Byron School Board Special Meeting (2/24/25)

001all right I'd like to call this um special meeting of Byron Independent School District 531 to order call attendance okay attendance please yep Lisa here Carrie here David here Nadia here Kelly here Alicia here Jeremy here now we need to make an approval on the agenda items is there anyone that would like to make a motion on the approval a motion to approve second okay a motion and a second has been made I have to do a roll call so Alicia yay David I Kelly I Carrie I Lisa hi Jeremy hi all right and now the discussion of the 2526 budget adjustment recommendations so last week uh when we met I went through the budget adjustments and uh started with last year um and into this year um at also then at at the end

002of last week or on W Wednesday morning I sent out a presentation to the um to the staff to the parents and community members who are on our list and uh and did a video um a 15minute video not the most exciting listening me talk but um the 15-minute video regarding the budget adjustment recommendations and kind of the reasonings behind it so I will kind of go through that uh again uh briefly and then if you have questions along the way we can do that as well so the first one is the uh staff members so we have 12 teachers who um are not all um reductions and cuts some of them would be um retiring or leaving that we know of and may not be replacing them or or replacing them at a a

003uh a part-time because they don't we don't have enough sections in that area maybe for a full-time teacher but we do have some where we might have to do some overloads but we are saving money and uh some of it also at the K5 level is because as you notice with uh our enrollment as we've been talking about quite a bit is uh our enrollment is going to be seems to be and appears to be um down compared to in kindergarten compared to last year as well as our other grade levels are not at the 180 Mark that a lot of grade levels are at so it's part of it is downsizing and uh having to do that and and then right I should say right sizing so we make sure that we have the

004um you know students and teachers at the right size and that um unfortunately that does mean reductions in staff so there are some again that are reductions at the middle school and high school we have fewer of those because that's where our larger populations are that's where our um uh sixth grade right now has 208 kids um so next year they'll have 197 in sixth grade and 208 in 7th grade so there isn't a lot of reductions at that point so um and then also uh two counselors we would have a counselor at the high school we have three there presently we would reduce one of the counselors at the high school at the elementary level we have a counselor at the primary a counselor at the inter intermediate and then we also have social

005emotional Paras at each school um what we would be doing is and then we have two counselors at the middle school um because of of reductions and and their lure we would be moving one of the elementary teach U counselors to the middle school so they would still have two as well and then we would have one counselor at the primary or the K5 level um as well as keeping the seal Paras we also are um working on or we will be having our social worker move to the Intermediate School to be extra support and have uh some a Cas there to be able to work with as well um she's districtwide so she would have to leave at some times throughout the week to work with high school and and kids and other kids

006throughout our district um but again we're trying to put as much as we can in that in that area as well and then also we have and I haven't heard back yet um from uh like Fernbrook or some other outside agencies for that have we've had therapists in our buildings before about getting therapists back in our buildings again as added support um uh as you heard and as you know we're also recommending to go to one licensed school nurse um at this time and uh again what we would do is is have and hire back two health aids but when we do post them we would post for LPNs and RNs um to have that experience and have that lier behind them but they would be on the staff uh on the staff contract or

007agreement and not on the teachers agreement and so um other school districts follow the same type of model we would have a person um in every Health office and then our LSN would be housed presently um their their hous or their working a office one at the primary school one at the middle school a health office so a lot of times they're not able to get out um so having one LSN model um that person would be housed at the primary school and then um be able to float and do the training do IEP meetings do some of the things that they need to with um our students for mailling and so forth and then also if a a health aid is is gone they could fill in during that time but again we would

008post it as we post we would posted for and hope that we will get LPN or an LPN or an RN licensed um nurse experienced nurse which other districts do and they've been able to find um uh people as well at the same time type of rate uh pay that we would be putting out um for that um so and then uh reduced Tech specialist halftime we would reduce some days for the receptionists um going from 190 days to 183 days so they would be there two days before school starts two days after the school year ends and um student contact days we would recode a paent to special education which gives us some money back and then we're moving the elementary AP um ad uh to have Anan or a a athletic director back

009at the high school and moving that to a Dean position which is a Tulsa position teacher on special assignment it's part of the teacher contract um so we would be doing that um it depends on who um applies and gets that position would depend on if we would save any money um um that way so that's not in the figures that you would see any questions before I move forward we can come back to at the end as well so I'd like to discuss that as we go through if possible I'll start um I think I think it's may be safe to say that I'm speaking for all of us and I say we would be remiss not to sincerely thank our administrators and staff that worked tirelessly to put these reductions together we know

010we asked you to do things that we all know aren't what's best for our staff and not best for our students but it's just the position we find ourselves in so thank you for doing that really really hard work um I think it's clear that this list was made with a lot of care and thought and consideration of impact in many many ways um I have a lot of questions I have questions about most of the items on the list and so I don't want to dominate the conversation I think it's important that our community and everyone hears from all of the board members tonight um but I I'll let other people talk first but I do have questions about most items do you want to start with any of yours Alicia just sure sure

011um so I think if we start with the the first item on the staff reduction list was the 7K through five teaching staff um I also just really want to clarify a lot of my questions were questions we received from community members um and so I might already know the answer but I think it's important we have the discussion out in the open so everyone kind of understands our thought process um one question we asked was if we could see specific scenarios or examples of how staff reductions will impact the daily School experiences so in K through 5 we were presented with two potential scenarios and I know a lot of this could change right depending on enrollment and um things like that but I don't did everyone have a chance to review that email

012that had the two scenarios okay um it's my understanding that the pros of the scenario where we keep the kindergarten specialist as is and then transition to a first through fifth grade model um for the rest of the specialist coverage um so that would leave us with one music teacher two art teachers and three PE Fitness teachers if I'm wrong about any of this please correct me this is just my understanding of um the information that I've been reading um so to me the pros are that we get to maintain that amazing kindergarten Discovery program that we all know and love and appreciate um and we get to keep three additional at teachers employed um and still save money the cons I see with that are that our students will have a lot less time

013in music um and instead they'll have more time in PE and art um I guess my concern or a piece that I think we need to discuss is when we think about like a well-balanced Classic Education um I think music and art are very important components of that and I feel like we currently have PE and fitness and adding PE enrichment um feels like we're losing we're losing something there for our students curriculum um I'm not saying it's not the best choice I just think it's a consideration we need to consider and maybe talk about it feels a little a little bit inequitable to me in that um accessing music outside of school is expensive and time consuming um and so that part stinks but yeah but we also need to wait against keeping three

014more teachers right right um one item that I wanted to add to this is that is it correct that the Innovations feature will will be gone with this model the Innovations is moving into a classroom yeah yes um The Innovation teacher will be employed as a to provide regular Services because of I've seniority he would move into a a regular classroom but in addition to what just just said that we're going to have reduced music coverage right we will also not going to have additional classes for Innovation for for first and second grade yes for first and second grade just something again also as bad as not having enough music right it's something that we need to will impact some kids right and we need to make sure that once we have resources back we

015can Institute those programs back um but yes thank you Alicia for forcing the what we've heard from about that item um and then does anyone else have anything they want to say about that model well so we' be so the music teacher is is um retiring correct correct okay so we would have to hire another music teacher so we're not going to replace that music teacher right and so the first model or scenario that we don't replace the ex excuse me the music teacher that's retiring okay and as a result we have teaching I mean we we have a we have one music teacher okay we do okay um so one more kind of add to that number one um it would be very helpful I think for myself and maybe for other community members

016to understand all those 12 Cuts how many are retiring and we're just not replacing there there's one that's retiring okay that we're not replacing and there are two that are leaving that we know of from the high school one one's on and so there are two at the high school that are leaving that we are not replacing one and we're partially replacing the other right so retiring or leaving and then nine people to be up yes yeah that's a good point the other part I just want to remind you again as as number one uh or as that's the proposal that we that the leadership team is coming with is as we look at our reductions and the cost of the reductions that you see is the one with the kindergarten Specialists still in in

017in buildings um it's also because we had reached our $1.6 million um asked or or kind of our task and then um we were trying to save as many teachers as possible so if you um don't do that and again and that's part of the next conversation I guess but if we were to go and not have the kindergarten Specialists to move then we would be losing we would be losing three teachers and so right now we're trying to hang on to as as many staff as possible with that first first one and it was you that second scenario was brought up because people asked you know what what are some other opportunities or some other things so that's why they brought brought for it but the leadership team is um recommending and and figuring

018into those numbers that we would keep the case specialist and then try to keep as many teachers as possible while still making being able to make reductions in that area and so with the 1.6 reduction 1.6 million reduction that we're planning on um does this how soon how soon are we going to be able to get to our 8% fund balance does that come into play like the 1.6 and how soon it is so if we cut less than 1.6 we it'll just take us a little bit longer it depends yeah and the reason why it depends is that it depends on what happens with the legislature depends on the unfunded mandates it depends what we did was if um when Julie sink was here when we first started going through this process and coming

019up with a number for the board is we said that if it was um everything was equal and we didn't add any other expenses to next year um then 1.6 would probably get you to about a 5% fund balance okay that's with everything equal and no other expenditures went up you know or anything like that now remember that we do have five um contracts to settle and we don't know what's happening with the legislature regarding those mandates around the unemployment insurance and so forth so this way the 1.6 gives cushion that you wouldn't be going in the hole next year and you won't be um closer to uh statutory operating debt so it's that it all depends right if you don't do the 1.6 you're getting closer to an opportunity that if those things come

020true then you may not be balanced next year as a balanced budget we're trying to give some cushion as what we could and then like I said whatever is not spent or or have to be paid out then goes towards your fund balance which again if it was all nothing it would be at 5% with the 1.6 in my mind we have to tr find a way to cut 1.6 I feel like there's so much unknown with the federal government and our state legislation right now that um I think five if we're I think if we even if we cut the 1.6 I think the 5% is probably a pretty Rosy Outlook depending on how all that shakes out um but um and then the so the second scenario my understanding is that um we

021would maintain the same specials programming that we currently have in 1st through 5th um and the cons are that the kindergarten Discovery program and the kindergarten model would be greatly affected basically we would um the we would lose our special programming we have for kindergarteners which does attract students for us um it would require hiring a music teacher so it's my understanding that that would save us less money as well is that true not necessarily because um again it could save us more money because you're you're releasing three teachers right right and then but you still have to hire one back and so and the one that is um you know is a the one who's retiring is a veteran teacher right and so you look at that as on the pay scale and so

022forth and then you hire one back you don't know where how much that would be and then when you start but in the end you're still releasing three teachers right right and so when you look at the difference it may be $30,000 difference maybe but again um there like I said earlier there were the reasons why we we are projecting or proposing the first model so you think it could potentially be $30,000 more cost savings for the second scenario possibly because because there's two people who are who would be totally replaced because we'd be bringing one back we would have to take those teachers from the kindergarten specialist move them into classrooms those three teachers and we would have to tell them they no longer have a position so we wouldn't be paying for those

023salaries but we would have to hire back right and possibly possibly look at other overloads as well because it' be a K12 they would have a K12 building and then the 35 they would be separated so okay um I'm sorry 30,000 more just for the k through five program or let's compare those those scenarios A and B financially would there be any difference financially between A and B there could be uh with B because you are releasing those two teachers there could be about a $30,000 savings to that additional additional savings but again you are releasing three teachers to be able to get that through right we're impacting a qu we're drastically impacting the quality of the Key Program yes corre yes or $30,000 right right and we do have to be able to attract

024new kindergarteners because we're already have low numbers for incoming kindergarten so can I have ask an organizational question so how what the purpose of this meeting right now right is to vote for this packet of reductions right yes there's a long list um do and as we're discussing one by one do we want to maybe interject and say something where we vote for each item no because what will end up happening is at the end um we are having this discussion and then at the end the next agenda item will be to take action on a resolution and during that resolution then um once it's brought forward you can then at that point say you know you're going with the whole package or you want to take this this this part out or this part

025out that sort of thing so um we don't vote on these things now this is just a discussion and then when the resolution comes that's when you would have to uh decide at that point um what you would want to take away and at the resolution we can State we can say that we approve all the items B one or B two that's what happened last year the board approved everything um but except for the LSN and that was something that was part of the resolution when when that was made okay thank you okay does anyone else have any feelings about the two scenarios I would prefer to a if a scenario a yeah kindergarten yeah yeah sounds good and then that's in line with the recommendation too from the experts so okay um the

026next question that I asked was will there be adjustments to class sizes schedules or elective offerings in the middle school and high school um and the response was actually very very optimistic we'll have um class sizes near our Target in the middle school and just to be clear that's because we have a lot more students in those classes um part of the cuts to primary were right sizing and cuts that we would have had to make um kind of regardless of the financial situation um and then High School will have larger class sizes but um the response was that we were able to maintain much of our profile of graduate programming um we do have to reduce some language offerings correct potentially yeah okay yes um um and then the next question just CL we're

027not reducing the we're not eliminating the language right the offering we are reducing the number of sections that would be available correct so yeah and I um when I talked to Malia today it sounds like it like most students I it sounds like probably will still be able to get the electives that they prefer um which is incredible news really um okay the next question please interrupt me if you have anything to say okay um this year some programs were cut that weren't included to my knowledge on a formal list such as gifted and talented enrichment at the intermediate school and boys volleyball I'm not questioning the decision to cut these programs but I'd like to understand if we should expect further reductions like these in the coming year ones that haven't been specifically outlined

028yet um can you please provide insight into how these decisions are being made and what we might anticipate moving forward um and it sounds like the gifted and talented program in the intermediate was more a result of Staffing changes and not wanting to hire or spend any additional money especially last year when we were um we had a lot of unknown and that we um Administration anticipates bringing that back next year so that hopefully will just be a temporary pause um and boys volleyball was a club level Sport and so part of our policy which this makes perfect sense is if our fund balance is below 8% we can it's irresponsible to add more official Sports as much as that hurts and we would love to support the boys volleyball team um and lastly that

029no other programs are set for reduction currently but if a staff member leaves then their role in Associated programs would be evaluated and the leadership team would talk to the board um to kind of come up with a plan about how we're going to address that so I thought that was really reassuring um see some of this we've already talk about uh the next questions I have are related to the LSN reduction um does anyone else have concern concerns that they would like to share first just with the overwhelming response we got from the community um it's concerning I guess I'm I'm concerned that we're replacing an LSN with health aids we can we can hope and wish that they will have an RN lure or LPN but we can't guarantee that so we're replacing

030one licensed skilled nurse with two health aids that just have to have a high school school diploma so we have we have people in each building we have bodies in each building but we don't necessarily have a skill set in each building so that is concerning to me agree I think you're saying a worst case scenario that we don't know right saying we're planing for a best case but you are counting on a worst case and but if you're counting on a best case you know I mean you're counting on a best case I'm counting on a worst case I'm not anything I'm commenting on your your addressing scenario she's introducing a realistic use correct yeah I think no why why not why no we don't know what's realistic what's realistic is that we put

031the put the job listing out and yes while we are hoping for an RN or LPN uh also keep in mind of where we are located uh we're in one of the most medical heavy areas in the country if not the world and there may be somebody that potentially is looking for an opportunity to not be uh in a scenario where they're working 40 hours a week 12 months a year they may want an opportunity to be in a situation where they're working in a school which better fits their work life balance there is an opportunity for an LPN or RN there's also an opportunity for a high school diploma we we don't no we cannot plan for the best we cannot plan for the worst and all I'm hearing is the assumptions that we

032cannot do anything other than the worst case scenario and I'm just commenting that that's not the case safety concerns aside I don't see evidence that we have really evaluated the um Revenue that our lsns generate um so in L I have that information I have a hard time supporting this reduction I I'm still hanging up on even the cost of the savings I I cannot comprehend a situation where uh with a a readily available part-time LPN and RN employment around the corner people would consider less uh competition that is less than that are we banking on people being willing to be underpaid that's that to me personally sounds exploitative uh and I don't think we should be considering that as a realistic scenario so with four people um under current model why just start keep

033that model versus having five people that may or may not result in savings and and also questionable reimbursement the medical reimbursement is is also I mean that's a huge Factor one yeah I know it's a huge factor and we so far from the research we've done so far we my understanding is that health aids are only able to build for certain limited number of items compared to um our or all the and and that is as as I put out to you that that is something that we will have to move forward with as to change that in our support staff contract and to be able to have a when I talked with Denise Flynn from Zed who does our ma building um we would have to make them into their own category and then

034we could then um uh Bill do ma billing for the services that are delegated to them from the L from the LSN and so um this again is uh having five people making sure that there is someone served in each office um to go out for that LSN and RN um this is what the school districts around us also have and I sent you them I sent some of them like today was kind of the range of of costs um we are not that far off with ours when you look at that and even if we added $4 an hour um our our LS or our our LPNs and our RNs our health aids work you know slightly beyond the school year not much more so uh if if we had $4 an hour for

035those to what we already are giving and we will be definitely towards the higher end of that range that I sent and um it would be about A50 $5,900 difference really because as they they again as Jeremy had said um is flexibility if they have uh kids and they're old enough but they want to be home home on when it's on student contact dayses they're here when the students are home they're home and they have their Summers off to be able to do that um there are and other districts have filled it with LPNs and and RNs and so I just and and then we can do the billing for that and it is a small part of um uh of our billing I unfortunately uh Denise couldn't give me the exact numbers um for

036each person but when you look at I know 2% of one of our um last year one of our uh lsns only 2% of her salary or her time was don't was for for that or 20% and so forth and so I don't think we we do have all of our Paras trained as pcas and so a lot of the things that we can charge for through ma billing is done through our Paras who are trained um through p as pcas and then also um you know spread transportation and there's other ways that that money comes in it's not when you see that we bring in $70,000 it's not all because of um the because we we only charging for lsns and specifically when we're talking about ma reimbursement or um reimbursement in this context

037we're only talking about the healthcare reimbursement that can be provided if at RN LPN or LSM provides the cares correct so um as I asked question about this I I'm an RN I don't currently work but I feel like I understand the roles um I there are a lot of really alarming answers um like for example we have an LPN currently in one of our buildings and because they were coded incorrectly we're not currently getting reimbursed from ma for those Health Care cares provided um that was alarming to me that tells me that we don't understand um the way our nursing Services reimbursement works and we need to do better job doing that and so what I would really there's there's other examples I have too like for example um sure other areas like area

038schools have similar models but cassen has one LSN one LPN and one RN that's very different than one LSN and four health aids Stewartville actually has one LSN one RN four health aids two PRN health aids and 35 PCA exam certified pasas mhm that was from the lsns from each of those schools um so that's very different than saying that's a similar model to this I from I understand excuse me but they their LPN for example in Casten and RN they're working in an office they're housing they're worked in a school and they're in there just like our LPNs are listed and would be listed as an LPN or an RN if we change the support staff model to be able to do that so then that would to me that would be the same

039so I think part of the confusion is the language that we're using is unclear um so if I'm understanding this correctly you're saying that when they like cassen for example has one LSN and two health aids but those two health aids are actually licensed nurses that can be reimbursed for the ma health care that they provide that's very different to me um can you bring the slide can you bring up the slide that has the wages because I was surprised to see that um no I I I that was I I just have these two okay let me see those those were for this those were for your benefit I'm not going to have other districts I'm not going to Pro you know but there was proof that other districts were able to hire LPN

040and RNs in these roles um so I for safety reasons I would not be comfortable listing these positions as a health aid I would be much more comfortable listing them as LPN and RN if this is something we decide to proceed with um I also think we need to figure out how we can audit our current billing and make sure we are maximizing our reimbursement because I don't we're we're obviously not doing that and I think we're leaving a lot of money on the table and that could be funding our nurses so do we have to have nison in the district all the time yes you we because we have more than a thousand students we have to employ a licensed school nurse so somebody an Alisa has to be there every single day what

041happens if they're sick if they're sick just like with teachers we have people that are have their are in a license that have subbed before um if we were to hire a RN then that RN could be um the responsible because they can still delegate as well sometimes just us with teachers um we can't find subs and other people people feeling like office staff um and if there's emergency we do again have one LPN that's that's presently in our district um that can be able to do that so you know if that LSN is sick or on a leave we would go out and have we have people that we've called before to ask if they could sub if not then we we make do with our office staff and so forth so and I

042want to be clear I'm not disparaging health aids like we can't like ourn can't do their jobs without them in most situations um they're a vital part of providing healthare um I just I I think um we need to make sure that they're appropriately supported so they can safely do their job too and also that our community is reassured that they have support they need I mean we lose two students and there goes our cost savings right so Mike how many PC do we have on the staff that are certified we're in the 30s I 3 how much was that right 36 36 what was the question 36 how many how many of our paers are considered trained to be pcas and can be available there's 36 yeah good and then each month they turn

043in their avilable time to the um office and then the LSN signs off on it and then they turn that in for us to turn into Z okay good so good so if so given what we've just heard right and to you again we sure of our community would it be possible or would would you consider changing the the two health aids positions to RN or LSN as yeah absolutely I mean it says Health a and health aid is because they would be in the because there would be in the office and then but you would go out and get an out we would have a category for LPNs and RNs and we would be out there looking for LPN or or RNs but they're working in a school office doing the things that our

044health aids are doing now um you know and so forth but we would be putting out there as kind of that requirement or preference cuz if we don't find somebody we would still want to have somebody in there but we would go first for the LPN or RNs and other districts have done that been able to find people for that so so what that would mean right is that we right now would not know what type of a person meaning what type of an education we would receive for this roles how can we the purpose of right now is to reassure the community that they will have support and and care that um that they will be comfortable with can we can we have at least one of those two new hires be only an

045orn or LSN I think if we hire we wouldn't hire another LSN right because we would just keep our model we have that but I think it would an RN yeah I think it would be reasonable to post for one RN and one LPN at the at the rate of the health a rate that we that fits into the budget um and just see what happens or you could do RN preferred um and if you had two RNs you had two RNs but again when you look at um some of those models or ranges even the RN we were not that far off with the ranges and so forth and that would be something we could come back with the to the board as a support staff and say well here's the here's the recommendation

046recommended ranges moving forward and when we post for those that's we would be looking for that in that in that range and and looking for an LPN or RN um first but again health aid are the ones that aren't licensed but there those those four I would contend those four positions are in off in health offices are doing very similar work oh I understand but it's very different when you can get reimbursed for care provided and understand that too so I think it would pay for itself I think and we don't know though because we're not tracking and we so we don't know if it would pay for itself but that's a different problem for a different day but we do need to I think audit our reimbursement and that would be through time studies

047and so forth and we can certainly do that okay great I get that every cut is a tough decision mhm I guarantee you if we sat and asked every one of the admin staff up here if they thought this was a terrible idea for the district I guarantee none of them would say yes they would not give us a recommendation if they thought it would make the district worse yeah I agree and I trust I trust them I mean they're the experts um and none of these are good for us right like you they had no good choices no good choices yeah any other questions regarding this one okay okay I'm going go back to the other slideshow then and any other questions with this slide um the um recoding the par to Fed yeah

048could you explain that a little bit Yeah so um we we still have one general education per um that works with our reading teacher um what we would do is have them do some intervention work with our spe special education teachers and what we can do then is code their time um to our special education and then um we get reimbursed through cedra through special education um for that so uh it would only probably wouldn't be the whole time but sometime it probably be it's like a $5,000 difference so but in know that's we're trying to do everything we can so okay um so do we need to make a decision now about how we're going to approach that orach do we wait till the resolution like the RN listing no so just just know

049that that is our plan is that when if if this were to happen if we were to go that model which we're proposing is that we would post it and we would post as an LS uh L LPN or an RN and but we have to come up with that first in the support staff agreement what does that look like what category is that so that we can get ma billing for that then we would post for that so just know that that is part of the plan okay and those those um our lson would still be housed in one area and be able to float and though that LPN and RN would be housed in in one of the buildings so we would still have people someone in the in their office at all

050times and then be able to have that LSN do the training and the other things that they might need to do administrative wise and have the time to do so okay I think this is something that it would be helpful for everyone to share their how they're feeling about that um making it an RN versus or LPN listing Well and the other thing too I just I want to say one thing about um several of the emails that we got from the community um one of them I'm just going to read the second but um School nurses often deal with the social emotional needs of students when the counselor is unavailable and are trusted adults for many students in their buildings that students confide in they also have the skills to help students cope with

051mental health issues and have helped out in situations of Mental Health crisis in the absence of a school counselor this nursing role could increase with the increased workload of the counselors due to the cuts in that area so I think that's something we really need M to make sure we're aware of because the School nurses I mean they're not just putting bandaids on the kids right right there's a lot more that goes into that and they're a trusted adult right and a counselor thank you for turning back to counselors we missed that fine item um how many counselors will we have left we'll have two at the high school two at the middle school we'll have one for K5 we'll have a social worker um that'll be working in the K5 area and we'll have

052two social emotional pairs one at each building to help with uh the deregulation and what they we have them are right now so that's that's what we'll have left for counselors and mental health supports and then also trying to Pro to bring in private so like a private pay therapist just to make it easier for families to access and kids to access will be pay for that um the the families would right right what what it yes what it does is um it's it's so that CH children don't have to leave school to go to a a session right and so forth and so that we have somebody there now they work with the kids on their case Lo but in case of emergencies or something or we need help with you know when it

053comes to asking questions and and uh strategies where they're able to do that but you know they're not we're not giving them case that's not theirs that they wouldn't sign up for so not as Equitable but um better than nothing yeah how are you feeling about the nurse situation I guess the nurse situation it would be great if we could keep to um but we do need to be realistic um bringing in the AIDS I I feel an RN or LPN is kind of what's needed um um as long as we can kind of navigate that and just make sure the safety is at the top of the list we need to do what's best for the district the children and everyone involved I think it would be great if we could include the LSN

054in the um I don't know if it's a possible but include the lson in the interview process or in helping select they would definitely be involved in that yeah great great because they would be ones kind of overseeing them and and training them so right okay all right um can I go on the next one or I think so I think okay um this is the target size class size um so you've seen this before um remember our Target size that the board approved is just that it's a Target it's not uh exact amount and so as you can see some school some classes are are less some class are lower than their target size some classes are higher than their target size and a lot of right sizing had to be here but again

055we are not more than two or three over in a class and hopefully again um if as the district gets more financially stable and has a operating referendum that you will be able to go out and hire more staff than at that time and notice that we are at 130 students here um I can tell you right now we we're at 115 that are registered and but we still have have some of the open roll families that we haven't heard from yet we'll be sending reminders out to them and maybe some others as well who live in the district so we're we are still hopeful that we'll get to 130 and so that's why we're leaving it there at this time but that's those are the class sizes across the bond K through 8 okay

056I have a comment about that the first grade class size is High um and we did talk about that I just want everyone to know the other option were worse um I just think it's important yeah okay um so this is with the athletic in activity so cut Supply budgets so right now you know the booster clubs do give our our um teams um budgets to work with and to get things we also give them a supply budget so each team would see a decrease in that area the etss is our strength training that um families pay for some the booster club pays for some we pay for some so we would not be paying the $3,600 and uh teams would have to continue to fund raise or find money for that either through boosters

057or pay themselves as a team um the eliminate huddle that is our streaming service or the filming service that we would use teams use it as well so they would be also using some of their booster money for that um but we would limitate the the streaming at this time the reduced number of athletic coaches and by cutting athletes um this is going again to one position or one team at each grade level which would decrease the number of coaching the number of of of officials uh number of transportation and that is a estimate um from our athletic department because it we don't break it out necessarily into middle school and and B squad or whatever but by the number of coaches and the amount of Transportation it's about a we would estimate around a

058$42,000 um Savings in in that area also then um no state tournament or clinic visits for our coaches that's on travel a lot of times those are out of town and so forth for a year and then we would reduce or eliminate the dance program we have five students who are part of the dance program and we have to have two coaches with them so that's part of that as well so as well as any competitions that they would have so um those are the ones that are being recommend recommend recommended from our athletic and activities area um quick question on the reducing the number of athletic coaches by cutting athletes the 42,000 do that so that's you said busing um coach's salaries and we don't know exactly how that would work out because of

059um again what they get paid some of them have longevity some of them don't so and then Transportation depends how many Way games they end up having how many they're having home games how many officials or how much do you pay officials those sort of things so that's the best estimate that we could come up with if there were um one team at each level only is that also including our um subsidizing them then too like however many athletes is that included in there how how would that work because we subsidize right it's about four depend on the sport it could be between 4 and to $600 a student for sports and that's across 7 through 12 right and so um would that be less well would it would be probably less you know but

060we still have the other sports the other officials the other transportation that would happen so it just seems like that reduction would be higher than 42 um again it's one it's just one or two teams um like you know so it's not a tremendous this amount of we're talking Middle School level well and and then could be freshman level as well okay and so forth so that 9th 10th grade level as well so okay okay okay and again that's our best estimation okay um I have a seventh grader and so I know and love of many kids that that will affect um so I would like to spend a little bit of time talking about it I um I understand the recommendation and um I I think I just feel like I need to ask

061the questions or at least talk about questions that we've talked about offline um like we know extracurriculars are a vital component component of our child's development it's not just the sport right um and I think it's also important to consider that these kids that will maybe be cut like they might be some of the kids that really need it the most um and so one question was well could we just increase activity fees for All Sports to make up for it and it sounds like the increase per participant in all sports would be about $70 more $7 to $100 probably some more for every participant for of every sport um and we increased our athletic fees by $70 last year correct yeah yeah and so our fees are already quite High highest in the HL

062but aren't they okay so aren't they around 200 around $200 what's that ours is right okay and I thought last year when we when we were talking about um reductions and and increasing in fees I thought we were right in line other schools were above us other schools were below us Rochester maybe was above us but in the area the schools that we play and the schools are Clos that we are higher than the are okay um that could be a solution though um yeah like Mike said it sounds like the sports cost each partic cost a school about 400 to 800 50 per participant which is a staggering number well well let me clarify that so if it's $450 per student right and they pay $200 we're still subsidizing the extra $250 to $400

063per student which is roughly around $700,000 um overall right so it's not reasonable in my opinion to say like well we'll just let parents pay for the whole sport if um you that was a question a couple community members had but it's it's it's way too much money it wouldn't be Equitable for those that can't afford that right right um another question that came up is um can we eliminate busing to away games in order to preserve letting everyone play um I don't think that's an unreasonable thing to consider like we already in middle school we already Drive our kids to practice every day after school so as inconvenient as it is we're used to kind of managing afternoon run um I guess I would love to hear like what the concerns are or like

064you know specific concerns are about besides the obvious that it's a huge inconvenience I I can tell you the discussion that we had was exactly that when you're having practices some kids in the spring or in the fall they'll ride their bikes from one school to another or one field to another um parents you know will sometimes be able to get them there or they'll carpool in a short amount of time but when you're asking an entire team to go to Stewartville or go to good hu or go to somewhere else you know to try to get make sure everyone has a ride there and and back and so forth and asking parents to leave their jobs to be able to do those things and we've talked about you know it that that becomes really

065difficult and um if you're going to have a program you want to be able to get them to their games and so forth and um yeah it is a big inconvenience and I know that's what Youth Sports probably do um but again we just felt that it was important to cuz we did talk about that but we thought it was important to keep the transportation piece there um it'll save you know some it'll cost us a little bit of money but in the overall picture it's not going to be a huge part of the SE so you would still need to have like the additional coaches and then all of that so really it would but that's not true though in seventh grade they have two coaches for 30 kids so we will they'll need

066two coaches regardless of how many kids they cut correct like the number of coaches won't be reduced no if there's one team if they only need one team they'll need they'll have one coach um because because they are a program I mean you can't leave a whole program I talked about the girls dance but you can't leave a whole program with just one coach and but you could as a basketball program you know they practice they you can have one coach for that team okay so seventh grade could have one coach e8th grade could have one coach okay I didn't realize that so then you you're eliminating those coaches which are many those coach's salaries and so forth okay yeah okay um I don't know does anyone else feel like we should consider other things

067or is everyone comfortable I think it's a very reasonable recommendation um yeah I just you know I I was surprised that we didn't get more feedback from the community yeah on Middle School sports yeah can we go to the next slide yeah okay so technology we have some technology supplies um tech technology licensing uh this is seniors can bring their own device but I also want to clarify that we do we will have Chromebooks but our Chromebooks are need to be are up for releasing this year to get new Chromebooks so what we would do is take the best ones of the previous of the ones we have now and use those if seniors want to to have their own Chromebook or are used Chromebooks from the school issued they can so if they don't

068have um their own computers and so forth they can do that um otherwise they can bring their own computer um and work with our staff and go through our servers and and our firewalls and so forth they would be part of that be expected to do that but it helps us then instead of for this year instead of buying four grade level sets of and releasing four grade level sets of Chromebooks we would have three three um sets for freshman sophomores and juniors and then allow seniors to bring their own if they would like but they if they don't then they would have you know the the ones that are still working that are still good from this year they just would be new ones any questions with this slide no I think as long

069as we have a plan for students that can't Absolut bring their own I think that's a good recommendation um adjustments to districtwide um so reduce capital budget so we get some Capital money every year and remember Capital can only be used for certain things and um can't be used for consumables um but you can buy chairs and furniture and those sort of things with them um and so we get so much and our buildings um get so much a year to spend so between the district um cutting back on some District plans as well as um I'm taking away I should say reducing the the amount that each building gets for some of their Capital um thoughts that or Capital uh um needs that we would save $20,000 on Capital budgets so that we could

070use them to to to get some other Capital things that we AB we absolutely need or as a district and then we're not taking the money out of out of our general fund to be able to pay for those we used our capital budget to help subsidize that um reduce district office fees as you know that we've had four U business off business directors and had to rep and do some with some interms and we're presently still there and so that has cost us more in the long run then it it probably has to just have a full-time person as well um we've also had because of uh things like data requests and so forth um we've had an increase in legal fees um right now as and then you also are going out for

071a superintendent search and so forth so those things are are things that are part of our district office fees that come out there that you don't expect and but then you won't have those for next year so Dan pan is confident that we we could save at least $25,000 on the things that are being paid for now that you won't be paying for for next year you'll still have legal fees but not as much as we probably had had this year um and then the grad credit is just a one credit for our interns that work with us and we wouldn't be paying for that one credit um but we would still have our we're still plan doing our intern um program reduce fees and operational cost we have many things that yes just going

072back to the grad credit um do you think that'll disuade any of the of the interns that UPC coming if they're not taking credit for no I I think the biggest thing for the interns is they get their student teaching in the fall okay and then they get a job every day here because we hire them as as subs and we use them as subs and they work as interventionists if they don't they don't not a sub that day and they they know that for that while they're out looking for a job that they they're getting paid every day and they're getting that experience we just worked with WSU to have a one credit class that we would offer them and we just wouldn't do that they they're not coming here for the one credit

073class okay um so um and then we uh again we we have been trying to do as much inh house and for operation costs with um lawn service and snow removal and doing other things so we we believe that with equipment and getting essential stuff that Dan believes that um we could reduce fees by up to another 655,000 or reduced cost in districtwide um right now um as you have seen that we are on track to um you know save some money for this year um if we were to save 3% of what the budget says that's around um I I I think it's 3% or even may be less than that $150,000 um so that would then stay in our general fund and uh be able to be carried over to next year then

074we have some subscriptions um one of them is uh for technology and uh uh our finance class the other one is for is through the high school and that's our library system and they would have another way to have kids check out books and so forth through our through that system and then require some chargebacks to community yet as they get fees they would um pay for some custodial time some utility time and so forth and so um those are what those um adjustments are and so right now with the expenditures oh you know never mind it's 2024 I was thinking it was 2025 I was just wondering if we're on track to spend to save that well for for for this year no it's it's 2425 this year we're on track to save the

075$150,000 okay Accord you know and so that would that's not that would be money you could carry over in the general fund for next year so we're counting it as part of the you know because that hopefully then um we would also look at ways to save money again for next year once the budgets approved and then what people need and you try to figure that out and try to stay within that budget for Less okay M and the cell C payment we think that we'll be able to find something yes the the high school the high school's confid okay so good that was my question too good anything else okay all right um uh Transportation pay to ride within walking distance remember we started that this year um people who are residents who are

076within 2 miles of school that's what within the legal walking distance or travel outside 2 miles but um so if they were if they want to be bust within that range then it was this year we moved it to we started it at $75 um per child or $150 per family remember we have a 187 80 or 173 School days and so it was still less than a dollar a day for the the entire family cuz that was the cap um and so then um this year we're proposing to raise that to by $50 so $125 per child again still for under a dollar a day to to bus and then that would move the cap to $250 for a family okay question is that all ages then within two miles all ages yes okay

077I was thinking I read something that it was like certain ages well no I I take um K5 I believe that's at a mile or 3/4 of a mile double check yes whatever the walking distance is is what that would be okay so also increase transportation of open roll students remember that we have uh several open roll students who we have a wait list who can hop on our buses out towards the end of our on the outsides of our district and they pay um $400 presly so we move that up to $500 for a student and I believe we're keeping the max at $800 um for a family um charge K8 students to attend games so this hasn't been done in the past um but we would sell activity passes um at open houses

078and stuff for $50 for the year so that as K8 students come to games um they they could uh that we would charge them as well we would not charge 9th through 12th graders um because uh it is their High School is their their um classmates their you know and that's that's part of that that High School experience um talked about the um possibility of ma billing because of uh how we would be able to track that if we were to be able to add LPNs lsns or excuse me and RN and then also increase can I pause how did you come up with that 20K number for increased ma bilding um it it was just trying to think off the top of my head why how we did that um it was when we

079are looking at adding the person um that back in this in the office in the special education office to be able to do more of the tracking and so forth we figured uh Dan and and the special education office figured that they could raise another $20,000 do you know what data they use to make that I I do not know I my I would love to see it if possible I'm a little concerned with the information I currently have that that number might I mean it could potentially be higher and the ma Bill may also be part of third third party building something you know but by adding that that person in the office because we lost that this year that the tracking part would be we'd be able to track better and be able

080to recruit more right so and is that going to be a new employee that's being hired um right now it is um a president employee that we would but we would post for that and see but we would be able to use some of that sped funding because they would be working in there to be able to pay for that position as well do districts ever have a nurse do that position that role like the ma billing like strictly ma yeah or just you know if you usually the lot the ma Billings are have to go through the through a Nur through the L LSN you know and be signed off but usually they don't have a nurse to do those things okay so I I guess the reason I asked is I was wondering

081if um maybe if you know we could combine I mean this is just thinking outside the box but combine a nurse with that administrative role it would give us another RN in the district to maybe be available to sub or to answer questions or things like that but but they would be housed in the district office though right yeah because they would be working with the special educate they're kind of also the admin assistant to the special education so okay um an increase in annual Sports Pass right now it's $95 um for for an adult we would um ask for recommending a $20 increase it's been a while since it's been increased so and then additional lease Levy gymnast for gymnastics center that was something that was not um done and or hasn't been done

082this year so we would be able to do that for next year and and increase bring in $50,000 that we didn't have from this year and we did confirm that that's possible yes yeah great great okay so um here are some of the additions and that we know we will be having to have a because of our case loads a bringing back a a sped teacher I to talked about overloads at um with teachers that have to take on extra sections so we we would have them at K or 1 through five we would also have them at the middle school in seventh grade grade and at the high school um to make up for making sure that we have enough sections for kids and then you look at the moving student assist to stien

083um it's those are not for kids those are for the teachers right now um teachers to fill out their FTE and so forth they're doing the organizational work for that and um collecting the names and getting them out to the teachers and so forth and then just monitoring that they show up it's not really teaching and we've been paying pain a pretty expensive FTE for that so we talked about moving that to um a stipend um instead and and so we figured between what we would offer for stien and what they're getting for that class um for those sections that would be at least a $4,000 savings um and then this this year we as part of our reductions we reduced the number of days that the counselors they would get extra days to come

084in during the summer summer and at the end and we so we would be adding those days back since we're going to having less counselors we would be adding those days back so the counselors we still have would have more time to be able to do some of that work that needs to be done especially at the beginning school year so and then again um the two health aids LPNs I was going by um what what we're paying presently for an LPN and so forth so that that's kind of where we're at any questions and are the health aids are they on the teacher contractor health aids are not only only the licensed School nurses the others are on the support staff contract which is the same contract that the custodial and the um clerical

085and so forth and so for want to hire an RN in one of those positions then we will have uh we will'll have to beay more to and our run it it yeah it depends on what we decide for our you know our track or our range and we could potentially get reimburse you know we might find some hidden reimbursement I know that's glass half full but so the total is 1. 617 that we are recommending at this time okay all right we come down here all right any other questions before we go back to the agenda so okay now action on resolution reducing and discontinuing educational programs and positions would it be possible to pull the LSN out for a roll call vote specifically on that position what would in the P to do

086is you would put you would make a there would have to be a motion um regarding that and then asking for that to be removed um and that would have to be seconded and then there would have to be a call if that was the case so whatever whatever is moving forward at this time um would be has to be a a motion and a second so a motion to pull the LSN reduction out of the resolution for a separate roll call vote s okay we have a motion in a second okay so so what you're um recommending or going for have to vote on is that you're going to go with the just so I can clarify go with the recommendations that the that are before you except that you will not um do

087the licensed school nurse that we'll continue with two licensed School nurses moving forward my intention was that we would still vote on reducing the LSN but I I wanted that to be a separate vote that we all go on record making does that make sense so like if you if you open the resolution it's all listed out there right are you asking to pull that out I'm asking to pull the LSN out specifically to be a se but still vote on it tonight and still vote on it tonight that so that would be a separate resolution that would be a separate resolution for to but you're still going to vote on keeping or reducing that ele my proposal would be personally to change the um I I would be okay reducing if the replacement was

088an LPN or RN so you can make that as the motion is that you are approving or you're making a motion to approve the recommendations by the that are in front of you and that um as part of the licensed school nurse that you would want the the the position to be filled with an LSN or LPN or RN cor so my intention is I think the community and everyone deserves to know specifically how we each feel about the LSN decision I don't know if that's an option but that was my intention with pulling it out it's going to be a roll call vote tonight anyway but that'll be the full but lumped in with everything else yeah um you I mean you can certainly do that but be a separate resolution just to reduce

089the LSN then that's what I would like can we just make an amendment to The Proposal right now I think so well the the amendment to The Proposal yeah you could make a motion and say that um you are still reducing an LSN but you want the hired to be an RN or an LPN first you want to go out for an RN or an LPN to you know to fill those to fill that position that that would be that's your that's the amendment the way I personally feel about it is if we can't hire an RN or LPN to fill the health aid positions then I would not be okay reducing an LSN um I don't know if that's how others feel yes that's how I feel but I don't know how we can

090guarantee that we can't we can't hold somebody's future based stuff of the future we have to we have to make a decision now one way or another yeah because we if you were to post and and you probably will not post until summer because it's for next year I mean our lsn's their two lsns would be working through this year through the school year so it wouldn't be really posted till the summer for next year late spring because people aren't really out looking for jobs for next next year right away um especially in that nursing area um so that would be really that would be something that you need to think about as well cuz we're not going to post for an LPN or an RN and not be able to find one and then

091go back we'd have to post for another LSN at that time if that that's what you would have to do if you don't find an RN and an LPN and you want to make sure one of those three spots are are there you would have to post for an Alice and at that time you know or and actually I believe our our lsns are on contract are are are tenure as being part of that so they would be on a put on a Ula un requested live abson so it would be their position for the next two years if if that opens back up so so if that's what I'm hearing is that that's not a feasible or responsible option so the way again you you you would wait till summer and try to go

092if you don't get it you could offer it back back to the person that was reduced but if they already have another job and don't want it then you would have and it would be at a reduced salary then well no you would if it depends depends I mean they could take one of the other two positions it would be reduced yes but they don't have all the obligations of an LSN then but if you don't find someone in the summer let's let's say an LPN and RN and you want to go back to a licensed school nurse that person would be on a unrequested believable absence you would have to call that person up and say do you want to do you want the LSN position cuz it's theirs for two years as long

093as you have it but if they decline it then you go out then so yeah I hear what you're saying David it's not fair to not make a decision so can we amend the current proposal to say that we're replacing this LSN with at least one LPN and one health aid I mean and you can certainly amend it any way that you want to try to do it and again it goes back to are you able to find that what if you don't is that you just leave the the position open till you find one you know are you filled with a health aid at the time um you know I a big sticking point for me is still what my original sticking point was that aside from the safety concerns if until we understand

094our ma reimbursement better and maximize our reimburse and just kind of audit that whole situation I don't think it's responsible to even honestly comment on what the reducing an LSN would actually save us I don't feel like we have a clear understanding of that we don't know what reimbursement we've missed out on what we could recoup um what we should have been recouping um so without that information I'm not comfortable supporting the reduction of and I would just also say that from the leadership team's perspective um yeah do we are we projecting a $20,000 savings we are um or do we want an L LPN and an RN or aren in those positions yes um would that mean we maybe not save as much as $20,000 even if it worked out the same we feel

095that the having one LSN and follow the model that many districts use and be able to and having each each are each building already staffed with with a person staffed in those buildings and having that LSN to be able to do the training and be able to do the monitoring of those positions and be able to fill in for those positions when they're gone that um having five people in that health health department or whatever you want to call it instead of four is is a a model that would be more efficient for for us so so is there a conversation about whether we accept to not have the 20K in savings but to instead have a position a person who has at least an LPN license in one of those roles are we would

096we we be comfortable with this Choice are you ask I'm asking everybody so if we if we so it the requirement would be that one of the positions areed with at least an LPN yeah again if we post it as it is a requirement that one of these is happening we are holding somebody's life in the decision until we make the hiring process happen right no we will need to we will need to accept right now except the reduction of reduction reduction right now but then have in our plan right to have we're hiring at least an LPN and we are ready to pay for that and and if we don't get the what's the option then the position stays open till we find more yeah we pay more yeah what happens if the next

097school year comes and we have these requirements and we're wanting this RN or LPN to take a Aid position so to speak instead of a teacher contract position then we're not going to have that position we're going to be lack of Staff right I think that puts us at Force at that point we'd have to meet and see if we need to take what we can get if it's an aid right and then I can tell you we'll be losing students in the district if that happens if we have just and I also think we could potentially be hardpressed to find an LSN that would feel comfortable Staffing a district with no other licensed nursing support I think that's a very realistic Poss how do the other districts do it with just one they have

098they have LPNs they've been able to go out and get LPNs and RNs you know and none of them and their LPN and RNs are in a Range that's similar to ours we may have to bump ours up a little bit but they're not on a teacher cont all their lsns are on teacher contract all their others are either LPNs or RNs are sitting in just as we would have that model and then they're being paid around the same that we would be paying and and this is only here say from previous board members but my understanding is the reason we have had three and have two is when our enrollment was was increasing so much at a time we had the funds to be able to do it um and that's how we got

099to more than one was we were just we was able to do it and made made sense um and other schools have not been in a situation like byon has 80 students to join this year and 60 next year uh so they've never been had an opportunity to have the Disposable funds which we now know weren't disposable at that time uh but that's my understanding is there was money still get it and again that's just hear say from previous board members I just want to make sure everyone understands that if we fire one LSN and hire health aids that are not licensed to take that role we are not tracking we do not know the answer in our district of how much reimbursement we will lose out on because an unlicensed person is providing that

100care so we might lose out on $20,000 of reimbursement we don't know the answer to that and I personally think until we can answer that question why would we put ourselves in a position to have a lower level of care and have the cost be a wash best maybe potentially best case scenario and just to put this up I want to remind the new board members that there are four board members currently on this board that voted last year to remove the ls a LSN from reduction we have three uh the recommendation was to cut two four of the current board members voted and approved to only reduce one here it is on the recommendation list again and with unknown mandates coming with unknown budget from the state um with too many questions uh and

101and hearing Julie sink talk about compounding it's potential that for every dollar that we don't cut this year we may end up cutting two next year and I personally would like to see this be our last round of cuts for this District so I don't like anything that's on this list personally uh but I'm on board to do what's best for the district and leading up to this meeting has been extremely stressful and we've gotten amazing feedback from the community so do I like the idea of anything here tonight no am I afraid that if we don't make these reductions tonight that we're kicking the can down the road and it could cost us more in the future that's where my stance comes from I understand what you're saying Jeremy um I do think it's

102important for us all to realize too we like I'm very committed to making the full amount in reductions as much as it would feel unfair to the admin we can go back to them and say we didn't think this was a safe reduction we can ask them to find another $20,000 I know that's unfair I know that's not I know that stinks but we have extracurriculars we can look at we have busing to extracurriculars like um you know I personally would rather see something like all Middle School sports go before we compromise our students safety so I do there is like you said none of it is good but there is fat to skim so I don't think it's accurate to say we won't be cutting the appropriate amount if we don't make this reduction

103the other and and I know I'm I'm coming across as an they I'm just trying to no it's good spoken um the other piece of this is if we're looking at other options what does that do for our staffing because if this results in additional staff Cuts we may not be able to make that decision and deciding vote till March 24th which now eliminates the opportunity for those potential staff members to put their name into a Hing pool and now we're impacting even further down the road I don't think it eliminates them from being able to do that I also think there's Cuts we can make that while they're not great to say the least like they wouldn't necessarily impact act staff I don't know that there are because I I got to put the

104trust in our admin team that they made every possible suggestion well we could cut Middle School football I mean there's one I mean obviously that's not popular that's not what I'm advocating for but I'm just saying there is there are things that and and I will also as Jeremy said um you know the leadership team we've spent many hours um looking at different scenario looking at different systems looking at and now we are at the point where we want people are wondering what they're going to be doing next year with all this as well and and we want to start that planning and we want to start placing this place teachers and we want to be able to tell teachers that we are reducing and staff that we are reducing um the reality so that

105they can go up because it is the start of hiring season for educators and that's why we push it up to this point I will tell though that um you know you you can certainly tell us and say you're going to you know eliminate this and not and not cut this part and down the road if things if people leave or whatever we can continue to look at different ways but I will just tell you that will be it it'll be very hard for the leadership team and myself to to to do that you may just have to say we're not going to we're going to be that much short of 1.6 then and hope that hope for the best moving forward um it will be really hard um for this leadership team to be

106able to come up with another amount where they worked really hard um we did to get to over 1.6 and we didn't have like what's Plan B because there was really no plan B at this time Mike what do you think we need to do to figure out our ma reimbursement issue we can do understand we can do a Time study of what our lsns our presid we doing right now um I know they're in the process of uh putting all that IEP and all that all those billing together for this year as they go through it we can do that I am I I I'll just tell you that I'm have if if you are able to hire an LPN and an RN you will you'll be able to build all those things that

107that those that the lsns are being built for or getting the builds for being able to get reimbursed for um I like I said I I think would it be a total $20,000 reduction if we didn't get a health aid in there but you have to remember if there was health aids in there now you're not paying them as much as the the LPNs and so you're making even more on that end um but the goal I think I think the admin team and the leadership team for next year would agree um that having LPN and RN is is is the priority and that's what we would that's what you will post for moving forward but we need to assume we will Le lose out on the ma reimbursement that one Allison is currently getting

108so only only if you don't have an LPN or RN yeah but I think we need to assume take take a conservative approach right we don't want to assume we're going to save more money than we might not and um I will tell you that right now if you recategorize it then the LPN that is working for us you can start doing the billing for her yeah how long have we known that that person was not categorized properly couple months to tell you the truth cuz I thought we were able to do that M again a lot of this went through funing went through our previous person Finance person that we go through them and then get our cedra get all of our funding through or all our um listing of special ed and and

109all that and so we are um more on top of it with Dan and with Marie and then also for next year we'll have another person be able to do it but if we move to that you're already adding an LPN because right now we're not getting that so you already be able to add her her Services as well and then be able to go out and get another LPN and RN and I understand there's always that chance that you will not be able to do that but other districts are a have been able to find them and keep them so because there was a motion in a second we need to take a vote before I make a new motion y so I just want to clarify what that motion is and then we

110need to take a second so your motion Alicia is uh to accept the the reductions as as presented except for you wanted to take the LSN off of that list and could you want to vote on the LSN separately correct and it was second yes so y so what we will do is pull up the resolution we will um Carrie can you see it I can see it okay maybe you will read it and you will read all the reductions down here except for when it comes to the LSN just skip over it for now you will skip over that one and then we'll read the same type of resolution um with the LSN however you want that to whoever makes a motion for that but it'll be the same type of resolution for that

111position okay so what was your question then David about making a motion I can't make another motion until the current motion is taken care of yes so just to clarify we're going to go through all of them first LS and last M what what you will do is read this and and reducing everything except for the LSN that is the motion that's on the table okay whereas the school board of independent District number 531 adopted a resolution on December 2nd 2024 directing the administration to make recommendations regarding the reduction and or discontin discontinuation of programs and positions and whereas said recommendations have been received and considered by the school board be it resolved by the school board of independent District 531 as follows the following programs and positions or portions thereof be discontinued this is

112a lot harder than I thought okay teaching staff uh 12 total 7even K through five one Middle School four high school and two counselors reduce Tech Specialists to 0.5 FTE reduce days of receptionists from 190 to 183 recode PA par professional to sped um reduce Elementary assistant principal to Dean reduce Athletics activities Supply budgets elim eliminate School contribution to uh ETS and eliminate the huddles um reduce coaches teams by cutting athletes reduce state tournament coaches clinics reduceed Dance Program reduceed technology supplies reduce technology subscriptions reduce capital budget reduce district office fees reduce grad credit for um WSU interns reduce operational costs and elim uh eliminate Ramsay subscription eliminate salt coal subscription you take the other one oh yep it was out y so she took it off sh y the motion for the adoption of

113the proceeding resolution was duly seconded by a member of uh was Nadia and upon vote being what's that I'll take okay go ahead can you to do a phone call Nadia yes Alicia yes David hi did you say hi sorry I hear very well Kelly yes Carrie hi Lisa yes Jeremy hi okay did you put it on the C on here did you put it on the agenda I no I just shared it with you in your email oh you put on your okay so now we need a a a motion regarding the the LSN what you would like to do with that position I would move to reduce the LSN position with the caveat that we put preferred on the postings for the health aids for LPN and RN second you I'm sorry I

114couldn't hear D you want to say a little bit louder David yep I I move to uh reduce the LSN position with the caveat that the postings for the health aids say preferred LPN and RN okay thank you and Carrie had second it okay so any any further disc disc um yes do we want to strengthen that language a little bit and say that we want to we are committed to hiring at least an LPN and an or RN for one of those roles was that requirement for hiring can we do that well there's a motion on the table about making it as David had said it's been seconded so you'll have to vote that that would be the worrying that would be used um and and then if people don't want to use that

115worrying you would you know vote vote the resolution as you know vote against it and then come up with something different so that was the that was the motion that was out there and seconded any other discussion regarding it is that couple thing cuz I don't have um yes go ahead whereas the school board of independent District number 531 adopted a resolution on December 2nd 2024 directing the administration to make recommendations regarding the reduction and or discontinuation of programs and positions and whereas said recommendations have been received and considered by the school board be it resolved by the school board of independent number 531 as follows that the programs and positions or portions thereof be discontinued oh I'm sorry teaching staff at one license school nurse with the caveat to hire LPN or RN for

116the position I thought it was preferred preferred yeah that was what it is but uh the caveat to um preferred hire have a preferred hire the the preferred um behind the caveat to um to have a preferred hire or um yeah preferred hire of a LPN so the word preferred is in there okay yeah so the the teaching staff won licensed school nurse preferred hire of LPN RN for the position we ready for call yep Nadia and I'm sorry is that do we also have to say that we will hire an additional health aid here like what does it say no that um we're just eliminating one only one um this is just for the reductions it's not about it's just saying that when we do hire that we would be having a preferred um

117for that but this this is for reductions made so we are we are reducing that that's what the resolutions are for not for adding people at this time it's for the reductions for reducing the license school nurse but there's a caveat that um when it is to be replaced that there would be a a preferred of a l LPN or an RN I'm sorry can I go last thank you no I'm sorry I can't hear you can I go last thank you okay um Alicia no David I Kelly I Carrie I Lisa no Jeremy i n so it's already four right and it needs to be a majority then no me get so really fast did you say no yes okay said no okay all right thank you um sorry I Wrong Way all right

118so we'll go to the next one then action on Elementary School Dean uh tosa job description slos okay so um one thing that we would like to do as part of the moving forward um is to as mentioned earlier we have a position right now at the primary school that's the assistant K5 um I should say it's the K5 assistant principal and AD our activities director um is doing both roles um the leadership team is recommending or had Rec is would like to move um the ad back to the high school and then make the position as a Dean at the primary at at the K5 level we so we would have a K5 principal and we would have a K5 Dean but also part of that Dean that Dean would be on teacher assignment

119um so they would be part of the teacher contract there will be some extended days right now we do have uh tosa agreement for our uh instructional coaches and so they would follow that same type of instructional or to agreement and so um as part of this as well uh we would be looking for this person to be our literacy we because we still are doing our um uh read the read act and then also working with uh a K5 curriculum as a teacher on special assignment um again the difference between a dean and an assistant principal is that an assistant principal um Can supervise staff can do their evaluations can do suspensions of of students um and and so forth where a Dean um is there to support support teachers deal with maybe some

120student Behavior if they get sent down to the office um and just be available to help so when the K5 principal is in one building the dean would be in the other building helping if there were mostly student behaviors and and supporting of staff staff when they're not doing those two items they'll also be working with our redact continue to work with redact and some of the curriculum um five K5 curriculum that we've been doing as well since we still have that since we did not fill with the district uh curriculum C uh director we didn't bring that back this year so we still have some split duties for people to take on um so what we would like to do is to approve this as um our uh job description and then we are

121will be posting for this position tomorrow uh internally and then uh we'll see who applies they have until Monday um to apply and then we will do interviews and and that would help us start filling in spots of who gets who's being displaced and be able to fill in spots so we can start planning our our leadership team our administrators and staffs can start planning on on the next steps so do you have any questions regarding the dean rule was this um description like an msba model polic or model description or it was actually one that we've you that we've used in the past we've had Deans in the past okay we just moved it from uh uh more at the secondary level okay to responsibilities at the elementary level okay and what is our

122normal um I guess process do we have the attorney review things like this or do we just look at it and if it's reasonable well because we've had it in the past and we all we're doing is changing some of the secondary duties to Elementary duties then yeah we don't need to have them look at it okay and you may have already said this already but is there specific lure that goes along with this that they have to have nope it's preferred that they have a admin license but it's not it's not required no so if we could have a a motion and and take action on on approving this then we can move forward as a admin team a motion to approve the dean of students posting second okay a motion and a second

123has been made take aoll call Jeremy hi Lisa hi g hi Kelly hi David hi Alicia hi Nadia hi thank you yeah okay last thing is adjournment um move to adjourn the meeting um can we just say just one more thank you to everyone um we know this like reading that list was hard to hear I think we all felt it and um like we know these are real lives and just please take good care all of you motion to adjourn motion to adjourn was made by David second second okay second okay so then Jeremy hi Lisa hi harrie hi Kelly hi David I Alicia I I all right meeting is adjured