001Stone County Board of Education board meeting is called to order. Notices for the meeting were properly posted and provided to those who requested direct notification. Let the record show all board members are present except Miss Fuqua, Dr. Herring, and Dr. Maples. We'll begin with a prayer led by Mr. Hillyard, followed by the pledge led by Mr. Young. >> Shall we pray? Our Father in heaven, thank you for the state you've given us and this opportunity to come together and discuss the workings of our school system. Father, we pray that we will make the best decisions we can for our employees and for our students. We pray that as we start this new school year that you'll bless everyone with good health and keep everyone safe. Watch over and protect us for our sins in Christ's
002name. Amen. >> Amen. 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. >> Board, we have an agenda before us. Do I hear a motion? >> I'll offer. >> Miss Kilgore offers a motion. Do I hear a second? Mr. Hillyard seconds. Any discussion? Hearing none, all those in favor? Motion passes. We'll begin with a superintendent report. >> Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Um I certainly have um a great report tonight. We get to recognize several folks in our district and also talk about um the playgrounds that are coming to our district as well. So, first of all, I have the honor to recognize the Alabama Governor of School Representatives Griggs Brown and also Addison Norwood. And the
003Alabama Governor School is a 13-day program held during the summer at Sanford University. It provides academic, creative, and leadership experiences for a limited number of rising high school juniors and seniors who have demonstrated exceptional ability and achievement in their studies. Students must show high intellectual and creative potential. Limestone County Schools had two students represented at the Alabama Governor School this year. Briggs Brown from East Limestone High School and Addison Norwood from Elkmont High School. both are rising seniors. Rather than just presenting these outstanding students with a superintendent commendation, I've asked both of them, which they were so glad to do this, I know, asked both of them to share a little bit about Alabama Governor School. Brick, will you come forward? You choice. And um tell the board a little bit about some of your
004experiences and what you learned by participating in the program. >> Yes. Thank you. Um good evening. My name is Briggs Brown, a rising senior from East Limestone High School, and I just wanted to take a moment and say thank you. Thank you for giving me the opportunity opportunity to attend Alabama Governor's School this summer. It was truly an honor to represent both my school and Limestone County alongside my friend Addison Norwood. During my time at the program, I participated in the magazine publishing class where I had the chance to collaborate with other creative students from across the state to develop a magazine centered around our time at Governor School as sort of like a memory book. Um, I got to show my creative creative flow of ideas and execution through digital design, photography, and editing.
005This class also allowed me to tour the Dot Dash Meredith Studio in Birmingham, where I got to see where Southern Living, people, and other magazines were created. We got to meet designers, photographers, and other creative minds that helped make such a personal and diverse piece of art that I see day-to-day on social media and newspaper sections of grocery stores. This allowed me to get a much better idea of what I would like to do in the future and opportunities I can apply for following college and in the future. I also took part of the creativity seminar in the afternoon which pushed me to think in new and innovative ways and challenged me to approach problems from different perspectives. This seminar helped me build friendships as well as see many different views of creative thinking. This
006this experience helped me grow not only as a student but as a thinker, a f and a future leader. I'm incredibly grateful for your support in making opportunities like this possible for so many students like me. And I'm proud of what I've learned and I'm going to bring what I've learned back to our school and community. Thank you for Thank you again for investing in students like me for this amazing program. Thank you. Now, you want to go up from Elmont. >> Hi, my name is Addison Norwood and like he just said, I'm from Elkmont High School. Um, I want to thank y'all for allowing me to go. Um, it's a it's an honor to represent Oakmont and Limestone County. So, at Governor School, I was able to do the legal seminar in the morning,
007which was amazing for me because I want to be a corporate lawyer. So, I really enjoyed it. So, my teacher was Dr. Judge Bowry. She was um a US district judge. So, it was really cool to have that firsthand experience from her. So, first we learned about the constitution and kind of like we interpreted it as well as talked about how it establishes the powers of um the branches in our government. Next, we talked about the difference between federal and um state courts as well as judges just like the different rules and what powers they have. Next, we talked about sentences. So, we talked about the differences like in how each crime has like a mandatory minimum or a maximum and how the judges can interpret that as well as add on due to like
008character, the history of the convicted. And next, my favorite part of the class probably was hearing from different lawyers. So, Judge Bow's family is just all lawyers. So her her husband is a corporate lawyer which he talked about just like how he builds relationships with his clients as well how as he talks about like the legal matters of the company and her daughter-in-law does stuff with human trafficking which it was kind of it was very heavy and a lot to hear because you know you don't it's not something you talk about every day. Not something you expect to hear but and her son or her son did stuff with gender law so it was really cool. He wrote um he wrote something to the Supreme Court. It was kind of like a point of information
009about the medicine and the hormone blockers and it was he showed us what he wrote to the Supreme Court and they ended up passing it for the whenever they were um doing the trial for the gender medicines. It was really cool because it was so much it had so much information like it had many like like 20 different articles just talking about the effects of medicine. And it was really cool because he's super passionate about it. And something else we did, we went to the Hudo L Black Black Court and we got to hear um pre-sentencings. So basically those are like plea changes. So we got to hear um three plea changes from change from not guilty to guilty. And you know it was kind of it was a lot. It was really um heavy
010you know because you know you think like those people have committed felonies. they've committed like very terrible crimes, but once you're in the room with them, you kind of humanize them and you kind of feel for them in that situation. It kind of it just kind of showed me that like there's an emotional side to law as well. And then the final thing we did was our MC trial. So, we had the opportunity to um do a mock trial and our coaches were um students from the Cumber Cumberland School of Law at Samford. So basically we're the class was split in half and we had a defense and a prosecution and our coaches taught us everything in the about the courtroom. So just like etiquette, you know, like how to um question witnesses and stuff
011like that. And luckily the defense won so that was a great victory, but the trial went really well. So my afternoon class, I had creativity with Briggs. And like you said, it was really cool just to learn different ways to think, you know, because like you think like like you want to go straight forward with everything you think like you know you have to follow all these rules but every time we were given a problem we didn't we had broad set of rules like we just could do whatever we want and it just kind of like it was kind of cool to see what everybody else did with those broad set of rules. So I definitely had a fun time and I definitely do want to thank all of y'all again. I'm very glad I
012was given this opportunity. Thank you. Well, I'm so glad that I had them come and speak because I certainly learned a lot and the experiences both of you had are phenomenal. Um, Rigs, when you talked about the different magazines you got to to work with, that's phenomenal. That you got to work with, you know, judges and lawyers, Addison, that that's great, too. So, we're got a lot to be proud of here in Limestone County and thank you for representing us so well. Next, we have the superintendence accommodation for Dr. Britten Anderson. I'm so glad you're here tonight. Thank you for joining us. I called her and told her about this good news and ask her if she would come to the board meeting as well, and she agreed to do that. But the National Space
013Club is a local nonprofit that promotes US space leadership in rocketry and a astronomic astronautics, excuse me, astronautics. The organization supports and recognizes exceptional educators who demonstrate a strong commitment to teaching excellence and community engagement by offering funding to educators interested in earning their national board certification. This year, Dr. Britten Anderson, an outstanding teacher at West Limestone High School, was selected as an MBCT scholarship recipient. National board certification is the most respected professional certification available in education and provides numerous benefits to teachers, students, and schools. It was designed to develop, retain, and recognize accomplished teachers and to generate ongoing improvements in schools nationwide. Please join me in congratulating Dr. Anderson as she once again shows her commitment to her students and her school by furthering her education and her professional development. Dr. Anderson And now,
014East Limestone High School. East Limestone High School was recently named a two-time blue ribbon lighthouse school based on the blueprint for excellence assessment process. East Limestone once again met the criteria in all nine categories. Student focus and support, school organization and culture, challenging standard and curriculum, active teaching and learning, technology and integration, professional community, leadership and educational vitality, school, family and community partnerships and indicators of success. Designation as a blue ribbon lighthouse school lasts for five years at which time the school will be eligible for revalidation. Blue Ribbon Lighthouse Schools commit to sharing expertise and exemplary practices with other schools on a local, regional, and national level as well as providing mentoring and networking to schools seeking guidance and assistance in school improvement initiatives. I would like for Laura Root to come forward. And as
015the board knows, Laura Root is our new principal at East Limestone. She couldn't be here last time, but she's here tonight. So, we're going to welcome her as the new principal. Um, she also had Justin Moore with her if you want to come forward, Justin. Um, B Medley is here as well. Um, Brian Green, I saw him in the back if y'all want to join us up front. Congratulations first of all. Congratulations y'all. So last um at our board retreat treat in the spring, we started talking about playgrounds and we started talked about accessibility of our playgrounds, making sure that our students had accessibility, um to make sure that the surface was appropriate for our students, to make sure that our equipment was safe, um provided great learning environments as they went through and played
016on the playgrounds. And so the board approved us to move forward with having playgrounds at all campuses. We started with Elmont. When we built the school, we were able to put in a great playground there. And then now all the other schools get to benefit um from us approving them to have a great playground. Um moving forward, I just want to share a little bit of information. The board has a notebook in front of you. We won't go through the whole notebook at all, but um I I think you'll appreciate that. But um just wanted to port out point out Compan is the company that is providing this um the materials equipment um their Omnia partners um which is a cooperative purchasing um so we're able to go to them directly and and use their
017materials um for our playgrounds. Um Christie the the consultant for them went around and talked to all of our elementary principles and u PE teachers and got some input on design. Um you know of course we had a budget we had to live within but um they were able to get some very nice playgrounds um through what the board approved um back a few months ago. And so if you'll just look through the front first part of your packet there, it talks a little bit about Compan. Um their US headquarters is in Austin, Texas. They do about,00 playgrounds in the US on an annual basis. Um so they do have a big footprint here in the states. Um they of course lead the industry in design and research. Um they're inclusive for all ages and
018abilities and of course they have the highest quality and durability on the market as far as playground equipment. Um they do use of course recycled material. Um so they try to protect the environment as well. Um they use a lot of um old fishing nets actually that are um you know um whatever captured in the ocean and then used um for a lot of their playground equipment. So, it's nice that they do focus on that as well. Um, the inclusive part I think is really important for our district. Um, you know, we we have children with special needs. Um, not just children that are in wheelchairs, but other children that that need certain play areas to play in um to feel comfortable um and also gain that experience of playing with others. And we believe
019these playgrounds um do accomplish that. Um, of course I like one part because I think, you know, resiliency is so important and that's kind of the word of the day, but one of their slides talks about, you know, it's very safe and and and Lee was talking to other principles today and talked about the surfacing, you know, when a kid does fall is they bounce right back up, you know, because it's very soft and very protective. But they talk about safe while encouraging risk, you know, and I think about that a little bit. um the kids are going to have to you know expand their um you know belief that they can do certain things on playgrounds as well and and so I think that's going to be important um because they need to take
020some risk once in a while um and our playgrounds will will provide that. There is a slide in here about the warranty um for these playgrounds. You know different parks of course have different warranties. We feel good about that. Um and you know they've been very um proactive and you know very responsive um in anything we've had at Elmont so far. So um we're certainly appreciative of that as well. Of course they have a design team that designs playground equipment around the needs of children. Um they understand of course the the physical needs, the social emotional needs of children, cognitive needs and also creative needs and the value of play. Um, so then if you go and look through um your booklet here, you'll see that we have the designs for each playground. Okay? So
021Cedar Hill is the first one and they're going to be very similar throughout. Okay? But there'll be pictures of the playground equipment. Um that will be the swings. Um that dome area that you'll see is something they highly recommend as far as play with our students. And I think she said about 70 students could actually play on that one piece of equipment. Um is that dome looking area that you see there. Um there's a bigger picture if you flip on through um where you can see a lot of students playing playing on that piece of equipment. You can see the surfacing there. Um there may be some minor changes as we go through this process. But um that just shows you some of the equipment there at um at Cedar Hill. >> Is the surfing
022different colors like it is? >> It can it will be different colors. Yep. Kind of based on what the school needs, their colors, their equipment, that kind of thing. >> Okay. >> Yep. I think most of the slides they actually say they put the slides um in a gray color. If they put them in another color, they'll fade. But the gray won't fade. So they suggest that the slides are gray. um so they won't have any fading over time. And then Creekide um if you'll look at the Creek Side just there's two different playgrounds at Creekide as you know there there's primary and elementary. So there's about a thousand kids there at Creekide and so there two different playgrounds but if if you look at that and and I added this to the agenda but
023if you look at the Creekide playground there's actually a picture of the shade there. There's two big pieces of shade and then there's a shaded area um that teachers can use kind of an umbrella shaded area. Um so the other schools will actually get two of the big shaded areas and one of the small shaded areas. Um but Creekide their playgrounds are a little bit smaller. Um so they only get one big shaded area in one and one big shaded area in the other. I thought the um there's a picture in here of the Y'all see that seessaw type apparatus. Y'all see that? I just think about the old >> Yeah, that one right there. And I think they said about seven or eight kids could actually um fit on that um seesaw and I
024think about >> we can do that with that 2x12. >> That's what I That's what I was thinking about. Um >> I think we had a 2 by8 or something. But I I don't know. We couldn't afford the 2x12. Um but you know, I think about it's just a lot different than what we what we had um at one time. But um anyway, very nice equipment, very nice opportunity for us as a board of education to do this throughout. Um great for our students. Um it'll be there for years to come and um just just great opportunity. So, thank you board um for agreeing to do this. Um and like I said, we do have the addition of the shade later. Um, and I put the budget in there for that as well. But, you
025know, it's kind of a it's a turnkey job for us. Um, the demol demolition of the equipment and removal of the equipment is included um in the original amount that we budgeted for. Um, there is we have had a few people want some of the equipment and so we may allow that to happen. Um, but they'll have to remove like the concrete on the base. Um, that's not part of the demolition part of it. Um, but there may be some opportunities for folks that want a piece of equipment to get a piece of equipment before we haul it off. >> Okay. Okay. >> That's all I had. Any questions on the uh Creek Side playground? Are you going to uh put the two playgrounds back toback or are they going to be in separate locations
026of >> They're they're separate. Um they're close but but they're separate actually. If you look at that um that picture in your little booklet, let's see what page it's on. >> Well, starting at page 25, I'm looking at a two separate playmat, >> right? >> That's the way it's set up. You know, it kind of helps with the two schools by doing it like that. >> Okay. >> Good. Okay, before we start with our financial update for Miss Hubard, we'll take a short break. If anyone would like to ease out, uh, you're welcome to stay. I'm not asking anybody to leave, but a lot of times when we have pictures, people want to ease out before we get finished. So, I'll give you that opportunity. >> I thought for sure all you had come to
027hear us, but uh, Hey, congratulations. Take care, my friend. >> Congratulations. >> Hey, how you doing? >> I was Yeah, I was talking directly. >> Thank you, sir. >> You did good. You did so good. Well, >> okay. >> Assuming everybody else is uh terribly interested in the school business for tonight. Miss Hubard will turn you loose. >> Okay. I handed out financials. We're going to look at the month of May. So, we're eight months in May. We were eight months through the fiscal year, which I still can't believe we're here, but we are here. So, that's about 67% of the way through the year. If you look at our local revenue, we were at 25.7 million and that's 83% of what we have budgeted for the year. If you look at our expenditures, we
028were at 93.4 million and that's 66% of what we budgeted, which is right on track for the year. If you look at the fund balance, one month is 12.2 million and we're sitting at 51 million. So, we have 4.17 months fund balance. We have moved four million over to the capital projects fund so far because that's 500,000 a month for eight months. And you always see there's a little bit more in there, but we have that extra money in there where we refinance the debt and then we have money that we save in there and that money earns interest as well. So, that's interest on that money for the year. So, I did want to point out on the little chart for the month of May, we got $258,000 in interest on our money market
029account. So, that put us a little over two million for the year. So, for eight months, we've got $2 million in interest, which is >> crazy. It's crazy. >> It's crazy, right? But we're going to ride on this one as long as we can because it's probably going to come down at some point, but we're going to enjoy it while it's here. That's all my good news for tonight. Y'all have any questions? Please ask. >> Anybody have anything? >> Item six, consent agenda. Do I hear a motion? >> Mr. Young offers a motion. Do I hear a second? >> I'll second. >> Miss Kilgore offers a second. Any discussion? Hearing none. All those in favor? Motion passes unanimously. Item seven, discussion, approval of personnel actions. Do I hear a motion? >> I'll Mr. Hyard offers
030a motion. Do I hear a second? >> I'll second. >> Dr. Hering. >> Dr. Herring seconds. Any discussion? And uh number A, item two is the instructional assistance. There are those new positions or filling in positions that became vacant. >> I have to go back. Yeah, I'd have to go back and look at that one. >> They new. >> Those are brand new. >> It's brand new, folks. Okay. So we we looked at schools that have over 60 EL students just to provide some support for most of our EL teachers have over >> between 70 and 90 on their case load that they see on a weekly basis. >> Okay. So we're in in our process we're we're moving them to speak English or we just picking them up and trying to put them into
031a grade or >> so the the purpose of them is to work with them to help them learn the English language. >> Okay. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. >> Any other discussion hearing? None. All those in favor? Motion passes unanimously. Item nine, price change for breakfast for employees and visitors to $3.15. >> Did I skip eight? >> Graduation. >> All right. >> I'm sorry. Item eight, graduation schedule for 2526 school year. Do I hear a motion? >> Mr. Young offers a motion. Do I hear a second? >> Mr. Hyard reluctantly seconds. Any discussion hearing? None. All those in favor? Passes unanimously. Now item nine, price change for breakfast for employees and visitors, $3.15 to comply with federal regulations. Do I hear a motion? My favorite motions end in to comply with federal regulations. Those are my
032favorite ones. Did you Did you offer that? Miss Kilgore offered a motion. Do I hear a second? >> Maybe. Maybe. Anybody? Mr. Young seconds. Any discussion? Hearing none. All those in favor? Motion passes unanimously. Item 10. Discussion approval of the settlement agreement. Do I hear a motion? We all feel the same way. Dr. Herring, >> I still need a motion. Mr. Young offers a motion. Do I hear a second? >> Is that a second, Dr. Herring? >> Okay. >> Dr. Herring offers a second. Any discussion? >> That's a reluctant second. >> Yes, sir. Yes, sir. It was. Do I Do I hear any discussion? Hearing none. All those in favor? passes unanimously. Item 11, student handbook updates to reflect focus act policies. Do I hear a motion? >> Motion. >> We're getting We're getting with
033it now. Now we're going. Now we're going. This the right side of my right side of the table offered the motion. Miss Kilgore offered the motion. Second, Mr. Young. Any discussion? And this is compliance with new state laws. Correct. Correct. This is putting everything in order, >> right? These are the consequences. Um, you know, I ran this by principles of course. These are the consequences we're going to have in place if student um violate the rules and the new law of the focus act. >> So basically, we we updated the rules before and now we're updating >> well, we did a policy and now we have the rules in the handbook and what students going to follow. And after tonight, if this is approved, we're going to make sure we get the word out to
034everyone with what the new law is and what the rules are moving forward. >> And is this different? I'm going to ask a stupid question. Is this different than the policies that we just updated? Is >> so this goes in the handbook. So it's like under the technology section of the handbook. So it gives the consequences. First time that a student breaks the rule, they get this consequence. Second time they get this consequence. And so that's what this is. The policy is more general, you know, and it abides, but this is more specific as far as what happens. >> But this is on each individual situation. It it narrows it down. >> Yeah. It's progressive. It gets the more you break the rule, the more strict the punishment >> and that's going to be a
035shock to our students. But I'll just throw throw that out there. >> Any other discussion hearing? None. All those in favor? Motion passes unanimously. Item 12, addition of Limestone County Board of Education policy 5.12, paid personal leave. Do I hear a motion? >> I'll offer. >> Miss Kilgore offers a motion. Do I hear a second? Mr. Hillyard offers a second. Any discussion? Hearing none. All those in favor? Motion passes unanimously. Item 13, license agreement between Limestone County Board of Education and Limestone County Commission. Do I hear a motion? >> I'll Mr. Young offers a motion. Do I hear a second? >> I'll second. >> Miss Kilgore seconds. Any discussion? >> And what's And what's that agreement? >> Where? Go ahead. >> So So there's a piece of land that we have over by the bus
036shop that the county commission is interested in. And so this gives them a right to get on the property to make sure it's suitable to build on. Um if we make an exchange with them, >> I can test it. >> Okay. >> Any other discussion? Hearing none. All those in favor? Motion passes unanimously. Uh item 14, is that correct? Purchase of shade for playgrounds at Blue Springs Elementary, Cedar Hill Elementary, Creekide Elementary, and Primary, Johnson Elementary, Sugar Creek Elementary, and Tanner Elementary at a cost of $230,000. $230,76923 from Compan Incorporated. Is that right? Compan. Do I hear a motion? >> Motion. Dr. >> Herring offers a motion. Dr. Herring offers a motion. Mr. Young seconds. Any discussion? Hearing none. All those in favor? Motion passes unanimously. Item 15. I'm sorry. >> We do have the
037new principal at Clemens here, Marty Bennett. If you want to stand, Marty, so I can see you. Thank you for being here. Um really like his start date is tomorrow. >> So we're really happy about that. We'll see you tomorrow at Owens, right? >> Okay. Very good. Welcome aboard. No pressure being here. >> No pressure. >> And we also have Miss Brooks here, too. Um I was going to recognize you, you know, when they came up, but I didn't want to do that because the board hadn't voted on you yet. So, um she's going to be a new assistant principal um over at East Limestone. So, >> great. Okay. >> Uh item 15, adjournment. Do I hear a motion? >> I'll offer. >> Miss Kilgore offers a motion. Do I hear a second? Miss Kilar
038offered an enthusiastic >> motion. Mr. Young seconds. All those in favor? Motion passes. Thank you. Thank you all.