001Good morning. It is April 16th in the West Central Secondary School Media Center. It's 7 o'clock and we'll start this meeting with the Igian 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. Roll call. Gross. Here all right. Um, this morning we have Mr. Crep with us and he would like to talk a little bit about some teacher pension. Yes. Good morning. Morning. I know you tried to limit this to two minutes. I'd like you to go over stop me when you have to, please. Um, I sent you an email this morning, uh, carbon copy of what was sent to all of our teachers yesterday. We've been informing our staff, um, throughout the last few months
002on the progress of some TR pension reform legislation. Okay. To give you a quick summary, the rule of 90 is gone, has been since 1989, but all those rule of 90 people have now retired or very close to leaving all the rest of us called here too. Um, with pension that is uh not very good to be simple and plain. Um, it is a big issue for educators and should also be a big issue for school boards, right? Um I was at the pension advocacy day last Tuesday. A teacher from another district said Senator Tory Westerm, hey, these pensions are a great attraction tool for teachers. And Senator Westerm very frankly said to this teacher, "Come on, you didn't go into teaching for your pension. You didn't go into teaching for your pension. You didn't
003go to And it's true. Mr. did not go teaching for his pension. But I can tell you this for sure. It is a retention tool that keeps teachers in the profession. It's that mid-career part and teachers have to make a choice, right? They can go elsewhere and probably make a ton more money in salary or they can stay in education, earn a decent living and have a good pension when they get to that retirement age. That's all covered in that email. There's a link to a website that covers all of the intricacies and nuances of the pension reform. What we want to pay attention to is there's three pieces of legislation out there. Number one, the most vibrant one is a rule of 6030, at least age 60 and at least 30 years of teaching
004and you get your full unreduced unpenalized pension. There's another very similar one that is a 6230 rule. Okay. Um, and then there's one that just continues to reduce penalties after age 60. Which one costs the most? You know, the Cadillac one. It's not really a Cadillac. Let's call it for the 6030. Um, we, and when I say we, I mean at Minnesota who is driving a lot of this stuff and the educators across the state are most advocating for a career rule like the rule of 90 was, a career rule that evens the playing field. keeps teachers in education. We certainly hope and it equalizes the injustices that have been done for 30ome years. That is nobody's fault. It was just I have a lot of information if you want to hear more. Um bottom
005line, it seems like it's a teacher issue and it is. I I strongly It's an issue that should come to your table because there no matter what you're going to pay for it, right? If teachers have to stay in teaching until age 65, you're going to pay that higher salary for many more years. If a teacher can retire at 60, you are going to be hiring a younger teacher at a lower salary. stay until 65, you have to pay that higher salary for an additional five years. So, you're going to pay for it no matter what. There's math on that. So, in that email, and I'm sure you're well aware of how to contact your legislators, that a quick email to those people coming from a schoolboard member might just swing that, might push it
006past the finish line and get that career rule that would benefit all of questions. Is it is it close? Um if you look at your 90 30 90 or 60 30 6230 rule 90 how close dollars or dollars? It is it is comparable. It's not close. Now with the age of normal retirement going up quite honestly I believe this is not the party line this is what I believe I believe I should have to work for longer too right and not get through I next year 6230 I've got four more years I'm okay with that thank you very good thanks for your time okay that brings us to our agenda. Um, there are no corrections or are there any corrections or additions anyone sees to the agenda as it's written? I'm going to look for
007a motion to approve the agenda. And a second. All in favor say I. I. Motion carries. Superintendent report. Okay. Mr. Brown, we have to be as quick as Mr. Yeah, that's right. I can do that. the legislature. Uh just for an update, they are on their Easter Passover break until next Monday at noon once they're back in session. They'll have about four weeks to finish up their work and they've got a lot of things ahead of them as you heard Mr. Krep talk about even just the the pension reform there. Um some of the items of note that I've taken off from MA's updates here. The first one is the GOP wants to repeal the unemployment uh mandate. Um but however, the DFL wants to fund it one more year at the state level and
008then on as a local levy. So that would be pretty significant for our district. That would add probably another 85 to $100,000 in expense annually onto our levy. So I guess one of the struggles that I have with it is they mandated now they're passing it off onto somebody else to take care of it later on. So that's kind of an issue for me. Um House Education Policy or House File 1124 uh would provide permanent flexibility for schools to start school September 1st. Remember there's a couple not this upcoming year, but years following school. Labor Day is later and so that would push us late into May into early June. So they're trying to get that flexibility to at least say, "Hey, can we start September 1st?" Uh Senate uh education finance. The big one
009to keep an eye on there is they're looking to repeal permanently repeal the inflationary index. So already for next year, we know we're getting 2.74% because of that inflationary piece that's included. state could also say, "Hey, we're going to put two more% on the formula plus your inflation." I don't think that's going to happen because we've not heard anything that way, but they're looking to repeal that for fiscal year 2029 just because I see how that will impact the budget, which there's good to that. I partly realize that it makes it difficult for the budget, but then each time we're not going to know where our funding is either. So, it's going to make it difficult there with the with the inflationary piece put in place. At least there was a little bit more of
010a guarantee to know here's what we'd be able to see there. Um, one other thing that would be helpful for us is just an increase in special education cross subsidy aid. We still see, you know, we've gotten some nice increases since they've started to add more to special ed cross subsidy aid, but having a higher percentage, believe it or 53% would be significant for us. And then I know we've talked a little bit about this before in the finance committee just that whole harmless to the compensatory need. Remember, I think that was going to be about a $65,000 uh change for us if they go with the new law that's putting in place. So, they're looking to do a one-year hold harmless and I think still trying to figure out some other nuances with that
011that's based on our free and reduced uh meal count and things like that. So, hopefully there'll be some opportunity for that. Uh and then the Senate Education Policy uh committee there with their omnibus bill, many of those different pieces were um taken off the table, so they're going to be working when they get back after that. But they were looking at an August 30th start date, repealing the eligibility 2 requirement, um allowing It should be K6 suspensions if negotiated in the IEP and teacher license your flexibility were all dropped there. And really the key piece right now every kindergarten through third grade. Uh there is no opportunity to suspend. And so we've got to find alternatives of what we would do um you know to address student behavior. We have things that are um you
012know at an elevated level. What can we do? So it's just trying to offer some flexibility with that. But right now there's no traction on that piece. community task force. Uh work is still being done to to get some things addressed there. I know that it's been a while since we've had our last meeting and we're just trying to think work through different ideas. Right now really administration is looking at feasibility of some different pieces of hey if this plan was to be put in place how does that work operationally? You know we're on a on an eight period day on a six period day. Um, and then how does that work with administrative structure if we're one site, three sites, if we're down to this many classes? So, there's still some time being put
013into that trying to get that sorted out so when the task force comes back, hopefully they can come to a consensus and get that figured out and and make that recommendation to to the board. Um, and then staffing for 2526 right now things are looking very good. We remember had to pull the last person off teaching position. Well, shortly after they interviewed again, we have a new candidate. Uh, but we do need to wait just a little bit. Mr. Sawski uh endorses this option here to wait for another semester because this uh teacher will student teach in the fall and then she'll be ready in um January. So, I don't have the contract for you today to review because I got to see how we hire teacher. I know can happen. I've heard people do
014that two years down the road. back when fax teachers were whether ws still programs people would go find fax teachers and offer them a contract based you know pending successful student teaching and all those other pieces there and so we will get that figured out here uh I know this person here Mr. said is just a real team player. I think looking to do some stuff prior to even doing that. So, we'll get some ways figured out where she can probably do the state FFA convention, willing to volunteer there, just already make some connections with students and then also looking to do some summer work and ready to jump in to do some things next fall. So, just really a great uh piece that we'll be able to look forward to there. Um English teacher,
015we are going to be scheduling interviews for next week. We do have some candidates for that position and will be getting those interviews scheduled and ready to go. Um on that in our support staff positions, custodial and um pair professional. We did review the radio and you're correct. It is rather expensive, over $1,000 to to post on a couple stations um and for advertising and things like that. So we did reach out again to the Classic Canary because we did get some candidates there. We've also reached out to the Echo Press. So we're going to use the Echo Press and Classic Canary because I did talk to the neighboring school. They They've used the jobs HQ uh to get their information out there. So hopefully that will help. Maggie's done a nice job of getting
016some decent numbers there. So it's still about $1,000 expense for the district. Um that'll be a month's worth instead of two weeks. I think it'll be 124 times on the radio. This will be four weeks in the Echo Press getting on jobs HQ and things like that. So we'll continue to monitor to see if that is able to garner any more candidates for us on that. And then the last piece I wanted to mention, our music position. We do have one candidate right now who submitted an application on the part-time piece, but I've also been reached out by a neighboring school who has some interest in maybe sharing the position. Um, so what I've got to now do is look at the math, right? We want a quality person there. So that's our first step
017that we need to look at. But the second piece is, okay, if we have them at 043, there's no benefits or anything like that. we put up to fulltime then do we pick up additional cost or so are we subsidizing part of that position uh for the other school and then of course there's going to be additional compensation needed because probably with travel time to the school and mileage there will be additional expense there so I'll work to draft an agreement um if that's the decision that administration feels is the best way to do that we'll do we'll work through that and bring that to the boards uh probably to our meeting here May 7th just to kind of review that to see uh but yeah when I first thought about this would be perfect.
018Somebody's looking for it be able to work and you start to pick one of those other pieces that could be additional costs and expenses. So again, if the one candidate doesn't work out, then we would definitely look at the other piece there to to do that. So hopefully we'll be full and ready to go next fall. The special ed vehicle was delivered on Monday. I know they're very excited about that. We'll be parking that vehicle in the garage back there and then the new mid bus will need to move out because it needs of course a higher garage door. So, we'll do that and have that ready to go. But, I'm sure that vehicle will be used quite often or solely used for special education, but I know there's already been some conflicts trying to
019get things figured out for our spring transportation. Uh Jake's done a nice job working with Palmer. Palmer, of course, as you know, gets to be the spring time of the year, right? all of our drivers aren't necessarily available there. And so trying to get that all addressed and taken care of and getting kids to practices when they need to be there at the right time has been a challenge, but they're working through that. And and so our other vehicle is not here yet. We're hoping here by the end of the school year that we'll have the other vehicle that was ordered. That'll just be a general use vehicle, which Jake said is going to be definitely necessary. I think our Yukon now already has 65 or 70,000 miles on it. So we'll want to continue
020to monitor that. upcoming dates. You can see those. Um, of course, no school Friday or Monday uh at the end of this week. And then we do have early release on May 7th and our school board meeting is May 7th. So, this is one of those times in the year that we'll actually have a couple Wednesdays in between before our next meeting. All right. Any questions for Mr. Brown? And we will move on to time. Um, health insurance we stop. Yeah, there was two other things I was going to write in my notes there. Um, health insurance, we did get the review back from our consultant. Unfortunately, there is an increase, but as a consultant would say, it's not as big as some of the increases they've seen for other districts, which still isn't helpful.
021Uh, so our committee reviewed it. they we need to get together again to make a recommendation, but looking at a 9.52% increase for health insurance for next year with a 15% cap the following year. Now, if our our claims are decent and we only need to have an 8%, they'll do that. However, it seems like they always seem to find the cap, right? It always sounds good, but the cap is always what they what they move to. So, it would be moving from Lakes Country to Source Well and through Blue Cross Blue Shield. Um, That is the lowest one right now. They're called smart plans. They have four different HSA plans. So, we'll get together the teachers union. They get shared a little bit, but they'll vote on it and then we'll get back to
022them. And we're looking at open enrollment starting May 12th and then going through the end of the school year. So May 30th would be the last day for the open enrollment period. And then remember their insurance takes effect July. However, their deductible will continue. So they absorb what's been used in the deductible from January through June, roll it over July through um December and then the deductible resets there, but the rate stays the same. So convoluted when it comes to our fiscal year and how that kind of works works there. The other piece I just wanted to address was um of course I sent you the press release that was sent out to our families in regards to the incident that happened. Um here's where it's still being discussed. Was it on property or not
023school property. Still very close to school property, very concerning uh for all involved. And so we're continuing to work with law enforcement to see what steps will continue to be taken. You know, the one thing I just want to commend our staff member who was out there. As soon as she saw law enforcement activity, I mean, she actually communicated with the individual, but as soon as she saw law enforcement respond, she moved the students in the after school daycare back into the building. Our buildings are secured. They're locked. And so she was able to do that. responded very well. Law enforcement also responded very well. I think somebody had said um was it on Facebook or posted somewhere that I think the call came in at 411 or 4:12 and by 4:14 uh things were
024taken care of, but we'll continue to to keep people um up to date on that as much as we can, but we right now are daycare students will uh have their activities on the north side of the school. So, we everything to the north side of the building um until we All right. Now any questions for just not trying to be negative or anything went through previous communications on the board before but at what point I've heard in just the short time that I've been back that you know there's some complaints about finding out about it as parents on Facebook before anything went out from the school district. And I understand that maybe it wasn't on school property. It was whatever that it just seems that when anything of that magnitude where there's sheriff involvement
025or something that even at the smallest level probably the least information I understand you don't have any that we get something out to the staff and and to the the parents as quickly as possible. And like I said, I don't mean any disrespect, nothing like that. That's just we went we went through this before with a lock down here previous like when I was on the board before and nothing we had we communicated it and with Dale at the time and about getting something out as quickly as possible even if it's there's not a lot of information because you don't know a lot of information but I think it just helps to ease the mind of parents and every I don't know how I'm not trying to tell you how to do it. Just tell
026what I heard. Yep. And if you know something happened on Friday that was very very close to school grounds and people didn't hear about till Sunday. So maybe so one of the things you know working with the attorney and what we can disclose and things like that becomes part of our our piece that we work through. So I think that was there was some nuances there that we're still working through with law enforcement to but we know there was an incident everybody knows that right all our kids are saved those it can still be done without information to an investigation or any anything along those lines. Just in this day and age where things get social media and every other media so very quickly I just feel like we have to respond the same way
027if we can get it's really all PR right that's all it is course we're always trying especially in our climate. If we can be better, I'm just wondering, Mr. I understand what you're saying. There's like two sides. It's very challenging to to balance. I wonder if asking other districts what their experience has been or somebody that's a specialist in this area communications. What what has the experience been? If you try and put something out that's very briefly where there's something that's being investigated, you know, something as you said very brief. How does that how does that work? Does it work well? Are there unintended consequences when you do that? You know, so so we're thinking about more information what what does that look like legally? What does it look like, you know, in the communities
028that I I will do that because I know we do have access to the D group um for our superintendent. So I'll kind of ask them because sometimes people's frustration as well is he didn't tell us anything. He just said he can't and most cases you can't I guess the main things are there was an incident our kids are safe our whatever you know just those very very basic things so that you can't have yeah I just struggle with the idea that we were going to send a message out that said one of our staff members talked to a lady and now the kids are all safe and they're inside the school and you know does that stir up more harm than Good. I mean, well, I guess that wouldn't go that way. You know,
029I would say they don't need to know what happened that that's what we have. You know, that that's the information we have. So, if you're if you're talking about putting something out, you know, outside of just saying all of our kids are safe today, you know, that that's the I'm I'm not arguing with you, Darren. I'm just saying that's the difficult part for me is how do you address that when that's, you know, in this situation there was a conversation had law enforcement came, but it wasn't on school property. The law enforcement wasn't on school property. That was a different spot and the kids went inside. Right? So, that's those are the pieces. And I'm again, I'm not arguing with the getting the information out as quickly as possible. I'm just saying, you know, if
030you take this particular instance, that's what we know. And if we say that, how much more mess up to say the kids say, "Well, what happened?" You know, all of a sudden now there's a hundred calls saying, "What happened?" Because you gave me that poor information. You know, again, I'm not I'm not trying to argue. I'm just saying that's my frustration with this whole piece is that's a difficult spot. And does it need to stir everybody up by putting something out to say we talked stir anybody up that I mean that but it also stirs people up if they don't hear great I I think that's my point about let's ask some professionals what what is recommended because what you just said is the start and then there's a rule development managing that you know
031so there's all of those pieces it seems like an easy decision to make but is always so I I would if you have access to a group I think we ask them yeah I'll give the group a call and actually we'll be meeting with all our region four superintendent so that's Morehead and all those to say hey here's the situation that happened at WCA how would you guys how would your Morhead has people just design right to respond and stuff like that so well I'll just ask them to say how would this be handled you know in your district one of the pros and cons of giving an early we're aware of obviously but also reach out to law enforcement as well because I think shortly after we put our release out and they put
032a release out and I mean we were actually working with them prior to that. So I'll talk to them just to say okay if we have an incident again like this how does this happen you know how do we respond to that and do that in the best way. We can do that and I can follow with that after that. All right. Any other questions, comments? Then we'll move to prove payment of claims. Mr. Porter, we u run through a few things here. We had fire payments for March for payroll for the 15th and 31st. April payroll will not be in this report due to that being just yesterday. So um the our bank recon is 100% caught up and I think Maggie and Paul everybody's pretty happy about that. So reconciliation is all up
033to speed. Um, you'll notice our Amazon and Elon credit card purchases are up due to the fiscal year 25 teachers, they're all submitting that stuff. Um, so the Amazon total $3,869 and the credit card $17,84. That includes wrestling, basketball, and honors. Um I think some of that was going to be reimbured sixth grade raising funds to do that. So uh city of El Lake utilities is up to duty usage for $4,443. Our bill for utilities is $2523, but I guess we ran flushing water for a couple days. So, we'll get a credit $15,000 or 15,000 gallon credit for sewer water flushing. Bus service $17,561. a little bit higher due to a couple new students and changes in special ed transportation needs. AL tech PSO for three full-time students and one part time for $12,66 and
034we had some building expense maintenance of the kitchen at North Elementary and a cooler fail. So, we had to buy a new one for 5 secondary building had some repairs G&R repair for 3639 cruise plumbing plumbing and heating for 2759 interstate power for,50 for generator repairs and egg processing trailer fixes and other HVAC issues. bus company for 485 for trip wrestling. That was the part that was sixth graders where they raised funds for $3,265. And then we'll have later on we'll improve our donation from donors. And uh so I would have put for a motion to approve the $65,000 $65,692.77 total claims. So second all in favor say I. I motion carries. All right, that brings us to our consent agenda. You have the uh the minutes from the March 19th and the April 2nd
035meetings. Um, we'll also approve the final reading of the following policies with the statuto and recommended changes from MSBA. Uh, number 509, enrollment of non-resident students. Policy 511, student fundraising. Policy 512, school sponsored student publications and activities. Policy 513, student promotion, retention, and program design. That is the end of consent agenda. Any questions or comments on that? And I'll look for a motion to approve the consent agenda. So move. Second. A motion in a second. All in favor say I. I. Motion carries. That brings us to our new business. We have the following donations to accept that sheet. All right, here we go. Um, we have Lakes Country Service Cooperative for 457423. Uh, West Central Area South PTO for 649.996. City of Barrett 1900. Hoffman Lions 1,000 Kensington Fire Relief 1500 North Township 300 uh
036Hoffman Lions 200 I apologize those last four,900 1,500 and 300 all go to summer wreck. Um, Hoffman Lions 200 goes to author visit for the library donation. Uh, American Heart Association 300 for kids heart challenge at North Fet. Grant County Lions $71322 to summer recan township 700 to summer rec then wave 500 for summer w Minnesota bofuels 45196 field trip donation west central south PTO parents 622 for field trip transportation donation township of lake 100 for summer wreck Treasure of town of Dall 250 for summer rec community health of care auxiliary 2,000 for summerrec treasury treasurer of town of north Ottawa 100 for summerre w city of elbow lake 7,000 for summer rec city of 1,000 for summerreb township 100 for summerre woops boosters 1809 for boys basketball awards. Uh Lakes Country Service Cooperative 82080
037for CTE grant uh egg donation. Kensington Lions Club 250 for summer wreck and also Kensington Lions Club 100 for author library donation and telecom 2500 auditorium donation. Everybody All those written down. All right. Look for a motion to approve the donations. Second roll call. Gross. Yes. Porter. Yes. Samstead. Yes. Sour. Yes. Alian. Yes. Yes. And Vincent, yes. 6.2 is a consider's Renaissance Global Conference. Mr. Brown, do you have some information on that? Yeah, I so we did do some checklist and follow up there to see if there was any other regional conferences. I said, "Can we does this ever come to Minneapolis, Chicago or Sou Falls or anything like that?" He said, "No, our conferences have been So, this is the sales rep that represents Minnesota." He said, "No, it's been Dallas, San Diego, and
038Orlando." He said, "That's the location that we've been thus far." He said, "We typically find a coastal community." So, I said, "I don't think we're going to get anything closer than that." Um, they are willing to compare registration fees, which about $595 a piece and so they will uh cover that for us. We did get our survey results back and we do have some work to do on that but the nice part he did tell us he said you know your school's not standing out from any other school district and so that was good to hear. Uh we had about 68 of our staff mainly teachers fill out that survey. He is asking us to send that out to our students the rest of our staff and our community. So I said I said do
039we put that on Facebook? if you want to make sure it's people in your community and not somebody else that just jumps on to take care of that. But then what they'll do is they've got a I didn't bring the book with me, but there's a gentleman who's written a book that works for just as well. He'll review that data and then he'll sit down with us to give us some different ideas of hey, these are some areas you probably want to work on. To start with there, I did ask our I was able to step into our senior high leadership team meeting or the secondary school leadership team meeting to say, "Hey, are we hearing any negative pieces from teachers that are concerned that we're doing this? It's going to be a limited number."
040And they said, "We've not heard a thing." So, I think they're excited about it. We realize it's going to be limiting. You know, maybe we don't take as many administrators um as we first sent with four. I do believe that's going to be the part where we're going to measure and um and really see how that's going to impact, you know, teacher morale and retention as well as character development and student achievement. And so there's some pieces in that monthly planner. This is kind of what would create that excitement to get started. And like I said, eventually there's a couple of schools. I was hoping to go tomorrow up to Biji to see um because they're a Renaissance school to see what they're doing, but I'm the acting principal tomorrow, so I'll be here to
041take care of that piece. Um but yeah, they the schools that we talked to, so it's B Brainard, Grand Rapids, they all speak highly of it to say we've seen some great things happen with this. So that's what we really want to do. And and I guess to me then our administrative team, we come back on a quarterly basis to say, hey, here's one of the pieces that we're working on for academic achievement. It could be as simple as we're really monitoring our attendance. You know, we make sure and here's what we're doing to reward good attendance. Here's what we're doing if attendance isn't meeting the level where we need to be. They could do that. Um there's different things um that they identify through certain months. I think October is you meet all the
042bus drivers outside with a cup of coffee. Um there's a teacher or a staff cart that you bring around with different things like that. And so hopefully measuring those pieces, getting survey results again to say, "Hey, are we meeting the mark?" I will tell you a job a survey um because I've done this work in a prior district. Having somebody survey that's expensive to get that type of work done. So to have it free to us to be able to get those results and see where we can target that work, I think will be will be valuable. So again, just requesting we have some grant funding that we're still waiting for on that. Our expense now would be probably around that $8,500. I also need to point out that the conference is over a weekend.
043It is not. So and our teachers are under the understanding that there is no pay for that. Normally there's a $30 stipent uh that they're going to do that on their own. When I brought that up to the the leadership team and a few of the union reps, they said, "No, this is a great opportunity and we believe that that would be, you know, part of the expectation that we'd also asked them to come in one day in the summertime to get those fall plans lined up and really ready to roll out." And so, I think there's some some critical pieces that we can really work on to move forward and there is an expense to it. There's no doubt it's not uh it would be nice if it could be out of Minneapolis. It's
044not going to be there. that they don't see that coming to Minneapolis. So, it's not going to be close there. You know, if they count out the four registration fees, now they're not really talking too much more than what it would cost to maybe go down to Minneapolis and things like that. One other piece that I have not had time to look at is um I've got to check and see if we don't stay on site at that conference center. Can we stay off site in a different hotel save cost but then is there do they say okay well then you got this fee here because sometimes that's what they figure that I've not but I want to check on that as well. So I did mention that to Mr. to say, "Hey, maybe we
045want to see if we can." But then you got to figure travel to get there, right? Then we got to have those eight people figure out so what is the cost to get people there and back if we have to we can't just walk. I mean, if we're three or four miles away and we have to Uber or something like that, then what is that expense as well? So, so that total cost of $8,500 would include um for my calculations getting a group down to the airport, the parking at the airport, the flights and we've also people that they would be responsible for their own meals. There's several meals that are covered. I think it's just two that are not. And so really there's quite a bit of commitment too from our our teachers and
046administration. Like I said, I think the flight would be a Friday and you come back on a Monday. So the actual conference is a Saturday, Sunday. So it's going to be one of those pieces there that uh again I think valuable. We will come back and make sure that there's measurables that are put in place to say, "Hey, here's how we're moving forward on this. These are the areas that we believe we need to improve upon. Um Jos's thing is they want to make sure that all of our students and staff like Mondays as much as they like Fridays. And so I think that's one of those pieces. I know Ryan I I wasn't able to make the high five Friday. I think I was over at the meeting at North, but I heard you
047were here for that. And I know that uh Barrett Agria was here the week before and had a great time. I mean the kids appreciate it. And so that's one of the things that's coming out of that Justin's book and that's what that conference as other schools, they get to share. There's going to be professional speakers there as well saying, "Hey, here's some pieces that will work in schools. Here's what we think makes a difference." And hopefully we can implement those things to really change that culture and climate. Uh, you know, to move forward that way. And I think I remember back to we talked about our vision statement being at Magnet School. I want to be a magnet school not only for our students, but also for our staff. So once they're here, how
048do we make sure that they want to be here? And it's going to be a tough decision for them to leave. We can make that change with this piece. And I know there's a question a little bit about funding. Remember that our staff development funding is a reserved dollar amount that the state has set up at 2%. So it comes into a reserved account. So we're not taking money away from supplies or anything like that. It is it does go into a reserved account. And I will say that this is something that I think as a district we need to improve upon a little bit is just our professional development. We don't people that go very often to anywhere. And I think that couple things. One, how are we asking people to improve their craft?
049And two, how are we also showing our appreciation to say, "Hey, we believe you're valuable and we want you to go get additional training." That budget has been very low utilized. And I think there's we've got people now doing some ELA networking over at Lakes Country, but that's really kind of one of my goals for our staff is to say, "Hey, we want to show you that we want to invest in you as well." So you can be a great teacher and then feel like we appreciate the work you're doing. Questions, comments. I think that's a good point that you made at the end, you know, what are they doing now outside of flying to coast? You know, are they going are our staff members going to NEA to that conference? Are they going to
050the other things that trainings that are available to help with the climate culture? like some of the things that you mentioned about bringing coffee out to the bus drivers or high five in here. I would think those would be things that we would be doing regardless of whether we go to this conference or not, right? Because that the attitude of climate culture won't change something because you go to one conference. That has to be in your mindset prior to going in after you really want to Um, it doesn't change overnight, right? I the part that you mentioned about staying off site, um, whether I would vote for this or not, I think staying on site is a good thing. Just from my perspective of if your goal is to network, it's pretty tough to network
051if you're in a different building because there's the classes during the day and then there's the conversation whether you're at MSBA conference or MEA or whatever it is. So, personally, I don't think that should be you're going to go be on site because that gives you the best opportunity to network. Um, I guess my hope would be that there is significant measurables to Hopefully the people who I'm not sure how your name goes or what it'll be committee to do that. So because that was one of the questions was who's going to be the selection process. So I did again talking with secondary school leadership team. They said yeah let's just have a so be not just secondary elementary as well because that was the other thought I said do we just scale it down
052and only do secondary. That brought them into play. Yeah, that's going to hurt the culture because that's that's I mean that's the other thing that I have written down here. You know that when you you're trying to change the climate and culture, one of the thing is including everybody, right? So if you're doing a high five and thinking, you know, what are we doing for the entire district? Because if we're simply limiting the district to one building all the time, that not going to help your climate. I guarant I guarantee you that. And I'm not just I think I think the elementary has their pieces and they've done some different things. Everybody needs to make the district as a whole regardless of where the buildings are any any cost reiterate that that's coming out of
053professional development dollars. So it's not it's not affecting classroom supplies or coaching positions or those types of things that we had to make cuts right whether Right. You know, we'll do the monthly playbook. I mean, that's kind of our plan. But I think hopefully and I guess I hope Darren the expectation is we get to do it one time. This is an ongoing piece so people can next year we send a different comes back and say eventually what I want to do is I want them to say, "Hey, West Central comes to this thing and they're actually demonstrating what they've got for their climate and culture. When people walk through the building, they go something's different." So I want to be model school to the region where they say, "Hey, can we come over and
054look at WCA to Hey, we just lost a teacher to you guys because you got something going on with this Renaissance group and it won't be easy. Those kind of things aren't easy. You want to be the best, you're going to have to work at it, right? I don't care what you're doing. Things like that, goals like that are tough to achieve. You got to put in. Yep. So, I look forward to it again. Other questions, comments? Look for a motion to approve the Renaissance Global Conference. Second. All in favor say I. I. Same sign. Motion carries. Uh that brings us to adopting resolutions relating to the termination renewal of teacher contracts and probationary teachers. Um we have a couple. We have three here. We'll handle each individually. We have to have to read every
055everything here. Um, be it resolved item number one, sorry, 6.3.1 Nicole is a probationary teacher here. Resolved a school district 2342 pursuant to Minnesota statute 122A. Subsection five of the district master agreement. The teacher contractation teacher independent school district 2342 shall be nonrenewed at the end of the 2425 school year effective June 30, 2025. And I'll just give a little clarification on that one. Um that remember Nicole, we're grateful for her filling in. She's done the part-time music and the part-time social worker under So we still we've been able to fill the social worker position with a candidate here that was secured I think a month and a half ago and the music is a position we have posted. So we have to always work to have somebody licensed in that position if they're under
056out of field permission and so that's why this piece um is this is why we have to not position again. Grateful for her stepping up and being a great team player to to fill in two roles. You don't see too many people that are licensed in elementary teaching elementary music and school social workers. So, she has done a nice job jumping in and this is the unfortunate part of that. Then when you're not licensed at the end of the year, this is what we need to to do for that position. I look for a motion for that resolution. Second roll call. Yes. Yes. Sour. Yes. Said yes. And girls. Yes. The second one. I will abain from the vote. Kaylin be resolved. School board independent district 2342. to Minnesota statute 122A.4 section master the teacher
057contract for Korbation teacher in Independent School District at the end of the 2025 school year effective June 30, 2025 you Oh, absolutely. Yeah. So, again, um looking to rightsize the district and based on our agreement, it's always the, you know, the last one hired. That's why that seniority list is one of those pieces that we take care of in earlier this winter because that's how the folks are identified through that list. So, again, nothing to do nonrenewal termination. It's nothing to do that with that. with our student population, our student enrollment, and uh just need to make sure that we we right size that as we move forward. Now, um you'll see further down in my notes that we would have had to do one more elementary teacher, but due to the one teacher being
058on leave of absence, we were one less there and our special education teacher would have also been another point of two. So that's just MSBA that was necessary that people do that. We actually did technically would have two additional cuts and again base more. We have to watch our budget but remember our budgets based on student enrollment. And so that's really where it's coming to as our where our classes are. So we're not creating extremely large classes. Now there could be many things that can happen too prior to the start of next school year. There's many different pieces that can happen there as well. Um kind of like what happened last year. So I think renewal they would have to reapply for those positions. Uh different story request absence. All right. I'll look for a
059motion. Second roll call. Gross. Yes. Yes. Sour. Yes. And Vincent. Yes. Motion carries. Um item number three is the this is now the ULA um we have resolved the school board district independent district 2342 um that it is proposed that Amanda Boston a continuing contract tenure teacher of school said district be placed on unrequested leave of absence for.3 FTE health or fringe benefits at the end of the 2025 school year effective June 3025 So that again is our preschool. So I think when I first got here they bumped it up to 6 because of our numbers. Our numbers continue to decline um in our preschool programs and hopefully that'll be a trend that'll but this one's a little bit different. So it's proposing to place and this is all based on statutory language. So not
060only so today you're proposing to place Amanda on unrequested leave of absence and when we come to the main meeting then you place her on unrequested leave of absence. So it's just a very long drawn out process but that's how statute works. So it does eliminate then the.3 position that has any questions comments look for a motion and a second roll call. Yes. Samson. Yes. Yes. Vincson. Yes. All right. I already went through your notes there. Who started that one? So that was to start. Item 6.5 approve a memorandum understanding between West Central area schools, Independent School District 2342 and Area Education Association, WCA for retirement. And so hopefully you saw the draft there and had an opportunity to look through that. So we have worked with the EA to come up with this proposed
061language and uh one of the things by statute people can come to the district by February 1st and ask for a retirement incentive um or an early retirement incentive. However, if we're beyond that date and so I did have MSBA review this uh our legal council is also taking a look at this but this just make it has to be open to everybody that meets those qualifications. So we can't limit it to a particular individual. So this is open to anybody who would submit that letter uh stating their intent. That's the one language change that MSBA I think the initial letter that you may read said indicating they said it needs to say state there intent to retire and separate from the district at the end of June there. And so we'll get that out
062to folks to see if there's interest. We know of one person who does have interest in this position. I think one of the other questions was what would be the net savings? Uh and I think what I shared with you earlier is you we're the one person that we're thinking of potentially is kind of under a part-time piece. So there's a little bit not as much savings there, but this will allow us to move to a full-time position and have some savings there and offer more electives. So right now, if we were to compare current to hiring somebody new would be about an $8,000 savings for the district. So, it's really meant to be kind of a win for both parties. And that does take in all those expenses, even the the tax sheltered or
063the tax advantage plan. So, be about $8,000 savings if we were going to go to a a full-time teacher at that same level, it's going to be closer to that $28,000. Questions, comments on the look for a motion to approve. A second. Second. All in favor say I. Motion carries. Uh call for milk bids. This is a annual. Yeah, there's nothing special there. We'll just get the advertising out. So we've been enforcing it. Remember the this this past year we're able to get more folks to bid on that with Stony Creek for a while. We had to go with our food vendor. So it's been nice that that's starting to open up again. often times it becomes a trucking issue and so now we should have some more opportunity but I'd like to get that
064started sooner or later so they don't say well our truck is full we can't put you on a route so we'll get that put out and and then probably meeting a recommendation of who our milk would be for the follow questions comments for a motion to call for milk beds and a second All in favor say I. I review capital outlay funding plan. And so I kind of given you that information to start with kind of what the purpose of capital outlay what follows the statutory guidelines. I don't know if you had the opportunity to look at the spreadsheet there um showing what our as we went through a few different pieces got more up to-ate numbers. Uh we're looking at our ELA curriculum being $54,377. There was a range before I think between 50
065and 82. The the uh company that they would like to use is at the 64 and 377. We did have $10,000 last year allocated to that sixth grade curriculum piece. So that's really why you're seeing the difference between the the 54 and the 64. So that will take care of our ELA curriculum, our foundations material, online school curriculum, just as we're still working towards that to make sure that we can have maybe some options for students who decide to unenroll at WCA that maybe we can do something there um with the online piece. That's a fine line, right? We don't want all of a sudden to have 40 students say that they're going to do that. So we'll work through that very carefully. Um I don't think we'll end up being as we've talked to
066the company that we're working with or looking into this with they said we probably don't want to be a registered online school oursel but there's other school districts who I thought were there they said no they just use the program and here's how they use it so we would look to model simply at the same level that way buildings and grounds repairs the $25,000 so that's going to include the entry stores entry steers at north this has all been reviewed um for the most part by the buildings and grounds committee roof repairs wood chips for the playgrounds those are getting low again so we do need to to get those uh put back in at all three sites and then the control panel for the hoops at the secondary school. So that's making sure that
067we're not behind that door and have anything happen to to cause any damage to the the curtains or anything like that. The buildings and ground equipment $7,300. So that's the replacement of the lift. The auditorium storage shelving is a new piece on there. Uh Chad came to me as well as Brad and just said if you go to that back room and I know some of the buildings folks have been there. It's we've got a lot of um set design pieces, but it's just all you got to go back four feet. And so they could use a piece of that wood if they knew what it was, but it's it's quite a mess. And so they would like to get some shelving there that they can have that organized so people can see what we
068have. The room actually has passibility so people can get through there. And so that shelving is about $3,400 to take care of that. And then that wax machine and the buildings and grounds committee remember Chad had on there the the buffing machine and he said I would prefer to take that off if we can get that storage shelving because he said that becomes quite a mess back there trying to organize through that. So we've got that activities would be the uniforms and equipment. So that's part of our uniform replacement cycle, our helmet reconditioning, new helmets that we have to purchase and things like that. I believe it's baseball tops and there's one other can't remember what it was. So I didn't want to say to get a group excited to say well he said the
069board meeting is going to be this and we're not getting it now. So I know there's one other activity that's in that cycle. Um school vehicle contribution I guess that's up to the board if we we've got the money. You know it's roughly that 300,000 a little over three I think $350,000 in those CDs. Do we want to just continue to use that for transportation and put this $10,000 back there? But I know there was talk about designating money and maybe getting it on that cycle. So that's why I have that there as well. Curriculum contribution. That's been another area next to professional development that we've not taken care of for a few years. And so we know well let's just see if we once we put our ELA or reading an ELA together, you're
070talking uh 85,000 plus 64,000. You're talking $150,000 in curriculum. Our annual capital outlay is 185. that would almost wipe out our entire capital outlay. So, we'd like to visiting with the other administrative staff. Let's start designating money there because next year we're going to have another big one. I think it's going to be social studies and um can't remember right off the top. Yeah. And science. I think the math is after that. So, you got a K12 math that's coming up. And so, I think we just want to try to stay ahead of that instead of all a sudden find out that we've got $175,000 in expenses that we have to take care of and then that's all that's going to be there. So, the recommendation is $35,000 there, $1,500 for sound panels at South
071uh that's in the cafeteria area. I think if we if you did the walkthroughs and heard that kind of through our community task force meetings, but that small cafeteria, there's really nothing there to address sound. And so, we're looking to take that, but we also want to make sure that they're movable as well to be repurposed or anything like that, too. So, it would be which they can be. And then hard service at the north playground is looking we don't really have anything for our students there. The basketball courts are on the south side. So you have playground on the north side all the way back the other side is the basketball court. So looking to add maybe a court there. We know that that green space gets used quite a bit because it's now
072brown space with the mud and dirt. So we felt that that would be as I asked again the admin team. They said I think that a hardc court would be something that would be appreciated by our students when they're outside. They can actually other pieces there as well. So, recommendation to do that and my dollar amount. I found out that concrete's $8 a square foot is what I was told by somebody um that I know. So, is that pretty close? And I mean, but then you got to talk about a basketball hoop and you got to talk about probably the labor to get it cleared out and get it prepped. So, 7500 might even be a little blight, I guess. I'm not sure, but I'm thinking possibly just a smaller either one hoop. I think
073this covers one. I'm not sure if it would cover two uh but to do that just to give those students in the head and feels like they can get that figured out where they can spread out some of that um to with supervision to allow students to play on the court there as well. So total expenses of $171, $177. Our revenue is projected to be $185,000 for outlay and then leaving $14,000 available for distribution to our elementary. Now, I know there was a request, could we maybe do that by student uh numbers and so it would be 1793 per student. So, I took 14,000 divided by our prek through 12th grade enrollment. And you'll see that that would be the distribution numbers there for each building. 261716 at south, 340589 north, and 797695 as the
074secondary school. So, and I don't know, you saw the the request form that we would have out there asking people to have that re submitted or returned by Thursday, May 1st, so that the administration can review that. And my plan is really to have the principles take the lead on that and come back with their recommendations for those requests. questions, comments on capital $10,000 committed fund just to say we got the vehicle and we come up with 50,000 we've got 50,000. So we'll just I'll talk to Todd and just have a probably like uniform cycle. We'll give you an update at the end of each year. So, here's our notice of our vehicles. Here's our plan time to purchase that. We have two vehicles now that are suburban by the custo. We are going to
075trade off. We were surprised to hear about these $1,500 traced that we thought be 500. All right. I don't know how you probably have to go out for bid on that or you just hire somebody or It's below that. We need quotes. I think we can just get quotes. We don't have to do this because it's below that threshold. The threshold is 25. I'm just wondering if maybe there's someies out there that maybe would help. Sure. Do that. Right. Individual contractor would say I'm all for that problem. Sure. Y know I think we'll probably talk to the same person that's going to be our most cost effective way in the city doing that more cost effective if we tie you with the city and they say okay we're bringing one truck over it'll be here.
076more tag on it. This will be if we're doing the hard. And does it have to be concrete or do you look at two become the same price now to get back there and get a decent finish. I mean they can do it but it's not the same quality maintenance later. Other questions or comments? Mr. Second second. All right. [Applause] I will go get that stuffed, right? Is that right? Yes. I'm gonna grab a computer. Y sub