North Adams School Board Meeting - April 2025

001To 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. Okay. All right. We'll go ahead. Any public comment on the agenda items? Okay, hearing none, we will move on to the consensus items. Um, don't really have anything in particular to go over. um do want to wish the Millers good luck in their new endeavor, have a new opportunity in Northern Indiana and are sad to see them leave and I think they're sad to leave too, but it's a great opportunity for the family and wishing the best. They've got great employees. Good luck to them and their two kids. Okay, any additional questions? Oh, I guess I should say Justin Hornswaggle this tiny system. It's been fun so

002far. Like I said, he has some mad recruitment skills. Thought he'd start an elementary running club and at count of what are we at 150? Oh, wow. Well, that that finished a couple weeks ago, but we we saw about 80. No, we saw about 90 kids and we consistently had about 80 elementary school. Perfect. Awesome. That's good. Careful what you ask for. Great. I'll make a motion to approve the consent. Have a motion on the table by WY to approve the consensus items as presented. Second. Second by Dave. Motion on the table by WY, seconded by Dave to approve this consensus items as presented. All those in favor announce by saying I. I. Opposition. Stand six to zero. On to the program update. Is that me? Yeah, that's you. Welcome. Well, I don't really have

003a whole lot. Um, just kind of talk about athletics a little bit. Um, still learning the ropes. Um, the good thing is is I I the ship wasn't a broken ship, so Dale had had a welloiled uh machine and um so just kind of following his lead for right now and kind of getting my feet under myself and learning the ropes and then make any adjustments that I feel like I need to make uh at that point in time. So, um really just kind of wanted to talk a little bit about our participation. I so I did ADM clear back in in August. Uh what Kim put out it was about 615 students. I don't know where we're at right now, but of those 615 students, there were 262 boys athletic spots um and 205

004girls athletic spots. Um with 11 boys sports, nine girl sports um just because there was no girls wrestling this year. of that um 78% of our boys are multiport athletes, 74% of our girls are multiport athletes. So, our kids are super busy. Um super super super busy. Um which is awesome. Um we love to see um they just they keep themselves busy year round. Um and that that um well it's it makes it's good to keep them out of trouble and two um it keeps them physically fit, healthy, and something uh to strive for. So with that, um I feel like um in a in an area where we need to get better athletically is our uh nutrition. They eat like high school kids, uh McDonald's and Taco Bell and all of that kind of

005stuff, which I think we all did. Um but I really think it's important that um they they understand um what they should be eating and what they should be putting in their body. Not that they shouldn't go out and eat some of that stuff on on a fun night or whatever, but I do think they need to understand fitness and nutrition. So, um that's one thing that I really want to uh focus on and I want to help them understand and get something put into place to help our athletes. And two, um strength and conditioning. Um really, uh we we're we're kind of behind a little bit on that. Um, everybody in our conference has a strength and conditioning coach. Not their PE, not their not their PE teacher, not not their um their coaches,

006but it is actual a coach that does strength and conditioning. Not that we can afford that at this point in time, but what can we do to put something into place um to fill that gap or try and try and narrow um some of some of the areas where they're they're ahead of us and where we can still be competitive in a conference that I think we could be competitive in. We are competitive in and almost every sport. Um, so, um, you know, I I think if we can focus on the nutrition, focus on being more specific with our with our training and with our weightlifting and where we need to get strength, um, where we need to understand our our physical conditions, um, I think that will help us continue to be successful and

007then potentially some of those areas where we're not quite as successful, maybe we can start to close that gap a little bit. Um, so those are the things that I'm I'm working on. I talked to Mrs. Hyatt about potentially talking with um there's a gentleman at the hospital who um focuses in physiology, strength and conditioning, nutrition. Um I just want to sit down with him and start to spitball on ideas and things that we can do. Um you know, whether that's coming on board with AMH or whether that's he just um volunteering some things. I'm not sure yet, but I'll sit down with him and a couple of our coaches and again just kind of spitball and and see what we can't come up with to help our athletes out. And I'll certainly share that

008with Mrs. Hyatt and um she'll let you know where we're at with things and what direction we're going to go from there. So, um that's kind of my focus right now. Um and then again, just getting through the spring. Um fall was crazy, winter not too bad, spring is crazy. Um, and then the only other thing that I wanted to do is I just wanted to make sure financially uh I was where I needed to be. So I went back I could go back three years and find uh Dale's the finances that he he had whether it's our expenditures or whether it's our receipts and just kind of see where where I am at right now as compared to where he was at uh in March, April um the two years that I had and

009we're we're pretty pretty close to that. So athletically we're okay. um financially, you know, need to sell tickets so we can get some more money. Um but um I think we're doing okay. This year I I offered to our student athletes um a very reduced season pass. So if they paid 25 bucks, they got a season pass for the for the entire year. um trying to be a little bit more creative for next year to see if I can't um extend that or potentially even get some donations so that every every student for sure high school um could get a all sport pass just given to them so we can get some people there, get some people at the events um continue to bring in a crowd. So just trying to be creative in in

010those those areas. Um, but other than that, so we're sitting pretty good financially or at least okay financially and an area of strength and conditioning and fitness and nutrition is the direction I'm going right now. Questions you have for me? What's your target date to have that announced on the sports passes? Not sure. I don't have a target date yet. I would like to know by 1 of July. um if I can if I can have some donations um where I don't have to have um students pay for it, I'd love to have it before that, but I haven't given that a whole lot more thought than I'd like to find some donations to bring in. So that's about it right now. I I mean I like that idea to have the students the all

011sport pass so that you know builds more spirit within the school you know being there for all the different events and everything else like that. So, I love that idea. One less um excuse for not going. You know, they don't they have that pass. They can get right on in. So, yeah. And I think it helped this year. I think we had some some um some student sections that were pretty good. Yeah. Um all year long so far. So, yeah. So, is there a call out date for the boys volleyball um for next year? Like when that's kind of set for Well, they played they played last night. They did. Yeah. So yeah, next season. Uh yes, they played last night. They played normal. They got beat in three sets, but it was close. 25,

01217, 18, 19ish somewhere in there. Uh first home matches tomorrow. Tomorrow and Thursday are our first two home matches. So I have to see how many 17 was was the 16 or 17 was the official number of boys that were there. all of the which play a secondary sport except for one. Um didn't have a secondary sport. So yeah, it was a pretty good turnout and I didn't go last night. I listened to it on the radio, but obviously be there tomorrow night to see see how things go. Cool. One thing you and I have also talked about and I know you've already done in at least one sport and Justin's kind of trying to get opportunities for our younger kids to participate in something. Yeah. and especially middle school, upper elementary. Yeah. So, um,

013for baseball, I can talk that. Um, I I started a quote unquote middle school baseball team this year, which consists I was going to do seventh and eighth grade. Um, but I wasn't sure what numbers were going to look like. So, uh, the few sixth graders that did ask if they could join, sure, come on in. The more the marrier at this point in time. So, uh, last count we had 34 kids that were playing middle school baseball, which is more than what we have in the high school program. So awesome. Um just getting them some experience, getting getting them on the field, getting them um used to what the high school coaches are going to what they're going to be like, what we're going to do. Actually, we brought them in and practiced with

014us during the winter during our open gym. So we would have open gym in the evening around 7:00 and those middle school kids got to come in and be around the high school kids one to to see how we do this and two they got to interact with the high school kids and start learning some drills and those kinds of things and obviously Justin did a f fantastic job with with the running club at the elementary but um yeah those are all those are all areas where I think it's super important. Pton's doing a great job with basketball. So is Andy. Um, I think all around we're we're doing um a relatively decent job making sure that we're getting our youth an opportunity to at least be involved in in several things. And I think

015it's important just because we come from so many schools all into one. Um sometimes uh you know in the past they may have been playing together for the first time as their as freshmen and that makes it pretty difficult to be successful. So, trying to build that out and um create more opportunities. Um I'd like to do a middle school baseball team, a middle school softball team. Um you know, and and continue to get all of those those kids opportunities to to be involved. So, yeah. Yeah. So, is your role gravitate gravitating towards middle school, too, then? Because I know like Tim kind doesn't matter oversee middle school athletics. So, Okay. I don't know. They is kind of working. You're working together. We're starting. Yes. I just did the middle school baseball because baseball is

016my thing. So, um, and I wanted to to to build a program and and have people come in knowing what I was expecting of them. So, that's that's kind of how that happened. I was going to say I think it's awesome to work together like that, though, because then that encourages the kids in at the age level they've already have a they had so much fun. the the the middle school kids, I think, were a little little intimidated the first time they came in, but the high school kids loved it. And by the time we were done, um we did so we did December, January, and February, and they were interacting, they were talking, they were in groups together, they were it was it was great. It was it was a lot of fun. So,

017what about as you work on the strengthening conditioning? I know your focus is high school age, but could we start as that broadens? um maybe open the opportunity to some of our middle school age kids and so forth. So it kind of pulls them in so then that they're already getting that mindset and for sure. Yeah, I would I think I would start with nutrition. I think we got to start with nutrition with all of them first. But yeah, I would love to see that trickle down to our element or to our middle school and be a part of that. Absolutely. Um yeah, there's there's obviously some big opportunities and things that we could do. Um yeah, some of our schools in our conference, for example, um their football programs, they will bus their middle

018school kids to the high school in the morning and do a a football education time and start lifting with them in middle school already. So that's it's big. It's big. So we're trying to get to that point, trying to to move that needle a little bit. So yeah, Nick and I have had some great conversations about different things that we can do football. I mean, that's always the elephant in the room, but we've we've had a lot of good conversations and he's putting some things into place um come this fall, actually this summer when they have some of their summer workouts. Um, so you know, it not saying that we're going to win seven games, not going to say we're going to win a game, but you know, the point is is to con to

019move it in the right direction. You know, score some touchdowns or be competitive. Um, that's that's a long ways to go, but we're we're working on it. Positive reinforcement, we can continue to have those going to speak volumes for that. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Thanks, Aaron. Thank you. Thank you. Okay, so we have no old business. Next up is new business. First item is approval of resolution to determine need for a project. So lots of people are on spring break or on vacation this week, so we might have some missing entities and I'll filled in. Um so this is um pursuant to Indiana code 61.120 and before any school corporation can enter into a lease bond or issue bonds for construction renovation of a school building um that exceeds our debt limit we have to have

020two public meetings which we've done and um the next we are doing is a resolution for determining the need. Um I've kind of gone over this with you a little bit. I wanted to go over it a little bit more explicitly since we've met had our bids and kind of refined what we were doing. So, um, for the building project 2025, these are the items in the in the pictures you see or in the blueprints you see that are shaded in red. These are in our notes. Um, so a lot of this renovation is not anything real fun and glamorous. It's plumbing for the most part. Um, so the first area is in the high school under BE Hall, which those of you who were former students knew it as the science wing, I think

021back in the day. It's a special education wing right now. Um, there's a lot of cast iron pipe pipe and again that pipe is failing, whether it's flaking or just disintegrating. And so we really need to get it replaced before we have complete failure or start having a lot more clogging issues. Um, luckily most of that is accessible from the tunnel under that area. So, we're not going to have a lot of things that are going to be problematic um as far as classrooms go and things like that. And most of that should be done in the summer anyway. Um while we're there, there are two gang restrooms. One on one side's the girls, the other side's the boys. We will be replacing a lot of that plumbing, updating all the partitions, floor, new paint,

022ceilings, lights, um fixtures. Um, while we're going through that area, we're also going to be the other piece in the high school is in the new storage area of one of the newer dining rooms from the last big renovation. The cast iron pipe starts there and goes to the outside of the storage area of the um shop. So unfortunately we are going to have to take up part of the floor that we had put down in the last renovate not the big renovation back in 2017 2018 in the project lead the way room all that con or cast iron pipes under there luckily it's um carpet on one epoxy on the other in the lab part. Um, but that does not have a tunnel under it. So, that's going to be trenching and so that'll

023be a mess, but a relatively enclosed space. Um, then if you look also in the high school, there is cast iron pipe that goes under the auxiliary gym, locker rooms, offices, and storage area. Also goes under the stairs to the upper wrestling room. um they are going to try to insert a smaller diameter pipe into what goes under the stairs because we're not going to rip out the stairs and and take care of that piece. And then we will be in the rest in the locker rooms will be most of that trenching. And then outside the auxiliary gym door there between the old a room greenhouse and the auxiliary gym there will be some cast iron pipe that is going out there to where it ties into the main um that'll get replaced. So again,

024we've been having a lot more issues there. That's a good thing to get done. Um I've been reassured that the work we just did in the auxiliary gym on redoing the floor and the aesthetics should not be disturbed. Um so they're going to do a lot of things about putting down paper, getting some fans with filters on them to try to minimize the dust, but Aaron, you're going to have to probably have a plan for a lot of dust mopping in there before anyone gets on that floor. Um, so that we're going to try to get started on if everything goes through maybe slightly at the very end of school because we can move the folks that are using those locker rooms somewhere else for that time. Um, let's see. Next thing is the big

025one that's going to be probably the most time consuming and kind of critical is in the elementary middle school is what we call the related arts hallway. The RAZ hallway. It's at the end of the connector where music, art, and the shop are. There are no tunnels there. So, many parts of those rooms, um, especially on the north side, the element, the art and music rooms are going to be taken down to dirt to get to all the plumbing that's going to have to be replaced. Now, the good part of that is those areas didn't really get touched in the big renovation a few years ago, and we just kind of made those areas work. So, we're going to renovate those areas while we're in there. Make the elementary art room. We're going to really

026reorganize it because it was still kind of set up as a homecck room, fax family and consumer science room. Going to make it more accessible. Add a restroom for the littles. Um, new casework. Um, Kenzie Wilson's middle school art room still has one of the old accordion walls in between it and what had been the the second middle school art when we had two teachers. They're going to make that a permanent wall, capture the back half of that second art room for storage and prep work and give her some real case work because she just had kind of standalone case work in there. Um the front half is going to be for OTP work and then our school site who's here a lot will have a small conference room to meet with parents and test

027kids and things like that. Um Jackie Morris or Jackie Sanderson, excuse me, is going to get um some new case work too and redo part of her bathroom that was in there. Joel Boucher's area is a total part of the south end. There's just going to be a little trench work that's going to go into the actual shop area, the storage, and the office. So, his classroom will largely be left alone, but most of that's just going to be having to move things for them to do a trench work. And luckily, most of that is concrete, so it can just be patched. And then a lot down the middle of the hallway. So, that area is getting a lot done. And then that gang restroom there um is getting same thing as the high school

028where we we're touching it. All the plumbing is getting replaced, new fixtures, partitions, floor, ceiling, lights. Um, and since the plumbing goes up through the ceiling to get into the game restrooms at the second floor of the middle school is going to go ahead while we're in there and do the upstairs restrooms to replace that plumbing and then do the same updates. Um, that's mostly it for what is going to be the 2025. Again, we are approving the lease bond for kind of two different projects. Um the 2027 lease bond is shown in yellow. So you see a big line of yellow down the main corridor that's in the now elementary special ed and preschool hallway and goes down to the activity center. Um, we had already replaced part of that, I think fall of

02923, maybe two years ago, when some of that cast iron pipe got past being used in the special ed hallway. And we did from the middle of the special ed hallway to the exterior. Well, now we have to do all the way from there down to the activity center. Um, but we'll be able to get rid of some of the mild carpeting in there and that will be replaced with what's been in the rest of the building after we get that trenched out. Um, another part are the north locker rooms in the middle school gym. Um, same thing. Again, we're going to be kind of downsizing there. Kids don't take showers like they used to, especially in middle school gym and middle school athletics. So, we're going to trade some of that, get some of

030those showers out, make some storage space at a detriment. Um, but upgrade the other fixtures, um, stools and sinks and things like that. Um, let's see. in the high schools. I don't have a yellow picture for this. It'll be the lower C and upper D restrooms will get a facelift and some new things. We need to repair the sink and clay traps in our art rooms because they do get used so much and it gets slow running a lot of times. Um, we do have some areas that we're looking at for some wall repairs and reinforcement. We're still having some issues we're finding with some uh basically of the brick of face pulling away from the original block from the building because expansion joints now aren't working for what they were back in the 60s

031when it was originally built. So, there's some work they've identified in um a couple places on the pool and main gym and auditorium. Um electrical is another big area we're going to start seeing a lot of re of improvements. Not really improvements, just general maintenance. Some things just have to be replaced after so many years of life. So, we're doing some electrical panel replacement in the pool and other original parts of the high school, updates, some electrical wiring and conduit and areas that we're starting to see that could be a problem. Um, and then some work just repairing the floor, upgrading some finishes in the pool and pool locker rooms. Um, and certainly some of the plumbing there needs upgraded. So that is the scope over the two different the 2025 and then the 2027.

032Luckily with most of this I'm not saying there aren't other things but this as far as the facility plan goes takes care of the vast majority of all the highest priority and high priority. So the two critical categories largely will be addressed with these. still going to have some HVAC controls we'll need to get done and then our always roofing and brick tuck pointing. But this is the main renovation maintenance critical replacement things that they identified will be accomplished through those. So the next section Kim Yeah, but he's not here. Okay, but I'll do it. Okay. Um I think you did stifle is not here tonight or I and but you had already heard previously about how that was going to be financed. It is a lease bond. Again we are not increasing any tax

033rate. Our debt service tax we're remaining at um4449 cents. That's our whole strategy is to maintain our tax rate is neutral. Um, I'm glad we did this because while I didn't see anything on the new legislative um information about lease bonds, there were things about geo bonds. So, lease bonds probably aren't too far away as far as only being able to do them every other year. They did lower I know the threshold for having to do a referendum from 80 cents to 70 cents. that we're still more than safe um at the tax rate we have, but they're they're tapping on the door a little. Yes. Yes. That's why I was I'm definitely glad we can get the highest and most critical things that we need to get repaired and renovated done before maybe other

034things might happen. Okay. Mr. Ainssworth, could you please summarize the resolution determining the need for the projects? Well, this next resolution is a resolution determining need for each of the projects. Resolution establishes need for the project pursuant to Indiana code requirements. Okay. Is there a motion and a second to adopt the resolution determining need for the projects? Motion to adopt it. Motion by Joel. I'll second. Seconded by Jill. Uh any discussion, questions or comments? All those in favor announcement by saying I I oppose. Same sign. Approve 7 to zero. Next up is the consideration for the resolution approval form of lease agreement. So again, this is one of those that I think was really a lot of the information has been provided previously. Um, this is broken down into two sections. Again, we're remaining tax

035neutral. Um, it is a lease bond and so as you see later in our agenda, because it's a lease bond, that means that the amount we're asking to bond is over our max debt limit. Um, and that's why we have to have a building corporation, which is a legal loophole for where they re they want schools to be able to bond over that because your max debt limits pretty minimal, honestly. So, you have to use a not for-profit building corporation that you appoint to actually take on the debt and then you basically pay the mortgage for them. It's that's convoluted. It's a lot of red tape. Um, but again, that's it's a lease bond, not a geo bond. So, lease bonds are a little more complicated. Okay. Scott, do you have anything else? Um, no,

036but I've reviewed this lease. It's it's compliant. It's virtually identical to every lease we've ever signed on a bond issue since I've been here. So, there's nothing to fear. They've worked before and they're going to work again. Okay. Um, can you summarize the resolution approving the form of lease agreements? Yeah, just it's a resolution which approves the form and it provides the preliminary terms of the lease agreement. As I indicated, they're not any different than the one we did four years ago, 5 years ago, last time we did bond issue. Okay. Literally same people, everything. Okay. Is there a motion and a second to adopt the resolution approving form of lease agreement? I'll make a motion to motion by WY. Is there a second? Second. Seconded by Darlene. Uh any questions, comments, discussion. All in

037favor announce I oppose. Same sign. Approved. 7 to zero. Next up is the approval of the resolution reapproving the North Adams Renovation Building Corporation. So, like I explained a moment ago, because with this type of bond, we exceed our maximum debt limit statutoily, we have to use this, they call it a loophole in the law that still allows school districts to borrow money that's more than this minimum amount or maximum amount, I guess I should say. And so Scott lots of times works with the individuals, often their former superintendent or community members who again are nonforprofit. What' you say? I said two out of three. Two out of three. True. Um and we still direct all of it. They'll end up meeting electing officers. They'll probably appoint Beth to be their representative that they'll filter

038all the business and financial things through so that we're not giving we still do all the work, but it's the loophole that it has to go through a pass through basically in order to do it. So Scott can probably explain it better than I. I think you pretty much defined it. We have to have an entity. In the old days, we formed a new entity every time we had a bond issue. Now they've backed off and we continue to use this. We we used this one to build the middle school. So it's been around a while. It was actually formed by the financing people at that time. In fact, today I just refiled the renewal of it with the Secretary of State. So it's good to go. But that's all it is. It's an entity

039that will own the ground where the construction's going to be. We got a piece of ground it's going to own. And Then it leases it back to the school with a lease that just basically is as you indicated a mortgage. You're sort of buying it back and when you get down to zero gets deed back to the school and what we're using is collateral. It's collateral. Yeah. For Yeah. Because the school can't really give collap but they can sell something. That's what they're selling it to the corporation. It seems extremely backward. It is. It it it really is a solution that probably could have been more easily handled if you just change the rules about the debt limit. But as it was, they said to create a fiction to go around the debt limit that

040they created and done all across the state. Yeah. Everybody that's build a building isn't one of these. Yeah. Okay. Can I have a motion and a second to approve the North Adams Renovation Building Corporation Board and officers? I'll make that motion. Motion by WY. A second. A second by Dave. Any questions, comments, discussion? All in favor by saying I. I. Oppose. Same sign. Approve seven to zero. Um, let's see. So we are up to the approval of the 2526 IDE Indian workforce development course titles course numbers curricular costs to the district. So this has been a this is always a lengthy process. Um it's been a little lengthier this year and I'm not going to tell you that we won't be coming back and having another discussion with you based on recent conversations with the

041legislature. But for now, Tiffany and Beth have worked long hours in going through every single course request, um, course titles from the DOE and from the DWD for CTE. Um, so basically what they're asking you to do is to approve course titles as are listed right now from the IDOE 202526 course title and description handbook as well as the DWD for CTE classes. Um and then the curricular fees for those courses that we have had requests made from teachers. They have made an effort to try to minimize as much as we can. Now I can tell you this is we talk about this a little more was going to talk about a little more house bill 101 where I had told you a few weeks ago they had added the curricular fee reimbursement numbers into

042the foundation grant. So it was going to become just built into your per pupil funding and that's what inflated what they were budgeting for schools. So look like most people were getting a one to 2% raise raise or increase in revenue. Um once it was pointed out to all the legislators that some of this has been artificially inflated because something that had been re a reimbursement amount from a standalone fund line basically from the state had been grouped into our state revenue based on student numbers. um they didn't like that because then the numbers started coming out that if you deduct that curricular fee reimbursement, many schools, including us, we're actually losing money um from previous years. And at the same time, they were wanting us to increase first year teacher salaries pretty significantly. Um

043looking at potentially loss of e- rate federally, turf percent went up. um health care or health medical plans are going up. Um so they realize that's that's not a good optic I think and so I do think there is an appetite for them to remove that. We have not been given a lot of guidance, but one of the things that we're hearing is after investigating the curricular fees argument, they feel that schools may have taken their intention and went too far with not charging anything curricularly for parents. What we're hearing is they feel there still are things parents can be charged a fee for. potentially renting a computer, consumable items that their child's going to use and it's not going to be able to be passed on. They are now saying, "Yeah, a textbook that

044you're going to hold in the in the district for six to 10 years, whatever the case may be, you don't need to charge for that." But things a kid are going to use or rent that should be fine. We still haven't gotten any guidance on this change of of thought. Um, but anyway, so that we can start ordering materials and so that they're here when school starts, we want to go ahead and approve what we have, maybe coming to you later after the legislative session settles and guidance comes out from the DOE and say we do want to differentiate between what you're seeing is what it's going to cost in total per student for these courses. We may be coming back and asking to charge some things to the families if you so see fit

045to try to help our education fund a little bit. Still not going to be anything like it once was. Um but that's what we're hearing. The other possible concern too with it being an education fund is that it could be interpreted that that's uh teacher bargain money too. Oh yeah. And that would really be a problem. Yes, I think they're starting to understand that. Although I think the bigger Yes, that is another whole discussion. But it's too early to know. It is. Even though we only have what two weeks left, less than a week. April 29th. Yeah. Still early. Just like that report you do the night before. It is. Just saying. So, long story short, you're probably going to hear about this again, but at least right now, we are approving how much it

046would cost to for a student to take a course. Who ends up paying for it might still be up for a discussion at a later date, but right now, this is the cost per student per course. Okay. All right. Um, any questions, comments, or a motion to approve the 2526 Ideally Indian course development course titles, course numbers, and curricular costs for the district. I'll make the motion. Motion by Michelle. Is there a second? I'll second it. Second by Wy. Motion by Michelle, second by WY. All those in favor announce by saying I. I. I. Oppose. Same sign. Approve. 7 to 0. The next step is the approval of the Adams Health Network Mutual aid agreement. So I also provided you today just a printed version of an update. Um but one of the things in

047there that I'll go ahead and talk about here is um we have been working a lot more closely with Adam's Health Network in this last year. um they have been extremely supportive to us in a variety of situations and um we actually now have started meeting um every couple months just to try to go over um things we're seeing with student health um and wellness. Um certainly they have been an entity that I had not really had a lot of information here before about our crisis emergency plan. So, we've been working with them in the last month on integrating them. And next May or not next May, this coming May, um early in May when we meet again, we're bringing in fire and police so that all those players at the table can discuss their

048agency's individual um I guess what they need to accomplish for each other and for the school. Should we have a crisis event here? Um and AMH has already done a lot with crisis management for their organization. So, it's great to talk to them, too. Um, they've been again just uh very helpful. When we had the flu epidemic here a few weeks ago and one of our nurses became ill, um they actually sent a nurse over for two weeks and um let them man one of the clinics because it was just really we were sending 30 and 40 kids home a day at that time. um they have helped with a contract um to their therapy department to take over for one of our SLPs on maternity leave so that they can um still do all

049the testing we need to get done and do the case conferences for those folks which again it's that's a big ask but they were more than happy to help provide that. So, another thing that they've talked with us about as we've been talking about the number of kids that we're seeing in our elementary clinic in particular is um and again they're bringing all their doctors that are in their different work their different heads of their different departments in and um so they're talking about well we could do try to make flu shot vac um immunizations for example more readily available so we could come in during back to school night or whatever because less kids who get sick less often from the flu or not as badly are going to be gone less. Um, then

050this brought up the whole point of the measles. Um, and that was not a great conversation because it whacked so much of COVID. Um, but again talking about being prepared for we could have a measles outbreak in our area. um that Allen County has already had one documented case and with um some of our unvaccinated population having a higher percentage than others and then we also have will be seeing here really soon our agriculture worker influx um who are largely unvaccinated as well. They are very concerned um as community health organization about we will have a large percentage of unvaccinated folks and so we could have a really high rate of infection really quickly. Um, and so they just want to be prepared. So we're starting those conversations too. We're auditing our our kiddos who

051may not have had the measles and rebella vaccination and just providing information to folks how you can get that if you wish. Of course, it's not a requirement, but also trying to provide more information um for everyone because again, even folks in my generation, you really didn't see anyone with measles. You didn't hear about it a whole lot. I guess in 2020 it was considered eradicated by the CDC. Now it's not. And so many of us, many folks may have chosen not to get a vaccination because it wasn't present. And so just making sure that they have education opportunities on what might happen should you contractive to your child, how to protect yourself. Um but then we'll also have to bring um have to make some decisions about so if we would have a positive

052case what does that mean for those folks who are unvaccinated potentially um they shared a lot of facts like even folks who only had one dose of the measles mumps and rebella are probably still 80 85% assured of not contracting at least a severe case of the measles or being or getting it at all. Um so continuity of education is going to come up again if we would start having um a spike in the measles and what would we do for students who either were ill or were unvaccinated and how would we provide continuity of education for them and again our job is to provide education. We're an educational platform just education make an educated decision for each family whatever is right for them and try to provide opportunity and access. Um, so we're working

053with the hospital on that too. Right now for this vote though, that was a long explanation. when they when we started meeting they realized that they had had anou with North Adams some years ago that's probably more than expired to if they had a crisis event at their campus or at Woodrest campus um and needed to evacuate staff andor patients um we would be potentially a site but certainly um with our bus fleet provide transportation and so this is just an updatedou I guess of what was well before my time here that basically allows us to do that and deals with indignification and things like that liability. And that's not uncommon for areas to have obviously with mass casualty world and the ever growing mass casualty world. I'll make a motion to approve that. Okay,

054perfect motion. Is there a second? I'll second motion by WY, seconded by Jill to approve the Adams Health Network uhou as presented. All those in favor announce by saying I. I oppose. Same sign approved. 7 to zero. Next up is the approval of the IDOE office of special education behavior grant. So, this was an opportunity that came up a few months ago and we are always trying to improve our services in the world of mental health, behavior, special education. Um, I think a lot of schools across the state, across the nation really, are seeing a spike in students who have um more significant or more frequent behavioral needs and supports. And so, um, the state did put out a grant. It they didn't really give us a lot of guidance on how much or or

055what, um, but we decided to go ahead and put in for it. Um, we didn't get all that we had requested, but pretty close. So, I think we have about $32,000 in a grant. It's not for personnel. Um, most of ours was about trying to grow capacity in house of staff and students. Um and so one of the things that is an evidence-based program is why try it helps um number one we pay for training for staff to deliver it largely K12 um it's to build resiliency regulation recognizing your own emotions and using strategies to um appropriately express those emotions as opposed to a meltdown angry withdrawing shutting down, whatever that case may be. Um, but again, it's it's really designed for resiliency and for those kids that lots of times just aren't motivated or

056don't feel like there's a reason to try. Hence, why try? Why do you want to why do you want to even make the effort? Um, we also there's an organization psipy.com that has a lot of online courses for different mental health and behavioral health. Um, you can get certificates for it. It's not like you're going you're not going to have a degree in anything, but it's growing capacity of our current staff to be able to address or have more information on how to address different um mental health conditions or behavioral health conditions. So, we have a lot of kids who may present with having experienced a great deal of trauma. Anxiety is something we're seeing more and more and more be diagnosed with kids with lots of different presentations. um sensory processing needs, autism spectrum

057disorder, a dHD, ADD, OD, anger, depression, all those things are more and more kids are presenting with different levels of it. So again, just trying to give more staff who um in different parts of the district who have some of these, I guess, capacities to understand some of these disorders or conditions better and be able to provide feedback, suggestion, at least maybe even provide sometimes it's just growing empathy to explain the why behind some behaviors. Um, so that's mostly what our um that our monies are going to be used for our PD curriculum and um well that's it really PD and curriculum. It all kind of falls under those two things. I think a lot of placement facilities actually use the white programming so they can get it here rather than there. Y beneficial especially

058since there's such a demand in Yeah, there is. And it's easy to give up when you don't have hope or you don't find hope. So, it's trying to give them a reason to keep plugging away and equipping those teachers is going to give them more confidence in how to help and maybe have a little more stamina and trying to get that out of those students. So, I think it's really cool. Good. I'll make a motion to approve. All right. Motion by Jill. Is there a second? I'll second. Okay. Motion by Jill, seconded by Joel to approve the um sorry I got lost in my journey here the IDO Office of Special Education Behavior Grant. All those in favor announcement saying I I oppose same sign. Approve 7 to zero. Next up we've got first reading

059of several policies. I apologize because I know it was probably you do have a packet of them at your table if that's helpful. So, I am, as I said in my notes, behind on policy work. So, we're going to be seeing a lot of these just trying to get caught up. And unfortunately, probably some of these are going to be changed again after the legislature comes to their final stopping point. But so, this time around, again, we don't vote on any of these. It's just a first reading. This is your time to discuss, ask questions, um ask me to do more research or bring other options to the table. So, the first batch we have are part of our bylaws. Um, they start with 0142. This one deals all things board member for the most

060part. So, it has some changes to how board members may be elected. I think the last time this was updated, we were still appointing board members, so this has changed it to an election. Um, and the different things that might happen to be able to be eligible to run, which again, none of them are really big surprises. Um and then um most of that one just deals with eligibility, what you can and can't do to be eligible. Then um one of the subsets of that is 042.1. It just is a very small change on um adding the word elected as opposed to appointed. 0142.2 a few changes on the oath. Most of it there is just actually putting the oath in the actual policy, giving the board permission to add a few more things if

061they would wish to do that on their own. Um, then there's the addition that you might be needed to take other oaths to be required for different transactions. I don't know that that's ever been here. Are you aware of any other addition? Like that's never that was a recommended addition from Niola. Um then 042.3 is if someone would vacate their position midterm or um what would we do in order to have to appoint um or fill that? This is the one that if the partisan um board legislation goes through, that one will have some pretty big changes because there will be pieces there that um if someone marks a political affiliation, then the actual political party of that county or district has the responsibility of filling the position and the local school system would not

062have any say. Wow. So, that's scary. That should be off. Yeah. And then the final one is just again statement about potential board compensation. And I realize there's some formatting things in here. When you're doing this in board docs and you have anything that has outline [Music] or like Roman numerals or A's or numbering, whenever you start deleting things, it when it gets to the final version, it'll get fixed. but it's off right now. Um, so basically it's the maximum of $2,000 per year. Um, and then the opportunity as a board to have a perdam amount for any official board action. This board in our January meeting voted not to have the PDM, but it just puts it as the option in the policy as every January. We can reconsider that. And then the final

063one in that group is 014.2 two and it's board member ethics mostly shoulds to sh which is a lot of these board recommendations. The only thing that's really new is um they do include a section here about board member relationships with students and needing to maintain a professional appropriate boundaries with them and what happens if that would not happen. Again, it's a different world we live in, unfortunately. But this is just to make sure that board members are held to a similar um or the same expectation as anyone else that works with or around kids or for kids. Is MySpace still a thing? Probably not. I don't think so. This was a copy and paste from there. I might remove MySpace just because I don't think it is. Maybe if they were going back in

064the day. Any questions on that batch right now? Of course, if you do have any further questions that you didn't think about tonight as you look at it again, just email me or call me. Okay, the next batch is 0164 and some supporting themes in bylaws. So 0164 is a new policy and it pretty much it's not really new. It just puts together everything about notice of meetings, notice of regular board meetings, notice of executive session, notice of special board meetings, notice of emergency board meetings. These all used to be very spec, very individual for each of those headings. Had their own little sub policy and now they're putting them all together. So, I don't think there was really anything too exciting or um surprising there. The next one is um 0165. This is about

065the actual meetings. What are they? What meetings do you have to um abide by open door law, which is virtually all of them? Um it defines what a meeting is and for your sake as board members, you might want to review that what it isn't. Those things you can have chance gatherings and things that aren't about official board action. You're fine. Um, I did have one thing that I didn't highlight in yellow. If you look under regular meetings where it has a little brack two little brackets, I meant to have that checked, but I would recommend that we keep that as part of this um policy that if we would need to change a meeting time for whatever reason, um that um we can do that as long as you're all in agreement and we

066provide the appropriate notification. I don't know what the case may be. Maybe there was a severe weather situation. Maybe I don't know. Maybe somebody was going to a regional M. I don't know that something that we wanted to support the kids in. Who knows what the case may be. Um maybe there's no power here. I don't know. Um but that we might need to change the meeting date. It's nothing that we're probably going to do often, if ever, but it's nice to have the option in policy to do that. Um, same thing, emergency meetings, special meetings. It defines what those are. Um, it adds a lot of things under emergency meetings, which I'm sure are postco if there was a declass a disaster um state of disaster emergency declared by the governor or our local

067county or city that it gives the opportunity to have special meetings. For example, let's say there had been a tornado here and some of the building had been damaged or something and we needed a board meeting to make some decisions on what we were going to do, what we needed to purchase, what we needed to do. That's a real life situation. J County just went through that. It is. Um, absolutely. So, it gives us the opportunity to do a lot of things quickly under a state of emergency if that's what would be needed. Um, let's see. location of meetings. it talks about um and then another one again this is postco is member participation in meetings through electronic means and we've talked about this was a board back when co was going through but I

068think they have refined and revised this some um so it talks about state legislation says um in order to take action you need to have at least 50% of the board physically present and then it gives a lot of parameters on if someone is attending virtually how often they can do that um in order for them to vote they still have to be able to be physically seen and heard. So, it would have to have audio and video um presence for them. And then in yellow, there are two options there. I suggested option one. Again, it's more we have to have at least um half or more folks physically present for any vote to be able to be taken. So, that means no more than three um could ever be virtual at any one time.

069Um or the other option is I guess you could do both if you wanted to that you would limit the number of virtual presentations a a board member could have in a year with the other qualifiers on there with the has you have to you can't do more than two in a row. You have to be physically present in between any set of two virtual. I think it kind of takes care of itself as my personal opinion. Um, so my recommendation was option one and leave option two, but that's up to you. Um, and again, it goes through some things about I think there's more leniency on virtual participation when there is a state of disaster because more people may not even physically be able to get anywhere or we might not be able to

070convene everyone together. Um, excuse me. Then the last one I you needed some input on is the amount of time if we were going to have someone need to appear virtually, the amount of heads up that we would need to do that. Um, my suggestion was 24 hours. That's be reasonable unless it is an emergency situation. But um Justin would have to do some special things to to get a board member present and make sure that the Facebook live stream could still see them, take their input, those things. Um so that's that one. And then the third one in that section 167.3 is public participation. Again, we've talked about this during CO. There really aren't a whole lot of changes um to what we had talked about previously, just a few revisions to the legislation

071that's happened postco. Um one of them that we're already aware of that basically public comment has to be permitted on a topic before any final action is on that topic if someone which is why we have public comment at the beginning on any um agenda items so that somebody can do that. Um, and then again, we didn't put any definite time limits. The previous board, um, members of the board didn't really want there to be a specific time limit because Stacy, as right now, the president does have a lot of authority to make a decision to limit someone. They can't repeat the same things that have already been stated. They can't speak again until everyone who is here to speak on a certain topic has already spoken once. if they become if someone would become

072irate obscene inappropriate, disruptive, she can stop that um discussion at that point as well. So that had been the previous board's thoughts on public participation if that's still your thoughts. That's kind of what I left in there. Um and then it has a special section which has always been in there. I just added um it has to be approved. any special request to add in a topic to the agenda can happen from the board or anyone else, but that it needs to be um approved needs to be received by the superintendent and the board president and it can only be placed on the agenda if both have approved that agenda item. And then of course we've had recent legislation about electronic recording of board meetings and that's when does that officially go into place? Is

073that June? July. July. Um everything has to be digitally viewable, recorded and archived um for future reference. As far as board meetings go, which we've already been doing, so it's not going to be a big chunk, but it's now part of the legislation. Any questions on that packet? The third packet are all the things that were rescended to be um because they're already included in a new policy or an existing policy. So the things about there was there was a separate policy for regular meetings, special meetings, emergency meetings, and then what defined a meeting that's just basically been replaced in a new or revised policy. So nothing's changed. It's just somewhere else. Um 1422.01. This is a new policy. I guess they felt it needed to be added even though it's kind of addressed in

074other places, but I'm sure it's part of a federal um workplace legislation on being a drug-free workplace. Um I really had no problem with both options being included. Just we do receive federal funding. So, we do need to make sure we have the verbiage in our policy that states we'll abide by all federal um drug free workplace act and the drug free communities and schools act and that were a place that's free from use of controlled substances or alcohol and alcohol. No big surprise there. Um 1520 was just another um in this batch of policies I was going through um basically deals with administrator contracts and um bargaining that may or may not happen with those one position that I did leave off that I didn't leave it off. It was never in this list

075and I think that's because officially the athletic director had been previously approved as also an assistant principal. When we approved Aaron, we only approved him as an athletic director. So, I am going to recommend that we additionally add athletic director to that list because that position does currently receive all the salary and benefits of other administrators. I'm sure Aaron will appreciate that. Um, and it says that any administrator who supervises one or more people can't be considered part of the collective bargaining unit. That's a legislative thing. It's not a here thing, but that's already we don't have any issues with that. Um, then it just talks about how you approve. There's really nothing too exciting, just some legislative um alignment. You can't have an operating referendum for the purpose or if part of the purpose

076is to give a bonus to an administrator. We don't do that. wouldn't do that anyway, but we don't do operating referendum. Um, and then approval of administrator contracts has to be the majority of a full board. There's a group of on the next one, four policies that kind of sort of well not kind of sort a lot have a lot of similar um verbiage. So 1520.08 08 is about administrators acting as sponsors or coaches and extracurriculars. 3120.08 is teachers or other certified staff operating in operating in those circumstances and 4120.08 are support staff who are coaches sponsors. So, this all deals with um basically policy we've already been doing because the IHSAA has already established a lot of this and we've been working under it. But it gets us in our policy deals with um

077anyone that is coaching, sponsoring any several different um sports or clubs. Um especially anything that has any physicality to it. Um they have to do a coaching course every two years and they have to basically get certified on head injury and concussions education, heat related illnesses and sudden cardiac arrest. Um and we've been doing that again for the last several years. It also expands it and we have I have chosen to add the amendments that allow it to be expanded to kids of any age because we already do it with our middle school coaches anyway. And I think whether we want to add it to the policy or not, now that I've just been looking through it, I want it added probably to all of our PE teachers as well because if you've ever seen

078middle school dodgeball head injuries are sometimes going to happen. Um, unfortunately a lot of compet compet competitive kids sometimes PE. So, I think it'd be good for them just to know the signs, symptoms, and also be aware as in that last policy which deals more specifically um the last couple pages is policy 5340 and this is if we have a student in any of these activities that show signs of a head injury um or sudden or cardiac symptoms, what we need to do about removing them from the event and what would have to happen before they may return to play. Um, and so all this kind of deals with those same things. Again, we've already got it in place. IHSAA already has it in place. This would just be getting it formally written into our

079policy. Questions on this one. Which one was that? I don't have that. We don't have that one. We don't have it on our own. No, it's on the I'm sorry, but I can make a copies. Oh, I got it. I've got it online. Okay. Two more. Um, the last or not the last, second to last packet is all the 1662.01, 3362.01, 4362.01 that involve threats made by students, parents, visitors, other staff members or agents of this board for staff members. Um, basically, uh, the one for administrators of 1662 had never been in place. It's a new policy, but all of them are about if something like this happens, the reporting requirements to the building administrator or the direct supervisor and what we need to do about it, if we need to involve law enforcement, and

080what um documentation needs to happen if that occurs. Um, again, nothing I don't think anything real surprising or um kind of out there stuff we already do is just revising the policy to reflect what is now in legislation. And the final two things in this batch are um related in um 5350 about student suicide awareness and prevention and 5517.01 bullying. Um not a lot of big changes in this policy. A lot of it is changing children to students. The big one um that came from legislation last year was a parent can request to review any materials used in bullying prevention or suicide prevention programing if they wish on requests. Um and then bullying has some of the same language in it where parents can request any bullying anti-bullying programming materials we we use to review.

081It also adds that victims of bullying have to be a priority. And I think this new legislative session we're going to see extensions of that because I've seen that in some legislation too a little more specifically. Um it's also in some title N. Um even though it doesn't address Title 9 doesn't address every situation of bullying. Um there's a lot more emphasis being put on making sure your alleged victims are protected and have interventions and supports put in for them, not just the disciplinary side of addressing the bullying behavior. There's some documentation on remediation and followup, how often you need to keep the documentation and making sure the parents have been notified within. Right now in the legislation, it's five business days. There is a bullying legislation piece that is um making that a lot

082more complex as far as a lot more steps, a lot shorter timeline. um like maybe even within 24 hours kind of thing before you might even know if you have bullying or not. That's going to be a little hard to do in some cases. Um and again, parents get to review the anti-bullying material. So that's a lot of paperwork. Please let me know now or later if you have questions. So the next meeting for folks who are new to the board is this same packet will come to you with any changes that have been requested and then we would be asked to vote on it or we can further revise. So no action on that one. Okay. So next up on the agenda is the approval of donations. We have three separate donation. The first

083one is from the Gator Optimus Club. So, $300. Yes. All three of these um were generous donations from some of our community organizations to help support our high school PBIS. So, every um quarter they try to have some kind of special event just to um recognize those kids who day in day out are doing what they're supposed to do. And lots of times um well certainly those things are expectations and they're again doing what they're supposed to do it sometimes those kids who take it for don't take it for granted that I'm supposed to do what I'm supposed to do don't always get recognized for doing that or have an opportunity to just kind of let off some steam. I'm a big believer that you need to work hard, but you also need to let

084kids recognize that working hard doesn't mean you can't always have some fun occasionally, too. Especially good, clean fun, what I call um that school doesn't always have to be just about books and work and boring and can have some opportunities to make memories and and have a good time, too. So, we are definitely appreciative to the Decatur Optimus Club for their $300 and the Decatur BFW for $500 donation and Bowen Health organization for their 500. I have a question. I know it in the past we had implemented a thank you to the individuals and we individually signed them as board members. Do we still send out a a thank you that it's just from the school? Okay, perfect. Okay, perfect. because I was going to say we used to sign just but yeah just so

085it's still being done that's okay if you'd like to sign it I'm sure we can okay is there a motion to approve the donations I'll make a motion to approve the donations motion by Michelle is there a seconded by Darlene motion by Michelle seconded by Darlene to approve the donations as presented all those in favor by saying I I oppose same N approved 7 to zero. Next up is the superintendent's report. Well, I'm going to let WY and I are going to tag team on this with some of the legislative updates because that's been I think a lot of the things that superintendents have been spending a lot of their time and energy on is trying to keep up with what's happening. Um, and this legislative session has been an extremely busy one, extremely important

086one. Um, and we're not done yet. Yeah. Uh but I did pass one sheet around but does highlight a few. This is only a few here. Uh the first item the uh uh Senate Bill 287 is the uh makeup of school boards. It did pass the house as you see 54 to 40. Uh and actually Matt Layman voted against it. So if you do see that you give him a thank you. Uh this uh it you still though you have the option to to declare nonpartisan. So it doesn't force you to uh come as a party but uh but that is those all three are options. Um it also in during an election you can't just vote straight ticket and include then the school board. You have to vote for the school board separately. One

087interesting thing on that though Joel I don't know if you want to share your concern personal concern with that bill. Yeah. I've been informed that even if it's I select nonpart if it's a partisan race Yeah. you can't participate. Yeah. Say that again. So, I wouldn't be able to run in a partisan race even if I was nonpartisan, right? Because I work for the Sure. I understand that. That's crazy. So even like a nonpartisan military if you were uh of national guard or and that's where down south s southern Indiana because of uh crane down there's a huge population of course of those workers that make up board me schoolboard members and they wouldn't be able to Wow. So, it's nice that they added the nonpartisan option, but it really doesn't fix the issue. Yeah.

088Yeah. Uh the uh Senate Bill one and then the uh House Bill that that's still in the works. Uh I did this is a I did put a quote from uh Senator Holden there. Um I have a a little more to follow up on that from this today. Kim also attended today was a a webinar. Um the Senate Bill 442. I had not seen this before, but this provides specific directions uh for school boards to approve annually uh any type of human sexuality instruction. And those are the uh stipulations that's outlined there. Um and uh you know I I think we need to be transparent. So I'm not sure, you know, but just making aware that this is an annual approval process. And then they're still working on absenteeism. Uh right now it looks like

089they're going to assign the Indiana Department of Ed to define what excused and unexcused is and then school districts need to set their policies to align with that. And it also prohibits a public school from expelling a student in kindergarten through 8th grade solely because the student is chronically absent or habitually truent. I can totally support that because many times it's not the child's problem, right? There's other circumstances particularly when they're really young which then go unfortunately develops habits. Sure. But then later as they get older then they so um and then and Kim can also add to this too this today uh the uh school board state school board association did a legislative update live update and they had a panel of uh actually Mark uh Mark Daniel superintendent from Fort Wayne uh Michelle

090Moore who is a past super assistant superintendent and is a professor at IU. Uh Bob Schultz, he's a longtime educator and then Scott Bowling who's the director of ISBO. Um one of the big messages I heard from them, they're saying that this comes from the governor and legislators that they believe uh schools and also this would be true for local government. Uh they can do more with less. uh school debt is a concern there they have uh when they see some of the facilities I can't say ours is an example of that but there are districts out there that you know anyways um also too many administrators and I don't see that here but uh another big thing is we must start thinking differently uh thinking more like a combination of private public. In other

091words, more businesslike and searching for other means of money. Although, on a side note, there's a lot of laws that stipulate school districts can't get money from other places. So, that would have to change. Uh again, as we know, sharing the money, it follows the child. um restraints on our operations uh budget because there's laws that's going to uh we'll need to share with charters. Now, here locally, we really don't have charters. However, if this goes into effect and over time, many of your charters are owned and operated by private sectors, private individuals that are in it to raise money. is they're in it for a profit. So, uh we hope that doesn't happen. Uh they mentioned that and this is true. Kim talked about this last month. It's property tax has really got people's

092attention because the last few years there's been spikes of 10 to 15%. Whereas in the past maybe a 2% increase or so and you kind of you know but um and I know I got you probably all got your property tax bill yesterday. Uh curriculum materials we've already talked about that situation. Um Mark Daniels talked about he sees uh the state really pushing to cond consolidate services across like transportation or school districts would consolidate transportation uh central office uh services shared. So other supporting services shared uh Fort Wayne community has already reduced $3 million uh by a reduction of staff in their central office. That was in the news not too long ago. Um uh here's some things that they suggested that we must and as I read the list I see us doing it

093thanks to Kim and administrators and what's going on that we know school district data and site sources so that we can continually share that have a strategy for tax management tell our story public relations you know be able to tell our story what what what's going on recognizing we can't be all things to all people. I think that's something that we maybe need to keep in mind uh and that we need to play to our strengths, prioritize what is important in our community. Uh demographics impact on our school district and recognize and share that. Kim does a good job of that, too. Uh examine our uh building capacity. I think we're pretty good. We did that quite a few years ago. Michelle was on the board back then, too, when we did consolidate buildings and

094and now that we're all under one roof, I think we've done the due diligence there. Examine our building uh open our buildings to community, be visible, uh public messaging with parents and business community leaders need to tell our story, too. Uh Kim has a perfect opportunity coming up Monday. uh state as the schools with the chambers uh monthly uh lunchon. So uh and then another statement that was ma made was it believed that this is just the first step of property tax reform and that there'll probably be more changes in the future. And closing with when there is reason to give thanks to legislators, we need to do it. Kim, you want to fill in the gaps? Oh, I don't know that there's a lot of gaps. Um, a few other things. Again, I kind

095of opened back to the page of your packet in front of you that looks like this. Um, Senate Bill 366. This is kind of going a little further with what some of those education leaders were talking about. There is a bill right now in or part of 366 that is about taking away the requirement for a superintendent to have any type of degree and a high school degree. Um wow. Yeah. um because they are I think thinking this can go more toward a business model and so the knowledge of student and student development and school finance and school law and all those things may not be as needed and that's concerning. Um there is also and again some of this information came from a variety of sources. We are also a member of the small

096and rural schools association and um sometimes they are a little more emotional in their report. So that might come out in some of this because I was just kind of cut and pasting from different places that I gather this information from. But I don't necessarily think this is terribly far off. I do think there is um an appetite right now to consolidate services. Um, for example, one of the things that was stated was one superintendent per county, especially in our counties that have smaller districts like ours. Um, not saying that's good, bad, or ugly. I would say consolidating central office, I think, has already been proven not to be a huge cost savings very often if you're not going to reduce buildings um, and other staffing. But that is I think one of their um

097potential money-saving efficiency thoughts. Um and there was some folks in this organization that thought they there might be an appetite to make the superintendency a politically appointed position than if it were going to be one superintendent who works with for example in our county three different boards. Um that's I think that could be really really far-fetched. three different fors that are all political now. Yeah. Well, Florida and Florida has that model. Not every district. That's what's strange about it, too. Some are elected, others are run just like ours. Um, and if you skip down to C where it says Senate Bill 373, I guess this kind of goes on the heel of this. This is just kind of exposing some of the political agenda potentially. Um, so last year in the legislative session, there was

098a directive given to the DOE to perform a transportation school transportation study and a school facility study. And the outcome of those studies um was that um perhaps it would be a good idea to have a county board that would oversee anything that would basically cause a operating levy or a change in your tax rate. Um, and these would be members of the community who had different skills in finance, business organizations, on and on and on. Um, so that there already is legislation that they're asking for three districts to do a pilot of this where there is a separate county board meeting made in a different in separate from you folks and above you folks that if it was anything that we were doing that would affect our tax rate or what we were trying

099to levy or a construction project, whatever you would recommend would then go to this board and they would make the final decision whether that happened or not. And within three years, basically all of our capital assets um and budget would go to this board. And I think while it's asking for a pilot program, I truly believe that is whenever there is a pilot program, yes, there is a desire to move a different direction. So I think this goes back to consolidation and centralization of services, transportation, facilities and I do think the desire is to make anything that is going to impact tax rate right now because this is the where the big appetite is is to control taxes and reduce property taxes is to try to make that I think more political I guess politically

100controlled. You wouldn't need a school board then at that point, right? Am I thinking on some things potentially? It just would not be operations. It would remove financial responsibility program. Yeah. But that affects operations. They're tied. It does. They're tied. It also doesn't necessarily address what your community Yes. particularly one because given our county there's three separate communities you have three you know separate social moors and potentially lots of different um I mean you have burn with a high concentration of Amish um which brings a whole set of considerations to the table that don't exist here right now and I mean it's it would be very difficult I would think to manage all of those and I personally believe all you'd doing is increasing your middle management, which is what places like Fort Wayne Community

101are just trying to get rid of because you have to have people in the intermediary. It's too much to manage. But I said it was quite some time ago. I don't remember if it was when you were here wy or not, but when we had discussion of one superintendent, I mean, it was kind of a short-lived discussion, but it was talked about. Yeah. It was actually when I and Mike announced our retirement. Uhhuh. North Adams school board did approach South Adams and Adams Central. Do you want to have a discussion? And it was a quick note. Yeah. That came about Daniel Sheepard chaired a big committee that did all sorts of government reform and that was a big focus and there was consolidation. Was that like 25 years ago? It's been low. Yeah. Yeah, but

102that's where all that came from was recommendations from that committee. And again, I think closing down schools was a hard decision. And it again, it comes back to you can't do be all things to all people, I guess. But the consolidation of facilities is where if you look at the research, that's where the money savings is operationally. And so it that's one of the major things that's helped us. It has it has um it's not pleasant to go through for some some of your constituents and I certainly recognize it probably um hurt some feelings especially when you still had community elementaryaries and things. But for us, based on our how many students we had and schools, buildings at below capacity significantly, it really operationally made sense to consolidate. When you're talking utilities, you're talking transportation,

103you're talking grounds, maintenance, um, and some administrative, someh you have to look at those things when you start looking at declining enrollments and things like that and it it has helped us and it has helped us be able to say we are being fiscally responsible. We are cert we are striving for efficiencies when these kinds of reports and things come out. Um other things let's see talked about several of them. One of the things I'd like you to take a moment to look at that again I have mixed feelings about it but from a purely financial standpoint I put some information together what SB46 um expanding some of the um benefits as far as new parent and child birth recovery leave. Um I'm not going to go through a lot of it but it just

104kind of gives you what the bill says. And then I did put this together and send it to our lobbying group just to show um basically just a summary I will tell you is presently this year I I looked at 2425 as an example we have had or have seven individuals who would qualify or did qualify for maternity child new new parent or child birth recovery leave because you're paying for subs different things there's a cost to the district. Um so about $15,000 more than would have been previously budgeted um in this situation under SB146 which basically is calling for the allowance of 20 additional paid leave days including for the partner or spouse of the delivering mother. um also gets 20 additional paid leave days and that does not include any accumulated leave. That

105is not expected to be used in congruence with that. Um if they would take an additional 20 paid leave days to what they took, it would cost the district an additional $38,000 compared to the 15,000. If they would use the 20 paid leave and decrease their unpaid leave by 17 days, it actually cost us more. Um cost us 52,000. That's a teacher. Um, so again, I have mixed feelings. I certainly don't have a problem supporting, but one of the things that I think was incorrectly conveyed to legislators is that often they're only getting three days of maternity leave. Well, that's the our contracts the same. They get three days maternity leave paid with the ability to take any acrue accumulated paid leave as well, which many industries don't allow you to acrue leave. We allow

106them to acrew it up to around 200 days and they get 12 new days every year of sick leave and three personal leave days. So again, it is what it is, but with every benefit becomes a cost. And then we talk about going to collective bargaining and having to explain, we've been having five to seven of these maternity leaves every year. There is a cost to it. And when you're not going to get much of new monies to do raises or whatever with, then this is another consideration we have to put into the maintenance. Um, then I put some additional things about SP1. Basically, I think we are just buying ourselves a year. They're going to go after property tax reform again next year for the next couple years. They are they have decided just

107to cap the MLGQ at 4% for one more year. Um, and I have a chart in there that shows the members of our lobbying group and they did the money runs on what would happen in the next three years with property taxes with how it's written. Um, basically we'd get less than 1% increase in 26, about 3% in 27, and then we lose almost 2% in 28. Um, and then it has some examples from the other districts in there. I'm not sure why we were losing so much more in 28. I'm going to have to dig into that a little more. This has been relatively new information shared. Um, so again, not nearly as bad from an initial standpoint as we originally were looking at with SB1, but as WY said and as we're hearing,

108this is just the first step into what I think what we saw previously is really where they want things to get to to a point. So, um I'll take this for now because it's better news than we were getting, but um it's we'll see where it ends up. I think the intentions are good. I really do think Thompson has good intentions for taxpayers. Unfortunately, it's the local government impact that is hard to mitigate. Um and I'm appreciative that they did what they did to try to do that for the time being. Um, that's it as far as my Oh, I'm sorry. That's not it. This is superintendent's report. I will real quick on some of what you had shared while and this process of information that you've gone through. I think it is very very

109imperative for us at this point in time having seen a lot of the changes that have transpired through the years. um and the repetitiveness of people saying it's not communicated enough or a lack of understanding that causes some of that extra angst. So the more proactive we can be in an effort to prevent reactivity is going to be our best best thing. While we cannot be all to everybody, we can be a majority to most. And I think that's that's what we need to be and that's what our focus needs to be because you have some people that follow this to a tea and understand it. Some people hear just enough to misunderstand it and I think the the more explanation we can offer and even if we're I don't want to say jumping the

110gun, but if we're sharing information knowing that it's not been completely voted on, it's still in discussion. It could still be a possibility. I think that's going to cause us less problems in the long run. I agree. Agree. It's a fine line between not wanting to several relationships with the legislators who have been willing to work with you. I think is some of what I hear from other superintendents versus going out and telling everyone this is what could happen. And sometimes I think maybe we've been too conservative to be honest with worrying about how someone may feel when they also make a lot of decisions based on what they hear from their constituents and if their constituents don't understand the impact of this because many people don't unless you're in the business you don't um

111same thing with local government. Unless you are the ones having to make those decisions and dealing with the budget you don't know what the impact um because again this is all local government stuff too. You're going to have there are going to be decisions made on what roads get fixed and what don't. There's going to be decisions made on what the public library can do and what it can't. Um, nobody wants to lose services, but that's those libraries talking about the only real way to cut is personnel and then cut the number of hours that libraries open. Mhm. So, you know, when people maybe see how services really are impacted, that also may, you know, be an enlightenment. We don't look at the trickle effect. We just look at the year. Yeah. And we're all

112taxpayers and I know we're all probably feeling the pinch. There's no there's no doubt about it. But it also costs a lot more to run things and that's what we have. There has to be a balancing act because you still want your kids to be educated well. You still want to have quality of life in your community. Um so I don't know. It's a middle ground somewhere. Last thing I have is a bunch of dates. Um, Adams County Emergency Management's been working with our districts in Adams County SRO's and they are going to do I don't think it's happened here. Maybe it has years ago. Where I came from, we did this every year, the mock crash fire prior. Yeah. Um, so that's April 11th and um, April 16th is our community Adams County Community

113Foundation senior scholarship night. April 22nd, um we are going to bring in some former law enforcement folks to present on choices matter, which is a lot about distracted driving and making good choices when you're behind the wheel. Um 4:25 I did give the wrong date last month is donuts grown-ups and that went out to in the last couple days I think um for folks to sign up if they want to if elementary and middle school or just middle school okay want to bring um a significant adult whether it's their parent grandparent aunt uncle favorite person whatever that may be um and they will have the opportunity to then go to the student's classroom and hang out for a little bit and kind of see what they do every day preschool school roundup. We had the

114virtual online, but the in-person one happens April 29th. In an effort to get more of our parents and our our community in more often, um especially in our secondary, the high school is having revitalizing an undergraduate awards day on May 12th. And the elementary kids love their day of awesome on May 15th. Preschool graduation is May 19th. The middle school is starting eighth grade graduation and awards on May 20th again to try to get more family involvement with our kids and celebrate with our kids more. Um May 22nd is field day at the elementary and middle school. And then for you folks and our seniors who I know are probably counting the hours at this point, commencement is May 30th, which is a Friday night at 7 PM. We usually ask that you guys are

115here by I think 5:30 um in the high school office. And their practice, senior's practice will be May 29th from 9 to 11:00 a.m. So we are in that season where is something every night going on. That's great. It is lots of fun stuff. Okay. Any other matters to come before the board member or public comment the meeting? Thank you.