Board of Education - Nov 24 2025

001Look at all this time and Mrs. Mullen Beck. We are ready. Hello everyone. Uh, welcome to tonight's meeting of the board of education of Glen Brook High School District 225. Um, and could we start please um with the role? Miss Smith. Mr. Downing here. Mr. Glowaki present. Mrs. Hope here. Miss Mullenbeck here. Mr. O'Hara here. Mr. Shine present. Dr. Steinberg. Six members present. Thank you, Miss Smith. Um, moving on. Um, do we have any changes to the agenda that was circulated? Uh, Dr. Grall, there have been no changes. In that case, could I have a motion, please, to approve the agenda? I move. Second. All in favor? I. Any opposed? Motion carries. Next on the agenda is our superintendent report. So, take it away, Dr. Grall. Thank you so much, Miss Melenbeck, and welcome to

002so many people who are here. For our friends who might be streaming online, I want to assure you that between two rooms, we have an amazing amount of student athletes, young scholars, parents, and community members here to celebrate in some amazing recognitions. To kick those off, I'd like to invite Mrs. Hughes and Dr. Georgees to the podium to introduce our journalism award recipients. Good evening. So, tonight uh from GBN, we are pleased to recognize our Torch editors and award recipients, including some recent alumni responsible for last year's editorial staff and some of the awards as well. So, when I say your first names, just u wave so that we can recognize you. So, for this year's uh staff, we have Natalie, Raphaela, Molly, Lucy, Jaden, and our alumni, Alex, and Senori, Caitlyn, and Marissa, who

003I was not able to be here this evening, but I wanted to share a little bit about why they're here. So, the National Scholastic Press Association conducts an annual critique service evaluating and scoring entries in the areas of coverage and content, text, visuals, and presentation. According to the NSPA's website, the composite score from all sections awards an honor rating ranging from third class to all-American. And the all-American rating is the highest rating given in the critique service. The 20242 edition of the torch earned all American recognition, making this the third time in the last four years that the torch has been recognized as an all-American newspaper. Our editors were Alex and Seni. In addition, we are recognizing several NSPA individual awards um for our journalists. First to our junior Lucy, seniors Raphaela, Molly, and alumni

004Marissa and Caitlyn who finished fifth in the nation for their page spread titled Teen Budgeting, which was published last fall. And finally, our seniors Jaden Han, Raphaela, and alumni Cait Kaitton Caitlyn Lou, sorry, earned honorable mention for their piece Behind the Headlines, which was the brainchild of then editor-inchief Alex. So, we want to say congratulations to our TORs journalists for their hard work and national recognition. Thank you, Miss Hughes. Similar to the torches experience, the Oracle was awarded the first place with two distinctions by NSPA and Anna Ellery and Molly, our current co-editors and chief were all part of the editorial board for that winning year last year. In addition to NSPA, these co-editors and chief are also here to represent the Oracles award at Kempa, the Kettlearine Press Association Journalism Conference that was held

005in uh last October. In addition to numerous individual awards for students, the newspaper received all Kempa honors, which is the highest honor for papers. The Oracle continues to receive accolades as it was just awarded third place in the nation at the best of show competition for newspapers at the journalism education association's national conference that was just held what was that last week. Yeah. Uh in uh Nashville. Um a total of 22 Oracle editors attended the JA conference along with almost 5,000 other student journalists from high schools around the country. Um the 16 editors from the paper competed in on-site competitions and of the 16 12 won awards and tonight we have them in attendance with us. So, Olivia uh for news writing, Meredith for editorial writing, Emma for feature writing, Bailey for sports writing, Molly

006for review writing, Ellery for commentary writing, Maya for newspaper layout, Zoha for press law and ethics, Anna for YB caption and sports, and Ammani for um graphic design and infographics. and also Reese and May who could not be with us this evening. So, let's give these ladies a round of applause. So proud of them and the kids at South know I always celebrate my awesome of the day and whenever I have my press conference it's my awesome of the day ladies. Um I would also like to take a moment to celebrate Mr. Bob Wisaki. um he is our Oracle teacher and adviser who was just named the 2025 Kempa adviser of the year. Now annually at the fall Scholastic Journalism Conference, Kempa um the organization honors adviserss of the year. These adviserss are selected for

007this distinction based on nominations that honor specific actions of what the adviser has done and or what has have they accomplished that sets them apart from their peers. I am so grateful that this organization has honored Bob for his knowledge, his inspirational work with our students and the quality of advising that he has provided these budding budding journalists. Your mentorship to other staff, your expertise and your passion for journalism have played a pivotal role in shaping these students and the journalism program at Glen Brook South. Uh and in the spirit of thanksgiving, I am eternally grateful to have the privilege to walk alongside you. Congratulations. So to all of our journalism honores, this would be your moment to make it out of here before soccer from North comes in. This is your moment. Congratulations. We

008are so proud of all of you. Congratulations, ladies. Good job. Good job. And as this transition is happening, we are very excited to welcome our 2025 IHSA Division 3A third place at state in boys soccer. So, as they come on in, go ahead and make a few rolls so everyone can see you guys. Welcome to everyone again. Welcome everyone. And we'll just give some of your parents just a few moments so they can transition on in here. And at this point, I'm pleased to introduce Mrs. Hughes and Mrs. Tomlinson, our athletic director. Yes, we are excited and thrilled to recognize our IHSA Division 3A third place at state boys soccer team. And so, as I say your first names, um, we're going in alphabetical order, so just wave when I say your first name, okay?

009We have Nick, Matteo, Paulo, Asher, Brennan, Ethan, Simon, Nikita, Ian, Jackson, Eric, Ben, Ethan, Kieran, Jack, Eddie is not with us right now. Kusrav Oh, he is. Yay, you're here. Okay. Um, Joseph, Tommy, Manuel, John, Alexander, Cam, Flynn, Michael, Adrian, and our coaches. We have Coach Vignyoki, Coach Ha, and Coach Lockach, and our coach, uh, Demano was not able to be here tonight, but we're very excited. Here to say some more words about the epic season of boys soccer is our athletic director, Molly Tomlinson. The GBN boys soccer team concluded their season with a remarkable overall record of 213 and3. The col c culminating in a third place finish at the IHSA state tournament. A season defined by exceptional leadership, resilience, and a historic championship run. The team secured multiple major titles throughout the year,

010including being crowned Bington tournament champs, CSL South co-ch champs, a title clinched by upsetting Maine South and forcing a three-way tie, and achieving an IHSA playoff sweep as regional, sectional, and super sectional champions. The team was led by a substantial and cohesive group of 20 seniors, four juniors, and two sophomores. This close-knit group successfully navigated adversity and injuries throughout the season, demonstrated a commitment to grind each match and into the playoffs. Their consistent effort resulted in an impressive 17game unbeaten streak leading into the state semifinals with the Spartans showing immense competitive spirit spirit in the postseason by defeating FM in a thrilling penalty kick shootout in the regional final. triumphing over Stevenson in double overtime in the sectional final and securing the trip to state with a convincing victory against Elgen South Elgen in the

011super sectional final. The team's success solidifies their position in program history, having truly left their mark as a group that achieved greatness through relentless effort and cohesion, proving that heart and resilience are the true foundation of a champion. Please help me congratulate the GBN's varsity soccer team and coaches for placing third in state. Congratulations. Again, a heartfelt congratulations to all of you. It's an amazing accomplishment, not only for each of you, but also for an amazing coaching staff. So, thank you so much for all that you do. At this point, you do have the opportunity to stay for a variety of wonderful reports. If you don't find that as exciting right now, you are welcome to make your way out. And we really appreciate you taking the time to come this evening. Thank you so

012much. Thank you. I feel with so many recognitions that a foldable wall would be very helpful at different times. Um, but what what an amazing uh uh challenge and opportunity for us. I know strategic plan. It's all in there. Um, with that said, we do have one more set of recognitions this evening. Uh for those who are not familiar, uh Glen Brookke annually submits um uh documents or artifacts to the Illinois chapter of the National School of Public Relations Association and we also uh submit them to the National School of Public Relations. Um and just the other week, we're very excited to share we received five awards uh awards of excellence in the areas of magazine and writing categories. A lot came from the amazing work of Christina Salanikas, our communications manager, and Carol Smith,

013our executive director of communications. Um, and focused a lot on the Glen Brooks publication, that annual magazine that we send to all of our families. And then we also received awards of merit, of course, in an amazing superintendent podcast that's available for subscription at any point in time, uh, as well as one of our videos. So, just want to extend a round of applause for our communications team for all of their accomplishments. And then finally, um it is no surprise that we are here this week for a shortened week to celebrate the Thanksgiving holiday. I think it's always important as we come around to this time of year that we pause and take a moment to reflect on the amazing contributions of so many. There's a lot of folks who often think that a school

014community is driven primarily by its students and staff, but there is also that firm foundation that exists throughout our community and with our families. The work that our parents do each and every day to support our children, especially achieve some of the accomplishments that we just saw. Whether it's helping students remember to balance a lot of things on their agenda, whether it's helping uber them, if you will, from one place to the next place or just make sure that they have the kindness and support that they need back home. Um, just on behalf of the entire district, thank you to everyone who contributes to making sure that our students can reach their full potential. Uh the one picture I just wanted to point out here, this is actually a bit of a photo wall uh

015that's outside of my office and in the middle of it it says the Glen Brook Way. If you haven't ever seen this before, what I had done um just a few weeks after I came in was I asked all of the different uh folks that I work with directly to share with me some photos that really demonstrate the Glen Brook way and what makes our school district amazing. And as I was looking through it today and thinking about what I wanted to share today, at the end of the day, it all comes down to providing that supportive environment to ensure that all of our staff and students feel a sense of belonging. And I'm so grateful to be part of a school learning community, a school district that takes time to pause and reflect and

016acknowledge those individuals and also the amazing accomplishments that our students and staff do each and every day. So, at the end of the day, my takeaway is thank you to everyone. And with that said, that concludes the superintendent's report. Well, thank you, Dr. Grall. That's uh was a lot of fun. Um so much accomplished and uh welldeserved awards all around. Um so, we are going to move on now to the board reports. Um and for tonight, I think what we'll focus on is uh many of our board members this past weekend um or starting on Friday attended the triple eye conference um in Chicago uh with school other school board members, other administrators. Uh it was a great uh opportunity to learn together um and I wanted to have everyone if they would like to

017share any thoughts or um learnings that they brought back from the conference. But we'll start I think with uh Superintendent Grall. Sure. Um so I just want to thank everyone certainly for taking the time throughout the last um three days uh four days for some folks um for attending the different workshops for coming together uh having an opportunity to learn from each other outside of just the boardroom setting. You know, it's a it's great to be able to talk about family and friends and the activities for the upcoming holidays. Um, one of the things that I really appreciated uh, learning more about at this conference was the concept of community engagement. And just like I mentioned about being thankful, engagement comes in so many forms and from so many groups of people. Um, one of

018the topics that this board will be discussing through the communications committee um, in January, if I recall correct, is the concept of how can we improve um, our ability to hear from students and what we often refer to in our profession as student voice. Um, there are so many different ways that um, we're discussed at the conference. One example is forming what's oftentimes referred to as a a superintendent student advisory committee. Um it takes students from all of your different schools, brings them together to have a a very informative and and uh engaging dialogue about different topics um that directly impact student life. And a key takeaway that so many of the school districts were mentioning is that it's important, for lack of better terms, to make sure that your committee is representative of your

019entire student population. So just tonight, we're fortunate to have some of our young scholars who focus their efforts in journalism here, as well as our student athletes um from our soccer team. There's also many other backgrounds and experiences. So just the other day we talked about um our growing population um of students that are in our multilingual program. So making sure that you have students who are in different specialized programs also being part of that to make sure you have a a comprehensive uh understanding of of what the student voice is. Um along those lines, I was able to attend another uh workshop about the concept of even possibly creating a position within the board for a student member to be part of. And what was really intriguing from that is hearing from districts who

020have traveled down that path and they've explained the incremental changes that they made over about a 2-year period of time to make sure that not only our students are prepared for that, but our community is prepared for that. and even the board from a governance uh standpoint is prepared for that. So just getting some of those takeaways and lessons that they learned was absolutely huge. So, those were my big takeaways from that. As well as I'd just like to point out around Northfield Township, we must all think along the same lines because as we go to these very large general sessions, very engaging speakers, and as we looked around, we saw district 34 and district 31, everyone all in the same spot. And we didn't even realize that until then we were getting up. So,

021I think there's something exciting happening in Northfield Township and we must all be on the same wavelength. Thank you, Dr. Grall. Uh, why don't we start? Um, Mr. Kawwaki, did you have anything you wanted to share from the conference? Um just kind of briefly there was so no there were so many excellent sessions and everything and it was interesting to see you know all these schools at kind of different ends of the spectrum in terms of what they've been wrestling with and things that we've wrestled with at different times and they're being at different stages but them always one thing that was common the schools that we may recognize as some of our peers or the top districts in the state uh always raising the bar having a formula for how to develop a culture

022of change and growth and raising that bar and coming back to it and sharing uh with it. So that's one thing I will challenge myself and the rest of the board that we share some of that experience with them in upcoming sessions and stuff. Excellent. Thank you. Uh Mr. O'Hara. Uh yeah, thank you. Uh it's it's always interesting, you know, I I I don't come from education and so when you go to these you feel like you're flying blind a little bit sometimes when you're here as a board member, you know, how am I helping you guys? And and so you go go to these and you listen to these other school districts talk and and it's always nice when you go to go to meetings and you realize, wow, they're really behind compared to

023us, you know, so you feel a little bit better when they're talking about issues that we've already dealt with or uh that we've we've handled successfully and then so you have to shop around and find ones like the ones with the students where they're participating and and whether that's something we do or not something we could definitely talk about. Um there I also attended one that was great that Joliet is doing where they have paid internships. They're partnering with um private and public companies in the Joliet area to try to get student uh interns to to get experience in stuff. Um especially if you're not potentially going to be going on to higher education. And that was something that to me was fascinating and something we should probably be looking at. Um so yes. Okay.

024Thank you uh Miss Hope. Uh I also like Dr. Grall went to a lot about community engagement and you know a lot of great ideas as a part of our communications committee in terms of increasing student voice and also parent voice and opportunities to hear more from all community members. went to a really interesting one on school improvement planning and also social media and the effective and intentional and legal use um for various roles within the community and kind of trying to keep not just keep up with but keep ahead of all of the technological advancements um in terms of communication. I think in general just felt consistently throughout the whole weekend a deep sense of gratitude for being a part of this community, this board. Um, as a board member, as a parent of

025a student, as a community member, just the relationships that we have and and the resources and just how well we're doing, like you said, it was just it's unbelievable. So, thank you. Thank you, Mr. Shine. So I have somewhat of a mirror image in a way of um Mr. O'Hara's comments in that I found that a number of districts who I were ahead of us in many areas. Um it wasn't surprising considering there are 600 odd districts. Um and I think that's one of the benefits of of attending something like this. uh you can learn something virtually any door you open and sit down and um so a couple of things a takeaway for me for me is I went to a seminar on trust and that the two things kind of bullet points that

026that I came away with was who's the most trusted person in in almost everybody's life? Who would that be? What do you think? It's mom, right? Mom is like the most trusted person. Pretty obvious, right? But one thing this this gentleman, you know, brought up and he he he talked about the expense of lack of trust. How expensive it is to an organization when trust is lost in in productivity, in inability to hire people, in inability to retain people. and he went through and gave a number of examples that I won't, you know, go through. And the last takeaway was that um your problem generally isn't communications. That's kind of like a symptom, but you have to dig into things um to find out really why communications are are an issue. And I thought that

027was an interesting analysis. Um along with this guy's been doing it for a long time. He's also a professor at I think University of Minnesota and has done a lot of research on it. So that that was one area that I I found to be interesting and worth sharing. Going back to this topic of um engaging engagement and bringing students to the table, I'm glad this has gotten a greater uh distribution and interest. Um I will say that I brought this up three years ago, but at the time it was only a few districts. This year when I went to a follow-up it was about 60 districts have students sitting at this table for engagement. Most of them it's two students and they've gone through as Dr. Grall um explained sort of an iterative process.

028Is it one? Is it two? Is it seniors, juniors? Do they come from you know you know the student government? And you know, so a lot of schools there's they they've they've they've created a path for us should we choose to do this. And most of them have this kind of superintendence type of council to help frame the issues and get them to the board table. And at least in the panel that I went to, they had the student present to the board. So they were they came in, you know, rock solid, you know, like a business presentation. and they they knew what they wanted to communicate, you know, they they got there, you know, 2 minutes or whatever and then, you know, they had to be prepared to answer questions and um so I

029thought that was great and and then they were responsible for bringing that back to their schools. So it wasn't just, hey, we'll go talk to the board. It's like and we we have a job to do. So I thought that was really great in terms of engagement. Um and let me see I had one other just give me one second please. Ah AI. So AI is coming whether we like it or not and one of the superintendent so he's trying to lead and get out ahead of this and they use the Google suite uh Gemini and um the Google notebook um LM language model and and the the reason they're kind of went down that path is the built-in uh safety aspects for students that it's already built into the platform and he uses it

030and I thought this was just fascinating. So he uses a tool to help communication with the board and he uses AI to uh generate a podcast, a video and prepare um um documents for the board. So he takes all of the stuff and he lets AI of course proof read but but collate it down into I I can't even imagine an AI generated you know podcast and video and he said this is a means by which the board can um approach the material much quicker and he used the thing well you get like you know 300 pages to read through we don't get that anymore sort of old school. That's but but is a means to to consolidate down the information and then then as an administrative team they're out kind of leading getting a

031sense of what does this tool do what are the limitations and they are concerned about the things you know we would talk about we've already started to talk about in terms of um you know integrity and he talked about policy and guidelines and things where and this was a you know I think a group where they they're pretty they were ahead of us and um it was interesting. So that was a couple of my takeaways and thanks for you know making it so we could all go to this. It's great. Yeah. Thank you everyone for sharing and uh it was a a great experience and and really um uh provided a lot of food for thought and opportunities to meet people who as you say you know some some districts are working through issues that

032maybe we've already been able to come to terms with but we're also introduced to new ideas that maybe we can bring to 225. Um myself I did also attend as a delegate um the IASB um meeting where there as we have discussed um there were some constitutional amendments that were introduced. Those all passed um there was one resolution that um was passed with regard to um school bus safety. Um, and the one of the the sessions that I attended that I thought was very useful and wanted to bring back to the board and probably is something that we'll be looking at um in the coming months talking a little bit about um what uh Mr. Shine had mentioned um in terms of trying to get some efficiencies and use um technology to bring us forward

033and and some processes that might be a little antiquated in the way we do it here or have been doing it is the the subject of um uh superintendent evaluations and administration evaluations. And whether we can um get uh start working with some different best practices and software platforms that might enable everyone to do this, which is extremely important, of course. and um important for our administrators to get feedback from the board um and also you know important for the board to be able to easily put together what the materials that we need to in order to give effective feedback. Um I think it would be helpful for us to start examining whether it's time to move away from you know Google Docs to something a little more uh robust when it comes to that

034process so that we can make it more effective and also not quite so drawn out. So um that is something we'll be looking at but um triple I was great. Um I want to mention also that many of our administrators were also able to attend not just the board members and I know that all of you attended um sessions that were gerine to your particular interests um and and things that you're trying to move forward and I hope that um those were also uh very useful for you. I'm sure they were and it was it was also just you know as as um Dr. mentioned it's nice to spend some time away from the board table with folks that you do work with um to know learn a little bit more about them um and

035I think it'll help us all work more effectively together which is to everyone's benefit so that's terrific okay um moving on unless anyone had another board report that they would like to give on another subject not triple I okay in that case we will move on now to um the next item on our agenda which is item live recognition of community visitors. Um, and it's our public comment period. Um, and we do have someone who will speak tonight. So, I would like to to say that with regard to public comment, this is an up to 30 minute period for public participation. Each individual may speak to the board for up to two minutes. We ask but do not require that each speaker state their name, address, and relationship to the district to facilitate follow-up if

036needed. All speakers are expected to conduct themselves with respect and civility towards others. Please remember that this is a business meeting of the board. All comments should be addressed to the board and should concern board business. The board receives public comments as a source of information and considers them in making decisions and in the establishment of policies. It is our practice to take no action on any items nor to discuss any items members of the public have raised until the board has had time to gather information and then objectively discuss available options. However, during the meeting, the board in its discretion may choose to address an issue or correct any misinformation raised during public comment. While the board does not control the topics brought to its attention or the substance of the public comment, speakers

037are reminded that their comments are not automatically protected by any immunity or other legal protection. Having said all that, we have Mr. William Sites. Am I pronouncing that correctly? You are, Madam President. Thank you. I brought uh 10 copies of my my letter. I I submitted a letter prior to uh about uh I know you had a lot of stuff going on. So the recording secretary um I know I've got three minutes. I just had I didn't I didn't include the email uh but you could ask the superintendent for the email that I referenced. I just wanted to comment on a couple of things uh um that I explained in my letter a little more detail. First on the school resource officer program. Um just a couple of updates on that. I did talk to

038superintendent about that. I would like to uh um emphasize um you know the superintendent told me that he's um talking about um um updating it to comply with state law. As I've as I said before the last time that I was here, it you know that program is never going to be a workable program for a segment of of your students and parents. Um the the fact of the matter is and as I explained in my letter just last week, um the village board had a meeting about um um ICE and ICE uh programs. Um the uh the village board does not take that issue in Glen View seriously. That's a village of Glen View police officer um at at the Glenbergal High School high school. I gave you a um an ordinance that was

039passed by the village board in Cook County. Um three different um communities with demographics similar to Glen Brook South, Evston, uh Arlington Heights and um uh Wheeling got rid of ice from their districts. The re the reason why that's important is that police officer can be deputized. He can he coordinate with it. And I I would encourage you to look at the at the video of from the Glen View and you can see what I'm talking about. And the second thing I want to talk about was Signo and the whole businesses of Signo. I I'm a property tax attorney. I've been doing a lot with the reason why my letter was a little bit late. I had to do with property taxes. you know, you're doing a good job and I don't want to uh

040but you know, property taxes are up 5.5% for you guys. You know, the property taxes are a big thing and you know, when I was when I um you you'll see the letter that I gave the superintendent before they the they voted on the signal thing uh to the to the village president and the trustees, you know, the $23.3 million. Um, I wanted to know if there was any coordination since that building's across the street and um, I did not because of other issues that I had with the superintendent on the school resource officer program. Um, I did not contact him but I did contact the park district and there was some discussion. Now I would say to you I would suggest that if in fact you have you are going to do something with

041that property you because at the last meeting the village president uh cut off public a public speaker saying we haven't decided what we're going to do. Well, you know you're going to spend $23.3 million and haven't decided what you're going to do. Well, you know what? Maybe you ought to say, you know, definitively, you know, hey, we are are not a partner in this program that the village is doing. You've got other priorities. You've got other things going on. So, I would suggest to you that, you know, they're not going to close on this until February that you not be perceived as having and I I gave you an email from two days before this was announced and I went to all the village budget meetings and this was not in there. So, suit yourself,

042but I would suggest that you do not do business the way they they do business. So, that'd be my suggestion on signote. I'm going to do a freedom of information request uh tomorrow. I'm going to ask you for what was what villages interactions on signal, but that's a lot of money and you know, um I I really would encourage you to to be transparent. So, those are my two comments. I wrote those in the letter. I'm sorry the letter didn't get to you with enough time to read it, but take a look at it. And I I really encourage you to not to not just do a new contract for the school resource officer program. hire our security staff. You know, you've got the resources to do that. And Madam President, I know I went

043over my three minutes. Thank you very much. I appreciate your time. Thank you, Mr. Sites. Next, we have our consent agenda. Dr. Grall, are there any changes to the consent agenda? There have been no changes. In that case, could I please have a motion regarding a motion? Second. Mr. Downing? Yes. Mr. Glowaki? Yes. Mrs. Hope? Yes. Mr. O'Hara? Yes. Mr. Shine? Yes. Miss Mullenbeck? Yes. Motion carries six to nothing. Our next item on the agenda is our discussion action agenda and we will begin with item 7.1 the recision of our intent to withdraw from the True North Education Cooperative 804. Uh Dr. Grall, thank you so much. Um I've spoken about this topic with our community with the board um quite some time. Um but a really important step took place last Wednesday. Um, it

044was at that meeting that the member districts of True North, so 18 districts, unanimously agreed to modify what's known as the articles of agreement. The articles of agreement ultimately outline, similar to board policy, how the cooperative will function. And through those revisions, the cooperative directly addressed every concern that Glen Brook as a district as well as many other member district have expressed over the past several years. Um before I go into those highlights, I do need to give tremendous credit to Mr. O'Hara, Mr. Glowaki, and previously um Mr. Dowy who has attended periodically um True North and often times to be very candid was the lone dissenting vote on some very important topics um that the district had been trying to bring up for several years. those um or that feeling that we were not

045being heard um ultimately resulted around April 14th of this year. Uh the board voting to move forward with the withdrawal from True North. Following our notification, several other districts followed until by June of 2025. Every single district in the cooperative indicated their intent to withdraw which would have led to the elimination of the cooperative. In August, a group of superintendents got together and challenged uh or at least put the question on a table, if you will, which is, is it in the best interest of all of our students, all of our current children and future children of our communities to eliminate True North as an option and as a service provider? or is it in their best interest to uh we used the term reimagine what true north could look like? And following that conversation,

046in less than two work uh two months, we got to work completely revising the model. And I just want to highlight a few of those changes. First of all, there was a recognition that when you are a part of the cooperative as was established, there was a large um not a cost of entry but a a cost of existence that for Glenbrook amounted to approximately $800,000 a year. And that was a cost that you had to pay as a district even if you used zero services of the cooperative. And so from just a general perspective, when you have an $800,000 bill and you're not getting anything from it, that is not fiscally responsible. Um, however, that's the model that the finance committee had adopted. And even with Glen Brook trying to suggest options to change

047that, um, we were unsuccessful. One of the first decisions that was made by the restructuring committee or the re-imagining committee is that membership fees would be eliminated. And so under the new model written directly into the articles of agreement that can only be amended by three4s of superintendent voting in that affirmative manner. Um there will be no membership fee. Another challenge was that in addition to membership fees, the cooperative had started levying what they referred to as assessments. So there was a facilities assessment to address aging infrastructure and things of that nature. Um those type types of assessments also cannot be levied moving forward without a three4s majority vote. And that three-4s is important because that is a very high threshold to meet um and ensures that an overwhelming majority of districts believe it's in

048the in the best interest of the cooperative to levy that fee. Another challenge that we identified was that program quality had transitioned um to an area that that superintendent and directors of special education were not comfortable with. And part of that was because of the lack of predictability in um of our of their staff. Were they going to have a job this year and next year? So we had a high level of turnover. Uh the lack of predictability on what school districts needed. Um, and so we rebuilt the model for tuition and and actually educating students in True North with a focus first and foremost on providing a world-class education for our uh students that have higher needs um while making sure we're implementing best practices and charging the appropriate tuition rate that pays for

049all of those services. In many ways, we use the example of a private therapeutic day school has a higher tuition amount because they need to pay for everything through the income they're bringing in, the tuition. That was not True North's model. True North would often times try to run programs with very few students in them that were not self-sufficient that were in some ways subsidizing other programs but at a cost of not having sufficient personnel to operate those programs that had larger student populations at a high level. Um and so as part of from a financial perspective um it is a self-sufficient tuition model or for services that are provided separate from tuition. everything's allin and when a district makes a commitment, they're making a commitment for that year. So, there's predictability of enrollment. To

050that end, um there was a concept called guaranteed placement, which meant um True North would guarantee access uh for spots for a student that might come up uh with a need in March or April. But what we actually found out was that was not being implemented uh at all grade levels. In fact, it was only available in some circumstances at the high school level and nearly never at the elementary level where the greatest needs were. So, we've kind of gone away from that model and said schools, you need you need to really plan so that they can implement a zerobased budgeting approach and build a program with the size you need and when you say you're committing to a service, you are committed to that service and have to pay for it. Uh the final

051big change was that there was a view over time that True North positioned itself more as an independent school district as opposed to working hand inand with its member districts um providing um additional services that couldn't otherwise be provided in the local districts. Um that was exhibited through having a very large administrative structure. Um salary structures that were commiserate with um um uh very large um high school districts. Um and over time even creating a professional development department that much of their program was not focused on special education but on general pedagogical approaches which again is not the area of of focus for a special education joint agreement or cooperative. Um and so we worked with our interim superintendent um who are their names are Jim and Jimmy just to be clear. Um we learned

052from individuals who have um you know collectively 60 years of experience in cooperatives um and built a very um uh small administrative team that is in alignment with um with cooperatives that focus not on having a superintendent of a cooperative but an executive director which again further illustrates that the cooperative is serving as an extension of the district, but not a standalone entity. Um, with all of this work, again, we've gotten to a point where the articles agreements have been ratified, all of the concerns that we've expressed have been addressed, and there was a a final change made in the governance model that actually ensures that every school district has a voice at the table through their superintendent. Um, the way True North was previously structured, the large group that got together on a monthly

053basis would include a representative from each board of education. So, still representation for each district. The difference is when we're talking about operating a cooperative, you need to have educational expertise at the table that is able to articulate what the needs of your district are and making sure that the cooperative is operating in alignment with those needs. Um so now there will be an executive committee um that will include superintendent uh serving in leadership roles um as well as working directly on a regular basis with the cooperative leadership. And then a governing uh board will still exist that will involve board member representation, but that governing board will only meet uh two to four times a year. And that's because there's only certain uh items that a governing board needs to do whereas other responsibilities

054are delegated to the executive committee. So with all of this done, um I am very comfortable making the recommendation that remaining in True North provides to Glennbrook and Northfield Township students access to options and access to supports at no cost unless we choose to use them. The only non-stated cost is as superintendent I'll be serving on the executive committee and we'll need to devote time for that. However, I have volunteered this particular room to serve as a meeting location. So, this is very convenient um to come down to. Um but we've we've come a long way. We are definitely not where we were when we took action. And should the district choose later on to withdraw, uh we we were uh part of the the leaders in crafting legislation that was signed by the governor

055this summer that makes it very clear we can withdraw without any additional approval processes outside of the state board of education's uh mandated process. Um it just requires an 18-month timeline. However, there's no cost to the district for remaining. We would just stop using services, file our intent to withdraw, and then 18 months later, it would become official. So, I am happy to answer any questions. I'm just so pleased with the work that we have been a or how we've been able to move forward um and believe that what True North will look like in 12 months or 18 months from now could truly be remarkable and an asset for our students who need those services. Thank you, Dr. Grall. Um questions from the board, Mr. O'Hara. Uh yeah, real quick. I know that probably

056our biggest issue was was the leaving issue where it took everybody to vote. You know, everybody had to agree that that someone could leave so one person could stop us. Um you mentioned that the new way to leave is statutory. That is correct. Um would there be any way to also write in case statute changes or you know um would there be a way to put in the agreements as well as the way to leave uh in case statute changes that we we have our own way? I mean so that that's a great question. That's actually where um the articles of agreement were in conflict with the law. Correct. So the law states the process to leave. cooperatives cannot lessen or increase the process of leaving. Um so the way the articles agreements are written

057right now, we don't mirror statute. We simply point to statute and say we will follow the statutory provision. Um I would say that we do a really good job of monitoring statute. Um should that or or or forgive me monitoring legislation should that change it might immediately prompt um us moving forward with our intent to withdraw but unfortunately in the articles we can't have more stringent or less stringent requirements. Okay, Miss Hope. Okay, Mr. I just want to thank everybody who was involved in this now and leading up to today. Um it has been a long long slog with True North and its predecessor uh named organization. Um so I I do have two questions. The first one is with the reinvigoration of True North, are there certain um services that we have brought inhouse

058that might be better provided back at True North? So that's my first question. And the second is you had provided or the administration had provided um cost projections for the impact on the district when we brought all of this inhouse. And I my I guess it's more of a request. Could we get an analysis of where we really fell out? We hired we had a projection we were going to hire this many people and it was going to cost this much. Those were projections. But then then we have a couple years of actuals and then you know where do you see it going forward? Um again not looking for an answer tonight but maybe a memo that kind of just reccharacterizes it for for the board. Thank you. So let's um address the first question

059which is through the reimagination of True North, might True North be a better setting for even some programs or students, individual students who are currently being served um uh in a district program. When we opened our new transition services school, overwhelmingly we brought all of our students back. And as we started to, to be very candid, operate a transition services school with a very um wide range of student needs, we have identified students who would be better served in a True North program. And so we've already identified some students that would be better served in that environment and either made that transition now or preparing to make that transition now. Go ahead. So were most of the students I guess I didn't equate that that most of the students were in the transition program. So

060but we provided services sort of throughout. Yeah. So, our True North programs, um, if we go back, let's just say four years to make it easy, um, we had our TLS program, those are the classrooms that were at Glumbre South and Glumbre North, staffed by True North, but housed in our two schools. That program came back first and relatively remains very similar uh to the program we've had and and um outside of unique student needs, most students can be served here and would continue to be served here best in the least restrictive environment. For our transition services students, we had two groups. We had one group of students that were wholly served by True North in Highland Park um at their facility, but we had a smaller group of students that were served out of

061our um location above little Louise. So, it was kind of a blend. As we brought back students from the True North transition services um which again was in Highland Park this year, we have identified some students that would be better served in a in that uh more welle equipped um private therapeutic day school setting or public therapeutic day school setting. Um and with the changes happening in True North, we think that would be a good placement for them. So I think to answer your question, there are some students who might very well be better served at True North. I don't know if we would ever move programs wholly back to True North. It would really be based on individual student needs. Very importantly, Mr. Shine has brought this up a few times about the importance

062of reconciling the um transition of programs from True North inhouse and understanding how financially that reconciles, student enrollment that reconciles and things of that nature. Um Dr. Cummings and Dr. John's are working in partnership with an external um program review that's being performed by the district management group that was approved last year. and we're actually almost here to the results and I think that report will answer a lot of your questions. Um we've identified a few areas for growth such as um uh appropriate staffing levels, appropriate um uh supports for the staff uh supports for students, programmatic structural recommendations. Um, and I think it would be really beneficial um, probably in the early spring to even present a summary of that report to the board and have those questions directly answered. Thank you. U, Mr.

063Glowaki, did you have any questions? I can put that in the podcast in the future. Yeah, I was going to say while well AI speaking of AI, I know we've probably had 300 plus pages of analysis done on True North and our use and everything. And I appreciate all the work that everybody's been doing and especially the folks like yourself most recently with kind of making uh some of the changes there that were well overdue. But I guess before I'm comfortable in pivoting and taking uh this off the table of us withdrawing, I would need to see that analysis in the current context kind of off of my colleagues comments of miss uh of the analysis. Where do we envision ourselves because this is a potentially a huge commitment between our resources and supporting an

064outside group and I know you are uh your time is very valuable. It's maybe invaluable as well too. sort of heavy torn between organizations. I'm being mindful of that as well, too. So, it' be helpful to have that additional analysis before I could vote one way or the other on changing focus uh with this. I would wish the study would be out earlier. I know it's not till the spring. Is there any way we can hold off on voting to our position until after we have some of the study to see what our gaps are because I'd hate to be I guess paying twice dipping. You know, we're paying for service here and there to support it. So, we're to clarify, we would not be paying anything to True North. That's what I thought. Yeah.

065Zero. Unless we send students there and we just built a program here to support those students. Well, but if we choose to send a student, that is a individualized decision made by a team that the board would not be engaged in. Right. So, that would be an individual student need basis. I wouldn't be able to provide an analysis on that or projections in terms of costs and everything. What I'm asking is the same analysis we did before about when we were moving the program back now moving it and having it in this co- environment where we've got true north. What does those projections look like going forward? Yeah, to clarify, the district is intending to move no programs back to true north. The only what we have access um what we have access to by

066remaining a member of True North is if we have individualized student needs that could best be served through a public therapeutic day school. True North remains an option for us. Similar to other therapeutic day schools in the northwest suburbs. Um there are times when one therapeutic day school option is better for one a student than another. That involves even the length of time a student might be in a vehicle to go from their home to the location. But in terms of specific costs, True North tuition is estimated at between um 80 and $90,000. that is directly comparable to private therapeutic day school settings which also we're um we're paying approximately 80 to $90,000 for and how many students we have enrolled in those currently and everything. Dr. Cummings, do you recall the average number? And

067and again, I don't want to put you guys on the spot, but this would be in perfectly okay. This would be in the subsequent analysis I think that my colleague asked for that would be very helpful to have that analysis. Currently approximately about 30 students we have placed right now in private therapeutic day schools and they would probably stay where they're at. Not necessarily True North. Absolutely. Yeah. I mean there's several within I would say the Northwest suburbs that are utilized depending on what the needs are. So this is where I'm just wrestling with that. We just it's a wonderful program and don't get me wrong, but when we have limited resources and more and more limited resources including our time is is there other options we should be looking at and be used as

068stewards of our resources to be more efficient is I'm sorry um just from my understanding so basically True North is going to be another one of these programs we can use on the side. is sort of like in our stable of programs we can use without any cost besides tuition or services but besides your time potentially which is a cost as Pete Pete mentions like you you'd have to spend some time on this but my understanding would be you wouldn't be dayto day doing stuff for them it'd be sort of um once a month or I mean do you have a yeah so um if the board's not familiar just using me as an example I serve as the district's representative to our liability consortium scrim I serve as our representative to our our uh

069health benefits consortium, NIHP. All of those typically involve a 2-hour meeting once a month uh where I represent the district's interest and then also bring back information for the respective areas. So this that would be about the commitment. So that that basically be our cost that we're planning on spending right now for going going forward with the new new program. and they would just be an option for us to use with students who might need that. Correct. If we weren't a member, we would not have guaranteed access to any services. I say guaranteed access because the way it's structured is non-member districts only get what's left after everyone else has committed and it's not predictable or guaranteed. So I I attended one of the meetings right about when it was turning around and there were

070still a few people that were resisting and I went there knowing one of the other people that had been more on the resistance side with kind of a cynicism or skepticism and I what I listened to was like it's kind of a no-brainer. I mean it cost us nothing except maybe a couple hours a time, right? But it's also good for you because you're probably picking up meet with other superintendents. It's great best practices. It's great growth. It's great development. It's great networking, right, with people that are here in our own area. Um, and it just gives us another option for our kids. So, is it good for the kiddos? And does it cost us anything more? It's rhetorical, I guess. Yeah. the So to be clear, remaining a member of True North costs nothing.

071Rem uh rescending our intent to withdraw would ultimately mean if we wanted to withdraw, there would be an 18-month period that you would have to wait. So there's there's a waiting period. Um, I would argue from a fiduciary standpoint, if there was an expense with that waiting period, then there would be an understanding of why um why you might want to process through uh leaving or what have you. But because there's no financial extent expense and all it does is provide us an option, I'm supportive of the recommendation to resend. And excuse excuse me going back to my a followup question on resources. Sorry I was up still before I lost control of the room. Uh assets don't we also have eyes to assets too. Uh remaining a member should the organization dissolve uh provides

072the district entitlement to a proportion of assets once all liabilities are paid for. If we withdraw, we uh lose any access to assets. Now, on the flip side, if you withdraw and you lose access to assets as part of the new um articles of agreement, you also lose the responsibility to pay future liabilities, which was originally estimated for Glen Brook at approximately $3 million. So, by not leaving, you also are not responsible for any of those liabilities. Thank you for that question. You did ask is it best for kids? Yeah. Was an important question. I will tell you one of the reasons why um I was invited to the table to do the rem imagining is because when I heard directly from our feeder school districts specifically district 27, 28, 30, and 31, they rely

073upon true north for their students. And because their students are our students, yes, I believe it's best for students. That's what I thought. So, last question. Of the ones that were resisting or removing there's I think there were still a few people left when I went back there in the summer. Are they still leaving or are they is any is anybody leaving or is everybody decided to stay or where what was what's the story with the rest of it? Out of 18 member districts um two districts said they did not in or said something other than stay. That was district 34 which has um continued their desire to move forward with full withdrawal. Uh and I anticipate that that will move forward with that like that. Um and then um Bameick Burn I'm forgetting their

074district number uh did intend that they were still contemplating whether to withdraw or remain. However, in subsequent conversations at the conference, I believe that they are intending to remain. I I think there was just a what's the turnaround of that? There was how many that were going to be leaving and how many and now one's just leaving? Oh, originally 18 members were leaving and now we're down to one at most two. Assuming Glen remains just to be clear. Um Mr. Gaki did ask is there a way to slow down or get the report and I just want to or speed up the report. Yeah. that we can at least get a see where we compare and how this supplements us. Um the report is focused on a program evaluation of Glenbrook and we do have

075a report that we can share that we actually had prepared for the regional office of education. Um which was a requirement of withdrawing that shows our program capacity. Um Dr. Cummings, do you think that would be in a spot for us to share in the near future being written for the state to withdraw? I don't know the status, but I would assume so. So, we can double check with Dr. John's to share that with the board. That's one option. The the program analysis, though, is based on Glen Brook's program to improve them. Um, not again about shifting resources anywhere. That will not be ready until closer to January. Um, but we can share the our capacity report that was drafted uh with the board to give perspective. is I know it'd be convenient for them

076to get the letter from us tomorrow saying we're staying or not, but is there final deadline or something that it is by the end of December? End of December. Mhm. I'm just making a note for the capacity report. Thank you. How many meetings do we have in December? Yeah, the process by the 8th for us. We have Yes. This has to We have to decide on the eth. next meeting because that is our only meeting before December. So it won't go on the consent agenda then obviously or can it? I I cannot I don't if Mr. Glowaki doesn't feel comfortable with where we are at the end of this discussion then we cannot put it on the consent agenda. I'd like to have it as a discussion item with the additional analysis that um China

077asked for. I do think I just just to clarifying and that I'm understanding what you're asking for, Mr. Guacki. What what what Dr. Grall is is recommending is that we um negate our recision essentially and stay in true north. But that does not require us to pay any money or to put in anything or to make any decision about using any service. That's correct. Other than Dr. Grall continuing to serve on the executive committee there. Correct. If we choose not to use any service, we pay nothing. That is correct. And that could continue indefinitely. There could we could just be part of the consortium, pay nothing, not use the services, and just have that ride for as long as we need to. And we could though if we had a particular student who hadn't their

078team decided that True North was a good placement for them, we would have the opportunity to pay the going market rate to have that student use their service. That is correct. So, I I guess Can I add to that too, Sandy? And it's really good for our feeder schools because they don't have that. And that's that's a really important piece that I that don't want to be missed. Correct. I agree because those as Dr. Grall points out, those are our kids. They'll be coming to 225. So they just earn a different place right now, but they're going to be here eventually. So I guess what I'm when you ask for a an analysis of the cost versus cost, I mean, what what cost? There's no cost. Well, we were looking at what our costs were

079and what usage of programs were and all the different programs over the years. So, we did a number of trend analysis and a lot of details that went into that that I would like to know I guess what are the new projections under this? What's the continuation of that look like because I'm not feeling equipped enough to make a decision one way or the other in terms of this at this point and I could understand why that would be problematic if we were thinking that we would be actually utilizing services sometime soon. I think what you're asking for is an analysis of what of our our costs of our program and whatever happens, we're still going to have our program. All all True North does is give us an an option that we don't even

080have to take. But we I guess the part that I'm then having issue with is we invested in a transitional program here based on the understanding of True North not meeting our needs any further and everything. We're saying now True North can meet those needs. So what I'm wrestling with is there's I I understand yeah I understand it differently. I understand it that there true north will now be a other another option like the other options that we currently already use. So it's just in addition not uh a cost of more right because we have other people at other school other that are being and it's very comparable in cost and actually we probably have a better connection with true north than we do with those others. So again, I thought it might it's probably

081not costing us anymore and it's probably better for the kids. The question I guess flipping around then should we put the our transitional program back on the table to review that again. That's But that's a different question than whether or not we should resend that because we because that's already serving a purpose and we already people there that are doing well. Yeah. Well, so if if we do not put it on a consent, we would be voting on it on the ETH anyway, right? Correct. I'm comfortable with that with the discussion too. Yeah. I mean, if you feel like we need more discussion, completely comfortable with that. But we do need to vote. Correct. But we won't have a definitive report by the next meeting when we're going to vote. I'm comfortable with that. But

082we shouldn't think we we're going to have information that we don't write. No, that that's just not going to be excuse me that that's not going to be ready. I mean, they they they don't have time and it's on the agenda. Um, it seems like there's not a lot of downside for us to do this. That's the I mean, how are we and and that's fine. How are we like hurt by doing it? I mean, I there are a number of areas to clarify. You know, many of us have brought up questions, but I don't see that it's central to the decision here. It's just information that would be good and might help us in our going forward. But I'm just trying to understand like what what would we learn that might uh Mr. Gwaki

083make you think this is not like we wouldn't want to agree to to rescend? I I guess I have not had the opportunity. We went through detailed item by item, bullet by bullet looking at why we wanted to pull out of True North before. We are now have a simple piece here. These are the couple of bullets. I would just like to put it in the same context as when we did the review initially and that would just help me. That's my request. I think that's f that's that makes perfect sense and we can certainly talk about it more at the next meeting. But I think you know the the difference between now and then is then we were paying $800,000 a year for nothing and this is we pay nothing for nothing. But we

084pay something for something and that just seems like a much better place. If that's an added as an amendment to the piece that's wonderful. I mean, our goal for for years was to to turn it into a pay as you go model. I mean, this is this is just in its simplest form. It's like we want services, we pay for them. We knew it would cost more for the particular services if we did that, but we didn't have that loaded upfront cost. Um, which was just viewed to be incredibly unfair. Um you I guess everybody understands that but it's it's hard to see the downside. Yeah. I mean we're now long no longer paying the 800,000 right which is great. We are taking care of our feeder schools because if those kids come up here

085better adjusted it's better for us it's better for them and it's not costing them anymore. Dr. Rebel. Um, do you can you comment or are you comfortable commenting on why District 34 would want to go the other way because they are, you know, they're they're they are GBS basically. I mean, they're 90 something% and it's I'm surprised to hear that. I I don't want to inappropriately speak for them, but I I think it was fairly well shared in the room that they had traveled down this journey for several years. And I think to and and they they have received full approval to to withdraw and leave. And I think to to reverse um just wasn't um wasn't okay for them. Is there an opportunity? The horse is out of the barn. Sounds like it. Is

086there an opportunity in the future for them to join should they should they so choose? Yeah. So, in fact, there's already two other districts that are interested in joining uh that are outside of the current service area. So, I I think there would be a pathway back for them if they would like. Um, what I intend and and in adding to the memo and I would ask for consent from the board to make sure I'm in alignment with this is I will articulate I I mention it in some bullet points that the direct savings to the district will be just in membership fees 623 $412. Um, that's before the facilities of assessment of approximately 200,000. But I'll articulate the savings um uh by rescending or remaining how there's no difference. There's still a savings. I

087will clarify that um there is a direct benefit to our students of maintaining additional options for our kiddos who need those options uh at some point during their educational journey and remaining a member provides access to that option. I'll also articulate that there is a direct benefit for continuity of the learning experience for our students in our feeder districts that are currently utilizing those services to if those services are the most appropriate for them to maintain them. Um so that would be what I would be seeking to clarify in the memo. That would be wonderful. Okay. All right. So that will come back on our December 8th discussion agenda. Yep. Okay. No problem. Um, did we have any other thoughts or comments on the True North agenda item? Okay. Um, the next item for our

088discussion is 7.2, the Glen Brook South STEM booster club. So, there has only been two new booster clubs in my 11 years uh of being in the district. Uh, so it's not something we see often. That's why we brought it full to the board uh to hear about it um and to share a little background. I'm going to ask Dr. Georgees to introduce the potential new Glenberrook South STEM booster club. Good evening. So I was approached by an extraordinary group of parents who are very passionate about um supporting STEM learning at Glen Brook South um particularly surrounding some of our extracurricular groups for example VEX Robotics um that uh recently was competing at the national level in their competitions. Um to be very direct, we had some recent changes in how much the board of

089education supports student travel. Um and that VEX Robotics program and other STEM programs were directly impacted by that. Um, so this booster club, very similar to an athletic boost booster club or a fine arts booster club, would like to do fundraising um to be able to support our students in um purchasing additional supply and equipment to make um some of our uh competition robots uh more fancier, competitive. Um they've also discussed a vision of being able to support fundraising for some additional um equipment that would be needed in some of our STEM spaces. Uh and just to be able to overall support programming such as the SCC program at Glen Brook South and the students um that have passion in those courses and the all of the the merit of extracurriculars that are associated with

090that. Um they are a very supportive and passionate group um and they put together this proposal uh and I am in support of it if if the board is from a procedural standpoint. We have a board policy. Um this is one that will be revised in the new uh the new policy manual. Uh it's a a weird title of I always forget if it's auxiliary adult or adult auxiliary organizations, also known as parent group. Um and before the school district can recognize a parent group, it does require the board to approve it. Um approving it simply recognizes them, provides them access to facility space. We do set up uh what we call an activity account in our agency fund uh to allow them to collect parent dues or donations and then we assist with writing

091out checks. Um and then with all of our parenting groups, we've actually worked with them to establish their own 501c3 status. Um so we've become pretty good at that. Um and we would assist them through that process and it just provides another option. Um, this this would be one of our well, this would be our first um uh science-based or engineering based uh booster club and perhaps it could be the start of something really cool across the district. I'm fully in support. Did any uh board member have any questions? I think it's great. All to see a GBN one soon, right? That would Okay. Um, sounds like we have some consensus on this one. Would this be something that could come back on consent? Uh, this certainly can come back on consent. Yes. Excellent. No,

092that sounds terrific. Um, I did see the robots on CBS. They did a great job. All of our students did a great job. Yes, that was fantastic. Excellent. Okay. Oh, this is a fun one. We're going to talk about our 26 27 um curricular change proposals. Too much anticipation. I am excited. I'm a little nervous now. Hold on. Hey, before you you talk about that, I just want to let you know the uh peach pear. That's so good. That's why it's the only one left in there. Second. Oh, is that horrible. And on that note, as Mr. Retag is preparing to approach the podium. Um we have that was a public service announcement. I I want to point out a few things. First, um each of the board members in front of you uh courtesy

093of Mr. Bag's efforts this afternoon uh has a copy of the 2026 to 2027 course guide. This document is also available online through the board of education's website as well as in a nice course guide section uh that is uh on the Glenber North and Glenber south website. Um each year we go through a process of uh reviewing the courses that we offering uh determine uh opportunities uh and changes that need to be made uh identify potentially new courses and um in some years even what we refer to as archiving uh different courses and we'll talk a little more about that in a future meeting. Uh but this year we have some really exciting offerings and I want to also recognize that we are fortunate to be graced with also the presence of Dr. Joyce

094Kim our associate principal of teaching and learning over at Glenrook South and Dr. Maria Vasalopoulos our associate principal of teaching and learning over at Glenrook North to support the presentation. Um there is a lot of information that's before you uh and the memo does a nice job outlining it. I've asked uh Mr. Breag to offer uh or practice the art a little bit of brevity and then open up for questions for everyone here. So Mr. Breag, the challenge has been presented. The gauntlet is laid. The three minutes is rolling. So uh good evening. Um just uh just to give everyone a quick 30 second preview of what this process entails. It's highly collaborative. It starts at the department level with our course teams. They look at specifically the curriculum improvement process which you heard about

095earlier this year. What did they identify? What does the strategic plan outline? And then there's a host of things they go through from alignment with their cross building partnerships to see if there's possibilities there all the way through insight meetings with my colleagues behind you, the student services department, college counselors. It's a robust process. It is a um for lack of a better word fun yet intense process as they look at what is the impact of a specific word in a title or in a description. And all in all, what it leads to is a formal process at the building where they come together as an instructional leadership team and they make a decision. They publicly share like this what they're proposing, what they've learned, and why they're doing it. And there's not a flag

096up and down vote or a clicker up and down vote, but there is a lot of head nodding or a lot of head shaking. And then we go from there to finally um finalizing at the district administrative team level. What that led to this year is um seven new courses coming forward. The first two are both dual credit. What's exciting about that is um you heard about this with our English is's who talked about last year they brought forward English composition 101. Um some of you may remember going what is a 10 why are we 101? It's college 101. And then the second part of that that's a semester course. Now our students will be able to select speech. So that would in essence give their first year of gen ed requirements in English. So

097we're also that's not to discredit the other ones up there. This will be our first real nice um general ed science course opportunity physical geology and then some other new uh courses that have come forward. In particular, I want to highlight that astronomy that was a two-year process in partnership across both buildings with the teachers and the department chairs to really work through this process of saying what would an astronomy sequence look like in our district. And then finally, American Sign Language. Um, we now have all of our languages with the rigorous opportunity for honors level. So, that was another important move for us. As always, we talk about alignment. Sometimes we bring forward courses that we do not have alignment in and we always tell you but we're working towards that. What would that

098take? This year you will see that we have yoga 2 which our uh physical education instructional supervisors talked about that it had started at one building while the other learned about it. We now will be bringing that forward. So there is the same sequence in both buildings and our radio broadcast or excuse me radio production and podcasting, sports media, television and film are now aligned in title, in curriculum and in offerings including their honors level work. Last but not least, you have in front of you in my last 15 seconds, you have the course guide as Grall mentioned that has a host of changes. I want to highlight a few at the very top that we did put in place a full listing of our dual credit offerings and our advanced placement courses that also

099allow you to see what is the Glen Brook title versus the Oakton title or what is the advanced placement title uh in the Glen Brooks versus the College Board. So you can see a nice comparison. And also we added two real important pieces of information for our families and our staff for that matter. Um, most courses now have an additional information section that allows us to have clarity. If you're looking for what is a dual credit, what has honors ability in it? That information clearly outlined. And last but not least, clarity. We know we're in um we have one more real deep year after next year for the APA cohort versus our legacy cohort. So really have helping our families understand when a course may be only offered for our APA group or our legacy

100group which again just as a reminder our current freshmen are our our first APA uh cohort where everyone else we decided to maintain the status quo structure. So with that my colleagues are going to step up. I think I met my three minute mark and we will take any questions or comments. And before the board asks some questions, I just want to highlight the important process of governance that we actually just experienced a few moments ago, but it ties to that first bullet point that Mr. Breag has in a completely I was going to say unrelated, but it's really related. So, in a separate presentation a few weeks ago, um the board had an opportunity to learn more about our AP courses and our dual credit courses that we currently have. And one of the

101board members asked a question, how many AP classes and how many dual credit classes do we have? Uh and then that got a little deeper. How many do we have at North? How many do we have at South? And so on and so forth. That question led to a wonderful conversation. We we thought it might start being very simple, just working with Carol and her team to get it on the website. And then we realized that my gosh, there's there's some inconsistencies here based on Oakton titles versus our titles. there's some inconsistencies based on how the AP or the College Board defines AP test and course titles versus how we label them. And then in a true Glenrooken enriched honors course, it's not just one AP test you can take. It can be two AP

102tests, all sorts of stuff. getting to the point of one of the reasons why we present things two times at the board is truly to get feedback to make it even better. Not just for the board, but also for the community as a whole. So, as a result of that one comment, we identified a gap in our communication that will really serve as a great resource for our families, especially those who are beginning to prepare or currently navigating the college application process that need to know the alignment of these different things. And now, it's not only on our website, but it's also in that beautiful small course guide that's uh sitting in front of you. So, thank you to the board for asking the questions and now that's your tea up to ask some more

103questions to see how we can make it better. Okay, no pressure, Mr. O'Hara. Do you have a groundbreaking transformational question for us? Sure. Um, no, thank you for all the work. I love the fact that we get I mean I kind of makes me want to go back to school and and do some studying. The astronomy course alone is awesome. Um, I guess this is probably just a a misprint or something, but you have Mandarin Chinese not being offered at GBS until the fourth year. Um, so I assume it's probably offered all four years at GBS. To look at that as it Yeah, we were talking a long time about True North. So, um, I don't think that's transformational though. I think that's just a misprint. That could be a misprint. Yes, we will look

104at that. I have Oh, but it's offered only at GI the fourth year and then it suddenly offered it. Yeah, we I'm sorry. I can go ahead and answer that as I'm looking at the three of them. Um, okay. So, languages are very difficult to maintain full courses at both buildings. Um, and we have watched a progression of not enough students at Glenberrook South being interested in Mandarin to support one whole section. So, starting two years ago, we had begun sending North, excuse me, South students to North because their Mandarin Chinese program was larger. That is following the natural progression of that cohort of children getting accustomed to traveling to North for that language. very similar things have been happening the other way. Um, for example, Spanish for heritage learners only takes place at South.

105This kind of mutual partnership between Glenrook North and Glen Brook South ensures that we get to be one of the best schools in the state in terms of offering the large variety of languages but to ensure that the programs are sufficient class sizes to to run. Um, so we are hosting it senior year because we do have a large enough cohort. Um, but that's the last class that had the large enough cohort. Oh, so moving forward. You guys are doing great. Go to North. Yes. But I think what you mentioned there is just another place where maybe in our additional information we need to clean that up. Yeah. I think that's a real again finding those little pieces tell us. Yep. Do we mention somewhere because Barb, you raised a great point. I was going

106to ask about that. Um, do we mention somewhere that you can take a clo a course like it even if it says GBN if you're like I really want to do Mandarin and you're coming from Glen View like how is that mentioned in this answer right so from a course guide perspective yeah from the course guide perspective we're very clear on where the course is offered and whether it's offered at both schools or not we tend to we obviously want our students to find courses a lot of that is tied to programs. For instance, as um Dr. George just mentioned with languages, um we want to ensure that program sequence is available. We tend to have conversations at the student services level if they're oneoff courses that are offered um at one building or the

107other staying understanding the impact on their schedule if they travel. There are opportunities um that's why we're trying to get alignment as best we can. A lot of other areas would be if a facilities was um different that um for instance um if we are talking about welding at one building or the other so it's it's program specific but there are opportunities to move well how would a parent know that I mean is that that goes in the in the counseling area in the selection of courses during their four-year planning process sorry personalized learning process. Yeah. No no that that's great. I I would suggest you put it in here too just in case a counselor forgets or you know like it's best to have it. Yeah, I think that's a great recommendation up in

108the in the front end to understand if you notice a course that's only offered at one school, what is the process? I think it's a great art um great addition. Yeah, we're an aster by those and stuff. Additional information would be the the new way to avoid multiple asterisks. You can you can give me credit asterisks these days. Yes. Have languages, too. It depends on which middle school. Oh, sorry. Yeah. Um, it depends on which middle schools offer the languages and it it depends on the middle school. So, there is a a school that teaches uh Mandarin, Chinese. Um, but most of the schools for that district go to North. And then for SHL, we have a large theater school. Yes. Population who is very interested in SHL because they've had that in their middle

109schools and a lot of those students come to South. So, I just wanted to explain sometimes it's also the middle school programming. Miss Hope, I know you were saying a little bit about the timing of all of this and I would just love to hear like I know um the personalized learning conversations already happened before the new course guide was approved and with the semester changes and you were talking a little bit about it looking different next year. Can you just remind me? Sure. So right now as we know that we're we're underway with this process. So as these courses come forward, this has been the traditional timeline we have structured. In fact, we once had these due in February even though the courses would be ready to go a few months later. So we

110moved it up to provide um more opportunities, greater clarity in the in the counseling area. However, what we have found um with the move to final exams before break, additional work that we would be reworking our timeline that new courses would be due in the second semester and we would be bringing them to this table and or this committee in May so that we would be ready for the summer so that when our folks came back and we had the process beginning in student services. Our course guide would be printed. All of our students would have access to it and it would be for the following August that the those courses would be implemented. This is a common process in other districts, especially those districts that have finals before break and there so as we

111make the transition in our schedule, it's the right time to make the transition in this process to afford uh greater alignment so that our freshmen when they're beginning their process, this cataloges in the hands of their families um at least a month and a half ahead of time. I I heard a lot about the standardization process between the two schools in particular where historically one school has offered a semester long course where the other has offered a year-long course from a lot of GA members and and teachers. I'm curious how the standardizations that happened for this year are handled by the teachers or how they felt about it and how many are left to kind of still work toward in the future where they're just not balanced in that way. Sure. So we had this

112year as you can see we had just a few that were outstanding in particular in the fine arts area and the broadcasting that was the heaviest area. Astronomy was another area in science. We still have a roughly 10% difference between the buildings. And for some of those there's good reason. We have differences in dual credit. that can come down to the credentials for the teachers and what's available in terms of facilities. We also have circumstances that quite frankly um we have historical offerings that meet the needs of individual or groups of students that have created differences in those structures. We have those pieces. We've had conversations. At this point, I think we've reached a strong alignment structure in th that 90%. And those conversations in those other areas, I hate to continue to go back

113to the curriculum mapping, but until we have strong curriculum mapping across those structures, it's really difficult for our IS's to navigate those complex conversations that have 30-year history of courses. Uh Dr. Grall had mentioned the idea of archiving courses. One of the things that is really our next step is to not only think about what are our new courses, but what are the courses we might consider removing or archiving. That's a lot of where that 10% lands right now. Courses that we have a history behind, we have a lot of value in what they have brought but perhaps they haven't run in a few years. Um how do we want to approach those? And that will be the next real alignment issue for us or target for us. Mr. Shine, actually that was, you know,

114sort of my takeaway is just how extensive this catalog is and in thinking about that is really how many of these courses exist only in this book. And I I'm curious then if if these are the universe of potential offerings and I don't know how many are in here. Um, how many are we really are we really offering and do we to your point and I do we need to call the herd a little bit here which I imagine there are staff highly invested in some of these courses making their you know suns setting quite a challenge. Correct. I I think that's that's the easiest answer for you and my time period is correct. Like it's great to have all this. It looks like a university. a nice midsize college would probably be happy to

115have a course catalog that looks like this. But I'm not sure it it helps our families that much if if there are a number of these courses or it's highly unlikely that we would actually offer them. I I think a lot of these conversations start with data. So, as we look at trends and what classes are running, that will be part of our spring work is to put that data into the the hands of our IS's and begin having those conversations. These, as you know, are are not easy conversations. They're not short conversations. They require time. Um, they require conversations about impact, about curriculum, and those are the those need to begin, and that's the intention of this spring. maybe as an interim, I mean, we have all kinds of asterisks and things in here,

116but but just have some kind of a code or, you know, a symbol that says, you know, may not be offered or whatever. So, you don't necessarily have to take it out and eliminate it because maybe there would be an interest or or or may not be offered, you know, please speak to your counselor or something. So, so maybe there is really, you know, an interest hiding there and we would then want to offer it, but to the point of, you know, so anyway, yeah, as a followup um for the spring, um Mr. Shine, you asked a question which again I don't think we've articulated um in the document, which is how many total courses do we offer? um just from a a sheer number standpoint, we've we've now done that for AP, we've done

117that for dual credit. So that's that's a takeaway. Um and the second takeaway is I will work with the team after registration and sectioning is primarily done um let's say after spring break um and we'll bring forth a report of the courses that do not run which I think is important information for us not only to have today but for us to monitor moving forward. Thanks Skip for those great questions. work. Mr. Glowaki, did you have any questions? Correct. No. Again, kudos on the wonderful work you guys in assembling this. I know it's been a labor. I don't know of love, but a labor to pull this all together. It's really going back to my kids, they're now at the other end of the spectrum would have been very helpful to guide them through this.

118And so, uh, thank you. Only these two, Dean, Mr. Downey. Um, no, I'll echo. Great work. You know, uh, I'll steal his line saying what can we do to support you? You know, I guess this I guess we have two questions. One being that and the other one being um, regarding multivariable calculus, linear algebra, can you tell me the learning objectives inner products and normthology and linear dynamic systems? Dr. Basilopoulos. I'm joking. I'm joking. No, I'm joking. I actually built that curriculum out for Anthony. Oh, okay. Uh, no, awesome work. Let us know what we can do to support you. Yeah, this this is terrific. Um, very interesting reading. I just want to understand, I guess, um, you know, I personally love the binder and I will take it and put it with all of

119my other binders, but I know some people enjoy doing these things online. And is all of this clickable and reachable and like like when you say additional information it's a hyperlink to additional information all that is that the way it works do we do we have a podcast there we have not done a podcast on this um I will say that one of the things we did a lot of work this year in terms of cleanup is aligning this paper copy which we will have um a copy for all incoming uh families that we also made sure that the digital version of this aligns and then it mirrors school links so that for our families from the language on here to the language in school links to how it looks in school links how the

120course sequences at the start um you could pull up the math one not to bring math back up again on page 72 how that lays out so that as a family goes they're moving horizontally through um that was the goal is to ensure that there's a consistent user experience whether you're print or you're digital. And to our communication teams, thank you so much. They built out the website to ensure that the navigation of print and digital was really clear and understanding that it's a seamless whatever you prefer, you will have the same user experience. That was really important. We received a lot of positive feedback, but also it would be nice if it operated the same. and we've done the best we can with making that alignment. That's terrific. Um I I'm sure that's much

121appreciated because you know it it is obviously a big project to have that consistent across different platforms. Um, but so essential because if you have inconsistencies that's going to cause a lot of confusion and you know there it's a lot of information already to process without having to navigate little things that you are you going to track down a counselor to get this answer you know that kind of thing. So that that's great to hear. Um, as far as what we are you are asking for the board tonight, I just want to make sure that we're all on the same page about that. There you are asking the board to approve these particular curricular changes that is adding courses and um the modifications to align the courses that you've laid out here. So there's no

122action requested tonight. It would come back on consent. It also would have the board approve the course guide in its entirety. So are is is everyone feeling feeling are do we have consensus that that makes sense to have on the consent agenda for our next meeting? Are we comfortable with that? Okay, great. Well, thank you so much. I just want to thank you um and share one more thing that uh two questions that came up was um how are people feeling about the alignment and what can we do as the board to support you and um this is my second year and just seeing the difference in alignment and the energy and the the feelings behind coming together and collaborating across town has been very different this year especially with the time that we've gotten

123with PLC work and so I just want to thank you for the time that we have for professional collaboration um PLC work and they can um zoom or they can they can make sure that they use that time for um connecting and also March Institute Day has been really helpful for so these are the the different um avenues that people have really learned uh of cross town colleagues and and really um gaining traction and in friendship and and collegiality. So I just want to thank you for for that time one more time. Thank you to that is good to hear. Okay, thank you all. All right. Um, okay. I think that brings us to a resolution authorizing intervention in property tax assessment proceedings, which sounds less fun. I don't know. I'm just going to say

124it. Um, um, Miss Tarver is not able to be here with us this evening. Um, so I'm going to take this one for her. Um, every few years we do need to formally present a resolution to the board of education that authorizes our uh, firm uh, which is Hower Isoa. I'm missing one name. Uh, thank you. Um, they ultimately assist not just Glenrook, but they assist all of the township school districts in navigating property tax appeals. Um, property tax appeals is an important uh, responsibility of all taxing bodies and that's why we work together. Um, these are individuals who ultimately are not per se appealing uh, the district. They're appealing the assessor's uh, assessment of of large businesses uh, industrial complexes and sometimes uh, residential um, homes. We tend only to get involved when the

125difference of an appeal would result in a net loss to the district in $100,000 or more. Um, and there's probably about 30 to 45 cases a year that we navigate. Um, most of our property tax objections, having done this for about 10 years, um, are from the same large companies every year. Um, so we've kind of been used to doing that. Um so ultimately this would come back to the board on consent. Again it just authorizes the firm to represent us which they have um probably for 20 to 30 years. I'll just throw it out to any member who has a question or concern about continue continuing what seems to be a longestablished process for us. Okay. So we'll bring it back on consent. Thank you. Okay. Um that brings us then to possible topics

126for future board meetings and um uh Dr. Grall and I talked about a couple that we um have went ahead and listed here and he can um elaborate on those for us. Certainly. Um, so a few weeks ago, maybe two, I shared with the board a link to the diligent community website as well as a new portion of the district website that gives our entire community access to a progress report, if you will, on our strategic planning goals. For example, even if you're in diligent right now for a board agenda, you'll notice we have agenda items and then we have attachments and then goals that are listed as focus areas. Every time we present something to the board, we are tagging what we're doing directly to the strategic plan and that instantly creates a dashboard

127of progress. Um what I'll be working with the team as we move into the second semester of the school year and we'll give a little preview of this next week. Um is what what is our percentage of completion? Uh the strategic plan has been in place last year and it's been in place this year. We've talked a lot about it this year. Um but are we at 100% on a goal? For example, a specific focus area is about creating personalized learning plans for our students. and Dr. Cummings will talk about that next week and share that we are at a 100% completion for our freshman class. That means that that part perhaps might have reached a completion level. On the other hand, we are continuing to navigate through. Just today, Dr. Romano presented a proposal

128for creating a bit of a a professional development opportunity for our staff members that are interested in learning the real nitty-gritty of what it means to be an administrator. And so she's created a pipeline program, if you will, um that we're we're still working on and we'll work through in the spring for implementation next year. So that we've made progress on, but we're not completed on. So, we'll get we'll go through some of those updates. I really want to encourage the board to take an opportunity, look at that dashboard, give some thoughts to conversations you've had with community members, students, parents, staff members. Um maybe you want to kind of highlight some things that maybe you're just curious of what's our status on. We may not have all the answers next time we come together,

129but I hope uh we'll start to see how this strategic plan that we adopted in 20 in 2024, how it's really coming to fruition. And uh it's very cool. And then to make sure everyone has an opportunity to be equally as excited as some members of the policy committee, uh Dr. John's is going to give this lovely update on the policy manual modernization project for sections 1 2 3 4 and 8 that includes wonderful exciting things such as the organization of the school district, community relations. Don't forget the structure of the board of education as well as operational topics and general school administration. So we'll give that little overview. Um, for some reason our public o open meetings for policy have not been hugely attended um by members of the community, but we're going to

130keep sharing information um because the board is actually going to move forward with adopting some of these uh sections that have been worked on um in the near future. And why we're starting with 1 2 3 4 and 8 is they are the shortest sections and most of those sections the majority of the board here has been part of revising over the last two years. So we're already really in alignment. The largest sections of the policy manual are personnel uh students and instruction five six and seven. And those have the greatest area for growth in terms of updating to modern language. So uh we'll be keeping on working through that. So for anyone who's excited in joining the policy uh effort, there will be a policy committee meeting right before uh next board meeting and

131you are all welcome to be there. There will be cookies. So encourage you to join and that will be a a working group meeting for the committee and before we have our next meeting with the is IASB team from press that um we're we're sort of chunking the work for policy but we want to be sure that um you know if if you even if you don't have time to join us at our meetings um that you're kept up to date on our progress so that at the end of this process when we have the full policy manual revised. We don't have to drop in a massive amount of information on you. You've had the opportunity to keep up with it. We just want to make sure that the full board is in a position

132to feel um uh fully up todate on the work so that when it comes time to vote on the policy manual, it's it's not a huge slog for you that you'll have um been able to um follow along. Um okay. Um, and I do believe that we will have a closed session this evening and we will have action coming out of the closed session this evening. Um, so uh other proposed topics of course I'm so sorry and I don't know if these are proposed topics or I just need to understand where we discuss them but I I um would love to continue the conversation or understand the next steps for adding students to the board or what that can look like. Um I think that would be really interesting. I feel as if that is

133a calendared for communications committee uh end of January. Okay. Um and then I keep coming back to some of what was shared at a previous board meeting and then at the parents association meeting at GBN that I went to and it was such a nice presentation about all of the data we're collecting about student engagement and a lot of the growth that we've experienced. And I'm I I just keep thinking about sort of the percentage of of kids who are feeling not a sense of belonging and who are not feeling a growth mindset. And you know that we're doing a lot of things to sort of try and improve those numbers. And I'd love to hear more about kind of detailed what what we're thinking of doing or what are some of those barriers or

134to help problem solve around that. I don't know if that's a something we have time for, but we absolutely have time for that. Um, a real good time might be towards the end of January, if not very early February. Um, each year the board is familiar with the term five essentials, uh, the the climate survey that's offered to staff, students, as well as parents. And we just talked today about how we're switching from the five essentials to our panorama survey which is the survey that we use to gather that information. Perhaps as part of launching that um uh window which is at the beginning of February um we can give a little preview of the data we get from it and we can talk about how we actionize it. Love it. Uh did any other

135board member have a a topic uh to suggest for future board meetings? Um, so sorry, Miss Hope. Um, of course. Oh. Oh, yeah. I would love to learn a little bit about college counseling. Okay. I would suggest a good time for that would be around the April timeline. That's okay. Excellent. Um, and of course, if things come to mind when you're not sitting at the board table, you're welcome to send an email or um, call R.J. myself and we'll make sure that we find a place to fit this in on the agenda. Um in that case now we are ready to move to closed. So closed session will be to consider the appointment employees of the public body or legal counsel for the public body including hearing testimony on a complaint lodged against an employee

136of the public body or against legal counsel for the public body to determine its validity. uh collective negot collective negotiating matters between the public body and its employees, their rep or their representatives or deliberations concerning salary schedules for one or more classes of employees and the placement of individual students in special education programs and other matters relating to individual students. That's those matters fall under section 2C 1, 2, and 10, excuse me, of the Open Meeting Act. Could I please have a motion to go into closed? So moved. All in favor? I. Any opposed? Motion carries. This will be a relatively And Miss Mullenbeck, we're back at 9:20 p.m. Excellent. So, we are back in open session and I believe that Mr. Downing has a motion. I move that the board of education approve the

137early graduation requests for the 2025 2026 school year as presented in the close session. Please second. M Mrs. Hope, yes. Mr. O'Hara, yes. Mr. Shine, yes. Mr. Downing, yes. Mr. Glowaki, yes. And Miss Mullenbeck, yes. Motion carries. And now we need a motion to adjurnn. So moved. Second. All in favor? Any opposed? Motion carries. We are journed at 9:21. Excellent. Thank you everyone.