001Mhm. >> Mhm. >> [music] >> Good evening. I'd like to call to order this Anoka Hennepin School Board meeting for today, February 23rd, 2026. Please join the board in the Pledge of Allegiance. I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America, and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. Our first order of business is to approve the board agenda. Is there a motion to approve the board agenda as presented? So moved. Um we have a motion from Director DeShane. Is there a second? Second. With a second from Co-Chair Langenfeld. [clears throat] Any discussion? Hearing none, all those in favor say I. I. Any opposed? With six in favor and zero opposed, the agenda is approved. Members, the next item on our
002agenda is item number four, the consent agenda. As normal, members can remove items for separate consideration and discussion if that's their desire. Is there a motion to accept the consent consent agenda as presented? So moved. With a motion from Director Simon. Is there a second? Second. Second from Director Arco. Any discussion? Hearing none, all those in favor say I. I. Any opposed say no. With six in favor and zero opposed, our consent agenda is approved. Our next agenda item is item five, communications, delegations, and petitions. This is our time for community members to provide input directly to the school board about issues that fall within the board's authority. We plan this agenda item for 15 minutes. Our policy allows for community speakers to speak up to five, um but if there are more, we could
003have the discretion to reduce that. As is, tonight we have three cards, so we will um have 5 minutes for each individual to speak. Speakers you will be able to reference a time on the screen to manage your comments and our microphone system will be muted at the end of the time allowed. We also welcome written testimony. If you have any more to say than the time allows. Please complete yellow cards and provide it to Ms. Ball if you would like um written follow up. A couple of procedural reminders our meeting participation procedures are in place to assure open and orderly public comments as well as to protect the due process and privacy rights of individuals under the law. If speakers use specific names of students, staff or board members I will need to interrupt
004or stop the speaker. Please remember to direct your comments to the school board chair. Members of the audience please listen respectfully. If the board cannot hear speakers, I may reset the time to allow speakers to be heard. Audience members that disrupt this portion may be asked to leave remainder of the meeting. Okay, we would first like to invite Shaylyn Berby. Welcome. Thank you. Good evening and thank you Superintendent McIntyre, um board members, district staff. My name is Shaylyn Berbig. I am a mother of four in this district. I am also speaking as a co-founder of the community organization Parents for Good. I am here tonight to express concerns about the district's communication during teacher contract negotiations and separately school budgeting. To toward the end of negotiations the district released communications that were deeply concerning. One
005graphic that was widely distributed by local media presented information that showed the district was offering pay raises to teachers but in reality Sorry. The district was offering no pay increase in the new contract. And the proposed increase for healthcare contributions did not come close to covering the rising premiums, leading to cut in teachers' take-home pay. That communication misrepresented the situation. It was disrespectful to teachers and misleading to the community. It appeared to be meant to turn the public against educators. The conflict we experienced last year was preventable. We understand the budget constraints, and we also understand that this board is the only body with the authority to address them. Approving a levy at referendum does not prevent careful budgeting. You can and should review expenditures thoroughly. Refusing to pursue additional funding while acknowledging shortfalls destabilizes
006our district. This prolonged conflict has harmed our district's reputation and left unaddressed will lead us back here in the same situations in less than 2 years. The standard course of action when schools are facing a funding gap is to to bring a levy referendum to voters. On December 8th, a school a board member stated that those that want a referendum must first convince them that we need one. On January 26th, that school board member and a and an additional school board member acknowledged budget budget shortfalls and suggested there might be additional budget cuts. The board does not need to be convinced that we need additional funding. It knows we need additional funding based on the statements they have made publicly. Continuing to refuse a referendum while anticipating harmful cuts neglects your responsibility to uphold the
007district's mission of providing safe, inclusive, and high-quality learning environments for all students. We continue this We will continue this conversation in the community. You can choose to be a part of shaping a responsible referendum that reflects shared priorities. There are areas where we share common ground, including managing student behavior, cell phone cell phone policies. Um let's work together to build a budget to build a referendum that the community can support when that stabilizes our schools and addresses our shared concerns. Thank you. Um if you have anything you would like to leave with Ms. Ball. Um our next speaker Rod Kroon. Good evening. I'm Rod Keen. Um I've testified several times on behalf of SEL, DEI, and CRT. I'm going to refer to the three programs as racial education because race is the center of the
008controversy. CRT is not directly taught, but its insights into systemic racism, the identification of power blocks, and the duties of the citizens uh citizens are discussed at least in the new standards. Operation Metro Surge has recently provided a stark real-world validation of why this curriculum is essential for our students. The primary argument against racial education is that it's divisive, that it creates an oppressor versus oppressed narrative. Christian nationalists and others maintain that group identities should be abandoned in favor of being an individual. Yet, they were silent as federal agents used racial profiling to arrest people of color irrespective of citizenship status. Racial education necessarily involves uh using racial grouping to respond to governmental racism. Denigrating group identity is a technique for disempowering those with little power. Opponents of racial education usually cite the boogeyman cultural
009Marxism to block racial conversations with the implication that it is a threat to our liberty. Yet they remain silent about the authoritarian actions that defined Metro Surge. I cite the murders of Alex Ready and Renee Good were immediately justified by slandering them as domestic terrorists before any investigation. The refusal of to share evidence with Minnesota. There's to be no investigation of Good's murder. There is no transparency. Deportations in defiance of court orders. Demands to show me your papers. Masked enforcers, unmarked cars, and disappearances. These hallmarks are of a dictatorship have been met with silence or justification by critics. Are they really concerned with freedom and democracy as they claim? Or do they have an entirely different agenda? Our students cannot be gaslit about murders that they witnessed. They experienced state terrorism in a country they
010remember as being free. They've seen love your neighbor in the powerful example of South Minneapolis residents banding together to protect their neighbors against an occupying force. And they watched an entire political party support the attacks on our liberty. If you try to erase our racial history, they will learn better from the internet. If you dodge the systemic racism they personally witnessed, you lose their respect and your credibility as educators. Critical race theory explains exactly what we are seeing. The three branches of government working in concert to attack people of color. The attacks were enabled first by a Supreme Court decision which effectively legalized racial profiling. And second, Congress's refusal to cross Trump. That is systemic racism. And now the seed of bigotry is is is sprouting into the invasive weed of oligarchy and dictatorship. CRT
011asks who has the power, how did they get it, and who's it used against. Operation Metro Surge is surely the starkest validation imaginable of CRT's analysis. At issue is what we want to educate self-actuating citizens or compliant subjects. The people of South Minneapolis showed us the meaning of love your neighbor. They stood in solidarity with the oppressed and against the oppressors. That's the goal of racial education. The anti-woke movement lost the culture war, especially among the young, because too many have friends who are black or brown or gay or trans. We saw how the logic of anti-woke plays out in the in Metro Surge. The demonization no longer works. Because they've lost their legitimacy, they resort to force and assaults on our democracy to prevail. Racial education is the defense of American democracy. It's an
012aggressive program of citizenship that asserts the rights of all and calls out the power interests that threaten those rights. We cannot abdicate our patriotic responsibility to protect those who cannot protect themselves without forgoing the ability to protect ourselves. We must continue to equip our students with the tools of SEL, DEI, and CRT to navigate and eventually dismantle systemic injustice. Thank you. If you'd like to leave your comments with Ms. Ball. Mhm. >> [clears throat] >> Our last speaker is Michelle Powers. >> Welcome. Good evening, Superintendent McIntyre, board co-chairs, board members, and the wonderful community members who are here and watching right now. My name is Michelle Powers and I am one of the co-founders of Parents for Good. I'm a resident of REMZI, a mom in the district, and a teacher in the district as
013well. Over the course of the last month, Parents for Good has been operating mutual aid for the families in Anoka-Hennepin who are too frightened to leave their homes, go to work, or even grocery shop due to threats of ICE. We have collected more than 500 volunteers. We have seven drop sites around the district and people who are at our hub seven days a week to collect, organize, and pack deliveries for these families. I want to mention that we not have not only been collecting food, but we have also been collecting personal items such as deodorant and toothpaste, um, as well as cleaning supplies and paper products, and even baby supplies like formula and diapers, and kitty litter and pup- puppy food, too, for the fur babies. In our estimations, which are rough, but in our
014estimations, we have provided at least 80,220 meals to families in the Anoka-Hennepin school district boundaries. We aren't looking for a big thank you or any credit, uh, but we do think that Anoka-Hennepin's lack of response to the families in our schools during this difficult time has continued to build a lack of trust in the community. Every opportunity that you have passed by not saying something does not go unnoticed. Fortunately, we live in an incredible community and the people who live here, and even those who don't, are watching and helping and we are very thankful for them. Thank you. If you have any comments, you could leave them with Ms. Ball. Um, that is all of the cards that we have for tonight. Our next agenda item is item six, Board Calendar and District Update. Superintendent
015McIntyre. All right, thank you, Coach Air Hoffman. Good evening, board members. Tonight, I'll be presenting some items of interest to the board and to the community regarding activities and events that we are proud of in our district. We do this to celebrate our students, staff, and community members who are contributing to the accomplishment of our mission, which is to effectively educate each of our students for success. So, to start things off, this is the time of year when our talented students are competing for awards. And to start things off, we had eight of our students, um, at our high schools recognized for their outstanding artwork and writing at the Minnesota Scholastic Art and Writing Awards. Blaine High School senior, Haley Lovenka, was honored with a gold key award for her original and creative piece this
016year. Silver Key honors were awarded to Andover High School freshman, Gail Utvig, and Anoka Middle School for the Arts students, Adabella Yang and Evelyn Sterba. Honorable mention awards were presented to Andover junior, Elizabeth Palak, along with a painting by Anoka High School senior, Alexa Pastrana, a ceramics and glass entry from Anoka sophomore, Iris Buxton, and a glass and ceramics entry from Anoka senior, Gus Morian. And you can see those, uh, pictures on the screen there. So, we just want to take a moment to say congratulations to all the participating students for their high achievement in the arts. Next, we want to recognize Beth Holmgren-Son, a 21-year veteran educator at Andover High School. She's been named the 2026 High School Teacher of the Year by the Minnesota Council for the Social Studies. This prestigious award recognizes
017leading educators within the state's social studies community. So, congratulations to Beth. Next, the Anoka Area Chamber of Commerce coordinates an annual State of the Cities luncheon. This year, the event featured a number of our city leaders. So, that included mayor of Anoka Eric Schoolquist and Andover mayor Jamie Bethell, uh Rapids mayor Jerry Koch, Champlin mayor Ryan Sebas, Ramsey mayor Ryan Haneman and Nowthen city clerk Natalie Johnson, who all provided important updates in the activities in their cities. We were joined by Anoka DECA students Stella Wallheim, Elizabeth Buffy, Lucy Machulis, and Angel Chibilee. They were also there for this real-life civics lesson and these students did a great job serving as ambassadors for our school district and represented Anoka High School very well at this business event. Next, parents of our students involved in our special
018education programming have a special parent resource event to inform families about resources available at schools in our district. The event is set for Thursday, March 5th from 5:30 to 6:30 at the Educational Service Center in Anoka. More information about the district special education programming is available online at ahschools.us/ SEAC. And uh it's hard to go unnoticed, it's tournament time for our student athletes at the this point of the year who compete um in our Minnesota State High School League sections and state playoffs here in late February and early March, throughout the month of March, honestly. And uh things started off with our Nordic skiing um uh skiers. And we want to take a moment to recognize Blaine High School boys Nordic skiing team who qualified for the state tournament for the fourth straight season. They
019finished 12th out of 16 teams at state. Uh special note for Blaine High School head coach Andy Schwen, who was named Section 5 Coach of the year, assistant coach Marie Peters was named section five assistant coach of the year, and assistant coach Paul Head was named section five volunteer of the year. So, clean sweep there for our Blaine ski team coaches. Champlin Park High School senior Caleb Osterberg who qualified for state after winning the section five individual title placed 39th overall at state. And Rapids High School student athletes Ruby Demmer and Bethany Law also were able to advance to the state championships. In Alpine skiing, Anoka High School freshman Connor Loughlin advanced onto the state. And just want to take another moment to recognize or feel like I do this every year. It's a nice
020problem to have here for our girls at Andover High School. Nine consecutive years at the state tournament and that's 11 total state appearances for the girls hockey team. In gymnastics, Blaine High School senior Grace Vassell qualified for state in the overall and the floor exercise. She placed seventh in the floor exercise and 13th in the all-around. Anoka High School sophomore Kaylee Lauren placed fourth in the vault and 19th in the all-around. Congratulations to them. Rapids High School students Nahome Yoma participated in the congressional debate and Adjua Amare Quaye Quaye competed in the Lincoln-Douglas debate at the Minnesota State High School League State Debate Tournament. Champlin Park High School defeated defeated the Northern Power Proctor High School 32 to 27 to win the 2026 Minnesota State Unified Basketball Championship held on February 12th. The tournament was
021hosted at the Target Center in Minneapolis and teams participated before a very enthusiastic crowd. I know some of you were able to attend that, I believe. Um and there was just a a strong student and community turnout. So, moving forward, March will see boys' hockey, wrestling, swim and dive, adaptive floor hockey, and boys and girls' basketball tournaments coming up. And we just want to take a moment to encourage our community members to attend the games and support their favorite teams. Best of luck to all those remaining teams as the uh winter season winds down. Our Anoka-Hennepin's annual STEM Fair was held Saturday, February 21st at Blaine High School. It featured 240 projects from students who opted to immerse themselves in an advanced opportunity to study science and STEM topics of their choice this school year.
022Awards were presented to students in a range of categories, including evidence in action, design and discovery, presentation power, visionary thinking, and out-of-the-box awards as well for exhibiting creativity and original thinking. Champlin Park High School teacher Kevin uh Molohan served as the coordinator for the STEM Fair, so an extra special thank you for all those extra efforts. February is I Love to Read Month. I know board members have been getting requests for um being guest readers, and teams from our middle schools are coming together throughout the district to convene in our annual um Battle of the Books, and uh they're going to test their knowledge of the materials that they've been reading throughout the year. This event is set for Wednesday, February 25th, starting at 9:00 a.m., so this Wednesday in the Erling Johnson rooms at
023the Educational Services Center in the energy is often and always very high for this competition. The traveling trophy is a prestigious award. Uh this event will also be live-streamed, and that can be found on the main page of our uh website. And finally, Minnesota Celebrating Public Schools Week. So, this is a time for the community to come together and celebrate, support, and champion public education, and those staff members who directly contribute to the future success of our students and our community as a whole through their day daily efforts. The world's changing rapidly and our schools share in the responsibility to educate and prepare students for their future and Anoka-Hennepin continues to work for excellence in all we do, but we also take time to celebrate the successes gained in our schools during Minnesota Public Schools
024Week. So, co-chair Hokman, thank you and that concludes my superintendent's report this evening. Lots of ground to cover. Thank you. Uh board members, are there any questions? Okay, very good. Thank you. Just uh special shout out. Kevin Monahan has been organizing that for years. Hard lots of hard work to help those kids do their their science projects. So, wonderful work there. Yeah, thank you. Our next agenda item is item 7A, American Indian Education Annual Update and Compliance Documents. We welcome Tom Shaw, Director of Student Services, Mindy Myers, Indian Education Program Coordinator, Kimberly Brandon, AIPAC Chair, Andrea Small, the AIPCA Vice Chair, and JOM member. Thank you. Andrea couldn't make it tonight, so just uh start with thank you. Superintendent McIntyre, Co-chair Hokman, Co-chair Langfeld, and members of the board. I'm Tom Shaw, Director of Student
025Services, and I'd like to introduce our American Indian Program Coordinator, Mindy Myers. Tonight she is going to share with you a high-level overview of the work that our American Indian Education team does to support students and families. And we're like you said, we're also joined by our wonderful chair, Kim Brandon. Uh boozhoo gaa kina wiyaa niin Ma'iingan Odichag. Kiizis gaa dibi Kiizis Inda Pinakazina. Niin >> So, um good evening everyone. My name is Minnie Maize. I'm very happy and excited to be here tonight to tell you about the work that we do, that our staff does each and every day to uplift and help and support our students. And with that, I'll turn it to Kim to introduce herself. Yes. Um chimichanga um Kimberly Brandon and Digina cause um my name is Kimberly Brandon. I
026am an enrolled member of the Kuching First Nations in Fort Francis, Ontario, Canada. Um I have three children now in the district. I used to have four. My other one graduated last year. Um and I am the APAC chair, current APAC chair. Thank you. Uh so, as we like to do, I'd like to ground us in why American Indian education exists and really it goes back to that relationship that our sovereign native nations have with the US government. And so, it goes all the way [clears throat] back to when our government signed treaties with the native nations here. Um when we signed those treaties, the US government made a commitment to support the education of American Indian students. And that has looked a lot of different ways since contact and over time. Um some that
027felt more supportive than others. Uh but really what we look at when we think of American Indian education today is the movement that happened in the 70s. So, as American Indian students started moving off reservation with their families and having a greater presence in our public school systems, we had community members and tribal leaders who went forward and advocated on behalf of our students' unique cultural needs and their academic needs. And so that's really the foundation of what exists today both at the federal and the state level. And so American Indian education is unique in the sense that our program exists through legislation at both of those levels, and our program is fully funded by state and federal grant dollars that are specifically set aside in legislation for American Indian students. Um so if you're
028interested in learning more about that, there's policies listed up above. And when we think about who our program supports or who's eligible to participate in our supplemental program, that is based on our state definition. Um and that is any student who identifies as North American Indian when they enroll in our school. So we utilize our school enrollment information to identify and reach out to our eligible students and families. Uh in Anoka-Hennepin, we serve just over 1,200 American Indian students K-12. And in order to do that, our team wears a lot of different hats. We are a large district, um and we have an amazing team of seven advisors who do the on-the-ground work. We have two staff members that split our elementary sites and support um around 500 students between all of those sites. And
029then we have five secondary advisors that are aligned to middle schools and the high schools that feed into them, and they each support just under 200 students across their schools. Um when we think about our team and the work that we do, again, there's lots of different buckets, and most importantly is that direct work with students in our schools. So when we think about those two elementary advisors, what are they doing every day? Well, they're traveling from site to site to site to lock in there 30 to 45 minutes twice a month with our K5 students. And their time looks like engaging in cultural activities and really the core of our work is connecting with those students and helping instill that sense of pride and connection with their native identity. At the middle school and
030high school level, it looks a little different. Our advisors are able to be in the building more frequently. So they as well run sort of monthly or twice monthly culture groups with their students. But on top of that, they're taking the time to pull data, identify students who are struggling academically or with attendance or with behaviors and connecting with school staff, meeting with those students one-on-one. Um all of their all of our advisors are available to our students and families to attend different meetings and be an additional layer of support. So our staff often attend IEP meetings, disciplinary meetings, or any other concerns that come up. And then our secondary advisors also wear an extra hat of supporting that college and career readiness. And so we'll talk a little bit about what our program did
031earlier this year later on. Um but a lot of times that's just providing additional information, additional reminders, and encouragement, and helping students set those goals, and and uh fill out applications and scholarships and things like that. When we are not doing that direct student support in the schools, our program also works to foster a sense of community and provide support through um evening [clears throat] and weekend activities. So we offer a lot of opportunities for our families and our students to connect culturally. We have an a traditionally based archery team, um culturally based archery team that's been going strong for quite a few years now. We've offered traditional lacrosse. We have Ojibwe and Dakota language tables in the evenings. We do community sewing to support regalia making. Our community has come together the last few
032years to make ribbon skirts and ribbon shirts that we give to our seniors as part of our senior honoring ceremony. Um and then we do trimesters celebrations. We just had over 200 people show up to celebrate the achievements, the academic and cultural achievements of our students this year. Um so those are some of the things that we do and during the day we try to offer um different opportunities for students. We take two college visits a year and we also try to take our students on at least one cultural field trip each year. When we're not wearing that hat, we also work to build a lot of community partnerships. And so with our program, we're really lucky to be able to offer tutoring scholarships to our students to provide additional support above and beyond the
033interventions and targeted services that happen in our district. So we just uh transitioned our partnership to Huntington Learning this year and we are also partnering um with Advantage Education programs and are able offer 60 ACT prep scholarships for our juniors to um prepare for the ACT. Uh we partner with different community organizations to share information about summer programs and I believe we're in our fourth year of partnership with the American Indian Family Center who provides at no cost to our program or our students or our district two therapists um that support students across two and a half sites right now. So that's a little bit of what our program looks like. Um we do set uh program goals each year. So this is an example of two of our program goals. They're based in the
034Minnesota World's Best Workforce um goal framework and we work with the research evaluation and testing team and our parent advisory committee to set our goals. Next slide. Um and at this time I'm going to turn it over to Kim. I don't know if I mentioned it, but a lot of the work we do is not possible without our parent advisory committee. So, we consult with them on every aspect of our program. Yeah. And what's nice about the committee is that we are made up of parents, um indigenous community members, um guardians, student representatives. Um what's really awesome this year is we have five student representatives. Um so, we're able to hear not only committee members adult committee members voices, but we're also able to hear those um student voices as well. And so, that they
035have their their spot at the table where they're letting us know what they think, what is working, what might not be working. Um so, it's it's been very lovely to see um the amount of student engagement that we are having in the committee. Um and then other than that, we meet once a month. Um sometimes we might do a special session, um not as often, but sometimes. Uh and then like I said, we do talk about the programming. Um we are very lucky to have both Mindy and Tom um be able to make um all the meetings and are able to answer any questions that we might have. Um so, it's been it it's a it's a really great partnership and we really do and I really do. This is my fourth Yeah. Fourth year?
036Yeah, on the committee. So, it's been really amazing to see just the progress that um that has been able to occur in in that short amount of time. So, I will turn it back to Mindy. All right. I think the next slide talks about our JOM committee. So, unfortunately Andrea wasn't able to be here tonight, but um each of our pockets of funding has a parent advisory committee. And so, the JOM committee is unique in that they are actually in charge of all of their dollars, not just advisory, but they have to vote on every single dollar spent out of our grant. And so, uh that's one pocket of money that supports our students. And then, the committee did meet on January 13th and unanimously did vote on concurrent. So, the um concurrent documentation was
037submitted and requires signatures from our APAC chair, the board co-chairs, and Superintendent McIntyre. Um it is in statute each year the parent committee issues a vote of concurrence and they discuss whether or not they feel the district essentially is doing the best they can to support American Indian students given all the things happening in a district. And so, sometimes that takes into consideration things that are happening within the program, but it's really about do we occur with the educational offerings of the district? Uh so, as we wrap up our presentation tonight, there's just a couple slides for program highlights. This is one um of the things that I alluded to earlier, but we were able to take quite a few of our students to Construct Tomorrow, which is a hands-on trades career fair. So, it's
038really exciting to see students engaging and actually doing hands-on activities with the different representatives from the unions. And so, they were able to um lay [clears throat] shingles, they were able to walk on beams, they were able to work with cement, hammer nails. For some students, these are things that they've never had the opportunity to do before. Um I was happy to see how engaged students were with speaking to the different representatives and learning about the different options for like pursuing that career. And we had quite a few students who walked away expressing that though they hadn't previously thought about a trades career, that now they're actually considering and looking to follow up with some of the different representatives. And we were able to tie that to our step program. So, we try to go
039to Construct Tomorrow every 2 to 3 years and pair it with an opportunity to head over to the step building. I think it's uh really unique thing that we have here in Anoka-Hennepin where our students can work and earn certificates while earning their high school diploma. And so, we like to make sure that all of our students are aware of that opportunity. The next slide just shows just a handful of pictures of some of the things that we've done this year. This is our second annual fall paddle. So, we had some families that braved some rainy weather and some really low rivers to do some canoeing this year. Um we gave away in partnership with the Shakopee Mdewakanton Sioux Community gave away over 60 backpacks filled with school supplies to our families. We hosted some
040community sewing sessions. Um we were able to take our elementary students to go and learn about their Dakota relatives at the Gibbs Farm and um at the Bell Museum. We are preparing for our pow wow, which I just love this picture of two of our students hugging in the middle of the arena last year. Um so, just an insight into some of the different things we do. [clears throat] This lady on the screen, Jackie Bird, we just had her out. Um she is an amazing storyteller, just great medicine. She sings, she plays guitar, she does puppetry. Um she brought her sons out and we spent an afternoon with her and I don't know. Look her up, Jackie Bird. She's amazing. Uh to wrap up, we just wanted to remind people of what guides our programming.
041So, everything that we do is grounded in the voice of voices of our students and families and that comes to us in a lot of different ways outside of our monthly meetings with both of our parent committees. Um, we're always taking into consideration the feedback from students both at the individual school level, advisors adapting what their lessons are going to be based on what students are interested in, all the way up to overall programming and what we're offering. And so, we have an annual public hearing in the winter that's tied to our trimester celebration. We have an annual needs assessment, a giant survey that we send out in the spring. Um, we have our grant reports that we summarize and send in and getting feedback from those people who oversee our grants. We have two
042annual travel consultations and all of the fun things. So, with that, um, are there any questions? Yeah, thank you for that presentation. Board members, do you have any questions for these presenters? Coach Herringfeld? Let's give him credit, John. I don't know if I have questions, I have some comments. First and foremost, thank you for an excellent presentation. And thank you for all of the data and other things that you submitted so that we could really dive deep in the success of the program. One of the things that really jumped out at me, and it's not surprising to see that the students are making progress like we need and want, is the fact that the strategies that you're using for student support are very carefully and thoughtful in that they are evidence-based. Um, many of them
043that I I recognize and I I really think those are really important. Um, I love the celebration of student achievement. That's a really important part that sometimes, um, I know as a fellow educator, I I didn't always remember to do. And then to, uh, you talked about your college visits. Um, you talked about your CTE visits. Those are very important in terms of field of vision and I appreciated that. And then I really, you know, I mean, the parent relationship is so vitally important to each and every child that we serve. And I think this program really just lifts it up and elevates it to a place where we can see it and we can see how well our kids do when we have that that partnership with our families and with our educators to
044really elevate uh, the best of every child. And I think the other piece that I really um, jumped out at me is the cultural support. Um, so that our students feel valued and respected and understand, you know, and you offer it to the community. Having been at the powwow last year and I know many others have attended many years. Really, um, celebrating the culture and understanding and inviting people to come and dance as well. And I think those are just really important parts of who we are as a community and we can learn with and from each other as well. So, excellent report. Lots of work still to do. Um, it just so many great things for our kids. So, I can't thank you enough and thank you for the team and for all the
045families that aren't here but have been part of this decision-making as well. Appreciate all of you. Director Simon. Thanks, Lana. Um, I just wanted to say thank you for your work. It's very impactful. Um, and thank you for volunteering for four years. That's a That's a lot of work, but it's really appreciated. Um, one request I'd give to Tom, um, Mindy, for some reason on my calendar I don't see the powwow. I don't see some of these things. So, please, just a reminder, send them. I would like to attend as many as I can. So, thank you. Does everybody have a pen? April 11th is the powwow at Chamblee Park High School. I'll send it over, too. Thank you. Send it to Corey, who will send it over. >> [laughter] >> Right now. Just kidding.
046All right. Thank you for that presentation. Um If there are no other comments, is there a motion to approve Appendix N annual compliance document as presented? So moved. Thank you, Director Simon. Is there a second? Second. With a second from Director Dechaine, is there any discussion? Hearing none, will all those in favor say I? I. >> I. Any opposed say no. With six in favor and zero opposed, that motion is approved. Thank you. >> Have a great night. Thank you. Our next agenda item is General Counsel, item 8A, 410.0 paid leave policy first read. Welcome Tim Palmatier, General Counsel, Dr. Jennifer Cherry, Chief Human Service Human Resources Officer, and Jessica Rogers, Associate General Counsel. Thank you, co-chairs Hoekman and Langfield, and rest of board members here and Superintendent McIntyre. Um we actually have three policies.
047I don't know if if uh if I can indulge in just maybe take them um one after another. Um but we um we actually have a new uh leave policy that was adopted uh through considerable work. Um Jess Rogers, who is uh our new Associate General Counsel, has really dug in on this work, and Jennifer Cherry uh and countless others have really been um significant in this. I I would be remiss if I didn't say uh the new paid leave policy is really um it's been a heavy lift. Um this is part of that lift and we have uh Jennifer can speak towards this uh probably most directly, but we have a number of people that are working really long hours uh implementing this policy uh this new uh requirement. Um this this uh policy
048is intended to at least um get into some of the nuts and the bolts to make it at least easier for administration and and the like. So, with that said, I'll I'll hand it over to um uh Jess Rogers. She can walk us through the the uh recommended uh revisions to this policy. Good evening, everyone. So, this is a rewrite of policy 410, which is currently titled FMLA Family Medical Leave Act Policy. Uh as Tim mentioned, the implementation of Minnesota paid leave on January 1 was the impetus for this rewrite. So, what we decided to do is to create one employee policy that gives employees sort of the whole world of the paid leave programs available to them, rather than to have a separate FMLA and a Minnesota paid leave policy and a you know,
049ESST [snorts] policy, whatever. We just decided to combine them for the employees' convenience. Um so, there are parts of the FMLA policy that are not strictly speaking required to be in policy, but we are as an employer required to give notice of certain things. Those are the posters you'll see in any workplace. Those posters have essentially been incorporated into this policy for both both um Family Medical Leave Act and Minnesota paid leave in those first two paragraphs. You see those links, that's what those are for. That's part of our legal requirement is to put employees on notice of of those things. Um other than that, like I said, the policy sort of combines them all together. So, one of the first things we do is uh go through the different types of leave available to
050all employees. It does state in that second paragraph that this is all subject to collective bargaining agreements. So, this is meant to be the basics of what's available to you, knowing that there may be more or sometimes some limitations in your collective bargaining agreement. So, on page one we start to go through the different programs, Family Medical Leave Act, Minnesota Paid Leave, Minnesota Pregnancy and Parental Leave, which is still legally a thing even though it's basically enveloped within Minnesota Paid Leave, and then Earned Sick and Safe Time. The next section goes through the use of leave. One important point is that we changed our process a little bit with the implementation of Minnesota Paid Leave and we added an email address that doesn't go to a person. It's [email protected] so that it can be checked
051by different people. But, that's the beginning of our leave process. So, any employee who wants to take leave for any reason will send an email to that address and it starts the process. And that is new, so it's good to put that in this revised policy. Then when we go through the available reasons why an employee can take leave, this is sort of the broadest set of reasoning possible and it comes from Minnesota Paid Leave, which is the broadest our leave laws. So, we want employees to know that basically almost any employee will be will be eligible for these types of leave for this amount of time. So, when we say there may be limitations in collective bargaining agreement, there really there's very few things they can limit. Basically, they can only limit what we
052allow them to use our accrued paid sick or vacation time for. Otherwise, these are all statutory creations. So, we go through the different types of leave, who family members are. Again, you'll see it's a very broad definition. These are largely taken from the Minnesota Paid Leave statute. A couple notes on documentation, what they have to do, the certification required under the various programs to take those leaves. And then there are a few things I would like to point out in here that are important. The Minnesota Paid Leave statute leaves us a few places where we can make decisions and anytime where we get to make a decision, it's important for us to put that in policy so employees know what is allowed in our district specifically. The first of those decisions is on page one
053under paragraph two, general statement of policy. We say that employees entitled to multiple programs described in this policy shall be required to take leave under various programs concurrently to the extent allowable. So that's to let them know you don't get 12 weeks of FMLA and 12 weeks of Minnesota paid leave. Generally speaking, you will take those all at the same time. But again, without having that written in policy, it's not necessarily clear and an employee could potentially grieve if we say, "No, we meant that. We just didn't tell you." The second decision we have to make is on page four under section 4D, where it says coordinated leave benefits. And that's where we essentially say that we do not allow employees to supplement those Minnesota paid leave state payments with their accrued uh sick and
054vacation time. So the law gives the employer the ability to decide Minnesota paid leave generally will pay somewhere around 2/3 of what an employee would normally make depending on on their salary, but that's an estimate. Employers have the option to allow employees to sort of top off with the paid leaves we give them. This section says we're not doing that right now unless it's required be by a collective bargaining agreement. And the reason for that is there are just a lot of technical issues. With this being a brand new law, we weren't entirely sure how they would interpret certain things and we just wanted to be sure if we decide to do this at some point down the road, we are able to do it correctly and in compliance with the law. And with us
055not knowing how some of these things were going to be interpreted by the state, we just felt that we couldn't guarantee that we could do it right at this time. So because that's a decision that's left up to the employer, we felt it was important to put that in our policy that at this time employees cannot supplement those Minnesota paid leave payments with their sick or vacation time unless that becomes required by a collective bargaining agreement. So the third decision that we have to make is under section five intermittent leave. And the statute again leaves it up to us what leave increments employees can take. So, intermittent leave is allowed by the statute. We don't have any control over that, but we do get to decide how much they have to take. So, for non-exempt
056employees, we have said they will take that leave in 15-minute increments. That's consistent with how they take sick and vacation leave now. If you're an exempt employee, you can only take leave in half or full-day increments, which again is consistent with how they can take sick or vacation time, and that's basically an FLSA requirement for exempt employees. So, those are the three decisions that we wanted to make sure we got in our policy, so it's clear where our stance is. Otherwise, we talk about job protection and retaliation. Those are legal requirements of both FMLA and Minnesota paid leave to say that your job is protected during this leave, and that we will not retaliate, and if you feel you have been retaliated against, it tells them who to report that to. Sorry, I know that
057was a lot of information very quickly, but with that I'm happy to take any questions. Director Odegaard. Hi, thanks. My question's about the paragraph D that you talked about, coordinated leave benefits. Could you just go through again with their what people are allowed to do? In my opinion, the way it's worded is a little confusing. Yes, the whole concept is a little confusing. So, what that says is an employee can either use their sick or vacation pay. Those are the accrued leaves that Hennepin gives them, or they could choose the Minnesota leave state payments. So, you have to choose one or the other. You can use your paid leave. If you don't have that or if you're saving it for some reason, then you can take those state payments. You just don't get to use
058both the same time to get to your full salary. Okay. That That's probably the part that is not perfectly clear, at least to me. just the If you're just reading it like I do, um I I don't know if you could use a little language that would make that crystal clear to people. Cuz I otherwise I think you you know, you do say in here you will only supplement paid leave to the extent required by a bargaining agreement, but I just feel like if you a little bit more make it crystal clear, so you either are going to take your vacation if you have it, or you can choose to take paid leave. That's fine, but you can't supplement paid leave with vacation in order to bring yourself up to your regular pay. I It's
059not perfectly clear. No, that's a fair comment, and we went back and forth on this. Some people refer to it as supplementing, some people say topping off. We weren't sure what was more common, what people would understand. So, it's it's fair. We're not quite there yet. >> [snorts] >> Director Arco. Yes. Uh thank you, Coach Herokman. Um thank you guys for the presentation. I just had a As I'm reading through this again, tell me if I'm wrong in any point, but it seems like the Minnesota paid leave, like the section B, is and it offers everything that the Family and Medical Leave Act offers, but more. Is that an accurate way of describing that? I would say that's accurate. Yeah, it's the same amount of leave, but there are many more reasons you can take
060it. Okay. And then there's also the opportunity for paid compensation. Um why then, I guess maybe in your opinion, would when this was passed, why wouldn't the state have not also repealed the Family and Medical Leave Act if the Minnesota Paid Leave Act is the same, but better? So, because the Family Medical Leave Act is a federal law, so the state couldn't repeal it. Um yeah. Okay. I see. That makes a lot of sense. Okay. Thank you. Mhm. Any other questions or comments? Okay. Thank you for that presentation. Next, item 8B, 605.0 shared time policy first read. Thank you, court co-chair Hoffman and uh board members. Um the next policy is a new policy um uh for the school district here. We do not currently have a shared time policy. Uh several other school districts
061actually have adopted policies of this nature. This uh shared time is essentially a program that's established through Minnesota statute that allows public schools to provide instruction to private and home school students on a limited basis. So, a student could uh maybe be at a private school, but decide they wanted to take an engineering class that we had at one of our schools. Uh shared time affords uh that private school student or home school student to come into our school, take that class. Um shared leave or not shared leave, I'm sorry. I'm kind of combining my policies right now, but shared time um actually um affords individuals um or I should say school districts um you know, compensation or funding for uh students who attend on such limited basis. Essentially, uh shared time is required as
062a matter of federal and state law with with respect to special education students. That is not so much the case uh for non-special education students. Um nevertheless, Anoka-Hennepin, like many school districts, uh permitted by Minnesota statute, has historically allowed attendance of non-special education students on a shared time basis. So, decisions regarding uh this have historically uh been made at our school sites. And so, what we're proposing with this policy is essentially a uniform approach uh with respect to all of our schools in terms of how they implement um shared time and offering shared time classes. >> [snorts] >> Um and what I would say here is is that while again there's no requirement of state statute to have a shared time policy, actually MDE's division of program finance has strongly advised that school boards have
063shared time policies. Again, we have not historically had that. So this policy is essentially being proposed to ensure that we have consistency across all school sites and to ensure that our practice aligns with the requirements of state law. Some of the key things that I'll point out with respect to this policy it requires the students participating and this is a lot of this is consistent with requirements of state law. Students participating must be residents of Anoka-Hennepin school district. They're required to maintain their enrollment status in their private or home school setting. They will be allowed to participate in only allowed to participate in in classes that actually are academic classes required for promotion or graduation. So for example, study hall wouldn't be something that would be offered as a matter of a to a shared
064time student and you couldn't generate revenue on the basis of that. Really important part of all this and this is again consistent with the way that most schools have approached it. The the amount of classes that a shared time student is permitted to participate through this policy would be less than 50%. So if you have five classes during the day, the shared time student would be afforded the opportunity to attend two classes whether that's at the um you know, secondary level or or elementary level. Um Transportation is not provided as a result of this policy. Students are expected to follow the district discipline policy who come in on a shared time status. And I guess finally the policy sets forth um just the procedures that need to be followed, time frames, and the such for
065uh shared time. So, we discussed this um at our uh policy committee meeting on February 2nd. Um there was an agreement to move forward for first read reading to tonight. Um I do want to say that um this work and this um this particular um policy was really developed uh with the considerable well, actually the hard laboring or of of Kate Grimm and Michelle Vandetop. They really uh took the lead on this uh recognizing that we're increasingly fielding questions with respect to shared time students. So, with that, I'll uh take any questions. Board members, are there any questions? Director Simon. Thanks, Linda. Thank you for presenting um um one key [clears throat] thing during the policy committee that we talked about is um not special education, but non-special education is voluntary for us to do
066this. But, if students come and do shared time in our schools, we're getting funding from the state for those for that time the students are there. So, I think that's just I think you might have said that, but it's important to reiterate that. Um one question I asked, which I I don't think we've gotten feedback on, I think Michelle uh Vandetop's getting that possibly is and it was a question I brought up because I've heard this question before from board members is that since it's a voluntary thing that we're doing and we are getting funding, but is are we spending anything else in addition to this, right? So, how does this affect our budget? Maybe it's all a net positive, but sometimes there's unforeseen things that we need to spend money on that uh we're
067doing. So, I know she was going to follow up on that, and I just want to make sure that I reiterated that that the board can get that feedback. So, thank you. Yep. Thank you, um Director Simon. Um yeah, and I think that um at least in in the discussion uh we can actually get a little bit more information on that. Um the policy really actually kind of kind of makes sure that we're guarding that, you know, to ensure for example on issues like transportation, we're not um offering additional transportation. We make it clear in the policy that we wouldn't add a section for example if we had a shared time student coming in. Um and it's also always based on on seat availability. Um so we we do have some provisions in there that
068give us flexibility to make sure that we're being um you know, good guardians of our budget. Um I don't really know the the actual numbers and that's probably another important part of getting information in response to what you're asking, which how many students are we talking about? Um generally speaking, I mean we see this with we do see it with home school students who want to have maybe some opportunity to to access a a class that's of a complex nature and maybe goes beyond the parent who's providing instruction in the home, calculus or um you know, an engineering class or a physics class. Um so we see it in that context. And then we also see it in situations where families want to have some social opportunities and maybe they pick a class that's not
069exactly maybe it is academic but also an opportunity to interact with with other peers. So the numbers is important for that question though. So thank you for that. Co-chair Lengenfeld. Thank you for the presentation. One of the wonderments that I had when I read this, is there any data sharing information or things that would be put in a policy? So for example, if a student comes um the student just comes with no background or no data to support a course that they might be requesting or coming into the schools. Is there anything like that? How how How do we know in terms of the right placement or any background about these students that are coming in that we're going to serve? Uh that's a really good question. So, I I do um obviously I'm not
070directly involved in that kind of work. Um but I do think it's um it's within our purview to our purview to be able to say um you need to demonstrate a certain competency and maybe even have a a test out option for that. So, if you if I wanted to uh say for example um enroll in a calculus class, um did I do the testing that actually allowed me to show that I was able to matriculate or promote to the next uh level of that class. So, we do uh I can't speak to it specifics, but as I understand it we have that in place to make sure that we're not placing a student improperly in a class. Okay. That makes sense? Yeah, it does make sense. I just wondered if it needed to be
071included in here if it was just a step that the schools take and have those conversations about that student before they come. Yeah, and I can I can add clarification and again in terms of working with the the group that actually um took a labor in order in this policy, see whether or not it uh it can even provide a a little bit more information or specifics on that. Thank you. Director Simon? Um Michelle, just uh um this may get at what you said, may not get at all of it, but if you look at uh 4A, course prerequisites and demonstrations, it says students granted share time enrollment in a specific course must have satisfied all prerequisite course requirements, and students may be required to demonstrate appropriate skill and or knowledge level for a course
072placement. So, I think I think that answers your question. I'm not sure. I could have just said that, too. Thanks. Director Audette? Thanks. Um could you talk you you mentioned that MDE was recommending this policy. What what was the why why did they recommend it? What what is it intended to do? It's in the MARS manual and um the MARS obviously has um school districts tracking enrollment and and attendance of students. I think the the recommendation is to ensure compliance with certain requirements as it relates to the shared time law. So when we talk about instruction needs to be at the public school. Instruction needs to be in an academic area. Those things are clarified through the policy and I'm surmising that MDE actually recommends that as a as a a policy to clarify those
073particular pieces. And then I think there is also a sense of like what is it There has to be some defining purpose in terms of what it means to be a shared time. If I took one class at a private school and 80% of my other classes at the public school, it starts to look like you're a student enrolled in the public school taking one class. So there there that is actually been what's accomplished through a lot of these shared time policies. But I can't speak directly towards whether or not that's exactly what MDE is recommending. Okay. Um so then under under B number one students requesting shared time privileges must remain enrolled at their non-public or home school for the majority of their educational instruction. What in layman's terms, what are we trying to
074say there? I think it actually gets to again, the notion that they're actually a bonafide non-public school student. Otherwise, they're they're enrolled in a private school, they're enrolled in they're they're at their their home school for the majority of their educational instruction. >> [clears throat] >> In what other status would they be if they weren't in that? Like I don't I don't understand this part. I'm not sure I really understand the question. They're they're either a public school student, but in this case they're not. So then they are either in a nonpublic or a home school. What other status could they possibly have is what I'm asking. I don't understand why I don't I don't get what this provision is aimed at. They must remain enrolled at their nonpublic school or home school as opposed
075to what? Well, I suppose perhaps no school at all. I mean and I will I will actually say that that's and that's an area where there is some concern. We actually might have family that's claiming home school status and maybe only wants to have their child attending uh 2 hours a day. Are they actually getting the majority of their instruction at home? So I think it actually ensures that we're we're this is a bonafide home school student. It's a bonafide nonpublic or private school student. I may be able to add to that. Um Yes. The 50% piece that you mentioned, I think that's in statute. So just verifying, you know, we can't go above 50% in that shared time status. So the remainder must be greater than 50% either home school or at a private
076school. And then Director Audette, for your first question, I and just from my experience over time when you get monitored, you know, fiscal monitoring, compliance monitoring, having the policy and laying out our practices helps us verify and and comply with those requirements to ensure we get the funding. So if we don't have those clear those, you know, we're going to get asked what you're how are you going about doing this in a practical sense? And that that verifies and then that allows us to collect the ADM and the funding that we can collect. Yeah. Yeah. And of course I'm good with that. I mean I we we should do that. We should collect the funding for sure. I think I'm just trying to understand and what I would what I would not want to do
077is put anything in place that limits somebody who's either in private school or in home school from being able to participate you know, in the public system for to the extent that they can. I I It's hard for me to tell if we're trying to do that or not in some way. And in part just because we we get into some of these really specific things. You got to do this, you got to do that. And my notes as we did that are just why or how come? What's the reason for that? And so I guess still not perfectly clear with that, but I would just say that I I would not be interested in doing that. I'm all for us uh setting up the policy and the terms for how it works um and
078ensuring that it you know, if it helps us to get the funding when the kids are uh the students are using the program, that all makes sense. But I don't see a reason to limit them from participating in any way. Yeah, and I would >> to. If I may, I would echo we we agree, right? So um this really matches practice and there's no intent to to do what you kind of explained there. I think it's all about just having clarity. And um I often think of over my time, you know, home school students might come for band or Right. something they can't get at home, right? And that's a common one. Or maybe it's just unique classes that just are hard to provide at home. So we want we welcome that. Just want clear
079clarity around making sure we can um account for it and support it and um when asked about it, can prove it, right? Yeah. Okay. Thank you. Director DeShane. Thank you. Uh was there a model policy that you used to base this off of? Like a lot of our policies come from the MSBA model policies as a starting place and then we go from there. That might help clarify why some of the language sounds the way it does. Yeah, actually um there is not an MSBA model policy, which is interesting. Um, the uh there are a number of school districts I I understand that this policy was drawn from when when Kate Grimm actually uh kind of took the labor in war and putting it together. Um, it it does follow kind of common practice. So,
080I can speak towards at least other districts adopting similar practices policies. >> [snorts] >> Okay. Uh thank you for that. Our next agenda item is 8 C 907.0 rewards policy repeal. Thank you, chair uh co-chair Hoffman um and school board members. This is kind of an interesting uh policy. Um, I'll just I'll say that I maybe one of my New Year's resolutions is to actually uh look at uh some policies that we could consider repealing and this really falls into that category. Um, this is a policy that was developed in in 2006. Uh to my understanding it's never been implemented. There is a a kind of a a small reference to rewards in the school board's ability to be able to uh adopt a rewards policy under 123B.02 subdivision 22. Um, but again, there's uh
081in my uh to my knowledge it's never been um employed by the school district. Um, and there are no uh to my understanding no uh directives or procedures kind of um contemplated by this particular policy that relates to rewards. So, let me just kind of maybe put it in the simplest possible terms. I mean, is it is it possible for the school board with this policy to issue a reward leading to the um prosecution of someone who engaged in some conduct within the school? Um, the this policy would allow that. Um, if we had a particular situation, which is uh never risen uh risen at this point, could we uh could the board still come together and actually um decide through its own adoption of a policy to go ahead and do it, they could.
082Um, but I think actually, given the fact that it's uh somewhat of an arcane policy and never been implemented, um I'm going to uh put this in the camp of policies which we could at least consider um repealing. Um, but of course it would be fine if it stayed uh with uh with our policies as well. So, at that, I guess I'll take any questions. Board members, any questions? >> [snorts] >> I guess it's a question. Yes, Director Adair. W- It would seem like to me, even without a policy like this, if the school board wanted to, uh they could we could decide to do this anyways. I know I don't feel like you need a policy to do it, right? You if if there was a situation that the board board wanted to do
083something like this, I feel like we could. So, I guess it's a yet another reason to say I wouldn't have a problem repealing it, but just wanted to make sure, I guess. You can't predict the future. Yeah. I I would agree with that. I I think the board certainly would have the authority. It's It's in statute. Um we would just have to come together and decide that we were going to uh put this together. I would I would imagine um that the board wouldn't want uh um you know, administration to decide that we're going to issue a $10,000 reward policy. I think we'd have to clear it through the board anyway. So, I think it's really uh kind of a probably a something that's predictable, right? Okay, if there are no other comments, is there
084a motion to approve the repeal of the rewards policy as presented in appendix Q? So moved. Thank you, Director Simon. Is there a second? Thank you, Co-chair Langenfeld. Um Is there any discussion? Hearing none, with all those in favor say I. I. Any opposed say no. With six in favor and zero opposed, the motion is approved. Thank you for the presentation. >> Thank you. Our next agenda item is labor and labor relations and benefits, item 9A. Authorize the 2025 to 2027 special education administration master agreement. Welcome, Dr. Cherry, Chief Human Resource Officer. Good evening, Co-chair Hockman, members of the board, Superintendent McIntyre. Pleased to be here this evening to announce that our special education administrators, who are represented by the special education uh program supervisors association, have ratified a new 2-year agreement with the effective
085dates July 1, 2025 through June 30th of 2027. Thanks to the members of this employee team and our district bargaining team for their work in negotiating an updated employment contract. The tentative agreement reached includes step movement both years of the contract. Uh salary schedule improvements include in year one uh moving the off-schedule performance and leadership pay to the schedule. Adding $250 to each cell on the schedule, plus an additional $1,450 to the top step that would not have seen step movement that year. In year two, the salary schedule improvement includes dropping the bottom step and adding a new top step, which is $3,275 more than the previous top step. Flexible benefits account contribution increase $2,409 in the first year uh remains stable in the second year. And in year two, the 403b matching contribution increased
086$624. This total compensation package includes a 6.18% increase or $182,000 in new money. The contract equals just over 6 million over the course of the 2 years of the contract. This proposed agreement is within the authority provided by the school board and as a result, I am seeking approval of the contract as presented in appendix R. Thank you, Dr. Cherry. Are there any questions from the board? Director Audette. Thanks, uh I noted in section 13 that uh there's a quite a bit of new language inserted in there. Could you just give us a high-level overview of what we're doing there? Just I think it's just spelling out some I just don't know why it's added. Uh this group is um a group that uh has continuing contract status and um under uh continuing contract, if
087uh we are to reduce the workforce in this group, uh we have to have a way of deciding who's um laid off first or who goes on an unrequested leave of absence. Uh the the uh contract uh previously referred to a statute 122a.40 that was repealed in 2018. And so, um uh when that uh statute was uh repealed, that was the old um LIFO statute, so last in, first out. It's pretty much um based upon seniority. Mhm. Um all bargaining groups were to bargain language about procedures for ULA. So, that had not been done in the past. >> Okay. Um and so, this is uh uh um uh um the language that we we landed on. Okay, good. So, there just had not been that language before, so. >> Thank you. Okay, if there are
088no other questions, um before us is the approval of the 2025-27 special education administrators master agreement as presented in appendix R. I would entertain a motion to approve the 2025-27 special education administrator master agreement. Thank you, Director Audette. Is there a second? Second. Thank you, Director DeShane. Is there any discussion? Hearing none, all those in favor say I. I. Any opposed? With six in favor and zero opposed, the motion is approved. Thank you, Board. Thank you. We are nearing our last board agenda item, item 10, board correspondence and communication. Members, this is your opportunity to share happenings in your community and report on committee assignments or other items of interest. Does anyone have anything to share? Director DeShane. Thank you. Uh just wanted to note a few things going on. I think um first I
089wanted to congratulate all of our student musicians who were a part of the Northwest Suburban Conference All-Conference concert uh and uh festivities. So, that includes choir, band, and orchestra students from all five of our high schools plus the rest of the Northwest Suburban Conference. I think there's 13 schools in total. This was an auditioned all conference ensemble and they performed at Bethel last night and it was it was wonderful. Very very proud of all of our students. It was hosted by Anoka High School so Principal Farley and all of the Anoka High School music program team huge thank you to all of you for the work that you did. Many of our music teachers from the rest of our high schools were all there and you could see the pride that they had in their
090students and in the performances that happened. So it was it was a really wonderful experience and I know that Anoka High School today hosted 2,000 students from across the Northwest Suburban Conference to listen to each other perform all day long. It was it was choir band and orchestra concerts all day long. What an amazing opportunity to celebrate student musicians. I thought it was wonderful. I also wanted to know we heard about a ton of teams and this is maybe breaking news but the Champlin Park boys swim and dive team is sending seven swimmers and and a diver to the state meet coming up this weekend. So really hopeful. Um the the the performances were very impressive. Tons of records broken and maybe more to come at state. So looking forward to watching that. Also Jackson
091Middle School competed at the state meet through for knowledge bowl which is Brightworks Spark Path uh event I guess is the way to say it and they won the triple team award. So they had the three top scoring teams from schools that had more than three teams participating. So that was really exciting to see all of those Jackson students out this weekend competing at the knowledge bowl competition. So thank you. Coach Chair Langfeld? Thank you. Um, exciting times. I bet the students were inspired by the Olympics to keep going. Anyway, um, I I wanted to just share a few things about I Love to Read Month. Obviously, uh, our superintendent talked about the Battle of the Books. And I think what I'd like to do is extend my gratitude to all of the teachers who
092write all the questions. And I got I was over at Jackson and the students were challenging the questions. Um, so that was interesting as well because there were characters in two books that did the same thing. So, some of that was going on. So, it was very very important uh, to do that and now uh, so a special thank you to those teachers. Congratulations to all the teams that participated across the district. Now, the the winners are coming forward on Wednesday and I'm very excited about that as well. Um, I know that many of us have sat in that room and watched the battles and and obviously a shout-out to all the teachers and all the staff who make this happen for our kids because they truly are into it as a competition of reading.
093So, something to celebrate. Um, I also had the privilege to um, be a mystery reader. And being a mystery reader is not an easy task if you're not that exciting. So, I have been a mystery reader in schools where the Chick-fil-A cow comes in and I'm not as popular. Um, but I want to give a shout-out to Miss Skinner's class and Miss Hostetler's class at Lincoln Elementary and also to um, um, let's see where I was today. I was with Miss Nelson's class as well at Ramsey. And to our extraordinary volunteer service coordinators to coordinate all the efforts. They have all the books ready to go um, for anybody who doesn't bring their books and I think that's very helpful as well. So it's it's a joyful time and the students were extraordinary. We have
094such great kids. Their behavior is always so engaging, so such great questions. I'm always so impressed and they they always are just outstanding when I've got had the privilege to visit. And then the last thing is I know I didn't get to go to the Olympics this year, but I was able to attend the Champlin Park High School State United Championship game at Target Center and it was intense. It truly was intense right down to the wire and uh the students were extraordinarily supportive and cheering a lot. And then one young man got to go to the free throw line. Of course he was fouled right at the end and and it was really interesting because all of the students knew that this particular student didn't welcome all the noise of cheering and screaming. So
095there was a big hush over all the student body so that the student could focus. It was it was really a celebration and so big cheers at the end and it was really exciting. So that's what I have. Director Arco. Yes, thank you Coach Hoekman. I got to do two things in the last couple weeks. I went to the science fair at Blaine High School and I got to see I got to actually be one of the judges for that science fair so it's fun to contrast that with like the elementary school science fair as well. Different caliber projects for sure. Um but well done to all the high school and middle school students who participated. Um then I also got to participate in the I love to read month. I I went to Madison
096Elementary. I got to read a book to two different classes. And in one of the classes before before we did the book reading Um, played a game and they invited me to play where they all stood in a circle and they would count down from 1,000 by 100 increments and whoever landed on zero would have to sit down and you just keep going and keep going until the last person standing wins. And before we started there's one student who pulled me over and she said, "Here, come stand here. This is the good spot." And I actually won. So, apparently we have a genius in our midst cuz I I don't think I could have counted that many thousands that fast, but so I had a good time doing that and I appreciate the invite, so
097yeah. Okay, great. Wonderful to hear all those good things happening in the district. The next item, uh, number 11 will be conducted in a closed session pursuant to Minnesota statute 13D.05 subsection 2A3 to discuss private student educational data and expulsion. This closed session will be held in the Michael Sullivan room. I would entertain a motion to move to the closed session. So moved. Thank you, Director Simon. Do we have a second? Second. Thank you, Co-Chair Langenfeld. Is there any discussion? Hearing none, all those in favor say I. I. Any opposed say no. With six in favor and zero opposed, we'll move to the executive session in the Michael Sullivan room. Should we take a 5-minute break? The meeting is recessed and will resume at 8:59. 7:59. Time flies. >> Woo.