June 8, 2026 Special Board Meeting and Work Session

001I'd like to call our meeting to order tonight. Thank you all for being here. Donna, if you'd please do the roll call. Ms. Chesney? Yes. Ms. Kearns? Yes. Mr. McMillan? Here. Mr. Moore? Here. Ms. Veal? Here. Ms. Williams? Here. Ms. Miller? Here. If you would all please stand for the pledge. I pledge 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. Could I have a motion, please, for approval of the agenda? I do. All right. Thank you, Kim. Can I have a second, please? I'll second. Thank you, Mike. Ready for a roll call? Ms. Chesney? Yes. Ms. Kearns? Ms. Kearns? Jennifer? kicked off yeah mr mcmillan yes mr moore yes miss beal miss williams miss

002miller yes thank you motion passes 6-0 station we're going to start with you i appreciate you guys leading with this agenda item here so following the may 26 board of education meeting i reached out to desi for some guidance and shared that the career ladder plan had not been approved I then worked with Human Resource. I want to thank Mark and Heather for going through and looking at the list of individuals who had applied for Career Ladder and then based off their years of experience, placing them in the correct stage. So for example, if an individual had applied for stage two, do they qualify for stage three? And so once we had those most accurate numbers, I In an effort to continue the collaboration, I convened a meeting with the working group from the career

003ladder, MSDA and DEA. And during that meeting, we reviewed the number of applicants, discussed the state career ladder grant allocated to the St. Joseph's School District, and the required 40% local contribution as well. The approach we reviewed ensured that each stage was adjusted fairly based on the funding levels. The proposal before you reflects that collaborative work and I just want to share. So MSTA and NEA and the working group after the Monday meeting said they would want to receive feedback from their members and so Wednesday of last week they said they would let me know by 8 o'clock that morning whether or not their members were in favor of the work. It received... you know 100 support from the career ladder working group there were only 13 of the 15 members who responded to the

004survey that's pretty good numbers indicating to me that you know there were some out on vacation out on florida and then 96 approval from nea who participate in that review process. MSTA did not give me a percent. They did share its appreciation for the district's willingness to revisit the original proposal and restore stage three opportunities. They noted that the revised proposal is an improvement over the versions presented in April and May, and they expressed appreciation for the response and notice of following employee feedback and board discussions and they recognized the value of continued collaboration with district leadership. What I'm sharing with you tonight is the revised version. It's three stages. And if you look at those stages, you have the documentation there and the plan itself, the revised career ladder plan. But at stage one,

005it would be 134850, stage two, 2697, and then stage three, 4495. In guidance from DESE, we have to stick with the approved hours for those three stages. So 50, 75, and 100. Are there any questions? Sure. How many educators are there in each tier? Great question. I'm going to share with you that because I got a number here for you. So the numbers for career ladder 26-27, there were a total of 12 that were on stage one. Now that just doesn't mean that an educator can't say that I only want to complete the hours for stage one, but based off years of experience in each of the stages, there are 12 individuals in stage one. There are 54 in stage two and there are stage three there's 336. And I had emailed a question asking

006about about the amount of savings at each of the tiers. Do you know that amount? We don't know that amount until we get really what happens, Ms. Williams says, and this is what Dusty has shared with me. The reason we have this money right now is because teachers sign up to, let's say they want to work towards stage three. But then at that particular point, if a teacher doesn't reach stage three. they can drop down to stage two and it becomes excess money for the state so um you know the teacher had committed to saying okay we're going to allocate five thousand dollars to this but they only completed up to three thousand so in essence then um you know if a teacher doesn't then they they're not compensated for that work so it's a

007moving target really yeah i get that but i guess what i was looking for like was like with Stage number three. It's going to be like a savings of 505 times at 336. Okay, but I didn't have Those original numbers and so I can do that myself Thank you I have one question. Sure. Are there any changes to staff groups that are allowed to participate? There were through the revision process ahead of time. But under guidance with DESE, we have to provide like there's certain coding that individuals have with core data that we have to adhere to. At one point, like counselors were not included. They are. And they're now included in the. Yeah. Okay, sorry, that's more of what I meant. And then are any previous activities now excluded? I know we had mentioned.

008tutoring and things like that yeah there was um msda had shared some concerns about building leadership ensuring that there's consistency across buildings that's something that we can do as district leadership to lift that up to ensure that you know what's happening in one building happens in the other building as well but are there any premium activities that are excluded in the categories yes there are five categories right now And so there is the categories of self are listed in the plan there. They are... I forgot the plan, but like what are we excluding, I guess is what I'm asking. Right. The exclusions would be, let me grab this to get a closer look here. I don't know that we're excluding anything except for the fact that we rolled it into and got approval on the

009fact that serving in a mentoring role to support students academic social emotional or collaborating with teachers to strengthen instructional and student support practices rather in an informal or informal setting the capacity there that was something that we wanted to include to ensure that students through this transition were supported and that teachers and counselors together could work through the mentoring of kids in that capacity. Thank you. You're welcome. Are there any further questions? Thank you for re-looking at that for staff. That's great. Could I have a motion please to approve the revised 2026-2027 career ladder plan as presented? Okay. Thank you, Cassandra. Can I have a second please? second thank you Latonya yes miss Kearns yes mr. McMillan yes mr. Moore yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes

010yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes

011yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes So when we did our reorganization meeting in April, we waited on a motion to approve the board secretary and Dr. Hedgeforth in their positions. because we knew that Donna was going to be retiring. So if I could please have a motion to approve Gina Bush as our board secretary, who will serve from July the 1st, 2026 to June the 30th, 2028, with an alternate secretary being Rebecca Dunn. Thank you, Kim. Can you roll Robert into that as well? I absolutely can. All righty. So then also as

012part of that motion, can we please add Dr. Robert Hedgecorth as the Treasurer of Assistant Superintendent of Business and Operations, and he will also serve in that position from July 1st until June 30, 2028. So I'll make a motion on that amended. Thank you. Okay. Okay. Thank you, Kim. All right. Could I have a second on that, please? I'll second that. Thank you, Mike. I have a question. We were looking at the policy and it mentions about being bonded and I was talking to Dr. Hedgecourt. Can you explain about our conversation? Yeah, I looked up some more information in the state of Missouri, you know mentions that the secretary needs a security bond of 5,000 And then the treasurer says in accordance with state law. Well, that's 50,000 So a security bond is basically a

013bond held by the district to ensure any type of financial security It claims work to be brought against it. And so I will ensure that those are in place for the board going forward. And that is the first sentence under duties of board secretary and duties of board treasurer as well. So I will ensure that we follow up. And if there needs to record who the new treasurer, which was still me or if it was still Dr. Segrist in the documentation or our secretary, I'll make sure that language is changed on the bond as well. Thank you. I appreciate it. Thank you. No problem. All right. Any other questions? Okay, we're ready for the vote. Ms. Chesney? Yes. Ms. Kearns? Yes. Mr. McMillan? Yes. Mr. Moore? Yes. Ms. Beal? Yes. Ms. Williams? Yes. Ms. Miller?

014Yes. Okay, motion passes 7-0. Okay, now I need a motion to adjourn from open to our work session, please. I move. All right, thank you, Kim. Second? I'll second. Thank you, Jacob. Ms. Chesney? Yes. Ms. Kearns? Yes. Mr. McMillan? Yes. Mr. Moore? Yes. Ms. Beal? Yes. Ms. Williams? Yes. Ms. Miller? Yes. Thank you. Motion passes 7-0. All right, I'd like to call to order, please, our work session tonight. And Donna, if you'd do the roll call again, please. Ms. Chesney? Yes. Ms. Kearns? Yes. Mr. McMillan? Yes. Mr. Moore? Here. Ms. Beal? Here. Ms. Williams? Here. Ms. Miller? Here. All right. Now, if I could please have a motion for the approval of the agenda for our work session. Okay. Thank you, Kim. Second, please. Okay. Thank you. Take it. All righty. Ms. Chesney? Yes. Ms.

015Kearns? Yes. Mr. Millen? Yes. Mr. Millen? Sorry. Mr. Moore? Yes. Ms. Beal? Yes. Ms. Williams? Yes. Ms. Miller? Yes. Okay, motion passes 7-0. All righty, items for discussion tonight. Dr. Hedgecorth, we're ready for our June budget amendment, please. Yeah, so this amendment is presented to the board as the final amendment for this fiscal year. You might have noted in the past, we would actually bring an amendment after the fiscal year was over, sometime in August. And so that is something that we don't think is best practice to do going forward. We'd like to bring that last amendment in June. And then that way, when the auditors come in in the fall, whatever our variance is, is the variance, instead of having a final amendment that matches what the actuals are. That way, when KPM comes

016in in the fall and they show what our revenues and expenses are, they will show the variance difference from that final amendment that says June to what the actuals were to show what that was. And I've been very vocal about us improving in what that variance is and what those percentages should be. And so this amendment is our final. document that we are presenting to the board to show how we believe FY26 will end. And so just to give you some highlights, each of the revenues and expenditures are listed by source. So you can see for our expenditures, we have certified and non-certified salaries, benefits, purchase services, supplies and materials, capital outlay, long and short-term debt, and the grant totals. And then for our revenues, we have local, county, state, federal, and other. and within

017each one there's only four funds. I know you see funds one, five, and six, but five and six are actually sub-funds of fund one. The reason we separate them out is just so in our financial software we can run reports. It makes it easiest for us to see what fund five is, which is food service, and what fund six is, which is activities, but all that really rolls up into fund one. Of course, you have Fund 2, which is a special teacher's fund, which is revenue from the state that goes towards teacher salaries and benefits. Fund 3 is debt service, which is only restricted to use for district debt. And then capital projects fund, which is Fund 4, which is for major capital projects. As we finish the year, earlier amendments had us ending the

018year at 9.99 for our operating fund balance percentage. And with this final amendment, we believe we will be at 10.24%. which puts us in the black just above 1.1 million dollars and with the final balance in fund three of about 9.5 million and a final balance in fund four about 1.8 million please note that that fund four balance is Typically, looking at your expenditures, usually you want that about 75% to 100% of what your fund for expenditures are. That's below that, so we do need to build up that fund for balance a little bit, the fund for as we go forward. But that's what we predict to be for the final year. Of course, once June 30th happens, because we're on a modified cash basis accounting, we will compile all the data, we will complete

019our ASBR, and then I will give you a report, probably usually comes around August, that shows where we actually ended up the year compared to the amended budget in June, and to show what the actuals were. I am confident in these numbers, I am confident these numbers are going to be very close to where our ASBR is. We spent a lot of due diligence studying our trends, what our current expenditures and revenues are, and where we believe we'll finish up. The biggest estimate is in the end of June, we pay our certified staff for June and July. So we have that double payment for salary benefits. To keep the work done in that same fiscal year, that's very common in most all public districts in the state of Missouri. So I'd be happy to answer

020any questions you might have. if you could please talk to us now about the preliminary budget sure i do need a um just note at the june meeting it will take an approval to get that for that budget to be approved um at that time so we'll all have that as action on that june meeting state of missouri specific about budget so just want to add that in all right so on our preliminary we have a forecast document that you guys have seen before and the reason I wanted to show you the forecast document is we're continuing to fine-tune the FY27 budget. It's going to be a 24-page document. It's much more expansive than previous documents that have been presented in the past that I feel like really simplifies, you know, where different areas are

021being budgeted with we're going to have listing of all the objects and all the functions. The previous two years FY26 budgeted year and FY27. So you'll get to see four years of data at the function and object level. And so I think that will help the board see the areas where we increased expenditures or decreased and what that trend line looks going forward. But today I did want to show you the major components of the FY27 budget. You weren't surprised when I brought that to you in June and where we were at. So if you look at the very top line where we have FY27 and start looking down the revenues, you can see that next year I estimate that our revenues will be about $159 million. where this year's revenues was $174 million. And

022so the decline is, remember this year we received two years of federal funding. There were previous years that accounts for about 10 million of it. And then the other five, about 3.7 million of it, is reduction in the foundation formula that's not being fully funded. And then the other 1.2 is scattered amongst county, local, and federal. So that is... you know, the decline in revenue that we have. And so you can see that percent is a 9% decline. That's not going to be typical. You know, a lot of that is from the federal, or sorry, from the state side. And so we estimate that we'll have about $3.3 million in fund four revenues. So our operating revenues will be about $155 million. If you look at expenditures, you can see that our certified and non-certified

023salaries have decreased, as well as benefits. Our insurance is going to be slightly up, and then our purchase services are lower than last year, but our supplies are more. The reason our supplies are higher is we used to capitalize a lot of our software and put it into Fund4, and Jake reorganized. that software list and moved a lot of that to supplies and materials. So in the past, if you looked at our Fund 4 expenditures, we would have years spending over $10 million in Fund 4. For next year, we're only budgeting $4.29 million in Fund 4. And so that has greatly decreased what our expenditures will be in those capital budgets. So if you look at total expenditures for funds one, two, and four, remember when you're looking at these forecasts, I take out fund

024three because all the money is restricted. So I pull it out just to make things. I guess easy to evaluate because you can only spend fund $3 on district debt. And so if you look at the fund one and two expenditures for this budget, you can see that we're looking at 158 million for expenditures. So all in all, that puts us at a budget deficit for next year, 3.7 million. This is a preliminary budget. You know, I know I've talked about a lot in the past, but I don't know assessed valuation yet. I don't know enrollment. I don't know our tax rate. And so those things do make a difference in our budget. So when I have the October amendment, I'm hoping this budget has improved. For this budget, I'm assuming 2% increase in assessed

025valuation for next year with our tax rate to be flat. Of course, that has to be calculated from the state auditor and the pro forma statements they send us. And so those whatever that calculates out to that's what we submit. And I hope as we continue to look at ways to reduce costs, whether it's through attrition or budgets being underspent and those things, I hope we can claw back to a balanced budget. But I have to report right now where I believe we'll be if I had to give you an answer today, and that's 3.7. But that's also assuming that no positions are being reduced through attrition, that there aren't any savings or underspent budgets. All budgets need to be spent to the full capacity and things like that. So if you look at what

026our full budget is, we're about $160 million in expenditures. So if you do some quick math, 1% of that is $1.6 million. 2% is $3.2. So we're just over 2% budget deficit. So if you're looking at this from a household income and you have a household income of $100,000, that means you're a little over $2,000 deficit right now. And so as a family of four, we gotta find ways to cut back that 2,000. I know when you look at it, 3.7 million sounds like a lot. But when you look at the volume of our budget compared to $100,000 household budget, what just over 2% is, hopefully that gives you a relativity of where we're at. And then we can easily bring that to a balanced level, I believe, if we get some good news on

027revenue and some prophecy numbers come in, which is the state sales tax we give the revenue. Be happy to answer any questions. I know that's a long answer, but I just wanted to explain You know some of the information in here and you will have that full 24 page budget I'm in our June meeting that really shows a lot of that detail from the function and object level Can you explain these numbers down here? Sure. So down at the bottom, I do have a trend line of our reserve ratio or operating fund balance percentage, as we typically talk about. And so you can see that for FY26, we have the aforementioned 10.24%. But if our deficit does stay at $3.7 million, we will be at 8.23%. And then I have the rest of the years

028forecasted out for FY28, FY29, and FY30 with the numbers that we believe at the current state. And so you can see in FY28, we continue to drop to 6.4. In FY29, we're at 2.9. And in FY30, we're at a slightly negative. And so the hard part with doing a forecast right now is there is a modernization task force for the foundation formula going on right now that they are going to present to Governor Kehoe in December. And so my forecast just used the old formula, but we know we're going to have a new one. So what that new formula looks like is going to be a huge impact on what our forecasts look like. And so that's the hard part about doing a forecast right now is that modernization task force. And so the state,

029when you look at the state revenue, please take that with caution. Just because of that, we don't know what that formula looks like. But we have a lot of history on our assessed valuation and what our property taxes will look like. The Prop C is very dependent on sales tax and what our economy looks like. And so this is- Our best estimate is we study the economy and study what trends look like for our revenue expenditures going forward. Also, in our expenditures, this doesn't include any other type of... initiative to reduce you know number of buildings or anything like that it takes our district as it sits right now and looks that okay we're gonna have an enrollment the slightly declining and what does it take to staff those buildings so it assumes that its

030status quo going forward for what that forecast would be for our operating fund balance percentage at the bottom. And then two lines up from that, you can see what the deficit or surplus would be in each year. You can see for FY26, we estimated $1.1 million surplus, but then as you go forward, we have the $3.7 million deficit. And then FY28, right now, if things were to stay status quo, a $2.8 million deficit. Thanks for asking that. And you've mentioned... Our revenue from this, they most likely will go lower after we receive the new formula, right? Yeah. Because it's not going to increase. We already know that. Yeah, the one statement the governor said is no new money for education. And so, of course, that's statewide. So I'm hoping there's a way for. our numbers

031to maybe slightly improve. And the reason I say that is right now the foundation formula subtracts your local tax effort for the 2004-2005 school year. And so if they do it for like the 2024, 2025, St. Joe has grown at a slower rate than other rapidly growing communities. So if you were rapidly growing community over the last 20 years, your 2004, 2005 local effort was relatively low to what it is today. Ours was relatively high back in 2004, 2005 relative to today on where St. Joe's grown. So I'm hoping with the new local effort subtraction, that's going to help us. There's some incentives in there that they have. There's other things they've talked about. But overall, there's not gonna be new budget, new money put to the foundation formula. So the one thing a lot

032of people don't talk about is even if they come up with this new foundation formula, it still has to pass the legislature. And if it doesn't pass, we're gonna just default back to the old one. A lot of people think that they might have trouble with that, but yeah, to answer your question specifically, I know I talked around a lot, but I do not see new cash inflows coming into the foundational formula going forward. Obviously where our reserve is at, we're a policy we'd like to be closer to 20%. What do you think is a realistic goal on a year-in-year-out basis for us to grow our reserve? Obviously you're probably not going to grow at 6%, but just breaking even right now for us, while it's good, it's not the best case scenario. It's not

033where we want to be. So if this forecast tool would align with where we'd want to be to get to 20%, what's a realistic growth percent each year that we could aim for? Yeah, I think we need to shoot for 2% to 3% growth. would be a viable goal to have. I also believe we want to hit that 14% range at minimum, because at about 14%, we don't have to get our TAM loan anymore. And that is interest. that I believe is an opportunity lost. And so if we can at least get to 14, 15%, yes, it's below the 20%, but then we don't have to take that note out every fall. So that's the first step I feel like, if we can get there as quickly as possible. And then, yes, you can maybe.

034get to 20% at a less faster pace and start trying to address the teacher salary schedule and things like that again. But I think it's imperative we do everything I can to get back to 14% to not have to take out that TAN loan anymore. And with the future state revenue, do you think the board should maybe consider entertaining like a debt, voluntary debt rollback? Is that something we should be discussing in August and September if we're going to think about it next spring? Or do you think we could proceed as is? Or is that something the board should begin to work through? I think we should entertain all options that we can. The main reason is because we're not seeing an increase in funding, most likely from the state. You know, there's news out

035of the federal government that they're looking to reduce title funding. And so that continues to reduce and of course expenditures with inflation continue to rise whether it's our electrical, whether it's our diesel fuel, things like that. And so I think we need to look at all options, have a really open mind and just present everything on the table and see what strategy works best for us. Thank you. And so looking at these numbers, it's going to be a loan every fall pretty much then, right? Yes, for the foreseeable future. I will just note too that In the 28-29 school year, there is a requirement by the state that our salaries increase by 0 to 3% based on inflation. So we will be required to increase our base starting 28-29. And if we don't start increasing

036the base sooner than that, we continue to fall further and further behind from other districts. Another thing I wanted to mention is FY27 is a non-reassessment year. And so that means that all the assessed valuation numbers come in the same year before unless there's new construction, demolition, or new property tax or personal property tax on the payrolls that allows us to receive a higher threshold from local effort. And so FY28 is a reassessment year. That is a year where if we see some reassessment growth above 3%, we could reach our goal quicker of trying to gain back to that 20%. I do have a conservative number of 3% in there, but historically that's where St. Joe's been. Last year, which is a reassessment year, we were just over 7%. The bad thing is though there's

037a lot of bills in state legislature this year that didn't pass, that almost did, that limits a lot of those things. So I hate to get liberal with the number I use for assessed valuation and try to put it at 5 or 6 percent because if one of those passes, you know, it's probably going to be 3 percent lower. So I stuck with 3 percent because that's been our historical. But please note there's some bills out there that almost made the finish line that really limit some. personal property amortization of personal property there's some that want to freeze all you know real property taxes so if any of those things hit that's going to be really tough to to see any type of revenue increases when our our costs continue to go up are there

038any further questions all right thank you dr hitchcock all right Stacia, we'll be looking at the alternative methods of instruction application, please. Absolutely. So for your reference, I've attached the state application for the alternative methods of instruction plan is required by any school district seeking to implement it during exceptional emergency circumstances. And so what you'll see there is part of the updated application requirements districts must clearly define how student attendance will be determined and reported each day for AMI. It's just a state application at this particular point. I did also put in the state application it was kind of difficult and the fact that some of them got cut off. And so I included the language that was used in the other portion of it. Are there any questions about the AMI plan? And so

039this is a revision. I wanted to present an informational item to you, hopefully at the June board meeting, that we can revise the academic calendar. In feedback from stakeholders, the start times for graduation were at one in five, and there were a number of stakeholders that spoke out and said that's too close together for logistics, just even in post-reflection of the ceremonies that we had. just recently and so their proposal based on principal feedback based off stakeholders would be to start Benton's graduation at noon and then Central's graduation at five o'clock. Looking at the comprehensive literacy plan. Thank you Lacey. Good evening. I am here. To present to you, annually we go over this, the comprehensive literacy plan for the St. Joe School District. It is a requirement as a result of Senate Bill 681.

040And within the plan, there are several items we give through curriculum instruction, assessment, leadership development, professional development, community support, and educator prep, recruitment, retention. All those things inform literacy in our school district. And so now that we have our professional development plan, our assessment plan that the board approved last month, we're ready to proceed with this plan. The big difference this year in this plan would be the assessment that we're utilizing. DESE approved DIBELS, which is an assessment that our teachers use currently right now, K-3. And this would be something that we could use now for... in place of i-ready it is a savings of 226 000 and some odd sense i would recommend it i think that our teachers prefer it it becomes it gives us real-time feedback about where deficits are with students

041and it allows teachers to hear students read so it's one-on-one assessment So that's a win-win for us, I think. Our teachers prefer that, they seem to. And I'll take any questions at this time. It is nice to get information back in real time. It is, yeah. And we are seeing an increase in our literacy scores, and I do attribute a lot of that to that information we're able to gain soon and act upon quickly. I feel like it's more accurate information, too, than... especially in kindergarten. You can see the misconceptions and the errors really easy. It gives you a composite score and it also gives you a domain score for each of the colors of foundational reading. Thank you very much. Alright, Sam, we're ready for you. The Hilliard Cinder Perkins Grant. The Perkins grant

042is a federal funded program that is based on the number of economically disadvantaged and underserved students through the Hilliard Technical Center. Once allocations are finalized, that is when Hilliards will begin looking at their budget and making sure that they are using those resources appropriately. Last year the Perkins Grant allocation was $463,000. We wanted to bring this to the board just because DESE will give us these allocations probably June or July. We're never quite sure. And so we just wanted to let you know that we are looking forward to that. Be happy to answer any questions about that one. Okay, rolling line along. Okay, the base and performance grant is also through Hilliard and so that looks at our teacher FTE and then post graduation outcomes. Again, this is numbers that we give to DESE and

043then they give us our allocations. Last year you could see that we received $378,000. We are hopeful that based on us adding two new programs at Hilliard that we will see an increase in that, but we will know hopefully in the next couple weeks. and i'd be more happy answering questions about that one as well thank you very much Alright, now we're looking at the SESI contract. Kara. Yes, so this is a renewal of our services that we currently have with Specialized Education Services Incorporated. They run, well last year they ran eight classrooms for us. This next year we have a proposal for them to run six, so we're cutting that down by two. There will be three high road classrooms at Webster, and then we will have them run three foundational skills classrooms at

044Lindbergh. Are there any questions about that contract? I just wanted to ask, how are we getting going from 8 to 6 next year? Yeah, so we were able to hire two SJSD staff with the reorganization. It actually helped us. We had a teacher that wanted to take over the structured learning classroom out at Ellison that we had been filling through SESI. And then we had a volunteer from our high school that stepped down to do foundations for us to take one of those off the table. And we actually added foundation classrooms this year. We added four. So we were at eight this last year and we'll be at 12 next year. And so we're still only having to contract out three. So we've expanded our programming, but still costing less. Are the ratio of the

045educators and the kids? Those are all the same in all our programming classrooms. So our foundational skills classrooms usually do not go above 10. And we try to keep it around eight if we can. Yes. Thank you. Any other questions? I'm taking this one. Okay. All right. So, again, thankful for Mr. Corral and his work with the human resources. I'm presenting this in regards to PDC committee. You know, you approved the professional learning plan for 26-27 in May. We have a national board cohort. that in the PDC committee want to support for individuals for national board certification moving forward. However, they would love for them to also sign a commitment to our district that when they sign up to take part in national boards, when we allocate the funds for that, that year of where

046they work on their national boards is a year and then they give two years after that as well. And so really this is you know mr krell worked with legal to present a contract to the individual that we present to them before they sign up for national boards that they commit to our district for three years did you say four teachers are doing it four teachers is what pdc approved funds for so this provides funds for them to get it and then once they get it they get an increase on their salary schedule correct that's correct so i don't want to be a debbie downer on this but if one of them would not pass the certification test at the end. How does that look moving forward for them? We would pay for the initial,

047the first round, and then anything afterwards they would be responsible for. So each portfolio is $450. There are four portfolios for national board certification. You know, you sit down with an individual and you look at their portfolios to say which one. you needed to retake. You won't have to retake all of them, but which one would you necessarily need to retake to achieve national board certification? And so that's an individual conference that we would be able to support. But, you know, we would provide funding for that first time. So if they don't pass one, they only have to retake the one. Is that correct? That's correct. That's correct. And they don't necessarily, let's say they don't get a good score, they can carry enough and they're three. portfolios to carry them over to national board

048certification so then they wouldn't be obligated to the two years after the program or what would that look like yeah um would they be obligated to that yes because there's costs along the way yes okay all right great questions any other questions um is it like pay back a portion of it or how much i'll let mr corral answer that That was something that I discussed with legal. We kept it consistent with our Grow Your Own and Pathways program to where if you do not complete the certain number of years, then you pay back the full amount. We were trying to be consistent with all of our contracts. And then also, if they don't pass, you're still obligated in order to stay the three years? Correct. And year one is the year they're going through

049the courses, so it's really a two-year commitment. If they don't pass, we actually talked about that too. I know some districts have implemented or if they don't pass, then they have to pay back those funds. We are not gonna require them to pay them back because we feel like going through those classes, it's like professional development to where they're going to get something out of it to bring back to their classroom and their students. So we hope they pass it. If they pass it, they get that additional $3,000 stipend. but if they don't pass it we are not going to require them to pay it back and what's the amount each person two thousand it's really when you talk when you consider professional development um that we send some of our staff to two thousand

050dollars is not that much money when it comes to pd and it's it's a real quality pd that they get and that focus is it's hard work so i appreciate the fact that they want to do it okay any other questions Okay, DLO. Good evening. I'm bringing you tonight a professional development. Basically, it's a contract for August 19th. We're wanting to have our conscious discipline. program that's what we use for our social-emotional resource at both our early learning centers and so they're wanting to utilize some of their PD funds and combine that on August 19th and so this is just the contract since it needs to be signed I needed to bring it to you all. Is it in-person training or virtual? In-person. Okay, because I noticed the word virtual in there when I was

051reading through and I got confused on that. Oh, well, it was my understanding it was in-person. Okay. Because they need the audio-visual and all that. Yeah, that's why. The table, the water, all that. Yeah, they do have options to do some virtual things, but this is in-person. Yeah. Any other questions? All right. Thank you very much. All right. Nutrition services. My first one this evening is just the free and reduced application packet for the 26-27 school year. And that comes directly from DESE and the only thing we do is we add our contact information to it. Any questions? I do have a comment. Yes. So it's interesting, you know, we've had discussions in this boardroom about what it might look like to provide free and reduced for the entire district. We know that... our district

052runs high compared to the state average on free and reduced. And personally, I've never quite understood why those that can't pay shouldn't pay, right? But as a kid who received this when I was growing up, I do kind of understand the The stigma and the weirdness can be around this. Here's my thing. I think about my parents when I was a kid. This is a nine-page application. Just an observation. We talk about families that don't fill it out that probably should. And I think it might have something to do with the size of this application. I'm afraid you're going to tell me this is all state driven and we can't do anything about it, but just an observation for a family that needs the help, this is kind of tough. Yeah, and unfortunately we don't

053really have any control over that that comes directly from Oh, yeah, it's a Family calls and they need help with the application. We assist them They can do it over they can do it online we actually prefer families do it online It's actually quicker and kind of more streamlined process than the paper because really the paper application or the packet itself really has more information than what they probably actually need to see, but we have to give them all that information. I see. That there's an explanation of what's really being asked. And it offers a couple different ways to get help. So it's just nice to see the further, the more explanation, how do you do it, and what can I ask when I come in. That's really helpful. This year is extremely important that

054we get these filled out, if I understand correct. Yes. This may not be a question for you, maybe just a broader question for admin, but what strategies do we have in place in the month of July and August to educate our parents and to assist parents? I think back to school night as a PTA person, just kind of a broad question. Do we have plans in place to drive these getting filled out? Quickly, so we've already been in communication with all the secretaries and all the buildings Providing them with instructions on how to help assist families fill out the application and to make sure that they know what information Absolutely has to be on the application order for us to even accept it because in the past a lot of times The holdup has been

055the family may fill it out and miss a couple things that they had to put on there So then it gets to us we realize It's not filled out all the way, so then we have to get back to the families. So we've already communicated with all the secretaries. We'll be speaking at the instructional leaders meeting on the 16th to also educate principals on what they can do to help. I know some schools are already planning events at back to school night where that's part of the push there is, hey, we have these applications. Let's go ahead and fill them out. We have events planned. I know we're going to have a booth at parties in the parkway where we're going to be assisting families with applications as well. We're planning on because July 1st

056is when they can start filling them out to apply for next school year. So once July 1st gets here, we'll be pushing all that information out to every family. And you said that online is a little simpler because it doesn't have as much information. Yeah. It's been a while since I did kindergarten, like, check-in, you know, when I take my kids. But I thought I did mine digitally when I took my kindergartner. This is not a question for you. Is there a way that we could do digital enrollment at Back to School 9, or if it is simpler than the nine-page packet? I don't know who answers that question, but... There's online enrollment open now. I think most people get their SNAP codes. I got all... Sorry, all four of my kids snap codes today.

057But to kind of expand on what you had said about making it a little more simple and also expand on what you had said about ease of use, are we sending the link to the digital application out maybe through like? Yeah, I was going to say. Yeah, I was going to say. We plan on doing that on July 1st because you can't fill it out prior to July 1st for it to apply to the 26-27 school year. That's the downside of having that online enrollment open before July 1st, but I know it helps at the school level so that's why on July 1st we're going to be Putting that out on parent square so everybody knows that that application is available We're going to post it on Facebook and our Facebook page and get it

058out to as many people as we can. Would you also like to stress it will be mandatory? Because the thing about is I know that a lot of like Even if it's online and even if it's at a meeting, a lot of individuals will be like, well, I know I qualify. I do every year. I go to Edison. I go to Cardin Park. They will not really understand or listen. And so, I mean, if we're able to really, really dress, you know, it's not like it used to be. Oh, I would love that. If you can get all the schools on board to help assist with that, I would love it. Thank you for your preparedness. It seems like you have a great plan, and it's great to hear that, so thank you. Yeah, we

059want to get that out to as many families as possible, especially with having CEP for so long. I know we have families in our district that have never had to fill out an application before, so this may be the first time they've ever had to do it. So we've got a game plan going, and we're ready for families to start filling those out July 1. Is there any way, so it's back to school night, I'm teacher A, is there any way I can know who has filled it out and who hasn't? So at back to school night, maybe there's to be some conversation? I don't know, that's pretty logistical. I don't know if that will work. Yeah, there's not really. It's confidential. Yeah. When you're face-to-face with that family, because I used to collect the

060paper. So the next one is the full pay meal prices. So every year DESE puts out the PLE tool, which is a federal calculator that is used to regulate full pay meal prices for any district participating in the National School Lunch Program. Based on the calculator, we are below what is recommended that we charge for full pay meal prices. So the calculator is recommending that we increase full meal prices by 10 cents. remind me how many days are there in a school year 169 yeah and this would only impact those who pay full price for meals it does not impact free or reduced students any further questions you're up next I bring before you a flag football job description. So this year, this was a club in a couple of our high schools. It's recognized

061as an emerging sport through Misha. We had successful participation, so that's why we're bringing the job description before you to give our kids and a coach access to provide that activity for kids. I'll take any questions you may have. Yeah, let's go through the qualifications. It says you need previous coaching experience. Do we have that for a flag? I mean, maybe last year's coaches? We do have some coaches that are interested. Once we have a job description approved, then we'll post it. Hopefully they will apply. Yeah, and maybe if they coached, let's say we get some new folks, would they have been able to coach anything in the past, like their kids, baseball, whatever? I mean, is that? Coaching experience is what we require. That's on the preferred, not the required. So we hope they

062have experience. Thank you. And then the mission requirements, what's the big hitter there? They just need to be certified through MISIA. Okay. A little bit of training. Yeah. Some training. Yeah. So if they're a coach all the way, there's some additional stuff they probably have to do through missions and videos and things like that to get certified. Okay. Thank you. Well, this could also provide an opportunity for during consolidation, maybe a coach who didn't get a head spot in another sport, an opportunity to have a head coaching position. Very possible. Okay, Mark, you're up. All right. You're going to get tired of me hearing about it. Extra duty salary schedule, so we brought these to you in March. We have a couple revisions that we need to make based on some decisions that have been

063made. So I'll just go through briefly on the titles. So with the addition of flag football, we're moving into category five. On the extra duty salary schedule, changes to summer weights. We currently have 12. between the three high schools, we've not about between the two. Additional wording, so we have coaches in wrestling that are coaching the boys and the girls. They're currently just getting a stipend, just a regular stipend to do both teams. Since it's the same season, they would get a 1.5. A lot of their meets are at the same site, but they're still coaching more kids in two different teams. And then for swimming, since we're adding swimming to both schools now, a lot of Kansas City schools have the same model to where you have one head coach for both high schools.

064I think North Kansas City has one head coach for all of their high schools. So we're going to combine. one coach for Benton and Central. They would get a 1.5 stipend since they would be again coaching two teams and then since the boys and girls are different seasons you would have one head coach for the boys, one head coach for the girls, both receiving the 1.5. And then changes to career ladder we have to go in and make adjustments to that too. What questions do you have? All right, additional pay rates. A couple suggestions here. Currently on the additional pay rates we have a chaperone for JROTC summer camps. We have events all throughout the year where JROTC has to do some competitions where they go overnight. We send a chaperone with them. So we

065are suggesting we remove summer camp and just a chaperone for JROTC so that's coded correctly. Back in March, we approved a increase for the para sub rate from $7 to $10 if a para is subbing all day. So to change that. And then we found out recently that a staff member was assisting students at one of our middle schools who made the Make 48 Challenge. And she was supervising students at that event, and we needed a pay rate for her at that event. So we were suggesting the very last one of the additional pay rate schedule. It says attending, preparing for, or presenting at various required professional development. We're going to add or student competition so they can get paid at that $25 per hour rate for that event or events that they attend. Questions

066on the pay rates? So what did the Bank 48 instructors get this year? Zero? No. We gave them $25 an hour. We found something we thought it could be coded at, but we wanted to make sure we were coding it correctly. So we made that adjustment to where it says student competitions. Okay. And this is just putting that on wax? Yes. They got paid. Okay, good. That sounds better than not. Yeah. All right, AEL salary schedule. So our adult learning and literacy program. Just want to make a note, I might make it three, four, or nine times that the salary schedule and these employees are funded 100% through a grant. No district funds are utilized for this adult learning program. There are a couple increases. The adult learning program does their own salary schedule. These

067positions that were increased are grossly underpaid. For example, the case managers moving from $18 to $21 an hour, that's just the step one. I did a little research. The state average, the lowest I found was $23 and the highest I found was $27 and we're only paying them a $21. And then the testing coordinator going from $18 to $19.50. And again, what I found there is the lowest was 22 and the highest was 23. Again, this program was 100% funded through a grant. All right. So back in December, we met with a group of administrators to discuss our administrative procedure. So this is not a policy. It's just how we implement the policy for inclement weather. So based on the discussion within the group, It was decided that we will really the big changes here

068are administrators will now report to the building on scenario A and scenario E. Scenario A is typically an AMI day to where the weather is bad but district operations are still in effect. This change was really done for two reasons. One, I can attest as a former building administrator in my three years. I had on two occasions, I went to work because I can't sit at home. When I was in the building, I had students show up. school that were walkers and their parents might go to work early and they did not know that there wasn't school so we had students showing up to the buildings luckily I was there and let them in we got a hold of somebody and they got a ride back home I know we had a student at Lafayette

069a few years ago as well that was out in the cold because they didn't they weren't aware that the building wasn't open And then reason number two is really it gives our building principals a chance to get some work done, collaborate with other building administrators because we know time is valuable once students are there. It's really kind of challenging to have time to sit down with their fellow administrators or an administrator from another building so we can coordinate some activities with that. And then the last... addition was scenario E. We know the past several years we've had to close individual buildings, whether it's a water main break, heat issues, power issues, and then we wanted to add a scenario in there about abnormal conditions just so we were covered. And then one of the attachments

070that you will see, this one right here, we kind of created a chart for our students and our parents to kind of see What's going to happen with us on these days? Kind of gives them some guidelines on what to expect and the same for our staff if there was questions I know when I was a teacher we would get the message follow scenario a and I'm like What is scenario a so I'm calling people saying what does this mean for me? So now we have a chart that they actually know what this means for me based on each scenario I'll take questions if you have any of those I don't think they can take you down this path. So let's see. Just help me here, Mark. So the scenario is proclaimed by that administration?

071Correct. Okay. And so we've got this one scenario. A, it says suspension of inverse classes due to cold ice and snow. Then we've got this other scenario, C or D, suspension of classes due to winter conditions. And one of them... You have to do alternative methods of learning and the other one you don't. Yeah, so A and E would be, A would be all buildings are closed, but district operations are still going on. Okay. Okay? Students are going to learn virtually. Yeah. Scenario B, we got six feet of snow. Nothing's going on in our buildings. Nobody's reporting. Those days have to be made up. That's suspension of all district coverage. Correct. I got you. Scenario E, C, and D would be we're letting out early because of snow or heat. Okay. So we've gone to

072school, storm's coming, starting to snow, we let out at two hours early. Partial day. Correct. And then scenario E would be for, it's similar to A, but it's individual buildings. You mean like it says right here, early at. I got you, brother. Thank you, I take things complicated. Thank you. Well, yeah, there's a lot there. Sorry, I had a question. So I was reading through some of the changes to the policy and on the attachment where it says scenario A, the green wording is the new proposed wording, correct? Yes. Okay. So when I was reading it, I read it a few times and I'll be honest, it could be because I was tired, but help me understand. Because where it says when an emergency closing of all operations has not been authorized, That did make

073sense. So, I mean, when, I guess when would employees decide, like why would we have employees? be required to work and report um if it's not been authorized like does that make sense so like i was reading it says when an emergency closing of all operations has not been authorized employees who are required to report and do not will be allowed to use appropriate paid leave but it's under suspension of in-person classes due to cold ice or snow which to me would be an authorized but in scenario a we're not closing all district operations we're just closing where students are not attending So central office is reporting scenario B is authorizing the closure of the entire district. So Dr. McGinnis in scenario A did not authorize all operations ceasing, just students not attending. The wording,

074and again, I very well could be reading too much into it, but the wording just was really confusing to me. And then who falls under that hourly employee umbrella? Is that like our support staff? That's almost everybody. So anybody that is our support staff, the ones that would be professional teachers and administrators are the ones who are not hourly. So our certified and non-certified staff? Are they both salary? Correct. Okay. Well, cause I know you're teaching. Yes. Well, cause I know this one here too. It says the previous policy said hourly employees who are not required will get the pay for the first three days. And on this one, it doesn't state that. So are we not going to pay the hourly employees for those three days? Yeah, we, we decided that that was back

075in July. And then we change things to where instead of giving them paid days to do nothing, we now have tasks for them to do. So some type of professional learning. So if you're a para, I know. I know Kara and some others have created some videos and some tasks for them to do as their work. I know nutrition services are doing some things. They might be creating some menus on those days, just some activities to where they probably don't have time to do these things during the school day. So we're giving them tasks on those days when they're not present with students. Well, because that was my question. If they're not reporting... but we're not giving them an opportunity to make up the work, but then now we're going to take away the pay.

076So that gives them an option to still get paid on that day. Correct. Now, we've had some that says, I'm not going to do that video. Sometimes you do not. And they choose to take a day off, and that's okay too. But if they choose to do that task that was assigned, they're getting paid for that day. Well, and that makes sense to me. I mean, more. Right. Taking away the day but not giving you an opportunity to do some work or do something. Right. Okay. I'll give you another example. You could have a maintenance worker that lives in Savannah and for whatever reason they're home with their kids because the weather's really bad but we need them to push no because we still have operations happening and they can choose to take leave time.

077So that's just another example. Well and I thought I read that when I said kind of at your discretion which I know. It's kind of great, but I assume that's what it was insinuating. I have a couple questions. When I'm looking at the policy, okay, so admin. What's the number of admin in the district? I can tell you exactly what that is right here. I'm just asking. Currently for district-wide, or are you just talking about building administrators? No, I mean I'm talking about the people required to come in on a snow day. Right now? No. If the policy was changed. Based on this year's numbers, 22. Okay. Is there a way to, like, pull the admin? I mean, I'm just asking because, like, I know that you asked three building principals, you know, but I

078mean, if it's, I'm thinking if it's rough on teachers coming in, it will be rough on admin also coming in. You know what I mean? I get the point of having a person at the building, but requiring an admin to come in on a snow day on the scenarios, I know it's been a convo for years. I'm just kind of leery of changing that aspect right now. It's just my concern. Are we able to pull the admin? I would say if we're going to pull the admin, there was no reason to have a committee. I didn't know you guys were having a committee. I'm just saying. What the committee had recommended. I know, but if I'm an admin and I'm not on the committee, who's going to listen to my input? I know they had

079conversations with other administrators, those individuals that were on the committee as we were going through this process. I'm just saying I would feel more comfortable with more input, I'm one of the admin who's required to come in and the weather's bad and I also have kids at home. I'm just saying. Is there a way for us to know who's on the committee? Yeah, I put that on the description. The individuals on the committee? Positions. I just put positions. I didn't put names on there. So it was an elementary principal, a middle school principal, a high school assistant principal. directors of elementary and secondary education, two of them, superintendent, myself, and the coordinator of human resources. So we had representation from each level. And did all the administration have opportunity to say if they wanted to

080participate in committee? Yes. Yeah, okay. All of them? No, we have selected them. We don't want a group of 22 because that's going to- It's going to take forever. You know what I mean? Like, are we emailing out and saying, like, hey, we're going to form a committee to, you know, revise this policy, and then maybe the first couple elementary or middle or high school, you know, that way everybody has some equal stake and opportunity to email. Yes, so I had, sorry, I had mentioned to our group in one of our leadership meetings that we were going to discuss this, and if you were interested, just shoot me an email. I'll just add, this is something we had in place years ago. Gosh, not even that long ago. Six years, the policy was still the

081same, but it was an expectation that administrators went into the building. When I was at Truman, I took a morning shift and the other person took the afternoon shift. So we do try to be flexible. And I also want to add, if the weather is terrible, that would be scenario B. And so we would keep everybody home. It would be a make-up day, but we do have that option. I mean there's some flexibility with this as well as far as if staff have their children because the school is closed. So we allowed some flexibility back in the day when we had this in place but the main reason we had it was to protect our kids and make sure if students are dropped off and it's freezing cold that we get them in contact with

082a parent. I think that would make sense if the scenario is more cold weather or whatever. I would say, um... Do you know the amount of times kids are left? Is it like every snow day? It's pretty frequent. It's more than you think. It happens quite a bit. Something to think about from an operational standpoint is if there's a lot of snow on a day, we're already preparing to make sure we can have school the next day. It's not, let's say we get a heavy snow on Monday, it's not Tuesday morning we're trying to make it clear. Usually it's all day Monday, Monday afternoon, salt and sidewalks and things in the night. So having an administrator at the building ensures that one, do we have any areas where maybe heat's out in the building or

083something like that that we're not aware of? We have our engineers in the building that are shoveling snow on the sidewalks, icing sidewalks, making sure it's clean. To have that supervisor there, that administrator there that, you know. engineers can go to if they have any questions or important areas that I should hit first and then making sure before they leave that day hey my building is ready for school on Tuesday for when kids show up and so that's an important aspect is just from an operational standpoint as I'm looking at it to make sure that our kids are safe our sidewalks our parking lots are clear and we're ready to go for the school the next day I'm just worried about if it's a policy if it's a procedure almost yes yes I get that

084I see that okay but it eliminates a lot of the flexibility because now it's in right and it's in stone I mean it's not it's not like it's well maybe we could know it's going to be the policy it's just my concern sorry we can go okay This one I'm really excited about. We've had lots of lots of positive feedback on our professional staff. I'm actually going to combine the next two because if you've looked through them you'll see that they are identical for our professional staff and our support staff, so really all staff. I'm not going to go through all the changes because I gave you that cheat sheet. But we met in starting in December and long discussions. I know our staff over the past several years have been asking for a change

085to our employee leave to where currently if you're a teacher, you can get the maximum you have seven sick days and six. personal days up to 13. If you're let's say a year one teacher you get 10 sick days and three personal days. Now these are all going to be personal days with a few exceptions as the committee met we really we analyzed several neighboring districts on how they implement their employee leave So we took a lot of those ideas and kind of made it our own So again, we analyzed a lot of districts down south that have the approved paid leave or PTO whatever you want to call it but we looked at employee leave vacation and bereavement. So with what you looked at I'll entertain some questions. I will make one note. So

086on the on the page where it's got the policy with all the red and green on page four there's a change that I'm going to have to make. On page four, on the bottom paragraph, it talks about staff who terminate employment. That's either through resignation or termination. Those individuals, if you resign or are terminated, you forfeit your banked leave. All your leave is carried over. That's been a policy in our district for I don't know how many years. That last line, it talks about... It says Except for current BAPL, which is our banked leave that BAPL needs to change to APL because You are paid out your current year's leave if you terminate your employment or resigned but you are not paid out your banked leave. If you retire from our district or unfortunately if

087you pass away then your banked leave is paid out. So that is one change that I would have to make to this if you guys approve this here in a couple weeks. I'll entertain some questions. I have a question about the full calendar year. Is that January to December? June? What's our full calendar year? That would be from July 1 to June 30th. Okay. I have additional questions, but I just have notes. I'll put it on the calendar. I've got some additional questions. I'll just wait until after I get those other answers from you. Okay. I think they're getting close to being done. I'm not putting pressure on you, but if If we don't approve this at the end of the month, we probably can't move forward with it until this time next year because

088as you're talking about leave and vacation days and all of that, it's going to be difficult to make those changes in July or August as the new school year, the fiscal year has already started. If we want to table this for the following year, obviously it's a choice. But I think based on feedback, MSTA and NEA both support it. I got confirmation from them. But I think our committee did a really good job on this. I don't think it's our goal to wait. I just know that. I just want my questions answered. That's fine. I'd love to answer them. Alright, thank you Mark. Alright, District Security Services. Sorry, just a note. Number 19 support staff is identical policy. Our goal is to make sure that we're all on the same playing field, whether it's administrators,

089teachers, paras, everybody gets the same thing moving forward. Thank you for that. What we have in front of you is a sample services agreement we'd be looking to sign with the approved vendor based on the RFP that you have in the agenda item as well and what this service does is During the evening if we have an alarm call or things like that at 2 AM, the service goes out and checks out the premises to see if it was a false alarm, if there's some sort of active threat that they might have to involve St. Joe Police Department. And so these are services we currently have right now. And so we've hit that time period where we need to put those out for bid again to ensure we're getting the best price possible. Any questions

090about that? Costs us now roughly. Would I be able to follow up with an email so I can get you a good number? I don't want to stay silent. I'll send you that. Sounds good. Thank you. All right. Thank you. All right. District Software Renewal, Jake Kira. I attached the software list that we have for renewal this year. As Robert alluded to earlier in that last column out there, I got an itemized list of each. software from our vendors because the way that we can fund it has changed. So anything over a single item over $5,000 for software becomes a capital item. So even though a lot of these are over $5,000 total, each individual item that they bill us for would be under that mark. So that's why we were able to make that

091change. If you have any questions about any of this, let me know. All right. Thank you. Next is Chromebooks. Okay, so this year is the end of year for our high school devices. Their warranty is up and that's when things get expensive to repair. Instead of purchasing new windows machines for the high school, we are planning on rotating. the current Windows laptops at the elementary level up to the high school kids because they're the newest ones we have. They are two years old currently. And then we are moving to a two-to-one model at the elementary level instead of one-to-one to help reduce some of the screen time that we have at the elementary level. We are also looking to move the laptop usage, which is currently grades three through six, down to grades two through

092six. So that way we give the kids a year on the machines before they start state testing. That way they're more familiar with them and that's less issues that come when testing time starts. So I didn't include a bid right now that will come for the board meeting because technology is in a wonderful place right now with hardware. So no vendor will give us a quote that lasts more than 30 days. So in order to scrunch it into the timeline that we need to get it approved. I put out an RFB, bids were due June 1st. We're currently evaluating some machines and then I'll bring a final bid for approval for you at the board meeting. The bids came in between 1.18 and 1.19. million is what we're looking at. They were all very similar.

093So we're getting demo devices from the manufacturers right now. We've got one, another one's on the way, and then we'll be able, based on some of that, we'll know which device that we think feels best for us. And these will be three-year lease. Three-year lease, so it'll be about $400,000 a year. Then we have a dollar buyout at the end, so we pay a dollar per machine. We do that most of the time because we can surplus them and then recycle them and make more money that way rather than letting the vendor take back the lease. Any questions on this one? I know the answer when I'm looking at this. Yep. It just made me think, you know, that this will be a major classroom change. Yes. I mean, not a... I don't know if

094it'll be a major change because honestly, I don't think we're getting like the computers that are sitting in there aren't being used 100% of the time anyway, right? It'll just be the teacher will have to bring the card in between the two classrooms that will be sharing it. So they'll have to schedule that time a little better will be the change. Yeah, like and the thing is, I'm not in the classroom. And so I mean, I don't know. As I looked at this, I was wondering if we ran this. by the teacher groups? We had discussions with administrators, they spoke with their teachers, and I worked with academic services on all of this to make sure this is a route that we could go and be successful. I was going to say, so what's the

095projected cost savings associated with this change, and how does it compare in our tech budget? So, it's kind of... It's a difficult state. The cost savings if we compare to if we would keep with our current cycle and we were to replace all of the high school machines this year, we're probably looking at a rough estimate probably around three million. Because the cost of everything's gone sky high this year, most vendors are up 25% on us. And instead of buying 2,200, we'd be buying about 3,000 machines. If you look at cost savings versus if we stay one-to-one, you can say we're about around $2 million is what we would be spending to stay one-to-one. Yeah, just kind of for general discussion, we did... some personal feedback from teachers who were concerned about this. And I

096did just enough research to be dangerous and see that there's a faction of folks that think that we do need less screen time. So I know that's a part of it. So it was what, House Bill 2230? It just died in the Senate, but it was actually raised this year. to put a cap on screen time when elementary school kids. And there was a big push. It passed through the house. And I think probably they're going to keep pushing. So next year, that limit may come into effect anyway. Yeah. I did hear a word used earlier. I'm going to mess this up. Somebody, the new system, the DIBELS. DIBELS. What is it, DIBELS? Yep. DIBELS. DIBELS. Now. I had questions about that too. I think what I'm getting at is, is it okay that... Yeah,

097all of our testing software, everything will work on Chromebook. Okay, even if we're going two to one on the computer rate? Yeah, it'll go by log in. Questions was, has admin... Considered or conducted like an instructional impact analysis on decreasing access to devices for these kids when a lot of our learning is being driven online, whether it's DIBELS, i-Ready, district assessments, math testing. Ms. Bill, that's a great question. So we've been very proactive on an academic service lens to really think what's best for our kids academically, how do kids learn? And screen time, we had the experience of through iReady that it wasn't improving student achievement. And so the first thing that we did was we lifted up UFLY. And so the University of Florida, that is no screen time whatsoever. The benchmark advanced, which

098is also a core ELA. Students have workbook materials. There are print materials for that. We want our students to be handwriting. We want students to be reading. We want students to be able to mark up text. And so those are shifts that we have made as instructional to look at core materials that can be supported without screen time. Well, and I also just worry about the additional instruction time and coordination that's going to take away from... the teachers, I mean, trying to fit everything in their day and then them losing some time by having to transition and share the device. So we just went one to one during COVID. So for what, 20 years, we've had laptop carts. And then it's just been in the past couple of years that it's been one to one.

099And that happened at the elementary level, basically because of COVID. because the kids were all at home and we had to purchase all those machines. So I mean, it's been a fairly standard practice and most districts around us aren't one to one at the elementary level. It's a rare thing that we have been. I remember pre-COVID, my kids had a lot of top cards, but also post-COVID now, a lot of our things are digitized. So that's why. I mean, maybe in 2020 we didn't need one-to-one laptops because we weren't doing as much digitized learning. Now we are, and we continue to push for, in some areas, more of that. Like, Dibbles is online, is it not? Yeah, yeah, but that's, I think, one thing that... sitting at a computer. Oh, devil's listening. Right, it's not

100like iReady where the students go and they read a passage. It's more teachers sitting next to them. Teacher has access to the device. They record the assessment materials through that device. So you're saying it was similar to like the iReady, but the teacher was just listening to them read it out loud, if that makes sense. Yeah. OK. Yeah, and even in the math materials that we lead up, you know, we've noticed that when we go to meet MPLCs with teachers, you know, in the past when students were doing things on screen time, we couldn't see the missteps that students were making. And so we're asking students and teachers to record on paper so that we can see those missteps and correct them through on time. And that's why the ReadyMath resources are also printed out

101as well. Something else to think about is Jake did a great job of demonstrating the cost savings of just the device, but there's something called total cost of ownership. What I mean by that is what does it take to administer and... configure devices on a mass level. You have to have staff that have to configure those devices, that have to collect those devices every year from students, clean them, get them ready to push back out. A lot of backend software is on per device model, meaning however many devices you have, that's what the subscription costs. And then the more devices you have, the more internet traffic, higher bandwidth, higher costs like that. So it's not just the cost of the device that expands, it's also the total cost of ownership around it to administer those

102devices. So that's something to think about. when you're looking at what your model should be for K6, 7, 8, and 9 through 12. Jake, you're up again. So last, our current iPads are ending year six, which means we've repaired them all that we can. Apple is a different beast, so there's no... Request for bids on this one Apple's a sole source vendor for education They don't give price breaks or do anything fun for us But I mean we do get them a little bit cheaper than they do retail so I've attached a quote for for iPads on this one. We will be moving two to one K one Remember, since we are bringing the Chromebooks down to second grade, just kindergarten, first grade, but we will stay one-to-one with special services on the laptops that

103those kids use for special education. They'll still have the ones that they need with the software installed. They won't have to share on those. They'll keep the same model on all of those. Any questions on this one? And this one's not a lease. It'll just be a purchase. So then will we be able to, the current McHads we have, what will happen with them? Those, we'll surplus and sell those. Okay. Yeah, we send all that stuff to a certified recycler so that way they make sure the hard drives are wiped and they're certified to do that. Because if we do it, we've got to remove hard drives. On iPads, there's no hard drive to remove so we just have to smash them. So being able to do that's actually a benefit for us. Okay, thank

104you. The property list you have before you is a lot of items from Lafayette in terms of extracurricular activities. And so if you look at policy DN-2, when the district no longer needs property or the property is not suitable for the district needs, the board by an affirmative vote of not less than two-thirds of the whole board may authorize the district the sale and transfer or lease of the property in accordance with law. And it goes on to talk about how that can be sold and it talks about real property not disposed in this way may be sold or leased to the highest bidder. Personal property may be sold to the highest bidder or otherwise disposed of as allowed by law. And so our administration at Lafayette went through a lot of the extra collectivity

105equipment whether it was old football pants, jerseys, soccer gear, golf gear, and all those different items. And items that could be used for middle school extra collectivities were held back. Those items, and especially sports that aren't at the middle school level, were part of this list. And what this will do is authorize us to then auction these items off. So folks that- went to Lafayette and want a chance to bid on some of those items would have that opportunity if you so approve this at the June board meeting. Is there a rush in order to do this? It seems kind of... School just closed a couple weeks ago. Yeah, so there were a lot of people who reached out and said, you know, I was a senior I would love to have bought my softball

106jersey, my baseball jersey. And so, you know, I wanted to honor them by them. A lot of people ask, can I just have it? The answer is no. Policy D and dash two states so we have to have surplus property board approved and we have to have it auctioned off. And so I wanted to do this in a timely manner so then that way people could have a chance of when this auction will be held to do that before maybe they go away for college or have other things that are going on in their life. Cuz if we wait six months, a year down the road, some of these things might be misplaced, damaged, forgotten about, lost. And so I wanted to get this in front of the board. So those folks that did want

107an opportunity to have a memento from their days at Lafayette a chance to do that. So this is trying to honor them. Thank you very much. All right. Review of policies. H and I. Donna. I sent all these out to you guys. This is the next set that needs to be looked at. I did get some questions from Rhonda and I'm getting answers for it. If any of the rest of you have any questions on them, please send them to me and I will get answers for you. Otherwise, we are going to bring them to meeting on the 22nd to readopt them all as a set. Okay. All right. It was eye-opening to look through those policies. Well, there's a ton that has to do with teaching every child in this community, whether they're in

108the public school, wherever they are, that every child matters. And these take care of all those children. So it's nice and I get those questions because we're concerned about our special needs or disabled but these make sure that every child every athlete every non athlete that we are being wise with our instruction with our caretaking of those children, so it was good to revisit them. All right, the next one is proposed policy BCG-1, board communication with legal. Donna, do you want to update us with the MSBA? I sent this to MSBA to ask them, you know, what do we need to do to get this into policy? They said they need to have their attorneys look at them, and they will get back to us as soon as possible. I did let them know that

109we want this done as quickly as possible. But I have not heard anything yet. I do know they're in the throes of having Summer Summit right now. So that may be putting a little curve in it. But I'm gonna follow up with them this week to see if they have gotten to it yet. I did read through the things that you had sent, Jacob. And I was making notes again. I have not had a chance to. draft an email to send to you guys. But I should have that before the end of the week, probably a couple days. I'll put all my notes together and send a response back. Any other comments about that? Jacob, do you have anything you want to share at this time? I mean, all mine was uploaded to the agenda,

110so I think everyone has access to it. As I read through it, it just seemed that some of our paragraphs were covering the same topics. And so the paragraphs that really expanded and got in more detail kind of procedurally I thought were better towards the back because it really spelled out what we're trying to accomplish. And so a lot of the times when we're things that I think we need to entertain maybe getting rid of is because it's covered other areas. So this isn't really about. eliminating any ideas. It's more just kind of cleaning it up and just simplifying and shortening it down. I can go through all this but I know my doesn't want me to so I just submitted it so everyone can look at it. I just when we get to the

111next board meeting I just want to be able to have every board member have a chance to give insight and discuss it and so that's why I submitted my stuff for the work session because hoping to have that conversation but if we want to wait till the 22nd we can. But yeah, yeah I think we more of the stuff than there is any disagreement on all the heavy points I think for the most part we're all men, but I do have Some of the questions that you felt were repetitive were They were for different purposes specifically like to limit individual authorities, so I am drafting a response. I've started typing it up. I'll just email it to everybody, though, for time's sake, and so everybody has the same information and the same amount of time

112to review it and get more feedback. Because I think we all need to have some input on it. Absolutely. Okay. Alright, the next one is the town hall discussion we Set a date for this at our last meeting and then decided we would put it on the work session To have some discussion about what the format of that would look like so if we could I feel like we need to get that decided so that public knows and everybody knows what we're going to be doing. So tonight, my question is really to the board. What are some ideas you have, what you feel like this should look like, and hopefully kind of narrow it down so that we can have a plan for that since we've put it off and put it off for several

113months. So that's what I'm looking for tonight, just some ideas. Do we want to have this particular topic? That way the public kind of gets narrowed in onto that topic and they can have input on that topic. That's kind of what I'm looking for, kind of a discussion that we can have about that. Okay. My mind goes immediately to finances. And, you know, I would love as a board member to have input from the public on... can get back on track financially and so you know what we tend to get is a lot of advocating for specific things but but boy I would like us to set the forum up in a way that we might mine some valuable insights as to what's really important because you know and hey maybe this is just me

114we didn't talk about it much but as I look at this five-year projection we got more changes coming And so what I would love to have happen is the public recognize that and say, okay, we've got some tough decisions to make and here's some input for you that's... Okay. I'm so sorry, we all keep doing that to each other. So I know I am only one of seven, and I didn't have to sit through all the other town halls that you guys did, but I personally don't think we should limit any of the town hall discussion. I think that we're setting it up as an avenue for stakeholders and community members to come ask questions, say their piece, whatever it may be, and painful and as uncomfortable as it may be, I think we should

115afford them the opportunity, but... The will of the board will be the will of the board. I just felt like that should be said. My idea was kind of like yours. I do agree that if we are going to limit it, we need to have more than one. And that at every meeting it's a different topic. Because there's lots going on in the district. And we were elected, you know, to listen. I know that when we all campaigned it was transparency and community engagement. Okay, so let's get the community to engage. Give them the opportunity. And it's not an opportunity if we're just choosing a topic and we're only open to listening on information that we want to hear. We need to hear everything. It's our job. Other thoughts? If we have to have more,

116we can have more. But I like the idea of that is specific. That is something that people have a lot of trouble with, is our finances, to give them a good picture and get input on that. So I like that preference. Yeah, I mean, don't hear me say that that has to be the only topic. But I would moderate it. I would set it up. I would advertise it that, you know, that's what would be very helpful to us. Right? But don't hear me say that I would limit it. I mean, I'm open to hear. But certainly that's what I would value is some insights as to. You know what the public feels about some of these tough decisions we're gonna have to make. Oh here we are. Do we have an idea who's gonna

117moderate? The OR? No. Or no they said they could do the first one I remember that. Yeah. No it'll be us. It'll be very similar to what we did during the consolidation process. It would look very similar to that. I volunteer. Hedge core distribute. Break the news. We have to reschedule the day of the event. Be out of the country. July 6th. Well I think we should have it wherever you are. You might get a lot of show up actually. So other thoughts? I mean I'd be okay if we had you know a topic maybe one of our CSIP topics at each meeting. I think having a focus maybe we could open with a maybe a presentation of our CSIP goals around finances. I think we have two smart goals when it comes to finances

118so maybe just informative for maybe five or ten minutes and then listen to the community's feedback on finances and their insights if we have more of them. I just think gearing it around our CSIP makes sense. I mean that's our continual school improvement plan and so I would be open to maybe making one of these about finances. If DLR comes and does facilities in the fall, that's another one of our CSIP goals. So I think if we just use our CSIP as our guiding document, we can't go wrong. I will say the advantage to being here is the technology piece. So if we wanted to live stream that we can do that easily from this location. And we have a work session right after the town hall as well. I mean, they can set it

119up in a different school, but I think it's a little bit more convenient here. Of course, if we have the numbers, that's why we moved them in the fall to accommodate. So we can kind of get a feel for who we think will be there, send out a survey or RSVP or something like that, see if somebody will do it. It's July, though, so I can't imagine it would be as well attended as the fall. Well, what if I'm looking at what we've just chatted about what if we did a combination of both? So we start the meeting with a little bit of discussion on Finance and not Robert doing it since he won't be here, but we could figure out Maybe that would look you know kind of just give that information out briefly

120and then people can Talk about whatever topics they want to Talk about and it would be the same format as we did in the fall where it would be a three minute Time limit just like we did in the fall. What are your thoughts about that? Kind of a combo of both of those Okay, okay Okay. All righty. How about between now and our meeting in June? I work with administration and we kind of get an agenda ish type thing situated so that we have that for the next meeting. Is that alright everyone? Okay. Alrighty. Alright so our next Board of Education meeting is June 22nd. Could I have a motion for adjournment please? Thank you Kim. Can I have a second? Thank you Cassandra. Alright Donna we're ready for roll call. Miss Chesney? Yes.

121Miss Kearns? Mr. McMillan? Yes. Mr. Moore? Yes. Miss Neal? Yes. Miss Williams? Yes. Ms. Miller? Yes. Okay, motion passes 7-0. We are adjourned.