May 19, 2025, ISD 199 School Board Meeting

001Next I have Mari Burgraff. Mari's gonna come on up. Alright, there's Mari. Good job. Alright. And we have Rafe Sporer. I'll come up. Yeah. Alright. And next we have Donovan Galliou. Yes. Now, a couple things about our season this year. We had a bunch of athletes qualify for the state tournament. And they went and bowled at the state tournament. Donovan got third in singles. Yes, give him a round of applause. Got fourth with Cheyenne Gakstetter in doubles. Yes. What a great coach. Now, Rafe, Mari, and Tristan Moy, and Theo Skar. We got first place. They won. Congratulations. Thank you for being here. Thank you all for being here tonight and bringing the kids. It's awesome. So as you can see, that was awesome. Three divisions, PICI, we won the ASD division. It was outstanding. We

002had a great year. A lot of fun things happened for the kids. And we bowl at a Dekulas every Monday, so it's an awesome event. We also, our adaptive bowling team is not a co-op. We run our own program at Simley High School, and it's all our kids. And so we're always excited when they do really well. Another update that something recent that happened at the high school on May 14th. We had our first annual and hopefully we'll do this every year from now on. Activities Awards Night. where we gave out over 80 awards in the PAC. It was an outstanding event. We had a lot of people come out and enjoy it. We gave out 67 triple threat awards. That was awards that were given to students who participated in three activities or more

003throughout the year. We gave out six pinnacle performer awards. That was to seniors who participated in three or more activities for four years. Then we gave out nine Iron Spartans. And that went to athletes that were in three sports for four years all the way through. That's participating every single day. We gave out nine Metro East Conference All Academic Awards. Anybody had earned All Conference in any sport and then had a 3.65 GPA. earned that award. We gave out three AAA awards. That's arts, athletics, and academics, excelling in all three. We gave out the Lori Beadle and the Tim Bakke scholarships, and they will also be getting that at the Best Foundation. The presentation, which is coming up down the road here, I think it's the 24th, but... Yep, and then we gave out our

004Apollo and Athena Awards. We also gave out two Minnesota Solo Ensemble Best in Sight Awards. We had over 60 performances at the 3AA and four Best in Sight Awards are given and we had two of them. And they performed at the Activities Awards night. And then we had two other students who got Minnesota Music Educators All-State Recognition. That's over a thousand musicians. uh tried out to get this award to get all state and we had two of them here at simley high school i do have the program with me if you're interested in looking that later on tonight it was a lot of fun and we are going to do that every year from now on so that was that was a blast our boys and girls golf team are fighting weather wind storms every

005week. They've had a really nice year. They're competing. They're supposed to be in conference championships this week. We don't know how that's going to go. But we're doing really well. I just want to mention some names. Eli Boone, Charlie Martin, Ethan Unglesby are our boys, kind of in our top five. And Ashley Leonard and Zoe Lang have been our varsity players. And we're looking for them to do really well here as the season starts to wrap up. I wanted to mention that we tried something new at the middle school this year in spring. We had a great track season. 88 middle school students participated in track. Our eighth grade championship got rained out. Couldn't find a way to get that thing made up. But our sixth and seventh graders did really well. And we also

006tried a new sport here in the middle school this year. We had 19 students participate in middle school badminton, which was the first time trying that this year at the middle school. It went really well. Michelle Ahrens And so it's another sport that could be an emerging sport here down the road for Simley High School. Our boys lacrosse team is in action tonight. They're playing right now. They're playing Minnehaha Academy. We have 48 students out for boys lacrosse. We are not in a co-op. Those are all Simley kids. Remember, lacrosse is one class. So there's 80 teams in the state of Minnesota. We are in that program, and we play just Simley High School. A lot of other teams co-op, and we just play ourselves. We're doing really well this year. We've got some wins,

007and we're hoping to keep improving each year. And we have a lot of young men participating in boys lacrosse. Our boys tennis team has been a work in progress. And this year we're finally getting over that kind of, every year I come to spring, I say we're working on boys. Well, we had 23 boys this year. Well, we had 21 boys and two girls playing boys tennis. Remember, if a female tennis player doesn't want to play in the spring and decides to play soccer, which the two girls that are doing, they don't want to play soccer, they can play with the men in the spring. They can only choose one or the other. And so we had 23 kids. We went three and five in the conference. We had six wins this year. We have

008a sophomore playing one singles in Camarique. And we're a much better team than we've been. I'm really proud of that program. Steve Johnson's the head coach. He's done a really good job of getting a lot of kids out for boys tennis. Our boys track and field teams are outstanding this year and we are in conference championships tomorrow but that has now already been rained out and so we're going to one full day on Thursday which will have all the conference championships on Thursday and then we come back the following week with our section championships. Just a couple things to keep your eyes on. In the boys division Nick Abrahamson set school record in the 3200 and he's leading our section with the best time right now. him and another student will be at it, but

009he probably will, if he can run his best, or close to his best, he should be in the state tournament representing us at St. Michael. Isaiah Wilson has three school records. He's also Apollo Athlete of the Year, our male athlete of the year. He owns three school records, the 110 hurdles, the 100 meter dash, and the long jump. Isaiah was in the state tournament in the long jump and the 110 hurdles last year. We expect to see him back there again. Isaac Shannon. has thrown a couple throws long enough to qualify right now for the state tournament in the disc. He's real close with the shot. On the women's side... We have the returning state champion in the 110 hurdles in Naomi Moore. We have the returning state runner-up in the triple jump in I

010said out of bio. We have Analee Schwab, who's now run our school record as just an eighth grader, and she will be in the 3200, and she will have a very good chance to be in the state tournament. Sydney Reese has been in the state tournament in disc and shot, so she'll have a good shot. Kanai Eberhardt has run a very good time in the 100 meter, and so she'll have a shot. of making the state tournament. Megan Gullarud, Emerson Hocking are all both right there. We think we're going to do very well here at the end of the season, and our track teams are going to represent us really well and possibly into the state tournament. Our girls softball team is on the field right now in the first round of section championships. We're

011beating Richfield right now 8-3, so hopefully since I've come into the meeting, we're still ahead in that game. We have a very young team, just a couple of seniors starting. It's dominated by sophomores, and we're getting to be a really good team, and we're going to be right in the mix to win the section this year. And we are very young, so the future looks bright for our girls softball team. The girls lacrosse team. The girls lacrosse team right now is currently 6-6. They have one more game in regular season. That is tomorrow. We've got rain and we've got issues with tomorrow's games. But we'll take a look at how we can get that in. But with me tonight, Courtney, why don't you come on up. With me tonight is Courtney Karowski, our senior captain.

012Now Courtney's amazing, amazing athlete. She plays hockey and lacrosse, and she also plays flag football. Now I asked her to come not to talk about lacrosse, but before she talks, I wanted to say a couple things about Courtney. Courtney is number one all-time in goals scored at Simley High School. She has 201 goals in her career. So that's an amazing amount. That's out of hand to score 201 goals in your career. She has over 250 points. That's assistant goals combined. She leads, she has over 250, what do we call it when we win the face-off? Ball controls. Ball controls. She starts it after every score of ball control. She has over 250 wins in ball controls. It's a big part of lacrosse to get the ball and get it in control and get it to

013your side and your end if you've watched lacrosse. Courtney is an amazing lacrosse player, and that's not why I asked her to come today. I wanted to recognize her, but Courtney is also, one of our captains and senior leaders of our new flag football program, our girls program. We have 29 girls playing girls five versus five flag football. It's our first year inaugural season. We're currently six and two, and Courtney's the quarterback. And Courtney, I asked her to come talk about her experience in our first year ever of running flag football. So Courtney, you've got the floor. Hi, I'm Courtney Kowarski, like Will said. I'm a senior on the first ever girls flag football team at Simile. Being a part of this inaugural season is truly something special and I'm proud to say I was

014a part of it. We've put in a bunch of time and effort over the past few months, all while many of us also competed in other spring sports. It's been such a fun and rewarding opportunity to play alongside other amazing athletes and showcase the wide range of skills we bring to the field. We started the season strong, beating South St. Paul twice and winning several other games by large margins. Right now we are 6-2, both losses coming in close one-score games against Park. We are heading into sections as the number two seed and we are excited to play Minneapolis North for a chance to compete in the first ever state girls flag football tournament. But beyond the record and the wins, what's made this team so special is the energy and support we bring to

015every practice and game. We play to win, but we also celebrate each other's big plays and always lift each other up. I'm incredibly proud to be a part of such a competitive and resilient group, and we hope to continue to make history in the weeks ahead. Thanks, Courtney. That's all I have. Will, before she goes, Courtney. So have you played football before, thrown a football? Because you're the quarterback. Yeah, I've thrown a football before, but I've never actually played football. And you've got baseball, too? That was my final piece. Thanks, Courtney. Our final sport that I wanted to touch base on tonight is baseball. We're currently 11-7. We were supposed to play Holy Angels tomorrow night, and we are right now in our QRF, the number one seed in sections. Now Holy Angels is the

016numbers two seeding section so that game would be a big game and would help determine the number one seed. We'll see if the weather is going to allow us to play. Our sections start next week over Memorial weekend. I always get to spend Memorial weekend at a playoff game which is always fun my wife loves it when we go over to Richfield or to wherever we're playing and we watch a baseball game on Memorial Day it's a tradition for us and it's a lot of fun we're excited about our baseball team and their chances they've been in the section finals the last two years and very very close to qualifying for the state tournament so we wish them a ton of luck and hopefully we can have finish with a great end of the season

017for sports with a lot of talented young people that's it for me and anybody any any questions i think one of the things to note a number of years ago as an example our track and field teams weren't high numbered uh team their high participation rates but those numbers have grown in 2015 we had we had a total of 18 students vote for tracking 2015. what was the total this year uh we're at um excuse me let me just make sure i don't give the right number i think i believe it's 66 boys i wrote it down 68 boys and 44 girls. That's just high school? That's not the 88 middle school students that we have at the middle school. Our track is our most popular school. Well, we built a track. Let me rephrase

018that. The committee passed a referendum that allowed us to build a turf and a track. You've got to have the facility. You've got to have the facility to run a track. We got new equipment. We hired coaches that are on staff, Dan Gerber and Gretchen Schwans. and they've recruited the heck out of the athletes here at Simley. It's become, and it builds on itself. When a program starts to have success, more kids want to be a part of it, and then people come out. And track is also one of those sports, comparing to basketball. Basketball, you're not dribbling when you're in kindergarten, first, second grade, and you're not traveling. I mean, track allows you to be an athlete and come out, and if you're fast or if you have good endurance or you're big and

019strong, you can throw, you can throw the disc. And it allows us to have athletes that maybe aren't committed to a traveling program for the last 10 years. It is one of those sports that you can just jump in and have some success. And it's a lot of fun. The reason for asking the question is that we have noted at Simi High School we have high participation rates. And one of the things that we sometimes reference in conversation is those activities that provide the opportunities for kids after school is like their eighth period. It's an important part of their growth as young adults as well. And just by finding the opportunities for our kids to be involved, we see that making a difference in our high school and our community. And it's a wonderful thing.

020And I think that comparison to track is one of those that really shows how those numbers show up. But then as you think about flag football, those young ladies are a lot of times participating in another activity and they're playing their games on Sunday because it's not a Minnesota State High School League sanctioned event. So they have an alternate schedule. Yeah, they play, they work out at night and after six o'clock. So they all go to their practices first and they come back for their flag football practice and then they practice on Saturday mornings and then they play on Sunday night at four o'clock. So these ladies have made a huge commitment to be a part of it. Down the road that may change though. Once it becomes a league sport, then our young female

021athletes will have to choose. The last point of that is that that league received funding to get started. Maybe you can just share a little bit about that. Yes. I was one of the ADs that went hard for a grant from the Minnesota Vikings. The Vikings are funding the whole league this year. And there was, I believe, 64 schools in the metro area or just kind of outer ring metro area that got selected. We were one of them. And we got a grant for three years. We were getting money from the Vikings for three years to fund this program. And the Vikings and the NFL are hoping... that five versus five female flag football will become a high school league sport in all of the states across the United States. Right now it's in nine

022states, and they want it to be, the NFL is really pushing to become a state high school league sport for all four girls to be a part of the football game. It's it's picking up really quickly my day job is in parks and rec world and the Minnesota Park and Rec Association is already pushing cities to have The flag football options for the younger, you know The elementary to start building those players to come up into the into the high school. So it's when you have someone like the NFL pushing something And like I said, we have 28 girls, 29 girls actually participating right now. It's been great. Where do they, dumb question, but where do they play when they play at home? We got to host one game. They play right in our stadium.

023The field gets cut in half. The field is about 25 yards wide and 70 yards long. First down in the middle. And so you can get two fields on your turf field going at once. So you play, four teams are playing at the same time. in a stadium. And they play at 4 o'clock on Sundays. I think their next, I would have to look at where their next game is. The exciting part that you see in the media about that is that there are a lot of girls that are not in any other activities but are finding flag football as their activity, which is a great thing. Thank you, Will. Thank you. Thank you. Do I have a motion and a second to approve the consent agenda items? Motion by Member Pearson. Second by Member

024Dukes. Motion by Member Pearson. Second by Member Dukes. The board will now vote by roll call. Member Larson. Aye. Member Nehemiah. Aye. Member Dukes. Aye. Member Pearson. Aye. Member Lonsbury. Aye. Member Klingner. Aye. Member Warrick. Aye. With seven out of seven aye votes, the motion is carried. Now on the board, we'll show the donations. Thank you to those who have donated to the school district. Your generosity and support of our schools and the community are much appreciated and they make a difference for our staff and students. All right, information items. We will begin with Principal Richardson from Pine Bend Elementary. Thank you, thank you. One of my favorite things to do as an extrovert is give tours after school. And I got to be careful because they can get a little lengthy because they have

025a lot of wonderful things to say about Pine Bend Elementary. But I was giving one to a family right after spring break. was walking them around and we just kept running into different people who had wonderful things to say about Pine Bend and one of the quotes from the mother as she was leaving was it is really nice to be in a school where people really love kids and it was exciting too and it's it's been fun to welcome them and it was fun to see her kind of acknowledge that and see that just in a very short amount of time through about five or six conversations that happened in a very short amount of time so um i am very excited to share a lot about pine bend today but i brought a lot

026of people with me to share a little bit more because um i can i can talk about pine bend and how wonderful it is um for quite a while and some of you have maybe experienced that with me in the past um but we've got some people who can kind of go a little bit deeper into the great work that we do every single day at pine bend so i'm going to go ahead and jump in and then we'll have a couple people Some witnesses joined me on the stand here. So coming into my third year at Pine Bend, one thing that was kind of really on my mind was just how do we make sure that we're continuing to provide a really awesome experience. And what I notice kind of day in and day

027out is how incredibly hard our teachers work and how... conscientious they are about making sure that kids are having a fantastic experience. And it's really the magic is really in the details. It's in kind of the extra phone call that goes home. It's kind of checking in, you know, knowing that a student might be having a difficult day just because of the way they showed up that day. But making sure that our kids are feeling a part of the team. And so it's something that I just, I have a lot of faith and trust in our staff to make sure that they're working. about how our kids are going home each day and feeling good about the work. One quote that I read came across last summer and I shared this with our staff opening

028week. The most important takeaway here is to know that you're not just teaching subjects but shaping lives. Your classroom has the power to be a haven of acceptance. a place where every student feels seen heard and valued. I think I had a wonderful K-12 experience and I still am able to connect with a lot of those folks because they are in and around my parents and around my siblings who live in my hometown. But a lot of the wonderful memories and experiences that I have I just see reflected every single day here. And again it's something that I think our staff is aware of it but i also know that i think sometimes people don't even realize how much the hard work and care and love that they're providing our kids is going to be

029something that they're going to take with them in in kind of for their lifetime so um A couple other moments of just, number one, looking sharp on the right there. We've got, speaking of lawyers, we've got some future lawyers there. And then, you know, just some celebrations in the classroom. But when we, entering our school year, some of our goals for our entire kind of nine months with our kids, we really looked at, you know, finding ways to not only try to get some results in some areas that we felt were very needed for kids to succeed and for learning to thrive. One big one is just being here and increased attendance and I think it's something that a lot of schools are working at. What we really tried to focus on was the communication

030part of that. We know that all parents want their kids at school every day, but we know that sometimes that's not happening. And sometimes it's just making sure that we're on the same page with families and we're connecting with them in all kinds of ways. Another thing is really looking at the things from a behavior lens that are getting in the way of learning and things that are disruptive to teaching and disruptive to getting that classroom culture to be in a place where it's extremely positive. And the two that we really honed in on were insubordination and physical aggression. And so we looked at different ways where we could make sure we're teaching the skills that can hopefully avoid those things as much as possible. And then we looked at teaching standards-based units and lessons.

031and making sure that we're having as many opportunities to. hone in on small groups to make sure that kids are getting what they need in real time and we'll talk a little bit more about that later tonight as well. And those are lofty and they're things that I think every school can probably look at closely. I think what has been powerful for me is some of the staffing situations that we have have led to a lot of success for these pieces and I also know there's areas where we need to we're learning as we go and we're continuing to see that there's aspects that are working and there's things we either need to tighten up or things that we need to kind of research a little bit more and figure out what is gonna work

032best because when our parents send us their best and our job is to help you know give them the best chance at growth and taking the leaps that we can and what is very exciting is when we do have conversations within our staff there's a lot of moments where we if we pause and zoom out a little bit we can see there there's students who are making incredible growth in ways that maybe isn't you know very public to other people in the building or is really maybe just between the teacher and the student but those moments are powerful and we keep looking for ways to celebrate those as well So our theme for the year was lighting the way at Pine Bend and what we talked about was finding ways that we can really honor

033students in big ways and small. We talked about how can we guide students on their path to success. We talked about, you know, a lot of people in the world of education have probably heard the phrase clarity before competence and there's a lot of things that we need to do to make sure students know what we're after and how we're going to get after it. and then making sure that we're supporting students so they know where we're going for the year. The thing that's exciting about a K-12 school and actually a pre-K-12 school is that we have some students for seven years and that's a long time and it's a great opportunity for us to help them really chart their academic course forward. And I saw this gentleman in the hallway with the northern lights.

034I thought that was pretty well done there, sir. So I wanted to put that up there. So a little bit about Pine Bend. This year we're at 541 students. We have 487 students kindergarten through fifth grade. We have 19 classrooms this year including, or not including, but in addition to, we also have four CARES CID classrooms with our special education moderate to severe program. which is one additional from last year as well. We have two pre-K classrooms with 49 students. One is a full day pre-K and then we have two different half day, a morning co-taught special education pre-K and an afternoon pre-K. And then we have one special education class with District 917, just with our partnership with them. So our school has a lot going on each and every day, over 500 kids

035and over 80 staff that are here at different points throughout the week. A little bit about Pine Bend, 18% of our students receive English language learner services, about a little over 20% of our staff receive, 20% of our students receive special education resources, and then 44.5% of our students are eligible for free and reduced meals. big piece of our work and you'll hear a little bit more about this with our student success coaches but diving into the 199 way this year and really looking at those three pieces and I'll speak very briefly to each one when I think about belonging I think about you know our classrooms there's I got a sports background and so the team analogy comes up a lot and I even hear our teachers use that language a lot about we

036are a team and I think one important piece of the puzzle for kids is making sure that they have multiple people in the building, both peers and adults, that they can connect with and they feel a part of the team. And so it's important for us to make sure that we're working hard so kids feel that they have connections and there's multiple adults that they trust and they can go to. One big piece with those relationships is all the different ways that we can connect with our kids. Sometimes it's doing something like getting challenged for a ice bucket challenge that I can't back down from a dare. Got to step up there for the kids. But also on the left there, you know, we have buddy classrooms and our older students have a chance to

037connect with younger students a couple times throughout the year. And those relationships go far away. They go pretty far away. I think our fourth and fifth graders don't necessarily always realize that they're... celebrity status and I think it's good for them to know that the younger students are listening and watching and imitating them in all kinds of ways whether it's on the bus or in the hallways. And then engagement, finding different opportunities for our kids to find things that they love to do and love to learn but also there's going to be challenging things that kids need to do every single day and when those challenges pop up. not backing down from them and finding some ways to utilize the adults in the room to make sure that they can stay engaged. I know as

038a parent of three, there are certain activities that are preferred, there are certain activities that are not preferred, and we need to stay engaged with all of it if it's essential. So finding opportunities to help kids kind of lock in per se is something that we're working on every single day. Now I have two wonderful guests that I'm going to ask to come up right now. I have our student council president, Coris Nodgrass, and I have our vice president, Gus Schwartz. So I'm going to have both of you come up and join me here. I have a couple questions for them that we workshopped today, and I just wanted you to get a chance to see some of our students' leaders. So one thing I want to say before we start, both of these fine

039Spartans have... kindergarten siblings. Cora has a younger brother Isaac and Gus has a younger sister Lila and it's really fun to and you probably don't notice it's usually at about 7 37 but I get a lot of opportunities to watch them kind of taking care of them and supporting them on their way so we have wonderful older siblings here which is kind of fun to see because your younger siblings are going to emulate that when they get older with kindergartners as well so. Thank you both for being wonderful older siblings as well. So we're going to start with our vice president, Mr. Schwartz. I've got a couple questions for him. Not only is Gus our vice president for student council, he also served on our student advisory council. And so he was several times throughout

040the year was coming together at the high school or a couple other spots to kind of... share his perspective on things. So my first question for you guys, what has been great about being on the Student Advisory Council? One great part of being on the Student Advisory Council was that we got to go to tour the police department. We got to see their police vehicles and we got to see the jail cells. At our last meeting, we got to taste test food. Some of the foods were new, like a chicken drumstick with seasoning. There was some chicken with flatbread. The flatbread was my favorite. I got to give my feedback to the adults. And what has been the best part of being the Student Council Vice President? One of the days President Kaur was gone,

041so I got to lead the meeting as President. It was fun to hand out popcorn to the whole school on Popcorn Fridays. Student Council is something I want to do next year. What is one reason that you like to be a leader? Everyone looks to me to see how we are going to do things at Pine Bend. And what is one reason you love Pine Bend? The teachers are really nice. The lunches are really good. I love their pizza. I can co-sign that. So thank you, Gus. President Snodgrass. What has been great about being on the student council this year? And I should say this is her second year being on student council. She was a classroom representative last year and is our president this year. We've gotten to do a lot of fun projects

042and help the school in ways that we didn't get to last year. We made tie blankets for the fire department and police department. The lollipop fundraiser helped fund our school store and helped donate money to the St. Jude's Children's Hospital. What is great about being president is that you're not in control but you have positive influence on the student council. And what is your favorite part of Pine Bend Elementary School? I love all the teachers and I love how they teach. They're understanding and they support staff and the support staff are great. I love them so much. Now we've got about, we're not really counting quite yet, but I think we have about 11 or 12 days left of school, is that correct? And she's gonna go on to the middle school. We're not adding

043a sixth grade. So I asked her what is one of her favorite memories of being a kindergartner at Pine Bend? In kindergarten I thought it was like awesome that I got to go on a field trip to the apple orchard and it was just a really fun memory from kindergarten. It did not take long for that to pop up for her. So I would love if we could give them a big round of applause for joining us. And our student council, I'm going to ask Ms. Bechet to come on up. Teresa Bechet is leading our student council and has done a wonderful job of bringing this to life the past couple years at Pine Bend. So I would love to, do you want to drive? No. Okay, I got this. Yeah, so our theme again

044is lighting the way. And what I wanted the student council to do this year is not just light the way at Pine Bend. that we can't just go beyond that. We can't just go beyond that. We can't just go beyond that. But go beyond into our community and even beyond that a little bit. And that's that's why we made the tie fleece blankets for our first responders to give to victims that, you know, they could they come across or whatever they may need it for and be or was here with that as well um they were very appreciative and then we gave them i believe it was and i think we had like 15 17 blankets that we were able to to give them um and also through our lollipop sales as she had mentioned

045we gave half the proceeds to st jude's hospital for that as well something different that we did this year as well is the school store the kids in the past have always just paid with money and just to be equitable uh this year too because sometimes you know kids don't have it and um things are you know 25 cents to two dollars and so we have used our spartan tickets which we give kids for positive behaviors um so that was really really great that everybody really could have the school store as a way to be rewarded or just for some fun with the money and a lot of the kids they don't really know this yet but we want to also give back to our schools so helping with track and field day however miss

046sarah wants to use the money ptsa we have talked to them also and i don't know if this is a for sure but i guess our popcorn machine is very very very very very slow so i guess that is something else that we would like to you know donate um to our school using the proceeds that we have made um and then coringus you don't know this either but another way that we're going to be giving back Wednesday is our last meeting and we have a lot of books that teachers have not used and we are going to go through them and don't need them. I have a friend that has started a bookmobile down by Red Wing and she has a brick and mortar as well for free books and she comes to the

047cities once a month to just gather and we're going to Figure out what books you guys think that kids would enjoy reading so it's another way of giving back so if I could have As Mr. Piney joins us, Mr. Piney and Ms. Bechet are our student success coaches and the work that they do has been absolutely invaluable for our students and for our families and I wanted them to take some time to talk a little bit about some of the approaches that they've used this year that have been powerful and effective for our kids and our families. I'll pass it over to them. All right, thanks, Principal Richardson. So up at the top, number one, our goal is to promote positive behavior. we kind of want to start from that end of things as much

048as possible and miss bache already mentioned our spartan tickets we've done um several different things to try to promote positive behavior this year and that's it's at the top of our list every time we've conducted weekly assemblies where we discuss proactive positive behavior and kind of model to the to the staff and students like their expectations we're here to meet them and our assemblies have really um have really been awesome this year they've they've come a long way um secondly uh also connected to the first goal is just we've spent a lot of time modeling and teaching core life skills through small groups and restorative practices So if we have children who are showing extra need with life skills, we will communicate with teachers and their families to just suggest, hey, we have some things

049that we could work through. You know, it might be two or three times a week, but we do proactive groups, and those have been really rewarding, and we've seen some very positive outcomes from that. And as far as restorative practice, that's a little bit on the reactive side where if you've done some harm, could be anything, we do want you to go through the process and consider the harm that's been caused and then get the opportunity to try and repair it. And then, you know... in another reactive sense we help to make sure that classroom learning can continue with minimal disruption we can kind of be called at any time and our goal is really to maintain the dignity of all of the children and to give the teacher the opportunity to continue instruction if

050a kid is having a really a really hard time and we we do that by you know inviting the child to a safe and calming place and then giving them an opportunity to understand how their behavior affects themselves, others, and then repair when necessary. And then ultimately, you know, after the fact, we do work with teachers on strategies just to see like, well, this is kind of, this keeps popping up at this time, or these are the moments of real struggle for the student. And so we try to look for ways that we can get ahead of it to maybe take a little bit of pressure off of the children in their moments where they seem to have the most difficulty and then slowly but surely, kind of add that pressure back in because ultimately

051we want all of our students to meet all all the expectations in the end and be yeah and be in their classroom for sure um one thing i wanted to add to this too because ben and i do spend a lot of time with a lot of these kids with the small groups it's a discussion that the two of us have had that when a teacher has, you know, 25 to 30 students, as much as they want to get to know all of them very individually. we really get to know them because it's a very small group. And sometimes it's only like two in a group. Sometimes it's one on one. And so it gives us the opportunity to really know, you know, maybe what are some triggers what's going on? Where a teacher just

052does not have all that time with all those, those children. So that's in a way how we also can work with the teacher of letting letting them know you know this is kind of what's going on and this might help because we know what's triggering that that student So the goal of success coaching is success. So we wanted to share a quick success one, two, three. It's hard to put it down to three because I think we really, yeah, I don't know. I want to do this because I think it's been really, really, really great. So it's wonderful to see kids when they have learned to ask for a break. or they have a scheduled break instead of disrupting the classroom or or running out um just kind of learning these sorts of things so

053we can reduce disruptive behavior in the classroom and ben mentioned this too that gives the teacher more consistency in instruction because they don't have to deal with a lot of the larger problems that are occurring and process. They don't have the time to do all this processing with these bigger behaviors. Our space in which, and we'll talk about on the next slide, the kids really know how to use it. And again, it's learned about where they can come in. And we have four separate areas in which the kids just really feel excuse me, that they have a safe space, a trusting relationships in which they can discuss whatever it is that they need and also do their homework if they need to. So we'll talk about that space. Actually, we'll go lower left first. That's

054the calming corner. It's often the landing spot for students who come to the room, especially if they're having really strong emotions about anything. We have things there for them to interact with. We've got like sort of a padded wall. We can throw balls against that. But it's really just a place for them to spend some time getting calm. Because there's really very little progress that can be made with a child who's not calm. You just can't start teaching and talking to them and say, you know, well, how did this affect you and others? They need to get their heart rate down. They need to slow their breathing. And they need to, you know, honestly kind of have maybe a smile on their face before we even really get into the tough stuff. But we do

055get into the tough stuff. On the right-hand side, bottom, is sort of a little processing space. Leading up to the beginning of this year, I just texted Teresa really quickly, and I was like, hey, what do you think about having like a little, you know, a coach's couch sort of situation? And I found this really nice nurse couple over in Woodbury that was basically just giving away some furniture. so my dad and i loaded that up on the trailer and brought it um like that same day we were in the middle of our training yeah um and it's actually a place teachers come and sit there to talk it's been a you know we it's awesome it's provided us a really great place to talk and there are some posters up on the wall that

056sort of describe our process um we talk about anonymity and um you know just basically keeping things focused respecting each other's perspectives and then really just getting to the heart of like when we do things it affects more than just just ourselves in the uh upper right we have small groups so that were that would be where we spend time with students on proactive instruction we will um We will teach things basically like recognizing when you're feeling upset. What are your sparks that get you really going, putting you into fight, flight, or fight mode? I said fight twice. Fight, flight, or freeze mode. And then we do have project and workspace. There are times where we really want a child to spend a lot of time thinking about the implications of their behavior. don't really

057like to talk about the negative things but if a child does you know is swearing we'll look into the cognitive effects of swearing or the effects that it can have on you and we'll do like a longer term project if it's a pattern for that student you know and then we can turn it into something that gets uh delivered to parents so that they know you know hey we're we're working on this um and that's kind of the the full the full space and you up in the small group place we do have a bulletin board that is centered around the 199 way which is belonging relationships and engagement and we will often use those pillars as we refer to them as we're having conversations with students and like this is what we're about we're

058about belonging and your behavior is working against that and that's and and so it's in the foundation of everything that we're trying to do get them to do yep yeah So that's a little bit about our space and what we do as success coaches. Thank you. Thank you. Can I just make a real quick comment? Because you might not be here at the end of the conference. I know you all like to leave. But I just am so excited to have our student success coaches and that our community has. you know, paid to help you guys be here. And we all know that teachers are, to some degree, a social worker. You guys have taken that to an N degree of social work. And just to hear all this and the restorative practices, I love

059to hear that you're repairing that harm. You're repairing the harm. It just seemed like we used to, instead we just... we separated the students or something like that and we didn't really deal with it for a number of reasons either the teacher didn't have time to deal with it because of because of the amount of kids in the class but now we have you and you are you're just so i'm just so grateful for having you and they have to repair with teachers too i mean i think that's really important too yeah yeah i would i would say before you all leave just so that you know i have a little spartan here at pine bend and I have seen the positive impact of your work. He went for two or three days probably telling

060me about an escalation between him and a good friend in the classroom. And it got to the point where by the third day, all he was talking about when he came home from school was, I said, how was school? And it would be whatever this relationship that's falling apart with this good buddy. And so the fourth day he gets home. he starts telling about this escalation it gets really and it was clearly blocking the learning it was all he was focused on I said then what happened he would tell me nothing I'm like then what happened and he goes then Thank God he didn't say Richard's. I don't want the principal there. But the de-escalation, even in him telling the story, and him and the little buddy got to go work it out, and they

061got to talk about it, and they're best friends again. But I thought about how that was black. He wasn't talking about anything that was happening in the class for days. just thank you thank you thank you for the work that you do it really makes a difference in in everything but that's you know to be honest i think that's even where that even the couch thing comes in because we were probably sitting on the couch it's a place where you know i kind of call it like kind of coffee hour you know where they feel comfortable and it's not like what you know we talk it out they've got talking pieces we respect each other when we talk everybody it's their perspective and it's it's very comfortable it's not shaming yeah there was relief in

062his voice when he said mr piney came it was like this release and this relief so it just you all are approaching it in the right way thank you uh miss bichet and mr piney um i asked rachel molo of one of our fantastic second grade teachers to join me um to talk a little bit about ufly now we are in our second year of utilizing ufly as a instructional tool and curriculum with our k uh first and second grade students around phonics and so i just wanted as someone who is inheriting students who have had one year of it and then her second year of teaching it herself I was hoping for her to share a little bit about the program just to kind of share our perspective on it. Yeah, so this is

063all part of our science of reading. We kind of did this phonics phase first for kindergarten through second grade, and it's two-day lessons of practicing all sorts of different skills. And then it has very consistent independent practice, a roll and read, and a decodable passage, and then there's some online games that go along with it. It's very evident, I think, That they've had a year under their belt at least from being in second grade and having it in first grade There are also like little home practice slips that go with that go home to show What to practice at home, which is a little difficult because it's set up as though They're the same activities that we do in class with each of our segmenting and blending. And I would say parents aren't exactly used

064to that type of format. You know, they're used to having a spelling list to practice. And we have these 10 words and you're going to practice those words all week. And then on Friday, you test those same words. And this time or with this program, it is a lot more. This might be your phonics pattern. You're gonna practice any words that you can kind of come across with that pattern and then it might be three of those words come Friday But you need to know how to kind of apply it all the way through so this is just kind of a snapshot of the layout of our lessons Like I said, they're very predictable. They are the same for every lesson as we go through They're the same in kindergarten first and second. They just

065change the skill and so They have some resources that go along with it too. But I think the kids have become so used to all the activities. They feel super confident in running through each one. They know which is next. They know if I skipped something on accident, they will call me out for sure. But they... We had one kind of scope and sequence for last year when we started just because everybody was new to it. So our second graders last year kind of started with the beginning skills as well. And now we kind of shifted. So everybody, okay, in first grade got these. I think we'll continue to do that as kindergartners this year got it as well. So kindergartners will be the first graders that have it. So they'll have it for the

066two years. But like I said, the comfortability with the independent activities and the daily exercises are definitely there. We did have to kind of differentiate the activities just a little bit to keep them a little more engaging and exciting. So we created games and things to do with that same roll and read just to do it with a partner or something like that. And then... kind of creating word chains using a little bit of the activities that we do throughout our lesson and kind of transforming them into independent or small group practices too just so they see some of those in different ways. They really are becoming little UFLY experts in our sequence and our skills. I even have, I had two students who just randomly asked if they could run the lesson for the

067day and I kind of... Took a gamble and said okay like you sit next to me and we'll kind of walk through and sure enough they could Flawlessly with the little teacher manual they led the lesson Two boys just stood up and were super confident and said okay now we do this now we take out our boards now We blend this word you're gonna switch this word to this one by switching the beginning sound and they just ran through it so confidently and now we have people who fight over who wants to run the lesson and i said some days i just have to do it you guys like i can't let you just teach the lessons all the time but it's super fun to see them so excited about it and they don't seem

068to get you know bored with the routine they really rely on that instead so very lovely all right um any questions for rachel Rachel, thank you so much. Let's give her a round of applause. Thank you very much. And then, Jeanette Meldy, our incredible learning partner, is going to come on down. And, you know, one thing we talked about early in the presentation was, and a lot of it comes from kind of the PLC process of, you know, analyzing data. I think as educators, we always want to be looking at where our kids are at, what do they need, where are their strengths, where are areas for us to grow. And I asked Mrs. Meldy to come and share a little bit about some of the things that we do kind of behind the scenes

069that can make a really big impact on students for the whole year. So I'll go ahead and pass it over to her. Hi, I'm Jeanette Meldy. I know some of you pretty well, but I am the learning partner here at Pine Bend. I have been in this role since the beginning of it in 2021. So this is my fourth year. I have taught second, fourth, and fifth grade. I came from a very strong fifth grade team, of which a few of them are here, that I worked with for many years. And we really dove right into plc we looked at our data we made decisions based on that and i guess when i started in this role i thought everybody did that and i found out that wasn't necessarily the case so i kind of

070made it one of my goals to help the school help our teachers to really take our data and use it to drive our instruction so do you want me okay So one of the big things that we do every year is three times a year we take our Fast Bridge reading and math testing. We are actually just almost done with it right now. This is so close. So we administer this in September, in January, and then again in May. And Sarah Pachel, who's our Title I lead, Sally McHenry, who's our Title I parent, and myself test our 470 plus K-5 students in reading and math. We do one-on-ones for kindergarten and first grade and then two through five are fluency. check ins with them. There's also some online components for both reading and math. So

071after our first year of doing this, we were kind of like, well, what do we do with this data? You know, this is good. This is good information. So Sarah Pakla and I decided that we wanted to do some data digs. And Principal Richardson has been very supportive of that. we basically meet with each teacher three times a year and talk about their data their particular students we look at students that might be struggling we look at if the whole class is struggling and we talk about what are some ways that we can support our students and their and their growth so we look at possibly for title like if there's students that would qualify for title we look at students that like a class that might need a whole class intervention or if there's

072groups of students that might need just some individual support and intervention in that way. Okay so this year I just thought I would give a couple examples of different things that we did with our data so we had a few kindergarten students who needed some number identification practice so with one particular teacher I was able to push into the classroom support them on a few, you know, few days a week, just working one on one, just every just a little bit of extra to help them. We have a couple second grade classes that showed a need for a whole class fluency intervention. So I worked with the teachers, introduced the intervention, and then was able to, you know, slowly back away. and be back in the classroom if I needed to but um really being

073able to push it off to the teacher so that it's one more thing that they can do to support their class especially with fluency and then we um with this particular class would go and do some weekly progress monitoring for those students just to track their their growth um go to the next slide um One team that I've worked with pretty consistently over the four years has been our third grade team. We've done a lot of different things from fluency, small group interventions to this past this past time we did a comprehension intervention which was kind of new so as a grade level we had one teacher who took on the fluency piece because those students were still showing a need for that and then we had three teachers in myself included helping with comprehension

074and we were able to divide and conquer and really support our students in smaller groups and it was really fun to get to work with a different you know lots of different kids and then we had some fourth grade classrooms that showed need for a whole class comprehension so I helped set up their intervention and again was able to go in and introduce it to the students but then pull back and let the teacher continue being there to support as needed but that's one that's a big thing that we've done here is looking at our data and we will look again next week we'll be celebrating a year of growth and just excited to look at it we'll talk about any students that we might want to really focus on in the fall but primarily

075we're looking at that success and the growth that we've had over the year so so anyway yeah so by looking at data you can uncover trends and identify relationships and gain valuable insights can be used to inform your decisions and your instruction and help you and your students achieve goals that's really what we're here for so thank you let's give Mrs. Melody a round of applause Any questions or comments for her before she... Another valuable role. Thank you for doing what you do with the teachers and the students for student success. Thank you. One theme with all three of those presentations, which were wonderful, thank you, is just being stubborn about the right things. And I think... when you look at how detailed all of those topics are, you know, student behavior, you know, phonemic

076awareness and literacy and kind of analyzing our data. I think the examples that Mrs. Melde shared kind of show you how complex learning is. There are times where we need to support an individual student on a very specific thing. Sometimes we need to help a whole class. Sometimes we have to help a whole grade level. And so it's important for us to kind of hone in and be as specific as possible because it is an art and a science. Big picture, and I'm just, I'd have to put it out there, banana phone is always funny. It will always be funny. But one thing that we did that I was very proud of this year is we took some time over several weeks and just really worked on making sure that we could get a positive

077phone call home to each and every student. And the thing that was fascinating was when you look for it, you see it. and people started to really look for it and those moments where kids are doing fantastic work it really helped us kind of dispel the no news is good news kind of thing that can happen in a lot of places in our world so it was fun to kind of honor and reinforce that I'm going to conclude in just a moment here, but I'm just going to say one of my career goals is just to work with and for great people. One thing that has been fantastic as I kind of close down my third year here is the support that we have from the district level. There's been a lot of moments where

078there's been some fantastic decisions made that have supported our kids with staffing, with programming, with curriculum, and it's been kind of a joy to have that support. The support is always pretty much a phone call away for me as a principal, and that makes it... makes my job a lot more palatable on a day-to-day. I should also say I work with incredible people that you got to see and that makes my job incredibly easy every single day because I know we have people who care about kids and are, like I said, are stubborn about the right things. So, but again, my big dream, you know, kind of when I zoom out and think about, you know, when I'm driving over here and I'm kind of taking a deep breath with like, what is it that

079we got to make sure we do? I think about making sure that when our fifth graders who are, you know, we have a whole crew of fifth graders leaving soon and they just took a tour of the middle school and there was a couple teary eyes on the way back. And I think it was realizing that, you know, there's going to be a big change. It's going to be one of the biggest ones they have. their educational career, but I want our families to be able to say truly that their student was challenged, that their student was cared for, and that their student loves learning. And I think if we can hit those three things, we're gonna be incredibly successful in all kinds of ways. So with that said, I'll leave it with go Spartans,

080and thank you so much, and thanks for your time tonight. So thank you. I want to thank you guys for being here this evening. I think we're all about getting results and results can look like a lot of different things. But those results come about with intentional efforts. And you just heard about some very, very intentional efforts. But those intentional efforts are heavy laden with adaptability. because you're adapting all the time. I don't know why it took me all these years to get to this point, but as I was sitting here tonight, I think we should probably change the name from Teachers to Learning Engineers because it is really that complexity that goes into making sure that you're setting every student up for success, finding what their jam is, and connecting with them and making

081that happen. And you just heard about that this evening. And Sherry, you mentioned that piece about having student success coaches and learning partners. it's that piece that helps a teacher to be able to focus and do even more but have that mutual support from somebody else that's not always there with them on their team in another light so thank you to pine bend for the way that you are working towards those results and being very nimble and really really taking those complex pieces and acting like a learning engineer because I spent the weekend with one of my nephews who's a mechanical engineer and he was talking about all this stuff and I'm like, dude, that's not that amazing. That happens in a classroom every day. So thank you. Thank you. Yes, that was wonderful. Welcome

082to stay for the 2025-26 budget update. Please, Director of Business Services, Heather Arne. Thank you. So we can start with a quick budgeting timeline review. We start the budgeting process in January and we end before June 30th when the school board approves the final budget. So at this point in the process, we are in that March through May ongoing conversations with leadership and school board where we're doing right sizing and considering any redesign. And some of the progress that we've made so far is determining the estimated labor agreement increases that are in line with the market, reviewed and adjusted revenue projections based on Minnesota Department of Education's calculations as they become available, the right size based on projected enrollments, and determined expenses necessary per statutes, and identified areas where reductions and restructuring were possible. But

083we have some unknowns our compensatory education aid. There's some unknowns there. We may see some larger cuts and We don't know specifically our federal allocations and The impact of immigration laws what that could have on enrollment So our budget projections are revenue at sixty million five hundred and forty nine thousand expenditures at sixty million eight hundred and seven thousand for a net deficit of 307,585. And we plan to use 150,000 of a restricted fund balance called MA third party billing. So our yet to be identified reductions, additional revenue or fund balance spending would be 157,508. um previously the projections were over budget by about 580 000 um we did some right sizing additions of 170 000 and right sizing reductions of 187 000 along with district level reductions of 405 415 so that's where we

084come to the 157 585 and this is just where we're at at this point in time um like i said there are some unknowns so there will still be some some fluctuation as we move forward. Do you want to add anything to this part? I just want to add, first of all, I want to thank Heather for the work that she's done in making sure we're getting our budget as aligned as possible and we're really waiting on that next piece to see what happens with the legislative session. As you know, they're scheduled to be done today, which is likely not to happen. It's likely that they'll come back for a special session. I also want to thank our board who's been very active legislatively. and that's been very helpful. And with that, I met with

085local legislators this past Friday morning and then the previous Saturday morning just to reinforce the aspects that are essential for our school district. I want to thank them for their ability to reach out, stay in touch with us, and advocate for us at the levels that they're at to make sure that we can hopefully get as much support as we can moving forward because this session helps set our budget for the next two school years. One of the hardest parts as a school district though is we're getting our state funding figured out and we're probably in the eighth inning of our funding. So it's a challenge and want to thank everybody for the work that they've done to get us to this point. And we're hoping that as that special session comes about, hopefully later

086in the week, we're not throwing too many things that were uncertain that might put us in a different spot, but hopefully we're set for as much success as we can be. If any other board members of any aspects related to budget or legislative pieces. but everybody's been very active Liz I think you've got one online I just want to second what Dave said I think also Dave you reaching out to me to the legislature is really helpful there's a variety of things I agree it's changing and I'm really... thank you Liz any other discussion yes thank you Heather thank you Now we will welcome Director of Learning Megan Blazek and Director of Instructional Technology Caroline Little who will share information on Simley High School graduation rates. Okay good evening you guys. okay so we're here

087um to share our graduation rates we did talk about this and answered some questions at our last work session um so it is the second time you're seeing these numbers um what you'll see on here is we have a comparison of our 2020 to 2023 and then this year's that were just released for 2024. it's important to point out that this is not this is a year delayed our graduations are we rates are we get them a year afterwards so it's very close to this year's graduation but it is not this year's rates it's last year's the numbers and then the final column is the comparison to the state graduation rate for 2024. we have three different schools that we're reporting on. So we have Simley and all the students at Simley. We have the

088ALP, which is our school within a school at Simley. And then in 2024, we also had 199 online. And this will be the only year that this shows up. It only shows up on graduation rates after a period of time. And we did close 199 online after 2024. So this will be the only year you see a graduation rate for that school. The very top line is district-wide in that graduation rate. Overall, our graduation rate is down from the 2023 and the 2022 graduation rate. We do have some areas to highlight. Our Simley ALP graduation rate has gone up significantly at 91.89%. And when you take all of those together, one thing to consider is that the 199 online graduation rate is at 53.85%. It's a very small group of students. a group of students

089that we see come in and out of that program so as we dig in more to these graduation rates we are looking to learn more about that but that is one one thing we do know about that graduation rate megan said it beautifully i think it's always important for us to all remember too that this is not that easy calculation that sometimes people think it is. There's a lot of different factors that go into play. And the piece that we're always committed to is then looking into those that did not graduate to as best we can determine what their path is towards graduation. And they're not lost. But sometimes we can't find them all, but if we can, we track down and figure out how we can help support them and get to where they

090need to be. And that's why you see graduation rates that are four-year graduation rates, five-year graduation rates, six-year graduation rates. Does it go to seven? it does close to seven as well and one thing we were able to clarify since the last time we looked at this at the work session was that students that currently finish their graduation requirements in summer they actually don't then count in the four-year graduation rate they would count in the 25-26 graduation rate so we were able to find that out and clarify it obviously we are all working towards higher rates right um but i think that i mean i appreciate the district's willingness to to try 199 online and see you know if there were other ways we can meet our students needs um you know i think if

091you if you take that out the rates look a lot more positive right um so i think it's just good for the community to to see this and hear um once the four years are finished it's not like okay godspeed go find you know adult basic ed somewhere or something like that um and as a former alternative school teacher as well. I wrote it in my work session notes and then here I want to email the ALP teachers because that is very very encouraging to see. That's such a great point to make because the other aspect that goes with 199 online it was something that was needed at the time but also if we had not had 199 online that 54% may not have ever graduated. Right. That's something that sometimes we look at those

092that didn't, but we actually provided a venue where there's some that probably wouldn't have so they could. Yeah. And there's probably some counting in Simley and the ALP potentially who are able to stay in school because we had 199 online too, so. Any other discussion or comments? Thank you. Thank you. All right, we are moving on to committee reports. Sarah, will you please give an update on the facilities committee? The facilities committee met this evening prior to the regular meeting, and the agenda included updates on summer projects. Wonderful. Jake, will you please give an update on finance? The Finance Committee met on April 14th. The agenda included updates on the monthly check register, a fiscal year to date comparison, and the 2025-26 budget. The committee has not met this month. Thank you. Darcy, will you

093give an update on personnel? Yeah, the Personnel Committee met on April 14th and discussed contract. Right. And the Policy Committee has not met this month. Membership reports. Dave will you please update us on AMSD? Sure AMSD has met two times. They met on April 11th and May 2nd and their agenda included their routine business and of course the legislative updates. Thank you. Shaina will you give an update on the Best Foundation? Yes Best Foundation met April 21st. The agenda included updates on the financial report, executive director report and action team updates. Next meeting is scheduled for later tonight. Thank you. Sherry, will you update us on MSBA? Sure. MSBA recently created a 2025 Federal Executive Orders and Legislation webpage to provide general guidance to recent changes. So you can visit the MSBA website for more

094information on this resource. Thank you. And finally, Dave, will you give an update on Intermediate School District 917? Yes, they met on April 1st and May 6th, and they had their routine business. They released the probationary teachers, and that pretty much covered both of their meetings. Okay. Thank you. all right moving on to action items our first one is the apple lease agreement and director of business services heather awney and director of instructional technology caroline little will introduce the recommendation to approve the apple lease agreement okay um So tonight we are talking about our refresh for our student devices for next year. This is something we do annually in order to be able to keep our refresh cycle going but in a purchasing the smallest amount of devices that we can each year. so this

095year we decided to we'd like to engage in a lease with apple and it would be for 900 ipads and their cases which is all coming out of the capital projects levy and the total purchase price is 385 140 and it would be financed over four years at a rate interest rate of zero percent and we did have an opportunity to discuss this at the work session um last week We will, as a district, retain ownership of all the devices at the end of the lease. So tonight we are asking the board to approve the Apple lease agreement for these student devices. Thank you. Do I have a motion and a second to approve the Apple lease agreement? Motion by Member Larson. Second by Member Klingner. Motion by Member Larson, second by Member Klingner. Any

096discussion? Seems too good to be true. 0% and you get to keep them? Yeah. And I recall you saying we get about six years worth of use out of each device too. We do. We really try to maximize it basically up until they're no longer supported. So that was my next question. So we wouldn't really have to do anything for another six years? for this particular set of devices yeah okay so we roll them into some of the younger grades we they enter in second grade sixth grade and ninth grade and having a smaller payment the 96 285 versus a big 385 000 payment allows us to use that capital projects levy for other items like the classroom furniture or curriculum needs i think liz has a question oh just raising her comment I reference

097here sort of the 2017 capital projects I think incredible continued use of those funds is just to remind folks how we're spending that money yeah great point Liz and um just appreciate your work on um you know that was how many years ago and we're still utilizing those funds and so um thank you any other discussion All right, the board will now vote by roll call. Member Nehemiah. Member Dukes. Aye. Member Pearson. Aye. Member Lonsberry. Aye. Member Klingner. Aye. Member Warwick. Aye. Member Larson. Aye. all right with seven out of seven i votes the motion is carried thank you thank you um we would like to invite director of community education barb pierce to introduce the recommendation to approve the 25 26 and 26 27 facility use fees Thank you. So I'm here tonight with

098our new proposed fees. Every two years, we take a look at our building costs and maintenance and eating and air conditioning and that kind of stuff. Compare with what other people are doing for fees for renting out our space. We do want the community to be able to use it, but we need to be able to keep it in good shape too. So we bring this to you tonight asking for approval to their slight increases in most of the areas to reflect our rising costs and we would ask that you approve our new fee schedule so we can get out. All right, do I have a motion and a second to approve? the 25 26 and 26 27 facility use fees motion by member Wark second by member Dukes any discussion sorry to ask this

099but the so the looking at the Spartan Center and the high school main gym the numbers don't track 26 20 they were the same Okay, do you see what I'm saying? Yes, I do see what you're saying. So the 42 to 44 and the 92 to 94 or I mean, they would be this. Yes, the spaces that we're renting for this year. So should be the same for class four. Right? And then class five. Right? I'm sorry. No, I thought I had fixed this and I obviously missed. Well, I'm just noticing on class three. Yeah, that would be helpful. So I was just curious. And then yeah, the cafeteria is, is also in that same bracket of 24 to 26. So is it the 36 to 38? Or the 42 to 44? Which, I guess

100what is the I don't understand why that's right. I guess I'm just asking is it yeah and it could be based on how much we use I'm sorry I didn't do all the research on this when we compared it with other spaces sure so potentially the Spartan Center is just the same price but then we'll get class four and class five so what we're saying is we we raised up the Spartan Center price higher than we raised up the main gym price right so Could you make it just a little bigger for my eyeballs? My eyeballs. I know, like, how is she seeing it over there? And that's fine. I'm just curious. I was just wondering if there... And I will say, we do not have too many people in Class 4, Class 5 gyms

101at all. And the cafeteria is hardly rented out by them either. It could be based on usage and if you want me to bring this back with a little more detail I'd be happy to do that. No I just was. We could amend too to make sure we've got if it is intended to be differently or intended to be the same amend the motion to make sure that that's accomplished if that's what we're looking to do. Is that you're looking to have it Barb to have the gym and the Spartan Center at the same rate? As they are in class two? As they are in the other classes, in class two, yes. Class three. And they'd be at the gym rate? Sorry for not being right on the spot here. So I would say yes,

102we would want them at what the gym and the cafeteria are at for that. So it's just amended? So we could amend it to say that we would want the Spartan Center fees to mirror the senior high school main gym fees. That make sense mm-hmm if that's what's intended if it's not you can always come in and other amendment to change you know or Is there any other ones that are like that? Mm-hmm. Yeah, I think probably yeah That won't be a bad idea. There's more technology they use in the Spartan Center, but there's more sure tear on the gym Yeah, so and there's more comparative data for the gym space and not as much comparative data. I use Spartan Center because everybody has a main gym but not everybody has those other spaces sure

103maybe we should uh um be the right term table this okay move to move the table all right okay second second okay pearson second all right so we will then to table to table to table not tagle all right move to table roll call vote okay um member dukes aye member pearson aye member lonsbury aye member klingner aye member warwick aye member larson aye and member niyamioya all right we have this vote has been tabled and um to the June meeting? Yes. Okay. If need be we can do something in advance with the special meeting for that item so they can do their work but we'll get that information first. Sounds great. Thank you. All right now I will introduce the recommendation to approve the school board self-appraisal process. We did discuss this on May

10412th and we do this every year. We ourselves like to the lifelong learners as well and make sure that we are we are carrying out our elected duties well and so we look at these seven items and we will rank them four strongly agree down to one strongly disagree number one the board members work together as a team communicate effectively with each other and treat each other with respect and dignity Two, the board communicates effectively with the public. three the decision-making process is effective for the board is maintaining its legal role which is a policy-making body five as individuals board members understand their role act accordingly and conduct themselves in a manner conducive to board productivity with attendance preparation and participation six the board agenda is structured for action-oriented meetings And seven agenda background materials

105are received relevant and reviewed in a timely manner. And so we will be this is our process. And so we Yes, we discussed it at the work work session last week. It is an action item tonight. And then if this passes, we will hold a closed session to review the summary of our self appraisal, we are in the middle of looking at dates that work for the seven of us. And then we will hold that special mean that closed session prior to the June 23 board meeting, where our self appraisal summary will be presented as an information item. Do we have any? Do I have motion in a second to approve? the school board self-appraisal process motion by member Pearson second by member Warrick any discussion I have one comment that we have had several

106uh ideas and actions that have come from this um well you know those seven points that you just brought up Carrie that and we've carried out so I think it's very reflective and a very um effective and reflective um tool agreed any other discussion All right, the board will now vote by roll call. Member Pearson? Aye. Member Lonsberry? Aye. Member Klingner? Aye. Member Warwick? Aye. Member Larson? Aye. Member Nehemiah? Aye. Member Dukes? Aye. Seven out of seven, the vote carries. Okay, we will move on to our superintendent and school board comments, beginning with Superintendent Bernardson. Thank you. First of all, I want to thank Pine Bend and Principal Richardson for hosting this evening and the great share that you provided. Also to Activities Director Will Short for sharing all the different things that are happening

107during this spring. It's just fun to see how our kids are involved. Gus, one of our Pine Bend students, mentioned Student Advisory Council. We had our last meeting way back on April 30th, but it was just a very rewarding year to me with our fourth, seventh, and 11th graders. help them understand some things, get their perspective on things and also find out what food should be on our menu. They really enjoy that aspect of being taste testers. I just want to remind people that Friday is a no school day for PK through five and a flex learning day for our sixth through 12th graders. There's lots of activities and recognitions going on. So you surely can find lots of things to take part in in our school district. our graduation is set for wednesday june

1083rd at 7 30 if it happens to be bad weather we move to thursday and we do have an early release day on that last day of school and this is our last board meeting before the end of the school year which is sounds pretty unique and just want to thank everyone in advance for a fabulous school year for your adaptability for your inspiring actions and all the different things that have taken place during the this past school year it's been fabulous look forward to a uh very um prosperous and let's put it that way sounds great all right um board member comments we'll begin with member niyamioya thank you member warwick uh yes first to thank principal paul richardson for having us here tonight and Cora and Gus the students that spoke if you

109love the interview process that you had uh congrats to Carol Sayer uh gosh I hope I got everybody in here uh Mr. Piney Ms. Bache Ms. Melody I didn't catch the other teacher's name with the UFLY Ms. Lola oh Ms. Mola okay uh UFLY and the phonics so glad we have phonics coming back into our reading program for everyone all over many different districts Did I get everybody here? Oh, and then our adaptive bowling team. Congrats to them as well for being here tonight too. And to piggyback off of Member Nehemiah, I'd like to thank all the families, the parents, and committees that took part in the Teacher Appreciation Week. Maybe it was from the parents, the families, maybe it was a meal, maybe it was flowers, maybe it was a coffee, maybe it was

110a kind note or an email. Especially at this busy time of the year, at the end of the year, teachers love to hear the positives. and like what Mr. Richardson talked about too, just having the positives and what you like, and a note that is sent home to all your students too. Teachers love to hear those positive notes as well. A couple of months ago, I would just want to note, I was able to attend an event with, along with Superintendent Berthenson and Member Pearson. We went to see and listen to Billy Mills. He's an American Lakota athlete who won a gold medal in the 10,000-meter run in 1964 Tokyo Olympics. No one had ever done it before, and it was just amazing to hear his story, to be there that evening. And my takeaway

111that night was that he shared many things, many inspiring thoughts, but one of them, for me, that resonated was that no matter how much we disagree, We always, it's always important to find the common ground and by listening to each other. So finding common ground, that was his, one of his goals. And then finally to our seniors, as Dave said, our senior graduating class of 2025. commencement is in a couple of weeks on a Wednesday night. What a wonderful time to look back on all the achievements that each one of our seniors have made and then a little time to take to look forward to what the next chapter is. Thank you. Member Dukes. Yeah, I'll echo all the things. I feel like I get to come to Pine Bend a lot. Not always like

112when I come here, it's always fun. Principal Richardson is always in the hallway and it's just a fun feeling when I get to come here. So thank you to you and everyone that's here. I'll echo the point about the seniors. I feel like I'll love to talk about that, but it's a thing. Last year's graduation was on my ninth year's graduation from high school to the day. And my mama just made sure she bring it up to me and I never would have thought, never. Never you could have convinced that girl that she was going to be on a school board handing someone a diploma and people would have my name on their diploma on their wall. Never. So really enjoy the moment. Hug that teacher that you really like and have that, you know.

113funny exchange with the woman who works inside the cafeteria because y'all are cool and y'all become cool over the year because you can never remember your lunch number or whatever the case may be, right? I really enjoy and lean in because you don't get it back. You don't get to do it again. So yeah, enjoy yourself and teachers have fun too, right? Because those are the last times you're going to get to hang out with that kid in your classroom during lunchtime that you really just want to go somewhere else so you can enjoy your lunch. So really enjoy ourselves and lean into the community. last couple days that you you all have thank you member klingner um thanks to principal richardson for hosting us i was a student here although we were pine bend

114bears back in the day remember that and so it's funny to hear the spartans but it makes sense anyways a lot of really cool things happening here and it's impressive to see and hear the students and the teachers talk about what they do um Yeah, sounds like there's some weather outside. Storm that we were supposed to have last time we were here. Congrats to echoing comments about the graduates. We'll get to greet them at graduation, so I'm excited about that. I'll be attending the Best Foundation night as a substitute hander-outer of awards, and so I'm excited about that as well. And then just well-earned rest periods for teachers coming up for year-round staff to adjust to a different type of workflow. It's that time of year where teachers greet each other with a number. Today

115for me, that number was 11. So countdown starts for us as well. But then also just remembering that for some kids, school is the safest and happiest place that they have. So just best wishes for everybody going into summer for a safe and happy summer. Thank you. Member Larson. Thank you. Thank you to all the guests that were here today. I was especially impressed with our youngest student speakers. They were very well prepared and very well spoken. That was really fun. The spring athletes, I feel like the spring sports are even more intense because their schedule is so much more condensed. because of rain, weather, all the things. They can't get outside on their fields as quick. So I'm really impressed hearing the schedule with those flag football players that they... They're playing multi-sports, a

116lot of them, plus all the school things on top of it. So I have a spring athlete in my house, and it was a nice breath when she wrapped up last week. So it gets intense, so kudos to those ones that are especially doing double time. And then just almost there, the home stretch, 11, 12 days. So congratulations to everyone for making it through. I'm disappointed I won't be able to be at graduation this year. That last couple years, it was... much more rewarding than i thought it would be to be able to be up there handing those diplomas and i've always said that i'm very honored to do it but i don't feel like i should be the one handing the diploma that the relationships that they've built with teachers and staff it's been

117so cool to watch those kids walk off the stage and go high five someone in the crowd um but i am very honored to have the opportunity but grateful for the for the ones who have helped make it through thank you member pearson Just thank you to Principal Richardson for how you laid out your Pine Bend update. We see a lot of presentations. And it speaks to me the way you laid this out, having the students highlighted, having the staff speak. And it just, it speaks a lot to your leadership, the way that you allowed them to be highlighted and them to tell the story. And I think it aligns with what we see here at Pine Bend. Like you said, it's fun and he's always in the hallway. I still wonder why you have

118an office because you're never in it. But it aligns with what we see here. So thank you for doing that. And thank you to Director Short for the activities award night that he highlighted. I had an opportunity to go. It was the first annual one. Apparently he has wanted to do this for a while. principal the new principal at Simley has given him the thumbs up and it was such a nice blend it was a lot of athletics but he wove in actors the musicians all of the activities and it was such a nice blend in a neat blend to see that group of students interact and be highlighted together I think it said a lot about district and just that we we honor the athletics we honor academics we honor the arts and see

119those kids come together on that same night and he gave them equal attention and those and details about each of their awards so it was nice thank you it is always a joy to be in each building so thank you for hosting us and you know I echo many of my fellow board members comments. But I just want to I just want to you know we touched on it with the the Apple agreement of the capital projects levy and then just again this our most recent operating levy that was passed just really grateful to the community for the support and as Heather laid out the budget planning there there are significant factors that are out of our control that impact how we can support support the district and the budget and so we're grateful for

120the community and you know I if if you are watching and you haven't been aware one of the the asks or desires of this most recent levy was an for security and additional SRO. And so I just want to welcome Officer Tarroud. He began end of April. And I just think the onboarding is great. So he can have this six weeks or so with Officer Eide in this current school year so that next fall they can just begin strong. So we are And I think that's a great point. Using striving to use the resources well, so thank you and yes, happy summer. The next work session will be held on Monday, June 9th and the next regular board meeting will be held on Monday, June 23rd at the district office. Do I have a motion

121and a second to adjourn tonight's meeting motion by member Warwick second by member I assume there's no discussion but is there any discussion um okay we will we will uh now vote by roll call member Lounsbury aye member Klingner aye member Warwick aye member Larson aye member Nehemiah member Dukes aye and member Pearson aye all right with seven out of seven votes the motion is carried at 7 22 pm