001themselves. And they will also share what language they were able to acquire. Good evening board members and community members. Really excited to be back with an update about the Pathways uh program. Unfortunately, Ben Cornell, one of our bilingual teachers, is not here today, but he's been part of the project since the brainstorming stage in 2019. Um, I'm Sylvia Gorski Dwarte, the family resource teacher for the district. Good evening everyone. My name is Marcelo Yunda and one of the bilingual teachers here at IT and I'm happy to be here tonight. [Music] No, Javier Middle School. [Music] Natalie gradu. Foreman French diplomat Springman. [Music] Leah Constant diplomat lang Frances. So, we wanted to circle back to why um we started the pathways program at district 34. Um it's important to recognize that the state has an official
002seal of biiteracy at the high school level that students can achieve in one or more languages. Um and it's an official award that goes on their transcript and diploma and carries many benefits um in their future. At district 34, we created a pathways program. Um, and this year, 92 students graduated and achieved this award that shows that they're on track um to earn the seal when they continue in high school. As you can see, this is our timeline for the this school year. We started in the springtime informing families, you guys, back about a year ago. Um we recruited families and informed them about not only the high school version but also what our school school district is starting. Uh students committed in November and started working on their community service um working towards their
003um language achievements and working on their projects all the way through the spring. Uh some students took additional language assessments. Um, and then in April and May, we were finally able to confirm which students achieved the award. Um, at the awards assembly for eighth grade and at graduation, students wore their medals and cords, as you can see, our students are wearing today. Um, and we did send those who achieved their information on to the high school. So, they know that these students are already on the pathway to achieve that award. Um, we look forward to continuing this program into the next school year. In these three columns, you'll see the three different components of this award. The English requirements can be met through grades, through map testing, through access scores, and some students did take
004um a stamp test in English. The world language component could be achieved also through grades in addition to having a proficiency level of a novice high. Some other students took an apprentice test, which is uh to get into the heritage program at GBS. Other students took stamp test and we did create our own Mongolian test and interview. um because it's a low frequency language but high frequency in our community. So we accommodated that big large community um in district 34. You'll hear more about it later this evening. Um the commitment part which is distinct and different from the state seal um at our level inquired four hours of community service using that language or supporting the culture. In addition, students also prepared an essay or different type of projects. We'll see some example an example
005later this evening. We had a great part students participation this year in both the schools IT and Springman at IT 55 students participated in the program and four of 46 of them met the requirements for the award. It's important to mention also that we had 16 students from the heritage program and 31 students from the global language classes. H at the springman we had 48 students participation and ironically 46 students also met the requirements for the award and also we had 17 students from the heritage program and 31 again ironically the same number from the global language program too. So this is like a for being the first year of implementing this program. It's a we are really excited and happy and really looking forward for the following years. Why should eighth graders participate in
006pathways? The first reason is that you could show off your language skills and grow your language superpower. It was really cool at graduation to wear a medal and a tassel to kind of show off that we know two languages. Not only that, but it helps build community. I think I can speak for all of us when I say that it was a lot of fun to go to the events and hang out with our friends, but also teach other students of our district, especially the little kids, the culture of our language. Third, this gets you ready for the official state seal of biiteracy in high school. Plus, you'll earn a cord and a medal to wear at graduation or two cords like Orangu and I. We had many different options for the projects that we
007did. Um, I chose to write an essay which was a great learning experience for me and it was pretty fun. And then a lot of my friends made posters or different art projects. And this video was made by Ava, a student edit. [Music] Colant [Music] as follows. and Glenfield. [Music] Amen. [Music] Community service pathways to bi literacy required us to do community service. I did all my hours at church. I had to help at events, clean up and things like that. Um, Latin American and Hispanic Heritage Night was about a bunch of students in AIA that made a display of Day of the Dead for the Hispanic Heritage Talent Show. For the multilingual night at Lion, as you can see, I'm in that photo. But um while we were there, we operated a booth and
008we did different like art projects like arts and crafts with the little kids that were there and we taught them about different countries and the languages that we spoke. For French week, I volunteered at Springman Middle School and stayed after school to make pins. And during lunch, I passed out raffles with my good friend Lucy Tipton. For my for my community service, I volunteered at Gator Game Night and taught students for a Mongolian traditional game called Shah. My friends and I volunteered at the multilingual family game night at Springman. In all, it was so much fun helping families, especially the little kids, and seeing the smiles on their faces. And it was so wholesome teaching them and being able to use our superpower to bond with them. And now looking to the future, as I
009said, we are really excited about the the growth of this program. It's so amazing seeing our students the engagement of them during the the different activities we have implemented this year. So for the school year 202526 the idea is to boost the participation of our 8th grade Spanish heritage students. Uh so they actually are getting ready to take a these advanced Spanish classes in high school. Also, we are h planning and to expand our volunteer opportunities so they have more choices compared to what we have this year. We had a great selection of choices this year. But the we are always trying to create more opportunities for them and uh also we are planning to streamline the program through a planning and making this process I could say more effective more engaging for them. And
010now the following year also uh for the 26 27 our plan is to expand our language offering at least choosing two of the 10 top languages that we we have now. So again we are really really excited and looking forward to see our program growing. Gracias. Gracias. Mercy. A huge thank you to our teachers, guidance, principals, school board members, and especially our families for always supporting us. You help us grow into students who are proud to be multilingual and multiculture. And we're just getting started. Thank you. Triben, I took French in high school. That was as good as it gets. Um, no, I'm very proud of you guys as it's awesome. I can't wait till you get your seal by literacy in high school. We can't wait to hear about that. That'll be fantastic. Does
011anybody have any questions? I just invite you all to come back in four years and show off. Just gonna say I love that you self described it as a superpower and it really is the fact that you can recognize that incredible keep it up. Thank you. [Laughter] Yeah, we could sell that to 225. I think we should. All right. Thank you very much. We're very proud of you. Thank you. Can I Yeah. Before you all go, we're going to do a quick group photo. Yeah. Come right back over. Quick reminder to our board members, there's a there's a little button in the center of your of your mic. So, when you you can either leave it on or you can we can treat, you know, like in the Senate, you know, they they push it
012when they want to talk or whatever. Either way, they don't need to be green if you want to be heard. Thank you. Well, I think they should. Sure. Anyone? I mean, this is our first class, so I think we should uh Don't you Doctor, what do you think? Yeah. here by you. I think short characters, two perfect for your hard work. Thank you, Raquel, for [Music] It's nice to move around, too. All right, next we have our audience comments section. And we got to wait for Becca. She's right there. Where? Oh, there she is. Thought she was walking out. Do we have any comments, Becca? We do not have it. Okay. I thought you switch. Yeah. Change. Well, okay. I think Scott I do. Oh, there we go. Uh, next we have our consideration of
013resolutions, our consent agenda. We have the 23039 personnel report, the 255040 payroll warrants, the 2541 vendor warrants, the fiscal year 2026 tenative budget and call for public hearing. We have the 2543 prevailing rate of wage resolution, the 2544 authorization to advance payment of warrants, and the 2545 annual certification of hazardous conditions. Can I have a motion and a second to approve the consent agenda as presented? I'll move it. So move. Thank you. Second. Great. Gabby, may I have a roll call? Kemalevich. I. Moon. I. Dolan. I. Pritsker. I. Subos. Hi. Julio. I. Nelson. I. Motion carries. Now we move along to our consideration of other resolutions. the 2546 administrator and exempt staff compensation. Mr. Dorin, this uh set of information is consistent with last year and we just recommend that the board approve as listed.
014Um this tracks along with the uh increases that are in the certified staff contract. Are there any questions or comments? If not, could I get a motion and a second to approve the resolution as presented? So moved. Moon. Is there a second? Second. Pritsker. Yes. Gabby. May I have a roll call? Moon. I. Dolan. I. Pritsker. I. Supos. Hi. Gilio. I. Nelson. I. Kemale Levich. I. Motion carries. Next we have the 2547 press issue8. Thank you. So there is you wouldn't know this but we took one of these policies off to do a little bit more work with. Um other than that I I think the only change that is probably worth noting that's not really functional. It's more in its placement is one that I don't know Kevin you might want to just speak
015to it for a moment. So, Title 9 uh is reverting to the 2020 form, which in essence is just a narrower definition for some of the relevant categories and it it it changes the way complaints would get processed and there are connections to other policies we have. So, for example, uh pending a certain kind of complaint, it would go through Title 9 only instead of being accessible to a complainant through the uniform grievance procedure. That's a different policy. That might have been clear as mud the way I explained that, but it's essentially reverting to 2020 um narrowing some of the definitions and processes. It's how it's positioned within the policies if you think about it that way. Mhm. Otherwise, you know, these are recommended policies through uh the Illinois School Boards Association as as per
016usual. A lot of footnote updates. There are. All right. Can I have a motion and second to approve the resolution as presented? So moved. Pritsker. Second. Dolan. Gabby. May I have a roll call? Dolan. I. Pritsker. Hi. Supos. Hi. Julio. I. Nelson I Chemovich I Moon I motion carries. Now we'll move on to our discussion section. We're going to be changing the order and we are going to be asking for our Mongolian community update to be our first discussion item. Yes, thank you. And we are very proud of our ongoing relationship with our Mongolian community here in District 34. and we thought it was important for the board and for the community to hear about an update on this on this important partnership that we value so much. Raquel, thank you. Uh, tonight we do
017have BPAC leaders from the Mongolian BPAC, our staff, current students and former students who will share with you how we've actively supported the academic and linguistic development of Glen View's fastest growing multilingual student group. and they'll introduce themselves to you. Good evening. My name is Zia Gentmore. I am a Mongolian community coordinator. Hi, my name is Nara Banzra. I'm a bilingual teacher and a current um parent at district 34. Hi, my name is Julia Jin Dangasuri. I'm a current parent and I'm a president of the Mongolian BPAC at the district 34. Hi, my name is Symbon Bat. I am the new leader of Mongolian club and I just graduated seventh grade from Springman. Hello, my name is Sa Pat and I'm going into eighth grade. I am the current leader as well as next year's
018leader of Springman's Mongolian club. Hello, my name is Indra. I'm the initiator and one of the current leaders of Mongolian club at Springman. I just graduated my 8th grade in Springman and I'm going to be freshman at JBS. [Applause] So today we will discuss the progress, growth and accomplishment of the Mongolian community in Glen View. All made possible through district 34 support and contributions. The Mongolian community is evidently expanding as reflected in the data. more than 160 fa families to speak Mongolian at home ranking it as the second most spoken language English and Spanish. We would like a highlight of journey from where we started the growth and where we are now. So as I remember back in 2012 uh the population of Mongolian students was less than 10. Uh as the Mongolian population increased
019the translating interpreting services increased as well. Our shared timeline includes when the population increased the need for parents involvement became necessary. The establishing a Mongolian BPA group became a vital part of our parents families held a variety of different kinds of workshops, events, meetings, and virtual learning sessions throughout this time and COVID. Also hiring not only Mongolian native speaking associates but also a Mongolian community coordinator as well as a certified Mongolian teacher. Supporting the Mongolian population was not limited to hiring the native speaking staff and teachers. We are the population that is thrilled to share that district 34 supported and helped to implement the afterchool Mongolian classes. This event has taken our community to the next level of achievement and has attracted so many parents and students to decide to move into our district schools.
020Most of our parents feel proud and fortunate to live in a district 34 school area. Mongolian families are proud to contribute to celebrations and cultural events throughout the D34 and the community through our music, dance, and much more. The participation of our Mongolian students and families has grown exponentially in the last years because of the inclusive environment that builds pride and connections to their heritage. When my kids started school, I faced many challenges due to the difference in a school systems. I made a decision to become more involved as a parent in order to better understand how to American education system works. Through this experience, I came to recognize the importance of the parents involvement. I took on the role of Mongolian BPAC president to support our community, many of whom has a language barrier
021that make it difficult to navigate district programs and advocate for their children. Also, I would like to express my gratitude for the inclusive learning opportunities provided to our Mongolian communities, Mongolian students. Here are some examples of events and programs we've created with the BPAC from Glen View Public Library visits for students and families to parent programs about writing at home and more. We observed a high need in mental in mental health in our community especially during COVID. District 34 partnered with family service center to provide culturally aware support that can navigate both American and Mongolian heritage experiences. Our work goes beyond district 34 by creating connections other organizations like family service center, Glenville public library, um youth services and other district in the area. Creating a community takes effort from all stakeholders to support our
022teachers and staff in better understanding our Mongolian students and families. We have provided professional development opportunities for them to learn more about this unique cultural group. This has a lasting impact on creating belonging and inclusion. Another example of creating belonging and inclusion is supporting students voices and choice. The Mongolian Club is an a great example of it. Our Mongolian Club fosters an inclusive community in Springman by bringing together Mongolian immigrants and those interested in Mongolian culture. Our mission is to share Mongolia's rich heritage, support newcomers, and promote cultural exchange through events, activities, and educational programs. We aim to build a diverse, welcoming and locally com connected community. I would like to share how the idea for the Mongolian club began. Two years ago, I moved from Mongolia to the United States without knowing English. It
023was a hard experience. I felt really lonely and isolated. With support from other Mongolian students, I slowly adjusted. But later I met newcomers facing the same struggles. And while I helped them, I knew it wasn't enough. Learning about the B literacy program made me realize how important it is to keep our language and culture alive. That inspired me and my partners to start the Mongolian club at Springman to support new immigrants and create a space where Mongolian American students can speak their mother language. I also want to add that this is just one of our goals. Many Forgan students didn't know much about Mongolia when I arrived. So, our club also aims to share knowledge about Mongolia with others. Our club has made a lot of impact. We share and teach Mongolian culture which breaks
024stereotypes. We support newcomers so they can feel welcomed and understood. We connect people and build friendship. We show how pride in your culture can bring a community together. And this is just the beginning. We are planning to develop and bring more largecale benefits not only to students but also to the school. District 34 is known for their extensive support and services. It even reached Mongolian consulate of Chicago at and who came to the Asian-American Native Hawaiian Pacific Islander Heritage Showcase to honor District 34 its contributions to the Mongolian community. District 34 is an example for other districts to follow. So looking ahead uh we hope that outstanding accomplishments at district 34 reach within the Mongolian ministry of education across the ocean. Additionally we hope that the generation we are nurturing here will return to Glenville
025giving back to this community with language culture and community thrive in harmony and raising the next generation of future leaders. Okay. Thank you. Thank you. That was awesome. It's amazing how fast you've grown this. That's fantastic. Thank you. Anybody have anything to add? I'm so excited to meet you all in at GBS someday. Thank you very much. Thank you. Thank you for all your hard work. Thank you. Mhm. That one girl young. Yeah. She seems like a rock star. Oh, there's Becca. Becca, do we have any audience comments? I know. I just was She's just He's just Thank you. That's awesome. All right. Next, we have our KWeight math teaching and learning update. Dr. Silverman. Yes. Thank you. Good luck following that. By the way, both of them. I hope you use your superpowers. We
026definitely we have math superpowers. Okay, let me just fire up the presentation. So, I want to first introduce my amazing colleague Jenny Burggerron. Jenny and I are going to share with you tonight. I also want to absolutely recognize our entire teaching staff because we have done some major lifting in the area of math education and especially this year with K5 similar to other to some of the other programs we heard about tonight a year ago. We were sharing about our new math resource and we spent this year implementing it and the teachers have been absolutely amazing and it's been just a tremendous amount of work. So, thank you to all of our teachers and our staff. So, with that, we're going to jump in here. Oh, thank you. All right. Swing back and forth. All
027right. Excellent. So, I our mission statement, I think, is super powerful, but I I I'm actually a huge fan, a bigger fan of our vision statement, and I think it fits nicely as a reminder uh with all of our curricular curriculum work and curricular programming. But uh our vision is where we're headed and I always want to believe that our teaching and learning is in a state of continuous improvement and we're always trying to maximize the potential of our teaching capacity and our children. And so a reminder that uh we have this vision statement. It's powerful. I love it and it just fits with what we do. And speaking of what we do, we have new goals because of our strategic plan that we're going to talk about next. But these are actually aligned to
028our new strategic goal uh objectives. In this case, we're looking at uh creativity, innovation. And then you can see the particular objectives that we're going to be striving for in our uh mathematical programming and sharing with you tonight. All right. So um what you see here is um from 2023 until projecting next year kind of where we've been in K8 with math. So in 2324 um that was when 68 was implementing a new resource that was the big ideas resource. And so um during that school year their focus was um their training um for the program and implementation support throughout the year. So they received professional development and um a lot of support from me. Then uh this school year 24-25 we had um some very intense um sessions in all the K5 uh with
029all the K5 teams at each school that focused on the go math which is the the resource we we adopted in K5 go math the learning model and we did this kind of in two parts. Um you can see the first part uh we called session one was focused on the instruction um and kind of just the learning the the newness of the approach within the go math um program. And then our second session uh which was in the spring, our first one was in the fall. Our second was kind of in the late winter or early spring was on um rotations in math class. And that is something that we'll talk a little bit more about throughout this presentation. And that is something that was uh something that some of the teachers had been
030experimenting with a little bit on their own before this um before we adopted this uh resource. But it is something that's really embedded within this resource and there's a lot of resources provided to the teachers. But um as we experimented with and explored and learned about this year, there's so much involved with it that um the implementation process is certainly longer than one school year. So, the support for the teachers will continue throughout next year. And we spent this year um spending a lot of time with them and hearing what their needs were and what they wanted support in. And we're hoping to really tailor the direction we go and the support we continue to give to um where they kind of feel that need for support. So, uh we'll share more about that with
031you as well. And then yeah, that was everything, right? Okay. So what you see up here now is the go math learning model the structure or framework that is um embedded in the program and it's called the 5e model which um it it is a framework outside of go math 2 but it's the one that they've adopted and it basically starts with a quick engage as you can see up there which is your quick um hook into the lesson and then the explore and the explain sections are the direct instruction provided by the teacher and the guided practice that um with the teacher and students working together. And then you've got this elaborate section. And this is where kind of that um that newness really was kind of our our our focus this year. This
032is where that those rotations come into play. So we really spent a lot of time working in that elaborate section um which I'll show a little video to you in a moment to kind of explain what the ideal looks like um when it's kind of functioning smoothly. and as um as desired. And then um math class ends with some kind of uh way to evaluate how students, you know, learned for the day. Usually that's with an exit ticket or some kind of quick check formatively. And then um independent practice, which could be homework or could be done in class. All right. So here um in a moment Matt will show um this little animation that gives an an overview of what math class um may look like with these rotations and with uh with the
033various student makeup and and differing needs found in every classroom. Um my caveat here is this is kind of what the um ideal is and just know that there's all the whole you know spectrum of everything what you might see but this is kind of what we um strive for I guess and when we are working with the teachers on what should rotations look like feel like sound like what should they be like so um there we go let's let's play Smoke instruction and rotations in math class. Math class starts with the teacher leading students through an engaging question or activity in whole class format. The teacher then guides the students in learning as they explore how to solve new problems. Students participate individually and also engage in peer conversations, allowing the teacher to hear
034all voices as she navigates through the group. After these conversations, she has a good idea about who might need a little bit more direct instruction, who might be ready for a challenge, and everyone in between. The students display a broad range of content understanding and varying degrees of readiness to move on. Because each student may need something different than the person they are sitting next to, this is when small group rotations can begin. The teacher can pull a small group of students who need more support with the lesson to her table table for more direct instruction and guidance with written practice. The rest of the students are a group of like-minded peers to work on activities together or independently. The highest achievers will come together and work through the practice problems and applications. Another group
035might be assigned to work on digital learning aligned to the curriculum in either waggle or the last group might be working on sharpening their math fluency. They'll stay in these groups for 5 to 10 minutes and then rotate on to another task. The group that was with the teacher will move on to written practice in their workbooks. And the students that were working in fluency will now take the spots at the teacher's table to get support while they work on their math projects. The students that were working on independent practice will move on to an enrichment activity. And the group that was doing digital practice will move on to independent practice and their math journals. The groups may stay like this for another 5 to 10 minutes and then they'll change their tasks once or
036twice again before the class ends. The teacher can tailor the work done with each group to meet their level and the groups can also work on tasks at their level as they work on their own. [Music] Many teachers will conclude their math class with an exit ticket which is a single math problem independently solved recapping the learning target date. This data lets the teacher know how well students understood the lesson and can be helpful as a teacher prepares for the next math lesson. Here are some benefits to running small group rotations in math. Teachers can correct errors as they emerge. Teachers can watch every student solve their problems and step in to intervene and correct misconceptions before they have a chance to build up. It also allows students to do many different things during math
037class when they're not part of the teacher group receiving direct instruction or support. They can work on their fluency practice with requisite content including waggle or any other independent activity including math games. These tests can be differentiated so students work at their readiness and achieve level. Finally, the greatest benefit observed in classrooms that run small groups in math is increased student engagement. When each minute of math class is tailored to the readiness level and needs of each student, the result is that the highest achievers won't get bored and the struggles won't equally disengage. The result is that nearly 100% of the students are engaged 100% of the time. with rotations. When structure meets purpose, every student has a chance to thrive. [Music] So that gives kind of an idea of what rotations ideally would look
038like in the classroom, but knowing that, you know, there's various various needs in every classroom. So things could look very different than what that is. But that's kind of typically what um we aim to to uh to see and to support. Um so what you see on the screen here right now is um some data that we collected this year. And this data shows the Waggle and EXL usage of students in grades K through 5. Waggle is the digital component from Go Math. And is a supplemental program that um also aligns to the math content that students are doing. And um you can see the data looks kind of similar for both of them. And that was uh interesting to Matt and I when we pulled it and looked at it and we kind of
039discussed a little bit why that might look the same. Um but let me talk about it to explain what you see here. The top two rows are averages and the bottom row is a year-to-ate total. Um it may be helpful to know that some grade levels such as fifth grade may have heavier digital practice usage than other grade levels such as kindergarten. Um, another thing to note is that Il's year-to-ate total down at the bottom is only tallying skills where students achieved a smart score of 80 or above, which is the requirement set by most teachers um to earn credit for it. And uh the date range for is only from January through May. So that's why those might look a little bit different. Um but what this shows us is that um teachers are
040finding the two digital programs that we have to support math to be um equally useful but they are kind of different purposes. Um they they they have and as we asked teachers about the two of them. Um, and maybe I should back up and say we started the year with only having Waggle for teachers and um, midway through the year we brought in for the teachers cuz they've had it in the past and they did miss it. and they shared with us that there was just a different purpose for um we can see that when we take a look at um the usage data that the teachers are using both of them kind of equally um and they do have different purposes there. Should I go into the different purposes? You're right. Yeah. Okay. Um
041so Waggle is um has a little bit more embedded instruction digitally and the ways that teachers may use Waggle in class is for either pre-teaching or re-teing um not in in place of the teacher. So I'll make that very clear. Nobody would expect Waggle to teach the lesson for them, but it could be helpful for students who maybe would preview a lesson or for a recap of the lesson. It is um as the as the students um kind of get these guided lessons, it's interactive with them. So the students have to respond to questions throughout kind of also getting information and acquiring knowledge. Whereas um is more wrote practice and is more like question upon question upon question. um increases their fluency and their um rec not necessarily recall but just that they already know
042an algorithm or they already know a skill and it's practice practice practice. Uh waggle is um less questions but more depth and is maybe more um more in quantity for the purpose of repetition and committing to your you know different part of your brain. So like lock that skill in. So they do have different purposes. is teachers find them to be both valuable and um we would rarely see as Matt and I uh circulated throughout the schools we would rarely rarely see students doing both and waggle on the same day. A lot of times teachers would give the choice or kind of dictate this today's Waggle today's but they did find a use for both of them to enhance what they were doing in their classroom. So to quasi quantify a little bit of the
043impact and to definitely point out that historically when you implement a new curricular resource or there's a change in our instructional model there can be a detriment or um a downgrade to student achievement. And this is our kindergarten first second grade as web data. We benchmark three times a year as you can see a fall, winter and spring. And sorry it's a little bit condensed there, but it's a little bit easier to see allin-one. And in the fall, we'll do the extensive uh Ames Web data dive for you as we usually do, but we want to give a little bit of preview. So this is the fall of this past school year. And then the spring, we strive for about 80% or so of our children in we'll call it tier one. It's the lowest
044at risk factor for them to achieve either their current or future goals. in this case in mathematics and then about um you know maybe 10 to 15% in tier 2 and then as small amount of is possible in terms of children needing tier three in this case for math intervention and so the reassuring factor here is that with the changes in the instructional model the new curricular resource and um the factors about the rigor built in and the shift in expectations for our children and hence why we came to you last spring to move our math programming and achievement forward. I'm I'm very pleased that we had these results and again in the spirit of our vision statement. This is just the start and it's a huge learning curve for our staff and our children
045and so we anticipate that these will grow even more but you could see even at second grade that is a very powerful uh achievement aggregate and and it is typical again that we typically have pretty strong achievement. It just it didn't dive or or falter with this new instructional model. So I wanted to point that out to jump over to NWA math and we've had some conversations in past meetings about the change in the test. So two years ago NWA changed their algorithm and basically they um approach the differentiation or the the adaptability of the test where it used to basically be endless to the entire scale of the test. So if a child kept answering correctly, they're going to keep moving through the RIT score, RIT range all the way potentially into high school.
046And so you would have children with these really strong root ranges up. The new algorithm um tightens that range basically give or take two grade levels above and two grade levels below. We responded, our children responded to that shift very favorably, which is great. We should celebrate that. I caution this data, especially as NWA is also reorming their entire math and reading assessments this summer. So, we're going to have new norms in the fall. And that could shift all of this around again. It's wonderful as we try to make sense out of all of it. up and down, left or right, sideways, forwards, backwards. This represents the number of children meeting their growth target. So each child, as you know, at the beginning of the year falls into sort of a cohort group and there's
047a writ they're expected to grow a certain number of RIT points and if they do from fall to spring, they sort of qualify as meeting their growth target. And so you can see 89% of our third graders, 84 and 74. This is strong. Historically sort of the general benchmark is about a 50% marker. We have been above that but um these are these are strong scores. They were strong last year. Again something changed. The curriculum changed the curriculum resource changed. Instructional methodology changed but this remained static. This was good. If this tanked, some of it would be with the implementation, but again, kids are rising, teachers are teaching, and here's a result of of that. Any questions on that? It's just a whole big map thing going on. Uh, every time I talk to you
048about it, I I feel bad. No superpowers here. My brain is mush. I'm just I'm just trying to I mean we we like to use this data to show our students growth and because they're in the process of doing all these changes. We're losing some ability to actually grasp this growth. Are they charging the same amount of money? Um yes. Yes. Uh yeah. And that should be some of our feedback here. like this this is two or three years of data here that it's I don't want to call it it's you can't really I mean it's showing that we're doing great work but you know we like to look at it over time that's we're talking about growth here and I'm just struggling with it personally maybe said another way the distribution is not normal
049for us to be able to look and use that in a meaningful way. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And that's that's not you. We we understand that. We I'm asking you to push back on them. They're making too many changes too quickly to to allow this data to actually help us decide especially because we also change our curriculum uh stuff too. Yeah. and and it's uh we've been giving NWA for 10 12 15 years 20 um and um you know so this is just something for all of us to think about um something you sometimes need to you you know may potentially change I don't know but um was this a planned multi-year changeover or is it a changeover that has become a multi-year process in from the NEWA algorithm. Yeah, I think it's both. I think
050they field tested maybe three years ago, realized some things were happening to us, didn't really respond to the field testing feedback and just plowed ahead. Mhm. Um and so here we are. Um I have and again I'll share in depth in the fall but if you look at our longevity I mean you see if we were um stock investments this meeting would be taking place in Hawaii and uh it would be amazing but uh it's very abnormal um especially for math I'm just right right yeah I mean I mean of a vendor If we had a relationship with a vendor where I work or it was this a multi-year unanticipated situation like this and the sole value was in the data we you know we'd probably be having very strong words. So I will echo
051what Scott and Dr. Dolan said. I think that's within our right. I I mean I'm I'm I'm right. I mean the value here is that the data and its perceived accuracy there there's not any other value being delivered right so therefore there's no value really being delivered. Yeah the interesting thing is we and we won't name districts that we've worked with that there are districts that aren't seeing the same type of growth even with the the change. So it is a unique experience where there are some districts even with the algorithm adjusting who aren't seeing they're seeing growth but not dramatically abnormal. So, we're we're waiting for the new norms to come out because the new norms will then regulate everything. Um, because of the shift that the test made from being truly adaptive, meaning
052it went from had no top had no it it theoretically had no top to being more closely aligned to a standards grade levelbased assessment. So, when you have something that originally was, I'm in fourth grade and I keep getting questions right and it keeps going higher and higher and higher and higher to a test that is more aligned with something that is predetermined, still has the adaptability, still gets harder, but its questions are more in alignment with the grade level strands of if I'm a fourth grader, it's going to go down a grade, up a grade, maybe up two grades, but not at the level that it used to go up. Um, is something we're trying to, you know, so I I mean, I can see the problem with having no top. Correct. Because as
053students grow, their growth might slow down perceptually, but not necessarily just based on how they're answering their questions. So, I see they're trying to solve that problem. I just I don't know how it's working for us. Yeah. The difficulty with the test going too high was you could never get especially at a young age to the complexity of a question that also had the age appropriateness of the topic or whatever it was for a child like they they were having difficulty with those those components and so kids were maybe understanding the content but not understanding the question. I I mean I don't know that we're going to solve it here. No, we aren't. But to to to be fair, if Doogie Hower was out there, like it's not an age appropriate question because there's a
054maturity that comes with solving advanced physics. Correct. Right. So like there's a little bit of a you know better conversation to have here in terms of like what we're solving for. Y I guess the only question that we need to ask is are we getting what we need from the assessment or not? And and if we are, then great. But if we're not, then we figure out how do we then go get the information that we need from somebody else. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And it strikes me as a bit weird that I mean, we're going they started a process of change and that sounds like the right choice to change. I'm not really going to argue that point, but there's known anomalies. There's known issues. I would expect at bare minimum um support and understanding,
055you know, helping us understand our data as we work through the I and so I'm just not hearing from you that we have a partner on the other side of the table who is helping us clean up a mess that they've made. We would agree. Okay. Okay. Yeah. So, in in other industries, Yep. this would be over by now. Yep. Okay. Yeah. All right. Well, we So, you have our our tacit thoughts here to push back if you want. Yeah. On our contract. We got your back. We appreciate it. Sounds good. Yeah. Thank you. Now, this data that Jenny's going to talk about is valid and reliable. Yes. Because we did it ourselves. And so, I'm going to have Jenny talk about it. This is our survey data. Um so we surveyed teachers for just
056their perception feedback on um how things went this year. And so uh you can see here that teachers had pretty good feelings on um most of the implementation. And how we're able to use this data is um in guiding us with where they still need support from us, you know, as we move forward into our second year of implementation and support. So, uh, what stood out both in the the questions here and, um, in the feedback that they had kind of a chance to give some open response to is that teachers, uh, still want some support with, um, student growth in mathematical reasoning and retention of skills. So, um, here's just kind of highlights from opportunities for continued support that we can still provide to them and some positive reflections that they had. So I
057summarized kind of the themes that uh were written and um teachers shared uh this information that will also continue to guide our professional development. Um, they would like support around word problems, continued support with small group and centers and incorporating more hands-on activities and games, reviewing previous content, uh, more support for students who struggle and are inter in intervention or reel or special ed students. Um things that they appreciated in go math were the increase in rigor, the multitude of engaging activities that the resource provides and that there is plenty of provided skill practice more than they need um is provided to them and that the lessons are really engaging. So using this information that we got from our survey feedback, we feel like we have a great um kind of direction for what we
058can do to support them next year and throughout our our year. Um the plan is to still reach out to them and say, "What do you feel like you need now?" And to give that support to them as we continue to support them with implementation. And now I'm going to hop over to 68 for a minute here, get you guys a little information about what they've been up to. Um, so this actually happened at this in the spring of last school year, but uh the math leaders in the township um brought in a very exciting guest speaker, Peter Ljidal. He is the mastermind behind the building thinking classrooms framework, which is um very exciting to math teachers. Not sure if anyone in here is familiar with him, but um math teachers are very excited about
059him. And uh a few of them saw him at some conferences or national um you workshops maybe, but we were very very excited to bring him as kind of a joint effort in district 225 and then all of the sender schools. We came together and brought him to um us and hosted something that was just a full day for our teachers. And so a bunch of our district 34 teachers participated in that learning experience. And that was um at the spring of not this previous school year, but the one right before it. And so um since then what our teachers have done is the teachers who attended have been able to implement some of his framework and strategies into their classrooms. And um also at our institute days or just through their um collaboration time
060with their um with their teaching partners and with the rest of the department, they've been able to share what they've learned and we are still, you know, working on opportunities for teachers who didn't attend to be brought into this just framework. It's a very um different it's a it's a very different approach for teaching math. It's very collaborative and um it's very exciting if you're present in the room with Peter as he guides you through it. And so the next uh two slides I have these little snippets that just show um this first one is a podcast I found with Peter talking. So it's kind of him explaining what his framework is. And so we'll start with that one. It's really quick. what a thinking classroom looks like. Rather than sitting in desk, students are
061standing in groups of three working at vertical whiteboards on a task. When they complete that task, they will be given another task. And if they get stuck on that task, they'll be given a hint. The students are moving through tremendous amounts of content with lots of conversation, deep understanding. These groups of three are not strategically created. The teacher has sat down and carefully decided who's going to work with who. And they're not self- selected groups. These groups are randomly selected. The students are spending the majority of the time in the classroom in this active stance constructing understanding and making meaning with other students who are also building and making meaning. That's what a thinking classroom is. And I want to add to him over there, but um it's also a productive struggle experience. He gives
062you very little to work off of. He just kind of poses something and says, "Have at it." and you have to work with your group to really figure out what you're trying to do. Um, and it's exciting and it's fun and after a teacher like sits through being a, you know, pretend student of his, they just leave so inspired like I want to do this, I want to do this. Um, but it is kind of difficult to transform. You know, your traditional, um, he's originally, I think, from Sweden and I think he does a lot of things in Canada. It's it's not very, um, you know, American. Um, so our curriculum doesn't necessarily just drop easily into his framework, but um, teachers try to adapt and try to work in his framework when they can
063because it's a very exciting way to um, to to run a math class. But the next screen, the next slide shows um, this is not one of our teachers. I have to share that. But I found a video of a different teacher from somewhere else who has her kids just doing one of his activities um or his using his framework. So I wanted to show it just so you could see what it looks like uh when his cl when his strategies are implemented. Building thinking class routine students are working in small groups of three in a total of five problems. What they're going to be doing is once a student is going to be holding the marker. That person is the recorder. They're going to be asking their partners how to solve the problem and
064recording their thinking. After they've worked on that first problem, then they're going to switch. The next person is going to hold the marker and again take on the role of a recorder. So, we have our students working collaboratively. They're solving five problems. Everybody is working at their own virtual whiteboard and recording their answers. [Music] And kids are encouraged to look around at each other's work. That's why it's vertical. It's it's meant for people to peer around the classroom and look at what everyone else is doing. And um it also can be differentiated like when you're there with Peter, if you finish one task, he goes up there and he just just like on the spot, he just adds to it and has you go a level deeper if that's what your group needs. He gives
065you a hint if that's what your group needs. And it's really inspiring to just be part of this. So it was very exciting that we had this experience for our teachers to come and be part of that. And um I feel like they're still on this just like roller coaster of excitement from when we had him come in here. and um and they're excited to share it with their colleagues that didn't attend. So, that's where we're at with 68. And back to you, Matt. So, just to bring our fun map talk up to the final grades, um, and for what it's worth and to potentially bring a sense of validity reliability, eighth graders, this is, uh, springtime, springtime for eighth graders, and you know, you can see a shift in the number of children meeting
066their uh, growth targets. Um, this is a little bit above average. It's not as dramatic as the other grades, but again, um, strong performance, which attests to the changes we're making in teaching learning and the curriculum resources and the methodology Jenny just described and the stability and achievement in something like NWA. We appreciate your time tonight. Thank you so much. Any questions, comments? Again, this is our continuous improvement just sharing a year out and we have many years to go here. I'm I'm pleased to see that since we switched to these new deliverables that it's actually working. So, that's awesome. No matter what niwa or maps, there's some engagement from the teachers that they like the new products. So, that's great. Yeah. you know, off the survey record, there's just so much feedback, I think,
067both of us here with how pleased people are with the direction we're going both K5 and 68 for math. Anybody else questions? on on the the triad piece that we were just you know looking at. I was wondering sort of if there was anything shared about you know in in the classroom handling um you know kids with sort of different you know proclivities. So like as personally a social extrovert who always led every single group project that looks great but I I would imagine maybe like a traditional in introvert it could be really intimidating. So I was wondering there's anything shared like how to flex to that or work within the classroom setting so that it works for all types of kids. Um that's a great question and I'm I'm I'm that kid too. I
068probably would have been very nervous as a student being in that setting. And when I participated in Peter's, I was very nervous about it, too. Luckily, I was in a group that happened to have one of my high school friends in it randomly, which was great cuz it was totally random. Um, but I found myself being just very quiet, and that was okay. Like, you were allowed to be quiet. That was okay. But um the way that I think Peter would answer that is that it it's okay to have um adaptions to um how you have that going on. Um, I guess I don't know exactly how to handle it except to say that I am that person and I experienced it and I I went through it and I was okay. I stayed quiet
069until I felt comfortable and when I did feel comfortable then I spoke up. Um I I read his book. Yeah. Um and it's we use it actually we used it like as a department at GBS. physics does it a lot at GBS and uh and he does cover a lot of that and he also but like also how she said they have group roles and they have to rotate those group roles so that kind of encourages everybody to share um but it is a great way of learning and it's encourages grit and problem solving and collaboration and it's good I think it helps to I have a daughter who is she did a whole speech in high school for speech about her uh you know shyness and her being an introvert. Um I think the
070opportunity for what we're trying to prepare them for in terms of the workforce being able to work with others, being able to hear others voices and then eventually provide their voice is something like my daughter didn't have going through school. So now she's in college. having to find that in a much more rigorous environment. Um, and fortunately she has the intelligence, baseline intelligence to be able to work through the the anxiety of it. But I think for a lot of kids, especially kids who would struggle in school and are introverts, the younger we're able to start something like this, the more prepared or the better prepared they would be for environments in the future where they may also feel uncomfortable, but now they have something behind them. I think having read just a little bit
071of this stuff, that's part of the the grit, the the getting I wasn't a great student. I would have been shy not because I didn't want to participate because I didn't know the answer. I mean it would have been purely that and we'll have that as well. My daughter would know the answer and still wouldn't share until we start to give her. And so if you start it, the younger you start it, the more you teach them the skills. It's all the collaborative communication skills that we're trying to build um that are hard in general. They're really hard when you do isolated work. And so hopefully this can engage and if GBS is doing something similar in their departments, hopefully our kids can develop those skills that when they come to you, it's you see
072less of the students who are shy. You're still going to have them. You're always going to have some kids that are shy. Math discourse is a really big theme in in Go Math as well. Um it it's really just a lot of um there's a lot of embedded questions where kids are encouraged to um have conversations with each other in small groups or even you know written just responses to questions to get their conversations about math flowing. So hopefully that too can help just develop this comfort that um maybe wasn't there back in the day when we were all growing up way back when? Way back for you. Mhm. Seems like the small groups is helpful as well cuz it's not like you're getting, you know, picked on the whole class. Like the teacher is
073looking right at you and you don't know the answer. You know that you can build your confidence in a small group a lot easier than in a big group setting, I think. So, I like that it's like a group of three helps build confidence, I would think. All right, one last quick question. So, is that professional development for this year? Are we going to start to do small pilot test like programs at certain grade levels next year? How are we envisioning taking this and testing the efficacy in the 68 the Peter the Peter thing? Yeah. Um well, there's really no plan to push that as a framework that we would require. Um it was something that like like I said before that the township came together for to bring Peter in. And um I think
074it really started with our GBS and GBN uh math chairs kind of having this idea and wanting to have kind of a similar experience provided at all the sender schools and together we were all like Peter let's bring in Peter and um so it was kind of a well hey let however far we can go with this let's do it and so it's more of um as the opportunity arises we're sharing it out but it is um and maybe Jessica because you say you do it often in physics. I know it's it's happening a lot at GBS in math, too, but um it's it's not very easy to just kind of take a math lesson and drop in Peter's framework onto it. It does take a bit of planning and um I think for teachers
075to take on that approach, they just need that time to prepare it and also they want to be ready. They need to be ready to want to do it. So as they feel ready and want to take that on, I am right here to support them. But um with the current um implementation of big ideas and with how our teachers loop sometimes or just change what they're teaching, some of them are still teaching new grade level or courses for the first time and may not be ready to take on more at this time. So we're kind of leaving it up to them. I've got a bunch of his books ready to to hand out. I'm ready to provide them with PD. And I know we've got a few of our teachers who've become leaders in
076this too that are ready to also This is kind of one of those things if we're going to be augmenting or expanding kind of teaching style and capacity depending on the setting. Um it always helps to have champions. So if somebody's like, "Hey, um I can be the person from a peer-to-peer standpoint." um would highly recommend that and would be curious to hear of any success stories that we have over this next couple years. Yeah. Well, you know, we do have some that are doing it a lot. Maybe I can I can ask them to come in and speak or at least make sure everybody else in their cohort knows what they're doing and what works for them because it's it's very much a style thing as much as anything. Yeah. We can talk about
077some of those memorable teaching moments that you had as a student. This could be one of them in the right setting and not forced, but where it's really natural. So I think it's an awesome way to start thinking about how to teach differently. Not to say that it has to be how you do it, but when the opportunity presents itself and it matches the personality of the students and the teacher, then it becomes a really kind of a magical experience. So to that I mean I think well done. Thanks for keep pushing. All right, we'll do. Thanks. Thank you. Great. Exciting good news. Yay. All good. Next, we'll move along to our uh strategic plan update. Becca, let me Yeah. Can I just say one thing first? Yeah. So, we're we're on to the fourth
078presentation of the evening. So, thanks for your patience. Uh we're going to we've taken a little bit of a different approach to our strategic plan. You you know that, right? We we've tried to sort of narrow the scope, make it more intuitive. uh we've created a dashboard. Becca will is going to be our primary uh narration voice as we work through this and then others can answer questions or chime in uh appropriately. The one thing I'm always uh mindful of and want to remind you of is that um I think any good strategic plan is dynamic rather than static. I mean these are malleable plans. we we respond to what we see and what we hear and and make those adaptations accordingly. So this is not this should never be viewed as some sort of
079hardcore linear process. Uh it es and flows it changes. You'll see some of these goals maybe have been fully met others are going to carry over into the next year may have taken on a different focus based on real-time information. So I would just ask that you keep that in mind as we move through here. Becca, great. Thank you for that. So as mentioned tonight we're going to present the strategic plan dashboard that you'll see behind you which can be found on our website under D34 or about D34. The dashboard showcases the status of each of the tactics that we presented at our board meeting in February. And so everything we're going to present tonight is a highle overview of the work done this year highlighting a few initiatives and then some of the plans
080for the 2526 school year. And so just to start off real quick couple of the colors just so that you have the understanding. Green is something that's completed. Yellow is something that's in progress. Blue is something that is ongoing. And then red is something that is a future initiative. So our first goal is belonging and well-being. And under our first objective, it is each school year students will experience an increase in feelings of safety and belonging. So one of the things we wanted to highlight was the most recent administration of the Panorama social emotional learning survey revealed that in our grades 3 through five, 90% of students reported that they had a teacher or adult in their school that they could count on, which we were excited about. Additionally, we had Dr. My Agmar, I
081hope I'm saying that correctly, a renowned Mongolian language specialist in the Library of Congress, returned to District 34 to lead a professional learning session for certified staff and associates to learn about Mongolian language fundamentals, pronunciation strategies, c cultural nuances, and effective classroom support for bicultural students. For our second objective, each school year, families will report an increase in sense of belonging as a member of the district 34 community. We hosted four equity and inclusion sessions for our parent leaders, which included our parent or our PTA council as well as the leaders of our BPAC organizations and we reviewed ways to ensure that all students and families felt included in our school activities. We also have a team which is evaluate re-evaluating our current mental health matters model in hopes to increase attendance for next year.
082And as a reminder, the mental health matters um program is a series of educational opportunities for our families. So this past year we had different topics such as partnering with the police department to focus on some technology safety guidelines for students. We also had um some outside resources come in and they discussed puberty and different fun topics like that for our parents. Um so this year we evaluated the families through our family newsletter to ask them kind of their feedback in hopes of increasing some of our attendance in future programs. For objective three, which was each school year, district 34 will increase the number of candidates, teachers hired, and total staff members from under reppresented demographics. We completed our current demographic profiles for all position groups. The affinity group leadership was expanded and a transition
083plan was established and our equity ambassador role continued in year two with participation in building based interviews. Our second goal is creativity and innovation. And actually before I move to the second goal, was there any questions because I know I'm kind of sharing a lot of information as we go through here. Were there any questions for the first goal? I have an overall question. Yes. Um I love this dashboard. It's great. I have a question around do these um milestones correlate to implementation goals that then like roll up to the large vision goals. Yeah. So, we kind of are just tracking in each trimester where our status is. And as you'll see, some of them continue to be blue because and especially with some of our um tactics that we have coming up, they're things
084that we continue to do each year. So, we may have accomplished uh I'm going to use kind of our teaching and learning department as an example. Some of our tactics are to review the the data that students take on a test and we do that annually. So, you might see that it continues to be blue just because there's not really a completion of the project. Other projects such as establish a current demographic profile we have completed. And so then we'll use that data for kind of the subsequent tactics that we have. Yeah. All right. So the second goal is creativity and innovation with the first objective of students and all student groups will show an increase in growth and achievement on available assessments. So, as we saw in the presentation this evening, professional development with
085new RA the new math resource has a focus on starting classes with a whole group standardsbased mini lesson and then small groupoup differentiated center support with inclusive instructional scaffolding. We also had each of our intermediate and middle schools engaged in the NWEA process through school improvement plans, MTSS meetings, and specifically student success meetings. Additionally, our primary buildings engaged in the Ames web process through school improvement plans, MTSS meetings, and student success meetings. In objective two, all students will exhibit an increase in their display of identified dispositions. And we have innovative staff professional development topic topics scheduled for February and April of the coming school year. Objective three, students will demonstrate increased engagement in learning. As you heard earlier this evening, in the first year, 92 eighth grade students earned their pathways to b literacy award
086recognizing their dedication to multilingualism. And then we also had student success meetings held regularly to discuss student supports as components of the MTSS process. At state at a statewide event with over 1100 participants, our BPACS hosted three sessions for preschool through 8th grade parents. And as part of objective four, staff will have an increased opportunities for professional learning to support innovative and culturally responsive practices and interdisciplinary instruction. So we have a late arrival calendar for professional development uh which tracks and identifies professional development continually throughout the year. And then we utilize data from our annual staff survey to plan for each year ahead. And our third and final goal is collaboration and community. So the first objective, district 34, will increase community and organizational partnerships to support targeted areas. We partnered with the PTA council
087to share input on concepts such as school supplies, which we've updated for the 2526 school year. We had many events. So I'm going to list a few of them here because they were very exciting. The title one literacy and mathematics night brought in hundreds of families to Westbrook and Hoffman where families engaged in hands-on learning to build fluency in num numeracy and literacy. We had new GEF sponsored STEM nights which were offered for all elementary students and each had a fantastic turnout. And the Glen Grove Community Project coordinated three family events. Each events each event celebrated the cultural beauty within our schools and district through fun activities and performances. We also completed 16 sessions of our educator wellness program in partnership with the family service center through a grant from the Coleman Foundation. And in
088objective two, district 34 will increase programs, partnerships, and activities between schools and family groups. Our Spanish Bpacks hosted parent workshops to help families learn how to navigate resources on their child's iPads and how to stay connected with district 34 through emails, Schoolagy, Seesaw, Powers School, and newsletters. In objective three, families in the community will report an increase in engagement in district 34. To effectively communicate with families in their preferred languages, staff leveraged the auto translation features in tools like Canva, S'more, and Google Workplace. And we also have our new communication platform, Parent Square, which offers automatic translation for emails and text messages, as well as a two-way communication platform, which works similarly to Talking Points. And with that, I will leave it open for any questions. So, uh, thank you, Beck. Let me just say
089quickly, you know, Becca has started really with a conceptual framework here and then really developed this and, you know, we worked as a cabinet team to try to really bring to life the work so that not only you as a board, but community members could go actually on here and see more of the granular work uh that that's being done. I you know that was in response really not just to best practice but you know the board had a particular interest in making sure that um you know this this is well seen and and I think rightly so because we're very proud of the work um and just remember too you know we have 800 people who work here Kevin I I mean so there's there's a lot of help and support that goes into
090actualizing these these things that sometimes get lost, you know, when we're when we're doing a presentation like this. So, I just need to say that, too. I appreciate that because we do have kind of departments responsible, but that doesn't mean those are the only people who are working on each of these each of these objectives. If I may, yes. Um, this is it's a fantastic start to reinforce and codify and show and a not so simple visual all the good things that everybody's doing and and um how it all moves in a direction that is very specific and explicit and that was the intention of the strategic plan and even some of the things that Alex and I had offered and shared with Dne on you know how do we track the progress right um
091one thing red is always gets everybody kind of upset or kind of awkward. So, might suggest maybe picking a empty circle or sure something else just, you know, gives everybody inspiration that we're not ignoring it. We just haven't started it yet. Yeah. Um, but then the other thing I think there's some opportunities here where we do have a let's just say a five essentials feedback or something like that where instead of looking at the arrow put in you know what was the was it plus 5%. Or put in a number. So if we can bring in some aspects of semi-quantitative trendbased over the last time we did it especially if we're going to be tracking you know terms and intervals it becomes very helpful to say okay we're making progress where we are tracking numbers
092and then we're also moving initiatives and engagement efforts forward so you can see how they are potentially linked together. Again awesome first first pass at it. It's a fantastic start and I'm excited to see how and where this can continue to communicate information in a way that the community and frankly everybody um will be able to see and say, "Oh, now I know why that's that's there and it's making an impact here and it's all because of that. Got it." Has there been any like community feedback about this dashboard at all? Not that I've heard. Okay. Red circles, purple. They're ovals. James, well, I will say that I do have to keep going back to what the colors mean. I do. I mean, I That's just me. I can't keep remembering completed in progress. That's
093uh that's just me. But otherwise, I mean, it's fantastic that we have a dashboard because completed. I love KPIs. This is good. Yeah. So, we can take a look at it and see if there's a different way to display or if there's a way that we can kind of get the words in there a little bit better. Yeah. I don't know. I don't I'm not going to offer suggestions for that. Just criticism. That's right. I mean, a second tab. I don't know. Um, but great. Thank you so much for the presentation. Does anybody have any thoughts or questions or uh things they want to talk about? All right, let's move along. Uh, do we have any audience comments? We do not. Okay, they could be on TV. Oh, right. Yes. Uh, next we have our
094report section. We have the number one foyer report, the number two referendum expense report, the number three construction change order report, the number four current financial projections, and number five monthly budget report. Any comments on the reports? Report remains amusing. Yes, I meant to send an email and I apologize. I'm usually better at this, but Eric, can I ask you one question about the monthly summary? Um, we've got 5.7 in favorable impact. How does that go back to the table on the page before? Because I we got 4.7 there. on the current projection. Yeah. Financial projections. The current financial projections show that we've got at least, you know, 5.676. Yeah. Favorable. But but on the prior table, how does that link back to the all funds in the annual budget? Because we've got 4.7 there.
095Or it doesn't because usually sometimes it kind of lines up a little bit better for me and maybe I'm just telling myself a story with the numbers. You talk about the monthly budget report afterwards. Correct. So the monthly the monthly budget report shows that benefit of 5.7 million favorable but on the prior page when we look at the annual budget and the annual either surplus or deficit. So is it that we're the 5.7 on the monthly actually yields where we were behind a million so it's a $4.7 million benefit or are they just not related? So he said on the first page it says surplus deficit all funds 4.7 all funds 4.7 wasn't that just what was on the paper in September last year so that's not actuals that's our question is that from September
096of 24 on the current financial projections on the top the top the yellow highlighted cow yeah that's what was 16 and now it says 5.7 I'm below. So there's a is it a million dollar favorable compared to the budget or is it 5.7 favorable? U so I would say for the most part the chart the next page is operating funds. Okay. There we go. Thank you. That's really what we're trying to get at. Thank you. Well, no. But page two says all funds. Page two. I'm on the current year of which reports? Oh, it says total revenue all funds. Total expenditures all funds. Yeah. So that that's not necessarily operating all funds. It happens to be that it says all funds, but it doesn't mean all funds. [Laughter] Um, we weren't so far. Yes. So,
097primarily what I focus on when I'm when I'm speaking to you and the community. Are we up or we're down? You you tend to already have a perspective on what we're doing with construction and it's almost like a separate conversation when it comes to those those other funds that we don't include in the operating funds, if that makes sense. So I'm really tracking our operational changes throughout the year. That's what you're saying. Yeah. So it says all but it's mostly operational. I'm not really commenting here. You know, we're talking about debt service uh life safety and construction which I've already kind of alluded to how I think we're going to end what's happening there. So this is you have an idea a oh recommend removing $5 million from current year budget to to to take
098care of expenses. I wanted you to see here that we actually do intend on anything better than that. So you have all in all we're trending very favorable. Yeah, this is a little bit behind. I would say in my estimation even better. Good work then. Thank you. Does that answer? Yeah. Yeah. No. Okay. I was looking at it and I was like, "All right, I'm missing something." So, thank you. And I forgot to send you a note. Um, next we have K. Other business. Dr. Dr. Ty, I do want to bring up there was a pretty extensive True North board meeting last week that we both attended. Uh it did last 4 and a half hours and from what been going on, we've talking about it's a really dynamic situation. We've gone from possibly two
099school districts leaving to the statement there was all school districts are exploring leaving true north. We they're also attempting to amend the articles of incorporation which will occur on June 30th because there's enough school districts that will vote for it to change the calculation about uh you know we had to pay an outside consultant to talk about our special uh education program. Uh, now they're amending it so that you don't have to hire an outside consultation person and you don't have to reimburse or use True North staff to come up with your comprehensive plan. Along those lines, we talked to our attorney and we amended the amendment to include any charges prior to 2025 that True North might come up with because that reflects us. But, uh, we made a pretty big discussion point about
100how it's interesting how in four months we've gone from four school districts saying that they don't want district 34 to leave True North to everyone wants to leave True North. And I made the push that uh, possibly when 25% of their operating funds for their fixed costs were leaving, everyone got a little worried. And then uh we also talked about how our school district spends the least amount per student and how the resources are there for them to start their own special education programming. And uh going forward, there's going to be there was another uh thing that was voted on to talk about uh the actual orderly dissolution of True North and that's in progress right now and has actually been voted on and the board voted I believe 17 to1 to one there was
101one no which was interesting because it was a school district that was asking for an orderly dissolution but uh going forward this true north thing is going to be very interesting as our last year in True North. If there's any questions, anybody want to talk about it, I'm happy to elaborate. These meetings are getting longer and longer. You're welcome. Uh well, and it's a it's a good foreshadowing for um actions that will come before this board from other school districts for your consideration for their withdrawal. So, there are more and more districts now that are making their proclamations um at their board meetings and then to be sent forward to the member districts to vote on. So, you're you're going to start to see a an increased frequency in in those votes on our board
102meetings. And it's also interesting, a lot of the documents we'll be getting aren't necessarily what we sent because they're not necessarily following the True North Articles of Incorporation, but more so like 225 is attempting the Illinois school code, which is a different lower bar. And uh as I I personally am not happy to four school districts told us that we couldn't leave. So as far as I'm concerned, I'm happy to tell them the same thing. those four school districts. Thanks for the update. Um, so just to clarify, there will not be an independent assessment or there will be or they can they have to do an assessment, but they could do it on their own with their own in-house staff, not hire someone, and they don't even have to ask True North for help. Um,
103I'm just going to make a comment now that I anticipate large language models being applied for the generation of these. Um, they may have already been completed and it it would probably behoove us to have some level of validation of any claims put forward before this board andor the district in terms of services delivered. um because I would hate for us to be on record validating or supporting somebody's withdrawal if they don't have the appropriate services behind it. So certainly I I do want to be mindful of the districts that allowed us to uh or as said that it would be okay for us to leave. Yeah. But those comments and that support came because we had put the investment behind. We proved it. We proved it. Yes. Well, they're lowering the bar. So proving
104it is now become easier. It's not to say we don't support them ultimately getting there. It's them being there when we say we support you too. Yeah. And then there was a large discussion about what an orderly dissolution uh process could look like and I will mention that I'm pretty sure there's going to be a lot of attorneys involved from multiple law firms. Mhm. I mean, wouldn't it be possible that the orderly dissolation would supersede individual departures if they if it actually moved forward? And it's possible. Yeah. Uh there's going to take longer. It it it will be interesting to see which path is shorter. Yeah. What happens once you get so many attorneys involved? What happens to all the funds that are going back? Well, I'm not sure who they're going to be billing.
105Are they billing the individual districts or are they billing? Well, I know who True North will be billing, right? Will be the member districts of which we're still a member for one year. One more year. Uh yeah, it's going to be interesting. And then there's also, you know, there's also two members that left True North in the last 20 plus years and they actually get a piece of the assets of a dis dissolved True North also. So there's there's a lot of calculations to be made. There's a lot of people's decision on what they need to do. And there are some school districts that really need to find a way to service their students that might not involve True North. And they're still looking into that, too. And on that point, I would say, you
106know, we we are represented by a law firm and we have a meeting scheduled next 18. Yeah. Coming up to discuss some of the particulars of these uh matters. Attorney bills are actually one of the things we're going to talk about. So, yeah, it's we'll try and keep you up to date on what's going on. Uh we don't have a meeting in July, but True North might. they are uh moving at breakneck speed to figure out where they want to be. And like I said before and I said at this meeting a a board of 18 members is really kind of dysfunctional. I mean, it's really hard to get everyone on the same page on what we want to do going forward, but it's working that way. And we'll talk about that. If that if
107there's no other business, I'd uh say we're adjourned. Thanks.