001okay i'd like to call the february 16 2022 regular february meeting of the fenton community high school district 100 board to order uh may have a roll call yes figueroa here kade here jellowick here lewis here brazinski rhaegal here ting pong pong here we have a quorum please join me in reciting the pledge of allegiance i pledge allegiance to the plague of the united states of america uh james please join me in reading our vented mission beliefs and bicycle way statements our friend mentioned statement to cultivate successful passionate empowered learners through rigor relevance in relationships our friend belief statements successful passionate empowered learners thrive when we provide a safe caring and welcoming environment diversity equity and inclusion unify our community school and home collaborate as one we champion innovative teaching and engage learning with state-of-the-art
002facilities we infuse social emotional learning into academics and culture we prepare students to fulfill their civic responsibilities we immerse students in authentic life experiences the bison way students and adults at fenton high school create a safe caring empathetic environment where we believe in each other respect diversity communicate openly grow together and hold each other to high expectations to become the leaders and innovators of the future thank you james dr benson recognitions oh my apologies um yep uh mary do we have any uh requests for public comments today yes we do we have two this evening okay thank you and uh just as the reminder public comments are limited to three minutes per person per speaker and limited to 30 minutes per topic first speaker aaron hausen and the topic is masks good evening um i
003read that it was a three-minute time period but we were told actually that it was five minutes right that was my mistake but i think we could certainly we i i ordered that's fine we will allow it thank you yep you bet you bet good evening um some of you already know me as our families volunteered side by side together in the community for years and you know how much that we care about the kids here some of you have welcomed our children into your homes where we have no question that they are in safe hands i know what it's like to serve on a board and i would like to extend my gratitude for your service i do not want this to be taken personally yet we are here fighting for our children and
004i can think of nothing more personal our family currently has two students enrolled at fenton and we are not insensitive to the tragedies befallen other families do to covet as we have experienced our share of loss over the last two years we believe that the decisions made to enforce the mask originally were done so in the interest of the children's health and well-being but it has been two years since the beginning of the pandemic and it is time to start taking up or i'm sorry start to start waking up to the fact that the enforcement of the masks is no longer the best way to protect our community health and well-being extends much deeper than just virus transmission what about the mental health of our children let's start talking about the constraining environment that they
005are made to navigate in school each day during the phase of life in which they are already struggling to carve out an identity while simultaneously preparing for their ever nearing adulthood responsibilities these additional constraints weigh heavily on their minds and spirit causing anxiety and depression to mount to sometimes dangerous levels that is the very definition of oppressive recently our daughter who struggles with anxiety and depression revealed to us that she was having a full-blown panic attack episode on the floor of the girl's bathroom she was found by a hall monitor who instead of helping her calm down and catch her breath instructed her to pull her mask out and to leave the bathroom where she couldn't stay she walked my daughter to the conference room and told her that she would let someone know that
006she was there our daughter sat in that conference room for an entire period with nobody checking on her she let herself out and came home when the bell rang i didn't even know that that happened until this morning when she told me she just chalked it up to another day at school do you know what a panic attack looks like clearly the staff at fatten is ill-trained in these matters and lacks the capacity to deal with them we cannot keep our blinders on to the things going on around us that defy common sense i am not a scientist so i'm not going to give statistics or numbers but one doesn't have to be a scientist to apply critical thinking skills to things that they observe for the last four months we have come to watch
007groups of students play basketball against one another strangers to one another slapping clawing grappling on the floor with each other in attempts to gain control of one ball the same ball that is then passed from player to player to player who are usually covered in sweat then they shake hands with the opposing team at the end of it all all while having to cover their face that doesn't seem like solid logic these children are leaving school and getting into cars with friends no masks they're going to each other's houses to hang out no masks the teachers are hanging out with each other at bars no masks so what purpose are they now still serving in our schools we understand that we understand the fear surrounding the subject i'm a mother i get it i'm not
008immune to fear i just had to learn when it was helpful and when it was harmful and how to keep it in check i still do i had to come with terms i had to come to terms with the fact that i cannot control everything and maybe that it wasn't even my place to try to do so because my children are their own people since judge grisha's ruling that governor pritzker has been exercising powers he never possessed and deemed enforcement of the mass mandate against the law our girls have decided to exercise their rights and have been coming to school unmasked each morning they are turned away and told that they may not enter their school building illinois provides education as a matter of right the school is infringing upon that right by continuing to
009deny these students access to the school building and the same in-person instruction as all the other students these girls are tired of allowing others to assume control over the governing of their bodies and health they're choosing to use their voices which we commend especially in a time when most cannot find their own or don't even believe that they have one we are choosing to live our lives the way that god intended with faith and without fear we have the right to govern ourselves accordingly within the parameters of the law we do not co-parent with the school and i'm personally grateful for that because it appears that the meaning and efficacy of lessons taught in history and science within these very walls have been lost on the majority please it is time to end this madness
010and make masks optional thank you are you guys going to vote on it right now next speaker i want to say thank you that was very heartfelt thank you i know it you uh it really came from the heart bob sylvetti i'm sorry if i misspelt your last name bob celavetti is the next speaker that they have left the topic is also masks uh good evening my name is max selarick and i just wanted to build on the idea of the last uh mentioned comments about the mask mandate i fence in high school i along with other students that i can speak for believe that masks should be optional at fenton we talk about it all the time at launch in classes kids complain there's kids that support it there's kids that are against it
011but ultimately it should be optional uh one example that i noticed that's pretty hypocritical in my opinion is the fact that we sit for eight hours a day with masks on and then we can go to lunch for 45 minutes without a mask on and then sit there talk to each other and then the next three hours of the day we go back in masks and that's just a problem i see personally next i'd like to address the issue of elk grove high school york high school in addison trail not requiring masks and we're another local school so i believe that we should follow in their footsteps another example is over the super bowl weekend there's people at parties at the super bowl many of them without masks parents kids friends families all together in
012one building then the next day so monday they send their kids to school without a mask on where's the logic in that i believe that fenton should make masks optional and end the mandate thank you [Applause] i just wanted to thank the the public comments today and and we we all as a board appreciate you engaging with us in that and we appreciate it thank you so much [Applause] so next we'll go with dr benson and recognitions here so let's celebrate some excellence thank you very much and michelle and sochi of you please come forward [Applause] as many of you may know the college board produces common exams like the s-a-t p-s-a-t and advanced placement exams a few years ago the college board created an initiative or a national recognition program for underrepresented groups and
013this is a highly respected honor uh prestigious and it involves uh top 10 percent in the psat or they either qualify through ap exams two or more uh exams where they get a three and so um and they also have to have at least a 3.5 gpa so these young ladies here are both qualified um so we congratulate them on this prestigious award which should help them in their college application process and what they want to do in the future so we're going to start out with with michelle azuman selected for the national african-american recognition award through the college board [Applause] thank you for having me here today i first want to thank my parents first off my dad's here today and i just really would not be here where i am without him and
014my mom just leading me and influencing me and you know challenging me throughout my childhood and my high school years i feel like being a student of color especially a black student here at fenton um there hasn't been a lot of times where i felt encouraged to use my voice encouraged and recognized for all the hard work that i put into my education knowing that there's an award that supports me as a black student um my hard work and my dedication to school and my studies um i'm really glad to see that there's something like that for people like me and that the future kids are coming up after me i really think that this is a something that is going to change the world honestly for the kids who aren't really spoken for um
015in this country i honestly can't really still believe that it's real and i just i'm just really glad to see my education and my hard work being validated so thank you [Applause] thank you michelle i know she's going to go right back to choir rehearsal right in the shell so thanks now next is sochi we go to the next slide next slide jim yeah there there she is and so she who's also very involved in a variety of activities congratulations on the national hispanic recognition award [Applause] okay hi um last time i was here i did not prepare a speech but this time i did um and then if it's okay i'd like to repeat it in spanish so that when my parents watch it again right okay thank you i'd like to first thank
016miss georgicus if she had an email to me reminding me to apply i obviously wouldn't have won it uh of course i'd mostly like to thank my parents for continuing to show endless support in my academic career i have never felt unsafe or uncomfortable vocalizing my grades scores motivation for school or opinion over my classes and i know it's because you always valued growth over perfection i can't wait to see what else these next three months have in store for us thank you none in spanish electronic or recording perfection [Applause] and now typically we do take a picture if you could step forward here oh first got a quick picture of michelle receiving her award that's okay yeah there we go okay congratulations let me switch with sochi real quick all right okay all right
017um [Applause] congratulations uh let's get right to informational items sure thank you so much uh we got a full agenda here i would like to invite the eos sullivan consultant phase three report and recommendation mr collins here along with the rest of the team str mr grossi hey everyone thank you for having us out again uh we've gone through several phases of this process and we now have our report from phase three to present to you and so uh we'll walk through that you've obviously had a chance to review there's a there's a very a lot of data that we provided we're going to focus on the highlights here to make sure that everyone understands kind of what's been presented and what it means moving forward in this entire process we've received nearly a thousand
018points of feedback from members of the public that's an excellent number we're very excited to see that means you have a very engaged community that's interested in this process and certainly wants uh to provide their feedback on the future of family so that was great to see as you know we've gone to the public in a number of different ways to give them opportunities to provide feedback through in-person presentations committee meetings multiple phone surveys online feedback forms we've done things in person and in virtual we provided things in english and in spanish basically if you wanted to give feedback you had multiple opportunities to give feedback and that was our goal was to make sure that anyone who wanted to have their voice heard in this process was able to do so in this phase
019three alone we had 443 responses to the phone survey and 111 responses directly from members of the community so very good numbers that is driving the data that we're about to present what you'll see there's a lot there so i'll walk you through that bullet by bullet but what we saw during the feedback the first thing we always look at is the overall level of support for the process this is where you might see things that tell you hey you can't move forward but the good news is everything we've seen in this data says we are good to move forward the community has said that they overall support doing something of course it'll be our job together to figure out what that something looks like but seeing 62 percent of support for at least one
020of the options was a very good number while only 25 said that they don't want to move forward at all well we'd like to see that 25 number be be a little bit lower it isn't enough that says hey listen there's a problem we need to stop it just tells us we need to make sure that the final plan is a good consensus plan that the community can support that second bullet there we're going to start to get into some of those options as you remember we had three options i know some of the district's experts are going to be talking you through and reminding you what is in those options and going through it with you so i'll save that for the people who actually know what they're talking about i'll just talk about
021them in generalities which is that the data that we got back was that all three uh we're in a decent position one of the things to understand remember we gather data multiple ways we talk to people what we call intuitively so what their gut reaction is and then we talk to people when they have a little bit more time to digest and understand the information and we talk to people once they've had a lot of time to really ask questions and get involved that shows us how people's opinions change as they get more information and know more of what we're talking about that first bullet focuses on that intuitive reaction this is where we typically see people who don't know a lot of what's going on so their initial reaction is just do what you
022can for as little as possible that's always the answer we get and every time in this process and you see that here where option one was the favorite of this group of the of the more intuitive group at plus 17. uh option two they're split on it's right around break even at negative two option three at negative 11. one thing i want to point out is that usually in this process when we get to the stage with other school districts what we see is that number for option three is usually around negative 20 or more not a negative 11. so while it is always a negative number the good news is uh it's it's less negative i hope there's no english teachers in the room um than we would typically see at this stage what
023you see there at that third bullet is that those who are a little bit more engaged and a little bit more passionate they show their preference more towards option two so you see with the the previous group they were a bit split option three option one option two about even without with the the people who are more engaged they show a clear preference for option two and then option three and then option one that second last bullet there those are the people who are the most engaged they show support for three then two then one what does this mean what it means is that the more engaged the more informed people are of what the challenges are what the needs are the more they move from supporting option one to option two and then option
024three that's an important thing that i wanna point out here we're gonna get more into that in future slides going to the next slide there okay so now without thinking about elections without thinking about referendums just as a plan what would this mean to us what we see in that is that you could move forward with option one immediately you'd have no concerns it would move forward you'd have no trouble getting something like that passed as a referendum the challenge is that it doesn't cover a lot of things that get people excited that get people passionate it really doesn't touch a lot of those educational components that would improve outcomes for students and that would improve outcomes for the community and so while option one is passable ultimately we've seen challenges with other districts where
025if you don't include those educational components you get what's apathy you get a lack of excitement from members of the community so while option one is doable it isn't the path that we would recommend moving forward the second bullet there goes into option two you could move forward with option two immediately based on the data one caveat with that is it would need to be paired with an educational campaign to make sure the public was well aware of what's included in that option why it was something that the districts felt was important to move forward and what led us to that point if you did that we believe option two would be successful immediately option three is doable there's not negative signs that we see that would say that option three is not doable you
026would simply need to make sure you engage the community before you move forward with an option three to make sure they know what's involved in them so with option three we'd suggest a little bit of time before you move forward in that but it would definitely we believe would achieve support and would be passable if you did that effort now we've got to talk about the reality of elections because if this if you were to move forward with any of these plans it means a referendum so let's talk about what the upcoming elections are and why that matters there are three elections coming up you have one in june one in november and one in next april each of those elections will have different uh a different we call it turn up different people will
027be showing up because they'll be candidates on the ballot there'll be issues in the ballot that they're passionate about and so each of these three elections you will see a different turnout and the upcoming june primary election you're going to see a turnout that is mostly older less minority driven more white and more conservative there's a we'll talk about why that matters as we get to the next slide the november election will be a bit more balanced of a turnout you're not going to see specific subgroups that are really over-represented in the november election the april election in 2023 is predicted to attract usually a very small and typically a much older elector let's go to the next slide we're going to talk about why that matters ultimately depending on the referendum that you move
028forward next slide please ultimately depending on the type of option path that you choose forward that path is going to be tied to certain groups are going to be very excited about it certain groups may not be excited about it and so using the election data that drives our recommendation here on this slide option one and option two so strong enough support that you could move forward with either one in the primary election in june we believe both would be successful again with that understanding that with option two you would still need to run an educational campaign to move people from sort of that initial group to a little bit more of an informed group but either one would be successful option three shows it there the projects included in option three are shown to
029be much more favorable with the turnout that would be coming out in november more balanced turnout again because usually what we see is um people who are a little bit more conservative they want to see protection of the infrastructure so they love like option one as you'll hear has a lot of infrastructure in it that's why those are things that they'll really like to see whereas when you see parents and and and typically females younger people they want to see that educational aspect of it that's what you see getting into more in options two and option three and so with that more balanced turnout in november that would tell us that if you wanted to move forward with option three our recommendation would be to do so in november uh because that will be a
030turnout that will be more favorable to that option that said because we have two elections within five months of each other which hasn't happened before at least not in over a decade you have a unique opportunity in front of you where if you did want to move forward with option three you could do so in june it is at least a bit unlikely to pass but not impossible at least opens up the chance that it could pass in gene but the more important part of why we would say this is a viable path is it gives people an opportunity to find out what is in that path ask questions about it become more engaged and get that information and if it didn't succeed in june you then have an immediate opportunity in november to run
031it again in that election that as we said would be a bit more balanced of a turnout and so this isn't an option that we typically would recommend because you usually don't have these two elections so close to each other but here in 2022 you do have this unique opportunity where that is a path you could pursue this is a little bit more costly to do this a little bit more labor intensive but again it opens up that opportunity that you could get option three as quickly as june and we know that with the rising costs of inflation supply chain issues every month that you delay certainly increases costs and i know the district is very focused on fiscal responsibility so it's something to think about and so those are the options available to you
032now that i've blathered on about the options i want to bring the experts up to explain what those options are thank you colin yeah i'd like to present the options that were used for that survey and again the charge was to create some distinctly different options to foster choice and and discussion so if we kind of go drive through these next please option one really concentrates on taking care of your existing building so really the infrastructure and life safety issues focuses on items like roofing uh protecting the outside masonry a lot of work with your existing mechanical systems again recognizing some of these pieces are almost 75 years old plumbing electrical issues like that also there's a security component here too your existing front entrance is very robust but this really focuses on all your
033other entrances so that's really kind of a nutshell for option one option two starts to incorporate more items that are educationally based you'll see some of these line item percentages have been adjusted to align with these targets recognizing there's still flexibility and choices within these so in addition to the life safety and maintenance that we discussed before programming and career spaces this includes items like science facilities multimedia labs construction technology again the security is a consistent theme from before classroom modernization this is where we touch all the existing classrooms so lighting classroom technology is improved in every classroom so every classroom gets touched classroom capacity this is the strategy where we're enlarging the smaller classrooms so taking existing classrooms where you have a three in a row subdividing those again to make them two so
034three to two to make larger classrooms we would also dedicate resources to replicate that capacity of that missing classroom so there's an addition that compensates for that the collaboration space is the next line item this is really going to be installed throughout the building this really creates opportunities for different types of educational practices really focusing on the hallways more informal spaces small breakout rooms and really disperse those throughout the campus this is probably one of the biggest areas we've seen in 21st century learning music and performing arts in this scenario in option two we're renovating the existing facilities really not fundamentally changing them but improving them within the the footprint that they're in now so new surfaces lighting air handling technology and some ada pieces to that through the option two driving to option three
035again recurring themes here uh life safety and infrastructure programming career spaces here we're really doing touching most of those creating a new within the existing spaces creating new uh direct to work and direct career programs within that security again classroom modernization is a consistent theme classroom capacity here we're doing more of it so really all the undersized classrooms would be replaced with new classrooms within the existing space of the appropriate size supplemented by new spaces to accommodate the shortfall in the numbers collaboration space again more of it really spreading this out of sight of the core disciplines even into some of the ancillary things like the programming and career culinary really giving those resources throughout the campus football stadium so this really renovates your complete stadium it'll convert it from a stock from a football
036only facility to be able to accommodate competition soccer new track drainage relating to that uh essentially a new facility in in the existing location just expanding it towards the south a small portion of locker renovations uh you have a lot of pretty dated locker rooms particularly athletically and and pe wise this is a portion of that work really just an effort to to start to improve that locker space is very expensive space to to rework paving and uh paving modifications you have a lot of paved surfaces some of it is not in ideal condition so this is a portion or just a step on the road to uh improving that fixing the the worst conditions not replanting it and not necessarily modifying the pickup and drop off a contribution towards repairing the uh shifted tennis
037courts and storm water management to do some of these improvements we need to code is very restrictive and very specific and stormwater issues whenever you do additions of any kind or any really site modifications you have to file for permits and it's highly regulated in an effort to prevent water from becoming a problem for your neighbors it's an important piece and i think something that really involves some more thought there's an overview for your information that dovetails with the categories that were surveyed now financial good evening my focus is going to be on the estimated impact of the various referendum scenarios on the taxpayers for option one that would generate an annual impact to a medium homeowner in the school district of approximately 116 dollars per year option two will generate an impact of approximately
038245 dollars per year and option three will generate an annual impact of approximately three hundred and eighty dollars per year as a general rule of thumb every 10 million dollars that the district borrows will cost the medium homeowner approximately 29 dollars per year okay up on the screen we have a sample ballot question that the voters would see on election day um the question is is fairly long and it's detailed and that's driven really by uh if it's approved the board of education is required to use the bond proceeds to fund only the projects that are detailed in the question the board is also required to complete the work they are seeking asking the community to approve the first part of that question shall the board of education of fenton improve the site of and
039renovate altar repair and equip that's right out of the illinois school code and then thereafter it gets more specific to the entity that is requesting you know the dollars including installing school safety emergency response systems and this is based really on on the projects that you looked at earlier this evening so uh that that'll continue to be tweaked as we you know move through this process but that's in essence what it would look like obviously it would have a box next to it you would check yes or no and then the part as far as the amounts that is left blank pending further discussion with the board so that's what the proposed ballot sample question would look like and this graph compares the annual tax rate that the taxpayers pay for to pay debt for
040all the high school districts in dupage county and you can see that currently fenton high school district 100 has the lowest bond and interest tax rate of all the high school districts in dupage county i'm going to turn it over now to colin to talk about the time table going forward all right so what does this look like of course this timeline is tentative but if you wanted to move forward with a referendum for the june election this is the timeline obviously today we're discussing the options available to us it would be at that next board meeting on march 16th where the board would need to vote in order to put a referendum on the ballot for june and then the june election is on june 28th of this year so that would be what
041the timeline looks ahead uh now we'll open it up to any questions you have for me or any of the uh the gentleman here or does your opportunity ask clarifying questions um it's for str um so the collaborative spaces yes so in phase two um or it's option two it would be like 75 percent of the collaborative spaces is uh 14 and a half million versus uh 100 is 19. okay so is that really i mean that's money that we could use someplace else right we could we can move that money around and and only do maybe 50 of the collaborative spaces correct yeah kind of in keeping with the structure that we used here to divide by percentage instead of each specific line item you really get bogged down quickly so yeah i think
042that's the beauty of this system you can kind of swap and exchange places again i think that collaborative space is something the campus is really in a rears on is very useful but i think 25 percent of collaborative space would be significantly useful comparison what you have today so you have those choices to redisperse those money and then that could be used towards classrooms or you know or towards warm uh strongholds absolutely yeah okay and you know just just uh something to keep in mind too since this is a public forum is this has been a process that the board and our district has been pursuing for roughly the past eight months a year and so we we don't take this lightly we did have a chance to uh ask questions and had comments to
043uh to talk about uh this and in a little bit of detail but also to be fair um i'd like to um encourage our board here to ask a few questions um if you haven't so the public yes absolutely it's very important i think that um it's known that this is not uh just one moment that we've done this we've been doing this for a very long time uh to deliberate and make sure that we're doing the right thing for the for the general public here in the community are the the numbers um pretty on point like as far as accuracy that 14 million for that you know we believe so uh we put a lot of effort into that and again predicting the future you know we did put in escalation for inflation certainly
044that's more challenging today than it was yesterday but we have accommodated for that so i think this is a good honest effort at a realistic cost for our area at this time how difficult was that given the fact that you know recently the everything has gone up in price so significantly due to covet so how how were you able to really difficult quality price here okay and again predicting the future is challenging in any any discipline and ours is no different and it's interesting to think that in reality um even if you could build it all today i would probably recommend you not because i think we will get stabilization in the markets that will return better value later so we use historical data for that uh certainly it has been above historical data recently
045and we've accommodated that into some degree but it's changing even today we got an update from a service that not only captured what has happened but what they expect to happen and some outlook in and you could see the cliff out in the future but at least there was a cliff out in the future where it does return to some degree of normalcy it is interesting projects we have going on now uh the supply chain issues are very significant i mean there's just no question about it and i'm really optimistic it's going to improve but accommodating future inflation is very challenging along the lines of what you just said if we do go for a june referendum and we pass how soon will we see the funds how long will the planning take how long
046before we start to work because that all plays into your correct your your costs and your timelines can we just get a rough estimate to help us put our talk about planning first and then we'll we'll double back up okay on the bonds uh planning you know would start to work right away but in a complication of you know traditionally spring referendum is much earlier in the year this year it's so late at the end of june so it really makes it virtually impossible to do any meaningful construction in the summer of uh summer of the year and there's the permit process the dead minimum for storm water permits is a 120-day permit window it's just the way it is i don't have to like it that's the one that's the way it is so
047that process built in it does get us well into the winter where we can't do outside construction but we could do some limited inside work but for the most part you'd cycle to really active work on site in the spring and then obviously in the summer of 23 we'd start the renovation at a project this scale you certainly can't do it all in one summer i'd estimate probably at least three summers and just to give you a sense of sense of scale and to keep the school going and to keep the school going safely for students and staff would envision some of the additions starting early spring of 23 because that can be outside and away from the students and build those spaces to give some ability to flex those spaces in early and allow
048people to go back in and work at the spaces that vacated so it's a little bit of three-dimensional chess there but it would start really in earnest with spring a year from almost a year from now nothing happens fast very true okay would you estimate it's about a three-year process then approximately i i think it would probably some portions would be beyond that uh but i think that's probably a reasonable expectation okay thank you in terms of the financing of timing uh upon passage of the referendum the district has five years to issue all the bonds and what what would make sense and what i would recommend is that we don't issue the bonds until the money's actually needed so it would be more related to when the bills start coming in so the district
049doesn't incur interest costs sooner than it needs to okay on the bond and i asked this earlier it you said this affects all taxing bodies so like the um the plants around us and you know the commercial yeah the illustration was just for the median homeowner so if you're if your home loan home is less it would cost less if your home was more cost more and then obviously the business and commercial industrial properties would pay their share as well okay the the also there's there's a median home value that was calculus 229 right 229 220. the us census median home value yeah that's the baseline that we're using as well so the building he was mentioning about storm water earlier with the options this site currently from what i've witnessed has seen has a
050drainage doesn't handle storm water well already and part of the building gets water in it because of that does any of their options address or how do we protect yeah everyone else's benefits historically there's been some water infiltration on the doors on the west side of the site when you really get a rainy vent and certainly there's more site flooding on the northeast corner for sure i think that for the purposes of the options we've kind of dominated the big picture items there's certainly a lot of choices to be made within all this uh i agree with your point that you know it makes prudent sense you know we kind of subscribe to the theory of warm dry and standing and dry not only refers to leaky roofs it certainly is just as applicable to
051uh ground water the water running in the doors so i think it'd be prudent to include that into that that itself probably isn't a huge project but does require to go through the permit process just as if we were doing an addition it's a very highly regulated uh environment but i think it merits serious consideration yeah so to kerry's point protecting the investment is uh i think very prudent right and then also um i want to mention john two who mentioned that um we we do have a water existing water problem here so that's something that we'll definitely need to focus on yeah it's not only that the water running in the doors like i said but the water that stands and freezes and people walk over there and yeah i mean there's a yeah
052safety yeah very dynamic site you have a lot of differing summer related issues some are some are independent it's pretty challenging i just have i have one other question based on we have five years to issue the bonds does that mean the taxpayers will incur the increase in taxes as the bonds are issued or does it happen all at once and goes into like a bank account for us to draw down that i am not clear on sure so so the um the the there'll be no impact to the taxpayers until the bonds are issued okay so this will be a gradual increase potentially over five years and not a sudden one all at once based on everything we've discussed here just at the end of the five years or the issuing of all the
053bonds then that dollar figure will truly be seen so that isn't something we're going to hit people with the day after it passes it's going to be incremental spread out as needed as we do work as permits are approved and and timing allows so this isn't a big one-time whack which makes me feel a little bit better as a taxpayer and that's actually nice to hear i did not i didn't even catch that until just now yeah more than likely the bonds will be issued in chunks as the as the money's needed for the construction project but it'll be spread out to the taxpayers and probably won't start hitting the taxes tax rules for probably two to three years that's great thank you real quick rob to add to that question how does that affect
054the length of the bond and how does that play out well well the intent would be to issue the bond to have the ability to issue the bonds over a 25-year period so uh and that'll be decisions again that's that's the intent right now but the board of education at the time of the issuance will be reviewing different scenarios to see how they want to structure the debt thank you any other questions if not phase four how does that look like colin all right so let's talk about what the future looks like at this next we can go to the next slide one more there we go um so what we'll be working with uh with all the experts and everyone that's you've heard from today we'll be to finalize what this plan looks like
055in the ballot question uh so making sure we finalize that language with legal and then uh identifying the appropriate election to move forward in and then what our team will do is develop the messaging that explains how we got here what's included in this uh so what the public can expect and then we'll have another meeting of our community committee which is already scheduled for march 10th and then as we talked about you all would vote at your next board meeting to put that question on the ballot and then we would work to get that information out to the public so that's what the next steps would look like here as part of phase four now that we've completed phase three okay thank you os str and rob rosie next is our equity report [Music]
056hello everyone my name is mike barago and this is your equity report first and foremost i hope that the new year is off to a great start for all of you since we didn't have a january report we will highlight information for both january and february our january and february commemorative observances and holidays are the following january 17th was martin luther king day february 1st was lunar new year february the entire month of february is black history month and on february 25th we have the gay straight alliance day for racial justice during our january 3rd institute day we had a number of teachers students admins and counselors who provided professional learning opportunities for our staff some highlights from that day included brave our gsa group here at fenn high school discussed gender identity this was
057led by ms muscarello and one of our student members the podcast club discussed topics about anti-racism and education the discussion was led by mr gendron ms toe and mr mitchell a micro regression student panel discussion where students participated and did an amazing job providing our staff with insights about their own experiences when it comes to microaggression in school mr maitl mr castro also led restorative practices discussions we also had daca and undocumented student updates from mr kano and mr gakis ebr discussion also uh were led by miss papa nikolao and we had trauma informed uh meeting discussion led by miss connor and mr jurger thank you to all the those that helped out lead the discussions on january 31st our instructional coaches led the fourth session of our grading for equity book study the session
058focused on developing bias resistant grading as well as valuing student knowledge as a base for their grades and minimizing if not eliminating the impact of environment and behavior i had a chance to join miss cushing and miss norris's cohort where great and thought provoking conversation took place big shout out to our teacher leaders for doing a great job facilitating the conversation our equal opportunity schools aka eos committee has hosted some fantastic events in january they hosted one of the most successful ap rush virtually ap teachers made themselves available through google me for students who are interested in learning more about their ap courses and the showing was greater than ever on february 1st the committee hosted a parent series event led by ap teachers students and parents who have had students take ap the purpose
059of the event was to provide parents with information about what ap is all about and why it's a great opportunity for students to take and just to highlight our whys the eos committee is committed to increasing student exposure to ap courses the rigor and college level experience that the courses offer not only increase students likelihood of success in college but that they graduate within the first four years big shout out to our committee leader ms ward and all the members for their amazing efforts at the end of the first semester we conducted our initial equity self audit with our staff the data we collected was reviewed by a professional learning strand and used as a baseline for developing professional learning opportunities for the month of february the strand has created weekly opportunities for staff to
060learn more about diversity equity and inclusion on february 10th the family and community as agency strand held their very first equity advisory committee meeting at deer grove leisure center the goal of the meeting was to inform parents and the community and community members about fenton's equity action plan as well as develop partnership with them through the formation of an advisory committee the meeting was a great success where we had members from pate sonitos polish parents group booster club and pto attend the event we also had representatives from bensonville school district to attend as noted in our commemorative observances and holidays this month is black history month a black student union and a diversity committee have put together events throughout the month to celebrate and recognize black excellence from both history and the present here are
061some of the planned events every day during announcements we will recognize black excellence from leaders in a variety of disciplines including science technology engineering math business arts history and those in communities such as lgbtq plus mr escobedo and kaleidoscope will host two open mic events themed around black history we partnered with our film club to show movies highlighting black excellence and black experience every wednesday after school this month 1800s versus 2020 virtual play screening will be scheduled in the next couple of weeks the premise of the play is if slaves from the 1800s could talk to black americans in the 2020s what would the conversation be like our bsu students would like to host name that tune game with prizes and soul food takeover during lunch periods we're excited for that lastly our chemistry teachers
062and students led by ms lamy and mr lynch set up a black history periodic table check out the images they did a great job more importantly we want to emphasize that black history and recognizing black excellence is not just for the month of february instead it's for every day that wraps it up for this report until next time my name is mike varago take care and be good to yourself okay i'll jump into um college credit opportunities here at fenton we just wanted to briefly talk about early college credit we all know it's very important it not only saves our students money and saves them time in the long run and helps them become more prepared for when they do enter a college setting but they're more likely to complete their experience through graduation when
063they actually do go to college so i have some important efforts and developments to share in this area so you you have an understanding of what we're doing here at fenton i think before i jump into specifics about fenton i want to clarify the general sources of early college credit that are available so there's dual credit dual enrollment and advanced placement they're all a little different so i i just wanted to kind of brief you on those subtle differences because trying to navigate this world of working with the universities some of them really prefer certain types of options and we're trying to pursue certain types of options so in a dual credit scenario those courses are taught by high school teachers that are credentialed by the university so the university has to say yes they
064have a master's degree in that content area they can teach our course for us so students stay on campus our teachers teach them mean state on high school yeah they stay on campus here at clinton our teachers teach them they're awarded the university credit and they're awarded a credit from us we use their curriculum for the most part or at least strongly aligned to their curriculum then there's dual enrollment in dual enrollment the courses are taught by the college or university professors either on their college campus or remotely our students become a registered student of that university or college and they're a registered student of the high school so they're dually enrolled or dually registered the credit is awarded by the college or university and they don't care what we do with the rest of
065it it's up to us whether we want to give them that credit or not the curriculum is developed and delivered by the calendar university the third way is through advanced placement which we've heard a lot about here at fenton because we do that really well right we have about 24 courses that we provide in this area these are taught by high school teachers that are trained by the college board not any specific university but by the organization itself students are registered at the high school not registered at any college in particular and the credit is awarded based on the college choices they make and whether that college chooses to award them credit based on how they performed on an exam the curriculum is adopted from the college board so those are the three general types
066of college credit with the dual enrollment i see they're registered at the college is that where the classes take place um for dual enrollment it's either on campus at the college or remotely it's transportation yeah we don't these are just general opportunities we don't actually have a dual enrollment opportunity where students go to a college campus at this time but in the case that we did we would likely provide the transportation right so i'm going to talk about what we're doing at fenton i just wanted to give that brief overview because it's nice to get some definitions out of the way um so we work with a variety of partners of course we pursue a partnership with the college of dupage right they're our community college we seek dual credit with them in a variety
067of areas right now where we're doing focusing much of our effort is in the cte areas such as culinary and education and some of those other career and technical education fields we also have been working with the college of dupage and this is a little sidebar-ish but the transition courses so sometimes at the community college students they'll look at students and say based on your test scores you have to take these remedial courses and you're not going to get any credit for them and in some community colleges not so much at cod as much as maybe some others you might have to take two or three non-credit bearing courses before you can even get a college credit in that area so there was a law passed in 2016 called the power act and it said
068you know what colleges you have to do something with the high schools so when a student graduates they can go into college credit bearing courses so we do we've been doing that with cog in the math area for the last couple of years and fenton was at the heart of a pilot for english last year so we're hoping to see some some pieces solidify in that area in the realm of english as well another university we've just started developing a stronger relationship with is elmhurst university they have been in discussion with us about dual credit for calc 3. if some of you might recall we just started offering cal 3 this year and we were partnering with the university of illinois in a dual enrollment situation it was okay we got feedback along the way
069we feel like a transition to a different program might be beneficial to our students at fenton so it wasn't okay it was okay but it we feel like a transition is would be good overall adequate's the better word yes it was adequate but not good okay got it it it may have had its pros and cons got it okay so trying to be diplomatic understood i'm not so um we're we feel pretty promised by the um relationship that we can establish with elmhurst university what they do differently in cal 3 just to be more specific is they actually have like a live teacher that will teach it instead of like email correspondence and sometimes u of i would zoom but the biggest piece is university of illinois used the special coding that students had to
070learn like a coding language before they could answer questions whereas in elmhurst they can just answer the questions so we're excited about that we do our we will have to sign an mou with them and we will have to um modify our course catalog just a bit because right now it says we partner with u of i and we're going to make that change and be looking to do that at a upcoming board meeting they also want to potentially work with us on dual enrollment in freshman college algebra freshman english one and a dual enrollment capacity so they still want their teachers teaching it they're not looking to credential our teachers to teach their courses whereas cod is sometimes willing to do that and allow our teachers to teach in a dual credit we also
071have the advanced placement where we have 24 different classes and based on the exam results our students earn many many credits and then we have the technology center of dupage and right now that center does work with cod and last year 24 of our students earned approximately 217 early credit early college credits so those are our primary partners right now in this work and we continue to look to see how we can grow these opportunities for students and as it evolves i'll continue to update you thank you michelle this this is wonderful um you know as far as the opportunity especially with our our status of our school as a title one school to have the opportunity to earn these credits and i just want to thank you know college dupage and elmhurst university publicly
072for um partnering with us in that way so just like to reiterate to you next month we'll uh we'll bring the mou uh our collaboration with elmer's to the board to approve exactly yeah will they have to have an mlu is college english one is that like our english for our uh no it'd be their college level freshman course english one-on-one thank you michelle just real quick lunch period exploration we're always trying to find more space for our students whether it's prior to covet or currently here we know it's crowded over there in our cafeteria we are just exploring the idea of a fourth period lunch as you guys know we are piloting a open lunch for our seniors um i think it's going well we wish they would take more advantage of it um
073but it is what it is uh so we're exploring this um a fourth period lunch perhaps seventh period um just to create more space um for next year so i'll keep you posted in regards to that question yes how long are lunch periods 45 minutes what about having two i mean have four but in a shorter amount of time and and then do study hall you know like just move them out a lot of a lot of black schedule does that but what it does patty is that it it plays with our traditional one through eight program so now if if uh if an individual if you split a a lunch uh in in half let's say 20 minutes right 23 minutes and um you're creating more slash and opportunities i guess to for lack
074of a better word for that students to to attend that that period um it's very tricky uh and difficult to to manage and part of the reason too as well as you know is where do we put them if we split them right if we have 350 students in the lunchroom let's say you want to split it in half where would that 150 go while one the other 150 is eating lunch we've looked at that um for a study hall or someplace or well we have study halls throughout the day we do not want to over populate our study halls what a fourth period lunch would do is just really to create more space for individuals it won't it won't do we really need more space i mean like like covets going it's it's 45
075minutes in a tight space it's tough for our kids it really is and you know if you welcome to come here any day and and observe them and i know some of you guys have done that it's just really tight uh during covet or prior to covet um so we're looking at that space what what a a simple solution is a fourth period launch it doesn't uh complicate um the schedules that we do have there are our master schedules so it's just hey look there's more opportunities hey look you take the 14 1500 students we have and divided by four or something bad effect so we're looking at that we're looking at the pros and cons just wanted to put that on your radars uh that could and could not happen but we're just exploring
076everything preparing for next year this is the time to start prepping for next year what what time would a seven period seventh period would start at 1 40. oh okay 140 there was a question in regards to hey look a lot of people eating lunch until 1 40. exactly and our solution would be a snack table yeah possibly during bison time whether it's an apple but some folks might like that because they would stay for an extracurricular or an athletic event they might rather prefer a seventh period lunch so they're refreshed and there's also opportunity if you got an early release uh eighth period um for seniors who have all their credits already they could take off right after sixth year so there's a lot of play there so we're just exploring it right now
077i just want to put that on your radar like anything else there's we don't like you guys don't like surprises we don't like surprises as well one other question approximately how many students are taking advantage of the launch pilot is it i would say about 60. yeah when it gets warmer though i hope so i hope so with that would you go away from would you be adding the period to the end if you're going with a seventh period uh first would we be adding a period no it would be an opportunity for students to have a seventh period lunch we would not add an extra period so instead of an eight per day it wouldn't not be a ninth period day it's just seventh period some students have lunch some students don't again creating
078space next slide please just uh heads up um summer school day starts june 13th ends july 25th um what are we going to do with uh polling place uh question is what are we going to do at the polling place uh we have been selected and we have uh agreed that fenton high school will be a polling place on june 28th for the primary election that the location for the polling will be in the field house so it's really separated and isolated from our summer school students summer school ends at approximately 12 o'clock so we should have enough individuals in the building to keep the two entities separated we will have a security guard on both hallways and the doors will be closed and folks who are voting knows not to enter the building in
079that direction so as you know the field house it's in the back over there they'll they'll park there vote leave so the enter correct on the side not through door one what's the benefit of having the polling place here i'm just you know you said you were selected i'm just here's what happened um usually the primary is in march okay and it's usually at the golf course this year was a special year uh summer of 2022 and the primary was scheduled in june so the golf course basically said we cannot hold it because that's the prime time for golfing so they were looking for places uh within the bensonville area and um usually schools and fenton had the facilities for it and quite frankly you know we know in bensonville fenton is the crossroad of
080the community everyone kind of knows where that is next slide go with quick updates here excuse me james yes and um it'll just be for this one uh election right it will only be one that's a great question julia yes it's just for this one i believe after this year it'll go back to march good question covert updates real quick trend is going down all age levels here this is into page all the slides i'll be showing is dupage and fenton that's a great trend to have here's another trend in regards to the age group the pediatrics from 0 to 4 5 to 14 and 16 to 19. headed that way covet cases where uh what is this one i cannot read it i'm sorry as it is what is it by residence yes once
081again uh it's on its way down really not much to report there covet case by hospitalization again going down all the trends are in the the right direction our fenton numbers you see that search there in january 17th the 14th and still continue to matriculate downwards thank you jose and sam for really keeping an eye on that and continuing with our mitigation efforts and real quickly what this one is about here is i just wanted to remind the board or inform the board where we're at especially with all the different mitigations the ruling i just want to spend just two or three minutes to regroup to summarize where we're at currently as of today so the federal mitigation in place to this point as we know public transportation transportation which includes our bus is run
082federally the cdc uh this includes our school buses and all school transportation still requires masking okay that's at the federal level it gets more interesting at the state level next slide please as you know on june i'm sorry on february 4th a temporary restraining order was issued by a lower court preventing the state from placing masking mandates for district named in the lawsuit fenton was not named in that lawsuit and the class action was not granted basically we're not bounded to that suit then on that i think the next day the illinois state attorney filed an appeal to the fourth district appellate court so it's a higher court in springfield on february 4th the appellate court is scheduled to make a ruling within two weeks when it was filed which could happen at the end
083of this week i'm hoping tomorrow i'm hoping friday okay then yesterday evening uh jay carr let me just remember the acronym the joint committee on administrative rules yesterday temporarily suspended the emergency mass rules for schools okay um so what did the appellate court do after yesterday the appellate court asked jay carr to submit any briefs they had by 1 pm today we are anticipating that telecourt would make a ruling soon if not tomorrow or friday and we are waiting on that ruling okay also we are preparing we know that mass option is probably around the corner okay we are prepared to that we are talking to individuals in in our building sam has done a great job with a communication effort um and we are preparing for that ruling from the appellate court to happen
084i think it could go either two ways right right uh so uh let's let's wait for that ruling it could be hey look it's the mask mandate is still uh applicable or it could be like the lower courts you know it's not null and void we're ready to act either way right now what's what's keeping us from going mass pop shawn now what is preventing us from going we're waiting for the appellate court to roll why do we have to wait for them because we are right now we're not named on the suit there um so we we are still in that mass mandate now that's not what my understanding of it but i mean you probably you know better because you've been speaking illegal but right um yeah there my understanding is that it
085it incorporated everyone you can look at it that way and that's how some school districts have interpreted it and some other public individuals have interpreted we have spoken to legal right now we're not legally bounded by that ruling at the lower court what patty what i'm i'm asking all the board is to wait for this appellate court to make that ruling this this uh whether it's tomorrow or on friday to see where we're at now with that said the board can also decide in regards to if the ruling is let's say a mask mask up right or still the mascot mandate is still in play the board could make a decision uh in regards to hey look we would like to go mask option i think we should vote on that i think we should
086go mast optional and vote on that tonight i i highly would recommend it that's a great uh that's a an opinion there if i think we should wait for the appellate court that would be my recommendation to the board i i want to just say this to i i understand i think i can speak for everyone here plus our community who who likes masks who likes to wear them no one zero no one does everybody wants to go back to normal whatever normal is now right we know that and i would just say this let's be very careful and cautious and wait for things to play out very likely we're going to have an answer within a week of this and thinks things are playing out though kit i i i disagree i mean the
087mass you know if you follow the science unless you're wearing an m95 with a filter on it masks don't do anything for the virus okay it it they're they're not effective our numbers have dropped off i think if if somebody wants to wear a mask if they feel more comfortable doing that um let them wear a mask i drive two little kids to school every morning twins they've gone mass optional at their school one wears a mask the other one doesn't one feels more comfortable wearing it the other one doesn't so it's let let those who feel like they want to protect themselves if they think that the mask does that then let them wear that but i don't think you should hold everybody else hostage i don't in my opinion it's not a matter
088of holding someone hostage it is uh it's a public health issue and i'm in a public setting and my concern should not solely be about my own comfortability but the environment that i'm in and i don't care for this mass it irritates the heck out of me however i'm not at home i'm in a public setting and it should be more than just about are you worried me and my ability i'm being considerate of of of my environment people in my environment and in my opinion it's the issue of that it's a consideration that i'm not on an island by myself and it's shown that whether i'm showing symptoms or not if i'm conte from i have it i'm spreading it that is that's just true and i see the mask the potential if it's
089one way or the other we can we'll address it at that time but the mask and the sanitizer it's just about prevention so james can i just ask you a question have you spoken to legal and what was their recommendation and could you um talk to us a little bit about if they gave you any sort of reason as to why maybe we should wait for the day or two until this uh ruling comes down right that's a great question before i answer that question just really we believe we've meaning the administration personally myself with that the layered mitigation which we have been endorsing and working on diligently day in and day out as well as the entire staff we believe for that to work to be back in school to be in person to
090be able to have extracurricular to be in in the halls and in the classroom i've repeatedly spoke to our legal at least twice this week the most prudent thing he said was to wait until the appellate court because he could go either both ways the reason why he said is to wait if it really depends if it's if it's masked on um it would and let's say we we decide to uh go mask optional it's very it's going to be very very difficult for us to get everyone back to hey look it's mascon okay here's where it stands here's where the law is this is the appellate court this is the law of the land it's going to be very hard there's a lot of analogy in getting in regards to letting the toothpaste out
091of the tube that's going to be a reality here that's the main reason there then he also said if it's mask optional act on it immediately this is a a very difficult and passionate subject and you can go on the internet and you can do research and you can even read professional journals that contradict each other regularly so far we as a board and as a school district have followed the recommendation of the state and the county to protect us legally and because that's the only advice we can get we're a school board personal feelings aside i have my opinions i have my training i have my background i also understand that we have to lead by example and we don't always agree with the laws we don't like seat belts we don't like helmets
092we don't like masks we don't like this we don't like that we're a society of laws and regulations i'm not particularly fond of how our governor went about this i think he could have been done better but the state board of education and the county board of education have made a determination we followed their determination until now i have a feeling we're within about a week or a week and a half of having a ruling we are eventually going to be going optional there's no way around it it's going to happen the numbers are showing that we followed this course and we've been prudent in doing so as much as i'd like to say tonight let's do it i'd like to hear what the courts say also it is not on our agenda we cannot
093vote on things that are not on our agenda otherwise we're violating other state statutes now if we want to wait for the ruling and call a special meeting i am very happy to have a debate on this and i have a vote on this and if four members say to do one thing so be it but honestly it's a moot point this is not on our agenda cannot act on this on our without this being on our agenda and we're gonna have a direction here in a couple of days i'd like to see where it goes and then we can get our opinions to the president and if we want to call a special meeting if we need to take specific action if we want to go against that recommendation i'm in favor of it
094let's have a meeting and let's have a debate let's have a vote but until then i feel this is a moot point this isn't even an agenda item that is true but and uh but if it is if it comes down and it is masked off its mask off i mean we don't even have to do anything right it's it's mad it's massive it's just done it's masculine if the pellet core says hey it's mask option it's a mask option we we comply to it like we're following the recommendations as we have done all along and i'm perfectly comfortable with that i'd like to see us let this play out and if it doesn't come out as match optional and enough of us feel that we should have a vote and go against that then
095let's call a special meeting let's address that specific topic let's make it an agenda item and let's vote on it and see where the seven of us feel the four of us feel that way four of us feel that way we're one of seven four four wins it's that simple you patty thank you john um just real quick next one right there for you kit is our we have four points we received this month uh first one is from abc 7 chicago in regards to remote learning its request to find out what remote tech equipment was returned damaged or missing from the 2021 school year the answer would be none then b is the illinois retired teacher association for 2022 basically uh they would like to know the individuals that are retiring the number of
096of individuals that are retiring from fenton number c is smart procurement this is basically um in regards to the staff name department phone extension and email address requests shared at the staff directory on our website site is that accurate mayor tennis yes it is okay that has been resolved and lastly from seiu local 773 a list of seiu members with hire date and email address this was also provided that's the end of the report okay thank you and uh next would be going through the consent agenda um starting with financials and do we have any questions okay um i do have a question just a clarification question about the covet leave mou and i i assume it's it does follow the the same as the fda correct that is correct okay so um and i
097i know i i asked this in an email but um to so just to clarify so if somebody is able to do their job at home they just they get regular pay but they're um on leave is that professional right i mean maybe a forensic would be like a secretary okay so secretary then that's eligible for the leave would then work as a secretary from home and then get the covered leave day okay if you get the covert leave pay instead of their regular pay no it's a regular pay oh it's just it has to do with are you taking a sick day you know like typically if you're at home like let's just say you've got a stomach ache and you're at home you take a sick day you don't work from home what
098we're saying here is with the coveted leave this is a special situation and someone could be at home and work and still benefit the organization so that that's the concept behind that so now my understanding is this is only for vaccinated individuals correct okay and and the reason for that is similar to what i said with with fda is that the other examples we have seen um that's how it has been and then it was agreed upon by both sides so then there's in my humble opinion i think there's discrimination going on against those who are unvaccinated this covetly is there a time period or clock put on this the end of the school year is the clock so it goes from the beginning of the school year to the end of the school year
099so all they do it'll they submit the the form it'll be how long is it every year i'm sorry would it be revisited no sir no it would just be for this school year just for this school year and then depending on what happens next school year if they wanted to reintroduce this conversation we would start the you know conversations over again but it's just for this school year yeah just like the teachers this is modeled exactly off what we do with the teachers the only difference is the security guards because they can't work from home they got they got a smaller number of days allotted and this was negotiated by their union yes this is a letter initiated by their union representing their members on what they wish correct yes that's all i wanted
100to hear and we agreed to it and there's no financial impact right or minimal sick instead of having sick days sick but they're working from home so it benefits us right no absolutely okay they're going to get paid either way correct you're either going to pay to land a couch and watch tv or they're going to be on their computer and coaching right on their couch you get paid no different than a lot of other people who work from home from their office so if someone is unvaccinated but they can still work from home then they don't get leave or they have to use sick time an unvaccinated person is not eligible for the covet leave so typical then if they're sick at home then they're they're sick at home but if they're not sick
101and they couldn't work from home we don't have uh arrangements where someone is just sick and therefore they just work from home this is a special circumstance around colvin that's a broader discussion which which we haven't entertained would be in general if someone is sick and unable to come in would you then allow them to work from home we're not ready for that conversation that opens up but don't you have that in there yeah that's part of that for you i'm talking about generally speaking let's say let's say again someone has a stomach ache and they're not able to come in we're not going to get into a realm where someone is homesick and they're in another one not coveted related and able to work from home and now they're gonna say okay you're gonna
102work from home rather than come in taking a sick day right it's this very very specific exposure for the district related to covet right got it so someone is home with colvin with cobit okay but can work but they're unvaccinated they don't get that same they're not eligible for the cold with leave okay i i see that as someone like for instance a insurance company when you take uh the extra precaution to do something like you get a smoke detector or a fire alarm system in your house you get a credit i mean that's how i i see that's how it was was it used to encourage people to be vaccinated or or just a benefit for them to be you know that's that's how i i see it as it was a benefit for
103those who took the extra precaution or to to be vaccinated is that what it you know and you said it was agreed by both sides so right i mean that's really what we come down to this is what their negotiated their union negotiated and we we agreed to it there's no cost to us they basically asked for that i think this is something that they need to fight out within the union that this isn't our place as someone who's been on both sides of that coin and fought the fight on both sides i i think we're diving in deeper than we need it's an mou that we're agreeing on correct they brought this mou to us we didn't bring this to them they initiated this mlu and this is the language they brought to us
104representing their members i i don't feel it's our place to go back and say well we're going to give you more because how does that help our bargaining position when we negotiate the contract with the next time this is what their members agreed to they brought it to us we can agree to it i think we're getting into this deeper than we have to we're just agreeing to something that their members offered because it benefits both parties we all think there's been a contract out there where i like every single page of it the the dilemma too is that um we've already agreed to it with fva correct any other questions with the consent agenda if not may have a motion to approve the consent agenda as presented i will make that motion okay okay
105thank you may i get a roll call please yes regal yes figueroa yes hey yes galwig no lewis yes redzinsky yes team paul palm yes and uh motion passed uh let's get to the discussion items uh with the teachers retirement system supplemental savings plan resolution so that that um is we have a resolution before you tonight to to act on or we hope you can act on it this happened began in 2018 the illinois legislature amended the illinois pension code to add a requirement that the teachers retirement system provide an optional deferred contribution contribution benefit to all eligible members of trs beginning in 2021. last year the po the code was further amended to clarify that the trs covered employers as the school district would uh must participate in the ssb the supplemental savings plan
106through trs so um this the legislature dictated it to the trs trs is then imposing it on us probably not the right word but but requiring school districts to offer a 457 plan which is basically a similar to a 401k in the in the private sector just a tax deferred savings program in addition they're also uh this hasn't begun yet but we're told it will begin um when they get this launched and it's been delayed a number of times due to some uh issues on their end with trs launching this this thing across the state you know so it's a pretty significant program to set up but new this change i think it was all employees at one time but just new employees now will be automatically enrolled so if you don't want to participate
107you'll have to opt out of the program so that's that's another requirement of the program so we have to offer it um through payroll deduction obviously and in order to make that happen the board has to act on the resolution in order to be full and compliant participants with this program so the other thing we're a little you know there's been some pushback from school administrators across the state on this because we now we offer these programs we don't offer a 457 but we offer a 403 b and we offer both a traditional plan and a roth one plan and we have total control over we use a third-party administrator to ensure that we're in compliance you know whatever people are contributing or if they take out a loan or all that you know requirements
108are monitored by us and we hire someone to do that and with this particular program that management responsibility liability uh i should say management responsibility is not ours it's on the state and they're using voya to administer that on their behalf however the liability still falls on us so that's been kind of a sticking point with schools across the state particularly northern illinois and they've been lobbying for some changes with this program um we've pushed it as far as we can go many some school district adopted this months ago we waited as long as we could along with many of my fellow colleagues to see if there was going to be any further changes but we're kind of at the end of our our rope and i don't mean to make it sound like this
109is a tragic you know program but do we not retire it is it is a little frustrating that they're kind of you know demanding this program but yet not really letting you control it um so anyhow uh that's kind of where we're at with this whole 457 plan um so once the board acts on the resolution there's additional paperwork that we'll have to submit to the trs to begin the program but um you know if this all goes the way it is unless trs you know delay something further staff would uh could enroll as early as march um as i said you know we offer a 403 v now both roth on a traditional plan we're considering offering our own 457 plan where we would have control over it i think that kind of makes
110sense i talked to mr tango about that as well it wouldn't cost us any additional money and it would be another option for our staff so you could contribute the max to the 457 you could contribute the max to the 403b and shelter even more money there hasn't been huge demand for that but there may be now that this program is out there so i probably gave you way more information than you wanted to hear on this but in any event there is a resolution we would ask the board to consider tonight to act on so is the ssp the same as the 457b or is it it is the 450. okay but the four that's we have control over that but we don't have control over the ssp correct yes so can we offer
111one or the other or can we just offer the 450 status well right now we don't have a 457 the 457 plan would be the ssp okay what we would propose is to offer our own 457 to kind of compete with this almost you could say um wait so it would be much easier for people to enroll or change or that type of thing if it's local and yeah exactly so this would be in addition to what we already offer 403 b the roth uh account and then also the uh the 457. yes okay the 457 is a defined benefit plan basically right that is so correct so it's a contributory from us from from the district we don't know it's we don't make any uh the there's no employer contribution it's just the the
112okay so it's a voluntary percentage-wise to to the trs yes okay got it so so right now my understanding when i was reading was that the ssp was like there's an opt-in option right now right but for new employees they have to opt out right now it's off opt-in for everybody because they've not flushed this out with the automatic enrollment for the new folks but that is coming we're told by the summer okay so we'll we'll when we hire new staff we will certainly inform them of you're now an enrollee of trs you know so um you know then here's how you if you want to change that we can guide them through that we'll do our due diligence and properly educating them to their options yeah it can be politically correct well said well
113said yes so just just to be clear we're voting on introducing the trs the 457 plan but not necessarily i'm sorry yeah we're asking the board to approve the resolution that would initiate this 457 sap through the trs yes right but but not exactly if we're going to self-administer or go through the state well it wouldn't be through the state it would be through we don't have a choice this is we're presenting it to you but it's really we have to do it we're [Music] well articulated thank you bruce may i have a motion that the board of education adopt the resolution authorizing execution of employer participation agreement for system supplemental savings plans through the teachers retirement system of illinois so moved second thank you i may have a roll call yes rhaego yes paid
114yes jellowick yes lewis yes redzinski yes figueroa yes ting po pong no no i'm just kidding yes all right uh so let's get to the committee report he almost reviewed the whole thing all over it that's right i didn't get the memory board reports let's start with the the bcf um we had a meeting last last thursday nothing new to report uh board di committee um we we we discussed meeting and it's gonna based on our scheduling and a lot going on with our next meeting we're gonna probably go through in april uh finance and facilities committee we had this uh we had the meeting this uh earlier this morning carrie john we went thoroughly on it so i think it was covered very well in our meeting and i think it was covered very
115well in our informational item and we have a lot that's going on we have a lot to consider and we're going to keep the public as well as formed as we can and just reassure everybody we're doing our due diligence and we're listening to the input and we're going to try and make the best decision possible moving forward and that's more than i wanted to say thank you well said the isp delegate i i don't have anything before we've got a meeting coming up for members uh it should be in your invites and uh blend land real quick there was a meeting uh two weeks ago i've uh put that in my report to to the board approximately a week ago there basically it's new legislation in springfield there's approximately 14 of them um once
116again they have not been voted for no there's a couple there's more couple interesting ones yes there is yeah like mental health days and um and also the teacher evaluations from for tenure correct so we'll see um in the next couple months where those new legislation fall into place thank you uh nedsec it was two meetings and uh one of them it was james attending two weeks ago correct and the meeting from yesterday i mean monday we didn't make it so we don't know about it right i will provide a briefing at my board report on that one but two weeks ago it was basically planning for the summer school at the netseq facilities all right thank you in the board policy committee nothing we've got a couple in a couple months we have one
117coming up we do we have not received any new policies yet um so the next board meeting um for new business next board meeting wednesday march 16th 2022 at 7 00 p.m as usual and board finance facilities committee meeting will take place prior to that regular march board meeting as well at 6. so may i have a motion and a second to go into closed session for the purpose of the employment employment compensation discipline performance or dismissal specific employees of the public body or legal counsel for the public body including hearing testimony on a complaint lodged against an employee of the public body or against legal counsel for the public body to determine its validity however a meeting to consider an increase in compensation to specific employee of the public body that is subject to
118the local government wage increase transparency act may not be closed and shall be opened to the public and posted and held in accordance with the act law five illinois cs 122 c1 and collective negotiating matters between the public body and its employees or their representatives or deliberations concerning salary schedules for one or more classes of employees again repeat 5l illinois cs120c2 2c2 uh can't get a motion it's not moved i'll say take a breath okay roll call please yes uh motion pass to go in executive session let's take a five minute break we'll come back oh i'll be happy too second okay roll call please oh here we go okay rhaegal yes lewis yes rosinski yes please figueroa yes yes yes motion pass and we are back in open session jim are you ready okay
119uh we have no further business so may have emotion and second to adjourn so moved second roll call please uh reagan julie yes okay redzinski yes figueroa yes haid yes jalawi yes lewis yes ting po pong yes uh everybody have a good night and uh meeting adjourned thank you thank you guys you motioned for the open session but and was it carrie yeah yes that sounds great you