04-14-2026 Kyrene Governing Board Study Session & Meeting

001Item 1.1 is called to order for our study session. Our study session is called to order at 5.02 p.m. Item 1.2 is our bond credit ratings and reserves. Associate Superintendent Chris Herman. And those in the audience tonight, I wanted to just do a quick overview of some of the things that we're looking to cover in tonight's study session. There we go. So there are several reasons why we wanted to talk about bond credit ratings and fund balances tonight, which a lot of times you'll hear fund balances also referred to as reserve balances. And the first reason is that Kyrene has a budget procedure that specifies Kyrene should evaluate our reserve balances versus peer districts every three years. That last review took place in 2022, but we decided to push this study session back in the

002timeline until after the long-range planning meetings had concluded. This review is also done to ensure that Kyrie maintains a high credit rating, which is correlated to maintaining reserves and fund balances at appropriate and adequate levels. And as you'll see in this presentation, it's oftentimes very difficult to pin down a precise answer for the question of, you know, what should a reserve balance be? But by looking at the criteria that's used by bond credit rating agencies in making comparisons against other school districts in Arizona, this practice and this review helps to guide us so that we make sound financial decisions into the future. So, you know, a couple of big questions. You know, what are bond credit ratings? Simply put, a bond credit rating is a way to assess the financial strength of an organization and

003the ability of that issuer, the borrower, to pay back any debt or any borrowing costs. Having comparable ways to look at credit ratings allows investors to compare and assess the risk of holding a bond, whether it be issued by a corporation, a municipality, or even a school district. Another big question is, well, why are credit ratings important? So voters in Kyrene's community have authorized us to issue bonds, which is a form of debt that's used to pay for most of our capital projects. The borrowing cost is determined by an interest rate, and the higher credit ratings typically result in lower interest rates for borrowers, which results in lower costs for our community to repay that debt, which that repayment is set in the form of secondary property taxes. who assigns credit ratings. Typically, Moody's is

004the most widely used agency, typically followed by Standard & Poor's and then Fitch. And Kyrene has historically received credit ratings from both Moody's and S&P, but not from Fitch. And what I wanted to do on this slide was show the scale that's used to assign bond credit ratings for those three most well-known agencies, Moody's, Standard & Poor's, and Fitch. You can see each of those three agencies across the top, and then you can see the rating scores that they use or the rating assignments that they provide kind of going from top to bottom. Anything that's related to a BBB or a higher amount would be considered investment-grade bonds. Sometimes you hear that terminology. And anything below that rating amount receives a junk bond classification. So you can see that as you move down the scale,

005the rating scale, the quality of the credit rating would decrease. So institutions that are rated towards the top of the scale are considered to have the highest quality of debt. Credit rating institutions issue both an issuer and a general obligation bond rating. And it's the general obligation bond rating that is relevant and applicable whenever bond sales take place. So you'll really hear both of those terms used in tonight's presentation. And I would want to also mention that during its most recent credit rating back in February of 2025, Kyrie received and also reaffirmed its AAA general obligation bond rating from Moody's and a AA rating from S&P. And both of those ratings are the highest bond ratings assigned to a school district in the state of Arizona. This slide shows the bond ratings that Kyrene has

006been assigned historically, and you can see that although we currently have that AAA rating from Moody's and the AA rating from S&P, that hasn't always been the case, as Kyrene's credit ratings have been upgraded and have improved over time. Kyrene, as a note, has maintained that AAA rating from Moody's since the 2021 year and that AA credit rating from S&P since 2008. So what sometimes gets confusing about credit ratings, especially when you look at the Moody's credit report, is that they actually are assigning two ratings. First is an issuer rating, and the second being a general obligation, sometimes called a GO rating. The metrics and the scoring methodologies that are used by Moody's is used to assign an issuer rating. We'll talk a little bit more about that in the presentation. However, it's actually the

007general obligation rating and not the issuer rating that is relevant when selling bonds. So let me try to unwrap a little bit about those definitions. The issuer rating reflects a district's ability to pay its debt without the use of secondary property taxes. This really isn't needed or even applicable for anything at Kyrene because we are not issuing any type of debt besides selling municipal bonds. The general obligation rating reflects the ability of Arizona school districts to separately finance the repayment of debt through secondary property tax collections and secures that ability through state statute. Because of this feature, all schools in the state of Arizona have a G.O. rating that is one notch higher than the issuer rating. And because only the general obligation rating or the G.O. rating is applicable when selling bonds, that's why

008it's referenced whenever we talk about what is Kyrene's bond credit rating. Next, we want to discuss or I'd like to discuss the process, I should say, that is used to assign credit ratings. And as I mentioned previously, there are two main credit rating agencies that we use, Moody's and Standard & Poor's, and we'll try to unwrap a little bit about their methodology here in the next few slides. But of the two, Moody's, again, being the most commonly used to establish a credit rating by organizations in school districts nationally. But many larger school districts, just like Kyrene, often use two credit rating agencies as it helps reinforce and validate the financial visibility of institutions when, or the viability, I should say, of institutions when we issue debt securities. And this can help keep interest rates lower

009and credit spreads lower in the municipal bond market. This slide that you see focuses just on the credit rating methodology used by Standard & Poor, which looks at a variety of factors outside of just their normal credit rating criteria. These additional factors include things like possible environmental areas, social factors, and governance areas. And you can see all the different considerations listed under those three columns. And these areas would also be considered along with their financial credit rating factors in order to determine their final overall bond credit rating. S&P does not provide as much detailed information as Moody's on the methodology and the scoring that's used for their credit ratings, nor do they give specific calculations for these metrics. However, we do know that the financial credit rating factors used in Kyrene's last credit rating, we

010just went through that in February of 2025, and those factors were things like institutional framework. Individual credit profile, the economy, financial performance, reserves and liquidity, management, debt, and liabilities. So, and a few of those we'll unwrap as we get further in the presentation with some definitions that Moody's provides, which are the same as what S&P would use as well. But ultimately, the combination of the financial credit factors that S&P evaluates and the environmental, the social, and the governance factors. that we mentioned previously, those are all used to determine the overall credit rating that they assign for our school district. So when you look at Moody's, in general, they provide a lot more information to us about their credit ratings and their credit rating criteria. So we can dive a little bit deeper into that process

011that they use to assign both the issuer and also the general obligation bond rating. Moody's assigns four main factors that are listed on this slide. They are the general economy of the school district, along with the weighting that they put on those factors, the financial performance, which is how they look at demonstrated financial results through audited financial statements, institutional framework. That relates to how most of the revenue is determined for a school district. And then finally, leverage, which relates to how much debt has been issued by a school district in addition to any unfunded pension liabilities as well. And even though Kyrene does not operate its own pension system and we're part of the Arizona State Retirement System, Moody's does evaluate our individual pension components within the overall state system as it's provided and reported

012in our annual comprehensive financial report. So within each of these factors, there are other sub-factors that ultimately determine that preliminary score from their credit rating, which they can then notch up or down depending on additional factors that we'll also discuss. So on this slide, these are the same four main categories plus the individual subfactors and the metrics that make up the overall weights that they use for their financial performance. And so each of these subfactors has a scale that assigns numeric values based on the overall strength and weakness for each individual area. I don't really want to go through each individual calculation, but I did want to make sure that those are available for people to see the things that were evaluated on. But you can see how Moody's ultimately will score and weight each

013of these areas to determine their overall numeric scoring metric. The purpose of these metrics and methodology really is to provide that standard platform to analyze and compare school districts across both the state and nationally. And these four factors would be considered by Moody's to be their most important way to evaluate and assign credit ratings. But again, you'll see there's other considerations that ultimately factor into that final rating. I do also want to talk briefly about institutional framework. That's a term that's sometimes not very familiar to people. And you can see that Moody's on this slide does not provide a definition or necessarily an explanation for that particular subfactor. So to determine its institutional framework, Moody's considers whether the state allows the bulk of a school district's operating revenue to be determined at the local level

014or if the state. determines the bulk of the school district's operating revenue to be at the state level. And so they also in that factor would consider the limits and hurdles imposed on the school district's ability to raise its own revenue. I'll go back real quick. So the total of these weighted numeric scores and the metrics, they ultimately are calculated. They determine that preliminary issuer rating. And again, that's different from the G.O. rating. We'll talk a little bit about that. We'll see how the scoring works. But they'll use additional factors to get to that final or that preliminary rating. And so Moody's will recognize, just like S&P, that there might be other factors outside of that financial scorecard. can and should impact the overall credit rating for a school district. And you can see all

015of those factors that are listed on this slide, and they cover a very wide range of topics and areas, ranging from things like external governance and economic conditions, local supports for public education, internal management practices, financial controls, and historical financial performance. Whenever you go out for a bond sale, all of these areas are discussed in great detail and reviewed during the ratings call that is held with a rating analyst, both at Moody's and at S&P. And those questions and conversations often dive pretty deeply into some of these individual subject areas and may also require additional follow-up or evidence to support what's happening across the district. So beyond those things, there are still other considerations that Moody's will make, and they have five other areas that may or may not what they consider to be notch

016or move the credit ratings score up or down. So you can see those things are listed. The first category is to assess the strength of local resources in the form of property values and per capita income. The second area relates to the scale of operations, and that relates to the overall size of a school district, as larger school districts often can have greater economies of scale to help buffer their operating budgets. The next factor is whether there's weak financial reporting. In that case, that would apply to school districts that do not report non-cash assets and liabilities accurately. That is not applicable for Kyrie, and that really is not applicable for, I would say, almost every school district, but it's still a consideration. But also for districts that may not comply with GASB rules for reporting

017their pension liabilities or other pension employment benefits, or for those areas that don't report gross capital asset values or depreciation. An assessment can also be made for whether the state may or has passed certain costs on the school districts and may in turn absorb some additional costs at the state level. So typically, if there were a notching factor applied for this area or this category, it would be applied for all school districts within the state. And finally, the category for significant change in leverage. That refers to the potential for sizable increases in leverage or fixed costs due to things like pension asset risks or unmet capital needs. So what does this mean? This really means that the combination of that numeric scoring and weighting, their other considerations, and these notching factors, they're all ultimately used

018to determine the final issuer rating that Moody's assigns. This is from their report. I know there's a lot of numbers on here, but in the interest of sharing how this works, I wanted to put this slide up. This is an exhibit taken from their February 2025 credit report for Kyrene from Moody's, and it shows the overall scoring for the four factors that we showed earlier. without any other types of adjustments or notching. And remember, this is all going to be used to determine their credit rating. And then what they'll do is they'll assign a higher one notch higher for the general obligation credit rating. So you can see that there are several areas where our scoring is actually relatively low and actually scored in the B levels, which does drag down that overall mathematical scoring

019and rating. Those areas include two things. It includes institutional, I'm sorry, enrollment trends and institutional framework. So our demographer has presented information to the board about Kyrene's enrollment changes being driven by primarily lower birth rates, housing trends, and a lack of neighborhood turnover. I think we've talked about that extensively with our board. But the institutional framework score, that lower score that we receive, is really based on the statewide Arizona school system itself. mostly pertaining to a school district's limited ability to control its own funding and the unpredictable nature of state funding in Arizona. So that's why we received that BBB score. Because we have several factors that scored relatively low in the rating system, you can see that the mathematical scoring for Kyrene would actually be an A3 issuer rating. However, I should say, they

020actually assigned us a higher rating of AA1 for an issuer rating, which is two levels above that. And in the report, they mentioned that the difference between that scorecard-indicated outcome and the actual issuer-assigned rating reflects other considerations assessed outside that scorecard that are beneficial to our district's credit profile, which would include things, and very specifically mentioned were local support of levy overrides, which are the ability to pass bonds and overrides. So this is how Moody's has determined that AA1 issuer rating. One notch higher would be their general obligation rating, which is AAA. And so that's why when we refer to that being a AAA rating for Moody's, this is exactly how that scoring works. So it's also important to understand the factors that could lead to a credit downgrade and what things are considered by

021those agencies. And those areas are listed on this slide, and they were pulled directly from both Moody's and S&P's credit report, the most recent one being from February of last year. And both agencies cite the potential decline of reserve balances. and the inability to produce a balanced operating budget as the top factors that could lead to a possible credit downgrade for Kyrene. So it's important to dive a little bit deeper into that topic about reserve balances and how they factor into balanced budgets so that way we can really understand more about what reserve balances look like in our district. So the term reserves relates to the accumulated carry forward balance, fund balance, I should say, from prior years, which that occurs when actual expenses come in less than the actual revenue that's received. And so

022a reserve balance that is stable or maybe growing slowly over time, it usually indicates good financial controls and spending practices within an organization. whereas declining reserve balances can indicate the inability of an organization to align its operating expenditures with its operating revenues, which would not result in a viable or sustainable long-term financial model. People often ask me what's the purpose of reserve balances, and the answer I provide is that they are necessary to help mitigate volatility or uncertainty from various funding sources, or they could provide funding to address unexpected or unanticipated costs that could be used during economic downturns or respond to legislative actions that don't allow enough time for us to make the proper financial adjustments. So there are two really good examples of recent situations where Kyrene had to rely on reserve balances

023in order to meet our financial obligations. The first is the economic impact from the COVID-19 pandemic and what it had or the impact it had on our community education staff, where we were obligated to pay employees during the pandemic times when we generated little and sometimes no revenue at all from community education programs. So reserve balances help meet the need of payroll, basically. The second example is related to the repayment of $4.8 million that Kyrene had to make as a result of the Quasimire v. Maricopa County lawsuit that was settled back in 2024. So these reserve balances allowed us to buffer the financial obligations without having to make drastic or detrimental decisions for our schools. So without these reserve balances, we would have been put in a really difficult financial situation. Another area where reserve

024balances could be extremely important is if the aggregate expenditure limit is ever enacted or enforced as the impact of Kyrene's budget was calculated or the impact that was calculated back in 2024 for Kyrene was almost $20 million. So even though the aggregate expenditure limit has been exempted for this upcoming budget year, which is a really good thing for schools to not have that kind of hanging over our shoulder, this has been a year-to-year decision in recent years. And so there's still no long-term solution to that issue. So again, that's another area where that reserves might come into play if the AEL was ever not. not resolved. So as we can see, or as we've seen early in the presentation, reserve balances, they're also part of the financial criteria used to assign a bond credit rating.

025And one more thing I would like to mention, this history about reserves, especially in Arizona, it's important to mention that before May of 2016, the Arizona legislation prevented the amounts and the ways that reserve balances could be rolled into the following year. And the budget carry forward amount for reserves was capped at 4% of the revenue control limit amount. However, in May of 2016, legislation was passed to remove that 4% restriction. So now districts have much more flexibility on how they can manage all of their funds. Another question that people often ask about reserves are, well, what funds are included in the balance and what's the right amount to have as a balance? And unfortunately, there are no consistent guidelines or targets for what is considered either too high of a balance or too low

026of a balance or just right of the balance. And rating agencies, though, they typically look at whether balances are stable over time, whether they're decreasing or whether they're increasing, because it shows whether the school district has been able to balance their budget over a consistent period of time and whether it has good controls, financial controls in place to align its expenditures with its operating revenue. And although the term operating fund is often used in these conversations and often or will be used in this presentation, there are no universal or formal definitions for what should be included as an operating fund. And the USFR, which is the accounting rulebook that we abide by, does not define or determine what should be included in the definition of an operating fund. So this makes it very difficult to

027compare reserve information amongst school districts. However, I will say as part of their financial criteria, Moody's does and has defined a list of funds included in their evaluation of reserve balances and operating revenues. And so that information can be used to compare reserve balances and information between Arizona school districts as long as they are selling bonds and receive a Moody's credit rating. So not all schools in Arizona meet that criteria, but we'll show you the ones that do. And so Moody's operating reserve balance definition focuses on the funds that would be applicable for operating activities across a school district, which would include individual and specific funds. included in the general fund, special revenue funds, capital projects, and debt service. And the rationale for their list of funds is to assess the ability of a school

028district to cover its operating expenditures in a sustainable budget environment and also repay the debt obligations for capital expenditures. And they use the information from the annual comprehensive financial report that schools produce every year to compile that information. And so I do want to mention that, again, we have a budget procedure that specifies that every three years we'll evaluate our reserve balances versus peer districts, which we will do that in just a moment. But, you know, I do want to mention again that that last review took place in 2022. And that school data was based on the financial year 2020. So that's just important to know that was the last fiscal year that we were able to do that review. But again, because we decided to wait until after the long-range regional planning meetings were

029concluded and that work was done before sharing this information, that's why we're outside of that three-year window. And the date for the comparison for this year will be 2024 data. So it's not quite current, but again. all of our reporting information has not been compiled for Moody's to be able to pull that together. So we've been able to gather the data from Moody's comparisons that show the operating fund balances and their definitions as a percentage of operating revenue for Kyrene versus 37 other school districts in Arizona who actually receive a credit rating from Moody's as well. And because of the wide difference in the size of schools across the state, Instead of just looking at the reserve dollar amount, a more comparable method is to look at the reserve balance as a percentage of total

030operating revenue in order to normalize that data. So the data for the following slides, again, I mentioned comes from 2024, which is the most recent data that's available. One other piece of information that I also want to note is that school districts received federal funding related to the COVID-19 pandemic in calendar years 2020 and 2021. And those pandemic funds were often referred to as ESSER funds. And these funds were available for schools to use until September of 2024. So there was a wide disparity between the distribution of ESSER funds as it was based on the population of Title I students across the state of Arizona. So I just want to mention this before we start looking at the data because it could be a possible explanation when you look at changes in fund balances versus

031the data that was presented last time using 2020 data. versus what we have now, including those years of ESSER funding. And I think you'll see what I'm talking about when you see some of these comparisons. So this slide shows the six school districts in Arizona who receive Moody's highest general obligation credit rating of 888. Kyrene's Reserve amounts the percentage of operating revenue is shown in orange, and it's 31.8%. And if you were curious, it was 24.9% back in 2020. That's the percentage, again, of total operating revenues. But we are actually by far the lowest in our AAA peer-rated group. So I've taken the names of the individual school districts off of these graphs that we're going to look at because the intent is not to focus the questions on why a particular school district might

032or might not have such a high or a low reserve level, but rather to show how we compare overall and whether our balances are in line with other districts or not. You'll see some acronyms at the bottom. I thought it might be helpful to see the types of school districts that we're comparing against. ESD represents elementary school districts. Kyrene is an elementary school district. USD represents unified high school districts. That would be K through 12. And then union high school districts would just be your 9 through 12 grades. Our peer group has an overall fund balance average of 54.5% of its operating revenues, and that amount has grown and increased from 42.5% back in 2020. So you can see Kyrene's amount numerically is 22.7% below the peer group current average. And one of the reasons

033why our reserve balances have not grown as much as our peer group over that time period is that Kyrene has decided to pay out a retention stipend to employees if there is underspending in its M&O budget rather than just let that underspending roll over and increase our reserve balances. So to give you some context, in the last several years, Kyrene has experienced some budget savings due to a variety of unfilled positions across the district, which are mostly non-teaching positions. So we typically refer to this situation as vacancy savings in our budget. And so over the last three years, Kyrene has paid out $9 million to employees in the form of a retention stipend, mostly from those vacancy savings. If that $9 million was not paid out as a stipend and just rolled over and increased

034our reserve balance, that would have increased that fund balance percentage from about 31.8% to 36.9%. still well below that AAA peer-rated group. And if you were curious to know about how many additional reserve dollars it would take to increase Kyrene's current fund balance of 31.8% to that peer average of 54.5%, it would take about $45 million of additional reserve dollars to get to that level, which is a significant amount. This is the same information as the previous slide. but for the peer group rated one notch below Kyrene. So these would be at the AA1 Moody's general obligation bond rating. So you can see there's a wide fluctuation in reserve balances for those AA1 school districts, but overall the average amount for that group is 39.8%, which is still 8% higher than what our reserve percentage

035is. This graph shows the peer group with a rating of two notches below Kyrene's rating. This would be your AA2 rating for school districts across Arizona. And again, you can see there is a wide variation between the individual school districts and what their balances would be, but the overall average for this group is 40.9%, which again is 9.1% higher than what Kyrene's current amount or most current amount was. And so finally, this graph shows the peer group with a rating that are three notches below Kyrene, a triple or a double A3 general obligation credit rating. And again, you can see a wide variation among school districts, but the overall average for this group is 42.5%. And again, that's 10.6% higher than Kyrene's most current amount. I know it's really hard to read these individual line

036items. But I thought it would really be important to try and give our board and the community a way to see where Kyrene's reserve balance sat versus the comparison against the other 37 districts in Arizona. And so Kyrene is identified in the graph as the orange bar. And I've also highlighted in gray the other AAA-rated school districts in Arizona. make me that would be easier to see where they fall. And I thought that information might be useful to see. So the remaining blue bars comprise the other AA1, AA2, and AA3 rated districts. It's the same information we just looked at, but this just gives you the entirety of all 38 districts that are rated comparatively by Moody's. And so what you can see is that Kyrene has a pretty low percentage. It's actually the 10th

037lowest reserve balance out of those 38 school districts in Arizona that again are rated and received a rating from Moody's in 2020 or with 2024 data. So as a general summary, when it comes to operating reserves, Kyrene does not have large reserve balance percentages versus other school districts in Arizona. Our reserve percentage balances are lower than the average for our AAA peer-rated group and also below the averages for the other peer groups that are rated below us. And both Moody's and S&P, I should say, in their... in their rating reports mentioned reserve balance as a key factor for determining our future credit ratings and preventing the downgrading of our rating for future years. And so it's really important to keep a high bond credit rating. Keeping that as high as possible is essential because it

038lowers that interest rate amount and the borrowing costs that are paid by taxpayers in Kyrene's school district. And that is important because Kyrene wants to keep the community's secondary property taxes as low as possible, and we greatly value their support in passing both bonds and overrides. I think one of the conclusions you can draw also from the presentation tonight is that financial results and reserve balances are extremely important in determining the school district's credit rating. However, there is no guarantee that you will receive a credit rating just by increasing your reserve balances. However, as mentioned by both Moody's and S&P, a decline in reserve balances is not viewed positively by either of those two institutions. And there would be a risk that your credit rating could decline if reserve balances would fall over time. So

039I know that's a lot of graphs and a lot of math tonight, but I'm happy to answer any questions that you might have. Board members have any questions? Yes, Member Davis. I'm glad you said do we have any questions right after you said the credit rating. So how, I know you explained all that. How far does it have to drop? Am I making sense with that question, the credit rating? Yeah, that's a great question. That's a question I'm probably asked all the time is what's the magic number or is there a magic number? They will never give you a magic number. And the reason being is, you know, they look at. comparatively, well, what are other districts doing, right? So, you know, when you look, and I looked at the difference between the data in

0402020 versus 2024 data, and districts have increased or decreased their ratings. There were six school districts that had a ratings decrease, or I'm sorry, rating, I think there were six that saw a rating decrease. I'll have to check my math here in a second. All the ones that had a rating decrease did have reserve balance drops, right? But they were across the board in different amounts. So Moody's and S&P, when they have these conversations about balances, they would love to have, you know, a magic number to say, we're going to do this every year. Right. But they also understand that sometimes possible when we have enrollment changes, which change our funding amounts. Right. So trying to peg a certain dollar amount is really hard in those situations. So they have looked at, I can tell

041you over the last. Nine years since I've been doing this, they look every year at what our operating revenues are and whether or not our balances have stayed the same or maybe even slightly increased. And that shows them that even though our enrollment has declined and our funding has declined significantly over time, we've still presented them with a balanced budget. And so I think for them. The demonstration of keeping your balances from dropping indicates the kinds of financial controls that are in place that an investor would want to know because at the end of the day, investors want to get their money back, right? And so that's what they've generally indicated to me, but there is no magic number for us to be able to look at. But I can tell you also that since...

042since the 2019-20 school year. There's lots of balances that I mentioned that fall into what Moody's evaluates, but M&O is, for me, one of the most important because that's where most of our operating revenues day-to-day come from. When you take out some of the one-time things that we've held money back for and stipends that we've paid out, that balance that we've had in M&O since that 2019-20 year and today... has fluctuated between like 14.1 million and 14.6 million. It's been pretty flat, right? And the rating agencies have never come back and said, that number should be X dollars higher, X dollars lower, right? I think it's the trend and I think it's the ability to balance current year operating revenues and expenses that they value because they know our enrollment and our operating revenue declines

043a little bit every year. Thank you. First of all, thank you for the presentation. I learned a lot. I have a couple of questions, and I want to congratulate you. It sounds like it's not an easy thing that you've managed to keep our AAA rating. So thanks for your hard work. On slide number seven, this is just a question of definition. Is this the one that's... One of them said local. Maybe it wasn't seven. Maybe... Somewhere it says local government. I didn't know what they meant by local government. Was that the district itself or the county? I didn't know what local government meant. So actually, all of the factors that impact our funding are considered by the credit rating agencies. So they'll look at federal funding. which for us is fairly small. It's mostly state

044funding, but they will consider that, and then also at the local level. Now, local level, they look at really two different categories, the first being how much of your overall M&O funding is funded from the state's general fund versus how much is supported by local property tax. So they kind of sometimes lump that into general economic conditions, but that really is looking at your local revenue that you generate. It goes to the state. We don't get to keep all that, and that's not how it works, but they do assess that from a local tax basis revenue generation. The second piece I look at from a local perspective is your ability to generate income beyond what the state funding formulas specify, and that would be from generating income from bonds, capital overrides. or from maintenance and

045operations overrides. So they consider that local revenue because we, our community has to approve that, right? That's not based on anything other than Kyrene's community voting yes or no. So it's the Kyrene community, it's the local. Correct. When they say local, it is really within our district's boundaries on both from a... property and a tax basis and also from the voting on approving bonds and overrides, but it's definitely the local community, local community. Mr. Herman, if you go to slide 11, I think this might be what you were referencing where it says local support for public education. Yes. Yes. So that is exactly what he was referencing there. It's about our local support in our own community. Yes. And I may have mentioned that also. Thank you for finding the slide. I may have mentioned

046that also in another part of the presentation in their notes, specifically when they talked about. our rating being higher than what the mathematical score would be. They did mention our ability to generate local sources of revenue through bonds and overrides being one of the factors for a credit notching in their scoring. Okay. On slide 16, I just have a general question when you get there. Do you know, or does anyone know, was any suggestion made at the time to use the state land trusts for COVID salaries? I don't remember any conversations about that. Whether it was held outside of my purview, I wouldn't be able to know. I thought it might be, but it just, nobody. No reflection of those conversations, and they were probably happening. where we weren't aware, we sort of got the

047after the fact. But I do not recall any conversations about the land trust during COVID. Because ESSER really came more from federal, if I understand correctly. There was some state revenue that we received during that time, very small amounts for different, very targeted support. But most of it came from the feds. So it would not have been through the state land trust. Okay, thank you. And my last question is on slide 17. It has to do with the state lands trust again. Are any state lands trust money defined as any kind of reserve funds? No, and the state land trust, I think you're specifically talking about Prop 123 distributions of funding. When you say state land trust, is that the connection? Maybe. Okay. I'm just talking about the Arizona State land stress. I don't know

048if that's a proposition. Prop 123 was the, well, there's two different pieces, and we could talk for a long time about that distinction. No, I know about it. It is through our M&O revenues where we receive that. We don't receive a separate funding source for Arizona State trust land. So any money that we receive from that distribution is in our M&O. operating fund and along with the other $105 million that we receive, right? So there's no specific line item that would be reserve amounts for state land trust. And that was, okay. That's the answer to my question. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Herman. Something separate from the Moody's and S&P reports, but maybe similar factors, is the Arizona Auditor General report that they put out every year on school district financial risk analysis. Do you

049know, do Moody's and S&P, do they look at that report as well as part of coming up with their bond ratings? They might, but they've never mentioned that to me during our ratings call that that's a factor that they've considered. Yeah, and it's... It wouldn't surprise me that they wouldn't change the results just because looking at that report, I know they have different metrics, but they flagged the same thing that SMP and Moody's did, which is the biggest challenges are changing weight and student count. And that's something that we're aware of. But I'm happy to see just in looking at the Auditor General report, I think they've also given good credit for the increases over the last four years in our operating budget and capital budget reserves. So thank you for that. And then I

050was appreciating your describing the distinction with the. sort of what I say with the vacancy savings or one-time savings and the decision whether or not to put those into the reserves or use them. Because I know we've had some conversations recently about, as we're thinking about implementing the school consolidation, there's inherently going to be more pull on our resources in some places than maybe we would in a normal year. How do we fund those? And it sounds like there are opportunities to fund those without pulling significantly from our reserves that might arise from things like the vacancy savings. And I know those vacancy savings aren't always going to be there. In fact, we sometimes hope they're not because then it means our positions are being filled. But to the extent that they are there, I

051know whether it's compensation, whether it's making sure that all of our schools have the resources they need, it's useful to know how that was used. Yeah, I think part of what we'll talk about... maybe in June, early June, is if we're able to, you know, with compensation, address the different areas in different ways, right? And so I think we've tried to make it really clear that if we have money available from a stipend, where does that come from? It typically comes from positions that we weren't able to fill, which we want to fill those positions. But, you know, you have the choice to say, do you want to invest that money in something else? Sometimes it may need to be... put towards things like some one year only, one time things like a transition year

052with schools, right? So we will definitely be looking at all the things that are considerations for next year and probably bringing that to the board when everything's pulled together in early June. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Herman. I also appreciate Board Member Collins' question that was a little bit around mine. But one of the thoughts that I had, and it'll go into things we're going to talk about later in the agenda, is just how much either the climate locally, the political climate statewide really does impact our ability and our credit rating. So when we talk about having unfunded mandates, that money has to come somewhere. So instead of going into reserve. We have to funnel it elsewhere and how that really impacts our ability to continue to be able to get the resources that we

053need. I also appreciate it because I know we heard a lot about this. Well, reserve balances are here for emergencies and things like that. But I really do appreciate you emphasizing the one time nature and especially with us consistently having a fairly. you know, a lower reserve balance in most, but consistent over many, many years. I think it speaks to a strategy where we have to use it truly in emergent situations and not let it be something that could come. could become an ongoing expense, which then would further deplete that reserve balance and then impact us even more negatively. It's just a cycle that I'm grateful that we've kind of been able to keep out of while being very conservative, supporting, you know, staff where we can with extra retention, stipends, or being able to

054meet other needs in creative ways. So I just want to, you know, recognize that and call that out. So thank you. And I'd just like to piggyback on that and say, you know, I just want to thank especially our finance teams and our district leadership teams and our school leaders and everybody's hand in this. The timeless spending model has really kept us in a position to be able to do all the things that were just presented and everything you just spoke about. The fact is. We are still reducing our budgets every year as long as enrollment's decreasing. We are doing a zero-based budget. We are making sure we are right-sizing this district year after year to be in line so that we are not having to dip into reserves to solve the problem. And you'll

055hear districts, sometimes around the time of year they're voting on their budgets, they're talking about being, you know, 10 million, 7 million, 15 million, 22 million, I've heard it all over, behind. And many of them are having to dip into their reserves, we will hear. Kyrene is not. And I really credit that to Mr. Herman and all of the directors and everybody, again, staying true to our timeless model and making the cuts where we've had to. Any additional questions? All right. Thank you, Mr. Herman. So item 1.3 will conclude our study session at 5.51 p.m. Thank you. All right. Good evening, everybody. Welcome. Our regular meeting. Our regular meeting is called to order at 6.02 p.m. Hi, folks. At this time, all blue cards need to be turned into the board secretary if you wish

056to request to speak to the governing board. Our school board meetings are held in public to conduct the business of the district. Kyrene School District believes education is a partnership between school and home, and we not only respect the rights of parents and guardians, but value their role in our district. We know students thrive when we all work together. As always, our board meetings are streamed live on the internet. For those who cannot watch the meeting live, a recording will be made available and posted within 48 hours. Board agendas may be obtained through the district office and the Kyrene website about 24 hours in advance of each board meeting. Our superintendent, Laura Tenias, and senior leadership are with us tonight. Item 2.2 is a roll call. Will board members state their name for the record?

057Cedric Collins. Bunny Davis. Kevin Walsh. Trina Nelson. Let the record show that four members are present. Item 2.3 is a moment of silence and Pledge of Allegiance. I'd love to invite the proud principal of Kyrene De La Colina to lead us in our moment of silence and Pledge of Allegiance. Item 2.4 is our land acknowledgement. Kyrene School District acknowledges that our community of schools is located on the ancestral lands of the O'odham and Peeposh peoples who have inhabited these lands since time immemorial. With this land acknowledgement, the district formally recognizes that the traditional care and keeping of these lands by Native peoples allows us to be here today. And item 2.5 is our Kymene promise. We promise to provide welcoming, inclusive learning environments in which every student is honored, valued, and feels a strong sense

058of belonging and purpose. We promise to provide rigorous and responsive learning environments in which every student is given what they need to develop knowledge, skills, confidence, and a passion for learning. We promise to provide vibrant world-class learning environments in which every student believes they are empowered and prepared to make a meaningful impact on a rapidly changing world. Item 3.1 is preview and approval of agenda. Are there any changes to tonight's agenda? Seeing none, may I have a motion to approve tonight's agenda? So move. Is there a second? Second. Motion by Member Davis and seconded by Member Walsh. All in favor say aye. Aye. Motion passes four to zero. Item 4.1 is our superintendent report. Superintendent Tenias. Thank you, President Nelson, governing board members, staff, and families and students here this evening. I'm super excited to

059share a superintendent's update report about what's going on in the district with so many of you here in attendance tonight. So I'd like to start by recognizing that this year was the 50th annual Ahwatukee Easter Parade, and Kyrene's staff members have proudly participated in the parade for years, and it's always a highlight of the spring season. We love having the chance to step outside the classroom and the district office to connect with the families and neighbors who make this community so special. It is a great reminder of what makes Kyrene such a wonderful place to live, work, and learn. And you can see one of our Kyrene school buses out there. Also excited to share, while I wasn't as happy with the overall final results being a Wildcat alumni, but our own Kalina, and I

060believe our principal is in the house. One made it to read to the final four. So at the beginning of April, we received the exciting news that Kyrene De La Colina finished second place out of 190 schools that participated in this year's read to the final four competition. At the event, they were presented with a check for $5,000 to support reading, literacy, and the library program. So congratulations, Coyotes. We are so proud of your dedication to reading. Also excited to share, I recently had the pleasure of visiting Kyrene Daylaw. De Los Lagos Dual Language Academy for a school-wide celebration of their A-plus School of Excellence designation from the Arizona Educational Foundation. I loved hearing the students showcase their Spanish in song and what students loved most about their school. Thank you to Governing Board Member

061Davis, who was able to join me, and Executive Director of School Effectiveness Kelly Brenner for joining in the celebration as well, and congratulations Mustangs. Also excited to share, since our last governing board meeting, I also had the opportunity to visit Kyrene Del Norte Dual Language Academy for their A-plus celebration. I loved hearing from Norte legend, Mr. Rick Moffitt, and from the students who shared what they love about their school. Thank you to governing board members Collins and governing board member Davis and our executive director, Dr. Garth Kupp, for joining in the celebration with me as well. And congratulations, Cougars. You might need you to move that forward for me. There we go. Sorry about that. On Saturday, March 28th, Kyrene's eSports Arena at Kyrene Traditional Academy hosted an exciting District Minecraft Championship featuring Altadania and

062Apprende Middle Schools. After a morning of competitive play, Apprende was crowned District Champion. Altadena delivered a strong performance as well, keeping the overall competition close throughout the day. So congratulations to all of our student competitors for their creativity, teamwork, and sportsmanship. And I am so very proud to share that CI Wagner teacher, Ms. Stephanie Garland, was selected as the Arizona Chapter of the Down Syndrome Network's 2026 Educator of the Year. That is really something. Ms. Scarlett was selected for her inspiring commitment to supporting students with Down syndrome and for making a meaningful difference for both students and their families. She was recognized and honored at an event last Saturday at the Phoenix Zoo. So congratulations, Ms. Scarlett. And get ready, it is the end of the year where we have activities going on almost every

063evening, it seems. So Kyrene School District and Chandler Public Library present the Kyrene School District Art Show at Sunset Library. Stop by the library to view artwork created by Kyrene kids in kindergarten through eighth grade. The show will be on display for the public from April 24th through May 12th, 2026. This event will run in conjunction with the virtual art show that we put on each year, which will go live on our website the week of April 20th. So I hope you get a chance to stop by. I'm super excited to be there next week. I also thought this might just be a nice time. I did send a community message out last week. I know the board was able to see that. I want to say a special shout out and thank you to

064our hiring special area leads for coming together in collaboration with school leaders, KEA, our association, my self, some district membership, and all of the special area leads that came together and really put their heads together, collaborating to come up with a solution that we think will work really well next year for our special areas. And so, you know, the shift, instead of switching at a semester, it will be a bi-weekly shift. So we're super excited about that. And finally, I just want to end with our Kyrene Resource Fair. Remind everybody that our school district's exceptional student services team invites you to our resource fair, an opportunity for families to discover all the local resources and create connections in our community. This enriching experience is tailored to families navigating the journey of raising children with disabilities.

065So join us on Wednesday, April 22nd at Kyrene Del Pueblo Middle School. And that concludes my superintendent. update. Great. Thank you. All right. Item 4.2 is board member statements. And I'm going to go ahead and kick us off this evening. I personally would like to congratulate Superintendent Tenyes. She was recently honored with the Caroline Warner Leadership and Education Award at their annual conference recently. And I know that working alongside you over the last few years has been a really wonderful experience. And I I just appreciate the example you set for all of our employees here in the district. But, you know, especially as a woman in leadership, you know, just what an honor this is. So I just wanted to take a moment and kind of share that with our community and congratulate you. Also,

066so excited to see such a full house this evening. It is one of the best and busiest times of the year with all of our end of year celebrations. So welcome to everybody here. Do any other board members have statements tonight? I just want to welcome our poetry contest winners. I've had a chance to read some of the poetry that we've seen from our students over the years and the ones tonight. And I cannot tell you how impressed I am with the work that you guys do. It is amazing the amount of talent and inspiration that comes out in this work. And I'm just really, really excited that we get to honor you tonight. families, I hope you're as proud as we are because they are really special. And to our staff who put all

067the work into this poetry contest, because I know it's a lot, thank you so much and looking forward to celebrating you all tonight. Thank you very much. Welcome, everybody. It's really nice to see all your smiling faces, and I'm looking forward to our ceremony. I just wanted to mention a couple things that I've done since our last meeting. First of all, I want to give an underlining to what President Nelson said about the hard work and collaboration that we've seen. with our superintendent and the special teachers. It's been a difficult thing for folks to get used to the idea that we're having to adjust our sights and stuff that goes along with it. But I know there was some bumps and you stuck with it and had a really good... conclusion to the whole thing.

068So I want to thank you for that very much. Also want to mention that I have the very distinct honor of going a couple of weeks ago to Ninos, which happens to be my... neighborhood school and they had a glow dance and I have it was so much fun I didn't want to leave but I was a little old for it but I sure enjoyed watching it and the community came together everybody had a great time it was a great vibe and it was put on by their small but mighty PTO who worked hard really hard and and just pulled off something that was a little bit complicated and They did it really well. So I hope I see our principal of Ninos is here today. So I hope you'll convey my thanks and admiration

069to the PTO people there. And finally, I wanted to mention that Superintendent Tenyes and myself had the opportunity to attend the East Valley Consortium, which is a group that gets together of school board. members and staff, lead staff at public school districts. And it was very instructive. It was nice to visit with our cohorts and get to know them. And there are a lot of really dedicated people who are interested in public schools in this part of the Valley. It's the part that I know. I'm not casting aspersions anywhere else. I just don't know that many people in other parts of the Valley. But thanks for going and taking me to that. And I appreciated it. That's it. You set me up. Normally I go first. And y'all took my two things I was going

070to mention. I was going to speak about Laura in the poetry contest, but that's right. I'll repeat it again anyway. Yeah, I had a great time reading the poetry. You know, as an educator, I want to say impressed because that's like downplaying what the students are doing. You know what I mean? I really enjoy reading them, showing a lot of talent. And I just know they're going to continue to get better as they if they continue to do it. You know, sometimes they do it and they stop. But if you continue to do it, young people, you'll get better at it. And maybe reading your work around the world one day, who knows? And congratulations to you again, Laura. You know, it's a lot of stuff that happens that a lot of people don't know.

071And sometimes you save reputations by not telling your side of the story. So, you know what I mean? You know me, I keep it real. So I'll just keep it real. But thank you for all that you do. We appreciate you. Okay. Item 5.1 is our Kyrene Poetry Contest winners. This is one of my favorite nights of the year. The talent that is, in this room is just incredible as my fellow board members have stated. Just appreciate all of the aspiring poets and writers and it's just such a great way to express yourself and I'd like to welcome our Director of Academic Equity and Excellence, Sarah Collins to recognize our contest winners. Our staff, our poets and our family members of our poets. Each year the district holds a poetry contest to recognize the importance

072of poets and poetry in our schools. At each school site, students were able to submit their poems to the school level contest between October and February. One poem per grade level was selected as a school winner, and these poems were submitted to the district contest. A team of staff anonymously scored all submissions to determine the district winner, which were three students per grade level. We are recognizing and celebrating our school and district winners at the board meeting today, and we always do it in April because it's National Poetry Month. Thank you. This year marked our second year creating a digital poetry anthology website in place of a printed collection, showcasing all school and district winners. Continuing this digital tradition highlights the competency of community contributor, outlined in the portrait of a Kyrene kid. Publishing student

073work online allows them to take pride in their role as writers and storytellers while amplifying their voices beyond the classroom. In addition to featuring all school winning poems in our digital anthology, district winners were given the opportunity to create a digital animation and audio recording of their poem. These video recreations are prominently highlighted on the homepage of the website, which I think we're going to get pulled up here, because this year we are going to invite three of our poetry winners up. They are going to introduce themselves, their school, their grade level, and then we're going to click on their poem, and you actually get to see the animation and the work that they completed. So if I could please have up Cameron, second grader from Cerritos, Caroline, fifth grade from Lomas, and Elise, eighth

074grader from Ocumaw. My name is Cameron. I'm in second grade, and my school is Cerritos. My name is Caroline. I'm in fifth grade. My school is Lomas and my poem is Brothers. Go ahead and then we'll hear. Either way. I'm Elise. I'm in eighth grade and I go to Aki Mall and my poem is All We Need. We'll start with Cameron's poem, please. Stitchin' is Picnic by Cameron. Stitch is blue, as blue as the sky. Stitch went to Mars, I don't know why. Mars is red, Stitch is not. Stitch had a picnic. I know why. Stitch was hungry and so am I. He had a picnic rug and a little bug chilling in a mug. Brothers by Caroline S. In the morning when you want to sleep, they wake you up with the loudest peep.

075Then they bust through the door. They want a hair tie. That's what they woke me for. So you decide to get up, but then you step on a toy truck. You ask for the house, there's a catastrophe, but all they would say is it wasn't me. Then you get some cereal, hoping for a miracle, but when you get to the table, please listen to me, this is not a fable. Choose your chair carefully, they may leave food on the seats. Trust me friends, brothers are not so neat. But still at the end of the day when they close the bedroom door, when they say, I love you, I will always say, I love you more. All We Need by Elise Klusaritz When there is violence, hunger and greed, and innocent people wait to be freed,

076while we watch bombs drop and hope and faith die, we beckon death to hail from the sky. we are quick to judge and quick to blame but the last thing we need's to inflict more pain there's only one thing that the world needs most it is all around us from coast to coast disagreements don't matter but what is within overpowers beliefs or color of skin hate is injury like flowing blood on the shore but love is the remedy that we need more We must let love reign and rain down on us. When we are unsure, in love we must trust. We the people, united we stand. Love is a force we all hold in our hand. Not only our hands, but the whole world's too. For young and old and me and you. To halt

077hate doesn't take a mighty deed. At the end of the day, love is all we need. Incredible. And they're all just as spectacular. One of the reasons why we went to a digital anthology last year was so that families could share it with people near and far. And we hope that you can do that. Go on our website and share those videos with everyone you know because they deserve it. Okay, we would like to recognize and thank all the people who helped make our district poetry contest such a success. We had site poetry coordinators at every school who volunteered their time to organize the school-level contest by communicating with staff and families the timeline and all the guidelines of the contest. Our two district poetry coordinators, a second year in a row, I've already talked

078them into next year too, were Megan Kroski and Brittany Maizia, to my left. They organize communication, share to site coordinators, and work with a team of judges to determine our district winners. We also need to make sure to recognize and thank our ed tech team, Jacinta Sorgal, Joanne Skoglund, and Alexis Lepershio. They played a vital role in helping to continue the digital poetry anthology, and you just saw how spectacular it is. We are now going to recognize all of the poetry contest winners. Certificates for all school winners have been or will be mailed to school sites. We are now going to call up each district winner to receive a certificate and a framed copy of their poem for a keepsake from Superintendent Tennis. All right, when you hear your name, go ahead and come on

079up. We have Avin Doremos from Kyrene Traditional Academy. And these are our kindergarten winners. This is kindergarten. We also have Aiden Reddish from Kyrene de la Paloma Arts Integration Academy. When you come up, we're going to have you stand up here in this big open area so we can take a picture at the end with all of our board members. Last kindergartner is Penny Kadumo from Wagner. All right, we're on to our first grade winners. Isabella Colby from Kyrene de la Colina. Sophia Hack from Kyrene de los Lagos Dual Language Academy. And Julian Reveles from Kyrene del Norte Dual Language Academy. All right, on to our second grade winners. Cameron Kennard from Kyrene de los Cerritos Leadership Academy. Addison Martinez from Kyrene de la Colina. And Ella Strebler from Kyrene de la Sierra. On to

080our third grade winners. Berkeley Cox from Kyrene de la Colina. That helps. Jace Bowersock from Kyrene de los Lagos Dual Language Academy. Anika Todd from Kyrene Monta Vista. All right, on to our fourth grade winners. We have Ava Phan from Kyrene de las Brisas. Alicia Estrada from Kyrene de los Ninos. Gianna Nicole from Kyrene del Norte Dual Language Academy. Now on to our fifth grade winners. We have Keelan Harris from Kyrene de las Brisas. Caroline Sommer, Kyrene De Las Lomas. And Nora Coffey from Kyrene De La Mirada Leadership Academy. Now on to our middle schoolers. We'll start with sixth graders. Delilah Holm from Kyrene Altadena Middle School. Olive Neald from Kyrene Apprende Middle School. And Penelope Lyons from Kyrene Centennial Middle School. Now on to our seventh grade winners. Addison Maynor from Kyrene Centennial Middle

081School. Abigail Robles from Kyrene Middle School. Kaitlyn Muth from Kyrene del Pueblo Middle School. And now on to our eighth grade winners. We have Abigail Williams from Kyrene Apprende Middle School. Elise Clusarist, Kyrene Akimal Al Middle School. And finally, Roshan Walia from Kyrene Altadena Middle School. If the board members could please come down to take a picture with all of our poets. Oh, thank you. Right. Congratulations to our winners. I'm going to pause for a minute. I know that parents, it is a school night. Happy to have people stay with us for the rest of the meeting. But if you would like to take pictures with your guests and your poets, you're welcome to do so in the lobby. So I'll just give everybody a minute to kind of get situated. Okay. Item 6.1 is

082request to speak to the governing board. As per board policy 1-302, the Kyrene governing board invites... The viewpoints of citizens throughout the district. In-person members of the audience may address the governing board by filling out a blue card provided at the sign-in table. Written comments may also be submitted electronically through links sent out in board meeting notifications. Electronic comments will be recorded and filed as part of the board meeting minutes following the meeting. State statute prohibits the governing board from discussing an item that is not on the agenda, but we do listen. And then we can also request that staff follow up as necessary. We value transparency and public input and to ensure that everyone has an opportunity to address the governing board, we've set a time limit based on the number of comments, which

083goes as follows. For 1 to 15 speakers, we have three minutes. For 16 to 30, it's two minutes. And anything over 30, so 31 or more. We have one minute. Superintendent Tanius is for me. We have a total of one public comment this evening. So we will have a total of three minutes for that comment. There will be a timer located on either screen and it'll flash red when you've got about 15 seconds left. For the record, as you approach, please state your name and your Kyrene affiliation. Our first comment will be by Ms. Marianne Lesher. And she is the proud principal at Kyrene Traditional Academy. Thank you. Thank you, President Nelson, members of the board, superintendents, members of our cabinet. I did not prepare anything specifically, but I wanted to just give a shout

084out to our facilities team, Mason Mead, Jeff Belding, Matt Griffin. We have so many wonderful people that work in that department. The reason is today our air conditioner went out. And, you know, that's always a red flag. And you go, oh, my goodness, is this going to be a quick thing or a long thing? Are we going to have to evacuate? And Mason and Jeff and Matt and the whole team just responded so quickly. The crisis team got into play and everything was great. They sent over the HVAC folks. They repaired it quickly. And I know not always that things can happen that quickly, but they are so on the spot. They are so responsive. They are so amenable. to working with us as school leaders. They never complain. They never, you know, give you

085that grouchy face of, oh, not you again. And they are just really great people. And I just thought I would take this opportunity to say thank you to Mason and Jeff and Matt and the entire facilities team, because I have, I've been in this district a long time. And as long as Mason has been here and the folks before as well, but specifically Mason is one of those people that does not get. the thanks and the kudos sometimes because he is a quiet, gentle, wonderful person. And I just wanted to say thank you to him and his team because he deserves the kudos and he deserves just the thanks. So I know that I can speak for all the other principals and school leaders to say thank you to Mason. And this is just one

086small example of what he does behind the scenes and what his team does behind the scenes every single day to support our schools and to support our leaders. So thank you for this opportunity. All right. Item 7.1 is our consent agenda. Are there any changes to tonight's consent agenda? Seeing none, can I have a motion to approve the consent agenda? So moved. Is there a second? Second. Motion by Member Walsh, second by Member Collins. All in favor, say aye. Aye. Motion passes 4-0. Item 8.1 is our presentation on annual audits by Heinfield Meech & Company. It's this type of meeting tonight. Cheering from the dais as we welcome financial director Ryan Lockery. Madam President, members of the board, Superintendent Teniez, for the record, I am Brian Lockery, Director of Finance here at Kyrene. This evening,

087you will hear a presentation from Brittany Williams, Audit Partner with Heinfeld Meech & Company, on the annual audits required by federal and state law. Heinfeld Meech & Company was founded in 1986 and is the independent audit firm procured by Kyrene to conduct four of the six audits that you will be voting on tonight. Brady Williams holds certificates as both a certified public accountant as well as a certified government financial manager and her areas of expertise are government and nonprofits. For some brief background, Kyrene contracts annually with independent auditors as required by law to conduct required audits across many sectors of our district including finance, information technology, student enrollment, transportation, grants, and many, many other areas. These required audits and the results are what are before you today for a statutorily required roll call vote on

088each report. The first one before you is a fiscal year 25 annual comprehensive financial report, also known as the ACFR or the ACFR, which represents the financial statements of the district presented in conformity with public accounting standards and audited in accordance with national and state auditing standards. A copy of the ACFR was provided as an attachment to the agenda and is available on Kyrene's website. The second one is the fiscal year 25 federally required single audit reporting package, which reflects the audited financial statements of the governmental activities of Kyrene against government auditing standards to ensure that both compliance and internal controls over financial reporting exist and are sufficient. A copy of the single audit reporting package is provided as an attachment to the agenda. The Fiscal Year 25 Uniform System of Financial Records Compliance Questionnaire

089is used to audit against the accounting standards to ensure compliance with numerous areas identified by the USFR. The USFR prescribes the minimum internal control policies and procedures to be used by school districts in Arizona. Audit firms are required to gain an understanding of the district's internal controls and obtain appropriate audit evidence to complete the compliance questionnaire in accordance with the requirements of the USFR. A copy of this report was provided as an attachment to the agenda. The fiscal year 25 Kyrene Employee Benefit Trust Financial Statements Report is designed to provide our citizens, taxpayers, and investments and creditors with a general overview of the trust's finances and to demonstrate the trust's accountability for the resources it receives. A copy of this report has also been provided as an attachment to the agenda. These four reports were

090completed by our independent auditors, Heinfeld Meech, which I will be turning over to Brittany in just a moment. There are two additional audits that were one-time audits this year. Kyrene was selected by the Arizona Department of Education for an administrative review of the Seamless Summer Option Food Service Program in July of 2025. The administrative review of the program yielded zero findings and no corrective action plan was required. A copy of this administrative review is attached to the agenda. Finally, Kyrene was selected for a Medicaid school-based claiming program comprehensive compliance review report. As part of that review, all supporting documentation regarding Medicaid was examined, including individualized education plans or other plans of care, clinical notes or service logs, quarterly progress reports, and evaluation reports when applicable. A copy of this compliance review was provided as an

091attachment to the agenda. Excuse me. As findings are identified during the audit process for any of these audits, finance staff work closely with impacted departments to ensure all proper documentation has been provided to auditors. Additionally, district staff work diligently to review practices and procedures to ensure compliance, both now and in the future. When corrective action plans are required, Kyrene staff make every effort to provide strong, actionable steps to identify and correct these findings. After the findings are published, I do provide a copy of all audit findings to our district leaders for transparency and for implementation of any changes to practices or procedures. Additionally, governing board members receive electronic copies of all reports. And at this time... I will ask Brittany Williams from Heinzel-Meach to present on the districts for required annual audits and financial compliance

092documents that Kyrene contracts with to be completed by Heinzel-Meach. Thanks so much, Brian. Madam President, members of the board, Superintendent Tonius, thank you so much for having me here this evening. Gosh, Brian just covered it all in your commentary. I mean, it's getting more exciting. As you review the electronic reports, the one thing that I like to point out is in the single audit report, there is a really great synopsis page, might be like page six or page seven, that says the summary of audit findings and question costs. And it really goes through the results of our audit in a really comprehensive manner. And it tells you, and I don't have it in front of me or on the screen, but basically there were... We issued an unmodified opinion on the financial statements, which is

093a clean opinion. We had no findings. We issued an unmodified opinion on the federal awards that we tested, and we had no findings. And the two federal programs that we tested this year were the Child Nutrition Program. Child Nutrition Cluster, and Title I. So we rotate those every year based on a risk assessment that's very prescriptive for us. And basically, that page is an A-plus this year because there were no findings. So that's what you need to know, right? Nice and clean. The USFR compliance questionnaire is a state compliance questionnaire with over 250 individual questions that we have to look at. We alternate schools. We alternate people that we talk to, but it goes over property control, student attendance, governing board policies, conflicts of interest, cash handling, student activities. Everything's in there. Procurement, HR. There's

094a smattering of things. And so, you know, there were a few findings in there. We always have to answer yes, no, or N.A. And there's always a few no's in there because, I mean, the district is big. really any district, just human error, you're going to have, you're going to have some things, but there wasn't anything that was like super egregious. They were pretty run of the mill standard findings. And then the last thing I wanted to point out was just the, The financial statements this year did have a change in GASB reporting. They required compensated absences to be re-evaluated. So the last time that compensated absences were evaluated was, you know, 20 something years ago. And there's all different kinds of leave now with sabbatical leave and jury duty and all these different things

095that people. you know, accumulate rather than just maybe PTO, how it used to be invested versus unvested. And so, um, Brian actually spent a lot of time on that, uh, too much time. Probably. But I mean, he had to do it because you had to be in accordance with standards and he did a great job implementing that and giving us the schedules that we needed. But it basically added some leave, some liability to the financial statements. And then lastly, you know, every year as we conclude the audit and we issue our audit opinion on the financial statements, I always email my communication to governance directly to all of you just to let you know if there's any concerns with the audit, if anything came up, there's estimates in there, difficulties in counting. countered in the

096audit, which there weren't any. And then it just kind of has a fraud checklist for you to review. So that is it for my presentation, but I'm happy to answer any questions you might have regarding the audit. And it went really well. And we're always so glad to come to Kyrene and it's just a great place. And we're really lucky to be able to work with everybody here. Thank you. Do any board members have any questions for our presenter? Yes, Ms. Rollins. Yes. First of all, thank you guys for the work that you do. It's a lot of work. Trust me, I know. The compensated absences, do we, and this, you know, Mr. Herman gets these questions all the time. What do we think that could potentially look like next year for the audit? You

097know, the biggest change was from last, from 24 to 25 financial statements. I believe it added, what do you think, a million? about a million of liability, but now going forward, it'll be pretty consistent. But if you look at the, um, the MDNA or the footnotes to the financial statements, it'll show you exactly the difference that was added. Um, but it, it added quite a bit because basically sick leave came onto the schedules this year. So the big change was for this year and then going forward, it'll, it'll be pretty steady. Yeah. I can't remember the exact number, but it was big. My mic's not on. Sorry. Because I want to make sure that continues to happen for the staff and the educators in the district. Right. Thank you so much. Sure. Thank you. Any

098other questions? All right. Thank you, Mr. Lockery. Great. Madam President, members of the board, just as a brief reminder, the audit reports themselves are required statutorily to be accepted by board members. Your vote is a reflection on a roll call vote of the acceptance, not necessarily the adoption or the approval of the audit finding as required by statute. It's just an acceptance of the audit report being accepted by board. And I can answer any questions you may have on any of the six audits or the process itself. Okay. Item 8.2. Again, this is a roll call vote. May I have a vote to accept the FY25 Annual Comprehensive Financial Report? We'll go one each member. Aye. Senator Collins, accept. I accept it. Aye. Aye. Motion passes 4-0. Item 8.3 is the single audit reporting package.

099Again, this is a roll call vote. So may I have a roll call vote to accept the FY25 single audit reporting package? Aye. Senator Collins, accept. I accept it. Aye. Aye. Motion passes 4-0. Item 8.4 is the uniform system of financial recordings compliance questionnaire for the fiscal year ending in... June 30th, 2025. Again, another roll call vote. May I have a vote to accept the Uniform System of Financial Records Compliance Questionnaire? Aye. Cedric Collins, accept. Aye. Aye. Motion passes 4-0. Item 8.5 is a Kyrene employee benefits trust financial statements. This, again, is a roll call vote. Do any board members have any questions concerning this item before we proceed? Okay. All right. Then we will go through a roll call vote to accept the Kyrene employee benefits trust financial statements by roll call. Aye. Senator

100Collins, accept. Aye. Aye. Aye. Motion passes 4-0. And finally, item 8.6 is the Arizona Department of Education Administrative Review of Kyrene Food Services for FY25. Another roll call vote. May I have a roll call vote to accept the Kyrene Food Services Program Review? Aye. Cedric Collins, accept. I accept it. Aye. Aye. 4-0. Motion passes. Item 8.7. I am so sorry, folks. We have another roll call vote. I thought we were done with the other one. Boo. So a roll call vote around the Kyrene Elementary Medicaid Compliance Review, our final report. We can begin a motion roll call vote to accept this report. Aye. Cedric Collins, accept. I accept. Aye. Aye. Motion passes 4-0. Thank you. All right. Item 8.8 is concluding our discussion around the Arizona School Board Association 2027 political agenda. This is a

101follow-up from the discussion that we had during our March 24th board meeting regarding ASBA's political agenda for the 2027 legislative session. Just kind of summarizing where we landed. If you look at the printouts that Ms. Moser provided us, the things that are highlighted on the orange sheet were the talking points. or the items that really stood out to us as board members. So I'd love to be able to, now that we've had some time to sit with some of these, to kind of open it up for discussion so that we can go ahead and reaffirm what our top priorities are. I'd love to narrow this list down to about three or four. Board member Davis, do you have anything you'd like to kind of say around this before we begin? Or should we just dive

102right into I'm happy to just dive right into the discussion around the I think we should just dive right in here. All right. Again, this is more of an open discussion. So a little less formalized at this point in time. I will go ahead and kick us off, if you don't mind. I think the thing that really stood out to me is around preserving and strengthening local control, as well as making sure that we're adequately funded by those who should be funding us. And I think, as I mentioned earlier during our study session today, just how... a lot of those things are really interconnected for us as a district around our ability to one, maintain our credit score, as well as what that does for our, you know. We run very lean reserves, as Mr.

103Herman has informed us, and just kind of how agile we have to be, which is admirable. But sometimes it feels as though we have to be unnecessarily. We shouldn't have to be as agile as we are if we were adequately funded. So I know that's kind of where I'm feeling drawn towards as far as what our priorities should be. But I'm happy to hear kind of what some of your thoughts have been over the last few weeks. You want us to talk about the one you brought up or one that we have? Because I have the one right here. Why don't you talk? I'm sorry. I don't understand. Can you explain what? So like you asking us to elaborate on your concern or to bring up your concern? So I think because what we did,

104we had. Yeah, we had some. We've got like nine here and we'd like to get it down to three or four. So. I was just saying, as I was looking over the whole list, those are the kind of things that I was drawn to as far as what is facing us as a district or even as a state as a whole. But I'm happy to hear everybody's thoughts because I know there were things that each of us called out specifically on this list. Well, for me, I'm going to stop doing that, naming the districts. But one district in particular just cut all of their social workers. And so for me, the providing consistent, dedicated sources of base funding based on most recent statewide case study that equips Arizona public schools with adequate support to address

105academic, social and emotional needs of its students. That's very, very, very important, especially as an educator. I see it every day. Like, you know, most people you see, you see it in the house with your kid, but that's just your kid. I'm an educator. I deal with twenty two hundred kids. in some capacity. And I understand what they're going through. If you just pay attention even around all the different schools, the self-harm rate, I'll say that, is high amongst teens. And so that's something that's needed because we don't know. One of the things I always tell my students, I treat them a certain way because I don't know what you go home to when you leave this school. Like, I don't know what your environment's like. So that resource at school is very, very important.

106And I was really heartbroken to see that that district didn't they didn't want to. I'm not going to sit here and try to make them paint them out to be the back. They just did it because they had no choice because of the funding. And so I was just like, man, that's kind of like where we are. And it's like, you know, the legislature is really, you know, grabbing people's hand because don't forget, you know, your homeboy horn. He was he's really trying to get SEL out of schools. So it's just heartbreaking to see that because it's cliche. The children are our future. But it's true because that generation takes care of the next generation. The generation takes care of the next generation. And if they're broken, who's going to take care of the next

107generation? Am I making sense with that? And yeah, so that one's definitely high on my priority list because if they're not mentally fit, the academics is going to go out the window. Like, period. And that's what people are realizing. A lot of these students aren't mentally fit. And they wonder why, like, oh, I was reading a little. Why is that? Because some of these kids, they think when you're going through stuff mentally, you're not worried about this work your teacher giving you. So if I start preaching up here, I'm going to stop right there, though. If I could say amen to what you just said. And also, I share your concern about just the state of our public schools in general. And I also. Locked into the ensure local control and flexibility in managing funds

108and programs within the Arizona constitutional requirement of a general and uniform public school system. Just based on my former life, the words general and uniform are words that are legal jargon. They've been adopted. But the case that they came from originally in the Roosevelt School District case also used the word adequate. And for years, I've been trying to figure out a way to help our legislature take up the responsibility of defining adequate as well. And I would really like to add that word to that particular provision, because general and uniform are terms of art, and adequate should also be a term of art. And I think if it were in there, it would give us some kind of support for other kinds of legislation. might be still my heart, you know, that it gives a

109legal basis for us to expect our legislature to do something about the adequacy of the education that we're being given. And I'd also like somehow to say that I think that defining that term should be left up to educational professionals, not... are elected representatives exclusively, maybe in conjunction with or whatever. And I don't know if that would go into this, but that would be the one thing that I would ask that maybe we suggest if you think that it's a good idea. I've written down a note about adding maybe requirements of a general adequate and uniform public schools. Right. And as I said, there's a legal basis for suggesting that. It doesn't come from the air. The other thing that I just wanted to mention, opposing any legislation that seeks to make school board elections

110partisan, I think that's really important to keep. So those are my two comments. I concur with everything that's been said by my fellow board members. I like the ones you've highlighted. I do note one of the items on here that I'm sure Asville will still continue to focus on is preserving and protecting the voters' original intent for Prop 123 and the funds there. And I hope that the folks that are at home are paying attention. The governor actually issued a statement yesterday that she's on a bills moratorium. She's signing nothing. until the legislature produces a budget that addresses the shortfall with the lapse of Prop 123. And I'm glad to see that that is becoming an issue that's front and center with budget discussions at the state because it's a responsibility failure to not address

111it going forward. So I like that it's on this list, even though it's not highlighted. I think it's already clearly on the radar of our governor. And I think the ones highlighted here are important. This is a depressing exercise, as we say every year, because we continue to do. has to be do more and more with less and less funding from the state. But I appreciate the work of ASBA to try to do their best to advocate for our public school students. So hearing all of this, I think we would, as long as everybody is okay, what I would recommend. After discussion would be moving forward with, you know, providing consistent and dedicated sources of base funding based on the recent state cost study to provide schools with adequate support to address academic, social, and

112emotional needs of its students, including lists, preserve and protect voters' original intent of Propositions 123 and 30301, 301. And then ensure local control and flexibility and manage fundings with the addendum that it does so in order to fulfill the requirements of a general, adequate and uniform public education system. And then opposing any legislation that seeks to make school board elections partisan. Does that kind of capture? Very good. Thanks. All right. So I think we're ready to take a vote on that. So may I have a motion to approve the top priorities for submission to the Arizona School Board Association indicating what we would like to see highlighted on the political agenda? I so move. Is there a second? I'll second. A quick pause here real quick. I have a question for our legal counsel. Do

113I also need to amend this motion to then allow Member Davis to then relay this information to ASBA as our delegate? Or is it enough just to do just the standard vote? I think it's enough to do the standard vote. Okay, cool. Thank you. All right. So. As we work with, if we have a motion by member Davis with a 2nd, by member Collins, all in favor say, I motion passes 4 to 0. My Mike was just. Blinking lots of different colors at me. It's a little scary. Okay. Item 9.1 is board committee and conference reports to any board members have any committee or conference reports. All right. Item 10.1. We are into the policy section, folks. As such, we are going to be having a lot of time with our legal counsel, Mr. Jordan

114LL. So item 10.1 is policy 1-302 around governing board meetings and open meeting law requirements. This is a first read. Thank you, President Nelson, members of the board. And I apologize for the timing when we are doing all of this. Policy has kind of went through a change in process and most of them ended up on my desk and sat there buried under increasing piles of work. But we're going to get caught up and we will be better next year. Policy 1302, and for all of the policies we'll be discussing today, there are general cleanup that the trust has proposed or that in our review, we've proposed just to make sure we're being consistent with our glossary of terms in particular, because that was something this board worked very hard on. But there are some

115just stylistic changes. And then there are also... statutory updates. So I'll speak to the statutory updates, but you will see additional changes that are really just language. nits that have been picked up upon review. So Policy 1302 is based on a 2025 session law that created an open meeting law exemption for communication between a quorum of a three-member advisory committee if not more than one member of the committee is a governing board member. So you'll see that change to the policy towards The top of page four. I'm happy to answer any other questions. Do any board members have any questions? I'd like, could you just explain it a little bit? Just put in different words for me. So what the legislature, this primarily for smaller school districts and for advisory committees. So if you have

116a committee that exists, there are certain quorum notice open meeting law requirements that exist for any of your advisory committees. What this provision was saying was if you have. particularly if you're in a small district, you have an advisory committee that's three members and only one of them is a board member. You don't have to follow all of the open meeting law requirements, but that would generally not exist for this board. Okay. Thank you. May I have a motion to approve the first read and adopt policy 1-302 about governing board meeting and open meeting law requirements? So moved. Is there a second? I'll second it. Motion by Member Walsh, second by Member Collins. All in favor say aye. Aye. Motion passes 4-0. Item 10.2 is Policy 1-401, Parents slash Legal Guardian Rights in Education. This

117is a first read, Mr. LL. Thank you, President Nelson, members of the board. Arizona session law from 2025 Senate Bill 2231 permits parents and guardians to request the health care credentials for employees or individuals who provide health services to students. And they may also request information regarding a school's emergency, a school employee's emergency response training. So you'll see in addition to the policy on page three. That reflects that, and then there are some formatting changes earlier in the policy. I'm happy to answer any questions. Yes, I have a question. Does this request of credentials, is there a requirement that the license, certificate, permit, or registration to practice a healthcare profession exist? Does everyone, for instance, in the nurse's office who may be sitting there to take, do you understand what I'm asking? So our health

118offices are staffed by a health assistant. We have five. Five FTE, just about district nurses that are actual RNs that monitor health care plans and provide direction and support to the health offices, to the health assistants. They also provide training to that group of staff and ongoing mentoring and support throughout the week and throughout the school year. So there is not a requirement that they hold a certain position or have a certain training. background. We are not alone in that in districts in the East Valley that staff that position with a health assistant and not a certified or a licensed medical professional. Okay, so What I'm wondering is if these folks can ask for this license, certificate, permit, or registration, and one of our health aides who's been trained but doesn't hold a license, certificate,

119permit, or registration of a healthcare professional delivers service to a child, and God forbid the child is badly injured or worse, are we then open for some kind of... We have pretty solid procedures around that as to what they do. And they call 911 when a child is injured. So they don't really do anything. They're not directed to administer medical care that they are not trained and able to do under the state. Department of Health actually allows for certain types of positions within a school to provide certain types of care. And if it requires an RN to do that, we have an RN do it. If it's something that allows an unlicensed professional to do the work, then we do typically have that. For an example, it might be... Diapering is one of those. It

120might be changing a feeding tube or administering medication. It might be checking blood sugar, things like that. So our nurses also train those staff, train our teaching staff and our instructional assistant staff regularly to do that work. Okay, that's great. Is that information that you just gave me published anywhere? Do we have that explanation anywhere that a parent might have access to learn that? You know what? That's a really good question. I'd have to go back and look at the website. I would just suggest that we make... If you actually look, we're going to touch on Policy 5404 later about administration and medication, which does speak specifically to some of the items Dr. Lane was talking about where school staff that maybe is not a licensed health care professional. would be administering epinephrine, naloxone, or

121a diabetes management plan or a seizure management plan. Yeah, and I appreciate that, and I'm glad we have that there. I'm just thinking of something that's maybe a little more accessible to someone who just wants to see what our practice is. Well, I mean, do you know... Sorry about that, Bunny. No, please. I do know on our website, we do also, we link to and we have the document from the Arizona Department of Health, which allows and details out what role within your school system can do and perform which type of medical support. So that is linked on our website today. And we. are very open and clear that it is a health assistant in those rooms, but I will also, after Jordan's done with the next one, but I'll also look for some more

122information. And again, yes, and I agree with all that. I just know that... Sometimes folks have trouble finding stuff, and this is something I think is really important if we're all concerned with the safety and health of the kids who are in care, of course, that if it's just really easy to find it. I don't know because I haven't looked to find it, but I just think it's something I'd at least like to make sure that we have in a really accessible form. So people don't have to dig for it. I'll work with. I'd appreciate it. Okay. It is in our policies and our procedures, which is on for accessible for everybody. So I do believe that's there. I think what you might be referring to, there's some in the handbook that talks about the

123positions and the health assistance. So I think it's actually in our parent handbook, but I'll pull the language and we'll double check it to make sure that it's getting at what you're asking for. I understand what member Davis is saying. And even though it. The information is there. Let's make it more readily accessible. Because I'm about to tell you a little dirty laundry like going on in my school. I'm actually, as the union leader, dealing with that right now. Because certain policies and procedures were not clearly explained to a parent, even though the person that did, they did what they were supposed to do within the policy. But because there was nothing accessible. That parent is like, oh, but it's like, well, we did what we had to do in that manner. So, yeah, let's

124see if we can make it a little more accessible and easy for people to find. I will say it is the first sentence on the health services website. So when you look at health services, it is in the About Kyrene, and health services is one of the pages. In the very first sentence, it says our health offices are staffed by health assistants. And then in the next paragraph, it states that registered district nurses provide medical consultation and training. Okay. Okay. Well, we'll talk. Can we talk more about it? At some point or I think I might need some clarity on what it is that you're asking for. That's more clear. I'm not sure that I would love some whether it's we don't have. Do we have do we have a monthly or bi-monthly or some

125kind of letter to parents that goes out like a bulletin or something? I do a monthly newsletter. Maybe in that talk about. Tell me what it is you what the content would be. Can I jump in? I would like to jump in here. Yeah. So I think board member Davis, because as I'm listening to the policy and yes, I understand that our health assistants are registered nurses. There's also a certain type of scope of work. that is attached to each one. And as a parent, if I don't go to the website and I see health assistant, but the registered nurses do X, Y, and Z, I think, are you asking to see like how the scope of work for a health assistant applies at a specific school? Is that kind of, I just want, if,

126if this was pursuant to 15 ARS 15, one 60.0 or whatever. They made an adjustment which indicates that they felt it's important to the powers that be that people know that they can ask what those licenses are. So what might... That's good. That helped. And so if a kid gets sick and a... Non-licensed, non-certificated, non-permitted, or non-registered health care person defined in our district tends to that child, even if they just call 911. And they don't do any extraordinary measures because they're not licensed, certificate, etc. That we don't somehow, people don't expect that those people are going to be able to intervene and get angry and sue us. I mean, I just, it seems to me that the more that we can repeat this kind of thing to our constituents. We don't lose anything by

127telling them more than once. Yes, I would agree. I think what we could do is either in the board update that comes out quarterly or in the superintendent update, what we can do is put these are the updated policies with very clear links so people can go to access the information. And it would just be keeping the public informed when there's a change in policy, should they not be watching a governing board meeting. So that would be a way to make sure somebody's aware of this change. Yes. And what it means, you know, if somebody doesn't have a license certificate permit or registration and they're in charge of the care and control of their children at a certain time and no one helps to the extent that they feel someone should help, it's not because

128we're being negligent. It's because they're not allowed to. I mean. Yes, I just don't know that there is a gap in people not knowing that. So that's what we'd have to, but we'll make sure that they have the update to the new legislation in the new policy. Okay. It's like Dr. Lane said, it is in our information when they realize we have a health assistant and not a certified RN. Okay. We'll see what happens. Just a quick note, I did look up the Arizona statute reference 15-160-04, and there's these magic words after the list of things, the credentials, that says, if any. So the statute actually suggests by saying, if any, that a lot of these folks may not have any of those credentials. It's not in the policy, I noted, but it's in the

129statute, the words, if any. I wouldn't be against that. Maybe we should put it in the policy. But that's consistent with what you're saying, Dr. Lane, that our staff are operating under that. Okay. Thank you. Okay. Just a question for Mr. Allel around Member Davis. Did we want the policy to reflect the, if any, to be a little more clear? Is that? I would. Okay. With that, is Mr. Allel, are we within our, that's within our scope to be able to? alter and change that great so with that being said um I just want to mention one thing. If you turn back to, again, we didn't talk about it because it's not an update to the policy, but there is a requirement that we are making parents aware of this policy annually. So it's part

130of our back to school information that goes out. So when I said that information is already shared in the parent handbook, on the website, this policy. So if you read access to information. We have to make sure that annually parents have access to this policy. So a lot of those safeguards are already in there to make sure that that information is going out annually. It will obviously be updated now that we're adopting this new piece to it. Thank you. Okay. So given where we have landed here, we would like to, I'd like to keep this just as a first read item. And then with the addendum, come back next week and do next, next week. No, some people aren't going to be here next week. Even if you, here's the thing, the statute's already in

131place. So this is already a law, which we are doing. Correct. So we'll come back next time as a second read with the updated language. So may I have a motion to approve the first read of policy? Wrong one, Trina. Policy 1-401. So moved. I will go ahead and second that. All in favor say aye. Aye. Motion passes 4-0. Item 10.3 is Policy 4-101, which is Board Authority to Employ. This is also a first read. Mr. Allel. Thank you, President Nelson, members of the board. This is just clarifying language. This is a couple of years ago. The legislature updated a few statutes about teacher contracts and specified that we cannot issue teacher contracts before March 15th. And the trust in reviewing the language determined that some clarification was needed regarding not just continuing teachers, but

132also probationary teachers. So that's what you see reflected in these changes. I'm happy to answer any questions. Do any board members have any questions? All right. May I have a motion to approve and adopt policy 4-101? So moved. I will go ahead and second that. All in favor, say aye. Aye. Motion passes 4-0. Item 10.4 is 5-201, Flag Display, U.S. Constitution, Bill of Rights, Moment of Silence, Declaration of Independence. First read, Mr. LL. Thank you, President Nelson, members of the board. So first and foremost, we're going to change the name of this policy because it was getting unwieldy to Patriotic Exercises and Observance Days. And then you'll see some changes regarding some organizational pieces for the observance days and some updated language. One of the pieces is that they... amended the statute last year that

133age-appropriate instruction is for grades 7 through 12, not every grade, for September 11th. So happy to answer any questions. May I ask, so we've added the U.S. Constitution for grades 7 through 12, a legible copy that wasn't in there before? Yeah, that was there. Oh, the red is what I have to look at. Oh, yeah. But that was just a link. Whatever. Yeah. Okay. Thank you. I like the link. Okay. Member Collins. So I'm reading the bottom statement. Should a parent guardian of a student object to the recitation of the passage said forth above, the student shall not be required to participate. That's their right to not participate. So I just want to ensure that I live in the real world. Sometimes there's retaliatory actions against people when they tend to not participate in certain

134things. So I don't even know how I'm trying to word this. Like, is there something we could put in there about retaliatory, retaliatory actions, if possible? You mean if someone doesn't say the pledge or something like that? Yeah, the pledge. It's actually for the declaration. They said the parent can opt out of it and the kid doesn't have to say it. But I live in the real world. I'm a teacher and I've had to check a few of my colleagues because of their certain beliefs. And it's like, nah, like, you know what I mean? So I just want to see if there's something that protects that student because they're. their kids. And the freedom of speech contains the freedom to not speak. Right. I mean, I'm not trying to make this harder than what it

135is. I'm just asking the question. Jordan, do we have a, I can't recall off the top of my head, another policy that would cover that exact, that we could pull language from? We have language about retaliation, certainly in the Title IX policies, if not some of the other ones. So we can find some language if the board would like to add to the end of that section on the bottom of page one. Member Walsh? Thank you. I appreciate that. On the point that Member Collins raised, Mr. Jordan, I note that the language talks about should the parent or guardian of the student object. I see in the statute the carve-out also applies to a student. So if the student objects, I wonder if... If there's any concern with having that language mirror the statute, so

136it would be not just a parent or guardian, but also a student. We can make that change. Thank you, sir. Thank you for picking up on that. Because when I think parent, I just automatically think student. Because my students, they're high school. They do their own thing. On the observance days, on number two, am I right in understanding that the word public was taken out of school? Sandra Day O'Connor Civic Celebration Day each used to say public school. I think we just replaced it with representing us as a district. So all of the schools within our organization. Oh, OK. I see. Okay, thank you. I did have a question kind of going back to what Member Walsh and Member Collins are saying, if we are going to add language around this, which does reflect statute,

137and I don't disagree. But I do think you also called out a different point. And we've seen this raised other times, if a student chooses to not participate, however, their parent would like them to. How, like, how do we address that? I know we've had Similar things when we get into patriotic observances and exercises of free speech and people feeling very strongly about what their children do and do not do. But if we are including this student here, how do we communicate our responsibility as educators or staff about respecting a student's choice versus balancing their parents' wishes for them? And is that something that also needs to be reflected in this? And does it or does that fall outside of the statute? I would just be concerned that a staff member look at this and

138say, well. I can force them to do it as long as the parent or guardian doesn't object because that's what the policy says and the statute actually is broader. So I think just aligning to the statute is the safest way to go. You're pointing up on a real tension. And I think this just talks about not requiring somebody to do something as opposed to requiring something to do something, which I'm more comfortable with. There is a little bit of competing statutes here that I think this is part of what. I think you're alluding to we're up against. It does not shock me that our legislature is sometimes inconsistent. Exactly. So some of the statutes they put just wanted to say against each other. So we will. I mean, we will have to address it on

139a case by case in those moments because the reality is there is the parents bill of rights and all of the statutes and policies around that that might. And so I think it would come down to a case of. having that conversation at that time from a legal view as to which one supersedes the other one based on the statutes because they're in conflict of each other or could be. Yeah. And if I might, it's also a question of when a student's personal rights attach to them, at what age, at what stage. Kids don't lose their right to freedom of speech. universally just because they're in school. And the concept of in loco parentis seems to have disappeared from everyone's lips, so I won't even bring that up. But yeah, I think it's an interesting

140point that I'll look forward to discussing later in time. Okay. If that is all around this policy, again, I would make a motion to approve this as a first read. So a motion to approve patriotic exercise and observance days as a first read. Can I get a motion to approve that? I so move. Is there a second? I second. All right. Motion by Member Davis, second by Member Collins. All in favor say aye. Aye. Motion passes four to zero. Item 10.5 is Policy 5-401, Police Interview Notification. Mr. Allel. Thank you, President Nelson, members of the board. This, again, reflects an update to statute, which requires school districts to immediately notify parents if law enforcement takes a juvenile into temporary custody after confirming with law enforcement that the notification does not pose risk to the student

141or the investigation. So those changes are reflected here. Happy to answer any questions. This gets into, before I open it up for other board members, while you think you have any questions, my question is more on the procedural end about how we confirm with law enforcement whether or not a parent is safe. Oftentimes, if it is a school resource officer or, you know, the Tempe police, they might not know. Is this a case where we would be reaching out to a local Department of Child Services? How would we confirm whether or not? notifying the parent or guardian would not pose a risk to the student. President Nelson, members of the board, this is for specific situations when the student is being taken into custody. So the student will have been at school. An officer will

142have shown up at school, interviewed the student, and is saying they're taking the student into custody. There's a form. that the officer needs to complete and that would be the opportunity for the site administrator to ask and confirm with the officer whether or not they can contact the parent. Member Collins. I have a question about the reasonable attempt. What exactly, I'm about to put on my member Davis hat here, what exactly do we mean by reasonable? And the only reason why I say that is because reasonable could be we called a parent one time. They didn't answer. Did you try the work phone number or did you try an alternate number that that's listed for a guardian? Because as an educator and as a black man educator, I've seen how police officers and don't get

143me wrong, I'm glad they're there. They prevent a lot of different things. But I've also seen how they're weaponized on campuses against students sometimes. Because a teacher just don't want to deal with that kid. And then that officer shows up and it's a problem. You guys watch the news. You've seen situations on TV. Let's act brand new. So I just want to like, what exactly does reasonable mean? Because that can have a lot of different context. Member Collins. I think the reason it has a lot of different contexts is because it could mean a lot of different things, depending on the parent situation, the custodian situation, what information we have regarding the parents. Obviously, if we have multiple contact numbers, we will strive to call each number until we speak. with the parent or guardian,

144unless, of course, we're informed by the police not to do so, which also can happen. But I also would caution against trying to go too far in the other direction, because, again, there will be situations where we won't be able to make contact, even though we will try a few phone numbers. We might text. We might email. We don't reach. I, from a district liability standpoint, I do not want us in a position where a parent is saying, you did not exhaust every possible means to get in touch with me before allowing this interview to happen. So in our procedures, we talk, I think, a bit more about. what numbers we'll call and in our trainings that we do with front office staff and administrators, we talk about what it looks like to make reasonable

145efforts, but I wouldn't want to change that language to create potential liability for us. And if I could just sort of piggyback a little bit, my understanding, and please correct me if I'm wrong, is reasonable, it's very situation specific. And it's what a reasonable person would do under those particular circumstances. So there is wiggle room. There's wiggle room both for the circumstances that the family might be in. There's different circumstances for why the police are interviewing. There are times where we are talking true emergency situations, and there are times where it is easier to tell the officers. I will take your card because I cannot reach the parent and let the student know to contact you at the end of the school day. Because again, we are also trying to, I've been having a conversation

146with some folks over at DCS about interviews. and whether or not we are allowing them to happen at the high school district in the manner they want. And part of the conversation that I've had with fellow in-house counsel and with the individuals from DCS is, you are not the only state agency that is protecting these kids and trying to provide services to those students. And when you do interviews on school campus, which a lot of officers and DCS investigators like to do because... We're a nice, convenient spot where they know the kid might be and they can show up. That also takes them away from the education that we're trying to provide. So in all of these situations, yes, it's a little amorphous in terms of reasonable attempts to notify the parents, reasonable attempts to

147make sure the interview happens at the time or at a later date. We will also include what I'll do in board memo is the board. I don't remember how long ago spent some time on this procedure. So again, the board doesn't adopt procedures, so they don't come before the board, but the board did weigh in and we had agreed at the time that it made more sense for that information to go in the procedure rather than the policy. So what I'll do is attach both this policy and the procedure that goes with it. That gives you the more details of how it is administratively is. put into action in our board memo. I believe that was two years ago, maybe three years ago. At least two because of this previous board. Member Welsh. Mr. Lell,

148when the statute talks about districts adopting policies, would that typically include not just the capital P policy that we refer to, but also the procedures that Superintendent Tanyas just referenced? Correct. Got it. So I see like in the statute, for example, there's a requirement that if you have a policy, it shall specify a reasonable maximum time after a parent is notified to interview people by law enforcement. So that level of detail might exist in the procedure and that would still be compliant with the law. Correct. Thank you. Oh, right. Are there any additional questions around this policy? I didn't hear anything in the discussion about anything we would like to add to this. So I'm going to take my privilege. I'm going to make a motion to approve a first read and adopt of policy

1495-401 police interview notification. Is there a second? A second. All in favor, say aye. Aye. Motion passes 4-0. Our next policy is policy 5-404, administration of medication. Mr. Lal. We have one that sounds very similar. So sorry, folks. 5-402, Department of Child Safety interview and custody first read. Mr. Allel. Thank you, President Nelson, members of the board. This is, again, a Senate bill that clarifies that a DCS caseworker may be required to present their identification upon a school visit and a valid driver's license. But if they present a valid driver's license, the school does not. keep a copy of that either digitally or physically with their personally identifiable information. And with that, I'm happy to answer any questions. Do any board members have any questions regarding this policy? May I have a motion to approve

150the first read and adopt policy dash five? 5-402, Department of Child Safety Interview and Custody. I so move. Is there a second? I'll second it. Motion by Member Davis, second by Member Collins. All in favor say aye. Aye. Motion passes 4-0. Item 10.7 is Policy 5-404, Administration of Medication. Mr. Allot. Thank you, President Nelson, members of the board. I believe this is our longest policy of the day. Really, all or 95% of the changes relate to a statutory change from autoinjectable epinephrine to epinephrine delivery system. That was done at the legislature. was a bill that made multiple statutory changes, and the trust has updated our language to reflect that as well. So with that, I can answer any questions that you have, to the extent I know anything about epinephrine delivery systems. I have a

151question. Will you practice with us how to say epinephrine? Sure. Okay, thank you. I had a question, sir. Yes, I had a question, sir. On page nine, I was when I was reading through this document about the diabetes number four. Like, yeah, page nine, section four, where I talked about the student must be capable of practicing. I mean, given that this is an elementary district and some kids are a type one and some of them have things that they carry around or whatever. How do we know with that? Maybe I'm just being too much of a teacher here, you know, like teacher dad. Like I'm always trying to make sure things are in place that, you know, that they at least know how to do things. Sure. I'm going to. Dr. Lane, just hear it

152from behind me. You don't have to answer it now. There is. There are very specific procedures with diabetes management plans where we meet with the parents who have to have specific orders from the health care provider regarding whether they're wearing a glucose monitor, whether they carry insulin or something. The plans are very specific. And in that process, part of it will be working with the registered nurses, not just the health assistants, this goes to the nurses, to review it with the parents to make sure. So there are a lot of checks along the way to make sure that if a student is identified in the management plan as being responsible for their own management, that they are capable of doing so. I believe that says that in number five, if you follow right after four,

153it does talk about. So in part of that plan, we can authorize students that are capable of practicing the proper safety. And should that not be the case, then number five gives the district an opportunity to say that can't be in the plan. We can't allow the student to do that because they're not showing that they can properly be able to do that. If I may, is the plan a special ed plan or is it a 504 plan or is it a plan plan? It's a health care plan. It's a special thing that we have. It's neither of the, it can be, you very likely could have all three plans for a student. You may have two of the three, you may have one of the three, but it is a specific health care plan.

154Okay, thank you. Are there any other questions for Mr. Lallala at this time? No. Thank you, sir, for answering. Okay. May I have a motion to approve the first read and adopt policy 5-404, administration of medication? I so move to motion. Is there a second? I'll second. Motion by Member Collins, second by Member Walsh. All in favor say aye. Aye. Motion passes 4-0. Policy... Item 10.8, Policy 5-410, Interscholastic Athletics. Mr. Allel. Thank you, President Nelson, members of the board. So this was a statutory update which talked specifically to high schools. regarding sponsored programs that are required to have an automated external defibrillator. So there is a little bit of cleanup language on the first page, but... The portion on the bottom of page two that actually speaks to the statutory change that was the proposal

155from the trust, my recommendation to the board is to not adopt that change. As we are not a high school district, we do not have grades 9 through 12. We are not required to do this. So that would be my recommendation. And I'm happy to answer any questions. Did this require the districts to buy these things? Was it a funded mandate or not? Unfunded mandate with the opportunity to accept any grants or donations that the districts could identify. I see. Thank you. Are there any additional questions regarding this policy? Seeing none, I will make a motion to approve and adopt policy 5-410, Interscholastic Athletics. Is there a second? I second. All in favor say aye. Aye. Motion passes 4-0. Item 11.1 is items for future consideration. Do any board members want to list any items

156for future consideration? Member Davis. I would just like to either for future... In the far future or right now, I would like to double check about representation to the Arizona School Boards Association. I believe that I still hold that position. And I just want clarification on that. And if I do, I would like to continue to do so. And I would also like to know if I am going to be able to attend their legal update, legislative update. in June. I believe we don't swap out ASBA representation until later in the fall. So yes, you still hold that position and that would be something that we would vote on again in the fall. Yeah, later this year. So if you wanted to continue, marinate on that. You have some time. Okay. And about the legislative

157update in June? The legal conference. The legal conference. It's here in Phoenix. So there's the law conference, which happens in September. Yes. Right. September. The board generally, you have procedures about who attends and what the process is. You'll contact Nancy and let her know your interest. There will be. in past years there has been an ASBA ASBO ASA joint webinar that they usually do at the end of the legislative session that is free that people can register for if they want just updates on what that's not in person but that's not in person that is a webinar that's in June that's when in June it's when the legislative session ends yeah I mean I think we can Figure out what one it is and then we can we can talk about it. Maybe once we

158get like the actual the actual date, if it's not the law conference in September, because, again, there are procedures for that. But typically the law conference in September is around all the new legislation that came out also. And it'll be a lot of policy updates. So the trust also does one, which we typically have attended the last couple of years now because. We use the trust policies. And then there's the ASBA one, which also is a legal. Yeah, I went I went to that one in September. I think it is. Is that what you're talking about? The one up in Flagstaff? No, no, that that was different. OK. I'll put something in the board memo for an item of future consideration with all of the upcoming ASPA and which one pertains to what topic. Thank

159you. Thank you. Item 12.1 is meeting dates. Our next regular meeting is scheduled for April 28th. Item 13.1 is adjournment. May I have a motion to adjourn this evening's meeting? I motion. I will second that motion. All in favor say aye. Aye. Motion passes 4-0. This meeting is adjourned at 7.53 p.m.