Marino the date for the next Community input meeting April 2 April 2nd let's reinforce that April 2nd Date and get a good turnout clarify that milissa okay the public portion of the next next was there an RSVP for that or yeah it was invitation only because it was for people who had not been to right yeah you the RSVP April 2D meeting yeah the RSVP would you mark me down for that thanks I haven't been to one yet that's why okay moving on public Force to the next regular meeting the Board of Education will be 6:30 p.m Tuesday
197April 8th 2025 the Kyle administration building do we have a motion to adjourn second all in favor signify by saying I I I those opposed I we stand adjourned