Yelm School Board meeting 2.12.2026

001Instead of tonight, we're honored to have news. Please stand. Welcome everyone. My name is Casey Shaw. I'm the school board president. Before we begin, I want to remind everyone that the agenda and the meeting packet are available on our district website at least 24 hours before each meeting. Please note that while we strive to provide all relevant materials for advance, modifications to the agenda are permissible. With that, we'll get right into it with the first item business is the bridge language smart. Good evening and welcome to Reline. Another hand for the Reline Band. Thank you, My name is Craig Curry and I have the privilege and honor of being the principal here at Richland Middle School. And on behalf of our staff, our students, and our parents, we want to thank you for the opportunity

002tonight to present our work that we've been doing this year, some of our metrics, and tell you a little bit how Ridgeline is working to improve learning, belonging, and community uh here in Y. This is aligned to our strategic plan. Um, so we're going to tell you a little story about our work so far this year. Um, you may not know it, but Ridgeline is in its 20 year of operation. Um, and I am the only the second principal here at Ridgeline. John Johnson opened the building in the 2006 seven kids to 67 uh 67 school year. uh and he served for 11 years. This is my ninth year here at Brooks. You see our uh vice principal Anthony Kucho. Uh this is his fifth year, his fifth year and he is the fourth uh

003vice principal of Edward's line. You're going to hear a little bit tonight about our AVID journey and we'll explain what that what what ABBA is. Um, but we started that in 2019 and that really serves our work. A little bit of context tonight. You're going to hear some fun things. You're going to get to hear from kids. That's the that's going to be the best thing. But you're also going to see some data. And we're going to going to try to make sense. Oh, there it goes. We're going to try to help uh make sense of that data for you. This is what's called uh the Washington School Improvement Framework. It's put out by OSPI and it kind of rates schools from 1 to 10. It takes all of your data and kind of rates

004them from 1 to 10. And this is based off of our last year's spring 2025 uh state testing scores. And you see that it rates all students, but it also gives us data for how we're doing with uh individual demographic rates. But this is just to show you that we feel like we are on an upward swing here with with our data. Um we are doing better with our students with disabilities, low-income students, which is something that we focus on. But really as you see all demographic groups um are on the rise and we have some mo momentum here. We do talk a lot about proficiency like how students are proficient but really we focus a lot on growth. We want to take kids from where they are and we want to grow them at

005least a year's worth and try to grow more. This data is in your board packet as well and shows you that like in eighth grade math we're achieving typical growth or advanced growth for 85% of our students. That's really outstanding. Then other areas we have about twothirds where we're getting typical growth or advanced growth. And so we really need to focus on where we're getting that low growth in students. We're focusing on how we can improve there. This is also part of the watch school improvement framework. And you see the red line that's around something called student growth percentiles and 50 or above. 50 represents one year of growth. So, we're also proudest that we're getting at least one year or more growth out of almost all of these demographic groups. And even where we're

006struggling with that, students with disabilities were getting very close to that full one year of growth. So, something we continue to work on. This is more about the how we're doing that, how we're getting to this data. So for the learning piece, you're going to learn about what we call tier one instruction, which is just the fancy educ education way of saying this is what all kids get. Uh tier one instruction and AVID's a big part of that. Tonight you're also going to hear about the AVID elective and you're going to hear from some of our AVID elective kids. uh you're going to hear about structured literacy class uh that's helping to improve literacy and you're also going to hear about our journey to become what's called a an avid national demonstration school. So with

007that I'm going to invite up Mr. Dan Walter who's going to tell you more about our schoolwide aid practices uh learning logs and progress monitoring and our pursuit of our demo status. Mr. Walter is uh English teacher extraordinaire. He's also our uh AVID site coordinator or a site coordinator and he's also an administrative intern. Told me he's crazy. He is an administrative intern. Let's give Mr. Walter a hand. >> Hello. Uh, Mr. Curry doesn't call me crazy when he gives me a bunch of stuff to do, so I don't know what that's about. But, um, thank you students, families, and school community for being here. School board. Hello. It's me again. Um, yeah, I want to talk to you about AVID and um everything we're doing in this building to promote learning. That's a really

008big focus for us this year um as part of our site plan. So, a couple things. Um AVID is a schoolwide system. It's very easy to get sucked into, oh, AVID's just a class and you are going to hear from some AD elective students as part of that class. But, uh reality is that Abbott is a system. It's it's way bigger than just a class. In fact, the tool that we use to uh grade ourselves have it focuses on instruction systems, leadership, and culture. There's four domains that we focus on as a building. Even Curry and Cute are being evaluated by AB and what they're doing. Um, so it's a good system of accountability, but it's also a good way just to assess where we're at. What you see on the screen right now is

009the Ridgeline wicker walk look force and some context that I think is very important. If you look at the top row, you'll see Wo R. That stands for wicker and that's an AVID thing. And what it stands for is writing, inquiry, collaboration, organization, and reading. Abid's a big uh proponent that teachers in their classroom should try to include as many pieces of wicker as they can in a lesson to maximize learning. And what you're seeing on the top row isn't things that I put together as a site coordinator. It's actually things that staff came together and said, "Hey, these are the pieces of Waker that we like the most that we want to commit to as a building." And that work started last year and it's continued into this year. And what you're this document

010is what teachers take with them when they do what's called learning walks. And what that means is that Mr. Curry finds some funding for us where teachers get to go into other classrooms to observe other teachers to learn from them. And I'm going to be honest with you, as a teacher, that's frightening. It's frightening thinking that you're going to have other staff members in your room, maybe seeing you at your worst, depending on which period they walk into, and they're going to learn from you and they're going to take notes on you. Um, but I can say with full confidence, we've done this now a while, two or three years. Um, and I've seen participation in it grow exponentially. teachers both have their doors wide open now for staff to come in uh because they

011know they're looking for that and when teachers debrief on what they saw we only share the positives we only share what's related to that nothing else so that's been a big positive in our building and a big shift that I think truly has helped us grow with learning and and school lot um there's our learning log schedule you can see all the teachers that you have volunteered to open their doors and we do it quite often and then you know AVID is a school system so therefore it's data driven um what Avid uh what the added site team talks about um we meet monthly after school um we look at data and how well we're either making or not progressing towards our goals and I read that back to staff and then staff interacts with

012that data by you know engineering PLC's and they progress monitor they um assess what's working in our classrooms what's not I'm part of the English PLC so we'll look at you know reading and writing are part of wicker and they're everything we do in ELA so are we helping students with reading and writing are we not what are some strategies we could use what are things we need to monitor and That's what we do here at Richland and Abid leads all of our conversations building wide. And I want to show you some pictures. On December 8th of 2025, we had what originally was going to be just one school, Cascade Middle School in Auburn. Ended up opening our doors to like every middle school in Olympia. Um, and what else? There's another school. What was

013the other school? Oh yeah, in Hilltop Heritage in a coma. So what we thought would be like four people coming and then you know Superintendent Woods and some avid people turned out to be like 30 people. Uh but it worked out really well. They learned a lot from us. They got to walk around the building and walk in classrooms. We had I think 12 teachers that open their doors for these people that they've never met before to come on in and to see what's going on. And the conversations were amazing. And here's some pictures of that. This is us in our um staff room, if you will, uh where we do a lot of our staff meetings. And they're I think listening to me at this time talk about Abbott, but just the sheer number

014of people that showed up. Uh Mr. Curry caught not the best pose, but he's talking about our why as a school and why we do have it and how it relates to everything we're doing here. And then like Mr. Curry said, the best part is listening to kids. And so we had elective students show up and just speak their truth and talk to a room full of people they may never meet again and to share their stories about, you know, where they came from, how Abbott supports them, and what they get out of the class. And now I want to show you a quick I think a minute and 30 video um that showcases us as an adult school because we are hoping to become an AVID intern at the National Demonstration School which I'll

015talk more about what that means in just a moment. Please watch. We'll see. Every student has as educators to find that gift. is a lot about holding students high expectations while giving them the support that they need to meet those expected and coming. I think his strategies for for studying food illustrations is important to us in this because it ultimately serves as reminder about building. You can watch the full video actually on Yum's YouTube page. It's live now. The real thing is 12 minutes long, so bring some popcorn. But it does a good job showcasing who we are as a school, our AVID journey, and where we're going. And we're hoping to become a n a national avid demonstration school. And here's just a quick date on that. Like I said, Cascade Middle School was

016here because they're also on the same track that we are implementing at the demo school. But check out those numbers. There's only five advent science and distinction or demonstration schools in the entirety of Washington State. Only one of those is a middle school. Um if Cascade joins us, the number three total will be one of the three. But of the 7,400 AVID schools across the world, not just the United States, um less than 3% of them are demonstration schools. So that's a big highlight and testament to all the work we're doing and continue to do. And real quickly, just so you're aware, demonstration doesn't mean that we're perfect by any means. It means that we're doing all the things and we're demonstrating habit and we're moving in the right direction and we're above expectations but

017it doesn't mean perfection. So know that even if we get it doesn't mean like oh good job there's no more work to be done. We solved the education. That's not the case. It's an ongoing process. Um students are ever evolving clientele which is what makes the work stressful and exciting at the same time. Um, but AVID gives us the tools that we need to be successful and helps us in everything that we do here at Richmond. Thank you. >> Thank you, Mr. Walter. Um it's March 10th is the day that we go for our demo validation and we will have a showcase and there'll be schools from the across the region who come and visit us. I'd also like to invite the board if the board would like to be part of that day and

018visit and even visit some classrooms. Um we'd love to have you. Um and I'll I'll reach out with that information. Thank you. All right. Now the the fun part, the AVID elective. Uh, AVID is schoolwide, but there's also a little elective in sixth, seventh, and eighth grade that focuses on teaching college and career readiness. Uh, we do a college visit on March 16th. We're going to St. Martins's University thanks to our club funding. Thank you, Per Club. Uh, they do tutorials and points of confusion in class. It really teaches them how to think academically and you're going to get to hear what students have to say about their experience. I'd like to invite up seventh grade AVID teacher extraordinaire and social studies teacher John McCartney. Give Don a hand. I'd like you guys to come

019up and join me. >> They look awesome in their new Avatar. >> Um, good evening. I'm really honored and privileged to be here to talk about AVID and the exciting things that we're doing in seventh grade. Um, this group of students, most of them started with me last year and they will continue with me into eighth grade as well, which really helps us to build relationships and um, really become a family. So, you'll hear a lot of kids talk about being an AVID family. Um, AVID stands for advancement via individual determination and these kids have determination. Um, AVID is an elective class that is academic and empowers students to find their voice, advocate their needs, improve grades and study habits, improve their communication skills, and to just be part of an awesome AVID family. So,

020I'd like to turn it over to the students to share a little bit about their AVID story and then also to share information that their classmates who couldn't be here today because we only had five minutes um what they had to say. >> Hi, my name is Alan Zar and my name is Jocelyn. This is my AVA story. Aba has helped me a lot with my grades and my emotional behavior at home. For my grades, I mostly had D's and Fs last year until I joined AVID. Now this year, I'm trying my hardest to get A's and B's. For my emotional behavior at home, Miss McCarti and AVID has helped me with strategies to control my behavior. >> And this is my AVID story. When I was in AVID in sixth grade, I really fell

021into a deep hole because my grades started piling or my missing design started piling up and my grades started slipping. And so that's when I realized I wanted back into Abid when I started using Cornell notes and I used a lot of strategies that we used in Abid. And so I reached out to Miss McCartney and I told her I wanted back into into Abid. And now I'm in AVID. There are some things our classmates have said. AVID is a safe learning environment where I feel like I can be myself and my classmates are like family or team. I really feel like I belong at RMS. These are some other things that our classmates have said. I have learned how I've learned to slow down and really like to see why I'm being asked to

022do. It may be hard, but there's always a way to get it done. Doing it well the first time saves me time later on. Hi, my name is Liz and I am going to be telling you about my story. Last year when I wasn't out, I was I didn't talk to my teachers know what I needed or or help. That's when I joined last year. I realized how um talking to teachers can help me with my grades and what I needed to be successful. And this is my Iowa story. Last year I wasn't an admin and I didn't really have that many that good of grades and I had to sit down in sport sometimes. And this year I talked to my teachers and I found a GPA it has risen and my grades have

023gotten better. And I think it's just like being an added because like it helps you with your organization, helps you be a good teachers. Now I'm going to be telling you about what other kids have been saying in our class. I I am going to get better at breaking assignments into smaller jobs in sixth grade. Getting in front of the class to share something was really scary. So we focused on this as a goal. Look at us now. We're standing you guys presently. Some other things our class have been working organization skills. We can go to our backpacks with our binders now. and shake it upside down and nothing will fall out. We are able to know what able to get a jobs officers and everything like that. >> My name is Eric. kind of

024get them. >> And my average story is when I was in sixth grade, I used my organization and socialization skills a lot. And I used them in the beginning of seventh grade year. But when I found out I wasn't in seventh grade avenues, I wanted to get in really, really bad cuz I was using some of those skills and I thought I could use more. Here are some things my classmates have said. Last year they had B's and Fs, but now they get B's, A's, and C's. I am in charge of my grades and I don't get stressed. I and I try to study and work hard to get better goals and study for better. I see my resources available in all my classes, including notes and posters on the wall. Work may be hard

025sometimes, but there's always a way to work harder and work in a better way. I can count on times on Thursday and Tuesday to get my work done. My classmates and me figure out things to work on on Tuesdays and Thursdays cuz those are our tutorial days. Our teachers give us guidance in when we ask them to for assignments we know where to get them. Uh I'm Gavin. Uh AVID has really helped me a lot balancing uh school between sports. It's definitely made the workload a lot easier on me. Um and these are some things that people said. People People have said that their grades haven't changed a lot yet, but they are feeling more confident in learning and they think they will. They automatically know how to fix their lower grades on important assignments

026with the information that they are given. They also care about their grades and actively try to work hard. One of the things that AVID has shown us is that we we have learned coral notes and we are learning new ways to take notes. We can also keep up with our workload a lot better. So this is why you should become a part of an average family or at least try to get someone in your family to do it. It's honestly really fun and you can learn a lot by communicating and just having a good relationship with your students and or your classmates and your teacher. Thank you all for coming to this event. It really makes us happy because it shows that you guys are caring about AVID. If you guys have any questions for

027Miss McCartney or one of my AV friends, then maybe I'll be glad to help you out. Again, thank you. Amazing job, guys. Very cool. you get to where get to hear from some more students in our structured literacy classes. It's a supportive elective for reading and literacy skills. We have five sections, sixth, seventh, and eighth grade. You're going to hear what students have to say about that. I would say to the board, if any community member asked you, uh, show me an example of where you're really using the funds and getting some good bang for your buck would be this class. It's funded by lap funds, federal lap funds, learning assistance funds, which we didn't used to have at the middle school. It was all for elementary, but you know, middle school students need support

028and and litery and reading as well. Um, so let's hear from Miss Julie, our student. Hi, my name is Julie Reer and it is my privilege to be the reading interventionist here at Wishwin. As Mr. already explained the structured literacy program is a new program um in Yale community schools at both of the middle schools and it is not a common program across the United States although it's there's a need across the United States and so I feel like we're one of the front runners in starting a program like this and I know that other districts across this uh the nation are looking at programs like ours so I feel really fortunate to the teach program and having these students here with mood tonight. So this is an elective class. Students are chosen to participate

029um as it is designed for students who need additional targeted reading support. The instruction is explicit and intentional with a focus on decoding, fluency, and comprehension which are the foundational skills that students need to be successful readers. This is exciting. What I'm going to share with you next is that from the spring 2025 scores on the district awe assessment to winter just took that assessment in January 72% of the students in our program showed an increase of scores and some were exponential they showed huge amount of growth but of that so 72% would be of the 54 students 39 children. So, it's really exciting. But in addition to seeing test scores and what as a teacher I personally live for, we see growth in confidence within our students. We're seeing their resilience increase. Students are

030beginning to believe in themselves as learners, often for the first time. Reading proficiency is truly life-changing. This impacts students academic trajectories. It expands future opportunities. It shapes their long-term success and it ultimately influences future generations. So tonight, we're fortunate to have a group of students here who would like to share their own experience within the structure of lit. >> Hello, my name is English Mills and I am in the sixth grade. Before this class, I felt like I can never read in front of people. Because of this class, I feel uncomfortable reading. Hi, my name is J Morales and I'm in the seventh grade. Before this class really fed reading in school, but now I read I can read high school words and I can read more smoothly. Hello, my name is Maxwell. I'm in

031the eighth grade and I would like to tell you about my prior experience to taking this class. I know I wasn't the best at reading and I didn't want to spend the time to fix it. But when I ded class, she taught me the purpose of reading and how it could affect my future. And ever since then, she's helped me improve more than just reading human, but has also helped me improve my self as a person. >> Hi, my name is Aan Stland and I'm in eighth grade. When I re received my class schedule before school started and saw that I had this class, I wasn't very excited. But now that I have this class, it's been in has been in this class, I learned that reading can be fun. This class has helped me

032with reading and it has also helped me with my writing skills. I feel more confident going to high school now. Hello, my name is Noah Manning and I'm an eighth grader at Richland Middle School. I participated in the structured literacy reading class with Mrs. Ruger during the first semester of the school. Before joining this class, my reading level was at the 38th percentile or about the level of a typical fifth grade. I often felt unfamiliar for the demands of eighth grade reading and was very anxious about high school. After just one semester in a structural literacy reading class, I improved up to the 78th percentile, well above average, and achieved what might normally take one or more years of this type of intervention. Early interventions like this were not only life-changing for students, but also

033cost effective. While structured literacy classes only cost a few thousand dollars per students, four years of IEP and special education services can cost tens of thousands. Supporting programs like this makes sense for both students and out. Thank you, Mrs. for helping me grow as a reader and give me confidence for the future. forgot to show our last but as you can see heard student voices which which is much more words on the site. Um I too welcome school board community members just anyone to ask questions about our program and any are welcome into our classroom at any time to see the the work that we're doing. So thank you again Susan Zen and members for being here. You guys are amazing. Thank you. Uh some recent data um that's also you know indicative of our

034learning. Uh we've had some growth in our benchmark data and we have some challenges in our benchmark. Uh as a staff we also look at grade data. We look at F rates. We look at student and parent perception data. And you'll uh learn more about that belonging as well. And we are just continually looking uh called cycles of inquiry looking as to how we can get better. In our recent benchmark data, we saw an 8% increase in eighth grade math moving out of high risk into uh some risk, no risk or advance. 12% increase in seventh grade uh literacy, 7% increase in eighth grade literacy. More than 58% of our students on IEPs met the growth of target on a read. More than 47% of the of those students met the growth target on a

035math. It's actually higher than our all students. So, we're we're we're really proud of um what we're doing to support just different learners. uh we still have some needs for improvement. Our sixth grade math, sixth grade is one of those transition years kind of like ninth grade at the high school. You just see a dip and so we continue to to fight against that and try to improve those numbers. And we do have some good growth uh from a lot of our students, but we need more of our students across the building growing at high levels. We also as a staff look at great data and rates. Uh there a few years ago we had some teachers who've had uh as high as a 40% F rate and we had a good staff conversation about

036uh what does it really mean to hold kids to high standards. Uh we say at this line high challenge, high support, high challenge, high support. You can't have one or the other. You have to have a balance of both. And so we've worked hard on our grading practices and we talked as a staff and we we had a staff member say, you know, if I get above a 10%, especially above 15% F rate, I start to think about what do I need to do differently to help kids pass. And so it's been a good conversation as a staff. As you see, uh we have each sixth grade, seventh grade, and eighth grade. This is for term two, uh below a 10% rate. We also look at longitudinal grade data over the years, how sixth graders

037do last year, the previous year, this term. Um and so that helps us to continue to improve our grading practices and our support students. We also three times a year put out a student survey and then we use that survey to actually meet with students. This is actually happening tomorrow uh in listening sessions where teachers invite three to six students in that they want to get a sense for what's helping your learning, what's getting in the way of your learning. Uh and then we use this data as a staff to think about how we can better support students. And you see some of the themes that came out in our January survey of students. And so for learning, we have continued cycles of inquiry. We're looking into uh we do learning walks. We uh have

038consistency in our tier one instruction. We do a twice quarterly review of grade data and F rates. uh progress monitoring, review of our CEP process, our school improvement plan. We do fall, winter, and spring student surveys and interviews on learning experiences. We also put out a parent survey. You just got one yesterday. So, check your email in the storm report. You can uh respond to that survey on learning experiences. And we know schools do a lot of things, but we know our bottom line is learning. And so we just keep a focus on that. But we know that kids can't learn if they don't feel like uh they belong, they don't have a connection to school and if they don't come to school. So I'm going to invite our assistant principal, Mr. Q, up to

039talk about attendance and safety, student recognition, positive supports, student voice, belonging. Mr. Q. Thank you, Mr. Good evening everyone. Storm families, ladies and gentlemen of the board. Want to say thank you for being here and giving us the opportunity to tell you all the good things happening at Autos. Truly is a great place to be. Uh I wanted to start with uh some clapping, making some noise. Um first I wanted us to give another round of applause to our bad students for their performances. That was great. Give it up. Second, the students that spoke. Um, most of you out there did middle school. As you can imagine, it's probably the most difficult time in your life to get up here and speak like this. Uh, it's not even easy now for a lot of people.

040So, please give a big round of applause to our students that stay up. Another round of applause supports. Round of applause for our teachers. Round of applause for Mr. Curry, the leader behind all of this. Please give it up for our learning. We really do focus on that. I can tell you that before it was written in policy and before it was um you know on the on the table at these big meetings that we go to, we were all about it already. This is something that was natural for us as a uh this is something that we value and this is something that we we work toward. Um the terms and the different systems and concepts came along and and we uh we made all of that work together. But the the essence of

041it was know when you're there here at RMS. Um in order to feel like you belong first you got to be here. So we're going to talk about attendance. Um and while you're here you got to feel safe. So those are the first two pieces here. Attendance could be better. We all know that. Uh right now our attendance rate is little bit lower than in years past at this time. But I say positive is that we do have 91% average daily attendance and uh we have a very dedicated staff that go and make sure that students that are not here are are accounted for and doing well. So we do follow-up phone calls, follow-up emails. Uh we have a team that uh runs different interventions and checks up on students. uh we have um more

042serious interventions when they're needed, but generally we just try to touch the base and say, "Hey, we're just checking on your student. We want to make a plan with you to help your student come back to school." Um and that works great. When it comes to safety, we believe that it's all about having clear and consistent expectations around how we handle ourselves and how we behave. So, uh, first day of school, we, uh, we get on a Zoom meeting and we talk to all the students in class. And then this year what we started doing was um doing this thing called a behavior briefing which is a 10-minute assembly before lunch where we put the kids on the bleachers right before they have lunch and we talk about expectations talk about our actual discipline policy

043referrals majors minors the different behaviors and outcomes of all of that. Um, this is not to scare students. This is to be clear about what's expected and to tell all of our students how we handle things and and how they're being protected through our discipline policy. So, up there you see officer Rehan. He is one of our assigned SRO's, resource officers. He's really great. Um, what I've learned is that a lot of cops when they get into doing uh the cop thing, they don't think of being in school, uh, working with kids all the time. They think of, uh, being on the streets, beating, catching bad guys. But, um, he has come in and he's been very, uh, enthusiastic about doing good carry at school. So, he was gracious enough to come and talk to

044our students. Again, not to scare anybody, right? but to just be clear about, hey, it's important that we are safe here at school. There are things that we want to prevent you. There are things that we want to protect you from. And so, he was there to to symbolize all of that. And uh it went over well as you can see the uh the enthusias um really big on student recognition. So, uh this came naturally. This was um our PE teachers uh Miss Bakis, Miss Walton, Mr. Bodin. uh they started this new thing of honoring students in PE. They started taking pictures. They sent the pictures to us. We decided to put that on a big slide that we use here every day in the commons. Uh we see the commons as another classroom, a

045way that we can reach kids. Um it's a pretty crazy classroom if you think about it like that, but it's fun. We have a lot of fun out here. Um, we put these slides up and kids come in and they get to see that not only are they recognized at a classroom level, but now the whole school gets to see and we we've seen a big increase in again the excitement behind that too. This was a kindness challenge that we did recently. Um, this got a lot of participation. Our students had this checklist that they would come and get on the do all these great things. And then here in the common classroom, they would run up to myself as Mr. Kirby and go, "I did it. I did. I did it. I was kind.

046I did this. I did that." We spent a couple minutes talking to them about their favorite um kindness uh you know, accomplishment that they've done. And then we hand them a big w of bucks. >> So, uh is it a bribe? It's just motivational. So, we give them bucks. Uh and really, you know, it's just about increasing the kindness and giving students an intentional way of doing that and also rewarding students for going above and beyond for doing that. Who did the kindest challenge of behavior? >> Probably. Um here's a pretty interesting thing. Not only do uh our staff members, you know, discuss kids and nominate kids for students of the month and things like that. Uh, but our kids nominate teachers for certain things. And, um, one of our things this year, we're working

047kids. You guys know the question that we're asking brothers. I paid you to see this. We ask students to name teachers that have helped them build confidence in the classroom. And of course, we have to talk about what that means. What does it mean to have confidence in the classroom? But um after a couple iterations of this, um it's it flows pretty well now. We do paper surveys. We did a Google link a few times. Um we had kid come kids come with video. But uh these students that nominate teachers uh their teachers found out about this in staff meetings that we have and I gave the actual forms to them. Uh they get to see the words that were spoken about them and uh that's when we need to bring extra boxes of tissues

048to these staff meetings because as you can imagine it's it's very very touching to hear from students about your impact on them or how they experience you. Uh, I haven't been nominated and but I'm not even I'm not I'm okay. >> Here's a fun. >> Basically, uh, what we're saying here is that we are for about students. It's not something that we do just that level one, two, or three. Uh but essentially we want you guys to know that uh we're not simply consulting students getting information from them. We want to make them a real part of our school and and giving them an opportunity to have real voice and it creates real change. Um it's not easy. There's a lot of work that goes into that as you guys have seen already. Um but

049we take this stuff very seriously. Our kids run our school in a sense and that's what we want. Here's another funny graphic. It goes in a circle. You see at the top it goes around. Basically, Mr. Curry talking about the tier one for everybody. So, at the very first box at the top, it's all about tier one schoolwide surveys. We break that down, examine the staff. We take more surveys, do more uh information gathering at the classroom level, break that down, then we go into one-on-one student interviews, which you see here in a second. We break that down, make change if we can, examine our systems and our policies, and then we run the cycle all over again. So that's just a visualization that Mr. Curry talked about this. Um, but we want you guys

050to know that this is also a big part of our student voice piece and our parent voice piece. Um, allowing everybody to have a say what's happening and knowing that we are taking that part and we we make adjustments for the possible and let everybody be heard. That's just another piece of it. Here's an example of that oneonone information gathering that I talked about. It's not just surveys. This these are empathy interviews. Uh the students hear this as listening sessions. We actually have this going on tomorrow. Have any of you been selected to be a part of our listening session? Josa. Um teachers sit down with students and they just let them talk. They ask them a few questions opened. But really the the main point here is giving students a space to voice their

051opinion, voice their experience in school, uh talk about what's going well, talk about uh what they'd like to see changed. And again, we learn that cycle. So this is just what it looks like in the classroom. The students who are not getting an interview, they come into the common, we take them outside um and they have a good time there as well. So they uh they take turns getting selected by the teachers and the ones that get chosen have a reward too. So there's something in it for everyone. Here's some graphics on teachers and how they feel about these uh student interviews and u interviews and listening sessions. um our staff overwhelmingly say that they like this and they want to keep on doing this. Uh and this is something that has been um a

052very fundamental part of our culture as well when it comes to belonging and listening students. Now here you'll see that um all of the domains of belonging are above 80%. Now, to me, what stands out is that when it comes to tier one, which uh can out there, can you raise your hand if you've heard educators talk about tier one at some point, tier one instruction, tier one systems, it's a is a term for meaning like something that everybody hates in school, right? So, with our tier one belonging systems, which you can see is that well, let me back up. Tier one is supposed to cover 80% of your students are supposed to have a positive effect on 80% and then out of that 20% you run your tier 2 interventions and then for those

053that still need you to run tier three. So it gets smaller and smaller. With tier one interventions you can see that boom 80% of our students have been positively affected by our systems. Uh so that shows that our tier one is effective. Last but not least, did I see Al? >> I talked too much. Sorry. We'll talk to Alison tomorrow. Um, it's not just systems, it's not just policy. Um, it's not just uh nice graphics on the board. Um, when we say that belonging is a valuable, we really mean it. Uh, kids raise your hand if you know Alison. Of course. So Allison is a very special student in one of our special programs and uh she has a heart. Um the biggest I've I've seen any kid I think in um she's so confident,

054so brave and she's so Allison and earlier in the year she um she can see the kids playing basketball at lunch and after lunch after the kids put the balls away she would come up to self Mr. Curry and she would ask if she can shoot hoops. Now this time we're at the last five minutes of lunch. What's the expectation? Last five minutes of lunch. >> Everybody's down. We try to calm it down, lower the heart rate, try to save the teachers that are going to see these kids in a minute. Um, but we cut Alison pray. Yeah, great to play ball. We started to realize Allison loves shooting ball. She does not love rebounding the ball. And so, uh, there was there was a a gap that we had to fill there. And sure

055enough, we had kids that volunteered that said, "Hey, is it okay if I go help Alison? Can can I go rebound for Alison while she shoots?" Of course, we let them do that. And we thought it was like um just a oneoff kind of thing. Well, it wasn't turned out to be an everyday thing. And Allison has been doing this every day since that first day when she's here, which is most days. She'll go and now it's it's a routine. It's a part of our culture where she will get the ball. Her designated rebounders for that day, which they do change. They go and they stand on both blocks. She shoots the ball, they rebound the ball and every time she makes one, which she is getting better at this, the whole lunchroom claps and

056um she shines, you know. And reason why we show this is because again this isn't a policy. This is created. This is just something organic that came because of our school culture and our students and their kindness and the comfort that kids have with each other. And although Allison is in the special program, like I said, you wouldn't know it. These kids don't treat her like she is. They treat her like she's one of them and they're having a good time. And uh it's very special to see. So, I got to talk to Alison tomorrow. I apologize for talking too much. So, she can see this, but yeah, she she's great. She's getting a lot better at basketball. >> Programs are important, but every time we say people over programs. People over programs. So, we

057got to remember who we're serving in the systems uh that we serve. See the students in the systems that we talk about. All right, we're almost there. Five more minutes, but we want you to hear from a special community member and special parent about how we're increasing our community events, our parent partnerships, our increased transparency and sharing of data, feedback on parents, and soliciting and responding to parent feedback. I'm gonna invite up Becca Cole, our booster club president and awesome Oliver. >> Anyway, I'm very honored to be here today to talk about this topic. It's very near and dear to my heart. Um, building community is something that we worked really hard at between our partnership with Ridgeline and the Booster Club. So, the first thing that I'm going to share with you is uh

058this particular this team night. This is a long-standing tradition at Ridgeline well before my time and this event truly takes a village to put on. So, not only is it wonderful for the students, they love it. Um, especially our sixth graders that are just kind of getting to experience being a teenager for the first time. Um, but also we have a huge huge volunteer base for these events. So, we always have over 20 uh family member volunteers that come in for these. They have a great time. Some of them are repeat people, but we often have new faces, too. And it really is just a great example of Ridge the Ridgeline community coming together to put on an event for our students. So, um you can see the picture on the right is uh at

059one of our events just a a sampling of this volunteer base. Family events is something that we've put a lot of energy into in the past couple of years and three out of four of the events that you're seeing up on the screen are new to Ridge that we've built we've built through this partnership together. Um, one that I really want to highlight is trunk or treat, which we put on earlier this year, which was the first time here at Ridgeline. It happens a lot at the elementary level, but we really had to kind of amp it up for our teenagers, and we had to figure out like how do we do this in a way that feels good for them. Um, so we had a massive amount of family members uh and students put

060on trunks, but we also had a wanted walk in the hallways here at Ridgeline. And we had student actors that were so engaged in this. And Mr. Walter, who you heard from earlier, really led the way on that. He worked for weeks with our students leading up to that, and we ended up with over 500 attendees um for this event. It was huge. We also have family movie nights that we're doing. Welcome. Ridgeline is a a longstanding activity here at Ridgeline for fifth grade families coming into the school. And this year we'll also be putting on a family go blow games and free spaghetti feed, which is new for us. So, we'll see how that goes. One thing I just want to point out is that we this these aren't money generators for us. We're

061really looking to build community. So uh we do that by one of the things is keeping it low barrier by keeping it low cost or no cost. So all of these events are free entry and all but family movie night is the only one we set up in sessions and that's the only thing that there's any cost for it. And I'll briefly just touch on recurring family engagement that we have as well. There's monthly coffee with the principal. We have monthly booster club meetings. The booster club um partners with RMS to do Stormmy store every week and that's where Mr. Q mentioned Stormy Bucks. That's where students can come and spend their Stormy Bucks. We have two volunteers there every week. And then we're trying something new this year that Mr. Co's going to be

062working with RMS trying to connect volunteers with volunteer needs in the school. We're just about to get that going and that is actually in direct response to families saying that they'd like more opportunities in the school to be able to volunteer. So, we're that's on the I will kind of skip because I know we're short on time. There's been some conversation already about the parent surveys and engagement there. So, I will close my piece and turn it back to Mr. Curry by sharing uh on the screen a quick quote from one of our parents recently at a booster club meeting and I think this really speaks to the sentiment that a lot of us family members hold for this is a really caring school and I'm really really proud to be in a space where

063I can partner with Ridgeline to put on so much and I just want to say too when I'm speaking we have We have a large fairly large booster club who's really committed to. So I've said I a lot but it's really a collective we always so thank you very much. >> We also knew these are some of our watchd dogs dads that we have come and spend day with us and help us out at lunch. Uh we have a college career fair that we're going to have in April 22nd of this year. Um there's some from last some of the pictures from last year. This is a way to get a lot of community in to our building. So that's pretty cool. And we'll just continue to reach out to parents. We want to build

064strong parent partnerships. Um, and this is actually the uh some constructive feedback and some affirming feedback that we've gotten on our survey so far. And I want to just end by saying this. Um, we feel like we can solve any problem with strong relationships with our parents. And so, you know, this was an anonymous survey. And so, it was great to get the firming feedback. That's pretty cool. But we look in the constructive feedback and we want this parent to reach out to us because if we're in a meeting with teachers parent about what we can solve these problems together, but we have to communicate and we love that are giving us this information and filling out the survey. We also want information out to us and we want meeting uh with our parents because

065that's a strong relationship that's going to help them learning forward every line. And I want to say thank you for enduring what planned uh but uh we're proud of our work and we're proud of our kids. Proud of our kids. uh and we thank you and would uh would to answer any questions that you may have. Thank you so much. I'll just say that I really appreciate AVID. My granddaughter graduated did AVID at RMS. So, keep going. That's great. And the kids in the reading program, keep it up because reading has to be able to read. It opened so many doors. I'm so excited. >> I'd just like to say to get the kids in to read the program, you are great speakers also. >> Yes. >> Really impressive. >> All the kids great speakers.

066>> I was looking at the girls too. Yeah, it's not easy and we all be proud of >> amazing >> and I just want to add um yeah I went longer than expected but um this is exactly what people need to hear. Um, in in a time where it seems as though all we hear is negative and all you read is negative on social media and uh people focus so much on negative. Um, this is why I love my job. Um, this is why I come to work every day. This is why these adults come to work because of you guys. And um you guys are pretty amazing. And the fact that you stood out here tonight and spoke and shared about your challenges and how you've grown, that's huge. I would have never done

067that in no school. Never. So I want to say thank you for that. Um you guys are a big inspiration for many and uh we're very proud of you. But I think it's Yeah. Give them a round of applause. But in a time when um people only said the negative things um and people are afraid to put positive things out there because they're afraid that they're going to be attacked or somebody's going to say, "Well, my experience wasn't bad. It was negative." uh what we saw and heard tonight uh is just a snapshot of the great things going on in this school district and I'm very proud of you guys and very appreciative of the leadership here as well. Um so thank you very very much. Um this was excellent community. All right, we're going

068to jump right into um superintendent comments. Uh students, you don't have to stick around if uh you don't want to, so don't feel bad if you're needing to walk out. Uh I just want to first uh talk about the uh walk out that happened today. Um yesterday at at some point we found out and got some information of social media uh messaging that was going out about an organized walk out today at the high school at 9:40 a.m. And so um last night we sent out a a message to our families letting them know um that is not something we support. is not something that we encourage and um we are bound by the state law that requires us to um follow attendance policies and so if students choose to leave then we've got to

069follow through on um our regular attendance. Um I will say that I was at the high school today. I got there about 8:30 knowing that this was scheduled for 9:40 and um I just need to say how proud I am of our staff. Uh our staff members carried on like it was a normal day and it really was at the highest school. It was not as big of a deal as people made it on social media. It was business as usual at school. Yes, some students left. I think probably, if I were to guess, probably about 50 students total. Uh, some of those even got excused by parents and so they went into the office, got their note, and walked off campus. Others did not and walked off campus. And I will also say many

070of them had no idea why they were walking off campus. Um, but they had friends that were doing it, therefore, uh, they were also doing it. But I want to go back to the staff, administrators, teachers that I'm planning period, third period, security staff, um counselors were all out and were all visible when uh this happened. And it was not a mass exodus. It was not um anything crazy. It was a handful of students here and there. And actually students would walk out into the common area outside. They were kind of looking around like when's this gonna happen and waiting for something big to happen. Something big did not happen. Um our staff talked to each student as they were walking called them by name and told them to be safe and make good choices.

071And many of them they also said, "You sure you don't want to go to class?" And uh they were with their friends and some actually turned around and went to class and some kept walking. Some students even came back to school after they walked out because they were cold and or they didn't know why they were walking out and parked their way down Neil Avenue, turned around, went back to school. And at that time, um students are made sure that they're not bringing anything on campus that is unsafe. Parents are contacted and they sent to class. Uh, a lot of parents were called today by staff letting them know that their child left campus and um I just think it's important to know that our staff handled this very very well and I think um

072the really the main uh communication that we received as a district was from community members not from parents and uh most of the community members have called Deb and Lisa at the district office and then at the high school. Um the things were uh why would you allow this to happen? Uh why is the school district supporting this? Um those kinds of things. And once it was cleared up that this was not something our district was supporting, this was not something that was led by staff. This was not something that um we were encouraging. And as a matter of fact, students were held accountable um for their attendance just as they would be any other day. Uh by the end of those conversations, people were appreciative and uh thanked us for the information. They did

073not know that, but that um I also want to say that uh people reached out, which is great. if they are concerned about something um I am glad they called whereas many of them just go to social media and uh launch comments without information and these people um I appreciate that they took the time to to call and ask questions and I appreciate our staff for answering. Last thing I'll say on this topic is that our kids are getting bombarded with so much on social media. Um, every moment that they are on their phone, they're getting bombarded and targeted with messaging on social media. It is very intentional and the algorithms um are very very accurate. They're very smart and these kids are being bombarded every day. And so as a community, as families, we've

074got to help our kids navigate these times where they're getting mixed messages of, hey, you need to do this, you need to walk out, you need to protest, you need to do this, you need to do do that. There are many schools in our county where walkouts are a weekly thing. Not every once in a while, it's just another Tuesday in some school. um it is happening all over the place and so we need to continue to educate our kids. We need to continue to um help them to know the value of being in school and that there are appropriate ways to express how they're feeling. And uh as a community, we need to find ways to um help bring those students together to have a conversation to where they don't feel like they have

075to um do something. um out of the ordinary to make a statement. And so I think it was important to address this and to comment on um how proud I am of our staff and um and happy to report our students were all safe. Um but uh very clear that this was not something that we were supporting or encouraging. Um a couple other things real quick. Uh I want to talk about uh capital funds. Have talked about that at previous board meetings. Uh since previous conversations and um you've seen in my bi-weekly communication that I'm sending out to all staff and families um just to continue to be transparent about our budget challenges that we have uh chosen to take some expenses that would normally be in the general fund. We got a general fund

076and then we have capital fund. Capital fund is typically used for um technology for um operations for um repairs things like that. But there are some things on the general fund side of things that you can use capital dollars for. So about $340,000 worth of expenditures we've moved over to the capital side. Um capital dollars are not replenished by the state. those are typically replenished through the bond, um through interest, things like that. So, it's kind of a one-time thing that you can do to help our our budget situation. The other thing we're going to get to tonight um is a resolution to transfer 1.1 million from our capital fund to our general fund. Um this is an allowable transfer of accumulated interest um revenue from 2015 to 2025. That also is going to help

077us because this year uh we are facing uh up to a $4 million deficit. That is just this year. And so how we finish this year is how we start next year. So if we start uh with a deficit next year, that is our beginning or ending this year with a deficit. That is our beginning spot next year. So, not only do we have this up to $4 million deficit this year, um we have an 8 to10 million deficit next year um because of a loss of levy dollars. That again was about 15% of our budget, about 15 to6 million that we have slowly been chipping away at. And so, this is the reason we're looking at capital dollars to see if there's any way to get one-time relief. And basically all that does is

078kicks can down the road um for the cuts or for levy dollars to come in. So again, we'll talk more about that resolution and uh two last things on here. Um I'm going to continue to do my bi-weekly communication uh to families and to staff um all with the same information every two weeks. Next one will come out February 20th. Uh that's where I am talking about any updates having to do with our budget um having to do with binding conditions which we are still in and um just giving updates to everybody so that they know our exact position and then uh last thing that I'll mention uh social media and parent square we have finally uh regained control of our um of our uh Facebook which we didn't have for months and months because

079we were in Facebook jail uh because of a comment that was put on there. Somehow someway Facebook then locked us out and months it was last spring that Terry which she was our communications director and work with them. By the way, you can't talk to anybody in Facebook just in case you wanted to know. We now have a backdoor way to be able to post on Facebook. Uh but that is it. Uh we can't do anything else. But thanks to Debbie, she is consistently pushing out messaging on Facebook. And then you also heard about Merit Square, which is our new communication to families. We're also pushing it out there regularly. We'll continue to share the good news through those platforms so that families can see more of what you heard and saw tonight and maybe

080a little less of what you might read on social media from those that are uninformed. U so that's all I've got for my comments and then community comment. We do have uh one person signed up. We have Tony here to speak on the student walk out. Tony, I'll come meet you in the podium with microphone. 00 for comments on non-aggenda items. The board will listen but not engage in discussion or take action tonight. Non-aggenda items may be referred to the administration for followup. Comments are limited to three minutes per speaker and 15 minutes per topic. Please note that comments directed the performance of specific school personnel are not permitted. All remarks must be appropriate for an open public meeting and presented respectfully. board president must have by added these expectations and disruptions beyond the comment

081period may result. Additionally, the board silence during public comment should not be interpreted as agreement or endorsement of the speaker for months. Our role during this portion is to listen. We value your participation and appreciate your cooperation in helping us maintain a respectful and productive meeting environment. >> You done? >> I think I'm ready for now. >> Okay. >> Well, I'm on your side on this. Uh my name is Tony. Um I was on the school board in Southern for 20 plus years. I'm also employer for 40 some odd years, student school district. So I have something to how this all goes. I'm shocked that there aren't more people signed up. shocked. There weren't people here that were kind of blind and simple about the protest and the comments as you all know were very

082much um critical of the school district which I thought was horrendous. the comments were apprentice and I came here primarily to make sure that there was a balance in how the comments went because I thought um you know I don't necessarily agree with everything in these circumstances but I thought that the comments were gross and fair since I'm about 90% retired I get a chance to read all those comments ahead of her uh I want to say a couple things though um and this is directed partly towards the district but I think partly towards people in the audience because this stuff gets back to people. A lot of the stuff that people talk about is just plat wrong in terms of the facts and fat and wrong about what people and what the district can

083control. And there's certain things that you can control. There's certain things that you can't. When you're talking about things that are governed by the law of the state of Washington, the school board just doesn't have chance to fix those things. You can't change what the law says. can't change certain things in terms of the way the law requires you to do things. Things like policy and how you treat that kind of stuff you can change. But when these district when these people get on social media and complain about things 95% of the time, it's not something that the school district can change. And when you see the critiques that come out, especially when they're um you know, they finish up with calling calling everybody liars and all this other stuff, it makes the comments in

084effect that plus just it just boils my blood. And I think that um people need to understand if you're going to come up here as a protester or as a person that wants to have a comment and direct the school district to do other things, you need to do it smartly, you need to do it with some knowledge. And those kind of comments don't really help anything. The stuff that's been printed out on all social media recently, it's just disgusting. It's vile. That's blaming teachers, administrators, and this board for things that are just ridiculous. Blaming teachers, administrators, and the border or the protesting hit is is ridiculous. And you said this this wasn't generated by any staff at the school district. I think that should be emphasized more. And I realize that you as a

085board and you as staff can't really do very much in terms of saying this wasn't our fault, but I think saying this wasn't our fault should be emphasized more. I I was pleased to hear you say that you were proud of the way this the staff handled the ball and I agree. I think that I mean we're dealing in a world today where simply saying I'm proud of the way it handled it was handled. You're essentially saying they did a good job. But the goofballs of the world that's not enough for them. You almost have to grab them by the neck and say, "Hey, we did the right thing here, guys. Knock it off." Again, I I understand. I'm not stupid. understand you can't do that any more than you can take a bunch of

086high school kids and chain them to their desks, which is what people want to see happen. People are commenting on social media, you have to force these kids to stay. Well, you can't force a teenager to sit at his desk. You cannot make them do that. And the people out, not necessarily you folks in the audience, but people that are posting on social media need to understand. And I I understand there's a limit to how much you can politicize your actions, but sometimes we need to understand that. I think the district needs to be a little more forceful now in response. Again, I get I get completely how difficult that is and the fine wire act that you're having to do. But on the same token, I think when when you have people, it's it's

087like a comment you made, you know, the staff is really teaching kids to do the right thing. But what that interprets as when it comes out in public is we're teaching these kids to do the right thing, which is we're teaching them to protest. You know, that's not what you said, but that's what people think so often. So, I would just encourage you to be as creative as you can and making sure that's not the message that is in any way, shape, or form getting out there. And again, I don't know how the hell you do that. That's why you guys are the educators, but you understand that people are getting on social media and talking about the fact that you're you're just, you know, all you're doing is is indoctrinating kids and they don't

088understand. And I think a lot of people don't understand how difficult it is to be a teacher, how much work it is, how dedicated it is. They think it's just an easy job. You come in and put your feet upon a desk and fled your paycheck. It is a terribly difficult job. Everybody that studied it, been around education, been around educators, they understand how tough this work is. It's not something you do on a whim. And I think the more people understand that, the more people in in the general audience that that understand that and publicize that, I think that's a message that needs to be pushed as much as you possibly can. And and I, you know, I it's not something I suppose I could some more than get paper. Um, the other thing

089that I've encouraged this for years is that protesting and and I'm I'll finish this up more time but protesting there is some value to protesting and even though you know I like the Vietnam Holy cow wait but the protesting the idea that when kids protest if they learn about it and they learn what happens and they learn that you do it peacefully and you learn that you have to deal the consequences, you know, you come back and the consequences here at school, if those kids walked out, they have a suspension or whatever the appropriate thing is. If the consequences at home, a lot of the guys that are seeing stuff on social media, they're getting punished by their families. So they know that if they protest and they do something that they're not supposed to,

090there's something happens when they're at school, something happens to their mom or dad kicks ass to get home or their kids friends that I used to be friends with, those guys are giving them a lot of hell when they get home. If that's dealt with in a school setting, if the if the schools say, "Look, you guys, this is what happens when you protest. This is the way things are dealt with. It's not all great. It's there is a there's a price to pay. If you if you do that setting in school, it's it's a it's a teaching moment or a learning moment. You know, sure they're going to miss a class of calculus or whatever class they're taking was calc, you know, been doing it for 10 years, but at least the fact that

091they have some value that comes out of it. I know you can't advertise. go ahead and protest and there you get extra few credits for it under your grades. But there is some value to it. And if parents would understand that a little bit and understand that maybe there's something to gain, it might be something positive. And if kids understood that there's a consequence and they have to deal with it, it might be worthwhile. So I, you know, I support what the district does and did. I wish you the best of how this is going to happen because I don't think it's going to end anything soon. I hope it stays peaceful. I hope that it ends up looking well for you, but you know, it's just a tough situation. I wish you the best.

092So, there you go. >> Thank you, sir. >> Um, moving on to item four, new business contracts. was approved. >> Any discussion? >> I just want to point out a couple uh retirements on here. Um every year when you see retirements, um each one of those retirements is uh a pretty special story and we'll have more opportunities obviously later in the year. that you see Gary Clling on there. Uh somebody who's been around a long time and and will certainly be missed. Don Craves, Don Lance, uh Mike Riley. Um you start to see names of people that have been in the profession a long long time and and or been in the L for a long long time. And so I just think it's important that uh we we talk about them and recognize them.

093a lot of opportunities this spring, but um it's also sad to see some of these folks that um have been around such a long time and had such a positive impact. But uh you'll see probably more as we move forward into the stream. All in favor? >> I opposed. Motion carries. Item B, resolution 032526, transfer of capital project fund to general fund. We have a motion second >> discussion. >> I'll just reiterate again. Um, this resolution allows us to move $1.1 million from capital fund to our general fund. Um this is an allowable transfer of accumulated interest revenue uh from 2015 through 2025 um and held in the guide fund. Again, this is the one time help. Um it's it's like your savings account. Uh once you spend those dollars, they're gone. So they're not

094reoccurring dollars. So it helps us immediately with our deficit. It does not help us long term. It just buys time uh for us. And so um the other thing is that we're legally allowed to do this. This is something that we've been um discussing with the ESD also discussing with OSBI and we are looking at other capital funds as well to transfer over to help with our deficit um not only to get us right this year but to start us off positive for next year and eliminate as much of that um that we're going to have to cut for next year. So I'll be bringing you more opportunities. We can talk about that steady session. >> Any any questions or the discussion on that? >> Not right. I'll have them later. But I think all

095in favor motion carries. We'll move into the board comments. You have a link to pass them to the end. Thank you. Okay. Um, yeah, super comprehensive presentation by RMS. Um, I know you guys are like, "Oh, it was so long." But I I really appreciated that. I didn't go to RMS, but my brother did, and he's never really liked school. But he had a lot to say about RMS. So, wonderful job you guys. And I love the topic of literacy and reading cuz since I was a kid, I've been a pretty passionate reader. Um, it was a really recreational thing for me when I was younger. My mom always told me that when she would try and read me bedtime stories, I would snatch the book out of her hand and pretend to read because

096apparently I was like two years old, so I didn't actually know how to read. But I eventually sort of taught myself. Um, unfortunately as I kind of climbed up the education ladder and you get to like middle school and high school and you have teachers throwing books at you and going you need to read this number of pages by day and you know you need to do this and do that. You kind of form this like inner rebellion like I don't want to read because you told me I have to read. I don't even want this book. Um, so it it becomes harder and I know that's the case for a lot of students and that's where that um kind of stagnation in literacy comes from. It's from, you know, just that inherent like I

097don't want to do something because I have to. I want to do something because I want to. And so I was thinking back to earlier today um or yesterday I guess I had my one friend come up to me and she was very upset. She was like Sophie like I totally failed my biology exam and you know like I just can't get myself to read these books. Like I just can't like can you help me? And I'm like I'm not sure like we can start meeting up. Um, I'm free Tuesdays, Fridays. Uh, I can I can help you out. So, we met up for the first time this morning. And so, the first thing I do is I go, I know you don't like reading, but give me a second. So, I walk over um,

098and this is in Mr. Clinton's classroom. Um, sportsman is a teacher. So I go over to where he has his whole like library in the back and I pull out four massive books like this big, right? And so I walk back over to her with these four books in my hands and she has utmost terror in her eyes and I I can tell she's alarmed. So I go, "Don't be alarmed." She goes, "No, I'm alarmed." I go, "Yeah, that's fair." And I'm like, I know this is kind of counterintuitive because you told me you can't you're not doing well in class because you don't like reading and I'm now giving you four books to read, but um unfortunately you're going to have to read in a biology class. So, I'm going to try and make

099this as fun as I can for you. So, just hear me out. She goes, "All right." And I'm going for these books and I'm like, "This one is a very diagram picture based book. um this would be helpful like anatomy um or even um physiology progression. And then I go this one's a bit more word heavy. Um if the diagrams aren't doing anything for you, you might want to supplement it with this. This one is a testing book. You might want to look at this, see how much your retention has improved. And then this is just a test. And cuz I know for me, I am not the type of student that can just read a book um and retain information. I need constant stimulation, constant change in order for my learning to progress because

100I know a lot of people, you know, you like read two sentences and then you're like, "Oh, I'm spaced out. I don't know." And so I go, you can read these in the order I just told you, or you could, you know, do the testing first, see how much you know at first, and then you could read the more word based hand book, or you can look at the diagrams first and then input names, the pictures. And so I go, this is a suggestion. I'm going to go to my math class. I'll be back in three hours and we'll see how you like it. So I go to my math class at the college. I go back to the high school and lo I see her at her desk with these four books now kind

101of forming like a question around here and she's so focused I almost don't want to ask her how she's doing but I sit down next to her and I'm like I was like oh and she goes like so and I'm going to give you some vocab I don't know if you know she goes I'm like reaching flow city like this is I'm locked in and you know I could just see the relief on her face that she was finally starting again. And I was relieved because, you know, I was really that I was able to give her the means um to understand her because that was her big problem because the first question I asked her before I even gave her the books was, you know, how do you study? And she goes, I don't

102know. I just look at the slides and do my best. Um, so that was a very happy moment for me and I'm really glad that she's found um her way of studying and it won't work for everyone but there are ways you can make reading exciting and fun and yeah so I think reading is a superpower. Everyone can do it and yes it is integral to not only like your professional life but even like your emotional mental wellbeing history is routine. So oh and of course I can't forget Mr. Clinton our sports medicine teacher he's retiring well from this school at least go to North Carolina and teach him but um I'm thankful I'm graduating at the same time he's leaving because I don't think I could do another year here without him. He's been

103absolutely wonderful. He will be missed very, very dearly. Okay, I got to try my best. I brought my water bottle in the car, so my throat's a little dry. Um, I want to start off with just saying like the pin before absolutely incredible. I'm a pin kid myself, so I'm a little biased, but it was amazing. Mr. Means was probably one of the best teachers I've ever had. So, I'll tell Pierce I said that. Um and then I was also here at RMS. It's just amazing to see the growth that's going on. Um structured literacy program at AVID and alike are just so amazing for the kids and it's just a great way to connect with students, families, and staff alike. It's just so nice to hear. Also, please let the kids know how amazing

104they did speaking. I will not be able to have done that. If I was in middle school, I would just like freeze up. I would freeze up there and be like, "Hey guys." Um, I think that's what I got. Um, I don't have much to add to what Sophie and Haley said, but I also say thank you to the band and then the students for speaking. I think that public speaking is really important and it's really good to grow confidence and it's great that you guys are doing that here. Um yeah, the band did amazing. Uh they could definitely compete with our high school band. They were great. It was awesome. And then along with the ring, uh me personally, my family when I was younger in elementary, middle school, my dad was in the

105army and so we moved around a ton. And I think it was when I lived in Virginia, I got put into a program much like what they're saying and it just helped me phenomenally like having radiating. It was like once a week we met and I was so behind her and then I caught up with everybody and it's definitely done me very much good. So I'm happy to hear that we're doing something school. And then along with Abbott, uh I was in Abbott, although I did go to YMS. It's a little bit different over there. There's one class for seventh grade or no, I think I don't know. And I believe I was also asked to do some sort of presentation in front of somebody and I said, "Yeah, because that sounded terrifying." And there

106was a couple girls that came up to the table at the start of this meeting and they were talking about how worried they were and everything. And she I'm still worried. My heart's beating a little bit extra right now. Um it does or I assume it does get easier, but it definitely tastes good. And so for them to just jump out and especially seventh grade, that's insanely impressive. I would have never have been able to do do that. So, they're great. And yeah, that's kind of all I have to say. Thank you. And thank you to the kids. >> Um, I uh would like to say thank you for hosting us. That was a a great evening. It was long. It was long, but it was important to hear all this stuff. There's a lot

107of positive uh information and we get we've been bombarded by so much negativity. And I will say I did have one community member uh storm the lumber yard and come and sit at my desk. Um was I rate to say the least about the students. Um but uh I don't know whether he was more irate that they uh had walked out that they were protesting or what they had said to him and I just talked to them and said well you know we they're not on school grounds and they walked out except you know their parents got to deal with them. They walked out of the school and so uh they weren't on school property and uh he's you know ratt and raven and he finally left he wasn't happy when he left but he

108wasn't ranting and raven when he left. Um um but you know the one thing I will say about the kids there's two sides my my fellow board member ex board member sitting in audience always tells me there's two sides to every story. There's two sides to every story. And for all the years that we shared the board together um I'll try to be brief here. There are two sides to the story and our students that exercise their right to walk out of school and go down there and protest. I would love to sit down and have a conversation with him as a citizen of this country, as a veteran of this country, and give them the other side of the story of the reason why they are protesting. and let them understand the other side

109of the story and why they are so freely going down there and holding up their signs with what's written on there and they're able to do that. So, I would love to sit and talk to them and give them the other side of the story as someone who signed a check that doesn't ever expire on their life and let them know why they're able to do that. I'll talk to them anytime because as a veteran, I'm giving them that right to do that. >> Well, fellas still remain. Thank you so much for this evening. Uh great presentation. It's obvious that there's a lot of effort. There's a lot of work, but there's a lot of effort that goes in. There's a lot of care. And so, uh I appreciate that sincerely. And for those of

110you that remain tonight, thank you for being here. I think it's important and it's does me good to see community members involved. Um, uh, Superintendent Woods, thanks for sending out that notice last night. I know that was a bit last minute. Um, one thing that I am excited with our we have a great community and there's there's a lot of opinions and not a lot of facts and so making an effort to get the correct information out. If there's questions, uh, I I'd like to make a call on our community to, um, route them back to the district and and and feel free to give out. I I had one phone call today from an upset individual and it ended rather quickly and they were pleased with with the conversation. Um, and I find that

111happens more often than not. But we have a lot of work to do here in Yung. And in the two and a half very long months that I've been involved so far, most of the time and effort that I've spent has been putting out fires and um, addressing a bunch of garbage information. And so there is a large community here that um that cares deeply and I would encourage you to to not be silent. We don't need to be getting into fights and bashion and saying ugly things. Be respectful. Be kind. But please speak up. Please communicate. And if you don't have the information, then direct them back to people that do have the information so that the facts can be delivered and so that we can get back to the very very very important

112work that we have in common. So um I know that was that was a a last minute um request yesterday to send out some information, but ultimately just to say this is the truth and can we move on from there. So um the kids did great. band was amazing. I get to listen to him all night. That was pretty awesome. So, thanks. >> Well, a lot said, I'm going to make it my portion way way shorter here. I would like to thank the Hawai excuse me RMS band for entertaining us and uh to the RMS Savage students for showing what they can do when they have a program like this. And on the walk out today, my thought is a lot of the kids that probably left really didn't care. They just wanted to get

113out of school for a while. But and my other thought on it is if they want a podcast, they can do it after school, before school. I'm fine with that. So, and uh I believe one of the Seattle area schools said they weren't going to charge any of the kids with an absence because they went to the Seahawks break. So, so what do you do? They'll make this a lot quicker than normal so my kids not to wait the whole thing and pick them up from resting practice for too long. Um, thanks for the presentation today. These school presentations are always a really good reminder of why why we work here, why we're doing what we're doing because our job isn't fun. Um, and it's not paid and it takes us away from our day

114jobs a lot of the time. Makes it harder harder for us to live. Um, as far as, you know, the community goes, this is a community I grew up in. This is a community I love. I've been here my whole life. Um, I got a lot of calls yesterday and a lot of calls in the morning. I had to step out of the work and I called Chris immediately with what I was hearing. Um, and I was extremely impressed um with Chris's response and the high school admin response to the information that was being sent out because I was getting it kind of live from a friend who has a kid at the high school. Um, with that being said, I flipped to social media during my lunch break and it was pure chaos as

115it usually is. And I'm this probably isn't for the people in this room because people in this room aren't the ones that are are on social media all the time, but if we would take half of the time and energy we spent arguing on social media and actually put it back into our kids and into the people of this community, this community would be thriving. And those people that do put the time in, they are here and they're still working. But the vocal minority on social media is it's pushing them aside and making it seem like this community is tatters. And so I just it's kind of another call to action that don't let politics consume your life because the last 8 years, 12 years, 16 years, heavens knows how long it's it's created this

116division in this entire country. And all we want to do is be right. and we're so sure we're right that we're willing to fight about it and we're not raising a new generation to critically think or to reach across the aisle and it's okay to be different. It's okay to have different beliefs, but it's not okay to behave the way we're behaving. And if we're going to get this thing back, we got to start working together regardless of political affiliation or belief um and fix this thing because otherwise it's it's not going to be fixed. So that's that's all I got for today. All right. Um, couple things. Uh, unified basketball, unified basketball is our high school students with special needs. Um, play basketball with their peers um with students that that don't have special

117needs. And so, four weekends, four Saturdays, um, our students get to go play against uh, Olympia, Tum Water, North Thirsten, the Riveridge, Tumor Line. Um, I think that's it. And, uh, last weekend I got to go, uh, went over to Olympia High School at 9:00 am and watched them from 9 to 11, uh, three games. It is the greatest thing you will ever go watch. If you have not watched Unified Basketball, please go. Um, you got to see a little bit of Alison. I've already talked to her and asked her if she's going to play when she gets to high school, and she says she thinks so. But, uh, you have an opportunity. Saturday morning, uh, we host at 9:00 a.m. at, uh, Neil High School is their last unified basketball game. Um, and we

118have so many kids that they end up playing about three games and they'll use both gyms. Um, but I would say for anybody, if you could go, go support these kids. Um they have so much fun and they are smiling the whole time and uh it is one of the greatest things that you will ever watch. Um this next week we have our binding and conditions meeting with the ESD and OSPI on the 18th. Um so that's our next one which I've been again bragging about every two weeks um on my communication to families. Uh that one is where they'll look at the adjustments we've made. so far, including what we just did tonight, the resolution that we made, they look at everything um budget related and say, "Okay, how are we doing? Are we

119making progress?" If we're not making progress, that's when they say, "Uh, we're going to put together uh a financial uh advisory committee to then take a closer look or, hey, you're on the right track. Good job. You're staying finding conditions. will meet again uh next uh quarter. So that meeting is happening this week. Uh we have a steady session Thursday. Uh good news, we have 15 policies and procedures that we are looking at. You got an email today from Debbie. Um only 91 pages, so it gives you a week to look those over. Uh but thankfully many of them are just minor changes. their um boilerplate language that uh when legislation changes uh we have to make changes to policy. Going back to my presentation I did at the high school around the different levels

120of policy critical recommended or uh policies that we as a district want to put in place because they are important to us in our community. Uh some of the ones we're bringing to you are critical and some are recommended. So um you have a week to look those over. The study session is just to discuss them obviously. Then after that you have to have a first reading at a board meeting. Then you have to have a second reading at that following board meeting. So there's process. Um but just wanted you to know. And just a reminder when this legislative session is over there will be more changes to policies that we then have to look at. It's always changing. uh we never get finished with policy and procedures. Um they're always being changed and many

121of them um are done to us, not necessarily with us. So keep that in mind. Um and then uh in addition to policies, we'll be talking budget and talking to you more about um uh capital transfers that we would be allowed to do to help us offset the deficit that we're facing. Uh last event that I'll share with you February 24th, uh Boys and Girls Club of YM, there's a fundraiser at Y Cinemas starts at 4:30. Um they did this a few years ago. It is a great event and the proceeds go to our yellow boys and girls club and um tickets can be found um online or uh let me know. I'll send you guys some information about that. But uh it's a it's a great event. Last thing I'll say just to wrap

122up um I don't go aboard meeting without saying transparency or transparent because it's my favorite word. Um as it relates to the event that we had today, I think it's important that people know how we go about this type of thing. We have um really four types of issues in our in our district in education. You've got student, you've got staff, you've got parent, family, and social media. The student and staff ones are usually pretty easy for us to get a handle on what's going on, what do we need to do, um how do we need to address it, who do we need to involve to do it. Those are often internal. We address those internally. For example, uh what was going on today was very quickly addressed within the system, within the school. Um

123I would venture to say these students didn't say much about it, but I would also venture to say they don't have much to say about it because it wasn't a big deal. Um so that was internally. Then we've got family issues or parent issues that come up occasionally that we have to send out communication about to inform our families. The fourth one, which is also the biggest waste of time, is social media issues. And this is where the five of us or six of us, Frank's not here, we have to wrestle with how much time and energy do we give these social media issues because many of them we address and take care of within our district. So then we have to say, okay, do we have to send out a communication to our community

124because of this issue because there is so much misinformation out there on social media about it. So my question I guess is a a rhetorical question not to be answered here but how much time does our community and our school district want us to be spending on social media issues rather than the first two student and staff and I think we know the answer to that question but that's what we have to wrestle with every time stuff like this comes up is we have to have this conversation with us of, okay, is this something we've got to send out communication on because people are talking about stuff that is so far in left field um and just wrong. We could do that every single day of the week and that is a waste of our

125time in most cases. There are some cases where it is important for us to get good information out, but it's not the best use of our time to always having to be focused on battling the misinformation on social media. We would like to spend our time on the first two things, our students and our staff. And so I just leave you with that. Um but I again want to say thank you to the board um for the work you're doing on your own as individuals answering the questions and correcting the information because you have your own family. You have your own job. You have your own lives. You don't get paid for this and you're fighting the battle as well. So thank you. >> All right. Next board meeting, February 26, 6 PM regular board

126meeting, district office. This meeting is adjourned. >> Thank you.