001our tech tonight. So there is a ambient microphone. So any whispers will probably be picked up. So warning on Facebook or wherever from >> I'm in the worst. I can't say anything. I made [Laughter] handed it off to you. Yeah, you know, it's like Yeah. >> Hold on. [Music] Shut down. [Music] It's hard. It's like There he is. There we go. I love everybody. [Music] Um again reminder for some that came in late we have like live mic all night so conversations is it it's in the laptop and our team told us that it works really well so All right. So, we're going to start this meeting. Got 605. Please stand for the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for it stands. One nation under God, indivisible, liberty and justice
002for all. >> All right. Dr. here. >> Dr. Hill >> here, >> Mr. H >> here, >> Mrs. Lunberg here, >> Mrs. Pas here, Miss >> here, and Mr. Smith >> here. Just making sure I'm not missing any other public comments. >> We'll start with board member comments. seven seconds. I I was hoping that is Crystal Copeland I don't see her here. I just wanted to comment um on her her letter to the board was encouraging us to get a second SRO and I want to tell um Crystal that I agree with her that Brie is an amazing SRO and I'm so glad she's at our school district. I'm so thankful for Chief Johnson to give one of his best officers to SRO work with our school district. I just think that her her camp
003her advocacy local advocacy was misplaced in that maybe she should send her signatures and her request for the second RO SRO to the city. And why do I say that? Because she's because Bri is her salon enforcement officer and then and she operates within our school district. We supplement her salary and benefits but they are the main providers of that. Personally, I don't support a second SRO mostly because our executives, our principles in all of our schools feel that this is the appropriate number of SRO's for our community. We also have to remember that we have Matt Monasuri soon to be in one building and we also have like Sunshine in as well. So, she has a lot of work on our school district. And the one thing I wanted to publicly volunteer that Crystal
004wants to work with Detective Marilo, there's a $740 million pot of money in the state for law enforcement interesting things like SRO to help with um the law enforcement challenges. They haven't they at the Solidus the Solidus Police Department has not accessed that yet, but I'm going to volunteer with Crystal and Maro to be on that grant writing team um as a reviewer, which is kind of what I do professionally. Um this is a gritty school district that goes after a lot of grants and um it has made it has helped a lot and I want to help them with that. Thank you. Can you hear me? the ambient mic. >> Okay, thanks Josh. >> All right, I got a couple things. One, I would tag on to just talked about acknledging that written message
005and general statement my tenure on the board. This is probably the best relationship we have with their SRO program. So, doing good things there. So appreciate what we've done with the police and B and all good things there. So um one other piece I know I've read in the paper and looked at the B school board and things of that nature as well as the hospital with kind of the immigrant status and collecting the data and all those things. Just want to say thanks to David and Admin, Jesse and Michelle and Corey and really our frontline secretaries for just like doing the work. We're doing the work and making sure we take care of that community. Um as well as I think the second reading of that policy um that Casby sent out to kind
006of update school uh laws are on our agenda for tonight. Um kind of relations with state and federal officers. So, um, you know, I think this board has come out and basically said we're not going to make a big public statement, but we're just going to work. So, appreciate you guys' efforts in getting that done. And then lastly, and I don't think this is going to change anything for this year, but um Aaron and I have talked a little bit about this, but you know, we're talking about a big activities plan and an overhaul and talking about different things and like gate for events and consistency and it's very inconsistent when you go to like various games and when they're open, when they're not, charging, when they're not, different things like that. And then also
007like really would like to look into um why we're charging students. I think the $4 dollars or whatever the activity pass um to encourage our students to attend these things. I don't think it's inhibiting them. I've actually seen a great attendance of all the events, but um we'd love to find a way to absorb that cost and make sure that we uh ask or help facilitate students participating in activities, events, all those types of things by basically saying you can come for free. So I know playoffs and even now I would love to. I know if they go away um that changes things, but definitely want to look into that for a future year. So other than that, hearing nothing else, we'll move forward. Uh acknowledge the written message already. Thank you, Crystal. And I
008have one public comment, John Fritz. >> Thank you. Is I don't know if there's a public mic somewhere. Is it just >> It's right behind. So >> Okay. Um I uh I'm John Fritz and I represent ice rink for Chaffy County. Um, and I'm sure you've uh heard probably a little bit of us over the last 15 years working to get an ice rink to this community and trying to bring ice hockey and ice skating. Um, probably a lot of you know that we own a a whole ice rink and have been looking for a location. Um, we also have a very temporary rink, uh, like you've maybe seen at a ski resort or a town plaza. And, um, we think that a temporary ice rink out at the Holman Park uh, area, Holman Avenue,
009the soccer fields, would be an awesome asset to our community. um ice rink for Chippy County owns all the equipment and uh proposes to fully run an ice rink uh for the benefit of our students and our you know community members, excuse me. But um you know we don't have any sort of official uh agreement with anybody and um this is sort of just our um coming out to say we would love to work with the school board and um uh provide that for the community completely free of charge. Um, and it would be uh it'd be pretty great to have another winter activity for our kids. Uh, then over time develop ice skating, figure skating, ice hockey, uh, things of that that that nature. Uh, also, if you're aware of what's going on at
010soccer fields, they would like to have a large pavilion out there. Um, I also coach soccer and we have to cancel practice constantly with lightning and threat of lightning. uh we have nowhere safe for the kids to go and so a large pavilion that could be a safe haven in the summer and a skating rink in the winter could be an awesome thing to provide our community. So just wanted to put that out there. >> Thank you. Does it require power? >> Yes, these uh the the totally temporary thing does require 300 amps of power. Uh yep. And then just hose water uh or any sort of spigot. It's a very you've probably seen these these skating rinks that are just like kind of roll them out and then start flooding. >> And with the
011when you say no cost to the district that includes insurance and maintenance and all those good things. >> We got it. Yep. >> And could the district use the rink for any activities that they >> getting the kids out there? I mean, I think there's probably some finer details to work out, but the uh the idea is um is uh yeah, we we carry insurance um we've got we've got all that um that we already carry when we've uh the lake up at Chalk Bank with Forest Service and have severalus that we've had in the past. >> So, yeah. Thank you. >> Thanks, John. >> All right. Um looking to get a motion to approve the agenda with these following changes. Uh remove approved RFPs as details are still in process expected for uh move
012action item 5B approve 2627 academic calendar to discussion and add action item 5C approved statement of support for CMC ballot initiative 7C. >> Was that a motion? So, but support >> questions. >> All right. Dr. Penn. >> Hi, >> Dr. D. >> Hi, >> Mr. Hawk. >> Hi, >> Mrs. Bumb. >> Hi, >> Mrs. Pascal. Hi, M. Sh. >> And Mr. Smith, >> hi. >> Okay, guest reports. We have none, but we do have Teresa somewhere for a detailed report on SPCC. Let's turn it over to you. >> Okay. I'm kind of adjusting with the change in technology. Expected to have my computer in front of me, but have my right hand man here. >> You tell me when. >> Okay, great. I'm Do you I'm Teresa Gillson. I'm the principal at the Sida Early
013Childhood Center and oversee all of our uh birth to five programming for the district. Um, I've included I took a little different spin. I feel like a lot of these presentations have been sharing what we're doing at the early childhood center, why we do it, and I it feels good to be in a place where I think uh the board has a foundational understanding of of what we're up to over at the early childhood center. I did include um this kind of one-pageformational sheet. I had a couple extra copies too for anyone in the audience that might be interested. This just sort of outlines our programming and then a couple of talking points about why early childhood is is so crucial um not only for um school and academic success in the K12 um arena,
014but also in um in terms of like from a business sense and crime prevention and kind of all of those um impacts. So, I included that. But I wanted to have our time together tonight uh be a little bit more focused on some of the changes that we've made, some of the things we're doing in terms of our programming, curriculum, those kinds of things. Um and just kind of what what changes we're making in uh to support our youngest learners. So different our funding is so complex um and it's different from K12 education. Our population is different. Um so this is just a kind of a brief summary of our funding and what we do is we layer funding. We combine funding sources to provide full day services um for our students. We have um
01556 Head Start slots and 56 early Head Start slots. So 112 children. Head Start is uh dedicated to serving our um community's most vulnerable. And so that's roughly between that and our special education population that's roughly about 80% of our population. Um so this correlates to I was thinking back to David's presentation on overall how the district did last year. So these are our kids that when we hone in on how did our free and reduced kids do on this 80% that's that's those freed kids. Um and then we um we have UPK which is prioritizes four-year-olds. That's our state funding. We have um staff tuitionbased. So that's a reduced rate of tuition to support our school district workforce. Um and then special education for any child over three to five. Uh we provide special
016education services. I know um uh Jody had a couple of questions about um we are currently about staff specifically that population. We're currently serving 29 staff children. Um and and not all of those, it's important to note not all of those are tuitionbased. Some of our support staff qualify for other funding sources um or if their child is is four. Um so like little back service. Yeah, he's currently uh partially funded by as a universal preschool child. Um did that get your question about staff tuition? Um, so the only piece here where we don't, so we can layer like Head Start, UPK funding, those kinds of things, but a child that's Head Start or early Head Start funded has to be entirely funded. We can't do Head Start, community based tuition. So that's a little
017bit of a shift. Um, and UPK has brought in a few community based, so maybe they're a four-year-old whose family doesn't head start qualify. So they can um they're private paying um the market rate. So we did a comparison with other preschools in our program and they're paying the market rate um for that second half of the day. So under UPK we shift a little bit but super complex >> market right now. >> Um so we pay so they are paying $500 a month roughly $1,000 a month. >> Okay. >> Their staff pay how much? They pay uh 200 for a half day, 400 for a full day in our toddler program. Yeah. Um so I was uh just again kind of getting back to some of those things I wanted to share with you
018some changes we've made. I stepped into my role in 2023. Um and we were we were facing some interesting challenges in in 2023. When I reflect on it, we were short staffed across our programming. I felt like we constantly had postings. I was constantly trying to recruit people. Will helped a lot with those efforts. Um, we were down an early childhood special education teacher. So, again, we have to take any child that has an IEP. Um, and we were down a special ed teacher for about 14 months. Um, we were finding inconsistent classroom practices. So, various curriculums kind of pieced together. Um, a focus on compliance and adult directed instruction. At the same time, we had um probably our highest risk three-year-olds. These were 2019 2020 babies. Um I knew this experience well. I had
019a baby in 2020 and I was on maternity leave. I remember uh Alona, our previous director, called me and she said, "We're shutting down." And I was like like for the week. And so all of a sudden I was uh homeschooling two first graders. I had a newborn at home. I was finishing two of my classes for my principal's license. And in the meantime, what happened was my husband's business went through the roof because he was in construction. Everybody realized that he could come to slide and work remotely. Um, and so I had like friends dropping off casserles, nobody to help me. So we just talk about that because it was like what happened to our population of young children is that essentially instead of 80% of our population coming through with some level of
020trauma, almost every child was coming through with some trauma, right? um they were just raised their early experiences were different than we'd ever seen. Um our highest percentage of special ed kiddos as well in that class. Um and we were just seeing increasing negative behavior, staff frustration, and burnout. Teachers were done. They were over it. Um let's see here. So our um so our goal to address this, it was kind of like we can't add more people. There's no other resources to add programming. So I was like, we have to shift what we're doing. We have to shift um how we're approaching this. Um and so we started to focus on conscious discipline and play-based learning. The idea was to get back to how do all young children learn best um and how do we
021um simplify what our teachers are doing, create fidelity across classrooms and and our hope was to decrease negative behavior and um increase staff retention. So, conscious discipline, if you've heard anything about this, conscious discipline is a um it's a comprehensive, it's a big multidisciplinary social emotional curriculum. I'll probably spend the rest of my career learning about all of the components of conscious discipline. It umbrellas a lot of um theories and strategies. It's uh built on brain research. It teaches adults to manage their own emotional state first. So that idea that we have to be regulated if we're going to support a child to regulate and then we can model healthy conflict resolution um and teach the missing social and emotional skill. The idea is that we're moving from punishment to problem solving. So it shifts
022the focus from either punishing bad or awarding good behavior to teaching the skill that the child's missing to navigate those social um scenarios. And it's built on the core principles of safety, connect connection and belonging. Um so this is the brain states model. So this is the idea that um for all human beings we have three states. The survival state which is ask the question am I safe? Um the connection am I loved? And then the problem solving what can I learn from this? um young children are in our building. We spend a lot of time in the first two um so supporting our staff to get children to the problem solving and then we teach new and that's where we teach new skills. Um the big other big piece with conscious discipline is creating
023a school family a culture of um safety and connection for both children and adults and families. Um, and then in each of those brain states, there's strategies that teachers and parents can use. So, what do we do when a child's in a survival state? What do we do when they're emotional state? And then how do we teach them in the problem solving state? Um, so there's examples, connection rituals. These are playful little greetings where a teacher carves out 30 seconds a day to connect with a child and check in with them. The idea is we want them to feel seen and loved. The safe place is a designated classroom area to support co-regulation. So that's not time out or let's go take a break over here. It's let's come to this space and um we
024have strategies within that space for the adult to teach them self-regulation skills. And then communication for both adults and children. Clear expect clear expectations. I need you to do this or we're doing this. Um and then empathy for the human experience for our children that arrive almost every day in the survival state. And then our second initiative was to get back to play-based learnings. I have um this um the uh all babies are born creative. I don't know if you've heard of the NASA creativity project. This was um a study done in the 1960s led by George Land and it was aimed at find finding creative researchers or or creative engineers for the space program and what they found they administered these uh creativity like thinking creative thinking tests or creative aptitude tests and what
025they found was four and five year olds 98% of them score at the genius level of these tests and by adulthood 2%. So it was so he began asking these questions. What is happening between those two stages of life that's stifling creativity and um and it suggests that somewhere between those two stages um something's happening that um we're diminishing creativity, stifling creativity and along that goes creative um problem solving, perseverance and interpersonal skills which we know are critical for the future. Um, we know that play is a way for children to practice and master skills at their own pace. So, previously before we were more playbased, our team spent a lot of time on figuring out what's what's developmentally appropriate practice where our children observing where children are. And what we learned is if we
026flip it and we make it childled, initiated by the child, they tell us what they can do and then our staff scaffold that to stretch them to the next level. Um, play supports whole child development across domains. You can see in this little picture, they've got a tube and they're using it to talk to each other and that was all initiated by them. But they're having um really playful interactions. They're you they're using their whole body to move. Uh they're problem solving um so across all domains um and not just a targeted domain. And then mounting evidence shows that play lays the foundation for skills our students need to thrive in the 21st century workforce. So again, that idea that we're we have children in our building that will probably um have careers or jobs
027that we can't even imagine at this point. Um but if we're fostering creativity, perseverance, problem solving, conflict resolution, um how those skills will transfer and how they can take them with us when they or with them when they leave us. So I was on that. >> Yeah. So when I again when we stepped when I stepped into this role, I was a little bit um naive. I thought this shift to play-based learning was going to be really easy. That the why was going to be the hardest part. What I learned was the how was the harder part. The why teachers got it. We had some incredible um veteran teachers that have been doing this a long time. They were set in their routines. Um and that shift, that change to support adults to do think
028differently and do something differently turns out can be challenging. Um, so we started with really looking I was like, "Okay, we're going to start small. We're not going to overwhelm teachers." So we started small and started just asking why questions like why why do the dump trucks why can they only be played with in the sandbox? And I was like I was like, you know, why does that why tell me about this? And it was like well because they'll they'll run into other kids. And um or they'll run into teachers legs. And I was like oh okay. And and don't get me wrong, we have 2,200 regulations that we have to meet for Head Start funding, right? But I was like, well, let me check and see. Well, turns out that's not a regulation. So,
029let's just give it a try and see what happens. And the opposite happened, right? What we found them doing was they were having these conversations. They were organizing their play. You can see this little girl on the ramp. Um, they got they figured out there's an up way and there's a down way. And so they organized all of that and they started including kiddos that didn't get opportunities to play otherwise. Um, and so it's it's turned out great. It's become like our tagline. We free the dump trucks and let's rethink a lot of the adult directed rule. Are they are is it a rule because we're uncomfortable with it as an adult or is there really a safety issue? So just kind of having some of those questions. Um, let's see here. What else did
030you want to say? Um and and that idea of kind of coming back to creativity. Were some of these rules stifling creativity and then we were just giving adult directive adult directive and we'd see negative behaviors increased. Um >> yeah, >> just want to say leave it to my child to just chill in the >> Totally. She's still >> Yeah. Yeah. And then um uh the other piece that we really talked to was letting go of school readiness. In school readiness, kindergarten readiness. We all we know what the purpose is of that. But it's become a buzzword for funders, which is okay. I write a lot of grants and I use the term all the time. Well, sometimes what a teachers hear is that in order for them to be kindergarten ready, in order for
031them to head over to Corey and his team, they need to know what they should in kindergarten. So, it was like, let's let go of let's let the kindergarten team do that. And our job is to teach them what they need to know as a three-year-old, as a four-year-old, as a 5-year-old. And then if we do our job there, the kindergarten team picks up. Um, so that idea that like if they can sit in a classroom and respond to their teacher appropriately, if they can get their coat and shoes and hats on by themselves, Corey's team can teach them to read. So, it's like that idea. Um, so we really like letting go of of some of those um words that can elicit the push down effect. And then we had to teach teachers how
032to guide playbased classrooms because it was like well if we're just gonna let them play then guess you don't need me or I guess I don't know what to do or and it's this I love this example. So in this example what can you do to build a taller tower with the blocks that's guiding play. We're not giving them a directive and then in versus instruction. Instruction would be build a wider base to make your tower taller. So, it's just those subtle shifts in our teachers language and once they started practicing and getting comfortable with that, we've really seen them flourish. >> We teach them how to do a pre-trip. >> Yes. Yes. Okay. Free the buses. They do love the bus. They do love the bus. We take one field trip in the spring
033to kindergarten bound over to elementary. It is a big We just drive around on the bus. Um but kind of coming back to this idea of supporting uh adults to think a little differently to implement new practices to get out of their comfort zone. Um we kind of came back to I came back to this idea and I was reflecting a lot. I got sort of met with some resistance. So reflected on my practice and how do I support teachers um to feel the same as we want children to feel in our buildings. It's like that idea that the need for connection never goes away. Um, and so we just really I've really focused our system on or my team has really focused our system on making sure that adults feel that same safety, connection,
034belonging so that we can create brave spaces to try something to new to do something differently. Um, so we created collaborative time focused on skill building. Our teachers didn't have planning time. They didn't have PLC time. Um, so we carved it out and made it a part of our master schedule so that they can count on that. They know they get it. We have an incredible um instructional coach in our building who runs those PLC's and can really teach these skills. Um and then we can provide feedback and ongoing support through our coaching um our evaluation system and our mentoring system. Um a goal was to create meaningful professional development. So we said here's the goals. We're keeping them simple. Here's how you do it. And now your prof now our professional development is going
035to align with that. they're g we're going to teach you how to do it and we're going to support you in doing it. So, we did a staff survey at the end of last year and this was one of the items and 96% of our staff reported what they had learned during our professional development time they um has changed their classroom practices. So, we felt pretty good about that metric. This is our child outcomes data. Um when we think about data in early childhood, it's all tied to funding, it's all tied to age and they grow so rapidly. So, this is something this is an area our our data I would like to get better at. Um because it's really hard to tease it apart because a child that comes through our door as a
036one-year-old in the fall is not it's comparing apples to oranges by the time um it's May or even our even our kindergarten bound kids. Um but what we see here is this is data. So these are um this is our 2425 data. We've uh pulled out our IEP kiddos. We did have a high percentage that moved on to kindergarten this year. Um, so these are our UPK children, our Head Start children, our district staff tuition children. Um, and these are those children that came through our door as um, 2019 2020 babies. So we see some pretty um, incredible growth in um, how they were performing in the fall versus how they were performing in the spring. So, up next this year, one of my messages to teachers and to our team has been we were
037not changing a whole bunch more. We're not drastically. This wasn't an initiative that's going to go away. We're going to stick with this. Um, this is, you know, researchbacked and and how children learn best. We're just going to dive deeper into our practice and we're going to get better at it. Um, so up next this year, we really focusing on teaming. So, that's our classrooms are structured with a lead teacher, a teaching assistant, and a pair professional. And not all of our teachers or you know when I went through teacher school didn't learn how to work with adults or how to lead a team, how to um communicate, how to have difficult conversations, how to learn where to give grace and where to be assertive. Um so we're really working on strengthening those sort of
038microclassroom teams. Again, the data and impact. I want to get better at how do you look at early childhood data um and how do you tease it apart um and make the comparisons be valid um and mapping our preschool standards to play. So when children leave our building, what do they need to know and how do we teach it through play? Um family education, we will be sharing with families um conscious discipline. We have our first family education night coming up on the 29th of this month as well as the power of play because a lot of our strategies that teachers are using in the classrooms can be duplicated in the home and can be really powerful powerful for families. And then building capacity to better serve our bilingual and multilingual children and families. Um
039our team has made incredible strides. We put together last year a committee that really looked at what are we doing and how do we do this better. We have a couple of staff that are native um Spanish speakers who um are really passionate about um connecting with that um population. Um and when we talk about development and development of language and literacy, a child that's learning two languages, three languages, what does that look like and and what's the research on that? So getting better at that way. And this is might recognize this is the long fellow garden having or having to snack. This is my 2020 baby hug and he is loving kindergarten. Um and we started out this year um with just um an opportunity to sit together and to redefine our vision vision
040and mission to better reflect our our current practices. So this is what we came up with. [Music] Is that everything? >> Yeah, that's it. >> Okay. >> Questions or Yeah, >> that was very >> questions, comments. >> I just I just have a question on enrollment data. the chart from David that has all of the schools by ECC. Um, you know, we saw a little bit of fellow enrollment this year. So, I'm wondering if we're seeing a dip in ECC or the scenes. >> Yeah. Yeah, we're still we're full at ECC and and running a weight list. Um, our toddler program is particularly full with a large weight list. Um, and that includes income qualifying families. Um but in compounding families who still can't get >> Yeah, absolutely. We see a little bit it gets
041a little bit trickier with UPK as four-year-olds because there are 10 providers in our county. I don't know exactly how many are in light of 10 in our county who are taking universal preschool. It's a little bit more um I don't I don't want to say competitive, but like we had to kind of look a little bit more for those four year olds, offer the community based tuition piece. Um but no, our enrollment is still is still full and maybe pulling some of those um like toddler weight list numbers to see kind of where we're at or how does it compare to previous years? We could do that. >> And do you see any change in the demographics? Like I know at one point there was some thought like are we going to lose Head
042Start kids and are we still we're still having high numbers? >> We still are having high numbers. Uh the office of Head Start did um has allowed a little bit more flexibility in qualifications. For example, they um if a family um qualifies for SNAP, the nutrition assistance program um then they can then they automatically qualify for Head Start. So they broadened a couple of those categories. It's still the same population but made it a little bit easier for families to qualify. And then Trace to dig a little deeper on that idea. I know the last couple of years slightest school district families were having a hard time difficult time qualifying for head starts parameters. They made too much money but housing was expensive. But did that help you? >> Yes. Yeah, that did help us
043qualify more head start and early head start. We do have they broaden the um Yeah. Yes, it did help. There's still that population that's just over. So, it's still >> not what but we're moving closer to better. >> And how many out of district students do we bring in? >> Yeah. Um I I did pull those numbers for you. I'm sorry to touch on that. >> No, that's okay. You didn't have your computer. >> So, we um let's see here. We are currently we are currently serving um eight out of district children and four of them are staff members children. >> Okay. Yeah. Yeah. And none of them are um IEP. Three of them are homebased in UNIVA Vista and that's a Head Start regulation. We have to serve the whole county and since the
044Head Start >> um since Bunav Vista doesn't have a Head Start program, we have to serve those families. when they get there. >> So then um but then what we do is just facilitate um transition into the grove um if if that works for the family or or any school. >> And then are there any children of staff on the waiting list? >> No. Yeah. Yeah. We always sort of it's like to call it a staff benefit and to say for sure that a staff member gets in it's challenging because we are capped with our ratios. So we have to be just transparent about that. >> Um but we're typically able to make it work and get them in. >> And then I have one comment and then one question. I have been able to
045see every principal move into a building and exert executive leadership and it's been really fascinating to watch and how valuable a principal is. And you took such a difficult thing like that stern sped teacher, right? Credential sped teacher and all of those COVID cohort babies >> and the challenges and the burnout that the staff had. And you distilled it down and you did three things that the pain credential teachers credential pay as if somebody was in first grade. Then the conscious discipline and the play. And it's we're in our second year now and it's fascinating to see it happen and it it's magic. So thank you for doing that and it's so it's fascinating to watch it happen at the other buildings too. And then how is change is hard >> right? So how are
046the adults doing with that change now? Um I think I think overall well I had the few we had the fewest openings at the early childhood center this year than we've had in my 16 years. Now, part of that is that data is skewed, right? Because sometimes we rapidly expanded. So, we had to there's no like hard Y. Yep. But I didn't spend all summer trying to hire. Um we had a we did have um we had one teacher that um she was like I I don't know like I don't know about that. I don't know how this feels for me. And she applied and moved over to Corey's team and it was like that's great. We're you know that's she's still we still see her as a part of our team. Like that's okay.
047um if you know, yeah, being an early childhood teacher is not for everyone. Um but just like being a middle school teacher or a high school teacher, um so that's okay, too. Like helping support staff to find their pathways and just really what brings them joy and and you know what makes them love their jobs is kind of boils down to. >> Okay. Thank you. So like shifting to that certified placement, you're not necessarily losing people because of pay anymore. Not as frequent. >> No, I mean it's it's a little bit tricky. We have the most classified staff with those additional support staff. I mean, and and sometimes it's just like um you know, I just have to like I got to do something else to make a little bit more money and but it's
048never like yeah, you know, like oh this job is terrible or whatever. No, but I think but yes, so it helps us retain but it helps us retain um you know solid teachers in each of our classrooms that can stay that um and consistency in that way. and if they're leading those micro teams. And then we have um we revamped our new teacher for our new staff training. Um so for example, we just brought on a parah last week. Um we had another one that uh decided she wants to go be a ski instructor or something. But anyways um and so we brought on a new parah and we have this like whole map, this whole timeline of supporting her in her role. And so um and it's all consistent because the lead teacher is
049still is still listening. Um, so just kind of mapping it out in that way. So I would say yes, less turnover for sure. >> Questions? >> Thank you. Great to get these reports. >> Um, we'll shift into district. I think that's you. >> I'm gonna let uh Aaron go first and then Savannah and then I'll I'll pick up from there. >> Okay. just on on student growth. >> Yeah, you can go on October count. Okay, I don't think you dropped me in the right place. >> Um, no, I mean I can talk about October gap real quick. That's that's the biggest topic right now from October because that's what dictates all of your funding. Not all of it, but about 90% of it. Um, and we haven't seen a decline in a long time. I
050think this year we're looking at potentially seeing a small decline in our student population. Looks like we have about 10 kids right now. Um, so basically there's a a day in this month where they're going to take our October account and that's what they fund us off of. So it's kind of a weird way of summing up all that we do on one day, but that's how the state does it. So um it's a bigger conversation on the state because there's a lot of defining enrollment across the state public schools. Um so yeah, so seeing us go down a little bit deviates from what we initially thought with the demographers report. Um there was a lot of homes that were not built in the last year that are getting ready to go online. So, I
051would be surprised if we see that go back up in the next year or so, but we're redoing our demographers report now to see what that might look like and how many students that might bring into the area. Um, but it's going to impact funding a little bit this year. So, I'll try to keep you updated as we go. I mean, for context, that could be like $100,000 roughly for 10 kids because you can think roughly 10 to 11,000 kids this year. So, it's it can impact things, but it's not enough for us to change our budget currently. I mean, I'll bring the minute budget in the next month or two, but it's not impacting any of our plans big time at this point. But it's definitely a trend that we want to make sure
052we're watching because there's a lot of schools right now that are really stressed about this. So, not something we need to be stressed about. We do have collapsible systems like we've talked about many times, board meetings, but um right now we're still pretty convinced that we're going to be able to with the increased formula funding, we're still going to see a lot of increased funding this year overall. So, it's a decrease in the expected increase. still pretty complic. >> Yeah. So, no, it'll be I mean it averages out over I think it's three years right now. They're the problem is they're looking at a smoothing formula for that. So, it's a little bit changing constantly. Um, so they're trying to figure out how to do that to put in the new formula over a certain
053amount of years and change the averaging. So it's we're down like 10 this year. I think it's the exact number is 11 FT this year. Um, but that's not what the averaging. So once they average it'll be a smaller number than that. So it's 14 students 11 and a half FTE two different numbers and then the 11 FTE gets averaged in a to be determined way. they stay with the way it's written or they adjust it and I will come back the first one which is perfect and the next run comes out from the state which is a more official run next month. So that's why hopefully by the next >> well you guys I mean I know you kind of mentioned in the email have you had a chance at all dig into those
054numbers and see if it's immigrant children if it's homeschooling if it's you know what >> yeah I mean it's it's really interesting because there's there's a couple buildings that are down in enrollment and you can so like lees is down in enrollment totally and one of the big reasons for that is the fourth grade class they just left al was a pretty big class and the incoming kindergarten class only has 75 kids. Um, so there's there's some pieces there. I mean, there's there's, you know, as we dug into it, it's pretty regular that sometimes for the kindergarten year families will homeschool and things like that and you may see them cut back in future grades. So, that's not overly concerning. But what's interesting is if you take the report and you look year to year.
055So last year's kindergarten class versus this year's first grade class, those cohorts all stayed roughly the same across the board up until high school. And so actually we talked a little bit about this um with Jesse. There's a bit more of a dip off in kids who left between 9th grade and 10th grade, 10th grade and 11th and up to 12th. All three of those classes have decreased in size. And there's a number of factors for that because you there's there's kids leaving, there's kids coming in. Um, there was quite a few that transitioned to online, but not necessarily more than normal as far as what we could tell when we talked. Um, so we're still trying to kind of figure that out, figure out exactly where they went. And Jim has really good data
056that can most of them we can track to a specific school district or or what they're doing right now. So, we're still trying to dive into that a little bit more. Um, the initial Yeah, the initial what you said, Matt, about the immigrant families, it doesn't seem like it's necessarily that impacted in our district. um based upon the kids that left that we dug into but the same exact gonna keep digs or various things how monastery is impacting us building >> when is there building >> uh it's set to open up for next semester so January one effectively >> and then aren't they increasing enrollment January >> uh the best grants best grants you designed for that increase so it's not expected um But we're gonna see how reality plays out versus design promises and
057all other stuff, right? >> It's worth noting that they have a gentleman's handshake because philosophically they don't expand past 160, right? Um as a philosophy and we supported them for the first time to get the best that was that was at that long >> David. Well, you know, 170 I can't manage time anymore. David, can you teach or Erin, I don't know who it is, the how or maybe even the principles because you add new students at each school, >> but it takes a while to see where you know the attendance secretaries at the schools are, right? And then then you pull out the kids who how does it work? >> I can talk about a little bit. I mean I would say yeah I mean I would say David will say the same thing.
058Jim Samson has has really impacted the um ease that we're able to do that and the ability that we have to get really accurate numbers quickly. Um so I mean they because we've gone everything's digital and we've put everything driven in campus he's able to really clean up the system throughout the summer and typically the secretaries come in and there's I mean it's constantly changing throughout September. Every week Jim brings a new recording up and down. >> Yeah. in the first week you might be up 20 kids and you're down five and you're up seven and then you figure out where you're at on the day that they actually count. So, um but I think largely that's Jim has cleaned that up to where it's we have a pretty good estimate by the end of
059September. >> So, that's kind of where we are. It's really >> Yes, you're not going to see much of a change in what it is. >> Um the harder part is it's it's a request for records. So when you go to the next school, let's say you went up the road to BV or down the roadaxi, BV would have to then file a request for records and that triggers that the countless towards the multiple bars >> and that table you had. >> So yeah, but if you get some of these large district online where they're kind of going around the state and kind of trying to skim off kids, um you know, some of the Colorado Springs districts and >> it's extremely unethical, but it's the way the system is, so whatever. Um so as
060they pull those they may not put those record requests in with the same kind of fidelity that they like a district like garage or district. Um so that can cause it difficult. On top of that, the online home school situation has changed over the last few years because when somebody leaves, are they an online school at home or at the home school that's also accessing some sort of online curriculum but not really in the school and it gets these muddy waters. Um, and but the nice part is we're talking about trying to chase down a handful of stories and normally our staff know the families. They can say this is what's happening. they have a good hint of what why why the family made the choice and can look at those things. So >> yeah,
061I mean the the two big points were the kindergarten class was smaller and that's fairly expected being able to call Cy and talk about that and just you know and also working with Jim and say this was kind of expected but then I mean when we started doing the trends I called Jesse and we were able to go through almost every kid and be like yeah this one makes sense >> whereas that doesn't yeah we're we're able to track down pretty much every one of those lost kids and figure out what happened. You know, it' be one of those things where some of the stories we might make a phone call and just see if there's a relationship wrong with the family. In the most case, it's not the issue. The family's made a different
062choice and let families do that. Principles, do you guys want to add anything thorough? >> The only other question I have is um do you have a rough estimate for out of district students? >> Not yet. I think that's next month. >> Okay. Yeah. Um, on that note, I think the other piece I did put it in the border report at one point is so you had a small dip in overall enrollment, but you had an increase in special ed students, right? And then we didn't plan for what we saw. So our plan isn't pulling as well as we would hope, right? And of the students, we have more of them. They're more intense than what we had expected. So that breaks your system resources. I think that's been a big struggle here in the
063buildings. >> Um, >> and is it across buildings? >> Yeah. >> So, there's there's enough stories there. There's some tense, you know, kiddos, you know, take a lot of time, a lot of manh hours, and you also staff burn out because you can't do that kind of intensity non-stop. >> It stretches everybody. Um, and the hard part academics always say like normally you can sit down and you can you can correct an academic need pretty fast. Behaviors are six months, years. It takes years to correct behavioral um issues if they can be corrected. And so you're talking about sitting in that storyline day after day after day, year after year. And those are really hard positions to be in. that take a lot of resources. Teaching somebody to decode is much easier than teaching somebody
064to regulate for whatever reason they may struggle with that. So, >> so Erin, I heard you say you feel we'll get the state numbers and all the things, but you know, like here was our hope. We're here now, but it's still more than where we were because the state's probably funding more. Plus, there's >> declining throughout the state people fund to go up. It's just how long it takes for the most. >> Yeah. I mean, we're receiving more money than last year by quite a bit because of the new formula rolling out and it's rolling out time frame. So, it's going to be Yeah, it's nowhere near the amount that we're like the decrease that we might see from these few kids is not near the amount that we saw in the increase. So, the
065client's holding there. Um, and I mean, as long as you don't continue to see a decline in student enrollment and a substantial decline, they're supposed to roll out the formula more every single year. So, we're going to continue to see increased uh revenues as long as we don't see a huge tank. >> I think the next uh this run that you talked about which gives us all the data on the numbers that'll be important coming out soon. Um and then the assessed valuation, it's a really important number coming out next we're tracking because if the overall average assessed values of homes goes down, then it pushes more of the burden on the state budget and off of the locals. And if you press it onto the state budget, that budget's not working well to say
066the least. So you're that right there is going to cause some storylines we have to track. We do expect the overall assessed valuation to go down. That'll be the prediction in the state, but we got to wait and see. It's a big number. Um >> um I don't remember. I'm hoping by November when the auditors here see that. Um, I think key thing is Aaron and I are still thinking there's, you know, one of your guys's kind of number one goal is teacher pay and taking another chunk out of that and keep on going. So, I still think we can make that happen. Um, the other things I've been working on and I'll let you go, Savannah. As you can see, this big board with lots and lots of numbers is just digging into capital
067projects and all of our operations. Um, trying to figure out and make sure those plans are going to be as accurate as possible so then we can come back and make commitments to here's how much money we have. We've thought through all the other details from tilt skillets to lighting. Um, so those RFPs we pulled off the lawyer so we don't have to dual approve the RFPs. So we'll put those out. Some of those RFPs are going to be around the lighting system, right? And that came quicker than even predicted because you cannot buy the lights in Colorado. So now entire lighting system has to be changed. Um, and we're looking hard at that. How do we recycle it? can put it like I can take all the fixtures out of the high school, >>
068store them for a year, put them in the long fellow, the bulbs and everything else, but then you're storing um >> you know, you're storing mercury and some stuff. It's not necessarily liability wise something we want to be storing. >> So, we're trying to look at those what is the consequences of that >> the building automation systems. Um we're trying to come up with new new ideas and rather than just say, well, here let's pull it all out, replace it all. What are other ideas? Can we reprogram those things? can we scavenge this to keep that building like how can we cheapen those things? Um on the same thing, the energy grid, it's really becoming one of our central conversations. I know a lot of you we're looking again at the electric bus. Um if
069some of those grants items can help us with infrastructure, then that could help us create some of our own micro grids as we're going to see electricity become the issue I think over the next five years as we look at technology. Um and we are at the end of the line technologically. So it's we're trying to design as many systems find partners because that's some of that stuff out. I bring it up because that SMS bedroom um right basically quadrupled from the original quote and that was because of our electrical system. It's our oldest building. Um so can we find grants for doing something inside that helps us with that electrical system so we can invest in that. Um there's a lot of different things, but that electrical is where we're spending a lot of
070energy um to try and figure it out just from the safety because remember every door access everything runs on technology now. Um so when your power goes out it's not just the inconvenience of not having lights, you know, Michelle has to have dark bathrooms with middle schoolers which is fascinating. Um but like everything kind of happens because you don't have all the solutions in place. So that's a big question we're working on as well as some other just trying to make sure that when we get to January, we've got the amended budget, we've got as much research as possible to say here as much money we can put towards teacher pay. So we're trying to resolve any issue as possible. The only other thing I I add and I know I put it in the
071board report but I'm also fully aware that my board report is not the most fun. I'm sure everyone else told it's pretty exciting but um but no I mean just to to give you confidence like our revenues last year at this time were 12% of our budget. They're 12% this year. Our expenditures last year at this time were 20%. They're 20% this year. So, we're tracking right where I expect this to be and I feel pretty confident where just for anything else in finances or student growth that October count questions you want to jump into. Next month is a lot of air. You got the auditor here start. >> Yeah. Everybody come back. It's going to be a great time. Audits are the most exciting thing ever. you're up. >> My job is more exciting.
072So, >> um I'm just gonna try to summarize this novel that I wrote this month um and share some things and you guys can ask me questions um as they arise. Um I think we've had a lot of success stories going into all of the buildings. I've gotten to go to the elementary school. I think I'm almost done with all of my get to know you interviews. Um that Yeah. Yeah. Um, I have a couple on my list that I've got to email, but I'm sending out the middle school interviews uh tomorrow just to get to know people. In my first board report, it was like explaining exactly what that meant. Like we're going over licensing, we're going over PD. I'm getting to know them as individuals, not only as teachers. Um, and so I
073get to start the middle school once um this week, which is great. Um, English, as you remember, I was talking about possibly adopting curriculum at the high school English level. Um, we found an open-source curriculum that almost hits all the standards and is um something that our teachers are interested in at the high school um and they're happy with it. And so we are not doing that anymore. We are going to go to the open source curriculum and really focus on the what and aligning assessments and things like that. um professional development. I got to run at the high school for their MTSS groups which was really exciting. Um we got to work on engagement and so that led into like SEAL and um trust and then um some rigorous task work. Um so that
074was fun and I think we got some pretty good feedback on that. um all celebrations. And then as far as the curriculum adoption moving out of English, we're talking about the curriculum adoption moving into math at both the high school and middle school levels. Um so we are pulling sources right now. We are getting samples. We're creating a vetting process. You guys can expect the um to see some curriculum by March for approval. Um so that's good. And I think teachers are really excited about looking at all the different resources that are out there now. Um, so I have I have some pretty good buy in the middle school in high school. Um, team leads, uh, thank you for the money for team leads because this is very exciting to me. just hearing Teresa talking
075about like all of the change that she's implemented and then seeing coaching on the board, I was like um so that's exciting to me that we have an opportunity to do this with our staff, not only to better our our students and our practices, but to build um teacher morale and to help us have that belonging and where we want to be. Um, so that is really exciting and we will have I kind of have a timeline at the end of my report around when you could see a draft for that um and what it could possibly look like. Um, let's see. Thank you for the time with teachers as well because I've gotten to be out and about um minus my Atlas work. So that has been a lot of fun and I am
076really enjoying getting to know everyone. um dates. We are editing Atlas right now. So, this next month in November, we're really just like I have all of the curriculum in for the most part. I think actually I can say all of it as of this morning. Um and so we're just diving into what that looks like. Obviously, when you have a bunch of curriculum in there, you're going to see one unit that you're like, "Oh, this these essential questions don't match with the learning objectives and don't match with the standards." And so, we did go in there and edit those things. Um, but in one of my courses in science in the middle school, um, we have some fairly new teachers in there. Um, and they're they've adopted curriculum recently. And so all of their
077all of their stuff is in there and we get to work on like assessments and um, aligning those all the way throughout and how do you know kids are learning things? What are our priorities? Um, our high leverage moves. So yeah, it's kind of where we're at in a summary of nine pages. >> Um, so you talked about the middle school math curriculum in 2014 with the new state exams in 2020, >> which is like a little shocking, but do we have any other subjects that are that out of alignment right now, or is that the dramatic one? >> um, I don't think so. I thought middle school English was, but I think they're right on the cusp. But you can was it 29? >> Uh, we adopted my scientists. >> No, that was two
078>> 22. So, I think that was my other concern was the English. >> Yeah. And high school English obviously, but they've got a really I mean, I put that in my board report, too, as far as what Atlas looks like. and they've got a really good foundation in there for an open resource program. >> So I was know what is open source? >> Open source means it's free. >> That's what I thought. >> I want to make sure that that's >> Yeah. >> Um >> it's the best word >> and they have a paid one that you can get too. But I mean for right now like getting to know our what is really important and I think there's plenty of resources there for us to work from right now and then and to something
079that we can purchase if that's where we need to go. >> So SP I'm curious maybe this was covered before. It's called guaranteed viable curriculum. >> What's guaranteed about it? Like how does what does that mean? >> The guaranteed part. Um the guaranteed part is um to me it's like the making sure that everybody has the same curriculum in any class regardless of the teacher. So they have access to that same rigor as they would in your class as they would in my class. Um, and yes, we have our own personal styles and we might do supplementary things that may be different, but they have access to the same sorry potential as next year like aligning them to get ready for the following year. >> That like makes way more sense than what I was
080thinking. >> CBC, oh successful. How perfect is that? Um, and then >> how what's the temperature like as far as is everybody excited about this? is are they open? And >> um is it are you >> Yeah, I mean I think >> I know that's a very general Yeah, that's >> um if you gave this to everyone and they were like they said nothing, I don't think we'd have any engagement. So I think there's good questions. I think there's people, >> you know, that are willing to have conversations and go to the hard places. So >> good. >> I'm enjoying because I've got that bigger, longer perspective. I'm seeing staff engage this conversation in a much higher level, much more depth, which means they have some capacity for that space. So hopefully through the work
081it actually increases capacity and I know it's still >> as long as I've been on the board, we've trusted the recommendation of the curriculum adoption committee, which is staff. And if you just said something about science and Kate here really was the leader of that last year or two years ago whenever >> for the high school or the science. >> Yeah. Um and you just said it's it's working. >> I don't know if that's the same one. Is it? >> It is the same. Darcy actually led that one. >> Beg. >> Darcy was here and led that curriculum adoption. It's what we're using. >> The one we're using right now, right? Yeah. But, you know, Yes. >> But I think >> I think RC was great and and Kate was they were passionate about it.
082And what you just said is it's it's aligning. >> Yeah. It's aligning. And >> I mean, if you think about a new teacher coming into a building and having to learn all of the things that are teaching and they already have the what in front of them, like they already are given the curriculum and it's guaranteed and it's there and they can see where it goes and where, you know, they're supposed to get kids to. That's that's the what and they can focus on the how because that is really hard as a new teacher and it and it's working out with the the scope and secrets from Longfellow and then up to the high school. So far >> I mean [Music] yeah I mean that's >> that's unfair for me to ask. You cannot have
083a different >> You're always unfair to me Joey. No. Uh, you know, I think I the way I see it, having been in the district a long time, is, you know, there's the data collection is kind of the phase that Savannah's been in. Savannah, correct me if I'm wrong. the data collection, getting it all together, getting it housed into one place, and then the next step is is kind of that doing that work and you're able to have a more educated conversation about these kinds of things. Does this align? How does that work? >> That Yeah, we're getting we're getting closer and closer. You know, it's and elementary is a little different just be, you know, because of Read Act and because a lot of our curriculum, you know, especially when it comes to literacy
084and math are resource-based and it kind of has been that way for a long time. Whereas you go up into the higher grades, it's it's just different. You know, what does English one mean at a high school level? And so really, that's kind of the big focus now. >> Okay. that that helps me understand. >> No, >> that's and I and I that's what I long for. >> All right. >> Not going to go easy on you. >> All right. I don't expect you to. >> Okay. So, the only things I would just mention is we are doing a lot of audits. You see, you have a threeyear enrollment audit. So, that means is every three years they go back and say you claim there's 100 students who go here. So they gave you all
085the money and whatever you claimed and then three years later they come back and review all those numbers. So that was all co. So the audit book just on that audit that's come in is six times longer than the last time you did it. Um so you're talking about a very different perspective that has showed up from the department of ed um where every penny is being thoroughly investigated. There are no freebies. It is so it is um it'll change. So, we will see how that goes. But we've had that. We did get our esser enroll, which is the last of those CO dollars, 100% done. So, that's a big success. We've had behavior audits, suspension restraint audits. We just had um an ELLL audit. We paid for a separate consultant come in because we
086know we need to look deeper at our programming for language acquisition. And so, we brought an expert in to kind of give us a finding so this next year we can say, "Here's the program we need." um as we're trying to address that. So, we know it's a growth area, but we needed someone to come in and say, "Here's that." So, we expect some recommendations um by the end of the semester from that audit. HA had to do an audit. Um it's got its own thing. I just mentioned that because just like one of those audits, six times more in depth. It's that's what everything is coming from every angle department right now. Um on the same side, that's our state department. I know there's a lot of news around the federal layoffs at the
087um federal department of education and I just want to make sure I sent you guys an email today from the commissioner. I get those pretty regularly. Again, there's zero negative consequences to date that have happened um to us from those layoffs. This layoffs hit the special education side of the piece um pretty hard, but we also are getting all the funding. All of our head start money has come in. um all of our IDA B has come in. So um all that money is still flowing to us. We haven't seen any of those draw downs, not um the actualized. So um it's just always an interesting thing to hear one thing on the news and see something else in your checkbook. >> Right. I'm I'm checking on that funding just because I'm very active doing
088children. And so far how I'm understanding it is, you know, military soldiers can military can be paid because there's money left over from last fiscal year. Head Start can be paid because there's money left over from last fiscal year. Just from what I have been reading, do we have any sense of when spend money or head start money? There's no prediction right now flows because um the people who would actually cut those checks to be for example are are no they're considered essential workers. Um so those workers are still there processing like our draw down requests. Um so that money that's what I'm saying the money is still flowing. I'm not going to pretend to understand everything going on. Federal government are making predictions on when they might >> we had some >> come to
089an agreement and turn the the engine back on >> later. Okay. So, so we have we just don't know >> what what I heard it's a little bit of a different context than you know the education social services has basically said there's like a 90-day window so there's enough this the funding slowly trickles down that 90 days >> it's over >> for right now so I want to make sure you guys are just aware I know we're um So, just keep betting with an eye on all those financial things, right? Because if you said somebody promised $100 and they end up paying you 80, you're going to hear in the news that there was a massive cut, right? Because you only got eight 80% of the $100 you were promised. That's a different thing than
090a cut revenue, a cut in expenses. You've also got to track a cut in promises right now. And so, we'll keep on tracking all that stuff. We'll be a report next month and Right. Everything will work out and we'll all sing kumbaya and it'll all be perfect in the next 30 days. When we come back, it'll be easy and no big deal. >> Be positive. >> Thanks. >> Is that all you have? >> That's Yeah. Unless you guys want to jump into anything else on technology, anything other >> Well, which one? Where are we? Where are we? >> We're just in the district report. >> Report. So, are we have we transitioned to mental health? >> Um, I didn't I didn't put much that into that meant to. Um, mental health teams, that's your counselors,
091your psychologists. We do have a DHS on just hired. Um, so that'll be trans transitioning in that space. Um, and please be aware I meet with like Monica Haskell from Department of We at least once a month pretty regularly. CCA, you'll hear one of those acronyms. JP County Youth Alliance. Um we were all there trying to help that countywide perspective setting priorities. Um and I'm proud like when we were there it was yesterday morning track of time. >> Um setting priorities you know your slide of schools was very very well represented because that's where money's at. We're going to be there and we were really the only ones but we're excited. Um, and just so you know, our priorities between Jesse and I, we really want to see some help working on some driving, preventative
092driving programs. Um, we've had two rollover accidents um that have indirectly affected our kids or directly affected our kids. Um, we know we've got >> spaces for kids at the trying to make sure there's more activities for kids. So, that's what we're pushing on that mental health piece. We've also asked the counseling team to help us set some recommendations around what is the best way to connect to kids who might be at risk for making bad choices either hurt themselves or others. Like um it's a hard thing. We don't want to advertise all the suicide screenings we do and all the threat screenings we do or all the safety towel things like it's it's a catch 22 and also they're working their tails off doing that stuff. So they want to come. We'll ask them
093to bring some recommendations on how to manage some of these things because I know community has a strong interest. Also asking on the technology piece like what are their recommendations for screen time philosophies as we try and navigate that? So I've asked them to kind of develop some of these things is mental health awareness. Any other questions on that stuff side of the house? Who did you ask? our mental health team which would be our counselors, psychologists and some of our other like Soul Vista you know DHS some of those other leaison agencies who assist our kids in human development >> my legs are all um I got to experience part of the conversation about board and just so the board knows there's debtree MLO and CASBY MLO conversations and let David know that I
094think it'd be worthwhile for your to meet with Cas investment bankers if you um I believe what the University is doing is technically called a debtree MLO >> it is and I'm going to learn more about it. >> Yeah. So just an opportunity to talk more about MLOS's and how we could potentially utilize them for various things. Safe BB's is doing it for like facilities improvements to allow more staff pay money as it's um and then obviously with everything else out there I mean there's some opportunities we need to discuss um bond with capacities on it or I think that conversations brought up on our end um but they'll want to talk to us about it. So I just encourage David to schedule some time in CA for the forward to meet with the investment
095bankers to talk through that >> real investment bankers. >> Okay. So yeah, >> the people who do the analysis on what is your line of credit that you have available, >> right? Okay, got >> the association came in to Aaron and I said, "Hey, we going to consider that." I said, "Well, we're going to look into it." So, we're starting close to hitting it. >> Well, capacities have increased, which was huge. Meeting with Mike actually. It was a great meeting for us as well. They've increased a little bit with HB1448 last year with the new formula. >> So yeah, there's there's potential there for sure. So we're going to explore what changes there is. What does that open up? Get you guys some facts. again trying to get all those as much of the number
096crunching as we can before January a couple months early so that we're really ready to make any. So um and then you know we heard from John Fitz earlier the ice rink curves to show up to a meeting at some point um to just talk through it because of his frustrations with doing that. Um, I would tell David to proceed with working with them and possibly going back with an ML by next meeting because he explained it to me that pretty much minimal impact. If they need to what's going on at home, then they're just going to do it all. So, it's like, yeah, we have some space, have a ice rink for the winter and long term. >> So, would it just be in the back where all that is? He thinks by the
097between the parking lot and the hill for the soccer fields there's enough space to >> make it level and do >> I haven't seen a drawing >> there's enough space between the parking lot fence and the fence little dog leg of grass that's actually worked the garden >> we want to extend our parking lot there's >> attach the garden >> attach the We already identify that spot to extend our parking lot. So maybe there's a benefit where they're helping us grade that so we can get a summer parking lot extension. >> No promises, but I think it's worthwhile. [Music] >> Your kids don't have to stay in >> Well, that's that's a longer term. >> That's longer term. >> I know a report later on. We are working with every city and county trying to
098get someone to engage and work on recreational spaces. >> It sounds like you just flood real quick and they drink and then they freeze up. >> Seems like >> don't know. That's good question. That was the first time he >> they can find that out and as we work through this process right away I'll do some investigation come back next month >> by our federal heard over success on this policy students are they abiding by the new rules are they adjusting to the no phones type just >> I don't have the same expectations for the staff because we use WebEx as like a safety thing >> and so I keep my phone on me during the day and I think it's an important >> I can't hear you. >> Sorry, it's the ambient microphone. I
099I said I don't have the same expectations for staff as I do for our kids. like I we we've invested in WebEx, which is a safety thing that I can text every single one of my staff members anytime that um I need something. And so I think they need to have phones on them. I've never really seen staff be unprofessional with phones and I would have a conversation with that, but I think it's important for us to have those conversations with kids, too, that like there are rules for adults and there are rules for students and you are students and they are the teachers. So, I don't know if that answers your question, but I'm not making my staff put all of their phones away. I don't know if anybody else does. >> Uh, I'm
100I'm right there with you, Michelle. Obviously, if there's a teacher using their phone in a professional manner on Tik Tok and conversation, but you know, they're adults and professionals. I trust them to use it as a tool as needed. You know, I know my cell phone I constantly have to to be on it while I'm around the building. And I've had kids ask me, "Hey, Mr. Hall, you're on your cell phone." I'm like, "Yeah, run the school on my cell phone." Um, so >> no, I think that's >> this is kind of the expectation. talk and then parents ask >> and um you know I think the other piece at the high school uh in the beginning of the year we didn't confiscate many many cell phones we had like 10 right um but there's
101been a little bit of an uptick in in confiscation of cell phones and I think it's kids testing the boundary waters whether will continue to enforce this consistently. >> You know, >> you're doing your job. >> Yeah. >> And kids will be kids, you know, I'll go into the bathroom at passing period and you'll see, >> right? Um you know, they're they're testing testing the waters. But uh I can't tell you when you walk into a classroom and a teacher's teaching or they're in a classroom. >> People people are not using. >> Yeah. >> Cory, your concern at at Longfellow was parents wanted to be able to have a device so that they could track their kids when they're young and biking home and stuff like that. >> Has it put parents at ease over
102there and it's working out or? >> Uh, you know, it's always balance. It's uh more so at the elementary level is the smart watches and so you know anymore you can have a phone on a watch >> and I also kind of catered with my staff I don't want them feeling like they have to be going around checking out every watch to see if it's a smartwatch and so kind of our just litness on that is is the kids using it during the day? Are we seeing them on it? That kind of stuff. There's I've had a few conversations with parents on that kind of stuff. If they, you know, if a parent shows up and says, "Oh, little Johnny's not feeling well and Miss Tanner is not in the loop and he's totally unaware,"
103then there's a parent conversation that needs to happen there. >> Yeah. >> I would actually say my nurse the other day said, "I feel so much busier this year than I have any other year." And it's because kids can't get on their phone and tell their parents, "Pick me up. I'm sick." Right now they actually have to go to the nurse and have that which is great like because half the time they can just probably go right back to class. >> Yeah. [Music] you know, from the school phone. >> From the school phone school phone. So, it's definitely being at the middle school. I can verify. >> Yeah. >> You all should be on the buses right after school. >> 500 phones. >> It's been great for after school hanging out because we're like, you
104can't be on your phone in here. Go. [Laughter] >> It is interesting. And I've talked to a lot of kids and I'm getting kids specifically thinking like I sat in your seminar. Um, they did bring up one other data point that a lot of kids have echoed is now they're going home, they're doing that doom scrolling all >> worse. So, it's like, you know, there's not that small hit. So, now they're getting on their phone and they're falling >> for a couple hours in their bedroom, which isn't good for anyone's mental health. So, they we can't pick that up. But, it was an interesting thing to have kids tell me that. And a couple kids echo, yeah, >> I'm seeing the same thing. my own personal habits kids involved. They have all said thank you.
105>> Well, and I actually was at a webinar the other day with a couple of C Bowler students who are like really working hard on initiatives for managing social media and doing things. So, they're making a whole little movie. So, they're actually sending me a bunch of information um because then I did this call just then and sending like their information on school presentations and what they'd love to come and do something to the kids. So it would be kind of the next step of like addressing what you're talking about >> now. >> Um now what? Like we don't have them at school, but now how can we manage outside of school? >> So and they've done a lot with hiding in like meditation and gratitude practices and >> and they're like 20-year-old college kids.
106So I think maybe the message would be better received than from us. >> That sounds like a great ador. Okay, we'll get you. >> Anything else? >> That's all I got. Anything else? Okay, we'll take our customary 10-minute break and let everybody leave that want to stick around for the rest. Nice young.