001Good evening, everyone. It is now 6.30 and I, Jacqueline Colton, President of the Duncanville ISD Board of Trustees, call this meeting of the Duncanville Independent School District to order. Let the record show that a quorum of trustees... present that the meeting has been duly called and that notice of this meeting has been posted in accordance with the Texas Open Meetings Act Texas Government Code Chapter 551. We will now move to opening ceremonies. Trustee Dr. Flowers will lead us in the invocation as we start the opening ceremonies. Thank you. Father, we come and we thank you for another day that we didn't earn. We thank you for the privilege to be able to serve in the capacities that we are here. We appreciate every good and perfect gift and recognize as it comes from you. In
002Jesus' name, amen. Thank you for that. Always looking for an opportunity to showcase our students. Ms. Avila. Will introduce the students who are leading the pledges on tonight. Thank you Thank you so much. Good evening. Madam president trustees and dr. Gorey tonight We have students from Duncanville High School Student Council who will be leading us in the Pledge of Allegiance and the Texas Pledge Students, please come up here and introduce yourselves Greetings, everyone. My name is Eli De La Rosa, and I'm also a junior, and I'm a committee chair of Succo. Thank you, students. Everyone, please stand. 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. Honor the Texas flag. I pledge allegiance
003to the Texas, one state under God, one and indivisible. Thank you students, please go ahead and stay there as we take a group photo trustees. May you stand up in your place, please Thank You miss Avila and Reese and Eli We appreciate you We will now move on to the superintendent's report and I will now turn the meeting over to dr. Gorey Thank you very much and good evening Madam President and other trustees and everyone assembled here today. It is certainly my pleasure to present our superintendent's report for September 15, 2025 school board meeting. I'd like to start off by speaking to Attendance Awareness Month. September is set aside for Attendance Awareness Month, and Student Services launched a program this year entitled Champions Attend and Champions Win. Each Tuesday features themed dress-up days to promote
004daily attendance, including CAP Days and Western Days. Campuses are spotlighted on the district's attendance scorecard with top elementaries and secondary schools recognized for their strong attendance. We know students can only learn when they show up ready to learn every day. Today marks the start of Hispanic Heritage Month celebrated nationwide from September 15th to October 15th. This month honors the invaluable contributions of the Latino community in strengthening our democracy. Duncanville ISD is excited to celebrate and showcase Hispanic heritage programs and host events on our campuses that highlight our students' talents and cultural pride. Duncanville ISD is proud to host the Discover Duncanville ISD Fall Festival on Saturday, October 25th from 9 a.m. to 12 p.m. at Armstrong Park. In partnership with the City of Duncanville Parks and Recreations, this event will showcase several of our choice
005programs for the community. It offers a preview of what to expect at the spring's Champion Choice events. We sure hope to see everyone there. We're so close to reaching our projected enrollment for the 25-26 school year. Currently, we have 10,981 students enrolled district-wide, which is 99.2% of our goal. A huge thank you to our Student Service Department and Campus Support Departments for their ongoing efforts in welcoming and enrolling new students. If you look at your projections, you'll see we've hit our projections at the middle school and at the high school level, and we're just a little short of making our projection at the elementary level and look forward to welcoming students every day. On Friday, September 12th, Duncanville High School hosted its annual college fair in the cafeteria, giving students the opportunities to meet representatives
006from over 100 colleges and universities. The event helps students explore future opportunities and look forward to taking the next step toward being college, career, and military ready. That does conclude our superintendent's report for today. Thank you, Madam President. Thank you, Dr. Goree. We will now move to recognitions, and I turn the meeting over to Mrs. Avila. All right, everyone. Good evening once again, Madam President, trustees, and Dr. Goree. Thank you for the opportunity to present the donations received in September 2025. Each month, we are proud to share the incredible generosity of our community and the ongoing support that they show for Duncanville ISD. Please take a look at the screen as I read the donations for this month. Starting out with Hastings Elementary and Bill Harts Elementary, we have Golden Chick for $200. The rest
007of the donations for this month are for Duncanville ISD. Starting with Concord Church, we have $10,000. Antioch Fellowship Church, we have $2,500. With Duncanville High School PTSA, we have $25. The Collab of Wheatland Plaza, we have $250. From BCB Financial Services, we have $100. From Duncanville Outreach Ministry, we have $250. From Neighborhood Credit Union, we have $100. And last on this page, from Scooters Coffee Duncanville, we have $25. Moving on to more donations for the district, we have First Christian Church with $1,000. Up next, we have D'Arce for $250. Next, we have AT&T Store of Mansfield with $100. Coffee Creek Media Group with $25. Crunch Fitness of Duncanville with $895.66. Duncanville Nutrition Lounge, we have $250. With Glow Key Rings, we have $50. From H&H Fine Arts Academy, we have $25. From Hamilton Counseling and
008Consulting, we have $250. And from Hot Work Cedar Hill, we have $60. And last but not least, we got one more page of donations. We have House of Spain for $150. Lavish Wink and More for $200. Legacy Toyota of Dallas for $500. Mirror Image Books for $250. New Life in Christ Lutheran Church for $500. Performa A-Z Specialties, $100. The Ear Hustler for $100. And last but not least, the Odigizua Foundation for $1,230. We are so thankful for these donations and the continued support of our community. And that is all we have for this evening, for this section. Thank you. Thank you, Ms. Avila, and thank you to all of our contributors. Okay, we now will ask Mrs. Brown if she would come. Thank you. Good evening, Board President Colton, Board of Trustees, and Dr. Gorey.
009Tonight, I am pleased to ask Ms. Brandi McIntosh-Lee if she would join me at the podium. Pleased to welcome Ms. Brandi McIntosh-Lee as the Director of Counseling for Duncanville ISD. With 30 years of experience in education, Mrs. Lee brings a strong record of leadership in counseling, campus administration, and post-secondary readiness. She earned a Master of Education in School Counseling from Dallas Baptist University, a Bachelor of Science degree from the University of North Texas, and an Associate of Arts degree from Southwestern Christian College. Her credentials include principal EC12 and counselor pre-K12 certifications. Mrs. Lee most recently served as the academic dean at the Collegiate Academy at Duncanville High School where she supported scholars and successfully transitioning to the college setting while strengthening systems for dual credit, academic support, and student success. Her previous leadership roles include
010principal of Smith Elementary and assistant principal of Hardin Elementary and Alexander Elementary. She also has extensive experience as a counselor at both the elementary and secondary levels, as well as classroom teaching experience in Dallas ISD. Her career reflects a consistent commitment to building strong systems of support for students, strengthening instructional practices, and fostering college and career readiness. We are confident that Mrs. Lee's leadership will be a valuable asset to our students, staff, and families, and we look forward to the positive impact she will continue to make across the district. Please join us in welcoming Mrs. Lee as she steps into her new role. Thank you, Mrs. Lee. Congratulations. We're so happy to have you in this new role, and we're sure that you'll make a real difference. So thank you. Okay, next. We will have,
011are there any board members who would like to make any acknowledgments or have any announcements? Thank you. We will now move to communications from citizens. And we don't have any. So we will now definitely move to closed session. Good evening. We are back from closed session and will continue with our agenda items. So we will now move to take action on items discussed during closed session. Do I have a motion to approve the superintendent's recommendation that we hire and issue a one-year contract to Alicia White for the position of Director of Accounting. So moved. Second. It's been properly moved and second that we hire and issue a one-year contract to Alicia White. Are there any questions, comments, or discussion? Please cast your vote electronically. Motion carries 5-0. Thank you. Next, do I have a motion
012to approve the superintendent's recommendation that we hire and issue a one-year contract to April Wyatt for the position of deputy chief? Okay, it's been properly moved and seconded. that we issue a one-year contract to Ms. April Wyatt. Are there any questions, comments, or discussion? There being none, please cast your vote electronically. Motion carries 5-0. Next, do I have a motion to approve the superintendent's recommendation that we hire and issue a one-year contract to Rosa Hernandez for the position of deputy chief? Thank you. It's been properly moved and second. Please cast your vote electronically. Motion carries 5-0. that we issue a one-year contract to Rosa Hernandez for the position of Deputy Chief. Next, do I have a motion to approve the superintendent's recommendation that we hire and issue a one-year contract to Elijah Granger for the
013position of Interim Principal? Properly moved and second that we issue a one-year contract to Elijah Granger for the position of interim principal. Are there any questions, comments, or discussion? There being none, please cast your vote electronically. Motion carries 5-0. So we would like to congratulate all that. have been, were hired tonight and we will meet them the next board meeting. Okay, with that, we'll go to our consent agenda. Do I have a motion to approve the consent agenda? Been properly moved and second that the consent agenda be approved as presented. Are there any questions, comments, or discussion? There being none, please cast your vote electronically. Motion carries 5-0. Thank you. We will now move on to Action Agenda Item A. Consider approval of a resolution authorizing the defeasance and or redemption of certain outstanding unlimited
014tax bonds, appointing authorized officers the authority to make all determinations required to effectuate such defeasance and or redemption. And the presenter is Ms. Darla Moss, CFO. and trustees dr. Corey the district has identified funds in the debt service fund to be used to prepay certain outstanding funds to reduce the outstanding debt and create interest savings for the district and our taxpayers the resolution we're asking you to consider tonight authorizes the chief financial officer and or superintendent to consult with the district's financial advisor to identify prepayment opportunities and to take appropriate actions to affect the defeasance and or redemption. The district's financial advisor, Mr. Josh McLaughlin, is here tonight. He's going to review this matter with the board and answer any questions you may have. Good evening, Madam President, members of the board, Dr. Gorey. It's
015a pleasure to see you all again. Again, this resolution allows the district to move forward with a prepayment of bonds, whether it's redemption where we pay off the bonds immediately or a defeasement where we put the money in escrow into those bonds are callable. Part of the reason of this is we just went through a legislative session. As you well know, TA doesn't put out the final rules on a lot of its programs until well into the new school year. We have that on the debt service side this year with the whole harmless funding. We don't expect them to put out final rules until after the November election. and then they won't put out their final template until March of next year. So once we know all the available revenues that you bring in at
016your current tax rate, we can then look at the district's outstanding debt portfolio and look at which bonds we could potentially defease if there are excess revenues. Currently, the district has roughly $322 million of outstanding bonds. $259 million are callable prior to final maturity. The benefit of actually prepaying debt is unlike a mortgage where you make an extra bond or mortgage payment, your payments don't change right away. Your bond payments by doing a bond prepayment or redemption or defeasance get lowered immediately. That is a benefit to the taxpayers as well as it builds bond capacity for the district. So with that, I'll be happy to answer any questions you might have. Thank you. I believe Mr. McFarland. Laughlin. Laughlin. Thank you very much for appearing before us tonight. I do have a question. So do
017we have any idea? I know a lot of things are in limbo, but do we have any idea how much money we could possibly save or what? So that's really going to be a function of how much excess revenue that is potentially available to the district how much fund balance you want to use to prepay bonds and the dollar amount of bonds as you can prepay. Once we know the dollar amount we can then determine how much money that you can save. Based upon our initial review we are thinking sort of the minimum of about 1.5 million. Again that doesn't use fund balance. that $1.5 million would save taxpayers over $600,000 of future interest costs. The other nice thing about doing a bond prepayment versus a refinancing is the fees are extremely less. Typically, you're
018not paying an underwriter, you're not paying rating agencies fees, you're not paying us as your financial advisor. It's simply making an extra bond payment. Okay, so I have a question. So that's prepaying, but we're in a deficit. So $18 million. So how does that work? So again, there's two sides of the equation, right? Your operations, your day-to-day general fund balance, that is where the deficit is versus your debt service fund where you're actually projected to have a slight surplus. And that surplus amount, I'm sorry, is how much? Initial projections is about $1.5 million. That said, again, TA has not put out its final rules in terms of state funding assistance. So, we won't know until sometime after you make your February 15th bond payment what the true excess revenues are to determine how many bonds
019you can actually prepay. So, you had shared a timeline with us. Could you recap that timeline? As it relates to what you're speaking? Exactly. Since you are June 30th fiscal year end, you make bond payments every August and February. Once we get past your February 15th bond payment, you will have collected the vast majority of your property taxes for the year, as well as we'll have good or better idea from the state in terms of what state funding assistance. Then we can look at and say how much the district paid during the year in terms of its bond payments versus how much revenue it did collect. and then we could determine the amount so sometime after february 15th and before your fiscal year end and june 30th we will run through that calculation with the
020district's administration principally miss moss and then we'll determine how many bonds you could prepay we'll come back to the board give you the actual dollar amount and then move forward subject to your approval Okay, so you will appear before us again before action takes place. Yes, ma'am. Are there any subsequent questions from the board? Okay, thank you very much. Thank you. Appreciate it. Okay, so do I have a motion that the Board of Trustees approve the resolution authorizing the defeasance and or redemption of certain outstanding bonds of the district as presented? Okay, it's been properly moved and second. Are there any questions, comments, or discussion? There being none, please cast your vote electronically. Okay, motion carries 5-0. Thank you. We will now move to action item B, consider adoption of the 2025 tax rate resolution.
021Thank you, Ms. Moss. Thank you, Ken. President Colton, Trustees, Dr. Goree. Tonight we're presenting the proposed tax rate for the current 2025-2026 fiscal year. So the purpose of this item is to review and formally adopt the district's tax rate, which is a required step in finalizing our budget for 2526. Adoption of the tax rate ensures the district can generate the local revenue needed to support operations, debt service, and instructional priorities. Tax code chapter 26 requires the board to adopt the tax rate prior to September 30th. The process of adopting the district's tax rate follows specific state requirements and deadlines. We began with the required public meeting to provide transparency and gather community input. This was completed on June 16th of 2025. In July, the certified property values were received from the appraisal district, establishing the
022local tax base. In August, We conducted the local property value survey as part of the TEA funding requirements. The maximum compressed tax rate was determined by TEA, which set the baseline for our maintenance and operations tax rate. Tonight, we are at the final step in the process. The board must act by statutory deadline for tax rate adoption, which again is September 30th. to ensure that the district has the legal authority to levy and collect taxes for the 25-26 fiscal year. As stated earlier, the TEA determined the maximum compressed tax rate of .6169. The MCR is added to the enrichment rate, which is .1283 for Duncanville ISD. The total of the MCR and the enrichment rate equals the total M&O rate. The tax rate we are proposing is composed of two parts. The maintenance and operations
023rate, which funds daily operations, including salaries, utilities, and classroom resources. The interest in sinking tax rate funds debt service on bonds approved by the voters. The tax rate we are proposing remains the same as the total rate for the 24-25 school year. Overall, taxes property value in the district shows a decrease of $117 million. The M&O levy reflects a small difference compared to last year, and that's likely due to the updated certified values and the additional $40,000 homestead exemption that has already been applied. The M&O and INS tax rate unchanged from the prior year. The average taxable value of a home in the district has decreased slightly. This is likely the result of the homestead exemption adjustment. Because of these factors, the average homeowner will see a decrease in projected taxes compared to last year,
024even though the M&O and the INS rates remain the same. We are required by statute to calculate the no new revenue tax rate, That rate is 1.08655, which is 1.75% lower than the proposed rate. The figures provided tonight represent estimates based on certified values and state formulas. Individual taxpayer bills may vary depending on specific property values and exemptions. The key takeaway is that while tax rates remain stable, the average homeowner is expected to benefit from a reduction in their projected tax burden. This table shows the board a five-year history of Duncanville's tax rates and the impact the tax rates have on a $200,000 home. The homestead exemption has increased by $115,000 over time, and this data is calculated based on a $200,000 home since the average home in Duncanville is just under $200,000 as seen
025on the previous slide. Senate Bill 4 increased the state mandatory homestead exemption applicable to school districts from $100,000 to $140,000 per eligible homestead. The increase is contingent upon the passage of the constitutional amendment, which will be on voter ballots in November 2025. The total tax rate proposed for board approval is $1.1057. 0.7452 is for M&O and 0.3605 is for INS. Again, this is the same rate as we proposed as the 2024-25 fiscal year. Per statute, there is a required motion if the no new revenue tax rate exceeds the proposed rate. The required motion language is included in the executive summary, and the resolution is included in tonight's board package. It is recommended that the board approve the 2025 tax rate resolution as presented. And I'm glad to answer any questions. Are there any questions? Okay,
026there are no questions from the board. So thank you very much for the very detailed report and for walking us through. It's very good to see that the tax rate is not increasing from last year and that, as a matter of fact, homeowners are likely to see a decrease in the amount of taxes they pay. So with that, do I have a motion to approve the property tax rate? I'm going to start over. Do I have a motion that the property tax rate be increased by the adoption of a tax rate of $1.1057? which is effectively a 1.75% increase in the tax rate. It's a little different how we have to state it because, yeah. There is actually no increase in the tax rate, but it's just based on the calculation, the state's calculation of
027the effective. No new revenue? Yes, yeah, the no new revenue rate. Okay. And this is something that we have to do by September 30th is adopt the tax rate. So thank you. Thank you. So it's been properly moved and seconded. that the property tax rate be increased by the adoption of a tax rate of $1.105700, which is effectively a 1.75% increase in the tax rate. So please cast your vote electronically. Okay, motion passes 5-0. Thank you, Mrs. Moss. So we now move on to action item C, budget amendments. And our presenter is our CFO. Thank you. Thank you. So the purpose of this item tonight is to present a budget amendment for the board's review and approval. Under Texas Education Code and the TEA's Financial Accountability System Resource Guide, the Board of Trustees is responsible
028for adopting and amending the district's official budget. Once a budget is adopted any necessary amendments to reflect changes and expenditures our revenues must be formally approved by the board So what we are proposing is a reduction of $1.3 million to the General Operating Fund. The details of that proposal are listed on this table. The $3.5 million that you see in the first item is in addition to revenue. This includes estimates of the teacher retention allotment. the basic cost allotment and the support staff allotments to be paid by the TEA. So we're reducing our revenue on that side. The offset for the teacher retention allotment is included in the 4.2 million salary cost as an expenditure. You'll see that in the bottom line there. The $107,186 is the net of positions that have been added and
029or deleted since the budget was adopted by the board in June. And by reviewing historical spending, we identified funds that were included in the budget but were not utilized in previous years. These items were adjusted in the current year budget in the amount of $1.4 million. The $630,090 reduction includes a reconciliation of the property insurance invoice to the budget, and the DCAD Dallas Central Appraisal District invoice was reconciled to the budget as well. As stated earlier, the $4.2 million includes the estimated expenditures for the teacher retention allotment. It also includes the 2% salary increase approved by the board in July. As a result of these changes, we are proposing a reduction of the general operating deficit from the current $18 million to $16.7 million. We will continue to evaluate expenditures each month with a focus
030on efficiency, sustainability, and academic priorities. The Child Nutrition budget, we are proposing a reduction of $193,287. This amount includes the additional 2% increase to salaries approved by the Board in July. Our team also worked with Child Nutrition staff to assess and identify staffing and operational efficiencies. The identified changes are included in the proposed reduction. We are not recommending any amendments at this time to the debt service budget. This slide shows the side-by-side of the amendment we are proposing for board approval tonight compared to the board adopted budget. And these changes are minimal, but we are moving in the right direction. We have not yet evaluated enrollment, and that could, of course, impact our revenue as well. And so just in summary, we're proposing a net reduction of $1.3 million to the general operating budget, $193,827
031reduction to the child nutrition budget, and no changes to the debt service budget. I'm glad to answer any questions. Do I have a motion to approve the budget amendment as presented? Okay, it's been properly moved and seconded. Are there any questions, comments, and or discussion regarding this item? If not, please cast your vote electronically. Motion passes 5-0. So thank you, Ms. Moss, for presenting. a decrease in the deficit for reviewing the way that we spend our funds and to ensure that we're as efficient as possible. And yes. And Madam President, I also add that we do plan in October to bring a more detailed conversation more around the plans to continue to make reductions to our current deficit. Down is always good for in this case. Okay. Thank you. So next item is action item
032D, consideration of the nomination of a candidate for the Dallas Central Appraisal District DCAD Board of Directors, presenter Ms. Darla Moss. Thank you again, and I think the board is familiar with this item. This is something that you do routinely. I'll just share a few highlights of the process. All of the information is included in your packet, but just for the public, there is a letter from the Dallas Central Appraisal District that you have. The election appointment is for two members to the Board of Directors for the Dallas Central Appraisal District. Duncanville is allotted 20 of those votes. And this letter that you're receiving, that we have received, is the first step in the process. The next step is the nomination of the candidates. The nomination may be made only by resolution as adopted by
033the board and submitted to the chief appraiser before October 15, 2025. So that's what we prepared for you tonight is that resolution. Specific qualifications and instructions for any nominees are also included in your packet. Before October 30th, 2025, the Chief Appraiser will prepare and submit a ballot of all timely submitted nominees to each taxing entity that is eligible to vote, and a resolution casting the votes must be submitted by the Board to the Chief Appraiser before December 15th, 2025, which is the day before. December 15th is a Friday, so December 12th is when the resolution casting the ballots will be required to be submitted to DCAD. Thank you. Do I have a motion for the Board of Trustees to nominate Trustee Cassandra Phillips to serve on the Dallas County Appraisal District Board of Directors? So
034moved. It's been properly moved and seconded that we nominate Trustee Cassandra Phillips to that board, which she served faithfully previously. So are there any questions, comments, or discussion? There being none, please cast your vote electronically. Thank you, 5-0, and thank you, Trustee Phillips. So we will now move to action item E, strategic plan update 2025 with presenter Mr. Graham. Madam President, as Mr. Graham is coming, I would like to give the board a little information as it speaks to our strategic plan and some of the information that Mr. Graham will be presenting today. As we looked at our strategic plan and we looked at our expected outcomes, certainly the primary focus is improving student performance across all grade levels. Clearly, we want to make sure that we define accountability results, things that we can measure.
035The second thing was really aligning of our financial resources to support our instructional priorities. If you'll remember, the strategic plan that we currently operate within began development December of 2020, which was right outside of COVID. The initial plan was designated to run from 2021 to 2026. Tonight, as we present the plan and as we look at a lot of data that we've received within the last year. or last six months really if you look at three years worth of test data our desire is to extend some of those due dates to 2028. we have refined and narrowed the primary focus to student achievement and fiscal responsibility, reducing the number of goals and ensuring that we're focusing on the main things. Again, when we look at the amount of data that we've received recently, we do
036believe that the SMART goals that we've set based on where we are today will get us to where we need to be as a district. I'd remind the board, too, though, that those goals that you are responsible for, such as early childhood literacy, Mathematic achievement at the early grades as well as college career and military readiness are all incorporated in this plan So at this point, I will ask mr. Graham to present. Thank you. Good evening to president Colton to all trustees and to dr. Gorey the strategic plan matters Because we when we use it effectively it's more than just a document but a clear roadmap to our future Our strategic plan should be something that any stakeholder in our district can pick up and understand and know exactly where we're going in this particular
037district. Today, our strategic plan aligns our resources, our people, and our priorities around common goals. This iteration of our plan is about one word, and that's focus. We recognize that as a district, we were trying to do too much with limited resources. of time, people, and funding. That reality led us to refine our approach and we reduced our goals from 19 in the previous iteration to 12 so we could concentrate on truly what moves the needle in student achievement. Every priority now is intentional and every goal is measurable. And if the initiative doesn't directly impact student learning, it doesn't belong in this plan. To sharpen this focus, we ensure that we provide you with meaningful data and clear evidence and progress for our future board meeting updates. As we look at refining this plan, we
038are now grounding ourselves in three key steps. First, it's the current state of analyzing our data. Next, the future state of where we want our children and our school to be. And then the action steps that we will take to get us there. This year, we're not just presenting a plan, but we're setting the tone for how we will operate in Duncanville ISD. The strategy only matters if it leads to results. That's why our plan is bold and clear this year. Focus on every student and every dollar. It reminds us that every decision must do two things. Elevate student achievement and ensure that we make wise decisions with our finances. As we look at our strategic plan, this year our priorities will remain the same, but every department now plays a role in every priority.
039Student achievement isn't just about the academics department, and fiscal responsibility isn't just about the business office. All priorities focus on one priority, which is student success. Our performance objectives were built. with lessons learned and designed to meet two guardrails. As Dr. Gorey stated, accountability in raising our district performance is a must. And second, trustee goals must be addressed. That's early childhood literacy, early childhood math, and CCMR, which is college, career, and military readiness. As we continue, the first priority is student academic success. And as I review these objectives, please remember you will continue to receive updates on the performance objectives throughout the year. Our first performance objective is to increase the percentage of third grade students meeting grade level on star reading from 34% to 43% by 2028. That is about a three-year gain each
040year, and we're currently at that 34%. Next, increased the percentage of third grade students meeting grade level on the star math from 27% to 35% by 2028. And finally, as part of the accountability system, the TEA accountability system improved the district accountability rating from domain two, school progress, from 72% to 80% by 2028. Again, why did we choose these particular goals? First of all, we want to ensure that we met those key components, ensure that we follow the trustee goals, ensure that students are improving, and ensure that our district gets that acceptable rating that we are striving for. Our second performance objective or priority number two, I'm sorry, priority number two has three performance objectives. And the first performance objective or priority number two is to increase the percentage of students graduating college or career
041ready from 89% to 96% by 2028. Again, priority number one focused on establishing that foundation of learning, but again, priority number two is about enrichment and engagement. It focuses on how well we're preparing our students for college and career readiness. So the first one is about CCMR. The second one is one that you've heard several times when increasing the average student attendance rate from 91% to 94% by 2028. which will net us somewhere in the ballpark of about $2 million. And the last one is to increase the number of students meeting TSI without College Bridge from 11% to 21%. And to break that particular one down, TSI stands for Texas Success Institute. Is it an assessment that our 11th and 12th grade students take to show that they are prepared for college? When students pass
042both, the math and the English portion and the writing portion of this particular test with a 950 or above, they will be TSI met, which means that now they will get a point in that first performance objective of CCMR. Now, there are several other ways that we can currently get that point through College Bridge, but College Bridge is going away in the future. So our goal is to ensure that without College Bridge, we can raise that 11% to 21% by 2028. Next, professional personnel and professional development. Priority three. goes without saying that teachers are our heart of success. Our goal is clear, recruit exceptional teachers, retain them, and grow every new and developing teacher into a great one. So the first performance objective is to increase the number of teachers receiving that TIA distinction from
043zero to 60 by 2028. Now the TIA is the Texas incentive a lot that Miss Brown talks about all the time the Texas incentive allotment and of course this is the first year that we'll be getting that we were starting at zero this is the base year for that so right now we're currently at zero now what does that mean That means that as far as every goal being related back to priority number one, student success, teachers can only get a certain amount of money between $3,000 and $32,000 for the district if they are rated highly effective. So again, that is the first one that goes back. The alignment is there. It goes back to that first performance, I mean that first priority. Priority number two, increase the percentage of teachers holding a valid teaching
044certificate from 85% to 88% by 2028. And the last one, of course, is to increase the retention of certified teachers from 79% to 82% by 2028. Our last... priority fiscal stewardship and operational excellence again while the first three priorities focus on student and teachers the final priority ensures that we have resources to make it all possible it's about alignment communication and consistency within all departments as we look at our first As we look at our first performance objective, increased instructional expenditures in function 11 from 52.7% to 60% by 2028. Function 11 is the classroom budget. It is how much we're spending on our teachers, how much we're spending on items that are happening during the day in the classroom. By raising this from 52.7% to about 60%, that will be adding about $5 to $6
045million to our budget in function 11. Again, we're putting the money where it affects children the most. Next, improve our school first rating from... An A, which we're currently at 90, to a 94 by 2028. Again, the financial integrity rating system of Texas is that first rating that Ms. Moss talks about all the time. And, of course, we want to continue to make sure that we're managing our money properly. Do we pay our bills on time? And, of course, how much debt and several other things that go into that first rating. And, finally, we want to reduce our payroll expenditures by 5%. from 85% to 80.3% by 2028. And that will allow us to cut about $6 million from our budget. As we finish with the key actions for this, we stated several times that
046the goal of this over the next three years is to ensure that we have data to show where we're going in this district, to ensure that we have cross-functional teams, which means that each priority, several departments will be working on that particular priority, not just the academics teams for the student success priority. Several departments will be working on that and monitoring that particular priority just as all other priorities. And finally, as we move into our next steps, we have developed departmental goals at this particular time. Each department has goals that will impact each priority. That work is already underway, and as I mentioned in the start, everyone has a role to play, and we're going to keep track of those particular teams and establish and monitor this progress throughout the year. At this time, that
047is the end of the presentation. And do we have questions? Yes, Trustee Fahey. Thank you. Tell me, the Strategic Planning Committee of years ago, I guess it was 2021, I know many of those people are gone. Who were the members who... develop these numbers, these percentages, who, what group was that? And I don't mean to, you know, defy or anything like that. I just hadn't heard much of these numbers until now. Thank you for that question. This year we chose to do an update to the original plan, which means we didn't start over. I said that because we are in a state of emergency here where we need to move quickly. Therefore, starting over a new plan at this particular time, we would have had to go through that particular process that you did starting
048in 2020, which would have taken... a semester or two to complete in order to start over. Therefore, we wanted to ensure that we looked at the current data that we have, used that information to gather and create goals that are realistic and achievable and what's best for Duncanville at this particular time. One thing I'll add to that, I think a little bit about the who. We looked at the academic readiness team, which consists of all of our academic executive directors, as well as our SLT team. Those were the teams that came along. We worked very closely with assessment. We set the goals. When we talked about the numbers and what we wanted to achieve, we set those numbers based on where we currently are today. But then we looked at that stretch data as we
049relate to where we want to be, and we looked at how. does this get us to a B district in pretty much all of our situations? What I will tell you is that some of the goals, even though they seem low, they are aggressive if you look at realistically how these numbers flow, but we do believe that they are realistic things that we can accomplish. Do we have the same percentages, the same numbers that we developed back in 2021 and see how we scored on those? I mean, how it turned out, I mean, I can understand the change, but I would like to see how those goals were met back then. And that's something that we want to ensure that you get during our board updates throughout this year. No longer will we come to
050you at the end of the year and just state or you not know where we're at during the particular year. But, yes, we do have the data to show how we did on the previous goals. I would like to see that, please. Thank you. That's fair. I will tell you, absolutely. What you're going to see is we can go back to your 2021 data and show you where we are today. But when you look at some of the data for some of those in-between years, it's just not good data. There was data there that is not good. But I do think it is fair that we start that 2021 and we can show the board where we would be if that were, you know, how we work toward achieving that data. But there is absolutely
051a point. Some of that data is just not credible and we can point out where that is believed to be the case. And that is critically why we had to start over. We had to start with new data because I can assure you data from last year was not reliable data. So we had to do some cleanup. Are we up for questions? Yes. Okay. So I have a question about our TSI. And we mentioned, of course, it's a test that we usually give to 11th and 12th graders. Is there a plan to start testing our students 8th, 9th, 10th grade? Because is there a plan to do that? We have discussed that. I don't know the plan is in place at this particular time, but they are looking aggressively at trying to push that down
052so we can ensure that students are prepared earlier than the 11th grade. Okay, you should have some notes or some records on that. We've been talking about that for a long time. But we are a TSI testing site, which means we have room to, what's the word I'm looking for, proctor the test on the high school campus. And there's so many advantages with being a TSI site. I'd like to see us come up with some plans for how we can take advantage of that. and start testing our students before the TSI scores help with CCMR for STAR. But it's also, there's no reason that they have to start at 11th grade to take it. So if we can take advantage of starting at 9th and 10th grade, and so that's one less thing that juniors
053and seniors will have to do when they get there. Absolutely. So, Dr. Corey, I'd like to, we can meet about that in our one-on-one and then you share out with us. Absolutely. Thank you. And then you mentioned the teacher incentive allotment being rated highly effective. What is that rating? Because that's not a rating on T-Test. So, what would they have to get for the incentive? Would you phone a friend on that? It's in one of your slides. Come on. Good evening again, President Colton, Board of Trustees, Dr. Gorey. Yes, Board of Trustees, Flowers. They have to get proficient or higher, and they have to get that in every single indicator, so no less than proficient. Okay. Yep. Thank you. That is part of the teacher incentive allotment. The other part is they have to meet
054that student growth factor. So you can have a high evaluation, but if you're student growth, the minimum is at least 55% student growth. That's the bench line. So you have three tiers to the teacher incentive allotment, but the bottom tier is having what we call equivalent to what we say a 3.7 evaluation, and so with five being distinguished. And so they have to have at least an average of a 3.7 score, which is at least proficient on every indicator, and a minimum of 55% med growth for their student achievement. So a teacher would be considered to be effective if they met both of those categories. Okay. So I was just concerned about the highly effective. That term is in use with T-Test, and it just kind of threw me off. So we may want to
055change that bullet or whatever that was. Thank you. Thank you. Are there any further questions? So I have a question, Mr. Graham. So I believe I heard that the department plans are underway. Yes. And then there's deployment and monitoring plans that will follow. What are the timelines for those? Currently, on the 24th and 25th, we will complete the department plans. We have meetings set up. There are two-hour meetings with the consultant and I about exactly what we're going to do for the department plans. After they create their department plans, they're going to create times that they're going to share out with the SLT department on updates for those particular department plans. Now, the ARC team that Dr. Gorey has spoke about has created our impact focus meeting for our principals. Those are meetings that we
056have with the principal where they'll go through their data and expectations throughout the year. And as we get that particular data, that's the data that we'll also come back and share with you during our board meeting updates. Okay. Okay. And so that's the monitoring plan. And then the deployment. I guess deployment and monitoring plans, is that? That's part of that reasoning there. The deployment is actually sharing that information out to the different groups to ensure that we're moving forward on the goals that we set. Okay, so I guess bottom line, I'm just trying to figure out when we'll be ready to just like to run with this. So the first data that you'll receive is the beginning of the year data that we of course they took that I already Tested at the beginning of
057the year and right now they're processing that information and you'll receive that in your first board update I don't know the date of that particular meeting One thing I'll add, though, Trust, in part of your question is that we're already running in a lot of ways. I think when you look at everything that's in our action plan as we built this out, even as our team has met weekly since this summer, a lot of these things were already running on. I think the delay is that we wish this presentation would have been last month or even in July, but because we did not have the data from the state yet, it delayed us being able to set these numbers. But a lot of the things that are going to go into those action plans that
058we want to We'll verify on the 24th and 25th those things are already taking place. An example, when you talk about the academic part with our implementation of the Blue Bunny curriculum and our work with Sustained Ed, our consultant, a lot of that work has already began. So I think that that's just going to be an opportunity for us when we present this. Our commitment is to present something in this space of either academics or strategic plan every month. I do believe you're going to see that readily data. And also remember, we have those three schedules that Mr. Graham referenced, those work sessions that we'll do at three different times of the year to look at our data as well. Great. Thank you. So do I have a motion that the Board of Trustees approve
059the revisions to the 2021-2026 strategic plan? It's been properly moved and second. Please cast your vote electronically. Motion carries 5-0. Thank you, Mr. Graham. So we will now move to action item F, purchase of classroom furniture. And Ms. Zamora, thank you. Good evening, Madam President, Trustees, and Dr. Gorey. So as part of the bond 2023 reconfiguration and realignment, the district solicited proposals from co-op approved vendors to replace the furniture in K-8 classrooms. The district requested proposals on May 23rd. 2025 for furniture replacement at the renovated elementary and middle schools. The proposal included replacement of both teacher and student furniture. So five vendors, all part of a purchasing co-ops, submitted proposals and were interviewed on July 17th, 2025 by a committee consisting of district and campus leadership. The vendors presented their proposals and provided samples of
060the proposed products. The committee then evaluated based on the overall design of the furniture, maintenance and durability qualities, experience and results of proposed personnel, quality of product as it relates to meeting the district needs, and warranty and service delivery approach. So based on this criteria and the price, as seen on the evaluation sheet that's on page 130 of your board book, PPG furnishings ranked first. The price by all vendors were based on 300 classrooms. With school now in session, the actual order will be based on current classrooms that we have now. The district will utilize bond savings to purchase this furniture. So it is recommended that the board approve possible action to enter into negotiations with PPG Furnishings for the furniture replacement agreement exceeding $50,000. I'd be happy to address any questions you may have.
061Trustees, are there any questions? I have an observation. So I noticed that PPG furnishings and Meteor education were within, what, $1,600 out of an almost $2 million contract. So can you just explain why? PPG, what's the better? Yes, so we looked at the durability. We looked at the product itself. We looked at the variety. One of the things that PPG products offer is for the same cost, you can have a dry erase table. And so if you're in a classroom, I mean, dry erases, kids can get markers, it can write on the desk. All that was offered. by PPG and no extra cost. So that's something that definitely appealed to us. So just the quality of the product and the variety that they offered at no extra cost. We felt like that was really, so
062I, as an element teacher, I would have loved that. So that was one of the things that stood out. Also warranty was big. We want to make sure that, you know, we had the best warranty. I mean, they're great quality, but things happen. And so they offered that. That was a little, that was better. The other thing that stood out was they're close by. And so if we needed to replace a product, it wouldn't take long to get a replacement. So that was one of several things that kind of stood out to us, to the committee. Okay, thank you very much. So you all put a lot of... thought and research into that selection, so Do I have a motion that the Board of Trustees consider and take possible action to negotiate and enter into
063an agreement with PPG furnishings for furniture replacement at the realignment schools It's been properly moved and second are there any further questions comments or discussion? There being none, please cast your vote electronically. Motion carries 5-0. Thank you, Ms. Moore. Thank you. Being that there are no further items to discuss, do I have a motion for adjourn? Madam President, I'd like to take this time to just formally say happy birthday to our superintendent. Since we're all together, happy birthday. Second to adjourn. Have a blessed week and thank you all for attending. Thank you.