001Good evening everyone. >> Right on time. >> Okay. Good evening. This meeting is a board meeting of the board of education and public for the purpose of conducting the school district's business and it's not to be considered a public community meeting. The agenda reserves two periods for public participation and those wishing to receive a personal response from the board or superintendent must complete a public comment form available at the meeting or on our website. Upon request of superintendent the district shall make reasonable accommodation for a person with disabilities to be a participate in this meeting. Can you please call the role? >> Mr. Albury Mr. Arnold >> Mrs. Brutder >> here >> Mr. Sola >> Mangus >> here >> riser >> here >> Mr. here. >> Okay. We have meeting minutes in our packet from
002November 17th and December 3rd. >> I'll move the board of education approved the attachment for September 17th and December 3rd, 205 as it >> I'll second. >> We have a motion and a second. Any discussion? All those in favor of approving the minutes from November 17th, December 3rd, please say I. I. Any opposed? Okay. Um, board policy provides that superintendent of schools shall prepare an agenda for all board meetings as directed by the president of the board of education. >> I'll move that board to approve the agenda as >> second. We have a motion and second. Any discussion? All those in favor of approving the agenda as presented, please say I. >> I. Any opposed? >> Okay. First up tonight is school presentations and we have some information about course modifications and proposals. You can
003turn Thank you. Ignore all of those tabs. All right. Good evening. Uh thank you for allowing the opportunity to go over the new course proposals. Um just as a reminder, our course our new course proposal uh process is um there is a consistent form that is shared out to all the building administrators. Um they usually distribute that to their department leaders, grade level leaders, whatever is applicable for their building. um they go through several different um cycles of gauging interest for different courses and then um when they post those new courses they have to talk about how it connects to your profile how it connects to our health um what would be necessary what how how it really benefits um schools. So tonight we have only two um new course proposals they both come from
004the high school. Um, the first one is peer-to-peer physical education. That is on page 47 of your board packet. Um, peer-to-p peer physical education um is an elective physical education course not to take the place of the um required graduation requirement um physical education courses. This would be open to all students. Um their intention is to increase academic independence, social engagement opportunities for all students and students with disabilities. Um they would like to demystify disabilities for all students, those with disabilities and those who um are do not have disabilities and they want to increase understanding and acceptance for all. The reason why they uh proposed this new course is uh one of the reasons is last year 165 students signed up for peer-to-peer 14 were able to get into the class. Um peerto-peer is something
005that has been growing and growing over the last years um because students are having such a positive experience in it. Um both our students um in the gened setting and our students with disabilities. Um so they want to increase the number of students who are able to participate in this and also um increase the interaction between our gen general education students and our students with um special needs. Um so some of the comments that um came through from the different review cycles to gauge interest um were that these were some of the most memorable experiences that students had in this course um in peer-to-peer um and they would like to um specifically focus on the physical education um portion of that. Um some of the um feedback um feedback that they received from students is
006that many of the times when they were connecting with their students um from the high need resource room or the um WISD room, they usually went onto the track, they were walking, they were doing different physical activities with them. So this was um that natural progression. Um this peer-to-p peer curriculum was created and maintained by Graham Valley State University um through the start project. All of the resources are free. they continually update it and then um distribute those resources um to educ. So um the only cost proposed for this new course um was two botchi ball sets 40 bucks each so $80. So um the cost is minimal um but the um payback for students is u priceless. So um peer-to-peer physical education anything you want to add to >> questions of course >> um
007the next one is AP seminar. This is on page 57 of your board packet. Um this would be an English credit course offering to 10th graders. Although it doesn't It doesn't need to be their 10th grade English uh uh course. It is a 10th grade option. Um they want to improve on reading, writing, and presentation skills. Um this is a um college board sanctioned course. So it is um an AP course, a specific AP course with the added GPA points, with the uh final examination um with performance tasks attached to it. uh where they are exploring academic and real world world topics and issues by analyzing divergent perspectives. Um when going through the AP curriculum design, a couple of the examples that they included were um social media impact on the teen brain. So students
008would have to analyze it, research, write um a research project on it and then present um their side and then argue back and forth. Another of the topics was uh college sports rules. Um there was a slew of different topics that they could choose from or their own interests. Um so things that were really applicable to students. Uh and it really they really want to encourage students to demonstrate critical thinking, collaboration, and academic research skills. All which as you know coincide with um different competencies on our so it really ties in nicely with our um portrait of graduate. Um the cost of um this new proposed course would be the training would primarily be the training of the um instructors of the course. It could be um a little over $1,000 per um instructor if
009they did it in person or about $800 if they did the online training. We would need about one to two teachers for the course depending on how many students enroll in it. So I couldn't give you exact numbers since students have not enrolled. Um again there it is an AP seminar class through the college board. So there would be two performance tasks and then a written um exam um in the spring when all the other API exams are happening. Um there is significant uh research already conducted from the schools that already offered the AP seminar and from their research uh said that 85 85% of students felt more prepared to develop arguments using evidence. Three out of four students felt more confident collaborating with their peers and four out of five students said that the
010course the course strengthened their ability to manage their academic workload. Um so again a good tie-in with our Helm and the competencies that we're trying um to get our students to strengthen. Um and they have it all research based so I can u supply those research materials to you um afterward. uh questions about AP seminar. >> How does this compare to what our offer? I mean, how does or how does it differ from what we offer? Because a lot of those schools I know are children developed with current offerings. So, what does this >> Great question. So, currently our 10th grade students, all 10th grade students take world lit comp and world lit speech. Uh semester long courses. um it doesn't matter the order in which you take those two courses, but they do have
011to take those two courses over their 10th grade year for their full English credit. They do contain different aspects that are also contained in this AP seminar. Um but this AP seminar is really designed to be more applicable to um current real world um topics so that students have more application. Um now is that something that we strive to do in all of our courses? Absolutely. Is this a curriculum that is already created um and has um created resources attached to it also? Yes. And plus the um AP um having the advanced placement uh program it it also helps them develop skills for uh AP classes their junior and their senior year because it's in the same format a similar format and they also have to take those performance tasks complete those performance tasks of
012that year and complete an exam. So, not all students would have to take it, but it might prepare them for um 11th and 12th grade courses later down the line if we want to. Um the suggestion was that if this course is um is approved that we would make AP lang an 11th and 12th grade class only. Currently, some 10th graders take AP lang. If this goes through, we would have them take this as their sophomore English AP option, not AP L, which is more um that's what most schools do is have AP L for 11 and 12th graders. >> So, so AP language is currently offered at 10, 11, and 12. Oh, what? >> It is. It is um so not all 10th graders take it as many as we can get into the
013course but we do cap it if there is an overflow. We give um priority to our 11th and 12th graders, but if there is room in the course, but we have been seeing an increased number of students trying to take um AP courses their sophomore year. >> And so this is approved and AP language and this would AP. >> Yes. So um college board um does offer two different courses AP seminar and one that's specifically English 10 AP seminar. Our intention since we don't offer AP seminar tube 9 through 12 is that this would be our 10th grade AP English offering. Uh so yes, you are correct. That would be our intention. >> Um so I appreciate um especially uh the fact that it was outlined that you know our teachers have noticed some gaps
014and this would fill in those gaps. I thought that was great. Um I've actually had a conversation with community member recently who's asking for more APA classes in the nine and 10 years. So I think this addresses um addresses that. My one question is about we have the the benefit and challenge of managing the AP and IB curriculum in the high school. And I guess I'm wondering how in in terms of like AP lang just what kind of flexibility we might offer for students based on interest in course material. The challenge with IB being like you get in a track where you have a two-year program and so students who do choose IB have a limited time to explore other courses. And I guess I'm wondering if there will be some flexibility if students are
015like really interested in topics especially in their sophomore year. >> Yeah. Um great question. That is something that we talked about in our um notes back and forth about. We will have to think about flexibility in the actual master schedule about when these courses are offered because you're right sometimes students who are um already have their four years planned out and there are specific hours they have to take um courses because they are single um courses. Now again we haven't surveyed students yet about um how many want to take this course. So I'm not sure if this would be a singleton course if there were three sections. Um, some schools make this the only 10th grade um, English offering because they want to prepare all students and allow all students to experience a College Board
016AP class. Um, so I don't have that data for you at this time. Um, but we would have to look at flexible options and think about exactly where it would be placed so that students could still continue um, on their path to take all the courses that they want to. uh in 10th grade year you cannot take IV courses so there are less singleton um courses 10th grade year so it should be okay 10th grade year but you're right 11 the subsequent years 11th and 12th grade we might have to move some classes around um since some of those singleton um courses so AP lang and AP lit are exactly where they need to be well we would definitely have to think about that and it would all help me students sign off this >>
017I mean in general I'm I'm really supportive I think a great offering especially the research related skills because it is a challenge to make sure students have that. Um I guess I just would want to make sure we didn't limit sort of what people could take as a sophomore knowing that their 11th and 12th grade years and for IB or consortium or whatever I would want to make sure people can speak the subjects they're interested in. So just a agree and we would definitely think about that. >> We're gonna talk about this discussion. >> Um I think this is this is when we were asking questions this time. I don't think we have a specific discussion. So >> it's on the agenda, but let's do it now. >> It was on twice. >> Okay. Sorry
018about that, guys. >> But we can just make this the discussion. to discussion. >> All right, we can go to discussion. >> My fault. So, so I do look at you then in in terms of just the overall and the other thing is but the question is um we continue it seems to add more and more options for students which is great to have options but we also have a problem over the last I don't know five or so years of scheduling and getting you know schedule set and people having their classes set by the time school starts etc etc and it feels like and I'm asking this as a question. Um, it just feels like we're complicating the the scheduling process by having so many options and setting up expectations that kids may or
019may not be able to enroll in the class of their choice. Um, so just curious about that, how how the high school is managing the scheduling overhaul and make sure that it's our we're not saying it's up for for expectations that we can't meet. >> Absolutely. You're you're absolutely correct and we need to start looking at efficiencies because um within the last five years we went to the block schedule which that in itself presented some some challenges um both positive and negative um for scheduling. It was something brand new and um with that we had to as you know um limit the number of API courses. There was um more um more things to consider when placing classes in certain periods. So we have talked um extensively about finding efficiencies in our schedule. Um picking
020a number you know if there are not at least this number of students signed up to take the course and committed and able to take it during this period we need to think about how we can take the students who were taking signed up to take that course um and put them in different classes or maybe not offer it in the next year. Um those are all different efficiency things that we need to think about. Brian, I know that we have talked about that. Um, >> as we get more classes on the books, it actually does offer the opportunity that we can start to schedule things on a basis. So, every other year we're offering a class which will hopefully help with four year programming. Right now, we offer everything in the same year. You're
021right. We do run into a problem that spread too thin, right? We may fall into the position where we don't have students to truly run a section. uh we now have some historical data that sort of look at say maybe we should offer this class every other year for academic purposes. We also have classes that are really difficult to run maybe they should be ran every other year class to run those every other year. So there's a lot of consideration scheduled together already working looking at this your upcoming year schedule all parts. An example of that would be um in 2020 in 2122 and then 22 23 we offered every science elective catalog. It was way too difficult way too much not only for scheduling but also for the teachers with all the different products
022they had. So on this past year, we offered certain electives first semester and some of them the second semester. And then we talked about some of them being, you know, every other year, some of them. Um we also talked about um cohorting um some of the the courses. Um so we're looking at some of those um different options to make our um schedule more efficient and also speak to what our students actually want to see because what we have heard students is they want more challenging options like this. Um, so we want to continue to introduce um courses like this because our students are asking for them. Um, and data is showing us that they want some of these courses and maybe some of the other courses that are not as popular like um that
023they're assigned classes that we don't have as high enrollment or registration for maybe we um, you know, only offer those every few years. But you're right, that is a problem that we will have to address. Yeah, it just seems that we hear that every year and just coming. So, we're just we're looking for some some assurance from the community that their children have their schedule set, you know, in in the fall. You know, maybe we can visit schools across the school or something. >> Students, do you have any comments? >> Um, I know this year I faced a lot of issues. um specifically like I have to take um I do study so it it's difficult but I would say I think I mean ensuring that the students like the seniors specifically the juniors that
024have these very high pressure schedules with classes that really do I mean I'm in the IV diploma so obviously this class if I wasn't able to take it I wouldn't be able to get my diploma um so kind of almost like even sitting down with them that could have fixed anything like sitting all the I mean students for example and like I know Marsh when she was still here sat down with all of us like tried to figure out scheduling works and obviously we're a smaller cohort of a bigger school but if it takes discussions with students to help scheduling I think students would be happy to be a part of the process and put time into this process to ensure that when fall comes they don't have a schedule I >> think well is
025definitely the show. I think the class itself I mean concept not even in 80% is critical you're taking things going to need every class you're in like the IP diploma or just IP classes in general think it's really important skill being pushed into class like maybe that is I haven't think but sure this would help future students I I love the idea of this class. I would see how it goes and consider whether this something everybody should take whether it's eighth year or just seminar. These skills are applicable and critical for junior senior year but also college but just like just do the types of skills plus focused on do this research and compile it and present it I think pretty beneficial for all students >> agreed that this material would um college board does
026suggest that the um introduction of the courses run at least two years um with a smaller cohort before it's introduced to the entire grade level. Um some um schools do offer it and that is the only 10th grade offering for English. Um but they've done a couple of so yes absolutely you want to look at that evaluate to see what the >> So those were the two new course proposals. Uh and then the next page is um just a quick summary of u modifi modifying existing courses. Uh these are not new courses. They are existing courses that u might just need a little bit of modification either in their name or uh their what is on the transcript. This first one, honors humanities. It's already on the books. Um several years ago we it was
027a co-taught class um with an English and social studies certified teacher. One of those teachers has since then retired and and the cohort um became smaller. Um so it's been taught by an English certified teacher. The hope of that teacher is that the cohort will grow again and be able to be offered both days um for um a double English credit since they would be taken on both days. So whereas before it was English social studies, he is only English certified and dual certified. So um we would be asking that in the future if the cohort is big enough to run a double section that we would um allowed to offer two English credits um as opposed to one English and one social studies. We cannot offer social studies credits. It's not social studies certified.
028The second one um renaming intro to anatomy and um physiology to anatomy and physiology 1 because we now have 2. So it shows a um a natural progression to that second course now that we have that second elective. The next one is advanced biochemistry forensic science to forensic science advanced biochemistry. I know it seems very slight, but sometimes in the registration process, some students will see that first word advance and think it's automatically an AP class and skip on that. We want to avoid that. We want to give um that offering to more students without them skipping through that course registration process. um intro to marine biology to just marine bi biology for the same um thought of the second one for&mp 1 and two there is no marine biology too so we want to
029keep with the same type of naming advanced biology zoology to zubiology for the same reason as before we want to take off that advanced name in the front so um students do not assume it's an AP course um that next one SWWC C um graph X and actually next few it was already um the name was already changed through the S SWWC to change Graph X to Graphic Arts Academy. They've already adopted that name in their course catalog and since it's a course that we offer here at Dexter, we would need to reciprocate that name change in our course catalog. And then because of that change, we would then want to rename graphic arts one to graphic design one and graphic arts 2 to graphic design 2 so that students don't mix up the names
030because they are way too close. And then the last one on there um the world history summer seminar. There was a small group of students last year, 16 total students um that because of an IB curriculum um change. There were 16 students um who needed a few more of the content standards from world history um to go into the um IB um social studies classes, whatever ones they chose. It could have been IB um world religions. Could have been a couple different choices. But there were a few students, there was 14 who over the summer took a seminar course um with our um IB um history teacher um to go over those course standards that were are not in those classes anymore because IB 20th um oral history is no longer a course in the
031IV curriculum. So that's why that happens. So it won't be something that is offered again. It was only for that small small ID change. >> You have all these mag changes. We've really been working hard over the last couple years to cleaning up the course offerings to make sure that we very clean list. So the team does an excellent job identifying additional changes to further. Thank you. Thanks. All right. Um, we have our first opportunity for public participation now. So, anyone would like to address the board. We will move on then to our administrative and board updates. Starting with our assistant superintendent Ryan who's >> doing the best. Uh, so traditionally the 100th day of school is quite the big hit around the deck school particularly with our elementary kids. We're not quite there yet.
032Uh but to our students delight, say it's the 67th day of school and our elementary teachers really embraced it. So every teacher had some sort of shirt on. I think good on them for taking on 750 elementary kids and encouraging it all day. But they were good champs. It was quite a lot of fun. I started going morning up there today. Uh but things were going really well. Last week was an interesting week. We had a short week with a snow day as well as professional development. Uh Melanie, your team had an excellent day of learning for our staff on Friday. Really focused on calcative education. Uh so really making sure that staff have the opportunity to learn the same standards but learn them in different ways at their own those staff to put down
03345 50 minutes to complete module others and that's okay. We want to give everyone time and space the afternoon they had chance within their building and departments to debrief and apply their learning. Uh so really trying to model for our educators what we're hoping to do with children in the classroom. Uh so it was a great day of learning and Melanie and the team did an awesome job with that. Uh as I alluded to, we also had a snow day last week. So uh snow day was I think the weather played out the way we expected. So it was justified. I will be honest. I was a little anxious. My first snow day call. Uh Dr. Timus must have made it known to the student body that he no longer was calling snow days because
034I received upwards of 50 emails from students pleading for a snow day. uh many of them sharing that they hadn't studied for their test the next day and I replied to all of them encouraging them to please study for their test but they likely uh had the opportunity to meet with the leadership team at the Washington County Road Commission last week which was quite interesting and they had a chance to share a little about who they are and what they do. Uh it was really enlightening and it really showed me that there's the art science to clearing roads on a given event. So when there is a big snow, their team is clearing more than 3,500 lane miles, more than 1,200 lane miles of state trunk line, 720 lane miles of subdivision roads in Washington
035County, and 1,600 lane miles of gravel roads. So if you think of one mile of gravel road, they might have to clear it three times, right? So there's three lane miles that they're actually working in that one mile. They have eight crews to perform this work. uh and at night time. So their creeks are done around 8 8:30 p.m. at night time. They only have five people and they're not plowing. They're not working at night. They're really just supervising and they're looking to make sure uh patrol is what they call it during the night. They do have a priority system. So their first priority are all the MOT freeway systems and county primary roads. Second are MM routes. Third are subdivision roads and fourth are unpaved roads. So being a community that has a lot
036of unpaved roads, it doesn't feel good to be forth. But as they explain why it makes a lot of sense as people get out of their home and out of their main streets to get on the main road to be caught in traffic because the road hasn't been cleared, but the you have to make sure to clear those main routes. And Dexter is things like North Territorial, Mass Road, they're working hard to make sure that those roads are cleared for us as quickly as possible. Dexter and Arbor Road. It's a road they're working to clear as quickly as possible to make sure that folks can get to where they need to be safely. They also shared about dirt roads that there's a lot of science behind why they do dirt roads when they do them.
037Uh so the other morning, for example, they intentionally didn't plow the dirt roads knowing that the rain was coming. After the rain fell and things started to turn to ice, it was easier to clear the snow with the ice. Had they cleared the snow, it would have been a skating rink and all our dirt roads and they probably wouldn't have schooled the rest of the week. So they were really thoughtful and you only missed school for one day had they been on the job too quickly and we went miss school Thursday as well. Uh so because they did that we actually were able to be in pretty good shape. Uh dirt roads and so for many of our back roads they have to change material and equipment to get to those roads. So it's not
038the same plows that they're using on the main roads. So it does take a little bit longer. Uh they also talked about if they throw salt down, which is not a great idea in the dirt road, it just turns to a med a mess and it's going to refreeze and it's going to be a real problem. Uh they shared that their crews are out there right around 4:00 a.m. and they're getting started and again they're shutting it down with about 8:30. They're looking at things like wind, wind direction, wind speed. They're looking at forecast and they're actually consulting with us. So they're letting us know where they are in process. Every route takes two hours to complete. So if you see this plow go by, you're probably not going to see it again for two
039hours. Uh so it was really terrific to hear the whole process and hear how they go about clearing county and making the road safe for us to drive. Uh one thing that they shared was they can't start too early in the day because they do depend on traffic to keep the roads clear. If they start clearing things too early, it's going to back it's going to be a big mess. So they're trying to time their clearing of the roads with when traffic will be flowing. Uh so again, just a great experience to hear that partnered really nicely and a good reminder for the community how we call a snow day. We are monitoring weather patterns. Uh the night before a big event, so last Wednesday, the Tuesday night prior, we're starting to monitor the weather
040and really think about what may be coming knowing that it was a winintry turning into uh rain and late morning. The countywide superintendent are all in communication. So, we're all talking about what are the road conditions in our community, our back roads, our main roads out there driving the roads. The morning of there are multiple individuals. So, in our district, it' be our transportation director, our building ground director, and myself are out driving the roads between 4 and 5:00 a.m. uh trying to gauge the safety for our buses. So both Wednesday and Thursday morning, we were out there driving many of the roads uh just to determine if we could go or not. So the three of us were coordinating to make a determination for Dexter. Simultaneously, all the county superintendents are sharing what their
041buildings are doing. It's helpful to know what Chelsea is doing. Being a neighboring district, sharing a lot of roads. So if there are roads that we can't get to, knowing that we share some of them, if they have checked them and they say it's not safe, it helps inform our decision and vice versa. Uh so once we do that, I'm making sure they'll let our leadership team in our district knowing our communication and then hope we'll program a message to go out. Uh we always struggle with how early it's too early to let you know. Generally, we're trying to get to you between 5 5:30 a reasonable time to people to get the phone call, get the email, get the text message to let folks know that they need to make plans for their child
042for the day. Uh, but generally how we call a snow day and of course we're talking and having conversations about what other events are on or off. We try our best to update them by midday. So, our process there. Otherwise, things have been going really well. I know there's a lot of excitement around the district for the winter break up coming and uh to our students and our staff or families and to all happy holidays. >> Please do it. It was well delivered. We only had a few people that didn't get it and none of it was at our end. There were so well and I did see that you had tricked in with about it. >> And you said it takes a little >> del. You may not get it at 5:30, but she'll
043get it by really well. >> And just so we know, if community members did not get the notification and want the notification, where should we send them their building principal to them to talk to us that way? They only have one. >> Perfect. Thank you. Okay. Um I just wanted to say happy break to all of our teachers and administrators and staff and thank you for all the work that you do on behalf of the board. And we will turn over to the students for an update. It was actually a very busy and successful um dance competition and they did very very well. They got first in their game day and competition and then they got second in jazz. So that looks great for them heading into national. They're doing great. And then it was
044also the festival. So a lot of kids from the jump club got to go out and kind of like embrace their own performances, singing, acting, directing, and they all got to kind of showcase their talents. They all did very well. Um last Friday we had school women in science. We actually got to go to the deck and we got to meet with all the seventh grade classes and teach a little bit about science and metals and nonmetals. At the end, I got to teach a little bit about the table using all my IB hopefully I've had enough knowledge to teach them about the table, but they all seem to enjoy it. I love getting to um see the community members. I got to see my grade teacher. Um, it was weird sending emails back and
045forth. My second grade teacher now at senior high school, but it's always fun to go to the other schools. They kind of see the other kids. Um, student council raised around $500 for toys for toss and tomorrow some of the kids and the officers are going to go out and then buy a ton of toys with all the money we have and donate those. Um, again, just another great way to help the community and it was great that big sale was so successful. Um, women science also had their big sale and this Thursday we get to give the money we raised in the items main society and in turn we get to meet with puppies. So that's going to be super fun. >> Um, and then in spirit week people are showing off their hats
046and their fun winter cups. That's the other side of things. We have our choir concert that choirs of the high school tomorrow night 7 p.m. in the high school CPA. Uh for sports, basketball has been doing very well for themselves. They beat Bedford this past Friday in overtime. It was great game and we have tomorrow great and that's where they play. They've also been doing very well. They will play 19 hockey. They're rock and rolling despite goalie issues. We did not have a goalie for a little bit and had our student section teachers Benny Willard who had guys earlier step in out of nowhere and they won. It was ridiculous. Um >> never played organized hockey before. >> It was truly >> miracle on ice. It was like the night. >> It was amazing. >>
047It was truly amazing. But they will play again on Wednesday at Ben's Ice Arena against Detroit County Day. That would be certainly good game and they won against Bedford 9 to1 on Saturday. Um shifting away from students just a little bit. Coach Jacobs, our football coach, got um he was recognized as the division 2 coach of the year for football. And I mean seeing how far we went this year was great to see. And the football team will have their banquet tonight. One quick thing we do. Thank you for the snow day. I mean, as much as it's nice not to go to school, dangerous roads or, you know, inexperienced driving in general, uh, it's it's makes it even more difficult, but students all as a safety. That's all I >> Thank you very much.
048I am still in contact with my second teacher on Facebook and I still can't anything but what I did when all right moving on to our consent items. Uh we have a new prior and a board of education approve it second. Any discussion? All those in favor of approving sub items, please say I. >> I. Any opposed? All right, moving on to our action items. Starting with the budget amendment. Each year, Dexter Community Schools stops a budget in June as required by law because much financial information is still unknown at that point in the year. Dexter Community Schools typically has a November budget revision, which represents a much more accurate annual budget. This was delayed by the state government shutdown this year. Can we get a motion? I move the board of education adopt the
0492025 2026 budget amendment resolutions general fund community service fund student school advisor activity fund and food services I'll second uh discussion all right so budget amendment you guys have in front of you a packet that I create it's a standard packet very consistent with what we've read in the past pretty detailed memo uh we did meet with finance committee earlier tonight I just thought I'd add a little context to the memo, we pull out some really important pieces for you. Uh just a reminder, uh it is a budget built on full staff, full staffing and full programming, right? So, we do that with our original budget. We roll forward what we have at that time. We u make a lot of estimates. Um if you notice, we did a really good job uh making estimates
050um based off of foundation allowance as well as um our student number or our student expectation. Um so, great job. Um, and if you also remember this year we did nothing. So >> page 28 does show a nice summary of that. >> Thank you. >> We did a really good job which means there really wasn't a lot of movement in our amendment if that makes sense. Right. So we already anticipated a $400 increase in for people allocation. It really ended up at about 442 which means we only added a tiny little bit of revenue for that um state um foundation balance. uh during our amendment period uh is when we get uh staffing accurate, right? So we roll forward what we had in the past and then we work on staffing and that's across all
051groups, right? Our individual contracts as well as our market units. Um so we get all of that in order over the summer uh so we can present to you a true cost. Um all of those true costs are now built into this budget. Um so you can see before you uh we are anticipating a revenue of 53.9 million and an expense of 58.4 million. the overall use of fund balance of 4.4. So, a couple other things I want to add. We talk a lot about 31A uh is really up in the air right now. It's not included here in this budget um because we're still waiting on a court decision and we really don't know if that's funding that we are going to elect to receive. Didn't feel responsible to that in the budget uh
052today. So uh make it known that if that does move forward that would be a difference in what you would see uh for budget to actual towards the end of the year. Um we spent some time in finance committee this evening looking at a lot of historic data um MPER's historical data um all the way back to 2000 maybe I mean 20 plus years. uh we're also able to look at uh healthcare cost uh data for the same time period 20 years just to get an idea of some of the trends. So we make some u big assumptions in our budget talk about that when we begin our budget process right that we um that we chat about in June when you're approving that initial budget and we still have some additional assumptions that we
053make during this process. So I want to be clear that those assumptions are built in. Um you know mixers rates are one of them. Uh we use a blend right and at the end of the year I'll come back to you and I'll say this was our expectation. These were our actual costs. We had an adjustment whether that's a positive or a negative uh to our to our books. Um another one is healthcare cost. Uh so that's a really big assumption and um we don't know our healthcare costs until we get all of our completed contracts until our open enrollment closes and all of our participants and our census data um is in our formula or in our um worksheet to actually calculate that true cost. Um remember the things that impact our healthcare are
054absences right major changes and um in our uh struct or in our historical data that we reviewed earlier there is usually a year- end variance um mostly to positive for the district uh but we do of or we did also see um an additional expense that was reported at year end. So just an additional piece of information that there are adjustments or true-ups at the end of the year to um tighten up these assumptions that we are required to make because we don't have perfect information. The um other piece is co grants, right? We talked a lot about this funding clip. Maybe you may have heard it from me, you may have heard other people. What happens when this one time money runs out? What happens when the state changes the way that they fund
055school districts? >> Well, what you're seeing in front of you today is the guidelines. So, um, since school year, um, up until last year, uh, the COVID grant data that was in our year-end financial results. Um, it shows that the district managed $24 million in CO funding and for one-time pad quarters. So, um, it's hard when things are so up and down, right? It's hard when they're adding new things to the year. Um, we presented to you today the best, um, best we can do based off the facts that um, I don't know what to anticipate from the state. Uh, you know, we received a budget from them in October this year, which made it really hard to spend, you know, really, really hard to turn around. Um, so it's uh it's been fun. Um,
056trying to think if there's anything else they want to pull out from. >> We also noted that there are several revenue streams that previously were able to categorical grants that just no longer exist. So the years past we've been able to get anywhere from 500,000 upwards of a million dollars in categorical grants that help support programs across the district. State offering those grants. And so we're dealing all these things at once >> all at the same time. And I think the other uh big piece to mention is the mysters. So it gets overly technical and extremely complex the way that the state provides funding to the district to offset costs. Um and it's not always been a thing. Um it it was a very standardized funding model for a long time and I would say
057the last four or five years it's just uh it's it's chaotic, right? uh new new offsets, new reimbursements, new passroughs, new categoricals. Um and what you're seeing here um in the memo on page one tried to highlight a few things for you. There's a few of those categoricals that were eliminated. So, for instance, this 147A1, uh that was not an expectation of ours that this would be eliminated, but that's about a $320,000 hit to the district. That would normally offset costs for us, and that's no longer. um there were a lot of changes in retired rates. Uh we were supposed to see this huge uh decrease and that's just not the case and we did a little study session on that quite a while ago in finance as well. So finance committee had the expectation
058that it's not going to be a true 5.75% savings. Um so we've been uh working through these things as we get more information. Um but just so you're aware there are things that happen but that's okay getting back to so it's one point two about it's an estimate um about what a little over so it's the best we know today I miss anything >> that was really helpful thank you questions or just have any uh thing that you want out >> well I I just amplified that comment. I don't know if Chris's comment just now or not, but the fact that uh we have a an increase in peripheral funding from 400 to 442 did not result in that increase in revenues. Um we're actually down. Last year we were at 5 million. This year
059we are expected to be at 54 million roughly. Um so we do have a slight decrease in in student count but not it's two people it's about >> yeah it's two people last year was 3300 last year >> so it's a decrease of 1.15 >> yeah so so it's not due to decrease in students it's not due to you know anything that the district has done it's this uh shell game I guess for lack of a better in Lancing where they um have certain categoricals that are now gone can't apply for. So just as a point of communication if you are to see your representatives um that that Dexter is facing a decrease in funding if this continues year after year we are decisions that will not be taxed. So if we can actually have
060some funding that would be very nice and at this time we don't expect any changes for any additional funding to to um so uh we keep an eye on it right we present to you guys financial narratives sometimes you receive those in November I know we had a conversation last year that that November narrative was not necessarily the best use of time because it was appearing um budget to actual um against the original budget, not against what we would call our real budget or our improvement. So, we did delay that uh for more clarity uh going forward. So, you'll receive from us um from our department of a financial narrative based off of 1231 um month end um to be able to compare what's happening against this new amended budget which is considered our real
061budget. >> Does that make sense? Y >> yeah. So, we were just kind of providing you data that might not have been um the clearest if that makes sense. >> Yeah. Yeah. >> The only other point I would add is later in today's agenda you'll see district is asking to spend funds those are bond dollars. It's a good general reminder that bond dollars very separate account the separate revenue stream. uh those are not being spent on the person that we cannot right so it is confusing at time when we put a number in front of the board to say if we're experiencing a deficit we're being aware of our budget and then we want to spend x number of dollars on an item or construction project those are different >> thank you >> okay does
062further discussion about this or >> I like the presentation of materials. I appreciate all the difficult succession of school boards training funds. Twice each year, the board pre-approves funding uh registration and travel expenses for each trustee to attend up to six MSP classes and subsequent six months. This allows trustes to register in a timely manner. Trustees may request approval to take additional classes as designer board of education approved funding including registration and travel costs for each board trustee to take up six may ask the classes between January 1 to June 30. I'll second that motion. >> We have a motion and a second. Any discussion? >> That's a good one. >> I support that. >> Yes. Just to remind everyone, there is a virtual conference the first weekend of uh February and the state is
063still paying for a number of the classes. So, it is a good time to get them in if you if you have more you'd like to do. Those >> That's right. All right. Anything else? Let's go a >> m. >> Next up is CBI 101 registration for student representatives. Bylaw 2305 encourages trustees to enhance their effectiveness through participation in MASP and other trainings for school board trustees. The board also supports training attendance for student representatives. I'll move that with the board of education approved funding for contrasted student representatives to take virtual MASB CBA 101 course anytime through June 30, 2026 even if you have graduated. >> I'll second. >> We have a motion and a second. Any further discussion? It is available and you can contact me if you'd like. All right, let's do a
064vote. >> I All right. Next up is school of choice slots for 627. Our packet contains executive summary regarding school of choice program. Can I get a motion? I'll move that the board of education for 30 slots for DHS IB diploma program 10th grade 10th grade and 11th grade with a minimum of 10 to grade one slot for virtual school and one slot for early college for the 20 26 to 27 discussion >> numbers feels like kindergarten will always be our largest we give priority to siblings of students that are already in the district. So think about kindergarten as an entry point the district that's why that number will always be a little bit larger than most of the other bringing out younger sibling text. We also have a number of students that are already
065here in school district that move elsewhere they want to continue. So some of those school choice spots are recaptured by kids are already going here. Uh so folks does great job helping managing all this real have the ability to offer them. >> Yep. This doesn't seem like consistent with what we've been doing. >> Any other questions? >> All right, let's do a vote. >> Mr. >> Yes, Mrs. >> Hi, >> Mr. Arnold. >> Hi, Mr. >> Hi, >> Right. Next up is our Alit sign banner. As part of the Albert sign project, the district would like to place a Dexter branded banner to cover the back of the sign, which will be visible from the road. Our packet includes a bid tabulation and recommendation from Ranger and the project will be paid with funds for
066the 2017 series 2. I get a motion. I'll move that the board of education award contract of purchase and installation of the sign banner to imaging group for 14,735 with 15% contingency of $2210 for a total amount not to exceed $16,945. >> I'll second a second discussion. >> I don't need this. >> The back of the the sign is not very good. This is just logo. >> Do we have a picture of it? Well, the first thing you see when you drive to the town nice opportunity to welcome people. >> It is the >> It looks half the night. >> Yeah. Okay. You talk about Ryan slowly. >> And was it part was it originally the budget for the budget? >> It was it was part of the side put it up after we saw
067the back of it. >> Yeah. >> We are still spending the spending >> extra interest money from 2017. >> Yeah. That the physics office Sharon and Christie done a great job. Do they I do have a question. Do they need to access the back to do any repairs? >> All the repairs are done from the front. So the big questions when you look at the back of the scoreboard, the slats and venting to help assign cool. Um so we call the engineers. We know that there's enough gap that that won't be an issue even in the summer. Um, but if there is an issue with the board, they actually take it do the work from the front comes out from the front, not back. Great question. Great. I thought the same thing. I'm like, wait
068a minute, how do we access that? So, the work comes from the front. >> Okay, let's do a vote. I >> All right. Next is the Albert Stadium lighting replacement. Our packet includes a bid tabulation and recommendation for the 2025 bond series one uh1 all lighting stadium lighting replacement project from construction um pending final review of financial and other qualification criteria. Granger recommends that DCS award the subcontract to O'Donnell electric and assigned it to Brager for management. I'll move with the board education award the L red stated lighting project electric for a total amount not good seats 171,230 and a sign a second discussion can you just give a brief reminder to the board about the project as a whole and what we've already paid for it >> so you previously approved the purchase of
069the light fixtures themselves so This is for the actual installation both of the light fixtures and conduit wire uh power uh distribution at Elbridge as well as taking down the existing lights once lights are up. Uh this will take place um depending on when everything comes in either be before spring sports start try and get this started over winter here. If not everything comes in, they'll do it for the summer so that it's fully available for fall sports going forward. Uh either way, they will not be doing anything during the season. It will be either the existing lights or the new lights fully operational for spring sports. So very clear Donald Electric's local locally owned company they're more likely the owner has kids in the district and they may have and uh project manager will
070probably be deadly. >> They also have kids. >> Yeah. So um and like uh yes we have we have a lot of connections there. They fully understand what it is that uh is required make sure that we're not affecting any of the sports uh in this project. U we're happy to hear a lot of news about delays to electrical gear. So all this stuff is relatively available. Might miss that March 1st date. Like I say, keep the existing lights up and operational, but will not have to go past the for installation. So this is like I say the installation of the previously purchased fixtures. Um and then we'll also include uh from MUCO we bought the light fixtures from, but they will coordinate the training bringing people out. um and getting getting everything into the
071uh press box so that they can be operated. >> Questions? >> And I will just note the facilities committee did verify that the lighting is actually going to be an improvement from what we have in terms of the light being focused on the field and less nuisance to people around than currently. So this should be upgrade or neighbors. Okay, >> just a reminder that Brian already said this, but we we could use this money to fill our fund balance loss. This is all bond money, which is unfortunately an issue can't choose to tax ourselves for the operations of schools, but we can do uh buildings out of local. We're using this You have questions? >> Maybe just a >> comment just so people understand the process go through like an RP process. While they are
072local, they were the best to have the experience and best local right because they are >> I would just add to that, you know, I was happy to see we had seven that are project and you know, we're talking with a lot of contractors to try and get people excited about the Sometimes you get two or three you're begging for two people to bit a project and call competitive. So to see the sort of turn out for the first project a good sign. >> Awesome. It's great. Thank you everyone. >> Thank you. >> Let's do this. >> Hi. Hi. >> Mrs. Riser. Hi. >> Hi. M. All right. Next up is the course. Next up is the course numbering. Um, this is only this vote is only about the minor modifications to the course names
073that were shared during the school presentation at the beginning of the meeting. I'll move that the board of education approve the re numbering renumbering back of HS courses as outlined in the executive summary 125 motion and a second discussion pretty straightforward makes sense. >> All right, let's move on to vote. I >> All right. Uh, moving on to discussion. Uh, didn't have a chance to talk about the course proposals earlier. Um, they are not up for action tonight. Is there any further discussion anyone has? Okay. If you think of any questions, send them to the superintendent and we will bring it back for action in a coming meeting. Um, so moving on to the change order process. Our packet includes an outline of the 2025 bond capital projects construction change order process is consistent with
074the process for previous bonds and this item is forformational purposes only. Board action is not required. This change or process did go through facilities committee and it was discussed and from my recollection the update was sort of the totals because the construction charges have gone up significantly. So they were raised to what people what our experts felt were appropriate for this time as far as It's just to operationalize that same process just 2025. >> Any other questions? >> Great. This never needs to be voted on by the board or it will come back. Correct. Future. >> It doesn't come back. >> Okay. Yep. Perfect. Thank you for that clarification. >> All right, it is time for our second opportunity for public participation. Is there anyone who would like to address the board? >> Happy holidays.
075Have a great winter break. >> All right, no one is here, so we will move on to board comments. Oh, I'll just add student representatives that there's a wrestling game on Thursday. It's their first um Oh, and they have a choir concert that you're all the schools are running through the choir and the orchestra concerts and the sixth grade was alive because Brandon when they were going to start the popcorn machine during basketball game set fire alarm. So, that was fun. They went out and nobody left. There's like four people that left everybody else. It's nice to know the fire alarms work. >> Nobody did the fire grill. >> Nobody Nobody But I to their credit went and chat back. So nobody was concerned and now there are four four fans in the concession. So,
076it was very live. >> Perfect. Anybody else? I will just say in January we do have an upcoming legislative breakfast and I can't remember the date off of the top of my head but I will remind everyone in January um it's like a Monday morning maybe around the 20th whatever that Monday is it is in person and if you can't go but you have some thoughts especially from finance committee if you send them my way make sure that we share our information with our legislators. All right. Um, we have a number of information items in our packet. We have nice job notes. We have finance committee notes from November minutes from November 17th. We have CIA minutes from December 3rd. We have our 2026 committee roster which was updated simply to show the ad box
077for said curriculum. Um, and we have facilities minutes from December 8th. We do not have a close session this evening. So we are able to adjourn.