001Am I working? Okay, thank you. Good evening. Welcome to the board of education meeting for community consolidated school district 46. It is Wednesday, October 15th, and we are here at Frederick School in Grace Lake. Can I get an a call to order and a roll call, please? Macden here. Nash here. Hume here. here. Weedman >> here. >> Student reps Johani, Genevie Hollenstein, and Charlie Rok. >> All right, that gives us a quorum. Will you join me in the pledge of allegiance, please? Thank you. Um, can I get a motion to approve our agenda for this evening, please? I'll move. >> I'll second. Miller. Ison. I Weedman Braden. I And Nash. Okay. Um, do we have any public comments for this evening? Okay. Thank you. All right. Uh, we are going to turn to our presentations
002for the evening and the first one is the Graves Lake Middle School Wave the Panther. I'll turn it over to you, Mr. Smith. Good evening, everyone. Thank you as always for allowing us to come and be part of your meeting tonight. And as always, I have brought a bunch of very excited and a little nervous students. Uh during this first presentation, we kind of get our feet wet with getting up and presenting in front of you. And they have practiced a lot and are ready to go. So, they are very excited to share some of their big thinking, big ideas that we have that we're going to be researching and working on this school year to help create GMS make us just a little bit better as they work through their eighth grade year. So,
003here we go. The Way of the Panther is a group of GMS students that educators value leadership, productivity, and teamwork. We help to make every voice big or small and 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. The way of the panther members were selected by volunteering through a Google form. The questions on on the form asked to define leadership in our own way and why we would like to be part of a this leadership team. We were also asked why we were also asked how we'd work to improve our school and our community. At this point in our group, we've had five full group meetings and a small group meetings to brainstorm and discuss what
004we want to accomplish for our school this year. All members are eager to find ways to make our school better and to ensure that everyone at Graves Lake Middle School feels safe and welcome. Our first big idea is no place for hate. We will work with Mrs. Dulian and Mrs. Palmer to expand on our no place for hate expectation to get the message out to all students at GMS that bullying is not okay. We would like to show the students how bullying affects others in a way that is better for our specific age group. We want all staff and students to be considerate including everyone and try to make someone smile every day. St. Our second big idea is the school assembly and planning. We will work with Miss Eddie, Mr. Jagger, and M to
005plan and put on more exciting and fun all school assemblies and find out do a practice round for the assembly so everything goes smoothly for the people running it. Our last assembly was super fun. Tons of people played the games and you know the excitement was there. We'll plan big activities before the big day so more kids are hyped and everyone's excited to come. You will also be using a theme suggestion box for the seventh and eighth graders so we will be able to show them what we have in planned and make something for everyone to look forward to. We will work with Miss Blackburn, Mr. Mr. Smith and Miss Murphy to work on a plan to create career day opportunities for our eighth grade students. One of our awesome team members came up with
006the with the idea of doing a career fair. Since we are already going to the fairgrounds on October 22nd, we think doing this will help students understand the different jobs colleges and people chose and what they did to help them choose. We could invite people or people in college to come talk to us during lunch or panther. It is a cool way for Panthers to learn more about different jobs and colleges and what people actually do in them. We will work with Mr. Smith and our D46 office staff in the Gra Lake Community Board to create an outdoor classroom/garden in space for GMS. We'll also be starting a club to help take care of the garden and get more people involved. It is a fun way to learn new things while also doing something hands-on
007and educational that is beneficial for all of us. The club could inspire others to do cool projects of their own. This ch is this is a chance to come together as a community, hang out and enjoy growing things as a team. Another one of our ideas is the GMS student Chromebook shut off expectations. We will work with Mr. Smith and our D46 technology department to discuss the possibility of extending the time for our middle school students to have access to their Chromebooks each night. We talked about how a lot of students are super busy with sports and stuff outside and after school and don't get home till really late, sometimes even 9:00 p.m. or later. Our Chromebooks shutting off at 10 p.m. makes it hard to finish work if we've been at practice or a
008game because after we have to drive back, eat, shower, and more. Some students were a lot students have other devices, but not everyone does. So, it's unfair for those who rely on their Chromebook to get their work done. We get that sleep is important, but the stress from not finishing our work on time can mess up our whole day and stress us out. less restrictions for just GMS could really be beneficial to many students. Another one of our big ideas is the student Alice update. We will work with Mr. Smith and our D46 technology department to see if there's a way or program that can give us our students more information and access to safety programs at GMS. Making safety drills more realistic will help us respond calmly and confidently when real emergencies occur. We
009are going to research to see if there is an app that would go directly to the student if the situation were to occur like the fire alarm that could ping everyone in the building right away. Substitutes don't have the raptor system, so we want to help further develop a procedure that could be that would be stated on our building PA system. >> We will work with Mr. stiff and Miss Murphy to plan and facilitate a great opportunity for our incoming seventh graders to feel comfortable making their move to GMS. It would also be awesome to have more of a tour to help the students feel more comfortable at the new start of the year. We could show spots where students can talk to teachers privately if they ever need support without stress. Having sixth graders
010visit our school early would help them get used to the layout and see how things work here. This could happen on a half day, so we don't have to worry about class schedules or lunch. So, those are all of our big ideas that our team will work on this school year. As you can see, not all of our teammates were able to join us tonight, but here are some of the here are some of the names of everyone on our team this year that will be working hard to achieve our goals. Thank you to our D46 school board of education, Dr. Glickman, Mrs. Gluff, and the D46 learning community for allowing us this time to introduce ourselves and giving us the opportunity to speak about what makes JMA such a wonderful place to be. We
011look forward to seeing how Seeing you next time with updates on how our projects. [Applause] >> Thank you so much students. Do we have questions or comments from the board? After a few more meetings, we've From the last meetings, we've talked about who wants to do certain projects and our ideas for each project. So, we're planning on breaking off into groups so each group can focus on the one activity so we can accomplish more throughout the whole year. question. Um, but I do have a comment. Um, these ideas are fantastic and as Mrs. Nash said, they're they are very ambitious and I just want to comment on the fact that you have these wonderful ideas that you've prepared, but the fact that you have spent time on your presentation skills makes it really clear and
012concise. and us as listeners, we're able to really focus on the ideas because we're not distracted by fidgeting or things that it can make public speaking um difficult. So, I commend you on your public speaking skills. >> Thank you. Before we move to our next presentation, this is the part where I'm supposed to gracefully uh invite our students and the parents that came with them. If it doesn't work for you to stay for the rest of the meeting, we understand. We'll give you a moment to exit. We'd also love for you to stay. We have three wonderful eighth graders who are sitting at the board meet at board tonight who will be participating in the meeting. So, it'll be great to have some people watching that, but there are people who have to go. We're
013just going to pause and give you a chance to do that. Thanks so much. While that's happening, our next presentation, Mr. Wadman, I'm very sorry you have to follow that, uh, is going to be about the tenative property tax levy, which is going to be just as exciting. I think we should get the panelists to present this next year. Well, good evening everyone. Uh I'll be presenting the proposed 2025 property tax levy presentation for community consolidated school district 46. Uh this presentation outlines the process, key figures and rationale behind the proposed levy which is required which is a required annual step in funding our schools. As with all financial decisions, our levy processes guided by the district's mission empowering learners, creating equity, and cultivating community. These are not just words. They serve as the foundation
014of how we allocate resources and make financial recommendations. Our goal is to ensure every dollar supports equitable opportunities and highquality education for all students. Uh this work connects directly with our strategic plan goals and board policy 4120 which calls for maintaining a fund balance between 25 and 30% for operating expenditures. This range supports fiscal stability. Uh and we're also committed to being transparent and alignment u ensuring our financial practices are clear and that they spot directly support district priorities. So here is the timetable, excuse me. So here is our timetable uh for the levy process. Uh on September 17th we held a preliminary discussion that was the finance committee. Uh tonight, October 15th, we are presenting the tenative levy. Uh the legal public notice will be presented tomorrow and we will hold the public hearing
015on November 19th. Finally, the adoptive levy will be filed uh with Lake County by December 23rd. That is the final Tuesday in the fiscal year. And this ensures that we meet all statutory deadlines under Illinois school code. To frame the levy discussion, it's helpful we recall where our revenues come from. The majority of CCFT's operating funds are generated locally through profit taxes, which account for 56% of our total budget. The remaining funds come from state and federal sources and from fees, grants, and other revenues. Because local funding drives our fiscal stability, the the levy process is essential to maintaining our programs and services. The aside, most of our spending is invested directly in people in classrooms. Combining salaries and benefits represent our largest categories reflecting the staff who serve our students every day. The remainder
016includes supplies, contracted services, transportation, and maintenance of facilities. Each line item supports our mission strategic goals. So, let's jump into the levy and review some key terms of the process itself. The property tax extension limitation law or PTEL limits how much property tax revenue can come from one year to the next. The increase is capped to the lesser of 5% or the prior year CPI plus the value of new construction. This limitation applies to applies to the PEL limiting rate which is different from the property tax rate. The Lake County clerk's office ultimately determines the final tax extension based on a levy request applying these limits to calculate the allowable rate. to to clarify a few of these terms. The tax levy is the total amount of money we request from property taxes. The extension
017refers to the actual taxes build to taxpayers. The CPI measures inflation and determines our maximum verbal growth. And EAV, the equalized assess valuation is the total taxable value of property within the district after county and state equalization. And for the 2025 levy, a few key points to point out. The CPI is 2.9%. We're estimating construction as 948149 just uh just below uh $1 million. The extension was that amount there 42651785. And the proposed extension is 44031779 including debt service and our IMRF portion which is payable to seed the extension equals 45980. Finally under public act 1020895 districts are required to disclose their cash reserves annually. This includes all funds tied to the operating levy and the obligations secured by those funds. We continue to monitor our fund balances closely to remain within B policy and
018ensure long-term financial health. That concludes my presentation uh on the 2025 property tax levy. I'll open up to questions from the board. >> Thank you questions. My only question is CPI set at 2.9. That's that's final. >> Yeah, that's the December 2024 value >> which represents the tax year. >> Thank you very much. >> Thank you. >> We will move to reports and I'll start on this side with Mr. Leman. We'll go around. So I wanted to call attention to a grad who is going to be working with me as an intern. Um she is also working at Liberty Prairie as an intern and our work is going to overlap just a bit. So I wanted to remind you during the sustainability task force we heard about the pathways program. There are seven pathways. It's
019a national recognized program that allows students to take classes which prepare them for an internship which then prepare them for the workforce or governance and so therefore she's gonna be working with me and she is going to be developing a session for discovery days depending on the school and so she is going to create a session that features a food and it's going to connect our outdoor learning spaces to the larger food. So, I'm pretty excited for her. She's gonna do many things, but her first task going to be to go visit the outdoor learning spaces at the different schools after school and kind of get a feel for what they look like. And I'm bringing this to your attention because outdoor learning spaces were part of our strategic plan. It's just a sweet full
020circle because she started at Central to And it actually gain skills in fourth. So I just I just wanted you to see that and ask you to join me in um I have two things this evening. The first thing is I had the opportunity to attend October 7th our mayor Mr. J. you haven't had an opportunity to take advantage of this conversation. I would strongly encourage very things mayor. Some of the things we spoke about was ICE response. We know that there's been a lot of activity neighborhoods and communities that have been impacted. And so the the mayor is very willing and students and that was really good to hear what may or may not have. So it was also especially important to refresh our um D46 ICE response guidelines and protocols. Thank you for
021that. In addition to the mayor's insight on ice, she also talked about community partnership opportunities, some things that are happening on infrastructure that includes a lot of sustainability. That was exciting to hear that as new projects for our community sustainability and certainly um investment dollars that will help to tax. So that was super nice to hear. Also we have a new facility here in Lake of Wonder. The next opportunity to engage with the mayor will be in February 2026 once a quarter. So if you haven't had an opportunity to attend one of the meetings that the mayor has certainly opportunity that's super awesome and I have to talking about opportunities and career pathies and such. So I have to folks I see in the members of bas county Illinois and as you know county girls
022has been an advocate and partner for us in our annual walks that we've conducted here in 46 and they also scholarship. Soy as you talk about your students that are come up and graduating seniors that's something that great opportunity to bring our community together. students. Hello everybody. My name is Charlie and I'm going to update you on some of our recent after school activities happening around GMS. We just ended our fall season where we had girls and boys soccer, softball, and cross country taking place. Our girls soccer team ended in second place after all of the regular g season games they played. And in in the conference tournament, they got third. They worked hard, had fun, and really showed how amazing they are. Our boys soccer team had many people try out, but only a
023special handful made it on the team. The boys tied for first at the end of their regular season. They enjoyed playing soccer this year and they worked hard to accomplish their goals. Our girls softball team started with two new coaches and they did amazing. This was a very competitive season and we ended up right in the middle. Our cross country team also had a very successful season with the boys team and two girls headed to state this weekend. This season started out with 70 participants and now we are down to the final nine. We also had our first round of inter murals in clubs taking place this fall and we're so excited to see over 80 students participating. Inter murals teach students about teamwork sportsmanship and confidence. Our students participated in the following inter murals.
024Golf yearbook board game, drama club, Lego club, video game club, photography, DND art club, cooking and polar be club. We now have basketball, dance, and cheer triyouts starting this week. We are beginning in our next chapter of new sports for the year. And many students and teachers are so excited to join to shine and show positive school sportsmanship. Hello, my name is Johan and I'm gonna update you on our up update you on our to update you on our update to our student announcements that I've been part of this year. The Panther podcast is our student run announcement video played daily during the students first period. The help students know more about what's happening at school. Students from Mrs. Paul and Donnie's class has been recording the opening and closing segments while other student volunteers
025contributed the rest. Students record their segments before school, during STEM class, or during panther block. A total of 18 students have participated so far. Our podcast includes the weather lunch special, joke of the day, sports update, teacher spotlight interviews, club information, special events including STEM for girls and PTO events, 100 positives, pledge of allegiance and more. The podcast is created with Canva, a digital design program. Canva allows the video to be created shared with the staff and allows collaborations between all involved. Canva also allows the podcast to be easily shared with staff each day. You would like to like episode. Mr. Smith is emailing you a link to view after the meeting tonight. Thank you. >> Good evening. My name is Genevie and I'm going to update you on some of the events happening around
026GMATs. I'm going to update you about three specific programs that we've continued to improve our students this year at GS. Panther Block is an opportunity to give students a way to grow so they can reach their full potential. Every six weeks, a student is placed into a reading or math Panther block that can with a series of skills specifically designed for that group of students. As a school, we hope this opportunity can improve math scores and overall grades. School assembly show positivity, school spirit, and a little bit of friendly competition. Our school has color wars where if you're on team gold, you will go against team blue. Our first assembly went great, and students had a ton of fun dressing up for our spirit week leading up to the assembly. Student of the month is
027a program at GMS and can recognize our students who are going above and beyond school expectations. Teachers nominate students that show a specific trait during school hours that is talked about in advisory. The trait changes monthly and for example can be perseverance or determination. I do have one more special celebration to share. The staff and students of GMS would like to congratulate Miss Schmid on defending her disration on phonomiological study of the reading motivation of ethnic minority developing readers. The title is they will and do read. After all their hard work, we're now happy to introduce you to a new staff member, Dr. Schmidt. All right, thank you very much for those reports. I will turn it over to Dr. Glickman for the superintendent report. >> Thank you so much. And I'm going to actually
028hand this over first to Amy Glock to talk with us about some professional development. >> Thanks. Good evening everyone. Uh I have a few things to talk to you about. We've been busy here uh supporting our staff. Um, I first want to talk about math. As you know, we have a new resource this year. I've talked about it a few times. Um, we have for both IM, which is illustrative math, which is K5, and for Amplify, which is for 68, we've had some, it's already started and it's going to be continuing all through now until January. Um, but we've had some in-classroom lesson studies as well as some in-classroom coaching. And so, uh, that's been an opportunity for our staff to see lessons in action and be able to ask, um, some of our vendors
029some just questions about the implementation of math. They have been incredibly complimentary of our students too in the way that our students are learning um, and what they're seeing happening within math in our classrooms. So, um, that is one layer. So our teachers had training. Now our teachers have been implementing and now we're giving them more support in their classrooms. In addition to that for math, we're providing support for our administrators and coaches where we're having some specific trainings for them on both of those resources and what should they be looking for to be able to support staff and to be able to help to grow their skills. Um as well in terms of literacy we are also doing some inclassroom coaching. We've been doing this for the last couple of years in Scholastic for
030K5. We're continuing to do that. Um as you know we changed the number of minutes in fifth grade for literacy instruction. So wanted to provide some additional support for that as um as we went from 106 minutes last year in fifth grade to 70 minutes this year. So wanted to be able to support our teachers with literacy instruction look like? Um, in addition to that, we're working with our coaches and spending a lot of time talking about the Illinois literacy plan and word work specifically and what does that look like at the upper grades as well as at the younger grades and primary. And we are working with the Lake County ROE to get some things planned for literacy for 68 as well. So, that is to come. And then lastly, I told you there's
031a lot of PD happening. Uh we had a half day last week as many of you know and that was spent on some really specific professional development for our staff. Um the majority of our staff were together for two hours at park um at Park campus and were listen we learned from Amber Bogrin who um helped us to uh learn a little bit more focus on supporting our students language development specifically for multilingual multilingual learners. Uh we are going to continue some series with that. I had the opportunity to be able to present alongside Amber. Um, and want to thank her for bringing her expertise to our district. Um, and so we'll continue that at upcoming half days in November. We're going to continue learning a little bit more about that. Um, in addition to
032that, um, our social workers, speech pathologists, occupational therapists, and hearing itinerants worked with Dr. Lorenzo and Mrs. Ms. wiki um to be able to talk about some more specific things for their roles um and um they will continue that work as well. And then our PSRP staff were um given some time to complete some of their compliance training. So um everybody was very involved that afternoon. So it was a great half day and u we've gotten some positive feedback about it. Thank you so much and I'm going to hand this over to Heather Lorenzo to give us as well. >> Thank you. Uh good evening everyone. I am going to share with you about our current um cyclical monitoring that we are starting for our special education department. Um ISV is responsible for ensuring that
033our districts across this state are effective in offering programming and education for our students with disabilities in accordance with IDA. And we've been monitored for many years using indicators of compliance like timelines um uh percentage codes for access to general education and things like that. Um and more recently is decided to adopt more comprehensive view for their monitoring and this is called cyclical monitoring and every district in the state of Illinois will be placed or is placed on one of six cohorts and will be monitored on a sixth year cycle. So this year is our year and the monitoring includes a small team that we are just getting started um on that work and our work is to review all of our practices, procedures and our IEP development for our students with disabilities in our
034district. So it's going to be a lengthy process and a lot of hard work and we are really looking forward to those results to see what we're doing well and where we Um, it is a year-long monitoring pro process. So, we should hear back around March or April on our performance. Wishing you all that. Thank you. I know that will be a lot of work. So, thank you for that. I'd like to highlight um a beautifification project we've had at one of our schools. Um, do we have a photo? We have a photo. Wonderful. Well, Avon Center School has our very first electronic digital sign. We're really happy. And if you look at some photos from the past, you can see it was time for an update. Um, you can see we've got our wonderful
035uh Avon Nova's um emblem on there as well. And we'd like to thank the PTF at Avon who helped to fund this project. So, it was a combination of funds that came through the PTF and also um from the school district as well. I'm curious, our students in the room, anybody went to Avon? Anybody? Oh, no. Students. Okay. Well, I can tell you it was time for new signs. So, there you go. What happened? Thank you for putting that up. All right. And then finally, um don't know if you realize that uh next week is principal appreciation week and I have proclamation um that's actually from our governor and although it is a little bit lengthy I'm going to read it but because I'm a teacher along with being a superintendent I have um a
036little job for everyone everyone here either knows principles or is a principal or has been a principal. So all of us have something in our minds that we might appreciate our principles for. So take a moment and think about what those things might be because I want you to listen for them. All right. So here we go. Whereas school principles play an integral role in nurturing a positive student centered culture in elementary, middle, and high schools across the state of Illinois. And whereas school principles are responsible for attracting and retaining the best teachers and support staff to ensure that each sees an equitable educational opportunity and services to reach their potential. And whereas it is the primary responsibility of the state of Illinois to provide adequate and equitable resources for schools so that all students
037have access to a quality education and foundation for a successful future. And whereas the Illinois Principles Association, which represents over 6,900 educational leaders statewide, believes that educators experiences and voices are essential to crafting effective educational policy. And whereas the Illinois Principles Association is committed to developing, supporting, and advocating for innovative educational leaders through highquality professional development, as we were just discussing, networking opportunities and legislative advocacy. And whereas school leaders face many obstacles in supporting and educating our young people. And it is through their perseverance, passion, and hopefilled leadership that Illino continues to produce quality career ready students. And whereas we must continue to encourage, support, and recognize our school principles who have a positive impact on Illinois students and the educational system in the land of Lincoln. Therefore, I JB Pritsker, Governor of the State
038of Illinois, do hereby proclaim October 19th to 25th, 2025 as Principal Week and specifically October 24th as Principal's Day in Illinois to recognize principles and the Illinois Principal Association for all that they do to help our children learn and succeed. So, next week, happy principles week. Uh we actually did celebrate with our principles a little bit yesterday, a little early with a breakfast, but really from the bottom of my heart, I would like to thank all of our building leaders for all that you do to make an enormous difference for our students every day. And that is the end of superintendent's report. >> Right. Thanks, Dr. Glickman. Okay. Um we are now to our consent agenda. Can I get a motion to approve the consent agenda along with report we received earlier today. >> I'll
039second, but I do have a quick just correction. It's a small one, but on the regular meeting minutes and the policy meeting minutes, it says that I brought up the idea of the mission statement. Could you change it statement, please? Thank you. Braden. >> Hi. >> Nash. >> Hi. >> H >> I Albertson. >> Hi. >> Miller. I And Weedman. >> Hi. >> Okay. That brings us to action items. Um, and the first is a motion to approve board policies 119. Did I get that right? All right. >> Weedman Miller. I Nash. >> Hi Braden. >> Hi. I Okay, motion passes. I need a motion to approve the resolution of the proposed 2025 tentative tax levy and schedule the public hearing on the 2025 tax levy and issue a notification to the public. >> Second.
040>> Iden. >> I Miller. >> I Weedman. >> Hi. >> And Nash. >> Hi. >> Okay. Motion passes. Next, I need a motion to approve the resolution authorizing and providing for the issue of not to exceed 17,250,000 general obligation debt certificates, limited tax for the purpose of improving the sites of and altering, repairing, and equipping school buildings and facilities. Authorizing an installment purchase agreement and authorizing the proposed sale of said certificates to the purchaser. >> Halverson. >> Hi >> Braden. >> I >> Miller I Nash and Weedman. >> Hi. >> Thank you. Our next motion is to approve the contract award for construction management services. >> I'll second. >> Yeah, we have the motion that we can talk. >> Do we get a second? >> Okay. I'm sorry. It's all my fault because I was
041trying to indicate to Mrs. Braden that we a moment to to talk a little bit about this one. That's all. >> Okay. And >> well, actually, I want to give um Chris a moment. No, I was looking at Chris. >> Okay. Good evening. Uh tonight, we're bringing a recommendation for approval of a construction manager contract with B Construction to support our upcoming multi-year capital improvement program, which is projected at approximately $37 million. The selection process began on September 2nd when the district issued a request a request for proposal sorry request for qualifications an RFQ uh for construction management services. The RFQ was broadly advertised and distributed to qualified firms and by the September 19th deadline we'd received 10 proposals from wellestablished firms across the region. Our evaluation team included the district administration and walled in
042an advisory capacity, reviewed all submissions using the standardized rubric. That rubric consisted of each firm's K12 experience, project team qualifications, approach to cost control and scheduling, fee structure, and alignment with our goals, particularly around summer construction, phasing, and minimizing disruption to instruction. Following this initial review, four firms were invited for interviews on October 7th. During these interviews, we focused on their experience managing multi-sight summer construction programs, the lessons learned from similar school projects, the specific staff they would assign to C6046 and how they approach sustainability and equity both within their own organizations and in partnership with school districts. Reference checks were conduct were conducted. After the interviews and based on the combination of written proposals, interviews and references, the evaluation team determined that their construction provided the strongest overall qualifications and alignment with the district's
043priorities. Therefore, the district is recommending, sorry, the administration is recommending that the board approve a contract for construction management services with bare construction pending final legal review. We're pleased to have Anthony and Cassidy from Bear Construction here with us this evening representing the team that will work working closely with the district and W throughout the program. special. >> We'll just introduce ourselves. We're My name is Cassidy Tarpy. I'm an account executive at Bear Construction um within the education space my entire career uh on the construction side and we're very excited and honored to partner with the district uh on all these exciting projects in the next few years. >> And uh I am Anthony Izzy. I'm a vice president over at Construction. I hate to say that, but um and just echo what Cassie said.
044We're very honored to be here and we appreciate the opportunity. >> Um so just to give you some context about where I'm coming from, we had the sustainability audit from forational advocacy report. Then we've got an equity policy and a resource conservation policy and I'm looking at kind of how they how they intersect. So my understanding is that we want to focus on waste both protecting our students and our staff from anything that we take out of our buildings and in our new projects. And we also want to think about the future and our future board and the students and work on the materials that we choose for those rehabs now will be the garbage in 20 years from now. So kind of with that as context I'm just looking for advice. I'm just looking
045for your guidance. Um so I have two questions. The first one is what are you learning about designing for reuse and remanufacture and in terms of materials selection? So the construction design process is a little bifurcated. So Matt's here, he can I think speak more to the design side. Um they're way more ingrained than we are in terms of the materials and and what's out there. From a construction standpoint, we focus on the waste that we're generating and how to minimize that and that we're um for the environment, everybody involved in the project. Um and then we also have a mechanical engineer on staff that would work with our architects to kind of identify uh some the most sustainable, you know, HVAC equipment and things like that. Um but Matt can talk a little bit
046about the design process and how we worked together to achieve that. Okay. >> And you know what and and maybe you could just speak from your expertise then in terms of the end pollution like what can we do so that we can divert a lot of that from the landfill right down the road. We have um over 15 lead accredited professionals. Um a lot of we're currently working on well buildings and lead certified buildings. One of the biggest lead certified buildings we've done is the old post office where it generated an immense amount of um so we're we're on this project do no different. Um typically we're selecting based providers that recycle the majority of the material coming off site. They provide reports for that shows where the material is going, how much actually ended
047up in the landfill versus what got recycled or sent to, you know, areas that needed that that type of material. Uh so that's something that that we do on all of our projects. So like post office it was an immense amount of waste 98% of it was recent. So those are the things we do from from a construction standpoint aside from working with suggest by chance that you mentioned is any of that data available to our resource conservation >> they have to do an annual report. >> Yeah absolutely it's a report that gets generated Did you have another question? >> I actually asked them both. Oh, great. Thank you. Unless there's anything else we should be thinking about or anything else. I think that'll all come out as we get more >> and I'll just
048wait. Thank you. Thank you very much. Welcome. >> Welcome. All right. I think we're ready for the vote. Braden, >> Iman, >> I >> and Nash. >> All right, motion passes. Congratulations. Welcome. All right, our final motion. I need a motion to approve the reduction force of the operations and maintenance assistant position. Miller. Hi Nash. Hi. Hi. Braden. >> Hi. >> Weedman. >> Hi. >> Anderson. >> Hi. >> Thank you. Lots of action items tonight. Uh brings us to unfinished business. And this is business that we've talked about before and we'll continue to talk about and it's time for the design. So, we'll have a media center design update. >> Thank you. And um we are very excited to introduce you to Matt Verden from um ROS. And before you start speaking, sir, I just
049want to mention that we have our wonderful students here at the table. And every time we have students at the table, I go and I meet them with them ahead of time or sometimes Mrs. does and we talk a little bit about the board agenda and what might be topics that they might have an interest in making comments on or having questions about and I think we agree that this was the one that might be of most interest to you. So, so just letting you know, sir, it's possible you're going to get some questions from these students away. >> All right. Well, thanks for uh having me come back. Um we're going to talk tonight uh kind of just a brief agenda here. Uh we're going to start with a design recap uh or recap
050of the design process. We've we've talked about this several times over the course of the past several months. Uh but just want to do a refresher of kind of how we got to where we're at today. Um we'll then dive into the final building designs, the culmination of what we've been putting together, all that all that effort that's been going in. We'll talk about the furniture selection process that the district has undertaken. uh we'll give you an update on where budget and then also with the schedule. So just the recap on the design process if you remember we focus very much on a participatory planning process where we get a lot of voices from the district and the community involved. Um it started with a core planning group way back in I think February. We
051had 20 to 30 participants if I remember correctly um that met over the course of several evenings over several weeks. Um and they were charged with really thinking about big picture stuff thinking about the district as a whole. and how do we what do we want that vision to be for what our modern media centers are going to look like. Um they were really focused on a couple of things. is to create guiding principles which are very subjective sort of the media center should be the hub of the building things that are kind of graded on scale as well as design criteria which are more objective seat 35 students that criteria and these are the things that really start to guide us as designers and influence us in how we start to apply that criteria
052to the designs of your building. Another key piece that came out of that were the components that make up what that media center looks like and how they're adjacent to each other, how they connect to each other, what are the lines of sight, how do students move through that. So, we come up with these bubble diagrams that kind of demonstrate and show in an ideal world how that movement happens and where those those spaces are next to each other. We then apply that to each of the buildings to see how we can make that work and what's the space that's available to make sure it's adequate for what we need to have as far as housing the right amount of books, the right amount of sort of stuff and that starts to define then do
053we need to move walls and take a bigger picture approach to this. From there we start to give that some more definition and then we start to get into a little more detail. So as those plans start to develop with more specificity we we create our user group process. So now we're bringing in staff and even students who are part of this process as well to start talking about how they're going to use the space on a day-to-day basis. So we're getting into the detail of this piece of equipment is going to be here. It needs two data connections and needs to be in this location and kind of really starting to to talk about what that uh that information is going to be. We start talking about casework, how much shelving do you need?
054Does it be open? Is it closed? How much storage do you need? All of that sort of stuff. And those really become the conduit information from your staff that planning group to our team and down to our staff. So everybody's working from that same playbook as we work through the entire process. Everybody knows that we're all going to see the same You then start to get into some of the fun stuff which is then applying the design to the building. So we had another committee of stakeholders from each building. One of the things that really came out during the core planning group and the user group is this idea of a biome theme and aligning that with building. So the biome kind of became the overarching theme that was applied for the entire district. And
055each then design committee had a task of how do we apply that to our specific building to align not just with what the theme is for that building but also complement finishes and colors and furniture in a way that like I said compliment with existing color schemes and building colors and things. So they were focused like I said on materials, colors, furniture, all of that fun stuff. So, with that, um, these are some of the I'll run through some some floor plans and final renderings of each building. We'll start with Meadow View, which landed in a floral metal meadow design. So, this is the floor plan. Um, fairly minimal changes to the footprint. Um, and as far as the layout, the story area is right where it was before. We opened up what used to
056be the computer lab. We now have an operable wall that opens into the larger larger group area of the media center which is part of that feedback we got from planning group. Here's some views of what that space will start to look like. So you can see we started to bring some of that color in to align with that floral metal meadow pattern. You can see where some of the furniture starting to be modeled as well. The here you can see where we've got some murals done on the walling. try to bring some more interest to that. Great sight lines throughout from the circulation desk everywhere. And then this is then what the maker space would look like, which is a pretty pretty standard classroom, but it's got a little more case for some of
057the fun stuff that happens in space. We then moved to Prairie View, which has got a grass prairie theme. This has probably got the most extensive work as far as moving walls within it. We were opening that computer lab up in a little bit had to move some of the media center work spaces out of the way to make that happen to make those sight lines work. Here you can see where that grass prairie started to bring in some greens of the grass but also kind of that blue that is the current school color and how that creates a battle through the space there and also helps provide some some guidance. Keep in mind I was supposed to have two architects here with me. I'm a mechanical engineer. So, understand that this is not my
058cup of tea to be talking about design, but they were stay they end up being sick, so they couldn't make it. So, forgive me. But, uh here you can see another shot of that where you've got the greens and the blues there. And again, here's a view of that that maker space there. We then look at Frederick, this building here. So, this is the sand and sea theme. Uh this is going to be a little bit more. It's got the both a STEM and a maker space. So instead of the maker space opening up to the media center, as we get to the older grade levels, the maker space and the STEM are going to open up to each other to allow for a little bit more coursework that happens concurrently with those groups. Here
059you can see um one of the options we'll talk about here in a second will be considered is actually closing off that upper level hallway that's currently open right now. from an acoustic standpoint to that space. We also then have some small group rooms that are getting built out here on the side to create some some small group areas to work collaboratively. There's a view from the other side of the room that you can see that mural and the kind of the sea and the waves and stuff uh here in the maker space. This is showing the maker space and the STEM lab opened up to each other with that wall opened obviously spaces but it starts to with the old as we move up in grade level finishes start to become a little bit
060more of an older student feel similarly a park where it's a forest theme decent amount of work here to kind of open up that work area in the middle and create a little bit more connection between some of those spaces The forest here starts to feel a little bit more literal just how the columns work in that space. And then again, as I mentioned, the uh administration worked with a vendor on getting some furniture selected. getting close to nailing that down as well. The furniture vendor was able to provide take some of our drawings, provide 3D views of the space to start to see how that furniture laid out in there. You can see it's a good mix of your traditional tables and chairs sort of stuff, but also brings in some of that flexible
061seating, some soft seating, some creative ways to show off and showcase some of the books that are of the theme of that day that period of time. um you know just really gives a lot of options of how to organize the space. We talk about budget when we started this process uh back in February or whenever that was uh we' started with a budget of about 3.8 million um we then through the grant proceeds that we're receiving through the state added another 451,000 so we're at 4.3 million for an overall budget for the project. Our most recent estimate that came in a couple weeks ago. Do not get accustomed to these being within $2,000 of each other, but they came in pretty much spot on. Uh so we're feeling really confident about where we're at.
062We've also worked a couple of alternates into the project. The first two there being, like I mentioned, the enclosure of second floor space up here at Frederick as well as at Meadow View, uh some of the ceiling that surrounds that space. There's got to be some work in that space. So, while we're taking the down to back up, just take advantage of that. The uh three alternates at the end there are tied to the grant. So, because we have to hit that $451,000 amount for the grant, we want to make sure that we've got some flexibility that if the exterior improvements at the four buildings that we're doing media center work at, if those come in too low or under that $450,000 threshold, we want to add scope to the project, make sure we get
063that to honor that obligation. So, with that, that brings us to schedule. Um, this month, our goal was to do a final page turn, which we A couple weeks ago, like I said, we got our final document estimate. That's all done. CF uh the CM RFP was underway and interviews were conducted. That's good to go. And we're here at the board update uh presenting the final presentation as well as awarding our partners with their contract. So, the next step um what we previously talked about from a schedule standpoint was we going to be out to bid starting tomorrow and we will be awarding the contract at the November board meeting. with the CM coming on board, they've got some work to do ahead of time to do their their effort for a few weeks and
064then they'll take over and kind of start managing that bid process and construction process as well. So, we're going to slide everything a month. So, instead of coming back at the November board award, we're going to take the next few weeks of this month to let them do their thing. We'll go out to bid month of November and we'll be back in December. from a construction standpoint. Still on schedule for summer. >> Before board asks questions of Matt, I want to point out a few things. Thank you so much, Matt. Um, first of all, let's just pause on this side slide for a moment. I just want to remind everyone in the room that you only saw designs for four schools because we're doing four schools this upcoming summer. The other three will happen the
065following summer. And so all of this work that you're seeing now, you'll be seeing again in a year with new designs with new biomes. Um, can we go back for a moment to slide 24? Bring this back. Thank you. >> I wanted the furniture selection one. Okay. I really want to pause on this slide for a moment. Um, because trying to picture what's really in this slide is what's going to help make each one of those media centers really come alive. So, what you're looking at is um very carefully selected. It's taken a long time. Um with very careful selection of finishes of exactly which colors to go with which biomes, so you can't tell that from here, right? Because every single school has different ones. But very specialized tables. If you look kind of
066um look, oh gosh, you see the thing that looks like I don't know a big stack of Oreo cookies maybe. Okay, those are those are called lily pads. And those are that's soft seating that kids will be able to just take one out and go sit somewhere. If you look down at the bottom right corner, that is called a grassy what? Grassy grassy. That's a grassy. And ly grassy and they will be in our schools and kids will be able to sit on those. Um on the other side it's like this these soft steps that will be great for kids to sit sit on. If you look at that thing that looks almost like a puppet show box. It's not really a puppet show box. That's something that kids will be able to sit in.
067So I'm just sharing that with you. If you look um look at that table that you can tell it comes apart, right? comes apart and then there's what six seats around it. So those tables were very carefully selected for the media centers so that we generally may sit like that but we might pull them apart so kids can sit in small groups. The table underneath it is that one of the the A-frame. Okay. Because there's another kind as well. All right. So keep and then also look at the top right you can see um what will be our new what do we call it? Yeah, circulation desk which is going to be brand new. >> Let's go to slide. I'm sorry to make you stand there, Matt. >> That's okay. >> But >> when you
068retire, if you want to be a furniture salesman, it's coming up. >> And we don't even have them here. All right. So, let's go to Frederick's slide, I think, is 18. The sand and sea for a moment. Frederick's school, I think it's 18. All right, perfect. So, that's not going to be white furniture, right? that's going to be special furniture um very carefully selected to go with that room. So, I'm only just pointing that out to you because as gorgeous as these slides are, it's going to be so much more spectacular when we have it all together with this gorgeous furniture in it as well. Okay, sorry. Now, any questions from Matt? >> Question just I'll just go back to my original question. So, what are we what are you learning about materials? Like we've
069done some schools and we'll do another round of this. What are you learning or what can you what advice can you give us about material? >> So, all of the furniture selected furniture. It's all low VC no offity. A lot of materials contain recycled content or recyclable focused on that as well. We're not really touching much from a system standpoint that lighting wise and I know just because we haven't done a lot of footprint extension there's already tons of savings in that is there do you have anything specific to feedback and if you don't that's fine I'm kind of catching you off guard here >> okay I know our student board members I'm very curious to hear your questions >> um so I know these are most of the designs for the younger kids besides
070Frederick but students get especially for GMS. Is there like specific areas to like study because most of the furniture was like for a group of kids or like some like special seats like where multiple kids would sit but is there any like furniture or areas where students can sit individually to study? >> So here you can kind of see the that'll have seating around how you use the space. We also have small groups to students. So one of the things that the core planning group really stressed during that design process was flexibility to be intentional about students learning different. >> Thank you. >> Um I just wanted to ask if there was any way that students at GMS or anywhere are able to help out with the media center. >> Yeah, for sure. So that
071um I touched on that a little bit during the user group process where we spent most of the time talking with staff about how they use the space. One of the user group meetings specifically involve students from those buildings as well. So we wanted to bring the students in and get feedback and there were a lot of ideas that came out of that. I think that's kind of where the theme really started from the student feedback from that. So that really was the driver of the design aesthetic standpoint and then also kind of how we use the spaces and what are the spaces that are >> so I think we actually can make a commitment to you right now about that. Last year we had meetings right at GMS with your group students who have
072now graduated that um as Mr. Verden was saying helped make decisions or help make recommendations. We will be coming to you to get feedback on um Avon and Woodview and GMS. So we'll be doing that. We kind of have all this pre-work we have to do for this summer and then as things are cooking, we'll be coming to you probably in the spring to talk about what's going to happen the following summer and it'll be you giving us feedback. >> Yeah, that's what I was going to mention on the schedule slide too was that now that we've kind of hit the bidding and ready for construction part. >> Okay. Thank you. Um I for the Frederick one I really really love um the whole layout but um you know the railing up above I feel
073like you should like they should cover it like close it up. So because I remember when I was in a lot of people used to look over and it was very very dangerous. So, I feel like we should I mean, not block it off, but like make sure you don't like look over it. >> 100%. And that's what you can kind of see in this image. Um, it's no longer is it a open railing that you're going to lean over, but it's got it's got windows and glass there. They're going to create not just an acoustic separation from the media center, but also a little bit safer environment. Yeah, I think that's a great idea because I knew a lot of people or saw a lot of people when I was in the library like
074looking over and thinking that's funny to put their life on the line. So, I just think that's um a great idea to kind of block off that area and I really think that that could be beneficial for everyone. >> Absolutely. >> Thank you. >> Where is the Frederick principal? >> Um one more thing we can go back the schedule again, please. I just want to point a few things out to our board. Here we go. All right. So, as you can see, um we've got a lot happening in the next couple of months. Uh we are going to be starting to work with Bear, um as early as this week. All right. We're trying to get ourselves together just to make some decisions together and get some things in place for that bidding process. Um
075board, I wanted you to know that it is possible that we'll be coming to you to do some kind of a a a special meeting in December just for the process of um awarding the bids because the one board meeting that we have in December is the 17th and necessary, we'll we'll do it then, but we might want to get it going even sooner so that some of that it just expedites the work. So, I'm just letting you know that it's possible. So, we we may be coming back to you for that. If we need to do that, it could really be any night of the week almost at any time. Um, we don't need to have the whole board there if we can't get the whole board. We just need a quorum so that
076we can award the bids. Okay. Thank you. >> Sorry. I crossed my teeth somewhere. Um, so I appreciate the work and I I really did like the designs and the colors. As somebody who works in a building that is institutional gray the majority of the time, I can't tell you how refreshing it is to see. >> Was it soft? >> Soft. >> Oh, institutional gray. Um, I I can't tell you how much I appreciate the colors that are going into this and I, you know, I'd love to see this kind of expand out. media centers to other areas because I think it makes a world of difference for the work environment, the learning environment. If they're in a place that they feel down and drab in, that's what the kind of kid we're going to
077get and I think we need happier spaces. So, but I thank you uh for the design and the work and I really did like them. And I just want to thank everybody that was a participant design. It was a big ask. You guys have a lot. It's not your day job. You still have your normal 9 to5 to do a lot of night. >> Thanks so much. See you in December. All right. Perfect. Okay. Um, that brings us to new business. Our first item of new business is the Durham Contract Extension. Sorry. >> Okay. Thank you. Tonight, we're bringing forward a discussion item regarding the renewal of our student transportation contract with Durham School Services for the 2627 and the 2728 school years. As you know, Durham has been our transportation provider for several years
078and they continue to deliver reliable service with stable driver staffing, a challenge that many districts in our region have struggled with. Maintaining that consistency is important for our families, for our students in their daily routines, and for our district's operational stability. Under state statute, districts are allowed to enter into um agreements that they deem appropriate, and this two-year renewal was negotiated jointly with Grace Lake High School District 127. That collaboration ensures that both districts operate under the same terms and rate structure, helping us maintain regional consistency and cost alignment. The proposed renewal includes an annual increase of 4% in each of the two years. To put that in context, our re current agreement provided increases of five and six in the previous two years. So, this renewal actually represents a moderation of recent cost growth.
079From a financial standpoint, the agreement provides predictability and stability in one of our largest contract services and allows us to plan with confidence while maintaining a strong service and avoiding the uncertainty and disruption that can come with going out to bid in a tight labor market. This item is for discussion only, but we wanted to bring it forward now so the board is aware of the terms and rationale behind the recommendation. >> Mr. An was there any appetite between the three contract? >> I think we um both 127 and ourselves didn't want to enter into anything longer. Um two years was was what we were asking for and that's what Durham responded with. Um, in two years we may well go up to bid together. Thanks, Mr. Wildman. Okay. Our second item of new business
080is the delegate and um, we need to to uh decide who is going to represent us in the IASB delegation where we there's really only I believe one resolution up uh legislative resolution up but there are a number of updates to the IASB constitution is what we understood from our uh dinner the update that we were given at our regional dinner last week. So I guess the first decision would be who and I know Mrs. Nash and Mrs. Elbert made the fabulous duo last year. She might be looking for a partner in this tonight. So Chissy, I'm wondering I thought we decided this. I thought Stephen was gonna do it this year. >> Did we? When did we decide? >> I have a big Maybe I dreamed it just like a year a year ago
081about now. Sounds good. >> I think I'm volunteering Stephen. >> So, >> yeah, and I can confirm that with Stephen for sure. >> Yeah, I could be wrong, but I did it already. >> All right. Um, that's fine. Unless someone else wants >> Yeah. Um, why don't we double check with Stephen and find out and then if that's not the case, we can come back and have a conversation. Well, I think um whoever does it needs to lead discussion at the next board meeting about so that you can come to consensus on your your thoughts about that. So, >> would it make sense to have an alternate? >> I mean, right. We want you to be able to decide at the next meeting. >> Yeah. >> So, if Stephen isn't going to do it, who
082will do it? >> So, we'll have Steen, Tamika, at at the AAA conference. >> Okay. Okay. And then Yeah, that go ahead. Sorry. >> I uh usually usually Saturday morning. >> Okay. >> So, timing wise um we need to discuss at the next meeting and vote at the following meeting. Is that your vote? I think we just come to consensus, >> right? >> Okay. So, that would be >> uh segue to our topics for future agenda items then. >> Okay. Yep. Right. And >> um Yep. I have that. Which should I take it away? Okay. So, um November 5th is our next Well, I'm going to start by just talking about the regular meetings that we have planned because there are going to be some special board meetings that I want to talk about, too.
083But regular meetings November 5th, um we have our uh Park campus wolves coming. So just like we had GMS students today, we'll have eighth graders, I think eth, maybe seventh and eth, I'm not sure, from park coming on November 5th. We will also have some students from GMS coming because we are planning to celebrate some athletes, um cross country athletes, right? Um uh Amy Gluck will do an update for us about our school report card data. Um, so she's got a lot of information to share. We'll do that ISB resolutions discussion. Um, led by one of the board members to be named be confirmed later. Um, we'll bring you an approval for that Durham contract. I think that was the only approval that will be needed that we're aware of right now. We also may
084be ready with a discussion of some safety and security uh, improvements, inter uh, excuse me, intercoms, clocks, access and cameras for our K4 schools. So, um we're hoping to be ready with that discussion November 5th. Um November 19th is our um is our second of the year finance committee meeting. So, that will be focused um on the audit, but we'll also be talking about something called the 1% tax and getting some input from the board about your interest in that topic. Um, it's board appreciation in November. So, we might have a little board appreciation, which, you know, Yes. Yes. It means cake. It means cake. And we could potentially have a second cake reason, although I'm sorry to tell you will still just be one cake. Um, because we might be ready to welcome a
085new superintendent on November 19th. Um, as in vote one in. I'm not You're not bleeding out the door. I'm hoping on the 19th, but um you may be you may be ready to vote on a new superintendent November 19th. Um also um I believe if we talk about those safety and security improvements on November 5th, we may be bringing you contracts to vote on right on the 19th. Great. Um and then that brings us to December 17th. Um, the only thing I have on that agenda at the moment is if you haven't voted on a new superintendent in November, you'll do it December December 17th, but I'm sure there'll be much more to come on that date as well. Um, as far as special board meetings, I mentioned already the one that might we might
086need to find a date for in December. The other ones, um, board, I know you already have these dates, but I just wanted to make it public. There'll be a series of closed session special board meetings. Hard to say closed session special board meetings um that are specifically about um interviewing for the new superintendent. So community members if you see things you if you see you will see posted special close session board meeting that's what that's about and close session. They're not open for the public to come to. Um and that's it for the meetings to come. >> Excellent. Thank you. Uh do we have any public comments for the end of our meeting? >> We do not. >> All right. Thank you. All right. At this time, um I need a motion to adjourn.
087We do have a close session this evening. So I need a motion to Oh, I do. I do. I do. I have it. uh to move into close session for the purposes of act 5CS122C1 the appointment employment compensation discipline performance or dismissal of specific employees of the public body or legal council for the public body including hearing testimony on a complaint lodged against a employee of the public body or against legal counsel for the public body to determine its so thank I'll >> hi >> Nash. >> Hi >> Miller. Hi Albertson. >> Hi >> Weedman. >> Hi >> Braden. And student reps Johani Jine. There you go. and Charlie Jerus, she's gone. >> Great. All right. Thank you. Um, we do not anticipate any taking any action after tonight's close session, so we will be
088adjourning directly from the close session this evening. Have a wonderful evening, everyone.