5-27-2025 Kyrene Governing Board Study Session and Meeting

0011.1 Call to Order Study Session. Our study session is called to order at 5 p.m. Today is Tuesday, May 27, 2025. Item 1.2 is our Budget Capital Plan. At this time, I'll turn it over to our Director of Finance, Mr. Brian Lockery. President Walsh, members of the Governing Board, Superintendent Tenias, for the record, I am Brian Lockery, Director of Finance. This evening, I will be presenting the Fiscal Year 26 Three Major Capital Budget Plans Created Under State Accounting Standards and District Governing Board Policies. We could just advance at one slide here. Excellent. We appreciate showing this slide each time to ensure the fiduciary responsibility of Kyrene as a public entity. to show that we are very transparent with our budget and go above and beyond to ensure that the public has access to all of

002this information. You can see a copy of this adopted budget, which won the 2024-25 Meritorious Budget Award. And that is a testament to the hard work of Mr. Herman and that entire team. Kyrene is one of only two school districts in Arizona who produces this report and earns that Meritorious Budget Award. One of only 130 school districts nationwide to receive that International Meritorious Budget Award. We as a district have received that for the last three years. This year, our colleagues in Crane Elementary School District have completed the lengthy process and complex task of creating their budget annual report that was also awarded the Meritorious Budget Award. So congratulations to our colleague Dale Ponder and the entire team at Crane Elementary School District for joining Kyrene in this esteemed achievement. The next slide is presented at

003each study session in case anyone has missed or not seen the previous session. We use it to explain that our spring budget presentations follow the format and categorizations of funds as defined by the uniform system of financial records and how that aligns with many other reporting structures used for school district and governmental accounting. The budget format used by school districts is prescribed under Arizona Revised Statutes, Title 15, Section 271, and developed by both the Office of the Auditor General and the Arizona Department of Education in conjunction with any statutory changes that are approved by the legislature and then signed by the governor. The budget format prescribes the fund accounting and financial reporting guidelines that must be followed. Our next slide brings us to that budget timeline that we often see. Chris Herman, Mr. Herman, presents

004this slide often when presenting the budget creation process. As you can see, we are closing in on the end of that budget area. The end of the sections of the budget before a proposed budget is aggregated and presented to the governing board and the public. And this capital projects presentation will bring together the three major capital plans used by the district to identify capital needs in the next budget year, as well as projections for future years. The next slide, tonight's presentation, is focusing on that final remaining fund type that we have not covered up until this point from a revenue perspective, which is capital projects. But because developing a capital plan is a little bit different than developing just an operating budget, we also have the ability to discuss expenditures while talking about the capital

005master plans and the three capital projects in this presentation, in addition to the revenue assumptions as a whole. We like to use this slide because it talks about the major capital projects funds that we have as a school district are responsible for. And when we talk about capital projects, these are those funds that account for the financial resources that are restricted, committed, or assigned specifically for capital outlays. This slide contains a listing of the individual funds that are included in the capital projects fund type. It's important to understand that these funds are specifically designated for capital purposes, meaning they can't be used for general staffing expenses, positions, employee compensation, or other ongoing operational expenditures for the district. Although there are nine funds listed within the capital projects fund type, you'll see in a couple slides

006that only three of these funds have revenue amounts budgeted for next year. That's just the revenue side. These are the district additional assistance, also known as DAA, the capital override, sometimes that's referred to as the DAA override or the DAA capital override, and then capital gifts and donations. However, if there were any unanticipated expenditures within any of these other funds next year, carry forward balances would be used to cover any of those expenses. Kyrene has worked very hard to develop a collaborative capital planning process between curriculum, technology, transportation, and facility teams that is both strategic and long-term in nature. Having a multi-year capital plan in place is critical to preparing sustainable financial plans and budgets because they allow us to clearly see and identify upcoming capital needs, which often have large costs associated with them.

007Although there are specific requirements and restrictions for each type of capital funding, at times there is some overlap or flexibility for how district additional assistance, the capital override, or bond funds may be used to address a particular capital need. And this team works very hard to leverage and maximize the flexibility across all of those funding areas and has done so for many years. As part of this collaborative process, each year these capital plans are reviewed and reprioritized where necessary to ensure the identified resources are optimized to support student needs, aligned to current year financial conditions, and are consistent with Kyrene's strategic plan, goals, and initiatives. This slide provides the estimated revenue projections for district additional assistance, capital override, and bond funds for the next year. DAA is that capital funding provided by the state and

008has some flexibility and that it can be retained for capital purposes or also can be allocated to maintenance and operations. The total DAA funding for next year is estimated to be $6.8 million. Historically, as we discussed in a previous study session, Kyrene is needed to allocate a portion of DAA to the maintenance and operations portion of the budget in order to maintain a balanced operational budget. At this time for fiscal year 2026, it is expected that about $1.7 million of that DAA allocation will still have to be allocated towards maintenance and operations to maintain a balanced budget for next year, leaving about $5.1 million remaining for capital purposes. However, this amount could be adjusted up or down once we are able to see a consolidated picture for our total budgeted revenues and operational expenditures across

009the district and is often adjusted during that May budget revision, as was recently completed at the last governing board meeting for fiscal year 25. Kyrene's long-term strategy for DAA is to prioritize and preserve this funding for curriculum and school capital needs, and all school capital allocations and curriculum capital needs will be funded from DAA in fiscal year 26. Kyrene's capital override that was passed by voters in November 2023 and the 25-26 school year will be year two of that capital override period. Funding for DAA overrides continues at the same funding level for seven total years, which would be through the 2030-2031 school year, unless it is renewed early. Each year, the capital override will provide $8.5 million in revenue versus the previous amount that had been approved by voters, and this funding is primarily used

010for technology areas. The Kareem community also authorized the district to sell bonds. In November of 2023, the first issuance from that bond authorization package occurred recently and raised $42.7 million in revenues to cover identified capital master planning needs for our schools. We want to take this moment to thank our community for their continued support of bond and overrides because as we shared during that last election, Kyrene typically spends about $27 million a year on capital and curriculum needs, but we only receive about $7 million from the state in the funding formulas. So if Kyrene had to just rely on the state capital funding, there is no way that our facilities, technology, curriculum, or transportation would look like it does for our students. This slide shows the total estimated capital revenues for the 26th fiscal year

01126 budget compared against a few previous years, as well as last year's adopted budget. And you can see that the total amount of $13.6 million in fiscal 26 estimated is almost $43 million lower than the 25 budget, primarily because there are no expected bond sales to take place in 25-26. But $42.7 million, as was just referred to, of bond revenues was collected this past spring, the 2024-25 fiscal year. It's important to note that as a district, you will see that there's a building renewal grant line there. The district does pursue and continues to pursue school facilities SFOB funds from the state of Arizona for projects that are eligible. However, the statewide requests from school district often exceed the available appropriations by the legislature to the building renewal grant fund. So oftentimes school districts. place requests

012into that grant fund and may be approved. However, there may not be any funding left in that fund for the SFOB to distribute to schools. It is important that we as a district continue to pursue those grants, those grant fund opportunities. But as you can see, it's not traditionally been a large revenue source for the Kyrene School District. Next, I will turn it over to Amy Gingell, who will discuss the components of the curriculum capital plan. Great. Thank you, Brian. Again, my name is Amy Gingell. I'm one of the directors of Academic Equity and Excellence. I work with curriculum in the district. And so I have an opportunity tonight to share with you a little bit about our five-year planning process. As Brian said, we work extensively on creating a five-year plan or extended plan

013so that we can anticipate the needs that we would have with curriculum. A couple of the things that we consider as we're looking at our five-year plan and readjusting it yearly is looking at Arizona standards and whether the plan that we have is in alignment with any updates to the Arizona standards. We are currently not expecting any updates to the Arizona standards, but when those do come out, they do come sometimes rather quickly. So we do always want to have that in mind as we're considering our five-year plan. We also consider the projected costs. Things have gone up in pricing, so we always project for those so we can look at what's coming up over the next few years. And then what is the cost to systematically update our resources for our course of study?

014So if we have a particular course that we know hasn't had an update in some period of time, we look at how do we align those different curriculums with our current course of study. We do look at our adoptions for multi-year purchases, and that's to maximize our available funding. We often get discounts from vendors if we pursue multi-year contracts, so we have continually done that work as we've gone through the adoption process. We always have ongoing program evaluation. We look at courses that still need to be maintained. Are there courses that have changed or we're looking at a different direction for, say, maybe an elective course that we've decided not to offer any longer. So we're always looking at how is our programming working and how much programming do we actually have that will need

015those curriculum resources in that five year span. We're also looking at something that's relatively new in the last three to five years is blended learning. This means that we have resources that are both paper, textbooks, or workbook type, and then also an online component. This can be an online component for teachers. It can also be an online component for students. Many of them have student programming that helps assist with intervention or enrichment depending on the course. So we have these new types of materials that we're constantly working with. And Damian will speak later about the technology devices, but these technology devices in conjunction with our new blended learning curriculum resources is really important for us to keep updated on both sides so that we're able to provide these resources for students and teachers. We can

016go to the next slide. So our capital budget, this is our expanded budget for the next five years. So we break this down by content area. So we look at all of the resources that go into each category and we estimate the budget needs that we have for that. You'll notice that as the plan shifts over the five years, we have different allocations. A lot of those are anticipated adoptions. So as we just went through an ELA middle school adoption, most of the board members were there to be part of that process. We will also have the opportunity to do some additional adoption cycles in the next coming years. So we always plan ahead for those. Sometimes we find things change and we don't decide to not do an adoption, but we do put those

017in. our five-year plan so that we can see that progression across the five across our entire plan. Okay so again some considerations that we have when we look at curriculum adoption as we are saying we plan that out over the five-year cycle. One of the most important things is if there will be any new standards from the Arizona Department of Education. We currently do not anticipate and have not been told that there will be any new standards rolling out in the 25-26 school year. That usually takes a year or two to cycle through having teacher committees work on that. So we usually have pretty good knowledge of that and can make adjustments to our five-year plan should that be something that arises. We also look to see if our current curriculum is still meeting our

018needs. There are no expected curriculum changes to the 25-26 school year. We are currently waiting guidance from the Governing Board and the Long Range Facilities Planning Committee before making any significant changes in our curriculum. This is based on we do purchase certain curriculum materials that are by school. We also have other curriculum materials that are by student count. So we want to make want to be as prudent as possible with decisions that are being made. So we are not making any significant changes going into this next school year to anticipate the time for this long range planning committee to to do the work that they are tasked with. We do have some contracts that expire. We have the opportunity with several vendors to make continuing contracts at a reasonable price. So we are pursuing that

019as well. So rather than going through a full adoption cycle, we are able to continue using the resources that we have, even though we are out of an adoption contract. But we can continue with year-long or multi-year contracts with those vendors. So we are working on that. That often saves the district money in purchasing those materials, or we can get them. in advance with a little bit cheaper price. So we do take a look at that and make sure that we're being prudent with any contracts that we sign so we get the best deal possible. And then we also look at the timelines for our materials to keep them up to date. We do try to spread out our adoption process. So we're not doing it all in one year and adopting several content areas.

020It does take a lot of time and energy. And we want the public to focus on the adoption that we have in front of them. So we usually typically do one or maybe two at a time. And so we spread those out over the course of the entire cycle in order to get feedback and have opportunity for our staff and our community to really be an integral part of those adoptions. We also want to make sure that we're thinking about our elementary teachers. Elementary teachers teach multiple content areas. And so when we do go to do an adoption, we want to plan out those adoptions. For example, we just adopted Discovery Ed for 3.5 science and we are implementing K-2 science in the 25-26 school year for all elementary teachers. So in that two year

021period, they have all had a brand new curriculum and new science kits that they had not had previously. So it takes a little time for everybody. to get used to that work. So putting another adoption right on top of that makes it very difficult for elementary teachers to really put a lot of energy and time into those curriculums. So we do space those out so they have a little bit of time to work with one new curriculum before they get the next one. So those are the considerations that we're making for adoptions. And I think I have one more slide. Which is this is just to show you our current capital plan. This is part of our curriculum management plan is when we what we have adopted what year we adopted it and then when

022were those standards adopted. So you can see that there's a variety of times when standards were implemented and then we have implemented curriculum as a response to that. We have also updated some of the additions. So you'll see a couple of in English and excuse me, English and math, you'll see that there's a parentheses with a 23 and a 24 school year. We were able to acquire the new additions for these resources at no additional cost. Our vendors were giving us the opportunity to update into a slightly new edition. This helps us keep those blended learning processes in place where they have a new website or a new program. It corresponds with a new workbook and so we were able to acquire the new workbook. So even though we technically adopted in 2017, we have

023a new edition, the second edition from 2023. So we keep all of this current so that we know exactly what should be coming up in our five-year plan, what is the most likely curriculum that we need to address as we move forward in our full planning cycle. And I think I'm turning this over to Damian now. Thanks, Amy. Just to continue on, the information technology portion of the capital override is very similar to what Amy just described, only we support the entire district, not just instructional, but all of the operations side of the house as well out of this funding. We also operate off of a capital master plan. Ours fluctuates from five to, it says eight here, but it's really five to 10 years, depending on the devices and what type of technology we're

024talking about. We kind of. break it down into four main buckets as far as the school building. So that would be devices, whether they're laptops, Chromebooks, iPads, really anything that students and teachers use on a regular basis. It includes things like 3D printers and cameras and you name it. If it's a piece of technology that you can find on a campus, it's likely being funded out of the instructional technology portion of the override. In addition to that, a lot of our curriculum resources. So not necessarily the funds that we use to purchase the actual curriculum, the technology portion of the curriculum, but the stuff that goes to support it. So for example, if you're teaching video production, you're going to need equipment to teach video production. That's what comes out of this. All of our

025STEM classes have equipment that we're able to fund partially out of capital override. So it's really those curriculum resources. I always joke, it's the things that make noise when it hits the table or the ground. That's what we fund out of this, not necessarily the licensing. But then to move on to the next bullet, which is the licensing. This supports everything that Amy just talked about. There's a lot of the stuff, a lot of stuff that the curriculum folks do require software licensing or use licensing to use the curriculum. We fund a portion of that out of capital override as well. But in addition to that, we have things that we just have to have in order to run. a district. So things like Synergy, which is our student information system that all of our

026grades are kept in, and all of the communications with parents regarding their teacher's classroom. And then we have Visions, which is how we pay our bills and how we pay our employees and how we track our financial accounts. All of that is paid for out of Capital Override as well. There's a whole bunch more licensing that goes in here. I named just the big ones, but that's a substantial portion of what we use the capital override for. And then these last two bullets, the infrastructure and other technology, these are things that vary year to year. Some years we spend very little on this. Other years we spend a lot. And it really, what dictates that is the... lifespan of the equipment. So for example, network infrastructure is the stuff that most people don't see. It's

027the wiring in the walls. It's the access points. It's the routers, the switches, the servers, things that have to be in place for all of those classroom devices to work. normal people would never run into this equipment. It's all the backend stuff. And the lifespan of that stuff ranges anywhere from a couple of years up to 15 or 20 years. It just really depends on the type of equipment that we're talking about. So all of that's paid for out of capital override. And then in addition to that, other types of systems that we kind of split fund depending on what it is. It could come out of capital override. It could come out of bond. Sometimes it can come out of another fund. But the things that don't really fit into computer-related technology, like our

028security systems, our AV systems in the NPRs and theaters. Two-way radios that the teachers and campuses use to communicate and keep their schools safe. Things that are used in food service like cash registers and then telephones in the classrooms. All of those types of things you don't necessarily think of as technology like a computer, but it is all technology funded with the capital override. And then on the next slide, this just gives you an overview. I know Mr. Lockery already spoke to it. We have about 8.5 million that's approved in capital override from year to year. And you can see these numbers at the bottom don't equal 8.5. And the reason for that is each year we have a small portion of. what I refer to as rollover funds. I'm not sure what Mr. Lockery

029refers to it as, but I refer to it as rollover funds. And what that really means is, for example, last year we were slated to replace part of our telephone system. Well, we suddenly realized after consulting with Cisco that they were going to extend the life of some of the equipment we had. So there was no need for us to extend it. Well, there is now a need. It's now truly end of life and we're going to have to do it. So we... We show that we came in a little under this year on actual expenses, but now we've rolled that budget over to the following year. So we're not spending anything above what we're allocated. It's just the way that the money rolls over from year to year and when we elect to do

030the projects. And that is my portion. I think we are now going to turn it over to Mr. Meady. Good evening. Mason Meade, Director of Facilities. I'll be going over the Capital Master Plan. The district has always maintained a Capital Master Plan, which is a 10-year Capital Master Plan. It is comprehensive and identifies all areas that qualify for bond spending across 25 district sites in the district office. It's a process to determine short-term and long-term facility maintenance needs. Life cycle analysis of replaceable systems performed by a third-party vendor. Third-party structural engineering company performs structural analysis on a rotating... Back to the other slide, please. Yep, thank you. A third-party structural engineering company performs structural analysis on rotating five site per year basis and preventative maintenance inspections done by district staff. Projects are prioritized based on

031the following criteria, safety and security, loss of instructional time, regulatory compliance, and connection to the strategic plan or other district goals. Next slide, please. There are three main areas, categories of the capital master plan, capital master plan, which align with the voter approved categories in the 2023 bond pamphlet, maintain schools, transportation and administrative. Budgeted areas under maintain schools and administrative construction projects, instruments, equipment and furniture and technology. Transportation includes funding for buses, other vehicles that transport children and technology related to transporting children. Next slide, please. As stated on the previous slide, the three main categories of the capital master plan that align with the voter approved categories in the 2023 bond pamphlet are maintained schools, transportation, and administrative. All projects listed under these three main categories are identified on the 10-year capital master plan. Maintain

032Schools represents construction projects, instruments, equipment, and furniture and technology. Maintain Schools for FY26 budget includes construction projects budgeted at $14.3 million. Instruments, equipment, and furniture budgeted at $1.6 million and technology budgeted at $4.4 million. The transportation category of the capital master plan identifies voter approved spending for school buses, white fleet vehicles that transport children, and technology related to transporting children. The transportation fiscal year 26 budget includes 10 new 81 passenger buses, 10 new 33 passenger buses, and five new white fleet for facilities, grounds, and warehouse. The administrative category of the capital master plan has the same areas as maintained schools, but with a much smaller dollar amount. Administrative fiscal year 26 budget includes the funding for phase three of the central campus improvements. Next slide, please. The previous slide showed bond spending in three categories,

033maintained schools, transportation, and administrative. This slide will take a deeper look into maintained schools, which is the largest portion of the school-related bond spending. Maintained schools consist of three areas, construction projects, instruments, equipment, and furniture, and technology. Looking at the table on this slide, you will see both fiscal year 25 estimated amounts and fiscal year 26 budget amounts. Construction projects is the largest area, and for reference, several major project expenses are notated in the comments column. During FY25, several significant facility projects were completed, including the Pueblo Middle School and Palomas LED upgrades, the replacement of Millennials Roof and Skylights, A campus-wide restroom renovation at Mariposa with additional completed projects include multiple site playfield renovations at Altadena, Brisas, Mariposa, Murata, Monta Vista, as well as fitness room renovations at all middle schools. Looking ahead to fiscal

034year 26, facilities is budgeting for key projects such as the roof and skylight replacement at Sierra, Monta Vista mechanical yard renovation, a campus-wide restroom renovation at Paloma. and safety and security upgrades at Wagner. The remaining $6.7 million in funding will support 29 additional projects across 14 school sites, which will include projects such as play court resurfacing, exterior weatherizations, and play field renovations. Instruments, equipment, and furniture represent approved bond spending for classroom furniture, musical instruments, athletic equipment, special needs furniture, and other equipment. Equipment for maintenance, grounds, and custodians also included. For fiscal year 25, new classroom furniture at Apprendi, which was the remaining pods that were left from the previous year, and braces were completed. For fiscal year 26, budgeting is for new classroom furniture at Altadena and Cerritos. The final area under maintain schools is

035technology. This area of the capital master plan is led by the district IT department. This highlights some of the larger items on the capital master plan for replacement and technology. For fiscal year 25, student devices, school desktops, school AV systems for NPRs and gyms were completed. And for fiscal year 26, technology is budgeting for student devices, data centers, security systems, and additional school, NPR, gym, and AV systems. One last reminder, this is a fluid document. Capital Master projects are added and or deferred on the Capital Master plan as we assess and prioritize needs across the district. I will now turn it back over to Mr. Lockery. Thank you, Mr. Meade. And that's actually a really good note for all of these capital master plans is that none of these are static documents as they're presented.

036They're the documents of the capital master plan and based on all the work that's gone into creating a master plan, but they can sometimes be a little more dynamic as emergency needs arise and they become fluid as necessary to ensure that all the district needs are covered. Let's talk briefly about the vehicle replacement plan over the next few years. We have really two areas. We have student transportation vehicles and then non-student transportation vehicles. On the next slide, you'll see that in fiscal 23-24, the district maintained about 120 buses. The goal is to reduce that total number to 80 buses through the trade-in of vehicles, the sale of vehicles, a reduction of the entire fleet to meet the needs of the district as it continues to decline. The fleet replacement of our what we call our

037yellow fleet or our student transportation vehicles, the yellow buses began in fiscal 23. And so far, we've received 15 new buses. Five of those were exceptional student services vehicles and 10 of them were general education buses. And you can see the 81 passenger vehicles are our general education buses and the 33 passenger buses row. refers to the exceptional student services buses. The replacement order, the replenishment of the fleet will have 20 on order in the next month for fiscal year 25-26, 10 from each of those categories. Those have a projected delivery date of February 2026. We are on track to reduce our fleet to the 80 by the 25-26 school year and then on track to turn over the entire yellow fleet by fiscal 28-29 when we purchase our last five yellow fleet general education

038buses. And then there will be a period of time where we don't anticipate the purchase of any new student transportation vehicles until that process begins once again in 2032-2033 as the vehicles that are coming into our system today start to age out and use out based on wear, tear, and just general age. All new buses do have state-of-the-art LED stop signs and school bus lights, and studies have shown that with these lights, there is a reduction in stop sign runners of 61% during daylight hours and 92% during dark hours. The next slide represents the Facilities Grounds warehouse replacement schedule. I believe I'm turning this back over to Mr. Mead. Thank you, Mr. Lockery. So facilities, grounds, warehouse, fleet is 35 vehicles. Our goal is to replace at least five vehicles a year, which will turn

039our fleet over in FY31. The graph or the chart here shows you our replacement plan. For FY25, we replaced four vehicles, four facilities, trucks, slash vans, and one warehouse box truck. Additionally, the district replaced four of the five food service box trucks as these had costly maintenance issues and were in need of replacement. For FY26, we will look to replace three facilities, trucks, vans, one grounds truck, and the warehouse mail van. I will turn it back over to Mr. Lockery. President Walsh, members of the governing board, we are available to answer any questions you may. Oh, I'm sorry. We have one more slide. I apologize. Damian, do you want to touch on the technology replacement schedule? I apologize. We had one more here. No problem. This will be very quick. Just like facilities, we have

040a replacement schedule for the IT fleet. You can see it on the screen. It fluctuates between four and five per year. One thing I do want to add, technology is paid for out of capital override. The technology fleet is paid for out of the portion of our capital override where the other vehicles we talked about are paid for out of bond. However, there are years when we are able to defer purchasing a car, for example, out of IT, in which case we're able to free up bond by allowing facilities to use some of that money. And so I just want to make you aware that we do sometimes shift whose department is receiving vehicles, but by and large, the budget stays the same every year from year to year. And Mr. President, members of the

041governing board, now I think we're ready for any questions you may have. Thanks, Mr. Nichols, for bringing up that last slide. Thank you to our presenters. Board members, any comments or questions? I have several questions. Please, Member Davis, go right ahead. Thank you. See if I can read my notes here. On slide number 12, curriculum adoption considerations. Just a comment, and I'm open to more information about this curriculum process. I just wonder, how are the curriculum, when you talk about curriculum needs, Amy, does that mean books and workbooks and things like that? What does the word curriculum needs mean? It can mean several different things. So yes, it could be a traditional, what you think of as a textbook that is purchased and then maintained in the classroom for student use. It could be workbooks.

042We have a lot of curriculum that currently use a consumable workbook, which means that they're purchased yearly for students to use. And so a student is given a book and they use it and consume the workbook throughout the school year. And then that is done. We also have online resources for students. When we talked about the blended learning, one of the things that we have is, for example, our English language arts curriculum for elementary has workbooks that students use and write in and can consume. We also have... I lost sound. Sorry, I hit my thing. Sorry about that. So we also have readers that students use in the classroom to read stories or work with their teachers on reading. We also have an online component for Amplify where they can actually go on and do

043some individualized student work where if they need an intervention pathway, they can have that. If they need an enrichment pathway, they can have that. And there's also resources for teachers to use in front of students. electronically or technologically based. So when we say needs, we're kind of looking at that across the whole spectrum of what are those things. We also have things like science kits when we adopted our new science, which is an actual kit with laboratory materials in it that teachers get quarterly. It's delivered to their campus quarterly and they use those materials. They're consumable, most of them. And then we refurbish those kits and send them out. So when we talk about needs, it's a large spectrum of different kinds of things that they might have, depending on the type of curriculum we're

044looking at. Okay, thank you. President Walsh and Superintendent Tenyes, I have a lot of interest in this area of curriculum, and I'd like to at some point discuss how I might be able to. get involved a little bit with it. If there is such a thing that's possible, since I don't know, but I really would like to discuss that at some point. I have some ideas about just general curriculum and it says somewhere, changes to curriculum guidance from the governing board. I guess what I'm saying is I'd like to be involved in the governing board guidance. Whatever that means, I'm not sure yet. I will say the governing board guidance in that statement, just to clarify that statement, is related to decisions that are being made about the long range facilities planning. So if we're

045not going to have as many schools, for example, we may not need as many resources or we may need different types of resources based on decisions that get made by that group. So that was what I meant in particular with that decision making. We also have the board comes into decision making when we do adoptions. So when we did the last adoption, we went through that cycle. We involve the board in a presentation to open a 60 day review. We also involve the board in closing that 60 day review and then approving funding when a recommendation is made for curriculum. So those are the two that I was referring to in the presentation. I can let Laura. or President Walsh answer the rest of your question. Thank you, Ms. Gingell and Member Davis. It's really

046good feedback. I know in the past, we've had different board members provide some feedback to the curriculum committee on things that are important to them when they are going through the curriculum assessment. So oftentimes by the time it gets to the board, there's been a rubric that the committee's already sort of used to assess some of the initial options. So I think. This would be a good opportunity for us to connect you with Superintendent Tenius and the curriculum team on that conversation. So Superintendent Tenius, I think we can probably coordinate on that next steps. That sounds great. That would be terrific. Thank you. I have one more question for Damian on slide 14. I don't see the letters AI here. I was just curious if there has been any discussion about AI. And again, I'm

047not, I don't yet, I haven't learned yet enough to know where it might have taken place or where it would show up. But it's a concern that I have about how AI is integrated into the learning process. And some of it is cost. Some of it is... just teaching and I guess just my interest as a former teacher myself of elementary school. I just wondered if we've talked about AI. So yeah, we have had lots of discussions about AI and will continue to as it evolves. As you know, AI can mean everything from a Google search. that's just a little smarter than it is all the way up to, you know, driving, robotic driving cars and everything in between. As far as the funding for that goes, should we ever decide to purchase some sort

048of AI that supports the classroom or the district, it would show up in one of these bullets. It would simply be a software licensing. I don't know that we would specifically call it out. However, as we're talking about AI moving forward, not only, it's not just a technology discussion, I guess, is what I want to bring up. It really is a curriculum and an instructional discussion. The board will likely be involved as we start moving down the road and considering what may, should, or should not be used. And it really, you know, it's hard to answer the exact question of what we might do or where we're headed because it's just constantly evolving. But we do get requests every day. We review them. We're starting to create a list. And we have a whole team

049between Dr. Lane's department and Amy's department and our department that will meet regularly and discuss these things and bring them to cabinet for review and eventually onto the board as well. Thank you. I hope that we're involved in that at some level. Something I think, since we are supposed to set policy, at some point, there's going to have to be a policy, in my view. So the more I understand, the better. And I appreciate your belief that I know about it already. That was nice of you, but I don't. So I need help to understand. Thank you. And I think that's all I have. Thank you, Member Davis. Vice President Nelson. Yes, just more of a comment from our presenters. Thank you so much for putting all this really detailed information together. I know this

050is my third time sitting through all of these, and every year it just becomes more digestible, and I think that's... Really important because one of our main jobs as governing board members is to approve a budget. And one of the things that I find myself leaning on when I get asked random questions in the community is the information I get in these study sessions because they just are so nuanced for things that I would have had no idea about as a community member. So I just want to thank you for all the time and the knowledge that you guys are imparting for us. Thank you, Vice President Nelson. Member Sedgley, any comments or feedback on your end? No, I'm good. Thank you. Thank you. Quick question for Ms. Gingell on slides 10 and 11 on

051the curriculum adoption. I know that the district's done a lot of work on sort of catching up. Because there was a period of time, especially, I think, after the recession and the freeze in state funding from our state government, that we simply did not have the financial resources to maintain the curriculum at the cadence that we wanted to. And that we've really invested a lot of resources in trying to bring our curriculum up to the standards that we... I think are expecting. Have you found that we've been able to keep up with that? And what's your experience with the curriculum adoption of that? I would say that, yes, we've gotten to a good place. Science was actually the last one that we had not really, standards came out in 2018 and we had not really

052addressed elementary science. to the best of extent that we could. And that's the one that we adopted last year. And we're able to get that fully implemented starting into this coming year. We'll have K2 on board. So that was a really important one for us because it was probably the one that was lagging the most. We have put together a pretty good plan and we're continuing to adapt that plan as we go through the next couple of years to really address. Now, are we getting to the point where we're going to have resources that we need to update? One of them that comes up is social studies comes up quite frequently because obviously social studies is changing. There's some history that's coming on board every day. And so really looking at that and being critical

053of do we need that update? And when does that update make sense? The other piece that we really are looking at is, again, what I spoke to about elementary teachers really having. to be thoughtful about when we implement curriculum. So we found that having everything on just a five-year cycle, oh, your five years is up, it's your turn to get the next curriculum, wasn't as productive for our teachers because when they get into year four, usually year three, four, and five, they're finally getting their feet under them and they're really getting to understand the complexities of a curriculum. And then to turn it around and be like, oops, five years, we have to do something new, seems... sometimes very challenging for teachers. And so we're trying to be very thoughtful about, we know we need

054to update certain things, which is why we did the new additions for both math and ELA and elementary school to keep them current and keep them up to date, but also to allow those teachers to sit in that. That sweet spot of, okay, we finally figured this out and we know what we're doing with it. And a slight change in a workbook or a change on an online is not so much overwhelming as a full adoption of a brand new curriculum. So I think we're in a really good place right now. And we have a really good five to six year plan ahead of us to really. kind of start making sure those adoptions don't fall behind. Because one of the things that really gets difficult is when all the content areas need to be

055updated at the same time. So we don't want that to be the case because that's an expense that we can't usually manage. So we want to make sure we spread them out and we're thoughtful about, okay, if we're going to spend a million and a half dollars on this one this year, we can wait for this one to come in a year from now or two years from now. So that's our process. But I do believe we have. gotten to a really good place with where our curriculums are and been able to consistently update what's needed to be updated. Excellent. No, thank you. That's a very thoughtful and helpful response. And then I was going to ask a question. on slide 19, but I think Mr. Mead and Mr. Lockery already addressed it. And it

056just had to do with the flexibility of some of the capital master plan expenses. And Ms. Gingell made reference to the Long-Range Planning Committee and what recommendations might come out of that and how that might change a curriculum adoption plan. I would expect that... the same logic would apply to some of the budgeted expenses for maintaining schools and that there's some flexibility here. So I don't have a question. I just wanted to commend both you, Mr. Mason, Mr. Mead, and Mr. Lockery for touching on that because that was something that I was going to ask you to address. So thank you. Any other comments or questions? All right. Thank you to our presenters. Item 1.3, conclude study session. Our study session is concluded at 5.50 p.m. We will take a 10-minute recess and then re-adjourn

057at 6 p.m. for the regular meeting. Thanks all. I recommend you just turn. Welcome back all. This is a regular meeting of the Kyrene Governing Board. Today is Tuesday, May 27, 2025. Item 2.1 would be our call to order of the public hearing. However, we had an unexpected failure of the air conditioning in our district office today, which required us to move our board meeting online. And therefore, we are going to reschedule the public hearing to our next regularly scheduled board meeting, which is going to be on Tuesday, June 10th. So we will have the public hearing at that time. With that being said, item 3.1 is convening regular meeting. Our regular meeting is convened and called to order at 6.03 p.m. Our school board meetings are held in public, conducted business of the district.

058As always, our meetings are streamed live for you to watch online. If you can't watch the meeting live, a recording will be made available within 24 hours after each meeting. All of our board agendas are posted on our district website and our district office at least 24 hours in advance of the board meeting. Our superintendent, Ms. Laura Tenius, as well as senior leadership are here with us this evening. Item 3.3 is roll call. Will board members please state their name for the record? Since we're meeting telephonically, I'll call on each board member individually. We'll start with Member Collins. Senator Collins. Member Davis. Bunny Davis. Member Satry. Amy Satry. Vice President Nelson. Trayton and Nelson. And Kevin Walsh. That's a great show. We've got five board members here this evening. Item 3.3 is a Pledge of

059Allegiance and Moment of Silence. Since we are meeting telephonically, I do not have a school leader to call upon tonight, so I will lead us in a moment of silence followed by the pledge. Pledge of Allegiance to the flag of the United States of America. and to the Republic for which it stands, one nation, under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. Item 3.4 is our district land acknowledgement. The Kyrene School District does acknowledge that our community of schools is located on the ancestral lands of the O'odham and Pipash peoples who have inhabited these lands since time immemorial. And with this land acknowledgement, the district formally recognizing the traditional care and keeping of these lands by Native peoples allows us to be here today. Item 3.5 is our carrying promise that we make at

060every meeting. We promise to provide welcoming, inclusive learning environments in which every student is honored, valued, and feels a strong sense of belonging and purpose. We promise to provide rigorous, responsive learning environments in which every student is given what they need to develop knowledge, skills, confidence, and passion for learning. And finally, 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 4.1 is preview and approval of agenda. Board members, I'll motion that we just update the agenda to remove the public hearing, which was item 2.1. This is going to be rescheduled to our next meeting. Are there any other proposed changes to the agenda? All right, hearing none, I'll make a motion to approve the agenda

061as modified. Is there a second to the motion? Second. Second by Vice President Nelson. All those in favor, please say aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Any opposed? Motion passes five to zero. Item 5.1 is our superintendent report. Superintendent Ennis. Thank you, President Walsh, governing board members, and those joining us remotely this evening. Just a few updates as we wrap up the last week of school. So I'm going to kick us off if we go to the next slide. We celebrated our third A-plus celebration on May 14th, Kyrene Monta Vista's A-plus designation by the Arizona Educational Foundation. It was a wonderful event that honored the hard work of staff and students alike that made a recognition like this possible. And at the end, we enjoyed a beautiful treat, a performance by Monta Vista's Lions Roar Choir.

062The mouthful. They did a fantastic job. We have one more A-plus celebration this week. Of course, that will come after this meeting. So we'll share any updates and pictures in our June meeting for our last A-plus. Next, it is also Speech-Language Hearing Month, the month of May, and I want to take a moment to thank our speech-language hearing professionals in Team Kyrene who work with Kyrene kids to ensure that no matter how they communicate, they feel included in their school community and receive the support they need to be successful in the classroom and beyond. In a related celebration, Sarah Schulhauser, a speech-language pathologist at Kyrene Traditional Academy, was awarded a grant from the Chandler Special Education Parent Advisory Council. She is the first speech-language pathologist to receive this grant, which is awarded to one outstanding

063school employee in Chandler each year. So congratulations, Sarah. Also, Millennial Preschool celebrated a Father's Day. The preschoolers celebrated Father's Day early in their classroom. Dads joined their little learners for a day of donuts and play. Thank you to Kyrene Dell Millennial Preschool team for providing this fun bonding opportunity for your students. And we have some quarter four sports champions. So congratulations to all of our fourth quarter champions. Fourth quarter sports is wrapped up in Kyrene. And I just want to wish everybody congratulations to all of our athletes this school year. Whether you celebrated championships or showed resilience through tough games, every moment on the field, court, and track has helped shape you into a stronger, more confident individual. And we are so proud of your hard work. growth, and sportsmanship this year. Here's to an

064amazing season. Also excited to share some more millennial news. Congratulations to fourth grade teacher Jen Brinkley for being recognized as an outstanding educator by Phoenix Rising Football Club on the pitch last weekend. Thank you, Phoenix Rising, for recognizing one of our incredible Kyrene educators. And I just want to wrap up with a happy last week, happy last day of school to all of our Kyrene kids, but especially to our eighth graders. Tomorrow night, our eighth grade students from throughout the district will be promoting to high school, which of course they now leave Kyrene and move on to Tempe Union. I am so proud of all that they have accomplished this year, and I can't wait to hear about the great things they are doing and achieving in their next venture. So congratulations to our eighth

065graders and to everybody else. Have a very safe and relaxing, wonderful summer. We will see you next school year. And that concludes my superintendent's update. Thank you, Superintendent Tanyas. Item 5.2 is board member statements. Joining board members have statements this evening. I do. Member Davis, go right ahead. Yes, I just wanted to take a moment at this point in time in the school year to thank my fellow board members and Superintendent Tenyes for helping me to learn my new job and just hopefully grow into a productive and contributing board member. I want to thank the members of the community who've supported us. but mostly you guys right now tonight. Thank you for your help and acceptance. And I look forward to next year. Thank you, Member Davis. A lot to look forward to. Yeah. Any

066other statements? I have one. I mean, I know it's weird because we're on Zoom. So I don't know if everybody can see me. But anywho, I just want to give a shout out to all of the eighth graders who are promoting to high school next year. I just want them to understand, you know, the next four years will fly by fast and embrace the new journey, make new friends and try new things because high school will be over before you know it. So that's my message to all the promoting eighth graders. Thank you, Member Collins. Member Satri. Yes, I just wanted to mention some fantastic events that I had attended over the past couple of weeks. I went to the Kyrene Murata Leadership Academy. They had a diving interleadership event. And the entire program was

067written by, produced by, and executed all by the students of the school. And they did a fabulous job. I was also invited to Esperanza for their Aladdin performance and it blew me away. It was amazing. I couldn't stop smiling the whole time. So I just wanted to thank them again for inviting me and having me there. And I also wanted to say that I'm very excited tomorrow night to be attending the Kyrene Apprende promotion. My daughter is going into high school next year. Oh my goodness. Yay. So. I'm very excited and I am excited for all the eighth graders who are on their way to the next chapter and ready to enter high school and I wish them all the best. Thank you. Thank you, Member Setri. Vice President Nelson. Yes, happy to add my

068congratulations to our promoting eighth graders. Also want to just say. Kind of a happy promotion and graduation to those of our team, Kyrene, who are going to be retiring or moving on to new adventures, that all of your hard work has been appreciated and just it's invaluable. I attended the years of service ceremony at the district office, and it was really wonderful to see all of. The longevity of service in that room was really incredible. So I just want to say thank you to them and congratulations to our retirees and to our community as a whole. I hope they have a very safe and happy summer. Thank you, Vice President Nelson. I'll echo all my board member sentiments to our promoting eighth graders, to our retiring staff. And also a quick shout out to our

069promoting fifth graders, because we've got a lot of fifth graders that are moving on to middle school. And I think they're going to have some clap outs this week. I've got a fifth grader that's been at his elementary school for eight years and now he's moving on. So to all of our students, regardless of what grade you are promoting out of, congratulations on a fantastic year. And to our families. You did it. Good job. It's been a doozy. Great year. So we hope everybody has a summer break that is relaxing, restful, and safe. Thank you. Item 6.1 is our KEA. That's our Kyrene Education Association officers. For the 25-26 school year, I'll turn it over to our superintendent, Ms. Laura Tenius. Thank you, President Walsh. And, you know, we thought we were going to be

070in person tonight. So when we made the shift to going on Zoom, I'm just going to introduce our officers tonight. This would be normally during recognition time, and I would have them in the boardroom with us, and you would get to meet them all. But I talked to President Delia Lighting today, and we decided that I'll just announce. our officers for the 25-26 school year and we will invite them back once school starts. I do not want them to have to come on a summer evening to a board meeting and so we will invite them back once school starts and you will get to see them all in person. But the good news is, you know, we so appreciate our relationship with KEA. It's just really one of the strongest, I think, in the state,

071maybe even the country. We work really well together and we have a really strong relationship and we communicate very well. So we're super excited that there's. We tend to keep officers and people in these positions for a long time, which I think says a lot about the association and the work that they do and the support that they give each other. And so we're just super grateful. I'm happy to say that Delia Lighting is going to stay as the KEA president for next year. I think that's really important, again, as I talked about for that. relationship piece and the systems that have been put in place. I believe they're all in the same positions as well as the same four. You see Mariah Monson, Vice President, Christina Ochoa, Secretary, and Jennifer Pooler-Ludwig as our Treasurer.

072So they will be joining us again. We're very excited about that. And as I shared, I will invite them into the boardroom once we're back in the fall and they can... say hello to everybody. So if you see them, please just say congratulations and let them know how much we appreciate their support in the association. It's a really important role. And that is all. Thank you, Superintendent Tanyas. I know Mr. Collins knows this better than most because Mr. Collins is very active in his school district's AEA chapter, but it is a huge time commitment, is a significant amount of work, and that is all on top of these officers having full-time committed jobs here in the district. So it is without an understatement that we say it's a Herculean effort. So it's, it's, I'm excited

073that we have all of them coming back. It's a beautiful partnership we have with our KEA and our leaders. So looking forward to recognizing them in person and upcoming meeting. Remember Collins, anything you want to add to that? Indeed, you know, you said in my folder, man, you said it was a Herculean effort. Like, I think a lot of people don't realize how much goes into that. And of course, you do it for free 99. You know, you don't get compensated for those efforts, but you do it because you love the community. You love your colleagues, whether they're certified or classified. And you do it to ensure that the students have the best experience possible as well. People think that the teachers union is all about the teachers and the unclassified, I mean, the classified

074staff, but it's also about the students ensuring that they have the proper people in place to do what's best for them as well. So. Thank you, Mr. Collins. Any other board members wish to speak on this item? All right. Seeing none, item 7.1 is request to speak to governing board. So as per board policy 1302, the Kyrie Governing Board invites all viewpoints from citizens throughout the district because we are meeting electronically. All comments today will be submitted electronically through the link that's sent out in our board meeting notifications. These electronic public comments are recorded as part of our meeting minutes. All the board members receive your comments in full and we read them in their entirety. Typically, those comments do need to be submitted by noon on the day of the meeting. However, today, since

075we had to move to a virtual meeting because of the AC issue sort of late in the day, we have extended the electronic public comment through tomorrow. So any people who wish to submit public comment are welcome to do so through the link that was included with the meeting notice. Item 8.1 is the consent agenda. Board members, any proposed changes to the consent agenda? Seeing none, would someone like to make a motion to approve the consent agenda? I motion. I have a motion by Member Collins. Is there a second to his motion? Second. A second by Member Satri. All those in favor, please say aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Any opposed? Motion passes 5-0. All right, board members, our next three items are all meet and confer tentative agreements. They are with our education support professional

076staff, ESP staff, our certified staff, and our administrator council, respectively. So we're going to start off with the first of those groups. That's our ESP meet and confer tentative agreements and our meet and confer red line document for the 2025. 26 school year and this is item 9.1. I will invite our associate superintendent, Ms. Lisa Gibson, to address the board. Good evening, President Walsh, Superintendent Tenyes, members of the governing board, and community members. The main purpose of the Meet and Confer group is to provide for employees the working conditions benefits and salary that allow the district to attract and retain high quality staff. Knowing this, our meet and confer groups meet on an annual basis to identify priorities and to work collaboratively on solutions. Tonight, I will begin with the tentative agreements for our educational

077support professionals. The ESP meet and confer season began on November 18th and our last meeting was held on May 1st. We had a total of six meetings and during the meet and confer season. In addition to these meetings, Holly Neal and Jen Belding and I met on a bi-weekly basis throughout the school year to discuss upcoming meet and confer meetings and to address employee concerns and working conditions. Tonight, I'm presenting five tentative agreements for ESP for approval tonight. Agreement number one is the 1% lift for ESP employees, which was the only option presented to the team this year. Agreement two is related to common time for emails, surveys, and mandatory trainings. Language was added to the document to ensure all ESP employees have access to a computer and are provided time during the workday to

078review important communication from their school site or from the district office. School-based staff in positions like crossing yards or lunch duty staff do not always have access to a computer or time to check messages. This language will ensure supervisors provide employees with time and access to a computer. Agreement number three, language was added for travel time prior to a life or personal event. If additional time is needed for travel, an employee can request to use personal or vacation time. The event itself can be ACA, which is authorized compensatory absence, but any additional days for travel to the destination could be requested as a personal or vacation day. Agreement 4, early in the meet and confer season, the committee identified personal days and ACA days as a priority. Because this is such a large topic to

079discuss, we would like to continue exploring our personal and ACA model for ESP staff for the 25-26 school year. And then agreement number five, the committee reviewed the documents, so the ESP meet and confer document, and made some revisions to the formatting or any outdated language. There were some changes to the document, but none of the changes resulted in a change to the meaning of the document. And with that, I know we typically invite the KEA and KESPA and CAC representatives to this meeting. And because we're on Zoom tonight, I just want to just do a really nice shout out for Holly, Neil, and Jen Belding for all their support this year. So tonight it'll be me helping to answer any questions that you may have about the ESP meet and confer tentative agreements. But

080they really helped create the tentative agreements with the team this year as well. So with that, are there any questions about the ESP tentative agreements? Thank you, Ms. Gibson. Board members, any comments or questions? None from me. All right. Seeing none, would someone like to make a motion to approve the tentative agreements for the Educational Support Professionals, ESP, Meet and Confer team and the ESP Meet and Confer redline documents for the 25-26 school year in the form that has been submitted to the board? So move. I have a motion by Member Davis. Is there a second to her motion? Second. Second by Vice President Nelson. All those in favor, please say aye. Aye. Aye. Any opposed? Motion passes 5-0. Item 9.2 is our certified meeting confer tentative agreements and meeting for redline for the 25-26

081school year. I'll turn it back to our Assistant Superintendent, Ms. Gibson. Our season for this certified meet and confer employee group began on December 4th, and our last meeting was held on April 21st for a total of five meetings. In addition to these meetings, Dahlia Lighting, KEA President, and I met on a weekly basis to discuss any employee-related concerns and or working conditions. Tonight, we bring forward, well, I will bring forward five tentative agreements for this certified meet and confer with compensation as tentative agreement number one, which was the only scenario provided to the team and then tentative agreement five is just the general language cleanup tentative agreement number two is a committee's tentative agreement on how the first five days teachers are on contract are distributed the distribution of the days was slightly reallocated

082with emphasis given to teachers for classroom setup and preparation language includes no meetings the day of meet the teacher The first day teachers are back on contract, half of that day needs to be identified for classroom preparation and planning. And then the division of any days within the first five days needs to be a half day or a full day. In tentative agreement number three, the meet and confer team clarified the definition of professional learning committee and individual. plan time. A statement was added that no other meetings can be held during early release time except for any special education meetings. In Tenet of Agreement number four, the Blackout Restricted Day form identifies the day before Thanksgiving holiday as a blackout day. Our calendars have been revised, and this year, the Wednesday before Thanksgiving was a

083holiday. To clarify this language, we added the word work before day, so the statement now reads, the work day prior to the Thanksgiving holiday is a blackout day. So those are the tentative agreements for certified meet and confer. Again, I would like to take a moment to thank Dahlia Lighting for all of her support this year, along with Joe Sherman, who was the facilitator for certified meet and confer group. And then I'm just here to answer, help answer any questions that you might have about the certified meet and confer tentative agreements. I have a question, President Walsh. Please, Member Davis, go right ahead. Thank you. Thank you for that. I have a question about early release. I think it was number four. Early release time, there won't be any meetings. Could you explain to me

084what that means and how it came about? So I believe you're referring to tentative agreement number three, which is, I just want to make sure I'm on the right one that you are. The meet and confer team clarified the definition of professional learning committees and individual plan time. There was a statement that no other meetings can be held during early release time except for special education meetings. Is that the one you're referring to? Perhaps. What is number four? Number four is the addition of the word workday prior to Thanksgiving holiday. Yes, it was number three. Okay, so basically when they're doing PLCs, like a professional learning committee, an individual plan time, the agreement is that there shouldn't be any other meetings held. that day, except for those meetings. So you can't call, you shouldn't be

085calling a staff meeting, that the only meetings would be like a mandatory special education meeting that needs to meet a specific timeline. So those would be the only meetings that can be held during that time or during that day. So the teacher's time to do the planning is protected. Correct. From distraction. They can. Okay. Correct. So that their PLC time is protected and their individual plan time is protected. Okay. And PLC is? Professional Learning Communities. So they work together. It's a cooperative committee kind of thing? So they would work together, could be in their grade level. So their grade level team is working as a professional learning community and they're looking at student data and making decisions for future lessons based on the data. Okay. All right. Thank you. You're welcome. Thank you, Member Davis.

086Any other board members? I know Assistant Superintendent Gibson, I know you already mentioned the praise that showered on Ms. Lighting and Ms. Sherman. I echo that, but also want to thank you on this. These are, in particular, Agreements 2 and 3, I think are... are something that I'm very proud that the district and our Korean Education Association came to. I love that. I think member Davis was exploring this, right? It's a little bit about putting boundaries around our teacher time and plan time. And I know that first five days of contract, I've heard so much positive feedback. about this tentative agreement and to allow the teachers just to get ready for the school year and their new students and how excited they are for that so i want to just thank you and miss sherman

087and the whole district for working with kea on getting those adopted and put in place here it's an honor to work with them so thank you Oh, I'm sorry. Please go ahead, Member Davis. Yeah, I want to just echo what you said. Those are great. It really, I'm sure, has come as a great relief to teachers and protects their planning time and their collegial time, too, to work together. So, yeah, thanks a lot. You did a great job. Thank you. If there are no other comments, I'll make a motion to approve the tenet of agreements for the Certified Meet and Confer team and the Certified Meet and Confer redline document for the 25-26 school year. Is there a second to the motion? I second. I have a second by Member Collins. All those in favor,

088please say aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Any opposed? The motion passes 5-0. And our next related item, this is for our Kyrene Administrator Council, or CAC, tentative agreements in terms of conditions of employment redline for our 25-26 school year. Ms. Gibson. The Kyrene Administrative Council had four meetings this year. December 12th was the first meeting of the CAC season and April 24th was the last meeting. The only tentative agreement tonight is compensation and the 1% lift to the salary schedule, which was actually approved at the May 13th governing board meeting. So they didn't have any redlining of the document, no other tentative agreements. It was just the 1% lift. With that, I... Happy to answer any questions as well. Thank you, Ms. Gibson. Board members, any comments or questions? Seeing none, would someone like to

089make a motion to approve the Kyrene Administrator Council Tenant Agreements and Terms and Conditions Employment Redline Document for 2526, Louier? Aye motion. I have a motion by Member Collins. I will second his motion. All those in favor, please say aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Any opposed? The motion passes 5-0. Thank you, Ms. Gibson. Item 9.4. This is a review of our special education opportunity. I will turn it over to Dr. Sandra Lane. Maybe. There we go. Okay. Thank you, President Walsh, members of the board, Superintendent Tenias. I am here along with Dr. Sippy Turner, our Exceptional Student Services Director, to give you an update on the work that we conducted in the fall to review our special education program within Kyrene. You could move the slide for me, Manny. Thanks. Thank you. So the purpose of

090the review was for us to begin to look at. What are the teaching and learning conditions in our district? That is a part of our strategic plan. In our strategic plan, we have laid out that we want to conduct a comprehensive review of the existing teaching and learning systems-wide conditions and develop and implement a plan to address identified needs. One of those areas that we knew we needed to start with and we knew we needed to address was special education and the way special education was functioning and working within Kyrene. Some of our challenges in special education is obviously staffing. President Walsh and Vice President Nelson have heard about those before. We have talked about the challenges of staffing. Those challenges continue for us. And so we wanted to look at what are those conditions

091that a teacher in or any of our related services provide related service providers are experiencing within Kyrene. So that was one of our challenges that we really wanted to get some information about. We also know that the challenge that you have also seen in our data dives is the achievement gap that is present between our students with disabilities and our general education students. And we know that there is a great need to address that gap. And we wanted to get some information about how some recommendations, how we might address those gaps. So next slide. So I do want to send a thank you out for everybody that contributed to the data we collected. Many staff, parents, board members, President Walsh and Vice President Nelson also participated. They contributed time, data, insights through a variety of

092methods. And so this was not just a small team of... people. This was everyone within the district. We had some of the highest participation in schedule sharing and it was noted by our by the company that we worked with to conduct this review that we had some great participation in that. in that regard. And so I just want to thank everybody because this was not done, like I said, just by a small group of people. The other group I would like to thank is our guiding coalition members. This was a team of school leaders, teachers, and district office staff. And if you advance the slide, you can see who those members are. So this team met three times during the course of the review. We met at the beginning of the review to really talk

093about what were some of our goals for this, what was... What were some of the things that we wanted to learn from this opportunity? And then we met to review the data a couple of times at the end of the project. We are not done. This group will come together again and we will add to this with some additional staff to help us as we continue this work. So now I'm going to pass it on to Dr. Turner. And Dr. Turner is going to share with you some of the recommendations from the review. So go ahead, Dr. Turner. Thank you. Thank you, Dr. Lane, President Walsh, board members, and Superintendent Tenius. It's my pleasure to share this with you. Through all the data analysis that this outside group did, they identified the following strengths within

094our district. So the first one that you see there is the strategic plan in action. They identified that the district is actively implementing its strategic plan to guide continuous growth. And I just lost my place. Sorry. to drive continuous improvement, which is evident through the resources that have been provided and how staff spend their time. Another one of their commendations was the culture of data that we have in the district, that we collect extensive data, have robust tracking systems, and there's a very strong data culture within the district. Innovative staffing solutions is another one that we partnered with outside agencies to address teaching vacancies in the hard to fill special education positions. And we're working to ensure greater stability in staffing. Our district organizational structure supports efforts to integrate students with disabilities into general education

095with exceptional student services, as well as our academic equity and excellence department. So we're all kind of working together to support all students. And then they also noted that we have a strong assistive technology support and the impact, the positive impact that that has on our students. So next slide will share a couple of the recommendations from the opportunity review. So these are what this group identified as some opportunities for growth within the district. So the first one is strengthening the multi-tiered systems of support or MTSS. And they did identify that we have built a comprehensive system of multi-tiered systems of support, that framework in the district. They did identify some areas that can be strengthened, such as professional development for general education teachers, empowering school leaders to lead this effort at their school, and

096then fostering accountability for implementing MTSS with fidelity. And another one of the recommendations was to adopt a workload-based special education staff model to better align resources with student needs and reduce staff burnout, improving retention of employees. And then the next slide. are the rest of the opportunities. So one was, another one was to optimize scheduling practices, ensuring that school sites establish scheduling priorities that are aligned with district and school goals and adopting a collaborative scheduling approach. And then strengthening collaboration practices and co-planning. And this opportunity is around prioritizing intentional collaboration between general and special education teachers to better support students with disabilities while providing development to both of those teacher groups on supporting students with disabilities. Another piece to that. same opportunity strength the strengthening collaboration practices was about establishing a clear onboarding process and

097training plan for instructional assistants. Our instructional assistants play a crucial role in supporting students with disabilities and so developing a comprehensive onboarding and training plan would be a good opportunity for us as to how to effectively assist students. These recommendations, the commendations and recommendations were shared first with the guiding coalition that Dr. Lane mentioned before. And they asked each member of the group to identify which one of which ones of these opportunities would be high impact as well as high feasibility so that we could determine where we wanted to go to next. And I'm going to pass it back to Dr. Lane to finish us off. Thank you, Dr. Turner. So I think what Dr. Turner just mentioned, that idea of something having high impact but also being feasible were some of our considerations as

098we decided where to move forward. And our next steps in this process is to continue to implement the collaboration and co-planning between general and special educators. We will continue the work to lay the foundation for this work during the 25-26 school year and launch this for the 26-27 school year. This is going to require work in other areas as well. Schedules will have to be there. There will also be professional development for both our general ed and our special ed. teachers around what does collaboration look like when we are talking about the success and instruction of our students with disabilities. So there's a number of things that go into laying the foundation for this work. We believe this is really important to the long-term outcomes for our children with disabilities. When children with disabilities are

099receiving core instruction, they are more likely to be learning core content. At the same time, they are... having some skill remediation within special education. And so we are helping to lessen that gap that we have. When children with disabilities are not receiving core instruction, that gap continues to grow. And so we know that that is critically important for our students. The onboarding and professional development of our instructional assistants is also critical to this work. We know that they're a very valuable part of what we do to support children with disabilities. And when they have the skills that they need and feel successful in that role, they are also more likely to stay with us, which goes back to the beginning of the presentation when I talked about those staffing challenges. So this... recommendation will be

100implemented in the 25-26 school year, so next school year. This does not mean that we are not addressing the other recommendations. A couple of those are things that will take some data systems that we would need to utilize. One of those is the workload-based staffing model. We need to have a way to calculate those service minutes and have have that be an accurate model and so that entails getting data out of our student information system and IEPs and working with our accountability and performance management department in order to help us to develop and calculate that model. The scheduling practices is something that goes along with this collaboration and co-planning idea. We would, to make this possible, We need to be looking at our schedules, look at when and where students with disabilities receive that service.

101And so there is a lot of overlap between these. There are recommendations on MTSS about Tier 1 instruction. And the involvement of children with disabilities in Tier 1 is also very aligned to this collaboration and co-planning. Because that's the purpose of this one. It is to... ensure that our students with disabilities are receiving quality instruction and having their needs, their instructional needs met within core instruction. So that is all the information we have for you. Do you have any questions for us? Thank you, Dr. Lane. Thank you, Dr. Turner. I appreciate the update and I want to thank the district for engaging in this exercise as well. because this was something that it wasn't just us assessing ourselves, correct? We had experts in the industry come in and tell us the good, the bad, and

102the ugly. And that I think requires a certain willingness to improve. And I'm really grateful that we did that. So first off, just thank you on that. With that, I will open it up to our board members. Do we have comments or questions on this item? I do. Deborah Davis, please. Thank you. Great report. Thank you very much. Just for a momentary, if I might just say, you know, I came from being the special ed lawyer for Tucson Unified School District. So I'm very well aware of how expensive and legally fraught all this is. So I think you've done a great job in. I don't know what experts you've brought in. That was one of my questions. Had there been any consultation? I assumed there had been. But this is a really hard thing to

103set up properly. And the rules change. And I know it's very difficult. So I commend you for your stick-to-itiveness. Thank you. Yes. And I don't know if you did. And I don't think this is out of line. Tucson Unified School District had a really vibrant and successful special ed program. And I don't know if anyone reached out to them or not, but there are several people involved who, if at any point anyone's interested, I can just for a touch base, what worked, that kind of thing. There are places that I believe without charging you, would be willing to chat about this. I hope I'm not overstepping, but it's just a little bit of inside baseball or football or whatever, Cedric, you'll have to correct me on that, that I have access to. So I just

104had one question, just a couple of specific questions. Two things I really liked. Adopting a, oh, I can't read. workload-based special education staff model. Yes, I like that a lot. So that's good in my estimation. And establishing good onboarding, very, really, really important. So that teachers, you know, the balance between general education and special educators. you know, working together and the general education people not being responsible for taking on all of the special education needs and how that gets worked out. Really important. So good on you guys for those are two really important areas. And the one thing you said that I just got a little confused about. The notion that the special ed kids have great disparity between their achievement level and the general education achievement level, is it still true? I've been away

105from it for a while, but is it still true that the attainment level, the progress level for special needs kids is set by their IEPs? No, the IEP identifies those areas of need and those areas of targeted instruction, but it does not, that the IEP does not set a cap for where we would expect that child to achieve. The great majority of our students with disabilities have average, are of average And so they all have that same ability to learn, but might need some different instruction. And that's really what the IEP is about, is to get them that different type of instruction and to outline what that looks like. So there really is, in most cases, and that's not 100%, but no reason why the gap should be. as wide as it is. These children

106just need a different type of instruction. Yes, and accommodation. So, but... You will notice we will be showing you that in the data dive that occurs in the next couple of months. And it will show you the gaps that we have between certain subgroups or groups of children. And one of those is our students with disabilities. There is a definite gap. Okay. Thank you. Good job. Yeah, you're welcome. To answer your question, we worked with a company called the District Management Group, and they have done special ed opportunity reviews of school districts across the country. And so they have, this is not the first one they've done. So they're very, it's a well-oiled machine for them. And then also have worked with districts to improve outcomes for children. And so we are working with them

107on that as well. Good job. Thank you. Welcome. Thank you, Member Davis. Other board members? I have a question. So I'm looking at, oh gosh, where did it go? The guiding member coalition. So looking at the recommendations and wanting to focus on collaboration in the co-planning between general and special education teachers, has any thought been given to adding some classroom teachers or site resource teachers to the guiding coalition members as you kind of move forward in this work? We have talked about where they might be involved. What we have been, the group that we have been talking to and working with so far on this is the school leader. And the school leader really needs to set the structure and the expectation at their campus. So that's the kind of the start of this work

108is there with the school leader. But we will certainly be getting input from teachers as well. Okay, great. Thank you. Again, I'm really impressed with the depth of this process, the report. I participated in one of the interviews. The questions asked were very thoughtful, very wide ranging. And so I'm glad it was so comprehensive and clearly beneficial. Thank you, Vice President Nelson. Any other board members? Seeing none, Dr. Lane, Dr. Turner, again, thank you for the work. I will say the... The workload assessment that Dr. Lane, you spoke to and that member Davis mentioned to me, I'm really glad to hear that the district is focusing on that as one of our, you know. I'd say focus areas for going forward. Because that's a tricky one, as you alluded to, because there's a lot that

109goes into it. But it's also so important because no student is the same. No school site is the same. So you can't just simply break up FTEs by school site and say, well, call it a day. There's so much more that goes into it. And it'd be easy to do what I just described, to just say, well, we're going to just break out FTEs by student enrollment. But I think doing what you're doing, which is a much more purposeful assessment of workload, it takes more time, it takes more energy, but I hope and I believe it'll get better results. So I'm glad to hear that that came out of the assessment and that the district is exploring that further. Yeah, we are. It is. Dr. Turner has actually begun to work with Dr. Ostmeyer just

110to ensure that we can extract the data out of our system and to begin to look at the quality of that data. Because if the data quality is not there, obviously, then the implementation of this model is going to be kind of, you know, brought with some. problems and we don't want that. We want to make sure that we are fairly applying our staffing formulas and our staffing allocations. And so we have work to do in that one, but it is going to continue to happen. And it all ties together with some of the broader conversations we've been having at the Long Range Planning Committee when we're talking about, you know, making sure that every school site has specials and making sure they have services. And these things get more and more challenging as you

111take a smaller student base and spread it out over more schools because you can't have your special ed places in two buildings at once. So I think that as we explore, you know, what the future might look like for this district, there could be some, maybe some added benefit out of that as well. Yeah, I would agree. And because traveling to more than two schools is also very challenging and problematic. So, and that's, as we continue to, you know, decline in student enrollment, that's kind of where we are at with some of our staff, especially in special education, like our speech language pathologists, if they're serving a small group of children at three different campuses, they are going to be traveling, you know. to three different schools every week and we really would like to

112in that also make sure that the workload is appropriate but that is one of our challenges as we continue to decline for sure. Thank you. Any other feedback for Dr. Lane or Dr. Turner? All right thank you again for our presenters. Item 9.5, board members. This is the Arizona School Board Association 2026 political agenda submission. So you remember at our last board meeting, we had a nice robust conversation among the board members about our priorities. Our fantastic board secretary, Ms. Nancy Mosier, took wonderful notes and compiled those priorities based on the board feedback. And those priorities are included. With your board docs, they were also circulated to each board member last week as part of our board memo. At this point, we can open it up for any additional conversation or feedback. Or if we

113think that the list included is sufficient, then we can take a motion to approve. I read it. I didn't see anything that needed to be adjusted from my perspective. That's just me. Thank you, Member Collins. Any other feedback? All right. It was a good conversation. So again, Ms. Mosley, thank you for compiling that. That being said, would someone like to make a motion to approve the proposed 26 as of political agenda items? I move. A motion by Member Davis. Is there a second to her motion? I second. And I have a second by Member Collins. All those in favor, please say aye. Aye. Aye. Any opposed? The motion passes 5-0. All right, item 9.6. This is a somewhat related item. This is the Arizona School Board Association delegate for our upcoming delegate assembly meeting for

114the Kyrene School Board. Some of you may know, but every year, the Arizona School Board Association has a delegate assembly. It's like their annual sort of State of the Union, where they come together, conduct business, and also vote, among other things, on this proposed agenda. Each district is given one delegate. to vote at the assembly. It's one vote for delegate. And there is a lot of discussion. There's a lot of, I think, dialogue and learning opportunity. But in any event, it is a forum for Kyrene to send one of our board members as a delegate. We do every year appoint both a delegate. and an alternate just in case something happens to that delegate. I believe Vice President Nelson has served in that role before. Vice President or former Vice President Margaret Wright served in

115that role prior to Member Nelson. It's a great opportunity. So at this chance, if folks have questions, Member Vice President Nelson, I'm sure is happy to answer them. But otherwise, is anybody interested? in serving as a delegate to the ASBA meeting. I am. I would like to. Wonderful. Member Davis has expressed interest. I think you'd be wonderful, Member Davis. Any other board member would be interested. I'd be interested in being an alternate. Wonderful. Any other board member interested in being an alternate? All right, hearing none, I'm happy to make a motion to recommend and appoint Member Davis as our delegate to the Arizona School Board Association Delegate Assembly and Member Satry as her alternate. Is there a second to my motion? Second. Second by Vice President Nelson. All those in favor, please say aye. Aye.

116Aye. Any opposed? Motion passes 5-0. Fantastic. Thank you very much, Member Davis and Member Satri. And Member Davis, after that meeting, which will be on September 6, 2025, there'll be a form for you to report back out to the board, which is what our next agenda item is, 10.1, Board Committee and Conferences Reports. So do any board members wish to provide updates on any conferences or committee meetings that they've participated in? I do. Please. All right. It was episode four of the Long Range Planning Committee. Really great meeting. So the work that they were focused on was really around a review of, started with a review of budget and enrollment and then kind of going over the four levers. For the committee to navigate as they really start to get into the details of what

117to do with our facilities, how can we pull those levers, what does it mean and what does that look like? And so just for this committee, the levers were, there was a capacity driven approach, which just means the idea is how do we get as many students into, get as many schools as we can to full capacity without restrictions of boundaries. The second one was a minimal change approach, meaning one that would be less disruptive to the greatest number of individuals. One was more of a regional approach. If we look at the district as far as each of our middle schools is anchored, and we kind of approach the work beginning from that approach. And then the fourth one was a redesign approach, which really was around... doing an assessment of a lot of the

118programs that we run and how we can effectively utilize those. Ideally, the redesign approach would be paired with either capacity approach, a minimal approach, or a regional approach, and then kind of layered, kind of like the cherry on top almost. But the committee, each of the tables kind of worked through and kind of talked about each of those approaches, and it was really nice that, I love a rubric, the committee was given kind of a guiding principles rubric to assess each of those options to really kind of ground themselves as then they move towards making recommendations for what they want to hear, which of those four, which two of those four options they want to hear more about when the committee comes back together in July. So the district will be coming back along with

119the demographer to talk more about a regional and redesign approach with a lot more details involved as far as kind of taking things from that hypothetical to what would this actually look like for Kyrene so the committee can actually begin to build some recommendations that they'll eventually bring to us and that's my report thank you vice president Nelson Board members, any questions for Vice President Nelson or Member Cedric, anything you would like to add to that? I know you're on the committee as well. No, I'm good. Thank you. I have a question. Please, Member Davis. Could you just real briefly do the different approaches, the different definitions? Yeah, absolutely. So the first one was capacity driven. The goal being to maximize savings by getting schools as close to full capacity as possible. It's very straightforward.

120Yeah, very straightforward. you know, build the schools. The next one was minimal change, which focused on, you know, having the least amount of change and disruption to boundaries, students, families, et cetera. And then there was a regional approach, which meant dividing the district, not dividing the district up, but using each of our middle schools as kind of an anchor and then looking at capacity through that lens rather than you know, the capacity driven approach. So less, less of a blunt instrument. I'll say that. And then the redesign approach would layer on top of one of those other three approaches. And that's really about reconfiguring schools to either improve grade transition or review of some of our choice programs. There are a lot of different opportunities and options available with that one, but it does need

121to be paired with one of the other three. It can't just stand on its own. And what would you say we do now? So what happened now, I didn't, because I'm a board member and will eventually vote on what the committee brings back to the table, there was a portion where I just was sitting and observing. I did not, the committee at large, each of the tables came to a consensus about which two approaches they wanted to drill down towards. And they chose to learn more about the practical application of a read. a regional approach and a redesign approach. So that's what the committee will learn more about in July. Okay. Board Member Davis, what I can share, and Vice President Nelson, you did a fantastic job. I'm going to put you up there to

122lead the next session. In session episode five, when we come back, what is happening now is we work with our demographer to give him this information. it would be unrealistic for us to run 600 scenarios because there's a lot of possibilities of what you could do here. So we really wanted to get an understanding of where the committee was. And it was very clear that regional redesign came out really significantly ahead of the other two. There is some crossover with capacity and regional. And so you'll see some capacity. You're still going to look at capacity. You don't not look at capacity. It's just we try to minimize the changes to the region. So now what we're doing is we've tasked the demographer to say, OK, based on where you know our enrollment will be in

123the next five years in which areas, he will be able to play out some models and we'll be able to bring. a lot of different options to the committee in the next meeting to say if we use a regional design and we keep our middle schools as an anchor whether we have the same number of middle schools or less however many that is but the middle school becomes the anchor for a region which schools make the most sense to feed into that middle school. And he does that. It's not just, you know, willy-nilly. There's some criteria, as Vice President Nelson referred to on the rubric that we pay attention to. There's depending on where the committee talks about redesign specifically around our programs, do we keep all of our program schools? Do we consolidate some

124of our program schools to maximize resources? Do we eliminate some of our program schools based on information we have? So we're going to get that in front of the committee. Once we know where we want the program schools to be positioned, then the demographer can, you know, again, run. five or six different scenarios that we'll put in front of the committee. So it's not like they have to go school by school. Would you do this with this school? Would you do this with this school? They have to look at that whole picture because the demographer can tell you based on where addresses are. which schools make the most sense. And then we'll bring, the goal is to bring a recommendation to the board. We anticipate we're going to need an August meeting to finish this

125work because we had to cancel the June regularly scheduled meeting because of a lot of conflicts with committee members. So we do not think they'll be able to make a recommendation at the end of the July meeting based on how much information they're going to get when we share this. So we think. They'll need a July meeting and an August meeting. And we are hopeful to be in front of the board by September sometime with a recommendation. Because once the recommendation is made, then we have to go have public hearings and town halls at all of the impacted sites that the board tells us to move forward with in exploring. So there's a lot that still has to happen before this is finalized. It's just what I want to share. So hopefully that helps. And

126the website is updated with all of the information about the board meetings and a message is going out to the long range plan about an August meeting. Terrific. Thank you. Any other feedback on this item? I just, I wanted to thank Trina, board member Nelson, for your attendance at these episodes and your work and you too. Board member Satri, thanks for doing it. Thank you, Member Davis. Item 11.1. This is our single policy read for the night. This is our staff, social, and emotional wellness policy. This is our third read. I'll turn it over to our Assistant Superintendent, Ms. Lisa Gibson. President Walsh, Superintendent Tenias, and Governing Board members, this is the third read for the Social Emotional Wellness Policy. Following the second review of the policy, additional language was added into the draft to

127enhance the document's flow and clarity. Specifically, narrative elements were added after the headings Commitments, Workplace Culture, and Staff Engagement. These additions provide introductory content for each sections to guide the reader and to outline the core commitments and organizational values. Additionally, a strikethrough was applied to the word all preceding staff engagement and the word offer was inserted into item number two within the staff engagement section. With that, I am happy to help answer any questions. I'll kick us off here. Thank you so much. This is... very much in line with what I was envisioning. It does flow a lot better. And I think it outlines the commitments in a way that, you know, it's very digestible. So I just appreciate you all going back to the board about that. So thank you. Thank you, Vice President

128Nelson. Any other feedback? And also thank you, Vice President Nelson, for your suggestions. Thanks. Very good policy with the team effort. So seeing no other feedback, I'll make a motion to approve the third read and adopt our staff social emotional wellness policy. Is there a second to that motion? Second. Second by Vice President Nelson. All those in favor, please say aye. Aye. Aye. Any opposed? Motion passes five to zero. Thank you all. Job well done. Job well done. Forward into the breach. Exactly so. Item 12.1 is items for future consideration. Do any board members wish to list items for future consideration? Seeing none, item 13.1 is our meeting dates. Our next regular meeting is scheduled for June 10th, 2025. It'll be in the district office. I'm told we'll have air conditioning. Item 14.1 is adjournment.

129I'll make a motion to adjourn this evening's meeting. Is there a second to the motion? Second. Second by Vice President Nelson. All those in favor, please say aye. Aye. Aye. Any opposed? Motion passes 5-0. Our meeting is adjourned at 7.13 p.m. Have a great night, everyone.