001meeting of the superior School District Board of Education like to meeting to order we have met official compliance all notifications roll call please Laur gsky here Nick Olen here Brook Taylor here gager here Nick Sher here Sarah mcen here and president olon here at this time would you all please rise for the Pledge of Allegiance I pledge allegiance to the flag the United States of America and to the Republic for which stands one nation under God indivisible with liberty and justice for all this meeting is a meeting of the Board of Education held in public for the purpose of conducting the school district's business and is not to be considered a public community meeting there is a time for comments by members of the public during the meeting as indicated on the agenda members of
002the public wishing to address the board on any of the topics included on tonight's agenda may do so by signing up on a public comment signup sheet near the entrance prior to the start of the meeting the board requests refraining from making any comments involving personally identifiable information about students staff or Administration comment should be respectful focused on items being considered by the board and will be restricted to 3 minutes in length action taken at today's Mee meeting will be final approval unless otherwise noted first on the agenda at our last meeting comments by members of the public the committee of the O heard from the following people about standards based grading Lee Sims Kyle Smith and Tyler Ross and at this time I would entertain other comments by members of the public I do
003see that we have eight people that have signed up to speak seven of the people referred to Lee Sims which I believe may be an attempt to allow Lee to speak longer than the three minutes the board you do have latitude to allow Mr Sims to speak longer than the three minutes I'll make a motion to approve second motion a second Mr Sims to address the board longer than the stated three minutes any discussion meaning 21 minutes like here or what are we doing there's 24 oh seven plus Lee okay Lee are you giving yourself your time I am defer to someone else all right all those in favor signify by saying I I opposed motion carries Mr SS thank you for allowing me to speak again uh last week's uh meeting uh and it's
004unfor I feel like one perspective mainly was allowed to respond to board member questions um I got 3 minutes and the discussion was an hour and a half so to expand a little bit more I get it I get it at last week's committee the whole I was able to hear from teachers and administrators about what the power of SBG is and I believe it I have seen it with my own eyes and have felt the positive change changes in my own classroom regarding how I communicate with my students because of this transition tobg I know I am better at giving feedback to my students about what they've learned what they haven't learned and how to improve I've also experienced and enjoy the benefits of that communication on the parent side of things where my
005focus when talking with parents is about what we are learning about in class instead of just their grade I believe in what was described as the power of SBG because I have experienced it and I was glad I was here last Monday to hear from my colleagues and my administrators about what that power of SBG is however this experience in the growth of communication does not negate supersede dismiss my experience with the dis with the diminished discipline grit and accountability in the learning process on a daily basis and what students actually know and can do I believe most of what I have talked about and what many uh have talked about are symptoms lack of Engagement in formative work not following deadlines not trying on summatives when they already have a grade moving slower through
006the curriculum lower ACT scores these are all symptoms of a problem what is the problem in my opinion so I ask you everyone here why do you come to work what is the number one reason why you come to work sure there may be many reasons but what is the number one priority of why you come to come to work and before you answer thinking about this one of my top five favorite movies Jerry McGuire there's a couple of quotes from that movie and I'm GNA ask you if you can think of one of the quotes and no Mrs Sim is not you had hello but I have a $20 bill here can somebody tell me what I would say the most famous quote from that movie is show me the money show me the
007money right here show me the money $20 show me the money this I would I would ask that we allow Mr Sims to make his presentation that the board refrain itself from any dialogue back and forth you see the current problem with the way we do SBG is that it negates the number one motivator in the real world and that is counting us staff were surveyed this spring about our priorities when considering solutions to our multi-million dollar deficit number one was salary and benefits show me the money last week food service was falling behind uh with inflation so they needed to increase school lunches a dime show me the money salary schedules have changed over the last 10 years show me the money every year we come to negotiate because show me the money what
008we do on a daily basis matters even those little things what we do how we do it and what we get when we do it matters because it counts you do this you get that or you don't do this and you don't get that it is objective accountability we have no such thing under our current SBG model without the number one motivator in the world objective accountability everything becomes personal and this is draining we are told you were better at making relationships with your students these issues would not exist if we're a more engaging teacher these issues would go away and I truly don't believe that's what admin thinks but what else are we teachers supposed to think when issues exist and the only message is make better relationships and be more more engaging we
009must be the problem however time and time again our teachers are told how amazing we are how much of a great job we are doing yet the problems persist I mentioned last week the comments that I and that many of us teachers hear all the time it's formative so it doesn't count I already have a grade for that standard so it doesn't matter the primary focus is on the policy not the teacher so I'm really struggling to find any real world application to how our current SBG practice is reflected in any workplace anywhere yes I know deadlines can be flexible make no mistake teachers have and are willing to work with students when uncontrollable circumstances arise or when people are doing their best but that's not what's happening the learning process formative is optional deadlines
010are optional and and and at times summatives are optional and that is not how the real world works running analogy was offered up last week and it was commented that hey if a student crosses a Finish Line without doing the work of the race good on them tell that to the 14,000 people coming to duth in two weeks all the work that they put in what that looks like is basically the gun goes off the kid hops in the golf cart gets dropped off just before the Finish Line they cross the finish line and then they get the finisher t-shirt having that t-shirt everybody assumes hey you ran the race in the real world you want that shirt you run that race or say we're having somebody build a house would you pay someone because
011they showed you they knew how to build a house no you pay them because they show up every day working hard putting nails and boards and actually building the house because every day comes that's the real world here's another analogy specifically regarding the policy of only taking the highest grade I I know a kid this this part is true I know a kid uh two weeks ago got a $450 feeding ticket uh in front of Catlin or on Catlin Avenue in front of wws so this analogy goes so this kid goes to court to contest the ticket the officer is there to confirm yes they were speeding then the judge says we'll tear up the ticket you don't know $450 you passed your driver's test a while back proving that you know how to drive
012safely and follow the laws and then the judge looks at the officer and says you know officer you made better relation ships and engage the citizens of superior more everyone would stop speeding follow the traffic laws dismissed that is a connection with the reality of what we are doing with that particular policy in the real world when hourly work workers punch for their shift every minute counts and when salaried employees need to take a day off they have to pay a sick day or pay a personal day and if they don't have a day to pay their pay is docked it is reduced because every single day counts imagine our district operating under this system teachers only get paid on evaluation day sick and personal days aren't a thing anymore because it matters not whether
013the teacher is present from dayto day or how good of a job they do for dayto day however on the evaluation day the teacher can show some sort of proficiency and get paid no matter what they've done or not done the previous four weeks to give you a glimpse of what a one would look like for a teacher this would on that evaluation day the principal would basically have made the lesson plan and basically co- tees with that teacher then because the teacher would want their full paycheck a three they asked for some specific feedback re-evaluate the next day do what the principal said and boom they got a three full paycheck but this works so well in the elementary schools I ask you what happens when students choose positive behaviors over negative ones like
014doing their schoolwork their homework helping someone out being nice they get paid at Bryant they get golden tickets or there's Cooper Kudos at Cooper that students can accumulate and buy things they want like toys or clothing or backpacks my own kids are pumped when they buy something with their golden tickets because of the good choices that they make other elementary schools do this and please do not eliminate it now that I've expressed how much it works to motivate kids to choose positive behaviors so what our older students want what motivates them I asked them last week I passed out a short questionnaire and told them which is honest I'm doing some research on how I can be a better teacher by understanding what motivates students interestingly I was a bit taken aback by how many
015students immediately said Sims don't change a thing you're doing great this was also while we were eating cake that several of them made me which said sorry we are annoying those girls talked a lot but I asked them what motivates you most academically the options were learning grades or grades and learning equally sure there could have been more but I want you to guess how many of the 61 students said learning alone two two out of the 61 17 out of the 61 said grades and learning equally that's 28% 402 out of 61 said grades alone that's 97% said they are motivated by grades of course they are that's the payment for their hard work and learning we say it's not about the grade but instead the learning and I think that we're completely missing
016where they are at which is exactly where the rest of the world is too things count I spoke to my principal last Friday about about much of this and I genuinely felt heard and I believe there is interest to get people together beyond the shared leadership group to discuss this however there's very limited time to talk as a board and Community about this and it's summertime regarding shared leadership being the group to address address this as was mentioned last week just because somebody can commit to the time commitments of shared leadership throughout the year and apply for the team why should that mean they don't get a say when problem solving on this big issue and this is a big issue not just an issue for a couple of people who are willing to speak
017at a school board meeting again 81 secondary teachers responded to sf's question regarding which grading system they would choose if given a choice five of the 81 shows our current practice only five leaving the other 75 indifferent or on a spectrum of some change to blending with traditional to scrapping the whole thing then why so few speak up about concerns let me ask you this as a as a hypothetical what if your boss began a new initiative requiring you to complete requiring you to complete a non-anonymous survey asking your opinion on a scale from zero to five five being Allin and zero being I do not want to do this and then all your co-workers and maybe you who chose a zero or one received a mandatory support meeting with Administration about how to get
018you on board do you think those colleagues feel supported wouldn't that set the tone for what one should do when they have concerns there is fear of Retribution for speaking up and that is a fact so why do I speak up because I still believe that together we can tackle our District's biggest challenges I have not given up on us we can do this together we must do this together it's all for our kids and they are worth it even though it's hard to me the situation is very similar to our discipline challenges three years ago month after month teachers brought up the discipline challenges and Labor Management meetings with no progress finally after the district learned that about 50% of teachers at at all levels wanted to quit teaching right now a task force
019was created people came together to listen to each other to learn with each other and we all learned that restorative practices doesn't mean no consequence we made the code of conduct better together and this has transformed our level of behaviors in our buildings we had a group we had Labor Management but this particular issue needed more similar cell phones us teachers got no traction reigning in inappropriate cell phone use until there was objective accountability and I thank you for that use it and you get a referral which is likely to lead to a detention or possibly a cell phone plan do this get that so I offer this solution and I know I've sent this to you but I'm just going to say it now I offer this solution ones across the board still earn
020a passing D minus 60% of the grade same as it currently works and there would be no negative impact on our increased graduation rates because students can still have zero participation in the learning process and obtain basic proficiency on standards with lots help that would not change all twos across the board would earn a c minus or 70% of the grade all threes and above would earn a maximum of 80% of the grade 1 2 3 60 70 80 that leaves 20% for a formative standard or a Spartan grade standard that actually count towards their grade allowing it another thing would be to allow individual teachers to choose how standard scores are determined and I know what we talked it at about this and I think I think we got some good conversation about it
021allowing teachers to choose either the highest score the mean the mode Etc also deadlines must count somehow absolutely nothing about the power of SBG that being communication would change we'd still use proficiency tables we'd still give quality feedback on where students are at and how to improve there is nothing to lose regarding grad rates or communication it would only be gains in what M motivates students and the rest of the world objective accountability I believe the symptoms of our current system would quickly and significantly subside similar to our progress with discipline and cell phones SBG loses nothing with a compromise I'll end with this my father was an administrator for the University of Minnesota so I got to hear a lot about how the the World works the working of things and one thing he
022taught me was that sometimes programs or initiatives once much of their mission has come to fruition begin to only exist for the sake of themselves I keep hearing well if we make changes then it wouldn't be SBG who cares what it's called I truly believe in the gains that we made with the power of SBG and that is communication but in the absence of objective accountability our current practice is left wanting it's okay to be honest about SB what SBG can and cannot do let's Rebrand it Spartan Bas base grading what whatever I don't care ultimately let's do what's best for our students together thank you for your time you this time I'd entertain a motion to approve appr the disposition of minutes from May 13 2024 motion to accept second Motion in a second
023to accept the disposition of minutes from May 13 2024 is there any further discussion hearing none all those in favor signify by saying I I opposed motion carries next is the report of the super superintendent our first is an informational item and do you have the graphic for this or no okay um the last couple years we've been trying to celebrate our guest teachers and we have sent out a nomination form in the spring to our staff asking for some nominations and we've had some great Representatives last couple years this year we want to recognize Tim stradiot he is a regular substitute teacher at the middle school um I just want to say a couple things that um folks said about him get any Nomine students um he's here for the kids he always brings
024his best energy and positive vibes he strives to deeply understand the content he's teaching and follow the sub plan so he recognizes how important those sub plans are and the work that teachers have put into those and he really works hard to try to make sure that that um is implemented they the way they desire he's willing to fill in wherever he's needed I know the staff at the middle school appreciate him um and last I think one of the quotes that I like the best is that he's a cool cat he's fun and so um we recognized him on the last weeks of last days of school and uh we thank him very much him and a group of his cohorts were together last Friday saw them and they were pretty excited about it
025he's he's a pretty energetic guy and known him for a long time also um that last evening or my goodness last Monday at the the H on June 3 principal riy Ryan Haroldson shared updates on the Great Lakes Elementary School gave a very thorough descriptive plan to us of where they've been where they're going and what some of his uh concerns are for the coming year but can say I really like is implementation of combined LLC with just BR reform all that stuff I think he really went beyond trying to incorporate those new students in the school and it was good to see that it was in our local newspaper as well yeah a followup like that so thanks Ryan for doing that there were no discussion items there were no action items board committee
026reports policies and rules committee no no action items no discussion items informational items that evening at the committee the whole meeting Captain Bill Lear from the Superior Police Department presented the report on the school resource officer program 2324 purer to policy 847 bill was asked a few questions that night I know that he'll get some answers back to us and we look forward to working with Bill this coming school year motion to accept policies and rules committee report motion the second to accept the policies and rules committee report is there any further discussion hearing none all those in favor signify by saying I I oppos motion carries Personnel negotiations committee one action item Administration recommends approval of the June 2024 new hires and separations report move to approve Motion in a second to approve the
027administration's recommendation of new hires and separations from June 2024 is there any further discussion hearing none all those in favor signify by saying I I opposed motion carries there were no discussion items and no informational items accept personal negotiation committee second Motion in a second to accept the Personnel negotiations committee report is there any further discussion hearing none all those in favor signify by I oos motion carries operations committee there's a new action item this evening Administration recommends approval of resolution 24-02 I'm sorry that is not the new one that's not to do compliance maintenance resolution CM summary Mo approve second motion to second or the approval of resolution 20 resolution 24-02 there any further discussion hearing none all those in favor signify by saying I I oppose motion carries second action item was an
028Administration recommends an increased cost for all student and staff launches that will take effect on July 1 2024 motion to approve second Motion in a second is there any further discussion hearing none all those in favor signify by saying I I opposed motion carries there were no discussion items there was one informational items buildings and grounds long range facility update David CR director Business Services walked us through a little bit of that entire plan all the one year two year three year all the way out to 1015 pretty extensive so and then there was a food service update from our director of food service Jamie Wilson new summer food service flyer and then some information of removal of 25 cents per meal charge for reduced status students will take effect on July 1 2024 this
029cost will be subsidized by fund 50 the Food Service account motion to accept the operations committee report second motion a second to accept the operations in committee report is there any further discussion hearing none all those in favor signify by saying I I oppos motion carries the teaching and learning Committee Action item resource approval the administration recommends the adoption of the following curriculum resource to support secondary math courses these courses are needed to meet seven-year curriculum cycle needs and content area standards motion to approve second motion the second to approve the resource or the math course the secondary math courses is there any further discussion hearing none all those in favor signify by saying I I opposed motion carries there were no discussion items informational items tonight we have Kate Tesh our director of continuous
030Improvement and assessment or end of year reports I apologize for my absence I watched the meeting uh in Chicago at oare where I was I like sort of a crank to never be able to leave there for about n hours I hung out I could have driven home uh so thank you I'm here tonight with two uh policy uh requirements for annual reporting I'll start with bullying and harassment since that's up on the screen um the policy states kind of a summary year end with data around bullying and harassment and also some of the uh kind of specifics around what we're doing as a district obviously principles can get way more specific with this so this is a pretty General overview but I wanted to share that with you so in the presentation here I
031have included the two main policies uh related to bullying and harassment it's an anti-harassment policy harassment policy uh so we've got our definition there below on on our beliefs around providing a really safe productive nurturing climate in our buildings and then we break it down more specifically into what what is the definition of harass assment um including those bullets uh verbal physical conduct are both included in that definition and bullying has an additional definition um this is all included in the materials packet so this is all in existence prior to this I think the two biggest pieces of this annual report are really to share with you what what's happening and what resources we have available in the district in the buildings to help teach promote um deal with uh bullying and harassment reports and
032then obviously the data that comes with that I know uh we've had numerous conversations at the board level around the speak up speakout materials and how critical they are in our ability with law enforcement in the community to respond prior to things becoming um tragic and I think that's a really important piece uh to continue to highlight and the funding for that is always held in the balance a little bit so I wanted to speak to that a little bit more tonight uh we utilize uh Second Step K8 as a kind of grounding resource in terms of materials that we can use universally among all buildings for uh preventative instruction around uh bullying and harassment there's a K5 version and a 68 version so they do separate those out into the two levels we have
033a number of materials that we receive from DPI in addition to other resources that our counselors Deans principls are pulling in when needed so this is kind of that Universal piece uh and then we add to that so here are the numbers specific to the bullying and harassment um data in edac climber uh so I think there's a there's an important uh Point around the work that went into developing our bullying and harassment uh investigation process uh it's really important that we document total incidents and then those that are substantiated versus unsubstantiated after the investigation happen so that's why you see three numbers uh there are total incidents 151 uh that reach the level of bullying and harassment in the system uh 113 of those were substantiated 38 were unsubstantiated so on this slide I
034have the school breakdown for you first school is our Middle School I would say that follows typical National Trends around being a difficult time in life where we're all really figuring it out how to interact with each other so that is obviously the most incidents are occurring uh but it does mirror State and National Trend data that I was able to find and then additionally high school for corers Northern Lights and Bryant on that left hand Slide the location incident locations are noted uh classroom is the number one uh location where these events typically occur according to our data I'm go to the next slide but if I need to back up for any questions let me know and then uh ethnicity breakdown and a gender breakdown uh we can drill down into this data
035by student by day by grade Etc I felt like this C these four Graphics C captured um some of the bigger pieces of data but if you have additional questions Ed climber provides us really great filtering ability to look at data very specifically but in general for the policy this was I might have missed it is this numbers of students being bullied or this numbers of students bullying this these are reports of bully bullying reports so being bullied so the demographics are those ones being bullied or doing doing the bullying yeah the aggressor not the victim uh do we keep victim stats then too we do um we keep and have to report a number of pieces to the department as well as part of our bullying investigation we make sure we capture see if
036there's patterns and right like that so okay there questions just Stack Up previous years do we have data on those or we have kept much more accurate data in the last year and I have not given this specific report we talked about that this year so this was kind of where I thought Baseline could be I can call data for you I started there with historical data but it's not it's not lining up we don't have sub this was the first year we tracked substantiated unsubstantiated with an edge of climber uh so I can pull back from State reporting but not CL as we Chang I also think we need to continue training on what is bullying what is harassment versus um disrespect insubordination or teasing there's there's a difference between the word bullying is
037misused often and so we need to keep training on what that surely is so when you say incidents it could involve six students yep pulling one one kid is that the demographics go into that six students yep drill down by the incident by the student obviously W to that yeah thank you yeah is part of that training you're talking about Amy happen when you substantiate or unsubstantiate this so that's like this isn't bullying yes and then there's a training moment there well part of is we work with our principles in August to provide training around the bullying investigation making sure it is substantiated versus unsubstantiated if it's been reported as bullying but it needs to be recoded to something else because it was mis it was miscoded so training principles in August and then yeah
038I would say most of that training happens on one to one at the school level when those things happen but um you know I think we do some of that through Public School works and things too so yeah and the counselors are a big piece of a lot of that investigation to in and Deans at the secondary thanks Kate on that one not going anywhere uh I don't have any graphics for AGR I feel a little broken record but I want to make sure that it's clear uh so AGR is achievement Gap reduction it is a DPI uh semi funded I always is not a fully funded um attempt at reducing class sizes um and originally it has modified over the years um and we have the ability uh in our schools that receive Title
039One funding to use a variety of resources to meet the need for this grant so we have the ability to reduce class sizes under 18 to1 we have the ability to use instructional coach support uh for teachers be able to gain These funds um and then tutoring is also uh a third option uh principles have to report this information by building by year I kind of like to do a summary for all of you for all of the buildings uh but essentially um the the reporting requirement for DPI around the money that we get to support lowering uh class sizes and trying to reduce uh the achievement Gap is pretty minimal um and I look at Dave because I don't a fiscal piece of it um and I think uh the so what we're required
040to do is to create goals by grade level by building and then that we have to principles have to report out on that to the DPI what I like to share one I like you to just be aware so I think it's important that you're aware of that term AGR uh at the elementaries covers grades K1 two and three so it's that early intervention those grade levels at the elementary level we utilize fastbridge assessment data to set those goals so that we have Universal goals at all of the elementary level uh grade levels that are associated with this Grant and we also um report out we set the goal as students will reach the Benchmark which is the 40th percentile nationally or show demonstrate growth from fall to winter to Spring and so we report
041out on each grade level at each building by each assessment so in kindergarten we report out on L sounds and decodable words number sequencing and number identification first grade we report on decodable Words site words decomposing numbers and place value and then in second and third grades we use the Adaptive reading assessment for both reading and the Adaptive assessment for math so it kind of pulls all of those skills together in general I will always come back with the specific data in my fall report but in general um we saw some really solid growth at our first grade level this year our kindergarten saw some really solid growth as well um we continue to support pockets of where we're seeing some stagnant growth across the district and continue to investigate into that but in terms
042of the reporting requirements for AGR the principles will get all of that information submitted here in June to the DPI thank you you thanks for coming back tonight also that evening Aon leers Robin reckinger Wendy Bender fzy Caitlyn zrock Kyle shur had a present ation about secondary standards based grading Dina Hagen from director of student services can you speak on that sorry I'll be brief because I already talked last week and I apologize I don't have a nice print off Le to Trump but you know first of all I want to thank you Lee and everybody else not just Lee it's you know we spoke for good group of individuals here about SPG and I appreciate the email as well information um I think it's hard to ignore you know we we talk all the
043time about having data to back back up our decisions our choices that we make and we have physical data here we have teachers we have experts in my opinion lot of Staff 20 years plus have spoker reached out to us um they're the expertise they're the ones that are in the classes implementing SVG every single day and I think it's important we start listening to the staff as a as a whole in regards to this this topic um I think we as a board do have the ability to bring up this topic and look into it and try to fix it and try to help um there to be I guess a mutual understanding on spvg and how we can all come together and make it better um you know I I heard the comment
044last week and I know Lee said it I wrote it down before he said but one of the comments that were made is if we change something then it wouldn't be SPG my opinion is doesn't matter if we call it SBG doesn't matter if we call it traditional I think all that matters is that we make a a system a grading skill whatever you want to call it something that works for the superior school district and not C necessarily what it's called um it's it's pretty clear clear and obvious to me that while there are benefits to it there are also cons we've heard plenty of the benefits we've heard the cons we can't sit back and just ignore the cons um we as a district have a motto of all means all we've heard
045it so many times month after month it seems like but it's not something we necessarily follow SBG in its current state does not meet all means all there's there's students that are natively affected div there students that benefit from it we got to come together and find a way if we truly mean all means all to find a way that it benefits all our students otherwise we should throw that model out the window and consider it unattainable if we're not going to even entertain how we can reach every student uh through this through this uh grading specific um we agreed last month that we would talk about this again at a at a board level I think it was uh put off October but I really think it's important that we as a board and
046a district um try to push this a little sooner with the teachers with the staff getting both those groups together and really sitting down and uh talking about it and trying to find a way to fix it you know I've I've heard tonight uh some suggestions on how how we can go about fixing it um and I think that's important that instead of again this isn't uh one group against another group saying well we're told dogs we should just do SBG and that's it and we got another side saying well this is how we can fix it this is how we can compromise almost in a sense I think we need to come together and figure out how we can compromise and how make SPG something that our district um can be proud of and
047our student and all our students can and use to their best ability because I do want to see a High graduation but I also want to see students retaining knowledge um retaining the abilities that they're going to need in the real world not necessarily for college but for higher higher employment outside of college I think we are lacking and we need to come up with something better I think the formative does need to be looked at and I think we as a again as a board and a district can say let's get together let's let's put a meeting in place let's let's talk about it let's find a happy compromise and make it the best we can so I won't say much more than that LE I and the rest of you I completely agree
048with you on on this topic and I I guess I won't ech Echo anym that LE says he summed it up very great but I think we as board need to start listening two years of data for surveys that data has not changed we need to start listening to our data our experts I mentioned um this after the last meeting I didn't know that it was going to come up but I I don't deliberate board ultimately does what it wants but I I feel compelled as legal advisor to have to speak to that issue after the last board meeting the this is a policymaking board and individually getting into the topics that you're you're getting into board has discretion wide discretion to do a lot of things but going into making determinations on a fixed
049for standard based grading is not a policy is not a policy board decision it's it you can control that to some degree through the administrators but it's just a scope question and I'm I'm alerting you to it I I don't stop you Mr Sim certainly entitled to speak everybody should speak things should be aired but there there is a there are parameters which the board should operate and because it's a policymaking board I've not seen a situation where the board essentially stepped out of that role to undertake what would be like a director of Educational Services decision that person could be disciplined by Amy or Amy can be overseen by board but effectively that's this board stepping into making a determination that is then the educational experts that you hire for that role so it's
050just a caution I I thought about it long and hard after last week I didn't know what was going to happen last week it did it seemed like some of the presentations went One Direction and then some of the speakers went other directions but I was it occurred to me at the time and there seemed to be a lot of interest in it but I would I would not doing what I should be doing for this board if I did not say what I just so Kyle is that I understand that this may not be a board decision but is it okay to have these open discussions because there really is no other forum for that well that that again that'll get into me having to address some things that I probably shouldn't wander into
051but that's that's where you have control over the administrator if if if there's discussions that are happening internally and Forum being provided which I understand there was some arguments about that questions could be asked about whether the Forum is being provided or not but this there's a there's a ton of things that this board doesn't provide a forum for you if if somebody says my child received a PID that I don't like the board doesn't get to do that the teacher gets to do that if the teachers problem with the parent and it's parental it goes to the building principal it goes to the education it goes to to Dr stari so I think I just add I've I've asked the board multiple times to allow us to and Crystal to work with the teacher
052identify our issues that need addressing and it's been seven days so yeah of time and only shared leadership to meet meeting tomorrow we have this on the agenda to talk about next steps with a large group of teachers to talk about next steps yeah and so well so I agree with Kyle to an extent with the superintendent here she can sit here and hear our concerns we might not as a board facilitate you know the changing of of a program but the superintendent can sit here and listen to our concerns listen to the concerns and the superintendent or M we're calling you these days and facilitate that she's got the authority to facilitated that and it's important for her to hear our concerns as a f whether you agree with it or disagree and I've
053heard I've heard your concerns I've heard our teachers concerns on all sides of the spectrum and now we need to sit on with teachers and do the work so and so then my question is because again we talk about the chain of command and so if people have followed that protocol and have gone to the principal and have gone you know to you the next step is always the board so how does that I'd argue some of the problems haven't gone through a process for us to be able to problem solve those okay is there harm in having the conversation between us because that's the only time we can speak the only time and for us to have a and so you can have conversations with the administrator you can have conversations you know between
054non Quorum groups of members the the concern always is the precedent that's being set scope issues on a board and it really has nothing to do with this issue I as a human being I listen to both sides and I I get the debate as as a human but as a matter of precedent scope questions are always one of what kind of edent is being set because effectively if if if this kind of decision can be taken and made and redirected at a board level why can't a parent come in and say I want this board to change my child's grade the contrary of that is when you have an individual something true but we've kind of it's kind of spurred into more of a a district situation it's a districtwide it's not something that's
055necessarily just one child one family you could change you could change my hypothetical and you could say there was a teacher that was uh say soundly many members of the class parents of students that were in a particular teachers's class didn't think a teacher was doing something direct correctly something like that could happen if that person came here and said I want to talk to the board about that teacher that would be completely inappropriate so that's my concern runs not not to the issue I have I have zero dog in the fight again I I respect Mr Sims lot I consider him a friend it's it's just it's 100% based on what generally speaking I mean I get retained in different contexts to give seminars on boardmedical there has to be a chain and there
056has to be a a allowing the administration to do its job you can be upset with the administration say I don't think that you're doing your job and you can correct that but to essentially effectively bypass the administrators that are present and take the issue directly to the board set a precedent that other issues that are outside the board scope can be addressed by the board that's the sir and I think it's important to recognize our policy on it 5421 the board believes that the district's grading system should be a reliable system and one that ensures each student's grade signif grade signify accurately his or her degree of accomplishment of those expected learning outcomes which are to be stated for each program at every grade level the board directs the superintendent to develop procedures for
057grading so then really last week the whole thing then really shouldn't have been on the agenda then I mean because we had people coming to speak for one obviously one I think it's we you do you guys get updates on lots of things that you don't act on I I think we have to have the conversation we we need to make it better right but I'm just asking the board to task us now to address the concerns and BR you an update and you could you could swing that policy different way the board directs superintendent superintendent doesn't know what to do unless the board has a discussion tells her what to do what you could look at it that you could look at it as a way as we just delegate do what you want
058so I I think that can be interpreted different ways but I'm I'm not talking tonight because I'm saying you haven't done anything in a week no I'm talking tonight because it's my only opportunity I'm not going to get it for probably months at this point if if ever so I I feel compelled to share a little bit too but I don't know I mean I guess there's really no point but I mean I struggle as well with the intrinsic motivation and I've said that since the beginning I've said it even when I was running for my stuff um even as adults intrinsic motivation is very difficult again we are motivated by something um I think that a positive you know I don't think any can argue the philosophy of SVG we want our kids to
059attain a standard that is very clear um it's how we get there I think that people are struggling with how can we get to that point where we are doing what's best for kids um I do think that you know some of the things that could be dealt with if formative can't then the deadlines the retakes those are all things that can be put on the radar of possible changes I also have a hard time ignoring the surveys that we've received over two years one was to all teachers one was to just the union members but they both did show that some change needs to probably take place uh even with our students the survey with the students it's hard to ignore you know they're even identifying that there are some problems with the current
060model um I think what Ed said too we want to make sure that our grad rates stay high but not at the expense of learning or lowering the bar and I say that really really respectfully um you know our grad rates 84% was it two years ago and now we have significantly raised that and that is do a lot in part to our teachers and staff and for the hard work that they've been doing but I also want to make sure that we're maintaining the level um that's again training our kids to be ready for the real world so I'd like to highlight another email that was brought to us that also was supportive of Standards based grading but also had some improvement recommendations and we as a board um don't get to have our
061personal preference we speak as a board um so you can personally support one cause or another but as a board we shouldn't be sitting at a board meeting and saying this person's right that person's wrong what we need to do is allow the people that we hire that have specific degrees about this information we've done the research this teacher that emailed us had excellent suggestions things take time they take time they take longer than three years when you have 300 some teachers improving things it's going to have to go through some bumps we're going to have to have people speaking out likely saying what can we do about this but it is not our decision at all at all and why are we spending this much time as a board on this issue when we
062have plenty of other things that we should also be doing and you all know this isn't something that you would usually bring to the board because it's not a policy decision about which curriculum or grading system we use I do think it's important I think it's important for and we we as a board were elected by the community by teachers and staff and we are the representatives so it's not you're absolutely right it's not just our preference but when we are hearing and seeing surveys and things I think it's our duty to again have discussions we may not be able to make changes and vote on things in particular but we have a duty to have the conversation how many how many is this is our first enough is it this is our this is
063my first semester what we need it's our it's our time and I do think there was somebody that made the was it called an employability standard that people that districts have added for standards Bas grading I thought that was a great there are good things that people have positive suggestions for um that can be taken into account and you could say this I get some Flack but don't tell them what they can and cannot come talk to us about I never said that I never said that Ed can I just say one thing that not toate everything that was said um mine is mine is more of an apology for last week I I feel like for myself I did not represent myself well um and maybe the way I spoke um presented I thought
064so I apologize to the other board members I I I'm not apologizing for what I said because I I believe in what I said but I the way I presented it was not was poor so I apologize to you guys for that thank you I'd like to move on the other reports that we had that evening DEA Hagen director of student services a special Department update Terry Saunders director of diversity equity and inclusion gave an end of the year of EI update motion accept second motion the second accept the teaching and learning committee report is there any further discussion hearing none all the signify by saying I I motion carries on the Budget Insurance Committee in informational items we had our report of our Revenue at this point and expenditures any com any any comments
065David at all at this point um I know I know what's coming up next so maybe I was when uh was up there talking I was let's try to find the amount because we just got an AGR payment we'll get it in our bank account tomorrow morning so um she said AGR only the funding only covers a small portion of it but nice check B yesterday oh good action items gifts grants and requests Administration recommends approval to accept gifts grants of requests received in May of 2024 approve second motion and second there any further discussion please just like to say thank you as a board for that very very impressive list again hearing none all those in favor signify by saying I I opposed motion carries now the new action item in red Administration recommends
066the approval of resolution 24-3 authorizing a taxable Tax and Revenue anticipation promisory note for cash flow purposes in an amount not to exceed $5 million motion to approve second motion and a second to improve the new action item is there any other discussion I think the biggest thing I just want to emphasize with this it isn't like we need this $5 million right now um just when I do whenever I do something I always have to have a backup plan what if the state besides they shut down the government or whatever and we don't get our $8 million payment that we're supposed to get at the end of August and all sudden I can't make payroll what this does is this puts money in the bank if we need to pull it we should pull
067it out need to use it don't pull it out interest on it um you're going to see this as a yearly thing you're actually going to see it like three times in the next year is what my plan is um because it has to get renewed for every school year um so my plan is when we approve the budget at the end of October there'll be another resolution in which we pay this off get a new um line of credit for another $5 million of estimated that and then actually next July what I really want to do don't hold me to it because I'm making a lot of promises now down the road but I really want to get a preliminary budget for you guys July it's going to it's going to be really it's
068G to be wonky because I'm getting into the bamum and I don't happen bamum next year but tied into that is this resolution because once you guys pass a preliminary resolution I can get this and then from that point forward you'll see this resolution and a preliminary budget in July and then it'll just be the St hopefully we never touch it no we don't have to but I'd much rather have it and not use it and need it and not have it so you said we'll have a budget every July then you said comprehensive right there limitations on the use of that versus just giving the you were District I blink check that what we can use for the yeah no just prim's eight and a half we got it at eight so they just
069gonna Char through a lot of money get money isn't cheap anymore it used to be cheap couple years ago now it's ch out money is that only if you use it right and that's where this is set up as the line of credit what it is is I go to NBC or bank account and they have this big account this is $5 million I need a million of it I dump it into our AP or vendor account it's a main fun 10 account then when I'm done using it I throw it back in there so if I only need it for a week or two weeks to cover a payroll I dump it back in there I only pay the interest off of the time I had it taken out days yeah and you really
070don't see using this for a payroll I mean yeah payroll I mean we we pump out you know $1.5 million payroll every two weeks so yeah AP is minimal you first see a need to actually use this we might need it in maybe towards the end of The Big Break is the beginning of November beginning of December that's where there's the biggest leg we get a nice chunk at the end of August and we don't get anything and then we're just flushed with cash come the middle of December we get we Ade and then we roll into February we get taxes and then we get big chunk of taxes again daab there used to be a really nice nice graph in the budget book that we used to do in um October that showed cash
071cash flow over the course that might be helpful just to make sure it's in there can see where there's more challenges in the course of the year and then and I mean we didn't have a lot of that previous when I started and then we have dashboards and stuff that I can go and see where our cash fls going kind of play going forward and that's where again this is we're managing I don't think we're going to need it all honesty I don't think we're going to need it I don't tell the bank that but I really don't think you will but again like I said I want to have it just in case if they're watching this told them amateur I have two quick questions please um is is there a fee to set
072it up or it's only if we take it out then the interest a resolution Fe we have to get resolution sure and can we use this one or do we still have minimal when you're talking about the bank um we cannot they cannot charge us if you okay and then so say the emergency situation which you're preparing us for Plan B um uh we do have to take out part of that money how are you going to prioritize like paying that back like would that be your top priority then so we're queing the less interest I'm assuming but just curious yeah I mean because it's so expensive to borrow that that is we just evaluate how we do not a district that's that flu bills pay don't pay this one but pay that one yeah
073we not at that point if be able get to that point be 8% interest is number one thing want okay peace thanks thanks any other discussion hearing none all those in favor signify by saying I I poose motion carries there no item accept Budget Insurance second a second to accept the Budget Insurance committee report is there any further discussion none all those in favor signify by saying opposed it carries other reports by members of the board graduation was wonderful thanks John with the weather we were all worried about it but it went very well I've enjoyed the opportunity to give some of my ducks back to some of the grass so excuse me again as the kids came for those that didn't know as it came forward and they shook your hand it's someone still
074have their little duck in your hand so you're going what thank you to all the principals teachers and staff and students that welcomed us for for our tours that was great y always nice to get in the schools see what's going on I know it's a busy time of year we had a lot of unexpected on our visit I know I got to pull the fire alarm at Boer so that was kind of exciting for me but uh so I was there for a fire drill no blue ink no good no fine we think where we got this thing from oh new Podium manufacturing made our new Podium for us yep impressive thank you to them any other District or program highlights Amy um just that we had salute to service in May and honored
075our retirees um working on through our literacy training uh right now at the elementary level to be in compliance with the reading Law summer school starting up soon um and I just want to thank the principes and the admin and the staff at the high school for pulling off a pretty seamless graduation event we had 209 20 299 students graduate um that was impressive 308 I think it was 308 is what I was told there so do you have the numbers for summer schools by chance or just someone no that's okay I'm gonna give a report in July about how going so high school summer school actually started today oh wow yeah and everyone else starts next Monday so in July I'll give a report on kind of how things are going and numbers and
076stuff thank you all right finding consideration of bills and pre-approved Bills second motion second to pay the bills any further discussion BR none all those in favor signify by saying I I oppos motion carries there motion to adjourn motion second motion to adjourn all those in favor sign or call sorry call you have to I you have favor by saying I carries right you got some things to sign in everybody