001We're going to call to order the regular called meeting of the Board of Trustees of the Venus Independent School District on September 15th, 2025 at 6 p.m. And we do have a quorum. If everyone would please stand for the invocation and the pledge. Mr. Shavira, you ready? 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. Texas Pledge. Under the Texas flag, I pledge allegiance to the Texas, one state, under God, one and indivisible. We'd like to welcome everybody here tonight. Rosie, do we have anybody that signed up? No, okay. We'll go to item number five, presentation of campus reports and recognition. So we will start with the recognitions and... REC Clark is a
002student of the month at Venus primary and I don't believe he is here tonight But we would like to congratulate REC Clark a kindergartner student in mrs Walker's class for being named our September student of the month Red is kind-hearted always willing to help and goes above and beyond to be a role model for his classmates His smile lights up our school every day. What a great bulldog. Oh and there he is This is Josiah Thompson Turner he is What is being said is he is engaged in the classroom answering questions and helping other students. He is quick to hold doors for everyone. I have seen him numerous times helping students in the hallway pick up dropped items. He has offered to carry classmates items to the next class. He is in the classroom. He
003shows respect using ma'am and sir and listen intently. You hold it. You hold it. Thank you. Joe. Joe. You're next. You're very welcome. Okay. So. But do we announce? We need to announce this. Okay. And our VHS student of the month is Avery Sansom, who is here. All right. So it says, we're thrilled to recognize Natalie Lopez as our PEA at September's Staff Member of the Month. Coach Lopez may be new to VPS, but she has already made a big impact, always working hard, stepping in wherever she is needed, doing it all with a positive attitude. We are so grateful to have her on our team. Natalie Lopez. Okay, we have here Miss Patty Cornelius What the staff has written Miss Cornelius is a truly exceptional educator who has been nominated for her outstanding dedication
004and positive impact on our students and colleagues She has been a wonderful colleague to work beside Consistently demonstrating great compassion and joy in her teaching Her amazing attitude and positive character create a supportive and engaging learning environment, and she genuinely cares about making the learning process a great experience for every student. Ms. Cornelius is also a great resource and wonderful listening ear, always willing to provide support when it's needed. So, Ms. Cornelius, congratulations. Now our campus reports. I'm waiting so I can see it. All right, good evening. Okay, so we've had a busy start of the school year, have hit the ground running. We hosted our first big event about a week and a half ago of grandparents lunch. We welcomed over 400 visitors to the building, so that was just an absolute fantastic day.
005And set up a fun photo booth fundraiser on the stage, and so that was just a neat way to get our grandparents more involved with our students. And now we've finished up our beginning of the year assessments. And one thing I wanted to talk about that we're doing at the primary this year is we have called them Paw Patrol walkthrough with our teachers, Wednesdays. Paw Patrol walkthrough Wednesdays. So our teachers are now going, every Wednesday morning they go and visit a new classroom. They have a form that is teacher created where they are looking for new strategies, things that they can implement in their classroom, aha moments. And so they have to fill it out, bring it to me, and then we discuss it in PLC. So I counted before I came this evening and
006so in the last two weeks we've done 30 peer walkthroughs and so we have first grade getting in the kinder pre-k pre-k seeing first grade and and the things are looking for oh I wish I could figure out how we do phonics dance oh I want to learn about Hegarty so it's just a fun way to build that the collaboration that culture of we're working together for the students other than that it's been a great month and we're just excited for the rest of the fall thank you I mainly had pictures this time. I would request that I follow someone else besides her next time. I'm going to get her to write my board report. We are growing. We have 641 students now, so adding a few more. We are still in need of our
007bilingual teacher, but Mr. Martinez is still working with a Teacher that we are hoping to get certified in the next couple of weeks So we also welcome back parents to our campus on September 2nd, but then we hosted Grandparents lunch and had a good turnout. We had over 200 plus parents come through and I Copied as much as I can copy. I will copy and so we to set up a photo booth and the teachers loved it, the kids loved it, and the grandparents. That line was the longest line, so they had a great time. We are working towards right now planning our reading campout night. Some of this is not up there. We're working on planning our reading campout night, and we are talking about open house right now. So we're trying to get
008those things nailed down. The pictures I've included, seems like that's all we have done since we started school, our drills. drills and drills so we got some pictures of the students they're practicing their drills I also brought some examples of our grammar focus of writing we've been busy writing and our avid focus of note-taking we are learning as third graders to do our avid strategies that we just just picked up and they've been doing them in fifth grade now we've dropped them down to third grade So that's about all we're doing right now. It's busy, busy, busy. Thank you. At the middle school, lots of things going on. I'm going to start with recognizing Miss Emily Bodie was our teacher of the month, and Miss Judy Hargrove was our support staff of the month. Y'all
009met Josiah before he left. He's phenomenal. Things happening. We used map data and went through, and we were able to increase our Algebra 1 numbers based on kiddos and their scores from map data. Band hall, we had some band hall things at the beginning of the year, but that's all been cleaned up, and the kids are in the band hall and just playing away. Ms. Nickel just submitted. I may have not told you all this, and that's bad on me, but Ms. Nickel was recognized as the Region 11 Assistant Principal of the Year for this year, and so she has been moved on to the next round of competition, so she just turned in her nomination for the Texas Assistant Principal of the Year, so fingers crossed with that. We have started our after-school feeding
010program. Today we started after-school tutoring. We agree with what you said about drills. We have completed all of our drills, and so that's been a lot. And our enrollment is still 518. We went up to 519, and then someone left. So we're back to 518. Thank you. Good evening from the high school. You've met Ms. Cornelius, and all I'm going to add to that is she's everywhere. Volleyball, football, freshman, sponsor. So she's not only phenomenal in the classroom, she's out of the classrooms and builds relationships. Our staff member of the month was Shelby Nugent, and she's in the technology department. And Warren will tell you that August and September is a busy, hectic time for them, but Shelby keeps us on task. You submit a ticket, she shows up with a smile on her face,
011is pretty knowledgeable. So we are very, very lucky to have her as our IT tech. Student of the Month, you met Avery, and I'm going to add to that. This young lady... can be just about anything or will be anything she wants to be. She does not mind putting in the work on the court, outside of the court, in the classroom. As a matter of fact, why are you here today? There you go. She's here doing a dual credit government report. So that just speaks to her, I guess, her passion. She's just a sponge. Okay, our enrollment is 671. We seem to have a steady kind of inflow, one by one, come through. Open, sorry. We had open house on August the 25th where our parents came through and they walked the building with their
012students and the teachers passed out the course syllabi as well as their grading policies and they went through the content, what was expected and what they were going to teach in that class. So for high school, you really don't, for some reason, get that big of a turnout, but we were happy. had quite a few come through. As far as the seasons, Avery and the volleyball team are in full swing and they have put in the work with Ms. Lopez. So that's a good... As a good team, they're a good unit there. Football season is also started up. Athletics, athletes and the coaches are in full swing there. I made a comment in Cabinet today. We scored more points this past game than I think we have all year, last year. And to see the
013kids' reaction was just great. So hopefully that momentum will continue to grow. The next group. I want you to highlight. was not only football, but cheer puts in their time. Band is out there right now. You have color guard, the star reps, and you have the student trainers all putting in work where it all fits together. So that's always good to see when they support each other. Upcoming events, we had Upward Bound, which is very college-oriented, started today. We have Volleyball at Ferris tomorrow. And then we have football Bridgeport this coming Friday. Cross country is cross country. They've been hard at it early in the morning for a long time now. They will be in Fort Worth. And on the 14th, we have ASVAB. And on the 21st, we have the PSAT. So a lot
014going on in the building and out of the building. Thank you. We'll go to item number six, consider approval of resolution of the board to set tax rate for Hill College Venus ISD. Good evening. We brought this last month as a proposal, so tonight it's up for consideration to approve the resolution of the board to set tax rate for Hill College slash Venus ISD at .042502. Anybody have any questions? Do we have a motion? We have a motion by Joe. Do we have a second? I'll second. Second by Kirby. All in favor? Motion carries. Thank you. Thank you. Go to item number seven, presentation of annual VISD property tax turnover report by Leimberger attorney at law. Mr. Hanna. Thank you very much. I'm very proud to be back here on behalf of Leimberger, getting to
015speak with you all again. As you know, Leimberger does the delinquent tax collections for Venus ISD, and we have since 2016. Very proud of that fact. Short. Avery, I doubt you showed up here tonight to hear about delinquent tax collections, but it becomes very important to know that we take care of when someone doesn't pay their taxes. We make sure that we put the best effort we can into making sure Venice ISD has exactly what y'all need the best we can to move forward. And going through the report, you'll see short answer. Overall, collections are great still. We've got some information in the packet that each of you have. Any time I'm speaking if y'all have questions, please let me know. I'm not gonna make your meeting real long, but You can see the base
016tax collections. We're at 338 thousand with a total collection of four hundred and forty three thousand four hundred twenty nine On the next page or in that Mailings paragraph you can see below it all the amounts that we mailed on a big part of what we do is making making sure people are aware if They become delinquent we make make sure they know about it. Then we make a phone call We do all these steps ahead of time, and then when mailings, multiple phone calls, we are now texting as well. All those things, if they don't lead to a resolution or a payment agreement, that's whenever the litigation moves into place. It's not the first thing we go to, but it's something we do. On the next page, you can see the litigation results. We
017filed 57 lawsuits last year for Venus ISD. We resolved 70 accounts. So you can see that 70 were resolved and 57 were filed. Not as many lawsuits were filed because we were able to get collections done without having to file the lawsuits that we had done the year before. All the amounts are next to it. You can see dismissed, suits in judgment, and suits for non-suit. All the numbers coincide with that chart you see above there. So if y'all have any questions, I can answer them. Next page, you're going to see the top 25 delinquent accounts. I put that together for y'all so that you can see what they are. Y'all may know who they are better than I do. I live in Cleburne, so I don't know the insides and outs of Venus like
018y'all do. But if anybody's on there and you want me to make a phone call to them, you've got someone you want me to call to get a hold of somebody, we will do it. If there's something you know about it and it's information we can use going forward, it's not. All this information is public on Scott Porter's website. So if you go and click on it, you can put in a parcel ID or an address and find out if someone's paid their taxes or hasn't. So we're not disclosing any private information, but we also don't put it up on the screen because of the nature that could be happening behind the scenes with somebody. Okay? One of the most important numbers that... The end would like to see is the TEA collection number. That's
019a 99.2. That's still in a good spot I would like to see it higher But and I've discussed a little bit with the end about that. There was a post turnover adjustment or a refund made by the appraisal district or Scott Porter's office the tax assessor collector here in Johnson County So when that decision is made after the turnover happens when I say that I should explain Someone has their taxes to be paid by January 31st, right? If they don't pay, then in February, penalties and interest start adding up. But that turnover doesn't happen to Linebarger until July 1st. And July 1st is whenever this turnover event happens where anybody that's still delinquent, that gets sent to us. That's when we get to work on behalf of y'all. That's where the statutory add-on fee comes
020into play, and that's where the penalties get higher. But it's kind of like a blockbuster return, as outdated as that is. When someone doesn't return it, there's going to be a fee, right? And so that's how our business works. So you'll see the TA number is still good. That refund section below is what's happened in that year as well. The best way I can explain on that top 25 account, you're going to see the status, current status on the right-hand side. Some of them say ready for sale. Last year, I was asked about a tax sale, about getting it done. We have had some. Some issues getting a tax sale in place, but we are going to have a November tax sale. It is all finalized. It's all good to go. When I spoke last
021week, I said October, but now it's been finalized in November. Those properties you see that are... Labeled ready for tax sale. They will be in that property unless someone pays it if someone pays it off It will not be in that tax sale But it is our last resort to make sure that we do our part of getting things collected So that you have your budget the best we can taking care of Like I said, if anybody has any questions about it, please let me know but that's what gives you the information that top account that you'll see on your list is in a bankruptcy status our Bankruptcy Department is already in line making sure that if there is a resolution of that account Then we will make sure Venus ISD is one of the
022top accounts to get paid on it That's the best, I can't go too far into that because of the status of bankruptcy. They get real skittish on us talking about things too much, but it's not a violation to have that in there and give you an update on your account. Moving on, you'll see another important page where it says 25 tax rule turnover and analysis. The 2024 tax year, the 2024 delinquency turned over to our law firm in July of 25 with 679 accounts for $373,000. That's down $25,554 from last year. There's things that come into play there with the exemption status for the homesteads that come into play there. Also, valuations there was some news made out of the appraisal district on about re-evaluation of things so the values are still there if there's
023ever any need for any property value studies we do that as well but we can talk about that at a different time but that's where you see it a lower turnover amount and actually lower Number of accounts as well, but it's all there We would love make no mistake about it. Even though we're we're business We would love if that number was down and we still had your collections there anything We don't have to get involved in we are just fine with that, but we'll take care of anybody we have to get involved with You can see the information about our collection process after that Finally, you'll see a pie chart under Venus independent school district status of accounts You'll see what's under lawsuit right now. You'll see also what's a clean account. That means
024there's not a hold code, a bankruptcy, or a deferral that's in place that keeps us from doing anything about someone that's delinquent. That's all delinquent numbers there. We make sure that the bad addresses and the deferrals are taken care of. The bad addresses mean there's research for us to do. I mean, we had a mailing, and it came back, and there's more work for us to do on it, and that's what we're on right now. We've got staff devoted towards that every single day. Really and truly as exciting as delinquent taxes can go that's about what you hear from me I'm always very proud to be in front of y'all I Enjoy the relationship that we have if y'all ever need anything my card is on each one of your packets Y'all probably already have
025my card, but it's got my cell phone on there, too Anything I can be available to help out. I love our relationship with line with line burger and Venus ISD Anything y'all just really wanted to ask an attorney for free. Okay Avery was that exciting? I appreciate y'all's time and I appreciate how good y'all are to us. Thank you very much. Thank you very much. We'll go to item number eight, presentation of 2025 state assessments, results, and ratings. Mrs. Camacho. Good evening members of the board is that time of year again where we are required to present our star EOC results in our ratings So Texas Education Code says we are required to report those before the end of September These all of this information is already available to the public. So the public as
026well as you can find it on the TEA assessment website. It's also posted on the Venus ISD website under required postings for accountability. So everything that we talk about tonight is available. I hope you will scroll down for us. So I am going to go pretty quickly because you've already seen a lot of these results and a lot of these ratings. So if you have any questions, you can stop me at any time. We're going to go campus by campus. We're going to look at results. And then we're going to look at ratings as well. So first for VES, so looking at third through fifth grade. You'll probably recognize these colored graphs. So anything in the red is going to be do not meet. Anything that's not red is approaches or higher. So the purple
027pink color, that's your approaches, which is still passing, but is your lowest passing level. Anything in the blue, that's going to be your meets. And then anything in the green is going to be your master's grade level. So anything in the red, do not meet. anything in the other colors that's going to be approaches or higher which is what we're going to look at today so for third grade reading language arts we were at 63 approaches and higher for third grade math we were at 44 approaches and higher for fourth grade reading language arts We were at 63% approaches or higher. And for fourth grade math, we were at 37% approaches or higher. Looking at fifth grade, they also added a science assessment. For fifth grade reading language arts, we were at 64% approaches and
028higher. For fifth grade math, we were at 63% approaches and higher. For fifth grade science, we were at 51% approaches and higher. And just a few data points for the elementary to kind of break that down. Some of our glows or some of the things that we're proud of is third grade RLA for approaches are higher. We increased 7% from this year to last year. Fifth grade RLA in the meets category, which again is your blue and your green. So that's a little higher standard. We increased 6%. And then we also look at cohorts. So what cohorts are is. Your students that took it in fifth grade this year were in fourth grade last year. So how did they do in fourth grade last year versus how they did in fifth grade this year? Because
029it's the same students taking the assessment. So in that cohort data, the students in fourth grade last year to fifth grade math this year, so the same students, overall, their grade level increased 23% approaches or higher. So we saw huge gains going from fourth to fifth grade. Some grows. It would be third and fourth grade math. So we know that third and fourth grade math is lower than we'd like overall And we are going to give a chance for principals as well to add some input about anything that they want to add or their plans of actions But those are the focuses based on the assessment results for the elementary Anything you want to add any questions about elementary? Okay, looking at ratings. So as you know, the ratings came out in August. The ratings
030came out for both 2024 and 2025. So we're focused on 2025, but we did put 2024 up for comparison. So you'll see 2025 is the bigger one. 2024 is the smaller one. So in... In 2025, overall, our scaled score was a 68, which is a D rating. And last year in 2024, it was a 59. So overall, it's about a nine point increase from year to year. And if you're unfamiliar with how ratings are calculated, there are three domains at the top. And you take the highest of those three domains, and that's worth 70%. And then your very, very bottom one that says closing the gaps, that's worth 30%. And you don't get a choice. They calculate that regardless of what it is. So in those, you'll see that there's a check mark next to
031the one that's used for calculations. And then your overall scale score is calculated that way. So any questions about ratings? for elementary can i go back and ask one question before we got here for ves so you said from fourth to fifth right we had a growth and we're tracking that cohort do we know what their growth was from third to fourth to fifth to find out like because i see fourth grade they're struggling right especially you know we're like 60 in the red or yeah 63 in the red for for fourth grade but are we tracking from like third to fourth to fifth to find out where's our breakdown because if we have a if we have a deficit here right but we go into fifth grade next year and this group has a
032growth where's our breakdown or our growth for this specific cohort going forward like where were they in third grade to fourth grade because we know they grew in fifth grade Yes, we do track that. I don't have it with me. Well, it's on my computer. But there consistently, there was a dip from third to fourth grade for that cohort. So we track them starting in third grade. We have every single cohort all the way up to 11th grade. And then we graph that as well so that we can see where the dips are. And so consistently for the last two years, there was a dip in fourth grade math in particular. And then they were able to recover in fifth grade. So are we doing anything additional for the fourth grade math? Like is there,
033have we found a reason why they're dipping in fourth grade math? The grade that we chose doesn't seem to meet the depth that they're being tested at. So we are trying to, we're doing some intervention a little bit more intentionally. We are pulling away from just computer intervention and running small groups. hitting each kid individually with their lowest teak that they hit. So it really does seem to be the breakdown between what's going on with the curriculum and what the student is getting and then what the test is testing. And just to be clear, the curriculum is the same for third, fourth, and fifth, or is there a different curriculum? But it's the same, third, fourth, and fifth, all the same? Yes, it is the same. Okay. in fourth grade than what it should be
034in third and fifth if we're dipping in fourth? Is there a reason for that? I think there is. Just in my observation, last year as the AP, I mostly worked with RLA, but for math, I see in fifth grade, we have a lot of small group instruction going on. The small group instruction meets the needs of individual kids. We pull back on that in fourth grade. So that is something that is being addressed this year. It's going to be required that we look at small group instruction. I'm having the teachers, all teachers, we are data tracking. We have never data tracked before. Anyway, we're going to be data tracking, and we are going to look at our kids broken down to an individual level. I'm going to have intervention lesson plans so that I know
035we are actually doing an intervention time. Last year, intervention time was at the beginning of the day, and I think we lost a lot of good time there that we ended up just kind of not being intentional with our instruction. In my opinion, that is the issue. We are not being intentional with the time we have. and what the students need. Yes, they come to us with a little bit of a gap from grade to grade, but we have to take them where they are, close as many gaps as we can, but continue moving forward. And I think that's the breakdown also. I think we do spend a lot of time. trying to close gaps, and then we miss all the grade level teaks for that. We also have in fifth grade very, very experienced
036teachers that have done this a very long time. And looking at those particular teachers, they track their data in fifth grade. They instruct based on their data. I just want to clarify. There were two answers there. I think I've got mixed up so The those scores so curriculum wise the same curriculum for everybody all the way through So that was so you said one of the reasons was curriculum But then it's the same curriculum all the way through and then I think you kind of alluded to maybe how teachers are implementing that curriculum not to get in the weeds from a board standpoint, but we do Invest quite a bit of money in curriculum and just for my knowledge I just want to clarify, is it a curricular issue? Because we've not only do we
037invest in a curriculum director, we also invest in multiple curriculum coaches. And so is that from our standpoint of economics, is it a curricular issue, curriculum, or is it a, is that, I never want to say personnel because that makes it sound like it's a person's problem. I get what you're saying. Or is it an implementation problem? I guess I could say that. I'm going to tell you my philosophy of what I think is going on because I'm kind of stepping into this. Personally, I feel a teacher should take a teak and should teach a teak, not teach a curriculum. I think that might be a little bit of our issue. I also believe last year, and again, I worked with RLA, so I'm not sure of all the ins and outs, but I did
038hear a lot. That the teachers were and I don't know if this is true or not Teachers were told they could not use any resources except this one curriculum and I don't know enough about the curriculum also to be able to make an educated assumption But I do I do think it's in the tier one instruction I just have a belief that a teacher Takes a teak they teach a teak with the very best Materials that they can find that meets the needs of the kids in their classroom Sometimes we have to supplement we all know no curriculum is inclusive and needs nothing Added or taken away We have to do a little bit of pulling resources from other places That's the best I know how that my goal this year is to teach teachers
039to teach kids with teaks and not teach just a curriculum. Does that kind of answer? I know you're on top of it. All the principles are. No, I'm just trying. My point was not getting those weeds. I'm kind of coming at it from behind. We get to hear, we've heard a lot in two years about curriculum, and then we change curriculum, and we hear more about curriculum, and then books, and all the, my question was based more or less on. Are we spending our money in the right places curricular-wise? Or is it an implementation problem? Yeah, honestly, Mr. Buck, I cannot really speak to that well enough to say, yes, you need to spend your money somewhere else. That's what the scores show us. But I cannot tell you that that curriculum has been taught
040with fidelity the way it's laid out. I do know that much. Okay, anything else kind of kind of weigh in there for one second What mrs. Whitworth was talking about just a science of teaching you taking a standard You take that standard that teach standard and you break that standard down Taking the teachers that they work like for instance a math problem I'll go ahead and work through that math problem myself. You have a no side. This is what the students must know. It tells you what the students must know. And your work tells you what the students must show. And then from there, you develop your objectives and you pull your different resources from this particular resource, that particular resource, and then you teach the class. But it starts with breaking down that standard.
041That is what he's talking about. We're getting back to that. That's what we're getting back to, breaking down the standard. Because if I just give a... teacher Resources or this curriculum and that curriculum and I haven't broken down that standard I haven't broken it down to what the students must exactly know and what they must show To match in that lesson plan these a master Lego level of rigor that the students are going to see on that exam There's no way we're going to improve and that's we're focusing on this here. Yeah when I say student learning We're focusing on taking that standard breaking that standard down working those teaching those teachers how to break it down into a no and show chart, and then turn that into rigorous lesson plans. Right. And I know
042I can speak on the RLA side. Our scores look much better because that is exactly what those teachers learned to do and actually did. We did our no and show. We broke it down. We looked at it from the objective, not from what the curriculum was telling us we needed to finish or do. When did we actually start this process you're talking about are we just starting it now do we start it before the year started or I mean where are we in that process of breaking the teaks down and That is something like for instance here if you talk about the high school you're gonna see in a second the high school had tremendous growth. They've been doing that process all last year because they're going through something called a Texas instructional leadership. They're
043going through that. What we're doing with this year we're rolling it through to the other campuses here. I personally know their coach that comes out and meet with Mrs. Camacho, meets with Dr. Morgan, Dr. Rebecca Vega and I had a talk with her and she actually pulled some data for me. if our students are growing for all campuses and we gave that to them in in the cabinet meeting sir but to answer your question we just started that process this year with the primary uh elementary and the middle school but the high school has been doing that uh all last year for all last year i know it for a fact because that's when i came here it's called a texas instructional leadership answer what sir oh at the beginning of the year sir at
044the beginning of the year the the program high school had to play is that something the ta required or something we went out and found on our own or? No, sir. That was something, be it the high school was on a list for improvement, that is something that was mandated by Region 11. To that, I think the question, one question was, is it curriculum or is it the implementation? And Mr. Buck, I think by implementation, you mean systems in place? Because I think, yeah, I think that, I think you have, systems in place and then once you have systems in place what mr. Gay was referring to is the data trackers I've been using data trackers at the high school with dr. Morgan for about two or three years now and then Ms. Rebecca has
045taught us how to refine that. But to me, it is curriculum, but I think it goes further than that. You have to have a system in place to check the implementation. Because regardless of what you have, you have the curriculum. Without that system, that implementation doesn't go through. So it's just a matter of different kind of systems that we went through last year with Rebecca to fine tune it. For hers being her first year as administration. I use the term implementation intentionally because she hasn't had time to really well, I guess I Mean, maybe she had time to do it. That's that system takes a while to get in place. So I didn't Know second guess on administration. I think y'all doing a great job Just I just curious to make sure that money was
046being spent curricular wise. That's the one thing we have control of so Thank you. All right moving on now to the middle school. All right, so looking at Same color, same charts, sixth grade reading language arts, we're at 63% approaches or higher. Sixth grade math was at 55% approaches or higher. Seventh grade reading language arts, 66% approaches or higher. And seventh grade math was at 29% approaches or higher. And next slide please. And then for eighth grade, of course we have the four tests for eighth grade. So reading language arts, we're at 78% approaches or higher. Eighth grade math, we're at 57% approaches or higher. Eighth grade science, 63% approaches or higher. And eighth grade social studies, 35% approaches or higher. And just a couple of glows and grows from the data. For sixth grade
047math, we increased by 14% from last year to this year. For seventh grade RLA, we increased by 8%. approaches are higher from last year to this year. An eighth grade RLA consistently performs very well year after year. Looking at some of the grows, grows for that campus would be seventh grade math and then eighth grade social studies. All right, any questions on that part before we go to the ratings? I'll just ask the same question as Ms. Buck. Is it curricular? Is it curriculum? Or is it implementation? I mean, or is it something in between? We control the money spent on curriculum. I would say, curricular-wise, what we have seen is that they are able to do the, like we see the scores in other grade levels. Seventh grade. I would definitely say it was
048an implementation issue. We have rearranged and we have some more experienced teachers in seventh grade this year. So some of that has been a personnel changes have went into that. The only, I guess, other thing I would say about seventh grade is those numbers. Sometimes the approaches numbers. That is what it is. We have to own that and fix that. And some of the same things they were saying. But traditionally you have those kids, those honors kids that help scores, you know, because they all do well. My sixth grade honors kids take the sixth grade star test. My seventh grade honors kids take the eighth grade star test. So no kids take. No seventh grade honors. No one takes that test that's in honors. And so that does affect the numbers some. To be fair,
049that's why you see very little or no green. Those super high kids are taking the test a grade level above them. So that's one piece. But it is very much been an implementation issue and a lack of experience and even certification. in that grade level, but this year we have a very experienced certified teacher in every math class. So what's the impact of the seventh grade honors taking the eighth grade, right? What's the impact and I'm talking student wise maybe this is daddy you can get back to us But how many kids are we saying collectively is? It's taking the eighth grade honors that we can say we still have a large majority of Students because I'm looking at over a hundred right in that 71 percent. Oh, absolutely, you know So and again, I'm
050seeing growth if I'm following tracking right we had some growth in It seems like we have growth in fifth, we have growth in sixth, but we're looking at fourth and seventh. Correct. Right? Absolutely. Am I kind of understanding what we're saying there? And I'm going to give an estimate of numbers so I can get your exact numbers. We have seventh graders that are the 30 kids that are in STEM that take the eighth grade test. And then we have at least two more sections of seventh grade honors. So I would estimate around 60 kids that are not taking that seventh grade test but are taking the eighth grade test. Okay. And most of those students move on to take out the Algebra I EOC in the eighth grade, and they do very well. The performance
051is very well. I think we had one student that didn't pass maybe in eighth grade last year. So those – Not well. It reports on the districts. We have breakdowns from – yes, from high school to middle school as well. I think we had one kid that didn't pass. Eighth graders taking that Algebra I. All right. Moving on, looking at ratings. for vms so again we have this year's and last year's um so if you look at the small one for 2025 we were at a 63 um and then uh for this year i'm sorry for 2024 we were at a 63 for 2025 we were at a 68 so that puts us at an improvement a gain of of five points so any any questions ratings scores for middle school before we move on
052moving right on All right, so for VHS, we have the end-of-course assessments. And so looking at, for English 1, we're at 57% approaches or higher. For English 2, we're at 69% approaches or higher. For biology, we're at 88% approaches or higher. For algebra 1, we're at 63% approaches or higher. And for U.S. history, we're at 93% approaches or higher. So just a couple of glows and grows. So your glows, the English, too, specifically the meats and higher, increased by 6%. So, again, those are your blue and your green. We consistently. do well on biology and U.S. history. So we're at 88%, which approaches are higher for biology, which is close, which is around what the state average is. And then 93% approaches are higher for U.S. history. And looking at grows, the grows for this
053campus would be English 1 and Algebra 1. And then if you'll move to the next one. So now looking at ratings. So you have in the smaller box, you have your rating for 2024. And in 2024, we were at a 69 or a D. And then for 2025, we were at an 80 or a B. So that's an overall gain of 11 points. The other big celebration for the high school, if you'll notice in the smaller box under identification of schools for improvement, it says that we were identified as a comprehensive support and improvement campus. And that, we were actually identified two, well, two and a half years ago now, but you have to stay for two years before you can exit. And then you have to score certain, you have to meet a certain
054cut point in order to exit. And so the high school has now done that. And if you'll look. at the one for 2025 it said they are not identified for comprehensive support targeted support or additional targeted support so that means that they have made the improvements necessary and they're no longer identified for 24. i know it's really small let me see 20 yeah which absolutely so it really started three years ago because as you know ccmr is a year lagged so you have to start early and you don't see your gains on that for a while So a couple of things that we've done at the high school level specifically, CTE, so they changed the way we get our CCMR points for IBCs. Those students have to have, now they have to have the whole
055pathway in CTE in order to get those. That means they have to be in the right classes for four years. Even if they take an industry-based certification test and pass it, we don't get a point anymore. We have to do all of the other things right. So we've completely refined, along with our CTE coordinator, some of the P-TECH pathways. We've completely refined those several years ago to make sure that students are in the right pathways and taking the right IBCs. The other thing that we've done is we've increased pre-AP and AP. So we've had more students taken past AP tests in the last three years. And so they can also get CCMR points that way. We've also had more dual credit participation. So dual credit coordinator, we consistently for the last three years had more
056participation and students do. better in the classes so they were also able to get their CCMR point that way and then the other thing that we've implemented is College Bridge which College Bridge at the for our seniors and so we started that implemented that two and a half years ago and consistently every year we have refined the way that we offer that to students and the students that are able to take it and it has Obviously for the students, it has some really great benefits because it can make them exempt from TSI when they go to college. And then it also fills in any gaps that they have before they go to college. So if you're not familiar with it, it's a state program, but students actually take a diagnostic and then they only work
057in the areas where they have deficits in. So it actually, it's tailored to each student. And we implement that in both English and in math. Now, is that program going away? I keep hearing the college bridge is going away. So, yes. Well, it's going to be around, but TEA is taking it off of the approval list for CCMR indicator points. Now, they have appealed it, and so there's been some back and forth. Actually, TEA did not approve anybody this year at all for the college prep programs. They approved nobody for one of the contents and they only approved like two and two providers which were both community colleges that aren't providers for us so Next year as of this right now next now next year CCMR points will count from this year So we will
058still see that and looking we're sitting really good and CCMR for this year and next year But after that we may see a change We may see a change and so we're already working to refine some of those things So how do we make sure that students get their CCMR point in a different way if we can't get it this way? And that really is working with every student because every student does it a different way. There's probably 10 different ways to get a CCMR point, and some students do really well in something, and other students do really well in something else. And so making sure that they have the opportunity in the way that they are able to do it. Well, most of the things we've talked about are multi-year processes that get fixed.
059CCMR is something that we could have fixed immediately, and I'm glad to see we did a good job fixing that in a year turnaround. So good job on that. All right, moving right along. Okay, so this right here, this is the Venus ISD rating. So in the small, little small box, you'll see the 2024 rating, which was a 64. And then in the larger box, you'll see the 2025 rating, which is a 69 or a D. So just something that I wanted to speak on briefly is. If you were to actually do the math, so you'll notice that, as I said before, the school progress, which was our highest one of those top three domains, that one right there is what count, that's the highest one, so that counts for 70% of our score. And
060then closing the gaps, our closing the gaps score was 72, and so that counts for 30%. If you were to actually do the math, we are a C district. However, there is something called a 3D rule, and that says that if you have a D in three of any of these four domains, you are not allowed to be a C. So if you were to do the math and look at it, we are actually a C. By numbers, we have a C. However, we fall under that 3D rule. And so if you look at it at the very bottom, it says, therefore, the highest overall scale score that can be awarded is a 69. So looking at that. We know what areas we were closest to. We need to push them where we need to
061push because each of those domains, while they all. They all measure the data. Each of them measure a little bit different. Some measure overall scores. Some measure individual student growth. Some measure things like some have more CCMR than others. Some measure more sub pops than others. So looking at that, we can really focus in on this is the kind of the areas we need to. And if we can push one of those, which obviously we want to improve on all of them, but if we can really focus in and push one of those, then that can make a big impact on the score overall. And I do want to point out, we improved five percentage points in every one of those categories. We did. Which is massive. Unfortunately, that 3D rule comes into effect and
062keeps us at a D, but no one sees that in the public. But I do want to make, we've shown great improvement. Well, we've shown good improvement. So, you know, kudos to the district for that. Any questions about ratings before we moved on? All right, almost done. Okay, next. Next, we have to look at TELPAS. So TELPAS is the English Language Proficiency Assessment that all of our emergent bilingual students have to take. Last year, we had 665 students in the district, and that's across grades K through 12 that took the assessment. So you'll see the... Shades of purple. The lighter shade, the very lighter shade at the beginning is a beginning rating. The darker shade is intermediate. As you get darker, you go to advance. And then the very darkest purple or that 11%, those
063are your students that scored advanced high. Okay. A couple of things about this data. Most of the students that were in the beginning category those are either students at the primary level who have just entered school or Students that are newcomers new to country. We have a very large population of new to country students across all levels including elementary middle and high school And so obviously when those students come it may be their first year Sometimes they've been here only a few months and they take the assessment for the first time and so that gives us a baseline So your students that are in that beginning level they're either brand new to school or brand new to the country most of the time. And then you can kind of see as students progress. And then
064your students in your advanced high category, students in advanced high category, if they meet some other criteria, they are able to actually exit their program. And so they would no longer be considered emergent bilingual. And so we had quite a few students this year. We had more students than ever. Ms. Roden could speak on that. But that exited the program. And so they are no longer considered an emergent bilingual student because they have now met their English language proficiency. Any questions? All right, moving on. All right, that's it. Plane of action. I let the principals speak. If y'all have any more questions for them, I'm happy to give them the mic. Anybody have any questions? Okay, that's it. Thank you very much. Thank you. We'll go to item number nine, executive session. It's 7 p.m.
065for 551.071, 551.072, 551.074, 551.076, 551.082, and 551.0821. We'll go to item number 10, reconvene from executive session at 8.12 p.m. Go to item 11, consent agenda. Did anybody have any questions on the consent agenda? We have a motion by Greg. Do we have a second? Second by Amber. All in favor? Motion carries. Item number 12, consider approval of library book purchase. Ms. Roberts? Okay, so we, over a month ago, posted the books on our required posting page that we had selected using the collection development policy that's in our new board policy. And they... were linked or maybe attached. Once it got into BoardBook, we had a little trouble getting links to work. So I think maybe we came through and attached them on the end. But this is the page that's on there. I've built
066them at the top. Junior Library Guild is a subscription type company. If you think back, well, not. some of you are maybe as old as I am, back to the CD of the Month Club. That's kind of what Junior Library Guild is like. They are a collection development company that picks the best books in each of these categories and makes them as recommendations. And so those are the books that were recommended and are going to be out for the month of September, October. So that's that first group of four because we get that for each of our campuses. And then other book orders we tend to order from Follett, which is one of our companies. They also do software for us. So it kind of makes a really nice seamless transition. And those are links
067to list of books for each of the different campuses. And so our recommendation, we did not, if you go up, right there is the Google form that we created in case anybody had any concerns or comments on them. We had not received any concerns or comments about the books that were posted for August 12th. And so our recommendation is just that you would approve the purchase of these books. Are any of these links available to the public? Yes, they are all. They're on there? Yes. Anybody that wants to see authors? Yes. In fact, Rose, you just want to click on one and open one up? Oh, nope, nope, sorry. Yes. Anybody else have any questions? No? Do we have a motion? Motion by Amber. Do we have a second? I'll second. Second by Kirby. All
068in favor? Yes, I'll second. Motion carries. Thank you very much. Thank you. Go to item number 13, consider approval of 2526 Emergency Operation Plan and Active Threat Annex. Anybody have any questions? We have a motion by Randall. Do we have a second? I'll second. Second by Amber. All in favor? Motion carries. Go to item number 14, consider approval of 3CX phone system. Warren? Good evening. For clarity's sake, just to try and make sure you all understand what I'm asking you to approve, I guess for the purposes of this discussion, when you think of phone system, I want you to think of the cell phone in your pocket. We have to have a phone system for the district, but we also have to have a phone service that that system uses. And so the same way
069that you have phone service to maybe T-Mobile or AT&T, and you also have a cell phone that connects to that, it's a similar thing for us. And so for this, the request is for the purchase of the phone system. Some of the bids that we entertained included the phone service along with the phone system. similar to what some cell phone service providers will do. If you buy my phone service or if you buy my phone, I'll give you a discount on the service and things like that. The recommendation I bring into you is to purchase 3CX through Vitter Name Synergy because it gives us the lowest long-term cost. And it gives us the features that we're looking for. All of the systems that we looked at were fantastic, but just the ones that had a
070significantly more cost had a lot of features that tended to duplicate what we already have. And so lots of video calling and video chat features, which we get through our Google licenses. And so we didn't want to duplicate features if we didn't have to. All of the bids were competitively bid via purchasing co-ops. And this purchase was something we had been looking at for a while. Last year we were made aware that the company that provides our current phone system was going out of business and that their support was going to stop in 2026. And so we've had time to do our due diligence and really evaluate our options. Business office set aside $50,000 in this year's budget just for this purpose. And then the rest of the funds will be coming from the technology
071department budget. to take care of that. So my recommendation would be to purchase a 3CX phone system along with accompanying hardware for a cost not to exceed $52,000. So they're going out of business a year from now? They are. I couldn't tell you where to go. Ultimately, my question is, are we planning on switching over right now? Are we planning on staying with them until they go out of business and then hooking up with a three-year contract with a new company, 3CX? My goal is to try and avoid a long-term contract if we can. But to answer your question directly, I don't know when they're going out of business, but based on their product roadmap, they will no longer be releasing security updates or providing support. And so if there's no support, that means if
072something is wrong, it's difficult for us to get it. If their target date is June of 26 going out of business when their service stops, are we planning on waiting until June of 2026 to switch over 3CX? Are we planning on switching over to 3CX in ASAP like in Christmas or something like that? No, the date that we lose service or we lose support is December 31st, 2025. And so ideally, we're going to book a time during the month of November to... Get to get the new the new system set up and installed that way we have some time and probably an ignorant question And you're gonna quickly set me right but our phone system does our actual if I'm sitting at a principal's desk that the phone Is basically my intercom and everything that
073is this going to impact that at all? I know some campuses have problems with all that this year Our intercom system has been a handful this year So you think of the intercom system as a as a layer that runs on top of the phone system So this is the phone system lets people, lets you get calls from outside, lets you make calls from person to person, desk to desk from the district. The intercom system is a layer that runs on top of that. So this doesn't affect that at all? Get back with you later. It could. Okay. As much time as we have put into our intercom system this year, the company still doesn't, we use a company called Entrato. And so they still don't have an answer for us as far as why
074things are working how they're supposed to be working. But we have some next steps that we're gonna do with them. It is possible that our phone system is the source of the problem. They can't quite say because it's not their phone system. And because our phone system is losing support, the phone system company isn't too interested in spending time with us on a product that. that they're about to be deprecating. Well, rolled up into my, ultimately, if we were switching over in July or June, that's a summertime, not really a big use time for all that. We have two and a half months to get it fixed all up. Rolling over in December, you really have, well, we're all on Christmas break, so principals all show up, and now all of a sudden the intercom
075doesn't work, emergency drills. So I just don't know if there's going to be any impact to that stuff, or is there going to be a, are we going to be? I would love to tell you absolutely not. But from what I have learned thus far about our intercom system, it is possible. We have a good relationship with a network contractor that we use quite a bit. So we have a backup plan if we need to no longer use Entrato anymore. We have a backup plan that will let us have functional intercoms and bells using the hardware that we currently have. It's going to require man hours to get that set up. One way or another we will have functional bells and intercoms My hope is that it works as intended So we don't have to
076try and get money back from a vendor who who isn't give us what we need sir well the the 52,000 or not to exceed 50,000 will that cover Is that an all-encompassing cost? Will that cover any sort of install, all equipment, everything? Yep. It's all the equipment, the support in setting it up, and then also the main hours from the company being on-site to help us get things set up. So one part that that doesn't cover is the phone service itself. And so the bid we're going with. Doesn't include that like the other ones did and so that's a regular cost that is budgeted for anyways that it's not paid for to my budget. It's paid for it of out of dance Paying paying our paying our regular bill is what that is but just
077to To be as clear as possible with y'all wanted to include that that total in there because that would be an apples-to-apples comparison and 52 is what you need. Yeah, I'm looking at 55 52 I'm looking at 12 7 in total. I'm looking at 98 354. Yeah, even I'm just trying to figure out where the 52, but if that's what you need, you don't have to explain it necessarily. I just want to make sure 52 is. The 68, 324 minus the 512 and 12, 770 gets us to just below 52. Just want to make sure that's everything. Thank you. Any other questions? No. Do we have a motion? Motion by Randall. Do we have a second? All in favor? Thank you. Motion carries. Thank you. We don't have anything for item number 15. Go to
078item number 16 reports, Mr. Gatewood. Yes, ma'am. It's been a busy month. I want to talk about enrollment numbers first. Right now, currently, we're sitting at 2,216 students. Breakdown by campus, the primary, 386. Elementary, 641. Middle school, 518. High school, 671. Looking at... ADA, we do have our ADA numbers here. I'll put that on there. We do have some change for ADA, but the biggest change for ADA, which attendance, our attendance, we have out of middle school, they lead the charge. I don't know, for some odd reason, the parents drop those middle school kids off pretty much every day. We have a little competition every week, and the middle school always wins, which is an interesting reason. This was interesting, but they're up 16 points from last year, 16 percentage points. So they're doing a
079great job of getting kids to school here. And looking at just our numbers from last year and this year time, the population has increased at the middle school quite a bit. Noodle's 518 doesn't indicate that, but the middle school is where our growth is coming, and also the elementary. The total across the district, we're down 48. .93 kids that's we're down total across the districts as our enrollment staffing one thing that I'm doing I'm keeping an eye on middle school social studies as the classes are very large and they're in portables And the portables only hold about 25 kids, so I'm just kind of keeping an eye on those numbers. Mrs. Buck has done a tremendous job of looking at her schedule and balancing out those classes to ensure that all the students can fit
080in those portables. But it's pretty packed. We're averaging roughly around 22 to 23 kids a class. So if we had an influx of, say, 15 middle school kids show up, we may have a little problem in our social studies department. Some critical shortage areas, the bilingual that was mentioned earlier and also the ESL aid at the high school and we have a vacancy for the police officer. Some legislative stuff that we're currently working through. Senate Bill 12 is giving all superintendents some problems. Everybody's having issues with that. And I spoke to some peers this past weekend and no one has it all figured out, but we're doing our very best. One huge impact that we're going to have across the district, we have never done parent-teacher conferences, but Senate Bill 12 mandates that we do
081two parent-teacher conferences each year. So we're going to do one in the fall. and one in the spring. So we will have those days there. We'll take the place of our PDA, Professional Development Day. So it's just mandated that we have two parent-teacher conference days. I think it's a great thing. We're inviting those parents in, not an open house. Here's an opportunity for you to schedule a time during the day. come and meet with your teacher and talk about any concerns their progress their grades whatever you have concerns with this shows that transparency and openness to the community also so i think that's a great good thing from senate bill 12 so i know the communications we talked about that in cabinet she's going to start communicating that as soon as possible as soon as
082she gets some guidance from the campus principals because it works best when we have parents sign up Here's a roster, sign up for a slot of time. Because worst thing is that you don't schedule those parents and they all show up at one time at 8 o'clock. So we're going to try to schedule it. So, for instance, here Howard Gatewood wants to talk to Mrs. Smith. Okay, here's your time at 8.30, 8.30 to 9 o'clock. Try to break it up between those times and schedule those parents. But we'll be doing those things all day. Yes, sir. You said those are gonna be on the Fridays. That's gonna notice or they're gonna be a little we have to PD today's out of first PD day. Dr Morgan, what is that the first one? Okay. No, what
083is the second one April? What? April 10th. Yes, sir. I just know in the past we've done that in my principal days and then it just seems like inevitably the done day we set across for all the teachers to do parent conferences The football team wants to leave at noon The administration office wants to have a training of some sort with the teachers and it conflict always turns out to be a conflict so I didn't know if we know so we know to be done differently but Just want to make sure in support of the teachers administration that you know anything worse is the parent and the conference and have to cancel because And that's called a meeting and it's funny that you mentioned that one thing that I mandated today in cabinet that we
084will not have any other training on those days. That day is dedicated for parent-teacher conferences. The worst thing we can do with a district is parents schedule something, they show up, and the teacher is not there to have that conference. And that is a horrible thing because a lot of these parents that want to talk to the teachers, they actually take off from work. So we're going to put that as soon as possible so those parents can know way ahead of time. I need to take this here day off because the district is taking time to dedicate. That's just dedicated solely for parent teacher conferences. It'll just be a regular work day. But teachers are only doing conferences. And some things I am mandating that during the conferences, I don't mean you go down around
085the hallway and hang out with your buddy and talk about the Cowboys game. You need to stay in your room. because that minute you leave your room and go somewhere else, parent will show up. And there's going to be some parents that don't reserve times whatsoever. They're just going to show up to talk to you. You still need to see those parents. Can I make a suggestion for us to be mindful of? Yes, ma'am. I know that those are the days that our kids were not in school. Yes, ma'am. And I will just give you an example for me. I did have my ARD scheduled on a Friday. It was a day that we were in school, and so that was easy for me because my child was in school as well. However, it was
086requested that we move it to the Friday that he wasn't in school. Some parents have worked out their schedules that they are home with their kids. So we're talking about those elementary, primary age kids that that may not always be the best day because their kids are at home, and a lot of parents are at home as well. So we might need to maybe implement. an alternative for some of those parents who can't. Yes, ma'am. Who have their kids. Either they're going to have to bring their kids to make those days or they're not. But we do need to be mindful of those parents that have those littles at home. Yes, ma'am. Because we're not in school that day. Do you think offering an online or Zoom version parent conference would suffice? Possibly. Yes, ma'am.
087Possibly. I do have another suggestion. I learned this weekend because I did learn something. Parent Square has it where you can actually sign up for all of that, and I think that is the biggest mode of communication with our parents, I think. So instead of sending a letter home that gets lost in transit. We push that out through ParentSquare, let them sign up for the times that work for them, and then go from there. That can fill up the teacher schedule pretty quick. Yes, ma'am. I did find that out. Most of our parents, just on that coffee talk, most of our parents actually don't look at our district website. They rely upon ParentSquare, which is real good because that's reliable information. It is coming from the district. push that out on ParentSquare, not just rely
088on our webpage because a lot of our parents do not look at it for some odd reason. 99% of people don't look at it. I don't look at it. It is not. And you have to kind of hunt and pick for things and when you try to look for it, you just give up. Exactly. Okay, so under the community engagement and communication, we conducted the first coffee talk. We had 55 people log in, which was awesome, amazing. Wasn't any problems. And just one of those things is just a very informal process. I'll just log on there, give a district update, and I just take questions, just fire them at me, and I will answer them to the best of my ability. I like that format. It's something that even the mayor, he was on it,
089and he wanted to do one jointly. I don't know how we would do that. I don't know. I just told him we'd have to look at it logistically because I'm just speaking on stuff that are just school-related. So, hey, whatever. Hop on board. There's plenty of room. We had open houses. All the campuses conducted open houses so far. Grandparents' Day was conducted. You talk about smiling faces. The grandparents were so happy just to be back on campus that we're recognizing them. They actually provided pictures. I don't think that will be successful at the high school or middle school. I don't think grandparents want to show up there. But at the elementary and the primary, it was a big success for us. upcoming engagement opportunities for the community we have the trunk-a-treat coming up and there
090will be additional activities during the cabinet we're talking about that today how we're always looking to make it bigger and better so I we have some great ideas what you're gonna see this year you have the traditional trunk-a-treat but there'll be some additional activities that will be set up like we have a bounce house that's at the elementary I did was brought up why can't we put the bounce house out there why can't we have students monitor that For instance, here, Mrs. Buck says she has a bunch of cornhole games. Why can't she put the cornhole out there? So you see additional games just beside the trunk-a-treat. We're always looking to expand on it and provide entertainment to our community. Transparency practices, monthly coffee talk. Yes, sir. On that trunk-a-treat, have we reached out to
091any other organizations like... We're past most people passing out candy but jackets coats any other organizations that are that would set up to look up passing out I mean could be I don't say dentist, but I think about the little back-to-school thing. I was right before wintertime. So if there's anybody that uh, you know Maybe not but if there was somebody want to pass, you know that take that opportunity to civic organizations I guess is what you'd call them. Yes, sir. That's a great idea because I've never ever in my life seen an event so well attended than that trunk-a-treat last year. It was a huge success. It's so successful it's become a logistical nightmare a little bit. No, no, sir. Those are all great ideas. Those things I need to hear. Yes, sir. Transparency
092practices, we're going to continue to try to be as transparent as possible with the community. I do have the monthly coffee talk coming up in October, and we have the parent-teacher conferences coming up there to meet us as transparent as can be, not hiding from anybody. jump on there, fire a question at me, please do so. I don't have a problem with that whatsoever to the community. And also we're bringing them in for the parent-teacher conferences. I also want to let you know I've conducted one-on-one meetings with all campus principals, and I've begun classroom walkthroughs with their admin teams. And one of the biggest things that I really enjoy is the student learning. In classes, I'm not just in there standing in the back. I actually go up to the students and ask, what are
093they learning? Do you understand it? Explain it to me. I was in a class today. They were talking about sciences. They were talking about a project with the groups were inventing simple, a simple machine type invention. They had different one group had a wedge, one group had a lever, one group had a screw. And I told him, hey, OK, explain to me what you're inventing. How's that work? What's the purpose of it? So it's real good to get out there and actually see the kids. I will say this here, if you're ever going to visit the elementary and the primary, make sure you have thick skin because kids will just come up to you and say, Mr. Gate, what's your ball? I'll say, yes, I know that. So I'm not worried about that. So it's
094real good getting out there on the campuses. The kids will just say anything down there. They will. They'll just say anything. Yes, ma'am. That's pretty much what I have for the superintendent's report, guys. Do you have anything? No? Thank you. Then we'll go to item 17, board request for additional items. I would like to add just a P-TECH progress of those kids that we have in that program, just kind of where we're at year-to-date on the progress of those enrollments, et cetera. Anybody else have any requests? Is there a, whether or not we're in a special ed teacher shortage right now, or are we fully staffed in special ed as far as hours, et cetera? And I'd also request maybe getting a presentation over AI communication tool. I know you talked about maybe ParentSquare would
095do some of that stuff at the conference we talked about, like Lancaster going to that AI where parents call and AI gives them all the information. Anything off your website, AI can regurgitate it to them. When's the next whatever? Ms. Fudge, wasn't she part of that one? Ms. Fudge has got some overall. I mean, not quotes or anything, just an investigation. I went through a conference, and it was super. You call up the parent, and you say, hey, when's the next parent-teacher conference at the middle school? And it scans, you know, and AI can scan everything in a second. And it goes, it looks like the next whatever it is is on blah, blah, blah, at the date, as long as it's properly inputted into the website. We always talk about how people don't use
096the website because it's so hard to navigate. This AI tool now takes any information you have on the website calendar and sets it in the regards states back to the parent as a conversation. We're just here on top of the website. I agree. All websites, not ours. Everybody's. It's hard to find things that are attached. Unless you're really familiar with it, yeah. Thanks. Anybody else have anything? Any requests? No? Our next scheduled board meeting is October 20th? And we will go to item 18, adjourn at 8.37 p.m. For reason.