001Um, all right folks, I would love to call the meeting to order. It's Tuesday, May 13th. The time is 7:01. Lonnie, can you call the role please? Her Johnson here. Frostben here. Burns here. Spurlock here. Moore here. Kim here. Carney here. meeting called to order is 72. Thank you. Um we have one public comment tonight. A quick refresher for the speaker. Um public comments are limited to three minutes. If you are still speaking at the end of those three minutes, feel free to finish your thought and then conclude. If you have written comments, uh please share them with LE if you wouldn't mind so that she can add them to the minutes for this meeting. And um as always, we just request that speakers conduct themselves with respect towards others. And our public commenter is
002Jackie Stson. Good evening, ladies and gentlemen of the board, District 9, District 97 staff members, and the public. I'm here to bring to your attention a very serious matter that I am sure was never addressed to the board or the public. My student attends Brooks Elementary and they have been bullied by a group of male students that call themselves the Wian Gang. The Wian Gang is a vicious known document gang from Chicago whereas the youngest member is 8 years old, the oldest is 41 years old. This this gang engage in shooting, robbing, carjacking, violent, physical assault, etc., etc. Now there have been incidents whereas my student has been chased down the hall by this gang with a belt. Another incident whereas one of the wing gang members threw a ball to hit Marano on his
003head. For the record there were incidents that were caught on camera and other witness present. And it is my belief that Brooks staff members did not follow protocol to keep my students safe. On March 20 of 25, multiple gang members surrounded my son at Brooks and stated, "We are the Y-N gang and we are going to Swiss cheese you." I immediately verbally and in rightly reporting this incident to the principal, April Caputo, and assistant principal Lupus Osierra. Swiss cheese mean that they will shoot you with a gun that has a switch on it and fill your body up with holes. My cries fell on deaf ears and was not taken seriously when I suggested to implement more saf safety measures to protect all students on April 2nd, 2025. Beforehand, I pleaded with principal computer insistent
004principal Oier that a student could bring a gun/ weapon to school and there could be many casualties. But I was told that the threats were just talk. On 1425, Brooks was on lockdown due to a student brought a knife to school. Ironically, that same student that brought a knife to school is one of the students that alleged he was a Yen gang member which was also bullying my student. This student name is in many reading reports that I have dressed to Brooks principal and assistant principal. On 416, 2025, there were another incident involving the same student allegedly seen on Snapchat with a gun and made threats to cause voluntary harm with the gun to Brooks students. We live in society in Oak Park North whereas staff members of district 97 does not take parents of
005color complaints, suggestions seriously enough. We are looked at as incompetent and inferior to any other ethnic group. I wonder if my last name was Omali, Goldberg, Kmenky, or Lombardi, would my concerns have been taken more seriously if a gun had got into Brook's school? Thank you for your time. Thank you. Um, okay, that takes us to the consent agenda. Do we have super remarks today? We don't have Okay. Okay. Uh, can someone move that the board of education approve the consent agenda as presented? Second, yes. Yes. If you car burn, yes. Spurlock, yes. Kim, yes. Johnson, yes. Mo, yes. All right. Um, action item 7.1, OPTA, teacher leader roles. I move that the board of education of Oak Park Elementary School District 97 approve the 2025 2026 for teacher leadership roles at a cost of
006$639,000 second yes more yes I'm sorry thank you Kim yes yes Burn. Yes. Rosen, yes. Her Johnson, yes. Motion to pass. Agenda item 7.2 literacy curriculum update. I move the board of education of Oak Park Elementary School District 97 approve a purchase of K5 English language arts curriculum materials core knowledge language arts and communi at a cost of 1,549,5365. I'll second. But did we ever get the followup information about the cost of the prior curriculum that I had asked at the table? I don't recall and I'm sorry I didn't ask her. Um I do not think we have that. Um uh Patrick and Towanda um do we have information on the cost of the prior curriculum? Unfortunately, those resources were not yet prior to my taking on this position. I don't have records that collect.
007Was there any was there any part of that that was an annual cost or was that a one-time purchase and then we've been using it all those years? Study was a one time purchase. Okay. Um I am not sure about treasures. Um, and I do believe we tried to search more reports for information and could not find what we were looking for. So, Holly, um I think you were asking because you wanted to understand what cost was being displaced and so there isn't an annual cost that's being displaced because in this case, unlike some of the renewals of like um software or assessments that you're going to see later tonight, this one was purchased and then used all those years. And then this is also a purchase of materials. And so you won't it it
008doesn't necessarily displace a um fresh cost of them. Yeah. And I apologize. Were we able to get the yearly future cost for it? This is the the one-time startup big materials, but then I believe there's an ongoing cost. Do we have that? Oh, I thought you just said there's no ongoing cost. To would you mind coming out come on out to answer those questions? I think there was a dashboard. I don't remember. So, it was in the notes, but I don't think there was actually an answer for that one in there. And the dashboard was unclear. That was my question back was it was unclear as to which part of this was annual because I know it's not all annual. I think I can. But um on the deck that was present in it a
009couple of weeks ago, there's a slide that identifies the teacher and student materials. Yes. So that that is a six-year subscription. And the only one-year subscription renewal cost would be for Boost reading license as well as Boost Lectura and the language studio license. Okay. And so that is an annual renewal cost of $52,232. And that was what I was clarify. Does that answer your question? Yes. Any other questions? Thank you. Thank you. So I think we need a second. I think we should bring the motion down. Yeah. Why don't you remake it? I move I move that the board of education at Oak Park Elementary School District 97 approve the purchase K5 English language arts curricular materials core knowledge language arts and cognos from um amplify at a cost of 1,549,5365 second thank you Ross
010Driven yes yes Burns yes spurlock yes Kim yes her Johnson Yes. Mo. Yes. Motion passed. All right. That takes us to agenda item eight. We have some reshuffleling, reorganizing happening. We've got Brooks and Brooks 8.3. First, I motion 7.3. I motion that the board of education Oak Park Elementary School District 97 approve the $10,000 donation proposal to Brooks Middle School music department as presented on April 22nd, 2025. Second, yes. Kim, yes. Moore, yes. Splot passed. All right, now to agenda item eight. Um, so we have a new board member being seated tonight, Becky Perez and two returning board members. Um, lucky for you, Venus and Nancy, you both get to take the oath of office again. Um, and so I believe you have copies of it. You don't have copies of it. It is the
011oath is linked. It's linked inside of your grouping, but we don't have a print out. I can't give you it. No, that's fine. So, Becky, why don't you come on up? Oh, you can't move yet, though. I'm just going to give her my zone. Okay. Can you see? No, I'm just going to um can somebody share the oath with I have it in your email. As long as it hasn't changed. Just to be clear, it's the one I I It's the one from the um the court policy. That should be right. Yes. So, read it. Yes, please. Wait, don't they do it in unison? I got No, we're doing it individually. So, we did it in you. It's up to our discretion whether they do it in unison. You guys want to do it in
012all at once? Um, I mean, I was watching the village does them separately. It's just it's nice to remind us of why we're here and then we don't have to try and all stay in sync on something like this. I don't have it. So, here you can hear. You can look up. I pulled it up. Okay. Becky want it. Okay. Why don't you go ahead please? Thank you. Okay. So I, Becky Perez, do solemnly swear that I will faithfully discharge the duties of the office of members of the board of education of Oak Park School District in accordance with the Constitution of the United States, the Constitution of the State of Illinois, and the laws of the state of Illinois to the best of my ability. I further swear that I shall respect taxpayer interest
013by serving as a faithful protector of the school district's assets. I shall encourage and respect the free expression of opinion by my fellow board members and others who seek a hearing before the board while respecting the privacy of students and employees. I shall recognize that a board member has no legal authority as an individual and that decisions can be made only by a majority vote at a public board meeting. I shall abide by majority decisions of the board while retaining the right to seek changes in such decisions through ethical and constructive channels. As a part of the board of education, I shall accept accept the responsibility for my role in the equitable and quality education of every student in the school district. I shall foster with the board extensive participation of the community, formulate goals,
014define outcomes, and set the course for Oak Park School District 97. I shall assist in establishing a structure and an environment designed to ensure all students have the opportunity to attain their maximum potential through a sound organizational framework. I shall strive to ensure a continuous assessment of student achievement and all conditions affecting the education of our children in compliance with state law. I shall serve as an education's key advocate on behalf of students and our community school or schools to advance the vision of Oak Park School District 97. I shall strive and I shall strive to work together with the district superintendent to lead the school district toward fulfilling the vision the board has created fostering excellence for every student in the areas of academic skills, knowledge, citizenship and personal development. Thank you. Welcome. [Applause]
015Venus or Nancy, do either of you have a preference for I, Venus her Johnson, do solemnly swear that I will faithfully discharge the duties of the office of member of the board of education of Oak Park School District 97 in accordance with the Constitution of the United States, the Constitution of the State of Illinois, and the laws of the state of Illinois to the best of my ability. I further swear or affirm that I shall respect taxpayer interest by serving as a faithful protector of the school district's assets. I shall encourage and respect the free expression of opinion by my fellow board members and others who seek a hearing before the board while respecting the privacy of students and employees. I shall recognize that a board member has no legal authority as an individual and
016that the decisions can be made only by a majority vote at a public board meeting. I shall abide by majority decisions of the board while retaining the right to seek changes in such decisions through ethical and constructive channels. As a part of the board of education, I shall accept the responsibility for my role in the equitable and quality education of every student in the dis in the school district. I shall foster with the board extensive participation of the community, formulate goals, define outcomes, and set the course for Oak Park School District 97. I shall assist in establishing a structure and an environment designed to ensure all students have the opportunity to attain their maximum potential through a sound organizational framework. I shall strive to ensure a continuous assessment of student achievement and all conditions affecting
017the education of our children in compliance with state law. I shall serve as education's key advocate on behalf of students in our community's schools to advance the vision for Oak Park School District 97. And I shall strive to work together with the district superintendent to lead the school district forward toward fulfilling the vision the board has created. Fostering excellence for every student in areas of academic skills, knowledge, citizenship, and personal development. Thank you. Welcome. All right, rounding it out. Um, I, Nancy Ross Driven, do solemnly affirm that I will faithfully discharge the duties of the office of member of the board of education of Oak Park School District 97 in accordance with the Constitution of the United States, the Constitution of the State of Illinois, and the laws of the state of Illinois to the
018best of my ability. I further affirm that I shall respect taxpayer interests by serving as a faithful protector of the school district assets. I shall encourage and respect the free expression of opinion by my fellow board members and others who seek a hearing before the board while respecting the privacy of students and employees. I shall recognize that a board member has no legal authority as an individual and that decisions can be made only by a majority of vote at the public board meeting. I shall abide by the majority decisions of the board while retaining the right to seek changes in such decisions through ethical and constructive channels. As part of the board of education, I shall accept the responsibility for my role in the equitable and quality education of every student in the school district.
019I shall foster with the board extensive participation of the community, formulate goals, define outcomes, and set the course for Oak Park School District 97. I shall assist in establishing a structure and environment designed to ensure all students have the opportunity to attain their maximum potential through a sound organizational framework. I shall strive to ensure a continuous assessment of students achievement and all conditions affecting the education of our children in compliance with state law. I shall serve as education's key advocate on behalf of students and our community's schools to advance the vision for Oak Park School District 97. And I shall strive to work together with the district superintendent to lead the school district toward fulfilling the vision of the board has created fostering excellence for every student in the areas of academic skills, knowledge, citizenship,
020and personal development. [Applause] Um, welcome all. Welcome back. Um, in one of my remaining moments as board president, I want to read a brief proclamation. [Laughter] It's going to embarrass. Not that easy. Don't cry. I also have a reusable shopping bag for you that might have something in it. Uh, okay. Proclamation of appreciation for board member Colleen Burns. Yay. Whereas Colleen Burns was elected by the citizens of Both Park to serve on the District 97 Board of Education on April 4th, 2023. And whereas Colleen Burns spent time as a board member striving to improve the quality of instruction in our schools, pursuing more equitable student and family access to critical resources, and advocating for the needs of every child the district serves. And whereas Colleen Burns played a pivotal role in the important work the
021board and district have undertaken and the achievements amassed during the past two years. And whereas Colleen Burns championed the district 97 community campaign for the portrait of an eighth grade graduate. And whereas Colleen Burns provided leadership support and advocated for safe and equitable schools. And whereas Colleen Burns always sought to make the work of the board in the district more visible and transparent in order to help the community better access it, understand it, and contribute to its success. And whereas Colleen Burns provided two years of dedicated service, including supporting the work of several key committees, the facilities advisory committee, PTO council, and the policy committee. Now therefore, it be resolved by the District 97 Board of Education that it affirms the affforementioned accomplishments of Colleen Burns, and be it further resolved that that the District
02297 Board of Education expresses its appreciation and gratitude to Colleen Burns for her leadership in helping to build build a better better future for our schools and students. Um, that was a certificate of appreciation for you. And you can keep the bag, too. It's for you. So, when I see you all at peace, Yeah. I can show off your swag. Thank you all. Thank you, Colleen. Thanks, Colleen. Sorry to embarrass you. [Applause] You're going to tell the car. [Applause] Um all right. So that takes us to board of ed reorganization. So um just a quick overview. We will start with president and then move on to vice president. Folks are welcome to nominate themselves or somebody else. If you would like to uh make remarks while nominating, feel free. And then we'll go around and
023vote. And folks can also make brief remarks when they vote if they want to. So if you're a candidate, you would make it while you're voting or before. You could do both if you really wanted to. One is plenty. Okay. I I nominate for the office of President Sheree Moore and Nancy Rost. Okay. Thank you. To be second. I was like, where's the language he's reading? I I I accept and I would like to make a brief comment if that's all right. Um, so I think it's important to say why we put our names in for this. So here's my quick ploy of why I put my name in for this. Um, my leadership vision starts with a call to the board to develop a robust and inclusive strategic plan to connect and guide critical
024decisions. We are currently guiding the administration and district based on pieces without putting them together. It would benefit our work in the district to clearly identify how equity, student learning, learning conditions, and the care and professional development of staff are connected with clear goals and measurable objectives. Expanding to reach uh agreement on the big this bigger picture is a crucial next step. Thankfully, we're not starting from scratch. were completed for setting transformation goals and the portrait of an eighth grade graduate included community data gathering. Fiscal goals shaped by Fork are already in place. We have an equity-driven vision and a mission that from conversations with board members, district staff, and the community still hold true. What we are missing is the up-to-date collective vision big picture that puts those together to guide the work of
025the board and the district effectively in the turbulent f federal and fiscal times in which we find ourselves. We can't afford to let this drop. Additionally, operationalizing board norms and procedures we've already agreed upon is a top priority. The heart of my platform is an ongoing commitment to the premise that transparent communication across the board and the district is paramount. I assert that we are better if we actively provide structures for ongoing engagement and communication, welcome disagreement, and challenge each other to reach our vision. Finally, I want to emphasize that as a candidate for school board president, I understand that this role is one of seven equal voices. My aim as president would be to f fac facilitate our collective wisdom to help us work together effectively as a unified board. All the work that
026we do must be a product of our shared vision, diverse perspectives, and unwavering commitment to our students. Did you want to say anything? Yes. Okay. So, um, I'm not great at speeches, but I'll just say that of us who have been on this board for some time. Um, and so, welcome, Becky. But for those of us who have been on the board, um, I've I'm the only person who hasn't had an opportunity to serve in this capacity as a member of the exec board. Part of that was because of professional reasons. Um, as you all know, I had to create structures for my job. I was the first person in my role. So, that created that was a lot big undertaking for me. Some of that was personal. Um, we have some health issues in
027my family which, you know, required me to be a little bit outside of, uh, this space. And then, if I'll be honest, a lot of that was self-doubt. Um, thinking I had to be perfect, thinking what if I say the wrong thing, thinking if I don't get it right. But I'm fortunate and grateful that I have board members and community members who reminded me that we're a board of seven, so I don't need to be perfect. and I always say crazy stuff at the board table anyway. Um, they also reminded me that I've stepped up as a leader by being courageous, asking the difficult questions, pushing us to have difficult and sometimes uncomfortable conversations. I presented ideas that contributed to improving communication, not just with a board, but in ways that made it more palatable
028to our community who didn't understand education uh verbiage, who didn't understand the things that we were talking about to meet people where they are. I presented ideas to support the accountability and success of our superintendent who is new. Um, and as we went through that whole process, my hope is that in two years when four of us are um, either rejoining the board or if we're in Colleen's position and we're getting some fancy bag that someone who is passionate about our community and someone who has really great ideas is encouraged to run for the board and know that you don't have to be perfect and that no matter if you're a single parent, um, um parents of a child with disabilities or if you have a demanding job as most parents do um that you
029can still make your contributions to this board. And so with that, I just want to collaborate and continue to collaborate with everyone and continue to push us to greatness and create structure so that the next people who are on this board have a easier transition than many of us have. Um and so that's it. Thank you. Um, maybe we just go around. Venus, do you mind voting first? Just say my vote. You mean? If you'd like to say anything about it, you're welcome to. Or you can just say it. I will say I'm my I cast my vote for Sheree. Um, I cast my vote for Sheree. We're voting for president or president. Yes. Um, I can appreciate both perspectives. Right now, I'm guessing they vote for Nancy. Oh, what does that mean? Um, I
030vote for Sh. Do we vote for ourselves or Yeah, you don't have to, but or you can just trade votes. Uh, I vote for myself. Um, I'm going to vote for Nancy. I will just briefly say um that I have appreciated serving in leadership with Nancy and I appreciate the energy and ideas that she brings to the work. uh I know that she will continue to bring that to the board and I also have a lot of respect for Shar and I am 100% committed to working with the new leadership and the whole board um no matter how it shakes out. So well we have one vote left. I'm voting for myself but still 43. So congratulations. Congratulations. Thank you. Um all right, vice president. Are you going to do all the nominating? Yes. I'm
031I'm like you with the She designated herself. I official nominator. I'm the nominating committee party of one. Um I would like to nominate for the role of vice president. I'm not looking at anything. I would like to nominate for the role of vice president uh John Kim. Second. Oh, we don't second. We already established that. You want to accept that nomination? I will accept. Yeah. Oh, anything you'd like to say? You don't have to. No, she has to. No, I mean, I've done this role before. I've worked with three different superintendent groups, I guess. Uh, and I'm just kind of interested in supporting um whoever is president, I think, helping us work through a lot of the the struggles in the district, uh, particularly under this new administration. Um, yeah. All right. Um, Holly, you
032want to vote first? Um, border. The suspense is killing each other. We have to vote. I think you can just do a voice vote on this one. We have to vote if the person is running out of post. You do have to vote. She has to get a majority of the votes. Even if there's nobody else. Okay. But we could just do a voice vote. I don't care. We could do a voice. We could have done either by now, but in favor. Let's just keep talking about it. Are we doing all in favor? All in favor? I. All right. Congratulations, Sheree and John. George. And then I think I have two last things to do. Board secretary and treasurer. So I think we're nominating to continue as board secretary. Who's our board treasurer? Well, we'll
033get to that in a moment. We recently appointed them. So you should do we need No, you just voice. All in favor of you want to make a speech. We want a speech. We got a speech. Not prepared. But it is truly an honor to serve among each of you. Um and in parallel with Dr. shy superintendent of schools. Um I have had a bird's eyee view into the hard work and dedication that each of you present even behind the scenes from my time at Julie makes a year. So yes, I accept the nom. Great. All in favor? I am really worried. Really worried. Um, and then I would like to nominate the continued service of our interim treasury. Yasmin data. Another point of order. What's that? I have a question. Point of order. Okay.
034Okay. So, when we have when we have someone in that role permanently, we didn't have to vote again. Correct. Just not here to accept. I was just We'll have to work with that. Okay. All in favor? Hi. All right. Um, I'm done. It's all yours. Wait, can I have it? Don't you have any parting words? Uh, I mean, I'm not going anywhere, so. Thank you, Nancy. Thank you. Yes. I also say I would like to thank both of you um for stepping up when your lives were hectic. Um, you have very hectic lives. We all do. And so thank you for stepping up especially I think you guys are in the end of co and so it feels like we've never had a dull moment and we've had some very difficult decisions and discussions here
035at this board table. Um and even when we didn't agree on the path forward um it was always done with respect and what was best for this district. So thank you both. Thank you. There's like a gallow or something that needs to be passed. Have you ever seen me use one? The guard for ceremonial institute. I'm getting a gavvel. Louise bought me one. I used it once and I got some very unpleasant books from some of the other board members even though I was joking. So I didn't bring it back. All right. So we're going to move on to um district transformation. Wait. Yeah. Okay. District uh transformation goal area updates. So we have two the logic model uh transformation goal uh 2A updates today. So, we're going to invite up Patrick Robinson, assistant superintendent
036of elementary schools and Holmes Elementary School building leadership team. Come on up. Did you hear us from that gallery? You are dandy. Thank you. No, Tammy, you're you're right here. Tammy is nervous. We're all very friendly. No, this is okay, Tammy. So, I'm only up here for a little bit just to introduce our homes team. So, it is with excitement that I introduce our homes team. Um, we have our new principal, principal Phillips. also our new assistant principal, principal prior and along with our um leadership team here at homes here to present our home school improvement logic model and then right after homes we're going to transition to man led by principal Ali and the leadership team at man and then we'll move right into the next presentation. So going to trans give you the
037power to present. Okay. The wrong way. Yes. Oh, here we go. All right. Good. Good evening, everyone. Um, I am Tammy Phillips. I am the proud principal of Holmes Elementary School. Um, and I brought some of my instructional team, so I'll let them introduce themselves. Nicole Prior, assistant principal at Holmes Elementary School. Lisa Hannah, language arts specialist at Homes. And MTSS lead. I'm Rosie Espinosa. I'm the instructional coach. Okay. And we have our timers. You got me. Okay. All right. So, we are just a little nervous. Um, as you know, we are a new team. Um, so this is my first year. um not only at homes in Oak Park, but in the state of Illinois. And so um yeah, so I'm excited to share um the work that we've done um at homes um
038thus far. All right. So um I titled this uh a year of learning for for this team um acknowledging the important work that the previous administration done had done before we arrived. Um but the primary focus this year was building and strengthening the culture and climate um of our school as well as some of our academic work. Um so the goal of this presentation is just to um review our climate and culture um reflect on what we've learned, share some of our academic successes, and then talk about future leadership moves. So a year of learning um our street data. So over to the right you'll see what um our SY25 goals were um in the areas of ELA, math, belonging, and engagement. And then um to the left of this chart shows our SY25 winter
039progress. And so while we have some areas that we definitely um wanted to celebrate um specifically drawing attention to our um belonging um and engagement um for uh belonging for grade three and then our um engagement for uh grade two. We realize that there is a lot of red on this chart and we still have some work um to be done. So one of our focuses will be um make uh finding ways to improve this data so that um we see the successes that we are wanting to see. Um what I've learned um listening to voices from the staff I think that I've learned that um they have a desire for stability and for uh clear communication um at at the same time enriching and allowing for a positive school and climate. um also focusing
040on structuring the collaboration and it's important to differentiate our professional development so every um educator is getting what they need. From parents, I've learned um that there's a strong value placed on small class sizes and more personalized learning. Um and families want to feel heard and included. And then from the students, just the need for consistency and belonging. Um and then their enthusiasm for cultural celebrations and a dedication for helping every student grow. celebrations and areas for continued growth. Um, some celebrations would be community building. We hosted three beginning of the year before I started. I thought it was important for me um to start forming and forging relationships with parents and with students and so we hosted three summer um events where they could come and meet the principal. Um so just enhancing those
041relationships among stakeholders. Um and then focusing on what we call win time, what I need time for our students, making sure that that instruction is targeted and supporting um and enrichment. And then cultural events, celebrations, fostering inclusivity. Um areas for growth would be or reflection would just be um navigating the impact of change when things unexpected change happens. Um and then just recognizing that at times sometimes communication could lack a clear and timely timeliness. Um so leaving staff feeling a little disconnect um and unclear on expectations. Key initiatives and work is again what I need time or that when time focusing on improving the structure of this time by tightening the organization and expectations to ensure more effective use of instructional minutes. Data talks with the leadership team and staff um that came with regularly
042structured conversations about student performance and instructional adjustments. building a stronger datainformed culture and then we were fortunate to pilot um the ELA curriculum supporting um district initiatives around that. So now moving on to celebrating our cultures and strengthening um our community bonds um and cultural appreciation. This year we were fortunate to honor a rich diversity of our school by celebrating um Black History Month, ArabAmerican uh Heritage Month, and Hispanic Heritage and more. Um these moments just led to students being able to see themselves and learn about themselves and build stronger and more inclusive community. And as you can see, there's some district people um that are up there who came um for a book readaloud. [Music] Thank you. Thank you. Okay. Boom. I'm gonna go to the next one. All right. That was a taste
043of homes. So, we um showcased a taste of homes um event where um it brought families together to share the food and the culture and the traditions of their um heritage. Um it was a joyful celebration of the flavors and the stories that make our community so special. Okay. um celebrating special moments. So just really quickly, this is a picture of a a parent who contacted me. She had been deployed um Dr. Shaw in this picture. She had been deployed to um Cuba or Kuwait overseas for over a year. Her student um is a fourth grader in our building. So she contacted me and said, "Hey, I'm coming home. He doesn't know. I want to surprise him. Can I do it at school?" And so this was part of that celebration. um career day students
044had the opportunity to um hear from aspiring um a group of guests including a law professor, scientists, um doctors who are parents in our building, a judge, and even a professional violinist. Um just giving them that exposure to possibly a career path that they want to follow. Um and now we'll move into academic growth and um instructional impact. Um so this slide um represents our focal cohort and um basically just to break it down 76% of our focal cohort students are currently performing um tier two two tier one or above in math according to the MAP assessment. 68 of our focal cohort students are currently in tier one or above in reading according to MAP. And then the sheet over to the right is a sheet that we developed as an instructional team blank at
045the student's face. But this is a sheet because I wanted it to be more than just a name on a spreadsheet. I wanted to be more than just um a student with data. So this sheet allowed us to really unpack the student as a whole and to um understand the student as a whole with regards to their attendance, their history, their strengths, um some areas of interest. Um and the chart the colors mean a lot of different things but this is one area where we felt that we could get a better understanding and a holistic view of our focal cohort students. Um we also developed a LEAP mon after school tutoring program and LEAP is an acronym for learn enhance and achieve form and so we have about 11 or 12 students who attend that
046after school program a couple of times uh a week. I'll talk about MTSS. Um so more of the important work that we've been doing this year is around the multi-tered system of supports or MTSS. Um this year we worked really hard to reduce the number of students who were below the 10th percentile by 39% in reading. Um we went from 41 students below the 10th percentile in the fall to 25 students um in the winter in the whole school. Um, in math we reduced the number of students below the 10th percentile by 35.5% from fall to winter. Um, going from 31 students to 20 students. And um, that impact was made by our amazing hardworking teachers, our um, general education and special education teachers, um, our MTSS team, our MTSS interventionist, language arts specialist, and
047um, our title one interventionist. So we do some things with MTSS. We conducted datadriven MTSS meetings every six to eight weeks. Um we used our outof classroom support staff to implement research-based interventions. We monitored student progress carefully and we made adjustments based on what our students showed us that they needed and um we are really proud of that. All right. So I'm going to speak to the other end of um the MTSS diamond is with with enrichment. So we have um enrichment for all um homes where we have students that are doing activities with our enrichment specialists at some point throughout the school year. In addition, um, our students that are either tier plus or tier plus are doing activities with our enrichment specialists on a weekly basis where they're participating in project-based learning. Currently,
048or with our winter MAP data, we have 51% of our students um, performing above grade level, meaning that they are at the 80th percentile or higher. Um and those are the students that we um have participating in those activities for with our enrichment specialists on a weekly basis. So 51% for reading and 41% for students um with math and collectively that's about 100 students a week that she is able to interact with and do that project- based learning. So, we again are really proud of the work and the growth that we're seeing with our students um and the supports that we've kind of put in place to make sure that we are reaching all of our students and meeting them where they are. So, these are just some pictures um pictures of students just hard
049at work. We are proud to um have some third graders be reading buddies with kindergarteners. Um our second graders um worked on a on an activity um as part of their science unit on enforcable force. Um actually it was our third graders um engineering process on building their own arcade game and invited the second graders to come and play those games. Um and then again just more students um working um doing group work um and then again uh reading buddies with kindergarteners and there's other grade levels who partner up as well. Um, now we're going to talk about commitment to growth, engaging, uh, and meaningful professional learning. Sure. So, a couple of highlights this year. Our staff engaged in um, an extensive, um, equity PD that started with the National Equity Project and kind of
050expanded out into some really deep and meaningful conversations. Um, we also took a deep dive into best literacy practices. And recently and going back to that target of really um fixing and honing in on the wind block, we've done some teacher um based um you pick professional development sessions as well. Okay. So I just think that um it's important to just appreciation and um for um my team. So, I just say, you know, I put this slide in here because I wanted to especially be show appreciation and say that I'm grateful for AP prior. Being new to um the state of Illinois, um I thought it was important to have someone that had a knowledge of Oak Park and as a veteran Oak Park Oak Park educator, um just her deep knowledge of Oakart and
051the relationships um and then just that steady partnership. She's been essential in helping me um build trust and continue to establish a long relationship um with the community. So, um yeah, we worked in tandem and I'm I'm just grateful and thankful for you. Um also with these two ladies. Um yeah, I couldn't do this work without them. Um, and then just saying that it's, you know, recognizing that it's a collective effort from our staff and our families who've embraced me in the community, who've embraced my leadership with openness and support to just make sure that um, we grow positively in the right direction um, and continue to do the work that um, is so important for our students. Next leadership steps um, building on the foundation of trust and partnership will be um, a focus
052of mine as uh, this next year. um will shift more intentionally toward strengthening our academic outcomes um while continuing to nurture those um the work that we've done for our culture. Um and then also we um are fortunate enough um Dr. Towanda back there to have signed up to pilot the new math curriculum to just ensure that we are aligning with the district goals um and enhancing student engagement and um um targeted support for all learners. And then in closing, um I just want to have to say at home as we take pride in celebrating meaningful moments with our families, with all stakeholders. Um we've grown grown together, looking forward to what has to come in SY26. Um and just as we move forward, um I just want you all to know how grateful I
053am to be a part of Oak Park. I think in coming here, and Dr. Shaw and I talk about this a lot, I could have landed anywhere, but I'm so thankful that I landed in in Oak Park. Um, so just know that I'm committed to continuous learning and growing and collaboration with all stakeholders to ensure that we are creating the best possible learning environment for every single student that walks through the Dub at Homes Elementary School. And that's all we have in 14. So are we going to do comments after each so they don't have to go back and forth? Yeah, if there are any questions or comments. Okay. Um, I have a quick comment there. Um, I uh wanted to let's see here. Oh, I want to appreciate that you acknowledge that there is
054work to do, but I also want to take to a moment to acknowledge the work that's been done and that growth. That was amazing and thank you. Thank you. Um, those numbers are moving the right way. Um, I love the student sheet. I'm actually commenting specifically because I wanted to say that um so often we see the data as an aggregate you know and parents especially like we see it as it's for the district or the school and and that is good right it helps us improve the larger systems but sometimes we forget that that data can also help individual students and that sheet right I was like you still my heart that is great it is a moment where we can really see how we can individually help students and that can really help
055shift the needle thank I appreciate that. And then just the last thing is appreciating the appreciation. I I think I think we need to actually do that more. And so I appreciated the amount of time that was spent saying thank you to the people who are doing work. So I thank you as well. Thank you. Thank you. Um did you have anything please? Hi. I do have one thing I was going to ask actually. Is it possible to get a question asked about how you were able to achieve like the feat of reducing your numbers from that um 10% and below for both math and reading. I think that was like my big highlight. Everything sounded really wonderful. So I appreciate that because you also mentioned there were after school you know tutoring. Um, I
056know there's, you know, what I need during the school day, um, built into the schedule. What would you say those students receive that helped them, you know, come out of the 10th percentile and below on math? Um, I think we got to really attribute it to hardworking teachers who are ready to differentiate for our students all the time. um is with what I need time or when time it's 30 minutes for math and for reading but they're differentiating all day long all of the time and so that really is a huge part of it along with our special education teachers um and then we do have the outofclassroom support um our MTSS interventionist focuses on math um I take a focus on reading and then we have a title one interventionist as well to help
057so there's a lot of support there and Yes. So, were those kids with IEPs? They were mixed in. All the school looked at really great. And to kind of add to what Lisa was saying, I think for me, um, it's been really important for the staff to to really understand what differentiated instruction means. I think a lot of times as educators, we think that when we hear the word differentiation, we think that, okay, I have a group of five students that I'm working with at a table. they're I'm doing what I need for them, but what are the other 15 20 kids doing away from the table? That should not be a one-sizefits-all. That work should be differentiated, too. And then understanding that what I need time that 30 minutes is crucial. Um because that's
058how we're going to close that achievement gap. We look at the importance of in our um weekly or uh every six week progress monitoring. We use that data to drive the instruction. So that data is live. So it's always telling us what our next structural move should be and understanding when time is a separate its own separate entity and not just an extension of the content block because within that content block you have a workshop model that will help you pull and teach those standards but when we look at the progress monitoring piece of it that win time is what is going to drive that instructional um academic or instructional decisions. So I'm going to repeat what you said just to make sure it's like clear. So it sounds like these kids with or without
059IEPs had an opportunity to have 30 minutes sometimes daily would you say of four days? Yeah. Four days a week except for on for the daily progress monitor and then um for math and reading. So 30 minutes for math and 30 minutes for reading and 120 minutes on top of the instructional time. And then they were also provided evidence-based interventions is my assumption is are we using foundations? Yes. Okay. And it's going to get tighter. I mean, this was year one and just understanding the the difference of it. And we took our we did a um a walk through, a learning walk, our instructional team did where we took live data in the moment. Um and we were able to look at the data and we took it back to our PLC's and had them
060look at and say, "Okay, what are the wins and what are the areas we need to work on?" Because we think that it's important that we can make these shifts, but if we don't have staff buyin, then it doesn't go anywhere. So, it's what what are you seeing now in this and what instructional shifts do we need to make as a building? And so, once we have staff buyin, the work is just beginning um as we move into the next year. And I think it's exciting and I wanted to celebrate that piece in particular because oftentimes the hardest part is having our MTSS pullout services be at capacity. So by being able to reduce some of those numbers, my hope is that some of those kids can go back into the classroom to get what
061they need versus pull out. So I really celebrate that for you. That's wonderful. Thank you. John, could you have any I have one small question about the data. So um I'm amazed by how much growth we're able to accomplish in all the different areas. There was one weird anomaly that I was wondering if you could explain. Um, in the year of learning slide, there's like a weird drop with the fourth grade ELA. That's like a pretty significant drop. And I was just curious like if you had any idea what that was because it really is kind of anomalous compared to pretty much the growth in almost every single other area. This bite here. Yeah. If you look at the ELA for fourth grade, it's like 64%. Um, and then it drops to 38%. To me,
062it's math. Yeah, it's math. The columns are ELA and math. Yeah. So, I'm looking at the ELA one. No, you're looking at ELA and math. 38 is under math. It's also ELA further on in the chart for the goal. Oh, sorry. I think I think so. They're both. Never mind. Maybe. Yeah, those were the goals. Mhm. Oh, so it's okay. I think I was reading them like Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, we had the conversation about this chart. Not the easiest thing to read. Get ready. Wasn't how much they And we can revisit how this chart is constructed for the future. I thought I had it in my head, but clearly I was wrong. I thought I did too, and I was also wrong. So, that's why I have time for questions. I have one more question.
063Okay. Can I um I'm sorry. Can I can I ask a question? So the three components of a student success are what's happening in the buildings with our professionals um the student themselves but also their families. So can you talk a little bit about um it sounds like you guys have tremendous support in the building for each student but how you shared some supports and information with families to help foster the success. And congratulations by the way on these these outstanding success so far this year. Thank you. Thank you. I appreciate that. Um the one thing I do is my is the hawk. I do um a weekly newsletter. I send it out every Friday to my families. Um we also have a very strong presence in the form of our PTO. And so we
064are always hosting events inviting parents in. Um we have um um we haven't had an academic night yet but that is coming soon. um the title one the title one we well we did yes have the title one that you hosted um and so just that communication being open um with them and then they are part of um and you wanted to add well I was just going to speak to the resources that we provided for parents to be able to build that connection at home so when we had the title one night we provided um reading resources in terms of like playing games and asking questions at home um we also had our math interventionist share the handtom mind packets that went home with students for like skill practice and having those manipulatives to
065be able to break down problems and to do that work. So, we use that way to kind of bridge what we're doing at school and allowing parents to then be able to support those students to do it at home as well. And we're also looking at we just had a meeting today about um the resources that we're going to um select um for our students to utilize over the summer um whether it's purchasing books um for them or or programming that they can do at home. Um but then also uh our social workers are really instrumental in making sure they can with parents um with resources. We have an angel fund um request that's blasted on our on our newsletter every week. And so just making sure that they know that we we want to
066be a one-stop shop. If we can't find the answer for you, we want to point you in the right direction to where you can because there is um a plethora of resources in our community and we want to make sure that they are aware of what those are. Okay, thank you. You're welcome. I don't have any questions. I'm blown away and if you had not said that you were new to Illinois, I would never have guessed it. You all did a fabulous job like answer all the questions that I probably would have asked. Um so, thank you so much and I apologize this is my first time meeting all of you. Well, thank you. I look forward to seeing uh the update. Absolutely. Yeah, can I just emphasize this building also has you have like
067a you're in an MTSS role. You're also a literacy interventionist and you're the math instructional coach. Instructional coach. Okay. Do you have somebody at your building that does math interventions only? Yes. Yes. Is it title one or MTSS interventionist? Okay. And that's Ashford. Okay. So I might compliment you know like making sure we also are aware that you have those positions to help that direct small group interventions out of the classroom. Absolutely. And I think I think what's important really appreciate the questions and the discussion and the recognition of like all this good work that's happening. I think what's also important for us to always keep in mind is that the um the culture pieces that the team is talking about are related to setting the groundwork and creating the groundwork upon which teachers feel
068connected to the work and students feel connected to and feel safe like so I think Becky to your point also I think some of your questions were also pointing to this idea that it's not like I'm being pulled out and and stigmatized but what I need and then I go back and become part of tier one and then sometimes I might need some more help but it's um more fluid in that grouping and everyone's got a data sheet right and everyone has a data sheet so that's sending a different message about um student ownership of their own intellectual development. Absolutely. And so we think as we um you know plan for next year the framework for teaching and student intellectual development is going to be a key focus. And so it's going to be a
069really a sharpening of all the things you hear from from the homes team. So thanks to all of you for [Applause] Next up we have manelcome. I'll just take you guys a couple chairs, please. They do have all that. Oh, no. Thanks so much for for having us today. I'd love to introduce our team to you all. Uh I know uh Patrick mentioned it's our it's our building leadership team, but my name is Susan Elli. I'm the man school principal. I have Mr. Bagley here who's our enrichment specialist. Uh Mr. Hayward, longtime uh fourth grade teacher at M school and uh Miss Buckley who is our instructional coach. One of the things that uh has been enjoyable to be at man, you'll see in our plan here in a little bit after we go through
070some of the data. Um this is my fifth year at band. So we were able to take a different path and in how we were able to create our our logic model. I'd be excited to share that with you all. Up here you'll see our our projections and our data. Um we we have some areas that we're really proud of. ELA especially, we've put a lot of time and energy into um spending like small group instruction within with our classrooms in that area. We've got some additional resources. And then with math, we have some pretty like pretty high goals. I I when I saw this chart again, I was like, how did we have 96% up there for for a couple of our grade levels? So, I I'm excited to review this chart uh next
071time or when whenever it's updated. One thing I really want to point out though is if you look at our focal cohort, uh the sense of belonging and engagement that you'll see um exceeded our like building overall, right? And it's exactly where we we like where we want it to be. uh we have a our full cohort sharing that they have a a high sense of belonging uh and connectedness with within our school and that I couldn't be more proud of. I think it goes a long way with the hard work that that our staff's been doing. Ali, before you go on, could I ask you to just and and for the team so when we look at that kind of data like our focal student cohort is telling us that I feel a sense
072of belonging. How does that impact school improvement overall? What? Because we have a theory of action that a focus on focal student cohorts is actually our strategy to lift core instruction and to change the experience for students wallto-wall, floor to ceiling. What is that true or not or not sure yet? And it's okay to say we don't we're not sure yet. Um but I think it's an important honest question as we're kind of developing our theory of action. Mr. Bagley is going to talk about that here in a little bit. um as we're going through our slides when you'll see some just images that'll capture ways that we work with all students but then also our focal core students. So hang tight it's coming up. Um one of the things that as we've worked through
073every year uh I feel like we've tried to improve the way we've developed our school improvement plan or our logic model. Um this past year felt strongly that we were like we're like missing some pieces, right? Like we have certain voices in the room but we're missing others, right? Um, so this past year we worked with some of our families to get a a survey out uh to our school community and then also created a uh a focus group as well that allowed for us to gather some additional um information. And uh we we used that opportunity to see what was working within our school areas for for improvement or opportunity. uh what those like uh priorities that families are identifying that we we need to try to work on as a as a school
074um and really try to get as much honest feedback as possible as we could could from them. This was just the the tenative timeline that we were able to follow. It started in late May, June before that survey went out uh in July. I had families coming through uh to the school and then by uh August we got together once again as a building leadership team with all that information and data um all around the table and based off of the other stuff that we already knew about our school and then started devising our plan. So some of the guided questions during this time with the parents um we went through four different categories. So belonging, engagement, ELA and math. And you're going to see some of the questions are similar especially for ELA and
075math but really focusing on their learner and what they have been discussing at home and really working through. So um this as you can see is like understood at what they understood at school um ways they felt supported respected and then what would your child need to have that greater sense um of engagement and belonging. So then the same here for engagement would be what would they share at home and that actually was a really important question to us because um many of the panorama survey results that always came up on a the lower end sometimes maybe it's the kids not understanding what it was to be like talking about school at home even like it could be a project that they did or the kids that it played with. So that um was one
076of the important questions we wanted to hit as well as um math. I love that question too because parents are like our kids talk about school all the time and then the kids report is like 38% of them like Yes. Um but then for math and ELA they're the same. So it's um what motivates them, how do they feel challenged, what frustrates them, and then what kind of worked for their child and the same for ELA for that subject area. These were some of our findings as well as we went through the process with our families. Um, families really were hoping for more just uh some like consistent practices too. Uh, an example was a survey that teachers sent out at the beginning of the year. One family may have received it, but another family
077may get something different or not at all and just serving as opportunities for us to learn about their learner, right? And uh be be extremely aware about who we're receiving, how we can best support them. So that was uh one of the pieces that we gathered from them. um understanding that the kids really were excited about the projects that took place throughout the school year. Those were like some of the most memorable experiences. Um and then we heard a lot of great positive feedback about the the mixed grade level groupings that we've had at the buildings. One world of and I've shared about shared about this in the past. The Mustang stables is one uh that our our families and our kids have really cherished and it's been great to see those uh connections across
078our building. uh but how how can we advance those and um take place even more regularly within the building. I could spend a very long time on this slide, but I'm going to make it really short, but this is our logic model um for this year, and I wanted to pay um attention to the action items. Um so, we're going to show a lot of images throughout this presentation, but I wanted to hit a few. So, at the beginning of the year, um teachers shared a survey with families to get information about their hopes and dreams for the year. Um they also asked, um for parent input on parent teacher conferences from parents, but then we went into um creating more of those Mustang stables by having reading buddies and making sure everyone has one
079across the building. Um and then we went into we've always had wildly important goals. We did this um for the past couple years, but we focused more on the social emotional learning aspect and those relationship buildings that we're going to go into as well. Um we created classroom environment plans for just our tier one um behavior plans in each classroom and grade level. Um my favorite was the learning walks to be honest with you. That is um we got to do a ghost walk. So just to kind of it's um all kids were present. The teachers got to do it during an institute day and just go into each other's classrooms and get ideas. They sat pictures and then we combined them into a folder to just reference back. Um as well as I was
080able to share them in our my monthly newsletter um to kind of Oh yeah, that sparked. I forgot about that. Um but then we got to do it um in the classroom with students present. Um, so teachers got to have a time where they got to leave their classroom and float around to the different rooms. Um, which had really positive feedback and it was really nice to not only get instructional practices but also build that um, sense of belonging amongst staff and being able to share those practices. Um, so that was Yeah. Can I add on one more thing to what Jen was saying there because she's kind of underelling the the length she went through to u make those learning walks happen. Uh if you know that asking a teacher to come into their
081classroom to observe their practice can be a little bit anxietyinducing especially if you're trying it for the first time as a school community. and Jen really did a great job of inviting um people in small ways to participate and then um really communicating it out that like the positives that came from that and I think it's something that we feel really strongly that we're going to be able to build on next year for sure. So then um we also had on their morning meetings as well and continuing that and making those stronger. Um but then we also had more professional development during staff meetings and lunch and learns and other times. So we really focused starting in January and um actually Patrick got to come and be there for our morning meeting session. Um and
082we really went through the different components but made it like teacher adult friendly so we can also build those relationships. Um we went through and talked a little bit more about teacher language with um responsive classroom. Um then we went into creating something it was a document on logical consequences so we can have common ways of addressing behaviors in our building. Um and it was really a process with BLT um staff um sharing feedback and I mean it's been a great ongoing project. Um and then we were also able to do PLC's. Um each each grade level created a project based on the feedback from the parents and how that was really um an engaging moment for students. So each grade level created at least one. Some grade levels did multiple projects. Um and students
083and families got to come and share their amazing work um with their families as well as siblings which was really nice too. And she's under underelling the projects too because we brought in Mr. Bagley who's not a home room teacher currently working with different grade level teams on like what their needs were. Our art teacher creating like sculptures like we it was a a schoolwide thing not just volunteers coming in to help out. Yeah. Awesome experience. I'm so glad that we had that feedback. And they're always on display in the library there. Oh, so there's some that are on display in the library, too. Yeah, that's right. Yeah. our projects. Um, so I can I can take this over to Harrison's Jimmy. Yeah. Okay. Um, so one of the big things we wanted to do
084to increase like engagement and belonging in our school was to have projects in each grade level. And when you look at students throughout the day and throughout the school year, some of the times that they're most excited to learn is through projects. And when you look at some of the different projects that we've had, we recently had uh second grade did a habitat uh day. Um we recently had the uh this is from our poetry uh slam. We did a poetry slam. Um those are highlights that students look forward to each year in those grade levels. And so when you look at that, one of the other things we wanted to look at was fostering connections across the building. um stu and so we have reading buddies across our building. Um I'm partnered with a
085first grade class. Um the kids are so connected to each other. It's someone they can look for on the playground. It's just a really really um awesome time for them. I even heard this year that they were trying to go to their like fourth grade buddies spring sings and different things. So it's someone that when they see around the building they can make a good connection to. Uh so going back to what Jim was talking about with our wigs, um Dr. Shaw's question and Dr. Shaw's question. Um our focus and our logic model was in a lot of ways around SEAL, both a sense of engagement and belonging. Um and our wigs are just a way to make those things visible not just for uh staff so that like as we're monitoring data and as
086we're monitoring progress, but also for students so that they take ownership of the goals that we're setting as a community. Um, so we had like whole school type initiatives um like our um community mural here where a dot was added to the mural for um our tallies of um out of class noninstructional interactions that staff intended to have with students. The special team specifically was focused on interacting with our focal cohort uh students. And so that was part of our team's goal in that. And then uh also uh uh class level based. So we have the you that was second grade teams uh feelings chart where it provided teachers an opportunity to have those interactions with students throughout the day so that they could have check-ins because so often you know something happens during lunch
087or gym or something else where teachers aren't quite sure. They invite students back in. We want to practice what we preach and being able to have those conversations with them even outside of the flow of the normal day. Um, again, just a reproduction of making those things visible. Um, we have our fifth grade uh student shoutouts, getting students then to be involved in making each other feel like they belong in the school environment and then having opportunities for staff to shout students out as well. Um, and then uh our football contract. We realized that like football is kind of a tough sport to do in recess. The seeds of this were sort of planted last school year, but we decided to like start out this school year intentionally like saying, "Hey, if you're going to
088play football, like the students collaboratively built it together and sign their names to it." Um, even something as as simple as like a parent um in our community, uh, our I can't remember what Laura's official media media specialist um does a wonderful artwork and and put up this mural that students see when they come in every day. I think ultimately that is the goal. I I think to sort of answer your question, Dr. shop. Um both in the data of what the students are reporting and also with um their just like anecdotally you notice the different in our focal cohort students they they look and feel like they belong in their school among their peers and they feel like they have adults that they can interact with. Um, I I think we have like data
089at least as what we've reviewed at BLT that has shown some improvements in areas as as far as like goals that we're hitting that that have uh raised the boats. But I think time will continue to tell um in that regard. Our ultimate goal though this year really is like making that belonging, that engagement visible both for staff and for students to be aware of and involved in the work. Um, so not only did teachers have wildly important goals, um, but actually I did too to make those connections with, um, staff members. And it wasn't, it was by month, but it was how many different staff members can I make connections with and have those meetings and check-ins with. Um, as well as going along with our morning meetings, um, I created some takeout PDs.
090The coaches got to go to a session in the fall. Um, and this was one of the great ideas there. So um each one is a or K2 and 35 a sheet that they can take with all the materials from morning meetings that week. Um so it's a quick little way for them to get more activities and greetings and shares in that morning to build that community. All right. And then um we're going to also turn a little bit of a focus to the academic wigs as well. Um fourth each grade level kind of identified a need in their grade level. And um for fourth grade we focused a lot on grammar. um help helping students improve their grammar. Um and uh in first grade they did um Lexia time, so focusing on the kids
091getting those Lexia minutes um and sort of having like a little bit of a friendly competition um with the other classes. Um second grade did the uh fact fluency as their focus as well. Um uh and then fifth grade really focused on vocabulary. So um you notic that students were struggling um with that as well. Finally, third grade right across the hall from me did um an excellent job of multiplication and really making that their focus of their academic way. The the vocabulary team names are excellent. The students came up with them themselves. That could be team clearly. some of our our next steps uh we realize we also are missing an important group of people right like every year trying to improve the process so uh making sure that we're going to continue we
092actually did this part gather feedback from the staff about uh looking ahead to next year's logic model uh we're uh and over the next couple weeks getting feedback from students we didn't get feedback from them last year um and share that with our team actually today of how we're going to be able to do so and then replicate those other pieces the the survey. They went out to families, right? There's uh we actually worked with we're really lucky. We have a family uh who that's what she does for a living, right? So, like she helped us design it. We sent it out uh and we'll continue to offer that focal I'm sorry, a focus group for all families and for our focal cohort uh of families. And then we'll come back together in August and
093put together an awesome plan for for next year. Thanks for listening to our our plans for 2425. I should have set my timer to see if we made it under time, but I Well, I think Patrick was gonna do a dance if he didn't. They're under time. Yeah, under time. All right. Thank you. Um, anybody open it up? I have a question. Um, so I'm looking at your outcome slide, slide 36. Um, and I was a little confused. Uh like I appreciate the focus on social emotional stuff, but that seems like the main focus of both your short-term and midterm outcomes. Like it's very behavior oriented. Uh but then you have in your long-term outcomes two academic goals. And so I'm kind of curious why there are not short and midterm actions along the way
094in relation to that. Oh, are you talking about the I would say um great question. the last four years that's really been like all of our focus. Um and we the social emotional goals were the ones we felt like there was inconsistency across like the staff, right? So like we talked about how we would we had to come together and build together like what some logical consequences would be. Um and let me give you some more more detail. When we met with the families, they had an opportunity. We were going to cover all four pieces, the engagement, belonging, math, and ELA. We didn't even get past like the engagement, belonging portions of the focus group that controlled just the the dynamics of what people felt was most important for us to address. Um, and that
095showed up in different ways like in our panorama information too at the end of last year, right? uh what students were reporting even though we didn't specifically ask them. We read it but right like in their actual survey data uh and families from that focus group they left notes but the the their voices really um were heard most importantly I think in those other areas. So we we really spent a lot of time in those other areas this year. The other structures and systems though have been working well for um our academic areas. And just to clarify in the context of your these logic models, when you say short, mid, long, you're talking about the school year, right? Like long-term is by the end of the school year, not correct. 10 years out. Correct. Correct.
096Yeah. Um I had a a question about the logic model, too, which is um I like them. I've used them like in my own work. I know that um it's not always intuitive for some folks and I also know that if you don't want to if it doesn't resonate for you, it's easy to just populate it and say, "Yeah, this is our logic model." And I'm just curious um how it's how both it's worked for you all as a building leadership team and and whether it's been kind of a helpful structure for thinking about things in in a deliberate way or however you might want to put it. And also if it's um a sort of framework that's resonated more broadly within the school as well or if or even if it's a framework that
097you kind of talk about with the school more broadly. We do talk about it. I'm going to let them answer because I um I think I can talk about the logic model. Jen could talk about it all day. So we're going to pass Jim the ones that on the spot. Yeah. I I think it's always, you know, every year we have a focus and I think the focus this year with the engagement and belonging um the it gives everyone a focus in our building and and we focus a lot of years on academic academic academic and so to be able to focus on the social part of engagement and belonging and when students feel engaged and when they belong they're going to want to learn more from you in your classroom. So, um, that that
098was when we talked about in August and I mean for me it's always at the forefront. Yeah. Yeah. I just add that um it our the work that we've done in our BLT the whole school year has been directed by our logic model. Um, like Jim said, um, having the like the clear focus for our staff and the work that we're doing together, at least in this year specifically, um, was really helpful in terms of like attention subtraction, right? As a teacher, you have so many things on your plate, so many things to focus on. Um, there are some ways in which we do that just naturally as a part of the profession. And so it's helpful then for the time that we have, the limited time that we have together, the limited amount of
099energy that we have to put our collective teacher efficacy to work to have a tool to help us focus that work. Now whether or not like all the staff feels that all the time, that's variable. But I think I think we've got a really good crew of uh uh school team leaders that help bring everyone along to make it work. have a question. Um, what are wigs? Yeah, they are wildly important goals. Okay. Well, thank you. And then my next question, what was the response rate for the survey? And then, of course, they're always um families that are hard harder to reach uh for various reasons. How do how are you intentional about reaching those families to make sure that they're as you mentioned uh their feedback or they're part of the conversation, right? So,
100we offered multiple opportunities over the summer that way um just like for people who may be traveling work different hours, right? Uh one of them was got rained out, which was a bummer like and no one was going out that day. Like it was a really bad storm. Um and then we had about 25% of our families respond to the the survey that went out. Uh this year, as I mentioned, we'll have like multiple focus groups. So we're inviting our the family of our focal forward students in here in about like in like 10 days. So that that just uh opens up the doors for for more and more participation. Uh and then we'll the survey will be open for a longer period of time this year. Um as well because we're think we closed
101it off by uh end of July this year. We're not getting back together to put work on the plan until uh close like middle of August. So it's just uh I'll have opportunities to send reminders as well. Um, and then, you know, one of the nice things is when people see me around, I ask questions, right? So, I'm in the community now, too. Um, I'm always welcoming feedback and wanting to know how their how their kids are doing. So, there's I would say we're actively looking. Um, our front office staff when people come in, pick up their kids, like they're we're constantly asking questions, right? Um, and because we want to know and our teachers part of this like if I'm sure you get like some good feedback from teachers either when something goes wrong
102or something goes well to say, "Hey, have you done the survey?" I would give that feedback in the survey. Are there opportunities for that? They're gone over the summer. Um, but if I start if we got it out sooner, then that might be an opportunity for us to do so. Um, and it's relatively new, right? So we just did it for the first time this past year but found a lot of value in it. Uh and the survey is more they they they were writing um it was so more of a rating scale right like uh we whereas the in-person experience is where people could elaborate more and those talkback sessions. Correct. Correct. Thank you. Yep. I have a question. Um I hope it comes out the way that it is in my head. But
103so when you you talked about the panorama data first let me say this we are very as a society and even in our school district are very academically focused. For you guys to take the leap and understand that hey our academics are pretty stable. we need to work on this social emotional piece is quite courageous because that's not an easy thing to do when everybody wants their kid in calculus by the time they're in sixth grade. So, thank you for that. I appreciate that. So, my question about having that social emotional sense of belonging, you have the panorama data. I know you did vocal cohort and I might have missed another survey in there, but could you discern from that data when for kids with the sense of belonging or that social emotional was it?
104Hey, we need to develop stronger relationships staff to student, student to student. Could could you gauge like where the disconnect was? It it breaks it down for us. It really does. uh for different so uh different groups of students, different demographics of students uh grade levels and uh in all of those areas that you just mentioned. So there's a lot of data in there um and we we can absolutely we we do do that. Okay. Well, what's nice about um focusing on the social emotional wig at the beginning um and that was what you got to see was a scoreboard so that it's visible to everyone. So students got to see and like want to work towards the goal. But it was nice um Oh my gosh, I just just lost my train of thought.
105No, but what was nice like being able to build the relationships, the K through fourth grade was the the teacher to student relationship and then fifth grade really wanted to focus on the peer relationships. So that's why that shout out board of fifth grade looked differently than the big broad um teacher connection one because we saw that in fifth grade those relationships they were able to have those peer relationships more versus the beginning of the year we wanted to build a teacher student relationship but both happened across all grade learnings. Thank you. I did want to jump in here to talk about your logical consequences. Yeah, you know product. So I wonder if it's something that looks like a T-chart like teacher managed versus admin managed or can you tell me about what the structure
106look like? Yeah, so it's almost in it like published version. Uh we've been working on it and um there's a large group of us have been working on it. So there it really is like think of like a general behavior, right? And part of logical consequences is like uh there's like you break you fix it, right? Like uh there's a way to uh repair the harm, right? um just make things that actually make sense for whatever actually took place. So, uh and then one of the next steps would be here here's some examples of things that you could do as a result, right? Like would you there's there's lots of different avenues you can go into, right? Um you can do multiple things that are within that uh example. Um like if someone were to
107make a mess, scenario based, someone it really is really scenario based. Someone were to make a mess in the restroom, right? Uh we may work with them to you breaking fixing. they have to clean it up and or have to apologize to someone for uh the the part that they have to help us out with, right? So, um we have to contact a family. So, there's a lot of different pieces that go into it. And then there's hyperlink resources. The the goal of it is also to allow for our staff to be more independent in those decisions. Like um because if there are things that happen once in a while, like our staff is great at doing so and can manage it. If it's like more repetitive, there's different steps that we need to take
108too. So the reason I asked about that is because one of the bigger pieces that's been kind of lingering is about discipline about like trying to respond to children's behavior and obviously restorative practices has the essence of it but sometimes we assume like reflection applies to every student and if you have a disability I've tried to explain it to some people that you know repetitive behaviors for like a child on the spectrum might be really different than what you would do social justice wise the child that can have a dialogue with you, right, if they're verbal. So, I think I really can appreciate that logical kind of model. I also wonder, and I know you were going to comment on this, about the training and the buyin from teachers because I think in some buildings
109we have like a behavior support specialist, we have assistant principles, we might have like in the middle schools, we have student success coaches. In your building, what's the structure? maybe remind me just Yeah, so we have a student support specialist in my building too. Um, and the way we really attacked that was through the professional learning that we did throughout the year. Um, as Miss Buckley mentioned, there were we the way we we framed it was creating positive classroom communities, right? And for about six or seven staff meetings, that's uh starting in January. Um, that's all we spent time on. Like how think about our teacher language. I want to forget some of these things. things I hope I don't but just like think being mindful of our our our words uh and our interactions
110with students uh the the routines and procedures that we have set up within our environment right um other things that were a part of that were the biases oh individual biases individual biases you linked into that so there were a variety of different things and a lot of those come from actually responsive classroom um and we we just reframed it for our own personal spaces So that was where that professional learning kind of came from and that's something that um I think is what we're going to continue exploring uh as a building and advancing because we want that to be consistent, right? Yeah. Because you have a social worker, you have a student support specialist, obviously there's administrators and other support staff, but like I think one of the other layers of it is that
111when we do have um some of the information kind of going to teachers, it's to help empower them to make those decisions. But we also have to prepare them to do that. So I I can appreciate you creating this model. Hopefully there is teacher feedback going into the He said building that logical consequences document. Okay. And I think it I mean they created it. They continue to build and all the resources consequences. We did one entire staff meeting was primarily about giving our team that worked on the the draft of it feedback on what we thought worked, what we thought didn't work, what resources we had that were common among us already. Um what were teacher actions that could be proactive that we could implement if we noticed those patterns that happen as well. What's
112a celebration? I mean that sounds wonderful that you took the lead on the you are a high performing school. So I I also applaud you for taking on the behavioral pieces. Anyone else have any questions? Yeah. So just to tag on to that, but it's fairly short. Is um I appreciated that you also looked at sense of belonging among staff because and that that was like highlighted at the start. Um teacher collaboration is important to efficacy. We all know this. And um you know calling that out I think is important because you know we're student focused but who's impacting the students? Um it was funny. I was going to ask you how you're building maintaining that over the year and then you did the presentation and showed that. So my new question on that one
113is um you mentioned getting feedback at the end of the year. Are you getting feedback over the course of the year as well on just how the sense of belonging and collaboration is going with the teachers as well. So we was I would say we're doing that throughout their PLC's. Okay. Um especially in the beginning of the year as that we're that was where the heavy lift was with that work. Uh there was a lot of new we had never did that before, right? So like the the creation of the wigs was brand new. Uh even though we maybe did it during co there's a lot of check-ins that happen. So like now we're doing it in person um with the check-ins but we got I think we we regularly collect feedback from our staff.
114Jen and I are at almost every PLC. So we're we're around and our staff I'm sorry. What are for those who are watching PLC? What is that? Absolutely. They're they're professional learning communities. uh which are typically formed of like it could be across a special area team. It could be a grade level team uh happens on a weekly basis. Uh typically have about an hour for us to work through things that are important for our kids that they're going to be learning uh coming up soon, right? Um what do we have some potential barriers? How are we going to remove those barriers? And uh what are we going to do if students are already meeting those goals that we're expecting them to learn and how like be able to help them even surpass those? And
115within those settings, that's where we can have a lot of collaborative conversations with staff. Thank you. That's super helpful because I was like, I think I know what that is, but I'm that clarity is kind of acronym soup over here. All of education. Anybody else? Or are you guys anxious to get back home and do your beds? All right. Thank you. Thank you all so much. Thank you. Okay. So, that brings us to discussion item 10.1. Uh, school year 26, annual contract renewals. We're not doing all right. 2 A 2 B school year. I'm not used to saying as is why I'm like this school year. This school year assessment changes. We have our team coming on up to talk about uh proposed changes. Uh this is the first uh presentation and then uh we
116will be bringing this back for action uh at a later board meeting. So we look forward to your questions on the board's on the team's presentation. You guys have you never know if nobody ever wants to sit in the middle. I'm pushing them that way. Go ahead, Mallerie. You take down. You can sit in the middle. All right. I'll just be behind you. Feel strong. Yes. All right. So, thank you everyone for the opportunity to share with you uh this assessment uh report and definitely uh looking forward for your input through this presentation. So uh had the opportunity to introduce to introduce our team and we're very proud of the work of the committee and how they come together and really this reflects all the work of all these people and multiple perspectives multiple uh
117programs multiple roles and really everybody coming together into making a decision for with the mind of what's best for students. Um, and what well we're going to introduce ourselves. Patrick Robinson, the assistant superintendent for elementary schools. Luis Leon is superintendent of middle schools. I'm Mallerie Maui. I teach eighth grade language arts at Brooks and then I'm also the ELA department chair. Trisha Groin. I'm the instructional coach at Longfellow. Christine Wetsza coordinator at Longfellow. And by uh Eric Bachman, fifth grade team lead. Longfellow. Sorry. and Emily Crean, director of UDL. So with that, the uh purpose of the assessment committee was to evaluate what our current assessments are and also to look about what what's next, what are some of the opportunities of really uh capture and improve our systems of assessment and really make a
118difference in our in the way that we design our instruction. At the same time we with the mind about having our students in our mind what's some of the needs and the best things and best strategies and best uh software that might be out there. So with that this falls into the transformational goal of with designing for all as we're looking about improving instruction. And so before we jump into the fun stuff um for tonight, we really just want to kind of take some time and just kind of we shared this graphic a few weeks ago. Um our goal as the um core instruction department is always to really just improve student um the student experience to really um improve student intellectual um engagement and really just provide teachers with the tools that they need
119to be successful and to do so. Um, and really just over the this year as a department, we really just been really engaging the team and really just kind of engaging teachers in a lot of committee work. We've heard from teaching and learning um around the work they've been doing around curriculum, but also this team will be um speaking tonight around the work that we have been engaging in around assessments. And so we really wanted to kind of take the time to really talk about our current assessment system and really kind of see what else is out there um as we think about to really improve our assessment system because we know that a strong assessment system is really key in really improving all of our other systems that really touch our student experiences. Assessment
120systems really kind of touch curriculum and instruction. It really gives teachers that real time data that they're able to use to really guide how they plan, how they deliver, how they provide feedback, how they come together. We just heard from man and also homes around how they're using that data to come together in professional learning committees to talk about students, to talk about planning, to talk about all of those things that really help improve student intellectual engagement. Also, assessments touch the framework for teaching. It's in all four domains of that. It touches professional learning. Um, that's how we plan professional development for teachers to really help improve our student outcomes. And then also, it helps us measure our students academic journey as we're measuring are they um learning the things that they need to learn?
121Are they mastering the grade level standards? How do we adjust the learning plans that we have? We looked at um MTSS. How are we looking at the um the um tier 2, tier three? Also, how are we looking at enrichment? And so assessments, a strong assessment system is really key to making sure we're improving all of our other systems. And so we really just wanted to make sure that as we look to improve our curriculum that we're also looking at our assessment system, too. So, I'm going to share a little bit about our timeline for how we engaged in this process. It was really um it was incredibly collaborative, which was nice meeting. I'm this is my second year in the district, so getting to know so many different colleagues at different schools and so
122many different roles. Um there are so many voices represented in this committee committee. Um but in our first few meetings in October and November, we defined our purpose and then collaboratively we developed a rubric for the criteria that we wanted whatever that next assessment system to hold. Um, we define that criteria based on our collective experiences and how we engage with students, what we know are best practices, and then how we can leverage our collective efficacy through this data um to ensure that we're giving our students a really quality experience. So, um, we defined that rubric, we looked at the assessment calendar, um, determined some alignments around that, which led us to meeting with vendors. We looked uh we met with uh Renaissance and then I Ready um and we actually utilized a rubric um
123that was weighted based on what was most important to us like these are our musthaves, musthaves, like it'd be nice to haves. Um and so we kind of went through it that way and and weighted our rubric and then that led us um to voting on all three suites based on that rubric. um looking at what uh just kind of what were the the strengths and then also the deltas of each of those um different suites for us. And then in March um we were really intentional intentional about um exploring both of the options through I Ready and Renaissance but then also looking at our current suite too. That was also part of the equation and we and we went through and weighted that as well. Um, but what we determined was that we we
124still wanted to follow up more. We wanted to make sure we picked like the best one. So, Emily went out and she did such a great job leading us through the process, but she actually reached out to other schools and districts and and received like anecdotal feed feedback um from teachers and colleagues uh in the area who already used this suite um to ensure that it was exactly as they they sold it to us. And then once the committee was um came up with a recommendation for the assessment suite, they felt really good about after going back and revisiting the current assessment suite. Um we were able to kind of make that recommendation to the superintendent. And then also we went through a couple of stakeholders to kind of communicate that recommendation. We shared it
125with at council. We shared it with the district leadership team also with everyone within our department. We also wanted to make sure we shared that with principles that were not part of the committee. Also our MTSS leads to make sure they were a part of that. We wanted to make sure that we were sharing this with as many individuals within the district that was not part of the committee to make sure we were receiving feedback and answering those questions. We wanted to make sure we heard as many voices as possible. And then we also wanted to make sure we sent out a communication to the entire staff letting everyone know that we were making this recommendation to the board tonight so everyone was aware of this and it brings us to tonight to this very
126moment. It's very dramatic. I'm glad you felt that. So now talking um we'll be talking about the portion of the committee where we about our assessment needs. And so, as Mallerie was stating already, we talked about what our purpose was as a group committee and as a group. And one of the things we wanted to talk about was like what were our foundations, what were our goals that we were looking for as a whole. And so, we found some trends that we were all talking about as well. So, we wanted to make sure that our assessments focused on the standards to make sure student growth was going to happen. Um, and that it aligned with curriculum as well. We also want to make sure the dyslexia screener happened as well to make sure we look
127at foundational skills for our to support our emerging learners, our learning readers as well and individual individualized learning platforms to make sure that we can um support our learners in that way. And then also the K12 alignment as we were talking about of the portrait of our eighth grader, making sure that we're continuing that process as well. And we know that our high school also uses uh the Renaissance program as well. So it does help our students kind of get familiar with that as we move on to not just eighth graders but as humans as a whole leaving district 97 to make sure that we are connecting community- based as well. And then um more instructional time. We all want to be in the classroom with our kids as much as possible. And currently our
128we start support with math right now. and math typically takes about 60 to 90 minutes to administer for both math and reading for our students um who are typically developing and so we also want to make sure that so part two and then um and that's also for Ames web as well it does take about 60 to 90 minutes twice a year so we wanted to make sure that we were making sure we're getting more instructional time as well and then for our K1 students when we're administering Ames web it is onetoone so again we wanted to make sure we could make sure as much time that we can gather the data and support kids within the classroom. Um, one of the things that we spent a lot of time on the committee talking about
129was all the different types of assessments that are out there and that are available and why they're important and how they really contribute to not only our teaching but to student learning. And one of the things we talked most about was the difference between what a standards aligned assessment is versus what a standardsbased assessment is and why both of these two systems or assessments um are important uh for classroom teachers and for students. So a standardsbased assessment is and we have the examples at the bottom is some what we're currently using which is mastery connect and that is really assessing each grade level standard. It's going into depth to or to measure their proficiency levels on those grade level standards like teaching to the test. What? Like teaching to the test? Uh not teaching to
130the test but teaching to the standard and having that standards having those tests aligned to that standard to say are students understanding what they're expected to at this grade level? Like these are the the common core statewide standards like are students understanding those? Um it is also our most um reliable assessment when we're talking about IR. Um like that is our way of measuring student understanding grade level standards and having those standardsbased assessments help us understand how we can guide our teaching and see trends whether students are really understanding those standards that we've taught. Are we missing something? Do students already get this and we just need to do a review and continue to move on and how we can differentiate based on that. Um MAP is an example of uh a standards aligned assessment
131where it is adaptive in nature. So it is staying on um it it I want to say surface level but it's not just surface level but it doesn't dive deep into where the standards are because students it's adaptive so students are going back and forth. So it's not giving us that deep information around how students are understanding the instruction that they're being taught in the standards at their at their grade level. That being said, MAP is a nationally normed assessment. It measures growth. It gives us a lot of good data as well. They're just two different assessments with two different purposes, but both are very important in how we are um reflecting on our teaching and how we're looking at student learning and growth. Really quickly, we have 17 more um slides to get through.
132Would you guys prefer questions at the end or are you okay with questions in between? Um, we're, you know, I was going to say we're okay with either, and I think that we are okay with either if something pops up for clarifying purposes. Um, but maybe if we wait till the end, you'll have noticed that your question might be resolved. Thank you. All right. Um, so, uh, in our first couple of meetings, what we did is we sat down and we talked about the weaknesses, the strengths, and the wishes of our current assessment suite because there are quite a few different assessments that we're using. Um, and within that we identified what our our look fors were going to be, which I think someone mentioned earlier. Um, and so we have our look fors and
133also our non-negotiables. And so the way I look at this chart here, I broke it into two categories. Basically, we have our basics to meet. So we wanted the assessment has to be accessible to all students. It has to be available in Spanish, standardsbased, nationally normed, and standards aligned. uh progress monitoring probes had to be included, foundational reading skills as well as a writing component. And then the other components are more focused on like teacher use of the assessment and which is directly tied to impact on students. Um so that would be the easyto read reports, resources for instruction, uh tracking the growth and the personalized learning plan. So just as a classroom teacher myself, that's kind of the part that I'm mostly focusing on because that's what's going to drive my instruction in the
134classroom. And then uh in that case so currently at the very bottom we are using that's our current suite um that slowly has been built up over time um as we're developing a better understanding of what's needed to get a complete snapshot of our children our students um so starting with map and as web and then slowly adding in mastery connect and now ESGI as well and so that's what we are currently working with Um we did sit and meet with uh I Ready as well um at and Renaissance and one thing that we're really beginning to look at with the vendors um is having like a centralized place for all the data points. Uh currently we're having to dig through multiple platforms to kind of look at that data. There's there's tends to be
135a lot of inconsistencies with that data just um and also the format and the approach of those assessments can be very different. And so that was one of the things that we really took into consideration as we're looking at um the vendors. And so as you can see in the next couple of slides here that we you'll see how we rated each group based on what we were finding out based on those criteria. Um and as we look through those things as well, there were 16 points altogether. So the next two slides also include those pieces as well. Um our current suite met 11 out of the 16 criteria models as well. Um but it does like Eric just said consist of multiple um suite pieces. So map as web and mastery connect in order
136to get all of that data combined. And then I Ready met nine of the 16 criteria um that we went of the criteria markers from our rubric and then Renaissance met 16 out of the 16 criteria markers that we had from our rubric. So it was nice to see that as well. Um and the writing component as you see is you move one of the things that we really focused on as well is that Renaissance when they explained it to us would take about at a around 30 minutes to administer maximum at a maximum I'm going to approximate 30 minutes um just into your brain down but that is a significant decrease from math which is 60 to 90 minutes as well which would give us exactly more time to analyze the data use it
137to make individualized instruction to support students more often. So that is what we're looking at too and that progress monitoring being a part of that piece as well. So it does help. And a bonus was that the social emotional screener that was added in for Renaissance which is something we currently do not have at all which would be nice to just have another extra. So with all of the information that we received after comparing all of the three assessment suites, the recommendation that we are making as a committee to the board tonight is that we move forward with the Renaissance Star assessment suite as our assessment system um for next year SY26. So we really do believe that Renaissance will help us streamline our assessments. So the STAR assessment tool from Renaissance is going to
138replace MAP as web and ESGI. So currently we're using MAP as that nationally normed reading and math benchmark that's adaptive and the students will take it you know twice or three times a year kind of that has varied a little bit. Um Star is going to replace this and since it and it is significantly shorter so like that about that 30 minutes as opposed to 60 to 90 minutes and that'll make getting that data point three times a year a lot easier for us to do with that reduced time. Um, currently we're using AS Web to progress monitor student learning between benchmark periods and for students who might have specific goals in reading or math. Um, Renaissance actually recommends using STAR because it is so short as a way to benchmark students up to once
139a month. So, that's a nice like check-in that we can do that we weren't able to do with MAP. And it um Renaissance also has something called CBM probes that can help us drill down on specific goals that students might have in an individualized education plan or in a like a reading intervention plan. And then finally, that third one is ESGI. Right now, we use ESGI with our mostly K1 students to assess things like letter naming fluency, letter sound fluency, and other early literacy and early math um benchmarks. And STAR has those things built in. So, we'll be able to use those. Additionally, one thing that our primary teachers really love about ESGI is they're able to create and customize assessments to really like assess the things that they're finding really important in their classroom.
140And Ren and Renaissance does have the DNA assessment which will allow our um K1 teachers to continue doing that. Renaissance doesn't yet have a early childhood and um PKP assessments in their suite. So, we are going to keep ESGI for those two grade levels. Um, and then just kind of moving on to that next row, Mastery Connect is what we've been using in the past several years for grades 4 through 8 to assess that standardsbased learning to see how our students are doing on standards in ELA and math and even in science in the middle schools. And we're going to be able to switch over to Renaissance's DNA assessment. And we're really excited about that because um it offers a lot more flexibility than Mastery Connect. Um the DNA suite has a um a high
141quality standardsbased assessment tool and it allows us to kind of create assessments aligned with our scope and sequence that we're teaching. So that's kind of a nice change for us and it's all in that same platform. And then another thing that is different with this assessment suite than our current assessment suite is that there are actually support systems aligned with it. So right now we have Lexia and Moby Max. And these are online programs that create kind of a personalized online learning path for students. And right now for students to use those programs, they need to either take an additional preassessment through that program or teachers have to kind of do the leg work of figuring out if they scored here on MAP, here's where I need to assign them in Lexia or Moby Max
142and it's not very streamlined. Renaissance actually aligns with this program called Freckle that is very that offers very similar things to Lexi Movie Max and it does all that leg work for you and takes students star results and creates online personalized learning similar to Lexi Movie Max, but it also creates um lesson plans that teachers can use individually or like in person. It's not all online plans. There's also things you can use in small groups. So, that's a really nice thing. Um, our district right now has a subscription to Nearpod, which is an engaging tool that let allows you to create like interactive lessons to collect formative assessments from students. And we have that tool right now. And I don't know how utilized it is, but I think it it's going to be a lot
143more utilized next year because again, Star Renaissance's star program will give teachers lessons recommended for specific students, specific groups of students, and spec and their classroom based on their data. And so it'll just make using that tool a lot easier and they'll have lessons ready to go. So um and then the last part that I want to talk about that kind of this I guess this isn't really a streamline but we have this additional support of the screener that Christine mentioned. And so we're excited to have that ability to um find out what needs our students might have with social emotional learning and have some resources that can support them. All right. Now, it's a million-dollar question, but it's not a million dollars. Uh what will this cost? Um so the next slide, this is
144our um this is what our current costs are. So this is literally what we paid this year school uh school year SY25 um for all of the um assessment tools and resources that we use. Um so you can see up there as the whole team has already talked about we have come together with a a group of resources, a group of assessments to create what we currently use. And so that total comes to a little over $276,000 that we spend each year on our um current assessment suite and resources. This is our proposed cost for SY26. If we continue to uh if we continue forward and move forward with Renaissance, uh we would be replacing that with star as uh Trisha was sharing DNA freckle. I think an important part of freckle is because I
145know Lexia has been a big talking point of the community, the board, the schools. Um with embedded in Freckle that comes with it is a program called Lelo and that is their market competitor. Um so that will come already embedded in Freckle. Um so we'll uh have access to all students. Um all students will have access to that. I said that backwards. Um we'll continue with Near Pod and then again there's that ESGI but that is only for our PKP and our early childhood. our K to8 will be able to all fall within Renaissance. Um and then the final one up there is um our Sabers seal screener. Um it is gray as opposed to all of the other ones that are are uh not great. Um because I think that we as a district
146need to do a little bit more um uh research around this. We are It is definitely something we want and it's definitely something we want to move forward to. The reason it says about 5,600 up there is because it's a dollar per student. So we would see but we also want to make sure that if we are giving a social emotional screener and students are flagged that we have interventions in place to support them. We do not just want to have students flagged and then be like well we don't have we don't have we haven't developed our tier 2 system yet or we haven't developed our tier three system yet. So that is up there. So because we are still working with teams to see what schools are ready to do this. Do we need
147to look at this at a pilot level? Um do we need to look at middle schools versus elementary schools or vice versa? So I there's still a little bit more research we're doing around that to make sure that we're not just buying a system and saying we have one, but that when we have a system and we're using it, we're we are we are supporting students at the end. So that's why it's gray because that would be the most it would cost, but then depending it would be a dollar per student and depending on what that looks like and how we roll that out, that could look less. So and then next slide. So, in summary, I think some really big takeaways from where we currently are to where we would like to move um
148is this year in school year 25, teachers had seven login sites to be able to access all of the assessments and the resources that go with it. We're proposing with this new assessment that teachers would have one login site. They would log into one place um and have all of the information that they need there. uh we would go from spending about two a little over $276,000 a year down to $231,000 a little over $2130,000 a year which is a little over a $45,000 savings and then all right Trish um so we think the transition to the Renaissance and if you don't mind going to that thank you um the transition to the Renaissance platform is going to really have a positive impact on teaching and learning in our schools. And to start with, we
149just will have more instructional time. Right now, we have a lot of time devoted to our beginning of the year testing with MAP and name as web and then that happens again in the middle of the year and the end of the year. And we'll be able to really just um bring this down to like an hour in total at the beginning of the year, which will give our teachers and students more time to build community and set expectations and get into the engaging instruction that we want to be doing all the time. It'll also give us kind of a running start to get started with our like our what I need time plans that the different schools mentioned. Um we will have immediate like data that we have about about our students. We will
150have resources immediately for personalized instruction for individuals and small groups of students. So just having that ready at hand right away will be so beneficial to us as we start the school year. Um, and then I also want to mention that it's also we'll be getting it's there's also enrichment resources within the program. It's not just for an intervention, but also for enrichment and kind of wherever students are at what they need. And then as an instructional coach, I work with our new teachers every year, helping them kind of learn all about the district curriculum and assessment and helping them anal find find the data, analyze the data, and use it to plan instruction. And streamlining our system from the the three or four systems that each teacher is using down to one will make
151like onboarding new staff and just all of our staff's lives a lot simpler and um just a lot easier for them to do the work of assessing analyzing the data and then using it and then really, you know, spend the time on changing our instruction to meet the needs of our students. So, it's really going to help with teacher efficacy. So, I'm going to take you back and probably echo a little bit of what was just said if you'll click to the next slide for me. Um, as far as impact on literacy goes, I mean, data really isn't meaningful unless we use it. And so, um, utilizing this data from this single source hub, um, I think is is really the big impact. And what you heard in in one of the previous presentations this
152evening is about PLC's, our professional learning communities. Um, I had the chance to go to New Orleans where we went to the AMLE conference and one of the seminars I attended was PLC's are the number one like mover for student growth um, and student outcomes. And this is the data that's meaningful when we meet as PLC's that's going to drive our instruction. So that tier one instruction and then also t uh towering down into our tier two, tier three as well. Um and then also to speak to like the IR component align versus standards space right um I is basically our exemplar for what do the standards look like in practice otherwise when we look at the standards there's a lot of room for like differentiation and what we consider to be rigorous um and
153so it kind of demystifies what do these types of questions look like what are the quality of questions that we should be asking in our classrooms and engaging it in in discussion. Um, and so I think having this data in front of us and it being standards based um is going to be a real difference maker for us as we're looking ahead to um make that impact uh for our students. And then I think the last thing was the writing component. Yeah. Okay. Um, so, uh, so it's going to be really nice that we have that writing component built in to the test. Um, just because, um, what we'll see is, and especially in middle school, it's really about that argumentative writing component. Um, but those standards for writing actually complement beautifully our reading standards,
154too. So this data will work hand inand in helping us leverage both the reading and the writing work that needs to happen in our classrooms. Um and then a few more things that are just on our radar that weren't in this presentation tonight but are still being actively problem solved around on many different levels. One being professional development. We know with any change that we need to get it right and we need to roll it out the first time so that teachers feel confident, families understand what's happening, students understand the new assessment tool and so making sure that our professional develop we have a solid professional development plan um that we are rolling it out in a timely fashion to make sure that um it's done well. Um so that is we're currently working on
155that behind the scenes. We also realize that we have our middle school redesign schedule which is new and is going to look different for our middle schoolers this year. Um and so how does that play into assessments? So working closely with our middle school redesign team, our middle school administration, um and making sure that this assessment fits into that schedule. Um talking about PLC's with department chairs, making sure all of that stuff is is is tight. Um, I already talked a little bit about that screener, but continued work on that screener, making sure that we have the supports needed for any student that comes up flagged. Uh, talking about our assessment calendar, one thing that really came up in our meeting was that um, spring data point is really important. It's really important to our
156teachers, it's really important to our schools, it's really important to our community. And making sure that we bring that bring that back. So, aligning with the assessment calendar so that we have three points again. we have our winter, our fall, winter and spring. Um, but also being mindful of all the other things. So, being mindful of ISA, our science assessment AR that's happening in the spring, being mindful of our panorama survey that comes out, our five essential survey that comes out. All of these things that do take away from our instructional time, but are important to help us build our structures, but being mindful as we're creating a calendar to make sure that we're including all of those things and thinking about it. Um, and then the last thing that's really on our radar is
157making sure that we have preserved our historical data. So, when we're switching a system, we want to make sure that we have um access to that historical data to go back to. Right now, we know we have access to our um master or our uh map data and our as web data that go will have historical data up to five years within our own systems. Um, and then we they have a database that we can go back if we ever need to go past five years. uh we're still looking into how what that looks like for Mastery Connect um and that standardsbased assessment and how we can how we can uh hold on to that historical data. So there are a few more moving pieces there but things that are definitely on on our radar.
158Um and then that takes us to the end of our presentation. Thank you. And we will definitely open up for questions. So I have first I want to say I so appreciate with this with the literacy component with what we're doing with math how the district is moving forward working as a team to robustly check all of the resources that we're putting in place in classrooms I think makes such a huge difference for actually coming up with resources and tools that will actually support teachers and supporting our students. I cannot emphasize that enough. Um I did just want to add one more thing for your radar that may already be there. So feel free to treat this like a question. Um and that is a parent community roll out because as you know in this
159community um I mean reasonably so people are test diverse. Why are you taking time for this? My students. So doing a component that shows how this is beneficial, how this is worked in can be critical. You know seeing earlier tonight the data sheet student data sheet. So it impacts not just giving the district the data we need but also or the classroom even it really individually helps students and I think as you look to roll this out don't ignore the parent community component because it'll help you out definitely thank you for that. Anyone else have questions? Um I had a couple questions first. Um so thank you guys for the presentation. I I think I I was I agree with Nancy. I think that as parents in the district, we got pretty comfortable with like
160what the map score sheet looks like, right? And so I was curious about kind of what does it look like to kids? I mean, our, you know, our kids now are comfortable that their score pops up on the after they take it. So, I was curious about what what it actually looks like to the students and to the parents um when they when they and how do they know like what how does it what information does it tell them? Right now we get told the district comparison, the state comparison and their own growth. Do we know what this one looks like? Sure. So, they will still get all of that same information. It is a nationally normed assessment. So they will get you know in comparison to where they are falling uh nationally uh locally
161um and then their own score individually. It also has that was one of the components that we asked a lot about was were those easy to read reports and making sure that families are un understand what data they're getting. Um this is just my personal opinion but my personal opinion is that the the reports that you get from STAR dive deeper into each. It's not just giving you a low, average, average, high, average, high. Um, it's not just giving you those those descriptors, but it's going a little bit more into those components to tell f let families know how students are doing. Um, and students have their own login where they're logging in and it's assigning them. So, they're seeing their own scores not only through the assessment, but then through freckle. Um I think
162a really big part in any of these uh resources that we that we need to mention too is teachers always have the power to override. So it doesn't the score will help guide but it doesn't it is not finalized. Um and so students will also have that ability. I don't know actually to be quite honest with you if a score pops up right at the end of the test the same way it does with math but students will still have access to their score and their data and and understand that. And I think that part of that professional development um is not only increasing that assessment and data literacy among staff, but also rolling that out with families and with students and so that every they understand what they're doing, why they're doing it, and
163why it's important because I think sometimes if they feel disconnect from it, then they're not putting forth their best effort, they're not trying their hardest. Um and how do we ensure that and I mean as we know differentiation and and the um the amount of work it takes for teachers to respond to individual student needs. Um what kind of I guess what kind of support is there? But I'm envisioning a a whole new set of scores and therefore if with all the tools that you describe a whole new set of um enrichment and follow-up activities that need to be done in small groups and for individual students and so is there I don't know have you guys thought about how we how we accomplish that so that you don't have a you know the the
164shame of it would be if you find out that a a kid's missing a couple standards and there's just not enough capacity to get to every kid on everything. um if you have because it sounds like there's more information to your point. So, I'm curious about that. I can talk a little bit about it and then I'll open it up if you guys have anything to add. I think that one of the nice things about this um and I know we went through the um the checklist with all the checks and everything, but it it the the system in it of itself will have the ability to group based on standard, based on skill. Um so teachers can go ahead and pull. They also can assign lessons. So through Nearpod, it's going to say like,
165"Hey, this group of students is really missing this skill, like pull them into a small lesson here, and here's some resources that you can use to do that." So it'll allow them to go ahead and already have the resources that they're needed to pull that, but then what it also does is it allows everybody else in the room because they're already grouped for teachers to be able to um have during win time have small groups. So if they're using freckle that day, freckle is only recommended for 45 minutes a day. So it would never go for uh you know we have students in intervent those what I need blocks for 150 minutes. So it's not meant to be a put on forget about you're doing your online platform. But if I'm working with a group
166and I want you working on something that matches your learning needs then I can have you on this freckle assignment. I can watch what you're doing afterwards and pull up a report to see how you're doing on that. and if you're understanding that skill or you're still missing things on that independent level. Um, so it gives them all one snapshot and it helps them go ahead and group. So it's taking some of that work out that they're currently doing now with our assessment suite. Right now they're taking map then they're using as web data they're figuring out what groups they need. We're look we're diving deep into the data to see what skills they are. Then we have to go to another resource and pull all of the resources. Um, so it kind of centralizes
167it. So hopefully we're giving teachers back time and so you know because it's there for them. Um it's also in collaboration. This is you know something that's going to be used during the intervention blocks and the wind block. So it's not something that we're using during our tier one core instruction. It's used to aid our tier one core instruction obviously with differentiation when we're using data to drive instruction. Um but we also have a brand new curriculum that's coming in that will be following that. This is really for that um that intervention piece that that enrichment piece that intervention piece that on grade level but we want to continue to build skills during those wind blocks um around the MTSS systems. All right. Except that's my last question is can that is the objective of
168the assessments obviously is to kind of say see where kids are but it seems like there's also this additive part to also improve where they are. Mhm. Um and so and so just curious on how STAR has told you they measure how effective it is on improving student learning, not just measuring. Uh so so Star is Renaissance whatever. Yes. Okay. Yeah. Star itself is just going to always tell us where the students are. Um, but I think the Renaissance site and all of their tools are because they're all aligned and it's data driven. Um, that we're giving students what they need, that we're using the data that students are showing us what they know. Um, showing us what they understand and then we're giving teachers the tools and the resources to say, "Hey, here's where
169teachers are." And provide them with those targeted interventions or that targeted enrichment. then we're helping them grow in those areas that they either are showing us that they need to grow or those areas that they're saying, "Hey, we've got this. We're ready to move on. Um we're ready to dive deeper into standards. We're ready to talk learn more about um whatever the next standard is." Um and so it helps guide that. Did that make sense? Yes. Do you guys have anything to add? It's having all of the systems kind of just talk to one another. That answers your question, Holly. So like having the assessment having the assessments talk to the tier one curriculum that we just approved. So having all of the systems talk to one another to kind of make sure that when
170we when students are actually we can see that students are actually mastering those standards and we can actually see that in how we track our data, how we track our student academic data. And so we'll be able to kind of see if the STAR assessment is actually working, if those resources are actually working in our achievement data. And I love anybody. Yeah. Yeah. So, one of the other things I liked about it was Renaissance showed us their on their website, they have um it's basically like how standards ramp up in their like as a kid is progressing. So if I look at a fifth grade standard, I could see what the fourth grade standards are that build towards capacity of that. I could see what the sixth grade standards that extend that learning. So just
171as a again as the as a teacher in the room that is one of the tools that I'll be using. Um and then they also break it down by skill if I remember correctly. I think it broke it down by like cuz the standards can be very complex. So like it breaks it down to like maybe a single lesson that you teach on just this. And so I really liked having that that piece too. I mean I I'm very thankful the machine's going to do some thinking for me, but I also like having the opportunity to say, "Hey, this is these are some intentional moves I'm going to make right here in my room." Um, and so I think that will only promote better teaching because I think you're going to have a better understanding
172of where kids need to go and where they've come if you haven't taught those grades. So I think that'll be a good continuity piece. And we talk a lot about like rigor. Exactly. Like teaching to where the standard needs to be. And we talk a lot about like decreasing the rigor and not teaching students to where having high expectations. And I think one of the things we saw a lot with Renaissance is that this will show teachers and Mallerie said it nicely. You know, the state standards give gives us exactly where instruction should be and this assessment will actually show or the resources that comes along with this gives teachers exactly where they should be teaching and how to get students up to that point and not teaching down here because if we don't have
173a way to measure, we keep instruction down and we're not get showing students how to like or teachers how to kind of raise that bar for instruction. And I think that's the important piece about it, assessments. And I think that's kind of that literacy and um that data um literacy and all of those things that we really have to provide the PD around because it's important and when it comes down to like planning for instruction, delivery of instruction. Anyone else have any questions? I had some questions. This one is I'm gonna at the risk of sounding like one of our congressmen, it's a yes or no question because I don't want to get into the weeds um because it's out of it's way out of my wheelhouse. So, we have new reading curriculum that we're
174rolling out. Now, we're rolling out this assessment and I could be you could be rolling out something else that I'm not naming. Is that manageable for our teachers? It's a good question. I'll let our teachers answers. So, we're actually all piloting math next year as well. uh at Longfellow. So, um it is something we've talked a lot about, but I think just the simplicity of having that one central location like I I think it will be manageable. We are also delaying the start of the math piloting until the second term. So, I think that gives us some time to kind of get acclimated to the assessment system up front and ELA up front and then add another load. Um, okay. And I want you to know that's been a big conversation piece as well is
175making sure that we are taking into account the teacher and student experience. Okay. Those were not yes or no answers. I was totally not politician, but I didn't cut you off and say reclaiming my time. Okay. So, but go ahead. I was just joking to add to that. I I don't have to add a little bit. Yes. And as an instructional coach, like I go to all of our team meetings and so we've talked about it and you know at first people are concerned because it is another thing to learn. But I think when they understood the the benefits they would be getting back in terms of instructional time it was just an automatic like win for teachers and for students like knowing that it's going to be less time testing more time teaching and
176learning and that I think the the extra learning it will take for teachers they were excited about the the change they would have in their classroom. Okay. I have like three more questions and this one is directed at you two. So I see that No, that's not hard. I see that this is 200 plus,000 that we're spending a year on this assessment suite, right? That's a nice chunk of change, but it's yearly. Some of our other contracts are multi multi-year. Is that ever a consideration? And if it isn't, could it be raised as a consideration? Yeah. So I think so with the um our former contracts um with the old assessment suites they came forth in our contracts as single kind of renewal contracts. So together they equaled up to that one single price and
177how what period of time though? So from my understanding it was each year we were renewing we were renewing um mastery connect um right but at 200 plus thousand right that's so my point is yeah so your point is like could we and we talked about like with Renaissance could we get a better deal if we do a multi-year contract so yes we are I had to process that out loud that's okay so then my next and this is it Um, I'll go with the So, where in that and I think it's slide 19 in this in the Renaissance suite, where is the dyslexia screener? Great. And then when does it start? Right there. Starts in kindergarten. Okay. Um, and it is in it is built into the star assessment. Okay. Um, there are also
178additional RAN testing which makes something a dyslexia screener. RAN stands for rapid automatic gaming. Um, and that there are additional screeners within the CBMs, which stand for curriculum based measures, and in the DNA, which is data and assessment. Sorry, there's a lot of acronyms. I was like, yes, finally. I heard you earlier talking about our education uh speak. Um, so yes, so it is built in in addition to there are additional screeners if stuff is popping up and teachers or teens have more concerns. Thank you. Last question for the la for the sabers the SEO. So I like it and I don't like it. So I feel like oh this is a great tool but then I'm like it's social emotional should that be a tool like that other like you know um so I
179know it's it's not part of the suite yet but I would love to hear and see other school districts who have used it. Um, and then you're talking about making sure you have the supports behind it. What supports did they have? Just doing that research because similar to everything else, if it's not done well, it it's it's really going to harm students. Agreed. Yeah. Agreed. And that's a big conversation that we are that's why it's still great. That's a big conversation that we're still having as a team because in the grand scheme of 200 plus,000, $5,600 is not that much, but it's not the dollar amount. the the tool and how we implement it and then what supports we have. Agreed. Okay, I'm done. Anything else? I do. I have three. Um I have some
180comments. So some celebrations, right? So what I heard was even though MAP used to have like a report that would say something like kids are ready to be taught X standard or this is an area you can focus in. You're saying that Renaissance or STAR has something similar to that, but what they're doing is providing a lesson to complement the area where they needed focus because there was PD for teachers to look at map reports and break it down during um those data dies. What I'm understanding as a plus is that there's a lesson and so that'll just make it more streamlined. Is that correct? just to clarify. Okay. The other one was um it sounds like you can group the cost was a plus. Um when it sounded like this is to address tier
181two. So meaning like um you know we're not looking at tier three type of interventions with these lessons for supplement because win is typically within the classroom not the pull out kids where you're saying like our reading interventionist and our math interventionist would also be using these. They would all have access to this. Um so usually with tier three we are using a different formalized approach such as foundations or just words. Um however there they do have access to this so it can there this can be additional support around that um and but for math we don't have uh some of our uh home room teachers are providing math intervention at a tier three level and a tier 2 level so they would have that support as well. Okay. And then um the good thing
182is there's tier like plus tier plus would have lessons as well. So that's a that's another big plus for me. The questions were um I know when we've ever worked with like you know a big assessment window. So just a consideration does Renaissance have the capacity for everyone in our district to log in during those windows? That would be my question for them. Are do we have the network and this you know like are we all going to crash on the same day and then we're going to get a bunch of emails about that. Yes. That would be my question because that would be a big frustration I think for teachers. Yeah. Um I can answer that in a short one. We So I talked to Michael. I've even set up um a communication between
183us and Renaissance so that we have a meeting coming up just to talk about all of those tech factors to even get down to like what kind of headphones do you recommend? Like all of those things to make sure that we can support it. Well, you were asking that voice. Yeah. At night. It's 9:30 you guys. I am usually fast asleep. I'm okay. Um, so but yes, so Becky, that is a question that we will ask to make sure that that technical support is there and make sure that we can, you know, we also want to make sure we can run it through Clevver. And so there are a lot of those technical questions behind the scenes that we are looking. The last one was Lexia versus Freckle. So Lexia is a targeted phonics-based intervention.
184It is very much available to kids with IEPs. So I wondered from the perspective of you know using freckle as an alternative would we ever consider keeping Lexia to focus on phonics or do are we suggesting that Freckle will cover the phonics? That's a great question. So we are suggesting that Freckle will uh will cover the phonics but not FCO. The embedded program within it called Lelo is Lexia's competitor and that will co cover that explicit phonics instruction. um that the same way that Lexia does. Um so while Freckle is in all subject areas K8, uh Lelo focuses ex directly on that phonics piece. Would Lelo be u available to kids after school hours. So something that happened with Epic, with Lexia, all of these subscriptions is kids like are cut off, you know, because
185of the extra expense. So they actually don't get to use it after school. Yeah. No, we we would not. I mean, I can't guarantee that it would happen all summer. I don't know when our contract would, you know, with that because we have a rollover and everything, but after hours, yes. Although, I will say this, we will like part of our professional development and reach out to community and students is at some point freckle is like, you're overdoing it, like back it up. So, I think we would have to be very explicitly clear on, yes, here are some lessons you can do at home, but we also don't want kids spending 200 minutes a week doing every freckle lesson they can possibly find. Uh, so we want to strike a nice balance there. All right,
186last call for questions. I have just a couple of they're more than yes or no, but I don't need long answers. Um I'm curious um both if you've begun to think about how you'll assess the uptake on this and whether people are taking advantage of it and to what degree and then also in addition to that like at what point do you think it's meaningful to start to evaluate like is it delivering in the ways that we're hoping that it will. Sure. Um so from a district bird's eye view we can check all usage reports. We can check usage reports as a district at the building all the way down to teacher and student usage. So uh we currently have started that this year where we are tracking usage on Lexia. We are tracking usage
187on Moby Max and some of the other systems that we currently have. So that practice would continue. Um, if we're noticing that there isn't usage and there isn't take up, then we would then that is a conversation to bring back to the team and say like, is this something we want to continue to pay for if no one's using it or is it because they just don't know it's good but they don't know or and so making sure that we've done our due diligence and professional development, making sure that teachers understand the resource, feel like they have access to the resource. So I think a lot of that is making sure uh part of our training idea is that every teacher would be trained in the district by Renaissance but in addition to that we
188would have a smaller group where there are people from each school that are kind of like our expert trainers. So there's someone to go to throughout and within that they will also be making sure that they're like a a point person as far as like here's how to use the resource if you tried this. Um, and that was one reason why we use the MTSS leads, why we talked to them, because they're also our uh group of teachers that are leading the um our benchmark meetings that are talking about the data, that are talking about what interventions are we using, how are we enriching this student. Um, and so making sure that those resources are um explicitly talked about and consistently brought up. And then this question of we think this is the right resource
189for us for all the reasons that you guys discussed which I I wasn't part of it but it all makes great sense to me. How do we assess were we right like is this the right resource for us? I definitely think that the next two years there will it will there will be a lot of feedback sessions. It will be talking to teachers. It will be listening to building principles be visiting BLTs. that we'll be, you know, working together as a core instruction team to hear about um what's going well and what's still challenging. Um I think that those are all of the conversations that we currently have, but they'll be a little bit more amped up talking about this specific this specific system. Um and student outcomes at the end of the day students
190doing well. Say good morning. Promise this is it. But I was just going to ask about um psychologists. So of course you know we use a lot of the map data right now. We use Ames web to be able to identify kids with disabilities. So I'm kind of looking at our team facilitator or UDL coordinators over there. How um how do the psychologists feel about the change? I was only able to talk to a couple of them as I move building to building, but um they're one of their game for right now. They know they're aware that change is going to happen. Um but they did talk about it as well as as a department as well. So I can ask some more about it, but I only have one input right now versus more.
191So I can ask more of the psychologist about it. But that was one of the questions as the UDL coordinator and as a team facilitator during this process. Those were most of my questions as well. Making sure that when students are brought to meeting who are looking for more support, how is this going to benefit them? How are we going to use that data? Because that was very integral to everything. So, and STAR does the same thing that Ames Web does as far as taking those curriculum based measures and graphing them, giving a rate of improvement, showing where they're nationally normed, showing, you know, uh, giving us a target for ambitious growth versus closing the gap growth. So, it will do all of those same things that as web currently does. And I also think
192it'll make it easier for um, any of our any of our support staff to access the data because it's all in one platform right now. Um, map and as web are fairly easy for everyone to access, but Mastery Connect is more difficult to access if you're not the classroom teacher or like a building admin. So, I think it'll just be easier to access in one platform. All right. Thank you guys. Thank you. Thank you. All right. That brings us to one special item. School year 26 annual contract renewals. Um if we can can we um if you have a burning question but if it's something that like a comment or a shout out if we can uh try to limit those as much as possible. I think staff will prefer to go home. I'm going
193to just shut out Michael right now. Get it out of the way while we're waiting. That's it. Or we may really like to answer questions. right into it. Any questions? Okay. Memo was very clear. I just have one question. Are we Is it the same cost as last year or is it new? Like what's the difference? It was about $10,000 more. So 4.4.04%. So And is this locked in even with any issues with tariffs? Yeah, these are all all locked in. So the the first three are annual. They do go every year. The power school one is one that was a multi-year to be able to kind of minimize some of the increases that are there. Um actually I think the J one as well. So J and P school are looking at a multi-year
194but only paid annually. Not that we have to pay three or four years. Okay. Did this go out for bid? Uh they did not uh they've gone through evaluation of are these the tools that we have been using that we like and we continue to use um because they're relatively specific to what we've been using. They wouldn't they have not gone out. Um, I would highlight too, I have a deck on there, but this is kind of a followup to the process that we presented back in I want to say it was February. I can't sit back here. Uh, September, Luis and I came and talked about this process. Sorry. Um, that this is the leading up to the summer. So, this is the first one and next board meeting the uh other departments that
195have renewals will come and present that. This f it's the same timeline that we talked about of of a May with approval in June. Next year we may do it a little bit earlier just to make sure that there's a time that you guys are having all of these cost. So um and then we are tracking this too in a system to make sure when the renewals come up flagged and all that happens throughout the year. So Michael will be asked to vote on this in June June 10th. Uh these ones we're coming back next meeting. Um I don't have I I'm fine really that they can come in the June if we want to put all of them. So then it's not hey we're approving the tech one and then we have core instruction.
196It's fine in June. It'll meet ours if there aren't any issues with it. But they would be separate. I believe there'll be separate motions for each one of the different. Okay. I was just asking because it says action six u 610. So I just wanted to be clear. Lier, was there a reason you put 610? Because the plan was to have a two meeting uh discussion across contracts across our whole um department team and then come forward with those individual motions by department or action in June so that we can meet the deadline for July. And I would say part of this for the court is the assessment today. and they're bringing assessments that how that goes depends on then what are the renewals that would potentially come if they were not move forward with
197that. So okay what was happening? All right. So, uh, quick overview, uh, individual small groupoup transportation. I laid out the process of of what we did with the RFP. Uh, and this is labeled it individual small groupoup transportation. It does serve mainly our Mckin Vento families. um had a number of providers that submitted proposals um and highlighted the difference from our current rate to the one that we're bringing forth as a recommendation of first all um as my like my grandma would say like don't you get suspect when something's too cheap like what is is there some reason why it's so much less it's oneird yeah know there and and as part of the proposals we had two or three proposals that were around that price um around the lower price around the price of
198this. Yeah, I think it's more a matter of that we hadn't looked at this and um we're this is you know we're continuing to to pay a higher rate without looking for the efficiencies. I understand that. But like I mean it's pretty well known that the cost of bus drivers and busing has gone nothing but up, right? Like there's no I I mean unless we were getting totally ripped off. Maybe that's what you're saying. But a lot of these aren't buses though, right? So these are big cars and Yeah. So but getting drivers is really my mom's bus driver and drives a special needs bus and like it's more like individual cuz they're the kids who are either unhoused or some of the kids I'm assuming some of it's also the kids who are going
199to alternate schools. I thought it was mainly beginning. So, do you want to say a little bit about what you did to vet the person? Yeah, so we've done a number of reference checks with companies that were there. Um, the solution, this one and a couple of the other ones are more and they call it like more taxi cab rather than like uh with Lake View and Sunrise, they were their staff, their people. They onboarded, they hired as they came up and as they were needed. Um, this solution and others do work with a number of organizations or other thirdparty companies. on this one specifically, we vetted through that like they bring them on as staff and as employees. They vet them, they train them, they have all of that information and they do work
200to consistent have consistent drivers for each one of the routes and all of that. And again, that was a number of districts we talked to. Uh again, this is being in that scenario with the same kind of questions and what does this look like and have heard very positive things from from districts that have similar numbers of routes and really even more routes than what we have um in this process. So um and and and contracts are written too. If there's issues, we have the opportunity for that. And we've worked with Luise and and honestly, this contract was written to um in collaboration with Robin Schwarz before during a time when Luise was out. Um so we we have that opportunity if there are issues, if they can't meet the needs. Um and we have
201providers that have spoken to as we talk to them if if there are any issues that they're willing to to support us in the future as well. and they do background checks on their drivers annually. Uh they're doing the consistent checks that they have. They meet all of the same like random drug tests, rand like things that would go through that Lake View or Sunrise or any other busing company and they require them to meet those same standards that they would have at that point. So, so just to throw in because you mentioned Lake View. So, originally the current rate we're paying is for our larger bus company, correct? It's for the company to provide so this is a different company that is I I think one of the areas of savings at least in
202my read of this is that this company specializes specifically more in the this pento piece for you know smaller yeah correct is that yeah and they have first has a first student is their bus company but this is an alternative kind of arm to that company out there right y Um, there's something else. Uh, any other questions? All right. So, that brings us to concluded items for remarks. I would just like to welcome Becky to the board. Welcome back. Have no idea what she's saying. All right. Um, another four marks of four assignments, which we'll need to redo them, right? Um, so FAC, FAC meets next week. Thank you. And I put in a fork plug for fact to um fork is really um for the projections really anxious to get some numbers on the
203next to the extent that we get just nail down some numbers for summer the next five summer like summer projects right now just we're waiting for that we just met and uh had a another presentation um about uh like child development um brain science stuff and kind of like a discussion about how to communicate um some of this information to our community. Hi suggested maybe have kind of almost like a task force uh work over the summer to develop some better ways to do like a town hall or community forum um so that we can get some of this information to PB. Yeah, it was good. It's a it's a very supportive excited group. Yeah, I would think that there's a strong interest in turning it into something because right now we have just like
20412 or 15 of us who all kind of agree and get really kind of inspired by the conversation that we're all seeing kids wanting to support adults. Um, but we're not sure what to do with it yet. Um, I realize I have some acronyms myself. Financial Oversight Review Committee, also known as board. Monday, we meet Monday. Next month, we're meeting we're getting projections based on the contract and based on the threats of this administration to withdraw funds from districts, particular ones like ours that might have uh policies that offend them. And it was it's about $4 million that's at risk. Yes. federal for federal funding. Um and Bob Gy also has raised some concerns going around the state about what the impact could be on state funding that then could affect the district. Also um
205CPI is going to come in it looks like lower uh which means we bring in less revenue and um so that has an effect on on things also. So we're going to get projections. We're going to run them by fork then we're going to run them by you guys. Thank you. Intergovernmental liaison report. So IA that was the last meeting and they're meeting again on Saturday. So I have a report for next meeting. Uh I am parent teacher organization council. Um yes PTLC. We had a meeting yesterday and unfortunately I was unable to attend because my son had baseball. But I did write a note um to apologize and that uh to see if we can meet to um get a download of what happened. Um I also asked Colleen if she was there so
206she could tell us what happened as well. So I'll check in with her if she'll have any uh sustainability task force. So the last were you you no you were not at case. Uh so there was a brief meeting of the cross agency group um meaning cross sorry cross-governmental group um starting to look at kind of top level issues. I'll I'll send a note around to folks but it's basically looking at um what is each institution doing? Where are there similarities? Where are there crossovers that will actually benefit sharing information between all of us? Possibly contracts. It's basically trying to take all of our sustainability efforts and bring them into alignment for the whole village, which is a good way of getting this implemented um with the convenience or the I am tired with basically
207um benefiting from from all of us working at the same time if we're if we're getting resources. Thank you. uh collaboration for early childhood. This one I actually pulled up because I'm tired. Um so a reminder that Sunday May 18th uh from 10 to 12 in Rem Park is blast off to kindergarten. So um send all your friends with littles over there so they can get prepared for kindergarten. It has been wellreceived every year so worth a visit. Um, we are also still looking at the IG just so we can um, it's kind of been rolling over for 20 years now. So, we're actually taking a look to see if maybe we need to change some things. There's also an annual meeting on Thursday at the high school. Oh, yeah. And we need um quum
208for that. No, no, I think it's just like a representative too. Okay. If it's direct the tri board, we would need forum. Yeah, there's not a tri board meeting. Sorry. Um I don't know where that's coming from, but I just got an email from collaboration. I don't I I wasn't Oh, that is that is not the tri board meeting. That is not the you have to just like a that is a that is a Yeah, what is it? It's a we it's a it's a come learn about the program as opposed to a tri board serious job. Yes. Do we have representation for that? Um, oh, I I can go. It's because I'm on se I'm on the You want a We But it's a It's a public meeting, right? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. If anyone's
209interested, they are having dinner catered uh at 6:30 and the meeting starts at 7. I can board the information, so just let me know. Can you? Yeah. Thank you. I am teaching. So if we send an email to D97, Becky's Roan email Ken Z. Who knew was on it? Uh OPAC Education Foundation, we have a meeting on Wednesday, which is tomorrow. Yep. Uh Oak Park forest community council. They had a meeting last week, I think, on substance abuse. I was not able to make it, but there's another meeting this Friday, which is their last meeting. Um, and I will get more information. Ed, generally speaking, stuff like that, they put on the the high school website. Um, Ed RD had a meeting in April where they asked uh state representative Michelle Musman to speak. uh
210she mostly talked about um her involvement with HP 1358 which is about creating a task force to review the waiver process. Um interestingly Ed is against it. So what's the address? Um they want waiver of what? Like all waivers. So like the P waver. Yeah. So they um I I missed like why but they're against it. Like IB is against it or is against it. I I didn't. They're like, "Well, we all know why." And I was like, "I don't know why." Um, so I can find out more if you're interested. Um, well, if it's coupled with all the money that it costs to do all the things that we all need that we I think it sounded like um maybe people are okay with the way the labor process has been working and they
211don't want a task force to come in and do XYZ. Um, and especially the way Michelle Hosman was speaking, it doubted like she was like against the PE waiverss and was talking about how PE leads to a greater laugh at that. Um, and so, but it was interesting because as soon as she got off the call, they were kind of critical about what she's supporting. So, I thought it was interesting. Um, the other uh thing was there's two other bills they've been talking a lot about. One is um SP 1519 which is looking at I didn't of course I didn't write it down but there were two amendments they talked about recently which is um talking about with SRO's which if you have an SRO schools all already have that so that was a little
212confusing um and also looking at provisions I think it's looking at like student behavior um and not applying to some of that outside school hours. So, oh, I'm sorry. I'm sorry. It was about ticketing by police. Um, and, uh, they're trying to curtail some of what's going on. And so, there's been clarification about what it data sharing and all of that. So, I feel like those are a lot of things we've already talked about as a district, but they're they're different. They're newer in some other districts. Um, and then finally, again, we're ahead of the curve. Uh, SP 2427 is a requirement for districts to have a cell phone ban policy. So, there's just been a lot of discussion about like having exclusions for students who need it for IEP purposes or English language learners
213or medical reasons. Um, and so, uh, their districts need to start working on I mean, it hasn't technically passed yet, but it's probably going to. Um, and so districts will need to work on this policy. Lastly, I apologize. I have to revisit the the collaboration for early childhood because I realize that I am actually the only one who has volunteered to go to man on Thursday. So I need someone to take one of those things like I can I I can't be both places at the same time for man or collaboration. You get a dinner with collaboration to learn about small children or go to a man PTO meeting. What time is the man meeting? Uh 6:30. I can do man. You can do ma'am. Yeah. Thank you, Gavin. That was easy. All right. Uh,
214look forward agenda proposal items preview for May 27th. Uh, we have SY25 a amended budget hearing, superintendent overview, district transformation goal area updates, social science curriculum recommendation discussion and action, SY25 amended budget presentation discussion. uh the annual audit services uh which we're taking action on 610 uh annual contract renewals action 610 and then IGA water meter data collection we discussed did we discuss that already yeah it was a previous meeting you just can't discuss it too much okay uh and then we talked about the indivi well there'll be action on that and then action on the individual and small group transportation contract which Michael discussed Okay, we have one quick ad about the approval of the assessor recommendation at the 10th time. We're going to ask for action at the next meeting. Okay. What was
215it? The assessment action on the assessment. Um, so I will say that the I think that when you guys are looking at the agenda, thinking about the social science curriculum and the budget, usually two financial things before we do teaching learning. I'm not saying we should reverse it, but just because a different um group of our community sometimes tends to be more interested in budget. Um and I I think that that um I think that this this particular time that conversation is particularly important. So, um, just being aware of what administration and when we're talking about cuts and we have are structuring it when we're talking with Fork and the financial team and Nancy weighed in because of her involvement in negotiations. We we just we're not trying to be alarmist, but we do need
216to give worst case scenarios based on kind of the actions this administration's willing to take with cutting funding. So I do think that one is it's really important and um we might not know for six months or a year like what what really is going to happen. So I would just highlight that one as I don't know more important than normal. Usually our budget conversation is a little bit quicker. I don't I you know I think we should be prepared. Now that's a good flag. And when we u meet for the agenda setting, we'll be sure to like see where can um highlight that and maybe if there are things that we can shorten, we can be proactive in doing that as well. Thank you for that flag. Holly, can I ask um on that
217topic? um accepting that the rule of law doesn't mean what it used to these days. Um do we have or have have we gotten access to like analyses of the degree to which the administration has discretion to um zero out the budget versus whether it would need to happen through legislative action? It needs to happen through legis. He's not following the rule of law. So I don't know. You're saying that any change to educational funding that the administration might make has to be legis I think it's all all monies and budgets are supposed to go through Congress. Yeah. Let's say and well I can tell you that often times Congress gives discretion to agencies in terms of how they allocate it. So the question is is the money that's currently allocated to states for education
218to what degree does discretion lie with the president versus the the authorizing legislation says you got to do it for xy and z. So the way we I I don't know if anyone knows the answer to that we certainly have but what we are preparing and the discussion we're having is you could do a thousand scenarios right of all different increments of how much is cut and how much is not. So, we're trying to identify um nothing cut, the most likely cuts based on the things we're hearing um and um everything cut, right? So, kind of three different scenarios. Yeah. And talk about it that way. Um because you know they they've implied maybe they're not going to take away lunch, right? So, right behind all the right, but there are also a number of
219instances where they've taken away funding and then there's been a lawsuit and they give it back is what I'm trying to get. Yeah. So, we're going to we're looking at um no cut midlevel like a midpoint um yeah brought up a couple like good points on that and then like um a full cut and trying to do three different scenarios which will take longer than when we talk about one scenario. Yeah. And I would just imagine there are groups that are doing this kind of I'm not saying like we need to do it as D97. I just imagine those analyses are out in the world somewhere and it might be useful to get them. Yeah. I was going to say I think it's really hard because of the lawsuits and then like you said he
220said he was going to take away um early childhood preschool. Then he said no I'm not going to do that. We had our budget meeting today at work and we're just kind of like it's a lot of unknowns but we're going to be conservative and just plan for worst case scenario. So I think that's probably what's in our best interest and hopefully it doesn't come to that. Um I think another complicating factor is you talked about the executive orders and then uh like the you know congressional appropriation process and you mentioned the agencies. So it's also the dubious nature of like the agency that the US Department of Education. So, it's just another Yeah, I don't want to belabor it. I will just say that in my own professional life, there are a number of
221buckets of money that are being threatened to be taken taken away. And one of the things we're doing is looking at to what extent does the administration have the authority to deliver on that threat. They may try to do it anyway, but it's a anyway. So just to throw in on this one last little belaboring the point. Um part of this is also there's a whole big impact to state budget that we don't know about that could then impact state funding as well. So by kind of offering a zeroed out version for federal that takes into account I mean worst case scenario is we zero out that and do and we are going to go we're going that we're going that dark. We're going no no and I think that's important. I'm just trying to
222get it. If there's a 0% chance of a zeroed out scenario, then there may be other more instructive scenarios, too. Right. And that makes sense. But it's kind of a looking at worst case, best case, and then somewhere in between. If we're prepared for both, we're good. Yeah. I I don't want to belabor it. I'm just saying worst case may not necessarily be zero. Worst case may be something other than zero. We Yes, we are. And we're going to have a range. So, we look forward to that presentation. Can I get a motion