Sycamore Schools Board Meeting June 10, 2026

001All right. Uh, we're now in session. Uh, Mr. Buren, can you please call the role? >> Mr. Balance, >> here. >> Mr. Cosno, >> here. >> Dr. James >> here. >> Mr. Harris, >> here. Could everyone please stand and face the flag and begin with the pledge of allegiance? I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. Thank you very much. All right, before we start the meeting, we like to start like we start every meeting with the district's mission and vision. So, our mission is to create a culture of academic excellence through inclusive and innovative learning opportunities for the whole child. And our vision is to empower all learners to reach their

002full potential in a globally competitive world. All right. Before we approve the agenda, I guess we need a motion to amend the agenda. >> So you just you there's no amendment needs to be made. You just need to simply state what you want to take off and what you want to add. >> Oh, okay. >> So since it's not been approved yet, there's nothing. >> Okay. All right. So the agenda, we're going to add the I'm assuming we're going to add the canvas. >> Um it's it's it's added on there already. >> Okay. that's added in there and we were going to take out the contract with Hamilton Hamilton Warren County. >> Okay. So, those will be taken out. Okay. Questions about that. All right. Do we have a motion to approve the agenda? >>

003So moved. >> Second. >> Thank you, Mr. Balot. For your motion. Thank you, Mr. Gosno, for your second. Okay. Person, could you please read the role? Mr. Balon, >> I. Mr. Gossnel. >> Hi, >> Mrs. Bick. >> Hi, >> Dr. James. >> Hi, >> Mr. Harris. >> Hi. >> All right. Do we have a motion to approve the minutes from our last meeting? >> Moved. >> Second. >> Thank you, Mr. Balot, for your motion. Thank you, Mr. Gos, for your second. Um, is there any questions about the the meetings from the uh minutes from the last meeting? Sorry. >> Yes. I um I would like to um request that we do one of two things under I'm going to pull up my documents here. Um under the section where it's the personnel consent item number

004two um there was um a summary that was added for that section Mr. person and I would like to either request that we put because people read statements, three board members read statements, written statements, I would either like to put those statements directly into the meeting minutes as we've done in the past. Usually after a board meeting, um if a board member reads a statement, we give the statement to the treasur and then the treasur adds that to the meeting minutes. Um, if that is not something that the board would like to do, I would like to suggest that we choose an objective summary. Um, maybe perhaps going through like YouTube or getting an AI summary that would be more objective for those because I do not agree with the accuracy or the summary, the

005gist of what's being said in those my input for that section only. I would be fine with adding the statements that were uh made. >> Yeah, that's that's fine with me. >> So then do you are you okay to send all the board members who had written statements? Are you okay to just share those with Mr. Buren or you can pull them off YouTube because they said I mean obviously everything is on the video so you can just watch the video and see it. >> I'm fine with sending. Okay. >> I think it's easier than to send versus you transcribing. >> Okay. We would like to approve the minutes of the next meeting or we can do that now. >> Yep. Since there's a motion on the floor, if if the board agrees to those

006that made the motions agreed to resend their motion, >> I I think we should actually approve the minutes with the statements added. So, go ahead and approve them um by take, you know, approve that we will remove the notes and add the statements um and then go ahead and approve them so that we follow the law. >> Right. Oh, because if we you're saying you're Mr. Person, you were saying if if we did it the way you were suggesting the next meeting that you're saying. >> Yeah, because I would prefer if we did it now because we Yeah, we need to approve our minutes. >> We'll add we'll add those statements to the to the minutes for >> Yeah. >> Okay. >> And remove the deliberation notes. >> Okay. [clears throat] >> And just for

007clarity, is that that that's what we want to do moving forward, right? If if we have a statement, >> a written statement, >> send it send it to Mr. President. >> Usually after the meeting, you >> give it to the treasur and then the treasure adds it to >> does with what he Yeah. Okay. >> Okay. >> Perfect. >> All right. So, with that on with that on the floor, uh, Mr. Person, can you please call the role? >> Uh, Mr. Valent. >> I. >> Mr. Cosnos. >> I. >> Mrs. B. >> I. >> Dr. James. >> Hi. >> Mr. Harris. >> I. All right. So, the minutes have been approved. All right. So, we're going to move to our first item on the agenda, and that would be our science course of study presentation.

008So, we've got some people here to present some science to us. Blind us a little bit of uh and uh Mike's going to set up here. Uh good morning everyone. My name is Chris Anderson. I work for Hamilton County Educational Service Center. I had uh the distinct pleasure this year to work with the K12 science course of study team. Uh we it's hard to describe kind of the journey we went on because it was it really was a a really great experience I think for everyone. Um but to give you a bit of an overview what we started with was we built ourselves a vision statement for science instruction in the district and we wanted to align it with the district's overall vision statement. And what that really came down to is building students who

009are scientifically literate and who can take action in their community. And uh we'll show the the statement here in in just a few minutes. Um what we did is we went on a journey that started to explore what does it mean to learn and think like a scientist. So in that that included exploring threedimensional learning which included crosscutting concepts. These are concepts that go across science grades and ideas and uh both vertically and horizontally. So things like thinking about systems and thinking about scale um using models. We uh dived into scientific and engineering practices. So conducting investigations um and our instructional phenomena, engaging in argumentation based on evidence. Um we also uh and we learned as students, right? So we learned as students. Um, we also, uh, built curriculum guides. So, based off what we

010were, we wanted the science instructor to look like overall, we built curriculum guides for each grade level to um, help the the each individual grade level professional learning community enact their vision. So, what we're going to do this morning is we you guys are going to be students, which I think is going to be very exciting for you all. Um, so Mike here, we are going to have a little bit of a a mini lesson. So, I'm going to hand it over to Mike and you guys are going to think. >> Okay. Um, so it took a little bit of figuring out how could we get this work and then I did not anticipate a uh a tree falling near my neighborhood. So, it was kind of wild. >> I made it so it was

011close. Um, but it kind of goes, I guess, kind of partly force of looking at something like this. Okay. So, as I as I look at this, you look at me, you think, Mike, why did you why did you bring in the oldest light set you could imagine? It's like this is the most dilapidated looking thing you could ever see. And it's true. Uh there's actually a story behind this and this is what we're going to be doing in a second. So the year is 2004. I'm a young teacher at Sycamore. Um I have a lot of things happen in the same year. I teach AP physics for the first time in Sycamore history. That that was a big moment. Um I buy my first car. I get married. Okay, so this is all going

012on and my wife and I buy a house and we buy this house before we're married and I move in first. So as we're getting ready to move in, we notice that there are a couple things that are broken. One of the things that's broken is the downstairs bathroom light fixture. And I'm like, "Dear spouse, I got this scientist. I'm an engineer. I can I can handle this. Don't worry." So, I go to Home Liar Co. Now, you think it's Home Depot, but it's not. It's Home Liar Co. So, I go to Home Liaro. And as I walk in there, I buy this light fixture. This exact light fixture. This is from 2004. So, as I go to buy this light fixture, the first thing I do is take it out of the package and

013think, "Huh, I went to buy a gold light fixture, but it's green." And only a decade later did I realize it says, "Please remove green protective coating before installing." It's fine. I mean, I Yeah, the kids all think I'm smart. They It's so They So true. All right. But I take this light fixture and I go and I install it. Okay. So, this is what happened when I installed that light fixture. We have power. Thank you. Okay. Now, I don't know about you, but the lights in my house are not supposed to look like this. So, I'm looking at this thinking something is wrong. What did I do? What did I build wrong? So, I'm thinking, well, that bulb is completely bright. These two bulbs look dim and that one or not working at all.

014And that one, I can't really tell what's going on. So, I think, well, maybe it's just one of these bulbs. So, I take one out. At which point, >> oh, >> I'm going, what the Yeah. So, I think, well, that bulb is unusual. I wonder what's going with this bulb. I take this bulb and what is going on? And then I'm thinking, okay, well, these two are weird. This this has got to be the problem. So, I take that one and the other bulbs turn on and off. Then I'm thinking, okay, well then it's got to be this bulb. So I take that bulb out and everything turns off. At which point I throw something and I say some words that I want to repeat and then I think what is going on? Okay, so

015the reason Home Depot is Home Liar Poe is because some clever clever evil person [snorts] has purchased this, has rewired it, has returned it, and I just happen to be the lucky person who purchased this. Now, it could have been a terrible thing, but instead turned out to be the inspiration for a fantastic physics lab, which you are now about to get to participate in. So, this is fun and this is what we do with our AP physics kids, but this is what we can do with lots and lots of different other levels of kids. And at the same time, this is what we can do when we're trying to get kids to inquire because do any of you right now know how this works or how this is? No. But are you intrigued a

016little bit? I'm hoping. So, what we've done is I have that set up, but I built a couple more of these Uh, so there's two more of these. Thank you. Yep. And so we've got electricity running out there. We didn't know exactly how many we think we could put one. I have enough to run two electrical outlets, but not three. Okay. Um, so I may run one on this table. >> Oh, yeah. >> We can try to run yours from the back wall. >> Yeah. Yours, if we're a little bit creative, there's an outlet that you run a third if you wanted to. They're not the same. >> But when person I spoke, I showed this to him and he said, "You know what? We uh if we can jump to that one, please. We

017looked at this and we thought, well, what tasks could we ask you to do?" Okay. And so I don't know if you want to click to the slide or just say yeah. Um so the first question is I guess as you look at this what else would you need to know? What else would you want to know in order to explain why these circuits work the way they do? And so to think about that what I would do in our classes what we would do there I hand you all a dry erase board. So on that side I hook you up with erase markers. I just give you a minute to I give you a second to just brainstorm. Think about what would I want to know or what would I need to know? The

018reason we're doing this dry erase markers is we just thinking, look, I don't want this to be permanent. I just want the freedom to think as I need to. I'm not worried about making a mistake. I'm just thinking about what else would I need to know in order to understand this phenomena, understand what's going on. >> I'll leave this guy. Oh, another >> phone. Sure. >> It's not working. >> Thank you. >> Can't work a marker. No, it's not working. >> We need more markers and you could >> you could get a lottery ticket or something. >> I know, right? So you got like the other thing we would probably have with kids too is like when as you're writing like you can talk to your shoulder partners because like dis like bouncing ideas back

019and forth and we can see your guy like the wheels turning with people but like pitch feel free to pitch ideas to each other >> and this is really great cuz like raise your hand if you're a homeowner. Okay. So you probably run into something similarly infuriating. [laughter] Oh yeah. Yeah. like a circuit. Mike, I thought you were going to say you call him liar po because of um it says like easy to install or something like my my ex-fin it said easy hang door and six hours on a Saturday and I thought again >> I'll pay the 75. >> We just learned that with a mattress installed. My wife and I are like yeah we can carry that up the stairs. laptop. That was always [laughter] >> All right. Uh what I would be

020curious about is just to hear a few if you're feeling brave, what kinds of things did you think you might want to know in order to understand better how what we just saw with those funky light bulbs, how that took place? Yeah. >> My first instinct would be to throw away all the four bulbs and get put new one of the part of the bulb. >> Excellent question. Um, so it turns out that the bulbs on this are old, but the bulbs on those are all brand new and I can switch them from one circuit to the other. Going to do exactly the same thing. Great question, though. >> If it's just in isolation, >> if I just had one of these and didn't know about the other ones, I would say possibly some kind

021of structural issue with this. So like you know how you sometimes bulbs loose >> and you're just not getting current to the bulb and everything like that. So >> So we want to rule out so far we're thinking about equipment errors. Is there an error in just like the bulbs themselves or is there an error in something with the structure? Is there a part that's broken? So, we tested these out. There's nothing broken, but this would be a great question. We're eliminating the first big round of things we could ask questions about. >> So, not necessarily the phenomenon, but some of my questions were um how much to just buy a new fixture >> and also do do we need this light? >> Those aren't explained to them. So, Then then my next question was

022I want how do I get inside the fixture and and what tools do I need to get get in there? >> Okay. Uh so great question. So Will is all about fixing this thing. Um to fix it, all you have to do is pop these guys off and you can see the inards so we can see what's going on. Our goal with our students is to get them to figure out how is this because this has been rewired. How is this wired without taking it apart? what things could we figure out just by looking at it, just by what we previously learned about circuits. How can we figure out how this is put together without doing that? At the last moment is the big reveal when they get to see it and then they all

023look and go that I can't make heads or tails, but um they figured out ahead of time. What else might you want to know >> about the circuit? >> It's open and close circuit. Like I'm thinking along the circuits and the wires and how they're the electricity's flowing and where it's stopping and where it's going. >> Okay. You might want to know where where it's flowing >> if there's a switch. Yep. >> Okay. So, there might be something to close the circuit that we're not seeing or how it's being how those that circuit's being set up in the first place that might impact other things. >> Is there a secret code that opens a panel? >> There's not. I mean, that would be lovely. Um, things that our kids sort of think about. So if

024you think about in your house, if you flip on a light switch on one side of the room, okay, does that have any effect on like whether your microwave works or doesn't work? >> Shouldn't. >> It shouldn't. [laughter] So what we started to talk about with kids there is there are things that are series circuits. There are things that are parallel circuits, which you probably digging back in your memory have heard some place way in the past. This is all about a mixture of series circuits and parallel circuits. And so our kids have spent some time digging around and thinking in the back like in the background. They've already learned about those things and they start to think about, oh, wait a minute. If I turn on or off this bulb and that one also

025goes off, that tells me immediately these two light bulbs are connected in a series circuit or in a parallel circuit. >> Uh, and they just keep kind of tweaking and digging around and playing with that and step by step they begin to analyze and think their way through this. >> So, what you guys have done here is do we've anchored our instruction in phenomena, right? There is something when there's no book, there's no notes. It was something you're you are experiencing and it is relevant to your lives, right? As as people who have probably owned a home at some point in your lives or actively own a home, this is something that's that's pretty relevant to you. Um, and even if you haven't, you interact with electronics and electricity. So, you do have some experience

026with this, but there's no like specific answer to this. This is just about trying to observe a a phenomena. And this is would be really be a springboard for what we would want to uh do next over the next few weeks. And that would be do any sort of things like conduct investigations, maybe craft our own investigation. So we could maybe test why these things are the way they are. We would create a model, a scientific model to maybe explain how Siri uh circuits work in both series and in parallel. We would collect and analyze data. We'd engage in argumentation based on evidence just kind of like how you guys did. And then we would communicate our findings. And that could be looking like any number of things. It would be um especially if we

027can get the kids out in the community with the community based solution. That was a big part of what we what we did in the course of study. So what you did just now is exactly what our vision is for the kids to do. Okay. Um and it doesn't matter if you are in Mike's AP physics class and it doesn't matter if you're in kindergarten. It's the same basic thing. every student can think like a scientist because every student can observe phenomena and every student can uh conduct an investigation and to think and to write down their observations and do all those things. So this was a bit of a mini uh tour of what we want uh what the teachers have articulated as their as their vision for science. I think if I was

028going to throw in one of this, if you think about the key piece of what what kids are going to do in this activity or any activity in science, the first piece they're going to do is say if this then what? Okay. And then after they ask then what? So if I twist this bulb, then what happens? That's the first piece. That's the observation piece. But then once we get the what? And the bigger question is and why? And our job is to get them to keep wanting to ask why, but also to keep trying to figure out how do I get to the why? How do I get that? And that's that's K through 12. That's what we're trying to do with our science curriculum. >> Does anybody want to be in Mike's class

029though? >> Yes. Well, it's not and it's not just Mike's class. It's it's it's the whole the whole K2. >> This is what uh you know as a as a group as a team we've we've um as this is our science vision. So >> awesome. Um did you want to share the vision statement? >> Yes, that would be that would be great. So uh this is the as a as a group we we've uh built and crafted this uh this vision statement science that sucks more uh schools of nights curiosity develop scientific literacy nurtures critical thinking so you can make a positive impact in your community what you just experienced really aligns with this right now I'd imagine your curiosity is peaked you would want to make I think a lot of people want to

030actually get in and see like I don't know what you guys got the rest of the board meeting but I would bet there's going to be something in the back of your mind like what is going on inside that circuitry I need to see that um and we've talked a little about scientific literacy. You can probably use terms like series and parallel uh a little bit more proficiently now than maybe you were 20 minutes ago. And then you were you were critically thinking, right? You were critically thinking like why is this this way? We and we were thinking through all the different possibilities whether it was like equipment failure or uh you know something with the with the circuits themselves. Now we didn't make a positive impact in our community, but that's okay. That's okay.

031It's only 8 it's not even 9:00 yet. There's plenty of time left. Um but yeah, this is our this is our vision statement. And this is what we worked on as a team. >> Well, thank you so much for joining us. We have a couple more slides. Um we've talked a little bit about learning like a scientist, but um one of the things that uh our teachers identified as being really important um you saw that in the vision statement was about making a positive impact, right? Um allowing our curiosity and our learning to drive positive impact in the community. And so because that was such a priority for the team, they identified that um we want to ensure that every student in Sycamore has at least one community connected learning experience a year at least

032once as a part of science. That could be going out into the community that could be bringing the community into our school buildings. Um and then they're working together to there's already amazing things happening. So we're curating, you know, what are some of those experiences and what are new experiences that we want to provide to our students as well. And it was really inspiring to see some tangibles come out of, you know, sometimes vision statements live at that 30,000 foot level and to see something that was really tangible and practical um so that our students know you don't have to wait till you're a quote unquote grown up to make a difference. You can make a difference today um with your learning. And so I'll let uh Rebecca tell you just a little bit about

033our process and then we'll um open up for questions. there was intentionality to ensure that we had representative voices in the course of study process and that um the process was a highly collaborative process. So we had over 40 educators from all seven buildings including representatives from grade levels and department our department chairs, teachers of different courses um at of science courses, ESU teachers and special educators all lent their voice to our science course of study process this year. Each month we had conversations about science course of study, pulling groups of teachers together, be they grade level reps, um be they uh department chairs or subject leaders coming together and talking about science both now and in the future. Part of our process was learning from the leading voices of research and science. So really

034grounding ourselves in what is excellent science instruction. Thinking about that horizontal and vertical experience for our students. What do we want a science experience to be for our students as they enter Sycamore and kindergartener as kindergarten and as they leave us? Formulating our vision and direction for the future of science. Really leaning into our vision statement saying that's our framework. That's our north star for creating uh experiences for students within science. Developing unit design templates. So we have our north star. We are grounded in best practices within science education. And now let's implement designing curricular units that align scope and sequence that ensure students are engaged in inquirybased tasks and community engagement experiences. And finally, the team's making decisions about instructional materials. So, what materials and resources are going to best help bring these science

035units, our our inquiry, our curiosity to life within Salem? a process that I'm so grateful for our teachers that came together and worked so collaboratively not only within grade levels but across grade levels to ensure we have that alignment in place that we are collaborative and highly articulated and many thanks to Chris Anderson who led us in that process every step of the way and will continue supporting us next year. >> Wonderful. So yes, um a special thank you to our guests who joined us and their leadership in this work. Thank you Mike. Thank you, Chris, and thank you, Rebecca, for your leadership as well in the curriculum process. And we wanted to open up for questions regarding our both our process, but also you may have gotten to um get some of the materials

036that you'll be able shortly as well. >> I'll go first. So, I am jealous of the science teachers right now. I I'm serious. This is this is kind of everything that I feel like all of my years of teaching has built toward was things like this. Um it it's it's that philosophy of being a a guide on the side rather than a sage on the stage, right? I felt like that was always discussed like if if you live in a home that has little kids in it, you know that they ask why all the time and eventually as they grow up they stop asking why so much for a variety of different reasons. But I feel like with this it's it's making sure they never let go of asking why, right? always keeping that developing

037these critical thinking skills, thinking outside of the textbook because I mean we're we're asking these kids to hopefully handle really big things moving forward, right? AI integration, food and water insecurity, climate. I mean like these are huge topics that it's going to take more than a textbook. It's going to take all this interacting and and just working on a phenomenon and if then why as much as they can. So, I I I am jealous. I'm serious. I I am. Um, if you guys need uh the the citizen science projects, the community-based stuff. Um, if you need ideas, I can probably throw more at you than you want to uh see, just because I I see a lot of that. Um, and then finally, I I'm sorry, I'm nerding out for a minute. Just everybody just

038just bear with me. Uh, I looked into the text that you guys selected, some of the core text materials. It's it's phenomenal stuff, right? The the environmental science text that you guys use from Pearson, I've used it uh personally in my coursework. Um the the narrative style of teaching this phenomenon seems to relate much better to kids in the classroom. It draws them in. It's it's we're telling a story and then we're working backwards on why do the bats have white nose syndrome and how how do we work through the scientific method, not just and here are the steps of the scientific method. So I I love that. I think that encourages this critical thinking skills. And then the uh the biology for the AP course that James Morris is like a phenomenal just like

039author within biology education. So just kind of getting to some of those. I think you said like like leaders in this space, the number of awards he's he's written. He has another book. I you guys didn't mention it, but I'm sure you've thought about it. The um biology, how life works. I'm sure that's somewhere in your pile of stuff to look at, too. So, um, anyway, I genuinely I'm I'm jealous. I'm so excited. This is this is really really fun. Uh, for for an actual question. [laughter] Sorry. When does when does science formally start? What? What? Because like right now I have a first grader. We don't have we don't have science class. We might have science time and and it's woven in, but when do we start having science class? >> I mean, yeah,

040I can answer. You're welcome to talk. >> Absolutely. So, um, science is starts in kindergarten and then continues on. So, you're correct in that especially in those younger grade levels that science tends to be more embedded into particularly the ELA standards as um students become acclimated to reading, writing, math. Uh but then I as we and we had lots of conversations with our elementary teachers that there really is a desire and an intentionality to say we it's a both and we both want to embed science within our our literacy block and we want to have time for students to be able to engage in scientific thinking to have these inquiry based and collaborative tasks. So, I think our course of study process gave our elementary teachers more time to collaborate and um to carve out

041time with intentionality for bringing science as a spotlight in the instructional day. >> Chris, what would you >> I would just add I think uh and you can correct if I'm wrong, but uh you're right, science time versus science class probably that shift is made when our students move to Greens. Um the only other thing I rejer I would uh share with Becky with Becky's comment is uh the biggest pressure for elementary science is time is [snorts] the scarce resource um especially with uh what the state requires LA and what will probably happen with math. So the conversation with those teachers was they were all like what what can we do? How I like well I can't create more time for you. I can't do any of that. I don't have those kind of powers.

042Uh and I it's you know any other decision to give you more time in schools is way way above my pay rate. So what we try to do is consider how we can make time flexible and what we can do to uh with other subjects both reading and math to as almost like a multiplier so that when you are doing science when it is science time or when you block out for science it's things like this and it's more uh more experiences inquiry based instruction. Um, and it's not easy, but it takes, like as Becky said, it takes a lot of intentionality. Um, and that really only comes with getting with your grade level PLC and figuring out what how time resources can be divvied up and shared and moved around. So, we kind of

043let them drive that train as to what was going to work best for them. Um, but we did kind of give them the permission to maybe take down some of the barriers that may that may have been in their minds like, "Oh, well, we can't do this. We can't do this." And we mostly just ask the question to them, "Why not?" And they're like, "Oh, well, I guess I can do that." Yes. Yeah. Yeah. You can. >> Thank you. >> Well, one of the things I like just experiences from my teaching career is that having that access for all students. Um, I think that's big cuz I even social study as a social studies teacher and they talk about the upper level, especially history courses at the high school. Well, we should put this gate

044up. We no, give all the kids the access because they're all going to get something a little bit different out of that as opposed to denying them that access too. Um, the other thing I think this things like that make science like this is physics, you know, and everyone when they hear physics kind of freaks out a little bit. uh my both my kids kind of freaked out a little bit uh when they heard physics, but this makes it approachable. It makes it, you know, something they can say, "Oh, that makes sense." As opposed to seeing some dense piece of, you know, scientific theory that they don't understand. It allows them to practice a little more and again get what they can out of that um and learn from that and have an experience from

045that than just simply sitting there and kind of going, "What the heck is going on?" So, I applaud you guys for that with just making the things like this accessible to a lot of different students. >> I I think I'll touch on that briefly. The magic in this activity is that I've done something like this with our eight kids and I've done something like this with our ninth grade kids who weren't ready to take biology yet, who are our most struggling learners. Um, all we shift is how we scaffold it. So, in case that question came up, I had I in a separate bin because I just brought a lot of bins. there's a spot where um you just change how much you scaffold this. So, you know, their job was to figure out what

046this looks like. Well, for the AP kids, they're going to draw it on their dry erase boards. But for this class or for that ninth grade class, we simplify it and I give them a bunch of pictures ahead of time. Which one of these do you think this could look like? And then let's test one of these things that'll tell us whether it works or not. But it tries to make exactly what you said. Let's make that science accessible to everybody. I think that's that's really our goal. Like part of what came out of our curriculum discussion is how do we take these same core ideas that want every kid to have these same core experiences, make them accessible for every Mike did a really great job of pitching when we were kind of planning

047this. We were kind of pitching ideas back and forth and we kind of landed on this because it is so accessible, right? Every Does anybody here have a physics background? Anybody here have a math background? Okay. So, anybody here have a construction background? a little bit. Okay. But every single person could do this. Everyone could participate because there was no wrong answer here. It was just what you were thinking. It was it wasn't about what the product was. Who cared like, "Yeah, you I bet if you wanted to, we could do this whole thing and you could make a circuit diagram and that would be fun for 30 minutes and that." No. What was important here is that you were thinking through the process. The the process of thinking was way more important than the

048end product. So, everybody can do it's okay. There's no there was no wrong answer. Every single answer you read, everybody wrote down on their whiteboard was correct. And so that lowers the barrier for anybody. It high performing kids, kids who struggle, all those kids can think. They can all think every single one. They might not be able to do complex math. They might not be able to make the circuit diagram, but they can think. And that's what we want to focus on. >> Even why not use LEDs? That was that was a right answer. >> That's a right answer. Yeah. Like well, yeah, exact. Well, this is silly. just use LEDs. >> Yeah, that was our thing about that that I learned. [laughter] >> I I would I want to say thank you for this

049presentation. I think uh it's a very important area. It's a very important field for more girls to get into. It needs we need more accessibility for for all kids, but I would like to see more girls and more women to have to go into this field. Um my question is how do we know how many students graduate from Sycamore and actually go into a science field into and later on in their >> I that's a great question. Well, I don't have an exact number for you. Uh I can tell you that the two top career career fields of interest currently in Sycamore are STEM as number one and then medical as number two. And that was definitely at the center of the conversation. both of those high school >> and a lot of the work

050we did at the 9 to2 level was aligning more uh electives to the career interests of students. Um so we're still hitting on a lot of standards that we would normally do but it is uh applied in a way that is aligned to to career connections. No, I I think that I mean I think the answer to getting more people to go into the field is to help them feel comfortable in science at starting at a very young age and to ask those questions and to feel like they're included and understanding and can take part into in it and sometimes people just are very intimidated by the word science. Right. So I think I I I really appreciate what you're doing and I appreciate you know just about it. Um really this is a field

051that is is very important right now in this time this day and age and we need more thinkers. We need more people. We need more problem solvers um to come out of education right now. Um so they need to and there's so much science is I mean science is changing the world clearly. So let's keep at it. >> Yeah. Thank you. And um as a scientist um I think the key word that I heard was exposure. So if the kids aren't exposed, they don't really know what those fields are. Because if you ask a lot of our seniors, my own children included, who say they want to be an engineer, what does an engineer do? They sit and do math all day. That's farthest from the truth because I work with engineers all day. Most

052engineers don't do any engineering work, but they have learned the pro the scientific process on how to solve problems um and how to apply that to issues or opportunities. So, um yeah, I think it's all about exposure and I know Miss Miss Lawson is working uh additionally on some career um opportunities to bring people in to continue that exposure in science. Uh which then to me just really um leads into the classroom, more engagement in the classroom when they can see what real world opportunities can come out of science. >> Thank you. And a special thank you to our course of study team. many many people who shaped this. Many teachers who um aren't physically in the room with us today, but they're thankful um are all over this plan and they've certainly made this

053um an incredible plan and experience for our kids and so and thank you again to Chris and Mike for joining us today. >> Thank you. That was awesome. Thank you very much. >> I'll make hard work the mic. >> No, no. If you don't mind just sending the white boards to the board. Thanks, Greg. I was thought about that. >> Thank you. >> And then we do the same thing with a parallel circuit. Then we would start to take the ext just kind of make a change and see what happened. Make a change and see what happened and we'll come to thection. >> All right. As they're packing up again, thank you for that presentation. Thank you for the time that all the whole entire team put into doing that. We're just going to uh

054make a quick introduction before we can proceed with the superintendent agenda. Um later in the personnel consent agenda, we'll be approving a new um hopefully approving a new for the green school. So, I'd like to give an introduction of Mr. Mark Bird and I'll leave that to uh our fine green school uh principal uh Mr. Cole. >> Awesome. Um so, I would like to introduce Mr. Mark Bird. Um he came to us um from Lakota. He was at their district office after being a special education teacher at Kings. He also coached sports at Kings. Um, and as we went through the process, the teachers absolutely fell in love with his demeanor. Um, how he was able to share his vision and connected with kids. But one of the things that was um really impressive is

055that, you know, we we call references, we do interviews, and you get to know a person a couple times for 30 to 45 minutes, but the number of text messages that we got after they found out that we were hiring Mark Birds like, "Oh man, what a hire. Great hire. Perfect." And like we'd run into people who said, you know, they uh he coached my kid. He was the best coach that my kid ever had. And so, um, you know, he crushed it through the interview process. We're so excited about how our team's going to come together. You can see we coordinated, um, some some spiritware this morning. Um, and as we did the Working Genius work, um, you know, if you remember the widget from Working Genius, I'm like the IW. Uh, Jordan is

056like the ET. uh and and Mark is an EW and so he kind of bridges the gap between the front end of the uh processes and so we're just really excited to um have Mark join us um and get started. He is wrapping up some of his work um at Lakota where he's been in the district office and he's been helping with data and systems um around MTSS and so that's something our building can absolutely use. But I think um we know that we hire people, right? That's something that I was told really early on and um he's just an absolutely wonderful person and we're excited to have him join us. So this is Mark Bird who's going to join us. >> Yeah, I just thank you. Thank for having me. Thank for giving me

057the opportunity to come out here. Um I'm excited. Like Greg said, I've been sitting in a district office for the last five years behind a computer and that ain't me. Um so really excited to get out, hang out with the kids, learn, lead, and grow with these two. Uh, and hopefully you'll approve it later. >> Much appreciated. >> All right. Well, thank you. Congratulations and thank you very much. All right. Let's go uh to the superintendent's agenda. Uh first thing on there is uh policy. Uh and your excitement, Mrs. Bidder. A second read of some policy there. Uh any questions about the policies that we have in front of us here? I will just mention there's a couple things that were happening. So, just as a reminder to the board, next meeting is going to

058be a big meeting because that's the meeting that we're going to formally approve the new manual and resend the OSBA policies. These are the remaining policies that we somewhat it was kind of held them off for a lot of different reasons whether that was conversation that needed to occur with department members curriculum um or legal just to make sure that we were right in regards to how the wording was coming together. Um I just want to make sure um that you have the opportunity heading into next meeting that um there's any questions that you have that need to be addressed. I will have information for you in regards to how I'm going to present that um uh next meeting. Um we also is it's important to mention that we have a district policy committee following

059this meeting today. There's no drafted agenda for that meeting. It's going to be more of an opportunity that if anything comes up from those members that we need to make sure that we address um that we will do that at that time and make sure that we have that feedback um heading into that next meeting as well. All right. >> Can I just um I I know you just said this to us. You have also shared this shared this with us many times. So, you're saying that for today, these second drafts, these are the these are sort of the the ones that have been fooled out that we should absolutely make sure if we have questions that we're bringing them to you during this time period and then before the next meeting. Yeah, that that's

060correct. um some of these in here um they may not be of necessarily you may not it was more of a consideration and for example we kind of talked about class rank at the last one right so we know what we believe to be true about class rank but the nola policy is built on a larger scale so we just wanted to make sure that we weren't um conflicting with our views within Sycamore around class rank but also meeting the letter of the law in regards to scholarships and things like that that we would have to do um interrogation of students. If I were to bring that one up, that was more or less making sure that um that is in line with what we believe to be true with what with what's happening politically

061in regards to immigration and things like that to make sure that we're in line and what we say we're doing is actually meeting the letter of the law and the policy. So, um that was helpful to get um feedback from legal as well. And so these are just ones that we felt like, hey, we should probably actually pull them off because we've either sickized or they're just unique. But in regards to you all and just making sure that you go through the manual, specifically the bylaws, if there's anything specific, we just want to make sure that we have that done for the following meeting just to make sure that way they get approved. And and again, I also want to make sure that we're all on the same page in that even if we say,

062you know what, there's nothing now and we've approved the manual, we meet monthly as a policy committee, any policy can come back out, go back to policy and there can be a rich discussion around that and we can change that at any point. This is just our opportunity to resend the OSBA and bring Neola in um and then start the real not the real work more work um on the administrative guidelines with each of these policies. just to once again I know you've said this many times um our board committee members our board members who are committee members y um have worked u diligently I know at every meeting it's been a lot of time and thank you for doing that work um >> really look at the new policies to make sure that they

063are the goal is to keep them in alignment with the current policies there was never an intention to just change all the policies and make them so drastically different and that right I know you've said that many times and I know that you've said that as board members I just want to reiterate that obviously is a little different so the wording may be different um but I appreciate that your diligence on that thank you for doing that work >> and there's just exponentially more policies >> sure there's a lot more say there's more depth and so at first we were thinking oh this is going to be a here's an OBA policy here's nola what are the and then we found that the congruence was just not there right uh But we did. And that's

064that's where like if you look at these policies, that's where we wanted to make sure we took a step back and we said, "Hey, what do we believe to be true? What's the law? And then how do we craft something that we're protected?" Because that's the other thing, you know, um you can sickize policies, but in the end, um we want to make sure that legal is fine with those and they can they can be defended, right? You don't want to be putting a policy in place because it feels good, but it's not protected by law. So that was that work that we had to do. Now, is part of Neiola's partnership with us a a continued review of policies and their need to change based off of legislation or or what have you? >>

065That's a really good question. So, um just as kind of the go back a little bit. So, our contract with OSBA was really one-sided. you basically paid for the access to the policy. But on our end, what we had to do is we had to use our own legal counsel to go through the revision of those policies and to um do the work to get them um to the point that we wanted to get them to a first read and a second read. The problem that we had with that and the original reason we brought it to the board was that there's a lot of error in that and there's a lot of money spent with our attorneys when there's actually an organization out there that does all this work and does it really well.

066So what our original contract with Niola was this year was heavy because it was all the work that we had to do to transition. So Norm was here a lot and Norm just doesn't do things for free. U great guy, right? But he was coming in and so we spent that consulting hours bringing him in to help manage all of this. That contract gets significantly reduced moving forward. But the level of support we get from Neiola is exactly what we need because what they will do is they release multiple times a year policies or if there's a special release, meaning we have one right now that's coming through on some of the changes in laws around marijuana, medical marijuana, um he is on top of that. He's reaching out to us letting us know what's

067coming. There's a legal update and then what we do is we'll feed those through the policy committees and he'll show up for our policy committees. So right now he's not really doing that because we've been doing so much work transition, but you'll see him more because he'll be coming to our policy committee meetings um on that quarterly basis to review all the updates that are coming and then we'll keep that cycle of first read, second read. So it's actually going to feel way more systematic. I know the transition has been kind of gosh you're meeting all the time what's happening. This is going to be feel much more rhythmic at that sense about how we're going to And I I just want to say and I I know I've said it before, but beyond have

068on behalf of the team, me personally, I'm just so thankful that you all agreed to move to Neiola um and you're supporting this work. It is such a um big undertaking, but um I had an opportunity to sit down with Miss Shunk the other day and we were having a conversation and um talking about just her as a leader and a future and she said one of the things that she's done this year that's made such an impact on her is being in all those policy meetings. She never had any she we all know policy exists, but until you live in it and understand that not everything's a policy. Some things are just how we do business, but everything's anchored in the policy around why we do and how that's structured through the board. She's

069like, "This was such a huge learning experience for me." And she enjoyed it thoroughly. And I'm sure if I talked to Miss Zelner or anybody else that was kind of popping in and out on those meetings, they would say the same thing. You just you learn so much through that process. So, it's been fantastic development for our team. It'll be great for the district long term. >> And the guidelines obviously will be really helpful. >> Yes. >> Agree. Yes. >> Because that'll be a way to >> and we have that all mapped out. Um, we What's really cool about that is I'm I'm really working hard to put some of that ownership over on our administrative team. Um, and so we have a lot of different administrators from assistant principles to principles that have signed

070up. um we took their their first priority, second priority and tried to put them in groups. And so we've got this really cool mix of administrators from across the district that are going to be coming together to review those guidelines in each of those areas um over the course of really I think it starts in a week or two and it'll go probably through December. Um it's not it's it's a big lift. Um, I'm not rushing it because at least we have the policy in place, but I'm really excited because I think that this gives a lot of our administrators that don't get to do district level work or really put their hands in policy to actually understand what the policy is and then here's a guideline and being able to say this doesn't really

071work with how we operate, how might we change that? But, um, Norm will be with us for the first round of guidelines and then we take that over ourselves for the remainder of them. Thank you. >> You're welcome. >> All right. Uh moving on. Uh is there a motion uh to approve uh the new uh science course of study? >> So moved. >> Second. >> Thank you uh Mrs. Bidder for your motion. Mr. Bal for your second. Any questions about that? Right. Can you call the role, please? >> Mrs. B. >> I. >> Mr. Benton. >> Hi. >> Mr. Gos. >> Hi. >> Dr. James. I >> Mr. Harris >> I All right. Next we had do we have a motion for an approval of contract with Limx Incorporated. >> Second. >> Thank you Mr.

072Gos for your motion. Thank you Dr. James for your second. >> Yeah I have a question. There's no contract attached here. So I don't know how we can approve a blank contract. >> And I apologize. I just now noticed that as well and has the same question. And that is my item. >> I do that. Um if you refresh your >> Yeah, if you refresh your um docs, [clears throat] it is on there. >> Thank you. >> Yes. >> Thank you, Mr. Harris. >> I'm not I just refreshed. It's not online. So I wonder are you signed on track? >> Let me look and see. I wonder if it's in the wrong place >> cuz I have it. >> Actually, I'm not signed in. I'm just on I'm signed in. Somebody put it under. We'll

073move it right now. >> Yeah. And while they're moving stuff around, if if I can ask. So So if I may be making some assumptions, but the way I was looking at this this this peer assessment software is basically a way of um filling in a lot of the gaps that Canvas is really weak on as far as um like assignment design and and module creation. like this. Canvas is good at kind of integrating things together, but it it fails it. This seems like much more um assessment level playground, right? Almost or sandbox where where teachers can build. >> So, peer assessment will be an excellent complement to Canvas, which is our instructional learning management system. So, Canvas will allow us to build common informative assessments. summit of assessments as well across all grade levels

074and all content areas. Um provides teachers lots of options and opportunities for creating assessments will allow us to be much more collaborative in designing those assessments and then get data from it instantaneously. Um we'll be very very helpful in teachers as they're designing curricular units and then responding to students both who need support and extension and as we look to refine our systems of support and find areas of of of gaps and of celebration as well. I want to point out too, one of the other benefits of this platform is it allows us to pull that data much better than some other systems. So with our new data specialist, this is going to make it a seamless transition, be able to pull the data out of there and put it into a dashboard and be

075able to use it to make instructional decisions. >> It also has other exciting capabilities. If we have students who are taking assessments on paper, teachers can pretty seamlessly take the paper assessment and put it into pair assessment. So we can still see it digitally, but if the preference is for our students or pencil in some places, that's still an option for them while still having data at their fingertips. >> And one more bonus, um, special thanks to Trisha Underwood, Andrew, Chris Guttermouth, who really dove into our assessment platforms that we have within the district and noticed that we had several, which means that our data collection was disjointed. So now we will have um a common assessment platform which is better systemically and better financially. We were able to um not purchase some resources that

076we had before and funnel our funds into pair assessment and get more for less. >> Thank you. Questions? >> Okay, Mr. Burton, can you call roll please? Mr. Gothno. >> Hi. >> Dr. Mr. James. >> Hi, >> Mr. Valent. >> Hi, >> Mrs. Miller. >> Hi, >> Mr. Harris. >> I All right. Next up is a um uh do I have a motion for an approval of a service contract with Hamilton County Educational Services. >> So, Luke second. >> Thank you, Dr. James, for your motion. Thank you, Mr. Bidder, for your second. Yeah, I I have some questions on this and you know my questions center more around process not around the need for these services. Um you know we're headed into a uh new fiscal budget year uh which contracts for you know that

077it's going to be a challenge to meet the board parameters and stay to stay within the board parameters when we already know that our salaries um are above the board parameter on increases our benefits are and that's 85%. So, you know, the other big bucket we always talk about is purchase services. Um, and we're seeing a large increase on contracts from purchase services. Last, uh, the last meeting, we approved a 20% increase on a Hamilton County purchase services. So, again, we're we're seeing these big increases. Um, so, uh, just bear with me, but there's there's multiple questions embedded in here around the process. Um, you know, I know we contract with many different ESC's. I I know I've seen Hamilton County and Warren County and Butler County and I even think we had a Lraine

078County at some point. Um my first question is how do we decide on which county we uh contract with? Do we compare prices? Do we say okay we need this service and do we go out and look at individual ESC's to determine who has the best price with the best service or do we typically just go with one? Um and you know who who in the district I mean it's certainly not Mr. Spencer's job, but who in the district is looking at these contracts and pushing back to some of our providers of, you know, these increases, you know, we can't take these increases. Um, and in my opinion, the increases that we're seeing in purchase services are not sustainable, financially sustainable. Um, and they will lead to us having to have cuts someplace else. So,

079you know, how do we determine, do we push back, who's who's responsible for this? um do we compare services and then at what point do we look at bringing some of these services inhouse? So I understand a lot of what's on this contract is part-time FTEES where we're not going to hire someone to do half or a quarter of an FTE or a few hours. I totally get that. But if you look at some of these um larger items that are on this contract, you know, they're for full-time a full-time person like sign language interpretation and um behavioral coaches. you know, if if we have a student that needs sign language interpretation that's in first or second grade and we're going to have this need in the district for 10 years, at what point do

080we look at having that inhouse versus uh contracting out which is going to cost us more money? So, you know, for example, $81,000 for a sign language interpreter is more than most or more than some of our teachers make um that are working full-time. So, I know I asked a lot of questions, but that's kind of, you know, I want to I want to learn more about the process and really who's ultimately responsible for, you know, putting these numbers before the board. >> So, this Hamilton County Educational Services contract isn't just student services. There are I can speak to those pieces that I am uh that I do oversee. Um but some of that is the basic services just being part of the the ESC um and the benefits that we get from from that

081having our our superintendants our um executive directors um professional development and continual regional and local meetings um to help support implementation of things from the state uh legislation you know those kind of things. But in terms of the student services that are accessed through this contract, um I can share with you that um we do have a process for IEP teams to consider the additional allocation of resources. We have an administrator from OSS attend those meetings if there is going to be an increase or a change in the allocation of services for students with disabilities. Um, and so, uh, when we look at something that you mentioned, uh, in terms of the sign language interpreters, those aren't easy to, uh, just hire directly. Um, and so we typically do default to these. Could we explore

082that as an option in the future? Absolutely, we could. And we could figure out where does that land? Is that a classified uh, role? Is that a certified role? Is it exempt? You know, those kind of things. Um, because you're right, it does. If a student requires an interpreter, that's a commitment for typically the duration of of their educational experience here at Sigmore. Um, and I do uh reach out to Warren County and Butler County to compare prices to see um and typically Hamilton County does give us better rate um for the sign language interpreters. Um so that's why we go with them typically. Um and then in terms of you know pushing back on the price increases that is something that with the ESC's it's not um like uh an individual contractor agency that's

083easy okay well for sycamore can you give us this rate because their rate >> is it the same rate for every school like if everybody wants the same service it's the same rate >> that's correct yeah and are there some ESC's that offer some services that other ESC's student. >> Yes. >> For example, the um uh the autism coaching that you see on that, we have 15 specialized classrooms across our district that um serve some pretty intensive needs students. And so that level of support is really beneficial. Not only beneficial, but um really something that is required for us to make sure that we are meeting those students. that is something that is not often offered through Bor County or Butler County. And so that level of expertise um it it's right there with Hamilton

084County. >> Yeah. It's again I'm not questioning the need. >> Yeah. >> It's more of the process from a financial standpoint because my concern is like I said in the beginning financially you know the the increases that we're seeing aren't sustainable with our budget. Yes. >> Not even with the potential to have a new levy. like we did not build in 10 and 20% increases in uh purchase services. Um and that money's got to come from somewhere else. You know, if you if we have a 3% board parameter of growth, um and you know, we're seeing contracts that are growing by 5% and and and 10% and 20%, you know, that money's got to come from somewhere. And one of the things uh Miss Spencer and I have many many conversations in regards to a

085lot of these contracted employees that we have and and to her point there are reasons, right? They're not easy to find a sign language interpreter, right? You might not need that all day or whatever that may be. There are nuances in that, but there is a markup that you're paying um to consult with an organization to get that employee in. So, anytime that we have an opportunity to say, "Hey, can we find a speech and language pathologist to come work for us?" Um and we've been having a lot of success. In fact, um we'll have another candidate come forward um for a position that we have been outsourcing because we weren't able to hire that position last year. That's the other thing. Um there are a lot of positions that there's just not a lot

086of candidates. Um specifically, I think about psychologists and physical therapists. We've been contracting. Um but the goal is to get out there and to attend job fairs and really try to recruit and get those people to come and work for Sycamore um and be a part of the organization because you're absolutely right. It's um it's a lot less a lot less or significantly less expensive to go that route. We just >> and I just times >> we have to change the way financially we're doing things you know or or it's just not going to be sustainable. If you look at the way our budget is increasing our five-year forecast is increasing over the next five years. If every one of us in the in the room is not concerned about that um we need to

087be. So, I mean, I challenge you to think outside the box on on how we can, you know, continue to provide the same services, um, but look at different ways to do it because, you know, these these are some big ticket items on here. Um, you know, and I would be interested, and this is just me, as you bring these contracts forward, and I know we have a lot during the summer, you know, to let the board know what increases that that we're seeing, uh, because we need to be prepared in the future that if we're continuing to see increases that are more than three and a half%, again, that money's got to come from somewhere. And the board parameters right now are three and a half%. So that would help me a lot is

088if if you know and I'm going to continue to ask these same questions like I did in the last meeting of you know where does this money come financially from. We can also I think help you [clears throat] there are services that I think when we purchase them from Hamilton County and stop purchasing them from a private entity to let you know why it's being added to this contract. >> And is it a new service? Is it something new that we haven't seen before? Is is this an increase over what we've seen? what with what what we saw last year or the year before. Those are things that would really help me as as we move forward with some of these big contracts over the summer. I know in the past we used to do

089a lot of private contracting with people. Um I don't see that as much. It seems to be more rolling into the ESC's. Um you know, I don't know if if that's a if that's cost benefit for us or not. I I don't know these things, but >> it's been a significant increase. >> Miss Spitzer used to put together a a spreadsheet for us every year, adding them together. I think that was Mr. Bella, do you think that was helpful? I always felt that was really helpful or something like that just so we can see >> but um >> that's still planned. Yeah, I I have done that in the past for the ESC contract. >> Oh, I see. So, but if that's something that is needed, we can >> I guess what I would like

090to say is >> um I I agree with what Mr. Ballot is saying. I think this things too. I think, you know, we're spending money um we're spending, you know, significant amount of money and we have to ask ourselves, could we hire a teacher for that, right? Or a therapist. Um I also do understand that it's really hard to hire specific like special education teachers are really hard to hire to find for teachers and therapists. So even if you're just telling us that information, you know, that that's helpful. I giving us reminders or giving us updates on on that I think is is helpful because it gives everyone context, right? Um and then the other thing I I think we all know this. I think we all know this. Um you have to comply with

091the law. You must, right? And so we we we still want you to do that, right? I don't think anyone here is telling you not to. So we're not trying to like oversee what you do and tell you you can't do that. So no one I don't think anyone would be saying that to you but having some more understanding and context of what's going on in the job market in this field so that we we understand um sometimes we'll see you know people leave like we'll see an agenda and we'll see several special education teachers leaving at once or speech therapists or occupational therapists and you know that's not necessarily our you know we're not necessarily trying to point it out but I see that a lot and I do often ask, but if we're

092seeing a lot of turnover, again, that would be helpful to know because now you're really going to need to use these services, right? Um, is some is there some resources that you need from us? Are we why are we lo are we why are we not retaining the staff? What's happening? Because at the end of the day, it's could potentially be more costly to have people leaving this field and we don't want that. >> Yeah. And I feel like you're need more resources. >> Yeah. I I don't think we're seeing a retention issue. Okay. um or the need to contract because folks are leaving. >> Okay. >> So, but I'm happy to look at our >> the changes we've had from last year to this year and looking at like like Mr. Levelville said >>

093what is what has been direct hired and what contract were we able to eliminate because of that. >> Yeah. I guess just that you know indicating it with us because that that goes to the process, right? Sure. We we know that you're you're following a process. we just like a little bit more I I know I work industry but I think having a little bit more information would be helpful not because we're questioning what you're doing but just so we understand what's happening with the budget if it really is increasing by 10 20% that is something we have to know >> well there are also things that we can challenge because there are there may be services on here that it might it's nice to have but can we do without and those are questions

094that I think we have to start asking And I hear you all saying, let's really start challenging the norm versus just road approvals of, hey, we've had this for a couple years and let's keep approving it versus, hey, maybe we don't need that service any longer. But >> to your point of a lot, the one thing I would remind the board is like when you're hiring a person like it may look like 70,000 on this contract, but for us it might be 95 because it's benefits. you're responsible for, you know, all the the retirement, the all the other things. So, it may look bad on here, but it might look worse if we brought them in house. So, sometimes being able to get a fraction of a person, like, you know, I'm looking at the

095administration of safety services. We didn't have that a few years ago. I'm pretty certain all the districts in the county have it and contribute to it. Contribute $11,000. We couldn't hire a person for that. Um, but >> could that fall under someone else's current scope? >> Also, do we need it? >> Yeah. Well, if we need it, could that fall under someone's current scope? Um, you know, I'm just I'm just asking to think outside the box because I'm I'm just I think we all know this. Our budget next year is going to be challenging. >> Yeah, >> very much so. >> Well, and and I think so. I think like offer guys a little bit of grace as well on this. I know that that some of this about about transparency. When I look at

096this, I'm seeing a lot of information that is going to be embedded within IEPs that we do not need to get involved, right? And so I I think as much of the story as you guys can bring to us about these are the needs, these are how the needs have changed um based on the language of the IEPs, like that that'll help tell that story. Um, and then when you can speak more uh to what Mr. Lewis was saying, when you can speak more, right, there's a if there's items that aren't necessarily embedded within an IEP, [clears throat] we can have a little more conversation about about the need and how that has changed. Um, and then the stuff that we want to keep individualized, you know, that that obviously is following a chain of

097documentation that we don't need to get into, you know. So >> well and I just want to from a process standpoint um we have very specific controls in place for backfilling of any position that we put from the responsible staffing standpoint when we did that and so no new FTE can be added without a routing of approval through different layers of the organization finally leading with Chad or ending with Chad of saying you know does this position need to be had but any position that's leaving us is a conversation in regards to does that position need to replaced and if I have a conversation with Miss Tommpkins about or sorry Miss Spencer about that right it's okay so what's the need what's the IEP can we do this internally what are case loads there's like

098a series of questions that goes forth now we're blessed because Miss Spencer has a ton of data she just lives in a data space and she can always say here's the data here's what we need um but the goal is always to look at where is it least expensive in-house or consulting but again somebody leaves you're in that position. You got to you've got to implement the IP and you got to do the work and that's where you go. But we we do have systems and controls and processes in place and we do feel the feel the weight of what you're saying, Mr. Valent um every day. Um and so we're trying our best to do what we can to keep operating. Uh but but really look at each. >> I think what I can

099say is based on your comments, we will do a really deep dive into all of our purchase services and our contracts and see where we can make some reductions. >> I would just like to say I'm not, you know, looking as one board member, I'm not looking to reduce the quality of education for students who have disabilities by any means. and I don't think anyone here is. So, I don't want anyone to be watching this and think that that's what we're talking about. What we're talking about is if there are areas where we could potentially uh change or you know negotiate on an on a contract or you know change the the price, we would like you to revisit that, right? Um and also keep informing us. >> Yep. >> Good discussion. Thank you. All

100right. Uh Mr. person, can you please call the role? >> Uh, Dr. J. >> I. >> Mrs. Miller, >> I. >> Mr. Benton, >> I. >> Mr. D. >> Hi, >> Mr. Harris. >> I All right. Next. Uh, do we have a motion for approval of a canvas contract renew renewal? >> Is there a second? >> Okay. Uh, thank you, Mr. Gos, for your motion. Thank you, uh, Dr. James for your second. >> Yeah. I just want to point out that, you know, again, nothing against Canvas. Um, if I do the quick math, this is a 5% increase, which is again more than board parameters of three and a half. So, that money's got to come from somewhere else. So, as we keep as we keep approving these contracts, I think the board just needs

101to keep in mind we're seeing more than three and a half% increases on all of these contracts. So, you know, just again, just keep this in mind as we're seeing new contracts. >> Yep. We're certainly looking from a tech standpoint if there's any other softwares or platforms that we don't need. Um this contract instructure uh previously had mastery connect which was an assessment platform that decided to not renew now that we're doing the pair assessment. Um, so we are continuing to look for areas that we can not have renewals and and we did actually we did go back and take off some line items from this um now that we are in year going into year five of this that we initially had to help with our initial implementation that we no longer needed. Um,

102so we're definitely aware of that. >> Appreciate >> if you know I think it would be helpful to Yeah. to kind of get um get those updates like when we have these large items like what is the percentage increase right that that would be helpful >> that yeah I not >> yeah thank you >> okay person could you please call the role >> I miss >> I >> Mr. I. >> All right. Next up, we have uh is there a uh motion to approve the Sycamore Athletic Coaches Handbook? >> So moved. >> Second. >> Uh thank you for your motion, Mr. Balot. Thank you for a second. Mrs. Bidder. >> Just a quick comment. Just uh thank you to Mr. Oington and his staff and Mrs. Lawson and our legal counsel for taking a look

103at this and it's been something that's been needed for a long time. Um, and Mr. Oington obviously has gotten it done within his first couple of years of being our athletic director. So, uh, appreciate his dedication to making sure that we're clear with our coaches about our expectations. So, um, it'll give everyone common language. >> Very good to see this. Yeah. Having done this for a long time, having some clear expectations and clear guidelines, you know, that helps people. It gives >> coaches a baseline to work from. It gives administrators and teachers something to look at if if the coach needs to improve all those kinds of things. So, great job with this. So, >> the the only thing I wanted to add that this is fantastic. Don't don't please don't misare any of that.

104Um, just as we move forward in all of our free time, um, we've approved a lot of different handbooks and they all kind of are starting to look a little bit different. If we could somehow like like pull them together, right? Like marry them together where they're where they're they're themed and they flow and they follow with again with all the free time that we have. I I totally get that. Um, all the content is absolutely fantastic. Um, that that was my only little little thought. design. >> Yeah. Marketing. >> Yeah. Well, a little a little common pouch, a little you know, >> it's really good feedback. We're in the process of um going to be creating a classified certified handbook as well. They've been on the they've been on the back burner for a

105couple years now. And so knowing that and hearing that I agree with that if they all just feel or align the same um I think that would be helpful and so we can >> because I mean I feel like there's there's a lot of similarities especially at the beginning right like we we go through the the mission and the vision and here's the really high level stuff and here's the portrait of an aviator like that all kind of feels the same and then and then let it go like then you know don't it doesn't need to follow the same table of contents or anything like that. I just it that was fine and >> it would be by assumption just for people listening and watching that the coach's handbook will follow policies and everything the

106school district and everything like that. So it's not like created out of ether you know for people who again for people who may not have a lot of experience in this. It's going to follow all the board policies and things like that to be congruent with that. So >> and it's important the handbook is not supposed to be a restatement of all the policies and all that's why the policy lives over somewhere else. >> Right. >> Yeah. Yeah. All right. >> Yeah. This is >> I I I feel like because this because we're talking about co the sports and just coaches. Um Mr. Louis and I actually had a conversation with some parents in our community about events and different things and you know I think this is really helpful because clearly I mean we

107already know that when you're in a in a club or a sport or we said a sport you you're go parents go to parent evenings and we listen to what the rules are but we can't state those rules enough um because the adults have to model good behavior and that seems to be a trend that we're seeing out not in necessarily our sycamore sports, but just in general um community events, not just not necessarily sycamore sponsored events, but even club or community events. So, I like that, you know, this does talk about communication with parents. Um it does it generally, you know, touches on, you know, just um how to talk to the coaches, too, if you're concerned. And I think that's something that's come up many times over the years um our district. So,

108thank you for putting this together for us. I think we that would still be a work in progress to you know have those conversations in our community wherever it may land but that is something that we that is highlighted with us is how adults are behaving towards one another um at games I mean not just not not necessarily sycamore games but community games. Okay. >> All right. Mr. Buren, could you please call the role? >> Mr. Hi. >> Mrs. Miller. Hi, >> Mr. Gos. >> Hi, >> Dr. Jennings. >> Hi, >> Mr. Harris. >> I All right. Uh, approval of out of Is there a motion to approve out of town field trips? >> Second. >> Thank you, Dr. James, for your motion. Thank you, Mrs. Bidder, for your second, right? You see those on

109there. >> The only thing of note, just to make sure, the state meet obviously was between board meetings, so we do have to send our kids to the state meet. So, you're approving it retroactively, but they already have gone had some success. Talk about that in a minute. Merson, could you please call the RO? >> Dr. James. >> Hi, >> Mrs. Miller. >> Hi. >> Mr. B. >> Hi, >> Mr. CN. >> Hi, >> Mr. Harris. >> Hi. >> All right. Um, other I just want to mention these couple of students because they did I was going to let the summer go by without any other, but they're too great to pass up. Uh you posasha uh fourth the state in shotp put uh she set a new school record 42 feet four I'm assum

1104 in uh but broke the it might be longer than that but I'm not very familiar with my track work but she broke Mandy Hester's um school record which she was a 1994 grad so a 32-year >> record but cool cool side story I had a conversation with Mandy Hester recently because she is the superintendent at Nelson County Public Schools in Virginia. >> Okay. >> And I saw her name pop up. I'm like, that's pretty incredible. Uh but she is um they are dealing with how to handle um Ohio now has a law that allows students that are homeschooled or at a p private school that don't offer sports. Virginia has none of that. and they're potentially considering making districts like implement that on their own. So, she was calling about that. She said, "This

111is special because I'm calling my alma mater." So, it was kind of a cool connection to that. Um, Eric Law finished fourth in the Paul Vault, 148, his personal vest at the state meet. That's pretty cool. So, fourth in the state's pretty incredible. And then Bailey Sako was eighth at the state in high jump. So, >> awesome. >> And also a personal tied a personal best. So, only other things I wanted to mention to the board. July 6th, we we sent something out to you about a um opportunity to connect as a retreat 4 to 7. And then Miss Johnson also sent you something for a 3pm training for Diligent Community, which is the new version of Board Docs. And basically Board Docs bought by Diligent. It wasn't a decision necessarily we make. diligent basically

112bought out board docs and they're just upgrading it. It looks like it'll be a nice upgrade uh for us. So, if everybody's able to make that, if it doesn't work for us, we can always set uh some other time. Um and then I just wanted to put on your radar, it doesn't need to be handled today, but we've talked about uh bringing Mike Clebon to town. He had talked to me about the end of July is available to him. So, I don't I don't know how that flows with your schedules, but it works well with mine. and I'll be in town. But I don't know if it works well with everybody else. But regardless, I am going to find a time to connect with them in person because we have some things we need to

113go over coaching wise. So whether that's here or out of town, >> how would we um set that up? I know we sent their vacation dates. So you have that. Do you >> Let me double check those. there's a time that we can >> and look and see if there's anything at the end of July that'll >> you talked about like a Friday Sat like a Friday night Saturday you look >> that's all I got >> okay all right next up uh is there a motion to approve the personnel consent agenda moved >> second Mr. ballot for your motion. Thank you, Mr. Spitter, for your second. All right, first committee, please call the roll. Mr. >> Hi. >> Mrs. B. >> Hi. >> Mr. Gos, >> hi. >> Dr. James. >> Hi, >> Mr. Harris.

114>> Hi. >> All right. And uh we move on to the treasurer's agenda now to uh the sale of vending machines. All right. is do need a motion to approve this. All right. Motion to approve the sale of a couple of vending machines. >> Second. >> Thank you, Dr. James, for your motion. Thank you, Mr. Peter, for your second. >> Okay. >> These were purchased a few years ago. Actually, more than a few. It feels like a few, but it was more than a few years ago. And the cost to operate from a staffing standpoint to what they're actually producing. Uh, Miss Helen just said, "We just need to get out of the vending business." and I trust her judgments and she's the one that manages all of that. And so >> I think they

115were vacant for two years. So yeah, >> we had to increase staffing in order to maintain them and just it didn't work. >> I I asked Miss Helbright a lot of follow. I'm a big reuse fan and she had already thought through every alternative I could present. So yeah, she's >> on top of it. All right, Mr. First, could you please call the RO? >> Dr. James, >> I. >> Mrs. Miller, >> I. >> Mr. Balance, >> hi. >> Mr. G, >> I. >> Mr. Harris, >> I. All right, next up is a motion to approve the resolution to proceed um for our combination uh expense and permanent improvement uh property tax levy that put it on the November 3rd ballot. I know we've talked a lot about this. Is there any more questions or

116anything? First, let's get our motion. I'm sorry. Um, is there a motion to approve? >> So moved. >> Second. >> All right. Thank you, Mrs. Bidder for a motion. Mr. Bal for your second. Any questions, concerns? >> Are there any questions or concerns that we should be giving you on this? >> Um, no. I mean, so we've worked with legal on putting this together. Um and so I will I will point out that what we modeled was our anticipation in the tax year 26 um you know increase what we've been modeling in our forecast and our levy presentation. That's what we've been modeling. Obviously the county doesn't know what the true valuation of 2026 is going to be yet for collection in 27. Um, so what's in what's in the resolution to proceed is the

117tax valuation that was determined at the end of 2025 or 26 collections, but the resolution spells out that we're going to that it's based on 26 collections, uh, sorry, 26 valuation and 27 collections, which the valuation will become available later this year to see, you know, exactly where the dollar amount's going to hit. Um but that's we were conservative in our estimation of property tax valuation increase. So and that was that was due to current legislation changes as well as why we were so conservative. >> All right. My my only tangent question is just in regards to um I still think we need legal guidance on who can say what, when, and where. >> In the process of working on that right now. So, I'll have some guidelines out for everybody within the next week

118or so. Very specific thing so you don't go and you get in trouble. And I don't get in trouble. Like I said, I'm not going to jail by myself. >> And that'll be and that will like So, so as board members, there's this as as teachers who are on summary. Yeah. Okay. >> Yeah. It'll be very specific as far as those kinds of things go. So, I think that's real important that people see that specificity so they don't make any inadvert. [clears throat] So, yes. >> Thank you. >> Okay. >> Mr. President, how does it work since we don't know the value of the property tax? We're saying not to exceed 6.95, but let's say that number comes in at 6.9%. And we have this breakout where we're saying 5.5 and 1.95. Does the breakout

119change if the if the total 6.95 were to change or how does that work? >> The breakout it would would change based on the valuation that's determined by the county for 2026. So we've spelled out and what we've been modeling as a five 1.95 split. that's that's further than the resolution. Um the exact dollar amount could differ based on where the valuation comes with the the increase that we modeled was only 9%. Um so this year for Hamilton County is is the triannual update. Um the value of a 9% increase is really conservative. That's again that's based on um really limiting our inside millillage the non-voted millillage to the max that's allowed to grow for collection purposes um for the inside mill but but the outside millage could could differ a little bit um and

120but then the split would differ as well. Uh the split is going to be what the split is spelled out in the resolution. And so if we happen to say it collects more than the 5.4 million, then that's what it's going to collect. >> Yes. But what we've been modeling is a conservative valuation [clears throat] increase of just the 9% just because with with all the property tax reform that was the conservative approach to doing that. So the split is going to change proportionally to whatever that 6.95 number is. I think the value the value yeah the value >> the dollar amount could change >> the actual millage will >> cannot differentiate from what's approved. So five and 1.95 and 1.95 is yes and whatever the actual >> the value of five and the value

121of 1.95 can >> based on the valuation and I think when >> why does the language say not to exceed why doesn't it just say 6.95 >> yeah there's a um ask that one more time >> so the value is going to change as Hamilton value change. So the way the this resolution is worded, it says not to exceed 6.95. So we're not going to exceed 6.95, but if the value of homes go up and we don't need to collect 6.95, we only need to collect 6.5 total or 6.85 total. That number could go down [clears throat] or no, it's set at 6.95 period. >> I think I know why >> it is set at 6.95 period. Um and that's just based on based on the modeling. It does seem a little bit backwards because

122we don't know the valuation yet. We just have to model what the valuation at the end of the year is going to be. And that's what we've been doing conservatively, but it could be more than that. We could we could actually collect more, but we can't collect. I don't anticipate valuation to go down >> because you it's you have to say that legally because what if the auditor estimated it at a little bit higher and that was higher than 6.95? It can't be. So basically it probably flattens out at whatever 6.95 is. As though if the amount was higher than 17,993 >> it' still be 6.5. >> It can't go higher. The point is it could go either the because we know the number can go either can go up or down. >> So that

123but as the value goes up you would think that the millillage would go down because you're collecting a percentage. So basically what it's saying is no matter what you can't go above 6.9 and that legally you have I think you have to put in there does not exceed because that number can flu the amount can fluctuate. >> Yeah. Well and look at it this way once what this is voted in in November >> if it's approved >> it's it whatever that amount is stays flat. >> Exactly. >> It does not go up. the dollar amount that we are collecting for 6.95 mills regardless of what happens to property values >> two three years down the road >> if property value goes up as we've seen in the past that 6.95 goes down >> correct the

124effective millage will go collect doesn't >> amount of money collected doesn't but the millage goes down >> yes eventually we would see that but the first year out >> 6.95 >> okay >> based on as primary value goes up that millage goes down >> correct yep >> then it fluctuates I guess my my follow-up question is if the property value to go down, which of course we don't think it will, that millage would go up. >> Correct. If the effective collection >> the effective collection would go up, >> but we're saying here not to exceed 6.95, but if the property value drops, we would collect more than 6.95. >> I think it's at this moment. >> Hold on. Mr. Swan has something to add here. I think it's a city valve in case if if

125values were to decrease that would push millage back up, but it's capped >> capped on the dollar amount. >> No, it's it's capped on the the millage amount. So >> So it is always >> 920 only works in one direction. So if values increase, millage will decrease, but if for some reason we had values decrease, millage would go up but to the cap 69. So I never I never realized that. >> It never comes into play. But >> Right. But that's interesting to know is it's a protection one way only. >> But this is a this is specific to the notice of the election date. This is talking about the date of the election. So that's why that that's why it says that. >> I think Mr. Burson answered the question. It's it's capped. >>

126But it can go down but can never go up. And then that that 17.9 million that's in there, that's not what we've been bottling because that's off what the county knows right now is the valuation at the end of 2025 for 2026 collections. They don't know yet what they're going what the valuation for 2026 with 2027 collections is going to be, which is why we have modeled the the conservative um increase of 9%. >> Great. Thank you. >> Yeah. Thank you. So, >> and just I feel like it's important to say because I know this is recent news. Um the amendment to abolish property tax in Ohio is not going to be on the fall ballot. Um I think this just came out a few days ago. >> I did see that. Yeah. >> Um

127they fell short of the number of signatures that they wanted to the committee fell short on their signatures. if they submit those signatures, they would basically have to to bank those signatures. By not um proceeding with putting it on the ballot, they're able to carry those signatures over. Um so they are looking at having it on the ballot next November with whatever, you know, amount of time that they've had to do. So it won't be on this ballot. Um chance it'll be on next year's. >> All right. Good job. Good discussion. Mr. Bur, would you please call the RO? >> Uh, Mrs. Ber, >> I. >> Mr. Balance, >> I. >> Mr. Gos, >> I. >> Dr. James, >> I. >> Mr. Harris, >> I. >> All right. Um, next up, uh, is there a

128motion to uh, proceed into executive session uh, pursuant to Ohio revised code section 121.22G1 22G1 to continue employment and dismissal of a public employee and also motion to enter executive session pursuant to Ohio revised code 121.22G4 to prepare for conduct and review negotiations or bargaining sessions with public employees. >> So moved. >> Thank you Mr. Bal for your motion. Thank you Dr. James for your second person. Can you call a role? No. Mr. Balance >> I. >> Dr. James. >> Hi, >> Mrs. Biddler. >> Hi, >> Mr. CO. >> Hi, >> Mr. Harris. >> I All right, the board will now enter into an executive session and we will not be reconvening and thank you very much.