CSISD Board Meeting 01/20/2025

001All right. Good 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. Harkbriter. Schoolboard members. I'm here this evening for a 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

002academic performance, 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 PI'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

003well as progress with House Bill 3 goals. For our House Bill three 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,

004college station 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 students in the class of 2024.

005um that 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

006the state, 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

007of those 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

008for special 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 ha 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

009report is 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

010have their 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 because the one one of the areas we're below the state is some of the like the dual dual credit programs and

011maybe on 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

012year. >> 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. >> It could. Didn't it just give kids other options that maybe are a little concerned about taking AP to pass a 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 on my piece of paper, but to put have it I don't

013know if 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. Thank you. You're welcome. Thanks. >> Any other questions from the board? All right, I'm going to close this public hearing. >> We're just going to walk through some teacher turnover slides for you. >> Okay. Good evening, Dr. Hark Ryder Ziggy, 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 PES uh teachers are PES 087. uh for whatever reason, taper also includes uh role 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 COVID 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 140

016teachers 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 seven 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 October

017of 24 >> yes >> okay that's it's not the whole school year that >> so it's from snapshot date to snapshot date which is when PS all of that PE's data is collected by the state from every district >> and this number includes retirees and long-term subs. >> Yes. For taper. Yes. So this is just graphically if you look at uh teacher turnover from year to year how College Station ISD 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 six 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 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. >> Or is 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

022don't matter 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.

023Why do 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 leave 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

024the spring. 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 one 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

025first year 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 >> 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 the stay

026interviews of what's keeping our folks here. You know, what's the hook to keep them there and we look for oneoffs 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 has done

027it 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 at 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 A&M in

028our 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 pipeline from&m

029and 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 a zeroyear

030teacher 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 this is

031not a community to do that so I don't know how many um again numbers more anecdotal but a lot of my wife's co-workers uh 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 COVID, 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 since COVID.

032Uh 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 should be

033able 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 think that's

034a 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. 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, those that want to

035stay 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 now. um if S

036rate 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 efficiency of the state. >>

037Yeah. 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 the you know, the challenge of a taper report like this is we won't really know if our numbers have gotten

038better 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 >> 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 below the state average again. >>

039I 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 and 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. I'll figure it out before the next meeting. But getting more frequent than

040annual 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 that information from month

041to 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. 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 perspective of asking as a

042board 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. Okay. >> 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 discipline was it

043not? >> 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 challenge is what

044are 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 have on the

045thought 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 that is then

046taken 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 do at

047least 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 >> Yeah, I think it does for that. >> I think so. Yeah. I mean, using thought exchange for those kind of follow-ups feels like a way to not have

048to wait for a 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. >> 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

049through those, but I mean I thought those were pretty telling on some of the gaps we have. Even without uh 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

050it right when he 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,

051yes, we've been below 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

052teachers still here are 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 that with the definition in there at least that exact example clearly says it was from

0532324 school year which would mean the snapshot occurs in October of 2023 compared to a 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 have the results and they were included in a transmitt with the link to the website and it was

054posted on the website but I think it would be a 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 in a 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

055the merit it deserves. Just just my observation on that for future reference. >> Okay, I think we're going to move on to um E1 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 rewards 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

056able to have a designation. Currently um teachers with national board are recognized and they receive the allotment 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,

057107 were 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

05820,000. Um, 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 through eight science. So we submit data in October and then in the spring every um every year the district has

059the opportunity to 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 through8 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

060see in 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 co 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 five years unless they earn a higher designation. So if a teacher earns a master designation they keep that designation for five 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. 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 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 the

068teachers 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 main teachers how many are not eligible today to um >> 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 are frustrated

069with 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 secondary level

070was 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. That's a

071that 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 >> additional. That's fantastic. >> 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 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 yes, 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 onle 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. >> Um 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 years

074$3.7 million in earnings that they are eligible to make. Um I commend you guys when when we interviewed Dr. Hike Rudder and every candidate I specifically asked about teacher incentive a lot and I want to thank you for tackling this giant bear that 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. My own wife dealt with it of trying to get that math of who's eligible and who's not. U but thank you guys for tackling this and making sure that our teachers can make more money. Um and take advantage of

075this opportunity. So, thank you. >> I think Coupe said this year's number is closer to 500 uh teachers. It's right below 500. >> Exactly what I was going to say. So, thank you so much for your work on this. Okay, I think we next up we have um Kevin Ross. >> Wow. >> 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. Uh again, all uh anticipation is fall of 2026. Uh

076it 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. 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 your way down multi-purpose area and then to your left you'll

077see 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 bust 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 the district money. We don't need to hire for that. Uh,

078one 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 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 excited again about this one. Uh we need to go ahead and

079uh 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 classes. So, as you work your way to the right, uh, automotive,

080uh, to start with, we'll set about 15 will be our max in there for safety reasons. So, a teacher, 15 times three, 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 we can gain in CTE uh which is really good for

081the 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 big part of CCMR and one of the biggest things we've

082got 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 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 teachers. So we will take firsttime seniors, even though they won't be

083a 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 call a floater. They they drive out there, they teach for a

084couple 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 not the Brazes County. Um and we already have a a custodian

085that 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 remissed, 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. >> Now, now you know, and you have to carry that burden. >> Is

086this why you teach CTE instead of camp? >> This is why I stay in the CTE lane because I don't understand what he just said. 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 or two. Uh basically what the number we usually chase is if we can get about a hundred kids on a CTE teacher role with the weighted funding it it it pays for itself. Yes

087sir. 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 it's 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 take in funding that we're going to cut that check for that and it's

088basically 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 spitballing is about a $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 bring it to our DEIC pro um group and they did approve it pending

089tonight. 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 the decrease in interest rate that they were willing to pay our school district.

090Uh 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 to bring this to light. Uh the exemption would allow us just to decide

091establish 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 that's one of the things that we've kind of been set on. Uh so

092this 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. I found out today we've been with uh e school 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 the district is we currently have 44 bank accounts at our school district and

093we have to pay a fee on every one of those bank accounts and then we have to pay fraudstoppper 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 us and we've sat down with them just to try to make sure they

094understand 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 world do we get 44 bank accounts? >> It's a shocker that they

095enjoy to reconcile them. Okay, >> thank you very much for your time. >> And that is going to bring us to item F, adjourn. level of Yeah. Wait. Oh my gosh. And it was set on auto and it was set on 71. It was 74. So mute. Oh yeah. Okay. Welcome everyone. I'm going to call this meeting to order. Uh declaration of a quorum. We have seven members present. Welcome to this meeting of College Station Independent School District Board of Trustees. We were elected at large to represent the interest of our community and our state in educating our students. Our mission for our students in this district is success each life, each day, each hour. We adhere to all pertinent laws, policies, and procedures in posting agendas and conducting our meetings. The detailed agenda information

096was made available to us at least three business days in advance, and we have all come to this meeting informed and prepared. We have just completed a workshop session where we heard reports and discussed much of the information needed to make decisions in either this meeting or in upcoming meetings. This is a meeting of the seven trustees in a public setting rather than a public meeting. As such, public comment is included on the agenda at a specific time and requires us to listen rather than take action so as to abide by the open meetings act. We are pleased that you have taken time this evening to join us. We are very proud of this school district and we thank you for your interest in and support of our students. And that is going to move

097us to recognitions. We're going to recognize some of those students. Good evening. I'm Don Newton. I'm the principal, the very proud principal at Rock Prairie Elementary. And I'm going to hand the microphone over to two of our amazing Wranglers that are here to tell you a little bit about themselves in our school. >> Good evening. My name is Matthew Pomos and I'm in third grade. I am a third grade student at Rock Prairie Elementary. I've been at Rock Perry since kindergarten and I really love my school. I am in the GT program and some of my favorite things to do are drawing and writing. I especially love making comics because I get to use both of those hobbies at the same time. I also really enjoy working in all the awesome projects we do in

098Miss Tolen's class, GT class. I want to say a big thank you to our custodians, Mr. CJ, Miss Alicia, Miss Carmen, Miss Daisy, and Miss Terra. They work very hard to every day to keep our school shiny and beautiful, and they always greet students with a smile. They really care about everyone at Rock Prairie. Some of my favorite memories at Rock Play are playing football at recess, the glow run, my GT project, and making lifelong friends, especially my best friend Aaron. Thank you for letting me share a little bit about myself and for letting me be a proud a proud prairie regular. Good evening. My name is Emily Johnson and I am a proud fourth grader at Rock Prairie Elementary. I have been at Rock Prairie. I have been a Rock Prairie Wrangler since kindergarten.

099So, our school has always been a really special place to me. At Rock Prairie, I love being a part of our student council program. This year, I am also excited to represent Rock Perry Elementary in the U.IO Ready Riding Competition. Some of my favorite memories at Rock Prairie are field day and all the times Dennis Lee and Nana Pudding come to visit us. It is so much fun. Every day in the morning announcements, we are reminded to make good choices, be kind, and try to make someone else smile today. Thank you, Rock Prairie, for always making me smile every day. >> Hello, I'm Donna Bington. I'm the proud principal at Greens Prairie Elementary, home of the Mustangs. And so I have two of our fourth grade students. This is Christian Dunn. You may have recognized

100him. He was our Santa at the musical when you came. They came to visit our school. And uh we they get gave a practice run. So uh Christian uh is a wonderful um actor and has a stage presence and really stole the show as Santa. And both of our students have been uh at Greens Prairie since kindergarten. And this is Parker Rodriguez. Uh she's also a fourth grader. She mentors our pre-K students twice a week and uh serves our campus. She also helps me when we have uh dance moves, dance in the morning for morning assembly like turkey tango. She always volunteers to help. I don't know if that's because you take pity on me or she just wants to show it how it really is done the right way, but she always helps me.

101We do that. So, I appreciate that. But I'm going to let them tell you a little bit about themselves. >> Hi, my name is Christian. A few things about myself is I really like to play baseball. Um, I like fishing and hunting. Uh, I'm almost as tall as my mom. Uh, >> my favorite subject in school is science. And what I like about Greens Prairie is all the nice staff and students in the class. >> Hi, I'm Parker Rodriguez. I'm in fourth grade. My favorite subject is Texas history. I like being a Mustang because I am part of a big school family. Please stand for the United States pledge. >> Hi, my name is Christian. I'll be leading you the United States pledge. Pledge. I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of

102America and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. Please stay standing for the Texas pledge. Honor the Texas pledge. I pledge allegiance to thee, Texas, one state under God, one and indivisible. >> And now for the moment of silence. You may begin. Thank you. at the end. Thank you. You may now be seated. >> Thank you guys. At this time, I would like to invite um our amazing fourth grade team at Rock Prairie Elementary to come up for a little big shout out. Thank you. As you can tell, we have a very organized and together team. So, they planned their outfits and we are we have stamped ourselves proudly with Rock Prairie here. So, um we have got Miss Theresa Alenal here, Miss Anel

103Angel Brussler, Miss Erica Mandel, I'm so sorry, Miss Melanie Matush, and Miss Lauren Dell here. combined they make up 44 years of experience in College Station ISD. And so that is a huge testament to these to their dedication to the commitment that they bring every single day, but also the way that they walk our vision and our mission every single day and every conversation that they have. I wish so badly that everybody could be here and sit in their PLC's and listen to the conversations. They laugh because yes, sometimes we have a little laughter and fun, but it's always tied right back to the experiences that they create every day for our kiddos. And so that goes into the lessons that they plan, the way that they engage them in the content, and the ways

104that they create experiences for our kiddos to engage with each other, too. And so although I could bring so many of our staff members up here, I wanted to take the time to really thank them for not only everything that they do for Rock Prairie, for the way that they support each other, for the way that they support our admin team and even other teams throughout the campus. And so thank you guys so much for being a huge part of all we do at Rock Prairie. So thank you. Thank you very much. Oh, I think >> All right. Well, I would like to introduce our amazing uh teachers and we have one that's uh coming in virtually. She is at Disney right now, Tori Dean. And so I thought, okay, Disney, come here. You know,

105I don't know. But so Tori Dean, I would like to recognize Tori Dean who is our GT specialist. Uh Amanda Simmons who is our uh counselor. Um Jessica McMurray who is our fourth grade teacher. And Mrs. Martha Jimenez, who is our cafeteria manager. And all of these ladies virtually here wear many, many hats. Uh these are our folks that are our go-to people, right? So Amanda uh is our counselor. She's our MTSS coordinator. She's our behavior specialist. She she does it all. She prioritizes meeting with kids, teaching classes, and doing all the things. If something needs to be done, I don't even have to really ask her. She just says, "Hey, I'll do that." Or, "I can I do this?" thought, well, yeah, you can. So, but things get done and what an honor it

106is to uh lead alongside her, leading our campus and keeping our focus on kids. And so, I I appreciate you very much. I'm going to move over to Jessica real quick. Jessica has a heart for kids. She always has great ideas. And not only that, she takes those ideas and go, "Okay, how can we make that happen?" to hammock gardens, gazeos, all the things. She is an awesome teacher. Her kids love learning because of her dedication and her passion for what she does. She has a heart for service. Anything that needs to be done as well, she leads and so always serves our campus and with the best intentions, the best heart uh and that can do attitude. So I very much appreciate her. Tori Dean is our GT specialist. Again, a person who serves

107along aside these wonderful leaders and just uh rem reminds us that we can enrich uh the lives of our students the way we teach and the what we provide for them and uh just helps us navigate that uh so that we are teaching um our students the best that we can being the best that we can be but also uh in an engaging and enriching way serving all of our students. Um, so I appreciate them. One thing I'm going to tell you is a highlight. Um, I told you they were our movers shakers. They are innovative idealist and they make that happen. So Jessica has written 20 grants, has received 20 grants at $20,000 total. That's amazing, right? Uhhuh. Amanda, she has been a third grade teacher, a fourth grade teacher, and now a counselor

108at our campus. But she has written 10 grants totaling $12,000. and Tori Dean has written is that about right 13 grants um and she's those 13 grants for $25,700. So total these ladies have um had great ideas and have received over $58,000 just at our campus and that's not including the campuses they have served before in College Station ISD. So they are not only leaders at our campus but leaders in College Station setting a great example for what can be in public education due to these teachers working hard each and every day. So amazing. Thank you. Got one more. Okay. Now Martha come over here. Martha and I have worked along I call her Miss Martha but Martha and I have been working alongside each other for a very long time. But Martha's along with

109our custodian uh are there at the crack of dawn, right? When the sun rises, they're there. Martha is our cafeteria manager and serves with a smile breakfast and lunch and all the things. So, she uh makes sure that her staff is running efficiently. She steps in when she's short staffed, which happens quite frequently. She knows every kid's name. She makes sure that everything's ordered, everything's running smoothly and all that and like time scheduled three minutes in between classes. So, we cannot do it without her. She welcomes our parents. She makes sure the cafeteria is running smoothly and is a great place and a positive place for our students and our staff. And I just appreciate her so much with a smile and a can do. I can do this. and just uh serves quietly uh

110uh helping her staff, pitching in, serving, doing the cashier, washing dishes. Sometimes I have to go back there and go, "Where is she?" And she's around the corner washing dishes or doing whatever she needs to do. But it's a service with a smile. And I appreciate you so very much. So, thank you. Well done. All right, President Eigy, members of the board, tonight we're proud to recognize students from our high school FFA chapters for an outstanding performance at the state leadership development events contest in Huntsville last semester. Leadership Development Events or LDEs are competitive events offered through FFA that help students develop real world leadership, communication, and career readiness skills. Through LDEs, students participate uh through public speaking, interviewing, critical thinking, teamwork, and decision-making by applying what they learn in a education courses to real

111life scenarios. These events are designed to build confidence, professionalism, and leadership abilities that prepare students for future careers both within and beyond their agricultural education. And we've had the distinct pleasure of hearing them practice uh what they take to these state competitions here at central office. And uh Sheridan, uh Kevin, I don't know how we can make this like a public thing so they can see how impressive these kids are, but um it is it is some of the most impressive professionalism and public speaking and uh researchbased datadriven um um experience that that I've seen from a student. So it's it's incredible. These students qualify for state by finishing se first or second in one of the state's 66 district competitions and first or second in one of 12 area competitions. These students represented College

112Station ISD with excellence, preparation, and professionalism on the statewide stage. And I know we have uh a few standing in the back confirmed that we're able to be here tonight. And our first that we're going to recognize is our state semi-finalist in Greenhand Creed, Kenna Black. And we had several students who competed in the green hand quiz who also finished as state semi-finalist. Uh Claire Kishnik and Brinley Holt. You guys make it. Oh, there they are. Y another state semi-finalist from Console. He was a state semi-finalist in the senior creed. That's Tanner Howard. Tanner. And then from Consol's FFA broadcasting team, uh, Ella Wright. That's right. If I could tag on before she leaves. Miss Jessica McMurray was my daughter's kindergarten teacher when we first got here and now she's about to graduate high school.

113So, thank you for that, Miss McMurray. Yeah. >> And before we move on, I do want to point out to everyone who's here tonight that the artwork in the back of the room is provided by Greens Prairie and Rock Prairie Elementary students. So, be sure you take a look at that. Um, it's always awesome to see what our students do. All right, Miss Eggy, members of the board, and our guests here tonight and watching online. January is schoolboard recognition month, a time when school districts across Texas pause to say thank you to the dedicated men and women who serve on our local school boards. Schoolboard members are volunteers who devote countless hours to setting the vision for our district, making complex decisions, and ensuring our schools serve every student well. Their work often happens behind

114the scenes, but its impact is felt every day in our classrooms, our campuses, and throughout our community. And so tonight, we want to recognize and thank our trustees for their commitment to public education and to our district here in College Station ISD. Their service reflects a deep belief in our schools, our students, and our community's future. And tonight, you've probably seen around the boardroom, we have several amazing posters that were created by our early education kiddos and some of our art classrooms around the district. And at each of your seats, board members, you have a nice branded portfolio um to recognize your contributions to our district. Um, but if if y'all in the audience will please join us in showing our appreciation for our trustees and for all members of our school board for their

115leadership and their service. All right, thank you guys. Um, that is going to move us to item D1, which is our board reports. Um, what reports do we have tonight? I'll start. Um, budget committee met and um, Miss Wilson did a great job of g tons of data. We reviewed enrollment data and allocation. Um, we did some comparisons of us to peer districts. We reviewed how our money is allocated. Um, she went over current staffing models. Um, I'll say with this committee, it's comprised of staff, um, some board members, community members, but we also have two, um, former superintendent from some districts, not ours, and they bring a lot of information. Wealth of just it's been really really um, really fun to work with them. Um, they bring some great ideas and so I'm really

116looking forward to seeing um, what this committee is going to bring the recommendations eventually um, after we meet again. Um, so that was a it was it was a really informational meeting. Um, I'll keep going because I'm on several things unless Do you want to do Head Start? Um, Head Start met. Um, they told us they've assessed over 400 children. Um, they're really excited. They met with the architects to see how we're going to reconfigure this building potentially so that they can serve more families and children. Um, April 1st is their big application event. Um, the budget was approved. Um, they do an amazing job with the budget because they are working with flat funding again for two years in a row. um and they're really creative with their budgeting. Um one of the neat

117things about that committee is they have a lot of parents on it and it's really great to see these parents come in and visit with each other and collaborate and share ideas and um one of the things that's just really um Miss Shelley and her staff, these parents stay after the meetings and really just talk and visit and um it's just really rewarding to see and also to hear about their kids' experiences and that those programs. So um those are that and I'll let someone else do community advisory. I wasn't prepared to do community advisory, but I will. Um, it's been um really great because um I have really appreciated how um Mr. Dunen and um Miss Ward have just structured that whole time so that we can um hear from the community some of

118the strengths that they see in our district and maybe some areas we can grow on. And so the last meeting that we had, we kind of focused in on an area um that we might want to see um just how we can come up with some solutions to. So I don't know that there's a whole lot to report out other than that. I know that process is going to be ongoing and I'm going to be interested to see what um that committee brings to the board later this spring. So I appreciate everyone who serves on that. >> I will report on education foundation, but before that I'm going to mention the Head Start policy. uh Shelley Rice and her team like just ooze for the community like you can just see it in those meetings

119and I mean to think Shelley held a a kiddo the entire meeting. So um just kudos to all those women who are really uh out there and trying to make our community just a better place and get our kids um a better future. U Education Foundation exciting um 50 Men Who can cook is on February 6th uh 6:30 to 9:30. I hope you're coming with a hunger because you get full quick. Um, also my husband might be cooking, so go try his food. Um, also you can get tickets and if you can't make it, you can uh buy a raffle ticket uh with a chance to win some jewelry from David Gardner. Um, also a private dinner at the Republic. Um, so that suite in the Republic is really great. Um, you can win it

120for 16 people. Um, all of that can be purchased at 50menhwhecook.org. And then our scholarship application is up and running. I know we've had about seven to 10 so far apply. Um, but it is open to CSISD seniors till March 1st. That's all I have. DIC is very easy because we basically just got a presentation on um the feedback from the c the calendar survey and I believe Mr. Man will be showing that to us shortly with the the with the results. Um and it was was one of our shorter meetings. So um you want to do intergovernmental? >> Yeah. Mrs. McAdams and I and Dr. Hark Rider were all at the intergovernmental committee today and it was essentially a presentation on the baseball facilities in Brian College Station with an eye towards some new

121fields that are being proposed there behind Costco in lie of the data center. Many people seemed excited to hear. So Dr. Dr. Hawk Rider talked about our new baseball and softball facilities from the bonds. The Brian ISD athletic director did the same and then we had several other presentations. It it seemed to be mostly an informational session on kind of the state of baseball fields in Brian College Station without a lot of other really truly just anformational session. So, it was interesting. >> Do you have one? I have one more I want to add because I want to add um I went to our region six grassroots meeting. I had to miss the budget committee meeting. It was the same night and I know um some other of you are interested in it. Grassroots meetings

122are every two years and they are per for our regions and it's where we start having the conversation as schoolboard members um in the region to discuss our legislative advocacy agenda and what's important to us. We had the the um our legislative priorities there, you know, to discuss they and and for many other districts with um throughout our region. And so we talked about those. I don't know. Um I won't go into all those details and we'll probably have our own discussions, but just so everybody knows there it was in Montgomery. There's some more limitations on this process this year that the the state has put on us. You can't have it at a TASBY office anymore. We don't get any credit for that for going to that if but but if you still believe

123it's important, I know many of you do, you know, there is still an opportunity to get involved with that process if you'd like to. So let me know. As we know, as we talk about here in here often, so much of what affects us and what we do is really um coming out of Austin. And that process is starting again. >> When you can get a red scarf, that's what you get if you go. >> Okay. Is that all of our board reports? Yes. Okay. Dr. Hog Rider. >> Yes, ma'am. This is the time of the year where myself and members of my staff become part-time weather forecasters. So, if you're not aware, uh we have a winter storm that unfortunately keeps getting closer and closer to College Station. And so, uh we're keeping a

124watchful eye on that. It's a very busy time with extracurricular activities. We have both cheer teams are supposed to go up to Fort Worth for national cheer competition. They're predicting an historic storm with north of eight inches of ice and snow. So, uh, it's not looking great to try to make it up there. We've got teams traveling around here as well. We have moved all middle school basketball games to Wednesday night and then varsity soccer and varsity basketball games will play Thursday to avoid any conflicts with the weather and we've got a few other teams traveling. So, we'll be in communication, coaches will be in communicating with players and also parents to make you aware and keep you updated. Uh, we'll be making some decisions here in the next 36 hours. uh trustee tour. Next

125set of tours is January 30th. We'll go to South Null and Oakwood. So excited to showcase those two campuses and see what Roco and Miss Laura have to show. So we know we got a lot of things to show up for us. February 2nd is our UIL realignment that is done every two years. And what's released on that day is our new districts for all of our sports for 2006 2007 school year and 2007208. We will still be uh both high schools will be at the 5A division. We're a little bit nervous because the uh 6A number dropped about 75 students which gets closer to where we are. So I'm concerned in two years if that number drops again it's going to be uh a major change for College Station ISD. And then February 13th

126will be the end of the fourth six weeks. >> All right. Thank you. We're going to move on to item E which is hearing of citizens. During this time, we will hear from citizens who registered to speak prior to the meeting in accordance with board operating procedures. The Open Meetings Act prevents us from responding to speakers regarding items not on the agenda. Comments related to items on the agenda may be discussed during deliberations on that specific agenda item. Public comments are limited to three minutes per person. Those needing an interpreter may have up to six minutes. Each person has one opportunity at the microphone regardless of minutes used. Unused minutes may not be acred by another speaker. The executive assistant will time the comments and alert the president when time has expired. The board asks

127that those addressing the board refrain from derogatory comments. Um, tonight we have speaker uh, Miss Moulder, Allison Moulder. >> Let's see. Do my best. All right. Good evening and thank you for the opportunity to speak tonight. I have three children, one of whom is currently school-aged. I have a deep desire that my younger children along with the other children in our community are able to benefit from the compassion, diligence, and expertise that my eldest child has experienced from his CSISD teachers. It is with that in mind that I express my concern regarding the recent teacher turnover rates published by TEA. Our district's turnover rate grew to 19.4%, 4% an increase of almost two percentage points from the previous year as opposed to some surrounding districts which showed an approximately 2% decrease in turnover. For comparison,

128the state average had a slight improvement from 19.1% to 18.8%. Though central office may measure retention using different methodology and has noted that we are making improvements in this measure which is great. We cannot ignore the trends shown in tea data. Another area of concern relates to staff investments. The district spends approximately 20% more than the state average on central office salaries while our teachers make approximately 10% below average. And I wish everyone could make above average in this room because all of you have such valuable uh roles. Um despite this difference, our teachers manage larger and larger class sizes, increase paperwork, and reduce time for collaboration. I also must speak up for our valuable pair of professionals who do not even make a livable wage. Central office roles are of course vital to the

129district's success, but our amazing teachers, support staff, and campus administrators serve the core function of a school district. If we want improved outcomes for our students, we must prioritize investment and support for those roles. And that doesn't have to be strictly increases in salary. The district can support teachers by providing a substitute for an hour or two a week per grade level so that the teachers can plan and complete paperwork by mobilizing community volunteers to take over lunch duty for teachers or through other creative solutions. Burnout is a primary reason for teaching for teachers leaving the field. As a licensed clinical social worker, I know that employment stressors teachers experience contribute to mental health issues like depression and anxiety, as well as acute and chronic physical health concerns like increased blood pressure and headaches. Our

130teachers deserve better. Neither our board, central office, or community have full control over the public education landscape or beholden to decisions made in Austin. However, we must take accountability for what we can control and correctly align our priorities. Our community clearly cares about this issue and needs transparent communication and a solid action plan to help keep our excellent teachers in College Station. Thank y'all very much. >> Thank you. >> All right. The next thing on our agenda is the consent agenda. That's going to be items G and items J1 to J1. >> Motion to approve as presented. >> Second. >> I have a motion by Dr. Payne and a second by Mr. Martenddale. Any comments? All in favor, please say I. >> I. Any opposed? All right, that motion passes 720 to zero. Next up,

131we're going to have um item H1 and that's going to be Mr. Man. >> All right. Good evening everybody. President Egy, Dr. Hark Rider, board of trustees. It is my pleasure to come to you this evening to talk with you about the 2627 school calendar. And we're just going to jump right in. Maybe something is not connecting here. Austin, here we go. There we go. All right. So you can see up on the screen um we directly emailed the day after uh the board meeting in um last month in December to all campuses and you can see the number in parenthesis that that encompasses. Whenever Austin sends the email out, he receives a report to the number of email addresses it's sent to all guardians um as well. And so I share this to say

132that we know that we have 21,724 confirmed recipients of an email. Now, don't know whether or not they opened it or not, but they have it. Um, I also post to Schooly um all of our campus news feeds uh primarily to gather student voice as much as possible. Um, but I know a lot of parents um jumped in on that because as I was watching the data come in, the parents were voting pretty quickly um before Austin could even get the email sent out. Um and then of course our staff have the option of getting it from their emails or um from the schooly feed. And then Austin also shared it out a couple of different ways through our communication outlets and then a couple of our um local news media outlets picked it up

133as well. And so we had 3171 total folks began a survey and 2764 which is an 87% completion rate um complete the four questions on the survey. So let's dig into those stats a little bit. If you do the straight math and add it here, you're going to see that we have more roles than what we have participants. And that's because we traditionally have allowed our people to multi select their roles so that they could share their voice in whichever um role that they would like to. And so um you can see on the left the 3326 total role selections. And whenever I broke it down I could see that there's 260 unique um individuals that picked more than one role for the purposes of the survey. And one of the pieces that was new

134this year with using thought exchange with the survey piece was it actually showed us how long people spent engaging with the survey and I found it very interesting and so I shared this with the EIC last week and I wanted to bring it forward here um because it's four questions and so you can see we had 184 folks answer them in less than 5 seconds. I mean they just went through they knew what they wanted and there they go and then you can see the folks that that took a little bit longer. Um, and I can confidently say that we did have one student in College Station ISTD that must have left it open on their browser for 14 days and seven hours because they did finally vote though. They voted for the no fall

135break version of the calendar. Interestingly enough, they needed to really think about it, right? Um, but of the folks that took a minute or less, which is the overwhelming majority of folks, you again, it's four questions. It doesn't take very long. um you can see the breakdown of the roles of the folks that um were able to get in there within that first u minute of completing the survey and get it taken care of. And then I know there was a question um brought up about the timing and do we feel like that folks um are going to be able to have the time to respond and see the emails? Is that a good time of year? And what this shows us is within the first three days almost 90% of the participants that opened

136the email completed the survey. Um, and then there were 10% of the folks that trickled in over the course of of the winter break. Um, and I can also say that there were five folks that completed it on Christmas day. So maybe that's the day that they got caught up on their email. Um, but I can definitely break it down and see the process um, of getting the votes completed. And you can see on this graph here of the folks um, within that first 90% of of how they broke it down, right? The date completed or within the first three days. So the the four questions that were asked, right? The first one is the we talked about this the describing your role and again it was self- select and 105 folks um chose not

137to give a response to that. And then uh people were able to respond to grade level or if they were a community member that they didn't identify with a specific grade level, they had that option as well. And 127 folks chose not to respond to that. And then this is the big question, right? Which calendar preference do you choose? and 407 folks um did not make a selection for this question. 73% of the people did pick the fall break version of the calendar. And then there was the opportunity as we've always had is the open comments where you can tell us anything you would like for us as a DEIC to consider as it relates to the calendars. And so just under 24% of our respondents added some sort of a comment into the comment

138box. And so these next couple of slides are summaries of what we see. Um and so you can see here, you know, as it says there was a diverse range of opinions regarding the calendar. Um and the hot topic was fall break and there was discussion around that and we'll get into more of that here in a moment. Um there's a lot of appreciation for some sort of a break um because the mental health piece that comes along with that and time to reconnect with family. Um, but there is some comments that talked about the challenges that it puts in for working families and parents and child care and disruption of student learning. Um, and then there are folks that would like to see it be longer, make sure that we're aligning with neighbor districts.

139Um, but then we also have those that we don't want any kind of a fall break because we want a longer summer. So, as I often tell DEIC, you can't make everybody happy. We got to figure out what the best option is to move forward. And the summary statement here says it's a balanced approach. And so you see the five themes that came out of the summary. And so fall break um it it was mentioned the most out of all of them and that's why it's ranked number one followed by teacher work days um and the conversation in the comments between um teaching staff and non-eing staff is where's the balance there? Um because there is there is the need for the work but there's also the child care challenges which is what comes in

140at number three. Um and then mental health. Um there's no disagreement amongst any of the comments about the need for mental health. Um the comments really themed around the need for the balance, right? And to be able to make it work for everybody because we've got a lot of diverse needs across the district. And then of course the the common theme of calendar alignment um for us to be sure to align with Texas A&M um and neighboring districts if at all possible. And so I dug specifically into the fall break length comments because that was a topic of conversation over the course of the fall as we were gathering um survey responses this September. And so I went through all 745 comments and did specific word searches um for a full week week just individual

141try to break it down and pull out the ones that mentioned any component of that and you can see that breakdown here. Um so any comments u between teachers, parents and students were the only categories or the only roles that I found where there was any comments and one of them was dualcoded. Um and so that was a teacher and a parent. And then you can see out of the total number of comments there. And so I just I pull this out because we spent a lot of time in DEIC talking about to have a full week in October or to not have a full week in October. And so this shows that we had 26 unique comments in an open comment section uh for people to bring up that topic out of the 745

142total comments. And so with that DEIC's recommendation, um just a quick reminder of the process, um we begin this in September. Um and that's really with me introducing the process to them, but sending out a survey to the staff and to the families. Um asking them kind of just in time survey questions and getting that iterative feedback process started. And we repeat that through October and November. And then whenever we come back in December, um this is where DEIC really looks at draft calendars and we get them prepped in to then send them out for the stakeholder feedback process which we've just completed. And then in January, um we process that data and conversations. And then here we are with you guys tonight. And so the DEIC does this is a voting action for them.

143and only teachers, community members, business members, and parent members of the DEIC are eligible to vote on the motion. And so at the January meeting, there were 15 of those specific members that were present. And you can see that all 15 of them uh voted for the fall break version calendar to be brought forth to the board tonight. So the details of that calendar, so you can see here, um I broke it down by the numbers. There's uh 170 instructional days, 78 in the fall, 92 in the spring. We've often or well we've always had a discrepancy between the fall and the spring um because we have always ended the fall semester before winter break. We um in my 21 years in the district have never come back after the winter break and took fall

144semester exams. Um and so that's a big reason for the the difference between the two semesters. Um you can see the total minutes 76, uh 210 and that gives us a cushion of minutes, just straight minutes of 3.73 days. Um but I want to draw your attention to May. Um this is a new piece this year where we have uh two designated teacher work days that can um be bad weather makeup days if necessary. And so really we have those three days plus two more. um if for some reason we do have big bad weather events or we do have infrastructure problems that causes things to have to be closed down without having to make things up um as much as possible. Uh we are as a district on 187 teacher contract days. Eight of

145those days are designated as work days. Nine of those days are professional learning days. And so with those, you see the 25 total teacher holidays that are throughout the the school year when you count up all the lime green colors and the 31 student holidays that are throughout the school year. Texas A&M did release their calendars recently and so whenever um I was made aware of that, I did adjust what we had down for our week of spring break to the following week to be in alignment with what Texas A&M had. and and&m did not have a fall break listed on their system calendar. And speaking of&M, we know that we receive a lot of comment and feedback asking that we work really hard to be aligned with their calendar. And so I wanted to

146illustrate um that we do take in very much into consideration&m's calendar. And so if you look on the left, um these items that are in this maroon color here, um these are not applicable to us as a district. And so there's nothing here for us to align. And then the ones that are in yellow, these are in alignment with&m being out and us not having class. And then if you look on the CSISD calendar side, what's in green&m is not in session. And so this doesn't apply um for these items that are in the green piece. There might be some smaller classes in session, but the general session is not in. Um and then you can see here um we do have some dates that are not in alignment. So, if we look at September

14725th, this is a teacher workday. This year, we had this workday um coupled with um the Labor Day holiday that's in September. And so, whenever we as DEIC um reviewed the survey from staff, the staff came back and said they'd like to see that work, they added on September 25th. October 9th is um our traditionally our parent conference day for elementary and a PD day for secondary. And then the two fall break days. And then if you come down here to February 12th and 15th and it's up here, it's a teacher work day and then it's a PD day and so um it's a longer break um for our students and our staff have a chance to to do some work within the building without kids there. As a part of our process with DEIC,

148we do ask them to give this give us a list of what you want us to try to build into calendars. Um and this comes in from conversations that they have with their staffs on their campus. And so you can see that we um took the list that they had and we tried to incorporate as much of all of that information into the calendar as we can. Um so we truly are taking the voice of the folks on the committee and their job is to gather that voice from their campuses. So this is an action item for the board of trustees tonight um to accept the recommendation of DEIC or not. And so with that I will turn it back over to you President Eigi and any questions or comments. Thank you, Mr. Man. I

149appreciate that and all the work that you guys do to put this together. >> You're welcome. >> Do we have any questions? >> Mr. Man, just when everyone was voting, uh, obviously heavy preference to have the fall break's calendar was not out yet, right? So, nobody knew that there wasn't going to be one. >> Yes, sir. >> I think my only question is about is it You've been here a long time. Is it standard for us to have nine days of teacher development before the school year starts? Is that pretty typical? >> Uh it varies from year to year. And so that's something that we've had an iterative piece over time. So standard, some years we've had eight or nine, some years we've had four or five. Okay. >> It just kind of depends on

150what's been adopted over the years. Part of the factor that's come in too is there used to be that law in place before District of Innovation where you couldn't start before the fourth Monday in August and then whenever that shifted then that brought back into the ability to have more days in August to get ready for the year. >> To that point, is this a change for us to have that the 17th and 18th of August be a work day? How is that how does that compare to this year? I'm not sure. >> Uh we've we had work days this year. Um, one of the differences from for this year and for this proposed calendar that uh the last I I forget exactly which year it started, but I want to say it was in

151the late 2010s where we started incorporating comp days. Um, and so last year and this year we did not incorporate the comp days into it. And we've leaned that into having very specific work days. And a big reason for the comp day piece um is we have a lot of staff that are not um contracted staff that are not guaranteed to work on those days. And so that's something that whenever um we had those comp days, we had to be very mindful of how are we taking care of those folks as well. And we have a lot of feedback saying we would like more work days built in the calendar. And so last this year and this calendar here are the first times that I can see in calendars other than in August where we

152have specifically called out these are work days. These are designed for teachers to have to get things done where in the past they were designated as PD days and they may have been turned into a workday. Um but we're trying to be very purposeful in designating very specifically. Um, and there's the question that will come up and um, this is one of the things that I want to make sure that I communicate effectively with staff next year is in order for us to receive the PD waiver, which is this cushion of days um, that we that we work on here, right? Whenever we look at the minutes, sorry, right here. Okay. Whenever we want to look at any kind of a of extra work, we have to have designated professional learning days after August PD

153and before the end of May before the last day of classes or we cannot claim any of those days as a PD waiver which the PD waiver what that does is allows us to provide instructional development and count in lie of instruction with students in the classroom. And so it gives us flexibility as a district and that was part of the district of innovation process whenever the state came out with that. And so I know I get a lot of questions about why do we have to have so many days built in through the year. So I wanted to be clear about that. >> Inde shared I think it was a student said we should hold school from 10 to two. I didn't see that on here. >> Yeah, I didn't put the >> might

154have been the teacher that listed that but that'd be a lot of minutes. Yeah, there's there's a lot of fun comments that have nothing really to do with calendar, but they like to tell me stuff. I didn't include those tonight. >> A motion to approve as presented. >> Second. Okay, I have a motion by Dr. Payne and a second by Miss Simmon. Any further discussion? >> All in favor, please say I. >> Any opposed? All right, that motion will pass. And that is going to move us to item I1, which is a policy update. Miss Goulsby, >> good evening. Uh, Mrs. Hester couldn't be here tonight, so I'm happy to present on her behalf. Uh, good evening, Dr. Hark Rider and board of trustees. I'm here to talk to you about the update 126. These

155are standard updates that we receive from the Texas Association of School Boards, also known as TASBY. Um, and these are standard from legislative sessions. So, we get these when there are updates at the state. We actually get these from our TASBY representative and these actually don't get adopted um tonight. This is going to be for information only. And we're going to go through these. If you have any questions, if there are things that you would like to consider prior to February, um this will go back before you in February to look at those local updates specifically. So when you look at some of these policy updates, when you look at legal, it's going to infor be informed by laws, statutes, statutes, um it should inform local decision-m, but it's not adopted like these are already

156in place based on state law. And then when you look at local policy, which those are the what we were going to highlight tonight, it's informed by legal policy, reflects the practices in the district, um and it's changed by board action. I will say that there were 150 updates with this um policy adjustment. We are going to highlight only the local. So, if there are things that you want more in depth, you do have that that wording and those changes attached to your agenda. But again, please let me know if you want to make note and we'll give you more information in February when you will have to take action. The first one um really impact the board when you look at the updates and preparation of agendas. What changed on this one is that

157instead of 72 hours of posting dead uh the posting deadline, it's three days, three business days. um 10day deadline for submitting agenda items and active roll call when you're voting. Board member uh board meetings and public participation. It revises the policy to ensure public comment occurs at the beginning of the board meetings. Contracted services. Contractor uh contractors may not engage in or assign instructional activities. So as I move forward, I will go over the title, allow you to read through the narrative. Please stop me if you have any questions. The next one is going to be technology resources and the cyber security updates. One thing to note on the technology resource and the artificial intelligence. Um there's a new policy providing guidance on the use um of AI in districts. And so it's requiring and

158related to training and implementation. College Station ISD is having preliminary conversations about what that looks like, what stakeholders need to be brought to the table to be able to inform, especially teachers at the campus level, uh, community members. We also want to make sure that we have, um, experts in the field from Texas A&M, from across the state. We want to make sure that as we're moving forward, we have all the stakeholders um, at the table. We have not set a timeline on that conversation because we want to make sure everyone is there. There's also a critical component from the cyber security piece, from the server piece. You know, when you put something in AI, are we is it going to um be risk or a liability? So, we have to make sure from the

159cyber piece, do are we equipped to be able to take those next steps, facilities and standards with safety and security, the facilities construction? There's also updates to the employment requirements and restrictions. Um, you will have seen um in the legislative session administrators that contract outside of the district with additional work that goes before the board. So you have seen that in consent agenda prior to but it's just to highlight um that that does go before you. Oh, sorry. Compensation and benefits with leaves and ab absences, term contracts, um, specifically regarding non-renewal, personnel management relations, meaning um, employee complaints and grievances. It's got an asterk by that because you will be seeing that um, discussed with our DOI conversation in the next agenda item. We're recommending no change to the policy so that we can actually

160be exempt from that with the DOI. We'll go into depth with that. Employee standards of conduct, instructional arrangements, um, specifically lesson plans, the new policy addressing instructional plans, course syllabi, uh, instructional resources and instructional materials, special ed with regards to video, audio monitoring. I know that C and I have had specific conversations internally about this and being able to plan accordingly. Academic achievement. The grading process reports to teachers, I mean parents, parent rights and responsibilities. This also goes with the adoption of Senate Bill 12. Attendance with regards to release time, wellness and health services, medical treatment, the student welfare, crisis intervention, student welfare, student safety, student welfare, child abuse and neglect. And those are updated reporting timelines with that specific one. Again, another thing that you will see when we talk about DOI or student

161rights and responsibilities, the student parent complaints and grievance process. Um, we we're recommending no change and to retain our current policy and procedure. Um the next one, student discipline, public complaints, community relations, uh with regards to conduct on school premises. And then one specific thing that I'd like to point your attention to is going to be DGA. This last bullet, um, this is where a board by March 1st has to be able to, um, look at the legal of the state has passed something where you would put in a daily period of prayer. Um, so the board will actually see this next month. Um, and it's the board is the action from the board is required by March 1st. So when you look at this, this would require obviously a daily period of prayer, but

162it also would require teachers and campuses to manage optin and opt out lists or rosters within the classrooms. You know, currently we feel like we have a very fair and equitable system for student rights. So this will be it's Senate Bill 11. You'll see lots of things around the news. um school districts are opting out or not taking action. So you will see this specific um bill in front of you. >> There's currently a federal law that protects students and staff members rights to pray, read whatever they would like to read uh during the school day as long as it doesn't interfere with the class. Senate Bill 11 is actually more restrictive because parents have to opt in for their child to participate. we would have to designate a prayer time not during the instructional

163day. Teachers have to monitor students. So if I've got a teacher in a classroom of 25 kids and I have five kids that have opted in and 20 that haven't, the 20 that haven't opted in cannot participate in that classroom. And so you can tell the nightmare of us trying to figure out how to make that process works. And in our opinion, we'll send you some more information. uh this is currently a federal law that protects the rights to do that now. >> It doesn't have to be a designated time and there's not an opt-in period. So Senate Bill 11 is actually more restrictive than the current federal law. So at this time it is an information item. If you would like to for um give us any considerations, any thought processes as we move

164forward, um Mrs. Hester or myself will be bringing this to you in February. Um thank you for uh basically taking it was I think 86 pages um is the uh policies that we'll be looking at to change um parts of and condensing that for us tonight. We appreciate that. >> Well, it was a team effort. Uh Mrs. Hester, I'm sure you're listening. Uh Mrs. Hester and Mr. Dunson did an outstanding job. Um, and so it's always a team effort, >> but I don't want to gloss over it. Do we have any questions that you'd like to ask uh, Miss Goulsby? >> Okay, great. Thank you so much. But I think you're up next, too, for I1, right? >> Yes, ma'am. >> We're going to move on to discussion and possible approval of recommended amendments to

165the district of innovation plan. So we have um several amendments, three amendments specifically to the district of innovation plan. In 2015, we uh public schools got the ability and the flexibility to be exempt from certain state mandates. Uh there are currently 900 individual uh school districts that have an adopted plan. In 2017, we actually passed a resolution here in this district to become a district of innovation. And then we have a five-year plan from March 8th to of 22 to March 8th of 27. Um we will work under the district of innovation plan that you see in front of you. And at any point in time during that time period, administration, DEIC and the board of trustees can consider amendments to our DOI. And that's why we're here tonight. December 10th, DEIC unanimously approved the

166following amendments for board consideration. The three that we're really going to highlight um as we move forward is going to be your transfer uh student policy, grievance policy, and the depository contract that Mrs. Wilson um actually talked about in workshop. When we look at our student transfer policy, um Texas Education Code authorizes school districts to admit non-residents. Um the biggest part of this provision um it does not and it restricts districts currently um the ability to revoke a mid-year transfer. So we would like to continue accepting transfers under this state law. However, we would like the uh option to revoke if the student fails to meet district expectations. And this actually gives us the ability to protect instructional quality, campus safety, and the effective use of district resources. Students who do not meet expectation um

167obviously will go through um the eligibility part of chronic attendance issues, um disciplinary concerns, and failure to make reasonable academic process progress. Currently, our local guidelines, um they're approved each year. Annual applications are required um pursuant to board policy. Again, it may be revoked during the school year based on established criteria. Consistently um uh failing to meet district academic attendance and behavioral expectations. Um obviously those eligibility requirements are very important to our district and the integrity of that. So this will give us the option to revoke a transfer if they do not meet the following eligibility requirements. Uh maintaining 85% average in all core subjects, demonstrate strong attendance with a minim minimum of 90% attendance rate. No more than three minor disciplinary referrals and have no major infractions such as DAP. And who who would

168be what's the process going to be for making that decision? Like who is that at the campus level? Is that central office? Who's who's deciding that that child has not done what they need to do to stay here? What's that look like? >> Transfer committee that would make that recommendation. >> And is that a committee that already exists? >> Yes. >> And who is on that? >> Uh Miss Hester, >> Mr. man. Uh, Miss Cooper and Miss Grande, >> principles, the campus would be involved in submitting the documentation. >> So, Dr. Hark Rider, so the the principal would initiate the paperwork and request to the district level committee for consideration. Is that the process? Thank you. Only our only hang on just a second sar, I'm sorry. Uh, one of the things that we'll work

169with principles on too is consistent communication. If there's becoming an issue with the child, I don't want the parent surprised that all of a sudden, hey, we're revoking the transfer without prior communication. Just make sure we're communicating with them. And then one get it gets to a point then they submit the documentation. >> Right? Surprises only at Christmas. I get it. Um the um I I just want to make sure that campus administration has um you know a part of that process because they're being the ones >> campus administrators will drive the whole Okay. >> whole situation. >> Thank you. Just as a followup is your expectation that it would be unusual for the committee to overrule a campus administrator who feels like a child needs >> Yeah. The only issue of of that happening

170would be insufficient evidence, >> right? But generally if they provide the evidence, the committee is just there to check the box and agree. >> It's more the administrator 100% of the time. >> Okay. Great. >> And just one other question at our I guess confirmation. The parents know all this and have to sign up for all this um before you know they would transfer into our >> Yes, ma'am. Of course. Sometimes the memories become foggy though, so the reminders will help. >> I like the reminder if as um problems start to occur. >> Now, there's no reminder if there was a major infraction of DAP. There's there's nothing to remind about on something serious. >> I think the key is established criteria like we're not changing the the yard line or something, but going into

171it, we know what's expected. So >> the next policy um would be our grievance policy. Senate Bill 12 really provides um some differing um procedures and steps than we are currently under. So um we would like to be able to retain our current grievance policy and procedures and steps um as opposed to what the state um passed under Senate Bill 12. uh we feel like it's more timely for our constit constituents. You know, if parents have frustrations at the campus level, that timeline actually can delay them getting resolve or a remedy. It also can delay the fact that when you're collecting evidence at the lowest level, meaning the campus as far as when you look at escalating a grievance, you know, when you're collecting evidence and data, it could become very stale very quickly. um

172what people remember um if you don't have it on camera. It's also another thing with our systems, security systems. Um you know, we have to consider all of those things. It also Senate Bill 12 allows the board to have a subset of board members hear a level three. Currently, all board members hear level three. um we have received feedback at level 3es that they appreciate the fact that all board members are involved um to having a subset that would go against some of the feedback that we have received during that level three. So we feel like the grievance policy that we have in place works very well um and it really emphasizes that resolution and accountability from that piece and from that standpoint. I know one of the differences was on the timeline as you

173mentioned and as you said we want things to be resolved as quickly as possible and at the lowest level uh as as possible. Can you can you confirm when does the clock though start on our grievous grievance um policy or you know the time for a somebody to make a grievance? Is it when the incident occurred or or are they allowed to go through the that you know some resolution uh efforts at that lowest level and then if that fails? >> So typically within 15 days of what when it occurred >> when it occurred. >> Yes ma'am. And so but we take into consideration any call to central office any call to the campus. The principles are phenomenal with trying to resolve and be able to work with parents. um if it does get to

174a grievance level, you know, there are considerations that we take in. Um we've we've given um our families multiple times when they have missed the deadline. We've had considerations when things come up. We don't want to just say no. We know that these are the timelines and yes, we want to stick to them because those are the policy um and we have to be able to have be efficient and follow those procedures, but we always want to be able to hear frustrations. We want to hear feedback. We want to be able to resolve things from our families because that's why we're here. So, because we have a grievance policy and for for standard practices, we do follow those guidelines, but there's never an opportunity to not come to the table. There's always an opportunity for

175people to come to us and find an outlet. We're going to give access to to families and to anyone at central office. We work well with the the campus and they're phenomenal at urgency. you know, when you have a grievance or when you have a frustration or a fear um from our families, um our campuses are phenomenal on making sure that's a sense of urgency. So, I hope I hope that helps. >> It does. I appreciate that because I mean if if good faith effort is going on on both parts, >> on both parties, then you know um and that is not resolved and maybe that >> takes a 16 17 days. we have some um flexibility to be able to still hear those grievances. >> Yes, ma'am. Typically, historically in the last two years,

176we have not seen any within that 16 17 day range. It's usually 30 to 60 or it happened in April and we get it in the summer. Um that's difficult to be able to exhaust. It doesn't mean we don't look into it. You know, we it does not mean that we don't investigate it. It doesn't mean that we don't contact campuses trying to figure out, okay, talk to me what happened. We collaborate on it. We stay connected to the families as best we can. And then you heard from Mrs. Wilson. Um she did a phenomenal job as to why we would want to add this as an amendment to our uh district of innovation. Um it was the depository contracts. it would better align and allow us to be more fiscally responsible for the district.

177>> Any other questions from the board? >> Just comment or two. First, thank you for the presentation. >> I think when we had detail and information like this that we're able to process, see the steps exactly what we're asking to be uh taking action on, it helps tremendously. So, thank you for the thorough presentation. Sir, >> uh, I voted against two of these three amendments in November and I think I went on record that I was not against the amendments but more a question about the process of which they reached the board. Thank you because you noted that in the presentation where DEIC approved these items in December. Uh, I just think that that protects the district in case someone challenges these amendments or one of the processes later on. So, thank you. >> Yes,

178sir. with with those comments, I'm more than happy to make a recommendation uh to approve as presented. >> I want I would like to update the board on a couple of things that we are going to look into um you know based on you know pre previous conversations about DEIC um and a couple of things that we kind of looked at when we got into the plans for the alignment. This is not an amendment but this is something that we found when we're digging into our DOI and making sure that all the plans are aligned. For example, this next step is to gonna we're going to put this DOI in front of Commissioner Morath, but part of that is really looking at our current language. And part of the current language in uh a few

179of our items we really feel like need to go to DEIC. It doesn't have to be an amendment, but we have to get their feedback on some of the items. So, if you'll focus um on the local guidelines, um this is about planning and preparation time. Each classroom teacher is entitled to at least 450 minutes within each twoe period of instructional preparation. This is about conference time and that prep time. So within our DOI that we adopted, it gives the flexibility in planning and preparation and it also um gives us the flexibility um within the instructional planning aotments. So, when we were digging into finding the procedures that align with this part that really um communicates what this looks like, uh we realize that we don't actually have the procedures in place and we would

180like to be able to have this conversation with our DEIC because they are the representation of our campuses. Um because it does talk about uh would allow for innovative scheduling for things such as PLC's. So currently we want to make sure that not only does our DOI align with policy but we also have the procedures in place that that look at that and explain that if that makes sense. >> So we are to be clear we've just talked about three amendments that we're about to potentially take action on. You're telling us that this is another part of our DOI that we're going to you guys are going to go to DIC with and >> it's not an amendment. It would just be getting their feedback. So, the three amendments that I just talked about, those

181are going to be what you approve to go and update our DOI. But we wanted to be able to give you a level of transparency and a level of communication that as we're going into some of the current existing um caveats that we don't have the procedures that does not have to be approved. It does not compromise what our D do D do D do D do D do D do D do D do D do D do DOI is but it does um we need to provide clarity to what those procedures look like. What does it look like and what are those standards and that feedback for flexible planning and prep time because we have gotten feedback about conference times um the concern for conference times. Well, this gives you flexibility to really kind

182of have an innovative schedule. So these next few is just to be able to be upfront that we do we currently do not have parameters or procedures in place for the sections of this DOI. So it does not impact the amendments tonight. It does not impact our submission to the commissioner. it does impact how we move forward. Gaining insight from DEIC, making sure that they're aware um you know the DEIC plans change. We don't want to make these in isolation. Um and so we want to be able to really listen to teachers, our campus, and a collective collaborative as we go through and create the parameters procedures for these. If that makes sense. I'm hearing that there could be some positive conversations coming up beneficial to >> Yeah, absolutely. It's us going back because we're

183a new administration team. This is something that we found and I I feel like it's important for us to be able to move forward in a collaborative way and model that. >> So, in your opinion, what is that? The DEIC has how many teachers total on it? >> Thinking out loud, every campus has a rep plus we have um at large. Plus we have at large and we have campus administrators as well. And then we also have uh two community members, two business members and two parents. And the only voting members are those folks. None of the district staff are allowed to vote. Uh the total committee is at 56 if you include all the district staff that are just in the room for we're a resource to the the voting committee members. So I

184believe off the top of my head the the voting numbers are about 28. >> So three to four percent of total teachers something like that. >> Yes. So typically when you look at the DEIC that's the collective that's the immediate planning partners that we have access to. Um you know this is not going to be a robust cumbersome um process. uh when you talk about the level of of expertise that we can get feedback from and I think it's just guidelines general guidelines that we can take these are not parameters that we want to be able to write and make this um to where it's the actual opposite of what DEI is doing for us but we'd be remissed if we did not create the procedures that we're currently um committed to. So >> So

185these are in there. There's just no detail how we're going to do them. >> Yes, ma'am. And we do I mean DEIC reports out to all of the teachers. Um and I I'm just anecdotally I've had a couple of teachers comment to me over time like oh I saw that in the DEIC you know report right >> well and part of the responsibility of the committee members is we can send them to gather campus feedback. That's part of the process of having the committee because you obviously cannot have a committee of 110 people, right? So, they they are voted upon by their staff. They have an election and they are on for three-year terms. And so, they are picked to represent them by the teachers themselves. Only the teachers are allowed to vote for their

186representative. And so, however we need to gather feedback is what we do through the committee. So, Miss Eigie, I I just we're taking action on amendments to the DOI. >> Yes. >> And there's a motion on the table and we are now having conversation about just how we're going to use DEI and and the DEIC. I I I just I'm and I appreciate the explanation. And I think we should utilize DEIC in every opportunity we have to get feedback from our stakeholders. But but the action item is an amendment to the DOI of which I've made a motion. And I I I think we need to address that or not. And if there's some conversation that piggybacks that that that's fine. Uh, and I appreciate the the the transparency, but the how this is combined

187is a little confusing to me. >> We probably got a little bit out of order here because Mr. Martineell did make a motion to um approve the amendments and we should have worked on that first before we >> I was wondering if that because I could hear Josh B in the back of my head. Was that a motion? As you said, I would love to. I was just trying to >> That was indeed a motion. Dr. Pay. I I I make motion we approve the DOI amendments as presented. >> Second. >> All right. We do have a motion by Mr. Martindell and a second by Dr. Payne. Is there any further discussion on the motion? All in favor, please say I. >> I. >> Any opposed? Okay, that motion is going to pass 70. And

188we appreciate your >> information and transparency. >> Absolutely not. My apologies if I caused a confusion. Um, I will defer to the board next time there is a motion made. I appreciate that. Um, the next update's the same thing. Um, when you look at the student teacher ratio language in the current DOI, um, we've got to develop local policy establishing parameters with regards to student teacher ratio because currently we are exempt um from that mandate and we do not have to um, submit a waiver uh, when you talk about student teacher ratios. So that is something that we need to be able to thoughtfully look forward uh look through and communicate and collaborate with our DEIC and our campuses. >> Can we receive an update at a future meeting about how these conversations went and

189how exactly they were framed up? >> Absolutely. >> Very good. Thank you. >> Yes, sir. >> Yeah. the the teachers. The amount of time teachers get to plan versus do other have other responsibilities in the day feels like a probably something a lot of teachers care deeply about. And whatever would be the most effective way to get the most stakeholder feedback on that, I think would be prudent of us because that does seem to be a something that comes up very often for teachers that I talked to the last few years that that time matters and when it's filled with things that are less valuable to them, that can be a point of frustration pretty quickly. So, if they obviously if they all are game for it, I don't they're the bosses or they they

190certainly know more about it than me, I should say. But I would love for more teacher feedback on that than less. >> What I'm hearing is our district's going to move forward in working on um how we're going to put those into place. So, >> yes, these decisions will not be made in isolation. >> Okay. >> And then the last one, um we need to be able to establish parameters for the class the notice of class size. um a campus or district is granted an exception um and shall provide written notice of an exception. Uh we actually have flexibility in this area and it allows the district to determine the appropriateness of a parent notification as innovative class structures are explored and uh potentially put into place. So, we need to be able to really

191have some strategic conversations around that as well because I know um we've received feedback, you know, just making sure that that's a committed process for us as well. >> All right, appreciate that. >> The last slide is going to be next steps. So, the board is approved. Uh we will submit this to TEA no later than the 15th day of the board adoptions. Um, we will update and maintain district websites for accessibility purposes. We will update legal uh or local policy. Uh, we will present the following section to DEIC for review. We'll create um parameters for the implementation of prep planning time, student teacher ratios, and class size, which are current provisions with inside of our uh district of innovation plan. and we will continue compliance of administrative rules and processes. Is there any other

192feedback that you'd like to give us as a team prior to other than definitely going to involve teachers in the stakeholder conversation being able to provide the parameters in which that's presented? For sure. Any other feedback from the board? >> I think I just appreciate that you guys are going through things and as you're finding things that we need to work on, that's what we're going to tackle. So, >> absolutely, >> one step at a time. >> Thank you, Miss Goulsby. >> Okay, the next item we're going to move to is item K1. Um, consider approval authorizing final negotiations for the construction manager at risk for the CSISD central office project. Mr. Buckner. >> All right. Good evening. So during the um November workshop, it was determined to um utilize a construction manager at risk

193or semar process procurement process for the new central office project which also includes the renovation of these two buildings to house um a couple departments that will remain here as well as uh moving over DAP to this location as well. Um so Semar is a very beneficial project for large-scale construction projects. It helps us with um budgets because we can bring us a construction manager in very early in the uh design process and get feedback during the process with uh multiple uh budget meetings and everything else as we go through different percentage milestones so that we know that we are tracking on budget or do we need to start looking at making some um decisions on the design of the building to uh bring it within budget. So far in the projects we've had, we've

194been very successful with this method and we've had um just about every single one of our projects come in under budget. Um with that being said, after that November meeting, we um released our RFP request for proposals pretty quickly and in December we opened those proposals from various uh contractors. We did have um responses from multiple entities and after that we reviewed those and scored those and tonight that's what we are bringing to you all tonight is the um recommendation from those as the best value uh construction manager at risk for this project as Pogue Construction. If you're remember Pogue Construction is currently our construction manager for the CTE phase 2 project. that project has been um very successful to this point and we don't see any reason why it won't remain that way. And

195that project does have a completion of July of 2026. So with that, this um the team they propose is the same team that we have on the CT project and they will just roll straight from our the location off Dalling Road to the uh location off of Sylvester Road for this project. Um we're looking at kind of a timetable of this one is August of 26 would be a GMP approval um which is a guaranteed maximum price for the project with construction starting immediately after that and then um then December of 27 completion of the central office project and then as soon as that project is complete and departments are moved into the new location renovation would start here for the school year starting in August of 28. So it'll be a quick project. Um

196but this would authorize um Dr. Hark Rider to negotiate the contract with the uh Seymour with the construction manager at risk of of PO Construction. >> Motion to approve as presented. >> Second. Okay. I have a motion by Dr. Payne and a second by Miss Simmon. Do we have any further discussion? Yeah, I'm not super familiar with the timeline. So, just to be clear, we're approving negotiations, but we're not actually approving the construction. There's still time to back out at some point. Is that correct? >> Correct. This is approving the PO construction as the contractor for this project. We will not have a price on this project until August of 2026. And by August of 2026, we feel confident that we'll know things like expected annual operating budget, >> etc., etc. Great. >> Yes. Right

197now, we just know we have a estimate on what the square footage is going to be for this. Um, we have a layout of the building, a very just we're in the schematic design phase still, so we know the layout of the building. We have spent probably 45 minutes discussing the um how we're going to run the HVAC in that building. We don't know those systems yet. We we're still like very early in this process which is why it's beneficial for STEM are having for this process having um Pogan early so we get them at the very beginning stages versus and get the full benefit of this. But there is um part of their proposal is a pre-construction fee and that if we do choose to back out during this, we just pay the pre-construction

198fee that they proposed. >> Great. That feels like it'll be valuable. Do we know what the approximate value of the real estate is of that land that we would be taking offline? >> It's my understanding is it's been offline for quite a few years since we purchased it. >> Yeah. Yeah. Sorry. I mean, it still has value regardless of like that would have to be >> value if we were to sell it. >> Factored. Yeah. Or you had to buy equivalent land in the future for another project, something like that. >> It's we can get it later. I'm just curious if anybody happens to know what that >> I know the bond is 30 30-ish million. Is that right? Is the 31 million something like that. >> That's the uh >> I want to make

199sure we're adding in the land value because that's obviously the total cost of the project. million marked in the original uh proposition to purchase land. >> We would not have to. >> Got it. Thank you. You know, I brought up some concerns when we um first talked about this in November, and I also asked for some additional information, and I appreciate getting some of that. Kind of along the same lines, I think, there of um when do we have to commit our $31 million of our bond money? And it and my concern is still the same. It's not really that bond money because yes, we we had it in um the bond committee and it went out to our voters for approval. But that was over, you know, that was three years ago and I

200think at that point we were looking at a nice steady growth in enrollment. We were look and um and that has not happened and I'm concerned more with the maintenance and operating costs going forward. So, so part of my question was to be able to estimate that a lot better. Some of it being, you know, the utilities and such on a 66,000 square foot building, but then also some of the needed personnel. And I again appreciate Mr. IC but that some of this together um because our in those same three years our enrollment numbers have dropped over 400 students and tell us exactly how much money that is but that's part of where our our budget constraints right now that's over well over four million dollars of less money that we have in our operating

201budget for those for those students and to add to our annual operating expenses for something that I'm not arguing it's not necessarily needed but um it's not classrooms it's not directly there with the students I I am struggling with moving forward spending that money and in fact I'll even I had an example that I saw just by chance yesterday that of a of a district north of Austin who has built two schools from a bond at the same time period They are under construction, planned to be opened in August of 2026. And they're asking their board, do we open none of those or maybe one of them because of the operating cost associated. So that's my um concern at this point and really understanding when we have to commit that money and how much it's

202going to cost moving forward. I do um I've spent a lot of time thinking about this because um I do think that it's important to look at the financial well-being of the district. That's one of the things that we as trustees um should be um oversight on. I I also had a chance to be a part of the bond committees in both 21 and 23 before I was on this board. Um in 21 it was a smaller bond package and the committee pressed back. there was some uh request for money to renovate this building here and um the committee said no it's not time for that yet. We're putting together a smaller package um and this needs to be all on students. um 23 we came back together and the district was much more in

203a place where they wanted to put together a comprehensive package that was going to take care of the needs of this district for a long time and I don't remember hearing anyone around me in that committee pressing back on the idea of finally taking care of the administrative staff um and this building at that time. Um, so I struggle a little bit with the idea of we're going to do all the projects that we um said we were going to do in that bond package except for this one. Um, I I understand the concern about operating costs, but we're not talking about the operating cost of like a school, which is a whole lot different because of all the staff that you have to have. Um, I've been asking some questions about just in general

204what that might look like um, from an operating cost perspective, and I know we can't give any exact numbers because we're not there yet. So, um, I just have to voice, uh, my strong feeling that we looked at three years ago what the needs of our district were going to be. Um, we toured this building. We saw what the staff here is is doing to make this work. Um, and I and we may be down some students, but our support staff here um, still has a need of being able to have the space that they need, getting DAP out of College View, High school. There's a whole lot of benefits to the district. um conference space. I mean, we could go on and on because I've asked a lot of questions about this. So, I

205know that's not really the whole discussion we're going to have here tonight, but um I just need to speak out and say that I feel that the flip side of it is that we went out to the community and said this is this is what we want to do to set our district up for years in the future. Um and I would have a little bit of an issue with us than saying, "Okay, we're just going to not do this one piece of it unless there's a really compelling reason to do that." I I'm the same. I was on the 23 bond committee and and I get the money component because I do think we're supposed to be good stewards of the taxpayer dollar. But I think it'd be shortsighted for us to say just

206just because our enrollment's down that there's the need doesn't outweigh what we need to do here because I would argue that this building does help have better outcomes for our students. It provides meeting space, space to collaborate. Um yeah, it is going to be offices, but I do think reconfiguring this building too to serve Head Start better. um DAP. I I just I get it, but I also would feel really bad having gone out and campaigned for the bond and then we don't deliver on what we've asked the voters who've already approved um this building. But the money the money component component is a big part of it, but I I still feel like this need is here and it's not going to go away just because we have our enrollment has gone down. In

2072023 when we were talking about the bond, did I I wasn't around that this these conversations. Did we expect to be at a deficit budget two years later? Because my the last three months, it seems like we've been surprised we're at a deficit budget. >> I I I believe we were at a deficit budget at the time. >> I think we're in a deficit budget most every year that we pass it. >> Careful. But >> and then it doesn't always work out that way. >> Yeah. So, I guess the other I think the the the challenge that I'm trying to balance in my own head is we're innovating to bring in new students into the district at the charge of we need money and then potentially turning around and spending operational money. >> These are

208totally different funds. >> They're not. >> Bond money is totally different. >> Builds a building, >> right? doesn't pay the bills once you've opened the building unless it's going to be empty. >> But the bond line was passed for the facility. >> Totally totally agree. >> Use that for on >> 100%. But once I'm questioning the operating cost moving forward after it's built, >> once the building is built, >> utilities and potential personnel, >> but we're we also have maintenance of this facility as well. Constant upkeep. >> And we would still have maintenance of this facility because it would still be here, right? My issue is we're we literally two months ago are finding innovative ways to bring in new revenue potentially at the cost of our current 14,000 students which we don't know and

209then adding unknown operational costs just feels like something we should at least be mindful of. It certainly doesn't negate that the bond was passed, but sunk fallacy cost is a real thing. And if it doesn't now make sense for our district to build a a new building because those dollars could be used somewhere else, like on the teacher salaries that are still 10% behind um state average from the last taper report, then I think it's at least worth a discussion. I think the biggest concern I have to be honest is the more time we put into I guess I just want to go on the record to say the more time we put into these guys working super hard with the architects at it seems like there's a risk that we get to August and

210then it's like well we better do this because we've already made a big investment in all of the time put into it and so I just want to go on record I guess to say like I don't want to be rushed in August to make a decision based on data that we've collected for four months when we're saying now that it would be helpful to have that data before we make that final decision. So that's the stake in the ground that I would like to put at least I don't feel like we know enough to make that decision. >> Me personally, >> there's also another thing I want to mention. Right now we're paying for meeting spaces places for people to meet. And you talk about wanting to keep people happy and not losing staff.

211When you have staff officing and closets and doubled up, tripled up in offices. There's a component to that too of keeping these guys that are running the district behind the scenes happy. Um, and I guess they just said that I get where you don't want to be surprised with with data in August, but they said as soon as they have the information, they'll get it to us and we'll have plenty of time to review it before. >> I also think too the trainings that we have here, most of the teachers and admin, there's not enough parking. I mean, there's a lot of issues. It's not just this building is not servicing a district of our size anymore. >> And for many, many years, we've made do with central office having less with the bonds, with

212spacing. I mean, it's been ongoing where central office gets updated, impacted least, and last. >> And I think all that's true. And I I there's that part of me. I know the folks who work hard in this building deserve, you know, a better some better facilities. Um, but I also know we're making a lot of sacrifices in other places with our wi with our in our teachers and classrooms and campuses. And the other thing is we have capacity in some of those elementary schools. We know that when we looked at um the resoning, we could put a conference room or a training room at an elementary room at an elementary and repurpose some space there if we really needed to be creative. you know, um, when we are when we're talking about the reason we

213are able to survive a few more years with deficit budgets is because we had to change our fiscal year to try, you know, to try to get more in our fund balance. We really have to be creative, I think. And we even sat down one of our budget priorities is to, you know, focus on academic quality first and also make informed um, difficult decisions if needed. And that that's where I'm >> just to clarify, we did not change the budget year to get more money in fund balance. That was not the goal. It was a that's like an accounting flip-flop. The the goal of it was to align July 1st with how we run the school district and budgeting and and being able to have supplies and everything ready to go when kids got to

214school >> versus September meeting. it was a very um it was a added benefit to be able to have that additional money in our fund balance. >> So what I'm hearing I think is that we um if we move forward with this um we will be able to get some additional information as time goes on um before August we'll be able to get some of these numbers and data that we're we're asking >> getting Paul going in this process now helps us get to that place sooner but I will tell you uh Mr. Phil you asked a question about the market value of that land looking at Braz calls it 1.8 $.8 million for that piece of property off of Best Road. I knew you had this question, Miss McAdams, so I worked with Miss

215Wilson and we were crunching some numbers over the weekend and looking at some things yesterday. Uh we're looking at 65,000 ft with this new uh potentially this new central office building. Uh the closest thing that we have in comparison to that would be College View is $55,000 ft. Uh and we budget about $65,000 for utilities and gas bills throughout. Now, that's an 11-y old building. This one's obviously going to have different energy code. This one's not going to have a kitchen with as much gas being used because we're not going to be cooking on the daily for lunches and things of that nature. Um, so ballpark that what you will, but if you were just looking for a number right now, um, but $55,000 feet, it calls you $65,000 a year is what we budget

216for that for utilities and gas. And when we get uh the numbers in for the building, we would bring uh the numbers to you guys in a workshop a month prior to us asking you guys to take action. That way, you've seen the numbers, ask any questions. soon as we got 30 days to accumulate any more information that you may need. >> You said August is when you would anticipate a GMP for this project. >> Yes, sir. >> Okay. So, so tonight we're simply considering construction manager at risk so they can be a part of the planning process. We're not approving a budget or approval of construction, simply the planning process, which is it is smart to have them in on the front end. It will help you manage the budget and see things in

217design that will help control the budget. I think over that time till August, I hear people asking for data on projected cost and everything else. So I think if administration is diligent in providing board with data along the way then hopefully come August that folks will feel like they have the information needed to make a decision one way or the other on whatever GMP is is proposed at that time. So we're we're we're debating two different things at this point in time. All we're doing tonight is considering the construction manager at risk and just make sure that the information that board members request associated with this project is when you have firm data to get it to us, please. And I know Melissa at BLK will play a huge role in some of those projected

218information. Is Melissa here? >> She is. >> Hi. How are you doing? Uh so if as long as we get that information along the way then then hopefully it will help with decision making uh in August. Until we have that we're we're debating we're we don't >> it's already >> we don't know what we're debating. >> It's already been instructed to the uh MEP engineers as well as that we're needing this information. I am hopeful probably around late May, June, we should be able to start getting into that with with where we are for projected utility costs and then also working with utility on what they're looking at for future rates as well. So, but no, we will get that information to you as soon as it's available to us. >> I appreciate that. I

219appreciate that that comment um Mr. Martdale because part of my question too was that it was on the timeline and when are we committing you know how much money along the way and when can we make a decision to decide it's not worth it's not the right time for this for this building and investing that extra um operating cost. So >> I would say we have until we bring the GMP to the board for approval. That's we have >> we're spending a little money by doing this because we're asking them to do some work but >> there would be >> yeah small compared to the whole project. >> Yes. >> So considering that on the table we have a motion by Dr. Payne and a second by Miss Simmon. >> All in favor please say

220I. >> Any opposed? That motion passes 70. >> Thank you uh Mr. Buckner and Mr. Syc. Uh that's going to move us to item L1, executive session. The board will meet in executive session to discuss superintendent midyear review that exe executive session deliberations will be held pursuant to personnel matters closed meeting exception to the Texas Open Meetings Act. Tell I don't think All right. She can't hear Right, we are um back from executive session at 9:55 and we're going to adjourn.