001School Corporation Board of Trustees regular school board meeting February 13th 2023 please rise and join me for the pledge of allegiance. I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands one nation under God indivisible with liberty and justice for all. Please join me for a moment of silence. Communications. Bronzeburg Education Foundation report. Mrs. Dixon. Thank you. The rally for our kids gala is scheduled for Friday, March 10th at 6 o'clock. There are only five tables remaining, so if you're interested, you can get reservations online through the BEF website or at the BEF office. The graduate walk brick special begins tomorrow through March 17th. You can order a graduate walk brick for $10 off the regular price of a current student brick. They must be
002ordered by March 17th to be placed in the ground by graduation. BF will announce once again be hosting pioneer camp this summer for two different weeks June 12th through the 15th and the 19th through the 22nd from 9 to 2 at the log cabin homestead property all Exiting third fourth and fifth grade students are invited to attend and registration will open soon visit the BF website to register and BF is excited to announce the the office staff will be expanding to include a development director role and Information can be found also on the BF website Operations Update, Mr. Boyd. Just have a real short presentation this evening. I'm sure this is the much-awaited annual report on use of facilities. not so much okay get that so this is this is the same information we presented
003last year updated for this past year we went back to 2019 last year because we needed to get before covet and as you can see the number of activities are continuing to build even beyond our pre-covered usage these are all the total community non-brownsburg schools events in our district in 2022 we had 6459 and a total of 2086 events The split between those things in the calendar that are Brownsburg school events, whether it's sports or performing arts or other meetings, and those that are in the calendar that are community-based is about one-third, two-thirds, probably a little bit less of a split, maybe like 60-40. But you can tell the number of events that are going on inside of our buildings throughout the school year is continuing to grow. And so this is something we're actually
004working on, how to better support these events, especially on weekends and after hours. Just thought that might be interesting information for you to be aware of. Happy to answer any questions. Any questions? Tax communication, Mr. Hacker. Very good. Thank you. So Mrs. Murphy and I have been working on... the um mailer to kind of go home for really to communicate celebrate and also provide support on some of the things that are going on here at brownsburg schools and so that related to property tax and so we are be sending something out to all bcsc community members something about this size just give reference and i'm going to show you the draft of this today it's about 6 by 11 card where our goal is again to to communicate some information about property taxes celebrate some
005some good things are going on here and and also offer some support which i'll get to on on the on the back side here but what you'll see is a graph here very it seems a little complicated but it but it does once i explain i think it'll it'll make a lot more sense here but notice the um the school tax rate is in the blue and you'll see that this is from 2012. which is the last time that the school corporation tax rate saw an increase. So 2011 to 2012 it went up and from 2012 and all the way down to 2023 we have seen a tax rate for the school rate drop. And so that just you see that steady decline there. That is laid over top of the purple which is the
006BCSC enrollment. And so as you can see And it's on a little bit different scale. The purple scale is over here on the right, starting at 6250, 7500, 8750, and 10,000. And so that's what those purple bars represent. And so from 2012, we're just under 7500 or so students, all the way up to most recently, we have surpassed the 10,000 student mark. And so I think our February 1 count is officially 10,025, a big mark for us. And again, that is students in K-12. That does not include our preschool. We have over 10,000 students that include the preschool number of this the first time in the BCSC history where we've eclipsed 10,000 in our current K-12 enrollment. What might be interesting here is the median home price. So Vicki worked with MIBOR, and we also
007got some other information from DLGF. where you'll see that the median home price in Brownsburg, just under $170,000 back in 2012, and all the way to, this is real number here, just about $354,000, I believe is what that number is. And then we've talked to some realtors what that projected number will be for 2023, since obviously we're just starting 23. We're expecting another 4% to 5% increase, according to some local realtors and information on MIBOR. But just the correlation between as enrollment has increased and home prices have increased, but we're still able to lower the tax rate, be fiscal responsible, especially to compete with those growing enrollment numbers. We've had to open in that time Lincoln Elementary. We've had to open in that time, again, we opened Crossroads Elementary. They have the new transportation center.
008We have the construction going on at West Middle School and such. And so, again, dealing with the capacity of a growing enrollment. But still able to lower that tax rate is a very big celebration for us. So that's the celebration. The communication, again, just talk about what is assessed value because oftentimes we hear back some feedback that the school is causing my taxes to go up. And so while our school rate is a part of the overall tax rate that property owners will pay, assessed value of your home is really one of the main reasons why the tax rate, or maybe what you're paying more in property taxes in Brownsburg is the true reason. Other celebrations here, again, as what I just shared there, 11 consecutive years of a tax rate decrease. We highlight in
009February 2023 that we will reaffirm that from the 2016 that's on the schedule for tonight, the 10-year tax pledge to guarantee not to raise the school tax rate for Brownsburg residents. Again, I hope that's on the board later this evening. And again, that we are fourth out of six schools in the county on tax rate. And again, that necessarily is, if you go to the budget presentation in July, we talk a lot about that. That isn't apples to apples. That has a lot to do with your tax base. amount of commercial properties versus residential, some different things there. But again, happy to celebrate that for Brownsburg schools. And this will go out to every community member. On the back side, you'll see that the information on assessed valuation. And so the Indiana assessed valuation growth
010is listed in the green. Brownsburg AV is in the purple. And then just for comparison, the average annual change is kind of that black line, that dashed line there. And so, as you can see, assessed value in Brownsburg has outpaced the state. Again, probably has to do with a lot of information related to the schools, with the community and things that are going on here. But something that will be a significant increase for all property owners and property taxes come this spring is the significant jump in assessed valuation in 23. As you can see, not only did the state rise, but Brownsburg rose quite a bit, 17%. And again, the reason for this is to celebrate but also communicate and also offer support. And so while this might be to our detriment, if more folks
011take advantage of tax breaks as far as revenue, we want to be a positive community member and support and ensure that those who may not know that the over 65 tax credit or circuit breaker credit and deductions for those over 65 who might meet certain... assessed valuation of their home. There's a limit there also how much they make. But just want to make sure that our community is aware of potential solutions and ways to lower the amount of property taxes they may have to pay, again, due to the increase in assessed valuation. And a quick example, this is from somebody who lives here in Brownsburg, a friend of mine who didn't mind sharing their information. And so this... We will get this on, I think tax bills will come out first week of April with
012a due date of May 10th for the spring. And then fall will be November 13th because I believe that November 10th is on a weekend. And so, but this is from 21 to 22. And so while again, we don't have the 2023 to understand what that total increase might be. What you'll find here, and this is a little bit why we receive, I think, some negative feedback on the school corporation, is that when we look at the tax rate from 2021 for the school rate here specifically, it was $1.4700. That was then dropped to $1.4635 in 2022. Also, then I want to take your attention to the assessment of the homestead property. It turned $78,800, $293,800 from one year to the next. And because of the assessed valuation and the total tax liability that this
013property owner needs to pay, again, as with tax caps, you'll see they went from paying $2,788 to $2,938 on the property tax. And even though that our property tax went down, you'll notice the percent difference. It looks like that maybe the school was a reason for that 6.07% of that increase, when in fact that is due to the assessment of the property multiplied by the school tax rate and what they pay from 21 to 22, specifically the school tax rate, has gone up by 6.07%. And so, again, I think this is just communication. Make sure that everyone's on the same page. Celebrate our tax rate drop over the last 11 years and also... the communication on the assessed valuation that might be increasing causing some more additional dollars in property taxes and so again this
014is a draft this might adjust a little bit once we send it to the um the printer and uh get it all mailed out but excited to do so and probably we'll do that around the beginning of spring break or just before spring break before tax property bills hit so again happy to answer any questions that you might have at this time questions okay sure i'd be happy to to talk to you after after this one yep sure Sure, absolutely. Thank you. Second reading of policies 1,000 and 2,000, Dr. Snap. This is our second reading of the policies that were presented in January. And third reading, they will be up in March for approval. If you have any questions or need to follow up on those otherwise, OK. First reading of policies 4,000 and 5,000,
015Dr. Jethro. Thanks. This is the first reading of the 4000s and 5000s. These take the place of the 2000s and 5000s from NEOLA. And so this is the first reading. As Dr. Snapp shared, this is a three-month process. So we'll do first reading next month. There'll be second reading. And then April will be third reading and then asking for approval at that time. First reading of student handbooks, Dr. Jessa. So it is that time of year that we provide information about the handbooks. All of this information is for all of the handbooks, the high school handbook, the middle school handbook, the elementary handbook, the high school athletics handbook, the middle school athletics handbook, BECC, Alpha, Harris. Those are all of them. So there really aren't very many significant changes this year. We, of course, update
016the dates every year. Then there are some small things. So, for instance, at the elementary, the lost and found, we donate the items that are not picked up every quarter. So that's a change this year that we have in them. Beyond that, we have a small change to the drug testing policy. is how we communicate with parents that information so it used to have to be a phone call or a letter but we're also using email now so this is the first reading this is slightly different than the policies this has two readings with approval after the second one so we'll come back next month asking for approval thank you any questions um so actually we have been at one for since covid and it has gone well um and it just it's more instructional
017time that we have questions redistricting update after Jessup okay so I wanted to share with you some information about redistricting we have had a few questions that have come up repeatedly so this is kind of a myth buster that I'm going to give to you So the first one is that Highland Spring is the only neighborhood to be split as a result of the redistricting. There are actually five neighborhoods that have been split in the last two redistricting efforts. So Lake Ridge is still split from the last redistricting. Claremont Heights is still split from the last redistricting. Branches, so we had the Eagle part of branches, will now go to West. So even though that neighborhood did not get split this time, there are ramifications of the feeder pattern change that we sent the Eagle
018students are going to west. So that was one. Highland Springs, the west side of Highland Springs will now go to east and everything else including Highland Green will go to west. And then Claremont Lakes. because it's a West District, because it's an Eagle District, will now be going to West. So those are, it sounds like there was just the one, but there are actually more than that because of the feeder pattern change, as well as the things that were changed when we opened Lincoln Elementary. Moving from there. Highland Springs was redistricted to balance elementary high ability classes. That actually was an option. It was not one of the options that the committee chose to do. So actually this option that we presented to you and you approved does not balance high ability numbers. Another one
019was that Highland Springs saved a bus route. If we think back to the early presentations, what saved us bus routes was the aligning of the Northern District. The change with Highland Springs actually did not save us a bus route. It was the northern areas that did. So last thing, really just giving you other updates about redistricting. Of the 6,100 letters that were mailed, here's what we learned. 83 had bad addresses. That means the letters were returned to us by the Postal Service or parents indicated on those forms that they had moved. So we are now in the process of requesting proof of residency from all of those 83 bad addresses. So it could be that a family moved from one home in Brownsburg to a different home in Brownsburg. At which point we'll determine which
020elementary they go to it could be that families moved from Brownsburg to a home outside of Brownsburg and then we have some different things that we would do with that We have 64 students that are going to withdraw at the end of the year We have 21 students who utilize fifth grade rights if you'll recall Parents are able to keep they are going to be fifth grader at their current elementary school as long as they provide transportation The same is true for going to be eighth graders, and we had 50 students who will utilize eighth grade rights. That turned out to be, I think the split was 23-27, so it really is almost going to be just a swap of those kids not going to their home school now, just staying where they were. And
021then... Here are some steps that are going to happen as a result of new students. All students moving to new schools will receive an email from their new school, they're from their principal, and this will really tell them any events that are happening this spring that they're welcome to attend. So if there's a school carnival or an art show or things like that, the new families can go and join those. Additionally, we're going to do new student tours on May 1st at the elementary level and the date for the middle school We are waiting on that right now because we need to look at all of our activity calendars at the middle school But those will also happen at the middle school and that's all I have Okay comments from patrons and just a reminder
022we have three minutes and please state your name and address upon approaching Garen Carnes you say it was two or three All right, thanks. Garen Carnes, 9550 Edgewater Court, Brownsburg. Just a few different things. I saw the survey that went out for the new 2023-24 calendar. And then I was just curious if the results will be given on the survey when that comes up. Basically just bumping the start of school back a day and adding one to Thanksgiving. I was curious if we anticipate continuing to do that into the future. Just personally, hopefully this will be the last time we'll keep backing the beginning of school up. It's just one day, but just overall it just kind of feels like just schedule creep with balanced calendar keeps happening. I know teachers love it, plenty of
023people love it, but I'm old school. I like summer break. It's nice to have kids at home when it's warm out. So just my thought there. A different question was just when it comes to posting agendas, I just don't know the answer to this. What is the policy or what is typical for when an agenda is posted and then when it would be final? Can we typically expect it just the Sunday before, the Friday before, morning of, if there is a policy for that or if there is a standard for that? And then let's see. One more thing. The three minutes is, I guess, quickly. Is that a change? OK, cool. Well, very good. I appreciate that. I thought two was very quick last time I was here for that. So that's something I'd like
024to see. But overall, I'd just like to welcome the new board up here. Anything that can be done to keep the public as apprised of. Any issues the better and I just Seeing some of the numbers of the students now that were cracking 10,000 is crazy, but cool to see It's great to see the Crossroads Elementary coming up quickly I happen to be in a run group with the new principal there So I know he's very excited to open that up and it's just great to see how the community is coming together But anyhow appreciate the time and have a good evening. Thank you Eric Knight Thank you, Eric Knight 63 56 barley Drive Brownsburg I just expressing concern I'd heard that the diversity equity and inclusion Position might be coming back. Just one of
025those parents. I strongly Oppose that and so that's all I wanted to come, you know Relate to you guys. Thank you David Wyatt Good evening, David Wyant, PO Box 513, Browsewood, Indiana. I have to go to the past to get to the future here. On November 17, 2022, you had multiple incidents and responses at the high school. In December, I asked a question, what practices and procedures were updated and changed as a result? That question went unanswered in December. I was not able to be here in January. That brings us here to today. There are no consent item details in the packet and formally the prior multiple administrations provided that information. The DEI position, if in fact it's going to be repopulated or restaffed, I'd like to understand the justification. What the purpose for that
026headcount is I'd like to know what the criteria is to use for success When the merit increase comes along for that individual I'd also like to know how it how one can become a member of the select committee for that individual because the last time that headcount was populated staff went out to the multiple members of the community and asked for help in selecting that candidate I'd like to be considered as I'm sure other members of the community were for how that headcount is selected if in fact it is I have also asked for a when the redistricting when the redistricting occurred I asked for a summary of that event and I was led to believe it was too complex well here this evening we've received a partial summary of that something that we can
027communicate to the public at large as to what has transpired. If you can please do so. I also noted that I've asked for the presentation materials to be included in the packet. Materials that you saw this evening were not in tonight's packet. So to Garen's question, not only when will that be published, but why is that packet incomplete? I also want to thank Ms. Dixon and welcome her to the board. And I went over and talked to Tracy here just a minute. If members, you can ensure that your mic is on and you would lean into your mic so that you can be heard. You can't hear folks out here. You can't hear you. And that's part of this participation thing is that we hear you and you hear us. You can clearly hear me
028without a microphone, but some of you don't have that blessing or curse. And thank you all for your time this evening. Thank you. Tiffany Dearman. Hello. Tiffany Dearman. My address is on the sheet. I'd rather not like. broadcast it. So I had a couple of questions, no surprise, I always have questions. My first question was Dr. Snap, will you be recommending to the board in the near future for a director of student learning or any other position that would include the responsibilities of the DEI coordinator? I don't know if you're going to answer that right now, but that's a question. Don't know if that's an accurate piece of information that we've heard or if it is not. but it would be great to have clarification on that tonight. If so, I would ask what problem
029are we trying to solve? You have stated on more than one occasion within the last 60 days and prior to that that you were not expecting to make a recommendation to refill that position, so I would assume that that meant you didn't see a need for it. What has occurred in our educational environment to cause such an about shift would be my question It's no secret that I do not support the DEI initiatives I think they do the exact opposite of what they profess to do I do think that based on teacher feedback some of the teacher feedback we did experience some of that with mrs. Webb in her role And that it create can create division and cause our students to look through things through the lens of race and Also would like to
030suggest that could possibly the board consider that this money which I believe for mrs. Webb was about a hundred and seven thousand or so in salary be used to add more teacher aides or teaching assistants for those teachers who Have to deal with a lot of behavioral issues in their classes and it's or maybe I shouldn't say a lot but regular That's destructive or disruptive to the learning of other students or just teachers who are overwhelmed and kind of have to use the same lesson style with every student regardless of where they are in their learning ability? Could we give our teachers back some more time by having assistance? Could we get maybe even three part-time positions out of that as opposed to adding more administrative layer to our schools? I feel like this could
031actually help give our teachers the ability to practice more compassion and empathy and understanding with their students even culturally. and also be a better way to pursue unity in our school community and educational excellence. Thank you. Thank you, Mrs. Zierman. Rob Kendall. Rob Kendall, Brownsburg. I just want to start by thanking the board and the administration for the presentation earlier by Mr. Hacker, which showed that tax reform and putting taxpayers first works. Your own presentation, which I thought was very good, showed after two major events. the town passing a large tax cut in 2012 and the school corporation after the failed referendum making a deal with pro-taxpayer advocates in the community to not seek a referendum. We have seen massive growth in assessed value in this community. So for that the board should be commended.
032I know the taxpayer pledge is on the agenda tonight I hope that passes again and I hope the the chart that I know gets sent out to the community is Continued proof to this board and to this administration that when people feel comfortable that their taxes are not going to be raised They're willing to invest in this community not just as home assessed value which we saw but also businesses one of the reasons we are seeing massive commercial growth in this community is the reliable pledge by the school corporation that there will not be referendums. So I want to thank the board for holding up their end of the bargain on that for the past six years. I want to thank Dr. Snapp and the board at the time for negotiating that deal and I
033hope the results have proven themselves which was what was said at the time that people will invest in this community if they feel comfortable that their taxes are not going to be raised. I know, speaking of Dr. Snapp, that he did meet with some parents earlier this year. I believe Dr. Friji was in that meeting as well. I believe at the time he was asked about the DEI officer. I believe he said to those parents that he did not see a need for that to come back. I know, according to different posts from people on social media, that Board Member Heffernan, when she was running for re-election, said she also did not see a need for the DEI officer to come back. so if we could get some clarification on if indeed the director of
034student learning will have dei responsibilities and if so what has changed from the comments not so long ago thank you thank you consent items dr snack thank you you have in front of you the approval of the minutes Please note the January 9th executive session did not take place, but we just approved the minutes, so we'll have that we did not meet. So we have a permanent record of that. And then also the 23rd meetings, claims, and superintendent's report asked for approval at this time. Do we have a motion? Second. Any questions? All those in favor, signify by saying aye. Aye. All those opposed, same sign. Motion passes. There is no old business. We'll move on to new business. Recommendation to approve construction contracts, Mr. Boyd. All right. This evening, we are recommending 18 different
035contracts that are resulting from 21 different bid packages and four basic projects. All of these were bid in compliance with the Indiana Public Works statutes. Nineteen of these packages are actually equipment only, no labor, and they were bid in advance to reduce the impact of continued supply chain issues that we've been seeing on our current projects. The two full projects that include both material and labor are the re-roof of this building, ECC and Stadium Drive. as well as the roof of the slope portions of Eagle Elementary School. We do anticipate bringing additional bids on these equipment-only projects to an upcoming board meeting. There's a group that come in in March, and there's several others that extend all the way out to June. As required, all the consultants associated with each of the projects have reviewed
036the bids and provided the recommendations being provided this evening. As a result of that review, the bid of S15 was found to be nonresponsive and has been removed from further consideration. All bids recommended this evening are the lowest responsible and responsive bidder, and I'm happy to answer any questions on the bids that are being presented tonight. Any questions? Like the ones that say there are no bids received, what is that? Right. So on one of the packages, bid package number nine for the automatic transfer switch. We verified that actually the bidder for bid package eight, emergency generators, Buckeye Power Sales, had included that inside their bid. So that one's taken care of. It's included inside the bid package number eight. The other two have to do with switchboards and panel boards, and we're working with
037our consultants and our attorneys as to how we can bring that back on, probably purchasing directly from the manufacturer, since we have publicly bid this and we receive no bids. um our actually our council has advised that we can start to use some different methods that are not normally used for public works projects any other questions to the motion so move second any other questions all in favor signify by saying aye aye opposed same sign motion passes thank you a recommendation to approve new social studies adoption for 2324 dr jessup Thank you. As you may recall, last year we adopted social studies materials K through 12. The Department of Education made a change to requirements within sixth grade where we have to teach a civics unit every year to our sixth grade students. The materials
038that we had did not meet that need because we didn't know we needed to meet that need until it came forward. So we're recommending the approval of We the People, the Citizen of the Constitution. which is something that our teachers have gone through as well as we had, I believe we offered 10 hours for parents to come in and review those materials. So ask for approval at this time. Do we have a motion? So moved. Second? Second. Any questions? In those 10 hours, how many people showed up? I believe the number of people who showed up was less than 10. I have a question. Once the next adoption cycle, sorry. Once the next adoption cycle takes place that will be incorporated in the content that is adopted. Hopefully I would tell you it is highly
039unlikely that it will be when textbook companies make textbooks they make them primarily for the big states and they make some small changes for Indiana because we are a small state compared to the Texas Texas and California adoptions so it is Possible that they will include a civics unit, but if not, then this these are materials and the way we're purchasing these is so that they are Continual use they're not books that are going to be consumed They're gonna be books that we're gonna be able to continue to use All those in favor signify signify by saying aye Oppose same sign motion passes recommendation to waive makeup day for snow day on January 25th 2023 doctors now This would make it like an old-fashioned snow day where you didn't have to make it up. So
040because of our performance and our instructional day longer than is required by the state of Indiana, we can waive instructional days. And so requesting that we do not make up January the 25th as a snow day and all the things that are tied with that through HR and those things for the people that worked and didn't work, et cetera. I'm going to approve. Do we have a motion? So moved. Second. Seconded. Any questions? All those in favor signify by saying aye. Aye. Opposed, same sign. Motion passes. Recommendation to change 23-24 school calendar, Dr. Snap. So it's about this time every year that we approve the calendar, not for the upcoming school year, but in advance. So the 23-24 school year calendar has been approved. I will note that this summer is a week longer. We
041had a patron that likes those long summers, longer summers, so it's a week longer. So we did poll all of our parents and ask them a question and staff. 87% of the staff and 80% of the parents responding said that they would prefer that students come back on Wednesday instead of Thursday. So that first student day would be a day earlier and then have the Wednesday off before Thanksgiving break. So we're just basically trading a day there. Since this calendar has already been approved, we need to adjust this calendar for the upcoming school year. And then when we're ready to propose the calendar for the 24-25 school year, we'll embed that change in that calendar. for the original approval, but request approval based on the survey data from our staff and parents. Do we have
042a motion? So moved. Do we have a second? Second. Any questions? All those in favor signify by saying aye. Aye. Opposed, same sign. Motion passes. Board Affirmation of Tax Rate Pledge. Dr. Snap. Thank you. Mr. Hacker and Mrs. Murphy did a great job of putting that mailer out to parents. There is also currently in the House legislation that would reduce the tax burden to taxpayers over the next, one version is four years, one version is two years, dropping it to 90, one is dropping it to, excuse me, 90%, one is dropping to 95% of the 1% that we pay. We understand that because assessed value has grown that people are going to be paying more in taxes and so part of our responsibility is to communicate to them about it and also also draw attention
043to those particularly those patrons over 65 that there are some avenues for them to pursue but in all of that we also want to continue that affirmation of the tax rate pledge that was taken in 2016. we have a couple new board members since we took that pledge and want to give them the opportunity to affirm the pledge that was taken then. So request affirmation of the tax rate pledge. So moved. Second. Any questions? So this is just affirming it from reaffirming the people that are on it from 2016 to 2026. That's correct. All those in favor signify by saying aye. Aye. Opposed, same sign. Motion passes. Superintendent comments. First of all, I'd like to remind everyone and point out we'll be getting more information out about the digital parenting on March the 1st. Mrs.
044Murphy will be communicating that through all school newsletters and those things. I think it's important. If I had a young child on social media, had a phone, period, I'd want to go and take a look at that. They do a nice job. In addition, we're going to begin to also talk about some new information, which is unfortunate, but kind of a threat matrix. about how we respond to those things a lot of comments about that and so begin to share that with our parents once again that presentation if parents cannot make it will be available they're talking about some online live options that night and mrs murphy will be getting out more information as that date approaches so wanted to do that and while we don't typically have a history of addressing uh patron comments
045because sometimes we need to go out and seek some information some of these were a little bit straightforward and so we can provide some information and happy to provide some follow-up and I'll do the best I can. I did mention that we did back up the calendar a week this year, so a day, and we do anticipate that that will be recommended in the 24-25 calendar. Minutes have to be approved, or excuse me, agenda has to be approved 20 or 48 business hours before the meeting. That's standard state law on open door. And you can thank the state legislator who intervened and said that all comments should be a minimum of three minutes and so we went along with the state legislature after that. There were a number of comments about the coordinator of diversity,
046equity, and inclusion that was approved a few years ago. The board's policy currently is that they need to approve a position and then approve the person. So that position was approved and is still on the books. It is not my intent to recommend someone for the position of diversity, equity, and inclusion. I will say that that is really embedded in many of our jobs today, including mine as superintendent, that we need to make sure that we are addressing our population as it changes in Brownsburg. 2010 when I arrived there were 7,200 students in the school. You saw tonight we're well over 10,000. Our free and reduced population then was one out of five students. Today it's one out of three students. And when you looked at our diversity then we were under 20%. Now Brownsburg
047is of the seven counties surrounding Marion County. Brownsburg has, and all the school districts in those seven counties, Brownsburg is the second most diverse school corporation. with over 35% of our students being students of color. And so when you begin to look at those things, including the number of special ed students, the number of ELL students, we had a window earlier this year where we enrolled 150 students. In a few week period of those 150 students that we enrolled, 50 of those students came to us without English as their primary language. And so the data shows that our community is rapidly changing. And if we're going to do the very best for our kids to educate them, we need to make sure that we're prepared to do that. There is a lot of misnomers about
048positions and those things that it's a position of indoctrination, a position to make white people feel bad about being white, to feel guilty for being white, to see everything through a lens. That is absolutely not true. Not anything that I would tolerate as a Brownsburg graduate and the superintendent of schools. That's not what we're about. And so I'm sorry for that misinformation that's out there that's, I think, quite honestly put out to divide. but not unify. So to hear that we will not be recommending, or I will not be recommending to the board a person for diversity, equity, and inclusion. However, that work is still important. And even in the absence of that person in this past year, we continued professional development because we thought it was important for our students and staff. We are
049looking seriously at adding a position of director of student learning to close achievement gaps that includes students of poverty students and with different language barriers students with special needs and all those things will be included in that area i think it's important to note a comment was made additional layer of administration As I mentioned, 7,200 students in 2010, over 10,000 now. The administrative team in the central office is 25% less in 2023 than it was in 2010. 25% fewer administrators in the central office with enrollment growth of over 2,800 people. And so when you look at those things in the central office and the needs of our students, that has certainly grown. So I think that that's important. I think I've addressed many of the questions. I think we did have a number on board
050packets and those things, the request of Mr. Wyant about what should be in the board packet, what's not. We've certainly worked and added more things when those materials were available, and I meet with him periodically and happy to continue to work through those things. At some point in time, some things will be included. Some things are accessible online, and some things are just not in there, if not for any other reason, they can be asked for. It's just... just, I think, a preference of what has been done in the past and what seems to be reasonable for us. But I think in pretty short order, I'm looking here to make sure I didn't miss anyone's questions the best possible. But that's where we're at and appreciate the board's time. Thank you. Thank you. Board member
051comments? This is Dixon. I want to thank Dr. Jessup and her office specifically. I had a number of parents reach out regarding redistricting, and the common response was, follow-up was, that your office and you specifically were very quick to respond. And even if people didn't necessarily get the answers that they wanted, they felt like they were given the opportunity for complete understanding. That's a huge undertaking, and I think it speaks to the professionalism of... your team and speaks well of us as a district overall so thank you for that thank you mr dixon mr wells i just want to echo what mrs dixon said uh thank you dr jessup for the presentation and letting everybody know the information as always thank you for the patron comments um this evening dr freaky as always thank you
052for all that i always speak on the southern harbor Thank you for all the people who spoke today. It is never easy to get out there and appreciate all comments, positive or not. And any comments that you ever feel that you need to do, just do it. I mean, that's what we're here for, to help you get your voices heard. Mr. Hilton. No comments this evening. Just thank everyone who came out and spoke. Thank you for working on the tax announcement. I think that will really help the community. And that's all I have to say. Do I have a motion for adjournment? So moved. Second. I have a second. Same sign? Motion passes. We're adjourned.