001Good evening everybody. I now call the Board of Education special work session to order at 5:00 p.m. Is there a motion to approve the agenda for Tuesday, March 31st, 2026? So moved. Is there a second? Second. All those in favor say aye. Aye. Opposed say nay. Tonight we will be discussing the proposed school boundaries. Before we begin, I want to note that while we are not holding public comment tonight as we are hosting open houses tomorrow starting at 6:00 p.m. regarding the draft on boundary scenarios. Board members, administrator, and strategic planning executive committee members will be spread out at each location to answer questions and listen to those attending. Feedback will be collected and reviewed via survey, and I will now turn this meeting over to Dr. Linnan for her opening statement. Thank you, President
002Newman. Good evening and thank you for being with us here tonight as well as those of you who are joining us online. I want to take a few moments just to ground us in our process of where we are and what you can expect in this meeting tonight as well as how we will continue to move forward. Over the past few months, we have engaged in difficult but necessary work of redesigning our school district. This process is started out of a commitment to long-term financial stability, but the goal has shifted to not just balancing a budget, but to thinking about how we expand the horizon of what is possible for every single student that we serve. We want to expand opportunities for our students. We want to strengthen our outcomes and create a community where
003everyone belongs and is supported. We must choose the collective good of all of our students as we move forward. Through your feedback, your conversations, and your engagement, you reminded us of what our schools mean to you. You have spoken about the pride, the history, and the role our schools play in the lives of your children and your families. We value that so much. You've also been very clear about what our future should look like as we think about access to advanced coursework and academic opportunities, strong fine arts, athletics, and extracurricular experiences. We also know that consistent on-site supports for students and staff is important as well as a sense of connection and continuity for students to move forward. With that, we have set for our guiding objectives as directed by our Board of Education through
004their resolution based on your feedback. Our key objectives here is to make sure that we're creating feeder patterns. And when we say feeder patterns, what does that actually mean? Not just moving kids from one school to the next, but it's about creating connected communities of students who stay together with their peers and their friends, and they grow together from kindergarten through graduation, building relationships, shared experiences, and a strong sense of connectedness. Consistent student experiences, ensuring that our students, regardless of where they live or which school they attend, they have access to high-quality programming opportunities and the relevant supports. We want to make sure that we're also operationally efficient, using our facilities and our resources responsibly so that we can reinvest in the programs and experiences that matter for our students. This is the heart of
005our work. So here tonight, with the direction provided by the Board of Education as well as working in conjunction with our strategic plan executive committee, they have helped to study and refine our possible options. We are now at the phase where we are looking at our school boundaries. Tonight you will see two boundary scenarios developed in partnership with RSP and Associates. Each scenario reflects a different priority. As you As you focus in on scenario one, the focus here it maintains our current high school boundaries. Scenario number two, it focuses on balancing enrollment across the district. These scenarios are not final. These are starting points. What we would hope to gain tonight is what is the impact of each of the scenarios, and we look forward to getting your questions and your feedback so that we
006continue to refine the path forward. So tomorrow night, there we will have sessions for our staff members. We will host virtual sessions for you, and staff members you have that information in our newsletter today. For our community, we will also have input sessions that will take place at 6:00 p.m. at Kennedy, Jefferson, and Washington high schools. At these sessions, families and staff will be able to review detailed boundary maps. You will also have the opportunity to enter your address to understand the potential school for your student as well as ask questions of our strategic plan executive committee and provide us with some feedback. If you're unable to attend, you will also have other options as well. I do want to be up front that we're still working on a few things. As we move forward,
007transportation is a key area for us. Transportation planning and staffing are critical, and our next steps our teams are already preparing for those next steps, and this will be part of our reconfiguration guidebook as we move forward. So again, I just want to thank you for being with us here tonight. I recognize that this is an opportunity for us. For some of our families, it's going to feel like a new exciting chapter. For others, it may bring some uncertainty at times, but I believe that we have become stronger together as we've been going through this process. So thank you for journeying along with us and continuing to give us your great feedback to make sure that we make the best decisions possible for our students. Thank you. Thank you, Dr. Linnan. I will now turn
008the meeting over to Rob from RSP for his presentation. Good evening. Pleasure to be on your big screen this evening, and I wish I could be there in person so you could get the real sense of the energy that our team has worked on for this project. For many of you, we're public pretty familiar with with me being the CEO and the work that we've been doing in Cedar Rapids going back to nearly 2010 and 11 school year. So almost 15 years that we've been partnering with your district in what happens with your enrollment, what happens with your boundaries, and some of the early work on your elementary facility master plan. So we thank you for allowing us to be a partner. We think that a good starting point is always to be data informed.
009And so I have a few slides just to bring everyone on the same baseline of what's happening or projected to happen in the district. This gives us a sense when you look at the two scenarios, are they the right scenarios with the factors that we've been examining in your district. Look at the full enrollment analysis report to really dig into that. But overall, we are anticipating enrollment declines through 2030-31 by almost 650 students. You see the breakdown is where there's increases, we see some slight increases at the elementary and the middle school, but the high school starts to decline quite significantly. You'll look at some other areas that we factored into this data that I don't have visuals in this presentation, but for sure new developments that are going in all through the district boundary,
010but also the impact of live births and what those elements might mean for future enrollment. So just kind of overview, there are some maps to help you understand our current situation with our pre-K, K-5, 6-8, 9-12 buildings as they're currently designated. Always look to the legend to understand what's in the maps. So the solid colors represent the elementary boundaries. Here's the middle school boundary map. And then our existing high school boundary map. this complete feeder or complete house as elementary students move through the system. Right now, we're not complete, and you can see, um, the breaks that are shown here with those dotted lines. So, that was just kind of a a quick background of the the current situation. Um, to start out on this process, we had the board, you gave us these, um,
011criteria, and there's eight of them. Um, for the scenarios, the top two are the ones that we focus on. The other six are elements that you're going to apply regardless of the scenario. So, the first was we ideally wanted to have that feeder pattern coherence, so that complete feeder, um, conversation. And then that second criteria, um, is geographically, how do we align students with, ideally, as close as they can be to the buildings that serve those grades. Not always an easy challenge, um, with where our buildings are and where kids actually live. The board, you also gave direction on what our feeder pattern would look like, and so this visual provides that. And there's a good host of information here. So, the first is as this aligns with each of those feeders, um, the red
012pink color is for Washington High School, the blue is for Jefferson, the green is for Kennedy. You can see the designation that when we move forward with either of these scenarios, our elementaries will be pre-K fours, we'll have an intermediate building for 5-6, a middle school for 7-8, and then our high school for 9-12, and then the buildings that would be retired or closed are listed and how they're associated with each of these feeder patterns. So, again, this is applied through, um, both of the scenarios for the direction to help identify what's actually going to happen in each of the buildings. From that, we've provided some different regional data to get a sense of where our kids are now and how does that relate to the buildings and where those buildings are located. And so,
013we used, um, Cedar River, we used 100 Highway, we used 380 Highway. Those were some some of the big points, as well as 151, and then you can see how that regionally breaks out with the students. In this packet, and where we'll spend the greater bulk of our time and and really open up for your questions, are going to be on these two scenarios. And all of them have maps, they all have different data tables, and I'll I'll go over each of those, um, when I go into detail about each of the scenarios. We tried to provide you with as much data. Remember I said data informs, and then over the next couple weeks, we have that, um, qualitative approach of how does this really resonate with the patrons and the students that are going
014to be impacted by this. So, other current data that helps understand what you see in those scenarios is driven by capacity. And so, on this page, we list off the gen ed rooms and what that maximum gen ed capacity could be. This was provided by the district. This, um, allows us to know the number of students that can be in any of these buildings as we move forward. You'll see this same information in each of the scenarios, and so we start with what would the enrollment be with our current scenarios, and where you see green shading, that means, um, we're less than 70% utilized, and where there, um, is a orange kind of color, that would be saying we're over 100%. Um, of what that capacity could be. Um, so again, just giving you a
015sense of based on where students reside and our market forecast, right? We know there's more private, parochial, home school kiddos that are in the district and in these areas, but this is what our market forecast is. You'll see the same thing with the secondary buildings. And then, as we get into the demographic data, you'll see things, uh, played out with what the race and ethnicity is for, again, the reside students. And then you'll also see the English second language, um, again, with each of the grade bands of, in this case, elementary, middle school, and high school. We also used a lot of census data to drive what is happening at a community level. Um, we had lots of conversation about using the free reduced lunch, and really most of that stemmed from knowing that there's
016different resources students may need with, um, a categorization of free and reduced lunch. Um, what we've developed, and I'll go into detail about this, is a tool to take this off of the student and have more of the conversation about what's happening at the community level in some of these areas where these students reside. And so, here's just kind of a snippet of it where we show you what the average percent household is in poverty, broken out by each of the zones, and then what the average percent minority population is. How you can see this on the maps, and what we've told the the committee regularly is don't judge a book by its cover. And sometimes you might say something, for instance, um, with this map where we're showing, um, when you look at the
017legend, the greater the diversity, the greater that blue color is, so the darker it gets. And so, this helps designate with the census data, um, where are we seeing, um, our pockets of minority population. When you start to marry that up with households in poverty, doesn't always, um, show that for comparing just those two variables. But again, just showing you a couple maps to get a sense of that census data. Not as granular as the planning areas that the board, you've heard me talk about on how we do our forecast, um, but it's still really good information to know what's happening in the community. From this information and some others I'll talk about on the next slide, we created this diversity index tool. So, using census block group data to understand what is the district
018average for our diversity, and then if it gets above that district average, it would mean that there's more diversity in that area. If it goes below that district average, less diversity. This generally speaking, lots of words on this, um, slide, but that's what we're trying to get at. Visually, how this starts to look when we're processing this in our tool, is the variables that are up on the top left. There's four of them that we look at. So, we're looking at a minority race population, education attainments, income and home values, and then poverty factors. All of that gets aggregated into what's happening with each of these zones to give it this total diversity score. Now, what does that really mean, right? So, um, what we'll talk about that here, um, on this next slide. So,
019when we look at what our current situation is with that tool run, um, we'll just focus on the elementary, so the district average for the final index score is 1.74. We highlighted, and do this on each of the tables where we're looking at this, where it's greater than, um, that district average. Um, so we could look at this two ways. We could have highlighted those that are less than that, right? So, ultimately, if you said this tool, we want, um, the equivalent or equal use of this diversity tool for every zone, meaning everyone would be 1.74, you would say there's some that are greater than this, there's some that are less than this. So, from just that lens, you'd say, "Hey, there's some other work that we may want to do with the diversity index."
020I don't believe that was necessarily the intent as we looked at this data as it was, to try to make sure that with whatever the zones look like, that we don't just overwhelm one zone with either too many kids that would be higher on the diversity or too many that are lower on the diversity, so you don't have some sort of similar experience that ties back to the key thing. What is the geography and how do we fit this into the feeders? Um, so those those are the the constraints, and then how do you look at some of this data, um, to move us along. The other elements, um, that we looked at with the two scenarios, was creating a students that are impacted by the boundaries. Now, fully, um, transparent, if you repurpose close
021a building, all those kids are impacted by it. Um, when we change boundaries and the boundary changes don't take place till 27-28, um, we are looking at the known students that are in those buildings based on where they should be going with reside, and when the building opens or we change, um, the boundary or a building closes, what is that impact in the 27-28? So, right now, we'd be looking at our current K2, and, um, how does that then get impacted when they're second and fourth graders? When we get to 26-27 school year, um, we'll have a whole 'nother grade that's impacted, so that SIBC goes up. So, we're just looking at the actual known kids that are in our system and how are they impacted [clears throat] um 2 years later. All right, I'm
022going to pause there. Any questions about some of that back-end data before I start to talk about each of the scenarios? Um if you don't mind clarifying, it looks like um I'm trying to understand the where the data is coming from, right? So, um we're sort of looking at what it sounds like neighborhoods or swaths of the community in the the census or national kind of database versus data that's coming directly out of our schools regarding student populations. Is that correct? Yeah, for the diversity index tool, absolutely. Okay. And also for So, for the things that we discussed, the poverty, diverse I guess there's different categories of that, but that's all coming from more of like a national census versus us pulling our current student and household data by building? Yeah, and so what I
023will say census data but it's local data as it relates to if you filled out the short-term or long survey um information, but then there's also been updates with one of the tools that we use um through ESRI, which is our mapping platform, that that updates this with with other census data checks, but it's it's not specific to each of the students that are in your district. It's who are living in the areas where those kids are residing. Do you mind explaining the reasoning for that versus actually using current current dem- Is there um certain stipulations we have to consider or um rules we need to follow when we gather that data or do you mind elaborating? Yeah, so we know that the students that we get in each of these areas are driven by
024the community variables. And so, specifically with the free reduced lunch, we didn't want to to isolate the conversation on uh the students that are free reduced lunch. Um and so, how does this then correlate with the community value variables that we're looking at? And when we look at with the current situation, we go back to um the data where we're looking at um this type of information, we're seeing something similar to what the current data would suggest with our free reduced lunch. So, again, ties back to the the more local data sets that are driven by census data, we should still be able to populate what that means for socioeconomics and those students that um will receive services for free reduced lunch. I'll give you one other cav- caveat that is important, participation rate, right?
025So, there's some areas where we may have, let's say, more impoverished students, but how many of them participate? It could be greater or it could be less. So, um there are some different nuances that change year to year based on some of those things that the district can control or even what we would try to anticipate. Okay, thank you, Robert. This is Caitlin, by the way. I was told we should state our name when so he knows who we're speaking to. Um that's helpful. I think I I was just trying to get discern, you know, um if these pockets of households, you know, that we see represented here in the darker lighter colors, if that is representative of students in that household or if those are, you know, individuals living in those units um in
026certain areas of town. So, just trying to parcel out. I appreciate you showing the percentages here and pairing those side by side. I think that helps us get a better picture, but um yep, appreciate the rundown. Oops, sorry. Can I just ask uh sorry, my name's Ashley. Just ask for clarification on so the diversity index tool variables. Can you just explain to us that um the education attainment? I think I I wasn't following there for a second. I just wanted to get a better clarification. Yeah, and I didn't really give those details. So, um when with the census data, we're able to know did you get a uh potentially just a high school diploma? Did you have um some college, let's say, um a year or 2 years? Do you have associate's degree? Do you
027have a bachelor's degree? Um do you have something greater than, right? A master's or PhD, EdD type. And so, um that kind of goes in somewhat hand in hand when you're marrying the income, the poverty. Um sometimes where when we look at what your level of educational attainment is, um it may indicate what your threshold is as well with what um you might have for earnings. So, inter- interlacing all of those together to make sure that we have a a better balanced view of of what's really happening in that area of the community. Any other questions? Not at this time. Thank you. All right, wonderful. And if you have some others, um I know Dr. Laney can pass those on at a later date. There's a lot of data um that we deep dived into.
028So, scenario one. So, this started right out of the gate with what the board, which you guys initially um requested, right? So, here's that feeder diagram, which should look exactly the same as what I showed you as far as um how we were looking at this with aligning everybody up into how you ultimately would end up going to your high school. And so, that pre-K 4-5-6-7-8-9-12. The general scenario that we followed was listed there on the bottom left where we're trying to follow that feeder pattern and adhere to the board grade configuration and assign attendance zones with that geographical location. And that's why going back to that map where kids are, where our buildings are or are not, um sometimes impacts that. Um what this feeder then looks like when you bring it to life,
029um you can see solid colors as we move through each of the feeders, you can see um the buildings that are going to be going offline, closed, retired, repurposed to some elements um are in the white hollow box. And so, you can see how those relate to where we currently are and how it shifts in into what it will look like when these boundaries are put in play. The map will show um a lot of good information. So, the solid color is going to represents the buildings that are highlighted in the legend that are going to be operational in this scenario. You will see red dotted lines on this map that indicate what the current elementary boundaries are. So, this gives you that context of where we are, where we're going, and then the geography
030of how this all fits together with scenario one. Challenges that we had right out of the gate are um not having buildings that are on the north side to minimize or limit our ability [clears throat] to come south, let's say, in this scenario to Maple Grove, the yellow. We show then the same elementary maps, but then how does it uh relate to the high school boundary? So, that green dotted line is the high school boundary. Scenario one, we keep the high school boundary in play. So, those three zones stay the same in this option. You see that again with this map where you see each of those three high schools and the dotted line represents the same colors that are contained within um those dotted lines. Then as we start to look at what scenario
031one does um with the number of kids, um you'll see as we go from left to right, we show what the feeder is, we show then the building, again, the color represented on the map with the color building will be in operation. We show what that future capacity is to further identify if it's being taken offline, there's a zero. Um then as you uh move to the right, we show what that current um enrollment is here in 2026-2027. Then as we move into the reside for um what this would be, um we're showing you the pre-K 4 enrollments um as we go through each of the years of 2027-2028 through 2030-2031. The last column show you that percent utilization. The green shading on this table indicates um we have two buildings that would be under
03270%. I also bring to your um when you look at the data, you'll see there's quite a bit of a range between the lowest utilized building and a building that's the highest utilized. So, if we just go out to 2030-2031, um we have a building, Johnson Elementary, that's at 52% and when we look down at West Willow, it's at 96%. In fact, if we look at Hiawatha, it's 97%. So, quite a bit of a range between those elementary buildings. We show the information as it relates as you move now into our intermediate school, our middle school, and our high school. And you'll see that there's more often than not areas where we have green shading. This is a math situation with capacity. Um that's a starting point, right? So, um I know we have a
033lot of educators that are in the room. Um obviously your admin staff, things that we do in the buildings doesn't mean these buildings aren't being um utilized. Um there's other things that are happening in the spaces, but when you start to get under 70% we highlight that because that may indicate there's something different you may need to do in that building with shared resources. So, you might have a part-time art teacher, um counselor, interventionist, things of that nature. Not saying that's happening now. We just know that when um we look at other school districts that we work with them all through the Midwest, that's sometimes something they wanted to have highlighted. We have that same demographic information as it relates to um the scenario. And so, broken down by each of the elementary, the intermediate,
034the middle school, the high school, you also see the same thing with the English second language students. And then as we move into the census data, all of this associated with the changes that are occurring with scenario one. And then when we get into that diversity index of the results, um this is shown here. And so, you can see there's um five elementary buildings I believe that are over the 1.74. And then um when we're looking at um the secondary, we just have Jefferson that's that's higher than that. With the students that are impacted by the boundaries, there's a lot of information here. Simply stated how you read this table. If you start from left to right, um this is the current boundary that the student would be associated with. And then as we move
035to the right, where are they being now changed based on where they reside to the building they would be attending with this new boundary. So, if I look at Harrison, I have 78 kids that would go to Hoover, and then I have 20 that go to Wilson. Some important observations. If we look at down below, um we're saying of the K2 population, we have about 41% that are impacted. Um we've broken this out basically where there's about 30% that's due to school closures and mergers, and then about 10% that are due to the boundary shifts. So, that to again just try to help you understand like how the student is getting impacted may be something of relevance in the decision that you as a board um might make. We also looked at the permits um
036with with your language of of like how they might be able to move around in the buildings. And so, we looked at if you reside in a zone, and now you would be attending the zone that you would be going to in 27-28, how does this play out? And so, what this does is it reduces our impact of students from what I showed on the previous slide because these students would already be at the building that they then would be associated with um in the boundary change. So, we do have some challenges. Um and some of these may not be challenges. So, I I use the word challenge, I don't mean that to mean that it's a a negative. Um we just know with the work that we do, again with a lot of districts
037um in Iowa and through the Midwest, that sometimes if the building is not physically in the zone, um that may be a challenge. Now, I have enough institutional knowledge where I remember when we had transitional zones and going back to when um Dr. Benson was there and um all of the the history of like bringing those out from transition zones to something different. So, this is not necessarily um a unique situation for Cedar Rapids. So, it could be something that we now basically incorporate, and you may say it's not a negative. Um we do know that um there's buildings that are underutilized, and that's just the nature of the size of the buildings and the number of grades that we're going to have in some of these, regardless of uh the scenario that we're looking
038at. We also know that just stating some of the obvious things, um there's some students that they're just going to have to travel farther, right? And so, I give the example of of Viola Gibson um becoming an intermediate building, which is naturally um you would normally walk to your school as a kindergarten, first grade, second grade, you're you're not walking to that building, right? It's an intermediate building. So, we we're just stating that. We know that that happens, and there's lots of places through the district where that occurs. Um there's fewer students that are impacted because we're not changing the high school boundaries. Um we're changing the feeder, that's that's a known, right? That's what we started out with. Um the other thing is what you're going to hear from a lot from your community,
039and that's some of those traditions, values, perceptions. Um we have multiple generations that have been going to some of these buildings. And so, this is a change. And so, what that means whether the building's being repurposed or you're having to now change and go to a different building, um that's going to have an impact. This last page I believe for scenario one, um helps you identify getting back to the two criteria that we have that we can leverage and understanding between the two scenarios. So, the feeder pattern coherence and the best geographical location. And so, um we've indicated that with the feeder pattern coherence, you know, we we kind of made it. There there's some things that are good about it. Um but some of it is just with our facilities um on the north
040side, um we we lack some um proximity for some of those students to be able to attend in a close building. When we look at the best geographical location, um really my big note here is um for the building locations in the existing school boundaries, we basically have said, "Hey, since the building's not in Kennedy High School um for Harding Middle School, then that's probably not seen as as ideal." So, that's why that part gets an X. And then the wide utilization of the elementary buildings um between that 50 and 80% is um quite quite large. And depending [clears throat] on the year, it's even larger, right? I showcased in 30-31 where it might be between 50 and 97%. So, um that just kind of gives you how do we tie this back with the
041data um into that. Um I'm going to pause for questions for scenario one. I would say this is more of a comment. This is Caitlin again. Um it's interesting when you just kind of uh take what we have and create the feeder and don't do a whole lot else, like we just the issues that we've been dealing with this whole year when it comes to access to you know, uh equitable um education in our schools and you know, staffing and other things like none of those things will be fixed. And that's I think that my main takeaway when I see those numbers, enrollment numbers as you go through into the high schools is um that will be like something that seems like it will perpetuate. Um so, I guess that would be my main concern.
042And then I also want to mention one thing that I didn't mention that's I think important as I go back to the projection data. Um in this scenario, Washington High School would be lower than 1,000 students. And and [snorts] without um talking with the committee and the admin team, that starts to create potentially some challenges with the course offerings and participation, whether it's fine arts, athletics, um clubs, um those things that when we start to get to a little bit lower student population. Robert, this is Scott. Um page 36 uh the in the one that will be with scenario two, I'm sure are very interesting to me. Um and then that that juxtaposition with the next page 37, just to confirm what you're saying is that the students who are impacted, once you take into
043account those that are already permitting into different schools, that actually reduces the amount of impact because there are students that are already in the schools that they would be shifting to. Am I understanding that correct? Yeah, let me give you a number example. So, if we look at Hiawatha, there's there's 23 students that in the scenario one, they actually are already at Hiawatha. So, when we look at um the students that are um if we go down the column of Hiawatha, of the 139 students, um those number would I say 23, um yeah, 23 students would be less impacted because in the SIBC, we're we're just looking, "Hey, you reside in this zone, this is where you now go." Here in the next slide, we know, "Hey, there's some students with that permit process, they're
044already there. Thank you. Then one other question just on this particular slide you already got up. It looks like we are including in the count the number of students who are at Madison right now who will move to Harrison. Um I kind of forgot how to form the question cuz obviously that that was that's something that's already been planned as we're remodeling the the Harrison building. I know there may be some other changes there, but can you kind of talk about how just our our previously planned putting all the students at Madison while construction is going on and then moving to Harrison. It you know, again, it's not that it doesn't cause a change there, but they were already with that peer group to some extent at least. Is that correct? That is correct and
045that's where there's so much information on here. If we go to the right in smaller prints, we put that on there cuz that was something I think Adam brought up at our last meeting that hey, this is this change is already happening. Somehow we have to document this and so we just put a note on there that that we know that that change is happening. These kids have been moved to align them, but when we look at where that physical boundary is right now and how it changes to your point, the number goes down lower because this was already a planned change that they would know about. And again, Scott It's okay if you don't have this information. One of the things I do think about is so I believe these students will move next
046year to Harrison. Am I right on that with construction? No, two So so it would be in that same Okay, I just wanted to make sure we weren't going to have a situation where we move students and then they move again. Okay, perfect. Thank you. Scott, I appreciate you bringing up like the permitting open enrollment process cuz I think that does pull play a pretty big role and impacts enrollment across our district. So in my time on the board, we haven't had any discussion around our permitting processes, open enrollment numbers. I know we're bringing that to the board now, but just wanted to toss it out to the board if that's something in policy that we might want to consider thinking about. That seems to shape a lot of our enrollment across the district. Any
047other questions from the board? All right, it's scenario two. All right, so on scenario two came about as our team looked at this and saw some of the deficiencies or challenges with scenario one and knowing that there's just limits of of how we could do this. If you think about this, we have really four big pieces, right? We have our high school pieces, then we have our middle school, intermediate, and then the elementary. So how they start to fit together, we're like oh, how can we maybe start addressing some of these and and make this maybe a better situation. Maybe not that you're moving, but a better situation what the enrollment means and the opportunities that students have. So that was kind of like our baseline. And so what you'll see is again some of
048the the notes on here are are important to showcase. So where we have things shaded in yellow, that's going to be something that's different. I have another slide that will help you see how this all fits together, I think a little bit better. But we want to take that context of what you saw as a board, what you directed, how that was for scenario one, what does this look like for scenario two? And so when we get into this visual, you can see we've we've changed some things around of what buildings would be associated and to help you understand what that looks like on this page, we put indent of those schools and put the word different with an arrow, right? So this helps me, this helps you, helps the community. We still have the
049buildings that are going offline, closed, retired, they're white, right? So we still have this complete feeder, but the way that I would explain this, and you'll see it on the maps, is to get more students at Washington. How can we accomplish that? And there's really two ways to do it. You go north, so counterclockwise, or you go south counterclockwise. Well, with knowing that we wanted to get Harding Middle School in Kennedy's boundary, that drove us to saying, hey, if we're going to physically get it in the boundary, we're looking south, right? So and that's that's how it came. It was not anything about, hey, we're we're looking towards that part of the district and and how do we do something that impacts them? It literally started with some of the conversations of what could we
050improve from scenario one? And so what starts to happen here is you'll see some changes with those elementary boundaries. Specifically, you can see Kenwood starts to go north. We're able to maybe keep more kids in the north because and I say north because we're not going south of the river, right? So there's we can distribute the kids maybe a little bit differently. And maybe not better, but a little bit different. So again, the solid colors represents what the zone would be in scenario two and the dotted red lines represents what that existing elementary boundary is. And then you can see how this correlates with the high school and so you can see we shifted this down to that Wilson area for what Jefferson's boundary is and then Kennedy moved over towards where Kenwood Elementary is,
051Harding Middle School is, and then I that kind of gets you those pieces as they as they move just a little bit. Then as we look at the secondary, you can see some other changes. Again, I didn't mention also Jefferson has some changes, too, right? So we go into Kennedy. So as Kennedy just can't take everything if we want to balance the enrollment as we make the the clockwise turn and so shifts happen at at each of the levels. This is what it looks like for that secondary. And then what does this do for the projections? And so you can see a little bit less green for buildings. Johnson Elementary is the one that stays consistently under, but it's a little bit higher than it was in scenario one. So again, less divergence of the
052range between the buildings. And then as we get to the secondary, key thing here is the Washington High School boundary. We're above a thousand students, closer between 1050 and 1100. When you look at the balance of students, this is pretty good pretty good break of students when you consider where these kids are living and how they're associated to the zones. So just on numbers, we we we bring them a little bit closer together. What this means for demographics, and you see the same thing with the race and ethnicity table, the ESL for each of these four grade bands. And then we start getting into that same census data of how that starts to take shape. And then as we get into the diversity index table, kind of similar, but a little bit difference when you
053look at the areas that are blue, greater than 1.74. And then the students that are impacted by the boundary change, a little bit less than scenario one for the elementary level. So you can see what that breakdown is. We're at about 40% and I think on the first one, 35% here. Verify that, but I think that's what it was about. And again, you can see that breakdown of the students, the 30% of those students are basically the school closures, mergers, and then 5% are the boundary shifts. That same table where we look at now we're impacting high school students. So this is where there's we may impact fewer elementary students, but now we're impacting high school students. There's some strategies there that if if this is a scenario that resonates that with time and with
054capacity, there there may be some options that you don't really have as much of a negative impact on students moving around it. We can talk about that at a later point. So here's that impact as they move to the building centers moves to each of the buildings. So you can see what those changes are. Then as we pull it back to the permit students, remember now we have intermediate middle school and high school on this. And so this all means that these students are already at the building that they would be programmed to be at in that 27-28 school year. So again, reduces the students that are impacted. All right, so the things that we we were able to to change from scenario one. The first is Harding Middle School is physically in the Kennedy
055boundary. We've changed the range of students in capacity for the elementary, so it's a much smaller range, so better balanced. We have allowed Washington High School to be greater than 1,000 students. Um but again, we still have the same things with that last bullet point. We still have traditions, values, perceptions. Um this one probably even more so because we're changing the high school boundaries. And so, um those are almost institutional in in the community, right? So, I'm going to say this is a change. Um the other thing that we note is with these changes, um the elementary buildings of Harrison and Van Buren will get over 90%. They get They can handle getting up to 100%. Um we're just acknowledging that with those buildings being over 90%, there's less potential flexibility of how you program
056the building. Maybe um if there's a third grade that pops, do we do we actually have the space um in the building for that? I I think we should, but um as you get to 90%, there's there's some challenges there in how building is programmed. Um again, how does this align back to those two um metrics that you as a board provided and and see that um really our our big challenge has continued to be that we don't have enough capacity on the north side. And then we also have some challenges on the high school, right? So, if I'm in the Wilson area, I'm used to going to Jefferson. I'm now going to Washington. That's that's a definitely um greater distance. Um I think committee member or committee member pointed out that um they now
057would be eligible for bussing where before now they they walk or try to get to Jefferson. So, again, depends on how you thin slice some of this. Um but we also know on that north side, we just don't have a lot of capacity up there either. So, when we look at that. But overall, um this appears on the metrics um to be a a better fit to what you guys provided. Um I want to pause there cuz I did say I was going to stop at after each um scenario. So, questions about scenario two. This is Scott again. Just to clarify, and Chad, this may be a question for you. When we're talking about 90% capacity of Van Buren and Harrison, just so we're clear, that's based on the future uh capacity of the new
058buildings, not the current buildings, right? That is correct. Thank you. Seemed so, but wanted to make sure. Rob, it's Cindy Garlock. On the scenario two, we're shifting Let me back up. We've we've had this ongoing discussion about Washington and the declining student population at Washington. And part of that is because there just isn't any area there for growth in the current Washington area. Now, we shift in scenario two, we shift the Washington attendance area, as you call it, clockwise. Can you talk a little bit about what impact that has on potential population growth? Is there a potential that there could be additional population growth by shifting that attendance area? Or It is. not? Yeah, I would say so if I pulled up the full enrollment analysis where we've met with the cities and we have
059where developments are. We don't have a lot of developments beyond what I would say infill and more of them being apartments. Um but what we know is those apartments have come online, we don't generate as many students. So, the key for Washington is really two elements is we know there's some rural areas that there's some pockets of development that are occurring out on our east side, but it's limited by infrastructure. It's not going to be homes um that we see in other parts of the district that might be three units per acre. So, what we have to establish that second piece is with there being limits on where we see some new developments and and we have some down in that Wilson area, um but not as much what I would say would be single
060family. And so, we want to try to capture a larger area of an existing um known um households or or residential types with one thing that we have to keep in mind. And this is a finish Let me go to the numbers. Some of this starts to speak to this. Is we know that there's going to be potential for re-greening. I can't specifically say, "Hey, when we do all of these changes and students have more um opportunities to pathways and access to all the cool stuff and what a feeder pattern a pattern or the strength of a feeder pattern, um does this increase our enrollment 10% in an area or 5%?" Whatever that is. Um it's always different in every community that we work in. But we've we have some flexibility that if I tie
061this back to things you maybe have heard me talk about in our enrollment analysis, and that's the subdivision life cycle. We've seen them change a little bit over the last couple years as interest rates increased, people tended to stay in place. Everywhere that we're working in Iowa, no matter if it's Des Moines or Cedar Rapids area. And so, we still have a lot of transiency, but um as we see some of those subdivision life cycles change if interest rates come down or as people age out and they move into other homes, when we start to see that, we also want to make sure that we have enough capacity in our buildings to be able to have that potential outcome come to light. So, long answer, there's lots of different variables, but there is definitely more
062development opportunity in Jefferson and Kennedy than what there is in Washington for how we generate kids from new development. So, I'm sorry, long answer, but I wanted to make sure you had the the whole context of the strategery of areas where you don't have access to developments with potential for kids versus those that do. Hello, Rob. This is Laura. Um just curious with again uh conversations surrounding Washington, uh was it considered to um keep Kenwood in Washington while also uh like you said, going clockwise with Washington. So, instead of giving Kennedy more space, essentially, and just shifting everyone, did you did you look at those numbers by chance keeping Kenwood a part of Washington, that area? No, we didn't go that far. It would It I mean, we could um devise a option where you
063either extend Washington north and south. So, we've already done south. You come north to get even more kids in there. Then if we do that, um we potentially, if we go all the way up to 100, then we have Harding Middle School that would be displaced, not physically in the boundary if if that's a big deal. Um that was something that stood out between scenario one and scenario two, but for sure, that could be explored um with either This is where we'd have a complete coherence feeder. Um we'd have to say anything that's in Kenwood would then be associated down. I think we'd have to look at the impacts. Um again, worth exploring, but could we put Could we add another elementary building in the Wilson area to this or is it you're either going
064clockwise and taking the Wilson area into Washington or you're now going counterclockwise and moving areas that would be east of 380 um into Washington. And uh we could explore that. It It just really comes down to um are are we comfortable with Harding Middle School either being in or not in the the zone that it ultimately serves currently. I think I have a couple comments on that. So, I know Harding has never been in area three. So, I feel like the community is kind of okay with that. And if you ask most people, they'll say, "Oh, no, Harding's right in, you know, by Kennedy." It's like So, um but another thing I'm just thinking of, you know, projecting population growth in the next 5 10 years. And if we know that Jefferson and Kennedy are
065growing significantly, um and I know we've talked about and we know we don't have the infrastructure up in area three yet. Um but I that's what led to my question of uh why are we even adding to Kennedy when that would just spread them Sorry, Kennedy, area three. That would just spread them even more. I'm just trying to think of like forward thinking. How would Yeah. So, we don't have to do this again or Yeah, that makes sense. This is Caitlin, and Laura, that's exactly what I was thinking. Like, are we designing a system for 10 to 15 20 years? Or to your Dr. Linnan, in one of your recent emails, you put something around like the board taking time every three to five years, I mean, maybe having a policy where we where we
066continue tweaking and updating this to account for that growth because when you're looking at that map on page 19, I think I wrote down, and then you take the permitted students, I feel like that there's still a growing and major concentration of affluent white families that are in uh that are feeding into one high school. So, that just isn't going to change, you know? And I think that I'm just coming from a vantage point of like this is um always an imbalance we've sort of had in the community for as long as I can remember. I'm not sure that this these scenarios um um maybe meaningfully shift, I would say that um since that growth is still out there at direction. So, that's sort of where I am like a bit stuck. Um I recognize
067that also we're trying to inch forward in the right direction. So, again, maybe a conversation around is it a 3 to 5 years we we come back and we drill down on this further? Are we setting this for 20 years? Um but I do want to make sure that we aren't setting certain schools up for success and others up for continued failure in some places. This is Jen Newman I just want to tag on to your comment. When I read that also in Dr. Lena's email that districts often look at this every 3 to 5 years. I thought if we did this every 3 to 5 years, we don't get these shocks to the system. So, I just want to voice some support for that thought that we that we look at this in more
068frequent intervals than we currently are. Rob, I had a question as a follow-up to that. So, like sort of if we are sticking a little bit more with business as usual, I'm curious because there was a group of people the spec committee that generously took their time to volunteer many hours to drill down in this information. Some of the board members attended. We were able to sit in on some of these sessions, but I'm just curious if there was discussion around that demographic imbalance specific to minority students populations in our community. Was that was that a topic of discussion or concern with that northern growth during your time with that committee? Yeah, there there was definitely conversations and I gave them context and and interestingly to to bring you up to speed with that, I
069actually had dinner with Dr. Benson cuz he's he's back in the the Kansas City area. And and I I shared with him the the quandary that we're in. And it always comes back to Harding Middle School. And [clears throat] even back in gosh, 15 years ago, um the conversation was at some point does Jefferson do they go counterclockwise and they take everything east of 380? Right? Knowing that we have these pockets. Um the challenge is if it is a challenge is where the facility is. If let's go back to a map is um when we start to look at this with um some of these um students and where they would end up going to um uh middle school and high school, right? So, um most of the conversation we started to talk about going
070to the north um was related to um where would we build the new middle school building? And so, where where that property is and how does this fit into this plan? Is is that when um we make some of the changes where it goes dramatically in a different way? Was kind of left there because if you go back to um our criteria, watch your eyes as I flip through this. Um if we go back to those eight criteria that we have that you guys provided, um we do have long-term facilities planning as number seven, right? So, um but how do you plan for something where you know money is needed? So, I think that's it was like, "Hey, we know this." And then as we looked at the data, um it appeared that enrollment-wise um
071we have space in both Kennedy and Jefferson as the new development comes online. Um what probably could be a potential outcome is the number of students between the buildings. If we start to pick up more kids in those new developments for high school and they would be targeted towards being at um Jefferson or Kennedy, we could see a greater um range at the high school. So, all the things you're talking about are it's difficult to say, "Here's what a boundary is going to be and we're going to incorporate it and it's going to be something that we use um with the complexities that we have in Cedar Rapids for for 10 years." Um we've done a great job of keeping the boundaries where they are for the most part with all the changes that have
072been happening with buildings, but I think you what we're seeing is you you have to now do some of these things and and the question for you all is, "How big of a move do you make?" And I always follow that up with um ultimately we're we're trying to provide a better outcome for students. So, what are those pathways? And I think a couple of you've already mentioned that um as one of the challenges that that we are trying to address. So, I think you guys have the right mindset. It's just how far do you move it? If I may add to cuz I I know Rob wasn't part of the most recent spec committee meeting. So, as a board rep, I can share kind of that was a really big conversation around demographics and
073and what changed. And and then, you know, to be clear, scenario two brings more evenness between the the high schools, which would also be your intermediate middle schools too based on on that method. So, it's it's a step in the right direction. You know, there was even some discussion and I believe it was Mr. Gadsinger from Wilson who brought this up that Dubuque went so far as to like carve up dis- their their attendance areas so that you might live next to this person and they but they go to a school on that side of town you go to that. That's the and and again because of the way our community's developed over years and how you know, housing decisions are made and and and it develops, you'd have to do something pretty drastic if
074you wanted to even it out. We also talked about is evening out the right thing or is are we offering unique opportunities and and and and you know, bringing value to our students through the the diversity in our schools at different levels in different places too. And so, I think I'm not sure that I don't want to speak for spec that we came to some conclusions cuz I don't believe we did, but it is definitely part of that conversation just to answer your question. Rob, this is David. Good to see you again. Do want to commend you 55 slides and I think you did that in less than an hour. So, that was pretty impressive. Um lots of information came at us really quick. I want to maybe talk specifically about utilization rate. Um and
075I think what I've what I've seen and what I've I know that our utilization on facilities was really low. It's part of the reason why we're having this conversation. It looked like scenario one very big variance. I guess my question to you is based on having done this with many districts, do you think the utilization rate that we're landing at is appropriate? Because you know, I like to think of myself as an eternal optimist, but I think it was on slide three where you said that we had statistically improbable enrollment decline. So, certainly I think we're all optimistic that we can reverse that and slow that down, but is landing at you know, I think your comment was the majority of them are over 70% utilization. I think I saw 80s across the board when
076you're starting to average them out. So, I guess that's the question of is that the right place for us to land or we should should we be looking at some other things? Yeah, I think there's there's a couple ways to answer that. Um the the first is we definitely want buildings that are predominantly over 70% from a best planning practice. Um just because that gets into being able to efficiently provide the services that would be equitably distributed to each of the buildings in each of the grade bands. So, so that's that's kind of the first starting point. The second thing with capacity is it's it takes on its own life form. Um I know we could have like Chad talking about, "Hey, here's these gen ed rooms. Here's the rooms we're using for our gifted
077and for ELL and all of these needs are definitely something that's growing with our student population." So, when when you see the 70% or some buildings that may be less than 70% the conversations that we're having with districts um are more about establishing a floor. And and let me let me give a little explanation to that cuz it's it's something that's maybe a little bit new. Um we usually talked about the ceiling. Like we can't have more than X number of kids, right? So, we establish a capacity. So, whatever that capacity is, we don't we don't want to go over that because we know then we just don't have space for the kids. Well, when we have a floor, we also know that there's realities of our finances. There's also some things that we call
078levers that when we look at things from just a number standpoint, it may say, "Why you're under 70%?" Well, let's get under the hood and look at what's actually happening in that building. What are the resources those kids need? Um do we have to have more intervention spaces? Do we have different programs there? So, I'm probably less concerned um since you're asking my opinion about some of the capacities knowing that there's probably other need in the buildings that we've already accounted for, that they're being used for some of these spaces, but is it the best space? Is there some other things we can do that improve the opportunities for some of these different populations? Like do we need a deregulation or sensory type rooms for um those students that maybe um are not in the
079the sped category. So, there's things we we we can start having these conversations when you have identified here's the buildings we're investing in, here's the programs in those buildings. Now, do we have the right space for those programs in those buildings and can we adapt those buildings um to better address those programs? So, kind kind of a long answer, but um I don't want to also just get stuck in a number that oh my gosh, we're at 75% and that's that's not a good thing. Um as long as we can provide the similar services for we'll just say with the gen ed through all of the buildings, um that's a good thing. It's also important to understand that the capacities are based on what we consider gen ed classrooms. And so, um some of these
080buildings our newer buildings are built with um some extra space involved for collaboration or other smaller rooms for um breakouts um uh learning as well. Some of our older buildings, um we have capacity of a number, but there isn't as much extra space in those buildings as well. This is Cindy again. Uh speaking of those extra spaces and and other programs, can you talk a little bit specifically about preschool? That's been um a priority for this board for a number of years to make preschool more accessible. Does one scenario do better with uh providing preschool access? Rob, I don't know if you want me to take that one, but when we took a look at our capacity since we were the ones that that gave Rob the numbers on capacity, we did take into consideration
081the need for preschool um in our buildings across our district. So, um when we counted up our classrooms in our buildings to get to that number, uh we did take that into consideration and the numbers that we have in this do not include um excuse me, that they do include the the preschool uh numbers. And and I'll build on that. So, a a lot of the districts, they're going both ways. Some are moving towards where you are now, having like an early learning center. And others are moving towards having the programs in the elementary buildings. And I think the key word is access, right? So, that that's something that has come up in all of the committee meetings and where if you have those programs in the elementary buildings, um because of location, you probably
082have better access for the households that would be wanting to use them versus when they're in an early learning center and the logistics of trying to get them there and if they have other kids that let's say are in the elementary building. So, um it's different in each community, but I think what we've been hearing is that it having them in the elementary buildings should provide better access for your clients. I was This is Caitlyn again. I was going to go back to the Dave's question around kind of the utilization. So, we talked a little bit about the minimums, that floor. So, going to the ceiling, I guess when I look at this, it still feels like there's even in the balance scenarios, these elementary schools are quite they're reaching capacity. So, I'm I'm interested
083to know maybe like a sweet spot for there was there was talk of can handle up to 100%. I don't think 100% is the goal in some of these newer elementary schools. Um I just have major concerns when we have 500 kids in a building right now, even adding 100, let alone 200 more is like that's just a lot and then you have safety and operational um concerns. So, um maybe from your vantage point, where where is like the sweet spot for a maximum capacity before we have other issues we need to think about and address. Yeah, that's a good thing. I'll start out. I know Chad may have some things to to add to it since he's familiar with the buildings. I I think our our starting point is not all of our buildings
084are the same, right? The new buildings have some definite advantages where they're designed and built for some of the other needs of students. And so, what that capacity looks like is um going to be very different than some of our older buildings. But when we get into what is the right percentage? So, I've kind of said when you get at 70% or lower, that's where we may have some inefficiencies. When we start to get at 95%, then we're really tight. And so, the question that you're almost asking is what is the right enrollment for a building? And once you've identified is this a three-section building, a four-section building, um where where do we provide those opportunities that if enrollment changes, let's say it grows, um we don't want to have to change the boundaries. We
085don't want to have to bring a portable. We don't want to do things that cause uh more cost or um puts us in a situation where we have to change boundaries, right? We impact negatively impact families um from that. So, how do we create some space? So, that sweet spot is usually in that um between the 75 and 95. And you're going to say, "Wow, that's a big range." Well, it's going to come back to the programming. What's the programs that we want to have? There are there some sacred cows of some programs probably in your buildings because of staff that we have there or space, traditions, right? All of these type of things. So, um we have some levers that can be moved when buildings get too full, but we have to take into
086account, I'll give you some other things. What what is the pickup drop-off like, right? It's always challenged in the larger elementary buildings. Um what is it like for our play grounds? Um what's it like with walking through the hallways? What what is the experience in the cafeterias, right? There's all of these elements that when the architect designs the building, they are saying, "Hey, you have this number of gen ed, your class size is this, you should be able to handle that." But then we have some things that I'm hearing from you and I hear from every district that we work with that yeah, that doesn't feel comfortable knowing that there's this many kids there, right? So, how how do you get the comfort to the logic to what is best um for the kids in
087Cedar Rapids? That's kind of what I think we're talking about here. And another thing to consider is um if you take a into account kindergarten through fourth grade in a building, um that and there's an average of 25 per um classroom, that's 500 students. Um and so, that 600 capacity or that 650 capacity again includes that preschool number um because we designed our new buildings for uh kindergarten pre fifth grade. So, taking out that fifth grade class is allows for there to be some breathing room there. We show our capacities at 600, 650, but obviously if we're at a four-section grade level, we're really around that 500 for K through four. That's really helpful. I just I know that there's been a lot of supports and hopefully as we continue to build these schools, we
088live we learn um you know, what is needed as we unveil and open those um combine combine two schools and the supports needed for the principals. So, maybe um even gathering maybe we already have done this, but principal feedback in those specific buildings of you know, um just sort of what that day-to-day would look like and feel like with the 100, 200 more kids and um considerations for us um based on their experience in the larger elementary. Director Byers, I would say one of the things I'm hopeful for here is that what by right doing the right sizing, making some tough decisions now, we we also aren't spreading staff over as many buildings. And so, hopefully we can solve you know, we can if if if a building has more students, you can have the
089proper support per student or or that sort of thing. It's just obviously very tough right now in the current situation we're in. So, I agree with you. And thank you, Chad, just painting a picture of the fifth, the preschool, how that all kind of breaks down and looks like. Um do we have any information on um Rob, the number of or maybe anybody in the room, the number of students who walk to school currently? Just I haven't seen that yet or do we have that at the elementary buildings? Okay. Just I know transportation might come later, but I'm just trying to think of um considerations from what families are experiencing at that building level and how we maybe gather some of that information just to put side by side with this because when it comes
090to interstates and highways and major roads, um just trying to make sure that we're thinking of of all the things. So, I heard um when we do the open houses tomorrow that families will be able to put in their address and see where they're going to go to school. Will they also see that they're eligible for bussing or not? Not at this point. Yeah, that's coming. Not yet. And I don't know if you want to We can also demo that part for you as well, but thank you for the notes when we bring transportation back. We just kind of have to know the exactness of where we land with the boundaries because as indicated here, just moving over a couple streets, you become a bus rider or you could be a walker. So, that would
091be the next phase. And Scott is already prepared uh to move us there. So, we'll make sure we bring that information back in the future. I'll just speak for myself. I appreciate I mean, scenario two looks like it's getting really close to what we're trying to accomplish. I also appreciate just the utilization cuz I think plenty of people will look at like, "Our utilization was so low. I thought we were closing buildings that were like in 60." But to be able to have the space to be able to expand and to just use those uh facilities um in the best possible use. And I think somebody's already commented to be able to talk to those the principals, the people in those buildings and go like if this were you know, the amount of students that
092were here, how would we utilize the space? So I appreciate all of the work that's gone into that. Look forward to the community being able to get a look at this and there is just so much information in here. So I just appreciate all of us being able to answer questions as best we can. I don't know what our relationship is with Rob past tonight. Like I mean is I assume that the questions when they come back and maybe somebody speaks to like once the community sees this and we get feedback from them, what what is that next step look like? Yeah, I think I'll let Dr. Lanen speak to that, but for sure as as you get these these iterations of things that might be considered, um, how it ties back to those criteria
093that we have and how do we evolve this to a plan that you as a board will feel comfortable in adopting. We're here to assist you in those efforts. So what that may look like, I'll let Dr. Lanen speak to that. So thank you so much and thank you for all of the questions. As we start the conversation tonight knowing that this was a starting point. And so we're going to collect all of the information. Our team is working really hard to make sure that we have a process parents will be able to scan, provide feedback and we'll take all that information back to the strategic plan executive committee. They are waiting on the feedback. While I think most people walked out the room saying, you know, we could push forward scenario two as our
094recommendation, but we do think that there's a 2.5 out there based on the feedback that we provide. We are contracted with RSP for one more scenario. So but I will say Rob has worked with us for many years. I can send him a text message all the things and he's like I just want to get this right for the district. And so we'll just keep working at it until we do that. So Rob, we really do appreciate it. And I just want to I don't know if you want to say anything else about this, but part of the conversation within the strategic plan executive committee was really thinking about the future. We realized that we have a dynamic on the north side of town by not having those schools. So what decisions do we make
095and taking into account the need for a possible another elementary school or another middle school? And that's kind of what Rob was teasing out earlier that we can take a look at those scenarios, but it's hard to know can we move into those because it takes funding to pull that off, but we just want to be transparent and bring that awareness. Scott, I don't know if you want to say more about that. Yeah, I think there was a general consensus in the room while we're not quite sure, you know, when you would move forward with that, but I think that group will help us do that when it's it's time. But you know, I've certainly come across as I've been part of this as a board member and and this spec committee kind of reiterated
096that that that need for something on the north side of town continues to come up as as you know, a lot of the pinch points that I'm hearing in emails from from family members or in conversations, they're driven by the fact there's not enough schools on the north side of town right now. And so I do think it's something that will have to be explored further. You know, and again I think leaving the door open for what that looks like, but also coming to a you know, some sort of decision point now. We're not going to have everything all at once. It's that chicken or egg. I mean I think we constantly have that conversation of, you know, getting you know, we got to get to a certain point to get the next piece of
097information, but we'd like to have that next piece of information to get to the certain point we need to get to, right? And so it it is always that that piece of it that I think will be a constant challenge through the process, but I wanted to also just circle back to Dr. Tominsky digging a little bit deeper into what community feedback will look like and putting a plug in too for to attend to continue to plug to attend our feedback sessions at Washington, Kennedy and Jefferson high schools. Those will be led by three building administrators who've been sitting on the strategic plan executive committee. And so community will have the opportunity to see, you know, kind of a condensed version of what we've seen tonight and also experience a gallery walk where they can
098look at posters around the room showing feeder patterns, showing elementary change maps, showing the high school maps. They can get up close with those and talk to strategic plan executive committees about the members about the process. And also in the handout we're providing, they'll be able to scan and provide feedback. And in that feedback, what we'll be able to to analyze and bring back to you as we'll ask them to rank order their most important criteria when considering boundaries. We asked that a long time ago and one of our spec committee members said, "Hey, like we asked this when things weren't as real. Let's re-ask it when it feels much more real." And also their level of support for each of the scenarios. Additional feedback and questions to help us get to if we do
099go to a 2.5, we want that to be informed by what we're hearing from the community. And the map that they're able to the Linn County site that we'll be able to direct people with tomorrow at the community meetings. We'll be able to show they'll type in their address and they'll see side by side in scenario one, where would I go to school in scenario two, where would I go to school? And there's a place where you can click on the side and we can we can demo it if want if we want to that lists those schools out. So it becomes really clear of where am I going? And while we don't have transportation details, we can start to make some assumptions based on roads we cross. We do have policy around and there's
100legislation around the amount of miles, the amount of time that you can spend on a bus. So we can while we don't have that, that will help them we can make there's some assumptions we can make. I appreciate I just I wanted to kind of just make a nod to the middle school. It's interesting like sitting here reflecting even just a few years into this role because there is so much foresight that goes into plan that we aren't making snap decisions, right? We we look at all the data, the growth and understand hey, how can we actually consider the bigger picture for for our community 5, 10, 15 years down the road. So I mean that that is has been the thing that's come up and Jenna will tell you, you know, that was that
101was a huge part of the conversation. Like how do we how do we fix exactly the issue that we're now dealing with right now? And it's sort of just where we are. So yeah, if there's any investors out there or major donors. But truly it's it's really interesting to just sit and think on that. And then I had just a couple other notes here. I was curious Rob from your vantage point. Um, you're like a third party option, you know, scale taking everything back. We had our highest priorities were well, when you take like data, demographics and a geographic lens, was there a point in this process where you or your firm were just looking at all of our buildings and then without all the other factors that we've considered, you know, saying these would
102be the ones that you would close based on purely geographic Not that we want to go back to that conversation, but I'm curious if we started there or if that was a part of this. Um, just an outside perspective on closures and locations geographic. Great great question. It's almost like fall down the rabbit hole, right? We we did not look at any other buildings to be closed. We used the list that was provided for the district as a baseline. Where you saw us start to move things was taking what was initially thought about with scenario one and starting to create scenario two. So kind of pushing us where we knew that if we're trying to get at some of these other bigger bucket items that you guys have with let's say access and programs and
103having the right number of kids starting at the the high school level and having this this feeder pattern that makes sense, that was where we started to move scenario two. And and through this conversation you even heard we we we ideally were thinking gosh, we'd like to go north from the standpoint of getting development that would be in all three of the zones, right? So that lent itself in the last meeting of well, if we build a new building. So so kind of segueing what if we knew that there was going to be a building in some location, um, if if we had a nice checkbook to do that, that would change our conversation with what we potentially might be considering. So short of all the data the district administration and conversations we've had, I
104think you're seeing it it really play out, but we just we're limited by the buildings that that we are building or we're reinvesting in and not having buildings maybe in places where it might make some of the scenarios a little bit different. Yeah, that's helpful just as a thinking through the whole process together. How do all the pieces play together? And then in your experience working with other districts, that permitting process, open enrollment, that number that we have there, I would guess that, you know, it it takes a certain number of years for that to like level out because those families are already, you know, they're they're on a certain trajectory. Maybe you already spoke to that, but is there a certain science to that, certain number of years where it sort of we see
105that decline in the open enrollment with new feeder patterns? Yeah, good question. So, I think there's two-part answers. You're kind of seeing a theme of that, right? Two parts. Um so, the the first part is those families, they've already elected to go to a building um different than where they reside, right? So, the permitting process does allow for some flexibility. Some of that might be the programs where they are or where they're not. Might be a household situation where we have two guardians with two different addresses. The address they have is in one boundary and it's in the other, right? So, so there's that element with with the permitting. Do I see permitting start to decline? No, I I typically I mean, we've been doing some work with I have obviously with you guys for
106um nearly 15 years. Um we still see um a certain number of students that will be moving around and I think that flexibility um is is something parents um in many situations would like to continue to have. So, does it decrease? Now, it's it if it does, it pops back up when we look at this historically over um 10 15 years. That's interesting. I I appreciate uh that vantage point and just the amount of years you've been working with us, that's pretty wonderful. Um and then just as a note here, I want to I know that there were a lot of opportunities for staff or families or students to engage with this process, which is really great. Um I guess one two-part question, I'm curious on the timeline that we, you know, again, thinking about
107a 2.5 or a a third scenario, um do we need to make this decision by a certain date if we're getting some of that feedback and we need to adjust? That might be a district. I'll let them respond and if there's something more they want me to add to, I will. I will say we're still on par for the April 27th uh final decision point um unless, you know, we decide that we aren't going to build a new middle school or something like that, right? Um something drastic uh changes, but I I think you've made the point here tonight knowing that wherever we start, it may not is not probably going to last for a 10 or 15 years. I think we just want to acknowledge that because we are also acknowledging that we have
108a dilemma on the north side of town. Um so, as far as moving pace and it kind of depend on our community, we look forward to receiving their feedback. Um we're glad that uh the team decided to put out both scenarios, so they're going to give us some reflections on scenario one and scenario two. I do think the team is poised to be able to move through that feedback. We've had a lot of discussion and we've just been keeping all the information along the way and so, we look forward to bringing back um another uh look at this for April 13th uh for the board. There'll be no decision at that time and so, the community will also have another opportunity and then on April 27th, we'll be looking forward to uh moving that decision
109forward. Uh just keeping in mind because transportation is important, we're also committed to making sure that we have our staffing process outlined and that needs to be completed before uh July 1st. I have a quick question for you, Rob. Sorry, this kind of goes back to a couple of points that were hit on. Um but you know, school closures are never exciting. No one really likes to do this. Um but I just want from your perspective to hear that we are in the right mindset to close the particular schools that we are closing and the number of schools we're closing. We're not overdoing it from your perspective? Um sorry, I didn't mean to just like feed you that, but I'm curious if you feel like we're overdoing it in the number of schools that we're
110closing. You know, this that's that's where I say my signal is going out. I can't hear you. Um Well, when we look at this, I I think the the the key thing is is is the data, right? So, let me go to a slide so it pops up there. Right? So, so a lot of the reasons that that you guys have come up with the list of buildings is not only your capacity, but it's the condition of the buildings, right? So, I think there was one or maybe two of the committee input sessions that we had, there was some conversation of do you have to take Nixon off right away? Right? And well, why are we taking it off? There there's things about that building that have met a situation where um other experts that
111have gone in and examined the building, what the costs are and and I don't chat and talked all this, there's there's reasons why the buildings are in a situation. Some of them might be condition. Um some of it might be related to we're trying to right-size the district for the students, the programs and the opportunities they get. And so, it's a complex answer and so, there's not anything that I'm seeing here from numbers where where we're bringing ourselves into if you look at the bottom of, you know, this 80% 81% that this is this is a nice start. The the things that and when I say start, now like, oh no, start, you got to do more buildings. Well, if we continue to decline, right? Most of it's at the high school. We're showing we
112indicated the elementary middle school, we should see some slight increases. If that doesn't happen and there's there's things we have to watch. So, when you say, hey, we should be looking at this every three to five years, probably for maybe boundary changes, but as you look at your enrollment, um this is what we've been talking about with administration. How how do you use some of the data sets we have to monitor um and to start to plan for things that they bring to you as a board and we're not like having to do major changes. It's just, hey, this and this is happening and so, here's where we need to go. Right? So, lot lots of that that's my 100,000 foot view. Um districts, they're they're going to be more in this situation where um
113we have financial constraints, we want to provide opportunities, we want to create pathways. Um one of the buckets that gets us there is maximizing how we use our facilities. I think it's also important to um look back at the 2018 plan and really look at what that laid out for us and this plan really emulates that almost identically. When you talk about the number of buildings that were taken offline and the actual location of those buildings that were taken offline, Nixon was originally in the 2018 plan to be um taken offline and combined with Hiawatha and I could go through all those scenarios, but if you look at the list, um it's it's pretty similar um if almost identical to what we were planning to do throughout the time of the 2018 plan. I think
114we're um expediting that plan a little bit, um but it's definitely uh something that we're we're true to the plan that we was developed in this district in 2018. This isn't for you um Rob, but I was just thinking through the offerings that we have for students and teachers and uh families to engage. Specific to teachers, I don't want to speak on their behalf, but I saw that we have virtual like some Zoom calls. Um I feel like the level of like candid engagement or just they're helpful for getting information, but if we're looking for feedback and digging a little bit deeper, I just wonder if we have a way out of building level for um our educators to be in company with each other having discussion um and ways to like collect and synthesize
115and compile their feedback um at a building level for us to see versus like individual surveys. I just think the collective nature of having those discussions, we might get some good information. So, I don't want to add another meeting or change formats, but just something that um I'm think may be worth considering. I'll just say for the first part, thank you for that and we've been in uh as soon as we have a spec meeting, we also have a meeting with our executive leadership team pretty much like the next day. And so, talking through this process, it one of the most important factors we want to do now is make sure we get out the same accurate information to all of the audiences. So, that was our first step in making sure that we offer
116the calls to our campuses uh so that we have people that have been involved in the process uh to be able to share that information. Um and our principals, they already they stand ready to have a follow-up meeting as we continue throughout this process where they can walk their own staff through the process and they can gather some of that feedback for us. Thank you. Any additional questions from the board? Okay. Thank you, Rob, for your presentation tonight. Truly appreciate that. Um And thank you, Dr. Lennon and the the administrative team as well. Thank you to the strategic plan executive committee for the time, care and thought that has been brought to this work. Um we also want to thank our community. Um we know that this has been a significant and ongoing effort. Um
117we appreciate the way our families, our staff, our community coalition and community members where this work began have continued to engage, ask questions and share feedback throughout this process. Please know that your voice matters. And the board values your continued input as we move closer to a final plan. As a reminder, tomorrow evening, we will host community input sessions in the cafeterias at Kennedy, Jefferson and Washington High Schools from 6:00 p.m. to 7:30 p.m. The same information will be shared at each location and translators will also be available. For those unable to attend, materials will be available online along with the feedback survey so you can still share your input. The board looks forward to continuing to receive your feedback as we move toward a final decision on April 27th. Thank you. With no further
118business, is there a motion to adjourn the meeting? So moved. Is there a second? >> Second. Second. All those in favor say I. I. Opposed say nay. We stand adjourned at 6:38 p.m.