Salida Schools Board Meeting 1/13/26

001I 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. >> Thank you. Miss Laterno, would you please call attendance? >> Yep. Uh Dr. Breenidge Pettit here. >> Dr. Hill >> here. >> Mrs. Lunberg is not with us tonight. Mrs. Pascal >> here. >> Dr. Rhodess >> here. >> And Miss Shookman >> here. >> It's now for time for board member comments. Does anybody have anything to say? >> Um I think we would just like to say thank you Tori for all of your many many years of service to our group. Thank you guys. I you know it's David's known for a while I said was my first conversation and that letting staff know and

002you know it's all those things even even in this job even stepping down. Yeah. >> And you know, we'll still on the chemistry in the building. Nobody gets it like they do about how tough this job can be. And you're always anybody that's worked their grain of salt who's in this business for kids. And have that time with students and I've been at this 25 years. I've been in the district for 18 of those years and a lot of different positions. I I want to spend the last few years of my career just working directly with kids because that's you know you want to go into that with that passion still in you and the academic part. So I know where I'm at and I appreciate you guys and all the support and also you

003know Jody was ask me where do you want to go? What do you want to do? And that's always the the big question. I've been in three of the buildings. There's three I haven't been in. So that's been over here. The other side over here is I I have a passion for middle schoolers that have a lot of behavior stuff and so that's kind of also in brain. So we'll see >> it's like all the administrators will say I'll take kid problems all day long. You know that kind of stuff. But it's hard, but you get it. Where the adults, you kind of it's like, you know, there's for lack of a better term sometimes where you just want to say, "Get your act together, you know, but we're all in a position where we

004have to hold our words and those sorts of things." But the kids, you're like, "Okay, I get why your act isn't together, but we're going to get it together and we're going to keep working." And so that's why I'm appreciate you guys and all the support over the years and all the relationships I've built. Thank you. >> Absolutely. Anybody else? Tiffany, anything you want to say? >> Well, I also want to recognize Shannon because she had a decade of service to the school district and she's also the one responsible um for the the cool COVID masks that match the bow ties and then the bow ties and then the beautiful knitting. So, you're quite a team. Thank you very much for all you do. I would also like to read a quote from one of

005the board reports for the public. This one comes from the tech department. It's pretty epic. The bottom line is that the Salida School District now uses the same communication platform, WebEx, as Apple, and 95% of Fortune 500 companies. We utilize the same paging and mass notification systems that the Pentagon does. Our new network has the same capabilities and architecture as Stanford, MIT, and Oxford universities. Once we transition to our new Palo Alto firewalls used by Harvard, eight of the 10 largest banks in the world and nine of the 10 Fortune 10s this summer, the Salida School District, technological infrastructure and backbone will be world class from end to end. Thank you Josh and Jake for doing that on a nickel budget. >> Back there teching. Yes. Okay. Okay, let's go ahead and go to public

006comments. If you haven't filled out your purple form, it's over here on the desk and you can bring it up to me. In the meantime, let's go ahead with Mike Lemon CBT communication. Reminder, you have three minutes. Make it efficient. >> Um, you can you you just own the arena. All right. I beg your pardon. Ready? Go. >> Representing myself as parents, as a teacher, as a coach, as a co-president for the SCA, and as a sweet team member. I just want to talk about the process start for the next couple of weeks. And I want to bring up the fact that since the restructure, we haven't necessarily come up with a clear communication plan between the CPC and the board of education. I want to throw something out there that we continue our collaborative

007nature by coming up with a way coming up with a mean coming up with a norm that is both are all effective, efficient, and accurate. There's so much misinformation being thrown around this place right now. Not this place but this place. The persontoperson communication at this point is going to be key. We don't want this us versus first them. They said, we said, I said, we me. That sort of thing. And the way to avoid all that is to make sure that we are communicating clearly and effectively and accurately. Yet again, the idea is how do we do that? Our first meeting is the 23rd with our orientation. Our first real meeting getting into the nuts and bolts is the 29th and I would love to between now and then try to come up with

008a plan for how is it that we're communicating back and forth either after meetings before meetings or what are we doing in the meantime in between meetings. So as CBT, as SCA, I would love to throw this out there that we are continue to build that bridge, continue to work together as we have the last few years to make this relationship that much stronger, knowing that we are all in this together and trust is so important and intent is so important and yet again the only way to really do that is to communicate directly. I appreciate your time. I appreciate your service and I look forward to seeing what we can do in this next semester. >> Excellent. All right. Thank you, Mike. Next, we have Roz Rosalyn Roberts talking about library policies. Are you

009ready? in touch. Um kind of together. >> Yeah. I am. >> Okay. Thanks, Ross. And um thanks for the leadership and preventing those cheeks from getting worse. Don't I Don't even say it. Don't even say it. All right. Next we have >> she has to go last. >> Oh, pardon me. >> Next we have Andre Wilkins, also of co-president of the union regarding postcards. Go. CPA Colorado Education Association uh puts together lobby day. That's next week on the 22nd where all the associations across the state of rural Colorado go to Denver and we see our legislators and we let them know how we feel about whether or not they follow through promises that they said they were going to do or not. And we've been doing this postcard um uh thing for a few years.

010If you remember BS factor got bought back after getting thousands upon thousands and tens and so many postcards legis legislators saying hey you ran on this follow through. You ran on this fall through Trump said follow through. And so the note card campaign next is looking at how we could work within the constraints of favor to make sure that we relish some funds at the state level to go back into public education instead of handcuffing us into not being able to make ends meet. I appreciate department of nickels and you know since we don't have pennies anymore I assume that's an inflation that didn't land. Uh, so I I Yeah, it's a little close to home. These postcards can be hand delivered next week by SEA members that are attending the rural retreat. All you

011have to do on the back is say, "Dear legislator," and then followed through with the second sheet that houses for you. Um, I'm not I don't want to debate politics and whether or not you think Taber is good or not. I do want you however to really look at this and see how much we are handcuffed um as a result of something that happened in 1988 and it is now 2026. >> Let's revisit still working just as >> if you have any questions Mike and I would be happy to answer as well as some other SBA members. I handed a bunch of cards and papers to Dr. Blackburn. If you need one, get one for anybody can turn them in. anybody submits up. So if you have some family members at home or friends that

012would be interested in this small step of acronism, I would appreciate that as well as >> Okay, hold on just a moment. Andre, raise your hands if you do not have a postcard to write on. Okay, we see have a couple gaps here. >> Well, and then there's not enough of these. And then do you have and raise your hand if you need some of the guidance with the um untie the knot? Raise them high. Teresa, it's okay. >> Oh yeah. >> Oh, >> okay. And then once we write our cards, we give them to anybody that's in the union, anybody on CBT or anybody that's doing the legislated. Who to whom do we give these? Alison, you give them to Sarah. Jana J's here. >> David. David or Andre. Okay, we got all kinds

013of options. Perfect. And under time. Way to go, Mr. Wilkins. All right, Miss Parks. Evelyn Parks. Okay. >> Okay. If you need, we can move through the agenda if you need that to happen. No, you're ready. go like I can stop her. >> Transportation, but I'm also the staff appreciation committee. And this month, as everybody I don't know if everybody knows, is board appreciation month. >> Not everybody's here, but every January, I always try to bring you guys something special. You guys got a nice dinner. Hopefully, you all got fed. There's still more food, so make sure you go get some more. But I found some really cool presents for you this year. Last year I just kind of gave you whatever. This year I found some really cool ones. >> Okay. >> So >>

014yeah, that's >> I got you some really nice head. >> Thank you >> book. >> Help me contain my thoughts. >> Well, you like to write things down. >> I do. I'm digital immigrant. >> Um, did you have one? goes in there. >> Getting them to the other. >> Yeah, I remember. >> Yeah, absolutely. >> So, who in this one? >> Well, Karen and then our new our new whoever we appoint. >> Okay. So, this one's for Karen. >> Okay. >> Yes, David. You're not forgotten. You get one, too. >> Thank you. >> Gosh, thank you, Evelyn. Really nice. >> And so does Kim because she is your secretary. >> Notebook. >> You get one, too. >> They're really nice. I really like them. And then thank god Brett was able to get these ordered

015in time. So these are really cool. So if you open them up, >> you indulge us, Miss Evelyn. >> These things are awesome. Especially for all you guys that like to go hiking or uh do stuff. >> Right. Right. >> Like hockey. Hockey and pickle ball. take your thermos. >> No way. >> And it's >> and it sets in there >> and it >> it also will hold your phone >> in one and one pocket for your ID if you're out hiking in the woods or >> lip balm. >> Yeah. Little Stanley jacket. >> Oh, it fits this. Okay. >> Oh, thank you. >> Yours? >> You're welcome. And then here's one for Karen. Jane Hill. >> You guys get yours later. >> Yes. >> And then I have one for whoever you picked for

016the new one. Are they Is that tonight or next? >> No, that's in February. >> February. Okay. Thank you very much, >> Miss Trustee Evelyn. Thank you. >> You're welcome. And thank you guys for all your hard work and your dedication. >> Thank you. >> Okay. I need a motion please to approve the agenda with the following changes. We are going to remove the guest reports um from CMC Salida for a >> future date. Yeah, a future date. May I have a motion? >> I'll move. >> Second. >> Oh, who? >> That was Jen. >> Jen. Okay. >> Is there any discussion about that? >> I don't think it's it's it's not any big deal, but we're fine. >> May we please vote? >> Yep. Dr. Becken Ridge. I >> Dr. Hill. >> Hi, >>

017Mrs. Haskell. >> Hi, >> Dr. Rhodess. I and Miss Shiffman. >> Hi. >> Thank you. Next, we do campus reports. Mighty Salida High School Spartans. Mr. Hull, you may have now have the floor. >> I am happy to be standing. >> So, um, wait, here goes five quick. Uh Chris Ru Ruiz up there wants to work for the board report. It's not like a a gang or something. >> Yeah. >> Right. Right. Or if you brought it in a little tighter. I love you. >> All right. mission. This is what we do. This is our business at the high school. We take care of kids uh academically, physically, socially, emotionally. Uh I want to point out girls wrestling up there. That's uh Lillian Morrison. First year of girls wrestling. So we have girls eating >>

018Morrison down. >> Yeah. Yes. >> Um, which is pretty exciting. Couple other pictures up there. MCO Dena's roller coaster activity. >> Um, I think my daughter's laying in the hallway there for a psychology uh project about uh sensory p perception. Um, but you know, our mission is we take care of kids, right? And make sure they have a purpose. Right? They come out of the high school with college and career prep, durable skills, uh know how to build relationships and understand belonging. Uh if you ask any staff member, I think they would be able to tell you what our mission is. Vision. We know all students by name, need, and strength. I think I've heard Dr. Blackburn say that once or twice. Um, also every single student within our school should be able to articulate

019what their purpose is, what their postsecary pathway is. Uh, they should also be able to identify an adult they feel connected with in the building. Right. Um, Hades Town director Andre over there. That's a picture from from Hades Town, which is a very successful musical this fall. Uh, main goals. Every year at the high school, our building leadership team comes up with an action plan. And, uh, our our goals changed a little bit this year. The past couple years, we've had the same goals and kind of achieved some of those and we're moving on to bigger and better goals this year. Uh number one being uh vertical teams, ensuring that every single course has a guaranteed and viable curriculum. Thank you to Savannah Crab, our new director of curriculum and instruction who is working with

020our vertical teams to achieve this and we're getting there. Um this that's a sample of some of the action steps. Each goal has probably I don't know 15 prong action steps under each goal. >> Uh but that's just a sample of some of them. Uh so first one birth a team. Second one pri prioritize a professional culture with a foundation of pedigogy. Uh really focusing on tier one instruction uh within our building, right? Um learning cycle, what do you teach is that first goal. Second part of the cycle is how do you teach it? Right? and that's professional um culture with a foundation of pedigogy. Uh third goal is still the same from the past couple years. We're still working on it. Every year we're getting a little bit better improving improving the efficacy of

021advisory. Right. Cookie and I uh do walkthroughs uh throughout our advisory. Uh Dawn and Mary, our counselors, also do walkthroughs. uh have come up with a really solid curriculum 9 through 12 in advisory that all the teachers are following. Uh really appreciate all the work they've put into it. Uh we've gotten really good feedback from the teachers this year how um easy it is to follow the curriculum and how how well it's working this year. So uh we're moving along on those goals. Oh, >> I don't want to miss cell phone policy. >> I know that's exciting. >> Go ahead, Cookie. >> So, we just wanted to report out a little bit about how the cell phone is going at Slide High School. Um, it's been such a game changer at the school. The entire

022vibe of classrooms and the building itself feels different without cell phones involved. Um, it's consistently enforced. I probably call home or usually text home now because we have this lovely WebEx program. so I can text families. About one to two cell phones a day per average for us at this point. Um, a lot of the time it's still like a kid, a junior who's like, "But I'm studying at the senior lounge." And I'm like, "Well, you can't have a phone on campus." Um, so about one to two phones daily and I text the parent for end of day pickup. I've gotten essentially no push back from parents this entire year. Nothing but support from parents. sometimes like a little bit of irritation because they have to come out. But no one has questioned the policy.

023Um, and I think just the noise is so nice to hear. And I want to really give a shout out to Andre and Mr. Bright who are our lunch monitors. Um, because one of the things that is new for the cell phone policy is that students are interacting again, which is great. And cell phones are dangerous for a lot of reasons, but they keep a very calm teenage environment. And what it looks like when you take cell phones away from children is kids screaming while playing pingpong and foosball and basketball and confusing volleyball games where you throw volleyballs at each other that I don't fully understand. >> Weird. >> And yes, it's the volleyball game. And Andre and Todd are the ones who are in charge of monitoring it, making sure the kids stay safe,

024making sure they have fun. Andre is not a bad ping pong player himself to tell you. >> You're welcome. >> Uh MTSS at at Saletta High School, multi-tiered systems of support. Uh for those of you that don't know, MTSS is a way that we ensure that every single student gets the support they need socially, emotionally, and academically. Right. And uh we're I guess two and a half years into our our system of MTDSS that we've developed. Um it's a 4-w weekek rotation of tier one and tier 2 interventions for students needing additional success. Uh so week one um every Thursday uh we go through an MTSS process with with teachers, right? And there's 60 minutes devoted towards MTSS with teachers on Thursdays. Week one of the month is professional development for teachers. Um and I'll

025talk a little bit more about that in a second. Uh week two MTSS meetings uh where we workshop in groups of teachers uh to talk through kids that may need extra support. Week three, Cookie and I go around to every single teacher in Toby and meet with them individually uh to review student progress and they have that hour to work on MTSS interventions uh individually. Week four, Don and Mary, our counselors, uh go around and meet with with every single teacher also and check in with them about interventions. So that's the cycle. Um tier one instructional support. I think it's really important to recognize our teachers bust their butts. They work super hard in our building and some of them have not well quite a few of them have not been through a traditional program.

026Right. Uh we have six brand new teachers in the building new to the profession. We also have 15 alternatively licensed teachers that haven't gone through a traditional program. uh we have a total of 27 teachers. So what that tells me is teachers need some support in pedigogy and instruction within our building. They're working super hard, right? But we we need to be there to give them that e extra support in instruction, right? Um and um we've uh we've created uh seven professional learning uh professional development sess sessions throughout the year. Uh we're working all together on a book right now, seven steps to a language rich classroom, which I've done before as a staff, which is just really good steps to support good instruction within the class and really focusing on that idea, how do

027you teach, how are you an effective teacher? Uh thankfully we have Savannah supporting our teachers with a guaranteed and viable curriculum on what they teach, right? So they don't have to spend all their time focusing on creating curriculum but focusing on the more important piece of how do I teach? How am I teaching? Uh so super important. Uh we're making good progress. Uh we're having teachers lead these professional development sessions. Um which is is really cool uh because we do have some some master teachers in the building uh that can really support other teachers. Uh tier two. Yeah. um MTSS tier 2. Uh what this looks like at the tier 2 basically means some of those kids that need a little extra support more than other students need. All right, we have a thing called

028Spartan Hour. Uh and students are placed in Spartan Hour for various reasons. One, they may have a uh where they need some extra support. uh they may have transitioned from a different uh learning environment where they were homeschooled or on an in an online school, right? And they need that extra support to come back to the high school, uh mental health concerns, extra time for ELLL students, uh and also academic interventions. The software that we use in Spartan Hour is called Exl for for Matt and read support. Uh so we have a number of kids uh that are in that that that Spartan hour for two lectures and so I love SL high school teachers. So I'm here to ask for more of them. Um, so the high school teachers are my favorite kind of

029humans. And so we have a couple different sapping requests based on some needs. So the first thing we're going to talk about is a request for a half FTE for MAP. We currently have three and a half FTE in our math department and we're requesting to move that halftime position to a full-time position. So a little bit of math history for our math department. Prior to 2021, we had four FT for math. Um from 2021 and to 2022 we moved to three and a half FT game. Um and the math department started covering some sharing some FT with science to cover an instructor loss after COVID. And the next year science regained a position math stated that three and a half load have consistently stated that three and a half load. when we had an

030instructor who that worked for who was local and when she chose to leave, we discovered that it was impossible to fill a 0.5 m instructor position. So last year, the fall semester, we couldn't hire even a long-term sub for the vacancy. So we ended up hiring an online teacher um to teach two geometry classes and absorbed another one. The spring semester, we had one qualified applicant who we hired for that position. She chose to leave at the end of this fall semester and then we had no applicants again for another contract acquisition. For some context about hiring back positions in general, I'm kind of racking my brain being in the building for eight years. In the last decade at Salive High School, we have not hired a full-time math teacher who's had more than three

031years of math experience. Math teachers do not exist. They are hard to hire and they are hard to recruit. They're hard to keep. And so making this position as exciting as possible by making them full-time gives us a larger possibility of getting really involved right. Um I think that this is a thing that would really help improve our instruction and prevent our kids. So moving to a full math teacher is our first request. And with that, our second request is asking for another entity of elective credits. So the chart that you see on the board is from last year's course registration. You will see student requests and then max capacity. So that is within our master schedule right now. How many people we can physically fit into rooms based on those requests. So introduction to

032woods 112 student requests. We can only physically serve 60 kids at max capacity. drafting, we have 90 student requests. Again, we can only serve 60. Guitar, 60 requests, we can serve 48. And that is consistent across all of our elections. We have way more requests than the ability to bid kids in classrooms for those. So, what we are asking for specifically is an FTE for a STEM teacher, ideally computer science and technology. about 25% of our students have request or have shown interest in following a STEM pathway and that feels like the thing that is consistently asked for that we are able to provide right now for kids. Having that extra elective teacher would lower the burden on core classes, lower the burden on other electives so that they can do things with more ability

033and then make sure kids are really getting to take classes they want to take and not classes that they have to take because it's the only option that fits because everything else >> new course this year senior seminar. Uh we're very thankful uh that the board pushed for this new course senior seminar. Uh basically it's a class at all here and uh as we know our nation uh right now there's a lot of civil discourse. a lot of uh or adults not knowing how to talk to one another, right? With different viewpoints. This course is designed for uh students learn how to talk about history. uh this this semester I did a lot of work created the curriculum basically from scratch with a lot of input from uh social studies team members from administrators uh

034and the course was very successful when we read through the feedback we were like wow you know how the the feedback the kids gave was was really um amazed with all the feedback and uh as you read through it I'm not going to read all of it up there but the the first piece of feedback I think that is probably the most applicable tackable class that I've taken for my life in the real world after high school right um super important. Uh, you know, I sat in that class sort of a bit. They were tackling topics and kids were engaged and uh deceptive things in a way that was more appropriate than most most well discussing topics. Um, so super proud of that this senior seminar, uh, the way it's going and look forward to

035to watching kids in there the next semester. >> So the other big shift that we did this year was switching to a based schedule. We identified some problems with our previous 4x4 block. Students were not receiving reading and math instruction for the entire academic year and were noticing significant learning loss as well as students were having trouble filling their schedules because we taught classes in too many different modalities. Students who took a CMS class at the CMC Ker building would have a class every other day. Students in the building in English have every day of the week. Some students were taking skinnies checking back with another skinny. It was very complicated and it was not creating good outcomes for change. So this year we switched the ADBA schedule. Students are receiving map and reading all

036year. We've immediately seen growth in our health data. I think that is entirely um um related to the 80day schedule and the lack of cell phones. Um students have more opportunities. We have way fewer scheduling gaps and we're able to get a lot more students to the classes that they requested. Um we have a longer advisory. Some of the things we did was also changing the times of our classes. We have longer advisory which has given advisors time to actually get through the course material. Um higher levels of student engagement with shorter blocks. The biggest challenge that we have is with athletic schedules. So students who have two away games in a week might not see their teacher for that entire week. That's been a huge concern of ours and we're working on ways um

037I'm not an athletics person but I'm learning a lot about athletics this year. This is a personal goal of mine to learn things about athletics and there's something called a cycle of for sport schedule where you set the schedule a few years in advance and we're currently trapped in a cycle. So our hope is that in the news cycle we can be a little bit more thoughtful about the way that you can meet their schedule to help students look to be in class more often. One of the requests we get from parents a lot is hey my kid plays basketball. Can they have all the core classes in first block but as you're about to see on our in a couple slides from now most of our kids do an extracurricular. Most of our kids

038are travel sports and when 80% of your student body is involved did not have 80% in core classes and first class. So we have to come up with a better solution and that's our goal for next year. >> Say that. >> Oh yes. >> Um >> seven y >> uh nth graders last year >> and we're down to seven and that feels like a really >> Colorado state. Okay. Um for years the state has gauged success of a high school on three categories. Achievement in test scores, growth and test scores, and postsecary workforce readiness. >> And they talked about a high school being successful if uh your test scores were high. uh your courses you had a lot of you know AP courses and academic courses your dropout rate was slow and that's how they

039they measured a high school right thankfully the state is changing and said and says we want high schoolers to come out of high school with something useful that value, right? And what they've come up with is this thing called the big three. Uh, and measure a high school success by these three categories. whether kids succeed college credit uh industry recognized uh or a quality workbased learning experience, right? and they're going to measure a high school on those categories to determine if they're successful and they're prepared for the next stage of life, whether that's career, college or military, their high school prepared them. Um, as you as you may know, uh, in the past they've had all types of programs to incentivize, uh, college credit, uh, workbased learning and industry recognized SER, and we get money

040for those things. They're in the process of changing that model of funding, right? and the they haven't really sorted out what it's going to look like, but I'm truly excited about it because we're doing all these things already for our kids. Um, if you looked at the class of 20 to 25, 75 or 76% of our kids were able to check one of these boxes, whether they had 12 college credits, an industry recognized SER, or a work-based learning experience. Uh just for example, I think this year um 67 kids are enrolled in internship programs through uh CMC, which is awesome. >> That's just 54% of our kids have at least 12 college credits. >> All right. So super excited about the state shifting to recognizing this as being important. Um and we're ahead of the

041curve. Uh last year we had the whole post secondary workforce readiness team from CDE come to Salida and pick our brains about what we're doing and modeling uh the rest of the state of what we're so proud of uh what our kids are doing and what our teachers are doing. Okay. And this last little bit is just a huge channel to our programming and to our pace. So this is just fall extracurricular participation. So this isn't counting all of the like extra time people are spending on things that they're really passionate about. This is when they actually can show up outside of school to do some sort of activity. 76% of our students were involved in some sort of fall extracurricular, which is why we see these lovely students here tonight. We invited 60. We're

042going to get hopefully 20 because there's basketball, there's volleyball tonight, there's football tonight, there's rock school tonight. Our kids are amazing. I get home from work and I am exhausted. I want to cook my dinner. I want to sit on my couch. I want to like watch my show and then ideally be asleep by like 8:15. best case scenario and our kids are getting home from games at 1 in the morning, showing up the next day, earning 12 college credits. We work with the best kids in the entire world and you can see that in how much they commit to their school days, their extracurriculars, every single thing that they do. So, here's our fall participation rates. Winter participation rates are also excellent. adding on that girls wrestling this year is really exciting. And I

043think we're just really lucky to get to work with these kids that we have. And I think we'll go ahead and wrap up because I know you don't want to hear from us anymore. You want to hear from them because they're infinitely better. There's one more slide and it's just for you, Jesse. Oh, there's >> there's a PSAT slide. You all gotten these reports. We gave them to you right after the state testing. We had huge wins all PSAT. Um, our math growth improve in increased by 11 percentage points compared to last year. That's huge, likely because all of our kids are in math class was an amazing thing. Um, small dip in ELA growth, but we think it was more tied to staffing disruptions. And we're just really excited to see where the rest

044of the year takes us. We're feeling really good about those numbers. I I don't want to jinx things. Um, but I am super excited with the new schedule with kids having math and reading all year. Uh, is a is a huge difference for us and um really excited to see what those scores look like in in uh in spring. And the other piece of it which I think we really need to recognize is thank you uh for the cell phone pulse. You walk into classes, kids are more engaged um and and you can see it. Um so um we are hopeful. Um last thing, thank you Mr. shuffle. Um, a great colleague CEO, but go sports. >> Thank you. >> Before we go back to the back to the kids and circle back. So, um,

045Jesse, we're going to respect the time of all these awesome Spartans and let's go ahead and break up into small groups now and then we'll circle back and if any if anybody on the board has any questions there. >> No, that's good. >> Um, I do just mention because we'll stop the video with this dynamic thing. So, we're going to stop all the recording for right now for the student moment. We'll come back. Thank you. Eat quietly. >> Um, we're we're going to start with Ben. You've got 45 seconds to synthesize the top two, three, four points. >> All right. Am I talking to you all? >> Uhhuh. Uh, yes. Yeah. >> So, uh, I had a senior and three freshman. freshman. They're all uh very happy with the the high school. They have uh

046seems like uh the senior has a very specific plan for his future. The the other three have really good general plans. Nothing nothing weird. Uh you uh can't read my own handwriting because I didn't have time. But so they're all really happy. Well, three of them have Mr. O uh for auto shop and other stuff. They're really impressed with him. >> So that's I don't know Mr. O, but I'm really glad that everybody likes him. >> Uh they're very excited about the like all of them, all four of them have been really happy or are excited about the CMC internship programs. Um they love uh Miss Freeze. >> Do you know Spanish or art? >> Uh wait, never mind. >> No, I had one was art and three was Spanish. Yeah, >> one was art,

047three were Spanish. >> Yeah. So, she's a hit. Um they very much like AB days. Uh it's unanimous and uh for things that they would like to change uh or or see more of, they would like uh more financial advice whether it's personal finance or like ethnic both. >> Was that mostly the freshman? >> Yeah, >> because they will have because they will get that. Well, >> we already >> Oh, okay. Okay. >> Yeah. Yeah, there's that was unanimous. And uh uh more language options, you know, besides Spanish, but that's fine to cover. >> And uh they all thought more PE classes would be >> Did you say PE? >> PE and PE. Got it. >> I guess it's I don't understand what the limitations there are, but I think there are limitations on what

048they can do for physical activity at school. >> Got it. Okay. Thanks, Ben. Jen. >> All right. I had juniors, junior, sophomore. >> Okay. >> Uh, internships. Yay. Could they please be available more and for more kids at all times? Students. Um, we are good at having a lot of extracurricular activities. It's very nice. There's something for everyone. Uh, everyone likes the addition of girls wrestling and esports just to cover more bases. um feminine hygiene projects products being in the restrooms. It would be great if they could be in all the restrooms because sometimes you're really far away from >> to >> situation. Um phone mixed reviews cell phone policy. Sorry, I really love it. Um but it's nice to hear what you think. Um, drug and alcohol use observed as higher here than in

049other schools that students have been to that are not in Salida. Why? There could be a variety of reasons, but it has been observed. Um, which I think we also hear. Um, it would be great if we had some even more even more things for students to do that are maybe indoors. Maybe not everyone wants to be surfing or skiing or whatever. Um, so some suggestions were some sort of open gym hours somewhere, maybe the rec center or pool is that we're calling it. Maybe school could have some free time for students where they are not charged entry. In my mind, I sort of thought students don't just get to go for free all the time. Apparently not. >> No, it's like 10 bucks. >> It's a lot. >> Let's talk to our community partners

050about that. Um, even if it was like on Thursdays after school from after school till whenever that would be great for students. >> Just a little a little >> advisory still not getting great. >> Some people seem to have one really strong advisor that they've had for years and they do seem to be using the time efficiently. Some have had a new adviser every year so that is probably a challenge. Um, but seems to be for many to most the first 5 to 10 minutes gung-ho, productive, helpful. Rest of the time, what are we doing? I don't know. It'd be great if we could have some more life skills built in or some really focused work on scholarships, things that maybe not everyone's getting in personal finance. I know I don't have all the information

051to reporting. um the quarter. >> So it doesn't feel maybe mindful and intentional at this point. Also, capstone seems to be very not clear depending on who your advisor is. So some kids just seem to not maybe know what they should be doing or they're just waiting and any day now they're going to find out and others have been talking about it with their adviser for three years straight. So, okay. >> Thanks, Chin. You got >> um I think some similar things. So, I had a senior and then three sophomore girls and actually all of them were unanimous that they really do like the cell phone ban. They think that classes go more smoothly. There's a lot more talking, a lot more socializing. And they said that having the peer pressure to not be on

052your phone is really helpful because in advisory especially once you would get to that free time people would pull out phones and even if you felt like you didn't want to personally do it it was just like well everyone else is doing it now there's no one to talk to. >> So they all really like that. Um lots of raving about CMC classes there. A lot of them were taking really heavy high load CMC classes. Um and really like CMC online options too. Like I know we don't do that necessarily a ton, but a lot of kind of the the kids that felt like it gave them a lot more options to be able to throw in some of those online CMC classes. And then they really like kind of the more non-traditional classes through

053CM2 like the wilderness first responder and different certifications and things. Um we talked about activities and the main thing that they all recommended adding was more of kind of like speech and debate like model UN. One of them said he did um yeah FFA Farmers of America >> future future >> farmers of America. >> Yes. >> Yep. >> And he said that was really good and included all the other aspects of speech and debate and would think that would be a great thing to add that's more academic extracurricular. >> Um things not going well is kind of the same with advisory like feel like the stuff isn't super worthwhile. a lot of busy work, very repetitive from freshman to senior year. They would like more college prep and they would like it to not be

054as long as it is and have or just have more study hall time um but not have to do all these kind of >> activities >> lessons. Yeah. Um and then the other thing that I've heard multiple times tonight and then apart from tonight also is the breaks during the blocks. >> Okay. They're not. >> Um well, and one can tell you why. >> I learned I learned why. >> They knew why. And >> the main thing was kind of kids, we even don't come back on time. And one of the teachers, I guess, did a break detention list that was super effective. And as soon as you didn't come back on time, you got put on that break detention list and you did not get another chance. But the rest of the class was

055not punish. Is there an option for more um and >> in class like an inclass break option? >> And that's the that's what the teachers have communicated with the kids is that they we can take break. It's just we can't >> leave the whole school's not leave once once. >> It was absolute disast. >> It's fair that you did that. enormous. >> Yeah. >> Well, yeah. And I >> we made a big mistake by giving them breaks because now they they feel like >> they want them. >> they're denied. Denied. >> Yeah. >> And um they had they had a lunch that's how long? >> Almost 50 minutes, which is 100. >> That is a long shot. >> Right. They have breaks during the day. We have 90 minutes of instructional times four where we

056cannot lose that time. >> Well, and maybe some of that comes down to just the professional development and pedigogy, right? Is like making sure teachers know that a kid can't sit for 90 minutes straight. Yeah. And you do need to give them something where they can get up and shake their legs and >> and that's yeah might be a few teachers that have >> in general. Okay. >> Okay. >> But you know what they want is 10 minutes top always. >> Yeah. But that does, you're right. That is 40 minutes a day. 10 minutes per class. >> Yeah. >> All right. Thanks, Mandy. Tiffany, what'd you find out? >> Put a hammer down. >> Yeah, Lily, >> you guys can go report back why you can't get your brakes. >> Okay. All right. What's Tiffany

057got? >> Um, I had one senior, two juniors, a sophomore, and a freshman. So, I had every grade. Um, one of the first things they said was breaks. Um, one thing that was said about the um, breaks was that there was a long line for the bathroom during passing periods and sometimes they have a hard time going to the bathroom and then making it to class on time. Um, so I think that's valid. >> Um, so I don't know what can be done about that, but feedback. Um it was also brought up and I think you mentioned this in your presentation that um with um the Monday, Wednesday, Tuesday, Thursday, there are some students that like missed like three weeks of one class. Um and that was really hard. Um and some teachers were better

058about it than others with work. Um and so um you know it was hard for them. um and their work. Um and then somebody else mentioned um inconsistent policies when people were absent for other reasons also with homework and making it up and it made it confusing for them. I think maybe also for some of the younger students are like new new to high school just trying to adjust um you know just keeping track of what different teachers policies are for missing school and making up word. Um, >> the two juniors really like career day this year, so that was great feedback. Um, advisory was very advisor specific um, as to whether or not it's helpful or not. Um, some of the students really liked it. Some of them don't find it helpful. Um, and

059I did hear the same thing like at the beginning it's really good usually but then it kind of peters off towards the end of the period and maybe 45 minutes is a bit long. Um, that's how long it is this year maybe. >> Yeah. >> Um, and then I did hear that same feedback that the CMC internships are really great and one of the favorite things that they've done um, and that they wish they had more opportunity for different foreign languages. Hey, thanks Tiffany. Um, Savannah and I had uh three juniors and two seniors. Um, the overall thesis is the kids are all right. Amazing interface, amazing insights, really interacted well with each other and with me and with Savannah. Um, three things. One, advisory. I'm the elder of this group. And why it's not

060the brightest shining star at Slida High School, it has improved so much from student feedback. I think specifically I thought I saw Mary here too. Yeah. Okay. Um but um that I I'm so thankful for the curriculum that you provide to the teachers and it what's nice is that it seems as if the teachers have autonomy to decide. They prioritize what is more essential. They give a little bit of homework sometimes and then they have their off off-topic conversations, but they're getting the big things done. Advisory is improving. Secondly, 100% of the students had a um a a really important teacher that they could turn to for positive things like um whittling down those college options for those seniors or negative things if they were struggling with their stressful high school life. And then um

061number three was um they wanted some more meat on the pathways of that one-page report and a little bit more specificity. And then finally, I wanted to say that um I'm really excited that Cookie's on the case and to help with um whoever our activities permanent activities director is because they were missing a lot um because of all of these activities that they were involved in and the best you you know best you could do is best you can do. and we were all fired up that Cal Hill is 18 and0 coming into this weekend for the wrestling season. Okay. >> Um okay, we're going to close it out um with you guys. It's been a long night for you guys been on the stage for quite a while. Does anybody have any questions for

062Cookie and Hole um about what they presented? Any areas of concern that you wanted to talk about? >> I was going to ask just from getting some feedback from students. Do you hear that there are teachers who don't agree with the cell phone removal policy and thereby don't enforce it? >> I think we've been pretty consistent. There was a little hiccup with with the teacher fall. We had to kind of reel that in a little bit. Um, but I I think for the most part very consistent for school, I'm not going to say, you know, might be a teacher standing in the hall on a Monday morning before school. Somebody take your phone out. >> Yeah. Um, >> that's you might report it to you. So, >> no, thank and I was worried about that.

063as far as could be consistent I don't know I don't see it in classroom but yeah >> I just wanted to say thanks if that's okay um I really appreciate the slide deck because there's a lot great way to see how much change has happened how much over time there's just a lot of details it's not one simple thing like you just changed the AB schedule. There was a lot of pieces and parts. So, just thanks to your staff because that change exhaustion is always a thing and I think you guys have been finding way to keep moving forward and I just appreciate um good stuff and I'm excited to see how the PSATs or the >> Yeah. Yeah. How how those things come together. I'm excited to hear that you guys are excited and

064um it's in a good space back and clear advisor. making sure it has gotten better room for improvement and um you know I think one large challenge in the high school is consistency among all the teachers teachers love but I've been there for a long time so this is a new experience for them curriculum we're doing our accountable support as far as consistency within >> I'll also say as a for a lot of dates um just showing what I think advisor a lot of development particularly secondary secondary teachers signed up to secondary they're class experts not necessarily child experts and I think that it's a thing that speaks to some teacher strengths and also really shows and so it's a thing that we really got into as a district and it's a thing that we're

065going to keep working on but I think it's a thing that is particularly difficult for certain teachers who are truly there but there are content um I also think that developmentally thinking about that child development piece and thinking about kids who are like I don't want to keep yes because we're like teenagers or developmentally you don't want to talk about that scalp. It's like that is logical and actually correct for where you are in your life and it's our job as the adults to kind of like give you the medicine a little bit sometimes and it's not always the most fun. >> I think that it's a little bit like taking all of those pieces of like the people that we're working with and trying to make the system move forward. I think we have

066a long way to go but I appreciate saying how far we've come as well. >> Very far. And you know there's there's like tons of lessons planned on college and career readiness and scholarship. So it like >> if you're the parent of senior worried about scholarships most of scholarship season scholarships is the spring. Those lessons come in the spring. >> Read each other's essay and give feedback. Apparently >> apparently >> well at least one of them. >> I mean that good. >> Weren't they they did that in advisory >> in the fall? >> Yeah. I actually think they did. Yes, >> they did. I mean, I remember everybody talking about it. >> Yeah. >> And a lot a lot of it is it's advisor dependence >> very much. >> You're like not tweaking that teacher

067strength. I'm a former math teacher. I was like, "God, you want me to talk about like feelings of No, >> that just s Yeah. Well, I I wanted to ask um Don specifically um you guys are doing this curriculum this year and I mean bless you but then for next year's round will you just tweak it? Okay. So the heavy lift. >> Okay. Right. It's >> making investments and we've got, you know, advisory steering committee that's kind of helping us figure out what lesson, you know, stick with and then what to get rid of and um we'll make adjustments. >> Okay. So this is the one more semester of heavy lift and then just put little 400 grit sandpaper. Okay, good. All right. I I just have one question for Cookie. Um, just talk a

068little bit about Cadip. Give an example of you don't even have to name a kid, but you know what what what they're doing and how what how's the pass rate going? You know, what are you finding? >> So, a couple things. One, seeing that the program no longer exists, thinking about the big three. Oh, >> they are redoing the way that they are providing funding to school based on now the big three. Industry recognized certificates are part of that big three, but it's not understated anymore. So this year I will still submit data on industry recognized certificates to the state, but we will not receive a check for those for at least the next two years as they redo their funding model. Don't panic about this. We're not panicking, so you shouldn't panic. Tell anyone

069to panic. Um >> I'm just anno I'm just annoyed. We're we like we got up and running and then this happens. >> Yeah. >> Model eventually will be better for our school in general. Okay. But right now that's how it is >> pros and cons with the state. >> Oh. Oh okay. >> Recognized certificates as a model. Right now we have woofer as a certificate our students are pursuing. We have um the NCR OSHA certificate that our students are pursuing. >> Um it's an OSHA certificate >> for safety. Yep. >> Construction. >> Great. >> Um, we have >> a couple students have done some grant funding programs to do wild and firefighting and we have nurse aid is a class on Fridays to get students their nursing or their exc. >> So, those are kind

070of our main industry recognized certificates that we are pursuing right now. Um, if you go into the PowerPoint I sent I actually link the list. So, Jody, you're someone who loves looking at >> I do and so I will go into the slides. There's a lot of different things, but one of the things that's tricky about it is that what's best for a child might not be on the state required list. >> Right. Right. >> Students are really into heavy equipment. Do you know what? There's not enough suit for heavy equipment on the state list. So, I'm going to put my money and energy into supporting my kid doing heavy equipment, even if it's not necessarily recognized by the state because I want to support, right? So I some really good like programs and pathways

071that are really like helping our kids. I think with the idea of a new tech feature potentially incorporating more Adobe certificates I think would be the next piece there. I would love to see that. >> Um but also not every kid is going to get a certificate because that's not right for every way not every kid is necessarily going to get college credits because that's not right for every kid. Sure. thing we're excited about with the big three is that one of those options is right for >> that align really nicely with >> represented by one of those options. >> You know, for example, there's I'm we're talking about two kids last year that graduated uh who are heavy equipment operators right now and making really good money, right? Um they had work-based learning experience

072at the high school and we supported their talent. They weren't counted for seated. >> Okay. Okay. >> Right. >> Yeah. >> So, you know, the other thing that's going away is a Senate. >> A Senate. >> Um, so and and this is all going to this new >> newer better thing, >> big three, which we're going to be fine with, you know, the next two years, what the state is doing is catching up other rural schools and schools that don't have these opportunities, right? And and and >> but they couldn't them while they were >> for them. >> Okay. >> So, you know, we're kind of hanging out there for a couple years, but once once >> but it'll be better. >> 28, it'll be it'll be good for us because we're ahead of the

073curve. >> Okay. >> Um um Friday CNA class >> through CNC. >> Through CMC. Got it. >> We have eight students signed up for it right now and they tap at 10. So, it's a community based class and we are Philly. I think >> Yeah, you are the community. Okay. >> Right. >> Okay. >> And then just to like help our CD like that program, we have students who I have a student who's working 12 hour shifts at the hospital on Tuesdays and Thursdays this year. Um >> and we are giving her workplace credit so she can still be um the oldest sports because she needs that sports. She wants to run track but she's able to do that she's gotten that way. >> Okay. That's exactly the kind of meat I wanted to learn

074about that >> child. >> Thank you. Okay. Anybody um anything else? Anything else? >> Okay. I did miss one. >> Okay. >> I think it's really encouraging to hear students say that they want teachers who teach from bell to bell and really do keep them engaged because that helps them not wish they had their cell phones. And they said when they're really engaged for that time and learning, they don't even think about it. And when that's not the experience in the classroom, they're >> they have an urge. >> But that but that's really cool that they they >> Yeah. I mean, you know, I think we're acknowledging um we're working on tier one instruction, >> right? Um teachers, >> everybody needs to improve, right? Um >> and uh >> you know, We're doing a lot.

075So, >> um the kids Oh, sorry. Um I did ask the kids when they were talking about missing class for sports so a lot because of the schedule. >> Um if any of the teachers recorded their lectures cuz I said, "Well, are they giving you their makeup work and are they good about that?" And they said, "Yeah, but it's not the same as um being there and hearing the lectures." Um and they said Mr. Beal did with the math. >> Is there a way that that could be done for them? >> I my read on it just as a teacher during COVID is that she got really burned out of videotaping themselves during co >> I think some people like really kept up with that skill and some people were like I never want to

076have to videotape myself teaching ever again and be on screen teaching ever again. Um, so yes, I think that that is an awesome tool that we can encourage more teachers to use. I also know that behind the scenes, we also have a lot of students who are like, "Yeah, but can I just do school from home?" Because like if I can just do the lectures, like see the lecture on I'll just check Canvas, I don't actually have to attend school. >> Yeah. >> And we try to make it really clear that we are an in-person school. We are not a virtual school. You must attend our building to learn. And so just trying to figure out that balance in a way that makes sure that the best instruction is when a student is in class

077and then making sure that the right kids are getting that other life that extra healthy thing. >> Yeah. No, I was just thinking about when they're having to miss for athletics for three weeks in a row. >> There ways to do it too. Like if there's a content that is being taught, you can look up YouTube videos of kids who have taught what you taught and then you just assign it to that student on campus. There are a lot of videos of me teaching algebra what it would be too that is >> um you mentioned that we're in a cycle of the sports calendar. How many more years are we stuck in this cycle before we can change something? >> Um it's a new cycle next year. >> Okay. >> But you know >> hopefully

078this is the tough thing right is we're in a league >> right? >> Tri peaks league right? So Tri Peaks League has basketball games on a Tuesday. There's >> right so there's >> there's limited >> wiggle room >> you have league obligations are independent change >> work with uh but the challenge is those those league commitments uh baseball volleyball are the ones >> and are most of the schools in our league on a 4 day week or a five day week >> um I think it's probably about half and half. >> So maybe there could be talk with I mean maybe there's a lot of other schools who have the same issue. If they're doing AB blocks, they would have the same problem. >> Is there any situation or does it not work >> Monday?

079Like A day is Monday and then B day is Monday and it's Monday and then B day is Sunday or Tuesday. >> I'm sure I asked that last year too. >> Yeah. >> And we also we have to come over from a middle school which I know a lot of multiple buildings and multiple like there's refs issues with >> it's everything >> and it's just it's really >> and you do what you know fourth block would be >> purple and white yeah >> and you and all those options this was this was the best one >> and you what you guys predicted last year has come of the downsides. It's still it was still worth the change but missing missing for sports and then um the kids loved just having four topics and now they

080have six. >> But they do that they think it's far more interesting that they actually really enjoy having something different from Monday to Tuesday that doesn't get nearly as boring and that they really appreciate having two nights to do homework because they can prioritize based on their schedule, >> you know. So they really do actually like it better. >> And one of the things my kids has wishing that I thought was going to happen has to happen. Um workload, right? Um it's the last time I did this at my test school, the kids got very overwhelmed with the amount of work teachers were assigning because they were still assigning it like it was 4x4. But I think our teachers have ad adjusted really well uh to to give them a workload world that that makes

081sense. So thankfully that has come to fruition. The adjustment has been pretty good. I thought there was >> they're still standing. >> There are the big one is is the sports thing. >> Yeah, Mandy too. I would say it's really sport specific and so with the league like they dictate it but each sport had their own commissioner and so I actually went to the soccer commissioner and said hey can I present to the league to switch to Mondays and Thursdays instead of Tuesdays and Thursdays but I had to present like we want to do it because of for us it's our AP block but also it's 80minute games for soccer we shouldn't be playing within two days it's better so I had to present it in a way travel's easier >> um and they were

082able to do that but that has no bearing on volleyball like the volleyball portion of the league >> potentially potentially could go a lot on the path of all the sports to the league. >> You you can't do well each sport has to do has to basically make their own schedule. The problem is like some sports have the the Tuesday Thursday cycle fits college sports and stuff like that whereas soccer it's an easy model that is slipped every third day instead of every other day and stuff like that. So there's it's more complicated than like to Jesse's point there are sometimes that you can make some changes. Uh, so >> Savannah and I asked for a solution for that and they said at least one home game and one away game a week. >> Yeah,

083that would certainly >> Yeah, >> that would help a lot. Yeah. Okay. Any other questions, comments, concerns, compliments? Well, no. And I just I appreciate your comment too on they can tell us their feedback, but that doesn't mean that we're going to give them exactly because as the adults in the room, we do have to make the harder calls, right? So, I think that is important to keep in mind as they say, we want breaks. We want our cell phones that, you know, as a parent, as a board, like this is what we do is see the adults in the room and take feedback and then ultimately make the decision that we think best. So, I think that's good to acknowledge. being a river town a lot of times. So the teachers like >> Oh

084yeah. >> Perfect med perfect med. >> Yeah. >> Okay. We're going to just advance through. Um you guys are totally excused if you want to. >> Vanny have a student here. Do you need do you want to leave? >> I was upstairs. >> Yeah. Yeah. Okay. Okay. I was just making sure you were taking care of Chan Chan. >> Okay. So, we are on um three and I just need to make >> Oh, sorry. Lucy. >> No district reports. I don't know that you guys got my reports. We've been here for a while. So, I want to go too much. I just think it's important for the community to know we had a great stable start. Um it really was a good start to the to the semester. We always have things that pop up,

085but that was good. I'm focused on capital projects, trying to get those things cleaned up and addressed as we head into budgeting season. Aaron and I are already starting to work theories and ideas, trying to figure out models. Um, and we were talking about hiring, trying to get our contracts out before spring breaks. We talked to the administrative team about that. And of course, you've got two big hires with the activities manager and the long fellow principal. We're hoping to have both those in front of you next month for um approval. So, we'll see um if we can pull that off. But that's kind of how they're roughly set up. And also, you know, legislation season started, so we're already starting um trying to figure out where our advocacy should be. Um and so I

086may be presenting a couple times at the Senate. We'll see how that goes. Um other than that, I think things have been talked about pretty thoroughly, so there's been good feedback. So, I'll just I don't think there's too much else. I don't know if either one of you want to dive in in general. >> No, we were going to talk about the budget, which is basically all what I was about the last couple weeks. But something that just came to mind that's something that you all should know about is Tracy Ray who's been the finance >> I know >> retiring. >> Yeah. >> And working in some capacity to bold, but >> Oh, good. Okay. >> But she's a huge resource for us to kind of see >> what comes next. I'm sure they'll hire

087somebody great, but she has been she also lives close by, so you know her as she's been a few board meetings with vice ch. >> She's pretty great deal. >> She's awesome. >> Yeah. Um okay, thanks for that. >> Yeah. >> All right. So, now we're going to go to um three, but we have some adjustments and I need a motion. We're kind of breaking all the Robert's rules of order, but I need a motion to take out um 3G I out of action. I mean consent, excuse me, and table them for the third reading. That's those are the CASBY library material policies. >> I'll make that motion. >> You'll make that motion in a second. >> Yep. Yep. >> Table. Hold on. >> I am. >> So, we're tableing. I've got GI all of

088the CASBY >> and it's just so it's it's just GI. >> Yep. >> Not purchasing. >> Yep. >> Okay. And Mandy >> Mandy gets the motion. >> Ben seconded >> second >> discussion. >> Um no. I mean it sounds like you're going to meet with the librarians and see what >> Yeah. And but it so it was good to have uh Roz come and speak tonight. It was good to know that they had some other suggestions. It doesn't have to be pushed through. So, let's wait and get their suggestions. >> Love that they're leading the way and um I'd be happy to help if you want a board member. >> Okay. >> All right. Ready? >> All right. Dr. Becker Rich Pettit. >> Hi, >> Dr. Hill. >> Hi, >> Mrs. Basel. >> Hi, >>

089Dr. Rhodess. >> Hi. >> And Miss Sherman. >> Hi. Okay. >> Now, I would like to make a motion to approve the consent agenda. We're still uh with those omission to approve the consent. >> Thank you, Mandy. Seconds. >> Second, >> Jen. Thank you. Are there any discussion items? >> Any discussion about the consent? >> Right. The consent agenda. The consent. Yeah. Yeah. Thank you for my vernacular. I don't think there are. and go ahead and move to >> All right. Dr. Becker Bridge Pettit. >> Hi, >> Dr. Hill. >> Hi, >> Mrs. Pascal. >> Hi, >> Dr. Rhodess. >> Hi, >> Miss Shookman. >> Hi. >> All the consents. All of the consents there. >> She's still here. >> Yep. Yep. Me, that's where I am, too. Okay. Excellent. Let's move to five action

090items. I need a motion to approve on second reading the school calendar instru you know ICA do I have a motion I'll move >> thanks Tiffany second Jen discussion I just do I do have one point uh and that is and Karen brought it to our attention she's not here tonight but um and and I I'm persuaded by her but in our in our calendar in um passing period is considered instructional time. I think we just need to be aware of that as a board. >> I mean what would it look like to take that out? I mean that would how many days would that add to our calendar? >> I don't know the exact but a couple weeks. >> Yeah. But be significant. >> It adds up like two weeks. >> Uh I mean

091if you were going to do that you'd want to run through a significant process with the community >> and with the staff. Uh, so I'm not going to recommend that right now. No, >> if you had a strong interest, then we could develop a process to have that conversation. I think there's better calendars all around, but you guys have heard my opinion on that before. So, >> yeah. And, uh, you know, Karen brought up a question. Does that mean that um, if if that is instructional time, are are teachers actively out in the hallways? I know they are. Most of the time they are for safety reasons in the back, you know, they're always are safe, but that is considered instructional time and we just need to we got to we got to accept that

092in our hearts right now. >> It's SEAL. >> It's >> I mean I I would argue that it instructional time now without cell phones, >> right? Right. >> Especially if teachers are in the hallway in their doorways and kids are walking and talking, I think that it's more arguably justifiable than it was before. I perhaps so perhaps so okay. >> All right. >> I think our I think we're finished with discussion >> for a vote. Dr. Breen Fed >> I. >> Dr. Hill. >> Hi. >> Mrs. Pascal. >> Hi. >> Dr. Rhodess. >> Hi. >> And Miss Shookman. >> Hi. >> 5B. I need a motion to authorize Superintendent David Blackburn to finalize the transportation equipment services agreement with HFP Starling. including the lease of two electric buses conditional upon the fi finalization of the

093XL energy grant. Do I have a motion? I'll move. >> Thanks, Mandy. Second, Jen. Let's have some discussion. >> So, while Connor's Connor's coming up, um I am excited about this. It's $1.4 million that we did not have in our budget. And I think it's important that the community knows just how much we are struggling to find every penny wherever they put the pennies. We're going to write them down. Uh Connor will probably cover this, but it I think it's helpful. I know when I was talking to administrators, um there were three recipients of this grant award. Cherry Creek, Jeffco, and Salida Schools. Um and so it definitely puts you in a different category than where all the other rural districts are trying to figure out. Um, we're going to keep on searching uh those

094grants out while they're doing tech. You know, I did we applied for another grant this week um that might help some of our staffing concerns when we're trying to figure out to do general fund. We also found another extension and possibly another one uh today. So, we'll be chasing that down. We're just going to keep chasing every grant. Wherever they put the dollars, we're going to get first in line and try and get those things in place. While we're warming up the Epson, um, if anybody needs to take quick potty, now's the time. >> I think the one who needed it did. >> Yeah. >> All right. Well, that's awesome doing that. I want to make sure we wrote the uh action item pretty carefully there because we wanted to make sure it was transparent.

095>> We could have just say approve the agreement. Um, but we just wanted to make sure we called out for clarity and when two years from now, we try and figure out when we did that. It's very easy to find it. Um, and this would just give if you voted yes, you'd be saying, "Dr. Blackburn, you have the authority to go finalize this." Um, so if there's any substantive change, then I'd have to bring that back. But trying to figure out the minutiae of this many minutes on a charger or such, those would be things we would just address as we're um kind of nitpicking back and forth on the contract. But I think we're pretty close and there is no concern whatsoever that the Excel Energy Grant isn't there. Um, but we just there's

096still more details and so we want to be careful and make sure it's clear. It is in the contract it's clear, but we want to clear it out so you didn't feel like you were somehow authorizing something while you the cart was before the horse. So, we want to put that in there. So, looks like your lamp is working correctly. >> It's getting bright and brighter. >> I'm going to shut off a light. >> Awesome. Well, good evening everyone. I'm Connor Harman with Highland Electric Fleets. I'm on our fleet solutions team. um really excited to talk to you about this exciting opportunity um for Slida School District in a partnership that would be with Excel Energy and Highland Electric Police. So, as Dr. Blackbird mentioned, Slida has been awarded $1.4 million in funding from Excel

097Energy and that's for electric school buses and charging infrastructure with the key piece here being birectional charging infrastructure. Um that was a keystone for Excel to provide this funding. And so just a quick foundation, the graphic here shows you the typical way that a electric vehicle is charged. You're getting power from the grid. So I'm going right to left here. Getting power from the grid. It's going into the charger. Charger charges up the vehicle battery. What birectional does is allows that process to flow the other way. So it takes the stored energy of a battery, sends it back to the charger and then it can either go back to the grid to provide grid services or go back to a building to provide emergency backup power. So this is specifically the technology that Excel is

098really interested in pursuing um and they've been directed by the public utilities commission to pursue this technology. So the scope of the project would be two electric school buses and two dedicated route chargers at the bus depot. So those vehicles have a dedicated charger to meet their daily routes and then one birectional charger at the middle school which is where we would do that birectional testing. And really we're thinking that testing probably a two-year pilot where we have really planned coordinated efforts when there aren't students in the building to bring this vehicle to the charger. Back up some lighting, some other critical loads. start small, but we're set up to keep building as we test the technology and see exactly how long we can power certain equipment. Um, and then lastly, I'll just add that

099buses are seen as a really good application for this five technology because they have larger batteries than your passenger vehicles and they have very fixed predictable cycles. So a few hours in the morning, few hours in the evening, and then they're sitting idle a good portion day or in the summer to do this sort of testing and potentially provide those community benefits. And so this is just uh the site plan for the school bus depot. So those school buses are where the electric bus would be. Um and then you can see there would be a new transformer and new electric chargers. Worked really closely with Evelyn here to make sure this fit her operations and her team. And then this is the plan for the middle school. So that bottom charger would go kind of

100in that rock pile. The back of the middle school that'll be protected by a fence. There'll be other software measures on there just to make sure we're protected from students. And then we would run into that panel room there to a emergency critical load panel. And we're looking to back up lighting, some camera systems, and again, we'll add on to it as we see fit with the technology, but it's going to be built in a way where we can keep adding to those systems. So, if we think there's capacity to add a backup refrigerator or something like that, we do it. We're going to start small and pilot it and work our way up from there. And again, this was the key point to get the Excel funding. The other districts that Dr. Blackford Blackford

101mentioned had six electric buses which was the program minimum and Excel made an exception for Salida to get two if we had this vehicle building. And then the reason Highland is involved here. So Highland is a electrification as a service provider. So we are going to be the implement of this project. Um we are working with Jeffco and Cherry on their birectional projects. We've been doing VTO G across the country for three years now and doing a monthly program with utilities um in doing that. And so Highland kind of spans the gamut when it comes to school bus electrification. Our goal is to take as much burden technology risk off the district and really fix those costs associated with these vehicles. So that starts with incentives and securing that funding, planning vehicle charger procurement through

102building the site, then also working on training the staff, the drivers on these vehicles. And then Highland is there throughout the useful life of this vehicle. So for this project, it would be a 12-year contract. And so Highland is fixing and covering all electricity cost of fuel on these vehicles. Our charge management software gives Evelyn and Bert team insight into the health and the state of charge and where these vehicles are located. That's also what allows us to conduct these birectional charging events will excel and provide them their reporting requirements. Then lastly, island is covering all repairs on these electric vehicles and the chargers themselves. So if a battery goes down, tires go down, anywhere between those two, Highland is paying for those repairs parts and the labor. And then this I think this is

103just a good visual for what Highland tries to do. There can be a lot of variable costs when it comes with electrification. And Highland takes all of those services I just outlined into a annual fee on a per vehicle per year basis. really takes that technology risk off the district and fixes the budget for these electric buses for the next 12 years. And then this is just a quick shop snapshot of where Highland operates. So we are across the country a couple projects up in Canada um operate against a wide variety of climate conditions. We're in urban, suburban, rural communities. Um and as Dr. Black Dr. Blackburn just mentioned of the other schools awarded under this Excel funding, Salida was the only rural district to get that funding. So, it's a potentially really exciting opportunity

104for that. And we've been working with Peak Speed Charter School um in Lafayette, Colorado for the past four years on their electric fleet. We actually did the first test of birectional charging with IC's bus, which is what we're using here with Excel about two years ago. And then we're going to get Jeff Co and Cher off the ground this year as well. Um, and one thing I will note that is imperative in this funding is that the project needs to be live and operating by the end of 2026. So, as you can imagine, if Harry's approval, we are kind of up and running to make sure that happens and can secure that funding for the district. >> And then another important part of what Highland does and part of our service offering is training your

105workforce. So, there's comprehensive training for drivers, mechanics, staff, operation team, whoever needs that training. we do help provide it. Um, and that would be in partnership with Macandless, who's the school bus dealer, to help provide that training. And that's on the chargers, on the vehicles, and the charge management software. And that last bullet point, we see a lot of bus drivers really do like driving electric buses. They're smoother, quieter, um, calmer ride for them. So, I will make no promise on driver retention, but it's something we have seen across the country that drivers really do like these vehicles. >> And they're promising steak lunches when they do turn. >> Sneak that in. >> Yeah, I'm in for the train. >> What do you say? >> I'm in for the train. >> Everyone's in. Um, and

106then another cool opportunity that is an option if you work with Highland, it's it's not something we have to do. We've just got a lot of feedback from districts and we've started implementing it is really using these vehicles as a STEM opportunity. A lot of districts see these buses as kind of a living laboratory to learn more about electric vehicle technology, whether that's a battery, that's electric motors, it's regenerative braking, kind of just incorporating some of that information into curriculum. And we work with curriculum partners to incorporate that if that's something districts are interested in, happy to help provide it. And so this is the the numbers piece. As I mentioned, all of those services we provide are meant to be encapsulating of everything you may see on an electric school bus. Um, and all

107of that is in return for a a base service price on a per year per vehicle basis. And I I will call out now these numbers may fluctuate slightly as we get all the mileage numbers down. Dr. I mentioned um I think the key thing to call out here is that this two-year pilot period I was talking about where we're really testing that technology Excel will be covering the first two years of the Highland contract. Um so essentially if this project is approved and moved forward that's two electric school buses two dedicated charges for those vehicles and birectional technology to provide emergency backup power to the middle school in which there would be no upfront costs to the district until year three. So they'll call that 2028. And then below is the the incentives that

108Excel is providing for this project. And then I may have gotten an older pres older version of the presentation, but I don't know Aaron or David if you wanted to cover this slide. >> Sure, I will. I thought this was important. So, this is kind of the slide I asked to put in here like how are we paying for it? Um, so the current >> Yep. >> currently, not currency, currently the district transfers out of general fund 80,000 a year to pay new buses every other year. Aaron and I and Evelyn were already preparing to come to you and say you need to increase that because the cost of buses continues to increase. The one we just bought was approximately 180. >> We just bought was 171 175,000 by next year. Well actually next year

109this year because of the new engine and the EPA standards going into the Cumins engines um prices will go up a lot. a new bus now, purchase a bus now, it would be 212,000. No. >> And I know I had some board members just ask, is that how much it really costs? Depends how you shop because if you ask what the base model is, meaning none of the things like we have to put retarders on our buses. That is a electromagnet goes around the drive shaft so you're not hitting the brakes going down passes. It allows you to slow down. Um >> Chains is those two and then you have to add seat belts in the first what? Three rows. first two, four, two to four rows, >> right? So, there's a lot of things

110they don't have included in those base prices that >> particularly the chains and the retarder and those those seat belts. Those are three big ones that change the price of when you're talking to maybe other people. >> And the magneto retarder, a cost for that on a bus is roughly $25,000 because a change will cost you now $8,000. A magneto retarder will cost you anywhere from 12 to $14,000 to install. So those are just two items that you wouldn't think about. But so we reduced the transfer amount by 466. Just want to pause. Can you go back a slide real quick? We've been talking. A lot of you mentioned the mileage was uh wasn't what we wanted on the kind of distance for these two routes. Been working with Connor. They rewrote that. It would

111be approximately another $1,100 a year per bus to make the mileage correct. But Highland, uh, we had a good argument today. And Highland said they would cut that in half. So when they just saying rather than doing the 11, it would be $500. So I just want to name that that's those are those minor details as we're saying, wait a minute, the mileage needs to go up and they're saying great, cost needs to go up and we're we're going through that contract negotiation stage. You can go back to that next slide. Um, so I just wanted to name there is a you know, put another thousand on that effectively to 476. um the 2028 that's what he mentioned right that's when we would start to pick it up. So we would um the first two

112years we continue to transfer 80,000 and then in 2028 we were reduced to 334 um so we would have the two electric buses by this uh calendar year they have to be in session or in working and then it would be four years you said Aaron right? >> Yeah. So >> because we're Yeah. Because you're going to be averaging out because you're going to get that full 80 the first couple years. So basically every four years it's still bikes most roughly. We'd have to do the math to see that a little bit but that's the idea. So >> we'll be getting three buses in four years though which is still faster than >> Yeah. Still faster and >> much more important. >> Yeah. So in other words, we're not asking you to give more money.

113We're saying let's reinvest the dollar strategy we have into something now that I think also matches community values. And that's why we say there's a no cost increase because you're taking a generic transfer and now you're specifically signing up I'll say half of that um over but the first two years Excel is paying that so you continue to bankroll those monies. So any questions on that? >> So you're saying we would reduce the transfer amount and use that to pay for the new buses, >> right? >> Reduction. Yeah. Yeah. >> Yeah. >> So, you'd use the 80,000 you're spending right now and in two years you I'm going to say cut in half. >> Okay. >> Which might not be a fair way to say it. Um you cut that so that you just reroute

114this specifically to these leases which is a service agreement. It's not for the buses. >> But for the next two years, we'd still transfer the 80. >> Correct. >> And that would go towards a new bus that we could then buy in three years. >> Yep. Got And you do have still as after this year you have 20 some odd thousand low 20s that'll be left in it after purchase of the bus. So in two years you're going to have 160 plus the 20 180 after two years and then 33 a year after that and then we can continue to monitor pricing on buses at that point. In fact you'd say this is the philosophy >> and I did mention that might be the most funds we're talking about a new motor for one of

115the buses. They're 45,000. Um, so that might be that fund might also be paying for that, but we would have to come back to you and go through the process to ask for those dollars. Okay, >> I only had one more slide before and it's just a example timeline. If this is approved and we're kicking off today, these are kind of all the steps we need to take on our end and manage these timelines to ensure this entire system is up and running, buses are operating by end of 2026. We accept >> any questions? You have Evelyn here, Aaron, Connor, myself that we can help. I know Ben, you had a few questions. I don't know if you want to ask those. >> I can. >> What is the U 12ear buyout >> in terms

116of after 12 years? >> So, it's it essentially that fair market value. It's how it's written in the contract. Um, so at the end assess what the fair market value is. Most likely it's going to be 20, 30, $40. It's not meant to be a lot of money and we'll know at that time, but it's fair market value and that's needed for how Highland is taking some tax benefits on these vehicles. So there's accelerated appreciation and all these other things that Highland can take advantage of and pass those savings along to the district. And so at the end of 12 years, it's a fair market value buyout. And that would be for the entire system. Could also just be the buses if not the chargers as well. >> So the charger would be a separate

117buyout. >> It could all be in one or it could be separate. It's just depending how it wants to be done with the district. >> If uh if it was a good deal to keep the chargers and that infrastructure, um would another brand of bus work? >> Yeah. So these are all the chargers are operable with all the brands of school buses. >> Okay. at this time. I just want to name 12 years. I don't know where technology is going >> today. Yes. >> Well, assuming that it would work at 11 and 1/2 years, we're hoping it'll work at 12 and a half, too, >> right? That'll be the goal. >> The uh So, I have more questions. I just uh I didn't uh do a big organizational thing. Um, is there a difference between

118uh the cost for registration of a bus and insurance for a bus electric versus diesel? >> Do you know on the do I don't know the answer? >> Actually, the registration will be the same because we register under the government. So, the registration for a school bus is roughly for the plates are about $15 a year. Uh, registration insurance is another kicker. I didn't even think about asking Sydney about that. So, you might want to send her an email. >> I can give you a generic answer to that question. >> Yeah, I don't think it would cost any more than normal insurance would as there is electric buses and electric vehicles already out there on the market and are being accepted by any and all insurance companies. I don't think if you have an electric

119car, you would pay more money for insurance. >> You we do at my f at my house for >> Is that because you park them inside? >> Most electric vehicles are parked inside. Most of them tell you to park them to keep the keep it warm >> warm enough in the winter. Yeah. >> And catch on fire. >> Well, I mean rare. >> So there's incorrect. >> Okay. All I'm I I don't know anything else than what I just told you. >> I would say it's >> compared to my other vehicle similar >> higher, but I actually have not brought the fact that we have somebody one of the problems with that is there's a higher repair cost higher repair cost in some cases, but if we have a contractor already paying the service agreement,

120I would think that that would mitigate some of that for our insurance. So I'd have to ask the insurance. Well, one thing is if you insure a $175,000 unit versus insuring a $400,000 unit, you would imagine you're paying