001Thank you. Yeah, that should do it. Thank you for the school board of Polk County. Thank you for the admin team. God bless them. See them through. Thank you for our superintendent. God, look on our country, our nation, and I look on our soldiers and look on everybody and you just give your name and praise. Let us do the work of the school board. Let us be productive. In Jesus' name we pray. Amen. I move to approve the agenda. I second. Those in favor? Aye. Those against? Our next item is the Share support, I don't really have that much. I just want to again. It's done my thanks to the superintendent doctor spells and. It's a fabulous staff that keep us on our toes with the policy committee and everything else is coming to make
002this district a whole lot better. And we have already done that. But like anything else, there's always room for more improvement. So having said that, I would like to just read the next thing is the Cherish Pick. And you just allow me a few seconds so I can read this. Good evening. It brings me great pressure to announce this month's Cherish Pick Award recipient. This month, I received 22 nominations, and using the rule-based scoring system, the selected teacher earned an impressive 72 out of 76 possible awards. The April 2026 Cherish Pick Award goes to Ms. Keisha Campbell. A pre-kindergarten teacher at Hawkeye Elementary School, Ms. Campbell was nominated by a colleague who recognized the powerful impact she has on her students by encouraging them daily to do their best. Both her colleague and principal share
003that Ms. Campbell has not missed a single day of school this year, demonstrating her strong commitment and dedication to her students. They also noted that despite working a second job, she continues to show up each day ready to support and inspire young learners. Please join me in congratulating Ms. Campbell for her outstanding dedication to students and... the Hutt Eye Elementary School community. With this goes a certificate reflecting of what I just said. And also a check from the district for $250. I've already paid the taxes. And so you can spend it however you want to. Thank you very much for your service. The next item is superintendent's report. This is the month of the military child. We have a lot of events going on the month of the military child. We have a big event
004coming up Tuesday, April 21st at 6 p.m. again at East Hope Middle. And we want to acknowledge the service of our youngest community members in the Hope County Schools. And we finally support approximately 2,075 military-connected students. So that's a great thing. And then we also have our annual event where we go up to Raleigh to celebrate the military. So we're looking forward to that. Dr. Owens goes and Mr. Castelaw and myself. So just, we're proud of our military. We're proud of being a military community. We have an event for our rising ninth graders. We have an event at each school, each middle school. West Hope Middle's rising. 9th grade of pre-registration life for parents. Thursday, April 16th, Sandy Grove Middle will be Monday, April 20th, and East Folk Middle will be Monday, the 27th. Again,
005that's for information for parents for rising 9th graders. I mentioned it last month, but I think I'm going to mention it every month. We're working hard to get us through the transition. To the new facility, we get our furniture. Identify and tag and getting all that ready. A lot it entails a lot. We also work on that. The ribbon cutting when we're waiting on that move in date that we'll get from the. Builders. We can share it. Nothing we've been trying to work on a rental for a few roadblocks with. We've talked about it. saving that library. It's a very good building. It has good bones. Again, we ran into a few roadblocks with that. We're still trying to talk that through. There was an estimated cost that we're trying to see work through that
006too. So I still think that would be a great place for meetings. There's a lot of things that we can do there. I think it was a proposed bus area. So we're trying to work those things out. So I'm working with Dr. Hunt on that. So we should have some more information next month. But that building does have good bones, as they say in the building community. This is the time of year that we are waiting on our date to go and meet with the county commissioners to talk about our upcoming budget. As soon as we get that date, we'll share that with the community. We've got a lot of fun things coming up, too. May 2nd, we have our prom. And then in May, we have our middle and high school graduation. So we're
007definitely looking forward to those. A lot of award ceremonies are going to be coming up in May. So there's a lot of things going on and a lot of fun, exciting things for students coming up. As administrators, we're busy, but it's a good busy because it's all about students. That's right. That's all I have. Next item is the public comment. All right. If I can get a motion motion to the consent agenda. Make a motion to approve the consent. March 10th and March 23rd. Those in favor. I guess. I also make a motion to approve the school board policy. Second, we get a set. Okay, those are favorite. I those against. Okay, next item is the administration, the information. Which is construction update apologize for not being able to be there in person. I appreciate
008it. Can you hear me? Can you hear John? Can you hear me now? Yes. How about that? Is that any better? You can't hear me? How about now, John? That's one, two, three. One, two, three. Yes, we can. Oh, you can? Okay. We can. Okay. That's why I can't be there in person. I apologize. But to give you the monthly update for the project, the school, a lot has been going on out there. You can see a lot has taken shape outside with paving and the landscaping starting. And inside the building, it looks a lot different than when your last visit. So as you can see here in the photos, the interior, the glass and stainless railing system around. The two-story area is going in place, looks really nice. The flooring, you can see going
009down the hallway there, is going down everywhere they put it down. They then protect it with paper, which you'll see in the following slides as well. This is the serving area for the kitchen. They got the epoxy flooring done in there, and you can see the tiles on the walls, and you can see through the opening in the background back to where the kitchen is. Next slide, please. And this is in the back area of the kitchen. Again, they have the epoxy flooring done. They have the FRP panels up on the walls. So it is getting close to ready for the kitchen equipment to be delivered and begin hookup to the utilities in there. Next slide, please. Painting continues everywhere out there as they touch up and they go around. The contractors continuously doing a
010quality check. Pardon me. And anywhere they see any deficiencies, they are immediately having them addressed. This will help speed up the entire process for final inspections and occupancy as well. Next slide, please. So here you can see the example of flooring is already done and on the left a science area and on the right student support services. They have it protected. The cabinetry is up in the science labs and they're doing paint touch up around them there and taking shape throughout the building. Next slide, please. And here's a better image of a science lab. So I give you a sense of the scale and the finishes that are in there. The countertops are in and have paper to protect them as well. So it's very reassuring to see everyone's taking a lot of effort to
011protect these finishes once they're put in. Next slide, please. This is the learning stair. They are getting it ready to put the wood finishing on it. That's just the plywood sub base that they can attach everything to. Next slide. Talking about the schedule. Don Sproles touched on a little bit. We're looking at being completed here this June. Currently, they're approximately 94% complete using June as a completion date. So not much left. The demolition and the additional work will commence following occupancy of the building and then the demolition and everything will start in the abatement of any hazardous materials in August. That work will then be completed next January. Again, we're looking at staff to begin moving into the new building in early June and have an occupancy completed by the third week of July. It
012takes a little time to get everybody and all their instructional materials relocated so they can arrange and set up their spaces as they need to, get all the technology in and tested. So that is the window to have that done so we're ready for the orientation and all the pre. school start your activities. So the contractor has assessed the impact and has submitted their opinions on some of those to the board. The team continues to review the assessments and assist with the determination of any extensions required. Next slide, please. As for the budget on their contract, they're about 82% paid. That matches up with progress. Actually, the project is further ahead than that, so that is good. Of the contingencies, the three categories, the contractor contingency, they've used about 91%, almost all of that. The
013design contingency, they've exceeded that allowance amount. However, in the owner contingency, you have continued to gain money in that contingency allotment. And that, again, is through value engineering options that have come up throughout the course of the project that we still even continue to look at and evaluate. Combined, all three contingencies started off at about $2.4 million. Right now, that's about $1.1 million remaining. There's $607,000, $608,000 of identified potential impacts, which will result in about $500,000 remaining. So all in all, the project budget physically remains sound and within budget. Next slide, please. So this is the detail sheet again. That shows the categories of where everything has been budgeted, how much has been expended from each. Again, under column E, the blocks that are highlighted in the yellow are the ones that have changed from
014last presentation. And the items in green on the right are funds that remain unencumbered that can be used available towards other improvements at this site. I know I went through that. I apologize for my constant coughing. Do you have any questions at this time? No questions. Thank you. Thank you, John. Next item is the child nutrition bid list. Good afternoon. Good afternoon. Please excuse my voice. I think you all can stay on the screen while we are prepared. WITH THE BOARD MEMBERS. THESE ARE 2026-27 CHILD NUTRITION PROPOSED BIDS. FIRST ONE IS OUR LOT 1. THIS IS OUR LARGE BID FOR ALL OF OUR FOOD PRODUCTS FROM EVERYTHING THAT WE USE THAT WE DO NOT USE, U.S. COMMODITIES. AND THEY HAVE REQUESTED A RENEWAL FOR THE FIRST TIME. is our paper goods and they have requested
015a renewal. One, lot four is our fresh produce and they have requested a renewal for one time. And lot six is our beverages, water and juice and they have requested a bid for renewal for one time. Are there any questions for our procurement alliance? We are part of the North Carolina procurement alliance buying group and so these companies follow under fall under their structure So are there any questions any questions? I make next one is our local bid and This is a new bid this company is with us for a very long time and they It was outbid by SFS PAC, but they got us back. And this is Sanitec Systems, and this is the company that we use for all of our sanitation, all of our used dishwasher. They come in and do trainings
016for our staff. They do our HACCP trainings as well. So they won, and they're very happy to be back in Oak County. And another local view is a renewal, and this is pro-serve food equipment. And this is a, they're renewing for the first time. This is all of our repairs for all of our equipment. Freezers, coolers, cooking equipment, anything that you find in the kitchen, they can do all of our repairs for us. On the next page, our grease trap, pumping, dumping, renewal number two. Our milk products, and this is Mayola, renewal number three. Our rice seasonings, Darryl Gourmet is number four. Our pests, Master Exterminators is number four. And our kitchen hood exhaust systems, Ken Smith wash on wheels is number four. All of the number fours will have to rebid next year. They
017can only bid renew for four times. So they'll have to renew the fours. Of course, none of the companies have to renew. Of course, when they renew, they keep the exact price that they had the year before without any adjustments. And are there any questions for that group? Any questions? No. All right. Our district contracts. This is our cafeteria, our port-a-sale, our inventory, and all of our financial software. And we work with Ms. Walina Richardson in the finance department because we do have to integrate with each other. So we use the same system that the district uses. And then we do not have to do a bid for free and reduced meal applications because we were approved for community eligibility meals at no charge on April 1st for our 2026-27 school year. So we will
018not have our students who continue to eat all meals, our breakfast, lunch, and after school snack at no charge. Is that a federal program? Yes, everything is. Everything is federal for child nutrition. Yes. Are there any questions any more questions? Thank you very much. Thank you. All right. The next item is the Kelly education staffing substitute staffing solution. Good evening, Board Chair, Vice Chair, and Board Members, and everyone in the building. Today, I will present Kelly Staffing Solutions. I'm going to present, but I would like you to know that Mr. Clarence Middlebrook and he's what we need. I brought Jennifer Caroselli, and she's the VP of Sales for North America, and as well as the Carolinas Client Services Director, Caroline Clayton, as well. And they are here to help answer any questions that you may
019have at the end of the presentation. Okay, so when we think about Kelly staffing, what we're trying to do is transition to a substitute staffing. And there's reasons why we're doing that. Our current substitute system requires significant time and effort from school and district staff. And I don't feel that we're utilizing using our staff as. As well, as we should be, we have internal limitations that make it difficult to attract and retain our substitutes. This company can get our rates up higher. They can get our rates higher. Go to the next. So. They had 28 years of proven success. And he said a slide deck, but if you don't mind, I have my notes. This is going to help us understand better. Okay, so. Our current pay structure is not competitive because we can only
020limit our substitutes, we as the Hope County Schools, to 29 hours per week. That's all they can work. So that means that if a substitute is in the classroom Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday, and Thursday, they may not be able to work Friday. And if that school leaves them for five days, they can't use them for five days. Also, they have limited ability to offer benefits. We cannot offer them any type of retirement, health insurance, any of that. because they're not permanent employees and the only ones that we can actually offer anything to is long-term subs but they have to be there for the entire year and then that's not the same insurance that we get as employees so what that results in is inconsistent substitute coverage and then that means we're using our teacher assistants
021more frequently which is not ideal for the system So I want to tell you what the financial context is. So in 2024, we spent $2 million on substitutes alone. In 2025, we spent $2.2 million on substitutes. And our current substitute pay with benefits, because we have to pay Social Security, whoever you are, starts at $125.95. And if we use a teacher assistant, we're paying a whopping $252.33 a day. That's why teacher assistants love to sew. But that takes them away from the purpose that they were hired for. Kelly Education delivers a full service solution. They include their daily recruiting, talent pipeline development. They have a great screening, hiring, onboarding, orientation. They will use our subs. And remember, the subs that we already have have already been through stringent hiring processes and have backroom checks done
022already. So they can use those. They can start off right away, but they also will give us the opportunity to use stuff that we have not gotten yet. So what helps us if we go to Kelly is that they can pay them better than we can because they can pay them weekly, we can pay them monthly. So if someone comes and works at the beginning of the month on the first and the second, we still can't pay them until the 30th, the end of the month, where if we can use the staffing service, they can pay them more frequently, which makes that seem more exciting for someone who's working. The key benefits that we will have for transitioning is that we'll expect improved fill rates. Like I said, right now we're using Frontline. That's not
023a staffing. That is just a system that we use to help us get the subs. But if the subs are not calling, if they're not answering, and you come to work at 730 and there's no sub in that class, the bookkeepers or the principals are still having to look for substitutes to come and cover that class. which means that now they're pulling tas just automatically because that's the easiest thing to do with kelly um like with kelly then they'll be able to they'll have a on-staff person for hope county schools dedicated to hope county schools that takes care of that so that means now the the school's not looking for so we have someone that we can go to um With them, they also allow the substitutes to have the ability to work more hours.
024They have more qualified in a larger pool than we have. There's reduced administration burdens to the school and district staff and the cost savings will include that they're going to pay for the front line system, which we now pay $20,000 for per year. If they take care of that because now they're going to be managing it, that makes it more cost efficient for Hope County Schools. The greatest impact on schools to me will be that the teacher assistants will remain in their assigned classrooms, which means now they're going to be doing the work that we hired them for and not having to cover classes themselves. It's less disruption for the instruction day. It's increased reliability and responsibility in filling absences because now we have a dedicated person too because right now when I think about
025it, in HR they start the process, then we have to make sure we get the subs into the system, then we have to make sure the system is being used correctly, make sure the teacher's doing whatever. With someone who's dedicated to doing that, then that means it's going to run smoother. We'll have them because of the support that they give us will have a strong support to our school operations So the staff and partner will cut like I said will cover the cost of the substitute calling system And that's going to reduce operation expenses for Hope County School And then Like I said before I just want you to really know understand the front line is just in scheduling to it It does not guarantee that we're going to have substitutes in the classroom. And
026that's what's happening to us now. Our fill rate is not as great as it should be. But like I said, with the person that they're going to have working in HR with HR staff, that means they're going to be, like I said, dedicated to calling the staff, making sure they have people. And their pool is bigger than our pool. So we'll have more opportunities to get more people into the school system. They are a full program management. And they, like I said, they include recruiting, hiring, training, and workforce oversight. We're going to retain the front line, but it's going to be managed by them now. If we decide to go with them, the absent management cost is covered under their partnership. The bottom line for this transition will give us an increased substitute availability, improved
027efficiency and reliability, reduced burden on our internal staff, and allows our educators and TAs to focus on student learning. And we have included in your pack, in your, and thank you for the opportunity to become, if they want to thank you for the opportunity, to become our partners. And they have included a sheet that has questions and answers. But like I said, if you have any questions right now, they are here to answer any questions that you may have. That's what I told them they would be able to answer questions if you had any. Does anyone have any questions? I do. Yes. What does your pool come from? Do you have any people in the whole county? Absolutely. You want to go first? Yes, go ahead. And first of all, thank you all for having
028us in to assist with Ms. Walina's presentation. But the biggest thing is we want a seamless transition. So you asked about the pool. So these folks are coming from your community. We're a grassroots organization when we get down to recruiting. So, I mean, we talk about the job fairs. We get our hands dirty with job fairs, recruiting events. If Holt County is planned 71st, we might have a table there recruiting folks from the community to come on board and serve in Europe. And we feel like, you know, when somebody comes from your community, have a better investment in what goes on in the actual classroom, your school system. Does that answer? Yeah, sure. Erica, what's the difference? Because you presented on another company about two years ago. And then, you know, then we didn't go
029with that company. What would be the difference? I don't think you know this, but you do. between that company and this company, other than grassroots? They're similar. They do provide the same services. This company is, the cost is a little more, is less. In addition to that, this company will give us someone every day in our system that will be in HR to help get subs in the building compared to the other company was only going to give us somebody once a week. And then they would work from home to help schools to get subs in the building. But this will be more hands on. Yes. Do you offer a la carte services? Could you explain? I mean, just like subs or just- Individual services, say for instance. Like the other organization was saying, like,
030if it was too much as a packet, then we can break the packet down. Oh, you guys are in control of that. So this is what happened during the implementation process. We all sit down together. Our bread and butter is daily substitutes, but we do everything except for bus driver. So we kind of. Y'all kind of tell us what y'all need and then we tailor that to your needs and come up with a solution that fits, tailors to a whole county school. Are there any. Other counties that you can kill this. I'm glad you asked. So across the Carolinas, and you'll see that in a packet week over 45 districts. So, I mean, if you drive that right down 95. It's not too many dishes you're going to see that don't use Kelly, but down
031the road about 30 minutes. If you go down to Lumberton, Robinson county is. When I'm biggest biggest clients and a quick story with Robinson, they went from what came on 4 years ago. they were like in the 70 75 percent um field which means 25 of their classrooms are not being fields and so in in return i mean we're all here for the students correct so that means we're a combining classroom so i'm at 10 10 students here i'm sending 15 to the gym and so like is learning really really keeping going on so um but now uh to the success there are our best or one of our best clients in north carolina um and a daily rate of on the low end they're gonna get a 95 so um if the district can
032And if we can take them where they only handle them on the worst case 5% of uncovered classroom, they can manage that a lot better than filling in 25%. And speaking with the finance office, she said she wouldn't go back to do it. Any more questions? I want to know. What is the cost like the least amount? Give an estimation. That's something that's a good question. So how we work It's not like a subscription. They said most people can be purchased a service like Netflix Whether I whether I watch one movie or 20 movies, they gonna try to be $19.99 a month with this is it's We don't we don't build if you don't feel so Whatever you send us and we if we fill up fill the classroom less will be going but we
033don't if the classroom goes I feel we don't have any financial liability for the absence And so once you break it down, it's a cost neutral, which. It's not a new cost for one, because we can agree we're already paying for it. So tomorrow when somebody comes in and sub, there's a cost there along with workers' comp and bike and all those things. So once we reallocate those resources and look at the apples of apples, it's a cost-neutral solution. And if I may add, if you think about it, so right now if we're paying ourselves $125,000 in the cost for the day and the social security to pay for them, then now we also have to pay workers comp from them we also have to pay um uh like i said social security the workers
034comp and plus the front line cost so all that blasted together his cost may be about when you add all that stuff together it may be maybe 50 more than what we're paying and that's a large number so Without using teacher assistance the cost we shouldn't see a significant difference because the fact that we're going to being able to get subs in the classroom Most of our cost is coming from pulling teachers sisters in the classroom and they're the most expensive that we're paying so you can't give us the dollar per day is it's going to be around 150 per per day per sub so what we're paying right now we're paying one $125 for someone who is just a substitute and $252 for a teacher assistant that's in the classroom per day. So we
035don't have a lot of substitutes in what you're saying because we've got to pull it together. Is that what you're saying? We've been using a lot of teacher assistants in the substitute. How is this going to benefit the substitute? The substitute? Oh, they can get benefits from KELOLAND. We can't give them benefits. They get paid weekly. They get monthly. I'll say one thing. They're not in full time, so they're not entitled to benefits. The who's paying him we can tell you how the employees them. Yes. Yes, so the biggest thing I would say I believe the thing we do best is the seamless transition So for the so the only thing they're gonna see different is once a week you get that check once a week for the direct deposit And instead of whole County
036schools on that line item. It's gonna say Kelly Kelly service And keep in mind, pulling these teacher assistants is problematic. And long term, if something happens, we could be paying a lot more. You see, the state is watching that also because that's the one group they would love to get rid of is the teacher assistants. So as long as we need them, then they'll look at that also. But if we're not utilizing them and how we're hiring them, that makes a big difference. Any more questions? I do have a few questions. My question, one of my questions is, you said you're going to get a pool. I just want us to make sure that we're not eliminating the pool we already have. We're adding that pool we have. To your to your pool and the
037other question is, let's say we got stuff that the teachers that only want to teach in a specific school. Are they going to continue to be given that opportunity or not? Absolutely. So. Chair cast alone the biggest thing, like I said, we don't want any really disruption, not to the classroom, but then. to the sub pool as it is. So if I like teaching at Hoke and I live two minutes down the road and that's where I want to sub at only, they still have that option. If they want to work five days a week, they have that option. If I want to work one day a week, they have an option. If I just want middle school. or middle school and elementary, they have an option. So they still have preferences. Now let's go
038back to the part about the pool. So I think this is very important as far as the implementation. Once that takes place, what will happen is Dr. Fortenberry and the staff will look at their current roster. And see like, who do we need to keep? Who maybe do we need to, it's time to move on from if they deem that possible. And I just like using round numbers. So let's say we have 300 subs. And you can transition all 300. And then once from day one, our team will start. It's not just getting one person. So one person would be in the district every day, but you get a team of about eight to 10 folks. So from that, if you go back to that wheel, you'll see recruiting, screening, training, onboarding, placement management. We
039recognize ourselves monthly. So there's a thing that the client manager, the person on site, they get out to all the schools and make sure. hey Kelly's okay but not only that checking on the health of subs uh giving out awards every month uh so if you work 20 days in a month you qualify for the seven month program so that's something it's pretty nice little package they they get passed along um but then like from day one that's when the recruiting team so if you saw the first first list I have improving I mean we're our staffing company so that's what we do very well we've been doing over 70 70 years cali services but uh 28 in the education field but they that recruiting engine starts from day one and that's what i said
040getting out in your community and in different avenues so it's not just like i say grassroots is the technology um putting out job job or postings getting the job fairs and things like that does that answer your question Yes, my last question is also so obviously you're going to consume our pool. And so do you all have a pool that's going to be together with us? We'll just they just constantly add it. So, like I said, we, that, that crop of subs that comes over. They're grandfathered in, so they don't have to. The only thing we need is their out-of-painter. And so once we start the implementation meetings, we'll come in for a few days and let them come in on a time that suits them to get their paperwork done, and they're good to
041go. From there, we start the recruiting process to add more to the pool to make sure we have a healthy number that can support when we do have gaps that... we're not sending kids to the gym or having to combine classrooms if there's a need there. So just so I'm clear, you're going to work with the people we already have. Absolutely. But you don't have a pool standing by already to help us out. You're going to go ahead and develop that additional pool. Yes, sir. So that's what you're paying us for, to add to the pool, to, like I said, get a number that we can support. Hands down when there is a need for. To fill it, fill a gap and if we decide to go on this contract, how long is the contract
042going to be for? Some use this today. Okay, and then also to answer your question, whole county shares with Cumberland county, Robinson county, Scotland county. They work at all the different schools. So, when I think of a pool, there's pools, there's probably some that work for Robinson county. It's already in his pool that they can come and transition over to work someday in whole county also. But that's what you need. Okay. So we utilize subs from all surrounding counties. So we're expected to see results. Yes, sir. Yes. Absolutely. Okay. Absolutely. Does anybody have any more questions? They're going to recruit too. Which we're not doing that for that. I got one more question. So you're going to be with Erica at the career fair that we're having next? The 18th. The 18th next week? Erica
043needs me down there. Y'all signed a contract tonight and she needs me down there. I'm holding her back. But the client manager is locked up with HR. So that's the... They're the face of Kelly every day. And not just for Dr. Gordon-Bayer, for all schools and bookkeepers in Hope County schools. One other piece, as far as bookkeepers, I know bookkeepers are very important in this process. They deal with, a lot of them deal with the front line system. And so a lot of times, I mean, it's frustrating when you have to make a phone call, you don't know what you're going to get on the other line, right? Our client managers are very versed with frontline. So instead of calling the 1-800 number, they can call the client manager directly and get an answer in
044two minutes versus sitting on the 1-800 line for dialing prompt. And I'm sorry, your name is? Clarence. Clarence Littlebrooks. Littlebrooks. Yes, ma'am. No, I'm okay. Does anybody have any more questions? Okay, thank you. Appreciate your time. Thank you so much. Thank you. All right. Next item is the state teacher compensation PRC 071. That's me again. This is concerning the teacher compensation that we give to our teachers in June. Each year we have to bring before the board guidance. The reason behind this is because this cuts down once you guys adopted or once you say yes is what we can do. This cuts down the problems that we have in June when people say, well, I should be getting it or I should not. The state is very specific on who should be receiving this compensation.
045So in this. In these sheets that I have given you, I'm just going to give you the recommendations. The state law says how we should disperse this money, but we recommendation that the whole kind of schools will implement this. As an administrative process following the guidance provided by and we're going to allocate the supplemental funds for teacher compensation. We also recommend that the whole cast was recalculate the per pupil allocation of teacher compensation funds based on the current year. Also, that whole cast will develop the appropriate amount of social security and retirement on an annual basis. That's depending on what the. The retirement rate is. during that year that we're giving the compensation. We also recommend that most county schools will pay a one-time payment for the school year, which is in June. This will
046be paid on June 5th, that's the last day, for our 10-month staff. Employees that started with the school after August 11th, which was this year's start date, will receive a prorated supplement amount. Employees must be actively employed when funds are dispersed in order to receive the supplement. Also, we will pay teachers instructional support that can be paid from the state. They can be paid from the state. That doesn't mean they can't be at the current time. They could be getting paid from federal or local, but they must be able to be in a position that can be paid by the state. So that means that pre-K teachers cannot be paid the supplement. So that's why I brought it to you because we have to actually take local funds to make sure pre-K teachers are included
047because since this has begun, all certified staff has gotten this and pre-K has always been paid from local funds. We currently, you can pay. principles or assistant principles if they are paid as a teacher's pay from a teacher scale. We currently have no principles or assistant principles that are paid that way, so they will not be included in this supplement. No central office employee or substitute teacher working in any capacity is eligible to receive this state funding. So for the 25-26 proposed teaching year, the amount that whole county schools has been given is $3,302,201. This has to pay the supplement plus all benefits that go with it. So currently the teachers and instructional support that will be receiving this is 626. That's the number. So the reason why I put the maximum amount eligible to
048be paid is because teachers see this on the internet also. And it says that the maximum amount that Hoke County can pay It's $4,815 per student. But because we have 626 staff members that will receive it, we recommend paying $4,047 per person. That's going to help us to pay everybody. Now, like I said, those who did not start on the 11th will have a prorated amount, so they may not get that. And the most important things. That I want you guys to understand before we give this sign or get it voted by you, because this is just information is that if the teachers are not working at a school, if they're not dedicated to a school, if their location is 000 or 810, they are not eligible for this supplement. It doesn't make a difference
049where they're being paid for. They have to be at a school. So again, we have 14 pre-case. staff members that should receive this and the amount of local funds that we will use is 56 658 dollars um so we can do this every year because the numbers will change So the amount that state gives us will change every year. And we do this until they decide to stop giving us the money. The dates of when school starts and ends will change. So that's the reason why we have to get it done every year. Because if we make it into a... The one thing that's going to have to make it more generalized, which could cause more issues. So this is what I am proposing to you guys that we adopt this so we can get
050and we, like I said, give this money in June. Any questions anybody have any questions? I have a question. Yes, ma'am. You said that. Teachers that don't work at a school. Don't get paid. Do we have any teachers that don't work? We don't have any teachers But we see when they say instructional staff they can work for EC or they can work for that owns in the in that department if she has them Coded to a central office location. They're not eligible. They have to be located Right Any more questions Thank you. Thank you. Next item is the reading of the license. Allison is getting that up. Good evening everyone and thank you for the opportunity to present tonight. I am here to share information on Reading Horizons, which serves as our Hope County's core
051program for phonemic awareness and phonics instruction in our district. This program is grounded in the science of reading and provides explicit instruction to ensure our students feel strong foundational literacy skills. Next slide please. So just a little bit about the program. Reading Horizons provides a structured, research-based approach to teaching phonics for our teachers. It includes consistent instructional routines such as direct modeling, guided practice, and immediate feedback to support teacher clarity and student mastery. And the program is also highly engaging, helping our students actively participate and retain the learning that is taking place. Next slide, please. Just some celebrations for this school year. We've seen a strong implementation across all of our K-3 classrooms. Teachers are delivering more consistent, high-quality phonics instruction. And we're also seeing increased engagement with students actively participating in lessons and applying
052their learning. Next slide, please. This year, we did what we call Reading Horizons Week. And during that week, we, the CNI team, went into every K-3 classroom to see every teacher in action. And we used that as an opportunity to celebrate the success of our teachers. You know, you have to celebrate the small wins along the way. And it was a great week. We saw all teachers provided positive feedback to all of them and even gave all of them a little gift bag. Thank you for teaching in Hope County Schools. And it was a really great week. And after that, a video is attached. We're not going to play it. It has been shared out previously. But after that, teachers were just so excited about just that week using the program. We received so many
053appreciative emails from them. And so it was a great week, a great start to the school year. Next slide, please. One of our biggest successes has been the implementation fidelity this school year with the lesson delivery time increasing from 19 minutes to 32 minutes and teacher adherence to the program grew from approximately 21% at the beginning of the year to 81% in the year. The beginning of the year is always a struggle training new teachers, supporting them, but we were so proud of that success from 21% to 81% middle of the school year. strong foundation in all of our classrooms. Next slide, please. Most importantly, we're seeing positive student outcomes, which is so important. We're even seeing that on our in-class assessments. Across grade levels, students are demonstrating growth in foundational reading skills, including phonemic
054awareness and decoding. This is so important because across the state, the topic now is about foundational learning. We know that kids get to middle school and high school and they cannot read. So across the state, the question is, why is that happening? And it's going back to foundational learning. foundational learning that bridge between kids learning to decode and sound out words to become Influent readers who can comprehend complex text and that is our goal for really focusing on our K-2 classroom and building those foundational skills in those classrooms So we're so proud of the outcomes this school year and the work that our teachers are doing next slide, please We, you know, when you have programs, it's so important to get teacher feedback. So this year we've incorporated a lot of teacher surveys, just getting
055their feedback on not only the program, but the support that they need in their classrooms. And we've had a positive response. 81% of our teachers rated the program highly and effective, and over 70% report a strong impact on student achievement and confidence with the use of the program. This tells us the program is... not only effective for students, but also sustainable and supportive for our teachers. You can go to the next slide. And as you go, a big part that I love about this is the program provides support for teachers because, you know, when we talk about phonics and phonemic awareness and sounding out words, we all do that in a different way, right? And even myself, I have to go on there and it teaches me how to do that for kids. When I
056think about the teachers that we're recruiting now, some of them may not have an educational background. It serves as a additional support for those teachers and that is a great part of it. It has been a success for us across the district. So just in closing, Reading Horizons has strengthened our Tier 1 literacy instruction, improved our teacher practice significantly, and most importantly, increased student outcomes across Hope County. Thank you. Any questions? No questions? Thank you. Next item is the The technology are for new high school building. Good evening. Mr chairman Superman spells and our board members tonight. I'll be talking about the 4 piece that we issued for the new technology in the new building. All four of these RFPs have the same goals, standardizing our technology, reducing long term support costs, and ensuring our
057staff and students have the technology they need on day one. This technology was also selected from staff input. We brought some devices in from vendors to be assessed by our staff. So our RFPs include that input and why we chose some of those devices. The first RFP is our interactive panels. These are our primary instructional tools for our classrooms. This RFP ensures every classroom has a modern, reliable panel installed, documented, and ready for teachers to use. The RFP also includes training for our technology staff and to train some power users so we can support the panels without any additional staffing. The second one we issued is for laptops for the staff in the classrooms. This RFP again provides a standardized workstation for the staff. This will avoid mixing old and new devices and we will
058reduce support complexity by having everyone in the building on the same platform. The third are desktop PCs. These devices will support labs, testing rooms, and administrative areas. They give us stable, long-lasting machines for high-demand environment and ensure that the building opens with fully equipped workspaces. Our fourth one is our displays slash TVs that will be in the building. These displays support our collaboration areas, some common spaces and instructional rooms that don't require our full interactive panels. This RFP will also include the installation so everything is mounted, wired, and ready before our building opens. Across all four of our RFPs, the goals are the same. Equip the new building with reliable, modern technology, standardized devices to reduce support issues, ensure everything is delivered and documented before June 15th, And make sure staff and students have the
059tools needed on day 1 and they get the maximum value for the school district money on this project. Any questions anyone is the next item is the. They consume report. Good evening. Well, I'm here to present the vacancy report for tonight and to let, you know, we are in recruitment season. This is HR Super Bowl. It's absolutely well time. So on this Saturday, we have our job fair from 9 to 12 at East Toke Middle School. Please come out and support that event. We have a total of 77 positions. You can see on the vacancy report that we need to fill for the 26-27 school year. Of those, you will see that we have 21 EC positions alone. With that, we are offering a sign-on bonus for our EC teachers with a clear license for
060three years of $5,500. Also, for our school psychologists, a bonus of 3500 dollars. We also want to like to thank Dr spells and the board and our kind of commissioners. We did increase the school year. I supplement to help with our recruitment efforts of 9% for certified. In addition to that, I classify 77% supplement increase for classified bus drivers are 18 dollars per hour. We do offer a 500 dollar relocation to whole kind of schools as well. So we do ask that you go out, put on your social media to have people come out this Saturday at East at 9 for our job fair. We would like to start the school year out with all of our classroom with a certified teacher questions. All right the next topic is the actions items. Can I motion
061for item? Number 1. I have a school budget. School budget. Item number one is a Hope County Schools budget fiscal year 2026-2027. Madam Chair, I'll make a motion to approve. Chairman. You got to smile. Chairman. I'll make a motion to approve Hope County Schools budget fiscal year 2026-2027. Second. Those in favor? Aye. Those against? No. Okay. All right. Second item is the 2025-2026 capital project budget reallocation. I make a motion that we accept the reallocation. Second. Those in favor? Aye. Aye. Those in favor? Aye. Aye. Thank you. That passes. And next item is the closed session. My computer is. Third item is a local board resolution, urgent budget passage. Just want to say something real quick on this. I think. I think. 4 members, I don't remember exactly who was email. But I received the
062email message. I'm making an assumption that all the other board members did that. I looked at the whole resolution. And, you know, as the board, we have a vote. Our message is very clear with this resolution. We're asking through an agency that does this for a leaving that they go to the legislators to pass our budget. We're going what, a year? And so it's not working out. So this is how we can throw our weight by passing this resolution to make sure that we get this done. I don't know how many other boards are doing this, but... So I'd like to get a motion to approve the local board resolution urgent budget passage. Chairman, yes, sir. I make a motion to approve the local board resolution urgent budget passage. Those in favor say aye. Aye.
063Those against? Okay. It passes. And now, closed session. I move to approve that we go into closed session and then open on June 1, 2023, page 318.11a1, 3 and 6, to prevent the disclosure of confidential personal health and student affairs. to consider matters related to the initial informant of individual employees and to consult with the board's attorney to reserve the attorney applying his privilege. I second. Those in favor say aye. Aye. Those against?