001moment. In compliance with chapter 551 open meetings of the Texas Government Code, I call to order a public hearing meeting of the board of trustees of the Austin Independent School District for Thursday, February 26, 2026 at 5:02 p.m. A quorum of the board is physically present at the Austin ISD central office to conduct this meeting. This meeting is being broadcast on cable channel 22 through Spectrum is down broadband and on channel 99 through AT&T Universe. Close captioning in English is available on these platforms for individuals who are deaf or heart of hearing. Welcome and thank you for joining us. Uh first is an opportunity for the public to share comments with the board. This time allows speakers to comment publicly about the district annual report andor our targeted improvement plans and local improvement plans. Uh,
002while we wish we could respond or provide feedback, the Texas Open Means Act does not authorize a board to discuss or respond to comments or complaints from members of the public if the subject is not on the meeting agenda. Members of the public wishing to participate in the public testimony portion of our meeting called a dedicated AISD phone line in advance of the meeting to uh sign up to speak in person or to audio record their remarks. We have one person signed up to speak in person and five who left a recorded message. Um our init uh inperson testimony is quite lowera and uh we're ready for you when you are. Thanks. >> Okay. >> Press the mic button. >> Good evening. My first comment is about these targeted improvement plans and by extension the
003turnaround plans. I think too often there are stu it's what's forgotten is that there are students at the schools right now. It's great that we're making plans to improve instruction and learning in the future, but those schools need help right now. We cannot and should not wait to enact these plans when there are student and staff that need support at this very moment. The school my kids attend, Pan Springs, has had a tip. We're also getting a tap, but we're short staffed and underresourced right now. So, I'm asking for the trustees, the superintendent, and his staff to go beyond these targeted improvement plans. Go beyond these turnaround plans and see what you can do to assign more dedicated staff right now. Not staff that's assigned to a region or several campuses, but staff that works
004at that school only. So, please go beyond the plans to do what you can do to help. Now, >> thank you. And we know you have two comments. So ready when you are for your second. >> Trustees, today you're receiving a report prepared by the administration that tells among other things metriculation and program enrollment across the district. The report is insufficient because it does not disagregate the data geographically or in terms of vertical teams and feeder patterns. As a result, you are not seeing what the rest of us are living and that is an inequitable racist white supremacist school system. There are well-funded and wellsupported courses and programs at westside mostly wealthy and white schools that are not offered at all at title one east side campuses serving mostly black and brown students. Program participation
005is governed largely by choice sheets which students are filling out right now. The district claims these choice sheets are universal but that is not true. The choice sheets bear lay bare the inequitable racist white supremacist school system that we have yet to disrupt. The long range plan calls for the establishment of baseline academics so that every family knows what they can expect at any Austin ISD school. And yet, we have not done enough to ensure that these programs are available to everyone. Commit to making the systemic changes that help us balance enrollment and more equitably distribute these resources so that the reports more accurately reflect the lived experiences of the staff, families, and students at all Austin ISD schools. Thank you. Thank you. I appreciate you being here. Uh we will now play recorded message
006for public testimony. So please listen carefully. >> Hi, my name is Patrick Davis. I'm a parent with students at both Keeling and at Blackshere. All of my kids walk to school. I'm calling to ask the board to intervene and prevent the superintendent from closing Blackshere. My message is very simple. We ask you to kindly save Blackshere. Thank you very much. My name is Rachel Bowen and I'm a Blackshire panel. On today's agenda is Black Sher's lip, but next year we inherit Oak Springs TAB. Since the board rejected a restart at Oak Springs, the path is built on Black's foundation of success. But Blackshire can't be separated from its location. We need stability to focus on academics, including Black Seth up to fail. In fact, the district expects 10 schools will continue to fail. I'm concerned
007that construction at Oak Springs just allows AIS to delay real academic progress for even longer by allowing for yet another restart. If our school fails, it will be a direct result of AIC decisions. New buildings can't manifest academic success. I urge you to look at alternatives to keep Blackshire open by designing Oak Springs to serve our early learners and allowing Blackure to continue for older students. Blackshire can't be considered in isolation. Campbell, Devala, and Valley are also underenrolled. AIC promised districtwide lottery changes. Not only was that process unjustifiably halted, I now hear you may not resume it at all despite promises not to vow to political pressure. These hard decisions should have been made in 2019 and failure to follow through now further erodess trust. Hi, this is Meg Kaving about um agenda item 5.1,
008specifically Black Shar's targeted improvement plan. Right now, it's unclear on the campus's final location. Please do not make it this decision now. It's not going to set Blackshirt up for success with this targeted improvement plan. This should be part of a long-term discussion ASC has planned for phase two of consolidation and that our school would close or move was thrown in at the last minute with these turnarounds planned school closures. We didn't have the time or money to mount a big campaign like Brel or Maplewoods. And the way the district has gone about this has been unfair to students, staff, and administrators. You essentially pit two title one schools against each other in this rush decision on the school's final location. And this kind of way of doing business. This is why East Austin doesn't
009trust AISD. Thank you. >> Hi, my name is Laura Dela. I'm a Blackshere parent and I'm calling to support taking advantage of this window of opportunity to construct a new campus at the Oakr site. And I'm also calling to request that a decision on the location of the Blackshere and Oak Springs combined campus is delayed until district-wide impacts related to TAP consolidation, campus program moves, school accountability results for year 2025 2026, attrition due to charter recruitment and vouchers, and individual school choice in response to boundary changes can at least be partially assessed. Many people have observed that specifically planning for a campus move in a couple of years creates a way to get around state accountability require requirements by starting a new campus. And I don't appreciate optics which appear to plan for student failure.
010There's a concern that a decision about blackshare is being rushed while decisions about other non-tap elementaryaries and other areas of Austin are being further delayed. Um, so I request a decision on Black Shear is also further delayed in order to effectively respond to system changes and allow communities to better prioritize student success together. >> Hello. Uh, my name is Mark Caparo. I am the parent of two children at Blackshar Elementary School and I am calling to uh implore you to uh delay a decision on the consolidated school um and obviously to keep Black Share open, a school that we love very much. Uh also I'm asking you very pointedly uh please do not continue to exploit the racial dynamics of the east side to ram this plan through. Um, and I would really implore again
011the board to find ways to fix the wounds that you have already inflicted on us with this plan. Um, so please again take the time and think about what you're doing here. Thank you very much. >> Thank you. That completes um all of our calls. Thank you to everyone who took the time to call in and share your perspective with us. And as a reminder, you may also share comments with the board by email at trusteesaustinisd.org. Uh, next up is item number three, a presentation on the 2024 2025 Texas academic performance report uh required by the state of all Texas districts. And Mr. Sgura, would you please introduce this item? >> Yes, President Boswell and trustees. Um tonight uh to present the district annual report I have joined me Dylan Fean Fenan sorry uh director
012of campus and district accountability Dr. Maryanne Maxwell assistant superintendent of academics and Miss Kat Katrina Montgomery our chief financial officer. So team take it away. >> Good evening board of trustees. We are pleased to present the district's annual report for school year 202425. Statute requires that each district's board of trustees holds a public hearing to review the annual report within 90 days of receiving the Texas academic performance report or taper from the Texas Education Agency. The taper report is a summitive report for each campus and district in the state. While the taper report for school year 2425 were released this past December, it's important to note that most of the data in the taper has been publicly available for several months. These performance reports have been used in the completion of the district scorecard and
013have provided the foundation for campus and district improvement planning, board reporting, and performance monitoring over the past eight months. Next slide. The annual report is required under Texas Education Code 39306, which requires publishing the annual report, holding a public hearing, and widely disseminating the report throughout the district. The complete annual report is available on the district website, and a direct link is provided in this presentation. There are six components of the annual report. the taper for the district and for each campus, the district's PE's financial report, the district's accreditation status, progress on campus performance objectives, reports on violent or criminal incidents, and reports on post-secary readiness. We're going to start by examining the taper report and we will look at student performance, enrollment, demographic data. The following slides contain highlights of the taper. We will
014go through these slides quickly to provide a sample of the extensive information that is available in these reports. STAR is the state's testing program for students in grades 3 through 12 and is based on state curriculum standards in reading, writing, mathematics, science, and social studies. STAR tests are designed to measure what students are learning in each grade and whether or not they are ready for the next grade. Much of the taper report is related to performance on the STAR assessment. But the taper also includes student and staff demographic information, enrollment, attendance, graduation rates, indicators of post-secary readiness, and post-secondary outcomes. Financial reports are also available through the online PES financial reports. In this first graph, we're going to take a look at um district star performance. The data shows general positive trends in students meeting
015grade level or above across most demographic groups with slight year-to-year improvements. The overall district performance increased slightly from 49% to 50% at meets grade level and above. Highest growth was seen among Asian students who increased by two percentage points. Several groups saw a 1 percentage point increase including students that identify as African-American, Hispanic, white. those enrolled in special education programming and those with a federal label of economically disadvantaged. Performance remains stable for those who identified as two or more races and students who are emergent bilingual. Overall, large achievement gaps persist and you can clearly observe them in the graph provided. In the next three slides, we're going to look at a comparison um between the state and Austin ISD when it comes to students that have a federal label of economically disadvantaged. In this first
016slide, we're going to look at reading star performance results. One chronic achievement gap within Austin ISD is performance among students with the federal label of economically dis. This slide displays reading star performance for the state of Texas in blue and Austin ISD in red. In every grade level, we see achievement gaps in reading when compared to the state. The gap ranges from 11% to 13% depending on the grade level. The highest performance level among this group in Austin ISD can be seen in fifth grade and in eighth grade. On the next slide, we will look at the same thing but in relation to math performance. Um, this slide details the math star performance specifically for economically disadvantaged students. As with reading data, we compare 2024 Austin ISD performance in red against 202425 state averages in
017blue. Performance for this subgroup in Austin ISD consistently trails the state average for the same demographic across all grade levels. District scores for Ecodis students range from a low of 11% in seventh grade to a high of 26% in fifth grade. In comparison, the state average for the same demographic is slightly higher or sorry is significantly higher, ranging from a low of 24% to a high of 37%. Within the district, the highest proficiency for this group once again can be seen in fifth grade and in eighth grade. Lastly, when we look at this dynamic, we're going to look at the EOCC results. In all five end of course exams, Austin ISD students um perform lower than the state average. The most significant disparity can be seen in algebra 1, where the district trails the state
018by 15 percentage points. The narrowest performance gap can be seen in US history where the district is trailing the state by five percentage points. We're going to shift gears in the next slide and look at attendance rate. Attendance in the taper report is a lagging indicator indicator. The blue bars represent attendance rates for school year 2324 and the red bars represent attendance rates for school year 223. Um on this graph we see a universal positive trend. We have a rare clean sweep. Every single demographic group shows an increased attendance rate in school year 2324. While Asian and white students have the highest raw attendance rates, the rate of growth is highest among students receiving special education services which was up by8 percentage points. and students that identify as black or African-American, which is up by6
019percentage points. The district attendance rate increased from 90.9% to 91.3%. On this slide, we're looking at the four-year state longitudinal graduate rates. Um, we're looking at a year year-over-year comparison between the class of 2023 and the class of 2024. The overall trend is that the district average dips slightly by8 percentage points, moving from 93.1% down to 92.3%. Despite the overall district dip, our students receiving special education services achieved a massive gain, jumping 8 percentage points from 80.1% to 88.1%. This is the most significant positive outlier in the chart. We also saw a 2.5 percentage point increase among students who receive emergent bilingual services. Next, we'll take a look at some of our post-secary readiness. >> We need to pause for a minute. We >> Okay, we don't need to pause for a minute. >> Okay.
020>> Next, we're going to take a look at some of our post-secary readiness indicators. In specific, the college career military readiness data. In this graph, we'll examine students CCMR readiness rates. Every single student demographic improved their CCMR readiness rates from school year 2223 to school year 23 24. The most significant gains were made among emergent bilingual students who grew by 11.5 percentage points and students that identify as black or African-American um which grew by 8.2 percentage points. These two groups outpaced the district district average effectively narrowing the achievement gap. The district's overall readiness rate increased by 5.5 percentage points, rising to 87.8. This increase was driven by these broad-based improvements across all demographic groups. Next, we're going to take a look at the district's student race and ethnicity profile. Austin ISD is a majority minority
021district. Hispanic students are the largest demographic, comprising the majority of the student body at 54.4%. Together, Hispanic and white students make up nearly 85% of the total population. African-American students represent 6% of the population. Asian students represent 4.8%. Students that identify as two or more races are 4.1% of the population. And American Indians and Pacific Islanders represent less than 1% of the population. Student enrollment in 2425 dropped by 564 students. The total student population was 72,175. And this represents a drop from the previous school year's total of 72,739. If we look further at subgroup demographics and program enrollment, um we see that the student population is nearly evenly divided by economic status with 51.1% classified as economically disadvantaged and 48.9% classified as non-economically disadvantaged. A significant portion of the student body, 48.5% is considered at
022risk. 31.4% 4% of students are identified as emergent bilingual. When we shift and take a look at program enrollment, we see that bilingual and ESL enrollment stands at 31% which aligns closely with emergent bilingual demographic data. 18.4% of students are receiving special education services and 13.9% of students participated in gift gifted and talented programs. When we take a look at student demographic data um in relationship to teachers race and ethnicity um the most striking insight is the inverse inverse relationship between the student and teacher populations regarding our two largest demographic groups. When we examine the Hispanic population, we observe an under reppresentation of Hispanic educators. 54.4% of students identify as Hispanic while 37.1% of the staff identify as Hispanic. When we examine the white population, we observe an over representation of white educators compared to
023the student body. White teachers account for 50.2% of the staff while 30.4% of the students identify as white. Other demographic groups show closer alignment between students and staff. Black or African-American student staff representation is nearly equal with 6% of students and 6.6% of teachers identifying as black or African-American. Asian representation is fairly close with 4.8% of students and 3.8% of teachers identifying as Asian. While the student population is predominantly Hispanic, the teaching staff is predominantly white. This suggests a disparity between the cultural or racial m makeup of the students and the educators serving them. When we look closer at teachers in terms of years of experience and degree type, when you look at teachers experience level, the district has a mix of new energy and experienced professionals, though it skews slightly towards early career teachers.
024The largest single group of teachers falls into the 1 to fiveyear experience range. When we combine them with beginning teachers, roughly 42% of the teaching staff has five years or less experience. Austin ISD also has a strong background of veteran educators. Teachers with 6 to 20 years of experience make up roughly 43% of the workforce. And lastly, if we look at our highly experienced educators, those with 21 plus years of experience, they account for approximately 15% of our teaching staff. When we look at teachers by the type of degrees they hold, we see that our teaching staff is highly educated with a significant proportion holding advanced degrees. The vast majority of teachers, 70% hold a bachelor's degree. Approximately 29% of Austin ISTD educators hold an advanced degree, that being either a master's or a doctorate.
025A small number of staff are listed as no degree, which typically refers to specific vocational or technical certifications rather than traditional post-secary degrees. And now we'll transition to our PES data. >> Thank you very much, Dylan. Um, now we're going to go over our PI's financial standard report. The PI's financial report is the public education information management system and PES reviews financial data and reporting services to ensure that all public school funding is appropriately accounted for and available for review. So this is the 2425 allocations of our funds. So in the far left column you see all of the different ways that we do we use or do dispersements. So you have operating expenditures recapture. Then you have general fund and the percent of how it's allocated and then the amount spent per student. And
026then next column you have all funds percent and then the amount per student. So if you look at the top two rows you can see that the majority of our funds are spent where we would want in operating expenditures and then the other portion is recapture. um recapture paid for 2425 is was $821 million which is 45.6% um of our total dispersements. And then now we'll go over the 2425 district accreditation status. If you look here, 2425, the district received an accreditation status of accredited. 2425 first rating, we received a superior achievement um an A. 2025 accountability rating, the district received a C79 overall. And the 2425 special education determination status is needs assistance. Now I'll turn it over to Dr. Maxwell. >> Thank you. So this slide shows uh how we um actually performed
027in the various domains of the uh rating status for the district. So it was 79 out of 100. And you can see by looking at this slide that um we actually scored pretty consistently in the different areas uh either mid to high C's as well mid to high 70s for student achievement, school progress and for closing the gap. So that was pretty consistent performance um across the district. Uh the next slide just talks a little bit more about uh the determination status for special education. We were assigned a needs assistance status. There could be four different uh areas. uh meets requirements, needs assistance, needs intervention, or needs substantial intervention. Uh as needs assistance, that really labels based on um a few factors of results driven accountability, so our RDA for special education, and also um
028some federally required elements. Uh the next slides talk a little bit about our district scorecard and our HB3 goals. Each campus is required to have a campus improvement plan that states campus performance objectives. What we do is we align those performance plans uh and um or the improvement plans and uh the performance objectives within it with the strategic plan of the district and certainly our scorecard. Um and our scorecard is evaluated and and reported on annually as far as the summitive results go and of course uh much more frequently as far as progress measures toward that scorecard. So that is all aligned to our campus performance objectives. Um and this is a snapshot of the goals. The next slide for our district scorecard. These are just the goals. We have goals and constraints. But as
029far as the goals go, um when we report on those, we include the past data of how we have been performing on in each of those areas and our yearly targets. So you can see goals one, two, and three are around literacy and numeracy outcomes and our CCMR outcomes as well. The next slide shows those are aligned of course to the HB3 goals that we're required to have as a district. You can see our performance on those goals last year according to our annual targets. Overall literacy uh the goal is to increase from on the star test for the students that are at the scoring at the meets level from 47% to 59%. Last year our target was 49% and we met that target at 49%. Um the uh numerousy was set to improve from
03039% to 55% by the year 2029. Last year that target was 40% and we met that target. We exceeded that target at 42%. Um and likewise and we've reported this of course in our summitives as well um the CCMR target um was uh also well it's set over flagging indicator but over the the course of five years uh to increase to 54.6% and we exceeded that target last year as well at 49.5% for that annual target. Uh next we include the report on violent or criminal incidents on campuses. Uh the next slide shows what that has looked like over the past few years with the total total number of offenses um and the percent of students disciplined. You can see in 20 between 20 uh 2 and 23 and the 23 24 year was an
031actually a small increase in those uh numbers and the percent of students disciplined. And then last year we saw uh a sizable decrease in that um to from 1.63% down to 1.43%. Um and then the next slide actually details out a little bit more on what those incidents were within this category. So you can see there at the bottom those are the totals again the decrease um to 1.43% overall with the total numbers from 1,185 from last year to 123 this year. That's a 14% decline in offenses. The largest decreases we found were in uh drug offenses, assaults with injury and aggravated sexual assaults. Uh and this is a record low for the past several years. This actually it was a decrease from last year, but it was also under um the numbers and the
032percentages that we were at in 22 23. Uh and then our final section talks about post-secary performance for um the next slide. Next two slides actually talk about the um enrollment in Texas institutions of higher education. We can see there there um is a gap that the district now this is a significantly lagging indicator. This is and this is from 2021 and 2022. So as this report is last year's report it's even further lagging from the years before that. Uh so that we can see several years ago the gap uh between the district and and the state. Um there was growth in several areas for Hispanics, emergent bilingual and economically disadvantaged students. Um and there also we can see that in those years there was a a notable enrollment drop uh for American Indian. Uh
033and on the next slide it actually talks about numbers for where those students are going and um the total you can see there highlighted uh in the yellow with uh 2022 showing for where our students were uh how many students were enrolling for 1,833 and there's a drop down in 2023 1,694. It's important to note as well that this is data only for Texas higher uh educa Texas institutions of higher education and so the numbers are actually um quite a bit larger uh just substantially larger I would say uh for when we're looking at the national student clearing house data so instead of uh for national student clearing house we have um uh 20 thou 2,626 totaling world graduates for the class of 2022 and 2568 for 2023. So there's still a drop but it
034was a little bit of a smaller drop in overall that that is how many are enrolled higher institutions. Um and that is the completion of our presentation and we open it up for questions. >> Thank you very much. Um so we have an hour budgeted for this. We can um you know just want to be thoughtful about how we're using our time. Uh so does anyone have questions? Do trustees have questions? >> Hour for both. our for both. Oh, we have two presentations. Yes, correct. I forgot that we had our other one, our taps and our tips. Yes. Um, do we want to listen to our tap presentation and ask questions or do we want to ask questions about this now? Does anyone have questions about this report? All right. Thank you. I know we've
035seen a lot of this data before. Really appreciate it here in one place um for our trustees and our community. Thank you all very much. Um, all right. Next up is a presentation about the 20 2526 targeted improvement plans and local improvement plans. And Mr. Sagura, would you please introduce this item? >> Thank you, President Boswell. I'd like to invite Dylan Fein, >> director of campus and district accountability. Dr. Dr. Angel Wilson, assistant superintendent of secondary school leadership, and Jennifer Pace, assistant superintendent of elementary school leadership, uh, to provide the presentation alongside myself. All right. So, uh, this is the 2025 2026 target improvement plans. Uh and one of the things that I want to note before we get started is that uh these plans um have already been submitted to the agency and accepted.
036Uh back in November on November 21st when we submitted our turnaround plans, these were all included within that. Uh the agency just in requests that we get these approved by the board um by this time uh which is why they came back around. Uh as we move forward, there are two things um two different types of plans that we'll be sharing today. the targeted improvement plan uh which are campuses with a federal accountability of comprehensive support and improvement and or receive a first acceptable account are required to develop and submit a targeted improvement plan. The TA submission deadline is November 21st as I just stated and the board approvals by March 31st. So we we are a little bit ahead but um certainly um well past when it was actually submitted to the agency and
037and since approved. >> And then new are the local improvement plans. Uh these are campuses identified with the federal accountability as additional uh targeted support ATS or targeted support TSI and or receive a first or second overall D-rating following an unacceptable rating. Uh one of the things to note is that these are retained locally and are not submitted to the agency and again they're required to be board approved by March 31st. Uh when you look at the different strategies you can go through the slides. They're on slide three now. Uh there are um and we've shared this before uh six different strategies that districts can use to um uh to implement turnaround plans or improvement plans. And you see those here uh they vary based on intensity. And one of the things that I've said
038before and I think it's worth saying again is that as you move down and accumulate unacceptable um ratings, the restrictions and the um interventions that are expected become um more rigorous. And so you've heard us talk around about turnaround plans before uh and some of those that were previously brought forward included um strategies that were um restarts or uh partner managed. Um, in this instance out of the six, what we're really looking to do is to lean into the intensive curriculum and instruction improvement. Uh, this is uh acknowledgement that there are great things happening at our schools uh with additional resources and a focus uh on the on the work and the the framework. We're um very confident these schools will um kind of move on move improve and ultimately uh exit uh any accountability
039risk or concern. And so with that, I'll hand it to Dylan to take us through the next couple of slides. >> Okay. So on this slide, we can see the campuses that were required to write a targeted improvement plan in school year 2526. Um there's 12 campuses required to write these plans. Eight campuses were mandated to write a tip due to a state consecutive unacceptable rating count of one or otherwise referred to as UA1. Um those are identified with asterisks next to the campus name. Seven of these campuses also have a federal label. Four campuses were mandated to write a tip due to a federal label of comprehensive support and improvement. Next slide. On this slide, we can see the campuses that were required to write local improvement plans. Um, in school year 2526, 16
040campuses were required to write local improvement plans. Five campuses were required to write a lip because they got a D-rating. Three of those also had a federal label. 11 campuses were required to write a lip because they had a federal label. Nine due to a label of targeted support and improvement which is referred to as TSI and two due to a label of additional targeted support which is referred to as ATS. The state requirements for campuses implementing targeted improvement plans and local improvement plans are outlined on the slide above. For campuses implementing targeted improvement plans, the goal is for them to leverage student growth metrics to get a C- rating in domain 2A and domain three of the TEA's accountability system. Campuses will leverage growth for one to two years. Then they should be in
041a position by year three to maintain a C- rating or higher through student achievement metrics. Austin ISD provides multiple coaching sessions for each TIP campus in collaboration with the district assessment and academics teams to ensure campuses can accurately monitor student achievement and develop appropriate intervention strategies to maximize accountability outcomes. For campuses implementing local improvement plans, the strategies are much more nuanced and specific to each campus's needs. As outlined in the lips provided to the board, we have a CDA staff member that provides one-on-one coaching to each lip campus. These coaching sessions identify the reason for identification and develop campus specific strategies to exit the label and maintain an overall C or higher average rating. >> Good evening, trustees. Superintendent Sigura um wanted to share information about our elementary school uh targeted improvement plans. Our targeted
042improvement plan work at the elementary level is centered on strengthening core instruction first and then using data to target supports for students who need additional acceleration. So, our targeted improvement plan campuses are focused on strengthening tier one instruction um especially through the use of highquality instructional materials and um to take that just a bit further even working to implement them as intended to maintain the rigor. additionally sharpening um PLC practice and that's especially focused on lesson internalization and really becoming familiar with the facilitation points um for the for each lesson and then um using student data to drive targeted supports and that's really reinforcing our MTSS systems. District and campus teams are providing coaching, leadership support, and monitoring to ensure strong implementation, especially through observation and feedback cycles. And so, we've been really focused on
043providing bite-sized, high lever action steps that can be easily observed on the follow-up visit and that will move the move the needle in terms of student outcomes. Um and also just instructional leadership development and that's across all levels um uh principles uh teachers coaches executive directors and this is really in an effort to sustain the work. Additionally, there are some um unique supports, a variety of unique supports that are kind of campus specific. Um that kind of includes variances in staff coaching, also student interventions and resources, um enrichment programs and wraparound services. And so some of that um contributes to variation in the targeted improvement plans. But overall, our targeted improvement plans are helping campuses bring focus and urgency to work already in motion to improve student outcomes. I'll turn it over to Dr. Wilson.
044>> Good evening. This next slide will highlight uh the two secondary campuses that are currently implementing target improvement plans and they are um very different and unique based on the campus type. So we have General Marshall Middle School and Rosedale School. for General Marshall Middle School. I am going to highlight three key areas and strategies of support that we are working to sharpen our saw and strengthen our muscle in this year. And then you are free to read the rest of those bulleted items um on your own. So at General Marshall Middle School, we are focused on building strong instructional systems that ensure every student is progressing towards grade level mastery. Our improvement plan is rooted in coherent data transparency and instructional rigor. So, one of the cool things going on at General Marshall Middle
045School this year that is new is that Marshall Middle School was designated as a lighthouse campus for our learning labs. Our learning labs are a cohort of about eight middle school campuses. The principles and admin teams meet on a regular basis at General Marshall Middle School. This campus welcomes us and opens their doors uh for us to be able to observe instruction primarily in the content areas of math and ELR and we are able to learn um together collaboratively as admin teams. We have deliverables that we go back out and execute such as videotaping our PLC's having feedback conferences whether it's with our um instructional leadership team or feedback conferences with teachers and staff. And then Marshall Middle School also receives um intense coaching throughout the learning lab model that focuses on other areas as
046well. This actually helps all leaders to build instructional capacity and excellence across the campus and beyond. A second key element or strategy that we are using at Marshall Middle School this year and at all of our middle school campuses is high quality instructional materials. This is not anything that is new but the effective implementation support followup feedback and progress monitoring is what we have focused on for this year. So we are fully implementing SABIS my perspectives and STEM scopes for math literacy and scopes for math and science. Our focus is not just on textbook and curriculum adoption but it's on deep implementation and lesson internalization. And you'll hear us mention a lot about lesson internalization when it comes to the work we are doing in our professional learning communities or teachers and administrators participate in
047structured PLC cycles to ensure materials are delivered not only with fidelity but also to the rigor and the level and extent that we should be going with the TE standard when we see this layout flow out in the classroom. And then lastly, PLC professional development, they are structured, they are purposeful, and they are centered on standards alignment. Are PLC's new at Marshall? No, they're not. We just have um we've articulated the format, the flow, the focus and the structure and we've been able to streamline those supports um on standards alignment, lesson internalization and also on student work analysis. Administrators are trained alongside teachers to ensure consistent feedback and monitoring and this also ensures that alignment happens um from the classroom instruction to campus leadership. The work at Marshall Middle School is about building sustainable systems,
048not quick fixes, so that instructional excellence becomes the norm and not the exception. And then if you look at the right column on this slide, we have our special campus, Rosedale School. Uh we're all familiar with Rosedale School. We know that uh this school serves students with significant and specialized needs that are unique and individualized. And we have a dedicated team of instructional leaders, um, administration team and support staff that are truly committed to delivering on the promise to every child and ensuring that they meet their fullest potential at the Rosedale School. Our improvement strategies for the Rosedale School are designed to ensure strong academic pathways, graduation clarity, and post-secary readiness for every student. You may be wondering why Rosdale has a tip to begin with. Um so I am going to highlight the second
049bullet and go into a little more detail of just the training the work with data clarity um and just sharpening our saw with data literacy and also ps coding which plays a huge huge um factor with the Rosedale school and the tip that we are currently implementing there. So graduation coding and ps alignment we are providing targeted training on graduation coding in partnership with PS and special education transition teams. This ensures accurate coding, proper credit alignment, and protects student graduation pathways. This work is critical to improving accountability outcomes and ensuring that students are not in unintentionally miscoded. We are providing targeted training on graduation coding in partnership with PES and special education um transition teams. And then we are also uh conducting conducting regular data reviews with campus administration department chairs and the district transition
050specialists and also our CCMR department. This crossf functional collaboration ensures that students are supported academically and for post-secary transition planning. So across both campuses, our approach is consistent, strong instructional systems, data transparency, cross- department alignment, focused professional learning, and also targeted student supports. These are not isolated strategies, but they are integrated systems designed to accelerate student outcomes and ensure sustainable improvement. All right, we are now ready for question and answer. >> Thank you all very much. Trustees, do we have any questions about these plans? Trusty Hunter. Thank you. I do have a question about the General Marshall uh plan. Do we know how many new teachers are at General Marshall? >> No, but in a second, Miss Presley will probably have that number. >> Okay. Um my because I'm wondering if if if there's a
051plan about that around that, right? Right. So, I know you have a plan around PLC's and teacher support, which is great, but if you're new, you're still learning on the job and you're doing this thing. >> Well, I can that's a good question, Trusty Hunter. I can answer that this is the first year where General Marshall is has all three grade levels. So, we've had a phase in process. So, I can tell you every eighth grade teacher on the campus um is a new teacher. And also um in the course of building a campus from the ground up, we have seen teacher attrition um at at a pretty high number for a startup campus. And so we are working a lot with new teacher support and campus support because we we have a a pretty
052significant number of new teachers um to probably each grade level. So you're right, the support is not only just for PLC, but we have on the job um embedded coaching development and support in the classrooms to be able to help with the lesson implementation that flows from the lesson internalization from PLC work. >> Okay. Thank you. And then for the superintendent, I just have to say that there's a glaring missing. We have our parents and I just don't see where we are bringing them in. um we got to get them in, right? They they have to know I've said many times parents see a 50 and they think their kid did 50% of the work. Not that we're giving a kid a chance. So, just really educating our parents about the system that they're sending
053their kids to every day and really um you know, we know you're busy. Here's a question a week or whatever. just whatever we can bring them in more so that they understand what's going on because I had a principal tell me one time parents can be very involved but at the point at which they're involved you might not like it so let's get ahead of the curve before they're they're angry or they want to know like why isn't my kid metriculating why can't my kid read so how can we as part of not necessarily the rebuilds but as part of our reconstruction of these schools and these tips and these lips to like really bring the parents in. >> Yes, that is a part that we um haven't necessarily highlighted in the plan. The tip
054is basically like a skeletal um outliner framework. So, it's very bare bones, very minimum uh minimal, but this is the work that we're working with with our executive directors and our school leadership teams weekly and daily in the classrooms and on the campus. We have our campuses tiered for support. So, General Marshall is a tier three campus. Um, with the secondary team, it's evenly distributed to where every ED only has between one to two, tier three campuses. And so, General Marshall receives uh, visits and school supports at least once a week, but many times it's two to three times a week. And one of the things that we've been working on has been the ESF levers, those five levers. Uh, one of them has been to focus deeply and strategically on parent and community engagement.
055So at our PD that we attended with General Marshall when we returned January 5th, uh teachers and staff were broken or they were divided into different groups and we looked at the map data. One of the things that we've heard loud and clear, Trusty Hunter from Trusty Kaufman, uh many of you is that, you know, it's one thing for the teacher to know the data and the admin to know the data, but does the parent know where the child stands? And so we allowed time during that PD day and for every PD day for teachers to call parents to send emails and to make those personalized touches and to send home data points. So this is something new this year but every parent has been updated on a regular basis when it comes to map
056boi other interim data points in between to ensure that there's a a strong bridge and partnership between the school to home. And then um one final question I want to go back to what uh Mr. uh Ger Mahara said. Um I know we are spread thin and resources are you know we're we're literally spinning straw into gold here but you said EDS have no more than three >> secondary secondary not elementary has a a bigger case load >> and this is what I'm saying. So the the one thing that parent just asked us was yeah having people transient and coming that's great that's wonderful but where's our dedicated support and I'm thinking where we see the need in these campuses we're going to have to figure out a way to have that dedicated support and
057we have our budget talks coming up and we really um are going to need to we're at that point the point that we told people we were going to get to um where we're going to have to have conversations about we cannot do everything and so we we don't want to touch the classroom, but what can we do to to ensure so we're almost um bidding against ourselves sometimes when it comes to this type of thing. So, just want to keep that in the forefront of our mind as we begin looking uh at at the budget at the the new budget uh thoughts. >> Yeah. And uh Trusty Hunter, I really appreciate you bringing that up. um you know the the committee member that um spoke here um you know one of the things that
058that we have seen as we um move into these um turnaround plans and are like really investing resources and going through these transitions is that each school um is is going through it in a different way. And there have been instances where we've gotten feedback from the community where in some cases they'd like to go faster and and really see some of the things that we intend to implement in the fall semester be brought into the spring semester and that's something that we are are absolutely exploring. Um you know we we tend to to really bring the communities together, hear community voice, hear staff voice, hear um um voice and and and then make an adjustment. And I think we're at the point now given what we've seen over the last couple weeks as some
059of these schools come together that we can make some refinements. And for that school specifically, I think there's an opportunity for sure. Um but yeah, I can provide an update to the board uh in the next board update. And the committee member and I have already had a conversation about some things to consider. >> Yeah. And I just wanted to add a little bit about Pan Springs. We are um supporting in some unique ways this semester. where we have um some of our academics team members there assisting with math and science instruction. We have some additional um coaching support for staff. Um and we have some of our team teaching and learning team helping with small groups and PLC's. So we are really trying to provide wraparound supports right now in the moment and I
060just wanted to add that because we don't always you know get to say that publicly. >> Awesome. Thank you so much. >> Thank you. Any additional questions? Hi, I knew. Oh, >> trustees Kintana and Gonzalez are on our virtual. Are we good if we take that first? >> No, we >> Okay, perfect. Trusty Kintana. Hi. >> Hi. Thank you for the presentation. Um, I just wanted a little bit more detail on the Rodriguez tip. Um, I know that they will be um welcoming Whitane students this year as a part of Whitane's TAP. And so I'm just wondering how Rodriguez's tip um includes them or factors them in. >> Yeah. So, Trusty Kandana, um, one of the things that, uh, you bring up a really, really good point. Um, the turnaround plan, uh, the TAP itself,
061it it's it's meant to be inclusive of both and really is the controlling plan. Um, and so when you look at the TAP plan for Woodane, you're going to see a lot of information around Rodriguez. Uh, and so one of the things that I probably need to do a better job of is kind of communicating kind of where there's overlap and where there's maybe a need for additional clarity when it comes to the tips. Um, but uh that that's that is where most of it lives. Um because that is what is ultimately going to be um the the plan that the agency looks for the Rodriguez. Essentially what tap is the tap for Rodriguez. Um, but I can um I don't know, Jennifer, if anything you want to add to that. We can provide more
062detail as far as what's in it, but it's it's just kind of a little bit different because they're coming together. >> Yeah. >> Um Oh, >> go ahead. >> Sorry. I was just going to add that um a lot of the strategies that we are using in our targeted improvement plans are similar. You've heard us talk about these with our turnaround plans. Um they're strategies that are working. um it's it's not rocket science, but it's really utilizing our high quality instructional materials and um providing a lot of supports for teachers and PLC's to internalize those lessons and then um building leadership capacity to understand the content to go in and observe and provide really consistent observation and feedback cycles. This is a big part of both the um targeted improvement plans and the turnaround plan.
063So, in that way, um, the the two plans that you mentioned are very similar. >> Thank you. I appreciate that explanation. Um, I guess I'm just wondering how I I know that tea wanted additional details on the white tap and um if the majority of the Rodriguez tip is in the white tap. Um, I guess I would just like an update on what changes we're making to the whiting tap um to um make it a plan that tea would accept. Um, you know, we've had this conversation before um in in November about how um Rodriguez doesn't, you know, on paper doesn't have the space. I know that we are, you know, going to make it work um with the the numbers that we have regardless, but um space is an issue. Um you know, send
064um sending um kids from my day to another failing school is an issue. And so I'm just wondering if we have an update um on that tap because um as you said it's going to be affecting two different schools here. >> I can have Lisha um provide an update on the turnaround plan. Um >> good afternoon. So with the TAP we um need to be more explicit in the supports. Um so we gave I think a minimal ex um explanation and again some of it had to do with the template that we have in which we can submit. It doesn't allow um for a lot of commentary and so we're working um with the agency on maybe um how we could submit maybe an addendum to it. Um one thing that we are doing um
065with Rodriguez this year is providing extra support through the observation and feedback cycle. And so we're running a pilot um with three of our elementary schools um and we're really supporting the administration with getting into the classrooms, giving teachers um feedback as to what they see and then providing um targeted professional development around that. Um we are also again engaging the principal um in strategies um to grow teachers according to the needs of the Wedain students that they'll be receiving. And Lisha, is there um an expected timeline for resubmission? >> Uh March 26. And so we we have drafts. Um we do want to engage with our um TEA partners um prior to submission. So we have a couple of individuals from the school improvement office that um is providing a little more guidance as
066to what it is that they want to see exactly. >> Thank you. Um just a couple more questions. Um I know that you know we had a conversation about the numbers and about the you know number of kids who have um uh special education needs and you know about there being a space issue. I I was wondering if if we have reconciled that at all. >> So I do know that this uh special education team Dr. ly um they're working on this um as far as assignments and space. Um we are looking at the number of um early childhood um classrooms that we have there um that are occupying space and if there is a need for as many. So um not to get into a totally different um presentation, but we are par partnering
067with the county for the Apple Blossom program. And so there is a potential that we may be able to offer um some of the early childhood um programming at Houston which is right up the street. Um so we are in the problem the problem solving um phase of it but we will make it work to receive all of the students. >> Thank you. Okay, just one more. I know. Um I just want to clarify that tea the template that we receive and fill out and send back um for approval of a plan that template is given to us at from TEA. >> Right. It's qual survey. Yeah. >> Okay. And so um you know adding more detail and and things like that is is dependent on the template that we get from TEA. >> Yeah.
068So, Trusty Kindana, um, as we build these plans, the the teams, I mean, the tabs and the tips and and really many of these, there's a lot of, um, work that goes in and it ends up being a very very big document. Uh, and then we have to squeeze that document down into what actually um is required to be submitted to the agency. Uh, and the reason this happens this way is because in many times the executive directors are working with the principles, we're working and getting feedback from the community. Sir there are different authors of the base data right because it's meant to be drafted closest to the school and then as we move towards submission date we review and then pull out the things that are required but the larger document which is
069a working document is really what informs the work. Um and that is true for how we've done it with taps. Um the taps and the tips the format it doesn't talk it doesn't you know communicate nearly all the things that we're doing. Uh, and I think that's probably what you're you're getting at. Um, but yeah, that it's it's a template. >> Okay. Thank you. >> Thank you. Okay. Trusty Kaufman is next. Uh, just for noting our time, we're at six o'clock. Just FYI, >> not to cut you off, just >> I have a quick procedural question. I'm I'm Did I understand correctly that the tips and the lips have been submitted and approved by the TEA already? >> The tips have the lips are not submitted, not to be submitted. >> Okay. Okay. So, on
070the tips, if we're voting to approve those this evening, what would be the consequence if the board chose to not approve one or more of the the tips? How what would be the process to resubmit or >> Yeah, we would have to amen amend the tip. Um, yeah, that's what would have to happen. >> Okay. So, we could make we could um and then that would be by the March 31 deadline that would have to happen or what would the timeline be for that? Uh that's the latest it be we could submit and the question would become does the change from the board or any request actually impact the template that is being submitted is maybe the there there are things that can be can be added things that we can do that don't actually
071aren't required to be incorporated into the template. >> Thank you Trusty Sing. >> I'll talk as fast as I can. Okay. So um could we pull up the slide slide number eight from the math star performance ecodis? >> Yeah the first presentation. Yeah, >> Maxwell, you might need to come up here just as a >> I don't know what the question is, but preparing >> Angel. >> It's about general stuff. >> Oh, yeah. >> I wrote that one down. So, um I really appreciate the um superintendent for for putting this in the presentation and I know that we are making a lot of really um big movement on this to to fix this gap. Um but I did want to ask you like what's happening with seventh grade math? like 11% I mean we're doing
072less than ha like fewer than half of our economically disadvantaged seventh graders are passing the star um compared to the state and so I just wanted to know why that's happening um like specifically and I don't need like a long like rambling answer I just want to know like I and I really want to hear from you like what do you think is happening with seventh grade math uh with seventh grade math specifically uh in the 2425 school year. Uh so I think there are a couple things. Um I think uh middle school and Austin ISD for I'm not well you want a rambling a lot a rambling answer so I'm not going to give you the I mean >> I mean I mean there there are lots of things that are contributing to why
073you know students who have been identified as economically disadvantaged are underperforming right and it goes to well where where are schools that have high percentage of students that are economically disadvantaged well many of them are in schools um you know in parts of Austin that have been historically underserved So you think back to 22 23 the number of vacancies that we had they were disproportionate in that part of town. You think about um the transitions that we had that were occurring between fifth grade and sixth grade and the um impact of programming or the misalignment with not misalignment wrong way to say it. The way that we were preparing students in elementary school to be successful in middle school in in a element in middle school sorry elementary school to middle school. Um and then
074I add on top of that, you know, really where we started our journey as an organization, it was climate and culture, it was um ensuring that we had educators in the classroom, making sure our curriculum met the needs of those educators because they were coming in from different levels, different experiences, you know, building up MTSS so that we had the resources to deploy, so we knew where our students were, identified which ones needed interventions, and then had the resources to get them back onto like grade level performance. and in middle school. Um, and that really, and we've talked about this before, like literacy was the start. >> So, we started with literacy and and so I would expect as far as math outcomes go, and we saw this in early literacy and early numer, um,
075math was going to lag. >> Yeah. >> And so, um, you know, there's I'm sure Maxwell has many other things that she'd like to add to them. One of the things I also know is that um I know this is for math but across uh then we have four different curriculum like for middle school mathematics um over the last five years and there's been a lot of change >> uh and I think all of that contributes um seventh grade versus eighth grade given the cohort and so this cohort is they're now eighth graders so I'm trying to think about their experience. Do you want to add anything to it? And I mean there's a lot of things that contribute. >> No, that's helpful. And so like I appreciate that, but like were our inputs into
076the system that much worse than the rest of the state? Like that's the question I have. >> Yeah, it's the pathways for advanced math programming as well. >> Overall dip in the state too in seventh grade math in general, not just for 11% to 24% is what I'm focused on here. Like >> were we that much worse in the state? Was our staffing that much worse? curriculum like I don't mean our staff I mean like the gaps like the >> well so so think about where we started in 23 had 30 Fs >> I mean like we started as an organization in 23 when the board came together as 30 Fs I mean we were behind the state in almost every category every category I think in fact so we've been building and growing out
077of it I think this reflects where we were and what we're coming out of >> I guess yes we were >> oh yeah >> we were that much >> and one of and one of the things I wanted to show was the previous year. >> Yeah. >> Right. So, I think going 20, you know, 22, 23, 23, 24, >> you know, showing kind of like what it is, we were we were behind and that's why when we talk about the reports we've been given over the last couple of months, and, you know, I think we tried to like highlight it in the presentations, maybe it didn't come through, >> but yeah, we're we're we're out we're on par with the state now in the last two reports that we gave, which is a very positive
078thing, but when it comes to closing the gaps, especially around students who've been identified as a family disadvantage or black and brown students, like those gaps are closing faster than the state. So, um yeah, it was that bad. >> Well, and when you have those gaps already that exist that are significant and then you combine that with students who diverge on the onle pathway versus the advanced pathway, which is what you see in seventh grade math. Very few students are take I say very few much fewer students are taking that test because many have gone on to an advanced math pathway and that seventh grade math you see that that happen. So when you have gaps it becomes even more pronounced um in situations like that. >> Yeah. I mean this is very sobering. Okay.
079So the my okay so this brings me to the point of the importance of us doing that academic baseline plan because that does actually give us a way to quantify the inputs. I'm not say like we're not as trustees we can't tell you these are the things you need to do. We're relying on the staff to figure that out. But like I feel like as a trustee I need some way to track these key inputs, the staffing levels, the parental engagement, not just that we're doing certain one-off sessions, but like I need to know like what percentage of parents are actually reading and understand their kids MAP scores. That's what I want to know. I don't want to know that we had a session and we did some cool stuff, but just really tell me
080are those, you know, of the 89% of kids who did not pass the seventh grade math, did their parents, are they even aware >> like so when we >> you know, so when we get to our um I look forward to the academic baseline development um and the academic vision development because I think that ties directly obviously like that is that is my way as a trustee to measure if we're if if y'all are kind of um investing in the like creating the inputs that are going to move the needle. Um and that ties directly to the budget, you know, like when we when we vote on a budget, I don't vote on a budget item. There's no budget item that says increase seventh grade math. The budget item is siphons or it's, you know,
081>> Yeah. parental engagement, you know, it's like it's different things. And so like that's I that's what I hope to see an alignment between the academic vision. Well, the outcomes first and foremost, the vision and then the budget. I mean, the the inputs and the budget. Like there should be like a really easy way for us to see that. And this just makes it so clear to me that like I know we're moving in the right direction. So don't take any of this as criticism. Um I know and I'm I need to like look at that data again like as a chaser to this graph like our latest map data. It's really good. So I'm I'm not like wallowing and I I know we're going to fix this but I also need to know like
082as we're entering budget season. I need to know what specifically you're looking at to fix it. How you identify those investments and so we as a board know what we're voting on to see that's going to result in closed gaps. >> Yeah. Uh and the one thing I would say trustees sing thank you for that comment and I don't I think this dialogue is fantastic by the way like I think it's exactly what we should be talking about because I have we have been as a system trying to move outcomes but do it in a way that aligns with who we are and do it at a time where we have less money right we have lots of disruptions we had a tea agreed order I mean the list goes on and on and on
083and on and we are seeing very encouraging results now in 2526 but you know it takes five years to move a year in year three. First year was kind of rough because of all the things we were going through. But in the presentation we gave on the constraint and progress measure I think it was four three where we had um uh accountability right and we listed inputs and outputs uh or inputs and out yeah inputs and outputs and we had them categorized and we got feedback from the trustees. So we track all these things. Some of them contribute in different ways. Some of them uh contribute to different schools in different ways. And so one of the things that I think is be really helpful is as we go through them recognizing that a school
084in one part of town may be impacted by one of the inputs differently than another part of town. And that's just the honest truth. We see that all the time whether it's a principal or the vacancies and there's still higher performing schools and students are still growing. Um so that's I think a great conversation to have and we are eager to have it. Uh Dr. Maxwell is going to be leading that work with me. Uh we have meetings coming up now that the board officers have been identified that will move forward very quickly. Um but I think going back to the early numeracy and early literacy reports and then to the um constraint progress measure around reducing number of apps the the data that we were showing I think we that is one really good
085place to to to think about as we move forward. Oh yeah, like I said, I'm gonna look at that, pull up those graphs as a chaser to this one because I know we're doing better. >> So, thank you. >> Thank you. Any additional questions? Um, okay. I would love um I really appreciate looking at that sidebyside, state data and local data. And I think it's a valuable lens that we don't always talk about when we talk about our monitoring reports and really um personally would love to see that as a supplemental page or something because I think it's really helpful context to get a sense with our our if we just chose economically disadvantaged students. I know when we take all students at masks what we have but um thank you for that conversation. And
086then the second thing is um I had a lot of questions about the targeted improvement plans and local improvement plans. Those were attached. Thank you to all the people who answered them. They were really thoughtful answers. Um and they get to a lot of things about what why some have a lot of details. Some seem really checkboxy. Um why um you know some of them say the board has already approved them on March 26th even though that day has not happened yet. Um you know and kind of why there's some things in there that seem odd right to our community. And so I think um I would love for those questions. I know you attach them to our information session. I would love to have them attached here too for anyone who's going to look
087at those. That would be very helpful. Um, so I think my questions were, you know, similar on that to Trusty Coffman's question and and we want people to understand that a hearing has meaning, right? We don't want this doesn't need to be performative. It needs to be meaningful and I understand why we turn them in early, but I think it would be helpful to let people see the answers to those questions as well. So, thank you for that. Thank you for everyone who did all the work. Um, any additional questions on this? All right. Um, thank you all. At this time, we will adjourn our public hearing at 6:14 p.m., take a short break, and then return to open our regular voting meeting. Um, Secretary Foster, do I have a motion to adjourn the meeting?
088>> I move that we adjourn the meeting. >> So moved. Meeting is adjourned at 6:14 p.m. Welcome back. in compliance with chapter 551 open meetings of the Texas Government Code. I call to order a regular voting meeting of the board of trustees of the Austin Independent School District for Thursday, February 26, 2026 at 6:22 p.m. A quorum of the board is physically present at Austin ISD center office to conduct this meeting which is being broadcast on cable channel 22 through Spectrum is down broadband and on channel 99 through AT&T Universe. Closed captioning and English is available on these platforms for individuals who are deaf and heart of hearing. Welcome and thank you for joining us again. Uh we'll start with public testimony for items on our consent agenda. Um as before, people wishing to participate
089in public testimony called an dedicated AISD phone line ahead of the meeting to sign up to speak in person or audio record remarks. And tonight we have one person signed up to speak in person and four who left a recorded message. Uh we'll begin with in-person testimony. Um callers are allotted one minute and our in-person speaker for tonight is Amy Moore. >> Hi, my name is Amy Moore and I'm here about agenda item 8.2. I'm just here to ask that AISD work with all of our TIP, TAP, and possible 1882 campus teachers and admin to create a volunteer program to provide meaningful support to um next year. In addition to parent and PTA volunteers, there are over 75 community volunteers working in classrooms at uh Web, Dolby, and Martin this year. They've been a consistent
090presence in some math classrooms that haven't had a consistent teacher this year. um which I fear will be the case more so next year as tea rules are difficult around staffing at our tip tap and 1882 campuses. Volunteers if trained and deployed correctly can help relieve some of the stress that our overworked campuses are um facing. I urge you to work on a concerted volunteer effort across our district to be ready ne for this next school year. I also want to give a huge public uh thank you to Sandra G, David T, Angel T, and Isidora Day. Without the help of these AISD folks, there would not be 75 volunteers um at our campuses this year. Let's just be more intentional, more focused, and issue a citywide call to engage and not waste the community
091resources we have. Thank you. >> Thank you for being here with us. Uh next up, we'll play the recorded messages for public testimony. So, please listen carefully. >> My name is Gabe Hernandez and I'm a Black Shear parent. Uh, I know today you guys are talking about Black Shear's lip, but I did want to talk about uh the Black Shear tap that we're taking on next year. Uh, particularly I'm calling to request a delay in making a decision on what to do with the new campus. I think a decision right now is based on a construction timeline and it rushes through decision- making that should take into account the needs of the new consolidated community. Uh, I think with the inherited tap coming up, resources should be focused on the academic success and not a
092new building. We're facing a reality where Black Share is the only one non-tap elementary school that is closed. Um, I know you call this a campus move, but it's a campus closure and this would be a backdoor restart for Oak Springs, which the board voted against in November. >> Hi, my name is Rachel Bowen and I'm a Black Share parent. I called earlier tonight on the hearing and I wanted to expand on those comments in uh connection with Blackshere and its local improvement plan as well as its future as an elementary school campus. We understand the importance of new construction for the Oak Springs community. So, we urge the design to be reconsidered to help last year continue serving all students and leveraging our valuable location and Houston code says. Specifically, we think a district
093should seriously consider returning Oak Springs to its original purpose, serving younger students, for example, K through two or early childhood um through kinder. Um, we know that this is done at other campuses in Austin and we think that allowing Blackshire to continue serving older students um would really help leverage our campuses success and allow for both historic campuses to continue. Thank you for your consideration. >> My name is Quitlawa and I'm asking for trustees to please vote no on GF local public complaints because there is a structural conflict that makes it impossible for complaints to fully present their case. The legal department not only advises on grievances, it also oversees public records responses. Parents face a 45day timeline to obtain key documents while GF local only keeps keeps only a 15 business day window to
094file and then restricts the ability to supplement the record after level one hearings. In my experience, records that are required to be maintained under federal law have not been provided during the grievance time frame at all. Under this policy, the same office that controls access to documents also benefits from rules that block parents from adding those documents later. That is not fairness. That is structural disadvantage. The filing deadline should be extended to at least 60 days for parents. And the right to supplement the record must be protected at all levels, especially when records have been delayed or withheld by the same department that now has all the concentrated power in this process. That is why I'm asking you to vote no on this agenda item until these changes can be made. Thank you. >> Hello
095trustees. My name is Lisa Flores. Trustees, please vote no on GF local because there's a structural conflict that makes it impossible for complaintants to fully present their case. The legal department not only advises on grievances, it also oversees public records responses. Parents face a 45day timeline to obtain key documents while GF local keeps only a 15 business day window to file and then restricts the availability the ability to supplement the record after record level one. In my experience, records that are required to be maintained under federal law have not been provided during the grievance time frame at all. Under this policy, the same office that controls access to documents also benefits from rules that block parents from adding those documents later. That is not fairness. That is a structural disadvantage. The filing deadline should be
096extended to at least 60 days for parents and the right to supplement the record must be protected at all levels, especially when records have been delayed or withheld. Thank you so much. Please vote no. >> Thank you. This concludes our public testimony. Thank you to all of our callers and our in-person speaker. Um and as a reminder to our community, you can also email the board at trusteesaustinisd.org. Um, we are going to very briefly recess our open meeting at 6:28 p.m. to move to a short executive session pursuant to Texas Government Code sections 551.074 and 551.071. As soon as we're finished with the executive session, we'll return to the open meeting to continue. Thank you. Hi, welcome back. Uh we will now and thank you for your patience. We'll now reconvene the open meeting at
0976:47 p.m. And our next item is a brief president's report. I want to take a moment to remind everyone that early voting is underway. It ends tomorrow, February 27th. Um both tonight and tomorrow, there are some polling places up until 1000 p.m. in Travis County. Uh you can get information at votervis.gov. And uh election day for the primary is on Tuesday, March 3rd. Uh next item is committee reports. As usual, we've posted the written reports as an attachment to this item on our board docs agenda. That's item number 4.1. It includes a committee report for the board policy committee and the Austin Education Fund. And the next item is the superintendent report. All right. Thank you, trustees. Uh, happy to provide a brief, um, somewhat brief, I should say, report. Um, the first, uh, um,
098topic I'd like to cover is just an update regarding Mendes Middle School. Uh, as we've communicated, um, AISC is taking back, um, a Mendes Middle School. Uh for awareness purposes, um the dis mendes middle school has been operating uh under a charter partner for quite some time. Uh the current partner has been operating since 20 uh 22. Uh the process for Austin ISD has to be very intentional. Uh we want to make sure we maintain academic momentum. We want to make sure we incorporate community, want to incorporate programming. uh and that uh requires us engaging and and that's what the plan uh includes as anything else uh with Austin ISD when we have um efforts like this we create uh transition teams and you can see here on this next slide uh who is responsible
099for each of these uh elements of work as the project managers we have Stephanie McGraw and Marlo uh Dr. sorry, executive director Marla Mallet and the executive director, the leads over the entire project are Dr. Angel Wilson. Uh we always create committees to ensure that we are getting the full purview of support within Austin ISTD. You can see those committees listed in the left and then the types of meetings occurring. The one thing I'll be very very clear about is um we are having an intentional conversations with the community throughout the entire process. Uh I was very fortunate to to participate in one just a couple days ago. Um but what I want to point out here is that you're going to see these occur over the next many months. Uh and some of these
100um conversations, you know, we're very clear that we don't have answers yet because we need to hear community voice before we arrive at the um final solution. It has to be done uh with community voice. There are different uh elements of academic success um that we're wanting to reinforce this plan with including academic rigor uh ensuring that we have pathways uh within the vertical uh by literacy and multilingualism. We have talked about the opportunity here. So, making sure we lean into that. And then, uh, as always and and perhaps even more importantly as we bring a new a school back into our um kind of I kind of I don't know. I want to say operations that sounds too uh I don't know sounds too uh binary like what's uh back into the the family
101I guess is what say uh students experience a stable inclusive learning environment. Uh and these have always been our students, but um it's been operated under a partner and now we have to be very intentional that we continue to see the growth um but we're able to incorporate um different elements um that align with who Austin ISD is. Uh one of the things that we've been doing also is uh just ensuring that there's um extreme awareness within the feeder schools around the opportunities for students. You can see here listed uh the choice sheet events that have that are occurred or are occurring or scheduled to occur. Uh it's always important to note that there are students in um Mendes rising seventh graders and eighth graders who have been with the partner and so we want
102to be very intentional. Uh so you'll see um refinement uh grade level by grade level uh just to ensure that our students have a a welcoming loving experience as they transition um into Austin ISD uh operating. Um uh one uh thing that's also very important is that we identify the leader uh of this campus. Uh back on February 11th we had our uh principal profile building um conversation. We had families, we had trustees uh attend, students and new staff members. Uh it was great. Uh that feedback always helps uh inform the decision. We we do it anytime we hire a new leader for our campus. Uh what's important to note here is that we need to identify this leader sooner than later. Uh the reason being is this person is going to help us uh
103continue to build uh and strengthen our relationship with the community, ensure that we're engaging with the feeder elementary schools and the high school uh but also um be uh very involved and kind of lead this transition. Um this is not too dissimilar to the same timeline we had when we launched uh General Marshall for the trustees that were around at that time. It's very similar timeline. February, March, we hire. They hired at they were hired on as a principal, continue through the spring semester and then enter the summer uh fully staffed, you know, with the master schedule with um everything set and ready to go for a successful fall launch. Uh we also have um enrollment efforts. Uh I was actually able to attend um this uh community event just a couple days ago. Uh
104it was great. Um had lots of conversation with families and even students. uh learned a lot about um things that we want to incorporate uh into the program at Mendes. Uh very exciting event. Um just very appreciative of all of the staff showing up and supporting uh and also um the great great questions we had from students uh and parents. Um and all of this is very meaningful and will absolutely help inform um how we move forward in um welcoming Mendes back into Austin ISD. As far as an update regarding hiring, um right now, as our trustees know and our community knows, there are lots of transitions occurring in Austin ISD, uh we need to make sure that we have um staff uh hired through the spring semester. This is an update of where we
105are uh as of the time this report was drafted. Uh so 27.59% overall um of the positions have been filled. uh we will continue to to work um and build uh the team out. Uh so really excited about that work and once the new leader is here they will certainly um finish that that effort. Uh we are um asking our families and community members to get involved. Uh one of the ways that you can do it is through our campus CAC. Uh as a school go through a transition. It's a great opportunity. Uh we have um invited families uh at the last event to participate. Um we also have um signups for volunteering at the campus. And just so our trustees are aware, you know, at the community meeting, there were lots of questions about
106how to participate, how to support, and we certainly connected um those families uh with with the right individuals to make sure that was done. So we're very very excited uh about um really about the next year for Mendes Middle School. Also want to provide a brief brief update on additional uh days school year's pilot uh also known as ADSY. You may heard hear that acronym around. Uh this is a a program that is supported by the agency. Uh but what allows us to do is to incorporate full day learning uh camps uh Saturday uh learning opportunities and also six extra instructional days within our calendar. Uh there are some things that we have to work through regarding professional development uh hours, but uh it is a a real opportunity to um increase uh instructional days
107and and in time and at the same time also provide opportunities in the summer. And so as we move forward um we've uh been engaged with principles. We've had conversations uh with staff. We've been working with the agency to see how this could work and actually having conversations with other districts to see how they've implemented. Uh we believe that there will be an opportunity um for this within Austin ISD. Uh the exact schools um have yet to be determined. Uh it is a pilot so you will not see this districtwide. Uh no need for concern there, but we do feel like there are lots of great opportunities regarding um ads and we'll provide more updates uh as the pilot um progresses. Uh lastly, before I transition over to finance, I want to provide an update
108regarding uh the meeting the board meeting cadence. Uh we've had questions over the last couple months and so just wanted to be really clear about how the cadence of meetings for our board um goes throughout the year. Uh so our families and staff um are aware. We have generally two board meetings each month. Um sometimes we had more but sometime and and but very few times have we had less except for July. And the first board meeting is um uh named the information session. This is on the first or second Thursday of the month. This is really where we view uh preview items that will be approved later in the month. And this is also the time where we provide our monitoring updates. Now, sometimes you'll see that move around if there's a conflict uh
109or perhaps data is not released um at the time that we expect. Uh but generally speaking, what you'll see at the board information sessions are uh monitoring updates, information around different initiatives, as well as preview of agenda items. The board voting meeting, which is the one we're on now, uh it's it's really where the board will take action on any actionable items. The superintendent's update is also tied to this meeting as well. Uh and and that is generally the cadence over the course of the year. Um, when it comes to posting timelines for board meetings, uh, they post posted for the board meeting review on the on Friday, two weeks prior to the meeting. Uh, board questions related to agenda items are submitted by Tuesday, one week prior to the meeting. And, uh, and post
110to the public at least three business days before. Uh, and our practice is always to post on Friday uh, one week before the meeting. And um the one thing I'll say about uh each of the um the the data points that I guess information the presentations that we provide to our trustees uh each one is is slightly different. The monitoring reports are very structured. Uh they're very um they're data driven. There's a structure to them that it's been you know we worked with our Lonear governance coach at the time to produce and it's in alignment with our scorecard. The information topics sometimes can vary in format and sometimes we get information very very late. Uh an example of this might be like I just did the superintendent update and there are pictures from Mendes Middle
111School which occur meeting which occurred two days ago. Right? So there are just some some elements are more flexible but generally speaking we try to be very very um uh clear uh regarding and have clear expectations of when each of these submissions um are made public and when they are made available to the board for comment. And so with that I'll transition into the um fiscal forecast uh which is um part of the um agenda and part of the board calendar as far as um budget calendar. And so I'll have uh Katrina Montgomery kind of walk us through this presentation. >> Thank you very much um Superintendent Sigura. Um so first we're going to start with the fiscal multi-year fiscal forecast. And a forecast is just a forward-looking long-term financial sustainability document. And so you're
112going to understand that there's a difference between a forecast and the budget. Um this early forecasting allows us reasonable uh response allows us to be responsible with our planning time. So we've been working on the budget since late last um late November or December. But looking at this fun fiscal forecast kind of helps us know which way we're going to go for FY2526 which is our current fiscal year as well as next year for FY2627. The one thing I just want to make sure that this forecast is not a budget. It is just a forecast. Thank you. So, the fund balance policy this the district has um um the board has approved a fund a for uh fund balance policy to be increased to 20% um 15% for FY 2425 through FY 2627 and then
113as of um June 27th so the 27th 28th year we have to be back to 20%. And under the policy, you'll see actual and target. So FY2425, even though our goal, our policy said 15%, we came in at 18.9% which was a a positive for the district. For FY226, our target is 15%, FY 2627, our target is 17%. And then, of course, for 2728, the target is 20%. What we're trying to do here is to make sure that we don't stay at 15% and then get to 27 28 and get to 20%. So fiscal forecast. So this has this page has a lot of lot going on. So let's walk through it. So the second column has our adopted budget that hasn't changed, right? We had our net change between our revenue recapture and operating
114expenditures showed that we had $111 million that we had to make up. We did property monetizations. There were two properties for $45 million in total and then we had pending strategies of $47 million to get us to the deficit of $19 million when we adopted the budget in June. Now, what we're projecting for FY2526 is that we're going to have a difference of $136 million. So, I want to talk about the we'll talk about a little bit in more detail the difference between the net change of the 111 million and the 136 million on the next slide. Then we have property monetizations. As I pointed out in the adopted budget, we had 45 million. One property is um going to close in this fiscal year, FY2526, which is 17 million. And then if you just
115go over a little bit to the right, you'll see the second property at 26 million, which is projected to close in FY2627. Going back to the projected column, you have pending strategies of $2 million. That's additional reductions for special education contract cuts. They've been doing a really good job, but this is an additional amount. And then when I presented at the info session, if you look at actual versus budget in December of 20, we were under budget by $29 million. So what we wanted to show is how well we're doing the work. And the work that we're doing is by reducing our expenses. And then you're going to see the board policy alignment. So this is our forecast. And what we want to be able to explain to you is where we need to get
116to to get to 15%. So if you go down to the bottom, you can see that there's a 15% at the bottom of the page. And in order for us to get there, we will have to cut reduce an additional $39 million for this current fiscal year. For FY 2627, you can see that our um revenue has decreased. Um, our recapture has also reduced and we also have operating expenditures decreased. But the deficit that we would have without anything just with looking at those three areas would be $166 million. We have the property monetization of 26 million and then we have pending strategies of 20 million. So one of the things we've been doing over the last few years is we've been reducing our deficit by controlling our expenses. And so this $20 million is
117collapsing only department vacancies. So all vacancies and that's $20 million. So what that will do is it will help us in 2627, but it will also help us in future years. And that's the work that we need to do. We've been doing a good job reducing expenses, but we have to start making permanent cuts or reducing the budget. Um and so then let's go back to FY2627. And so to get to 17% which you saw on the previous slide, that means the additional amount that we have to figure is $125 million. So when we see that number, we are already working on strategies of how we can do this. We have a document that says this is the number and how we're going to propose that we do this. It is not fully flushed out,
118but we are working towards coming up with a specific plan of how we can reduce the 125 million. That's one. The second thing we can do in FY2627 is we can the district can come in at 15%. Which would reduce the 125 million to 110 million. But the thing we want to be careful at when we do that is that that would mean we'd have to make up 5% in FY26 I mean FY2728. So we really want to be strategically to not strategic to not overwhelm the system all in one year. And then you have FY2728 forecast. Um you can see that you have your revenue, your recapture operating expenditures. And then um we're saying that we would reduce we would have to have an additional $24 million of reductions or additional revenue to get
119us to the 20%. So the next slide FY226. This slide just kind of wants we want to be really clear about how we got from the $19 million deficit this fiscal year to the $49 million deficit. There's quite a few things that happened right during this year. So, our enrollment decreased which had an impact on our ADA. And one of the things we've talked about is even though our enrollment decreased, our ADA didn't decrease at the same level, but that's still a financial um uh increases our deficit. We had um we lost some additional funding on SHARS and our property values went down from a negative 2% to a negative 4%. So, we so that all of those things equal approximately $23 million. We've had additional funding requests this fiscal year totaling $15 million. And
120then a property monetization that we talked about under the adopted budget was $45 million. But when the property moved to the next year, that was $26 million and the second property came in less than what we budgeted. So that's an additional $2 million difference. You have implemented strategies and reductions of $11 million of which we've already accounted for. We talked about the $2 million for the sped contracts. So what this $23 million here is the difference between when we passed the adopted budget, we knew we had $47.5 million worth of reductions to make and we knew that we could do that. And so now with all of these other things that have happened, there is an additional 23 million. Right? So then this is all of the ways that we got from the $19 million
121deficit that we passed in June till the $49 million deficit that we're projecting now. So if you look at the strategies we've had for this fiscal year, we have a hiring freeze which started in January. Um that's going to help us continuously reduce because the number that you saw previously was through December. So the hiring freeze had not been in enacted yet. You have additional revenue related to stop um stop on buses. Chris and his team got a new vendor and so the revenue is coming in higher than we projected. Pecard limitation adjustments. We've been reducing the amount of spend for PECards. From November, from July through January, we've reduced $1.3 million from last year to this year. And then pre-approval process. Everything has to go through approval process whether it goes through your executive
122director or your officer. And then finally through me. So on this last slide here, we're going to talk about operating capacity. So the superintendent and I were meeting and we were drawing something up and so we this is the clearest way that we can make sure that everyone understands where we are because we understand that there's a lot of numbers and it's a lot going on. But if you look at our revenue, we're projecting or forecast for 2627 is $1.4 um billion. The recapture is $610 million. And so those two numbers are should be pretty relatively fixed. Then our amount available for operating expenditure should be $823 million. So that that's the easy way to look at that's what our operating expenditure should be. And what we're forecasting now is that our operating expenditures are
123$989 million. So this is the easiest way for us to see why year-over-year we're having a deficit because our operating expenditures are always higher than the revenueless recapture. This is this slide. I wanted to show this slide. I want us to be clear that there's a difference between the forecast and the budget. But some of the information we used in the forecast is even though our the team is projecting that enrollment would stay the same and we're going to hire for enrollment that they're projecting, we're still going to build our budget at a smaller rate for all everything else. It's going to be at enrollment of 66,000 instead of 69,000. Um our average daily attendance instead of at snapshot it was 62,000. It's going to be at 60,000. And then our property value changed. The
124estimate from TCAD was between a 3% and 5% property value. In the past, last year we went in the middle and we still had to add an additional um negative -2%. So we're going to go at the high mark to have a property value decrease of 5%. The next slide is just an overview of the engagement that the team has been doing. We want to make sure that we're speaking to whoever like whoever invites us so we can make sure that we're telling the story about the the things that we're implementing and changing at Austin ISD. And on this very last slide on Saturday, February 28th from 11 to 12, we have our virt uh first virtual session with the community. And that's the end of the presentation. And I'm here to answer questions. >>
125Thank you so much for all of this um and for the superintendent report. So now we have uh the opportunity to ask questions or clarifications about both the fiscal forecast and the superintendent report. Uh so who has questions? Trusty Singh. >> I wanted to see if we could get a copy of that presentation emailed to us. Is it because I don't think I see it in board docs. Is it there? >> This one there. >> It is. Okay. Maybe I just >> click the last. >> Okay. That's trusty questions. >> Oh, no. Then it's not >> Oh, it's on the superintendent's report. Okay. This budget present. Okay. I was looking the wrong spot. Okay. Can you please pull up that the slide that had the 29 million um that we need to find to cut
126this year? >> Oh. Yeah. Yeah, that's probably at the end of the board meeting. >> Okay. So, I guess my question is, do we where's that $39 million going to be cut from? >> So, this is where budget forecasts and projections all come together. Um, some of that's going to be made up on our lack of spend. It may have not been clearly said, but you see actual versus budget December 2025. >> So, in the months from July 1 through December, we have picked up 29 million. Right? So, we're spending less. You out of the last couple presentations, we showed like a cumulative budget and a cumulative expense. And there's that margin. that margin is only going to continue to grow, right? So that will contribute to that 39. So that's a big part of
127it. And I don't if you remember last year there was at one point we were like 110 million then it was like 98 million, 90 million, 85 million and then we made up like at 70 no what we end up >> 78 million. the the challenge we have trusty seeing is it's how it's how much of that to you know to incorporate at this point given that we're halfway through the year >> right but that number is going to grow so a lot of that will be picked up by that um there'll be some other adjustments we make but they're not going to be um like there aren't cuts that you can make that are going to be like the the val the largest portion of that it's things that we're not doing, >> okay?
128>> And bud and like spending wisely. And this is where if you if our budget was, this is not going to sound weird, but if the budget was tighter across the entire system, >> then that number wouldn't exist in the same way. Like you wouldn't have that margin, but then that difference wouldn't be on the at the net. It wouldn't net out that high either. >> So, do you feel like we're going to be able to make up that 49 million by the end of this fiscal year? Oh, we have to >> 39 million. >> 39, sorry. >> Yeah, 39 million. Well, well, I know I feel very confident that without on our what we've done already on our current trajectory, we'll make up the the majority of it. There'll be some other things that
129we have to look at, but the majority of it will be made up. >> Okay. >> And and does that make sense? I'm not sure if I'm what I'm saying makes sense, but like so let's if I bet budget $100 for the entire I don't know. >> No, it's fine. You don't have to get it. I I guess what would be helpful for the next time we get this? This was a really good presentation. It's super clear. Um it it might be helpful just to have like a paragraph like narrative or something that just explains like your perspective on like like should we be freaking out right now or not, you know, like that's what I want to know and like where where do we expect? So it is comforting to know that you think
130that we are going to be able to um make up this 39 million. Um but that's not really I don't really see that in here. So I think to kind of hear your >> no I I appreciate that trustee seeing and and do you remember last last year in April May we had a very difficult conversation on the dis here about going below 20%. >> Right. And I remember that conversation very vividly because it it was hard to have that conversation and one of the things that we knew is if we were tighter and we managed better we would pick up a lot of it and at the end you saw that we ended up at 17.6% 6% was the final fund balance. >> 18.1 and we thought we at one point be 14. >>
131And so this is really budget management. It's it's being really thoughtful about spend. There are cuts to be made. I'm not necessarily as concerned about 25 26. Forecasting 26 27 27 28. >> That's where the work needs to come in. You know, one of the things that drove that biggest margin was one of the properties not being able to close in this fiscal year, >> right? That's how sensitive it it is. So the other question becomes if we cut something knowing that a future um cash injection is coming that cut could hurt you pretty significantly and the fiscal year timing is really what we're kind of navigating in between. >> So those are conversations Katrina and I have. I mean there is extreme urgency. No one should leave this meeting thinking that there aren't there
132isn't a lot of work to do or hard work to do over the next couple years or this year for next year that or even the following year. Um, but as far as this year goes in and making up that gap, we have we're confident we'll make up much of it just based on what we've done already. There's still some work to do, but >> much of it on based on what we've done already. >> Would you agree, Katrina? >> I agree. I do want to add one part. What you what um, Superintendent Sigur talked about, remember we showed the slide where you when he talked about the budgeting process, year-over-year, we have a deficit, but we always do better. And I think I've heard you say, President Boswell, what's where's the magic? Right. what
133what Superintendent Sigur is saying, we have to do better in our budget process. So, we have to get the budget as lean as possible. Yes, it is a strategy to say, I'm going to do a deficit and then come in better. Everybody's happy. Yeah, that's great. But our budget process needs to be tighter. So, one of the ways we're going to do this is with vacancies. Everything needs to be tighter. So, when we pass the budget, there shouldn't be all of these large swings at the end of the year. >> Okay, that's helpful. And then um Miss Hogr, you mentioned something about um the next uh school year 2627 and the possibility of dipping below um 17.1%. I think I heard you say something like that and then recommend against that. >> Thank you. because
134I would I would have a really hard time approving a budget in June that put us below a 17.1% um fund balance. Just letting you know. Well, the policy says 15, but we're we're we're beating our plan 15 and then jumped to 20, you know, then I'm right there with you one year and >> yeah, there's a I I want to also be really clear like this next the slide that shows there's two things that are fixed, right, every year and it's the revenue you get from the state and the recapture payment. They're they're fixed in how they're calculated and we have no control over that. None. And we can grow revenue by having students come in, but the relationship between the two still exists. So we are always going to be our operating expenses
135always are going to be the net of that number those two the the difference between the two and we've never showed it that way but I think it's really really important because there are lots of other funding sources that we have that come in but they've been drying up >> right title dollars we have grants from the city of Austin there are things that that dry up and there are things that are still really really important that we do and so then we have to figure out how do can we even incorporate those into our system if we do It's going to put pressure on the operating expenditures that we have already. And I think it just reinforces that we have limited ability to for us to impact that calculation. We can become more efficient.
136We can make our decisions. You know, we can grow enrollment. Um but at the end of the day, like we have to be really really thoughtful about every dollar we spend. Like bottom line, every dollar has got to be hyper thoughtful. >> Thank you. Um, okay. We have budgeted 10 minutes left to let people know. Um, who has a question? Trusty Foster. Secretary Foster. Um, ju just to be clear that I'm reading this correctly and perhaps to drive the the point home, our problem, we are getting getting ever more efficient and I bet we're among the most efficient around. There's there's not a lot of loose loosey goosey stuff going. Um, this seems to be driven by a decrease in property values. and recapture >> and so first yes >> yes decrease in property values
137chars has decreased city of Austin um has decreased we've lost federal grants and so one of the things the super superintendent and I talked about it's almost like the perfect storm like what else right and so yes it's all of those things and >> so I think that's important for everyone to know how hard you all are working, how diligently, and how seriously this is being taken. And we're battling a poor a perfect storm that we're not controlling property values, we're not controlling recapture. Um we're adjusting on the other side of the ledger for these realities. Um the the dire question that I have is is this a moment or is this a permanent and cascading contraction it's it's um I think based on it's the latter. So just just to be clear, um I
138think what I've seen in my almost eight years here, you know, there was a time where property values were increasing at 10 14%. >> Yeah. I mean, we just very quick, you know, very high. The the the numbers and the way the um financing worked were in our favor for a period of time. And so we were able to to do things. uh and we were also not as tight when it comes to budget and so what we're seeing now is a reduction in those things and at the same time we should we're getting tighter in budget because this is best practice um but it's going to continue to eb and flow and that's what makes this really really hard so when trusty singing just moments ago talked about how are you going to are
139you going to make that up well we will make up a big portion of it but if I were to sit here and say we're going to cut $35 million you know in the next couple months like knowing that there are things coming or that the revenue is that the there are savings to be had or the fact that there's a prop there's a property that's going to close in the second next fiscal year then you begin to cut bone when you're like anticipating the uncertainty which is kind of weird to say but that's what we're doing that's like a lot of what you're trying to do is like anticipating uncertainty as best we can and incorporate into this process um but yeah it's the latter for sure >> so what what that gives rise
140to me for and then um sort of cease my my comment and question. Um is one the importance once again of this budget cycle but then from a board visioning standpoint anticipating basically a new reality and who are we going to be as this contraction continues. Um it is um as they say existential to me. So, I'm I'm I'm really sobered by this um reality and it interesting that primaries are coming up and that elections are coming up and that many of the things that are out of our control are things reflected in our democracy and who is in charge and what the values are of those people in charge. We need folks who are going to restructure our school finance if we're going to survive. Um or at least Yeah. Uh I I really
141appreciate as always the work that you all are doing and I guess promise on from my standpoint to be as serious and sober and realistic as possible as we enter this budgeting cycle. >> Thank you. As we have five minutes left in our a loted time, additional questions. Uh I just want to share a quick appreciation for um being conservative about our enrollment projection. Uh and also want to just I know there's been discussion about doing more recruitment, being more thoughtful about that. people have been um trained to help with enrollment and would just love an update sometime in an upcoming meeting soon about just active ways that we're actually recruiting people and I know there are a lot of people in our community who are ready to be part of that work and just
142what that looks like and how people can engage. Um, thank you for that because as as we said, the only way we can meaningfully grow our budget is to grow our number of students and uh as we're losing just to be thoughtful about how we're also doing whatever we can to gain in addition to making our schools a place people are excited to be um going out talking to them about that and inviting them in as well. So, thank you for that. Um and and then um you know and I hope we end up with way more than 66,000 students. But I also appreciate not banking on that and and um I hope we are pleasantly surprised. Uh and then um with the engagement, thank you for all the engagement opportunities. Um I went to
143look to to get the link for the one on Saturday and don't see it on our budget page. That seems like it's not been quite updated. I found it on the district calendar for anyone who's looking at it. Um but just want to make sure that's um you guys are working really hard to plan that and we know our community shows up. Yes. So, I want to be sure people know where to find those. We'll get that. >> So, thank you. I appreciate that because I know you do really good work and people actually show up to talk about budget on a Saturday morning in our community, which I really thank you for all the people who engage to that degree. Uh, anything else? All right. Thank you all. Thank you so much for this.
144Uh, anything about the superintendent report? We're good. Excited about the additional day school year pilot for um where that's going to be. I hope that's really um a good opportunity where you're where we're going to try that out. Okay. Um can you please introduce the next item? >> Uh thank you, President Boswell. I'd like to welcome up Christine Steampport, our operations officer, to give the intruder detection update. >> Good evening, trustee. Here to give the in uh notice of intruder detection audit update for the month of December 2025 and January 2026. So in those months um Austin ISD we had 25 schools audited by TEA. Five schools had one or more findings requiring a corrective action. As a reminder TEA is required to audit 75% of Austin ISD schools during the 2526 school year. Currently
14557.3% of Austin ISD campuses have been audited this school year. In each of the past two school years, TEA has audited 100% of Austin ISD schools for intruder detection audits. And of course, if there are any questions, we can answer those during close session due to the sensit sensitive nature of safety and security. Thank you. >> Thank you, trustees. Any question about this? All right. Thank you so much. really appreciate the work and appreciate everyone uh on our campuses who's working to keep our campuses safe and uh make sure we pass all these audits. Thank you. Uh Superintendent Sigero, will you please introduce our next item? Thank you, President Boswell. Our next item is the Gibson Internal Audit accounts payable final report. Our partners with Gibson Consulting have provided a recorded presentation in advance of
146today's meeting which is included in tonight's agenda item and have shared a presentation with backup data. We have Greg Gibson, Ali Ta Tyla, and Shannon John's joining us virtually to answer any questions from the board members. Are they on the virtuals? There they are. >> Hi, welcome. >> Uh, trustees, are there any questions about the accounts payable internal audit? Uh Trusty Coffman. >> Uh thank you to Gibson and company for the reports and the both the written and the audio. Um but this question relates to you superintendent just around the um understanding the importance of timely payment of our vendors and our people. Um and that was one of the issues that had come out of the the um audit was ways to ensure that we have on-time payments for all of our vendors and
147others who we do business with. Um short of another audit, what will be the reporting to the board in terms of improvement in that area? Like will we be able to get an update later on um improvements in on-time payments for vendors? I can do that as a board uh update notification. Um just to I I I very much agree with you. Um you know, we have partners that are working with us. It's very very important. Uh especially because many of them are smaller uh organizations that that cash does flow. Uh I can tell you that it has improved over the last many years. Um being out of an organization that paid uh lots of invoices, but I'm happy to write an update um in a board notification. um perhaps quarterly. Um I I can
148create a timeline for it and just kind of show you the progress. >> I'd appreciate it. I think it's important to be aware. Thank you. >> Okay. >> Thank you. Any additional questions or comments? >> Yeah. Um my question is also for the superintendent. It's um regarding the performance monitoring um recommendations or the findings um I guess are on page 10 and 11. But it's referring to like the finding um from Gibson was that departmental performance is not regularly monitored contributing to late payments to vendors and also um another recommendation to integrate performance targets into staff evaluations to provide clear benchmarks for assessing individual and departmental effectiveness. So is your understanding that this is just really more as they relate to um financial issues or is it just like overall moni um performance of our
149different departments? >> Yeah. So um two things well three things I think. The first is um if you were to look at 2425 and where we are today um you'll see many of these metrics have been improved. Uh, one of the things that we do or that I do is, um, build out key performance indicators for departments. Uh, I think what we run into when it comes to accounts payable or like POS or invoice payments, so many people contribute to that process. Uh, that tying um, kind of each an individual's performance to an element within it is challenging given the way that we're set up for performance because there are lots of other things that that individuals do. It's just one aspect of it. >> Uh but as far as departmental um overview and performance,
150uh that is an area for opportunity. Um you know, we are also, just so you're aware, trustee seeing um building out a survey um for our principles to respond to because I also want to understand how our principles view our departments and how we're performing to support them. And so out of that, I think will come um kind of a a new approach to how we evaluate department performance. Uh so this will help contribute to that and certainly the feedback from our principles. Um but yeah it is generally overall >> okay and I know um I know that our first rating is like the highest possible category right is are vendor payment is timeliness of vendor payments like one of the things that first looks at at all or I mean I know it's kind
151of random but >> I I don't think that it's that level of granularity. >> Okay. Um, and I I I I came out of a lot of the worlds that where money flows like this. Um, and and what I would say is we've made a lot of improvements here or to go back to 20 like 22 or 2021. >> Um, and so I know it's there's room for improvement for sure. Uh, and I think we compete well with other school districts as far as you timeless and payments. Um, I hear very little of it now than I did two or three years ago to be honest, which is also kind of an anecdotal indicator. Um, and I and I would bet that y'all probably have heard less over the last year versus three years ago.
152Um, uh, but but I'm not aware of it being specifically uh something that the agency looks at to determine um, first rating. >> Okay. Thank you. >> Thank you. Any additional questions or comments? All right. Yeah, I think the only ones I'm hearing are activity funds occasionally, which is I know a separate process. So, um, thank you. I appreciate that. All right. Next up is um our next audit item. Can you please introduce that? >> Uh, yes. Thank you. Our our team, our next item is the Gibson internal audit. Uh, the CIS and PE's final report. Our partners at Gibson Consulting have provided a recorded presentation in advance of today's meeting which is included in tonight's agenda item. They've also shared a presentation with supporting data and are ready to answer any questions from board
153members and is our team and myself. >> All right, trustees. Any questions about this one? Trusty Hunter. Uh earlier in the presentation uh that we had uh during the hearing, one of the concerns at uh Rosedale was incorrect um I guess assigning when it comes to like what are we doing? I know um Dr. Angel Wilson said that there's training going on behind that. I guess I'm just wondering um don't we just have those PES code and we know that those PES codes get assigned to like how are we mis assigning codes? >> If only it was that simple. Uh Trusty Hunter uh there are a couple things that I think uh need to be we need to talk about. I think the first is the system is itself um had to be improved, right?
154the way that the we as a um central uh administrative staff support our campuses that system had to improve. And so a lot of the work that technology did over the last two years, I'm not sure if you recall last year, Trusty Hunter, where I was sharing with our board, the um improvement in PE's reporting actually helps us identify or get more funding from the state because students were going uncoded that should have been coded and they were receiving services, but they weren't getting the proper code. And so we had to improve our system and Oscar can certainly speak to much of that. The other thing is that training has to occur within our campuses because the staff at our campuses are many in many cases the ones inputting the data. And so there's a
155lot of professional development that had to be built out and deployed so that those that are in the classroom or the ones responsible for the campus to report understand how to report. Um it's not as simple as you know just pulling down a menu and and kind of you know just fig figuring out which one to select. You have to understand you know the student um student experience with services the students receiving and then make the connection. So uh there's a lot of work has gone into it. It's improved vastly already. Um certainly Oscar feel free to speak to anything I missed but uh it is not quite that simple and that's why it was a big area of improvement and and I would say we've actually picked up um funding from the state because
156of the improvement we made over the last year. Oscar, what do you want to Sure. Good evening, President Boswell to Sigura, board of trustees. Uh, I think a helpful framework for this would be a framework that I, uh, call PPT, people, processes, and technology. So, to uh, what superintendent said, there's the technology piece, the coding piece, the the system piece, but there's also consideration for do we have the right processes and are the people affecting those right processes. So, it's a holistic approach to look at that. And so focusing on all three has been our strategy to improve those those measures. >> Thank you. Anyone else? >> Trusty Sing. >> Yeah. Or Jacob. >> Um this for the superintendent again I guess. Um kind two two parts maybe. There are 11 recommendations in the audit
157and only one of those is marked as low. So 10 are medium or high. And of of those also um you know one of the high ones is transition of short-term funded positions to general funded positions which I assume is going to be a significant cost. And so, you know, the two parts are there's there's a lot of recommendations in here and um you know, how how are we going to be updated on the progress to those or the timelines for those and then the expected costs for those too as we're going into the budget because a lot of these seem like somewhat expensive items to implement. >> Yeah. And Oscar is going to have a great response because we've actually gone through presentations where we can show all the things that we've done already.
158I I want to be really clear. This this is a a lagging data set in in many ways. So um a lot of the work in the recommendations here have been incorporated into the system and have already begun to to progress and get embedded. So yes there are many in here but many of them have already been tackled or far along in the progression. Um so Oscar anything you want to add to that but and so as far as updates I think the first place to show you how our work kind of aligns with the audit report because we don't have like an updated report that goes alongside this right it's independent of us. Um but I'm happy to do that. Um Oscar, go ahead. >> Yeah, happy to provide an update. Um we are
159on target to have many of these completed by the end of this cycle. So along with this uh audit uh TEA implemented their new PES modernization EDFI and so we we had to do some of the work to stay uh in alignment with the submission deadlines anyway. So much of that work has started. Um some of the other ones I think longer term will be completed by the next school year. Um, with regards to, for example, the recommendation around staffing, that's why we're working with uh, Miss Montgomery and our vacancies and really understanding reconfiguring those trade-off decisions of where do we make those investments uh, and how do we leverage some of the vacancies or some of the positions and uh, in terms of our our systems and technologies. As we've moved more to a
160deeper uh, partnership with Frontline, those automations create opportunities, create efficiencies, and so we don't need as many of the say technical roles to support the systems. And so that's that trade-off. And so long term, we'll be using those savings or those vacancies um to uh address some of the concerns in the audit so that way we can make a sustainable decision uh around how we support those uh those positions long term. >> Okay. And so then just to clarify, some of those expenses then are still to be projected out. They're not they're not in any of the budgeting that we're doing so far. there they're I would say that we're looking to absorb it in our existing budget, right, by making adjustments with as he said vacancy savings or just other areas where we're collapsing.
161Um, and so yeah, there there'll be some, but really as we've talked about it, and I think maybe this is where we start with the update to the board via board update is just what we've done this far. So you can see kind of which one of these have already been woven into the work and which ones may have some budget consideration moving forward. But they're not I mean I can't there aren't big big numbers that would I don't know that we would wouldn't be able to manage within our existing budget. Okay. I Yeah, I guess I'm, you know, my concern was it just seems my understanding of the report was that some of this is paid for, you know, through one, it's contractors, and two, it's being paid for outside of our general fund
162budget through through sources that are potentially at risk or that might not continue or that we shouldn't be. >> Yeah. And so this is uh this is um whenever you have an initiative and you're starting something big, you typically have to expand resources, right, to to meet the the needs of the organization. Uh and there have been times and certainly this is one of those times where we've had to rely on difference of funding sources to bring partners in to help us get there. I mean when we turned over the the technology system or we turn over CIS, we always get other folks to come in and help us with it. Um and so there is a transition period and once the system stabilizes then we're in a much better position to like make those
163refinements to ensure sustainability. Um so there will be some of that trustee diodio but a lot of the big lifts that I think would move the needle in the budget you know many of those have like been occurring and have occurred. Um, but what we can do is provide the presentation that kind of aligns this audit report with what we've done this far and then I can clearly outline kind of what to expect moving forward. That's probably the best way to to provide the clarity I think you're seeking. >> Yeah, I would appreciate that moving into budget season because yeah, just some of the positions that they were talking about um potentially being in jeopardy seemed like ones that that we need to ensure we continue having. So yeah, >> thank you trusty thing. >>
164Oh, I just wanted to um give kudos to Gibson. I think this is a really well done report. It's super clear. Um so thank you. Um I did want to ask Gibson um are you all seeing school districts wanting to get audits done of um like their AI systems and things like that? like you do talk about data governance and things like that, but can you just share if there's any any advice or anything that we should should be on our radar? And I'm sure Dr. Rodriguez also has some thoughts on that as well because I I know you're on top of it. So, Ali, do you want to answer that? I mean, we I'll let you start and I'll chime in if needed. I I think we're ready for you to chime in as
165needed. >> Oh, wait. They can't hear you. >> Okay, someone's muted. >> Oh, he's >> I think you're muted. >> He's not muted actually, but he's not heard. >> I can share with you. We're uh we have have not yet been requested to do an AI audit. Um if your question is specifically about AI, but we are working with clients to introduce AI um into their future. Uh a lot of our districts are in the early stages of developing uh policy guidelines and guard rails about how AI should be used. Um there's a lot of organic things happening from the um at the schools and in the lower levels of department. individuals are using AI. Um, but most of our clients are early in the stages of doing district level, district sponsored AI within a
166policy framework um that guides it according to the board's um direction. >> Can you hear me now? >> Yes, >> you're you're on. >> Okay. Sorry about that. Um, we don't use Zoom, so I I guess my computer was confused with the microphone. Um agree with Greg everything he said on the student side uh in the instructional side and AI usage we seen it uh some school districts are piloting and working on it um and I also see some evidence of AI usage on the ad operational stuff uh help desk uh maybe human resources chat bots response uh calls from the employees um maybe level one help desk calls for technical support those are are using a um AI agents I think that having um intentional projects how we can incorporate AI we've seen it
167examples will will help your um financial u resource allocations but we have to be very careful as auditors it will not it will be missed if we don't say it um these AI uh we don't want them to train our data or train their models with our data We have to be very um purposeful about how they use our data. So has to come with the guard rails that Greg mentioned. >> Thank you. Any additional questions? >> All right. Thank you so much to the Gibson team for your great work and thank you to our policy committee for supporting that work on behalf of the board and uh all the staff who've been part of that. Really appreciate our relationship with you and the work you're doing. Thank you. Um appreciate it. Thank you. Thanks
168very much. >> Yeah. All right. Uh we will now move to our consent agenda. Uh any consent agenda items anyone would like to pull for a separate vote? Trusty Kaufman. >> Yes. I would like to pull 12.1 for a separate vote. >> Okay. Anything else? Yes. Um hold on. I don't know the number. Um yeah, I wanted to pull Sorry. I should have been prepared. It's the one about the tip approvals. Um, >> thank you. Yes. 8.2. There it is. For separate vote, please. Okay. Anything in addition? >> All right. >> Well, separate vote. Are you pulling to >> to >> Okay. >> Yeah. >> Pulling it from the consent agenda. >> Yeah. Okay. Uh, Secretary Foster, do I have a motion to approve the consent agenda? I move to approve consent agenda items 8.1,
1699.1 through 9.3, 10.1, 11.1 through 11.3, and 12.2 through 12.8. >> Thank you. Is there a second? >> Second. Thank you. All right, trustees. Any discussion on any of these consent items? All right. Having a motion by Secretary Foster, a second by Trusty Whitley Chu to approve consent agenda items 8.1, 9.1 through 9.3, 10.1, 11.1 through 11.3, and 12.2 through 12.8. All those in favor, please raise your right hand. And the motion carries by all those on the DIS. Um, all right. We will now move to items pulled from agenda for consent. Uh the first one we can discuss is uh you want to start with 8.2 or 12.1? We'll start with 12.1. It got pulled first. Um so agenda item uh 12.1. Any questions or comments about this? uh due to additional comments that
170we received since it was posted publicly and and due to some further you know consideration in trying to understand the differences between GF for public complaints and FNG for student and parent complaints and DGVA for staff complaints and how all those have been impacted by Senate Bill 12. Um I would like to send I would like to send this back to the policy committee for further um review and the opportunity to address some of the questions and concerns that we've heard or that we've developed ourselves. >> Additional comments on this. >> Uh the policy committee is happy to have it back and uh and we have a meeting coming up very soon which we can discuss it before we bring it back to the board. >> Perfect. Thank you. Do we need a motion? >>
171If there's no objection, you can >> Okay. Any objection? All right. Well, we will pull 12.1 to send back to the policy committee. Thank you, Trusty Coffman. Thank you, Trusty Hunter, for that. Um, next is uh agenda item 8.2 pulled by trustee Singh. Uh, any comments or questions on this? >> Um, I already shared some of my concerns when we discussed it earlier. Uh, any other discussion? Okay. Do we have a motion on 8 point uh, Trusty Hunter, do you have a >> Okay. >> I move to approve consent agenda item 8.2. Uh, do we have a second? >> Second. >> Separate. >> Yeah. Agenda item 8.2. >> Agenda item 8.2. Thank you. >> Do we have a second? >> Second. >> Thank you. Having uh any discussion further? All right. Having a motion by
172trustee uh Secretary Foster, a second by Trustee Whitley Chu to approve agenda item 8.2. All those in favor, please raise your right hand. Uh any post? Okay. Any abstaining? All right. The motion passes. Um seven to uh seven in favor, one opposed, none abstaining, including trustee uh Gonzalez on Zoom. Um thank you. Uh okay. Next up is agenda item for a separate vote. That's agenda item 13.1. Uh would any trustee like to go to an executive session before we consider agenda item 13.1? >> That has been our practice. >> Yes. Um so would you like to go and have a chance to discuss that? >> Be very quick. Just want to clarify some. >> Perfect. Okay. So um we will now recess the open meeting at 7:49 p.m. and move to executive session pursuant to
173Texas government code sections 551.074 551.072 072 551.073 551.087 551.076 551.0821 and 551.071. Uh thank you. And uh would we like to just have our full executive session now or would we like to go come back vote on this and then go back in for our exe do our full executive session? Okay. So um for the people with us this evening um after we come back from our executive session we will b we will return to the open session take a vote on agenda item 13.1 and then adjourn the meeting. Um those activities will be recorded and included in all replays of tonight's meeting. So thank you for joining us and have a good evening. Uh we will uh go to executive session uh at we are adjourning this meeting at 7:50 um or recessing this
174meeting at 7:50 p.m. Thank you.