001All righty. Good. My microphone is not working at the moment. So, good evening everybody. We're going to go ahead and get the meeting started this evening for the board of education September 3rd, 2025 at 6 p.m. here at Frederick School. I need a call to order. Mac >> here. >> Braden here. Nash absent. Albertson here. Hume here. Miller >> here. And Weedman >> here. >> Okay, that's Please join me for the pledge. Okay. Need a motion to approve the agenda for this evening. >> Miller. >> Hi. >> Mac. >> Hi. >> Albertson. Hi, Weedman. >> Hi, >> Braden. I And I >> Very good. Thank you. Uh, public comments. Do we have We have public comment. Yes. One public comment. Go ahead to that microphone over there. There should be a button. Hopefully, that one
002is working. All right. Oh, yeah. It's working. Great. Awesome. All right. Good evening, members of the board. My name is Anamelia Vika and I'm the parent of students in the dual language program at Avon Center School. I truly value the district's commitment to bilingualism and I'm deeply grateful for the many wonderful teachers who have enriched my children's Spanish language learning with their knowledge and diversity. But I'm here tonight because because of a serious concern. My children and many others in the program have yet to receive structured English literacy instruction. They are not being taught phonics, grammar or foundational skills in a systematic way which are absolutely necessary to achieve by literacy. When I learned that Grey Lake District 46 offer dual language, I moved here so my children could benefit. I want them to grow
003up bilingual by literate and be prepared for the future. But since 2020, my eldest has not had a single English literacy lesson with clear goals. Instead, English instruction is scattered. There is no written and no clear guidance for teachers. Teachers themselves lack the clarity about language allocation and there is no systematic English instruction in classrooms. The only exposure students get to English is in specials, arts, PE and music with the exception of fourth grade math in science or social studies. When I asked if phonics or literacy skills were explicitly being taught during these English blocks, the answer was no. Every year I have asked for clarity and the only response I receive is that my children will learn. Yet there is no actual plan. No one knows it. Not the teachers, not the parents and
004not even the previous director. Let me be clear. Living English learners with only unstructured English time and specials. Time that is geared specifically towards language acquisition does not follow the guiding principles of dual language education. Those principles call for systematic, explicit, and intentional instructions in both languages, including literacy development with clear goals. Specials may reinforce language, but they cannot replace structured English literacy instruction. And I must ask, are these special teachers providing the English instruction even endorsed as required by the law? If not, our students are missing trained support in language acquisition. These classes also have no language outcomes. for speaking, listening, reading or writing. They are they align with WEDA guidelines? If not, this English time is not true instruction and students are being denied the literacy support that they are entitled to under
005state and federal law. Let's switch places for a second. Let's imagine this meeting was in Spanish and everything around us was in Spanish. I will assume you don't speak the language. Now, your children are the language learners. You know, colleges and jobs require Spanish fluency. So, you send them to school to gain fluency in Spanish to prepare them for college and future careers. But instead of receiving structure lessons in reading and writing, they only hear Spanish occasionally in art, music, or gym. Without structure support, goals, and measurable outcomes, would they be ready for AP courses, competitive colleges, or high demand careers? This is the reality that our students are facing today. Without structure, they are being set up to struggle and not thrive. Therefore, I respectfully and urgently request that the board take immediate action
006to ensure that students receive structure literacy instruction in both English and Spanish, phonics, reading, writing, and comprehension through a written plan aligned with dual language standards. Guarantee daily structure English instruction beginning in early grades with clear goals and measurable outcomes. Provide teachers with training and resources to deliver biliteracy instruction. Monitor progress in biiteracy using consistent assessment and accountability measures. Be transparent with families and share the plan publicly. Thank you for your commitment to ensuring access and opportunity for every student in this district. Thank you very much for sharing your public comment. And just so you're aware too, the the board takes the public comments and is able to go back and um investigate and follow up and then we will follow up with you on those comments. Thank you for sharing that this evening. Appreciate
007it. Uh okay, that moves us to the section of our agenda this evening for board reports. I'll I'll start down on this side. Mr. >> We actually um so a year ago I shared that I'm working on the citizens advisory group for the Illinois Department of Transportation study road. So the last time we met was in July of 24 just met again. I wanted to give you an I think it would most came back with 39 alternatives options for reducing traffic congestion and then also increasing and what was interesting the conversation that the um talked about how widening roads actually induces traffic. It provides temporary relief but then ites traffic unless it's part of a larger that impacts our students because that comes back with an option that we asked for which would be some
008combination of paths then it could not additional traffic. So I wanted to give you a little update on that. Um second area is the community engagement committee met for our first annual meeting and if you're not familiar with that that's the committee that brings PTO and key volunteers together and I started that during the pandemic. So we had our first meeting and I wanted to thank Dr. Lorenzo because she came and gave us a beautiful and very comprehensive overview of the early childhood program. And as she was telling us about that program, something surprised me and I just wanted to hold this hold you and your team up. Apparently, the program has doubled in size in the last 10 years with only two additional fulltime staff. So, that's pretty impressive, especially given some of the
009accolades that she's gotten over the years. So, um just want to thank you again for for helping us understand the importance that especially because it's our youngest and most vulnerable, most at risk students. Um, and then also not so happy, Woodview outdoor learning classroom. Um, someone decided to smash the pumpkins and the melons and cut up some of the corn that was planted by our littles at the end of last school year. They were looking forward to harvesting that. So, if there's anything you can think of that might help us brainstorm some solutions for that, just to make it more clear in the gardens themselves, this is the work of our little hands, our people, and Just something to be aware of. That's my report. >> Thank you, Mrs. >> Thank you. Um, I have
010a few items actually. Um, I do want to report that this weekend I'm going to be attending the consortium consortium of state school boards associations conference in Washington DC. um there I'm going to be trained as an advocate um to share the stories about how legislation and funding have real specific impacts on our district and on our students and families. Um and I wanted to thank uh Dr. Glickman and Miss Palser and Dr. Lorenzo for putting together some specific stories that I can share uh with our elected representatives in Washington um about how um funding and legislation will affect us directly here um in D46. Um, I also wanted to share that last week I attended an internet safety event with Jesse Weinberger at Graves Lake North High School. This was done at both uh
011North and Central for students and then parents. Um, I went to the event at North High School and we were there for three hours um going over a lot of the um concerns and challenges with children in the internet. Um, and I thought it was very helpful information. I know Dr. Glickman shared this information with our D46 families. I don't know how many of them were able to attend. Um, but it struck me as I was listening to a lot of this information that it would be helpful for parents of younger children to know about some of these concerns. For many of the things we talked about, the concern with was with more with younger children. There's a lot of other concerns for teens. Um, but I thought I know um, this kind of information
012has been shared with families in the past and I believe that there's plans to share some updated information about new concerns um, in the future. So, I appreciate that. Um, and then lastly, I wanted to share that um, on Wednesday, September 10th, uh, at the College of Lake County, there's a community cares fair. Um this is going to bring together about 40 different organizations um nonprofits um some government organizations to share information about resources that they have available for people in the community. Um and this event will also provide those organizations with an opportunity to recruit volunteers. So it kind of helps people who are seeking who need help right now and then also for people who have time and a desire to help their their neighbors um they'll be able to connect with them
013as well. And that's um on September 10th from 3 to 7 at the College Lake County. >> No report tonight. >> Okay. The only thing I've got a couple things to share just timing uh as we are engaged now in the superintendent search for um the replacement superintendent for our wonderful Dr. Glickman. Uh we have two upcoming uh focus groups. Uh they're both happening tomorrow currently. Uh 3:45 p.m. is the staff focus group that will be here in the Falcon Room at Frederick School. And then later in the evening at 6:30 p.m. is the community focus group in which we invite, you know, members of the community to come in um and share questions that are going to be asked and things that they would like to know with our representatives from the consulting group
014for our search firm. So those two important things with the superintendent and that's all I have. I will hand it over to Dr. Glickman for the superintendent report. >> Thank you, Dr. Mack. Well, first I want to welcome I do we have a couple of students in the house. Are you students? Yeah. Where are you coming from? Central. Well, we're really glad you're here. Um we hope you uh enjoy our meeting. If you have any questions at the end, we'll be happy to talk with you. Welcome. Absolutely. Um we finished off our back to school nights last week and um got some really great feedback on them. So um the year is off and running. Back to school nights are done, right? So the school year is really on its way. And then I wanted
015to me mention some things regarding our construction planning. Um construction planning is ongoing and um a number of us are invested in a lot of time right now in planning for our upgraded libraries that will some of the work being done this upcoming summer. So there have been a lot of design meetings as recently as today. Who on the table was at meetings all day today? Yes, we were. So if you were reaching out to us, that's where we were today. uh visiting. We had a little caravan and some uh some sharing of cars going from building to building at Forest Bowls today looking at carpet swatches and paint and lots of fantastic opportunities. So, we're really looking forward to sharing that with you board. Um at October board meeting, we'll have Wold coming out
016um with lots of things for you to look at. Um, we're also embarking on hiring a construction manager, a CM, and I'm going to hand this over to Mr. Wildman to talk about that. >> Thank you. We have begun the process of selecting a construction management firm through a request for qualifications or RFQ. Under Illinois law, professional services like architects and construction managers are chosen based on qualifications and experience, not low bid. So, here's how the processes will work. The district public um has issued a publicly an RFQ inviting interested construction management firms to submit their qualifications. This was released on September 2nd. Submissions are due at 5:00 p.m. on on September 19th. An administrative selection an administrative selection committee will review the submissions, interview finalists, and determine the most qualified firm. The committee will
017then make a recommendation to the board of education. Once the firm is selected, administration and the construction manager will manage the day-to-day work of planning and construction. The board will continue to oversee the process through budget approvals, project updates, and any major scope changes. In short, the board governs and authorizes while the administration and the CM firm execute the work. This ensures that we follow Illinois law, protect transparency, and select the partner best qualified to manage the projects of this size and importance. >> Thank you. All right. And then um I'm going to hand this over to Leslie Armstrong who's going to share with you board the plans that are in place to be communicating with our community about this work. >> Good evening board. To ensure transparency with our internal and our community stakeholders,
018we have created a communications plan to include updates uh on our maintaining excellence moving forward web page that we have set up also through our district newsletter, our social media, and with the press. >> Thank you so much. All right, and that is it for the superintendent's report tonight. All right, thank you very much. Uh, next up we have the consent agenda. I need a motion to approve the consent agenda tonight, which also includes the personnel addendum that was shared with us earlier this evening. >> I'll second. >> Any comments? >> Braden. Hi. Hi, Albertson. >> I Miller I >> Matt >> I >> and Weedman >> I >> Okay, thank you. Consent agenda is approved. We do not have any action items listed for this evening. So, we're going to move along to a
019couple of updates that we have on the unfinished business portion of the agenda. Uh first up is the summer facilities update. Yes. >> All right. While Mr. Desires is walking up. I want to mention to you board that having um seen both of these reports, the facilities update and the technology update, I can tell you that they're both pretty brief and concise because both of these team members are skilled at being brief and concise. But I'm but I want to make sure you understand that the work was robust and enormous amount of work happened this summer. um you're seeing kind of, you know, a a high level view of it, but an enormous amount of time went into each and every one of these projects. All right, Jose, please take it away. Good evening, members
020of the board, administration, staff, and community. Tonight, uh I'll be providing an update on the summer capital projects completed across our district. Before we get into the projects, I want to ground us in our mission that is empowering learners, creating equity, and cultivating community. That mission drives how we prioritize capital dollars, safe, healthy, and equitable learning environments that help every student and staff member thrive. our facilities work is guided by our district values and strategic plan. We believe in inspiring and empowering learners, honoring integrity and respect, excuse me, and collaborating to make decisions based on consensus in facilities. Our goal is to review and expand the the master facilities plan annually to create equitable and high quality learning environments and to align decisions to district goals. Each year we carry out reoccurring tasks to ensure
021the safety and sustainability of our facilities. This includes health life safety inspections and the with the regional office of education along with preventive maintenance on our major systems and ongoing training for our operations maintenance and staff and safety initiatives and protocols. Uh we begin with the Frederick school. Um this year we uh installed a new uh concrete pad on the exterior of their receiving area along with replacing uh two chillers that were uh beyond their uh their time. So much needed a lot of uh I believe half the circuit or half the unit was working at the end of time and uh all of these projects were um along with the help of DHA uh came down to uh getting done in completion and everybody's enjoying a nice cool evening here. Also at Frederick uh
022we uh installed a new asphalt pavement or gaga pit. The kids enjoy the Gaga Pit. Uh I have no idea how they play the game. All I can see is a bunch of little kids playing inside, but it was brought to our attention because the kids uh when it rains or gets uh moist gets muddy, they're not able to enjoy um the Gaga pit per se, and it keeps them really busy and uh and uh engaged. So we they asked us for uh an answer and we uh what we decided was to put an asphalt uh uh ground uh pad and then the uh first side you'll see a number of us took part took in using the excavator and on day two of his employment James our new facility manager got to run the
023excavator. Uh moving on to Grace Lake Middle School, we had two new boilers installed to replace end of life equipment along with uh also renovating. We moved on to renovating the uh art room which had never been renovated before. Uh this included all the cabinets, uh the plumbing, new stainless steel uh sinks, um and most important the flooring. The flooring was horrendous unfortunately. So the best uh answer and less maintenance and a decent nice product was to remove the tile and uh seal the concrete. So, it was polished and sealed which made it look really nice at the end. Uh Avon had uh new flooring installed replacing the old uh carpet, but the LBT um tile was installed and uh along with um much needed and another thing that we did was the two condensing
024units on the outside of the school needed um a fence installed around them because uh some individuals found it uh fun to turn off the units on the weekends for some reason. So we'd wake up or we'd wake up, we'd come in on Monday mornings would hear complaints about things being nice and warm during the summer and um so we wanted to make sure that this would uh would stop. So new fencing was added. Prairie View School had also a new chiller installed um to replace end of life equipment. This chiller serve the uh most of the classroom areas at the building. So much needed replacement. Um the other thing we did was had uh over 300 feet of uh an 8ft fence installed in the uh playground area. This would help uh replace a
0254ft fence which is pretty uh it was in bad shape but also was not keeping all the balls inside the uh the play area. And what would happen is the kids would go behind the fence and pick up the balls, but along with that would bring a tick or two with them. So, we wanted to end that. So, uh what we did was add that fence um around the perimeter and also added 4t of gravel track to keep the vegetation away from the fence. Also to stop the uh ve you keep the vegetation at bay. Everything along the pond in the back of Prairie View grows like crazy. It can be dry and it'll grow really fast. So, uh, Park Campus, moving on to Park Campus here. We had that, uh, infamous RTU unit replaced.
026Um, had many leaks. We'd have to, uh, add, uh, gas to it just to keep it going. Uh, finally had its last, uh, year with us. Much needed replacement. uh that equipment was replaced and ready to go. Now u it's a little too cold sometimes so it's doing its job. Um another thing we did was the outdoor learning space. Actually that's something that you already know but u we're just finishing uh now we have to keep up with the vegetation and keep it going. Um so in summary um this summer's work focused completely on unfinished products ensuring clean and safe learning environments and supporting sustainability. Looking ahead we will continue working proactively with administration premar and world architects to update our long range facility plan and ensure our facilities meet the needs of our students
027staff and the community. Thank you. And I'm happy to take any questions. >> I just have one and you may or may not know the answer. Um the the age of the old chillers that we had taken out versus obviously the new one. What what change in efficiency came with those? Do you know? >> I don't know off the top of my head. I know that uh as far as efficiency rating there might be uh certain stages uh as far as operations are concerned uh it's uh very hard to explain but uh within within the um need of any of these units you have various stages. So in part uh one unit will have two stages. So depending on the need or how uh hot it is outside they'll turn on and run. In our
028case, we had to run uh one stage no matter how hot it was continuously. So, it was just a energy wasting cycle for us. Now that we have two units, one can that can be mostly redundant. Uh we can run as needed what we need for it's pretty much how everything uh we try to run in small case. Thank you and good evening. I'm excited to be here tonight to um talk about the technology team's summer projects. Um throughout my presentation, I'll share how the technology team has supported the district's mission um of empowering learners, creating equity, and cultivating community. Um we've also done a lot to support the district values. Um specifically I'd like to highlight um the collaboration that supports in decision making built on consensus. Several of the projects that we completed
029um came out of planning and design team recommendations and so that's something um that we really value here. Um all of these projects also relate to the strategic plan goal based on technology um which focuses on that technology plan and ensuring um technology rich learning environments. So like the operations and maintenance team, there's lots of things that we do yearly and this is just a a list of some of the things um including preparing student Chromebooks um supporting online registration and completing state reporting. This summer, one of the big projects that the team worked on was um the certified staff laptop refresh. So, we had 150 staff members come visit the ISC, which is where it's a cute little house outside of GMS where the technology department is housed. Um since the start of the
030school year, we've worked to swap out everybody else's device, and we're wrapping that up this week. Um teachers have been excited about the speed of those new devices and a fresh new start. Um and we've gotten lots of positive feedback about those. Additionally, we um replaced the last of our end of life network switches. So that um project was funded through um we used the last of our remaining rate funds for the 2020 2025 rate cycle um to replace 18 switches and I'm excited to share that all of our switches are supported right now. So, that's a good place to be. Um, part of the referendum um was implementing safety and security updates. Um, as you'll remember, the safety and security committee came and presented to the board last spring. They spent some time evaluating
031a bunch of different emergency management systems to meet um part of that referendum goal and ultimately they recommended Raptor's emergency management system to implement which you guys approved. I think it was in June. Um so my team worked to implement that new system that included the installation of gateways and beacons. You will see them um as you walk through the that helps um when a staff member presses their emergency badge, which you'll also see all of us wearing now. Um it helps us locate where the emergency is happening throughout the building. So that's what the physical installation is. Um there was also a lot of work to get the data that was required for um being able to account for students and staff during an emergency, getting that data sharing between Raptor and getting all
032those badges set up. So, we are um already starting to use this system. Um schools have started to use it during their drills and all of the administrators at the table can attest to that is working and and it lets you know it's working. So, that's working. Um additionally, um part of the raptor umbrella is dismissal safe. And so, we implemented that um this summer. As parents, you might have drive line being used at some of our buildings. This is a replacement for that. Um it manages student pickups at our K4 buildings um and Park Campus and ensures that um students are getting to their families and everyone is where they're supposed to be safely. Additionally, additionally, um we implemented incident IQ which is our um new an inventory system. We did that along with
033the M department. That is their ticketing system as well. As part of that work, um we performed an inventory check to make sure that we knew exactly what we had, where it was before we put it into that new inventory system. Um there's a lot of meetings um to get the system set exactly the way we want. Um, but I'm excited to share that in the first two weeks, we've completed over 1,000 tickets. That is a lot of tickets. Thanks, Darl. Um, those tickets range um all kinds of things as it can be user management. It could be um something an issue with a student Chromebook, um an issue with the display, network, phone, just really I need help with the technology that's available to me and my students. And that number of tickets, I
034would say, isn't um unusual for this time of year. It's a busy time. As everyone comes back, they need to make sure everything's ready for this start of the year. Um this new system though kind of gave us a window and allowed us to track um those tickets and make sure everything was getting addressed. And it also made it easier to communicate with staff. So, we've gotten positive feedback from staff about the ticketing system. And one thing that's really nice about it is that it allows staff to say, "Hey, kind of like rate your service." I'm gonna um say, but it it lets lets us lets them give us feedback on how we did in in meeting their needs. And we've gotten nothing but five star reviews. Not to brag, but it's pretty exciting. Um
035the team also uh supported some of the teaching and learning initiatives including up uh including setting up the new integration with our math resources um and updating standards based on work that the um standard based grading and reporting professional development team and then that the teachers at the grade levels did um for those reporters and that is it. So, if you have any questions, I'd be happy to to >> Thank you very much. >> The board have any questions? >> Yep. >> I just had a comment I wanted to make. Board, I I hope you can see uh how much work happens in the summer in a school district and particularly in these two departments. Um and Amanda, I'm gonna you're gonna kill me, but I'm going to make public a little bit about a
036conversation you and I just had. Yeah, I know. She's going to turn red. Um, well, we were talking about Raptor and I had made the comment about how smoothly that roll out has gone and she looked at me like, "What are you talking about?" And I said, "Right, yeah." And I said, "Well, because because from the outside looking in, it has gone very smoothly. We know the, you know, enormous amount of work that you've had to do and your teammates have had to do in order to make that happen. Um, and by the way, required many people to think through changes in practice. And so, thank you to everyone who has participated in bringing an even safer environment for our students and staff. And thank you. >> Yes, I both teams. Yes. Thank you very
037much to both teams for sharing those updates that show how important it is over the summer. Um, we have no new business for this evening. So, I'm going to grace everybody with a short meeting tonight. We do have topics for future agenda items. We do um September 17th, we'll start whoops with a um a policy committee meeting. So, I do want to ask our policy committee members hopefully you've had a chance to review the stack of policies that we're going to be talking about next uh later in the month. And you will have noticed they are all fiveyear reviews. Um most of them do not have a word of change. Some of them have very slight changes. Things like what was I looking at? Um one of them had the word web master and that
038was changed to I don't remember web administrator that kind of thing. So, I wanted to ask the policy committee, do you want the meeting to start at 5 with the board meeting starting at six or do you want it to start at 5:30 thinking that there will be less conversation? >> I'm gonna jump in. I would like to make a little use this time where there's not a lot of compliance issues to talk about to create space to have conversation that leads us beyond compliance. So, we've got a lot of transitions coming up and I might be served as well to take a look at a variety of different policies, not necessarily the ones on our on our list, but if we could choose one policy area and think about so I'm thinking about changes
039in food service and maybe we want to look at some of the relevant policies for food service and see are we getting the results that those policies are designed for. So I would love to at least have about 15 20 minutes at 510 or That would be um I'm fine with that. I just want to know in advance what are the policies and what's the conversation we want to have. >> Yeah, absolutely. Not like 5:15. >> Split the difference. 5:15. >> Yes. Okay. Policy committee meeting is going to start at 5:15. Um yeah, anyone? Yes, certainly. Um and then I lost my notes. Okay. Um then we will so those policies will come to the board also at the regular board meeting at six o'clock but the rest of that meeting will be a um
040finance committee meeting. And so all of these things will happen at that meeting. We do have folks coming from Wald um to give an update. Um then we have a financing update from Layman James. Then we'll have a well exit first we'll have a public hearing. Right. First we'll have a public not in order here public hearing for um the budget. We'll have a proposed timeline for the 2025 levy and um also kind of tagging in because we just it's a matter of timing. So uh Dr. will bring our EIS IMRF reports that need approval. So that will happen all on September 17th. Um October 15th, um we have students coming from GMS. So we'll have our way of the panther students coming to talk with us and then to sit at the table. Um
041we'll do a final review of those policy updates. Then we have world coming back to talk very specifically about the design work that we've been doing. Um and we're intending to bring um approval for the CM that u Mr. Wman was talking about. Um and then just zooming on a little bit later in the year, we have the Park campus wolves coming on November 5th. So our um upper grade students coming and talking with us from park and sitting at the table. Um, November 19th will again be a policy committee meeting and that will be um about the audit and um all I can tell you right now about December 17th is we're expecting that you're approving a new superintendent contract in December 17th and then it'll be January. We'll talk about that when we
042get closer. Okay. I don't know what I said. Finance. Did I say finance? Okay, thank you. Finance, that's a lot of policy. That's a lot of policy. So, finance again on November 19th. Sorry about that. >> Thank you, Dr. Glickman. Uh, do we have any additional public comments signed up? Okay, we do have a close session tonight. So, I need a motion to approve the board to go into close session in accordance with the following statutes. Public Act 5 Illinois CS120 paragraph C1 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 and public act 5 Illinois
043CS120 paragraph C2 collective negotiating ating matters between the public body and its employees or their representatives or deliberations concerning salary schedules for one or more classes of employees. The board does not expect to have any additional business coming out of the close session. So, we will adjourn directly from there. I need a motion to approve our entry into close session. >> I'll second. >> Okay. Hume I Miller I Mac >> I >> Halverson I >> Weedman >> I >> and Braden I >> thank you very much everybody that was a nice short meeting for everybody enjoy the rest of your evening.