001Good evening everyone. Um I'm going to call to order this uh workshop meeting declaration of a quorum. We have seven members present. Um item C is hearing of citizens. We have no one signed up to speak at this meeting. So that's going to move us to item D. Um, and I'm going to open our public hearing and we're going to receive a presentation related to the CSISD taper report for the 2425 school year. Miss Hendrickk. Good evening, Miss Higgy and Dr. Hark Ryder. Schoolboard members. I'm here this evening for our public hearing on the Texas Academic Performance Report taper for 2425. So it is from last year's data and some of the data as you'll see is actually from two years ago. Uh this report is an annual requirement. We're going to go over academic
002performance, some financial references, staff programs as well as demographics. This is a very long report. Um and it is included our district performance on star attendance rates, dropout, graduation information as well as college readiness. We will also look at the district profile for student information as well as demographics, staff information, and the programs that those students are in. In addition to taper, we are asked to reference our team's financial standard reports, which Miss Wilson has covered in multiple different sessions as we're also looking ahead. Our district is an accredited district. Our campus performance objectives were shared at the September meeting with our campus improvement plans and that presentation. Our special education does meet requirements for their determination status uh report on violent and criminal incidents. We've done student performance and post-secondary institutions and as well
003as progress with House Bill 3 goals. For our House Bill 3 goals, you've seen that multiple times. That's grade three reading, grade three math as well as CCMR. You've seen it multiple times including big presentations this September and we'll also kind of reference it this evening. So the components that we're going to cover tonight is we're going to go over STAR the postsecondary readiness staff and student demographics and then where this information is shared publicly. beginning with our star results. So, we're just going to stay at the umbrella view. Um, grades three through eight reading and this is at the approaches passing level and this is all star including Spanish, English, star, alternate to where applicable. You'll see that for each grade 3 through 8, we are above the state. State is in blue, college
004station in red. Next, we go to 3 through 8 mathematics. Again, at the approaches level, you'll see once again that we are above the state in each area. Keep in mind that with our seventh graders, we have only about half of our students taking on grade level seventh due to our advanced grade, our advanced mathematics program. Then we move to five and eight science and grade eight social studies. Once again, above the state in all areas. Then for STAR, we're going to finish up with the end of course. They take these this test as they take the course. So in the algebra one, we do have multiple middle school students in those calculations. And once again, you'll see we're above the state. For postsecary readiness, we have 100,5 students in the class of 2024. um
005that is a year behind because we're still collecting doc uh data for the class of 2025. Our four-year graduation rate was 95.9 well above the state. Our annual dropout rate, you have to reverse your mentality. You'd like a 0% dropout where we're at 2% of high school students dropping out while the state is at almost six. And then college, career, and military readiness. This is the class of 2024. We were at 71.7% which is below the state. It's an area that this district has been working on. And in that entire time of effort that we put towards it, our indicators and what we can qualify for CCMR continue to change. And then we move to advanced dual credit AP college readiness type indicators. For our advanced dual credit completion, we are a little below the
006state, but I want to move ahead to our AP graduates. Our AP graduates are very strong. You can see there were well above the state with 34.7% of our graduates having some kind of AP credit um when they graduate. Uh 63% of our students are considered college ready. And again, those are the indicators um in the accountability manual with the CCMR indicators. TSI graduates were pretty even with the state, but more of our students take SAT and ACT. We want to highlight our advanced program here at College Station ISD. It's an amazing program with over with 34% of our 11th and 12th graders having participated in some form of a AP exam. It's well above the state. I also broke it down into subjects. So you can see by subject what our percentages are of
007those students participating. And the highlight for me is that 86.1% of those students who take a AP exam for College Station ISD meet the criteria. An excellent passing rate, well above the state. For SAT and ACT participation, we have 65% of the students who have taken SAT. We uh give those on the campus levels. they register for them with 64% of them at or above criteria which is well above the state. Our average score for the SAT also well above the state and ACT as well. Then we're going to move to staff and student profiles. As of snapshot of October 24, we have 14,268 students enrolled. Our overall attendance rate for 2324 was 95%. This was our student population of those 14 plus students by race, ethnicity. See each of the categories and percentage for
008special populations. the percentage of students in economically disadvantaged emergent bilingual it's English as second language students at risk special education 504 dyslexia and gifted and talented. Now we're going to move to staff. For 2425, we had 2,60 staff members. And you can see the breakdown of teachers and other roles within the district there. As far as a teacher profile, we had 961 total teachers with 29% of them h holding an advanced degree. As far as their years of experience, it's broken down here by their years experience as well as our turnover rate. All of these results for the big district College Station ISD report as well as each individual campus are being posted on our website. Um, the reports just came in December 18th, so that's a lot of downloading and uploading. The district report
009is there and we're in the process. They could be there anytime tonight, but they'll be there. Um, and with that, I will take any public comment or questions. >> I can't recall on CCMR. Is some of that data hard to track because it's after they leave or is this just the metrics that we are able to capture? That is a great question because a lot of it is after the fact. And so like our class of 2025 that graduated back in May, we are still collecting data on as far as college readiness and where they go. There um there's a level one or two that the college can give them when they enroll, which we don't know till way after the fact. Uh there still is the military readiness indicator, but we have to have
010their DD4 farm and we have to redact it. Um and we're still collecting those well after they had left us in May. >> So I would imagine it's difficult to track all of that when they're no longer part of the district. >> Absolutely. You have to depend on their loyalty to College Station ISD and coming back to us to share that documentation with it. It can't be just a verbal phone call. It needs to be documentation such as the DD form for military. >> I can tell you from experience those are a giant pain to acquire. >> Yes sir, they are. >> Can I ask another quick question along those lines? Um cuz the one one of the areas we're below the state is some of the like the dual dual credit programs and maybe
011on some of the um how is that affecting our CCMR right on the college and career readiness and maybe on the SAT part as well. Are those areas that I I either the state is not really measuring things in a way that we think is appropriate or is it a place that we have an opportunity to do better? Does that make sense? >> And you have to remember with CCMR, you have a student that has 11 opportunities for us to get credit for, but so many of those students get areas of multiple credit, multiple indicators. We don't give bonus credit for them. Um, >> we've been more heavy here historically with College Station with AP courses than dual credit. This last year we added Tiffany, we had two different dual credit courses this last year.
012>> That's history. >> Yeah. So, we are continuing to work with Blend on potential other offerings for kids >> which would be a one of those 11 things that would help with college. could and it just give kids other options that maybe are a little concerned about taking AP to pass the test versus taking dual credit and getting credit for the course, not just uh on one test. >> Yeah. >> Are we going to go through the teacher turnover slides separately or is that part of >> Yeah, separately once you've got us have any more questions for Sherry. I will say thank you. Like you mentioned, these reports are there's so much information when you look at those blue pieces of blue and white piece of paper, but to put have it I don't know
013if they help you put that in this summary or if you do all this work, but it helps so much to have it, you know, summarized like this. So, thank you. >> You're welcome. >> Any other questions from the board? >> All right, I'm going to close this public hearing. Rich is going to walk through some teacher turnover slides for you. Okay. Good evening Dr. Hark Ryder Missy the board. Uh we do have some um slides to show you guys. I think just happened. >> There we go. All right. So, looking at teacher turnover. So, just to kind of give an overview of what these terms mean. Teacher turnover of course are the number of teachers that are no longer employed in the district compared to the previous year. Whereas retention is the number of
014teachers who are who remain in the district. So, um, when you look at teacher turnover, it does include teachers who leave the district for any reason or if they move into non-eing roles. So, when you're looking at taper and taper's uh definition of teacher turnover, taper looks at our data from snapshot to snapshot. So, the snapshot date, our fall snapshot is the last Friday in October. So they look at uh for example the FTE count of teachers from the fall of 23 24 and looking at those same teachers if they returned or not the following school year. Um when you look at uh staff classification or role ids that's with ps uh teachers are ps 087 uh for whatever reason taper also includes uh ro ID 047 which is substitutes um more in line with
015a permanent or long-term sub and we do not um count that in as a district when we are looking at turnover. uh we also when we are calculating our turnover don't include retirees. So this just gives an overview of teacher turnover from year to year. Um if I could bring everyone's attention really kind of looking at the standout is co 2020 2021. So looking at the last four years if you take a look at this you can see our turnover rate. Um but to get a better uh view of what that is or understanding of what that is, if you look at that column, that's the turnover count. It shows you the number of teachers um who left the district um or changed assignments in those respective years. So you can see 21 uh 202122
016140 teachers and then it increased another 50 teachers in 2223 and then in 2324 there was actually a a decrease in the number of teachers. It went down to 177 and then this last school year um 195 I don't know what the 7 is. is I don't know what 7 of a person is but um you can see how it has it increased in 24 25. I can I ask one thing on that because that was new to me that that data point then when we're looking at that number it's coming >> how do I get back >> oh >> sorry I was gonna go back to that >> but just um when I'm looking at that number you're saying it was from the >> previous year so um 23 24 October yes until really
017October of 24 >> yes >> okay that's it's not the whole school year >> and so it's from snapshot date to snapshot date which is when PS all of that PI's data is collected by the state from every district >> and this number includes retirees and long-term subs for taper. Yes. So this is just graphically if you look at uh teacher turnover from year to year how College Station ISTD compares to both the state and region six uh you can see that uh it goes back several years where the state or where we were below both the state and region 6 average and then in the last couple of years you can see where uh we were still below region and state until the 2425 school year but it's still a really close um in
018alignment with the state. And then something else that we thought was interesting is looking at teacher retention by years of experience. So if you look green is our teachers who enter the profession and leave within one year as compared to our more veteran teachers. If you start to look at the purple and that kind of gold above that or tan, our teachers, our more veteran teachers historically um stay in the profession longer and you know they you know we talk about if a teacher can make it past the first five years then then you've got them. And we can definitely see that one of the areas that we have to look at is how we retain those new teachers coming in, whether that be um the support they get on the campus level um at
019that first year. And I think for us a lot of it is making sure that that support goes beyond just that first year that they are in the classroom. I was sharing with cabinet that one of the questions that we get overwhelmingly when we go to job fairs um and it doesn't matter what university we're at you're going over and over again we answer the question of what supports are in place in the district for firstear teachers um so you're looking at mentoring um having instructional coaches on campus um but in our current climate I think we have to go beyond just having mentor support um when you start to think about um mental health issues and that's very prevalent. Uh we have to look at how we're going to provide support beyond just how
020do I plan a lesson, how do I deal with classroom management, but providing support in addition to that on just how to manage the daytoday. Um, so that's year-over-year. And then this shows our districtwide average overlaid with that year um, years of experience. So, any questions? >> You mentioned long-term subs, and I don't know if you know the numbers. Are is a large percent of them retired teachers, former teachers, or >> that are long-term subs? Yeah, I know a lot of teachers will sometimes get the itch and want to come back and sub. >> We we do have a a good number of our our sub pool are teachers who have retired who will come back and sub. Most of them though don't enter into long-term sub because that um once they get beyond 20
021days, it could impact their um their after retirement pay. Um, so they can't exceed a certain limit, but we do have several retirees who come back and sub in the district. >> So, are the long-term what, and I I'm asking out of ignorance, are long-term subs made up of everything? You got aspiring teachers and >> people who are looking for work or I'm just curious. Yeah. All the above. >> Yeah, that that would be an inconsistent number, too. like you may pick up a long-term sub for a teacher who's having a baby and then next year you may work and there may not be a long-term sub available that you get into and so you're eliminated out of that number if that's the case. >> And so the state says long-term subs and retirees don't
022matter in retention. It's all the same. >> Yes, they count those. >> Yeah. So I appreciate this is helpful. Thank you. The overview is helpful. I think I mean obviously the the data point that feels most concerning is the increase in the teacher turnover. I went back and looked at old taper reports and they were called something else before taper. I don't remember the wasn't as clever as a initial so I don't recall it. But this was the first year since 2010. So the first year in 15 years that our turnover was higher than the state average. And then I also noticed that in our peer group of district peers that we use 10 of the 12 the turnover went down from last year and ours was one of only two that went up. Why
023do we think we're the anomaly of those other districts that are sort of like us? And also, what do we think is driving our not great performance against the state average for the first time in 15 years? >> Yeah, there's a no one answer. There's a lot of, you know, factors that teachers lead the profession for. Some of those we don't have any control over and some that do. So I think from our standpoint, anytime we have a metric that's not meeting our expectations, then we want to dig in and do what we can obviously to improve that whether that's teacher turnover, whether that's student performance. So our goal is to get out uh we'll survey administrators, teachers, get some feedback. Uh we're also Miss Leafer has some experience on our cabinet visits in the
024spring. She's went out in the district before and we'll do that this year to be a little bit more scripted and what they call stay interviews. So you visit with staff members that stay with you and why are they staying and then what factors potentially that we can control here that may be driving folks out. What changes could we make? Obviously looking at the data points, your early year teachers is is problematic from a standpoint of we've got a mentor program but they seem to be leaving more often across the state. uh teachers that enter the profession, 41% are leaving in years 1 through five. So our numbers are similar. So why? And I think those are questions and concerns. Uh we've come up with some ideas potentially that uh principles meeting with their first
025year teachers on their campus next year, maybe once a month as just a check-in. It's no training. It's no anything. Just having a conversation and building relationships uh with those groups. >> So I got to confess something. Could Could we maybe see turnover numbers per campus at some point or retention? >> We have those. I'll be able to share it to you in a separate email if that's okay. >> I mean, I like the discussion of trying to find out underlying reasons for it. I mean, um although we also another piece of information is the like exit surveys. we been doing exit surveys um on folks and and kind of compiling summarizing some of that data. >> Yeah, we do exit surveys uh pane's idea and I agree it's probably a little bit to do
026the stay interviews of what's keeping our folks here. You know, what's the hook to keep them there and we look for one-offs on exit interviews of if there's a common theme of why people are leaving or if there's a particular campus that the turnover rate seems higher than normal without a leadership change. And so I think it's just us digging into that data and having conversations and making adjustments. >> I mean, and Mr. Yes, Mr. Man's on the front front row there. The man has been doing a whole lot of summary data information with AI and and being able to, you know, take some of that information and consolidate it into maybe something that could be um some meaningful feedback for it for us. Um and >> yeah, we've got data broken down. Uh Jeff
027has done it by comparable districts by campus percentages campuses compared to state average district retention by years of experience all the way up. So we have all of that we can share. >> The other thing I noticed was that our new teacher numbers are really really high beginning teachers that zero years of experience which I was surprised. It feels like when we're losing these teachers we're not backfilling with experience. Uh I noticed that our state we were twice the state average this year in number of beginning teachers which is about three times our district peers. Do are we having trouble finding experienced teachers compared to our district peers? >> I think just nationwide finding experienced teachers is an issue. the I can tell you that being in like always living in this area, having Texas
028A&M in our backyard has been a huge huge asset um to having those teachers um available that are graduating and and ready to stay here. Uh but I can tell you that when we go out to job fairs, we go in the fall and in the spring. In the fall, um we have folks that are graduating in December. And although we will collect up, you know, upwards of a hundred resumes. A lot of those folks have already accepted um positions, but that is definitely one of our largest pools. But when it comes down to having experienced uh most of those folks are going to be people who are moving to the area for some reason or other um where we so I mean just by nature we're getting those more inexperienced teachers because they're our
029pipeline from&m and from Sam Houston. >> Yeah. And campuses I mean when they have multiple positions open and multiple people that apply we don't micromanage who principles hire. So they have the discretion to hire an experienced teacher, inexperience, whatever they want to do. >> But doesn't it seem a little odd that I mean it's not a new number. I want to be clear the historically we've been at about 3.7% beginning teachers to the state average of eight. This year we were 14% zeroyear teachers to the state average of seven. So this isn't I understand obviously Texas A&M is here but this it feels that's a feels like a tremendous I mean four times what our last 10year average has been. That means unless I'm misunderstanding we've gone from about one of every 20 teachers is
030a zeroyear teacher to about one of every seven and that's just in the last 12 months. Bridget, can we run number on applications per year with years of experience? >> Yes, we could get that information. >> We'll get that >> just that feels like a that was a significant piece of information that stood out. I think part of that I mean my wife's been in the district for 10 years and what I would tell you just I don't have no I won't give you percentages but part of what you're seeing is we hire a lot of people out of&m right they've been student teachers here so we get young teachers the most people who live in this community are 18 to 21 or 30 35 plus so in order for them usually to meet somebody
031this is not a community to do that so I don't know how many um again not numbers more anecdotal but a lot of my wife's co-workers have gone to other districts to larger cities in hopes of meeting more people in their age demographic. So, and then you look at the national average, right, where you're seeing people leave teaching at a drastic rate ever since CO, then you're going to have to hire teachers with less experience because they're getting out of the industry. So, again, I don't know numbers >> that would play out across the whole state, right? Where it's not unique to us. >> Well, I Yeah, but you pick I mean, there's a thousand plus districts. So I don't know that we're entirely >> something that's unique to us is affordability in College Station
032since CO uh the cost of living here is extremely high compared to surrounding areas. Our teacher pay scales if surrounding areas if you get anywhere around the Houston area is not touching that market. So they're not going to come to College Station for a job unless they're wanting to be in College Station to retire. So I think that's a factor as well >> in some of the information just for long-term planning. uh when you generate the report for the number of candidates based on experience, >> is it possible for you to uh just look back at the fall and for core content openings, how many applications maybe we had for a particular position. Let's say one of our high schools had we had a biology position posted. Could could you retroactively see you could you
033should be able to see how many people applied for that? >> We can see >> vacancy. >> Yes. >> I'm just curious what our our candidate pool looks like because I know it's becoming more challenging. just curious since we're having this conversation if that might be a piece of information that would uh benefit um some of our efforts or focus some efforts also >> and I think Dr. Dr. Hark Ryder touched on one of the challenging things that not a lot of people like to talk about is classroom behavior since co of what we're seeing with kids and how they react and social interactions and driving you maybe young inexperienced teachers who aren't ready for that. Um maybe they were great in school but getting in the classroom is a whole different experience and I
034think that's a genuine challenge for teachers. As my wife will say it is the most rewarding job she's ever had. It's also the most challenging job she's ever had. >> Yeah. There are a lot of factors that we can't control, but I think what I heard about um us needing to focus in on our newer teachers and how to support them and how to mentor them and give them what they need to help them grow and want to stay as a teacher. I mean, I think that's that's really key in all of this because we can't know why every number looks the way that it does right now. Um and there are lots of challenges, but we are at the doorstep of&M and we are going to get those new teachers walking in the door,
035those that want to stay here. And so I I just I'm really zeroing in on what you said. I think that's an important thing for us to be looking at as a district. >> One more comment. Um because this does concern me. I mean, we sit and go through everything and look at how we're above the state in so many metrics, you know, through the taper, but then to have this one not be is something I think, you know, it is concerning. I'm also even a little more concerned to tonight because I realize that this is quite old data. It is for more than a year ago if you're you're explaining right. It came that the it was between October 2023 to 2024. So we don't know what's been happening for more than a year
036now. Um if s rate >> that's why I was clarifying with the with the retention part specifically even though it is it was from even though we're saying 2425 it the taper report is measuring from a snapshot of October of 23 >> 2020 that example was 2023 I think maybe that's but I think the example that I was talking about when I was looking at the definition, but our taper like the percentage that you see was looking at the number of teachers in October of 2024 and then what number of those same teachers were in our district this past October 2025. Okay. So that this taper has June S or SA it has our test scores from May but it has this October 2025. Okay. So I I will hold my read. >> There's the
037efficiency of the state Kim. >> Yeah. Exactly. I'm surprised they got it to us that soon. So thank >> So can you talk a little bit more about I was probably a little less clear. This is my fault. I apologize, but ex like what exactly are we doing? I heard surveys, but we've done like we did thought exchange in the fall with teachers. I read back through that this last couple of days and that had a fairly considerable amount of feedback. I don't know what we've done with that feedback. Unfortunately, one of the feedbacks was too many surveys. So, I'm a little hesitant that the the answer is now to go do more surveys, but can we can we be, you know, the challenge of a taper report like this is we won't really know
038if our numbers have gotten better or worse for another 12 months. And that feels like an awfully long time to hope for the best. And I know that you mentioned in September, Dr. Hark Rider, that you expected the turnover to be even less this year. You mentioned 10 a 10% figure in September. >> I don't remember. >> Well, expecting it to be even better. You were referencing the last two years. Are we still >> I mean that's that's everything that we do we want to improve. So yeah, we never are going to anticipate we're going to drop. >> Sure. >> But outside of anticipation, what are our actual concrete plans for ensuring that we're taking the surveys we've done? We're listening and we're gonna make this number better than it is so that we're not
039below the state average again. >> I think you just outlined the steps we're going to take. >> Survey have conversations. Take action. >> So, we already did one survey two months ago. >> Yeah. I'm talking specific survey to retention, not a generic survey. >> Okay. >> Yeah. Not an overarching. We want to dig in specifically into the retention piece. And then the teacher advisory committee, how often is that meeting? >> Yeah, last year we met uh two times, maybe three. This year we're going to meet in the spring. We're going to talk about uh teacher retention. We're going to talk about staff development. We're going to talk about curriculum plans moving forward. >> Okay. Well, I would love for that to I don't know the exact metrics. all figured out before the next meeting. But
040getting more frequent than annual reports on this feels important. So, however, I'll figure out the exact protocol, but uh I would love to make sure we're continuing to be informed on exactly what is happening on a month-to-month or quarterly basis. Um, just so we're not waiting a year to get this information. >> Well, HR has information when we anytime we process a separation, we track the resignations that we receive or separations from month to month. The department the departments where those separations are coming from um the reason for the separation, whether that be someone who's resigned or if they have retired. So, we do have that information in HR. Anytime Dr. Hark Rider, if Austin reaches out to us and needs to know um what our separations look like or resignations look like, we have
041that information from month to month. >> This is state data, right? And we're also talking because we have that. You're also talking about annual contracts for teachers. >> Sure. >> So, they would have to break contract for them to pop up on those numbers for just teachers if that's what we're talking about. >> Right. Yeah, that's I was going to say one of the challenges is yes, we may have um certain circumstances that pop up during the year where somebody leaves, but the majority of this is an annual thing. And so we really don't know in January what our turnover rate is going to look like um going into next school year. >> That's why they use the snapshot data. So it's an apples to apples comparison, >> right? But I mean just from a
042perspective of asking as a board there's going to be limited information I would think that you could give us because most people are not leaving in the middle of the year. Is that fair? >> Correct. That's correct. >> Yeah. I mean the things we can measure like we have a teacher advisory committee and it hasn't met since last year. >> Is that correct? Did I understand that correctly? >> Correct. Yeah. We don't meet just to meet. Yeah. We had a lot of other uh >> different things that we did this fall and we were setting up the spring because a big conversation piece is the curriculum spot. >> Yeah. >> Obviously with teacher retention rate as another step that we could take. >> Well, TAC as I understand it too was primarily to deal with
043discipline. Was it not? >> I don't remember. >> Just to give feedback. Yeah, we we talked a variety of topics last year in a couple of different meetings and just trying to get a feel for teachers to be able to have a voice. Also, you mentioned surveys. The new platform we have is so much more robust than the surveys we've been doing in the past and it is going to provide us with some takes the data and gives us some plans and what to do with it. So, I think I think we have a more powerful tool to capture information like you're wanting from teachers and and to see the why. >> Yeah. And I mean, I read through the thought exchange survey from November and it's ton of great information. And I think the
044challenge is what are we doing with that information? How are we how are we using it to to move forward? I mean, one of the key, you know, things that came out of that was that we had lumped campus admin and central office together. I think we talked about that a couple board meetings ago and that was a a theme throughout the AI summary on each of the questions on thought exchange. I just the last thing I'll say is I I it's probably annoying maybe to people but I don't think we can overstate why it matters when retention is when turnover rate is relative to the state the worst it's been in 15 years why it's important now to listen to teachers I mean on that thought exchange listen to them even more than we
045have on the thought exchange the question that we did the worst on was the district and school leadership involving staff and meaningful decision-making processes. So only 39% of teachers agreed or strongly agreed that that was the case. And so I think there's clear evidence across the various numbers that we have that teachers probably aren't feeling like they're part of these important conversations. And so it's great to talk to them and do exit interviews and it's great to do stay interviews, but it's going to be important that we are doing something because otherwise I'm afraid we'll be having the same conversation in a year. >> Chris, to answer your question about what we're doing with the thought exchange survey that was conducted in the fall. If you recall when we presented that information, the strategy districtwide
046that is then taken down to the campus level is to do a general district survey push into the campuses. And so Melanie and I have met with I think almost all of the principles on their specific campus data to dig into asking those follow-up questions. you mentioned um talking about the difference between district and campus admin decision-making processes and and how to understand that. Those are all details that we're working out directly with the campus leaders who are closest to those teachers. And so that's that's the process that's being moved forward with that data. Now, does it happen open in the public all the time? No. But it it is that process that was presented originally is currently moving forward. All those principles are being charged and encouraged and supported by the communications department to
047do at least one of those exchanges that we showed you to ask a follow-up question. Work with our guiding coalitions to try to understand their specific campus data. Uh try to understand how to increase the survey participation. All of those things are being worked out currently at the campus level with the support of the district. And then even to that point, um, several of our campuses have already started using the platform on their own to survey students, parents, staff on some of the more specific data points that they want to talk to or just to work into their normal rhythm. So does that answer your question about it for that? >> I think so. Yeah, I mean using thought exchange for those kind of follow-ups feels like a way to not have to wait for
048a year to get that feedback loop from turnover. So that's an that's a perfect example of you know being able to ask those questions. I thought the this the AI summary was very clear in places where there was some opportunities and but we have to actually you know follow up and and get clarity on what those opportunities are and then report back so that we see that we're either making headway people are feeling more heard they are feeling more valued. It just it feels hard to recognize exactly what it is that's happening without clearer data which I know is what we're seeking. Yeah. But I did feel like we if if anyone wants to go I mean those are all online right the anyone that's watching this or listening can go read through those but
049I mean I thought those were pretty telling on some of the gaps we have even without u some of the specificity of the questions. I still thought the AI summary was pretty clear from where people probably filled in the blank. I think I oop, sorry. I think I can speak for all of us when I say that not a single one of us are wanting any of our educators to leave the district or quit teaching, right? And it's important for us to retain those teachers because it's pertinent to not only the families and the students, but our community as a whole. So, it sounds like we we're digging and we're using the right programs to get the data and the wise, but now it's tackling the solutions. And I think Austin said it right when
050he said, "We're not going to see all of that all the time." And the public's not going to see that all the time because sometimes that's a campus thing that has to be worked out. And then I think it gets up to the district when it needs to follow the chain of command. I was just going to say that I I think we have a lot of really hardworking teachers and administrators and staff throughout this district and as we look at numbers sometimes um sometimes it's hard right and sometimes there is a year where a number doesn't go the way that we would like for it to but there's always so many factors that are a part of that um when I look at the fact that we're um I mean historically yes we've been
051below the state average. We've been below the region six average. Um, so I would just like to put a little bit out there that there's still a lot of great things that have been happening in this district. Um, and I would like to say let's just consider that when we're talking about wanting good data, this data right here, as you know, Miss Cooper has just described to us, it includes a lot of things that we can't really like put in there as like, hey, this is good data because it includes things like long-term subs. it includes like our retirees. And so I know that I would I would be more concerned at looking at a different turnover rate like that is actually calculated by our district that's actually showing us are our teachers still here.
052Are they here but they've moved into a different position? Um those kind of things are relevant too. So I'm not saying we don't need to have some work in this area. I'm not saying that we don't need to do surveys and figure out and get input from teachers, but I'm also saying that I don't think that this number is the only data data point and the only piece that we should be looking at. Y'all are not going to like this, but can you scroll up to slide two because I am still confused on the time period of this. Um and may and and you maybe we can talk take it offline but um the slide two with the definition in there at least that exact example clearly says it was from 2324 school year which
053would mean the snapshot occurs in October of 2023 compared to a 2024 which would mean the fall of 2024. We can we don't if if that's not true or if we're unclear, we can find that out and let me know, please. >> Okay. >> Thanks. >> Just one more item and we can close. I if we do a survey to collect additional information on this or the use of thought exchange or whatever it may be, uh can can we have a board report on those results? because I know that did the survey uh you did a wonderful presentation I think in November al about thought exchange and the survey and and I know we had the results and they were included in a transmitt with the link to the website and it was posted on
054the website but I think it would be of benefit for us as a board for that information to be then presented to us in a meeting so that we can have conversations and ask questions about what we're getting from those results as opposed to just posting them. They're there, people can look at it, so on and so forth. I think we owe it to the community to have those conversations relative to that feedback. And I think then it will provide some validation to our stakeholders and our teachers in particular that we're taking time to discuss, you know, public meeting what they're saying to us in these surveys. I don't think putting it in transmitt and putting it on a website and us not having a conversation as a board um gives the results the merit
055it deserves. Just just my observation on that for future reference. >> Okay, I think we're going to move on to um E1 to teacher incentive a lotments. >> Yes. All right. So shifting gears a little bit talking about retaining teachers I am going to um talk about one of the avenues that we utilize here in College Station ISTD to retain teachers and that is through our participation in the teacher incentive aotment. Um so what is TIA? Um it is a state-f funded program that allows districts to provide financial awards to high performing teachers particularly high-erforming teachers um that are serving high needs and um rural campuses. So through TIA teachers can earn three levels of designations currently which is recognized exemplary or masters. Um teachers who obtain their national board certification are also um able
056to have a designation. Currently um teachers with national board are recognized and they receive the aotment um for the recognized designation. Uh that is changing and I'll talk about that a little bit more later. So those designations do generate annual funding aotment for the school district and 90% of those funds go directly to teachers to increase their compensation. 10% of that is retained at the district level for implementation of TIA and administrative costs. For example, some of the student growth measures that we use or the tests that we use for TIA, some of that um goes to pay for that. That's like just one example. So this is an overview. Um the first data submission was in the year of 2223 and that year uh we designated 177 teachers. 39 of those were recognized, 107
057were exemplary, 31 were masters and um those designations generated 1.7 million. Um and then you can see how that has increased in 2324 269 designations and in 2425 357 designations. So last year based on that um data submission we had uh we generated $3.6 million in TIA funds. So looking at this um by campus, these the next two graphs show um how those designations look across campuses um the number of recognized exemplary and master at every campus as well as the um amount that they generate as far as their allotment. So the least that a teacher can earn is $3,000 at the recognized level. Um, but a teacher with a master designation can earn up to $32,000. And you can see that we do have um a couple c of campuses that are above 20,000.
058Um, one where teachers um are generating almost $25,000. And this is just 2425 same um same data. So, looking at our progression, when the district originally applied for TIA, um the district was very clear and the the committee that worked on this uh wanted to make sure that we started small um and got it right. So rather than trying to um make every course an eligible assignment, uh the decision was made by that committee to start with two categories, early childhood, which is prek and head start. PreK and Head Start use circle data um as the student growth measure and then it was K through 8 English language arts and math and 2 through8 science. So we submit data in October and then in the spring every um every year the district has the opportunity
059to submit expansion and modification application. So um in that application we are able to add additional eligible courses. So in 2023 we were able to add biology 5 through eight social studies and US history algebra 1, English one and English 2 and then a number of CTE and fine arts courses. So um algebra 1, English uh one and English two that first year we utilized um the end of course data and compared it to STAR for the previous year. Um after doing that for one year and and knowing that we had MAP test which MAP is the assessment that we use um for a number of our courses uh we did switch over to MAP for algebra 1, English one and English 2 and were able to add additional courses. So as you can see
060in 2024 um we are now up to six categories all English at the high school level, algebra 1 and two and geometry. There are a number of social studies courses in category three. Um category three is our student growth measure there is locally um locally developed assessments. Our c um content coordinator uh develops assessments, field tests those assessments or pilots them for a year before we add them to our application. Um we were able to add additional CTE courses. Originally we used precision exams which are exams that students are able to earn certifications but there was a limit to the number of courses that um precision exams that there were precision exams for. So, um Kevin Ross and Sheran Cling scales um went out and searched and found ICEV and those um it provided additional
061courses or additional test for CTE courses. And then in category six for fine arts, there are now there's now opportunity for basically all fine arts teachers to earn um or to be eligible for teacher incentive aotment. Um, so what's next? Because, you know, we want as many teachers to be able to um earn a designation and that extra um aotment as possible. And so possible expansions that we are looking at in athletics, we're looking at PE. Um, additional secondary sciences, chemistry is is a big one. Um we're looking at ESL at the secondary level and then languages other than English. Uh the the hugest the the biggest um challenge for these courses is having the student growth measure. So having the test that you can use um to measure student growth. Uh MAP is not
062available for these courses and so we are researching other measures. Um, for example, TEAKS ready is one of the ones that we are looking at. Um, the the challenge that we're having right now is that the TICSS ready um tests would have to be imported into our current system which is performance matters. Um, and it's making sure that we are able to um select a student growth measure that is going to be able to fit with the platforms that we use when we um when it comes down to disagregating all of the data. Um but we are continuing to expand each year. Um with House Bill 2, there came some changes with TIA. So some of the key changes are noted here. So starting this year, um there's an increase in the support that TEA
063provides to districts um with implementing TIA as well as regional support. So, we have a a a a dedicated person at region six that we can reach out to at any time if we need any assistance with anything dealing with TIA. Um there's also um now something called enhanced TIA that I'll talk about in just a moment. And then now there is also more um ESPC state board of education is reviewing national board certification and what that looks like as it pertains to uh teacher incentive aotment. And then starting next year in 2627 we now have three designation levels. Starting in 2627 there will be four. Um there's a fourth level now um acknowledged. So right now you have to uh your overall TIA score a teacher's overall TIA score has to be 3.7 um
064to earn a recognized designation with the addition of acknowledged a teacher's overall score of 3.5 would allow them to earn a designation. uh there's going to be an increase in the allotment payouts and then once a teacher earns a designation that designation lasts for 5 years unless they earn a higher designation. So if a teacher earns a master designation they keep that designation for 5 years. So our first year our first uh year cohort those designations will expire in July of 2027. The original TIA um rules was that during that fourth year, you would have the opportunity to um have your data submitted that following fall um to renew your designation or to earn another designation. They have changed that now for only for teachers who have a master designation. Um there's an opportunity for
065early renewal. So those teachers uh if they earn or if their um overall score is at the master level their five-year clock will start over one year early. So enhanced TIA sorry so districts can now earn an enhanced TIA designation. To earn an enhanced TIA designation, uh districts have to build an evaluation system and a compensation plan for both teachers and principles. So for a district to be enhanced TIA, it's not only teachers who will be awarded um an incentive. The incentive would also be awarded to principles and assistant principles. In order to do that though, um, one caveat is that 100% of your assignments have to be eligible teaching assignments. The other is that your compensation plan has to change from like our we have like a a step um compensation plan. It would
066have to change to a compensation plan that's based on performance instead of years of service. So performance-based pay. Um those districts though who are an enhanced TIA district are able to retain an additional 10% of those funds to support the new system. And then uh finally I'll just share um our latest submission. So we were able to submit 256 new proposed designations to TIA and you can see the breakdown there. Um 157 of those are teachers who did not have a designation previously. So this is their first designation. And then 99 are teachers who held a designation um of either recognized or exemplary who have now earned a higher designation. Uh we will not uh learn well we should learn in the next few weeks. It's usually end of uh January, beginning of February when
067we learn if our application was accepted. And then um in later in the spring in midappril is when that funding map goes out. Uh that shows the aotment that is generated by each um campus in the district. And that just talks about the number of CSISD teachers who have a current or a proposed designation. 487. So almost half of our teachers have a designation or have been submitted for a proposed designation. Okay. Any questions? That's awesome that half of our teachers are able to take advantage of that. Um, and I also like that we're adding I mean to me adding more um eligible teachers. >> Where are we on that percentage though? Like what percentage of all of our teachers are eligible now? So it's in and so the verbiage for TIA it's not really
068the teachers that are eligible, it's the courses that are eligible. So currently right now all of our elementary are eligible. Um intermediate and middle school most of those are where our area right now other than like PE would be at the secondary level. It's having like chemistry I keep coming to is a big one. Um and the the rub there is finding an assessment that we can utilize to measure that student growth. >> Okay. So, I mean, you could figure out like based on all our teachers, how many are not eligible today to um get >> I can't tell you that number off >> the top of your head. Yeah, that's so but there's >> and most of them are in um the SEC secondary. It is I would say I know there's teachers who
069frustrated with it too and frustrating to me that some of um teachers teaching these uh core science classes or an AP science or math class and not eligible, you know, for this. So, I appreciate all the work that we are to, >> you know, get 100% of those courses, but that I mean, I'm assuming that's the goal is to get all teachers eligible. >> As many Yes. as many as possible. And and for AP, if it's a if it's an eligible teaching assignment, then those AP courses, they are eligible as well. Um we have because of the fact that we had some things in our original um application or for our at the district level some of the criteria. Uh one of the criteria that was kind of started to hinder us in at the
070secondary level was the number of sections that a teacher had to teach in order to um be able to be included in that data submission. Um and so what we have have decided now is that if you are in an eligible teaching assignment and you teach at least 10 students your data will be included because it what was starting to happen because of of scheduling when you think of PLC's and different things like that you could have a teacher who was teaching two sections of algebra one but three sections of a course that wasn't eligible and that teacher if they did not have at least three sections of that eligible assignment, their data wasn't included. And so now if you are in an eligible teaching assignment, your data will be included. >> Oh, that's wonderful.
071That's a that should add some more to that's fantastic. And my other question is on you mentioned the total number like if you're a master um I know is somewhat based on our if we're rural or or so forth. Um is do we have teachers who are getting an extra 32 >> the >> what's the highest for college? highest for us is between 20 and 25,000. Okay. Just off the top of my head thinking about looking at there's a system called SCOMS where all of that data is. Um we have teachers at a particular campus who are earning $23,000 >> additional. That's fantastic. >> And that's all state money, right? That's not local. So >> it's not local. It's all state. And um I was we had our the state had the first TIA conference
072uh last summer um and Commissioner Morath was there and that was one of the questions for like from the panel was how long can this be sustained? Um because there has been definitely some some concern that this will go away. Um and so based on what we are told this is is not going away and they are actively trying to increase the amount that can be um allotted to teachers. >> So when this started this was legislators, my opinion wanting to say that we could pay teachers 100 grand, right? >> Yes. It was giving them a six a six figure salary. >> So but it was also government math. So when they rolled it out, they said, "Okay, who's eligible?" Right. And who's not? Yes. >> And it was based on growth of how you
073did with your students. Correct. >> You mentioned rural, so there's an emphasis on that. So if you're teaching on level students, it is typically easier to show growth with on level, right? Wouldn't you agree? Versus advanced. >> So it can be for better or worse, what what not the teacher's fault, but a bit of gaming the system. If you teach on level compared to advance, it would be harder to do. >> And because it was government math and we rolled it out and we said, "Go figure it out." Every district was basically told, "Go figure it out." Right. >> Yes. >> And we started small, which I understand, but we also excluded a lot of teachers in that process. And so I commend the fact that we've now over 350 whatever doubled in a couple
074years, $3.7 million in earnings that they are eligible to make. >> Um I commend you guys. When when we interviewed Dr. Hike Rider and every candidate, I specifically asked about teacher incentive a lot >> and I want to thank you for tackling this giant bear to again dealing with government math and who's eligible and who's not to get now K through 12 eligible, CTE eligible, um fine arts eligible. It's not just core classes. So, thank you for tackling that. Thank you for taking this on so that our teachers can make more money. I know it's a challenge. Uh my own wife dealt with it of trying to get that math of who's eligible and who's not. Um but thank you guys for tackling this and making sure that our teachers can make more money. Um
075and take advantage of this opportunity. So, thank you. >> I think Coupe said this year's number is closer to 500 uh teachers. It's right below 500. >> Yes. >> Yeah. Exactly what I was going to say. So, thank you so much for your work on this. Absolutely. >> Okay, I think we next up we have um Kevin Ross. >> Wow, we're gone. All right. Good evening, Miss Egg, Dr. Hawker, members of the board. Uh very proud to be here tonight. uh as you a lot of you were there a couple weeks ago when we had uh a little kind of a soft ground uh opening there with the CTE center. Now we need to start talking about staffing of that CTE center. So I'm going to talk to you a little bit about that tonight.
076Uh again, all uh anticipation is fall of 2026. Uh it sounds like everything is moving forward. We are scheduling kids as we speak uh with our counselors. We really want to be proactive here to try to get as good a teachers as possible. So, I'm here to talk to you a little bit about that tonight. This is just an aerial just to kind of remind everybody of the blueprint of the building. Uh top left you can see a mechanics, work your way over from welding. Uh you'll see vet science, agricultural, animal science, drop down to cosmetology. Uh the really nice thing about this is we were able to capture three different cosmetology labs in here. Uh that's going to tie in really well so kids can advance uh all three uh years of it. Work
077your way down multi-purpose area and then to your left you'll see construction and automotive. Just want to remind everybody this is not a new school. Uh we do not have a cafeteria. Uh this no new mascots or anything of that nature. This is to bring kids out. We're going to train them and we're going to bus them right back to their home campus. That way they can always continue to do athletics, fine arts, uh anything they want to at that home campus. Uh we have some existing FTEEs which is really nice. Uh FTEES are an acronyms we use all the time for full-time equivalent. That means basically one teacher. So we have a couple of existing FTEEs that we're going to propose we move from our current campus that will move out there which saves
078the district money. We don't need to hire for that. Uh, one of those is an a mechanics FTE from Console and the other one is a construction FTE from College Station High School. We have some new FTEEs for CSISD. Uh, we've never had an automotive, welding or cosmetologist person to my knowledge, uh, at least in the last many, many years. So, we need to go ahead and work towards getting those hired. If you'll notice on the left, uh, remember we do have kids currently sitting in automotive and welding at Brian uh, ISD. Those kids will now come to us and stay home with us. So, we need to look at uh getting an automotive and a welding teacher. We currently do not have those in the district. On the right side, you'll see cosmetology. Very
079excited again about this one. Uh we need to go ahead and uh start working to get towards a cosmetologist. Okay. Now, keep in mind um at full capacity there will be one automotive, one welding. There possibly will be three cosmetologists, but that will be years down the road as we build and gain and gain and kids sign up. So, what I'm presenting tonight is the one cosmetologist. Just a couple of uh things for you here at full capacity. Uh let's start at the top with automotive. We will be running three double blocks. Okay? So, that's three two period classes. They will not be just teaching a single class. At traditional high schools, my teachers teach six out of seven periods. These teachers will basically be doing the same thing, but it'll be three two period
080classes. So, as you work your way to the right, uh, automotive, uh, to start with, we'll set about 15 will be our max in there for safety reasons. So, a teacher, 15* 3, which equals 45. What just want to point this out because the district's working really hard to make sure uh, the equity of all teachers teaching full loads. Okay. So, when you see that 45, that's actually 90 students in the CTE uh, world. And then when you look to the far right, I just want to remind people uh the state has done a really good thing for CTE and give us a thing called weighted funding. Uh these courses are very expensive. We have a lot of consumable supplies. So that uh that number is times 1.47 and that's the highest funding level that
081we can gain in CTE uh which is really good for the district. So as you kind of work your way down, I just wanted to highlight all of these courses are double block. All of these teachers will will be teaching max capacity three double blocks and all of these courses are at our middle and highest tier for funding which is a really good thing. Uh as you work your way down to the bottom wanted to point this out. Uh get a lot of questions with this. How are we going to actually start enrolling kids and then what happens if we hit max capacity early on? Um in the bottom is basically how this is going to happen. Um, you just got a presentation from the tapper going back to the CCMR. Well, CT is a
082big part of CCMR and one of the biggest things we've got to do is we've got to capture these kids to be completers. How you do that is you get them for three years. So, we want to really put the emphasis on sophomores so we can have them for three years. And at the end of that three years, there's an IBC, another an acronym, uh, industrybased certification. So for CCMR in the CTE world, if we can keep them for three years and get that IBC, which every one of these courses has an IBC, then that's good for our accountability. So again, we'll start with sophomores. We'll fill those in. From there, we'll take juniors. Uh and then we want to get as many kids as possible, okay? We want to maximize our funding, maximize our
083teachers. So we will take firsttime seniors, even though they won't be a completer, that's okay. even though they won't have an IBC, that's okay. They're going to get some real world hands-on experience before they graduate and maybe they want to get into the trades when they graduate. So, that's how we will um get students involved. Couple of other things that we have going on out there right now. Uh we are currently using a portable building with two classrooms and that's where we're teaching wildlife, ranging ecology, practicum and egg, livestock, and our vet science courses. Uh we're currently using three different CTE teachers. Uh one from Console and two from College Station High School. They are a teachers. Uh we've been doing this now. This will be our second year. It's going well. It's what we
084call a floater. They they drive out there, they teach for a couple classes, then they go back to their home campus to finish out their day. We will uh more than likely continue this process. We're not uh looking for any more a teachers. We have enough, but I just wanted to point that out. So they will physically leave the uh portable and enter the building now and we'll continue teaching that way. Overall the CT center st center staffing needs like I said there's no cafeterias, there's no uh things that you see at a traditional uh campus. We'll have CTE teachers at full capacity. We will have a nurse. We'll have a security guard and we'll have a custo custodian. Uh our security guard will be one of those through TNT uh uh security guard. uh
085not the Brazes County. Um and we already have a a custodian that kind of floats out there. We would then hopefully get them as full-time. With that, I would love to entertain any questions uh you have. I think this is awesome. Again, at the um beam ceremony and all the signing ceremony, this is what 15 plus years in the works or whatever it is. So, seeing all these come to life u is exceptional. I would be remiss, Mr. Ross, if I didn't point out, Mr. Hogan's here and Miss Parkerson, my Mrs. Payne, my English teaching wife, is only an acronym if it makes a word or you use it as a word. Otherwise, it's an abbreviation or initialism. And she's ruined my life by telling me that. So, I'm just making that correction. Yeah. Now,
086now you know and you have to carry that burden. >> Is this why you teach CTE instead of camp? >> This is why I stay in the CTE lane cuz I don't understand what he just said. Clarkson, Mr. >> We are really thankful to have you doing CTE. This is exciting. >> I I'm excited to hear about it. So, >> thank you. >> Hey, Kevin. Have and you probably have if you put pencil to paper just to calculate the additional waiting and the revenue piece relative to the cost of the new positions just how that will play out at all. >> Yes, sir. I haven't toyed with it in the last probably year to two. Uh basically what the number we usually chase is if we can get about a hundred kids on a CTE
087teacher role with the weighted funding it it it pays for itself. Yes sir. Plus the 45% that goes to the general fund. >> Yes sir. >> Very good. Yeah. I I concur with Dr. Payne. Not all the English stuff he was talking about but just that this is uh this is wonderful. It's been a long time coming for our school district. >> Yes sir. Kevin, speak on the savings of not having to use Brian anymore. >> Oh, yes. So, uh, over the last, uh, five years, uh, every year I get to cut a tuition check. Uh, it's a wash, uh, through ADA, another anacronym. Um, but that's what we what we generate. uh we had anou with Brian ISD and basically what we got together and said was whatever that student generates that you would
088take in funding that we're going to cut that check for that and it's basically a wash. Uh over the last five years it's fluctuated. The highest we've paid is 130,000. The lowest we've paid is about 68,000 and that's because they can only take so many of our students. So just a good average for just uh spitballing is about $100,000 a year is what we're paying in tuition that now we will keep in house with our own staff. Yes, sir. >> Okay. Thank you. >> All right. Thank you'all. >> All right. And next we're going to hear from Miss Wilson. Good evening, Miss Eagy Board of Trustees. I want to take just a moment to talk to you about something that we would like to bring to you tonight about the district of innovation. We did
089bring it to our DEIC pro um group and they did approve it pending tonight. Uh the reason why we're bringing this is because of Texas Education Code 45.205 through 209. Um, and it deals with just the length of a contract for depository. You can do a two-year contract with the possibility of extending it two additional three-year terms. The other thing in there is just the contract term extension must match up with the district's fiscal year. And as you guys know, we changed our fiscal year this uh previous year. And so, we need to kind of clean up that. Uh, when we started looking at this and visiting with our current depository, there were several things that kind of came out in the light of that. uh one of them being just the increase in or
090the decrease in interest rate that they were willing to pay our school district. Uh before we would get 20 bases above the fed fund rate, they changed that to 30 basis points below the fed fund rate. So that was one thing that was just a big shocker point for us, especially with us being in a deficit budget. Uh the other thing that they did was they did the interest credit rate of 4%. And that's just where we have to they give us 4% of our our earnings and then anything over that for fees that we have to cover that as a district. And so there were some there were some things that came up right at the last moment that kind of concern our school district. And so that's really kind of why we want
091to bring this to light. Uh the exemption would allow us just to decide establish a contract for a term that aligns with the district needs again that fiscal year. Uh and the other thing would just allow us to kind of renegotiate that contract. Uh so we would like to put it we we actually have it on the um I call it on the street right now. Uh we have visited with a lot of banks. We've had sitdown meetings with a lot of banks. There are a lot of banks interested in doing business with our school district. And I think just the competition there is very beneficial because we really we have to look at every piece of revenue that we can possibly look at uh to bring in savings to our school district. And so
092that's one of the things that we've kind of been set on. Uh, so this would allow us to try to do a three-year contract with a bank and get us back on that TEA every two-year contract and align us with our fiscal year. Um, and then at the same time, we're in the process of doing a update to our software system. Uh, I found out today we've been with uh, ESchool since and e Finance since um, 1998, I think I was told, 1997. And so we're in the process of updating our software program. And we this will allow us to spend a lot of time with the new software and the new bank and just look at efficiencies. And so one of the things that kind of shines out to me as being new to
093the district is we currently have 44 bank accounts at our school district and we have to pay a fee on every one of those bank accounts and then we have to pay fraud stopper fees. And so we're really taking a deep dive into those numbers just to see if we can draw that back and save money. That kind of goes with that earned income credit. Uh, and then we would do a competitive bid hopefully that we would see um some competition come to. We had three we even did a uh pre-bid. Um, Miss Schaefer helped us with that and we allowed banks to come in and visit with us and we had three banks visit with us. We've had two additional banks, no, excuse me, three additional banks that have come in and visited with
094us and we've sat down with them just to try to make sure they understand that we're very serious about this. Um, we would continue to be transparent to the board like we always have with our banking and then we would make sure that we're following all competitive laws as well as the collateralization with the banks and everything else. So, it's basically just align with our fiscal year and to make sure we're competitive uh in the market that we're in right now. Is there any questions? >> This is an action item with the other amendments at the regular meeting, correct? >> Yes, sir. >> And this was ran through DEIC in December, I believe. >> Yes, sir. Okay. It was >> sounds good to me. My only question would be how do you how in the
095world do we get 44 bank accounts? >> It's a shocker that they enjoy to reconcile them. >> But okay. >> Okay. Thank you very much for your time. >> And that is going to bring us to item F, adjourn.