001That'll be for a I don't know. 60 seconds. You had heard from Josh, have you? Welcome everybody. This is our workshop Tuesday, May 20th, 2020 25 about five o'clock. Thank y'all for being here. Call to order. Declaration of a quorum. I was hoping to say seven. I'm saying six still, but the one that was supposed to be here is not. And the one that's we're welcoming back is here. So, welcome back, Dr. Payne. So, uh, thank y'all for being here. First item is item C, hearing of citizens. We don't have any for the workshop. Item D, D1, consideration, discussion of board policy beed local. Mr. Dunson, Mr. Horak members of the board I'm going to provide y'all with a quick overview of this policy update beed local that there he is. Give him a [Laughter]
002second. I'm just giving you a quick overview of um an update to board policy beed local which provides us with information related to public comment and citizen participation. So you'll if you'll recall last May we updated our policy or I'm sorry our our board operating procedures to allow citizens to sign up um prior to the board meetings online through our district website. We've been doing that for the past year or so and um that change was ultimately decided by you guys in order to provide a more streamlined process. Gives folks a little bit more time to sign up. Those signups have been going well and has been um a welcome change to to providing us with a little bit better of a streamlined process to do that. Um the update really has to do with
003updating the policy language to reflect that board operating procedure change. Um but we've also consulted with our policy consultants to make sure that our legal language is up to date as well. Um continuing to protect the rights of our citizens to sign up and address you during open meetings. And so what's being updated the policy language to align with the board operating procedures. So, I've called a few of those items out that you have printed there on your desk. Um, this was also provided several weeks ago at Transmitt if you um had a time to review it at that time as well. But here's an example of how um the the policy is being updated to reflect the board operating procedure language. Um and then here is here is how it's called out in the
004board operating procedure and reflected there in our policy. Another update is that we're we'll be removing information that's more administrative in nature or in our operating procedures that does not need to be in policy. Now, these are recommendations provided to us from our policy consultants. And so you can see there on page two, there are some strikeouts there in red um that have been identified as relating more toward the administrative tasks like how we conduct this portion of our meetings and the things that the board president reads prior to calling citizens up to speak there in that slide. And then third, these edits will also align with standard policy text and provide clarification for our specific local policy. So I'll call out on the bottom of page two there on your printout. Um, and here
005for the viewing public in our presentation, we have those updates, the strikeouts, and the additional language there. And then lastly, it is also recommended that we add the standard policy text to include in this policy related to concerns, complaints, and disruption during board meetings. There any questions about this policy update? No questions. So, we're not taking action on this this evening. This would be for consideration, discussion, and potential action next month. I would just be sure to point out, you've already said it, but to be clear, we're not making any changes in what we are doing. Correct. We're just updating our policy to reflect what we are doing. Correct. And I think we learned it the I don't know who all was in the TASBY section at the conference in September. Is that when we
006went? Um I went to the one in regards to board operating procedures and things like that. Um many boards in the state of Texas were already operating in this facet. So um it's nothing new statewide. Um, I talked to a lot of board members at that time and and they said it just made um public comment a little bit more streamlined and um and moving the meeting and and keeping it organized and all that. So, uh, and then it's it's less pressure on community members to have to get here and sign up and turn in a card and all that and not know the procedure and all that. So, at least it's outlined. So, there's no other questions. All right. If y'all have anything else uh down the road, just email Austin, I guess, and
007we'll go from there. Uh item D2, receive a construction update from Mr. Simac. Good evening, Mr. Hack, Dr. Harker, members of the board. Um if you've been around town, you know that we've got a few things going on uh with our construction projects from the 23 bond and the 24 bond. I'll give you a brief overview of what we have going uh with all of those projects this evening. So, um our middle school fields uh annuality high school, everything affiliated and associated with that project. Uh College Station High School, Rock Prair Elementary, CTE phase 2, um and the things that we have going with uh stadium improvements, which you will be voting on a GMP guarantee maximum price this evening. Um so, without further ado, middle school athletic fields, you may recall this is a
008local contract with Jacody. They are contract manager at risk. We started this project late October uh right into November. And so the first substantial completion was to take care of all of the tracks and the turf fields. Um and we hit that deadline. We missed it by about two or three days uh with Wilbur Middle School because of weather. We couldn't get out and paint the stripes on the track because it was so cold. Uh but those tracks were available to our student athletes during track season and we got all three turf fields done. Currently, we are working now to complete bleachers and to complete the restroom concession stand facilities. And I'll show you that here in just a moment. And so, um, in the fall, this is what it looked like at each of
009our campuses. AMCMS there on your left, CSMS in the middle, Wellelburn on your right. Uh, you will see now, uh, this was just, uh, recently, uh, we've got our turf field in, the track situations have been taken care of. Um, and we are rocking and rolling a lot along right now with our concession and restroom facilities. And so, Welber Middle School is what everything is being modeled after. that was built whenever Wver Middle School was open. Because we have expanded the bleacher capacity between 650 and 700, we had to add additional restrooms um to be in compliance with state code. And so um the restroom facilities and concession facilities at AMCMS and CSMS are modeled after what we have there at Welurn. Uh we will start bricking at AMCMS and CSMS tomorrow. They are currently
010working on the roof um at Welurn Middle School as we speak. Uh you may notice in this picture AMCMS um is a little bit longer and that's because of the the uh area in which we had to build. So it's a little bit longer and more narrow whereas CSM is a little bit shorter and a little bit wider and it's just us building to the area in which we had available to us. But um the square footage and everything else within this restroom facilities is identical. U bleacher expansion we are done at AMCMS. We are done at Welurn. Uh this was yesterday afternoon late at CSMS. Uh they should be done there with that bleacher expansion um come Monday or Tuesday of next week&M Consolidated High School uh you saw this as you drove in.
011Durotch is our um contract manager at risk for this project. We got this project started uh not too long after spring break. We are pushing hard to be done summer of 2026. Uh you guys may recall it is a twotory addition there on the um what what used to be the bus loop on the west end of the building. um a total of almost 60,000 square feet, 16 science labs, four special services uh rooms, a weight room, a film room. Um and then you've got phase 4 also that is currently going to be ongoing this summer um with a lot of work and a lot of facelift items uh within the building to help clean up that um just clean up the overall appearance of the building and all the areas that haven't been touched
012yet. And so, um, that picture on the left is an aerial shot of the gyms and that west parking lot. And then you'll see what it used to look like in the bus loop. Here's where we are currently. You'll notice, uh, we've been working on the gym. So, that's a mod bit that is going in on top of that roof system there. Uh, we'll come back later and add more to that. Um, right now, tomorrow morning is an exciting day. We will start drilling peers. There are 96 peers to be drilled at High School and that is for part of the foundation. And so, that is a big day. uh because once you get your peers started then you can start moving towards getting ready to pour a slab and um that is a that
013is a monumental occasion on any job site at this time. Uh we have been working really hard to get the roof done. The roof is slated to be an 18-month project. Again I remind you that we've known since 2017 that Amald High School needed a new roof. Uh so we're pushing really hard to get it done. Um, we want to make sure that if we're going to continue to remodel and put work into the building that we don't have to come back behind it and redo the work because it was damaged by water. And one of the reasons why we started with the gym spaces is because our gym floors have been have been damaged um repeatedly because of the water that has been coming through the roof and and causing leaks within the gyms.
014And we just had those gym floors and the main gym repainted and redone last year. So we uh what you're seeing here now is the multisport fieldhouse. We had to move to it last week. They've been doing AP testing in the building. So to not cause any distractions on AP testing, we flipped over and moved to the multisport fieldhouse. Um so our roofing contractor on this has been great to work with. The uh superintendent on this job has been excellent and he has uh he has he has delivered. They have worked every single day with the exception of Easter Sunday. Um so very pleased with their efforts so far. Baseball and softball, we're rocking and rolling. Dirt work is well underway. Uh we will be getting ready to lime those fields and treat the dirt
015next week. Uh we are cutting to grade as we speak. We've run into some issues. Um these are existing fields. Uh 1989 for baseball. One of the first day 30 minutes into the project, we're digging out the fence post on the outfield fence and we can't get them out of the ground. And so we go get a heavier piece of equipment and we find as we're pulling them out of the ground, we're also pulling out in some cases the old poles that have just been bent over and laid down underneath the ground. And then also some in some cases just the concrete that was left from behind from the previous fence. I don't know when that happened or when it didn't happen. Uh but it led it was it was a lot of concrete. And
016so we're we're we're catching some things here and there. Uh but we're we're making great progress and very pleased so far. Uh Symmetry is the is the team that is going to be installing the turf on our fields and Jacody is our uh contract manager at risk with these and that is again a local contractor. They're here every day uh and they're working six days a week. uh Dzones and scoreboards. So, the DZone work will begin next week. Had a meeting this morning. Uh we've been working really hard to accommodate our our coaching staffs and everything else that they have going on with the fields. And so, now that next week, get past Memorial Day, uh we'll start rocking and rolling with cutting out that DZone and installing the turf there. Uh the digital scoreboards
017permit pending and we're working with the city on that. We're very close to having that in hand with the stamp plan. um our Dzone uh our digital scoreboards will begin getting installed next month and so very early June with that. I'm very excited to announce that digital scoreboards is our company that we um selected for our uh new digital screens and they are very close to announcing a pretty major sponsorship partnership in the state of Texas that'll be very significant for them moving forward. There'll be hands-on training provided to our coaching staffs and everyone else that'll be using the boards this summer. It's certainly going to be a learning curve. However, these are iPadbased and one of the reasons why we went with this version of the digital scoreboard is because of its ease of
018access and use. And so, we're very much looking forward to that. They also provide you with software packages that are geared towards advertisements. Mr. Dunson was a big part of this process and selecting these digital boards because of his experience at the Barry Center in Scyer ISD. Um, and understanding where it is that we we need to go moving forward. Um, College Station High School, we're rocking and rolling there as well. Jamala is our contract manager at risk. We started that project just a little bit after we did. Um they're at consolidated estimated completion is December of 2026. I'm going to tell you now we are pushing as hard as we can to be done in August. Um obviously weather plays a big factor in that and here recently we've had a lot of weather.
019Uh the middle school projects would be much further along had we not had so much weather and so it really is situation right now where I'm praying for a drought. I hope the next six months it doesn't rain or drop. I'm probably the only person in the room that feels that way. Uh but I'd like to get vertical and get dried in before it starts raining again. Don't know if that'll happen, but that is my my wish. It is definitely going to rain now. So, um but nonetheless, adding a little bit over 100,000 square feet, CT classrooms, labs, art classrooms, science classrooms, and a third gym. Uh there's some miscellaneous things in there as well with AP improvements, roof repairs, and a locker room uh locker room efficiencies. Currently, College Station High School, since that
020school has been built, the varsity sports that participate in the gyms at College Station High School have not been located on the same level as the gym because those locker rooms were built too small. Uh, currently, boys basketball, Miss Eaggan can attest to this. They are working uh they are locked in a closet and do not even have a restroom facility in their current locker room situation. So, we are looking to fix that as well. So, you can see pre-construction. Um although you know we don't have a lot of grass growing there. We are certainly working on that as well. Uh but here we are. We have already started drilling peers. So at Cassaul we have 96 peers to drill. At College Station High School because of the school being built on a hill and
021we're expanding off of all four wings of the building. We are dig digging 148 peers at College Station High School. Some of these um are different sizes. Uh you can see uh we go 60 foot deep, some are 60 in wide, some are 48 inches wide. Uh but it is a significant process. We've already completed it in one area and we've moved to the next area of the building. So, we're making great progress there uh with our peers at College Station High School. Baseball and softball, we have started there with the lights. Uh it is quite interesting. So, we started yesterday and with the retrofit of lights going to LED. Currently, you have roughly 24 of the old lenses on a pole. And now, we're going to be able to provide more light and brighter
022light and more efficient light with just six lenses on a pole. And so, uh, it's going to be a really nice situation when we get that done. We were slow just a tiny bit yesterday because there was, excuse me, because there was a bee swarm at College Station High School and it was pretty significant. Uh, it's the most bees that I've ever seen in one place. Fortunately, it has moved on today. Uh, but I do have Jimmy the beekeeper with George, our pest control specialist, there evening double checking and making sure that everything is good to go. I don't know his real name, but he's in my phone as Jimmy the Beekeeper. Um this is very similar to what we have at at Consolidated the same company uh we are making it'll be identical for
023both fields and the really cool thing about these boards is everything you see there with the exception of Cougarfield for the trust up top. Everything there is digital and so uh we're really excited for what that's going to bring. It also brings new sound systems for the for the stadiums which will be a great improvement. If you've been to College Station High School lately the visitor side the sound system has not worked on the visitor side for a number of years. It's it's been blown and shorted out and so this will be a great improvement for both stadiums. Rockberry Elementary, we're underway there as well. Jamala is also our contract manager at risk for the construction project at Rock Elementary School. Uh we are pushing, it'll be a two summer project. We'll also be doing
024some work throughout the year. We'll be starting on the addition, which will be a new front office area and security festival uh next week. Currently, what we've been working on is the new car rider line and the new parking lot. We have been staying on that side of the building to stay away from the front of the building, not to create any havoc for our young people that are going to school there every day. So, we are very much looking forward to all of these projects. I know the kids are really looking forward to 1:30, but I can assure you that us and the contractors and the subs that we're working with daily cannot wait to see our kids right away on the bus the last day of school and so we can try to
025take advantage of all the time we have with a little bit less crowds around it. So, um, with this, like I said, new office space will take care of those atriums that are there, the car ride line, security fencing, and campus drainage. If you don't know, at Rock Prairie, they currently have Lake Rock Prairie that it forms in the back of the school. Uh, it took us, it wasn't in the original scope of the documents, but after uh, observing the campus and reviewing some things, it was very much something that we determined needed to be taken care of. And so, this is the uh, detention pond. I call it a detention pond with, you know, fingers because in all of my years, I've been here since 2001, I've seen water in it twice. One of
026those was most recently when we got five inches of rain in an hour. That was a lot of fun. And then Hurricane Katrina. And so we are reworking that detention pond because as you'll see here, uh, and this cursor, it is working. So your new cares will come in. It'll wrap around. This will be the 35 space parking lot. That will give much needed much needed relief to what the parking situation is currently at Harbor Prairie. And very similar to what we've done at Greenspray, it'll wrap around, it'll come through and then come across. Uh we'll be able to be in the front of the building and then people will be able to move on about their day. Um so that's going to help us tremendously. They'll be able to double stack in there. Uh
027CT phase 2 we got started yesterday. So with that, that's PO Construction project started yesterday. And when I say started yesterday, we started putting in our uh swip fencing uh yesterday. That'll be a total of uh almost 58,500 square feet. That's a mechanics, animal science, auto techch, construction, cosmetology, and a multi multi-purpose arena of Bette Tech, a lot so on and so forth. You may recall that initially cosmetology was going to be placed at college at College View High School. That was going to be a situation where one, we didn't have the amount of space that was required. Number two, it wasn't going to be a full program. So, we could put people in cosmetology, but we were only going to be offering them two levels of cosmetology when you need three levels of cos
028cosmetology. So, we were physically going to set kids up to be non-competers, uh, which is not good, um, for anybody across the board. And so, we're very excited that this has worked out and that we moved it out. On top of that, the transportation piece of that was going to be an absolute nightmare. We were going to be busing kids to the CTE center out um, south of town and then we were going to be going to the north side of town. It was going to make things very challenging and trying to accommodate all that. So, we're very excited that cosmetology has been rolled into CTE phase 2. some additional scope that we're picking up some things that were not completed um from phase one with the a barn. We'll have a new gate. We'll
029be able to concrete the driveway and we're adding some shade awnings that have been determined to be needed for the livestock that are there at CTE phase 2. So, this is your current gate at CTE there on the left. This will be your new gate there on the right. Um it'll have a camera and everything else. We'll be able to document anybody and everybody that comes through. I cannot tell you the number of phone calls that I have received from the sheriff's office about people reporting that the gates's been left open or that the gates's been unlocked or that there's a suspicious vehicle there. I have made a number of trips um to that facility to identify what's going on um to just try to help lock the gate and things of that nature. Uh
030it's a little bit burdensome, so I'm really excited for that new new thing. However, my dog does absolutely love going to CTE phase 2. Um and then this is where we have started. So this is what we're working towards. And this is your current field. And so we put our our fencing in here and we've got it here going around. And so we put this out. We're working on protecting these post oak trees that we have here. They're very beautiful trees that have been there for a really long time. But your new building will be in this general area. In fact, this will be concreted and this will become our fire lane for this facility. So we're very excited for what that brings and we're looking forward to getting that rocking and rolling. Uh the
031job trailer for Poke should be uh coming out next week and it'll just be uh blowing and going from there and moving as quickly as we can to get that project done. Stadium improvements. We'll talk about this tonight in the board meeting or you'll be reviewing this tonight in the board meeting for a guaranteed maximum price. Um I want to want to point some things out to you. And so what you see there in the middle of the screen is what was initially outlined um as the scope for this project. And so if you recall, the bond steering committee and everyone else uh the previous team outlined what the bond scope was going to be. And so as we inherited these bond scopes and we start to attack these projects, you you go and you
032look and you observe and I've been in the district for a really long time and there's some things that I've witnessed observed. I'm at facilities all the time. I'm at events all the time. And so there were some things that needed to be taken care of that weren't necessarily within the scope. So, I'm very excited to tell you that not only we providing additional scope within this project to remedy some things that need to be done that should have been addressed uh previously, we're under budget and so you'll be able to see that tonight. Roughly a $30 million budget and we're going to come in about $3 half million under budget with a guaranteed maximum price. Now, granted, things could go terribly arrive as we go throughout these projects, which is why you build in
033contingencies and things of that nature. Uh but to add the amount of scope that you see there on the bottom, a complete bleacher replacement, and I'll show you on the next slide. I'll talk more about that on the next slide. CSHS press box improvements. Initially, you'll notice it was just a roof replacement envelope repairs. That press box has leaked from day one. Um, and we have a number of issues that have been created by the water in that press box. But at the same time, that is not while it looks really pretty from the outside. It is a very unuser friendly press box. Um, our coaching staffs, you have a defensive staff, they're on the window. Whenever it's not their time on the window and it's the offense, then they have to trade places because
034there's no lines of sight. There's bars in the way. um is is a really cumbersome uh press box. So, we're going to be able to do some things there that weren't in the initial scope. Electrical services that can solve. We're gonna have a brand new transformer for the fieldhouse. We're gonna have an additional transformer added back behind left field. Um right now, our current transformer is maxed out. We can't possibly get anything more out of it. And so, we're able to increase those. We're uh we're improving the HVAC controls that are currently consolidated. They've been giving us trouble for a number of years. And we're going to go ahead and replace the roof. We've had a number of issues with the roof. We've had several uh leaks throughout the building on a on a number
035of occasions. And so with the additional savings that we've had, we've been able to go ahead and replace we'll be able to replace the roof as well, assuming this GMP gets approved this evening. And then we've doing some tidying and maintenance issues at the tennis courts uh with a new sidewalk that will provide access to the restroom facilities that will be built. And it also just keeps people from having to walk through the mud uh whenever they're at our tennis events. So why are we replacing the entire bleachers? So the bleachers that are currently there are from 1989. That makes them 35 years old. Typically speaking, aluminum bleachers in Texas can last up to 30 years if they've been cared for properly. Uh on top of that, because of these being built in 1989, the
036additional bleachers that were going to be built were not going to be connected. So, it wasn't going to be a fluid situation. It was going to look like piece mil together. So, you were going to have the addition the the current bleachers and then we were just going to butt up right beside them some of some bleachers that didn't match them because they don't do bleachers that way anymore and we couldn't build them that way. And so it wasn't going to be cohesive. And so we really started looking at it. And you can see here, this is multiple steps, multiple places throughout where our planks are light. If you've ever walked and seen any of these places, these are patch welds that have gone bad. Uh because the bleachers are wearing out. And so if
037you step on these spots, they're soft. They give. And this is throughout the entire bleachers. Um and so we're very excited that with the aggressiveness of the timeline and everything else that we've been able to do with this project that we're going to do a full new set of bleachers on both the home and visitor side and at College Station High School and Animal High School they will have identical number of seats for both and we will be able to have it'll it'll you won't know the difference between Console and College Station High School with the exception of the school colors. So deferred maintenance um complete new roof at Console, we've already touched on that. you know, we're well started. Rockville Elementary School has needed a roof and so we were able to roll that
038into this project. And so, one of the reasons why we are starting more and focusing more on the outside of the building and do we are doing some remodeling in the building, but we don't want to remodel without doing the roof. And so, we're taking a little bit different approach. We're going to push hard. That roof gets started. Uh, they're going to start moving materials in. They've already started moving materials in. We'll be doing a lot more, but that roof will get started next week. It just for us the idea of doing a remodel and then doing the roof is just kind of backwards to our approach. And so um last summer we remodeled Cypress Grove Elementary School or excuse me Intermediate School and now we will be starting the roof replacement there the day
039after Memorial Day. And so um it's beautiful what's been done at Cypress Grove. I think Miss Cameron and her team are very appreciative and really like what's there. It's just uh we've already had some of it get damaged by water because we have roof leaks and so we're going to get that roof done as well. Spring Creek Elementary School has leaked since day one. And part of that is because of the way they had the mechanical operations with the HVAC system, the rooftop systems on top. The way the uh they were penetrating it, it allowed for water to get in and get underneath the membrane and then it could run the course of the building. And so we've had to do mechanical repairs on that. That that contract group has been working great. We've been
040in touch with Miss Chopa. I've checked on the job site a number of times. They should wrap up in the next couple of weeks. They've been working after hours in the evenings and on the weekends to get that taken care of. central office. We have done some work here already. We uh went on the roof and explored and found some warranty issues that we were able to get taken care of, which has helped us some. We've worked with an engineer. Our biggest issue here at central office is these columns that you find in the breezeway are also the drainage systems that run through them. If you ever hear it raining really loud, you'll hear the water rushing through those columns. Well, some of those columns are backed up. We can't unplug them. Some of those
041columns can't handle the volume of water that comes off the roof in the front of the building. And so we've worked with an engineer and we have that out right now and we will be uh moving on that project very soon. I anticipate to bring something back to you next month. Not part of deferred maintenance, but a roof update for you. We had the major hail stom right there around spring break that was pretty significant. Obviously, it hit hard, real hard north of town. Uh but also there was some hail stom on the this end of town. We have physically been on every single roof in this district. Uh we didn't we didn't take anything for chance. We didn't take anything for granted. We know for a fact that we have to have a full
042roof replacement at College Hills. We are currently working uh we had an engineer out that I was with a couple of weeks ago. Uh we'll be getting core samples uh next week. So we know that there's repairs that need to be done at Oakwood AMCMS College and the Barbara Bush Parent Center. The extent of those repairs is to be determined. I've also spent time here recently. There was a lighter hell storm um on the south end of town. Greens Prairie, Pan Trail, um, and Welurn all were buildings that we have been on multiple times trying to determine is this something that is going to be hell damage that that comes back to haunt us later. And so we'll be taking core samples on those roofs as well to make sure that we make the most
043informed decision for that because the last thing that we want to do is get three years down the road and have a situation where they tell us, "Hey, you had hell damage and you didn't do your due diligence." And so we've we've kind of had to deal with some of that related to a hell storm from a few years ago. And so we're just trying to avoid that now. Um, unfortunately with the roof situation, it is 2% of the building value for the deductible. Um, and so that'll be a pretty hefty number. Uh, when we get back at it and we have to go through it, uh, we may do some pre um, we may do some things this summer, but I I don't think that we'll be able I think the earliest we'll be
044able to get started. College Hills will be priority number one. I think the earliest we'll be able to get started there is potentially August or September. And that's pushing as hard as we can uh, working through all of this. And so, um, that's just a handful of things that we've got going on. we get the GMP approved tonight, they'll start mobilization and getting contracts signed for the stadium improvement projects. Uh we've got track repairs going on right now and and a few other things. And so Dzones gets started next week, baseball, softball's ongoing, and um just a handful of things going on. Questions? Absolutely. Kind of a good problem to have question. We may I think this has already been decided, but as far as the advertising on the scoreboards, is that going to be
045by the district or the booster clubs? That'll be by the district. That'll be Mr. Dunson's office in communications. Okay, deal. And then on a just a much lighter note, I uh heard a rumor that we may eventually have a dedicated cross country course out at the CTE Center. You know, the uh I have a meeting scheduled for them on Thursday. Um they uh they have met with um Coach Simak, the assistant athletic director, Mr. Mson, Coach Branch, and a few others have met out there. Uh they're giving me a lot of heartburn right now and unfortunately it doesn't do anything for my hairline. Um they are they want to host a district cross country meet next year, which is awesome because it's a great course and it's really cool. You come over the hill and
046you see Kyle Field, the place of misery sometimes, but you see Kyle Field and and you get to run down to the finish line, which is amazing. The problem is is they're inviting people to an active construction site. Yeah. And then and it's also a situation where like parking and everything else. So we're meeting again on Thursday. That is the ultimate goal is to be able to provide them with that cross country course because I think it's amazing place for it. It's just that we've got to make sure that we can accommodate the number of cars that'll be there, the number of buses and and portaotties and everything else that go with it. So, Mr. Ben, I heard a name in that meeting. I'll bet it gets done. What's that? I heard a name in
047that meeting he had. I'll bet it gets done. Okay. The biggest issue is all the parking will be uh out in the pasture. So if there's any sort of rain, uh we may have 25 buses stuck and 150 cars stuck. So somebody a lot of money, but probably not a lot of happy parents. That's just an opportunity for the Amech kids. There you go. They saw that problem like that. I guarantee you. Now that I heard it was kind of shooting for after the CT center was done. Well, they uh next year might be a little aggressive. They surprised me with a text message last week saying, "Hey, we're all go for the uh cross country meet next uh next semester." And I was like, "Excuse me." So, we're going to have a little bit
048of a follow-up so they can kind of walk me through everything because, you know, it's an active construction site and if you've been here around any of our active construction site, we have a lot going on and there's a lot of moving parts and um I don't really want to invite people to see that, but at the same time, I want to support our programs as best I can. It's true. Cross country all day long. All day long. And honestly, joking aside, that is kind of my um question. I mean obviously you got you are managing so much and a couple of the big I mean the main school uh projects right at the two high schools and at Rock Prairie just we talked a little bit about some of it before but just all
049you might just touch on all the things you do have to manage especially how during the school year with those three projects going on and I mean how much new how much will have be happening during the school year as opposed to trying to get, you know, things done in the summer because, well, with our two comprehensive high schools, those are going to be projects that go year round. Obviously, we're going to push as hard as we can. Uh, we've been coordinating daily. I'm on these job sites daily. I'm I'm in touch with our superintendents daily. Um, right now, currently, what we have is it's myself and Mr. Buckner, uh, Paul Buckner, our executive director of facilities. You may recall that previously there was an assistant director in that department and we opted not to
050backfill that position. And so, that is why you see Mr. Buckner and myself so much. It was once upon a time John Hall and Renee Rimenez. Now it's myself and Mr. Buckner. And Mr. Buckner is unable to be with us this evening. His wife won an incredible trip to all expense paid to Portugal and I wasn't the guy to say no to something like that. So, uh, very excited and very happy for him and I hope that he's listening right now so I can give him a hard time when he returns. Um, he he actually texted right beforehand and said good luck. So, uh, but no, so obviously coordination of some of the bigger pieces like here at Anam Solidated, we have to do a sidewalk and there's some things that we have to bust
051out and so we try to set those things up to where we can attack them whenever there's not as much traffic within the building, there's not as much traffic around the building and so um, occupied campuses make it really really hard um, and ensuring that we have everybody protected and safe as much as possible and try to control the chaos as much as we can. Um, but with with each of those sites uh, it really is there there's a large undertaking. Um, and so you try to be mindful of traffic, you try to be mindful of what the student flow is, and safety is the number one priority for all of those. Any of our contractors that are working with us on a daily basis, we have an application that they complete. Um, and so
052we only have a handful of people. Previously, uh, the M it was the the operating procedure was to provide everybody with a badge. Um, only a handful of people are getting a badge now. And so they they go through a process where they're background and finger fingerprinted by their own company. They're then background and fingerprinted by us. on top of another background screener with the application that they fill out. And so, um, one of the reasons why we chose the contract managers at risk that we did is because of their experience working with occupied campuses. And so, with that, they have extreme safety protocols in place for workers and where the workers can be and where they can utilize restrooms and things of that nature, no contact with students, etc., etc. And so, uh, with
053each of these, it's checking in daily. Obviously, there's lead times on objects and things of that nature, but the biggest coordination piece right now is trying to do the biggest, heaviest lifting during the summer. And so, for the two comprehensive high schools, we want to get vertical as quickly as possible. That means we've got to get the slab poured as quickly as possible. That's why it's so important. I know it was really inconvenient for a lot of people that we started these projects, but time is money. And if you ever look at the inflationary cost of what was projected out with each of these high schools, it's $3 million a year for every year that we wait to get these projects done. That's $3 million that could have been utilized on something else within Anamity
054High School or something else within College Station High School. And so I'm not willing to leave that money sitting on the table. And so, uh, it's myself and Mr. Buckner and then there's a gentleman named Brian Bill. Um, we did have someone retire recently and so we will be looking to back fill that position as a construction coordinator. Uh, but right now it's pretty much six days a week. Um, and so there is no stopping that phone call. Typically speaking, the the contractors get to the job site early. So the first phone call or text message usually is hitting about 6:15 every morning right now. Oh, go ahead. Yeah, it is and I really do appreciate that you've said it before all the effort and all the projects going on because of the money that's
055being, you know, saved in the district. So, I appreciate that comment as well. I guess I was actually not um I was also also thinking about the things that will happen inside the building. Most of the big is additions outside, but particularly consult with the phase 4. Will that will most of that happen though next summer then or during the summer still? Some of we are attacking phase four this summer as well. So it's going to be a part of over the next two summers. But for example, will be both summers, right? But because of the aggressive nature that we took and with the new contractors that we have and with a lot of new subs and just more competitive process in this are, you know, you may recall we we adopted a guarantee maximum
056price consolidated that was under budget under what was projected through the bond steering committee and through the initial scope. And so uh been working with Miss Elder very closely. Um, if you recall last summer, we put the beautiful gray slate on the entryway when you walk in an S cons high school. And then we left the the 1970s tile and random places around the building. We're pulling all that out of the building. Mrs. Elder, one of the first things she ever told me when I walked her building was she's like, I want these lockers out of my building. They keep telling me, "No, can you get the lockers out of the building?" Those are going to start getting ripped out on Friday. Um, and so we are doing things this summer. We're going to be
057in the fine arts orchestra wing. We're doing the gyms. the gyms weren't initially on the scope of things to be done. So, we're going to repaint the gyms. We're going into the basketball locker room area. We're replacing ceiling tile in phase 4, which is going to be your orchestra um area and your choir and your those ensemble rooms and everything else. And so, I was actually there with Mr. Eekes this morning just touching base on things. And so, yes, a lot is happening this summer. Paint, ceiling grid, floors, removal of um removal of lockers, and then getting that gray slate tile throughout the entire building. So, it's a fluid process throughout the building. And it's not a situation where it's like it's here and it's not here. Um it's it's going to be more more
058I appreciate all that. So I will summarize that. It sounds like I mean obviously the external stuff will be going on a lot over the whole um 15 18 months. The internal will as much as possible be done in the summer which they they understand that August the 1st is the day that the students or that the teachers return to the building. Um obviously our push is to be done with as much as we can by August the 1st. We may be working around the clock. We may be working on the weekends. We're going to do whatever we got to do to make sure that we don't impact the learning environment that's on that campus any more than we have to. LED lights is another thing. I mean, there's just so many pieces going on.
059Uh, and LED lights is one of those things that's got a long lead time right now. And so, that might be a situation where we're doing LED lights on a weekend uh because we can't get them in right now. And so, we get mixed reports. Um, and I should have something on that tomorrow when we're going to be able to get those in. On that note, I wanted to thank you. I've heard from a lot of people in the community. I know it's a headache for you, but they're excited to see all the projects at all the different schools, people working on the weekends. Um, so I appreciate your team and everyone just really um trying to make use the best use of our dollars. I'm also very excited to see different contractors, especially when
060I hear you talk about, you know, something leaking from the beginning. I'm glad that we've been able to go out and get competitive bids from other um I'm glad our district's attractive now to these people to come bid on projects, and I really appreciate that. I think the competition has helped us and you'll see it tonight with the guaranteed maximum price for the stadiums. Uh obviously that's a local contractor, but Jacody had for a number of years wanted to do business with College Station IC. Never could get a foot in the door and they have been absolutely fantastic to work with on our middle school projects. I'm extremely excited that they're going to be with us for baseball, softball, and for the stadiums. Um I have learned very quickly. Last summer I walked in and
061inherited a lot of projects. I have learned very quickly probably, you know, obviously our Melissa Fleming and her architect team with VK are amazing. Um, but I've learned very quickly that the superintendent you have on the job is critical. And we have some amazing superintendents with all of our jobs. And Robert K, Robert Krupa with Jakakota Construction is 70 years old and runs circles around me with the amount of energy he has. And I just hope that I still have that much energy at 70 because I'm probably still going to be working at age 70. Thank you. Thank you. Uh D3 presentation and discussion on the 2526 general fund budget. Miss Wilson. Good evening, Dr. Hark Rider, Mr. Horic, Board of Trustees. Uh it's my pleasure to talk to you about the budget workshop a
062little bit about our next 2526 budget year. So what we're going to kind of spend a little bit of time on is legislative update, some budget considerations, and then kind of what the next steps look like. So, as you know, right now it's been kind of crazy with the legislative session, but it's nearly over. So, the last day for the House to vote out of Senate bill and the last day for the Senate to consider all bills is May 28th. Sendai, of course, is June 2nd. So, we're wrapping that up and the governor has to approve all bills by or vote veto bills passed by June 22nd. Um, so a few things that have happened just in the last couple weeks that have really kind of um kind of structured how we're doing a few
063things is uh committee substitute house bill 2. We talked about that the last time, but when it went to the Senate, there was a lot of changes and so there's a lot of consolidated key bills that were consolidated into committee substitute house bill 2. And so that's some of the ones that you see on the screen there. Uh is Senate Bill uh 26, teacher retention aotment. Senate bill 2253, teacher prep and certification. Senate bill 27, teacher bill of rights. Senate bill 2252 and house bill 123, that's the early literacy and numeracy. Uh they rolled in school safety aotment, uh which we're excited about that. It doesn't cover our a lotment. I'll go over that in a little bit, but we're excited to see some increase in funding there. uh Senate Bill 568, special education aotment.
064That's something they looked at the last legislative session, even did a study, and then of course we walked away with nothing out of that legislative session. They've rolled some of those pieces into uh House Bill 2, and it's really exciting to see what they've done with special education there. We've needed increases in funding for a long time. If there's anything that's very meaningful other than teacher raises that's come out of this, it would be some of the a lotments they've given for special ed. I'll go over some more detail about that later as well. House Bill 120 was the last one that they wrote in there, the CTE changes. Okay. So, what is Senate uh committee substitute House Bill 2? They have given $8 billion. Uh a majority of it is designated on teacher races.
065I'm going to explain a little bit kind of what the positive and the negative is to that, but it's not meaningful races for anyone else other than the ones that are classroom teachers. Okay. Uh, and it doesn't do a lot of increase in a basic aotment and we'll kind of go through some of that. Uh, there is an increase in the basic aotment from 55. If you remember from what came out of house bill to originally, we were slated to get 395 and now we're down to 55. Not only we down to 55, they they're using they're reallocating 800 million that's in that tier 2 funding to tier one. So, back to the basic aotment. And I'll explain that a little bit later to make that a little bit clearer. So we will see an
066increase in basic aotment, but then you see a decrease in the tier 2 funding. Uh the total increase right now to the basic aotment is is $55. It brings it to 6,215. If you remember last time we met, I kind of talked to you through anytime we see a basic aotment increase, 40% of that basic allotment has to be sent spent for compensation. They repealed that. teacher retention aotment provides the teacher retention a lotment they set aside provides 2500 per teacher that's from three to four years experience and if you have five plus years of experience it sets aside $5,500. I will go in a little bit which ones qualify and which ones don't. Uh there is also a teacher incentive aotment. It's going to add a new acknowledgement designation and increases the a lotment
067for recognized and exemplary designations. Uh there's also liability insurance. You're going to see a lot of things in this bill that says classroom teachers. So this is liability insurance for classroom teachers, pre kindergarten kids. Right now it says adds children of classroom teachers to the list of eligible students for state funded prek. Um certification exam fees, they're going to wave those. That will be beneficial. We pay for special education and bilingual certification exam fees. They're talking about waving that. The transportation aotment for sped is moved to a $113. So that's a per mile cost, but it it's about $18,000 increase for our school district. I'll go through that in a sec. Special education aotment. Uh like I said earlier, this is very it it transitions to intensity based formula. Those transicity based formulas are going
068to be set for our commissioner. We won't see huge increases the first bienium. That's going to start really the second bienium. So, you're going to see some even further increases in sped there. Uh, they provide $1,000 per student for special education evaluations, which will be helpful to our school district. Uh, in addition, I've read some laws that same rules that say first-time evaluation, and then some leave that word out. And so, we'll kind of have to watch that. Uh, dyslexia aotment, it expands the number of students who can generate those funds. Of course, I think it generates $10,000 for our school district. uh career and technology aotment. It expands the course to generate the um aotment funding for JOTC. Okay. So, what are the impa impacts that this has for our school district? Um I
069just want to put this up there. I know you've seen this before, but our when we get our state funding a little wonky in times, you know, we have tier one funding. That's when we talk basic aotment. We have tier 2 funding. That's when we talk enrichment pennies. And I know you were all familiar with enrichment pennies because you went out for your additional golden pennies and when you did you realized that the state matches on those golden pennies up to a guaranteed price and so that's really your tier 2 funding which is kind of separate. Okay. So when we talk to tier twos here's kind of tier one just to explain it and then you've got tier two. So tier one, when your basic aotment goes up, it's with the $55, you're going to
070see a little bit of money increases to all of those other allocations because it's a formula based system where you've got a formula and it runs off your basic aotment. Okay? So it might be 0.005% of a basic allotment and is increased for a certain one of these programs. Transportation is a little bit different. It's a per mile funding, but it is a part of the tier one funding. uh our basic aotment brings additional $630,000 right now $981 is what's in the law that from the $55 increase in basic a lotment. So that's what our school district is slated to receive at this time. However, with the tier 2 money u it's going to decrease $210,000. Okay? And that's really basically taking us back to that $129.52. And so when you look at how we've
071received any additional funding over the last several years since 2019, it's the little bit of money we get from tier 2 funding because when that guaranteed price goes up and we have all of our eight pennies, we get a little bit more money because our pennies are worth more. Okay? So that's how you're generating a little bit more money and that's what they're capping right there. So does that make sense? Okay. And remind me, have they said they're going to freeze that for ever or Right now it's frozen? Yes. Yeah, they would freeze it at the 129. Yes, ma'am. 32, I believe. But yes, um I showed you this screen. It would take a change in law to reverse it back. Yes. Chances are once they change it this way, hardressed to change it back.
072Yeah. Again, little thing that people think, oh, we're getting even the $55 um dollar basic a lotment increase would we would not be getting at all. Yeah. Okay. Um I I showed you the percentage rates over the last I think the last time I showed you the percentage rates like what were we talking about from 2019? A 392% increase in general insurance. I wanted to show you the number. Okay. So, since 2019, our insurance has increased 2,196,000. Our utilities have c increased 622,000. Fuel cost 215,000. We have taken a effort to give as much raise as we possibly can and that's increased $16 million since 2019. Okay, so those are big numbers, but we haven't received any increase in the basic ament since 2019. And this one shows $55. Okay. In addition to the $55,
073they set aside those monies for 2500 for teachers. And believe me, I am so very excited that teachers are going to get a raise. Uh that's three to four years of experience, 5,500 for five plus the funding they set aside basically because I took all of our teachers in those ranges and I calculated what that would be is $4,182,375. Okay. What they didn't add to the formula is stat men. Okay? And so what that is is anytime we go past our table set by the state saying this is how much you are required to pay a teacher. If you pay above this, you have to pay the statutory minimum which is TRS. Okay? So we'll have to pay TRS on this. That is not included in the amount right now. So the cost of this
074race that will come out of that basic aotment that I just showed you is $489,000. That just covers the benefits. If you look at the second column there, let's talk about the teachers that are not included on that that are on the same exact scale as the teachers that are going to receive it. That's our nurses, our ESL teachers, our instructional coaches, our librarians. None of those qualify for the race. To add those teachers to qualify for the race, it's another $655,000. Now, a lot of school districts, including College Station ISD, has moved certain teacher qualified positions to an administrative pay scale. That might be your art facilitators, that might be your counselors, and then when your APS and your principles move to that administrative pay scale, they're not on the teacher scale anymore. They
075don't qualify. So, that's additional cost to the school district to make it right with no additional funding. Okay. Can we move them back? No. No. And in fact, some schools have even talked, can we give a stipen? You know, like something that separates it. So, because if you think about my pay scale now, I'm going to have to do two pay scales because I'm going to have to have one if we don't give the raise that has the 5500 for this group of state teachers and then one that doesn't. Okay. So, here are some other thing. It also does not include the zero to two years. So, a teacher with zero, one, or two years, uh, they're not included in the race at all. That'd be up to us to figure out what to do
076with that. Thank you. I forgot to mention that. Um, so here are some of the a lotment adjustments. So, special education, I've got a lot of words up there, so I'll kind of kind of go through what I'm talking about. Special education, when you run through the formulas, our new proposed aotment is 18,46,255. Our current, because I always kind of want to have something that we can kind of go back to. In fact, if you look at my previous screens, if you look in the bottom right hand corner, you'll know where I gathered my data so that we know where to go back and get the numbers. Um 2025 budget 18,719. So even the new allotment doesn't cover what our budget was for the previous year. It is a step in the right direction because
077our current allotment is the 17 million 211. Okay. When I say required spend, so when you do your I I'm gonna try not to get in too many of the weeds, but the the state requires you to spend 55% of your aotment. So what they're trying to take into consideration is you've got principles that are in AR meetings. You've got nurses that work on one-on-one. You've got other things that work with these students that can't be included in that allocation. Okay? So 55 has to be a true onetoone allocation. the remaining of that can help offset some of the other costs associated with the program. So our required spend is 9.4 million and then of course we're spending closer to the 18.7. The number out to the side of there that's 608. That's how much
078they're going to estimate that will be in those initial valuations. Okay. So if you add those two numbers together it's a step in the right direction. So I tell you when we go through this and look at sped I think that's the one thing. Oh I shouldn't said that. I think that is one in the step in the right direction. Okay. Transportation. The new proposed aotment is the million79. The budget is 5.4 million. Our current aotment is 1 million61. And so you can see there's not a lot of increases there. Safety and security. Great. They doubled it. They went from $10 to um they went to 10 to 20 per student. And then they went from 14,000 or Yeah. They went to 37 37,000. Yeah. Uh so it's 432. It went from 432 current a
079lotment to 945. Of course, our district does amazing on security in our district. And we are spending 2.2 million, but we're making sure that we have an officer or we have a security person at every campus. And so um those are the numbers we're spending. That's actually the law that was put in the last legislative session, but it costs more than what the a lotment is. U bilingual education, the new proposed aotment is the 1.2 million. Our budget 1.49. Our current aotment is 1,107. Of course, that required spend, that's almost everything is the 609. Early education is a little bit different. We are going to get an increase of 228,000. And we're lucky because some school districts are going to end upside end up upside down on this aotment. So, what's going on is they're
080they're now adding a few more kids to how much money you get, but I don't know if you remember, maybe two legislative sessions ago, they said, "We want you to go full day prek." Now, you could opt out of the program of full day prek if you said you didn't have the capacity. Okay? So, what they're saying, if you do full preK, what we're going to do is take your I what money you generate for early ed for those kids. We're going to give it back to the state and then they're going to stick it into the funding um allocations to take us to full day prek. So, in a sense, we're losing this money. It's going back to the state and hopes that then they're they're going to give me ADA on those preK
081kids, okay, for a full day. I only currently get half day funding on prek kits. So, that's kind of what's going on with that. We do get 228, but guess what? Now, we have a requirement back to that math um and reading. Thank you. So, yes. So, that 228 will kind of go to that program. All right. So, this looks confusing and I've had a lot of questions on what does this mean? So, I'm going to kind of walk through what I've done here. 2024, that's our current adopted budget that you see there. current law. That's me taking current formulas and running it through the system and saying how much money would we generate. If you look at the revenue from one year to the other, yes, we decreased in revenue. But remember, we're losing
082students. And when you lose students, you have to decrease your expenditures. That's when you have to make sure your classrooms are not still staying at the same level when you're losing students. Okay. So, with that in mind, and then you can see expenditures. And so, you see this big decrease 2,294 that has That is what we have done here at College Station. We have decreased our budget 2,294,000 as of right now. Okay. Um, but that doesn't show much when you look at deficit 4.9 to deficit 3.3 because of the fact we're losing revenue. But our deficit, if we were current law and the legislative session was not going on, our deficit would be 3.3. Okay. Now, if you look at the next bill and the only raises in this bill are the ones that are
083required to go for the teacher compensation, the revenue we would receive is the 154 and then of course the expenditures are 156. So, our deficit would be 1.9 million and the only people getting a raise is our classroom teachers and they have to be in the they have to be in the classroom and we report those a certain way for PES and so they'll have that information. So this is kind of what it looks like. I know this is again a lot of information. We would love your feedback. But what I did is did a one and a half percent raise and man we were hoping that we would get a increase in basic aotment and we would have been able to take that and give meaningful raises to all of our staff. Not that
084teachers don't deserve it the same as anyone else but there's a lot of people that deserve raises as well. But if you do a 1.5% for everyone except for that House Bill two class, so just classroom teachers do their regular and then a 1.5 for everyone, then it would take that 1.9 million to a deficit of 2.783. Does that make sense to everyone? If you look at the 2%, that's a 2% raise for all the pay families and then paying classroom teachers the raise, that'll bring our deficit to 3,39,000. Now, if you give all teachers that are on the pay scale, not those that I've talked about that are on the administrative pay scale, but on our teacher pay scale, uh, and did a one and a half% raise to all staff and then paid
085all of those teachers the same, then you're going to see a $3.3 million deficit. And then, of course, if you did the same thing and then did a 2% to all paid families, then you would see a $3.5 million deficit. I think the thing that confuses me is that so um all the teachers that would be getting the committee substitute from house bill two money where are they in here? Are they they're in that top they're included in that top row? Okay, the top row if you look at the two first ones that's just the people that are in the bill that are just in the bill and then everyone else gets a one and a half percent. So it's about a thousand. So everybody else they would they would get theirs which is more
086than one and a half% the the teachers in the bill from the bill would get whatever that calculates to be right. Yes. And then um this would be and that's included in there and then everybody else gets one or two. Yes ma'am. The other two columns are just taking that and saying everybody in that pay scale because we typically move those teachers the exact same way. And it's the first year we would just move the beginning pay scale $500 which brings us a little over 52,000 for a a zeroyear teacher year experience and then move the other two up 1250 and then 2500 then 5,500 and then that those are the numbers you're looking at there. Does anybody have any questions? I'm not sure I get the last two question two columns. I'm not sure
087I get to their%. No, they're in there. They're just getting instead of Yes, sir. The flip picks up. It picks up our ESL teachers are all they'll get a one and a half% and then but everybody else gets on the wall and then your other two columns everyone in that pay family only would get the 2500 5,000 or 1250 if you're going to one or two year. Yes sir. um roughly almost a $5 million deficit this year. So this is going that this is currently how it sits. So, right now, uh, the Senate last night called a formal meeting, which is kind of a little trick of the trade, meaning they could have a formal meeting called with less hours in order to call the meeting. No public testimony. Voted this out of committee because
088they've been catching a lot of backlash over it. A lot of folks aren't happy. A lot of educators are calling in. So, now it goes to the Senate floor. The Senate will vote it out. Then it goes back to the House. My understanding is the House is not pleased about it at all. Uh if the House votes against it, it goes to a conference committee. So basically, you have five senators, five House members. They sit in a room how long it takes. Uh and I promise you, they'll be done before June the second because I know they don't want to have a special session and make a decision of what that's going to look like. And then basically once that committee confirms it, both houses will approve and the governor will sign it. So that's
089the race of why they're up against the clock. The other point, uh, House Bill four, which dealt with accountability, which the House passed that would eliminate the STAR test. The Senate, from my understanding, is basically holding it hostage right now. So, it's kind of like, you take this bill, we'll approve this bill, and we'll all be friends. And if the House digs in on that, they're not going to pass. House Bill 4 star test will continue as is for the next two years with A throughF ratings. So, that's kind of what's taking place behind the scenes. I think the biggest issue that what we're trying to show you is the inequities that it in it creates with yes it is more money given the largest teacher raise in in the history of the state of
090Texas which is fabulous but all of that money is earmarked to one group of people and then we have another 1100 employees that there's literally no money extra to give raises or more money to operate our school district and and that's the rub. The other part of it is with those raises, which are tremendous, it puts all of our uh salaries out of whack. So, basically, as a 20-year teacher, I think we looked at the number roughly, they're making $371 a day. That's more than any assistant principal I have. It's more dang near more than any directors we have. So, the potential incentive for a teacher to move into admin work potentially or advance their career financially, there's nothing good about them doing it because yeah, you could take it. You're going to make the
091same daily rate, but you're going to work 20, 30, however many more days that you're going to work. So, and we don't have the funds. If it had been House Bill 395, we could have we could have increased those min, mid, and max charts to equalize that. So it it it puts everything out of whack. That's a it's a problem long term of of how do we address it when we're constantly chasing money. So what can we do? I mean I know a lot of us have been reaching out to Dyson and Wharton, their freshman rep representatives like at this point. What it sounds like so much is already in motion and going to happen no matter what we do. But what would you suggest we do and what we tell people that have been
092reaching out to us? I say continue to reach out to both of those guys. because they've been very responsive to all of our teams that have reached out. I think Senator Schwartner, uh, he is actually, if I'm not mistaken, part of the conference committee, if that's if that's going to go to conference committee, and then just let your voice be heard of of how we feel about it. What I'm hearing behind the scenes is the Senate does not have an appetite to do any changes to where they are. They feel like this is the best. And so, they're kind of holding the House hostage right now of how bad do you want to get rid of Star? Do you want to get rid of it bad enough to give in this? And I think the
093the House's thought process is we have to you're putting all the money in, which is great, but it's going into pots. And the pots are problematic for the longevity of public ed as as we currently know it. And I think that's that's the rub, which is why we're not even looking at the House bill option because you don't think that's going to which would be more give us more leeway with how we would spend our I think the only hope we have and some of Heather's people talked this weekend from what I'm hearing our best shot at a basic a lotment increase may get to $100 maybe and that would be you know it's it's better than nothing. Beggars can't be choosers, but it it still does not uh we survive for two years and
094then the next session we hope and pray, can we get funding to survive another two years and that's not healthy uh for us as a school district or any other school district in the state of Texas. You're we're surviving versus trying to to flourish and uh do the best that we can do with our kids every day. So best we can hope for is $100. That's like Warren Buffett giving me a hundred bucks, right? Of the budget that we're talking about and what kind of money we're working with. So my question is, which you probably don't know, if we're at 395 increase and we're down to 55, where the blank did that go, why did we go from 395 to $55? Because rough math. Now I get you're talking laws and where it has to
095go. That'd be a $4.5 million increase for the district and we're not in red numbers anymore. And we're getting 630,000. So where where did it go? How do we go from 395 to 55? I know there was a lot of behind the scenes deals trying to come to a compromise and I'm not going to mention names. What was publicly put out was not was not what was agreed to behind the scenes. So what the governor did was go and buy a bunch of people to put in office to pass school vouchers and promise we were going to get equal money. And now we're getting peanuts. However much vouchers are going to cost, which rural Texas doesn't have private schools, private schools. So you're taking public dollars and putting them in private organizations that don't have
096any accountability or reporting. It doesn't make sense to me. Out of an even billion dollars and there's been no explanation. Like part of the some of the testimony is like where did you get to a billion? Like where did the billion dollars come from? and nobody's provided any answer because it's just a big fat round number and your point is well taken Dr. campaign. But part of that money, like you said, is earmarked in all these specific things. But it is actually, I have to also remember that this bill at 8 billion is 1.1 billion less than the House bill, almost exactly the same amount of of money. It's a billion dollars less than the bill that the House bill approved. Problem here is, in my opinion, is the governor does not care about K
097through2 public education and does not want to fund it. and my email is public if he wants to find me on a lighter note. That's an understatement. Sorry. Go ahead. Oh, sorry. Go ahead. No, you go ahead. Is it negative? Because I got a real light note. Well, considering that nobody cares about what happens at the local level in Austin, it's probably light. But yeah, this this whole we're going to create these buckets that have to be used for specific specific purposes is just another example of these folks who meet for a few months, a couple months really, uh, every two years in Austin, uh, think they know how to spend our tax dollars better than the people who are at the local level in College Station, Brian, so forth, and deal with this on
098a daily level. It's just it's it's if it wasn't if the consequences weren't so high, uh it would be laughable. U so my my email is public, too. And Josh, I think it goes back to one of our legislative priorities that you guys came up with, local control, and this is just another example of how that has consistently been stripped back over the last 10 years. we probably don't recognize enough, but Hark Rider and his team have been keeping us all very updated nightly, hourly almost it feels like um when I'm asleep even on just everything that's going on um with all of these things at the House and Senate and all just everything. So, thank you for that. I ran the numbers because when you look you look at some of these and you
099look at the pay families and stuff like Dr. her was talking about what would it take to make this right. It's 570 for basic a lotment just in addition to the 55 just to fix what just happened right here. So in the the what can we do category for whatever it might be worth is Senator Schwartner. Everybody has got to contact him in his office. Dr. P. One other thing I'd like to add. You know, in in previous years, we wanted more money. We as a state didn't have the funds to give. Uh but these last two legislative sessions, we've had the largest surplus in the history of the state of Texas, and we've done nothing with it in my opinion. And we're holding teach they've been holding teachers pay hostage the entire time to
100get what they want to pass, right, money to send again public tax dollars to private institutions. You could go back to and make an argument of the largest teacher pay raise in the history of the state actually is the money that should have been given 1921 23 25 except it's six years late and it's just getting us caught up maybe correct close not even 100%. I heard an interview with Shortner and he was patting himself on the back saying that same thing. We're giving the largest teacher pay raise ever and he's trying to justify it that the money's all there. It's just in different buckets. I mean that was I think an exact quote from him. So, I do think if people reach out to him in email that you aren't buying what he's selling.
101I watched the hearing on Thursday, I think is when it was. And um it just shows how uneducated and I'm just going to call it because it is. It's uneducated these folks are when it comes to school finance. I mean, it's one of the hardest things. I hope everybody here and everybody watching, Miss Wilson, you gave a phenomenal and I know you're not done, but you you've given a phenomenal kindergarten level understanding of school finance right here, which is one of the hardest things as a school board member to come in and understand. So, I appreciate that. But but what I recognized watching the hearing and and listening the testimonies and all that was that these legislature legislative folks have had four or five months to hear from the constituents and I know that everybody's
102been very vocal. I know I have. I've talked to Dyson. I've talked to Wharton. Um we've all talked to them and they still don't get it. They still don't understand it. The Frisco CFO testified and one of them said, "Hey, can you put that like in writing and send it to me? I'd like to read it." And I'm like, "What the hell? Why? This should have been done like four months ago." So, um, that's the frustrating part, but we deal with unfunded mandates all the time. That's all this is. It's an unfunded mandate. Hey, we want to we're going to dangle this out here. Like Dr. Harker said, we're going to put this out here, but hey, by the way, if you want this STAR testing to go away, you got to jump on board.
103So, um, you know, Mr. Ben mentioned it if if we could get down to the local control part of it. I mean, I know there's some folks that think we don't know what we're doing and the administrative doesn't know what they're doing, but I promise you, I've sat on this board long enough. I don't think we've ever gone a year since we've been on, we haven't given a raise. We've sucked up some deficits and it's it's frustrating, but I by God I'm not gonna let folks sit out there and do their job and and not get rewarded for it in some facet even if it's small. I hate to say that, but but we've got to be able to keep the lights on. We got to be able to keep the kids in the class.
104We got to be able to keep operating the district. So, we can we can complain about what's going on in Austin because it's a horrible city. It really is. And I said it, but we we can o I'm just telling you we can only voice our concerns so much and in the end we've got to deal with the cards were dealt and you've done a fantastic job to kind of put the pieces of what we do know up until May 20th today. And you know, we're we're going to work through it and and go from there. I'm not trying to close this out because I know you still got to roll on with stuff, but that's just where I'm at. And I'm breaking pins up here. So, I'm going to turn it over to you.
105Um, I just I want to end I want to go back to those numbers because I I mean all that is so important just to say because that's got us into the situation we're in. But but you're right, we got to deal with these guards and and um this is where we are at this present moment with hopefully it gets may get better. But um so to kind of summarize like this the previous page and this one you've said um we're looking at take you you all have looked at taking $2.3 million out of the budget. That's on the previous slide. Right. Yes ma'am. Out of out of our expenditures and we're not done. We can talk about and you're not and we can talk about what those are. We we should talk about what
106those those are. And um and if we just jump up over to we're dealing with the bill, right? Oh, sorry. Nope. Nope. I wanted to I can't read this. The red on there. I'm so sorry. The 1.9 is our deficit then with the bill. So starting at that point, then we have the addition of possible pay raises for the other other folks that are not included in the House bill and which is approximately,00 staff members. Yeah. About half, right? Yeah. About half of our staff. Um so what we have to look at is you know that 1.9 would go potentially to 2.7 3.3 and 3.5. Are we going to talk more? So so that's part of what we would have to decide on as a team. Right. Correct. That would be a final decision for
107that would be at the June meeting and I'd like to have a June workshop the week of June the 8th that we just only thing on it is going to be the uh budget as long as it takes. Hopefully by that point everything's in stone. We've got hard numbers of we know the revenue that we're going to have and then you guys have all of that information prior to coming to the June 17th I believe that meeting. I think I think a workshop on the more details of that would be fantastic. sooner rather than well I mean I know that we're dealing with all the unknowns of the legislature but there obvious a lot of things have been going on behind the scenes with the team to so we need to continue to get those
108just be discussing those options too because the other are we going to get more on the 2.3 million dollar we let her finish and then we can well I didn't see it specifically in here but we're gonna we're gonna go talk about it ma'am perfect good okay so um on the budget process these are some of the things we've done. So, we've trained our staffed. We have looked at campus funding allocated by student and we kind of talked about that last month. We've looked at compared district peers. So, we've kind of looked to find our outliers and so where do we spend a lot more per student than others so that we know that we're looking at those items. We've built zerobased budgets for all of the departments and they've been brutal. Um, and we've
109looked at every single line on those zerobased budgets. We've looked in the detail on every single line of this budget. Uh we have audited campus and department staff and so I spent a lot of time just looking at what other everyone has on their campus and how it relates to each other. And we've reviewed funding sources. And so if there's if if we've got funds that are federal or something like that, those are things that if someone's requesting something that fits there and there's money, it's a conversation. Um, we've reallocated funds to campuses. So, there were some funds up here at our district level. That's one of the cuts that you're seeing in those dollars where we might have had some funds being spent out of central office and some out of the campus. So,
110what we try to do is collect some of those funds and move it to the campus level. And so, that's something that we've done. So, when you've looked at the cuts on your campus level, unless there was a lot of decrease in students, they did not get cut in their supply budget. Okay, those all stayed the same in group. Um, of course, some of that is from moving some of these items over there. Um, between maybe science materials, maybe some other things, GT materials, sped materials where we would buy the wipes and then mail them to the campus. We're just going to have them buy the wipes on their campus. Um, so there's been a lot of things like that where we've looked to try to make sure that we're not duplicating things. Um, we've
111done allocations. I've compared those allocations to other school districts, not just to the one I came from, but to other ones in the state of Texas, and that goes down to Departmental of athletics. It goes to band, fine arts, it goes to CTE and everything. So, we've looked compared those numbers and then we've worked with those leaders to see if we can come down a little bit, not to where where we were comparing them, not what we were finding at other districts, but at least get that conversation started. And I'm not going to lie, the people in this district have been absolutely amazing. They have worked hard to look at their budgets and see if there's ways that they can cut. And that's been across the board. I haven't received a lot of complaints from
112our our principles of things that were going on or the department directors. Everybody's been willing to try to come to the table and talk. Um worked with departments to reduce expenditures and then we've reviewed the preliminary tax information. So what we're going to continue to do is monitor the legislative session, continue auditing position budget, and continue review budget for savings. So when you talk about probably some of the larger items that are coming out of the budget are your staffing allocations. And even if you look at your first rating and you look at staffing allocations, when you decrease students, you have to decrease staff. And so we kept the class constant at the elementaryaries 22 to1. just when we were over and we could pull a teacher and still keep that at 22 to one,
113we pulled that teacher. We didn't no one lost their job. It was just from just reducing the staff member. Uh we had class constants at intermediate schools of 25 and we kept them completely solid. There wasn't a teacher to take at those campuses. And then the high schools, we kept the class constant at 25 and we reduced a few teachers there. And it wasn't, like I said, it was just basically looking at inefficiencies. Um, and I shouldn't say that because we would love to keep those teachers there, but when you're faced with a budget, you've got to got to look at anywhere you possibly can. And if there's anything that we can reduce that we have to look at those numbers when they're least impactful to kids. And I think we've looked at that every
114time. We try to find the most least impacted. I don't know if that's probably a double. I can't really say that. We try to find what's least impacted impactful for children and made the cuts there. We looked at instructional aid. So we built a staffing model and um or we revisited the staffing model and made sure that we were equivalent across campuses. And so when you see we we decreased some instructional aids. We actually increased a couple instructional aids as well because they didn't have enough compared to the other campuses. Some campuses had two more than their 150 to1 and some were less than that. And so we kind of moved that staff around to make sure that they were equivalent. We looked at office staff and um there are a few office staff that
115we might decrease if they were to resign, but we're not going to move any at this point. But if they resign, there are a few things like a receptionist at a campus that has less than 550 when there's someone there that can maybe help it when we're in times like this. And so, um, those are really what we're looking at. We took hard, uh, looks at other things, but at this point, we didn't feel like we could could cut other things. And so, for the most part, that's the positions we're looking at at this time. Um, but as you know, and you look at these numbers, we're going to have to, excuse me, continue to to to review and look at things. But, um, other things that we looked at that our district has done
116an amazing job at is the overtime we had budgeted from year to year. that number could be decreased. We've looked at substitutes that have been budgeted from year to year that could be decreased because most of the time when that has been they've kind of increased that number is because we had a sub for an aid position and it was budgeted there and it was budgeted in subs. And so those were easy grabs where we can kind of look at those subs and decrease those amounts. And so that's really kind of what we've looked at. We've looked at every single line. I I kind of know where there's a little bit more we can go and get. Um, but we really kind of wanted to hold off to see what the legislative w was going
117to finalize. So, did I kind of cover that's where that number is coming from. Uh, for example, I can tell you there 750 to 800,000 of that is just in non-payroll items and I'll have more detail. Um, we are still reviewing budgets in a sense and like I said, we've gone line to lineto line. Um, and we have imported, and I say we, and I mean Chris behind me, has input ported uh input all of those items into our software system. We just had a few budgets that came in yesterday that we don't have in the system yet. And so until we get that in, we won't know like exactly how much supplies we decreased exactly how much, but I'll have those at the next workshop. this particular slide. Where are we at as far
118as um are we back in good standing with the comproller and the appraisal district and undervaluations and so forth? Okay. Yeah, we're we're working on that. Um we've got it turned in to get our homestead exemption corrected. And then once we have that, that's $2 million to our district that's currently not on the current summary finance that we will see in the near future. And so we've got that in the works and we have our numbers and so that we can actually get a good calculation. Um, there was several judgments, 179 in the past and I think another 60 to 70D were approved in May. All of that revenue is going to be out of our current tax revenue and then we're going to have to go and do comproller reports back in to receive
119that money back. So, we're going to lose our value for property taxes and we're going to have to go back to the comproller and hope that they'll give us our state funding. Because you remember, if you look at at the cup, when our taxes go down, state revenue should go up. What's happening is you have to go back and look at several cups back. Well, we just lost our local revenue that's coming out of this year's budget. So, we need the state to make that cut full. And so, that's why we do property value studies to go back and try to get that money when it's past time. So, some of these judgments go back to 2018. We're only supposed to go to 2021, I believe. And so, unless there's large judgments, we can try
120to go and get previous money, and we will try to do that. Okay. Per poor ballis poor per our poor board policy. I'm sorry I'm getting tongue tied trying to talk as fast as Josh and I'm not holding up my deal. Okay, so we have to have near three months operating expenditures. Right now we're sitting at 4 million and we will be putting more fund balance in this year because of the fact that we changed our fiscal year from a 12 month to 10 month. This is our 10-month fiscal year. Okay. What questions do you have for me that I haven't already answered? Back to that fund balance. How much are we going to be putting back in there? I'm estimating about six million. So, we we should have extra to help with the raises.
121To help with the raises and help with having another year of a deficit budget if we have to. Yes, ma'am. That's huge. Couple of follow-up questions. Um, I know one of the buckets the legislaturator is apparently creating is the a teacher sentiment a lotment. Are are we rocking and rolling on that? We are. Bridget works really hard and then she's got an additional staff member that helps her with that. Okay. We are very much involved in the teacher incentive aotment. That's what you're asking, right? Yes. Yes. Okay. Yeah. I mean I I know uh at that point I would say we need more transparency though so that teachers understand how they can get it and when and where. We've done really good, I think, on the lower end, uh, you know, K through six and
122stuff. I think it's been much more challenging on the high school end where people aren't sure where they stand. And I I just think we can be more clear so teachers can understand how they get it, when they get it, and all that stuff is money's out there. We need to advocate for them to go get it for for us to get it. And I think we need to help our teachers do that. And I think we can do a better job at the high school level. I know as of a couple years ago there were still like for lack of a better say classifications of teachers who we didn't have the system in place for them to get those. Is that still and I think Bridget might want to answer this but I can
123tell you Dr. Hark Rider fine arts was one of the buckets that I think we're trying we've worked into the mix and that was probably expand. So start expand. measure. And so are there more eligible Okay. Yeah, I was going to be kind of a follow-up question was is you use you use the term as we're able and just just from a a board standpoint or budget, however you want to put it, if there's anything that we could do to kind of help with that, increase the the ability to to have more and more teachers eligible. And I think it's a very important question and a great point that you made, Dr. Payne, that we still have a lot of teachers that are that are either not knowledgeable enough about it, but a number that
124especially at the high school level that are not eligible now. I mean, I think it's worth bringing it having it as a discussion for us in maybe a couple months with an update on on TIA. I I think so to make everybody more aware and have us know where we where we are. And one more question. So, um the um pre kindergarten classroom teachers, their kids being eligible. Um, is is that something that we're going to be able to offer as far as space or I know because that's a that's you know we there's been a a request at different times to have a you know prek daycare whatever for teachers and you know that has its own set of issues but if if a teacher in CSISD wants to take advantage of that particular
125bucket the legisle lator has given us. Are they going to be able to or too early to tell? I think it would depend on the capacity and how the law is written or if it's something that do we have to increase a teacher if we have capacity. Sometimes I know that in other districts they've offered it to their teachers if there's capacity, meaning there's seats available. So, I'm not for sure at this point how the raw laws written, but I'll pay attention and let you know if I find anything out. Yeah. Who knows it could change again. So, I have two two questions. Well, one is on your staffing model models because I know I understand that that's the the reality is that not only is it our biggest bucket of um money is our
126staff, right? But also that the reality if we have fewer students and opportunities to um um you know to meet all the needs of our students with fewer with fewer teachers, that's where we're going to have to have to make some cuts. Um, do we take into account those staffing models that you know like title one schools are not you know may have different populations than you know I don't know just are those in those models. Absolutely. That's a great point. So the reason why you should do a staffing model is for uh well even title one purposes on supplemental not supplant rules because you've got to establish your base level and that's what that staffing model does. It establishes the base level and make sure that we're funding campuses equitable. So when they get
127that title one funds, every bit of that is above the base level. So it's above the staffing model. Are we making sure our campuses are using their title one funds? Like is there education component there? Yes, we're we're working on that. Um I think Patty does an amazing job of working with the and I keep calling people by first name so I apologize for that. I think she does an amazing job and I think we have some initiatives for next year that we're going to get involved in it. Chris and I and Lindsay are going to go out and work with them every quarter and I think Miss Leafur is going to do as well just to kind of stay on top of it to make sure that they're spending those numbers and so we
128have a plan moving forward. I appreciate everything you've done. I know there's districts um that are shutting down schools and laying off teachers and I think y'all have done a great job so far of trying to find money without impacting learning for our kids. Um and I really appreciate that. Thank you. I couldn't agree more, Heather, because I think what we're talking about here is protecting jobs, the teachers in the front of the room and kids. Um, because the alternative is much worse. And I'm not saying I want hear sound, not saying this is what's next, but the alternative is to close campuses. We opened a lot quickly. And so, yeah, our class sizes may go up a body or two or three. And if two teachers retire, excuse me, if two teachers retire and
129we only fill it with one, okay, that that's what we had to do because the alternative is much worse where we close an elementary school in a neighborhood or three loes that or we close two. I mean, you're you're talking drastic. This is this is nightmare budget stuff. Again, the difference is nightmarish and I don't think people understand that. And again, you want to attack and then and then look at the laws that restrict the spending. You can't just say, "Oh, we're paying for this software program. let's cut that and we can hire two more teachers. No, we can't because that's not what you can do with the funding. So, um the challenges are unbelievable. Um and they're unbelievable because our legislators put us in this situation. Yeah. Thank you for what you guys are
130doing. So true. And you provided so much information that helps us understand how these bills and the legislators impacting us directly. I will still I do want to add one thing though. Um I feel um at this point in the part that I feel personally that I w wish we had a little bit more information on is um just more on that say that 2.3 of exactly where that money is um going to be coming from. I'm and then also usually at this point we're looking at um I mean is there going to be any what are the additional expenses on the other side? We didn't I mean usually there's something else in there that you know it be that's driving an additional uh expense as well. Obviously the we're going to have the revenue
131down for the number of students but you know usually we're having to expand this type of teacher or maybe we need to add we added another counselor at one point you those kind of things right. So, so kind of that comparison where are we going to have to add a little bit because we're kind of being forced to, but then also then a little more specifics on where those where we're finding uh these these reductions that we have to do as you said. We Sure. And the mainly the ads right now we're having are in the special education department and so there are ads there that we're looking at those numbers still and we can bring that to you. But yes, there will be some additions as well. Anything else? And and in all honesty,
132one one number I'd probably bringing to you right now would be insurance. And guess what? It's down. It's part of that 2.2. So there you go. You're welcome. Thank you. All right. If nothing else, we're going to journ. I've been to church. Yeah. Church. All the seats are all I'll take this one over here. How are you sir? [Music] Good evening everybody. We're not starting quite yet. If you are here, if you're a teacher, coach, sponsor, or here representing a student group that's being recognized, could you come and meet me in this back corner really quick so I can just give y'all some information before we roll? We got lots of kids here tonight, so I just want to make sure that you all have all the information you need. Thank you. Welcome everybody to
133our 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 either this meeting or
134an 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 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 principal of&M Consolidated Middle School
135uh 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 Giana 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 Cashaw always makes the lessons
136very fun and I've definitely grown this year. [Applause] Hi, I'm Roco Grandandy 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 [Applause] though. 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 we're doing, whether it's learning
137about 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. [Music] 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 second or you can
138head to your pods. Oh, wait. Sorry, honey. Let's do a picture. I want to recognize two staff from my school. My two PE coaches, Coach Julie Wellman and Coach Blake Herura. 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 y'all come up here. You know who you are. Miss Avalos, Miss Stevens, if you could also come up. Tonight I want to go ahead and highlight
139a theme and the theme is unsung heroes. And uh I have asked Mr. Mark Ramos, Miss Amy Frevley, Miss uh Joanne Pulchin, and Miss Jacqueline Swan, along with my assistant principles, Ashley Stevens, and Katie Avalos 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 fabulous. I enjoy the fact that we get
140to 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 easier. These are two fabulous educators that could
141probably make a lot more money. We were just talking about it earlier, teacher instead of aotment, but they chose to support teachers and everything that 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. Thank you. [Applause] It doesn't matter. Hello everyone. My name is Shannon Cthar. 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 so much more than just getting students to and from school safely. It's about
142showing 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. Ron 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 to recognize um Kennedy's bus driver, Mr. Ron. His compassion and care have truly
143touched 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 kindless, 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 would also like to present a golden heart award to Miss Kennedy Bonds. She
144and 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. [Applause] 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. Let's grab a picture. All right, here we go. Everybody smile. One, two, three. Good job. I don't know who this goes to. anyone. I'm gonna stand up here tonight if that's all right so I can see everybody. Okay. Howdy everyone. My name's Austin Dunson. I'm the director of communications. And as you can see by this incredibly full room tonight,
145we 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 competition. 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 and um give their sponsor coach or teacher their certificates to take home with them. So to start us off, if you are
146a 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 faced Collieville Heritage in the state championship game and delivered a commanding performance. Come on, buddy. Winning four to zero and bringing
147home 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 C 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 Tomplant was named the region 3 assistant coach of the year. Finally, the city of College Station issued a proclamation designating April 22nd, 2025 as&m Consolidated High School Lady Tiger Soccer Day. And the Texas House
148of 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. [Applause] Congrats again. [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. Well, 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
149who 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 [Applause] 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 and coaches, thank you for representing College Station with pride, passion, and purpose. We are proud of each and every one of you.
150Let's give them a big round of applause. [Applause] [Music] Six miles. One, two, three. [Applause] 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 ISD visual arts students who participated in this year's TAEA 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 receive 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
151are 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. All right. Congratulations, guys. [Applause] All right, state track CSHS and console. 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
1522025 UL UIL state track and field meet. These student athletes competed 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 biggest 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. Okay,
153congratulations, 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 52nd. Tristan Edrington placed 55th. And Avery Hendrickk 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] All right, gymnastics. Y'all come on up. that 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
154the 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 in regionals, and place seventh overall in the state. in 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
155state. I'm sorry. Um, individual highlights. Uh, Ty Taplan placed fourth in the state out of 156 individual qualifiers. Molly Elie placed seventh in region two. Lexi Hardsy placed 15th in the state in 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 Kenna 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 the 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.
156[Applause] All right, anglers. So, we have a unique one here tonight. Thi 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 is the first tournament of the year with 149 boats competing and our anglers made a big splash. Thanks to a strong showing from multiple 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
157and 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 and determined state powerliffters from&m Consolidated High School who competed in the Texas High School Power Associ Powerlifting Association state meets this year. Powerlifting is a sport that demands a lot of physical strength and mental fus focus and incredible work ethic. And these athletes demonstrated all of that and more as they represented Canaw and CSISD at the highest level of competition. We have Cameron
158Rostston who qualified with a 550 lb squat, 325 lb bench, and 475 lb 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 550lb squat, 405 lb bench, and 445 lb deadlift. And Becca Maguire qualified for the state meet with a 615 lb squat, 405 lb deadlift, and 510 lb deadlift. I'm sorry, 405 pound 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 squat, 190 for the bench, and 280 for the deadlift. And Sarah, and I'm so sorry, I'm gonna butcher her last name. There you go, coach. Thanks, buddy. Finished 10th in the state.
159um 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. [Applause] 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 in Anam Castalia Middle School. So, make sure y'all check that out before you head out this evening. race to 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
160a 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. DEIC met um and we will 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
161about 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 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 just 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
162all 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 couple a lot of updates on on numbers. Uh that that uh program continues to um just do impressive things. Uh also, um they are continuing to um try as much as possible to have kiddos be on their home campus when the uh so if they're going to be in kindergarten at
163uh 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 at 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 School's graduations will be
164Friday, 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. 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 the 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 limited to three minutes per person. Those needing an interpreter may have up to six minutes. Each person has one opportunity at the microphone regardless of minutes used. Unused minutes may not be acred by another speaker. The
165executive assistant will time the comments and alert the president when time has expired. 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 then transferred to Pant 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 Degar, and Britney Kaine.
166I'm also a proud parent of two students who graduated from CSHS and our youngest son who will attend Welber 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 I'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
167much. 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 yet 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
168means 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 spent 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 hours. 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
169of 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 the 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. I 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.
170My 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 not 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
171at 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 suspension 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,
172I 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 ll 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 Nickel 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.
173It 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 meant 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,
174whether through personal meetings, phone calls, or emails, and I appreciate the opportunity to meet with Dr. Hark Rider 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 first gathering sufficient input from staff and the community. Although additional planning time is valuable, extending 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
175I 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, and 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
176some 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 actually 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
177and 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 addition 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
178to 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 can 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
179place 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 going through, you would be moved to make some changes for the better. Thank you for your time, [Applause] Amy Sheilac. I know. I practiced. Good evening board, ladies and gentlemen. My name is Amy Sheilac. I'm a parent of
180a third and a fourth grader here. I am 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 CTE 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
181no 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 education 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
182parents 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 the 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
183educators. 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 teachers 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
184Miss Simmon. Any further discussion? All those in favor say I. 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. 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 carry 6 with one abstension. Uh, brings to item H1. Consider approval of the 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
185you 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 of. 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. And so whenever we look into the future, we need to also
186maximize 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 305, 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 additional 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
187minutes per day 1750 this adds into 3.97 additional days with everything calculated. Okay. And we have always been over 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 PD 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,
188we 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 January. 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,
189March 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 notice 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 because 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
190or 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 opportunity 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
191got 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. Horact, I'll turn it over for you. Mr. Mr. Man, can you let um the people watching and in the audience, can you explain DEIC what it's comprised of, who makes up 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
192representatives 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 meet or voting members. We're there for input. We're there to provide information. 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
193with 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? made I think it just happened like a week or two last week. Okay. Yeah. Uh 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. Wasn'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
194things done. um 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 that, but 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
195pay. 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 additional 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
196so 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 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 and 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
197a 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 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 some 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
198is 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 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 is 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
199compensation. 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 studies 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 I um asking you know second, third, fourth graders to actually get more
200learning 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 little frustrated with the rush on it that it you know we do spend a lot of time when we have calendar issues or when we go through a calendar we spend months talking about it and understanding the impact of this and getting our input
201from 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 I 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
202wait 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 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 um how 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
203adjusting 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. And 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
204work 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, more 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
205working 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 it 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 there was another opt 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
206option. 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. Nor 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
207during 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 going 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
208the 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, before 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
209PD 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 match up because, oh, by the way, this is what the district looks like, you know, year-over-year. 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
210day because that is not the that's the decision that district has made. Correct. Correct. 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 yeah, 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 are 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
211both 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 that 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
212with 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 elementaryaries wouldn't add 10 minutes. But we also have a lot of other things we have to consider. 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
213of 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, "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
214little 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 the 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
215changes 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 time 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 Missy.
216I'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 what 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
217losing 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. Couple follow-up questions. Um in regard to Dr. Payne's comments. So, will Consol have the the win Wednesday? She currently they 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're they name it different things. Yes, sir. Okay. And then as far as communications
218with 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 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 it 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
219do 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 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 teacher, the spouse of a teacher, the number one concern is that 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
220the 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 and and as everybody around this room, everybody out there knows, 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
221this 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 is 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
222if 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 different set of eyes, it there there are changes and and and that that different set of eyes needs to happen either with the administration, and it'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
223making sure they that they're working. If not, we change them and we change them to benefit the teachers, the kids, the taxpayers, everybody else. Um, so 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 on 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 don't we have the 10 minutes? Kind of walked them through the uh basically what we just went through and there were no other
224questions. 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 and so forth and and everybody on this board, everybody this administration would give huge raises, as much 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
225that's the first time since 2019. Um, and so, you know, 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. The students, the teachers, what's it? 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.
226I'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 writer said, you know, it gives these high school principles APS to 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, even 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
227to the 10 minutes that could be utilized and beneficial down the road. So, I motion to approve as presented. Second motion by Dr. Payne, second by Miss Simmon. Any further discussion or comment? Yeah, I do want to uh kind of do it 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 struggle because it's not an easy decision. Um I really do appreciate your your comment, Christian, 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
228I 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 elementaryaries did. Sometimes a shorter day of learning is better for the kid. The more additional days without without No, I'm not saying anything different that 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. Yeah. Okay.
229Sorry. Sorry if I lost. Sorry. Yeah, you go. Thank you. I think and if I'm wrong, let me know. So, what can 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 minutes 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. But I was getting to
230she 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. We 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 night. 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
231or 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 come 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
232creative 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 board member uh 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
233believe 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 rates for the 2526 school year. Miss Wilson, 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
234the 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 ICT 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, what 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%.
235It'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. 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 digits. Is that correct? 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. U and then it's something we're going to look at longer term if you know because remember part of the numbers that Heather showed we've paid uh an increase of 329% in insurance uh cost
236over 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 potentially with the district increasing the their our portion of the compensation? We could look 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
237form 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 your it could be upwards of 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
238that 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 take 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
239answer. 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 increase 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 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
24026,856,631 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. 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 selected 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
241said 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 a 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
242going 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. Nonetheless, with this tonight, it is our recommendation, excuse me, that the College Station Independent School Board of Trustees approved the guaranteed maximum price of 26,856,631 for the stadium improvement projects at Anam Consolidated High 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
243comment that it's that this is to me the perfect example of where uh 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 mean, 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
244have 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 anybody 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
245was 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 got 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
246district 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 going 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
247I 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. We're not we're not building the Taj Mahal. No. U whether on our schools, our athletic facilities, our CTE center. Um, you can there's lots of stories 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 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
248opportunities 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 I 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,
249Rock 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 very 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
250uh 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 state structures at well at Creek View and River Ben. 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 playground solutions for 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
251is 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 so 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
252able 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 Bleachers 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
253because the way this project was designed, if you've ever been to the Cassaul 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 planned was just adding separate pockets of bleachers on either side. Well, right now if you've been to Cassaul 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 true ramps,
254and 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 projects. 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
255say 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 24 bond funds. Mr. SAC. Yes, sir. Mr. Horack. 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
256meet 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 place. 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 edition and renovation project, Brock Prairie Elementary Edition and renovation project, baseball and
257softball 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. Penn, second by Mr. Ben. Any further discussion or questions? All those in favor say I. All those opposed. Motion carries 70. Thank you, Mr. 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
258rampant. 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 I want people to think about somebody they care about in their life. Um, who's a good person who tries hard 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. Hart Rider that I've seen, I
259find um to be horrible, disgusting behavior. And a lot of it is wrong and misinformation and and you can't correct it because 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 at it I was about 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
260credence 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 or 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 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
261can 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 2526. It's going to fly by. Like I said tonight, we've been doing this five years, a little over. It's flown by. Not Not all good, not all bad. But I appreciate everything y'all are doing 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
262Dr. 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 chose 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. Yeah. Uh, back in open session 9:00 we are ajourned. I don't care. Yeah, you're good.