CSISD Board Meeting 5/20/2025 - Regular Meeting

001[Music] Welcome everybody to our regularly scheduled meeting Tuesday, May 20th, 2025. Call to order declar declaration of a quorum. Seven members present. Welcome back, Dr. Payne. Appreciate you. Welcome to this meeting at College Station Independent School District Board of Trustees. We were elected at large to represent the interests 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 and posting agendas and conducting our meeting. The detailed agenda information was made available to us at least 72 hours in advance, and we have all come to this meeting informed and prepared. We've just completed a workshop meeting where we heard reports and discussed much of the information needed to make decisions in

002either 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've taken the time this evening to join us. We are very proud of this school district. We thank you for your interest in and support of our students. Bring us to item C, recognitions. We have, I believe, Oakwood Intermediate and Anam Consolidated Middle School. Wow. Everybody came here to It's kind of can become a tradition when Hollik Street's in the house that everybody comes standing room only. Um, my name is Omar Espia and I am the proud

003principal of&m Consolidated Middle School uh over on Hollik Street and I have brought two wonderful Bobcats with me tonight uh to help us with the pledges. Uh didn't have to go too far. Uh Gianna Grande, you might recognize the name. Uh she uh along with Mr. Eddie Lopez uh are welcome are coming to welcome everybody and do the pledges for us. And I'm going to let them introduce themselves. Hi, my name is Giana Grande. Two of my favorite things about Bobcat Country is my orchestra and engineering classes. Um, the teachers always make the lessons engaging and fun. I always walk out of the classrooms knowing more than I did before. Hi, my name is Eddie Lopez. I'm an eighth grader at CMS. Two things that I like is science and orchestra. I feel like Miss

004Cashaw always makes the lessons very fun and I've definitely grown this year. [Applause] Hi, I'm Roco Granny at Oakwood Intermediate. I am very proud to present um Adonis Booth and Hattie Lynch. Adonis is a sixth grader. Hadtie is a fifth grader. They're here representing Oakwood Intermediate. Hello, my name is Adonis Booth and two things that I like about Oakwood is that the coaches uh tried their hardest to push us to achieve our goals and orchestra because Mr. Curtis is waited uh uh do the violin when I couldn't do it. And now I know how to play uh 10 pieces of what was it? It was a tough song though. [Applause] Hi, my name is Hattie Lynch. Two things I like about Oakwood is the PE coaches. They're always trying to make us better at whatever

005we're doing, whether it's learning about life or getting better at sports. I also like orchestra because they're always pushing us to be our best. We've learned from memory music to learning how to play music off reading it off a paper. Thank you, Haddie. Um, please rise for the pledge of allegiance to to the United States. Right. I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America. and to the republic for which it stands. One nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. Please remain standing for the Texas pledge. Honor the Texas flag. I pledge allegiance to thee, Texas, one state under God, one and indivisible. Please remain standing for a moment of silence. You may be seated. You guys can have a seat. You guys can have a seat for a

006second or you can head to your paws. Oh, wait. Take a picture. Sorry, honey. Let's do a picture. [Applause] I want to recognize two staff from my school. My two PE coaches, Coach Julie Wellman and Coach Blake Herder. These coaches model the accountability, consistency, and effort that our students emulate. They teach our students to set goals for themselves and work hard to achieve them. And that teaches our students the self-reliance and self-confidence that they need in life. Hard work beats talent. That's the mantra in our gym. And our entire campus emulates that. And I'm very, very proud and they deserve this recognition and more. Thank you, Coach Wellman and Coach Hera. [Applause] If I could have you all come up here. You know who you are. Miss Abalos, Miss Stevens, if you could also come

007up. Tonight I want to go ahead and highlight a theme and the theme is unsung heroes. And u I have asked Mr. Mark Ramos, Miss Amy Frevley, Miss Joanne Pulchin, and Miss Jacqueline Swan, along with my assistant principles, Ashley Stevens, and Katie Abalos to join us tonight. We hear a lot, we see a lot in the classroom, but it's the unsung heroes. These are pair of professionals that uh work in our special ed department in day out. They work in tandem with our teachers to support students in little ways that people don't ever see. And so I wanted to take the moment and I really do appreciate Dr. Hark Rider, Mr. Horack and the board allowing us to have the time. Uh this has been a new thing that's been instituted recently and it is

008fabulous. I enjoy the fact that we get to you get to see not just me what I see every day. Now Miss Stevens and Miss Avalos didn't realize I was going to have them come up here. I've been telling them for about two weeks, hey, it might be a good idea for you to come to the board meeting. But it's also because they're two unsung heroes as well. It's not just referrals, it's supporting teachers. Sometimes they're caught in between principal, student, teacher, and all about it. And I tell them every day, whatever is the best decision for the student. I don't care if anybody else gets mad or angry, that's what matters. And they are the ones caught between rock and hard place all too often. Um, and they, you know, it'd be a lot

009easier. These are two fabulous educators that could probably make a lot more money. We were just talking about it earlier teacher instead of aotment but they chose to support teachers and everything we do is to support students and support teachers as they support students and so these individuals here we could not do I definitely couldn't do my job without them here and so uh I thought it was appropriate to honor them tonight. Thank you. Mhm. Thank you guys. [Applause] This or this? It doesn't matter. You're comfortable. Hello everyone. My name is Shannon Ctharb. I am the director of transportation. And next to um Mr. Ron Schaefer, who is our driver is Carol Lester. She's my assistant director. Um today I just wanted to say a little bit about Mr. Schaefer. Being a bus driver means

010so much more than just getting students to and from school safely. It's about showing up for them every single day with a smile, a listening ear, a heart that cares. It's about see being someone they can count on, someone they feel safe with, and sometimes someone they feel comfortable talking with when they just need it the most. The connection we build on that bus, no matter how short the ride, can bring a spot in a student's day that just brightens it. And this responsibility and privilege Mr. Hon Schaefer does not take lightly. I'd also like to ask Miss uh Kennedy Bonds and her mom Casey Turbo to come up, please. I want to read a little bit of an email that these two sent because it was so special. It says, "I especially would like

011to recognize um Kennedy's bus driver, Mr. Ron. His compassion and care have truly touched our hearts. He checks on Kennedy regularly and even prays for her." Kennedy would come home with funny stories about Mr. Ron being the last on stop on the route. They had time to chat and she always enjoyed those conversations. He clearly made listening an impact on her and it's a lasting impact. I hope the district can take a moment to recognize Mr. Ron for the incredible kindness, selfless person he is. He goes above and beyond and it doesn't go unnoticed. Thank you again for all your support and taking time to listen. So, at this time, I'd like to recognize Ron Schaefer as a transportation employee of the month for all that you do for our community and students. And I

012would also like to present a golden heart award to Miss Kennedy Bonds. She and her mother have taken time to lift Mr. Ron up with praise for an excellent job he does for our district. So, thank you so much. This is for you. This is for you. And I also want to um sorry I wanted to thank the um the um education foundation. They have given Mr. Ron a gift card as well. So thank you so much. Can we get our picture? I didn't see this coming. Thank you. Thank you. Let's grab a picture. All right. Here we go. Everybody smiles. One, two, three. Thank you. Good job. I don't know who this goes to. I'm going to take it. I'm gonna stand up here tonight if that's all right so I can see everybody.

013Okay. Howdy everyone. My name's Austin Dunson. I'm the director of communications. And as you can see by this incredibly full room tonight, we have dozens nearly a hundred I think it was over a hundred students were invited to be recognized tonight for their accomplishments for uh competing and excelling at the state level in their respective competitions. So we have we do have an extraordinary amount of students to recognize tonight from a wide range of activities you as you've seen on the agenda. And so we are going to do our recognition portion a little bit differently if you've been to a board meeting or watched one before. So we're going to ask our student groups to come up together as one team and I'll read their recognition and accomplishments and then we'll take a group photo

014and um give their sponsor kosher teacher their certificates to take home with them. So to start us off, if you are a member or a coach um or you're here representing the&m Consolidated High School Lady Tiger soccer team, will you please come forward? [Applause] So, you may have already seen it or heard it, but we are thrilled to recognize the&m Consolidated High School girls soccer team tonight who made history this spring by winning the 2025 UIL 5A Division 1 state championship, the school's first ever state title in girls soccer. The Tigers had an incredible season, finishing undefeated um with a record of 26 wins, zero losses, and one draw. They swept through district play, capturing the district title with a perfect record, and then battled through five rounds of playoffs. On April 11th, the team

015faced Collieville Heritage in the state championship game and delivered a commanding performance. Come on, buddy. Winning four to zero and bringing home the gold for the first time in school history. The Lady Tigers also earned a slew of postseason honors, including um Jolie Ingram being named the state final MVP. Um we had several named to the UIL state teams for um for the first and second teams for the Texas Association of Co soccer coaches, all state team, academic state um honors, district honors, and more. as well as our coaching staff earned earned honors. Coh head coach Caleb Blakeley was named the region 3 head coach of the year and the district 17 5A coach of the year and assistant coach Aaron Tomlin was named the region 3 assistant coach of the year. Finally, the city

016of College Station issued a proclamation designating April 22nd, 2025 as&m Consolidated High School Lady Tiger Soccer Day. And the Texas House of Representatives issued a resolution on the House floor congratulating the team. So, please join us in celebrating this extraordinary group of student athletes and their coaches. Uh we'd also like to present the uh board of trustees as well as Dr. Hark Rider with a gold medal uh and uh as a token of our appreciation for your support uh and all along the way. So thank you very much uh to our leaders in this district that uh support all programs. Thank you. [Music] [Applause] Congrats again, y'all. [Applause] All right, College Station A team, y'all are up next. Y'all come forward. Where we at? Oh, we're coming around. We're coming around the back. All right.

017Well, they're coming around. [Applause] Now, we're also proud to recognize the outstanding achievements of our College Station A team or Special Olympics athletes who competed across the state this year in swimming, powerlifting, cycling, track, and field, and fundamental events. These athletes trained with determination and heart and their efforts paid off in remarkable ways. Over the course of the year, the A team brought home a total of 37 gold medals. Yep. 16 silver medals and seven bronze medals. [Applause] These medals represent more than just competition results for these young athletes. They reflect the spirit of perseverance, sportsmanship, and pride in representing the College Station community. We also like to give a very special thank you to their dedicated coaches and student coaches who are here with them tonight. So to our College Station A team athletes

018and coaches, thank you for representing College Station with pride, passion, and purpose. We are proud of each and every one of you. Let's give them a big round of [Applause] applause. Here we go. Six miles. One, two, three. [Applause] [Music] T's mom. All right. If you are a student or art teacher here being recognized uh for visual arts for vase um junior vase or team, please come forward. [Applause] We are proud to recognize the creativity and talent of our College Station ISTD visual arts students who participated in this year's TA competitions including the visual arts scholastic event or vase junior vase for middle school and intermediate and team the Texas elementary art meet. These competitions are designed to elevate student creativity and expression through the visual arts. Students present original artwork, engage with jurors, and

019receive ratings based on their creativity, craftsmanship, and personal voice. Across CSISD, students, elementary through high school earned top honors, and we are thrilled that they are here tonight to be recognized. So, just give a wave a hand if you participated in vase this year. Any high schoolers? Where my high schoolers at? Oh, there you are. Okay, high school, junior vase, give a wave here. There we go. And team where my elementary kids at. Awesome. These student artists have demonstrated not only incredible skill, but also their ability to express creative voice through their work. We're proud of every student and teacher who guided them and inspired them daily. So, please give a big round of applause for our talented CSISD visual artists. Stay right there. All right, congratulations guys. [Applause] All right, state track CSHS and

020console. Y'all come on up. All right. We're also proud to recognize several of our exceptional athletes from our two comprehensive high schools tonight who represented CSISD at the 2025 UL UIL state track and field meet. These student athletes compete at the highest level in the state and and demonstrated remarkable talent, dedication, and perseverance. We had a total of five students compete. We had Brilan Hunter from&m Consolidated who placed ninth in the high jump. Riley Schulz who uh competed in the pole vault, placed eighth. Canon Williams who placed sixth in the triple jump. Jada Stanford who placed third in the 200 meter, third in the 400 meter, and Laney Cass, who placed third in the 300 meter, and sixth in the high jump. These athletes have made our community proud by representing their schools on the

021biggest stage in Texas High School track and field. So, please join us in congratulating them and thanking their coaches for an incredible season and outstanding state performances. [Applause] Stay right there. Parents. Okay, congratulations, guys. Thank you. All right. Where are my state golfers at? All right. Tonight, we're also proud to recognize student athletes. We had uh students from both comprehensive high schools. I think we just have College Station High School here tonight who competed at the 2025 UIL State Golf Tournament. From College Station High School, Gage Alzando placed seventh. Parker Coyle placed 11th, Keller Henson placed to 52nd, Tristan Edington placed 55th, and Avery Hendrick placed 60th. And overall, as a team, they are the seventh best golf team in 5A in the state of Texas. So, please give them a round of applause. [Applause]

022All right, gymnastics. Y'all come on up. Tonight, we're proud to recognize the incredibly talented student athletes from both of our comprehensive high schools who represented CSISD in gymnastics during the 2025 season. This is the first year both of our high school gymnastics teams qualified for the state competition. And I don't know if you've ever been to a high school gymnastics meet, but I had the privilege of joining them at regionals this year in Brian and it is the most fierce and joyful competition that I've ever been a part of. It's also a little confusing because they all cheer for each other on the other teams. So, but it is incredibly encouraging to watch them and their coaches are incredibly dedicated. So, congratulations to these teams. Um throughout the season, Console finished second in district, second

023in regionals, and placed seventh overall in the state. And College Station High School finished third at regionals and finished 11th of the state, or I'm sorry, I have this wrong. Yeah, 11th in the state. I'm sorry. Um individual highlights. Uh Ty Taplan placed fourth in the state out of 156 individual qualifiers. Molly Elely placed seventh in region two. Lexi Hardsy placed 15th in the state and vault third in region. And in College Station High School, Lissa Fowler third in region in allaround. Um Emily Thompson fifth in region two. Hannah Anderson second uh in beam in region. Ella McKenna eighth in region two. and Ken Lairman Zoa Garner vital to the team scoring and qualification for state. So it's important to note that not all these athletes in um received individual rankings but um because of

024the way that gymnastics scoring works um everybody contributed to the strength and the success of their team. So please join me in giving them a big round of applause for their success this year. [Applause] All right, anglers. So, we have a unique one here tonight. Th this is a group of students from both of our high schools who compete in a uh club-based program called the CS Anglers. It's bass fishing and they recently um had some accomplishments at the state level. So tonight we're excited to also recognize the College Station Angler Fishing Team for an impressive performance at the Texas High School Bass Association Houston Division tournament at Lake Limestone. This was the first tournament of the year with 149 boats competing and our anglers made a big splash. Thanks to a strong showing from

025multiple boats teams, the CS anglers brought home the overall team trophy with team finishes. First place Wyatt Dixon and Turner Mang uh Mangum. Third place Caleb Williams and Asher HL. Fourth place Parker Coyle and Braden Stansy. And 10th place Jackson Bruner and Jackson Reutder. This outstanding performance reflects not only the skill and preparation of these incredible students, but the teamwork and sportsmanship that they learn in school through their different extracurricular activities. So, please join us in congratulating the CS English Fishing team for a great season. [Applause] All right. And last but not least, Console State Powerlifting. So, we're also proud to recognize our dedicated determined state powerliffters from&m Consolidated High School who competed in the Texas High School Power Assoc Powerlifting Association state meets this year. Powerlifting is a sport that demands a lot of

026physical strength and mental fus focus and incredible work ethic and these athletes demonstrated all of that and more as they represent Canaw and CSISD at the highest level of competition. We have Cameron Rostston who qualified with a 550 lb squat, 325lb bench, and 475lb deadlift for the state meet. Cortavian Hutcherson qualified to the state meet with a 545 pound squat, 385 pound bench, and 515 pound deadlift. And at the state uh meet, he performed with a 550 lb squat, 405 lb bench, and 445 lb deadlift. And Beckham Magguire qualified for the state meet with a 615 lb squat, 405 lb deadlift, and 510 lb deadlift. I'm sorry, 405 lb bench and 510 lb deadlift. For the girls, Camry Burns finished ninth in the state in her weight class with state lifts of 360 for the

027squat, 190 for the bench, and 280 for the deadlift. And Sarah, and I'm so sorry, I'm going to butcher her last name. Z, there you go, coach. Thanks, buddy. Finished 10th in the state. um and qualified with a 330 lb squat, 200lb bench, and 290 lb deadlift. These students are led by coach Don Miller, whose leadership, training, and encouragement helped guide them through a successful season. So, please join us in congratulating our last student group of the night, and Coach Miller for their incredible accomplishments, dedication, and representation of CSISD. All right. And that concludes our recognitions for tonight. Thank you. uh brings item C4. We'd like to recognize the artwork there at the back of our boardroom from the Oakwood Intermediate School and Anum Casalia Middle School. So, make sure y'all check that out before

028you head out this evening. brings item D, board reports. Anybody like to start I mean I have a report from the end of the year for education foundation. Um they wrapping up a busy year as always um with the event last week which was the senior scholarship reception where $175,000 worth of scholarships were given to 130 of our seniors. Um, we also had a special surprise where 10 teachers won uh $500 classroom grants and that's through a social media campaign where um the community can nominate teachers and then they are selected randomly from uh those nominations and that's sponsored by HB. So I loved seeing the pictures um that you guys put out of that. Um but yeah, education foundation always doing great things for our students. So thank you. DIC met um and we

029will be I won't steal Mr. Man's thunder for later, but we discussed the uh school calendar being amended and the additional 10 minutes um added to the day. So, we'll learn more about that later. And I was going to just mention that we that the safety committee did meet. It's one of the ones we can't really talk about in here about what we talk about, but just to know that we do have a safety committee. It's existed for a long time. It has representatives from um admin campuses, school board as well as our um you know first responders throughout the the community. So that's an ongoing thing and led by Miss Budro very well. And so we we met a few weeks ago. I also want to make another just a comment on I was

030just very I just wanted to say al and I don't know if you'll talk about this. I just wanted to thank the administration for the um outreach last week that they did on all the campuses for for spending that time to go out and um have some communication with our our staff at all of our campuses made so and and thanks to all the the also to the the teachers and whoever came and also did that side of it as well. So just thanks to everybody who made that made that effort on both sides. Um the Head Start Policy Council had um their I believe last meeting of the school year um and uh got um a couple a lot of updates on on numbers. Uh that that uh program continues to um just do

031impressive things. Uh also, um they are continuing to um try as much as possible to have kiddos be on their home campus when then the um um so if they're going to be in kindergarten at uh Rock Prairie, then that's where they would hopefully be for Head Start. Um and last thing was that they are looking at doing some uh programming changes as far as their home visits versus trainings. they're doing um with um basically internal to make sure they're all on the same page. And so a lot of good things happening there and um it's just a a program that continues to grow and and continues to have positive effects down the line for for CSISD and College Station. Anything else? Dr. Hark Rider, superintendent update. Yes, sir. Busy week. Uh senior walks yesterday

032at the elementary campuses went very well. Uh Thursday is our last day. We'll have an early release and College View High School graduation is that evening. Uh console and College Station high schools graduations will be Friday. College Station High at 4, Consol at 8. Monday will be a holiday and then our summer leadership institute with our administrators, directors, and other folks within the district will be May 28th and 29th. All right. Bring us to item E, 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. 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

033limited 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 asked those addressing the board refrain from any derogatory comments. Our first um first one tonight is Heidi Divera and we are going to have y'all speak from the front so Miss Eggy can actually see y'all instead of having to flip around. So we made that modification just so we can all pay attention. Thank you. My name is Heidi Divera and I've been a teacher with CSISD for the past seven years. I was first hired by Jeff Duron at Rock Prairie Elementary and

034then transferred to Pont Trail in order to return to intermediate level. I've been blessed to serve with amazing colleagues and instructional coaches and under the outstanding leadership of three principles including Mr. Duron, Kelly Deg Gear, and Britney Kaine. I'm also a proud parent of two students who graduated from CSHS and our youngest son who will attend Wilbur Middle next year. Prior to CSISD, I earned my master's degree in education and taught in three other states and school districts. I've relocated frequently due to my husband's job. I now have 17 years of classroom and teaching experience and actually have an informed basis of comparison when I consider the current state of our district. My professional reviews have always been excellent and I have exemplary TIA status. I've done curriculum writing, served as a mentor teacher, and

035I'm on my campus leadership team. I recently made the decision to resign my current position. While I still love the students and the content I teach, the additional demands imposed on teachers in this district have simply become too much. My roster this year included 106 students, 23 of whom had specialized learning plans such as a 504 or IEP. That is more than 20% of my students and resulted in 171 daily accommodations that I was supposed to make and document accordingly. This is absolutely unrealistic and indicative of the complete overhaul needed within special education services. In addition to countless spat accommodations, classroom teachers also assumed all remediation since we lost the services of coach and specialists who used to meet with students. Another new program, Character Strong, was introduced and while I value it, it was

036yet another expectation of classroom teachers beyond normal curriculum. A third and significant detrimental change implemented this year has been the requirement of two PLC meetings per week. Add to that 504 or IEP meetings on other days. This simply means more work to take home, especially because I teach ELA. One writing assignment for 106 students requires hours of grading in order to provide meaningful feedback. The week before last, I spend at least 10 hours in the evenings grading final projects. That's literally another part-time job. This year, I've resorted to making copies during my lunch period. Many of my colleagues come in on the weekends just to make copies. Add to that nearly 1,000 grades every six weeks, and I have no idea when you think we have the time to do all of this during working

037hours. You have forced solutions for problems that didn't even exist at every campus and have wasted taxpayer money to outside consultants instead of investing the funds in what teachers and students actually need. I'm truly saddened by the direction of this district. After 17 years in the classroom, I've never felt more micromanaged. Thank you for hearing my concerns and I hope that your awareness leads to real change in the direction and leadership of CSISD. Thank you, Ashley Craig. My name is Ashley Craig. I'm a principal human factors and process systems engineer formerly with NASA and now with an international engineering firm. I also serve as a PhD mentor for Rice University and on the industry and industry advisory board for Embry Riddle Aeronautical University. Before engineering full-time, I taught aerospace and astronomy at Willis High School.

038I coached three sports. I left the teaching profession in Willis of ISD of 2022. Although I moved on, I feel called to advocate for those who are still in the classroom and are clearly now leaving. They deserve better. My final year of teaching was defined by toxicity, intimidation, and emotional distress. Conditions which I wouldn't wish on anyone. And yet, I hear the same concerns echoed by teachers here at College Station ISD. Even this evening, the moment that pushed me beyond my limits came in my final year. I spoke up when I found out my assistant coach was not able to have a statemandated planning period. To be clear, this is a legal violation. Instead of support, I was told by Jason Glenn, the director of athletics and fine arts at that time, that it was

039not a fit for the culture at Willis ISD or Willis High School. I was explicitly told that I could not speak to HR, raise concerns with administration. This conversation was recorded and he knew it because I had learned at my time for Willis ISD that I could not trust the process. After res after resigning, I prepped for hours to leave behind organized lesson plans, resources for supports for students, accommodations as well for my replacement. Still, I was reported to the Texas A Education Agency for contract abandonment. The board's letter called me unworthy to instruct or supervise the youth of this state. When TEA reviewed my case and listened to my recordings, their legal council apologized and found of my version accurate and confirmed retaliation had occurred. I was sus I was uh provided the minimum

040suspension allowed because even the state recognized the truth. When I asked to speak at Willis ISD board meeting, I was told by Dr. Hark Rider's office that I was not permitted to and I was again silenced. So tonight, I speak with a voice that I didn't have to have then. For myself, for those who cannot speak without fear, to this board, I offer you one clear call to action. Establish a protective mechanism for anonymous feedback. Retiliation is real and silencing people is also real. If you want the truth, you must make it safe to tell. Thank you for your time and for hearing what I was never actually l to say [Applause] Heather Nickel. Good evening. I'm sorry. Good evening, Dr. Harker. I'm a proud and sorry, members of the board. My name is Heather

041Nickel and I'm a proud parent of two children in CSISD. I come before you tonight with a sense of hope. Last month's board meeting made it clear that parents across our district care deeply about the decisions being made. It is also highlighted that concerns among teachers aren't isolated to just a few campuses and that many more parents beyond the most vocal want to see meaningful change. To the parents of our great district, I urge you to stay involved and to stay informed. Our teachers and children need your continued attention and support to ensure they can thrive. It's also up to us to hold the board accountable for the decisions made during these meetings. I want to sincerely thank the cabinet members who visited our campuses. Your willingness to be present, listen, and engage in conversation

042meant a great deal to our teachers. I know over 250 attended, and I'm extremely thankful for our teachers being open despite their fears. I'm also encouraged by the ongoing conversations I've had with many of you on the board, whether through personal meetings, phone calls, or emails, and I appreciate the opportunity to meet with Dr. Hart Grider in the coming weeks. This type of open communication gives me hope that we can collaborate to create solutions that benefits both our educators and our students. I'd like to briefly address the proposed extension of the 25 to 2026 school calendar year. While I understand the reasoning behind the proposal, I'm concerned that the district is once again moving forward with major decisions without get verse gathering sufficient input from staff and the community. Although additional planning time is valuable,

043extending the school day and adding four teacher planning work days effectively increases teachers workload with additional compensation. Essentially asking them to work for the same pay. Based on the feedback teachers shared during the cabinet visits and teachers that I have spoken to, it's clear that many do not favor of this change. So my ask of the board is simple but important. Before voting on this tonight, please seek direct feedback from the campuses. If this is approved without the input, it will only reinforce the feeling that teachers voices are not being heard and the board continues to approve items without getting feedback from the people they represent. Thank you for your time and your commitment to doing what's best for our district. [Applause] Meg Anderson. Good evening, members of the board. My name is Meg Anderson

044and I'm here tonight as a concerned parent and community member. I speak with a deep respect for the educators who dedicate their lives to our children. I'm not a school teacher, but I have many friends who are, and some of them have asked me to speak for them. I'm alarmed by the number of teachers who are leaving our district. From what I've heard, they're not just retiring or relocating. They are fleeing for other jobs. And who could blame them? The current workload for teachers has become unsustainable, and future expectations do not sound like an improvement. I'm hearing reports of excessive meetings that cut into already stretched planning time. Add to that the recent proposal of an extension of the school day by 10 minutes without corresponding a pay pay increase. That means our teachers will

045actually be paid less per hour for next year. This is not how we retain or show respect for our great educators. There's such a staggering loss every time an experienced teacher leaves to take another job. The recent graduates and newly emergency certified are not going to be able to give the same quality education to our children compared to the ones who have built up years of experience. While our teachers face rising expectations and burnout, they're also facing nearly a 7% increase in insurance premiums. That hits hard, especially when, from what I've heard, administration salaries have gone up by as much as 50% over the past 5 years. If that figure is accurate, we need to ask ourselves, are we showing our valuable teachers that we support them and stand in the trenches with them? In

046addition to the teachers, let's talk about pair of professionals. Even after their upcoming raises, the pay will be decreasing because of rising insurance costs. I do not understand how we expect to have a deep pool of qualified paraprofessionals to help our kids and teachers when they could quit and make more working at McDonald's. I do not even know a single paraprofessional who can live on their own salary and support themselves. It's beyond belief. Beyond the numbers, I want to talk about hearts and minds. The mental health of our teachers and our students is in crisis. My teacher friends are stressed out, overworked, and we cannot ignore this. Everyone, teachers, staff, students, everyone's under too much pressure. There are free programs available through Texas A&M that will provide education, awareness, and support for suicide prevention. We

047can bring one of them into the schools and get if we can get the approval to implement. It should be an absolute priority to help our kids who are feeling hopeless and overwhelmed. Our district has long been a place of pride. Let's keep it that way by doing right by our teachers, protecting mental health of our kids, and ensuring fairness and pay and policy. I know I covered a lot of topics tonight, but that's because I had so much input from my valuable teacher friends. I put the word out that I was willing to speak. Even though I truly despise having to do this kind of thing, as it shows by how much I'm shaking, I think if you could walk alongside any teacher in this district for one week and see what they are

048going through, you would be moved to make some changes for the better. Thank you for your time, Amy Sheilac. This time, Jeff, I know. I practiced. Good evening board, ladies and gentlemen. My name is Amy Sheilac. I'm a parent of a third and a fourth grader here. I'm also here tonight as a voice for educators in this district. Educators who are still reluctant to speak for themselves for fear of professional retaliation. When I addressed you last month, I shared that teacher morale seems at an all-time low, and that many are overwhelmed, burned out, and feeling unheard. Sadly, tonight's vote on the proposed 10-minute extension to the school day compounds that concern. I understand that the primary purpose of this schedule adjustment is to align the two high schools so all students can access the new

049CTE building equitably. I support that goal. But the impact of this change doesn't stop there. These 10 minutes per day amount to 3.9 additional full full work days for teachers days students will be not on campus. And yet there's no compensation proposed for these additional work days. It's being framed as a benefit extra time to get things done, but in reality it's unpaid labor. Teachers are being asked to give more of themselves when they're already stretched too thin. Let it be noted the impact of students not being on campus should also be further explored. While to a financially stable dual parent household, this may not seem like a negative impact, it can wreak havoc on single parent households whose budgets are already stretched to the max. At the April workshop, we were told the district

050education improvement committee would meet to review this change before tonight's board vote, and I understand we'll hear more about that. I searched for DEIC meeting minutes and the last update available online is from September of 24. This really leaves parents and frankly teachers in the dark. I do not I do want to thank the board for sending delegates out into the schools and gathering feedback these past few weeks. The effort was noted and appreciated, but I understand that when cabinet members returned to report, none shared feedback from staff regarding the 10-minute change. Not clear on if it wasn't gathered or not shared. This is what's most disheartening. And we're asking our teachers to work more, pushing them toward the top of the education minute spectrum compared to ne neighboring districts while we still pay them

051the least. As Miss Lever's chart from last month's workshop showed, our 20-year veteran educators are at the bottom of the salary range among our peer districts. Nothing about that translates to demonstrating how highly we value our experienced and loyal educators. It seems unjust that we're prioritizing a CTE building schedule, something that only impacts high schools, while continuing to neglect the very real issue of inequitable teacher pay and unreasonable workload demands across all campuses. One teacher recently told me she feels angry, exhausted, and unheard. And she's not alone. I urge you to please table tonight's vote. Take more time to collect meaningful, transparent feedback from teachers, admin, and impacted families across all campuses. and more importantly consider how to fairly compensate teachers if this change must move forward. We should not be asking more from our

052teachers without giving them more in return. Thank you. Bring us to item F, consent agenda, item G, J2, J3, J4, J5, J6, J7, J8 through J12. That is all. Motion to approve. Second. A motion by Dr. Payne, second by Miss Simmon. Any further discussion? All those in favor say I. I. All those opposed, same sign. Motion carries. 70. Actually, I'm sorry. Yeah. I I need to because of a professional relationship, I need to abstain. Oh, okay. Yeah. Um, I'm going to redo the vote if that's okay. Absolutely. Okay. So, we have a motion by Dr. Payne, second by Miss Simmon. All those in favor say I. I. All those opposed, same sign. And all those abstain. I. Okay. So, we have motion carries 6 with one abstension. Uh, brings to item H1. Consider approval of

053the adjustments to the instructional calendar for 2526 school year. Mr. man. All right. Good evening everybody. Dr. Hark Rider, Mr. Horac, ladies and gentlemen of the board, it is my pleasure to come to you this evening to talk with you about the calendar adjustment. And so, as discussed in the the board workshop last month, um there is a need to identify 10 minutes to the school day for the coming school year. And as you can see, the reason has been discussed for both of our comprehensive high schools to be on the same bell schedule. Um, currently we're unable to maximize our CT facility to its current um, possibilities because our schools are on different schedules and it's hard to get kids back and forth and run a consistent schedule for them to be a part

054of. Um and we were also informed that we um will no long we're running out of time where we can send students to the Brian ISTD CTE center. I mean and so whenever we look into the future, we need to also maximize what our taxpayers have approved for us to utilize. So with this change, we would add the 10 minutes on to the end of the day. And so you can see instead of 3:05, it would be 3:15. And then instead of 3:50, it would be four o'clock for our elementary and secondary campuses. Um, and this is the same 45 minute window of time that we currently have for our bus routes to be able to run the routes between. It just shifts everything by 10 minutes. And with this change, it does add four

055additional days worth of minutes to our calendar that was adopted. And so you recall from all the calendar conversations this year um we have to have a minimum of 75,600 minutes of instruction per year and then you add um the 10 minutes per day 1750 this adds into 3.97 additional days with everything calculated. Okay. And we have always been the last several years we've applied for the PD waiver and we've been able to get the waiver. We don't know 100% that we'll get it, but we anticipate getting it. And so that would give us four additional cushion days of credit that we can count instructional minutes because we're providing professional development for our staff per the requirements of the waiver from the first day of instruction through the last day of instruction. So the August

056PD days do not count for the waiver. It has to be the PD days during the year. Okay. So with these 10 minutes and the PD waiver, we'd have a cushion of almost eight days for the coming year. And again, we maintain this cushion because um several um legislative sessions ago, we moved away from bad weather days. So districts are responsible for maintaining their own days and their own minutes. And as we learned this year that sometimes things happen and you have to have some extra days, right? And so with these um 10 additional minutes um we can designate four of these days that are currently designated as instructional days and to teacher planningwork days if you guys so choose to do that. This right here is the same calendar that the board adopted in

057January. And what is different is I have the calculations of the additional minutes on the right side. And these are the dates um whenever we discussed um as a as a cabinet about where to place um August 29th, November 21st, March 6th, and April 2nd. These are the dates that um we came to. And the reason why is because we had higher rates of absences of both students and staff on these days because if you go back and you look at the days, you see that those are before major breaks and that's that's a big contributing factor that's been a burden um for many reasons. Uh the trend we noticed um is something that we wanted to work on. We had a lot of feedback about how does this fit in with grading periods, but

058because we're on six weeks and nine weeks, there's not a clean way to set that up to where we could say everybody would have the time to get their grades entered and everything graded and updated because you're picking either secondary or elementary. And so we had to come on something that we felt was a common ground for everybody to get some benefit out of all this. The days would be designated as planning and work day. They're not PD days. They're not we're not doing campus staff development. They are for the teachers to do the work that they say that they need. And all of our feedback in DEIC, we receive feedback from staff saying, "I need more time. I need more time. Time to work, time to get things done." And so, this is an

059opportunity that we are able to provide for them. So, this is four less days with students in front of them. And if for some reason we used our 3.97 cushion days, then we have other days where we could say we got to bring kids into school because something happened and we ran out of those other days. So it provides us some flexibility in the event of something we don't know could happen. So with that, the recommendation that we have as administration is for the board to approve the adjusted calendar that would designate the four days as presented in the teacher planning work days. So Mr. Horack, I'll turn it over for you. Mr. man, can you let um the people watching and in the audience, can you explain DEIC what it's comprised of, who makes

060up that committee so people can understand how many people had input on this? Yeah, absolutely. Um so our DEIC is the district education improvement council. It's a required DEA committee. And we have representatives from each campus. We also have representatives from secondary and elementary at large on there. Um and then we have um is it two board members or three? I can't remember. Two board members. Okay. Sorry, I can't keep them all straight. Um, yeah, I know. And you got to be at a lot of them. So, um, we also have community representatives, business representatives, parents on there. And so, this year, our committee size is about 44 45 members. Um, we have district staff that attend the meetings, but we're not voting meeting or voting members. We're there for input. We're there to provide

061information. And so, we presented this information into EIC. We did get some questions. Um, I sent with them a Google form and asked them to get us back some questions and we did receive those and those were in line with the things that we discussed tonight. And obviously to follow up on that, they're the same folks who take us through the whole calendar schedule. Yes, ma'am. For months and months, right? Yes. And I believe they vote on which calendar to recommend to us. Was there a um a vote on this recommendation out of DEIC? I mean, I think it just happened like a week or two. Last week. Okay. Yeah. No, there was no vote on this. This was just purely getting some input on the dates that we had selected for making this change.

062Wasn't one of the uh forgive me as I forget all the details, but uh College Station High School does win Wednesdays. I'm looking for Grimes. Grimes out there, right? Yes. Which is a time that allows uh students to get things done. um that you know your your dental appointments, your orthodontia. I should have been an orthodontist in this town, I think. Um but it allows for those extra things to be done during the day, which is a benefit for students, right? So the goal here is to get both high schools kind of in line with that same opportunity where we're giving time to students to get the extra things they need done. And what we're doing here is giving teachers I I'm I'm married to an English teacher. Um, I don't know if people know

063that, but I when I hear things, uh, I know how long grading takes and they need time back. Um, I know what they go through. I know that they need more time every single day all the time and they need more pay. And we're battling a deficit from a lack of support from the state. And and what we're trying to do is to keep everyone employed um, and keep jobs and give payraises and not close campuses. um which is a severity where we get with bad uh with the lack of funding uh that can happen. That's not where we are, but what we're trying to do is take care of the teachers that we do have and take care of the students that we have. So, um there's some real benefits. I get that there's

064additional time at one of the high schools, but there's some real benefits in what we're trying to accomplish here. Correct. Uh yes, and I would also add and I'm sure Dr. hard. I could too, but we share staff between campuses and so it makes it very challenging to effectively share staff when we're on different bell schedules. And having been a middle school principal here and an and an intermediate school principal here that had to share staff between three, it's very challenging if you're not on the same schedule to maximize all the staffing needs. I I understand adding an additional 10 minutes is some people are not really thrilled about it, but we have this beautiful center that we're going to build 30 million that our voters voted on that they wanted this for our kids

065and it will provide opportunities for kids to graduate with skills to be immediately employable because the reality of our world is is not every kid's going to college, nor should they. We we need people like this. So, I think it would be a real disservice to our students if we don't build this center and allow full usage of it and being able to bus kids there with the opportunity of who it can expand to and beyond just the high schools. I think those are all very important comments. Obviously, um this is driven by the CT center which adds so much benefit to not not by itself. That's what I was saying is the advantage of the win Wednesday. So, it's not just CTE that's driving this and being able to um there needed to be

066some changes at the at Yes. at at least one of the high schools schedules anyway. True. True. Um and I do think we've heard from teachers that some more um time on their schedules to do, you know, their planning and and work day is important. But I've thought a whole lot about this. I think and I've heard from a lot of um teachers. I think um I have come to maybe some of the conclusions that I heard from some people who spoke tonight and I even wrote I wrote them down so you have to bear with me while I go through my my where I am on this because um again I do see some benefits but I also believe there are a number of problems with the proposal and here's my main three one

067is that we I feel like it is another thing that we are asking our staff to do. Um, yes, it's just 10 minutes, but it really is mathematically the equivalent of four more days of work without really being able to um have any added compensation. Um, so I do think it's more work on the on their plate. two and probably really really importantly to me is I think that um that this may be good for the high schools but I think um we haven't really thought about or maybe I'm going to say that's not true. We I think it has a more of a negative impact on some of the lower grades. That's what one of my concerns be especially because that you know the elementary schools and intermediate schools that there is data and

068studies that show that students um learn better and retain better retain more when they have more shorter days. And I just I think this this is going in the opposite direction that a um asking you know second, third, fourth graders to actually get more learning out of the 10 minutes a day and and and losing you know four actual calendar days of instruction. I think it's going to be painful not only to the staff but als the the or I worry it's going to impact the students. Um, so I don't feel that especially with the younger grades that they're going to be able to get that same learning out of those 10 10 minutes. Um, I think there's data that shows that. So that worries me. And then the third thing is I'm I'm a

069little frustrated with the rush on it that it you know we do spend a lot of time when we have calendar issues uh or when we go through a calendar. We spend months talking about it and understanding the impact of this and getting our input from our constituents that are impacted from it and understanding the pros and cons. And I think there are some serious issues with it right now. and we did not go to me feel I feel like we did we rushed it and not did not go through a process that allowed um all that input to occur. So those are my three things. So kind of in conclusion I think I think um I know there's reasons to to be making the suggestion this move but I also think that um we

070I I I think it's too rush. I think we should consider waiting a year to do this because this is not needed um until the 2026 school year for the new CTE center and I I think it would be um could be beneficial to to wait this to me this is a data-driven decision based on the benefit of what a school is already doing. So one of the high schools is already doing this. So I don't see why I mean we're comparing both high schools and we saw a benefit. So this is a data-driven decision. Well, I think I do want to let me let me clarify one thing. Can I answer that real quickly? I just want to say I I I recognize the benefits to the high schools. I'm worried about some of

071um how that the younger students. It's a very different world. That's Let me clarify why the 10 minutes was added to the elementary per TEA. If you have different uh times for different levels, your least amount of time is what goes to your 75,600 minutes. So without adjusting the elementary time, the 10 minutes would have been added to intermediate, middle, and high school, and they wouldn't have got four work days. The schedule would have stayed exactly the same, working 10 extra minutes a day. So this was the compromise because I talked to the DIC last year, this year, think you were in the meeting, and they asked, "How do we get more flexibility with our calendar?" This was the day they approved the uh the calendar for this coming year. And I made the statement.

072And I said, "The way I've seen other districts do it, not knowing we were going to make this change or the recommendation this year was you have to add more minutes to your school day. That's the only way you get more flexibility and able to strategically have work days, days off, however you want to do that." And so at that point in time, there wasn't everybody was, "Okay, that makes sense. We'll have that conversation." And so it came to fruition a little bit earlier. And so correct 10 minutes a day is four days. 3.9.7 days. Teacher work 187 days. They work 187 days. Whether we bring kids 187 or 172 or 168 doesn't matter. That's their contract and that's the days they work. So the benefit from what we've heard from teachers over the years,

073more time, more time, more time. Great. We need the 10 minutes in order to make the calendar work to get kids back and forth to the CTE center. Take that time and all four days go back to teachers with a day that they're currently going to be working anyway. It's not extra days. It didn't go from 187 to 191. It's still 187 days. I was at that meeting. I do remember you saying that um just kind of saying one way to do this is to just add some flexibility. there was not um I just wanted to clarify why was that why it was done at the elementary level and I do understand that as well. What I feel like though is that they didn't have a chance to have input in this and see if

074there was another option another solution that might work better for them because I understand we have to have the same amount of minutes. I think the other option was extending the school year. What were some of the other options? I think that would be the other option. Extend the school year. Am I right? Correct. Or you could take if you could take those four days that we marked, I can make those four holidays and then those four days are going to be added into the back of the calendar. So instead of working the memorial the Tuesday or whatever it is next year after Memorial Day, you're going to work that entire week after Memorial Day. And I would have a sneaking suspicion our folks wouldn't be real happy about coming back and working four days.

075Nor is it beneficial to us as a district to have teachers work and have work days when we don't have kids. If they're working during that throughout the year, they have times to plan, prep, and get ready before a holiday and they're not thinking about school during spring break or over Labor Day weekend or over the Thanksgiving break. They have that opportunity to get prepped and plan. When they come back a week later, they already know where they are and they're ready to go. And so, you know, to me, we've got to, you made the statement, why don't we wait till next year? Sure, I can wait till next year. And what if the schedule that's both high schools have an opportunity this year to work on that calendar? Do they like it? They're both

076going to have an advisory period. The advisory period, I think this year is after lunch. They may come to me after and say, you know what, God, I don't like this. Can we move it before lunch? Yeah, we could. The minutes aren't going to change, but the flexibility of their calendar. It's a data-driven decision. Like Darren said, they've got a year to evaluate their current schedule with seven periods and advisory period. Does it work for them knowing that they have to be aligned in order to make the facility work? The other data piece that Dr. Payne mentioned and I guess you mentioned also, Mr. Man, the four days that were selected obviously show either students and or staff have rhetorically been not present on campuses. Correct. Which were before Labor Day, before turkey day break,

077before spring break, and before Easter break. So, I think when we're looking at the days, um, you know, we can talk about, you know, we're pulling kids out out of the class, giving teachers an opportunity to to work and and be in their classroom and and PD days without having to come back after school after the end of the year, Memorial Day. But we're we're putting these days on days when the data shows we don't have a lot of people on campus anyway. So, not saying it's a justification, but I think it was thought out based on, hey, if we got to add four days or we got to do this and pull kids out of out of the out of the class to accommodate the 10 minutes, then these are the four days that

078match up because, oh, by the way, this is what the district looks like, you know, year-over-year. Well, let me sorry. Go ahead. Let me back up for a second and just um clarify here. Um it's not a recommendation to us to approve adding 10 minutes to the day because that is not the that that's the decision that district has made. Correct. Correct. Okay. So I mean I think we need to back up a second and look at like why we're making the calendar amendment because that that's what we're actually being asked to move on. But you I've had a lot of conversations with people about this um and had to think about it a whole lot um because it isn't brand new um and I think we have to step back and say okay what

079are the driving factors behind the decision to add 10 minutes to the day. It's a studentdriven decision. Um, it's a student-driven decision because we have or are going to have an additional facility to be able to prepare a lot of students for the workforce and we've had input from both of our high schools. Correct. The administration from both of our high schools has come together and said what is the best way for us to enable those students to be able to use this center? And the the solution that came out of that was the 10 minutes. Is that correct? Both both of our high school principles, Justin and Gwen, sat down together with their staff, came up with some scenarios for us, and they needed 10 minutes to make it work based on some preferences

080that both of those have. Gwen also has an advisory type period. Justin has the win time in order to make it work and have the 30 minutes for lunch across the board for everybody. That was their uh compromise was, hey, we need we need 10 minutes to come up with a calendar that would work. They gave us uh two different uh bell schedule options that would work with a 30-minute lunch for everybody. So, we're sitting here in a situation where um both both campuses together have come together and said, "This is what we think is best for our students." It's hard because sometimes we might say, "Well, if we if we could just make everything perfect, okay, our elementarymentaries wouldn't add 10 minutes." But we also have a lot of other things we have to

081consider. And I think sometimes we have to step back and look at things um as a whole for our for our district as a whole. And all of those students are going to someday have the opportunity if they want to be in one of those programs to take advantage of the CTE programs because we're creating a calendar and a school day where it works for them to be able to do that. And so I guess, you know, I've had to sit here and think about what would I say and what would I do when this comes up in front of me. And um I think we have to go back to trusting a little bit of the process that has gone on that a lot of us haven't been able to see and we say,

082"Hey, did you get input from everybody?" Um I believe that you guys have gone and gotten input from the people that that you needed to talk to to be able to figure out how the CTE schedule would work. And here's the other thing that that I struggle with a little bit. It is 10 minutes. It's not insignificant, but we're not saying, "Hey, we're going to, you know, increase the the day by an hour or something." So, when we're sitting and talking about like elementary students shouldn't go for really long days, we're not making their day really really long. And so, I think it's hard to know where that line is sometimes. But I also um have come back to the the idea of the fact that this is really a small adjustment in the in

083the grand scheme of things. And so I just I feel like as we're talking about it, we might think about that a little bit and and about how every single one of our students is going to have this opportunity when they get to high school um because of these changes that are being made. And and you know this calendar stuff like I remember when I heard about the 10 minutes the one of the first things I said was okay now that we're going to have these extra days built into our calendar how what are we going to do with it? And I think this is where the calendar comes into play. if that's what we need to do to make it work for our high school students, then we have the opportunity to give some

084time back to our teachers. So to me, giving the time back to the teachers is we have that opportunity to do that. So I don't know that I would want to sit here and not move on a calendar when we have that opportunity. So I I agree with Missi. I've talked with a lot of folks. I've actually talked with a lot of folks on this more than almost anything else that's been brought before the board. It's been really interesting. And I also feel like we all talked to a different subset of teachers and parents because we have kids at different stages in different schools. And yes, some people, you know, were a little upset about it, but overwhelmingly they were glad it was not added to the beginning of the day because they talked about

085what a struggle that is sometimes to get kids out the door and that yes, in the end 10 minutes for the greater good of the CTE center when we are about to lose our ability to send kids to Brian. So we would be losing those kids would then be losing that opportunity. Um because we quite frankly probably almost overstate our welcome there and having to pay I believe right to send our kids there. Um so that would be a savings to the district. I I just I'm with Miss Eggy. I feel like this was the least disruptive way to accomplish what we need to accomplish as a district um for for these kids. Got a couple follow-up questions. Um in regard to Dr. Payne's comments. So, will Consol have the the win Wednesday? She currently

086they have an advisory period every day and I'm not sure if uh College Station High School is y'all just on Wednesday and next year it's fall five. I thought so. They're all five days a week. Just they name it different things. Yes, sir. Okay. And then as far as communications with the the elementary schools, um I assume either through DIC or through the administration that there have been conversations. Reached out to them for comments. Uh Mr. Leer, do you remember? I don't remember. I don't think we got a ton of responses back. Three, three responses back. Yes, sir. Yeah. I I mean I I'd have to and the whole thought of it Josh is when we came to the realization that we've got to have 10 minutes to make it work and we looked at

087it our team was very all right great teachers been wanting more time cool we got four days give it back look in the calendar let's figure out where to make it work so that was the only uh conversation point was that period there was nothing else discussed about what we would do with that I was say just just to follow up with what Miss Iggy said and and I am not any way, shape or form asking for sympathy, but because I I signed up for this uh but um you know when when the board makes decisions, there's a lot of factors that go into it. And I understand a as a as a parent, my number one concern is is my child. And I understand as a teacher or the spouse of a teacher number

088one concern is well the students plus being the teacher. Uh but you know as a as a board we you know we have to teachers, students, taxpayers, we have to balance all of that and this particular issue uh I think although I understand where Miss McAdams is coming from with the you know the 10 extra minutes with the elementary school kids but from a strictly student perspective it seems like a no-brainer and from a a taxpayer perspective, it seems like a no-brainer because now we're utilizing the CTE center, we're putting more qualified uh professionals out into our community, so forth and so on. The the one that that the the group that this has potentially an negative effect on is teachers. And so, you know, and and as everybody around this room, everybody out there

089knows, teachers are asked to do a lot and more and more from mandates from the state, unfunded mandates, uh, us putting, you know, trying programs to, um, increase the the the scores for our lower socioeconomic kids. So for there there's a there's all kinds of factors that go into this and this this decision for me falls into that category of there's there's not a 100% perfect decision for all of the parties involved. Um, and anyway, I as I am known to do, I'll I'll ramble sometimes, but uh I I do think there's in order to give teachers a little bit more prep time, this extra 10 minutes a day, it'll hopefully be worth it. And if not, you know, we come back and we evaluate it next year in two years and see if this

090is not working. That's that's the thing, too, with a lot of the programs that we put into place or the administration puts into place. it it's it's it's not a lifetime decision. It has immediate effects and immediate uh causes that that come to it, but everything should be continuously evaluated to see if it's working, if it's not working. And that's one of the things that I when the board um elected to bring in Dr. for Hark Rider. One of the the big reasons behind that was we've had a lot of great superintendent and administrations in College Station ISD, but they had for years and years been um from in-house, so to speak, and to just bring in a different set of eyes to look at things. and and and sometimes when you bring in a

091different set of eyes, it there there are changes and and then that that different set of eyes needs to happen either with the administration that's in place or if if Dr. Hawk Rider retires, whatever it might be, where we've got we're constantly looking at these programs, looking at these decisions, and making sure they that they're working. And if not, we change them and we change them to benefit the teachers, the kids, the taxpayers, everybody else. Um, so I'll shut up now. I will add on our campus, I forgot to mention this earlier. Our campus uh cabinet visits, I believe there were four campuses. Uh, we took notes, submitted all of our notes. I think it was four cabinet members came back. One of them were me. Uh, that the question came up about the minutes

092on a campus. So, there's four out of the 19 that that we had some questions. Mine was pretty simple. Why don't we have I think it was elementary campus. Why do we have the 10 minutes? kind of walked them through the uh basically what we just went through and there were no other questions. So it wasn't uh a recurring theme during those visits last week. As a parent, I just want to add to that what I just said. Sorry, Kristen. It's fine. Is it's great. I I I have also talked to a lot of teachers and I I understand as well as I can not being a teacher the the the the pressures that are put on it. and so forth. And and everybody on this board, everybody this administration would give huge raises, as

093much time off as you want, so forth and so on. But for those of y'all that were here for our our board workshop, and Dr. Payne alluded to it. The the funding for public schools in Texas right now it they they've they're probably going to increase the aotment by $55 per student for the that's the first time since 2019. Um and so yeah, we can get creative. We can as much as we can. Uh but I I don't want I don't want the teachers who are listening to think that we're not hearing their concerns. Dr. Payne's married to one Mr. Horax married to a teacher so forth and so um it it it's we constantly think about it and we're constantly trying to figure out ways to to make this work from students to teachers.

094What's that? We don't have a choice. Yeah. We also don't have a threem minute limit. I would kill for that at home. My wife's going to kill me for saying that. Sorry. I'm with you. She's probably texting me right now. Your wife may ship you back. Japan. I got like five more months. I'm trying to get out of my system. So, as a parent of elementary kids, lots of them. Um, I do think this could create a year of trial and error, kind of like Dr. Hark Rider said, you know, it gives these high school principles, APS kind of adjust and make changes for the for the following year. But at an elementary level, having taught, I could see where this like leads to creativity for the teachers during their day with that 10 minutes,

095even brain breaks, which has data that shows it helps students perform better. I mean, we've had a lot of complaints about interventionists being taken away. This 10 minutes at Riverbend especially, they have these flex times. This could help bring these kids that bridge the gaps. So, I just think there's a lot to the 10 minutes that could be utilized and beneficial down the road. So, I motion to approve as presented. A second. Motion by Dr. Payne, second by Miss Sim. Any further discussion or comment? Yeah, I do want to uh kind of do just to close because I I truly truly appreciate all the discussion and everybody's input. Again, it was not we all got a lot of input from teachers and such and it I mean I struggled because it's not an easy decision.

096Um I really do appreciate your your comment, Kristen, but I also think the because I do think they need more time for those kind of brain breaks and recess or whatever it is on the elementary campuses. But um unfortunately I think that's may be exactly what happens and and why I say I think they're going to lose four the equivalent of four instructional days, right? I mean, yeah, it may make that day give them a break, but they're this they lose four instructional days. And if they're using their 10 minutes a day for for a brain breaks or instructional time, right? They're still, and we go with this, they're still losing those four days out of their calendar that would be full instructional days. Right. Right. But I'm just saying if if that's how the

097elementary student sometimes a shorter day of learning is better for the kid, the more additional days without without No, I'm not saying anything different. The um I'm saying if we had those four additional days or however many was that um the the school day would be shorter. It is that. Yeah. Okay. Sorry. Sorry if I lost. Sorry. Can you try? Yeah, you go. Thank you. I I think and if I'm wrong, let me know. So, what Matums is saying is we're losing four instructional days because now teachers are going to have them for for planning so forth. And if the 10 minutes aren't used, then there's no real addition for for for learning or for things that lead to the to learning, then we're really losing that instruction time. But the creativity of the 10

098minutes falls to the classroom and we don't manage the classroom. The teacher has the autonomy to do that with those 10 minutes. So whether they want to use them for instruction or whether they want to use them for a brain break or recess or whatever, they they have control over that. Right. But I was getting to she mentioned she was concerned about the four instructional days that were missing. But earlier in this in a comment she made that's where I'm trying to clarify. You mentioned studies show that a shorter day for younger learners is better. So, I'm really trying to understand because it kind of contradicts each other on that. But like you just said, like you just mentioned what's happening with that extra 10 minutes. It's not it's not on us as a board.

099We don't do that. So, no, it's going to be up to the leadership of each school to lead their teachers in the classroom is my thoughts. Yeah, 10 minutes at intermediate, middle, and high. They're on bell schedules. So, the 10 minutes is going to be embedded somewhere during the school day. The most flexible calendars we have or schedules is the elementary because they're not on a bill. Every 52 minutes, whatever it is, it's not ringing. And so, we would work with our elementary teams of uh get the 10 of them together and get creative on what that potentially would look like. Is it is it given to recess? Is it given to whatever they want to come up with? do they have a longer uh intervention period? So, there's some flexibility there that they could

100come up and what that's going to look like because we're hitting our instructional minutes that required by TEA with our current calendar. So, the 10 is 10 extra and it may look different on different days. Uh, you know, we try not to micromanage what they're doing there. We like them to get creative. So, they may get creative on different days and different weeks to do different things with that calendar. All that is appreciated. Um, I still I still fear that it will be the loss of instructional time bec on those longer days for the younger grades. Um then the other thing I will say again that I do just I do feel like this was a process that was decided. I think the process is important and that is one of the things as a

101board member um that is our role not to micromanage what they how they do it but to make sure there was a process so that we all believe we came to the right con conclusion and I I think I appreciate that the high schools had their say and came up with work what works for them. I believe we moved quickly without enough input from the other campuses. So, I'm uncomfortable with um where we are at this point. I'll remind everybody we have a motion by Dr. Payne, second by Miss Simmon. Any further comments? All those in favor say I. I. All those opposed, same sign. Okay. Motion carries 61. Thank you, Mr. Man. That will bring us to item J1. Consider the renewal of employee health insurance with Blue Cross Blue Shield of Texas and

102rates for the 2526 school year. Miss Wilson, the district fully insured Blue Cross Blue Shield, sorry. Uh the average the RFP came back. The average increase is 6.99%. on this on the screen you'll kind of see we brought this to you last month just to see where we relate to all of our peer districts on our healthc care coverage. Um the rates came back as right here. It's like I said a 6.99% increase, but due to the the disruption indicator and to making sure that people can use their existing doctors, we would like to make the recommendation to renew with College Station ISTD and Blue Cross Blue Shield for the 2526 school year. Do I have any questions? I don't talk about health insurance. Motion to approve as presented. I do have one question. So,

103what you said on on I thought you said something about on average, what what are we actually looking at for an increase for employees if we choose this plan? Um, sure. It is an increase of um there are different rates based on the different program that they do. So you can kind of look at um Okay. It's less than 8%. It's about 6.99%. Yes, ma'am. The different ones will be different levels. Some may be a little less, some may be a little bit more. It averages at 699, but the average you gave us is the average for this plan is what I was trying to Okay. Yes. And if I'm not mistaken, Josh, correct me or Coupe if I'm wrong, the first Blue Cross Blue Shield number we got back for an increase was double

104digits. Is that correct? cancel. How much? 29% 29% increase was what they first sent us and then obviously work with our team because obviously that's not going to fly. Um and then it's something we're going to look at longer term of you know because remember part of the numbers that Heather showed we've paid uh an increase of 329% in insurance uh cost over the last six years. But will we still be one of the districts that's compensating? We're contributing more than other districts. Yes. Yes. But is the school district's contribution remaining the same? Yes, sir. Okay. Um, assuming there's some miracle in Austin in the next couple weeks, is that something that we could look at as far as the budget is potentially with the district increasing the their portion of the compensation? We could

105look at that as a district. However, I just wanted to show how comparative how much competitively we are. We outpay all the other school districts and it's a large amount. Um what I would suggest is to take any of that increase that you might have and give it to all employees no matter if they take the health insurance or not in the form of a raise. Correct. That would be uh current pay scales, hourly wages, how we are comparison. And this is one of the areas where most of our staff I didn't years ago either like I'm going to make X here and X there. I never think about insurance costs and our insurance cost compared to the TRS is lower and lower to the fact depending on what plan you are could be upwards

106of three or $4,000 cheaper than it is at other districts. But most employees and we have to do a good job and make sure we're marketing our insurance what it costs a month what we're providing as a district because it is money in their pocket that they don't necessarily realize they're going to see because they're only looking at the salary and what that will be versus the deductions. So that's kind of on our end when we're recruiting teachers, having conversations that we make sure we highlight that, especially if they're potentially coming from a different district of, hey, we may be 3,000 short on the salary, but we're 3,000 cheaper, uh, you know, on the insurance benefits. So in the end, it's a wash. You're not losing money coming to work for us. How many folks

107take advantage of the insurance? Just do you have any idea roughly like a percentage? No, I'm sorry. I don't have that number with me. Do you know the percentage of employees? It's $ 8.5 million worth is what we pay every year. I'll get you that number. So you have to you have to ask in the form of a question that she would answer. So it has to be in numbers dollar. It has to be in dollars. I would guess north of 70% pretty easily. And I apologize for that. I think this is a great time to just go back to what we were talking about earlier in our workshop again. This is um an example of costs that have been going up and um we would be in a better place to be able to

108increase our contribution if we were being better funded by the state. We have a motion on the floor by Dr. Payne. That's where we're at. I'll second a second by Miss Simmon. Any further comment or discussion? All those in favor say I. I. All those opposed. Motion carries 70. Thank you, Miss Wilson. Brings us to item K1. Consider approval for the GMP amendment of 26,856,631 for the stadium improvement project at AMCHS and CSHS with Jacody Construction and to appoint the district superintendent, Dr. Tim Harker, to district's representative and to authorize him to execute agreement with Jacody Construction. Mr. Sorry, Mac. Yes, sir. Good evening. Thank you uh for the opportunity. Uh very excited to bring this project to you today as a guaranteed maximum price. You may recall that back in October uh we uh

109selected and nominated and went with Jacody as our contract manager at risk. And so since that time, we have been planning uh we discussed this some during board workshop, outlined all the additional scope that we're going to be able to provide throughout this project. Uh, and even with the additional scope, with a $30 million budget, we're coming in at $26,856,631. Um, and that is, as I said earlier and pointed out to you, that is with all the additional things that we're doing that were not outlined within this project. And so, we're very excited for this process. Um, I will tell you that once we get this approved, uh, we're going to certainly mobilize and get contracts going and you'll see work getting started right next door right away. Uh, but this is going to be

110a very aggressive and very heavy timeline. uh we're going to wait until the end of football season to really get started in the stadium and we've been working with athletics. We've been working with coach Schmidt next door and helping him understand he's going to schedule his games on the road uh for 2026 to start off the season. Um and essentially what you're talking about is we're going to be rebuilding an entire stadium everything goes to plan in 10 months. Um so that's a really aggressive timeline. It's going to be really challenging and we'll do the absolute best that we can. But nonetheless, with this tonight, it is our recommendation, excuse me, that the College Station Independent School Board of Trustees approve the guaranteed maximum price of 26,856,631 for the stadium improvement projects at Anam Consolidated

111High School and College Station High School and authorize the superintendent to execute all related documents using the 2024 bond funds. I move that we approve as presented. A second. Motion by Miss Eyee, second by Miss Wilson. One comment is uh you know&m did that for 400 million and so this is a bargain my I do want to say something on this because it's kind of the same comment that it's that this is to me the perfect example of where you know our voters and our local community supports our public schools. They vote for our our bonds. This is a lot of money compared to even some of the deficit we're we're we're been talking about. They do when we go out and ask our voters to support us, they do and we thank them. I

112mean, and these are but but it is also that reminder to them that we cannot use that funds those funds for all the thing other things we've been talking about tonight for teacher salaries, for the insurance, you know, for electricity and and gas for our buses. And that's really again part of the overall frustration to me with what's coming out of Austin is that we do have that support here, but that Austin makes all the rules and holds a lot of the the money. So just thanks again to the voters for for supporting this. Yes, ma'am. I I was about to just say the exact same thing because I know Mr. Horak was in the board meeting and you know made the comment about school finance and and um for anybody watching the video or

113anybody who doesn't know this it's it's two separate buckets of money and we can't use bond money to to pay teachers uh to pay health insurance premium so forth and so on and so it's a um uh but at the same time as you said our community is very supportive we did we were able to do the VA TR a year or two ago that uh was a voter for approved way for us to to give uh additional teacher raises. Uh so yeah, just you know, as we're as we're voting on these kind of things, just please everybody keep that in mind that it's the way school finance is set up, it's two separate deals. Well, and another thing and and I appreciate Mr. Syc and Miss Wilson, Mr. Buckner, all y'all doing what you

114got to do because the voters vote for this and then they challenge us to be fiscally responsible and you're blowing and going like this. Um, and if you get any sleep, that's your problem. But, um, I hope I hope you get some sleep at the end of this. And I hope you see the reward from overseeing this because you are being fiscally responsible. You're helping the district be fiscally responsible. And I appreciate that because I didn't think I'd be sitting in this chair after all the name calling I got and yelling and told I don't know what I'm doing and all that from everybody through the years for this project. I didn't think I'd be sitting here to watch it go to fruition. I'm just being honest, y'all, because I didn't know where we were

115going to be headed. So, um, this is this is a big time knowing I've got a daughter that's going to be a Tiger next year, having gone to Tiger and seeing what's about to happen long time ago. But it's it's neat to see because I've watched the school go through a transformation right after I graduated. It went through one and then another few years ago and I never saw anything happen with the other part of the facilities knowing it needed to happen. So here we are. Appreciate you. Motion on the floor from first Eggy Wilson. Go ahead. Mor just if I could add one more thing and we're not we're not building the Taj Mahal. No. Uh whether on our schools, our athletic facilities, our CTE center. Um, you know, you can there's lots of

116stories in social media about, you know, $60 million stadiums for high schools and so forth. And that's not that that that is not CSISD. I think this is a a a functional, safe facility that that that that we can be proud of. And it shows our students make the teams, not the facilities. And this is just a reward for those kids. And I want to say, yeah, these facilities create opportunities for our athletes. I mean, if y'all we've signed a bunch of kids to go play places somewhere. It gives them an opportunity and it also creates a safe environment for community to come together um on the weekends to these games and to host other events. So, it it Yeah. And as someone who those stands have nostalgia for me since they were built when

117I was a freshman, um I'm happy to see them get replaced in a nice safe facility. Real quick before you vote, thanks to our team shooting me some numbers over here. 154 employees take our insurance which is 70.5% of our employees. Cool. All those in favor say I. All those opposed. Motion carry 70. Item K2. Consider approval for the playground improvement projects at College Hills, Creek View, Forest Ridge, Riverbend, Rock Prairie, Southn No, Southwood Valley, Spring Creek. the amount of 1,328,755 to Playground Solutions of Texas utilizing by board contract 679-22 from 21 bomb funds and campus PTO funds. Mr. Smeck. Uh yes, sir. Mr. Hor, excuse me. So, this is a project that was identified in the 2021 bond package and here we are in 2025 and we're finally able to tackle this project. We're

118very excited to be able to provide this for our campuses. This is something I hear about quite frequently from our elementary principles. And so what this will do is take the wood chips out of the playground structures and get the pour in place type structure like a track-like surface beneath all of our playground equipment. And then we're in conjunction with some of our PTO's that have been raising money and uh doing different efforts on campuses. We'll also be able to help them and work together to be able to provide some additional structures to the playground and some safe structures at well at Creek View and River Bin. And so, uh, it is recommended that the College Station Independent School District Board of Trustees approve the elementary playground improvements project in the amount of 1,328,755 to

119playground solutions of Texas utilizing by board contract 67922 from both 21 2021 bond funds and campus PTO funds. Move to accept as presented. I have a quick question. This is not all our elementary campuses, correct? No, ma'am. And so this is uh this is eight out of 10. And so previously um one of the reason why it's taken okay so it's eight out of 10 and the reason why is two campuses previously were done as single projects and so when you do a single project you pay additional mobilization fees you pay additional planning fees and design fees and so we decided to encompass it all into one so that way we're only mobilizing once we're also only therefore having to pay a design fee one time and one of the reasons why it's taken us

120so long to get to this point is whenever I first got into this position and then when Miss Wilson came aboard board and we all started looking at it, we we came up a little bit short on projects that were identified in 2021. And so this is being able to happen because of interest earnings from the 2021 bond and us going through the last of the projects that weren't able to be covered from the 2021 bond and identifying that this is a need for our elementary students and our elementary campuses. Second motion by Mr. Ben, second by Dr. Payne. Any further question, comment? All those in favor say I. I. All those opposed. Motion carries 70. K2, consider approval for the replacement of the bleachers at AMCHS softball stadium. The amount of $424,200 to Southern

121Bleachers utilizing by board contract 679-22 from 24 bond funds. Mr. Sac. Yes, sir. Very excited for this project. So, you may recall that we have a contract manager at risk that's managing our baseball and softball projects. And so, those projects, as you can see right next door, are already underway. This is something that we have pulled out and we're going directly to Southern Bleachers on our own. Uh partly because the way this project was designed, if you've ever been to the Cassell softball stadium, it has some of the it's it's requiring the greatest amount of work in all of these projects to get it up to par with what a 5A program should be that has a level of talent and everything else in which they have across the street. And so what was initially

122planned was just adding separate pockets of bleachers on either side. Well, right now if you've been to Consol Softball Stadium and you've been to College Station High School softball stadium, they are not comparable. And so to get College Console to a comparable level as to what College Station High School is at, we're going to need to demo those bleachers, get them up to the back stop, build tree ramps, and build a different program. And so we've gone directly to Southern Bleachers on this ourselves, uh, which will allow us a little bit of a cost savings there, um, to be able to take this on. Southern Bleachers has been absolutely fantastic to work with with our middle school projects. They're also going to be the ones that are going to be taking care of our stadium

123projects. So, we're very excited to be recommending them here. And so, it is recommended that the College Station Independent School District Board of Trustees approve the AMCHS softball stadium bleachers projects in the amount of $424,200 to Southern Bleachers utilizing the byboard contract 67922 from the 2024 bond funds. I move to approved. Second. Second. Motion by Miss McAdam, second by Miss Simmon. Any further questions, discussion? All those in favor say I. I. All those opposed. Motion carries 70. K4, consider approval for materials testing with CME testing and engineering, Inc. for AMCHS addition and renovation project, CSHS edition renovation project, Rock Prairie Elementary renovation and addition project, baseball and softball turf replacement project, CTE phase 2 project, and AMCHS and CSHS stadium improvement to CME testing and engineering inc. the amount of $470,713 utilizing both 23 and

12424 bond funds. Mr. Sak. Yes, sir. Mr. Horac. So, when you do projects, you are required to have materials testing done throughout. Currently, CME is our um consultant working with us on our middle school projects. And so, uh they've been fantastic to work with. Uh if you don't know, materials testing consists of inspections for various stages of the additions and renovation projects to ensure that the materials being used meet the specifications set forth in the project manuals as designed by architects and engineers on the project. So it may be structural steel, it might be the concrete, it might be the the depth of the gravel that which is going beneath our baseball and softball fields. It's a variety of different things. It is someone who is there on site every single time something is taking

125place. You don't go to a job site without seeing CME currently uh there representing us on the projects that we already have them adopted for. So, it is recommended that the College Station Independent School Board District Board, excuse me, Independent School District Board of Trustees approve the materials testing for the AMCHS addition and renovation project, CSHS Addition and Renovation Project, Rock Prairie Elementary Edition and Renovation Project, baseball and softball turf replacement project, CTE phase 2 project, and the AMCHS and CSHS stadium improvement project to CME Testing and Engineering Incorporated in the amount of 470 $470,713 using utilizing the 2023 and 2024 bond funds. Motion to approve. Second. Motion by Dr. Payne, second by Mr. Ben. Any further discussion or questions? All those in favor say I. I. All those opposed. Motion carries. 70. Thank you,

126Mr. Simon. Thank you. That'll bring us to executive session. Mr. Horack, before we go to executive session, um it's been a long meeting. Good conversation. Appreciate people being here. I appreciate passionate uh parents, teachers coming to speak. Um, I just spent six months in basically a third world country where uh I saw kids uh who live in shanty towns, 120 degrees in the summer if they have parents. AIDS was rampant. Um, it was horrible, horrible things. Um, it happened. And yet I would go out, people drive crazy, worse than here. Um, and I would see smiles on faces um because, you know, they didn't know any better, didn't know any different. And it if I I want people to think about somebody they care about in their life. Um who's a good person who tries

127hard and works hard. And then I want you to think about someone anonymously attacking them online constantly. Um you don't know who the person is. You don't even know if they know you or the person you care about. You don't know where they work. Um you don't know if it's a where the disgruntled uh angst comes from. But the anonymous posting against us, but mostly Dr. Hark Rider that I've seen, I find um to be horrible, disgusting behavior. And a lot of it is wrong and misinformation and and you can't correct it cuz they don't care. Um it's just disheartening to see. But earlier today, I saw a a mom who sent an email because a bus driver meant the world to some young lady. And I'm a I'm a big softy and it eyes

128about in tears over here about what we do, how good this district is, how many great things that happen, how many wonderful teachers we have, how many amazing students, um, and all the things that we have here. And again, I appreciate passionate parents and you care about your kiddo more than anyone and we all care about teachers. Um it's just disheartening to see um anonymous misinformation being given any credence here. Um and I hope our district is better than that. That's all I got. Sorry. Appreciate it. Uh we're going to go to exec. Um this being the last meeting before the summer, uh I try to always say it. Thank y'all to everyone for what you do. Um it does not go unnoticed. And as much as you think we don't know what we're doing

129or we have no clue, we try to get as much input and we appreciate everything y'all do. I think it was Miss Cot and Miss Richtor that I saw on May 1st at the volunteer lunchon and I said, "Well, I woke up told my wife this is the busiest month of the year and they agreed 100% and here we are, y'all." That flew by. Um, it flies by and we can those that have kids that have already graduated and moved out of the house. I'm not there yet, but I can't imagine what it's going to be like come 25 26 because it's going to fly by. Like I said tonight, we've been doing this 5 years, a little over. It's flown by. Not not all good, not all bad. But I appreciate everything y'all are

130doing because it makes us know why we do what we do and sit up here for y'all. And maybe we don't vote the way y'all want us to sometimes. Maybe we do. But know that we're looking after all 14,000 students and every single 2,000 plus employees. And if we could focus on just one or three or four, we'd love to do it, but we can't do that. And kind of like what Dr. Payne said, we don't follow all the social media stuff, but we hear about it. Personal threats, personal attacks, I've I've had them, and I still come up here and sit here and put my face out there. So, if you don't think this means something to me, we can have a conversation. But I appreciate what y'all do because I'm not there. I

131chose not to be there. It wasn't for me. Y'all did. So, I appreciate it. Y'all enjoy your summer. If you're here when we get back, thank you. See y'all next time. [Music] Uh back in open session 9 o'clock we are ajourned.