001I want to first say welcome welcome to our community our students tonight our staff who are doing an excellent job in moving school district as always I want to thank the board for the opportunity to serve serum with the only directors missing are director and director Edwards so I want to say welcome welcome Do we have any uh do we have zoom tonight? >> Okay. Okay. I didn't see to all our alumni uh and all our stakeholders who support us. At this time we have established. We're going to call this meeting to order on 21st4 at 6:30 a.m. We're going to stand for a moment of silence. In tonight's moment of silence, we stand for our our students, our parents, our teachers, our st our community and even our politicians. It is it is season.
002This is also the first day of early voting. So please exercise your right to vote. after we stand and then we're going to go into special recog. Thank you. >> All right. 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. >> Special recognition. So, as you know, we recognize our students and faculty and community that show their stripes. And so, we have a we have a long list of support and fun things to talk about today. So, I'll let Mr. Carlock start us. >> All right. So, we're recognizing some of our readers in the district. Um, so this reader reading the most books for K1 first grade at James Matthew Elementary School for
003the first quarter, Kicia Smith. [Applause] >> Not here. Okay. >> All right. Rearia home. Same thing. Reading the most books for kindergarten through first grade. But this student is from South Elementary School. All right, they're enjoying their day off today. Okay, Jonathan Hillier reading the most books for K through first grade. Come on up live and in person. You want to go back? >> Okay, you can go back. >> Our next wonderful reader comes from Broadmore. Payton Kennedy, reading the most books, K through. [Applause] All right. Kylie Glover, reading the most books, second through third grade, Broadmore Elementary School. Okay. Edward Arnold, reading the most books, second through third grade. James Matthews Elementary School. All right. Still proud of you even though you're not here. Okay. Courtland. Courtland Reed. Reading the most books. Second through
004third grade. South. >> Congratulations. >> Thank you. Price [Applause] reading the most books. Second through third grade 34th Avenue. >> Congratulations Also from 34th Elementary School, we have Riker Harmon, fourth through sixth grade, reading the most books. Brooklyn Dismute, reading the most books. Fourth through sixth grade. Nasier Collier reading the most books for the sixth grade. James Matthews Elementary School. >> Nasir not here. >> I'm sad. >> I didn't mean to. Uh, Paris McDow, reading the most books, fourth through sixth grade, Southwood Elementary School. [Applause] Come on down, Perry. Okay. And those were our elementary school um readers. Will the elementary principles from those schools please stand if you're in the house? We have Dr. [Applause] All right. Thank you. Navy Goldmith, reading the most books, seventh through 8th grade. Pine Bluff Junior High School,
005first quarter. Navy. Belle Oliver, reading the most books, 7th through 8th grade, Palm Bluff Junior High School. Lauren Summons, reading the most books, ninth grade, um, Academy. [Applause] Angel Smith, reading the most books, nth grade academy. [Applause] >> Come on down, Angel. Get your award on your day off. And we have the illustrious principal from Pondup Junior High here, Miss Harris. All right. Now for our high school, we have Somaya Bridgeport, 10th through 12th grade, reading the most books. >> Okay. And this is also from the high school but not a book award but for these students are being recognized for receiving platinum certification by passing the highest difficulty levels of each assessment for the national career readiness certification. All right. So the first person is Omarian Tucker. [Applause] Zamarian White Keon Smith, James Into
006[Applause] Devin McFaten. Okay. The great principal of Pine Love High School. Is he in the house? Dr. Ronald Lin. All right, we don't have a certificate for you today. Okay, now we want to recognize our partners. Um, this community partner uh was with Samaritan Peak uh International and this past weekend or was it a weekend ago? >> Week ago, >> at least a weekend ago, uh they donated 1,000 pair of athletic shoes um not only to the school, but the leftovers are part of the district's uh shoe closet. So, uh, Cal Alexander is the regional director. So, we want to recognize him for tonight. >> That was a really big event. >> Oh, yes. And the event wouldn't have taken place without the famous Dr. Tammy. Dr. Wilson, will you come up? She made sure
007that everything was in place, lined up so that we could not only host the celebration, but she made everyone feel comfortable in a new pair of shoes. >> Thank you. >> I'll just say of that event, um, you know, we get these ideas and these wonderful things and we want to do it and we want everything to take place, but you made it to where it was just so easy. I said, "Dr. Dr. Wilson, you want to do this, Mr. Carlock?" And you handled it. You met with I mean very several Zooms, several several different meetings and thank you so much for all of that. >> Thank you. Thank you. >> All right. Thank you. Thank you. minutes that last meeting scheduled September 25th, 2024. Board members, you had opportunity to view those minutes. Are
008any questions, comments, concerns about those welcome? >> Yeah, my speakers on the teach. Are any questions, comments, concerns about the September 25th minutes? None. I'd like to enterain a motion to approve the minutes for September 25th. Second raise for question. None. All in favor say I. >> I for all the folks say no. >> Okay. So, as far as the financial report, what you will see in your packet and um I hope this is easier to read that way where you have just that one document with the links on it. So, um in that the first report that you'll see is the local revenue collection breakdown. Remember that's the Google sheet that uh Miss Reed has created for us to look at how our tax dollar money is coming in and where you'll see that
009each month. And so, we're I want to make sure we include that every month so you guys can keep up with our local tax dollars. Um the next document is the board report all funds period 1 through three other report. Um also so notice on the board report we are less all those activity accounts but we were able to consolidate so many of those and clean up the board report uh funds uh for September is the next document for September we have the bank uh the bank reconciliation we reconcile the report and then our check register the last reports are about the building fund and the building project. You notice that first document is just our eance document letting you know all the bond proceeds that are in there. Obviously, we started with the bond
010proceeds from last year as beginning balance and then we've added those bond proceeds from this school year. Bond proceeds. Uh the next document is the document that Miss Reed has put together for each month July, August, and September of what the bond proceeds interest is versus what we paid out. And then the last is the total project cost starting when we began the project September 23. >> All right. At this time, I'd like to enterain a motion to approve the financial present for September 24th. >> Private second. Any questions? Any discussion? >> It is a continuation from last year. Remember, that's the they clean up all those phone bills. And so, it'll be Any other questions, comments, concerns? >> Hearing none, we're ready to vote. All in favor say I. >> I for me. All
011the post say no. Y to board committee reports. >> Um does anyone I know that we haven't had a chance to meet with all committees this last month. I know that Dr. has some uh facilities updates. Um, anything anyone else finals and then what else? Okay. So, you want to start with >> Well, good evening everyone. Um, I'm speaking for the facilities committee and just give you an update on the progress we've made so far. First, uh, glad to say we closed on the downtown building. We were looking at selling that building. on that building. Uh we're also looking at getting bids for HVAC for the uh James Matthews GM also Jack Ro. We have the units for the uh GM, but we're looking at getting those installed. So, we're looking at getting folks for
012that. And uh last but not least, we'll have hard speak to us on progress of the hospital. And that will be the end of our report. So, I'm Clayton B with Lewis Architects, members of the board and Dr. Barry. Thank you for letting us both be here. I just wanted to quickly give a brief overview and obviously Sean's got some exciting things to show y'all. I would say to this point as a progress report, this project has run smooth. Uh anybody that's been saying prayers about uh not a lot of rain, it has worked because we've got the vast majority of that hardened drain in and that is a blessing to have that much installed. Hopefully we can get the whole thing done uh without a heavy rain. Uh which that's made dirt work go
013smooth. Uh we've got footings some footings in and we're up to we're up to grade building pad just about everywhere. Uh but it has been a smooth project to this point. There's always some bumps along the way. Uh, East Harding has done a great job. Uh, uh, just team team uh, effort. Uh, Dr. Barbrey, Mr. Drag, and their team has just worked great with us and, uh, uh, hopefully we can continue that that smooth of a of a progress on this project because it's really going well and it's changing fast out there. So, we're really grateful to to be here with this progress report and just hopefully encourage the community and and you guys that things seem to be more smooth. >> Thank you, sir. >> All right. So, I can thank you for that.
014I will just his statements there that we are going project is going very well. Uh I know the dry weather is not great for everybody, but it's wonderful for construction. So, we certainly uh certainly are appreciative. Just to give uh everyone kind of a quick overview. Uh it's getting a little harder to recognize what the site will look like originally, but on that one. Okay. So, that little hole right there that you see and this area right here, flat spot. That's where McFaten Gym used to sit was right there. >> Uh and that hole is actually the one storm drain that we still have left on site from the original pro uh the original project. That was right out in front of McFaden in between there and the cafeteria. So that was the original lowest
015spot on campus. Uh and we're still using that to help pull some of the water off the project. It's kind of our one low spot, if you will. Um you can see here and I'll start the video in just a minute but uh this will be the front new front of the high school which will face Olive Street you see over here. Uh and we are finalizing the last of the demo up here to the far west. That's what little bit you see there is what's the smaller building of what used to be the tric building. So get this started. We kind of talk through as it goes. Here you can see this kind of picks up where we left off at the demo at the end of last month's meeting. That's the very end
016of the Mc George building you see coming down before you there. All the metal is being separated out. Concrete's coming out. Again, this is the end of the tric building. Uh that wall right there by the excavator is the last of the larger building to the front side and the small building to the side. Here's pouring some footings. Again, this is coming along the front of your building. That'll be the main entrance to the left. This is coming up towards um around about to go into the cafeteria along the north side. We've got most of the whole east side of the property poured as far as footings go. There's the Harding drain. It is 12 Those pieces are 12 feet wide, 10 feet tall, and about six foot deep each one of them. You can
017drive your car through it. Uh this was taken a few days ago, but we've got several hundred pieces already installed of the 300 that we'll finalize with. You can see we're already about halfway across the football field. Uh that will continue on just to the west side of the football field. kind of where the old fieldhouse used to be is where that will continue. As you're coming down here, this is kind of coming back towards the academy. You can see the plumbing uh coming up. That's for the where the CL buildings are. And you can see the gravel roaded here is the new drive that will be the drop off right across the front of the building. A lot of that gravel we are actually reusing from crushing concrete on site. You've seen the crushing
018activities going. Uh, and this is kind of coming around to the back of where the new kitchen area will be. As you start to see some of the plumbing coming up, the hardy drain we're filling in as we're going. You can see the few pieces there on the top side. Back to an overview of uh progress to date. So, if you were to come on site uh in the near future, our masons have just mobilized and so we're starting to CMU block below grade right now. We will get our first part of the slabs going in the end of this month, assuming everything still stays dry. And you will start to see checkerboard slabs being poured all through November. Masonry walls, as those slabs dry enough up, we'll start going vertical. And we hope to
019start red iron going up uh in December. So, we are making great progress. Like I said, the dry weather is helping tremendously. Overall, we've brought in about 85,000 yards of fill so far. And we are starting to level out the far west side of the site and we'll finish up the demo with the the little tric building uh probably early next month. that'll kind of get us up to potentially a stopping point for now as far as so we're very excited. Uh the project is moving along. It is holding schedule well. Uh we've had great communications and great relationship with architects and with the fine blood district. We've been able to work through many issues quickly and keep everybody moving and running on. We certainly appreciate it. Any questions? >> I'll say this Dr. O
020meetings which is owner architect construction management meetings and right now they're bi-weekly. So every two weeks we'll meet and look at progress and talk about different things um as the project goes. Those will get weekly more often. But any would like to schedule You just need to email me and we can walk you can do that. However, our next OAC meeting is Tuesday, October 29th at 10:00. If any of you want to go, come to the meeting on site walk that day. Just email me, let me know. Tuesday the 29th at 10. And as you see, Thank you very much. >> Okay. for the facilities did not meet but I did want to remind it and so hopefully that will come before you and the basis for that there would be one standard federal standard
021federal procurement but then there are different so and tonight is my last board meeting of the board. So I wanted to take this opportunity today. I want to thank the rest of the board members for uh it's been a pleasure to ser I will continue to support the district and I hope to continue to support the district. Thank you. >> All right. I guess I uh in terms of governance, uh we had an opportunity to go down to a lovely audit at the Arkansas State Legislature chaired by uh who supporters did superend on it and thankfully uh many of the items that were that were concerned were did not occur through our administration and so we had some dialogue and some conversation about next steps and how we going to those things going forward. I
022just want to say I want to thank superintendent and her team for helping us to clean up some of those things that we've been doing over the last year trying to get us back to the office. Would you like to share more about that? >> Yes, sure. And I put that just under my updates for uh finance. And so um for those that don't know board, if there are a significant amount of m findings or findings in an audit that are repeat findings, those have to go before legislative audit and we have to go sit before the committee and they make recommendations as well. So what happens is when we were audited for fiscal year um and currently right now we're in fiscal we're in fiscal year 25 but auditors are here and they're auditing
023now fiscal year 24 you know it's a year behind. So, I always say that wasn't your audit that um we had to go before the legislative audit for. Um two of the findings um were and you guys saw that in the report. Two of them were uh repeat findings and then the rest were mostly things that we self-reported as a district. Uh those were things that we knew were concerns when we came in and started working in the finance department. And so that was um that was an easy thing to talk about when we when we were able to say we found this and we we knew it was a problem and we reported it to you. And so the hope and what I said to Miss Chesterfield would be that we won't be back.
024That would be the goal. I don't want to ever have to go back there again. And so, um, but I do appreciate, uh, they sent a letter to the superintendent, the board president saying that they request that we both be there for that. So, I appreciate Dr. Rice for coming as part of that. And so, um, it it went well and we're going to be done with that. >> Uh, the other thing I like to govern Thank you Michelle for sending uh board members local to us. Uh so if you're interested, please get back in the shelter so you can arrangements uh to attend. I'll be meeting with that. But I'm looking forward to attending that and forward to attending the training in terms of learning how to continue to be a professional board member.
025That's the only thing I have from the governs you all updated on that going forward. Okay. >> Thank you. boards. All right, now we're going to move to >> Good evening. >> I'm Martin. I am the vice chair of the classified person policy committee. Okay. >> I just want to introduce myself to you all. Uh our chair person is out for a few months. So I'm chair. >> Okay. >> We're going through policies right now and hopefully next month we'll continue to talk about some of those. >> Okay. >> All right. Thank you so much. >> All right. I do not see. >> All right, I guess we'll move on to >> All right. And really quickly before we move on to my official report, I believe we had some students come into the meeting
026that we wanted to recognize and so I'd like to do that really quickly if that's okay because I want to make sure that they get that. >> Principles, you might have to help me out. >> Do we have Payton Kennedy? Elementary School >> first grade top reader reader. >> Got it. >> Congratulations. Thank you. >> You're welcome. >> Thank you. work. Um, Reia Holmes [Applause] for kindergarten from first grade. >> Congratulations. >> My favorite color. >> Thank you so much. Good job. >> And last but not least is Lauren Summons from Ninth Grade Academy. Congratulations. Good job, >> Daddy. Thank you. [Music] >> All right. For the superintendent report, I just as a reminder, I like to talk to you guys about the six systems and how every decision we're making as a board and
027in the school as our focus is on students and how those and how those systems affect our students. And so I want to start tonight by our academics. Um, and as you know that the state has now finally released our Atlas summitive scores and So, we haven't had um a whole lot of time with the scores, but we have had some time. And so, I just kind of wanted to present you a quick overview of um just I'm calling it just a quick overview for the board if you don't mind. Thank you so much, Mr. Sims. So, this is information specifically that I want everyone to be aware of that came from the state department. So, the first time ever Arkansas has a comprehensive student progress system kindergarten through high school. And so this is
028called Atlas. It was developed alongside alongside Arkansas teachers and it's aligned to the Arkansas academic standards. Um this year's results, it's it's set the baseline for that. So this is the first time that they've been assessed on those specific Arkansas standards. Um what we're doing and what we've been encouraged to do is take this data, reflect on our curriculum, make sure that our rigor is there. um looking at all the things across the district as far as consistency and what those what those scores are telling us about how our students performed on those standards. Um and then we're going to take this information eventually the state will take this information and still create a school letter grade. We haven't gotten much more information about the letter grade right now because of the way that everything
029has changed with the assessment. Um so we were not assigned a letter grade at this time. we were told that we would get a letter grade and hopefully we're going to be in meetings with um people from the state department about how that's determined because so many different factors have changed across the state. This is the baseline data. And so the way that the Atlas assessment is um is assessed, they have a level one, level two, level three, level four. So I'm going to go back real quick and talk to you about the levels. So if a student scored in level one, that they are demonstrating limited understanding of those standards. If they scored in a level two, it shows that they have a basic understanding of the standards and that they may know proficient
030in some of those standards but not enough to be fully proficient. Level three says that the student does demonstrate proficient understanding and knowledge of all those standards being assessed. a level four is that they have an advanced understanding of that knowledge and they're ready to be accelerated. And so when you go back and look at the baseline, what they've set, um this is the state. So in the state across Arkansas, um in ELA, which is the uh the reading test, students scored at a 26% we had 26% of our students that were in level one, 39.69% 69% of our students in level two, 23% in level three, 10% in level four. In math, those numbers were 35% in level one, 31% in level two, 21 and 3, 11, four, and then you have the science
031course as well. I will be very specific and say this was again the first time we've gone back and I say gone back to in the past, we used to give what they called an end of course exam. We went away doing an end of course exam and now we're back to that. So in math you have an end of course algebra end of course geometry across the state those the geometry scores were pretty dismal. And so some of the reflections that the teachers that were on that committee, there was hundreds of teachers on this committee that was looking at cut scores and looking at questions and things like that. And the teachers that were part of that committee said, "Well, we have been I mean, this is what we were told. I wasn't in
032that committee, but they said things like, you know, in geometry, we were even though we knew we were teaching geometry, we were still planning for the ACT aspire, which means the student had to know all realms of mathematics for that grade. And so we now can go back to focusing specifically on just geometry standards. And so with that being our baseline this year, we're really hoping that um we can focus more on those geometry standards and do a better job next year. But geometry, algebra, physical science, geometry, algebra, and biology for the end of course exams that we have. So this was the state. So then we talked about the levels, level one, level two, level three, and level four. So here are our districtwide results of the three subjects. So if you look the
033first one on the top left is science and it's just the way the report presented. So in our district we had and I have to pull it up here so I can see it. I can't read it from here. But what you see in the orange is level one, the light green is level two, the dark green is level three, and the blue is level four. So I would like to share that we are not we were told not to compare proficiency levels that what we saw on the ACT Aspire versus what we see on the atlas. But the positive that we see is that you know the level the level two and three those are students that are that do have knowledge of our standards. And so when you look at our ELA scores,
034we still have almost over half of our students. We're going to celebrate that positive. If you look at it break by breakdown by grade level, this is your ELA summit to by grade level. And we did have grades if you look at fifth and sixth grade that scored less. I mean, there were less students in level one than the rest of the levels. The next slide would be our math scores and that's where you'll see I'll bring your attention to geometry. Our geometry um assessment was not very positive. It definitely mirror what happened across the state. And then the next you have our science which I was pleased with our scienceum. ways as far as we still had students with a basic knowledge. Now we need I mean with I'm sorry with um a basic
035knowledge we're just looking to push those. So in our training one of the things that they said was that um if students are in level two it can be a reflection that they are getting the standards they're just not going deep enough the depth of knowledge of being able to apply those standards they that a difference in a level two and a level three would be the application of their knowledge. If they were a three, they were applying the knowledge and they could answer those questions better. If they were a two, they had a basic understanding but not a depth of understanding. What I want to share next is something that we brought before you a lot last year. So remember in the board meetings when we talked about our district CFAs, DCFAs and Miss
036Rolls and we presented on things like that. So when we provided those district CFAs last year, those were the assessments that we were giving our students that were only based on Arkansas standards. We were trying to see if we could prepare them and assess the our students with the standards that they've been teaching which we call the priority standards. And so if you look at this data and I'll try to there's a lot. M Miss Ross created this but it's very interesting. I'm just going to talk about third grade. So at the top what you see is third grade. And if you look at our DCFA I'm just top left the top left data right there. In our district CFA in quarter 4 the overall this is just overall in ELA. We had 85% of
037our students scored in limited understanding. That was on our test that we gave. We had 10% scored basic, 4% in proficient and 1% in advance. Now the discrepancy that you will see is that on our district CFA in third grade in quarter 4, we tested 185 students. If you look to the right on the right side of that, we actually tested 244 students on the Atlas. So we tested more students on the Atlas test, which of course is good, but we need to be testing that many DCFA as well. But if you look at the top right quadrant right there where it says Atlas and it's got limited basic proficient, we had 56% of our students overall score limited understanding on ELA. 36 in basic, six in proficient and two in advance. if our DCFAs
038are showing predicting closely to what the students possibly could score. And to go a little bit deeper in reading fundamentals and vocabulary, that was one of our priority standards. And that was a standard that was assessed on the Atlas assessment. If you look in third grade on the district CFA, we had 1% score above mastery. We had 38% that were at or near mastery. We had 61% that was below mastery. If you go to the assess the actual Atlas assessment, those correlate very closely. So, we're going to take this and we and we pulled the same thing for fifth grade as well, the same the same priority standard and the same overall just so that you could see. And the reason why we chose third and fifth grade to show you guys tonight is because
039those were the two grade levels that we we tested the most in the DCFA just to see the correlation. And so I thought this was really good data on our part as a baseline because we can take this now and say first of all giving the DCFA is very important. We need to continue to do that. Second of all, it looks as if our district test that we're giving the students is just as rigorous and on the same line of standard as what they're going to be assessed in the atlas. And so if we know we're teaching those standards and we know what those questions look like and we're preparing them for that, then it should result in a stronger understanding of those standards and that type of rigorous question. So what I want to
040do with this data now with our district team is meet with principles and talk about the importance of those standards and teaching those and then utilizing that district CFA as well. That's one another piece of data that we're bringing into this. But quick notes, I will say this. So, you know how the original bullet said that this assessment will provide um a kindergarten test all the way up to high school. So, we were we gave the K3 screeners this school year and those screener results just came in last Thursday. Um we do have the results. we have not had enough time to really um dig into the results. Those results are going to be utilized for this school year to plan for students needing um independent reading plans and also independent math plans. So if
041a student scored in a level one on the summitive assessment then we have to make sure that they have an independent reading plan in that. If they score in a level one or risk on the screener data. We have to make sure that they have a plan. And the good thing is is most of them already do have plans. We already have most students in those interventions that need to be there because we began giving screener assessment data the beginning of school because we knew we needed to make sure that we providing those interventions. This is just another piece of data that goes a little bit deeper that um that we'll be able to utilize and be more um specific to those specific inter Um, and then we also will be providing this. We have
042not put this on our Facebook page yet, but it will be coming out. I wanted to let you guys know the state sent out a parent resource document on this document. There are lots of links um to help our parents to understand the scores. Um, and I will say this, the way that this works now is every has access to log in to their students account and see their child's scores. And it does have a pretty good tutorial explaining what those scores mean. Um the parent will get they have to use the students um name, first and last name, birth date, and they get a code from the district. And so our district testing coordinator, Miss Lee, and our building testing coordinators are creating those documents, those tickets is what we'll call to send home
043to parents if parents request them. And we also would email them to them at at a parents request. And so we just didn't want to pass that out because it did have those student information on there. It has their birth date and their and all the information. It's private. So we want to make sure that parents are requesting those. So, we'll send a note home from the schools saying, "If you would like your child's stuff, here's what your child's score will tell you. If you would like your child's code, please contact your child's teacher and we'll get that out to you." But we will also send home and post different parent resources. >> I have a question about the test. Is this a paper test or is this a computer test? >> Computer test. And
044they have to type it. It has a writing portion this year. One of the first that were very noticeable in our data is our students were poorly in writing for sure that really affected some of our I mean that was just very obvious that that affected ELA scores are writing so that was something we've already discussed >> so when they do the act the actual testing do all computers all the students you know computers at the same time they get off how does it work >> yes uh and actually this test doesn't have necessarily a time limit They have up to all day to take it. Once they start the testing, they can take it as long as they do it within that school day. Just even that one section. Used to you only have
045like 60 minutes to do reading or or 30 minutes to do math. Now, if they do the ELA, when they log in that day, they do have as long as they can on that day to complete that task. But it is online and we do have them all in the same room unless there specific type of accommodations that we pull them out for. What grade do they >> It's not required. The transition plan starts for fifth grade. So, we start um tools for learning is what we call it at the elementary school. But, um keyboarding itself is not really required until 7th grade. >> So, are they taking exams that they have to type? >> Yes, our our DCFA they do have to But I don't necessarily know. We're not doing a re a writing
046prompt on that. And so that's something that we could look into for sure. >> They do not type. I mean, they just answer the questions like an open response type thing and multiple choice, but they do not do an actual writing prompt in that. And I think that's something we need to look at. Any questions about the go the rest is just an update in academics. We're still participating in boardroom in the classroom, our PLC project, and that's something that we continue to move forward with. Um, we discussed the legislative audit that we attended. School board election day is November the 5th and I I wanted to talk to you about the board training opportunities board. There was a they call it a regional training that uh was going to be hosted in Powen and
047it's this week and it was hard for everybody to get that on their calendar. Plus, it's out of town even though it's considered regional. Um so I emailed our uh co-op director and this was something she already kind of had going and so the other superintendents in the area also agreed. So, we are going to host that same board training that you can earn those three hours at our actual co-op here. And that date is December the 3. I'll give you some more information about that so you can register if you would like. It'll be at our Arkansas River Co-op. Um, our buses are here. We got all our new buses. So, we have a beautiful fleet right now of 10 passenger buses uh that were some are 65 and some are 71. We also
048have two new passenger buses. Um, so we are continually to update our fleet. We actually run 25 bus routes and so this is helping us get our route buses. I'm so excited that um, a student can enter the bus. That's smells so nice and new. Um, and then we are um, Mr. Dr. Coen talked about soliciting the quotes for James Matthews and Jack Roby. uh under human capital. This month is National Principles Month and we are very pleased with our principles and the hard work that they do and we thank them for all the things that they're doing and I would like to recognize our principles for National Principles Month. Um we've had a lot of professional development this month. Uh we had a group of administrators and teachers go to Atlanta um to uh
049work coincide people for educational epiphany. You know, our star grants that we our star program that we have at 9th grade academy. We had our teachers attend another training for that in New Orleans to see another school and visit with other educators that are part of that program. And we're working on our high quality instructional materials. We have kids first actually on site going through HQIM with our teachers. And then there's an opportunity that we are going to participate in. It's an apprenticeship pathway for pair professionals to obtain a special education lure. It's new that the department has put out and it's something that work I said department of education and so we're working with that as a pilot program. I think we have three teachers uh three pair professionals that actually work for us
050at this time that could qualify for this and so it's just in the beginnings right now but we're we're looking to do that. uh under student support. We're excited to announce we're going to have ACT boot camp this week. Um it's this Wednesday from 6:00 to 8. It's going to be a focus uh reading and science focus. We have free food, free transportation for all students and I think we had over 65 students sign up so far. And so thank you Miss Ross for making that happen too. Working with she's working with our uh Miss Maddie Collins and yes and all that to take care of that. So we're excited. We have we were granted more safety grant money from the state department. They had another group of grant money go out and so we
051applied for it and so we will begin insure updating all all of our um our doors, our locks, our classroom locks, making sure that everyone has a key. We're looking at different so those may be some quotes that you can be coming before you soon. I'm hoping to do a keyless entry if it's it's affordable to do like the key fobs with this grant. Um And then uh also the shoe closet. We have gosh almost over 500 pair of shoes that we'll be able to students would receive. As far as stakeholder communication, every campus participated in grandparents day. We had a lot of great grandparents come out and support our students and we had a really great showing for the good Samaritan giveaway. >> Any questions, comments, concerns for Barbara? to get my question together.
052But first question is does the atlas align with the students regularly like what they do in class what they learn in class. >> It should absolutely the atlas is so we teach Arkansas state standards and we those priority standards from the Arkansas state standards. The curriculum resources are just resources that we use to teach those standards. >> Second question, do the scores from the reflect how the students typically score like if they're students are doing well as students? >> I have not compared actual classrooms. Sure. I mean, I think it would be very easily to do based on now what you would see, you would have to look at a reflection of because what we have now are third graders are now fourth graders. So, you would look back to see those third graders that
053were level one versus two versus two versus four. How did they how were their report cards or how were their grades in third grade? You could do that. That would be correlation. I think the um and I would look even further How did they score on their classroom formative assessments and their district formative assessments? >> I think that I mean I know looking at that specifically I hadn't thought about actual classroom grades though. >> Good. Thank you. >> Now we can move on to the business. >> So the first thing uh that you have for new business is the policy 5.7. I provided that to you last board meeting. It was Um there was new legislation and it's about media um selection of library media center materials. So if someone um how do we select
054the materials and then if someone um want would like to challenge a material what is our policy for that? So we had a policy in place. However the uh based on legislation ASBA updated that policy just to add some more wording. So, what you have in your packet is the new changes that were highlighted based on ASBA's recommendations. And so, I would ask that you adopt this 5.7 ASBA policy. >> All right. At this time, I entertain a motion to adopt the policy 5.7 move second. Ready for question? Any discussion? Hearing none. All in favor say I. >> I. >> All right. For me, all say no. The eyes have. >> And so the next item on your agenda is our purchases. And so under the purchases, we have the property insurance. If you remember,
055we've already done vehicle insurance and we were waiting to we we had submitted changes to the property insurance to the insurance company. And so, but the way that um this document reads, we will since this property was done last year, the way that this is, we will have to receive credits for it. So, I need you guys to approve the property insurance less, and I I put an email in there. It's going to be less around $76,000. All right. At this time, I'd like to enter a motion to approve the insurance. >> Second move probably second. Ready for question? >> Any comments, concerns? >> Um, so I know this is like the replacement cost of our buildings. >> Yes. And the reason why I know that is because there's been a lot of adjustment to
056this because of recent issues with other districts across the state. Wind being an example when they just built a brand new school and it was destroyed by the tornado. So our property values actually our premiums across the state have all gone up because it has to be replaced. And so um I will say that other districts, you know, as superintendents we have monthly Zooms and we talk about different things and so districts are seeking as well as we will be just to see if there would be a better premium that we could get from somewhere else. But at this time, this is still the most consistent one we can get. Um I know that there's a big push for us to continue to work to get better premiums. This one looks a little higher than
057last year because last year, remember, we were able to when when the governor had an excess of money, they gave us an opportunity to take a 20% they paid 20% of our premium last year and we've asked for that again this year as as districts across the state and they have not provided that. So, we're going to have to pay this premium without that red. And um so you're saying that they're going to give us a credit for the buildings that we no longer have. Yes. That's the one. Yes. The deadline. >> Okay. So also we have other buildings that they weren't. >> They were but they weren't. Yes. And they're coming off but the replacement for them. The only one that we had to we were still having to pay a specific fee was
058the one downtown. Now, we were paying a premium on uh Oak Park and Indiana Street and those are coming. Any questions, comments, concerns move second. We have discussion ready to go. All in favor say I. >> I for me. All post say no. >> Um this was something that um Mr. Sims would continue to use. We did seek um more than one bid for this virus. This is a three-year commitment for this antivirus and it was the best deal that we could get based on the cyber security that we needed. We will be paying for it out of federal funds. >> All right. At this time, I entertain a motion to approve the purchase of District Antirus Cyber Security. Second private second. Ready for questions? Hearing none. All in favor say I. >> I for
059me. All post say no. >> And personnel we uh there are two actions or there are two items to be for hiring on the personnel action chart. I don't need to go in executive session unless you would like to. >> What's the board? This time I'd like to be hiring I have a classified hire social worker. We've had two social workers resigned this school year. Um moving one moved and one took a job that he's always wanted which I'm very happy for him. Um and that's that's come before you. So this is a licensed social worker. We're only going to replace one. We're not repling both at this time just for financial concerns and but we know we have a need for that so we're going to replace the one and the other hire is
060a special education teacher. She's retired and um she has agreed to come back to teach special ed at 34 and so we're happy to have her. We need her and so that's the two hires. >> This time I'd like to entertain a motion to approve personnel hires as presented. second question discussion. >> I have a question. >> So, how many social workers will >> we used to have one at a school, one at each school? serving I mean one will be serving two >> I didn't know which two schools >> any other questions concerns are being none all in favor say I >> all oppose say no it's all post say no thank you very much at this We are ready for entertain question. None. All in favor say I. >> I supposed say no.
061I also want to take this opportunity. Thank you for coming out the staff to come with us a little early tonight. So professional purpose imports.