Board of Education Regular Meeting September 9, 2025

001Thank you. Good. Two one now. They not heard it. What is the silence about? So for live, >> we'll call this September meeting of the school district board of education to order. Miss Schultz call a roll. >> Mr. Iverson, Mr. Lynch, Mr. Mackey. >> Hi, >> Mrs. here and Mr. Taylor >> here and President Lynch is off enjoying a welcome holiday and we're expecting Mr. And so the first thing we'll start off with the United States and for all. Okay, we have an agenda and need a motion to approve that agenda. >> I will uh make a motion to approve tonight's agenda with the ability to move items around if necessary based on uh Second. >> We have a motion in a second. >> Any discussion? >> Mr. Mackey. >> Hi, >> Mrs. Shik. Hi,

002>> Mr. Taylor. >> Hi. >> Next on the agenda is the approval of the minutes. Let me get this up. Uh, read the minutes carefully. Anyone have any comments? So if hearing no comments, I will make a motion that we accept the minutes for the regular meeting of August 5, 2025 and the special meeting that we had on September 2nd, 2025. It's my >> Mr. Mackey. Hi Mrs. Sch. Hi and Mr. Taylor. Hi So for the consent agenda, we have the office claims September meeting and then also the usual uh personnel, resignations and hirings. Anyone have discussion whether you like? >> Uh no discussion. I just have more of a a clarified question again. And I always like to ask the resations are effective as of immediate right it would be pointed out if anybody

003was staying and then just where we are with the open hires that we're precenior >> one at the high school teacher and then we have a family school and other than that we are great >> that's good to just take note of and have figured out that's wonderful. Is the family school getting along okay with that for the moment at least? >> Oh, very okay. Well, I'll be happy to make a motion that we approve this consent agenda including the claims and all the personnel. So, a second for that. >> I'll second. >> Any other discussion? >> Mr. Mackey. >> Hi, >> Mrs. Shik. Hi. >> And Mr. Taylor. >> Hi. Okay, now is the time for public comment if we have anyone listening to >> We have one person. >> Is that the ground

004rules here? >> Yes, sir. >> The board welcomes the comments of our community members, but to ensure that everyone will have an opportunity to participate. We have a few ground rules we ask to follow. Anyone intending to address the board shall sign the speaker signage sheet at the front of the boardroom. Speakers will be called in the order in which they are listed on the signage sheet. Speaker comments are limited limited to three minutes with a total time of 30 minutes. To be respectful of everyone's time, we ask that you cover only points not previously made. The order will listen carefully to your comments but are not able to respond during this time. While we cannot limit individuals constitutional rights to express themselves, we also remind speakers that you are each responsible for your own

005speech. In order to respect all persons when addressing the board, we request that the speaker address issues rather than people. The board will listen with respect and ask those who address the board to speak in a respectful manner. >> Good evening. My name is Liser. I'm a member of the board of public open school and we just want to make sure that we're all invited to our playground openings on the 26th of September. And we're planning on a lot of people to be there. We both you all can be there as well because you help the success of that. This is our formal invitation to the board and to all other interested parties. That was less than three minutes. So I >> can I just ask what time that four o'clock sorry four o'clock. >>

006Thank you very much. comments. So, now we're on the discussion items. The first one, cell phone procedures. See, Mr. Do you have comments? >> Yes. >> Uh, the board had asked to see what the specific cell phone procedures would be at the individual school. So I collected those present had a chance to read through them and they want to give uh opportunity for any questions that you may have. >> Yes sir. >> Middle school is not >> Oh maybe I didn't say middle school. >> It it is almost identical to these. I think they use as a template. Sorry about that. Yes, that was their model. Yes. >> For some reason, >> they were not getting a pass. >> Yeah. >> How's it been going so far? >> Uh, as of today, there were seven

007phone incidents injured from around the district. All seven of those were from the high school, which isn't a surprise, but it's a relatively low number. uh considering and I had checked in with uh Shantel couple of days ago into last week and she said it's been a team effort. Teachers have been jumping in and helping helping with that. So early successes, early wins. We'll keep checking in on that to see how it goes. I kind of share with the staff they anticipate it'll go up before it starts coming down. But the middle schools I was talking about Joel he said been very very smooth start. So that's just one year actually comments has been going great and actually in my conversations with those kids they appreciate it. So are they talking to each other? It's

008a lot louder. >> That would have been an interesting experiment. the end of last year to the noise meter compare it to last week. >> Okay. Anything else? >> That's it. >> Okay. Next, we're gonna have a strategic initiative update from past my screen here. Um this is really the term progress review I think is apppropo because this is never done. We are just checking in on our progress. How are we doing so far? Um I will note that there are some last three years we've been pretty consistent with our three major strategies and there's a slight shift that I'll point out for this year. Just for public clarification, this is the overall strategy of the arts school district through the superintendent board. >> That is correct. That's great. Um, this is built on the

009premise that there are specific strategies out there that have shown time and time again to change outcomes for students. Um these are a series of uh strategies from school districts that get um other than expected results. So these these have been the foundation of our work over the last three years. Uh last year the strategic initiatives and and projects that I think are also important there which focused on high quality instruction. And you'll notice that each of these yellow points are followed up with what are the specific things we're doing. So we have instructional agreements in each of our um schools. We have an instructional model across the district. Each of our schools is enga engaged in coaching um to various degrees and everyone is required to have a professional development plan where we take

010advantage of our Friday time that we are so fortunate to be gifted by the community to focus on improving our outcomes. Um that second point is we're ensuring that all students have access to grade level standards and curriculum. I know it seems like a obvious like why wouldn't you but many people actually don't and so we're ensuring that through classroom walkthroughs which are coaching um providing professional learning opportunities for folks when they've adopted uh curriculum to follow up with those curriculum and then of course it should be supported the professional development plan. I'll note that this year the high school has u made a shift in this area and they're adding a progress monitoring tool tightly aligned to the SAT. So I think that would be a benefit there. And then our last goal um

011has been student well-being and primarily that work focused on having uh tier one behavior responses. like what's happening in the classroom and then also what's happening when students are not able to manage that behavior in the classroom. How does that change? Um we did a lot of work last year on creating advisory outcomes and agreements across the schools and then again using our professional development time to support that. And then we always have a few projects that are hanging out there. I try to insist that let's not have any distractions but these are really distractions. These are critical things for our organization. We engaged all last year in our facilities master plan. Um we did a health benefits proposal last year as a big shift. We're about to engage in that process again. We engaged

012in a personnel policy review the DRC which is a teacher group. And then of course we started our self work. Um last year our first school of retaining and recruiting staff, we monitor uh the teaching and learning uh Colorado survey every other year. So we don't have that data this year. Um and so primarily we're just reporting out on salary changes. Starting salary for teachers is at 53,194 right now. That's an 18 roughly an 18% increase from where we started in 2122. That has been across all of our employee classes with some experiencing greater than 18% growth. Um bus drivers, special education aids, pair professionals, some of those um where we felt like those uh cooks, assistant cooks, those salaries were really lagging. We've added extra extra support there. We are working on since uh

013we just have our new numbers in this year for new hires and positions. I think Amanda what you were asking about is we'll have a report coming out the next month just talking about what's our staff turnover look like? How how often are we placing your staff just still working on it? >> Can you go back? Yep. What are the So there's a time the staff survey results time. Does that imply that they think they have enough 64% of people think they have sufficient time to plan? >> Yeah. You know, and time is a is a difficult concept. Um, and I find like in working with teachers now for 30 years. Um, this idea of concept like do I are you employing me for eight hours a day or are you employing me for an

014occupation that takes more than that is a constant conversation. Um, and so it's not atypical really to get rated low on, hey, do do we have enough time. Um, but that is just showing that there's been some progress there. And I hope we see more progress as we continue to work with teacher groups on like how do we how do we take advantage of the time that we do do have. We're always uh acutely aware of the school performance frameworks. Um these are the ways that the state um evaluates our individual schools. They give us ratings as a district. Um we are in an accredited district for the second year in a row. The high school remains on a performance plan which is a great place to be. The middle school remains on a performance

015plan. And the elementary school remain on an improvement plan. And so we'll be working with the elementary school this year on what changes are we making to try to get back onto the uh performance plan. I should say that it's the way this system works for an elementary school of our size that's case 4 is really not fair um because 75% of their performance framework is aimed at fourth grade. And so there's so many other amazing things going on that this this doesn't really capture that. We do care about the outcomes for fourth graders and I'm not trying to make light of that but their entire growth score is based on um that group of roughly a hundred hundred students. I was part of a panel last year. We are talking at the state about

016how that change that specifically for the K4 elementary school. That is the tough one. These larger elementary schools that go K6 they get a little more advantage there. That's four five six four five six. Yeah, they're getting more um not just the one off the one group there. >> So, where is focus going to be the ability to kind of give some ideas of of the elementary? >> We've made some some shifts that we all spoke about and were aware of last year as a board on how we're doing intervention and working on uh supporting individual instruction in the classroom through coaching model and really an enhanced coaching model. And then in addition to that, um we're looking at a new ELA curriculum for for the elementary school. They've had one for a while. They're

017not getting the results that they want to get out of it. It's a little bit peace. Um and so Kelly is leading the leading the charge on that. How are they going to get there? >> And are you building overseeing the coaching or you also part of the the coaching cycle? Yeah, predominantly it's building leaders, but then I go out at least once a month with building leaders to go and coach the cycles and I work with building leaders on what is highly effective coaching. anyway or >> Nope. It will not be included. >> It will not be included. No, >> they have a different separate on separate. >> Yeah. Yeah. They have a different met they have very different metrics. So when we dig down into that performance framework, we like to look at

018how are we doing. There's a rating. This is uh looking at our students across 3 through 8. So it's a summary of that in ELA performance. And we've experienced some growth in having more students move into those top two categories um which are meeting the standard and exceeding the standard. And so you see in 24 25 35% of our kids met the standard for ELA and 7% of the kids exceeded. And so that number has continued to grow over time. We didn't see the kind of growth that we had seen from 23 to 24. But frankly, that was such a big step that I was really pleased to see that we're yeah, consistently we're making uh small growth there and we still want to keep that lowest number. I'd like to see it remain consistently

019below 15, closer to 10%, but you know, we're working on that. Math performance, uh similar kind of shift. We held we had slight gains. We saw a little bit of growth in those kids that are scoring advanced. Um and so it was good it was good for that regard too like we held held on to the growth that we we made and I was I was very encouraged >> there has notid >> that's been consistent. Yep. And so when you look at those proficiency trends across the two areas there, it's pretty pretty remarkable that not one area or the other is increasing at a greater rate. There is been equal growth in in both areas. Um I when I created this graph, I looked at it twice. I was like, "Oh, I must have done

020I must have done something with the data because that can't be right." But um that that's accurate looking at the total number of students that are proficient in the third through eighth grade population. Um so good it's a it's good growth. A little flatter this this last year but heading in the right direction and it's still a good trend. One thing that's interesting to note here the state proficiency levels for this year 44.8% 8% for ELA um was actually not much lower than that maybe two percentage points lower in and so the state has gained slightly where we have gained what 14% in ELA so we are we are improving at a greater rate than we're seeing across the state and that's very similar for math as well so right now we're just hovering underneath

021state averages >> is three >> three through eight that is correct. Now, we're not just interested in um performance. I mean, that that's important. We want everyone to achieve, but we al want to make sure that we have a value ad program and that people are growing. And so, as you look across the bars, um the last bar is the 2425 school year. And so, for growth in third through 8th grade in ELA, we're looking in the 55th percentile. We were at 63 the previous year. So that's not uncommon. When you have a really high year of growth, you get a little bit lower growth. Our goal is to stay um really between 55 and that blue line is at I think 66%. We want to stay in there. So we're getting consistently more growth

022than uh students are other peers are getting in other schools. And this is comparative to other schools. This is saying what are we adding that other schools are not adding. And we need to keep that up all other schools. Yeah. >> And we need to keep that number up um so that we continue to make growth towards um state averages and then eventually exceed state averages. And then a little breakdown there so you can see the difference between our minority and our non-minority students which you're seeing are growing uh almost at identical rates in in ELA. And we looked at math as well. uh and math also slid back slightly but still at the 50th percentile. So still doing average for for the state. Um like I said again that is not atypical to dip

023down. I wouldn't be at all surprised to see it bounce back up next year. The PSAT and SAT is most often compared along this idea of a mean scale score, which is what's the average score that students are getting. The the gray bar that's on there is the state's average score. And then the blue bars are our average scores. And so you can see in the PSAT, which is ninth and tenth grade, uh we had a slight increase in our average score from a 447 to a 451, almost 452. Um and then in 11th grade was just a slight slight dip on the average. You know, there's probably nothing to be too concerned about going up 2% or down 2%. It's not not something overwhelming. Um, and then you can see both also there a

024breakout between our minority and our non-minority students. Um, and this is in reading and writing. And so you might notice that our minority students are actually performing closer to average than our non- minority students. And then again, just for so everybody understands public, this is just grade 11 that you're looking at the bottom, not the entire high school. So it's a small number of relatively small. That's correct. 89 kids or something. >> That's correct. >> Right. This is broken out into two groups. Ninth and 10th grade bump together who are both taking the PSAT, the pre SAT, and then 11th grade pulled out the SAT. And that's the assessment that the state uses um to measure graduation readiness. They have specific cut scores that they have established there. Um then we're looking at the same

025thing for math. Just looking at the mean scale score. Um you see we're making progress on the on the average when we look at all students having a slight increase in the PSAT from 420 to 425 and then in the SAT growth from 449 basically to 462. So some nice nice growth there. Um and then when you look at the breakdown again between minority and non-minority students, you see that minority students are beating the state average for minority student non- minority students are lagging behind the state average. So this is this data we it's been kind of consistently right here like we've been performing average expected and so I'm hopeful that our use of the SAT um both prep materials plus diagnostic tools to help us ensure that both our math and our language arts

026classes are tightly tied to grade level standards and expectations. And then also it goes I think it goes without saying but it's worth saying that the entire school really owns these scores. Reading and writing takes place in science and social studies. This is a team the team effort. It would be unfair to say this is solely the responsibility of a few teachers. And again we'd like to look at performance but then also growth. How are we doing on the growth side of things? The gray bars are the uh state's average growth and then um you can see both our our student um all students growing at the 43rd percentile. And then again, you notice that difference that we're seeing between minority and non- minority students. >> So this so this is a little confusing. This

027is judging from PSAT 910 to 11. Yeah, it's combining just the growth score across all three areas. Um, so that's what's our all three years. What's our value ad? >> Okay, so you would expect that this is showing that 45% of minority students this last year grew in their 11th grade compared to their ninth and 10th. Is that how I read this? It's a it's all students who have growth data and it's the how much they've improved from one year to the next compared to other students other like students across the state. So the 50th percentile means you our students on average scored on average like the state. If you perform at the 60th percentile then our students are growing more than typical students across the state. So, we're having a greater value ad. If

028we're growing below 50%, say we're growing in the 30th percentile, then our students would not be gaining uh an equivalent amount of knowledge that they would be gaining in other schools. >> So, in this case, is there an estimate of how many kids don't take the PSA >> chance? Because if they're if you're looking at growth data, they don't take the PSAT, then you don't have, right? They have to be they all >> they all take it. >> There's no Okay. >> Okay. Yeah. >> Oh, I didn't think they had to take it. >> It is. It's required. It's the state assessment. It's the the state has identified the SAT and the PSAT have their assessments for math and ELA in 9th, 10th, and 11th grade. Um there was a time a while back when

029the state had their own. there was like CAMASS and then they had a high school version of that and then they were using the ACT for a while and now the state has settled on the SAT as their measure for academic growth and performance. Um then we also looked at growth of course in in mathematics. um you're seeing we're still we're last year we're at the 50th percentile we're at the 45th percentile and again you know I wouldn't make too big a deal about being slightly above or slightly below the line but I think if you're seeing consistency uh one way or the other that's that's concern we should talk about it should figure out what we want to do next um that just talk about growth and performance which is a big part of

030what we're here to do is to improve outcomes for students. There's more to that, but just the academic side of their questions from the board. The only question I have is the results of the minority students. >> Yeah. Um, we have from especially with the SAT data and Sean and the school have access to detailed reports that go basically standard by standard just say how do we do so they can look for particular areas of of weakness to see if it's something that we're lacking. You just make it bigger. Maybe we don't teach fractions enough and so we notice that we're down. So there's that opportunity to to look the the difference between minority and non-minority students. I would also want to look and break it out and I didn't for this but I I

031have looked you know what's the difference between our economically disadvantaged students and our non-economically disadvantaged students. How do our uh minority economically disadvantaged students do compared to the state? How do our non- minority note economically disadvantaged students do compared to the state? Typically, when you're in the situation where you have non- minority, not economically disadvantaged students, so you're talking about white privileged kids who have solid economics standing at their home, um when they're underperforming compared to their peers, I immediately look towards curriculum. are we teaching those students at a rigorous enough level um to bring them up with their peers? We had similar data at that middle school um and we were able to move that. I I think that's not atypical in in schools where we have 50% of our students as identified as

032being economically disadvantaged. It's not uncommon for folks to respond by saying, "Hey, I have to, you know, teach down to help kids catch up." And that is not an effective strategy. The best strategy is to teach at the highest level prop possible and pull kids up to that point, not try to go down and grab them, drag them up. And so that's some of the work that I think that we need to do. I'm hopeful that the SAT tools that uh the high school has will um be of benefit helping us identify where are those areas. There is no doubt in my mind that we have excellent teachers in those rooms. We have people that care deeply about kids. They care deeply about their content. They care deeply about the success of students. And so

033when you're in that situation where people are teaching as hard as they can um and they care deeply about the the outcomes, you have to wonder like, hey, are we teaching the right things? Um so we'll take a good good look at that. I think it's being analytical about it and not being opinionated about it. You know, shouldn't be my opinion whether or not we should teach book X or book Y. It should be analytical like, hey, are our kids learning the skills they need given that these are the materials we're asking them? And I'm looking forward to doing that work with with staff and I know that Sean and Shantel are also excited to to do that. And it's been a journey. You know, we'll we'll know a lot more um by mid year

034and, you know, into the winter we'll get more data. Um, I was alluding to the fact there's more than ju just achievement and growth. And we've talked a lot about student well-being. How are students doing? We track behavior data rigorously. Um, it puts a significant burden on our assistant principles and our principles to make sure that we're documenting that that information. Um, and I wanted to share some of the most significant shifts we have seen in the last two years. First, there's just been a 20% decre decrease in documented behavior incidents. Um, that means we're actually seeing less behaviors that we are having to um engage in, you know, coming up with appropriate responses to. We've seen significant decreases in what I would call detrimental studentto student interactions, bullying, fighting, harassment, threats. We've seen those

035drop in the neighborhood between 45 and 67%. I like to believe that that is um due to the quality of the relationships that our students are developing with each other through things like advisory and sports and in their courses they are and the relationship that they have with their peers. So we have specific instruction around um how what are appropriate interactions and how do we respond when things aren't doing well. >> This is districtwide >> districtide all 12 I I could could give you that. Yep. I don't have it in this presentation. Um but that was that's significant. Like do I think it'll drop 60% next year? I I mean I that would be fantastic, but I find that hard to believe. But we should see that these behaviors are diminished um over time. >>

036I know that you guys have talked to a lot of the cheer, right? Classroom, the teacher kind of the first line of defense. And so with um that emphasis in your opinion or have you received feedback that um the expectation is that it's handled in a classroom now and actually the same approach actually kept calling out or requesting uh whatever maybe your support systems are in those schools that that is a reason for any of the decrease is just because teachers are more well equipped to handle in a tier one and they can get it quicker. Also, it's just not going to the office level as much. Do you see? I don't think it's a bad or good thing. I was asking >> I I think maybe it's it's two parts. Um, one part I

037do think we have shared agreements on what responses are supposed to look like in classrooms and how we um I don't want to say escalate because it's not really the right word, but like how we responded in greater levels. Um and so I think that helps because it creates a predictable environment so students are clear on what the expectations are and they uh are clear on what the response is going to be. Um I don't I don't think that um suddenly teachers are managing fighting in classrooms. I still think these big behaviors are making their way to the office. But I do think there's a reduction in the big behaviors because our staff are aware of what students are how students are behaving and engaging with each other in the classroom and they are inter

038they're intervening uh appropriately before it gets to that point. I mean I guess what you know to have you kind of speak more about when you see a 60% I mean you can read into that like what was happening in the schools if we're on what was going on and so now if we are framing it and we're understanding that then teachers have been um either brought into a different system um learning better ways of of a tier to again build relationships, find kids engaged, create belonging in classrooms. So some of those things just like dissipate before it gets there. But uh yeah, I hoping that teachers are not responsible for managing those type behaviors. I'm hoping that there's a clear system of this crossed the line and therefore this is this is out of

039the classroom, somebody's coming in or being called out. But I mean those are big numbers. >> Yeah. And and I wanted to give just kind of a feel like what kind of numbers are we talking about? whether it was it 10,000 kids and then now it's only 7,000 kids and so um there were in 2324 there were just over,00 incidents documented across 15600 kids and then in 20 um 324 last year 23 23 24 last year that was down to like 880 or something 870 all the categories way more than this all the categories. So that was our 20% decrease. A good way to look like our drug and alcohol tobacco violations dropped 57%. But that's really they went from 57 incidents to 20 incidents. Um so it hasn't diminished and that's that's pretty good,

040you know, reduction and that's these are similar kinds of numbers that you would see bullying and fighting. I'm happy to share. >> It's important to kind of talk about that as a whole because If you're seeing these, you're like, "Holy." It's like, "No." You know, because there is still a perception, right, that drugs and alcohol. So I think this is great getting in front of us seeing that we're actually having data that shows um where our business is where we how we are responding and that it is actually important for community. >> Yeah, I think this is uh a testament to the amount of work that our building leaders and staff have been putting into tending to relationships and our response to behaviors. Um I also really proud of the number of um a 35%

041decrease in just suspensions. There's been an enormous increase in conversations with building leaders and with families. And I think that that is our best opportunity for learning and for diminishing behaviors. It's through conversation with those people that are engaged in their behaviors are just another form of communication. So, let's take the time to find out what are people trying to say and what do they need. And so while we've seen this in and out of school suspensions go down, we've seen the amount of time that our building principles are spending talking to students and to families go up. And I think that's a positive. Um, and then I already I already gave away the big the big news. There are only seven seven cell phone incidents up now, which I I thought was pretty great.

042Um, another big success from last year is that we successfully launched preschool. I say we, but I mean Kelly. Uh, and she should be here to bask in that. But, um, we we're able to launch preschool. We have incredible staff that, um, and we are haven't filled all of our seats yet. So, we're going to push out a little bit of a media campaign to try to bring some more um, folks in. >> I ask about seats related to the preschool. Will that out the current district? services that elementary, middle, and high school because they're now having to um serve the preschool as well. Okay. >> It's a different provider and this same person has been serving all the preschool students in our area now just some of them are in our space. Yeah, I

043think that was important to public because I think thereceptions. >> So that's why I wanted to again have it in the meeting as that there is a designated preschool person. It is not the current group that we have serving elementary school. Correct. >> That is correct. Yes. >> Clarification. You have two you have more than one class for 16. So do we have 16 or 32 slots? We actually have one class right now. >> Okay. So, >> yeah, just one class is 16 student currently. >> And so, what time do we have a moment? >> Um, well, that's a good question because it varies from day to day because some people come in on a couple of days and then so we have kind of a magnet board of names to kind of figure out

044what the openings are. So, we're encouraging people that are interested in attending to call and say, "Hey, I'd like to be there five days a week. Great. We have X number of those slots or I'd like to be on a Tuesday and Thursday, right? We have Y number of those spots. I'm not going to say numbers because I don't know them off my top my head. I don't want to be misqued, but definitely calling the elementary schools. >> At any particular time, can't have more than 16 students in a class. Correct. At the any particular >> at any particular time, that class is capped >> because it's a preschool. >> Preschool with specific ratios for preschools. Yes. Um, so looking into this year, um, sticking with high quality instruction, sticking with grade levels, um, standards

045and curriculum. I mentioned the work that we're adding to the high school. And then rather than just talk about student well-being, we're really that focuses on student engagement. How are we engaging um engaging kids? And are we doing that through um engaging content, engaging lessons? Um looking at our instructional practices, do they encourage engagement versus a class that hands out worksheets and have everyone um you know put their head down and work independently? Are there more opportunities for students to engage with peers? Um, so we did, you know, we have been talking about cell phones, but really cell phones are just one easy step to increase student engagement, to provide more opportunities. And I'm speaking about the learning classroom, the learning environment, but I also mean in the cafeteria, in the hallways, we have these

046other opportunities. We want to see our kids working together. Another area that we're focused on is um student attendance. You may have seen the article in the paper. Our chronic absenteeism rate and to be chronically absent is to miss 10% of school days for whatever reason, whether it's excused or unexcused. If you miss 10%, you're considered chronically absent. If you have 167 days in our calendar, you miss 17 days of school for family vacations, for illness, or whatever, you're chronically absent. The state is has told me time and time again that the parents reason for removing the child from the school is irrelevant to them. Um I don't always agree with that but it is it is their stance and our chronic absenteeism rate is near 40% and it is about 10 to 12% higher

047than the state average. We are in the bottom 20 schools or districts for the state of Colorado when it comes to chronic absenteeism. Now our attendance rate is about just over 90% 90.3 and the state average I think last year was like 91 or 91 and a half right in there and so we are just lagging slightly behind that but our students who are chronically absent that's 40% of the kids. So, if we brought 10 students into a room, four of them have missed more than three weeks of school. And so, this is a serious issue. It's hard to engage kids that aren't here. It's hard to get good growth, hard to get academic learning when students aren't with us. And so, I've been working with uh uh building uh assistant principles specifically to address

048chronic absentis. Are we documenting those percentages by building? >> Yes. >> Better in one building versus another. >> It seems they're all pretty typical. Yeah, they're all kind of around the same area. It's not like one is, you know, at 47% another one is 27%. They're all in the high 30s. Um, and when you look at other districts in our area like a Bayfield, it's slightly better than us. Agnosio is slightly worse than us. Um, so I don't know if it's regional. You know, maybe we have a large number of kids that have to leave for family business or ranch work or they leave to go hunting. I don't know if it's just specific to our region. Um, but I do know that I don't want to be in the bottom 20 districts in the

049state. I want to better understand why our students are missing so much instruction. Um, and there's probably a number in there that's reasonable and appropriate. I just don't think 40% is it yet. So, we're working on it. Um, we'll be communicating a lot to families, helping them understand what chronic absenteeism is, providing strategies for helping families get to school, making people aware. We've created a a visualization on our student data website to help people understand like I when I told a family like, well, you know, you miss 17 days, you're chronically absent. They were a little shocked like, "Whoa, whoa, whoa. You just said 17 days. That doesn't seem like that much." I was like, "Yeah, but that's a definition is 10% of the time." And when you start thinking about it, if you're missing

05010% of your work day or 10% of your work week, um, that starts to have an impact over time. So, we want to work for families to improve that. >> So, currently, like are you guys sending out like the eight day letter and meet with a student at like day 15 or whatever? like what are we currently doing that either we need to strengthen or get rid of? Are not far into digging into what current systems are. >> We are we've been looking what we've been addressing attendance but not from this chronic absentee perspective of addressing attendant primarily from the unexcused angle. Like we're really worried about the kids that just are not showing up. there's no family members saying where they are and so we're having to track down where they are. We we've

051been less and I don't think that's necessarily appropriate but less concerned about families that say hey we're off to the you know my daughter is a rodeo princess and we're going to be gone for two weeks. Um we haven't that hasn't raised alarm. I like I said the state has a different perspective on that. I happen to think kids spending time with their families doing meaningful activities is a beneficial use of time. Um I think meaningful activities though is up for debate. Um people staying home for multiple days in a row to play modern warfare is probably not a beneficial use of time. people on a family tour to a national park or to rodeo or I remember uh some families who had to travel to Arizona or New Mexico to pick up their cattle

052to bring them back and you're leaving for a week to do that seems like a meaningful use of time and so having to work with families to try to figure that out. Some families might go to a Caval game which would be a terrible >> examp Yeah. Well, it won't help the chronic absenteeism number. Yeah. Yeah. >> Yep. So those even if they're marked excused >> still counts. It still counts against >> Yeah. And I think it's information we have to convey like, hey, here's the data. This is what's going on. We have to be good listeners and find out how can we help, how can we help support families. Um, some families have a real challenge with transportation. So, we should step in and help with that as much as we can. So, we

053more along the lines of let's have conversation, let's listen rather than let's punish. So just at the beginning of this year, were you able to pull together some information for people to make them for for parents to make them understand that we are in you know what I would consider kind of dire straits for this capacity. There's been Brandy helped me with an article in the paper and then I'm working with our new uh communications person Kelsey Bean to help with some materials that we can start sending home and we'll do kind of like a tier one approach and then we'll have a more targeted approach with some families and we're try to communicate early and often. um you know, as I've talked about in here before, we have a limited amount of, you know,

054hours in the day and time and energy. And so, this is one more thing that is going to potentially distract our administrators and spending time in the classroom and working on improving the quality of the instruction. But the reality is, as we're all looking at, it's like they're not here, we're not teaching them, so got to get them here. So, it's a worthwhile endeavor. I think it'll be interesting to see if we don't seem to improve much this year that has to become a more serious priority for next year >> even more priority really make them understand that uh the modern world still >> and it needs to be purpose which comes back to yet to measure the student engagement Well, that is an interesting question in that um I think if we all wrote

055down on a 3x5 card right now what engagement is, we'd come up with different answers. Um and so that's part of our task I think as a group is to we've done this in other areas is like how are we going to describe what that looks like? Well, it looks different ways at different times. Um certainly last year was easy to identify when kids weren't engaged. They had their phone in their lap and their heading out. So, like that was easy. Well, we took that one. You know, now we're not going to be able to catch those as fast. Um, but you know, there's more to being engaged um than just showing up, you know. I think >> and they're still understanding the pace of the lecture, you know. So, that's what I mean. >>

056Yeah. We haven't You're right about like what how are we going to do a head count? what's that look like um in a room like we went in and you know I said the Darcy like only 20% of the kids are engaged like we have to have a common definition for that um because I happen to be that engaged was you know vigorously taking notes in a particular way as opposed to engage was like they had eyes on text that season so we'll work we'll work on that you know our student well-being task which we've gotten some really good results that was a three-year approach of getting better and better in those areas. And I see student engagement to staying here for a while. So, we'll start again like we did with behavior and say,

057what's a matrix for that? What's it look like? How do we coach people? What are the high yield instructional strategies that increase engagement? Um how do we avoid a classroom where it's possible to be so passive that you're not doing anything with your peers or engaging with the teacher? and how do we help staff understand like, hey, there are strategies you could do instead of allowing kids to opt out. Um, and then supporting them like when kids do choose to opt out, there's a new um, just like with the phones, we all have to approach it together. Can't just leave it on teachers alone by themselves to, you know, whip kids into engagement. >> Yep. I think we've been through questions. >> Yeah. Okay. >> I mean, I know >> I'm pretty good with questions.

058I think we're I think we're good, though. >> Yes. So, we'll move on to the Let's see. The master plan. >> Oh, I the master plan, I think, is just a verbal update. We've all been highly engaged in this. Um, so I just want to give a little update on our main task right now is that we're collecting data rather than opinions. Collecting data about our two proposed sites um that we could potentially if the board chooses build a K8 school and if the community want to support that. So we're looking at those two sites. Um we've initiated some of the initial research we saw at the impact. There was a discussion about school safety. Um by the way that was really fascinating to me that the highest the most dangerous thing on school campuses

059is transportation. Um and so making sure that we have safe routes to school and around school pickup and drop off. Um, but then we'll continue with the traffic study, uh, the environmental, uh, preliminary environmental impact study. I believe they're focused on campus on the third today or Thursday. They're supposed to be on campus. Um, and so we'll continue with those. We'll have that data to share uh, at the impact meeting at the end of October on the 27th and then we'll bring that to the board meeting at the beginning of November. And at that time I would suggest that the board make a decision essentially about where they think so that we can get started on the best grant. And that's the next most important step is that once we know what kind of school

060it is, what school program it is, which is essentially what grades it addresses, and we know the location, then we can begin to craft the best grant. And that best grant is what could give us access up to upwards of 40% of the total cost of our project. And as we've talked about publicly, it's not inexpensive to build a school. So a 40% reduction with a quality best grant is worth our time and time and money. Don't say I just some of that stuff I think we need to say out in a public setting because we did it at impact but I don't think we've done it at the board. But that's that's our next next step right now. >> And that meeting is the 27th of October. >> That is correct. And I believe

061it's from 5:30 to 7. Okay. So that's all we have for for a master plan. Next is a capital I'm gonna do it right now for you. >> I absolutely will not. >> Um, all right. Well, thank you. Still not used to this microphone. So, I'll spend just a few minutes on kind of the first chunk of this. Um, and then a little bit more time discussing fuel conditions. I promised you guys an update. We had a little bit more information about options, things we're looking at going forward with our irrigation system. So, I want to try to spend most of my time on that. So, quickly kind of just starting from the top, uh, last month I went through some of the OCR updates we were doing. We were still in process with a

062uh parking lot at the high school. It is completed as are the other OCR requirements that we needed to complete. The only thing that we are waiting on is a couple of bathroom doors um mounted at the high school that have been vandalized after um Josh had continued completed that portion of his uh work being done. So, we need to get those doors back on at the high school and then we're set there. Uh we were also still working on the elementary sewer line a month ago. That has been completed. They put in a liner kind of from there's a clean out right over here. Goes underneath the office and it kind of does a couple of big dips. I'm sure you guys heard lots about that last year. That has been put in. We

063were planning on a couple of cleanouts here and at the elementary school, but the team that was out those were not necessary. So, it came with a pretty substantial savings for us to not have to put in those cleanouts. That is one of those things I'm hoping we don't regret not doing later on. Uh but we will we will see. We did run into a little bit of a snag with that liner in the last couple of weeks and that there was two sink lines that dump into that liner or the basically when you have that liner through the pipe. There has to be a hole inside of it in order for contributing lines to be able to dump their contents. So, we had a couple of sink lines that were backing up. Um, this

064is a good example of being in a really old building where we all think we know where the piping goes. Um, the sink in the teachers lounge right back here. Um, we all believed and I had been told that it exited that way towards the street. So when we had the sewer line company come out, we told them said, "This has nothing to do with the liner. That line goes out to the street." And so they worked and worked and worked and looked and looked and looked and eventually they actually went to the roof were able to run a camera down the line vertically and were able to determine that that line does in fact go that way and lands into that main line. So that has all been taken care of. all the saints

065are trained properly want and knock on wood, we made it through the first week of school without major uh survey that will continue at the high school. Uh lockers upstairs are completed. I did want to uh say a really big shout out and thank you to our high school custodial team who completed that work on their own. Most of the capital improvement projects, you know, a lot of them we will farm out to u outside contractors and then our maintenance team tries to do as much as we can. With this particular project, our custodial staff jumped in um and got them done and did a spectacular job. So, the only thing we're waiting on there, kind of see it if I zoom in is we still need to put cove base in right over top

066of those benches, which is where the uh the blockers used to be. So, that was we were waiting for that to come in. It's now in a install it. But thanks to that team. Next chunk here. So, a month ago, you might remember the night before this meeting, we had a water crisis in this building where uh basically there had been a water mane break out during the construction site out on 160. When that water mane break took place, particulates and soil entering into the water system, which then made its way into uh our backflows, and one of them had a seal that failed, and then we had a tremendous amount of water dumping down into the wave room in the basement of the school. uh if it had happened at 11 o'clock at night

067and we had the discovery to the next day, it would have been a really really catastrophic event to the school. Fortunately, we were able to catch it within the first I think probably maybe few minutes um that it was happening and so we were able to jump on it, but there was a certain amount of mitigation that had to be done. Uh Mountain Man got them out right away. uh they were able to dry the floor and also kind of went into the processes of being able to document that all of the moisture was pulled out of the floor so we're not looking at issues surrounding mold and mildew um especially around kids. I appreciate management documentation that they did through that process is going to help Eric and I out a lot because we

068are planning on moving forward with an insurance claim. A big part of that insurance claim uh will end up being the fact that approximately 25% of our GI floor was affected by this. And so now believes that we would be justified in placing that gym for so we will be working through whether or not that's an appropriate thing for us to do and whether or not our insurance company uh that's something that they'll do. So I will keep in touch with all of you about the future of that claim. Did throw a few pictures in that I'll just sort of explain as we go through. Uh first one on the left side that is the uh backflow. Ke want to call it a blowout for oil field stuff but that is not what it is

069even though it looks a little bit like it. Um backflow that's the one where we had a seal that failed and we dumped a lot of water. Dan Britain was very concerned about possibility of this taking place and and I don't blame him. You know the idea of a water line break happening and then us having swimming pool at the bottom of our school. So, we went ahead and added a project that we hadn't planned on originally, which was to put a lid station down in that wave room, which is designed that if we do have, you know, another leak or water dump, that pump in the bottom of that sump pump will turn on automatically and then pump that water out. We tested it. will take 88 gallons a minute out of that basement

070to be able to handle even the the uh uh event that we had last month. But that's what the rest of those pictures are are of that lift station which if this event was to duplicate itself, we are now protected so that it's it's not an issue. Also had Dan install an alarm on that so that let's say this happened at midnight and it pumps all the water out and then it stops Well, how did we know that it was going to happen? So, we have an alarm on that system that will continue to sound until someone does something with it. So, that even if this happened at midnight, we have, you know, there's no evidence of water on the floor when we get here the next morning. We're going to know if that pump

071was triggered so that then we can go find the reason, you know, what happened that water ended up in that pump that we had. >> So, that alarm doesn't go to the superintendent's phone. >> No, it just I'm curious with the lift pump. >> Yes. Where is it sending that water? Is it guaranteed that you can actually get rid of that water if there's a problem? >> So, we tested that, too. And I should have put a picture in here. So, if you This room right here where the backflow is on the other side of that room is a is a 6 inch line that goes drop straight down into a really, really big line. So, we actually tied this line into it so that all of that water would then dump into that line.

072And that's a bigger line than what we're coming from. So it will accommodate the amount of water that we would be like in other words the amount of water that that pump up there that line can't question. Okay, before I talk about field conditions, are there any questions about those first pieces that I went over today? Okay, so last month I promised you that we would talk a little bit about kind of what we have done with the field um where we are right now and then some of the options of what we have going forward. So at that point I think well I'll get to that in a second. So at a month ago we were using pause water at a very very high expense. We did appreciate the the district's willingness to work

073with us to be able to kind of do whatever it took to be able to keep those fields green so that going into fall sports seasons our kids could have a nice field to play on. um we were able to uh find a solution and at the last meeting I mentioned that sometimes the simplest solution is what you're looking for and we were able to find that. So I'll detail that in just a second but um if you haven't looked at the field first picture here is what it looked like on August 1st. Second picture is what it looked like last week. It's actually a little greener than it was in the beginning of August. Of course now it's lined um football lines and soccer lines. And I thought this was a neat picture of

074over night and what it looked like um that he had players on. So excited about that. To kind of go over the shortterm fix of what we ended up doing um through just a few really fortuitous conversations that I had with some folks including a a drilling uh consultant and the town engineer as well as the town. Uh basically what we looked at was what could we do to raise the level of the river so that it would cover up our intake pipe which basically the whole system predicates on. And up until this point, we kind of just looked at, you know, when the river drops and it goes below that intake pipe, there's not much we can do about it. Um, I was a little bit naive, I think, uh, which maybe maybe my

075led me to asking some questions that maybe help them find a solution, but basically, we'll put some rocks in the river and make a little dam. I sort of assume that might be a really difficult thing to do from a permitting aspect and whatnot. But it turns out that as this one the town owns the water rights that they have the right to be able to make alterations to the river to access their water right. And I probably should have known that Northern Colorado was all irrigation and I see farmers in the river and in the irrigation ditch all the time um doing things to make sure they can get their water. So the picture on the left corner is the temporary dam that was put in place uh that then created a pool of

076water behind it. This picture, it's kind of hard to uh it's this one right here. That is the very very tip top of our intake pipe sticking out over the water. And you can sort of see the shadow of it. It almost is like a fish underwater that just kind of goes like this. um that that has been totally submerged for the last month and therefore we've been able to get water successfully for our fields ever since. About two weeks ago, I was starting to sweat a little bit, but the river was continuing to drop and you could actually see the little corner of that intake pipe sticking out. Uh we got a really nice rainy day that week and I think they've had enough rain since that it has it has solidified. Um, I've

077talked to a number of locals who have said that this year is the lowest they've ever seen that river and some of them in 40 to 50 years. So, it it felt good that on the lowest year that we've seen, we were able to find something that that was successful and able to keep those those fields green. So, that is the short-term solution. And as we've been going through this whole situation and Rick and my conversations, we really have approached it from a emergent short-term situation we needed to solve something right now to be able to get those fields green, but then also looking at a much longer term situation for how do we make this sustainable in the future. So that's what I'm going to shift to now. um the fix that we put

078in place this this year is not going to be available to us next year. Um and so the the basic reasoning for that is kind of the long-term vision for the Yushi Park area. Um, this would be the areas near the pickle ball courts and the dog uh park and then there's a lagoon back in there that the town is going to be making some adjustments and and I think as the town has been working on this and it's important to remember that they're in the same boat that we are that as our fields were turning yellow so was Park and so they have been working for a few years on trying to determine a long-term solution as well uh that would hopefully address this issue and so this is the longterm solution that the

079town is putting together. Uh I'll zoom in on this picture just a little bit to kind of show you. Um I should have brought a laser pointer, I guess. Um this is the site of the current well placement. Right up here is where our current intake pipe would be. This kind of looks like a necklace. That's the site of a new dam or rock installation very similar to what you see at various points in town. And that is also basically where they put in our temporary dam this year. So with this plan, they would be putting in a permanent structure there um in a rock formation and then putting in it's hard to see it, but there will be a diversion pipe right here on top of that on top of the just just in

080front of it that will then lead to what Rick and I are calling the lazy river right here. Um and it ends up being a bird watching area. Water flows through this area into a large existing lagoon. But back here, there's a smaller ditch which is going to flow towards the pickle ball courts. Then I cut it off down here, but kind of down in this corner. And if you've been over there, look at it. There's kind of a hole down in there, you know, fairly close to the pickle ball, which is where they would be putting in a new system or a new vault. So it'll be deeper than the existing vault. Same pump setup that they currently have. It'll be a vertical pump, but it should be something that is set up better

081to work better. The purpose of this long distance run here out of the lazy river is that that's where your particulates settle out so that when we have murky water and cloudy water, um that those particulates settle out to the bottom before the water gets to our pump. So, um, we've had issues in the past with our pump sucking up all kinds of weird junk from the river, contaminating our systems, clogging up filters, and this is something that they are proposing that should be able to help with that. Um, >> so Jason, that that diversion is open water, a small open water, >> settled out. >> This this piece is now this diversion right here, I believe that would be a pipe. It's going to be down low. Um, I do like its placement here.

082And just from a strategic standpoint, like when you look where the existing one is way above that rock structure as opposed to right here at the, you know, the deepest part of the lake is always going to be right at the base of the dam, right? And so that's kind of their idea with what they're they're doing here with this. I I do want to make it clear that all of this has nothing to do with our irrigation. This is all, you know, park strategic town wanting this to be a really, really awesome park that is also going to include an irrigation component to it that could potentially affect us um a lot and hopefully in a really, really good way. Okay. Um, as Rick and I have been working through this, oh, there's a

083picture here. So, this is where you can see the pickle ball courts would be up here. This is the dog. um people playing with their dogs. And then down here is kind of that deep point where that ditch kind of dead ends in that area where they would be talking about putting the ball. As Rick and I have been working through this, we have gone into it with three uh criteria uh that we've used as our guiding lights and that I'm using as I work through these decisions and deciding what we're going to do next. So the first one is that we want the district to be able to control its own destiny when it comes to water. Second one is that we do not want to require the use of drinking water for field

084irrigation. The third one want to do all that and have it be economical for the school district. Now I think it's important to remember that the options that I'm going to go over with you. I am not saying that all of those options satisfy all three of those criteria. one of them potentially could satisfy all of those criteria and I'll go over that in just a moment. The other thing that I wanted to make sure that I mentioned tonight is that we have never had a formal water agreement with the town. Um it's been a handshake agreement. Very little money has um passed between us during that time. There was a few years when we were paying a little bit for electricity for the pump and I think the last time that was done was

085in 2022 and it was around $2,200 at that point. Uh Eric was able to find some other payments for me for prior years ranging between $1,500 and $2,000. So I want to make sure that it's known that I really appreciate what the town has done for us over the years and that they've not been gouging us on water. Um, now we haven't got the water that we've needed for our fields, but it's also not been something where there's been a the town has not sherked on their responsibility for this. And I I just want to make sure that I put that in. Um, and that I'm really grateful for what they have done for us. The other thing that I have to mention is that the town does have water rights. We do not. And

086so any agreement that we enter into with the town is going to have them kind of being in the driver's seat a little bit because they do own they they own those water rights. Uh so all of that said, here's the four options that we're looking at. I actually want to start with option four because it kind of provides a nice perspective that that will help in looking at those other options, especially from the standpoint of being economical for the district. Um, and that is the possibility of installing a turf field. That has been investigated and was found that it would cost approximately a million dollars to put in the initial turf field and then you basically have to put money aside over the course of the life of that surface to replace it in

08710 to 15 years. So, the numbers that I saw was a million dollars up front, approximately $100,000 um a year that has to be put aside so that in 10 to 15 years that can be addressed. If we were wanting to also address the baseball field and the softball fields, which I mentioned a month ago is really important to me. I was a baseball player. Um, I would want as a baseball player to have a nice field just as much as I would want the football players to have. But that would drive that price up even more if we were going to try to put artificial turf on all of those fields. Um, so we can kind of see when we run it through that filter the amount of money that could be spent on

088this if we were to choose to go that direction. So going back up to option one um, and this is kind of the classic rent versus buy situation. So option one is that we can uh partner with the town to invest into a new solution that they that I detailed for you up there. Um the town is projecting the total for that entire project to be $100,000. Um if we were to go into it 5050 with them, that would be a $50,000 one-time investment. And it could be less. Um Darren with the town has has explained to me that it it well could be less, but the 100 grand total would be would be the top for that. Um that would give us a seat at the table. um a part of the design process

089as far as kind of the nitty-gritty if we were to choose to go that direction. >> And that's the project you're speaking. >> That's the lazy river and the lagoon. >> That's exactly right. Correct. Um which that project in one way, shape or form is going to happen whether we sign on to it or not. Um the second option is that we could go more of a yearlyou with the town where we per we give them a sum of money yet to be determined where we basically are renting the rights to the water. um they invest in the equipment and the you know doing the project and then we just pay a yearly sum each year to be able to get water for our fields as part of thatou probably somewhere in the5 to $10,000

090per year which on one hand feels like a lot of money but on the other hand when we start talking about the possibility of putting $100,000 away each summer to be able to replace a turf field it's a pretty small sum if we were to go that direction. Option three is the only one that has the potential in my mind of satisfying all three of those criteria in that if the district was to own a well, it truly would allow us to control our destiny when it comes to water. Um obviously would not require the use of drinking water. The biggest question for it is whether it can be done economically or not. So that's why I put that the cost is currently unknown. Um, I have gone into a contract with Joel Hellwig, um,

091of Justice Well Systems, which I appreciate your connection with him, um, to explore the possibilities of drilling a well. Um, it would be real easy to say, well, it's going to be too expensive to drill a well. Uh, and then the reality is maybe it doesn't cost as much as we thought it would, which case we would have missed out on an opportunity. On the other hand, without exploration of some kind or without resource research, you could dive into a project like that, spend a tremendous amount of time and a lot of money and get to the end and not have good usable water in your fields. And I'm not okay with that either. So, what we are doing with Joel is we're dipping our toes into this question um figuratively of is this something

092that could be possible? um we are not paying him a very large sum of money right now for him to spend a couple weeks looking into this and to get back to us with this might work and if it does if he gets to that point then I'm willing to continue to investigate a little farther until we get to the point where we either pull the trigger and say yes this is what we want to do or nope this is way too risky for taxpayer funds and we're not willing to take this risk. Um just to kind of let you know where I am with those other options kind of the buy versus rent. um is that I I like to think farreaching for the district as much as possible and I tend to have

093more of a buy versus rent mentality in general. When we also look at funds available, we know that we currently have capital funds available that we could use to be able to make that initial investment. And then at that point, the yearly payments aren't going to have to happen. In a few years, we could well hit a point where, let's say, we have to cut budgets and maybe we don't want to have to spend $10,000 every year to being able to pay that yearly quote unquote rental payment. So, kind of where I am with it is that if I feel like we're going to be in this for more than five years, I feel like probably purchasing the seat at that table and actually making the investment is probably a good way to go. If

094we get into this drilling thing and feel like that's going to be a good option, let's say we know that it's going to be a year or two down the line, then at that point, I think it's probably would be very economical to let the town do their thing, build their system, they can own it, we would rent the water from them for the year or two years that it takes to be able to get the well up and running and then at that point we have our own solution that belongs to us goes forward. I would not be a huge proponent for renting long term because very soon, you know, within five years, you're going to spend as much money on the rent as you would have spent to purchase the initial solution in

095the first place. So, if it's something where if we decide not to drill the well, if I feel like we can solve this problem for the next 10, 20, 30 years and do it for $50,000, we really came out ahead. So, um I think that covers everything that I wanted to go over. I apologize that was a pretty long-winded presentation. Um would be happy to take any questions that you have at this point. >> Questions from the board? >> When do we have to let know what our >> So, and I've appreciated the town's flexibility on this. I sat down and had a meeting with Darren Lewis last week. Um what he is doing because he has to create budgets and he has to, you know, basically make proposals. his budget proposal is that he

096is hoping that the school district will go into a partnership with them and if we choose to go into that partnership then great but he also understands that we may not. Okay. So we have time to be able to make this decision. um he is aware of the well option that we are looking at and he's also aware and we've discussed the possibility of putting together an agreement where we would pay a sum yearly for our water if we end up going that direction. So I do not feel that we are under the gun right now for that um which is a good thing. I appreciate that from them. But just know that if and when they publish a budget, they are putting us in as a hoped for partner for that particular project. >>

097Okay. >> A couple questions, Jason. Yes, sir. >> What is the time frame for the investigation of the well that that we're >> So, when I talked to Joel last week, he said he kind of thought he needed about two weeks to be able to do it. So, we contracted him to 10 hours of just basic research. He has a geologist associated with Colorado School of Mines that he thinks can help with um kind of the plate tecton we need to go back to high school plate tectonics. Uh you know so we have we have sand we have shale here you know in this area which complicates drilling. We also have a lot of geothermal going on underground and we don't want to tap into that. So the question is once you drill through that

098that manga shale shell, what we want is this Dakota aquifer that sits on on the rocks right below that. And and he his term was he said it's kind of a crapshoot and whether or not once we get through that bank of soil, that shelf, is there good water underneath that? And so that's kind of what he's needing to explore in similar wells around here. and then talking to someone who knows more about the plates. The unfortunate thing is that there has not been a really good, I'll call it a survey um of the plates under this area. Um Joel mentioned to me he would love to be able to eventually truly document what underground looks like here because it would aid in future well drilling. Um, northern Colorado, where I'm from, there's a a

099massive, massive oil boom that's been going up there for the last 12, 15 years. And they know everything there is to know about underground because those big oil companies have spent a tremendous amount of money surveying exactly what's happening. And so when they drill, they know what they're drilling into. And currently in this area, we just don't have that. There is not as much money in water as there is in petroleum. So, um, so he's going to have to do what he can to hopefully help us feel more comfortable and and I want you guys to know, I mean, solveny with our community and the funds that we've been given are of utmost importance to me. I I am not willing to um go to a casino with our public dollars. You know, I I

100would want to feel fairly comfortable that if we're going to spend money on this, that there's going to be a big payout at the end. Joel did tell me if if this does pan out, if this is something like if we do it and the water is there, this would be an unbelievable move for our school district to be able to own our own water rights to our field. Um, and and would be a just better than winning the lottery, you know, if it if it's something that works out for us at that point. Well, you did mention that talking about other wells. That was my question. There must be precedent for somebody who's drilled a well at some point >> in in the vicinity of where we would do. This is on it's going

101to be on school district property. >> School district property. So, the challenge there is that the closer you are to the water, the more able you are to to access surface water. And by surface, it's still underground, but it's still it's leeched out from the river, right? Once you move on to school property, it's far enough away from the river that you're no longer accessing surface water. And that's where you get that point where you're actually having to drill through all of that shale. It's called oil shell for a reason, which drilling the act of drilling through that contaminates your water in the first place. And then you've got to be able to get to that pure water source below. Anything over 80 feet deep you have to cement and case just exactly if the

102same way that you would you know do with the petroleum well and so that significantly boosts the cost that you have. So the question of wells, there's lots of wells near the river. Like if we wanted to get an easement from the town to be able to drill a well right next to kind of where they're putting their well, it would be a lot easier, but then at that point we're still beholdened to the town for that easement and whatnot. So, um I think that there probably is precedent, but the challenge is the farther we get away from the water, the harder it is to be able to determine how deep we have to go to be able to get to that water. >> Well, you probably already considered is there any chance that we

103could enter because we don't own own our own water, but there are existing wells that we could tap into, right? >> So, it's interesting that you say that. Um, I was on a call about a month ago with a lady who works with the water conservancy district. There is a well of some kind of near the corner of the district property that according to what we found there is owned by a private citizen, but it would be worth me finding out a little bit more about what that is. It seemed very out of place on what I was looking at and I don't know if that's irrigation water or not but as we're looking at this question of a well yes I mean I if it exists and it's there it'd be a wonderful thing

104>> that building >> no it's all the way up kind of are you familiar with this right >> so it would be on the if you go to the high school it would be north of the high school where you and I talked about um solar panels. >> Supposedly on the corner of that there is a record that there was was a well there at some point in time. >> Never owned by the school district. The record that I saw I think was like 1955. It went way way way way back. >> Well, thank you very much for that report. I think that was really great for us to hear all of these aspects of what's going on. >> Thank you. I appreciate the work of you. >> Thanks, Butch. >> From now on, this

105will be noted as the Mackie report anytime I talk about the grass. >> Okay, we're all done. We'll move on to Mr. Burke who has a cash flow report. Good evening. Uh slide two on the cash flow similar to last year's yeah format July and August are actual shows projections based on averages what we show right now is that we will still be solit March when first round right now everything looks good. We'll do I will update this weekly and then I added a couple of other slides here just to show some of the differences over time. Slide three shows where we are this year in terms of Florida property tax versus state share. So our total program this year is 19.6 million local taxes. Now that local tax number does not include 1.7 that

106has not been calculated states program that is >> the program so you can see in 2122 here I started 54% local share share % then the reason for that if you look at slide four shows the valuation trends since 2020 tax year 21 that year our spread was at $322 million projection for tax year 25 was was relatively flat until this year's that little section on 2.5. So those are based on the preliminary evaluations that came out in August final ones in December. Questions for Mr. B. It's great information. A little shocking as always. 88% pretty well. Thank you agreement assessment calendar item F. Just want to make you aware just want to make you aware of this year's uh schedule of assessments and some surveys. We're conducting health survey which is a partnership with

107the uh state and assists with some of our grant funding. There is do not believe there's anything on here that hasn't been on here yet the past. No action is needed. Just awareness information. >> Any questions assessment? >> Okay. Then we can move on to a discussion of uh board visits to schools. Uh given that uh President Lynch said he could be slated at anywhere, but given that maybe he's not here until October. >> Yes. And I'm perfectly happy to be able I have visited the middle school for so a few years since the high school and I'm happy to do that. Would you prefer going into high school? That's okay. >> Yeah. I've got all the schools. >> Yeah. So, I mean, you're you're very familiar with the elementary school because So, high school.

108and Should we put in there? He said moment talk about that. superintendent just we we we wore him out and now he's what I what I'm wondering is if uh San Juan Mountain School would be I think a a nice thing if Mr. Hull thinks that would be appropriate. >> Yes. >> Um you know just to schedule maybe one visit San Mountain School and I can reach out to Stuart Is that okay if I reach out to her directly and then say that work sometime either well two visits or one visit? So right now I have uh elementary school Dave and myself or President Lynch middle school Amanda and myself high school Butch and Bob and then I'll inquire about S. Fantastic. Okay check that off. That's very good. So we're going to move on

109to action items as further discussion on that. We have a food service contract to consider. This was a little bit of ground day. We issued two pieces here. One for milk pizza. And as we have this is the fourth year in a row. We receive one bid for each of them and below it shows decrease in price seal milk. roughly $700 and for the pizza. >> So given that this is a contract signed now it's if milk prices vary it will still limit this price. Correct. comments or questions. >> I don't know if you can answer that. I was just wondering about the >> I can raise a question. >> I can find out for myself. I was just curious about >> I used the request for data. >> Okay. Have no further comments. We

110need a a motion to accept this food service agreement with Papa Murphy's medical proposal. I'll second that. >> Schultz. >> Mr. Mack. >> Hi, >> Mrs. Sh. Hi, >> Mr. Taylor. >> Hi. >> So, finally got here. We're moving on to this the second reading of policies. That was very easy. Thank you very much for this. And I'll just ask which was were you happy with the way it is worded? Now I know you brought a very comment about liability there. So otherwise I didn't have it. >> Well, excellent. Thank you for taking care of that. And so we need a motion to accept this policy KFR on second the uh I'm sorry not policy it's what am I trying to say rule regulation. So we'll hear a motion >> is a policy right >>

111aced. >> Any further discussion? >> Take the vote. >> Mr. Mackey. >> Hi, >> Mrs. Shik. Hi. >> And Mr. Taylor. >> Hi. >> Okay. Excellent. Uh, comments from the board on meetings. >> You haven't come to >> Not yet. Not yet. tomorrow. I think probably safe to say that both superintendent action and the board don't have any opposition we've kind of removed ourselves from the process as a board as a organization uh there will be you know some financial impact to those of us that remain but we're still waiting for >> and that'll be the 26 26 27 >> 26 27 school year the school year >> no I wasn't able to go to the first stack meeting that was today so it's a district accountability uh committee and when I talked to Mr.

112Holton, he was saying that there potentially the DAC is actually going to attempt to redo the schedule. Currently, it meets um the hour before the the board meeting, right? There's conflicts to get um maybe the majority of people that would like to participate. So, I think they're in talks of maybe trying to change the date, potentially the time. So, more information will go out. Um, if anybody is interested in joining DACK, you can email myself or uh Joel Hernandez uh about joining DACK and just keep you know that information out as it's kind of nailed down >> the DAC members still membership. >> I mean it was the first meeting of the year and again I wasn't there. I think there's some there was some conflicts in schedule which is why I think um looking

113at trying to move the heat time right and day of the week >> the actual roster is pretty much the same as last year or >> yeah for for now I think that that uh as Mandy was saying we're just trying to move the date to there's conflicting other board meetings in town that other engaged parents are have identified like hey that second Tuesday is complicated for us so we're looking at possibly changing that and possibly adding some additional time to the meeting. They have a lot of responsibilities when it comes to um looking at our unified improvement plan and talking about our budget. They're supposed to give the board recommendations on that. That takes a lot of work and they're deeply interested in increasing parent engagement and trying to manage both of those things

114in a short amount of time. It's been complicated for them. So, they're exploring ways to increase membership and maybe expand some time. So, we're giving them space to do that. >> Okay. And they uh we don't have an event on the agenda for the future yet. Give us a report. That'd be nice to hear from at some point. >> Well, for me, the early childhood council met on the 27th of August and the main thing to record is Lauren Harris was able to secure a lucrative grant from Valentine Foundation to fund educational opportunities for the local early childhood ed teachers. So, that's kind of That's it for >> three months. >> So any further trouble in >> Okay, Mr. Holtz. >> Uh I'll just give a little extra Boseis uh update. We have the superintendent

115advisory council is splitting for additional meetings in addition to our regular monthly meeting to support Bosey's regular Bosey's operations and discuss our special education supports. We're dividing up into two subgroups. One is going to address the pending separation from Monazuma Cortez. What's that look like for staff and services? Um there are a lot of shared positions in the Boseies. That's how composes work and so navigating that is going to be difficult. So there's a group of us who are engaged in that work and then another group of us who are working on um what is how will we decide what the contribution is from districts? how much money will be contributing. Part of that will depend on the volume of services. You can have Boseis light and pay a little less money or you can

116enhance the services that you're getting but you got to pay for those to get the extra staff members. And so getting that group to decide like hey what's the right the right level to best support our students and and staff. Um and then looking at our structure, the the Boseies uh hasn't in the past had a systematic way of increasing our contribution, our proportional share. And so they've come to superintendent over the years with we think it's eight more percent, we think it's four more percent. And after a long discussion, both the both these director and the uh superintendent advisory council thought that was a bad way to proceed. And so we're going to try to build a predictable schedule that also pivots off of how the state determines how much additional funds is coming

117to districts. Um so we're looking at that um making it some kind of proportion or some kind of incremental amount that's comparable. So districts aren't experiencing a 2% increase in Boseis is showing up asking for a 10 or vice versa. Districts get a 8% increase and BOSI isn't getting a fair share of that. So we're working on that. Um that'll take us a minute to go through. I suspect I'll be the rest of your those activities. And then our biggest lift in our general monthly meeting is just figuring out how to improve special education services across the district. looking at more uniform instructional practices, looking at tools by which we can help our support our principles and evaluating the quality of our programs. Um, and just working on ensuring that our staff are influenced by

118the best and most appropriate programming and not just operating based on this is the way we've always done it. Um, so that's a big lift, big lift there. And the only other thing I wanted to say publicly was just uh I want to make sure that I Kelly uh Binding did an incredible amount of work. I asked her to share the work and she insisted on on tackling the bulk of that and it is really is because of her that we have uh successfully launched preschool and I'm very grateful for that. she was adamant about making sure that um she was able to expand educational opportunities some of our youngest community members. So I'm really excited about that. I think that was a big win. Boseies is very excited for us as well and uh

119we're looking forward to working more closely now with the early childhood council. Any further >> regarding topics for upcoming meetings? What is next on the agenda is I brought uh to the board um concerns relating specific populations in our school and maybe a policy for uh to look at and review. I would really like that added to the next month's meeting. I have um engaged with families for you know several months to ensure that this could be a public conversation. Sorry if I got added uh to at least the discussing discussion section of next month's meeting, please. >> Yes. And I I neglected to say that at our last meeting when we were planning that is on the list for next month. So, but thank you for saying that. >> Yes. >> Thank you. >>

120I'd just like to step out here and just call out your staff here, Heather, Jason, and Bart. You make this all happen. So, thank you very much. >> Thank you. Anything else? All right, we're done. >> Thank you. Any questions?