CCSD 46 Board of Education Meeting: January 28th, 2025

001I don't know. >> You need ribbons. Yeah, you have to. We do. We must. Okay, good evening everybody. We're going to go ahead and get started. Uh, this is the board meeting for the Community Consolidated School District 46 this evening, Wednesday, January 28th, uh, a little bit after 6 p.m. here at Frederick School. I need a call to order via a roll call of all board members, including our two student board members this evening. >> Mac >> here. Braden here. Nash absent. Halverson >> here. Hume here. Miller here. Weedman absent. Demarco >> here. >> And Gabanssky >> here. >> Wonderful. I would like to welcome the two student board members this evening. Thank you for being here this evening. Please join me for the pledge. Okay. Thank you. I need a motion to approve this

002evening's agenda. >> I'll move. >> I'll second. >> Okay. >> Miller. >> I >> Halverson. >> I >> Braden. >> I Hume >> I >> Okay, thank you. The agenda is approved. Do we have any but no public comments are signed up? Okay, we're going to move right to the fun part. So, we've got the recognition. First this evening, Graves Lake Middle School 7th grade girls basketball team. Wonderful. Welcome tonight. I'm going to hand that over to Good evening everyone. I'd like to just be up here to introduce Coach Everett to take it away. >> Thank you. All right, I'm going to call my um winners seventh grade basketball team up. So, Amaya, come on up. [applause] Aubrey, Lacy, Lily, Briana, Kenzie, Scarlet, Payton, Molly, Eileen, Avery, Autumn [applause] B, and our manager, Egypt. [applause]

003Okay, I just want to tell you that I am so so so proud of this team. Overall, we went 12 and three out of all of our games. And the best part was how the friendships they built and the teamwork that they showed. Even on the tough games, they were there for each other. They cheered each other on. They held each other's back on the court and off the court. And it was so amazing to see. We started every practice with like a get to know you question. So, they got to know each other a lot throughout the season. They sang songs on the bus rides. Um, we even had some glows and grows for each other too during practice too. So, it was really nice to see their support for each other and their

004teamwork and I'm just so proud. They also helped me like sometimes I got emotional and they would like take over the pep talks and cheering each other on. So, they even helped me too and I learned a lot from you guys. So, I want you guys to always remember as I get emotional again, that's just how I am [laughter] to keep being a team off the court and keep building each other up always and having each other's back and cheering each other on because it was so so so nice to see you guys do that the whole season, even today when they play each other in about an hour here, North First Central. [laughter] Be there for each other and have some good rivalry. And I love you guys. And congratulations. [applause] >> Congratulations to

005you all. I had the the pleasure of seeing a couple of the games and it was a wonderful Thank you for being leaders and students and athletes and representatives of district 46. It's really special to be part of that in the community. So, congratulations to you all again. >> [applause] >> We do have some uh little little awards for you here if you want to come up here and then if we want we could do a picture with the board. >> Congratulations. Should we go? Do we want to do a picture? Yeah. Hold up. Let us come around. I haven't gone my eye doctor appointment. >> [applause] >> All right. And uh just a couple comments for me. First of all, Mrs. Ever, thank you so much for your heartfelt comments. Um talking with a

006lump in your throat actually makes a big difference for other people. So, thank you. And um students and parents, this is the time where I always let people know you are welcome to stay, but we understand if you don't. And there's going to be a long meeting in front of you. So, if you're gonna choose not to stay, now is the time for a quiet exit. We'll we'll hold for you. >> Yeah. Have fun at the game. [applause] >> See you. >> Congratulations. I'll give them a minute here. Okay. All right. That is a wonderful way to start the evening and we're going to continue on with an equally wonderful way to continue the evening. And we are welcoming the Graves Lake Middle School way of the Panther again this evening here at the board

007table and with the presentation this evening. And I'll hand it over to Mr. Smith >> for just a moment. Again, good evening. Thank you again for coming in or for allowing us to come in and be part of our meeting tonight. Sorry, didn't you come to me? It's usually how that works. Uh we have a small but mighty group tonight. Uh lots of activities as you can see because our basketball team has things going on. There's a Graves Lake Central versus Grez Lake North basketball game going on tonight. Lots of things happening. And we also hit the sickness bug, too. So, we lost a member today as well. So, um but we're ready and we have a lot to present to you tonight. We've done lots of work and there's lots of excitement about the

008things that we have been focusing on over the last couple of months since we've last been here to update you. So, before uh any further ado, here we go. Welcome Dr. Carmona to D46. The Way of the Panther is a group of dedicated GMS students and educators that value leadership, productivity, and teamwork. We help to make every voice, big or [music] small, heard. Our goal is to better GMS for the future and to leave a legacy of inspiration and passion for the upcoming students to continue our work. We're excited to update everyone tonight on the activities we've been working on since our last visit. We've been busy. Okay, I'm Charlie and this is what we've done so far. Since late September, we have met at least weekly in full group or small meetings to continue

009to fulfill the goals we've set to achieve in the areas we'll update you on tonight. Our team members are eager to find ways to make our school better and to ensure that everyone at Graves Lake Middle School feels safe and welcomed and have more and different ways to learn important skills for their future. Hi, I'm Jerry and in the past weeks we've discussed our many ideas from our initial brainstorming sessions at the beginning of the year. We have streamlined our work and we are putting together our focus on the three main ideas for growth at GMS for the remainder of the school year. Also, the other ideas we discussed will continue to be worked on at all times as well. Our ideas from the beginning of the year were No Place for Hate, Raptor for

010student ideas, seventh grade orientation, career exploration options, school assemblies and Friday night outs, GMS community garden, Chromebook shut off times, and GMS graduation ideas. Hi, I'm Molly. Um, we decided to focus our small group work on three big topics that we thought would be best for our learning community. No place for hate, career exploration, GMS community garden. We will work on the following ideas as the need arises throughout the rest of the school year. School assemblies and FNOS's Raptor for students. GMS graduation ideas. Seventh grade orientation. Chromebook shut off time. Um, here's what we have been working on for No Place for Hate. We have been working with Miss Julian and Miss Palmer [music] to expand on our No Place for Hate building level expectations and get the message out to all our students at

011GMS that bullying and unkind language and actions are not okay. Spreading awareness around the school and community. Three lessons from the Anti-Defamation League. Identity tree words that hurt, heal, and help to be determined. 25 through 26 climate survey October 2025 and May 2026 November advisory reviewed the results. Posters that include kindness, positivity, inclusivess, and mental health awareness. Kindness bulletin board ideas. Earlier in the year, students took a survey on their on the environment at GMS. Results came back and showed that only 38% of the time joking about race, ethnicity, nationality, or ability is not happening. Students were also given the question on if students are being kind. And overall, half of the time they were, but we still have stuff to improve on. Um, we also have other results for how often do you see

012students speaking up for someone and how often do you see students reporting conflicts to adults? More than half of the students do never see students speaking up for someone or one to two times a month and same for how often do you see students reporting conflicts to adults? Um, we need to improve the numbers so we can make GMS a safe place for kindness and no hate. >> We have been working with Miss Julian and Miss Palmer to expand on our no place for hate building level expectations and to get the message out to all students at GMS that bullying is unkind bullying and unkind language. We have been reviewing the data and you can see that we still have work to do. As we continue to lead this initiative with Miss Dulian and Miss

013Palmer this year, we will look to brainstorm more ideas to try and help our students use kind language and actions around the building at all times. Here are some activities we are working to do for No Place to Hate. On February 11th, Think Kindness Day, board members and district office can please join us. ADL activities, words that can hurt, help, and heal. guest speaker Brian Williams 10:40 a.m. at GMS. He's going to talk about kindness and spreadingness. Career exploration for eighth graders. We have been working with Miss Blackford to create a plan for career exploration opportunities for the eighth grade students. Career exploration helps students one connect stu school to real life. Two, discover interests and strengths. Three, learn about college, trades, military, and career options. We are hoping to extend our experience from Navigate

014Lake County in October by offering lunch and learn opportunities for the students. Lunch and learns will allow the students to focus on real conversations with professionals. They will be smaller groups and engaging, and students will be able to choose which sessions to attend. Career exploration lunch and learns will be a cool way for pancers to learn more about different jobs in colleges and what people actually do in them. Here's our career exploration timeline. First, we will plan and gather input. Use navigate career categories and survey [music] students and families to identify interest of careers and volunteers. Next, we will recruit and schedule speakers and contact local businesses, colleges, trade programs, and community organizations. Then, we will launch lunch and learn [music] sessions, schedule visitors and student signups, and try to provide one to two options

015per week with student choice to attend. Last, we will reflect, review feedback and attendance, and share highlights and make sure students are make sure and make suggestions for future years. Our continued planning has led us to many discussions about what our GMS community garden will look like now and into the future. Our field trip to the existing Graves Lake community garden earlier this fall has presented us with this information. Many of the current gardeners are many years retired. Each gardener is expected to bring their own tools and maintain their own space. The water source is an important part of the garden and needs to be centrally located. Compost pile in the fall becomes very large and sometimes hard to add to. Maintaining your own space means different to different and some spaces become overgrown. Gardeners

016have the opportunity to plant what they'd like. Some stick to solely vegetables. Some add annual flowers to the gardens as well. Our continued planning has led us to many discussions about what our GMS community garden will look like now and into the future. Our student committee members have and will continue to collaborate with members from the Grace Lake Village and substantially and sustain sustainability team to plan and design the initial layout and how to use our garden property and plots. The spring and the summer, the focus will be on a few key de developmental steps, including groundbreaking and completing the garden plots, researching and purchasing a reliable water source, learning from the village staff how community members sign up for the garden plots, researching and learning how to start seeds for the GS plots. Our

017plan is to also include establishing clear guidelines for garden use and create signage to post defining our garden expectations, creating a shared tool system to support organization and sustainability. Plans for a studentrun garden club this summer and ongoing will play an important role in supporting and maintaining the garden while helping to continue to develop long-term plans. >> Our work for this and summer. In addition, we will continue our already started collaboration with GMS teachers to continue to discuss how we can align the garden with curriculum goals and instructional opportunities with our students in our core and encore classrooms around GMS. This will include how we can work with our district food service provider to donate the food we've grown back to the students through our food service program. Plans are being made to decide who

018will care for the garden during the summer, possibly through student and family service. Once these initial ideas have come to life, we are hoping to celebrate our hard work by hosting GMS garden grand opening ceremony celebrating the collective efforts of students, staff and community partners. Our team our team ideas are work that will take place in the future. GMS garden will continue to grow and improve in the future years with plans to make it fun, helpful, and easy for everyone to use. Raised garden beds will be added so students and adults who need extra support can comfortably. The garden will continue to connect be connected more closely to the classroom learning giving adults hands-on experience giving students hands-on experiences that's tie into what they learn at school across all content and encore classrooms. We also

019hope to connect with the Avon food pantry and egg farmers market to share what we grow and support our community needs. The GMS garden will continue to grow and improve in future years with plans New design features in a storage shed will be added to organize tools and supplies and add to the visual appeal of the landscape. We hope to work with our district on&m and staff GMS custodians to develop plan for the continued upkeep of the gardens through consistent landscape and continue grounds maintenance. We'll also continue to review the garden layout to make improvements and explore fundraisers and community to help families learn how to garden. Our team will present more about our plans to GMS community garden to the lake village board on Tuesday, February 17th. >> Here are a way of the

020Panthers team members. >> Thank you to our D46 school board of education, Dr. Glickman, Mrs. Gluck, Dr. Carmona, the D46 school board, and the D46 learning community for allowing us this time an opportunity to speak about our updated students leadership team goals and how we plan to continue to help make GMS an even more wonderful place to be. We look forward to seeing you next time with more updates on how our projects are going. [applause] What a wonderful presentation. Thank you for that. I open up for any comments or questions from the board for our presenters. Yes, Miss Hume. >> Um I just wanted to commend you on like really sophisticated highle work with your planning. Um I was really interested in the survey that you did with students um to look at like the

021questions of like self-reporting and and bullying and things like that. And um I just thought that was a really effective way to measure how effective your um your initiatives are to see if those numbers change. Um and I just want to commend you for for taking that those steps to do that. Nice work, >> Braden. I'm gonna speak on behalf of the board and say I think we should take on a couple of those summer service days. Um so sign the board up for a couple of those for the summer. >> I agree. the garden. >> I agree. I'm going to piggyback on what Mrs. Hun said. I think it's an exceptional demonstration of leadership when you have a survey that has over 500 responses to that information. I mean, that's that's huge. Um, I

022I I'm grateful for that information because it gives us a picture into what's happening directly from you. I also am blown away by that community garden proposal. And for me, I mean, there's so much in there anyway, but the raised garden beds are incredible. And what an idea to make sure that that is in there so that people who might be in wheelchairs or people who are who might need a little bit of extra support. It's those things that sometimes are overlooked or maybe not thought of, but you have thought of that and that is pretty darn incredible. So, thank you for making that part of that proposal because you're going to impact so many lives more than I think you probably know. So, thank you for that. >> So, I want to add my

023thanks and I too I'm going to piggyback on what Mrs. Hun said. I was so impressed about how many different ways you've approached this. You've got design, you have some statistics, you've got some public speaking. It just is so exciting to listen to what you're up to. I also have a question for you. You had a lot a lot a lot of ideas and you got to three. Can you tell us about how you made your decision and how you narrowed it down to three? Why was it gardens and the other two? >> We decided on focusing on three big main ideas because we understood that we wanted to get the most important ones to us and make sure that they were going to be done. >> Well, thank you for your commitment to quality

024then, too. Thank you so much for all of your work. >> [applause] >> And students, as you know, and I've told you this before, working with this group is Mr. Smith's very f favorite thing to do, and I know that's true. Um, you've done an amazing job. We are so excited. Now, we've got two students who are staying at the board table. So, we invite you to go on back. and the rest of you, we would love for you to stay and cheer on your partners, but if you do want to go home, this is the time to go. Okay? So, it's up to you, but we'll give a moment while you're figuring that out with your families. Thank you again. Okay, that brings us now to the uh board report segment of the agenda

025this evening. This is where the board members will share anything and I will ask our student board members this evening to share their uh items as well. Um and I'll I'll start in fact I'll start with the student board members this evening because I haven't done that yet. So, welcome to Gianna and Jerry for sitting at the board member board table with us this evening. And this is your time for your board reports. >> Okay. Um, my name is Jerry once again and I'm going to first start us off with our school activities updates. GMS athletics continue to show strength, competitiveness, and lots of Panther PL pride during the winter season sports season. Basketball had a great year led by the seventh grade girls winning the conference championship. The seventh and eighth grade boys teams

026had also had strong seasons with the eighth grade boys staying undefeated until the conference tournament and finishing in third place. The eighth grade girls team earned a solid fourth place finish. Our combined GMS, Frederick, and Park School wrestling team is already having another excellent season so far with as with athletes wrestling well in competitions and building excitement for the postseason and possible state finals appearances. At the same time, boys and girls volleyball and bowling seasons are just getting started. Students are already learning new skills, working hard, and having fun setting up exciting seasons ahead for all teams. For our second thing we're going to talk about is our fine arts and acade academic activities. Our students continue to shine in our fine arts and academic activities at GMS. Demonstrating talent, dedication, and strong school support

027throughout. The science Olympia team had been preparing for months and competed in an invitational last weekend in Rockford, earning medals in 16 out of 23 events and showing outstanding potential going into their regional competition this spring. Their enthusiasm and positivity were clear throughout the event. The GMS jazz band al had also started its spring competition this season at Buffalo Grove High School, earning outstanding praises from the judges who expressed that the group sounded like a high school jazz band in theater. The students delivered a remarkable performance of Annie Jr. which couldn't have been done without the cast, pit band, stage crew, and the dedicated staff for putting in exceptional work and having support for one another. Finally, our excitement is building for the spring play Charlotte's Web on February 26th and 28th, including a special

028performance for the fourth graders across the district. Hi, I'm Giana and I'm going to give other school updates. GMS has had a lot of exciting schoolwide and PTO sponsored events arriving for students and families. The PTO Beat the Winter Blues roller skating rink night will be tomorrow from 6:00 to 8:00 p.m. at Just for Fun Roller Rink. Families are also invited to support GMS at Culver's Night on Tuesday, February 3rd from 5:00 to 8:00 p.m. The Route 83 showdown is also coming up on February 27th with a fun [music] new twist as GMS and Frederick staff will team up to go against Grace Lakes's first responders and a fun community event. More events in GMS include family read on February 25th and the annual St. Baldick's event on March 11th. GMS will also welcome a

029think kindness speaker supporting our no place for hate expectations. As you can see, we're super busy at GMS in these cold winter seasons. We hope you can all stop by and take part in some of the many of activities we have going on. >> Marvelous. Thank you both. I appreciate those those reports. I'll move along the table. Mrs. Halverson, >> thank you for those reports. I have no report this week. >> Okay. Thank you, Mrs. Hume. No report. Mrs. Braden, >> No report this week. Mrs. Miller, I have a little something to go ahead. >> Do you want to go first? >> You No, you go first. >> Okay. Um, so I listened to a a webinar um live streamed from the Brookings Center for Education about AI that I thought was pretty interesting. They

030just published a report and [clears throat] it's called a new direction for students in an AI world. Prosper, Prepare, Protect. and they offer three pillars for schools all all different um stakeholders in schools to consider what their action steps are based on their on their findings. Um I won't go into all of them but they had ways that generative AI benefit learning ways that they just um compromise the school experience not just learning but school experiences and relationships um in schools. And I think some of the key takeaways fell into two categories. Um again the negatives and positives but also leverage points and I thought this was interesting. The leverage points to were the purchasing power of school districts that we can use this so that educators are actually at the table designing AI as

031opposed to being given it and then asked to implement it already designed. So, I thought that was pretty interesting thought about using procurement to be part of advocating for what we want for our kids when it comes to AI. And then the second was parent um parent advocacy and parent engagement. So, I'm just keeping those things on my radar. Not exactly sure what next steps might be, but I wanted to make you aware that that report is out and available um if anybody's interested. The second board report is that the community engagement committee has started their annual spring leadership training. We kicked it off last night with Holly O'Hare O'Hare from CPS schools. [music] And um I'm sorry, she worked with CPS schools. She has her own consulting business, but it's really a sweet group.

032We're from all corners of our community, both in school and out of school, but all kind of joining arms working with kids and working on leadership skills. So, just wanted to make you aware there's some people [clears throat] are putting in some extra time um to do that. So, that's my board report. >> All right. >> Thank you, Mrs. Miller. Um I've got a couple things. I I want to remind the board that we have not yet shared our triple I learnings and so I think I'm going to recommend that for a future board topic or maybe we just do it at board reports next time. So, if you have those those notes from that conference, just kind of review them a little bit. Also, with respect to that as well, we're coming up for

033the spring dinner for IASB, which I think um you probably have either gotten in your email box. If you are going, please let Mrs. Walker know as soon as possible because that's coming up in uh April, I believe, April 15th. We do not have a board meeting that evening, so it does not conflict with anything. Um, and finally, as is the case many times with a school community, we uh are close as family. And I want to take a moment to extend condolences on behalf of the board of education for two very recent losses in our community to two people who were very important. Um, first, Mr. Fry, who was a former math teacher at Park Campus, uh, and was well loved and well respected in that community. And also to Mr. Linder and his

034family and friends who was a former board member who served the district with distinction from 2007 to 2010. And as a family community, as a school community, we experiences we experience these losses as acutely and as greatly as the family and friends that these individuals have impacted uh in our district. And we will hold those families and friends and loved ones very close. Thank you. That brings me to the end of my board report and I will hand it over to Dr. Glitzman for the superintendent's report. >> Thank you, Dr. Mack. Well, I will start with our fabulous GMS Panthers who a couple of times in their report um made reference to welcoming Dr. Carmona. So, I would like to also welcome Dr. Alfonso Carmona sitting out here in the audience. Dr. Carmona, if you

035did not know, is the next superintendent in school district 46 starting on July 1st. So, we're so glad that you're here and we're so glad you're here on such a robust evening. So, what a fun night for you to be here. Um, I also do we have any high school students here for government class tonight? That's what I thought. So, um, we're really glad you're here. Are you here from Central or North or both? Central. Both from Central. So, you're here for an interesting board meeting. We we know that you might have come anyway, but this time you're coming for your government class. So, we're really glad you're here and please feel free to contact any of us at, you know, after the meeting if you have questions about what you saw tonight. Okay. Um,

036and then I'd also like to scroll back. Well, it's super cold outside right now, but it was really cold over the long weekend. And I would like to thank our on&M team um led by Jose Zyers who's at the table tonight um for all of the work that they did to take to keep our buildings safe during that intensely cold time. Throughout that long weekend, we had people here every four hours going through every one of our schools to make sure that um things were were popping along. Well, not popping. you don't want anything popping. [laughter] We And we did have A COUPLE WELL, HERE'S the thing. We did have a couple things pop. Um, but we were able to take care of it right away and that's because we knew about it right away.

037So, thank you um, Jose and thank you to everyone who is a part of keeping things safe in our school district. And I'm going to hand it over to Mrs. Gluck who's going to talk about a recent leadership academy that we had along with a a kindergarten meet and greet and some other info. >> Thanks. Uh, good evening. Uh so the first thing I want to talk about are is a leadership academy that we had last week. Um and it was run by Amy Musquera who is from Adelante Specialists. Um and the title of the academy was effective leadership in a dual language district ensuring success for all. And really the focus was around how will our leaders help to sustain and promote our dual language programming where we have some changes that are coming

038starting next school year. And we focused um as well on multilingual learning in general. And so um had we engaged in some activities and planning and some application for where do we go from here? So, it was just a start um and a great day, a full day of learning together. Um, and it was it it's very rare that we do an academy like that that's just for our leadership team and we were very intentional about that so that it could be customized for us. So, it was great. Uh, and in addition to that, uh, we have kindergarten meet and greet coming up next week. Um, so on February 5th at 5:30 at Park and then uh from 6:00 to 7 at Avon, Prairie View, Wood View, and Meadow View. So, uh, that's an opportunity

039for our incoming kindergarten families to come in to see the school and to get a tour and learn a little bit more about each of their schools. So, we're really excited about that. >> Thank you. And we're gonna round it up with Mrs. Peler who's going to talk about uh registration and some things important things regarding that along with um an AI survey that we've been doing. >> Yes, thank you. So um registration is an important part of everything we do as a school district knowing who's going to be coming to our schools and making sure we have the resources and staff to do that. Um registration opened last week and we were already starting to see some families um complete that process. Um, as a reminder, we are opening a two-way duel program for

040kindergarteners, and that can be um you can express interest through our registration process for that program if you have an incoming kindergartener. Um, to piggyback off of um Mrs. Miller's comments about generative AI, our district is currently working on um creating guidance for the use of AI by staff and students. Um, as a part of that work, we're gathering feedback from families, um, with a survey that has been shared in the last two district newsletters. Um, we're also working to gather some feedback from our seventh and eighth grade students during their advisory periods coming up here soon. Um, the technology planning and design team will then use all of that data to um, write our guidance document for the district. >> Thank you. And that um closes up the superintendent report tonight. >> Wonderful. Thank

041you, Dr. Glickman. Uh we are on to the consent agenda. I need a motion to approve this evening's consent agenda, which also includes the personnel addendum that was sent to us earlier today. >> I'll move a second. Okay. Braden. >> Hi. Hun >> I >> Halverson >> I >> Miller >> abstain >> and Mac >> I >> okay thank you very much that brings us now to the finance committee portion of the meeting and I am going to invite Mr. Lacroy and Mr. Gordon who are members of the finance committee to join us at the board table. >> Well, they are joining. I didn't know if anyone had a card from the policy meeting that you want to pass my way, but if you do, just if I could have it before the end of

042the meeting or before we go home. >> May I have one, Mr. Miller? May I have one? >> I need one to write. We need one, please. Yeah. Are you okay with me writing something? >> Absolutely. Yeah, that's the point. Okay, I think the first we're switching these. We're flipping them a little bit. So, we're going to start off with the update on the long range facilities plan. >> Good evening everybody. Um, we're here again to give another update. Quick reminder, Matt Verden with W Architects and Engineers. Uh give a quick update on the long range facility plan where we're at. Um just a quick reminder, uh this is intended to be a living document that we are going to update regularly. So there'll be regular updates to this. This is one of those. Um

043and it's a tool that we're going to kind of starting to evolve a little bit. So historically, what we've talked about is the long range plan being your 10-year deferred maintenance uh work that we have a backlog of. And then separate or secondary to that was also then the educational advocacy work which is the media center renovations, some of the student support renovations. What we've done in this update is we are now merging those into the single spreadsheet so we can track funding through all of that. So you're going to see the numbers are going to look a little different here, but that's the that's going to be part of the reason for that. So if you look um here's the breakdown by building. You'll notice um at the bottom the that first column is

044at 55 million in change. Um, and when we look at where we were last year or back in September when we were here for the update for the finance committee meeting, we were at 44 million. So that $11 million difference, you'll notice we've now added that bottom line item of educational adequacy, which is that roughly 11.5ish amount. And that's basically the difference. There's some other eb and flows up on the the line items above that. As we've gotten bid results in for the media center work, the first round of media center work, that's now reflected in here. Um, we've got some of the safety and security work that um, Amanda and her team have been working on. Uh, some of those numbers are starting to come in and get firmed up. You've started to approve

045some of those. And we've also had just some back and forth [music] with some items that through those two work scopes were kind of double dipped in some of the long range planning items. So, we're starting to clean some of that up too as we go through. You'll notice that we'll come back to this in a minute, but that first one to twoyear column is sitting at 18.9 million. Just keep that number in the back of your head when we get down a little bit later. So, let's talk about the work that's been done already. Uh, a little little over $2 million of the work. Uh, last summer we had the HVAC work. Um, the the cooling equipment at this building as well as Prairie View as well as the the heating plant at GMS.

046Um, a few years before that at GMS, there were a handful of rooftop units that were replaced as well. And then [music] some miscellaneous parking lot and some door hardware work that was done over a couple buildings as well. All of that work, just for note, was funded outside of the bond issuance the year before. that was funded through on andm funds and other other district monies that are available. This is a slide just as a reminder of what we talked about back in September. So that bond issuance is going to come out in or the bond sale is going to come out in two issuance. Uh the first one is 17 million which I think you approved in November. Um so those those dollars have been received and the focus of those are the

047that one to twoyear column which is your safety security building envelope some of those known deficiencies. That's the your your high important stuff, your high urgency items, as well as the media center renovations that will do the first four buildings this summer. The remaining three will be next summer. Um issuance two then, which will be probably around 2027, will be for another 20 million and that'll hit then the 3 to 5year column. Um as well as uh the student support space renovations that are going to start getting designed here in the next year or so. The thing that's a little different on this is we're starting to look at other funding sources. that 18.9 we talked about was obviously more than the 17 million for that first uh that first issuance. So in your onm

048funds, there's about a million dollars out of that that money every year that gets uh focused towards some of the line items that are in that long range facility plan. So let's include those dollars in that amount. We also have that DECO grant for about half a million dollars. So in reality for that one to two years, it's not just 17, we're going to add two and a half to that. So it's about 19.5 million which gives us a nice little half a million dollar or so cushion of that 18.9 that's in that first one to twoyear column. So we're sitting pretty good for where we want to be as we know that they're going to be es and flows and you know bids can come in higher or lower wherever that's at. So it

049gives us a nice little cushion as far as the work that's coming up here in the next year. Um, if you remember back to a year ago, back in January 25, we talked about what the summer 25 scope or summer 26 scope was going to look like. And we had estimated that at around $10.2 million. As of today, we're sitting at about 12.1. So, we can talk through a little bit what that is. As like I said, we're starting to firm up some of those dollars. So, media center renovations. Um, we've got firm bid results for those first four buildings. That's what you're going to take some action on tonight to wrap that up. Uh we've also got the coming up some of the abatement work we got to do at a couple of buildings

050to get ready for the summer 27 renovations. Uh we've got the work that's tied to then to the grant which is the uh exterior envelope work from the long range utility plan. We've also then got the security improvements that we talked about earlier. Uh that's hitting your intercoms, some of your cameras, um card access for your doors, things like that. It's about making sure your buildings are safe. And then lastly, there's a some on andm improvements down there that are um some of the parking lot work that occurred at Avon is now going to happen at the the rest of the buildings as well as there's a few uh HVAC items that premisear who you have your um HVAC maintenance contract with have identified as being a little bit more urgent and we're going to

051get those replaced as soon as possible. So all in all, if you try to make an apple apples to apples comparison of the January 25 scope to this, uh you take that roughly 1.2 for the O andM improvements um off of that 12.1. There's also uh in the last year you've added uh the CM services. So there's some cost associated with that. That's a couple hundred,000. We end up with it's about a 106 to 10.2. It's about a $400,000 difference. So we're sitting at stuff we estimated a year plus ago about 97% of where we were. So we're within 3% of what those estimates were. We're in pretty good shape with I think overall with that. Are there any questions? This isn't a question, Matt, but I'm just wondering if it would be helpful reminder

052of the grant that you were talking about because it's been a little while since we talked about that grant at this table. >> Yeah, so that was a uh grant through the Department of Commerce and Economic Opportunity, which is a state funded grant. Um it covers I think was $451,000 uh for exterior improvements. So on the the long range plan, there was a litany of, you know, just miscellaneous tuck pointing and masonry repairs, some foundation repairs, uh things like that that we're able to apply that grant to. Um the dollar amount there of the 971, the way that we're going to um pursue the bidding for that is we're going to get um we got to cover at least that $451,000 of the grant. And then while we've got that contractor here doing work, take

053advantage of the economy of scale, that scope. We've got alternates then to start to pull in some of the other buildings outside of that to try to accomplish all of that in one economic or be as economic as we can with that approach. >> Thank you very much. Any comments or questions from other board members? Thank you very much. >> All righty. >> [laughter] >> All right. Next up, Mr. Wildman, I'll hand it over to you for updated 5-year projections. Members of the finance committee, tonight we are reviewing our five-year financial projections. Again, as always, these projections are designed to help us understand where we're headed financially based on what we know today, while also recognizing the projections are influenced by a wide range of variables beyond our control. As with all the financial decision-m

054that we make here at CCSD46, a 5-year projections process is guided by the district's mission, empowering learners, creating creating equity, and cultivating community. This work also connects directly with our strategic plan goals and board policies. I'm going to go straight into the projections because it's quite a long slide deck. It's about 20 slides. Um, fiveyear projections help us understand trends, anticipate challenges, and evaluate decisions not just on today but based on the long-term impact. This allows the board and the finance committee to make informed responsible financial decisions that support educational priorities while maintaining fiscal stability. Uh the model how are the projections built? [music] The model the models used in this projection rely on frontline analytics where we input all the known information that we have. Specifically, uh, we use the 2025 26 2526 adopted

055budget. That's the current year's budget. We use the 2025 tenative levy process which was actually presented on the last time we did financial projections. [music] So, we know what that is. Uh, we use audited financial balances. So, they were actually also presented on on November 19th. So, everything happened on November 19th. It's the same information. Um and we're con bringing it back here today. Um audit financials they're from a CPA they're not from my numbers they're from bigilly. Um, we've also include all our current collected bargaining agreements, the both the PSRP for four years and the GFT for the next three years and all known major increases in cost drivers which um going to talk about in the next slide such as transportation, health insurance [music] and special ed tuition. So, uh, the assumption still

056contains the the change that the district will become a tier 2 district in fiscal year 2028. We'll talk a little bit about that when I have the graph in front of me. So, just hold that thought. Um, all purchase services are 4%. We have transportation held at four. We've seen very large increases over the last five to seven years, but we're seeing a little bit more stability in transportation moving forward. Um, health insurance is currently at 17%. I attended the EBC preliminary budget preliminary renewal meeting today and I can tell you that it will be 17%. It's uh 16.8 and 17.8 for our HMO and PO plans on a blended increase is 17.1 going forward. Health insurance um 7% in all the the remaining four years in the five-year projection. Special ed tuition is showing

057an increase of 15%. That's not changed uh since 2000 since the November projection obviously and we have uh hopefully a normalized increase of 5% and 4% in the next three and five years. Um small operating surplus this is kind of I'm going to talk a little bit of a look back. So in fiscal year 2021 2022, you're going to see this on the graph when I go forward. We saw a slight increase in our operating fund balance. Uh that was the last year we ended with an operating surplus prior to the referendum and after that point we began to deficit spend during this period. We also issued Dub working cash bonds. That was the final year that when you mentioned that the 2 million [music] that was the final year of the DAB bonds. Um

058so that was year three of the of the three-year plan. Uh those bond proceeds have been used to supply significant facility needs across the district includes new roofs at Avon Prairie View, Woodview, Frederick, a whole new building automation system at all buildings and new chillers at Frederick, Prairie View, and the new balls at GMS that Matt just told us about. Operational draw down from 2022 through 2025 was intentional to allow us to stay operations. And while this was expected, it also contributed to a standard and pause credit rating being adjusted from double A plus to double A in May of 2025. Uh the successful March of 2024 operating levy referendum now provides additional operating resources, supports capital funding. We just heard about that. Um we we successfully issued $170 million worth of debt certificates. They

059were actually received in December and we plan to spend roughly about $12 million in the next uh year on all the different things that we're planning and they'll support our long-range facility plan. The next two slides are just repeated. I'm just showing them for for completeness. This was on on November 19th. It's also shown on November 19th. And that gets me to the uh five-year projection which is updated. That brings us to the forward-looking projection. Um the additional savings that you can see in fiscal year um additional savings from retirements in the outer years were identified in the projection model. Uh so the green line is the improvement and the and the orange line is what was actually presented in November. So you can see that that is it's about1 to2 million difference in the

060projections in the Audi years of four and five but essentially it's the same projection line through years one through three. >> Um the >> Chris I just want to jump in for a [music] moment just just to just stay on that slide for a second. >> I I've got a whole thing to talk about it. >> Oh fabulous. >> I'm not finished. I've got want to talk about I please don't jump right now yet. Keep it going. >> Okay. Um the line compares the operating fund balance with the district savings account. I just want to bring everyone back to see what we're exactly looking at. Um compares the operating fund balance the district savings account um for daily operations. That's what we use. And the blue line is the 25% line threshold. The minimum recommended

061safety net as by a board policy. As you can see back in fiscal year 202122 the district reached its highest fund balance. This was bolstered by COVID esser funding that the district received in addition to our daily operations. Um the intersection between 23 and 2024. This is when the district's fund balance uh dropped below the 25% threshold. And as you can see, we're currently operating below a 25% threshold. Um long term, what are the risks to the district for that? obviously doesn't it is a financial risk in terms of the credit rating. I already mentioned that back in November and it continues to be a risk as we anticipate issuing more debt in the next two years. So why is this happening? Um the funding gap GCCSD has historically been underfunded by the state. Um,

062per recent data going back from 2017 through 2025, the district has increased its adequacy from 65% to 70%. Um, under the Illinois evidence-based funding formula, and this is approximately $50 million per year, continues to be $50 million per year with the exception of where we're actually looking forward to actually becoming a tier 2 district. So, the referendum impact has obviously had an impact on that. Um, in 2024, the community approved the limiting rate. It was passed narrowly from with 52 to 48% by approximately 150 votes. This has allowed the district to raise the money for the 37 million for all the different capital needs that we have while simultaneously keeping the overall tax rate the same as the old debt dropped off which was used to build pocket. Uh the referendum though was never expected

063to fix the level of adequacy. I expect the district's adequacy to be 80 to 85% in 2028 in the upcoming years. Excuse me, pushing the district into tier 2. That's in the model. As a comparison, I just want you to think about this. Zion Elementary District is currently 96% funded. Okay? Gurnie is 81% funded and Woodland is 98% funded. So even with the additional funding, we are still the lowest funded district in our cohort. Okay, I just want to rephrase that and remember that that 15 million was the gap. The district asked for 6 million during the referendum. The board extended 7.8. And of that 7.8, 3 million is going to debt certificates. Okay, like most districts, CCSD is facing has faced inflationary pressure on many things. Salaries, benefits, which make up just portion of

064our budget. Special education, we have a 15% increase. Health insurance 17% and transportation, which although is actually normalized right now, has seen very large increases over the last decade. So while the model reflects all known information, we do acknowledge the significant uncertainty that ignists at the state and the federal funding level. So as of today, we still don't know what will happen with title three and title one part 8 and various other federal programs that have historically been stable foundational supports for schools. Special education may receive reduced funding which could material impact the district. And to obviously maintain the the district's mission of empowering learners and creating equity, we must stabilize this line. The 2024 referendum was a start, but we must continue to look at long-term operational efficiencies. So this slide moving on now

065assesses the funding gap between our current fund balance and the 25% fund balance threshold. The graph goes from $8.5 million for 2027 growing as you can see potential changes to revenues which are not obviously captured in this. These are future considerations. Mandated categoricals that's they uh they will probably face increased proration as the state prioritizes EBF funding over all the other mandated categorical grants. Obviously, I just talked about federal funding, but on a positive note, the district is um pursuing and moving forward with the potential for the county school sales tax initiative, which would not directly give the district operating funds, but would allow them to offset that with capital funding. Those funds can only be used for capital and for security measures. and other things similar a limited scope. It wouldn't be a we'd

066be able to offset those going forward. Uh potential changes to expenditures uh evaluate cost management uh cost management options where possible. I already mentioned that I went to the preliminary general meeting today and we'll be reconvening an insurance advisory committee on February 26 20 February 26 of this year. Um the district is continuing to look at staffing contractual services and department and building budgets as we move into the budget process for 26 2027. As I already mentioned, the S&P the standard and pause which is our only rating that we have right now um for our current debt um issued a report in May of 2025 that if we do not increase our fund balance further downgrades will probably be looked at. That's the exact wording. So next steps uh with the new levy in place,

067continued monitoring um the five-year model um needs needs to be evaluated obviously moving forward. Um district should continue to evaluate its [music] fund balance through 2029 and as always projections are are only as uh good as they are at the time. They need we need to run updated projections as we have more information moving forward. Um we'll continue to revise them as new data legislation or economic conditions emerge. Our goal is to remain transparent, proactive, and disciplined in ensuring fiscal stability that supports strong educational outcomes. >> Chris, can you go back to slide 13, please? >> Thanks. Okay, we um I know you spoke about this, but I just wanted to speak about it a little bit more. Um [music] so board, you've seen essentially the same presentation back in November. That projection is a

068little bit different. It is a little bit more positive and I wanted to make sure everyone understood why that is. Chris mentioned um looking at retirements. So a business office always looks at retirements whenever they're doing a five-year projection. That's that's standard. However, this time to create this particular update, they looked at exactly who is retiring [music] and what the potential savings would be with those retirements. Now, we can't make a clear prediction uh a stable prediction as to what we would be hiring people at, but we are able to predict how much, you know, what somebody will be making when they're going out. So that is the difference between that green line and that orange line. The green line is the new line. So as Chris told you, it is roughly about 2 million.

069You said 2 million um dollars difference in the positive um I believe it's four years out. >> Yes. >> Four years out. >> Three to three to four years out and by using that more precise method of calculating. I just wanted to make sure everyone understood that. Okay. All right. What questions do you have for us? >> So, you referenced the um S&P and the potential bond down rating. Do do the projections that you have on there, does that assume stable bond rating? And if the bond rating did go down, do you have a sense as to what the dollar impact might be? >> So, this is all we this is all we know right now. um based on what we issued debt on most recently, the the S&P was assuming that there would be

070a positive trajectory moving forward. The they've not seen these projections because these were these were produced after the bond rating was actually produced. When the next issuance is going to be looked at, updated projections will have to be given to the the S&P and then they'll make their decision. I don't assume there's going to be any interim changes between now and the issuance of new debt unless unless the S&P thinks that that is is something that they wish to do. So, as long as as long as no extra debt is issued, I don't see why it shouldn't be looked at till 2027. >> I have a question. So, I noticed a lot of the percentage symbol. I was wondering what did the percentages mean? >> I'm not sure which slide you're asking about. >> These

071ones. >> Yeah. >> This one. >> Yeah. >> Okay. So these are um assumptions that we have to use going forward. They're best guesses. So the closer we are to the first year, we have more information. So we know that there's going to be a 17% increase because I found it out today. I went to a meeting and I was told by a group of insurance people, your increase is 17%. So check mark. That's great. going forward, we don't know what 2028 through 2031 is going to be. So, we have to put a number in there and it's has to be something reasonable, realistic, and something that makes sense from an assumption perspective. So, we put 7% in there because we just don't know what's going to happen. And that's how projections work. You basically

072use all your known assumptions that you know today and then you make the best guess you can with the information you have and you look at the line and you see if it's going up, down or it's steady. And if it's going up, you're doing great. It means that you your revenues exceed your expenditures. You have a surplus. You you everything's doing great. If everything is flat, you're very well balanced. But it's going the other direction. You have what's called structural deficit. I'm going to add in another way to look at this is it's a way to um make your best guess as to how much money something is going to cost in the next year. So, think about it like if you have an activity, maybe a sport or an activity that your family

073maybe pays for and you know what it costs this year and you're like, "Okay, great. We we can afford that." And then you have to figure out, "Okay, but how much is it really going to cost next year?" And then how much how are we going to afford to pay for it next year? That's what we're doing right now is trying to figure out how everything that we have to do, what it's going to cost next year. And these things that Mr. Wildman has has listed up there are the things that are changing the most that we have to pay attention to. So it's the transportation which is bus service that cost is going up. Health insurance which um our staff needs health insurance your families do as well. And that cost has gone up

074a lot for a lot of reasons that we're not going to go into right now. and um special education the the cost for supporting students who need a lot of extra support that cost is going up a lot too. Does that help? Excellent. >> I have a question. I was wondering that and you mentioned that our school district is funded less than others around us. Why is that? >> Oh, whoa. That's a good question. We asked that. >> Why is that? [laughter] >> We're going to need five hours. >> All right. You guys are on the board now forever. >> So I I will try my best. Okay. So, uh, districts receive the majority of their funding through local property taxes. And the local property taxes are based on every home, every [music] business, every

075everything, every piece of real estate within a school district's boundaries. Okay? And then there's a levy that I have to do every year presented to the board. And the bud says, "Yeah, this is great. we're going to increase the amount of money that everyone pays in their property taxes. The district's property taxes don't cover all the things that it needs to for all the different things that we have to do as a school district. So, the state of Illinois does an assessment every year and says of 851 school districts, which we have, it assesses them all from a percentage of adequacy. Okay? So if you are a district that has a lot of affluence and rich neighborhoods, you may well be 120% funded, which means that school district collects all that money and is able

076to collect it and spend it on teachers and spending all the different things that it needs to do. Our district is underfunded between 65 and 70%. So every year we're underfunded by 30%. Which is the dollar equivalent of $15 million. So over five years, $15 million adds up to a lot of money. So we have to be able to do what we can do for the best for our staff, our students, and running the school district um with not enough money. >> Do you want it again from someone who taught eighth grade? >> Okay. [laughter] Really fast. So we get most of the money from um pe from people's homes, people's taxes, right? From families and such. But we get some money from the state of Illinois as [music] well. And we are not getting

077enough money from the state of Illinois to pay the difference between what we need and what we have. And in some of those other school districts, they're able to collect more money from um from the community where the schools are. A lot of times that's because those communities have a lot of businesses and things in them and we don't have that necessarily in our school district. So we're relying on the state to give more money to our school district and they're trying but we need more. All right. This is a fun game. [laughter] >> Can I add something to that? >> Please do. >> So m Dr. Glickman said we get money from taxes from our houses and the state gives us money and the federal government gives us money but the federal government has

078decided to give us less money and so that means that we have to figure out what to do like what do we cut is there another way to make money um so that's a piece of this equation as well >> thank you >> have some questions uh it was about the assumption around the tier changing, right? We went uh eight years for us to move 5% on the adequacy scale and then moving another 5% in the next three years. Is that a function of the referendum? By and large, >> it is >> because the adequacy target, right, the formula, it's not real simple, but uh it speaks to the population that you're trying to educate, right? And there are some trends that are moving towards making our population you know, needing more resources to to

079educate that population, right? >> Yep. >> What is the I mean, are you sure about this assumption? And then I'd like to talk to you on a followup on like what that means to go from tier one to tier two. >> So, with the whole harmless and that sort of thing. So there are 23 different criterias criteria that make up EBF and each so back in the day pre 2017 we used to have general state aid okay state aid I could calculate I could create a spreadsheet I could figure out the low housing income and I could figure out what our increase was going to be within $5,000 okay EBF came and took various mandated categoricals rolled it into general state aid and it became a very complicated formula that is updated every year. It's

080also it's also complicated because the CPS and I mentioned this last back in November um was a tier one district became a tier two and has dropped back into tier one. So there's less money in the tier one pool as well. Might recall that last year we had to make a sizable adjustment to our t tier funding. Now um local funding the 7.8 8 million extra is additional funding that's available to the district from from the from the funding criteria from the the actual adequacy calculation. So just thinking about it, right? If we are $15 million underfunded and that is 30%. Okay. And we've just added 7.8 in one year plus the we're going to we're definitely moving up into adequacy. We're probably going to move into tier two. And tier 2's cut off is

081currently 78%. 78%. >> Yeah. So we will creep we will creep into tier two. Part one of the question. Part two, what does that do? It it basically halves the the contribution. So if you were getting $2 million, you now get $1 million as your t incremental. Yes. Still held harmless from the previous year to what it's but it is half of it. So this is the side effect. It's kind of a the paradox of of yay, we passed a referendum, but uh oh, we're going into tier two. Tier two should be a celebration, but with everything else that we've got, it's actually less funding. So, I'm doing my best to model that because if I didn't and I showed us continuing, you might think, "Oh, that's great." But then, uh oh, we don't have

082it because of the one to two years it changes. So two to one was the effect that was for example purposes right in real like I'm curious what that line looks like for projection if we don't go to tier two in 2028 does it change materially >> well >> so maybe real numbers is what I'm rough real numbers I know it's three years out >> we'd probably add another three to five million $5 million over over the five years over the sorry over the three years we probably add three to four million dollars I'm trying to give you rough numbers. >> 25%. >> It does not because if it had done we would already be out of it because we've been at 65 70% and we've not bottle rocketed out of where we are. It's

083it's sustained us. We the district needs more money from something else. Chris, I have a question about um we have a data center going in and there's a whole lot of research that says that the construction of data centers increase energy costs and water costs. We've had assurances that that is not the case for this kind of data center. But I'm wondering if it's uh makes sense to track our energy and water costs over time just to make [music] sure that those come to fruition. And if so, how would we do that? And how would that work with other benchmarks that we might have to climb out of our fund balance deficit? A lot of questions in that, but >> can I can you try >> Can you break it down? >> Break it down

084for me, please. Yeah, that'll be easy. >> How would we and maybe this is a dumb question, but how would we monitor energy costs and water costs to make sure they're doing what we think they're going to do? Is that just a simple looking at the bills, or is there a more complicated way to do that? So we have a building automation system that allows us to do you want to talk about that? [laughter] It basically allows us to um as best as we can with our with our controls and our current systems we have from HVAC perspective um to to program or as best as we can to have the heat come on and come off which is controlling when you need the most heat and when you don't. So that's that's a kind

085of prospective way to to spend less when your heat's on all the time. When it's cold, you can't really do that. But moving aside from that, um the district obviously has solar. We are we're able to produce a significant amount of electricity on the buildings which do have them which is helpful too in offsetting the actual what we actually pay to come. Water use I I don't know. Do you want to jump in and help? We have clear budget lines that say what our our energy spending is and like that's what you're asking. That is what I'm asking. >> Oh, sorry. I haven't missed that. Okay. >> No, that other was helpful, too. Okay. I appreciate all of it, but what are the line numbers that we should be paying attention to if we want

086to track energy and water costs to make sure that they are aligned with what we're expecting. >> And you maybe we'll >> and you can >> Yeah, why don't you get that to the board on that one? >> Know every line. >> Yeah, we'll get back to you on that one. Yeah. Yeah. Cost per hour. >> And just for those just for those watching tonight, um the data center, can you explain who which districts the data center will contribute to? And [laughter] >> it's Fremont, I believe. >> Yeah. >> Is Fremont. Yeah. >> And D127. District 127 does get that that increase in its EAV. Yeah. But we do not boundaries >> funds not in terms of energy and water cost. >> Right. In terms of the actual property taxes. >> Yeah. >> Correct. >>

087Do you have is there any estimate on how much D127 will benefit? We don't know. Any other questions from the board or finance committee? All right. >> All right. Yes. Yes. Go ahead. Yes. >> Um I was just wondering why we would lose money if we went up a tier or to tier two. >> Um we're not losing money. We're losing the incremental change. So I'm trying to explain this. If you're in tier one, you get the largest increase. If you're in tier two, you get a smaller increase. So, what we're trying to calculate is the difference between tier one and tier two. The district still gets what it got last year and it still gets an increase, but the increase isn't as big as what it would be if we were still in tier

088one. >> The way I think about it, the way I think about it is if this is enough, this is adequate. There are some schools that are like just shy of adequate and some are a little bit further and then there's us down here with most of the other schools in the state. So, we have a farther gap to fill. So they give us a little more money until we get to the middle and then they say, "Okay, now you're at the middle. So we're going to we're going to make sure the people below you get money first and then what's left you get some of that." But if you're at the top and some people are over, you just get less as you get closer to that. Does that make sense? Is that clear?

089>> Okay. Thank you very much. Thank you, Mr. LaCroy. Thank you, Mr. Gordon. Okay, we've got a few action items that we need to get to this evening. Uh, first on our list, I need a motion to uphold the suspension of student 2025-10-1 as identified in a previous close session. >> I'll move. >> I'll second. >> Okay. We Miller >> I >> Mac >> I >> Braden >> I >> Hume >> I and Halerson >> abstain. >> Motion carries. Next I need a motion please to approve the intercom project with forward edge. >> I'll move second. >> Go ahead. >> Okay. Y I >> Braden >> I >> Hersonson >> I >> Miller >> I Mac >> I motion approved. Uh next I need please a motion to approve the access control for the internal

090doors as it was presented to us. >> I'll move. >> I'll second. >> Okay. Alverson >> I >> Mac >> I >> Braden >> I >> Hume >> I >> and Miller >> I >> thank you. Motion carries. And the final action item I need a motion please to approve the bid award for the media center renovations at Frederick Meadow View Park and Prairie View. >> I'll move second. >> Okay. Mac >> I >> Braden >> I >> Albertson >> I >> Miller >> I'm gonna vote I but I just want to heads up that I'm struggling with the amount of money that we're approving with the projections that we're looking at. So I'm just absolutely voting I'm voting I this time and just thinking I think we need some discussion about what the priorities

091are in the case that we need to make some reductions >> and Hume >> I thank you. Motion carries. We do not have any unfinished business this evening. We do have a couple of new business items. The first one being the proposed 2026 2027 [music] school calendar uh waving legal holidays as required under public act 0960640 which is Veterans Day in November 11th, President Lincoln's birthday February 12th, Cashmeir Pilaskk's birthday March 2nd in order to hold school. >> I can talk about that. Uh so I can just give you the highlevel pieces of the calendar for some of the information. Um we have the um we have the first and last day will remain half days. Uh the with the first day of school being September or August 17th for our staff uh and but

092August [music] 19th for our students. A change with that in this new calendar recommendation is that kindergarteners will start the same day as grades 1 through eight. As we have been having them start the second day, that's a full day of school. So we thought they should have a half day the same as everyone else on their first day of school. Um so that is the recommendation for that. Uh an additional change is that we are recommending moving parent teacher conferences to October instead of November. um where we would continue to have two half days and conferences after that and then move our March conferences to February. And the focus of those conferences will be about student progress um so far and an opportunity to interact with families earlier in the school year rather than

093waiting until after the first report card comes out and after the second report card comes out. So, an opportunity for those connections to be made. Uh, and then winter break and spring break align with district 127 and we would continue to wave the legal holidays, Veterans Day, Lincoln's birthday, and Kasmar Palaski Day. Uh with this recommendation, our last day of school without emergency days would be May 28th, uh which is before Memorial Day and allows for us to head into construction on the remaining buildings if we have no emergency days. Any questions about the calendar? >> I've got a question. Um for conferences moving earlier, I think it's a great idea. I'm just curious what the thought process was there. Were you getting feedback from parents or staff? >> Um, we've been having this conversation

094for a while. Uh, many surrounding districts have had that conversation as well and have moved their conferences earlier. We did take do a survey of our staff to look at where conferences fell and the interactions. Uh, the majority of staff were on board with moving it earlier in order to have those those interactions with families earlier. Any other questions about that from anybody or our student representatives this evening? Calendars are important. [laughter] >> All right. Thank you. >> Thank you. Okay. Next up, uh we have the contract award for three rooftop units at Prairie View with Premisar. >> Yes. I want with the uh the three RTUs for uh preview after the uh this summer we had the one RTU that we needed to change at uh park. We had everything uh all the units

095re-evaluated with our partners at Premisar and um also the long range plan and the units that turn out to be in the most need in deteriorating condition were the ones at Prairie View. So, in order to be in a more uh proactive role, uh we wanted to begin by changing these three units to make sure we don't have um an issue like uh GMS 2.0. Uh that's what we are want to avoid. Um just wanted to make sure everybody understood. [laughter] So, you know, the ticket item for this is uh 628,000 inclusive of a uh $30,000 combat rebate. So, upgraded machines, more energy efficiency, uh is uh something that we have to uh keep in mind all the time. and we would like to continue to uh monitor and uh be responsible and making sure

096that we upgrade these machines for the future of our facilities. >> And as as Jose, as Mr. Zyrus has pointed out, um these replacements were on our long range plan. So, this is just about moving them up um as a priority sooner so that we aren't in a situation of damage. comments or questions from board members? Do we have one down there? >> Yes. Go ahead. >> Um, >> Jerry, >> okay, I have a question. What is uh RTU, >> Mr. Zers? >> And by the way, you're not the only one who wants to know that. There is somebody out there watching this who's saying, "What's the same? What is that?" So, thank you. RTU stands for a rooftop unit and typically these units sit on the roof and what they do is they cool

097and they heat certain areas of the building. So, Prairie View happens to have three units. Um, so that is basically what a rooftop unit does. And further down the line, they are separated in zones, have VIV boxes which preheat, make more rooms comfortable. So that you know students, teachers, everybody's uh has a nice comfortable environment you know to learn in. >> Any other questions? >> Just and I'm not sure if this is something that you're able to answer right now or not. I'm just curious if that price is consistent with what the projection was or if there's been a change just because we know the price of everything is going up if that's fairly close to what it the expectation was previously. I don't know what the original price was when we started pricing these.

098They were a lot more expensive. Uh the unit that that is on the currently on the roof now was basically the Cadillac for rooftop units, but we went to more efficient up-to-date uh quality equipment which is half the price or less. So in essence from 900,000 we went down to 600,000 with something that's quality and and we'll have ample warranty. Okay, thank you, Mr. Zires. Uh, next up on the new business uh, list, earlier this evening, we had a policy committee uh, meeting, and these are the press policy updates that we discussed this evening. I'm going to let Dr. Glickman >> take that. >> Yes, as you can see, there are many, many policies on this list. We're not going to review them all here tonight or we'll be here for the same hour that

099we were at our policy committee meeting for. But here's a a summary. Um, all of these policies are updated because of slight legal changes, um, small language changes, those kinds of things. Um, there's one policy that's updated a little bit more significantly and that's the curriculum content one because there are so many more u mandates that we have to follow that change our curriculum. There are two policies on this list that we have a couple of um tweaks that we are little pieces of information we need to gather um before we're able to make a final recommendation. So, as we agreed in the policy committee meeting at the next board meeting, which is the meeting that you'll be voting on them, we will bring that information back to all of you so that you can

100make an informed vote on those two policies. >> Thank you, Dr. Glickman. And just like an added extra comment for our student representatives and if for our Graves Lake visitors, Grace Lake Central visitors, that's how the board operates with policy. That's how we govern. So we don't just we don't sit up here and just throw out edicts, right, to the community and to the teachers and to the staff. It's through the policies that the that the board governs. So we have to keep those there's always updates legally and everything and that's how we do it. Thank you, Dr. Glickman. That was the final item on our new business. uh list we have topics for future agenda items. I had mentioned earlier the triple eye learning I don't know if that's an agenda item but we

101can do that within our perhaps within our board reports but set aside a little bit of few extra minutes for that next >> and actually that timing is perfect because we otherwise have a relatively short board meeting next time. >> Oh goodly who knows I'm well our um our park campus wolves will be here next next time. So, just like we had our wonderful Panthers here tonight, we'll have some students from Park sitting at the board table next next time. Um, and then we'll have those triple eye learnings from the for the board reports. Um, and then all we have on the agenda at this time are approvals for those three things that we just talked about, the calendar, the policies, and the RT RTUs. Um a week later there is a special board meeting

102that's a close session meeting. Um board as you know we are in the process of uh looking for a new assistant superintendent for finance um since um Mr. Wellman ha has has resigned from his position. And so we're in the process of those interviews. Um, as in the past, the board I know likes to do a final interview with a final candidate. So, we've set aside February 18th at 6 p.m. [music] to do that. Okay. And that's a closed meeting. And then February 25th is another regular meeting. Um, that will be we'll have our finance committee meeting that night and Dr. Woke will be bringing a staffing recommendation that evening. We also are intending to bring a final candidate for you to actually hire for our assistant superintendent for finance and that brings us to

103March and I'll give you more information in March and February. >> Wonderful. Thank you Dr. Glickman. Uh do we have any public comments signed up at this point? >> Dr. Can I just to the next since it's a light meeting during the policy section, why don't we go ahead and go back and I'll um share what the results from the check-in were and then we can maybe think about what what's going to happen in policy meetings going forward to align with that policy that tells us what our purpose is. >> So, before I forget Okay. Thank you, Mr. Miller. And sorry, was there was there any public comment, Dr. Wal? No, no public comment. Okay. Um, I am going to get us into close session in a moment here, but I don't know if our

104[snorts] Graves Lake Central students need a picture with the board as proof for your attendance this evening. You know, you can come up and take a wonderful picture with us. My hair is done, yours is better, and we'll go from there. I do need a motion now to enter into close session in accordance with public act 5 Illinois CS120/2C1 the appointment employment compensation discipline performance or dismissal of specific employees of the public body or legal counsel for the public body including hearing testimony on a complaint lodged against an employee of the public body or against legal counsel for the public body to determine its validity. We do not anticipate any further business after the close session. So, we will adjourn directly from there without coming back into open session. I need a motion to head

105into close session. >> I'll move. >> I'll second. >> Second. >> Okay. >> Hun. >> Miller. >> I >> Halverson >> I >> and Braden >> I. >> Excellent. I would like to congratulate again Gianna and Jera and thank you for being here at the board table. I hope you run for office one day. >> Great questions. [applause] >> Thank you everybody for attending this evening. Have a good night. Stay warm out there. >> Good job, ladies. And we can do the pictures up here with you